Chapter 7
Steve felt his throat constrict. He knew he was compulsively clenching his fists, but he couldn’t stop. He felt nauseous and overwhelmed, but he tried his best to keep listening to what was being said to him.
“This is the last frame where we can see him, after this shot, he disappears from the camera’s view”
Sam, Natasha and Steve had been going over the bunker videos Natasha had obtained. But Steve soon found out he was not ready to re-watch the events of that day. His vision had started to go blurry the moment the video showed him, Bucky and Tony standing inside the abandoned base.
Sam had been transfixed by the scenes unfolding before his eyes. He could pinpoint the exact moment Tony connected the murder of his parents with the man standing right next to him. His training as a counselor let him see all the tale tales of a PTSD victim in Tony Stark. The chain of events had been painful to watch. He knew Tony had been in shock when he had attacked Bucky, but he was appalled by the way Steve had intervened. Steve had antagonized Stark in an instant, escalating the fight in mere seconds. He knew the Captain had been hard pressed to react in a way that would save his friend from Stark’s ire, but he was convinced there ought to have been an alternative to the way things progressed.
For her part, Natasha had been impressed by the sheer violence of the fight, and even more so with what she had discovered of Tony. The man had seemed unwilling to use any sort of deadly force on either man, and it was only when his arc reactor had been compromised that he had lashed out with enough force to destroy the Winter Soldier’s metal arm. She had also been impressed by Steve’s lack of restrain. Those last few blows to Tony’s suit had been merciless.
The last part of the video had been the most frustrating to watch for the three of them. The camera that had been placed in that room had only captured that final fight partially, with Tony, Bucky and Steve appearing and disappearing from the video at random intervals, until the last thing they could see was Tony on the bottom right corner of the screen, receiving blow after blow to his chest plate, destroying the reactor.
Steve’s face had been hidden from view, and if anyone else had seen the video, they would not have believed it was Captain America the one slamming Iron Man to the floor with such raw violence, even Steve had a hard time recognizing himself in those last few frames. The sound of a metal shield resonating in the video brought Steve to that moment, he could still feel the phantom weight of his shield on his hands, the intensity of his swirling emotions whilst he delivered blow after blow on the armor.
Blinking back his memories, he tried to focus all his attention back to the recording, he could no longer see himself in the frame, but he knew the sound he had heard meant he and Bucky had left the building, leaving Tony behind.
Steve held his breath as he watched what had happened next. They saw how Tony had tried to incorporate himself several times, before collapsing helplessly on the floor, unmoving, his hitched breath indicating the man was struggling to breath. After a while, Tony had crawled over in the direction were Steve and Bucky had exited the room, disappearing from the camera’s view, revealing a large pool of blood were Tony’s suit had been moments before. The sound of metal scrapping metal indicated that Tony had collapsed on top of Steve’s metal shield, but for several more minutes nothing else could be seen or heard.
Steve’s anxiety was growing by the minute, what had happened? Where had Tony gone? Had he somehow managed to crawl himself out of the facility? He was about to ask Natasha when he saw a bright light coming from where he could only assume Tony’s unmoving body had collapsed.
The sudden change of brightness had distorted the quality of the video for an instant, but after those couple of seconds the scene on the video restored itself, showing nothing out of the ordinary.
“What was that?!” Steve asked perplexedly, he couldn’t comprehend what that light had been.
“‘THAT’ seems to be the way Tony escaped from that bunker” said Natasha with a tired voice.
“What were you thinking Steve?” Came Sam’s voice, barely over a whisper.
Steve sat there, not taking his eyes away from the screen of the computer where they had just seen Tony disappear. Sam felt a sudden hatred for the man, for himself, for this whole mess they were all in.
“Steve, all this time, I thought you and Stark had fought because of the Accords, because he had refused to stand down, because he still believed Barnes was a threat as the Winter Soldier, I don’t know, I guess I even thought it had been because he was being a jerk or something… but now?!” Sam had stood up from his chair, a look of disbelief on his face “Steve, I just witnessed a man learn of their parents’ death at the hands of an assassin, while said assassin was standing right next to him. And to top it all off, he learnt that he had been lied to by a person he trusted, someone he considered a friend!”
“I… Sam, I know it looked bad, but I had no other choice at the time” Steve said with pleading eyes.
“No Steve, it didn’t only look bad, it was brutal!” he took a deep breath, trying to control his outburst “I’m mad Steve, because I just saw an incredible injustice done to a man I once respected, a man I went against by following you, a man that could be dead, and I’m starting to feel it might also be on me whatever happened to him”
Steve was taken aback by that “What are you talking about Sam?”
“I’m talking about the fact that I was the one who told Tony where to find you Steve! I knew the plan; you and Bucky would search that bunker for more Winter Soldiers. I was so sure Zemo would use them against you and that you needed all the backup you could get... and then Tony came to the raft. He told me he knew Bucky was innocent… damnit, he wanted to help you Steve!! And I feel like I sent him to his death by disclosing your location”
Steve went silent for a moment. He had been wondering how Tony had found them in Siberia, but he had let it slide considering the avalanche of events that had taken place ever since.
“I… none of this was your fault Sam… I, it was all on me. If I hadn’t kept the truth from Tony…”
Sam couldn’t talk, he was too mad, too emotional to think straight, he knew he needed to keep his temper under control, least he said something he would later regret “I need some air” he said finally, turning his back on Steve and Natasha and stepping out of the room.
Sam left the room in a hurry, with Steve hot on his heels, but Natasha stopped him with a firm hand on his shoulder.
“Let him go, he needs to cool down”
It looked like Steve wanted to protest but decided against it. Turning back to the computer, he sat back down heavily on his chair.
“What do you think?” he asked her, looking back at the frozen image on the video, where the bright light that seemed to be the answer to this mystery taunted him.
“About the video? I think Tony managed to escape from that bunker, but it’s still unclear if someone helped him or if he managed it by himself, although we can’t discard other possibilities”
“You think something else could have happened? Do you think someone took him against his will?”
She gave him a small nod “Tony was in a compromised condition; his weakened state could’ve made it very easy for anyone to take advantage of the situation”
With a heavy sigh he closed his eyes, unwilling to let his fears run wild. Turning his head back to her, he cleared his throat “and what do you think about what Sam said?”
“I think he has every right to be mad. You’ve kept a lot of things from us Steve. I’ve known about the Stark’s videos for a long time, I knew they had been the reason for your fallout with Tony, but you kept that information from everyone else. Sam has been blindly following you, not questioning you once, but if you want that to continue, you have to trust him, trust US. A team that cannot trust its members is doomed to fail”
She had made her peace with her role on the Avenger’s breakup a long time ago. In her line of work, you couldn’t have the luxury of growing a conscience, but she was not yet so far gone that she couldn’t differentiate right from wrong, and she knew they had all wronged Tony. She knew what keeping secrets entailed and how soul crushing it could be, she was an expert in that regard after all. But there was no other way, Steve had to learn not to let his heart choose for him in the battlefield, he could not let the whole world burn down because of his personal beliefs, he had to learn to compromise once in a while.
“Think about it, Steve” she said turning for the door, leaving Steve to ponder on what they had told him. She opted to go looking for Sam, the man would no doubt be needing someone to keep him company.
Natasha found Sam on the roof of the apartment complex they were staying at. He was taking some fresh air, looking at the bright colors of the evening sky.
“Sam, are you ok?”
The man closed his eyes and let out a deep breath.
“Yeah, I’m ok Nat, thanks”
Climbing the railing the man was propped against, she sat down next to him with practiced ease, both watching the sunset in companionable silence. They stayed there for a while, watching the sky turn colors, from red to pink to dark blue, until Sam finally let out another deep sigh.
“I always thought I understood Steve, you know?”
Natasha said nothing, letting the man vent his frustrations.
“As ridiculous as it may sound I… I always thought Steve was a paragon of truth, of justice. Ever since I met him, I’ve been following him with the belief that we can make a difference, that our work is for the people, to save lives in one way or another. I’m not naïve, I know Steve is only human, with flaws like everyone else, but he just… he always seemed larger than life, all the time”
Putting a hand through his short buzz hair he fell silent, turning to look at the night sky, trying to find his answers there.
“But today, you saw something different, a side of him you had never seen before” said Natasha knowingly. She understood what Sam was going through. She had never been as awestruck as he had been with Steve, but even she had been pulled to the man by some indescribable force, something about him compelled people to do their best, to constantly look for his approval, and she had not been the exception. But it was so easy to forget Steve was still a kid in some ways, too young and inexperienced outside the battlefield that it made her question everyone’s sanity, including her own, for following him unquestioningly.
“I… yes. I didn’t like what I saw today. I sat there watching how a man I worked with, a man I respected, was beaten down by two enhanced individuals. I saw how he was lied to, and how Steve somehow expected the man to be rational about it all”
“And this thing we’re doing, looking for Stark? It’s Steve looking for Bucky all over again Natasha!”
Taking a deep breath, he tried to control his emotions. “I’ve been reading this Stark’s bill everyone is going on about. I’m mad that Stark didn’t tell us about the modifications to the Accords he had rallied for, I know he explained them to us, but he never told us just how bad they were, or how bad they could be. And even if I'm mad that he withheld that information, I can’t help feeling we should have trusted Tony, we ought to have known the man wouldn’t throw us to the wolves, that he had shown time and again his compromise to protecting people, to protecting US!... Nat, what we were doing was wrong, entering other countries with our own agendas, not respecting their sovereignty or authority... Stark was right to oppose that!”
Closing his eyes, he continued “I’m disappointed in myself, I let my judgement be influenced by my loyalty to Steve. I knew these accords could be something potentially beneficial to everyone, but I turned my back on them, on Stark, to follow Steve blindly”
Turning his head to look at Natasha, he gave her the saddest smile she had ever seen on him “I just feel so ashamed for what I’ve done. For not saying something sooner. I feel like a coward”
Natasha’s stoic face softened at his words. She knew things had been especially hard for Sam. His loyalty was one of his best assets, and one of his worst defects.
“You’re a good man Sam” she said, hopping off from the rail shad had been sitting on “But don’t let all of this keep you down. We’ve all done some very questionable things, but we have to live with our decisions. There’s nothing for us to do but try to do better in the future”
Sam looked at her perplexedly, he hadn’t expected a word of comfort from Natasha, but he was greatly thankful for it.
“Thanks Nat”
She huffed in response, “Sure. Now let’s get out of here, it’s getting late”