I do not own any of these characters or Marvel. :)

Too much. It was too much.

The world spun on its axis, the colors around him swirled to form a kaleidoscopic mess. His hand clenched on the black leather of the worn sofa he leaned against, the same sofa they'd spent hours on for movie night.

You can't tell me Star Trek is better than Star Wars, Barton, that's blasphemy.

Swallowing hard and firmly keeping his eyes closed, Tony fought back the onslaught of fond memories, of simpler times, of a shared home.

He opened his eyes. Forced himself to take in the rich red walls, the cream white marble of the kitchen against the sharp black of the counter.

"Tony?" It was Rhodey.

"Yeah?" he replied softly, his eyes wandering across what used to be his home.

Silence. "You okay?"

"Yeah," he breathed, finally dragging his gaze to Rhodey and trying for a small smile.

Rhodey frowned. "You sure?"

"Yes, my concerned bestie, I am absolutely fine. Now, isn't it time for your physical therapy? Come on now, Rhodey, you can't skip these things. You don't want to make your therapist angry, do you? Come on," he rambled, ushering his friend outside.

Rhodey frowned, but allowed himself to be guided out.

He stopped at the doorway once Rhodey was ahead of him. Looked back at the blood red walls, the clinical white of the kitchen in contrast with the dark black of the counter. Sighed heavily, then walked out.

He was just going to live in the lab forever. It seemed like a logical plan. Get food from JARVIS ordering takeout, sleep from the convenient bed he had placed into the corner. As for boredom, there was enough in his lab to keep him busy for months.

The Avengers had been back in the tower for two weeks now and Tony hadn't seen them once.

They hadn't attempted to see him once.

So there he remained, locked away in his tower, working for hours on everything and nothing. Eventually JARVIS refused to order any more food from outside, leaving Tony starving, coffee-deprived, and cursing his past self for embedding that into his AI.

Hovering over the "enter" button on the password device, he bit his lip and threw a dirty look at the ceiling of his sanctuary. Tony pressed the button and stepped out of his lab for the first time in two weeks.

He hated it.

A piercing vulnerability struck him in the chest and he hunched over almost unintentionally, wrapping his arms around himself. His heart burned and he fought the panicked urge to run back into his safe place and stay there forever.

The mechanic reached the open kitchen and stopped, hearing the distinct sounds of laughing and loud voices.

It was instantaneous, the silence that fell over his former family as he entered the room. They stared at him for about 30 seconds before awkwardly glancing at each other for guidance. Steve, ever the united front, stuttered a quiet, "Tony…"

"Sorry," he said. "Didn't mean to… interrupt. Just, you know, needed some coffee, sweet sweet coffee…" he trailed off and focused all of his attention on the half-filled coffee pot on the counter. Tried to ignore the pointed stares he felt on the back of his neck, he gripped the pot tight enough to turn his knuckles white and poured it carefully into a cup.

"It's good to see you again, Tony." Steve. That was obviously Steve.

Clint scoffed.

And there it was.

"Good to see him again? What the hell are you playing at, Steve? It's definitely not good to see him again. Now you know who would have been good to see again? My family. My kids, and my wife, that's who."

Tony fixed his eyes on the coffee and felt himself instinctively curl up. He blinked once or twice to the liquid in his hands, then quietly muttered, "I'm sorry."

"Sorry. Because 'sorry' makes everything okay. Saying 'sorry' fixes everything you broke. Just go back to your little hidey-hole, Stark, and leave the rest of us here alone." Oh, good, Wanda's talking now.

"Yeah," he sighed. "Yeah, I'll do that."

And walked back to the lab with his head hung low.

Whenever Tony thought things were finally getting better, he was getting the hang of this whole living in the lab thing, it was like the universe just wanted to say screw you, Stark, I want to see you suffer.

James Buchanan Barnes lived with them now.

They'd taken a vote, apparently, one of those that he wasn't in on anymore.

Things had been simpler since that day in the kitchen. He'd stayed holed up in his lab until it was too much or Pepper dragged him out for a meeting, and the others avoided him in any way possible.

Well, everyone except Steve.

It was like he knew exactly when Tony came out of his hole in the ground, and was instantly there, standing uncertainly, giving him those damn puppy eyes.

God, he hated those eyes.

(No, he didn't)

The genius didn't go out as much though. He didn't think he could handle seeing Barnes in a casual setting without remembering, remembering.

Murderous eyes, raised fists, blood, pain pain painpainpain,

He's my friend.

Shattered inside, it hurts, why, I didn't mean to, it hurts so badI'msorry,

So was I.

He wasn't that much of a masochist.

"Tony, you need to talk to them."

Tony rolled his eyes and manipulated the hologram with one hand while he held the phone to his ear with the other hand.

"No, I'm pretty sure I'm good, Brucie, and they don't seem to be that bothered, either," he said.

"Tony. You need to apologize, that's the only way any of this is going to get better." Bruce's voice held a frustrated note.

Tony was silent for a few seconds.

"Tony?"

"Why do I…? I mean, it's not just- never mind." He cut himself off as a voice whispered in his mind.

Isn't it though, Tony? Isn't it your fault?

"I gotta go, Brucie," he rushed.

"Tony-"

He hung up.

It was nearing midnight. Tony cringed at the obnoxiously loud sound of the microwave whirring. It cut through the silence and dark of the kitchen and probably woke everybody on the floor.

He scrunched up his face in disgust at the boxed lasagna he took out of the microwave when it beeped and cursed his inability to remember groceries.

"Mr… Stark?"

He whirled around at the rough voice.

It was Barnes.

The engineer's jaw dropped open and he fumbled with the box in his hand.

"Mr. Barnes," he breathed, wide-eyed.

"I wante-" Bucky started. Tony cut him off before he could utter anything else.

"It's fine, whatever, I'm just going to go back to the lab, it's- it's all good. I-I'm sorry. Didn't mean to come in your w-way." Tony internally cursed at the stuttering. He walked backwards until he hit the doorway and raised the corners of his lips for a millisecond before disappearing out of sight.

He leaned against the wall next to the door and slid down.

Sighed.

This is going to be a long night.

The next time he met - or was forced to meet - Bucky Barnes was by pure coincidence and induced a whole new level of cursing at the universe from Tony.

It might have been inadvertently his fault, though.

Just a little.

Pepper had been bothering him about the faulty elevator for weeks but he'd never really gotten around to it, or even calling some elevator guy to fix it.

He probably should have.

Tony had been fast-walking back from a meeting Pepper had forced him to go to, ignoring almost every stare he knew he was getting from his employes in the lobby, and clenching his hands in frustration.

He pressed the "down" button on the wall and fidgeted restlessly, fighting the strong urge to fix his pants.

Wow, I have sorely underestimated the extreme importance of multiple bathrooms on this floor.

Yes, he needed to pee.

After hours (20 seconds), the doors finally slid open and Tony groaned internally, cursing his very existence, the universe, JARVIS, as they revealed the bane of Tony's existence: Barnes.

It was time to choose. Which was more important to him: peeing and having to face him, or avoiding the absolute humiliation that he would probably experience when he peed his pants in front of the many people in the lobby.

Sometimes Tony really wanted to ask the universe why it constantly chose him, of all people, to play cosmic jokes on.

He walked into the elevator stiffly.

Looked forwards.

Clenched his buttcheeks.

Watched the doors close and essentially seal his fate.

I hate you, he thought.

He wasn't sure exactly to whom he was directing that statement to, but it was someone up there, that was for sure.

It was more than a little awkward.

He carefully avoided Bucky's gaze and focused on thinking about anything but his extremely full bladder.

"So…" Barnes started hesitantly. He stopped.

There was a muffling silence for about 20 seconds and then:

"Um… what?" Tony muttered, unable to bear the overwhelming quiet on top of his desperate need to go to the bathroom.

"I just…. I mean, I understand, but- I just wanted to than-"

Crash.

The elevator was shrouded in darkness.

Oh no.

Oh no, no, nonononono.

The only sounds they could hear were each other's breaths and a few faint creaks from the roof.

Barnes's breathing picked up. In the darkness of the space they were in, Tony glimpsed him sliding down the metal wall. The metal fingers of his left arm tapped consistently and manically against the floor.

"Uh. You… you okay, Barnes?" he asked.

No response.

After a minute of Barnes quietly panicking and not replying to Tony's question, he approached the soldier calmly and bent down in front of what he assumed to be his face. "You sure about that?"

Barnes opened his previously clenched shut eyes to stare agitatedly at Tony. His scared blue orbs induced a small ache in the mechanic's heart and he inwardly grimaced.

"Breathe, Barnes," he said soothingly, "breathe. Come on, you got this. Breathe with me. In. Out, that's it. In. Out."

At some point during the assassin's panic attack, Tony's hand drifted up and rested comfortingly on Barnes's flesh arm.

Barnes sighed. Probably unintentionally, he reached up to grip Tony's arm and held on with a desperation akin to a drowning man holding onto a piece of wood floating in the ocean.

Barnes followed his breathing for the next few minutes; he calmed down just as Tony removed his hand from his arm.

"You good now?" Tony broke the silence hesitantly, not certain of what had just occurred.

"Yeah," was the only reply.

"Okay… then."

And that was that.

.

.

.

Later, he would look back to that moment as the first time he realized that the man who'd killed his parents, who had mercilessly murdered his mother, was still human.

And that scared him shitless.

Thanks for reading! Review if you liked it! I will most likely be writing more...