Zagreb
A week later
Natasha walked into Steve's room, her face a mixture of worry and satisfaction. She found him resting, or at least attempting to. The stress of the past weeks was evident in his features, the lines on his face deeper, his eyes tired, his beard longer and his hair messier. Not the usual Captain America picture America loves so much.
"Steve," she began, her voice soft. "I found Iris."
His eyes snapped open at the sound of her voice. He sat up immediately, his gaze intent on her. "Where?" he asked.
"She's in Europe," Natasha replied, "Zagreb."
Relief and worry crossed Steve's face. He nodded, his mind filled with questions and plans. "I need to go. I can't waste any more time. I'll take one of the jets."
"No," Natasha said firmly. "We should go. You're not going alone."
Steve tossed a bag on his bed and began to pack the essentials. "Nat, I need you here. We need all hands on deck to find Bucky."
"Yes, but we have no idea what she's gotten into," she said, sitting on the bed while he rummaged through his drawers. "I highly doubt she's stayed out of trouble." Nat chuckled, but her voice was serious and concerned.
"I can handle it, Nat. I need you here to find Bucky. You know HYDRA better than anyone. I need you here."
Natasha nodded, understanding his concerns. "We will continue the search, Steve. But right now, Iris might be our best chance of finding Bucky. Don't mess this up."
Steve looked at her, his gaze filled with gratitude. He knew she was right. As much as a part of him wanted to stay here, to be part of the search for Bucky, he also knew that Iris could be their best chance of finding him.
"Alright," he said, standing up, his bag ready "I'll go find Iris. But you need to promise me you'll call the moment you find something."
"I promise, Steve," Natasha replied, offering him a small smile. "We'll bring Bucky home."
As each hour passed on the jet to Europe his mind kept racing, the thought that Bucky was in the hands of Hydra. The thoughts of what they could be doing to him, of the possibility of the Winter Soldier returning, haunted him. He tried to dismiss these thoughts, focusing on the task at hand - finding Iris. He wondered about her activities and whereabouts over the past two years. The initial months without her were challenging. One day he was falling for her, and the next, her bed was cold, her scent missing. He wasn't angry with her, but he was hurt. The fact that she gave up on them, on him, quickly and easily without discussing it, was painful. He eventually came to understand her reasons, but that didn't lessen the pain.
Meanwhile, at the compound, the atmosphere was tense. Natasha, Clint, Sam, Wanda, and Tony were working around the clock, following every lead, every possible trace of Hydra's movements. Despite their efforts, the leads were scarce and they seemed to be always one step behind Hydra.
Back in Zagreb, Steve landed in the early hours of the morning. As he went through the city, going to the last known address Natasha had found, he found himself standing in front of the apartment building, he felt a surge of anticipation. He knew he was on the right track.
After making his way to her apartment, he knocked on the door. There was no answer. He knocked again, this time a bit louder. Again, no answer.
Growing impatient, he decided to pick the lock. As he quickly took a look around he pulled out a small lock picking set from his pocket and he had the door open in no time.
He stepped into the dimly lit apartment. The place was silent, a small apartment with only one room. At the far right he could see the two stove kitchen with some leftovers on the side and a few dishes in the sink. On the other side of the room, there was a mattress on the floor and some books and clothes scattered around. He moved cautiously, his eyes scanning every inch of the place.
Suddenly, a knife whizzed past his head and crashed into the wall behind him. He turned around just in time to dodge another one.
"Iris, wait!" He tried to reason with her, but she was in full attack mode.
With a swift move, she aimed a high kick at his head, which he blocked with his forearm.
"Iris, it's me! Steve!"
But Iris seemed not to hear him, her attacks relentless. It was clear that she had been living on high alert.
Finally, he managed to catch her wrist mid-strike, pulling her towards him. "Iris!" He shouted, looking her straight in the eyes. "I'm not here to hurt you. It's me, Steve."
For a moment, she stilled, her eyes locking onto his. And then he saw it, the recognition, the surprise, and then a wave of emotions he couldn't read.
"Iris," Steve whispered, loosening his grip on her wrist.
"Steve?" she asked, her voice uncertain, her breathing shaken.
"It's me," he answered, slowly lowering his hands and giving her a small, reassuring smile.
She quickly backed away going to retrieve her knives.
"Steve" she asked, her voice still shaking. "What... what are you doing here?" she looked at him confused as she closed the door which was still open.
"Iris," Steve began, his voice serious. "I need your help."
Her eyes widened at his words, her confusion evident. "My help? With what?" she asked. The hardened look in her eyes softened somewhat, replaced by concern. Steve took a deep breath, ready to tell her everything that had happened.
"We might need to sit down for this"
He started explaining everything about the situation with Hydra, the serum, the supersoldiers, and most importantly, Bucky's abduction. Iris sat silently, absorbing everything he was saying, her mind racing to process the information.
"But how, how can I help Steve?" she asked, her brows furrowed.
"Iris, we might have the best technology and the most skilled people, but we don't really know HYDRA. Nat knows the most, but it's still not enough. We need someone who has been inside, someone..."
"...Someone who can think like them," Iris finished his sentence for him.
"I didn't mean it like that," he looked straight at her, his face softening, his hand reaching for hers.
Her gaze fell on his hand over hers. She slowly retracted her hand and stood up, moving to the window to look outside.
After a long silence, she sighed, "How long did you say it's been since they took him?"
"Two weeks," his head lowered to the ground, his pain evident in his words.
"He's gone," she whispered.
"What do you mean?" Steve cried out.
"8 days," she turned to face him, she could swear she saw his eyes watering, "8 days is how long it used to take them to make him disappear." Her body tensed, her hands gripping the radiator under the window. "8 days to bring the Winter Soldier into action."
Her mind was flooded with memories of those days back in Siberia. She had witnessed too much pain.
Steve rose up, "I brought him back once, Iris, we can do it again," he moved closer to her, "I can't leave him, I won't leave him. He's my brother, even if blood says otherwise."
She could lie to herself as much as she wanted, but she couldn't deny that there wasn't even an inch of her that wanted to stay in Zagreb while James, despite everything, was in HYDRA's hands. The thought of him reliving Siberia once again made her stomach twist, her bile rising up.
"Make yourself at home, there's some leftovers. I have to deal with a few things. We leave tomorrow morning" she stated as she took her coat and headed outside.
Steve watched as she left, his mind racing. For Bucky, he would walk through hell and back if he had to. With Iris by his side, they had a chance of surviving the flames.
Steve looked at the leftovers that Iris had pointed out. They were scant and looked as though they had been sitting for a while, she seemed to be surviving rather than living.
He decided he would cook a proper meal for both of them. He headed out to a nearby supermarket.
Back at the apartment, he started cooking. The aroma of lasagna quickly filled the small space, a comforting smell.
As the evening fell, he set the table. He set a place for Iris, he didn't know when she would return.
He waited, the apartment quiet apart from the occasional sounds from the bustling streets below. The minutes turned into hours, and still, there was no sign of Iris.
Suddenly, the sound of the door opening broke the silence. Iris walked in, her gaze landing on the table. Steve stood up, relief washing over him. "You're back,". She nodded, taking off her coat and moving closer to the table.
"You cooked," she said, moving closer to the table. "...lasagna," she sighed, a small smile appearing on her face.
"Yeah, I, I had time to master the recipe once and for all," he chuckled, sitting back down at the table.
She mimicked his movements.
She took a bite, "You've definitely improved," she admitted, giving him a small smile "Thank you, Steve."
He returned her smile with one of his own, but a bit hesitant. They ate their meal in silence, the tension in the room slowly dissipating.
After dinner, Steve explained everything that they had already done, every lead they had followed, every dead-end they had hit.
But to him she seemed distant, lost in her own mind, her own world, which apparently Steve was never allowed to enter. But this wasn't his place anymore, she made her choice, he couldn't get attached again, just for her to leave when everything is over.
She then broke the silence. "I think I might know where to start," she said.
"Where?" Steve asked.
"We don't need to follow the supersoldiers, it's not that HYDRA that we need to find" she replied her gaze fixed on the window beside Steve "We need to find The winter soldier program"
"I'm not following," Steve said, confusion clear in his voice.
"You're right, HYDRA is a huge organization, it's everywhere but that's exactly what we are not looking for," Iris explained. "We are searching for the HYDRA that's hidden away, that doesn't infiltrate, the one that builds and breaks everything."
"But how do we find them?" Steve asked.
"Iris looked at him, her jaw tense, her hands gripping the table "We start from where it all began," she said. "Siberia."
"I need to call the others"
"You do you, I'll go rest"
Iris quietly moved around the small room, gathering a yoga mat and a thin blanket from a cupboard. She laid the towel out on the floor next to the window, opposite the mattress.
"I'll take the floor," she said, her voice barely above a whisper as she heard Steve closing the call. She avoided Steve's gaze, focusing on smoothing out the mat.
"I can take the floor, Iris," Steve offered, but she shook her head.
"No, you take the mattress. You need to rest," she insisted, her tone leaving no room for argument.
Steve hesitated, his eyes filled with concern. He wanted to protest, to insist, but he knew better than to argue with Iris when she had made up her mind.
"Alright," he finally conceded, giving her a small nod.
As they each settled in, the room fell into silence. The only sounds were the soft rustling of fabric and the distant hum of the city outside.
In the pitch-black silence of the night, when sleep didn't come easy, he glanced over at Iris, her silhouette barely visible in the dim light filtering through the window. She was sitting on the floor, her back against the wall.
Finally, unable to bear the silence any longer, Steve spoke, "Iris?"
She turned her head towards him, her face masked in shadows, "Yes?"
He swallowed hard, struggling to find the right words. "Were you... were you there when they tortured Bucky in Siberia?" he paused his voice unsure "I mean, were you there"
A heavy silence filled the room, so dense it was almost suffocating. Finally, Iris answered, her voice barely audible, "Yes."
Steve's heart clenched at her admission. He knew that Bucky had endured all sorts of things at the hands of Hydra, but hearing Iris confirm it made it all the more real, all the more terrifying.
"He never really talked about it, you know," Steve continued, his voice choked with emotion. "Bucky... he... he was never able to bring himself to talk to me about it. But I know... I know it was hell for him."
Iris remained silent, her gaze fixed on the dark of the room.
"You're the only one who really knows what happened there, Iris," Steve said, his voice trembling. "You're the only one who saw... who saw what they did to him."
Iris turned her gaze back to Steve, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. "Steve, I..."
However, Steve interrupted her, "I don't want to know, I don't want any of you to relive it by talking about it out loud." She could feel him holding back tears. "But the fact that you despise him so much and you're still willing to help him, that scares me," his voice cracked, "because it makes me realize how bad it is."
Iris rose from the floor, her movements slow and quiet. Her eyes lingered for a moment on Steve. She could see the way his shoulders were hunched, the tension in his body visible even in the darkness. Crossing the small room, she sat down next to him on the mattress. The space was tight, but neither of them seemed to mind.
She could feel the heaviness in the air. She placed a comforting hand on his arm, her fingers lightly brushing against his skin. There was a certain intimacy in the gesture, to which his arm twitched.
"Steve," she whispered, her voice barely audible in the silence of the room. "I know you're scared. I am too. But we are going to bring Bucky home. We will do whatever it takes." Her words hung in the air, a beacon of hope in the suffocating darkness.
Steve turned to look at her, his eyes a reflection of the fear he was feeling.
"Iris I can't do this again" he took a deep breath "Iris, after you left... it felt like I lost a part of myself," he admitted, his gaze falling to her hand still on his arm. His eyes met Iris's, a silent plea in his gaze.
His gaze was intense, his blue eyes filled with a raw honesty that made Iris's heart ache. "I can't go through that again, Iris," he confessed, his voice heavy with emotion. "As much as I care about you, I can't let myself grow attached to you again if there's a chance you'll leave. I can't handle losing you a second time."
"It wasn't about you, Steve," she sighed. "There were things... things I saw, things I experienced... It took me years to put them in a corner of my mind where I could barely find them. And..."
"And Bucky brought them all up," he sighed.
"Yes," she moved closer to Steve, her hands on his thighs. "Steve, I never thought a man could bear so much," a tear slid down her cheek, and he instinctively wiped it away. "I saw it all, and... I've done it too. They forced me to... and they forced him too." Another tear stained her cheeks. "There's not one night I go without remembering the ice in his eyes as he marked my skin with his knife," she cried out, guiding his hand under her t-shirt where he could feel at least five circular scars. "And there's not one night I go without seeing the pain in his eyes as I burned his skin with a match."
Steve gently pulled her into his arms, his heart aching at the pain she felt. His hand traced the scars on her skin, each one a stark reminder of the horror Hydra had inflicted on them. The room was filled with silence, broken only by their shared breaths.
"None of this was your choice," he whispered into Iris' hair, holding her close. "You both were forced into this life... forced to do things you never would have chosen. But you're here now, and we're together. All of us."
A soft sigh escaped Iris' lips as she nestled closer into Steve's embrace. The warmth of his body was comforting, a stark contrast to the cold memories that haunted her. She felt safe in his arms, the fear and pain of her past momentarily forgotten.
The day had been long and their bodies craved rest. Steve gently adjusted his grip around Iris. With a final soft kiss on her forehead, he closed his eyes, his thoughts gradually fading into the comforting rhythm of Iris' breathing.
In the quiet darkness of the room, they found solace in each other's arms.