Hi, guys! Told you I wouldn't abandon this, but I can see why one would doubt. Late's better than never, right?

Many thanks to Zenoneel-Sarior, Beautiful-Tyant77, Lowell the Lonely, richbecky213, lazydasy, slightlybookish, Crystalzap, musteteersaddict, evestephie, Myxes, sami1010220, Aurora Marie Williams, and 3 Guests for your reviews on the last chapter! The response blows me away every time I think about it.

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Chapter 16: Sleeping Beauty

"Never be afraid to raise your voice for honesty and truth and compassion against injustice and lying and greed. If people all over the world...would do this, it would change the earth."

― William Faulkner

When Steve slowly crawled back to consciousness, he wished he hadn't. Everything hurt. Every single thing, like it hadn't since Project Rebirth.

The music was nice, a somewhat high pitched croon. He didn't know the song until he looked to see who he could hear breathing and found Sam beside his hospital bed, reading. It was probably Trouble Man, then. The situation reminded Steve of when he first woke up after being defrosted, only more painful. A lot more painful.

In an attempt to keep Sam from worrying, he made the only joke he could think of. "On your left."

This time, Sam only smiled and put his book down. "Sleeping beauty finally awakens. How you feeling?" he asked.

Despite that he knew the question was about more than his physical state, that was all Steve gave him right now. "Like I got hit with a tank, but worse," he groaned.

The evasion was obvious, but thankfully Sam didn't say anything. "You look like you got hit with a tank," he said instead, "You've been out nearly two days. It was touch and go for a while, you kept healing up before everything was in the right place. It was kind of nasty looking." He grimaced.

If Sam of all people had that look, it really must have been bad. He wasn't going there just yet, there were more important things to think about. "Bucky?" Steve asked hopefully.

"Disappeared. Not even Natasha can find him," Sam told him, shaking his head.

While Steve had privately expected that, he was still disappointed. He had been so sure that his old friend had pulled him out of the river… Was that shiny arm a hallucination? He refused to believe it. "I might have a few ideas," he replied.

It took another day for Steve to be released from the hospital. A normal man would have been stuck there for a month. He was still itching to get on his feet and go after Bucky within hours.

The first thing he did was call Tony. Or at least try, he wasn't picking up. "Hello, Captain Rogers. I apologize that Mister Stark is not available right now. Is there anything I can do for you?" the AI asked politely.

"Where's Tony? Is he alright?" Steve asked anxiously. Had HYDRA gone after him?

"Sir is stressed, but he is in as good of a physical condition as possible," JARVIS answered carefully.

"JARVIS, are you hiding something important from me?" Steve questioned sharply. Last time that happened, Tony was dying. He wasn't dealing with that before time travel took him away for the last time.

There was a short pause. "If you'll head to 20th and Greenway, I believe that Sir could use some assistance," JARVIS suddenly replied.

That was only two blocks away. Phone still held to his ear, Steve took off with his heart in his throat. "What's the situation?" he asked.

"Sir is currently in combat with the Winter Soldier and locked in a stalemate," JARVIS replied, but by then Steve was close enough to see for himself.

The Iron Man armor and a figure in black leather were fighting, punching and kicking and curiously not using their main weapons. There was no sign of repulsors or guns. Just a device on the ground that was emitting a bright blue glow.

Steve knew that glow. His memories from before the Serum were fuzzy, but that color, much like the Tesseract and the arc reactor, was branded into them. It was time, and he couldn't stand that. "Shut it down!" he shouted.

It was too late. Tony had already tackled Bucky through the disc of light.

But how did they not disappear? No, they rolled with the force of the movement until momentum ran out and stayed there in an inelegant heap. There was no sign of movement from either.

Nothing could be heard over the pounding of Steve's heart in his head. He dropped his phone in favor of rolling Tony off of Bucky and checking whether they were even alive. The light the arc reactor gave off was the first sign and made his hands tremble as he felt for Bucky's pulse and miraculously found it.

Only after he knew that they were both alive was Steve able to sit back and pant for breath. He couldn't believe it, eyes going from one to the other and back again. Was there a chance that time travel wasn't going to be the end of them?

"Captain? Are you still there?" JARVIS called from the dropped phone.

With shaking hands, Steve picked it up again. "Yeah, I'm here. They're both alive, but I'll need help to get them to the Tower," he said.

"Sending a message to Mister Wilson and Agent Romanoff now," JARVIS reported helpfully.

An unsteady laugh left Steve and he combed his free hand through his hair. "Thanks JARVIS. You're a real gem," he complimented. What Tony (and often enough the rest of them) would do without the all-seeing AI, he wasn't sure.

JARVIS's reply was expected and true: "I do my best, Captain."

Natasha got there in the next few minutes. "I can't believe It on Man was the one to find him," she commented, impressed. Without more than a glance she helped to carry Bucky to her car and strap him into the back.

"That makes one of us," Steve teased weakly.

"Barnes I can take no problem, but I don't think we'll be able to get Iron Man in without wrecking my car," Natasha said, analyzing her teammate.

"JARVIS, is there any chance you can fly Iron Man back and put him in the infirmary?" Steve requested.

"Of course, Captain," the armor said in the familiar tinny voice. It was strange watching it move and shoot off into the sky with Tony inside, yet know that Tony wasn't controlling it.

Meanwhile Natasha collected the piece of equipment that had caused this. "What do you think it is?" she asked, frowning at it. She set it in the trunk carefully.

Steve didn't answer until they were in the Tower infirmary. The Iron Man armor was parked on a reinforced bed beside Bucky, both far too still. He had pulled a chair up between them to best respond to any movement as he explained what he knew to Natasha. Sam stood by the door, having arrived not long after them.

"So you're saying that they're in 1943 but right here at the same time, because of the thing in Natasha's trunk?" Sam asked with audible disbelief.

"It looks that way," Steve confirmed, still bamboozled at their physical presence. If their bodies were here, then how were they solid back then? Maybe a copy was made or something?

"If I didn't know you so well, I'd say that you cracked," Natasha stated dryly, "The Starosta file makes a lot more sense now, though." She brought it out from a large purse and set it on a C table to be viewed by them all.

Curiosity about what information survived and the guesswork afterward had Steve look at it. He found himself impressed by the amount of truth involved, and humored by the confusion. "JARVIS, when is Bruce expected to get here?" he asked while the others continued to look it over.

"His flight arrives at eight this evening," JARVIS responded. It was a miracle that Bruce had gotten word of SHIELD going down, where he had been. The isolation made it difficult for him to get back, leaving him to arrive days after the event. Right in time for this one.

Satisfied, Steve went back to what he had been doing. Until then Bucky would be fine on his own and the suit would take care of Tony.

There was no formal call, but somehow the entire team ended up gathering at the Tower by the end of the next night. Clint came out of the woodwork without excuse or reason, and Thor chose the weirdest and most fortunate of times to reappear. That meant that they were all there for the discussion about Iron Man. Specifically, the discussion about whether they could humanely leave him in the armor.

"There's no reaching Tony, and Miss Potts and Colonel Rhodes both referred me to you to get the armor off, Steve," Bruce said reluctantly.

Surprised, Steve looked at the glowing eyes of Iron Man. Of course Tony would have three different backup plans for everything. Even this, in a way. That he was still trusted with this in spite of everything that had happened lately, made a lump rise in his throat. "Nobody can tell anyone about this," he told the others sternly.

"Of course," Bruce agreed immediately. The others followed suit fast enough that Steve felt safe in their word.

He had to take a deep breath before he pulled at the correct places in the armor. First the torso pieces, then the limbs, were released to lie on the bed. The helmet was last and Steve prayed that Tony would forgive him for this.

There was silence as Steve gently pulled the helmet off, then set Tony's head down on the pillow. No one appeared to know what to say, all staring at the face that the helmet had hidden.

Clint was the first to speak. "This can't be right," he stated with disbelief. "Is this some kind of joke?" He looked to Natasha, only to find her recovering from her own shock.

"Tony has always been Iron Man," Steve explained reluctantly, returning to his chair, "He asked me not to tell, so I never did. Just helped him patch himself up and cover up." He didn't feel guilty about it, no matter what his teammates' shocked looks and reprimands.

"Now I feel bad about some of the things I've said about Tony," Clint said, frowning at the man on the bed.

In Steve's opinion, it served him right.

"This is very confusing. If you would not mind explaining, Captain, as you seem the most knowledgeable about the situation?" Thor requested grandly. He leaned on a wall, watching expectantly.

With a sigh, Steve resigned himself to it. He told the entire story, even about their relationship in the past, for the first time. The Avengers were a very good audience; they knew exactly when to gasp or laugh and always looked eager to hear more. "You know the rest. You were there for it," he finished tiredly.

It had been an hour, but no one seemed tired. If anything they were energized by what they heard, putting together pieces that they hadn't made sense before. Bright eyed and excited that everything was coming together about their team leader.

Steve looked on with fond eyes. Now that there were no more secrets, he felt lighter in a way. Not entirely, it would take Tony and Bucky waking up for that, but better. His lips tilted upward when he noticed Bruce and Natasha scribbling on a pad of paper while Sam and Clint talked.

"Somehow I do not think that this story is over," Thor mused.

The idea was absurd, but Steve felt reassured. "I hope not," he agreed quietly.

That night Bruce set up machines and tubes to properly care for Tony and Bucky's bodily functions. He then gave them all a very informative lesson about how and when to roll a comatose or unconscious person to prevent bedsores. "Always do your best to prevent them," he told them seriously, "An infected bedsore was what killed Christopher Reeve in the end. Not his broken neck." Once it got explained that he was talking about the first actor to play Superman on television, he then continued on to other small procedures that would be helpful but not too invasive for their liking. Things like joint manipulation and how to change a bed around them.

Of course there were nurses and nursing assistants on call for times that team members were injured, but it didn't feel right to leave it all up to the professionals. Bucky was an unknown factor and nobody was sure of him after what happened at SHIELD, but Tony was theirs. Someone was always in the room unless the Avengers alarm went off, both to watch over them and to make them comfortable.

Then Thor called Steve over, pointing to a cut on Tony's hand. "That was not there last night," he pointed out with concern.

Steve frowned and tilted Tony's hand this way and that, sickly relieved just to be able to hold his hand again. "I recognize this cut…" he muttered. It was fuzzy, but he remembered mother henning Tony when he got this exact injury while at work.

Before his eyes, a small burn appeared on the side of Tony's thumb. He remembered that too, the unwieldy welding torch had slipped and Tony had to scramble to catch it before it fell and broke.

"I think he's getting the injuries he had back then," Steve said, frowning. How would that even work?

"Do you think that the injuries which killed him would be included in that?" Thor asked suddenly.

That hadn't occurred to Steve until now, or he hadn't let it. "I need to talk to Bruce," he said suddenly and rocketed out of his chair, down to Bruce's lab.

The look on his face must have been terrified, because Bruce dropped what he was doing right away. "What is it?" he questioned immediately.

"What about when their past time counterparts die? Do you have any idea what'll happen?" Steve asked in a rush. If anyone outside of Tony might have that answer, it would be Bruce.

The doctor frowned with thought. "The two ideas I can come up with are that they'll either die that exact way, or that they'll wake up at that point. What happened?"

"Tony got two injuries that I recognize from back then," Steve said. Then he stopped short, realizing exactly what that meant and oh God, this was going to be awful.

It was obvious when Bruce realized the same thing: he went pale under his tan and his dark eyes went wide. "Oh, oh no. The Winter Soldier experiments," he said.

Steve nodded and let out a shaky breath. It was all in his head but he felt the tingle of electricity on his skin from Howard's machine. "What do you think we can do?" he asked.

"I think the best we can do is treat whatever injuries he comes up with. This isn't like any other situation I've ever seen," Bruce said with a helpless shrug.

It wasn't a situation that any of them had ever seen.

From then on the team was able to keep track of the timeline by the injuries that cropped up on Tony's body. An occasional burn, bruise, or cut would crop up and be noted down as it was treated by the doctor.

At first it was weird but no big deal. Tony's injuries were minor, mere scrapes in the course of things. Bucky got a little lean, but stayed in one piece.

And then the day of Project Rebirth came. It was so long ago and so much had happened since that Steve nearly forgot about that incident until he walked into the infirmary to find the doctors in a tizzy, shouting for bandages and liquid stitches. "What is it? What happened?" he demanded, heart rate sky rocketing as he watched from the doorway.

Oh God, blood was getting everywhere on Tony's bed and the doctors' gloves. The only reason fear didn't wash through Steve completely was because it was too early. There hadn't been a trace of the Zola's tortuous experiments yet.

"What was that?" Clint's voice was wary but not fearful as he came to stand next to Steve, beside the doorway.

For a moment Steve wracked his memory. Being interrupted by the doctor and finding out that Tony was shipping out came to mind. "Project Rebirth. I was so out of it that I didn't know he got hurt until later, going after the guy who shot the doctor." He still felt guilty about that, for so many reasons.

Clint chuckled. "Not even out of the States yet and he's already fighting. Just like Iron Man." His voice was almost fond as he watched the slowly deescalating scene.

"Just like Tony," Steve agreed softly.

They stood and watched as the doctors left with their biological material bags filled with bandages, nodding to the Avengers they passed on the way. One stopped to say, "He'll be fine if that's the extent of it for a while. But I'm sure you already knew that." Her dark eyes crinkled in a smile up at them.

Steve nodded. "Thank you." He patted her on the shoulder of her scrubs on his way to sit between the hospital beds.

On the other side of Tony's bed, Clint took another chair. "It's still so weird to think that Stark has been Iron Man this whole time." He peered Tony, analyzing every detail like he hadn't a couple dozen times before. If Tony had been awake for it, he probably would have gotten nervous by now.

"Is it really that weird?" Steve didn't think so. Knowing Tony like he did, it would be more absurd if Iron Man was someone else.

After a moment of thought, Clint nodded and sat back. "I guess not. I can see Stark doing all the stupid stuff, at least."

It wasn't a joke but Steve still smiled. "You have no idea," he said.

But between now and then was Tony's time as a HYDRA POW, and with it Zola's experiments. The mere idea had Steve's gut roiling. Imagining what had happened was bad enough; having to watch Tony suffer and be unable to do anything would be sheer hell.

For a long while nothing happened with Tony and Bucky; it was a relief but the longer that went on, the closer they got to…

Just back from an Avengers call, Steve had barely gotten done showering when JARVIS called for him. "Captain, you are needed immediately in the medical ward." How did a computer program sound worried?

The breath caught in Steve's chest. There could only be one thing happening and he half hoped it would never come. "I'm on my way." He hopped into a pair of pajama pants and threw on a shirt, and then sprinted out the door.

He didn't bother with the elevator, it was faster for him to run up the stairs. All the while his thoughts buzzed with curious fear. The lies Tony had told about Zola's experiments were sickening and Steve wasn't sure he wanted to know the truth if it was worse than that. But he couldn't bear not knowing.

The chaos from the medical ward could be heard the whole way at the stairway and it felt like Steve was choking on his own heart.

"Get a bag of AB type!"

"How'd his wrist break?!"

"WHERE'S THE AIR EVAC?!"

It hurt his feet a little to skid around the corner into the medical room but Steve didn't care. Not when he could see Tony's limbs jerking and his mouth open in an unending, silent scream. "What can I do?" he asked when one of the doctors glanced at him.

"Lead the evac team down from the roof!" she ordered and immediately went back to putting a needle in Tony's arm.

It felt like getting the paramedics to the room took forever. A few times they had to tell Steve to slow down, they were mere mortals here, and the less said about his impatience with the elevator, the better.

"What are we looking at?" the man who seemed in charge of the evacuation team asked as Tony was transferred to the stretcher.

Standing against the wall right next to the door, Steve listened with growing horror to the list of what had already happened. Needle marks all over the major muscle groups, broken wrist, choked on his feeding tube, bands of bruising across the body, seizures, renal failure beginning, heart rate and blood pressure alternating between dangerously high and even worse lows… As the list went on, Steve started to feel a little sick; this was so much worse than Tony and Bucky's lies had hinted at.

Then he heard his name. "Rogers, go with them!" the doctor from before, Jones, told him.

That was an order Steve had no problem obeying. He very nearly snapped off a salute to her automatically, but then just led the way back to the helicopter. "JARVIS, tell the rest of the team to look after Bucky and that Tony and I are being airlifted," he ordered, voice strained.

"Reporting to them now, Captain Rogers." God bless JARVIS.

The helicopter was crowded and Steve was relegated to the passenger seat in the front; his own knees creaked under his tight grip as he tried to conquer the sudden surge of anxiety. He didn't like to think of the last time he was in the front seat of an aircraft.

"Don't like heights?" the pilot asked, almost teasing.

"Last time I was in the front of a plane, I crashed it in Greenland," Steve answered. Just thinking about it, he felt his temperature drop again.

The helicopter lifted off gently. "Good thing this isn't a plane," the pilot observed and began to fly them further into New York.

"Captain Rogers, what are we supposed to be looking at?" called one of the paramedics from the back.

How was he supposed to know what they were seeing? He had barely gotten to Italy at that point.

"He's stabilizing," the lead paramedic reported with relief.

If only that could last. "He was on that table for three days. I don't think that was the last of it," Steve told them bitterly.

This was one of the times he despised being right. For three solid days Steve stayed parked in the chair right beside Tony's hospital bed, leaving only to use the bathroom and bring food up to the room. An Avengers alarm came but Natasha told him to stay where he was; the rest of the team would take care of it. He was sickeningly grateful to her and horribly guilty about being glad he could sit this one out.

Like hell was he leaving Tony so vulnerable in what was practically a public place.

On the third day bruising appeared in a strange pattern on Tony's face and his ears started bleeding. Even though it was diagnosed as burst eardrums, a broken cheek, and (unconnected) ripped vocal chords, Steve still breathed a sigh of relief. "I'll be there soon, Tony," he whispered and kissed the work rough knuckles.

Stupidly, he felt ready to cry. Either Tony would wake up soon, or he'd die, and Steve wasn't ready to face that kind of terror.

Luckily he got a distraction. Unfortunately, it was in the form of Pepper Potts gasping from the doorway. "Oh my god…" Looking lost, she wandered in and sat down heavily on the opposite side of the bed from Steve.

Tactfully, he didn't say anything. He had been here through the whole thing so far and still found it shocking.

For several minutes they sat in silence, Pepper visibly overwhelmed. Then she swallowed and gave Steve a weak smile. "How are you holding up?"

Still holding onto Tony's hand, he nodded. "Holding up. Hoping he wakes up at the end of this instead of dying… Again." It still boggled his mind, even years after figuring out what was going on.

"He always thought the Starosta thing was weird. Suspicious." Pepper's laugh sounded closer to a sob than it should have. "I don't think he ever suspected this though."

Steve should have expected Tony to tell her at least a little of what was going on. For some reason it took him by surprise. "I'm not sure I want to know what was going through his head," he said truthfully. It wouldn't matter when this was over, either way.

"For being a genius, he can be an idiot. A paranoid idiot. I knew you'd never hurt him, not on purpose. He's just been betrayed too many times to believe it," Pepper explained sadly. She picked up Tony's free hand and squeezed it.

"I can't blame him, knowing too much but not enough. It did look bad," Steve admitted.

"Tell me what really happened," Pepper urged gently. It was clear that he could refuse and she wouldn't press, but by now she deserved the truth.

So Steve told her. Even about their relationship, which made her laugh and then cry. There wasn't a single trace of pity but something like peace in her eyes by the time he finished his part of the story. "And when he wakes up?" she prompted.

The titanium band still (always) in his pocket burned. "That's up to him." Hopefully Tony would want to continue where they left off, even if only part of their silly imaginings could come true. But Steve would accept anything his man wanted from him, even if it was to screw off to Papua New Guinea or something. As long as Tony was alive to tell him what he wanted, anything was acceptable.

"He's been in love with you for years. I wouldn't be surprised if he dragged you to the courthouse for a wedding, still in his hospital gown." The mental image made them both giggle.

Even worse, Steve could see it happening. "We'll get there when we get there," he said but couldn't help the hope that rose up in his chest.

Once it was clear that Zola's experiments were over the doctors were willing to release Tony back to the Tower, but for once Steve disagreed. This wasn't the end of it. Soon enough Tony would be back on the table suffering nearly the same things again, and after that was his… death. Or waking. No one seemed to know but they conceded the necessity.

Weeks passed and injuries came and went. The results of the chicken attacks and the mushroom incident made Steve laugh, but gunshots and a cracked skull made him wince with sympathy. Another round on Zola's table made him want to snap the dead scientist's neck. Back at the Tower a gunshot wound opened up on Bucky's leg, but Bruce wrapped it and that was that.

Soon it would all be over. The possible forks in the path were just ahead and Steve was terrified of which one they would be forced onto. Would Tony and Bucky live? Would they die?

The worst part was that Steve could only pray.