I'll admit, I have a slight pumpkin spice problem, and that's where this angle to the ongoing series came from. I hope you enjoy. I did.

Don't own it. If I did, I wouldn't be spending time writing stories about it.

The first part of this story is Steve's POV in When Passed My Friend and Left Me Standing Bleakly. It doesn't have to be read to understand this one, but it helps! s/9817842/1/When-Passed-My-Friend-and-Left-Me-Stan ding-Bleakly

Darcy juggled the two cups of coffee in her hands to dig her S.H.I.E.L.D pass out of the pocket of her jeans. The security guard's eyes were a little too busy watching the way her shirt stretched tight across chest, and she wondered if he knew who she was.

"Hey dude. You're currently oogling Captain America's girlfriend. Consider yourself warned."

She was a little gratified to see his eyes snap back up to her face. "Sorry," he apologized.

She finally worked the pass out of her pocket and clipped it to bottom of her shirt. "Even if I wasn't, it's just not cool to stare like that. It's a dick move. I'm also good friends with Thor. He's like my adopted big brother."

There was definitely a hard swallow on the part of the guard. "I'll…I'll be less of a dick in the future, Miss Lewis."

She grinned at him. "Smart move. Do you know where the captain is? He's been all involved in this super secret project, and I haven't seen him for two weeks. So today, Barton stops in at the lab and drops off this pass, tells me to come find my boyfriend. Do you know what's going on?"

"Above my level, ma'am. But there's some kind of high level prisoner came in two weeks ago, had the whole place in an uproar. Might be the first place to start looking. Subsection C, area 24."

Darcy beamed at him. "You totally redeemed yourself from being a dick…" She dipped to look at his badge. "Bob. Really? Bob?"

He shrugged. "Robert was too formal, and Rob sounds like a wishlist."

Darcy laughed again. "Awesome. See ya later, Bob."

She headed for the elevator, again juggling the coffee. She hadn't even spoken to Steve in the two weeks. He'd sent a couple of very terse texts, which told her he was in the middle of something very classified, and she was willing to bet that the high level prisoner was the metal armed fuck who'd been toying with him. There's been shaky video uploaded to the internet of a car accident, and the Natasha's red hair had been a dead giveaway. Plus, Stark had released her from the Tower. He wouldn't have done that unless he'd gotten the all clear from Steve.

Something bad had happened, and Darcy needed to know what it was. She wanted her boyfriend back.

She received a few strange looks as she headed for Area 24 once off the elevator, but she had the S.H.I.E.L.D badge clipped to her shirt, so no one questioned her. The S.H.I.E.L.D office was decidedly unfriendly in appearance and feel, and she was glad that Tony Stark had rescued Jane from them.

Area 24 was a lab type area, she saw as she entered it. The main focus was in the center of the large hangar type room, and that was a brick walled area surrounded by viewing ports and computer consoles. Toward the back of the area, she saw Steve talking with a lab coated scientist, and headed toward him.

The cries of alarm that erupted from some of the S.H.I.E.L.D employees brought Darcy to a halt, eyes widening. She saw Steve's head snap up, looking through one of the viewing ports in alarm, and winced as a man exploded out of one, arms up to shield his face. He tumbled smoothly to the floor and came to his feet already running.

S.H.I.E.L.D agents moved to intercept him, but the long haired man, wearing green hospital scrubs, easily tossed them aside as he ran toward the exit. Toward Darcy.

She was frozen and couldn't move, not even when Steve saw her and cried out a warning. He was also chanting something that sounded like 'fuck' but that wasn't quite it.

The prisoner skidded to a halt within arm's length of Darcy. He had crazy eyes, face twisted and desperate. His hands were held low in front of him, ready to rip or destroy. Judging by the way everyone froze, she was in mortal danger right now.

Darcy had seen enough internet pictures of the Winter Soldier to recognize him, even without the tactical clothes, but this man didn't look like a cold blooded killing machine. He looked crazed and confused.

She did the only thing she could think of, thrusting one of the Styrofoam coffee cups out at him. "Coffee?" she squeaked, eyes fixed on the twisted face in front of her. The eyes narrowed and glanced down at the cup, then looked back up at her. "It's like the lifeblood of the universe," she cajoled, shaking the cup slightly so its contents sloshed.

She ignored Steve's strangled "What are you doing?" from behind the prisoner, and pulled the coffee cup back to take a long audible sniff..

"Yummy stuff. Seriously. Pumpkin spice latte. Limited edition."

A small corner of her mind wondered what she was doing, but those crazy eyes were calling to her. Even more so than Erik Selvig after Loki had scrambled his brain, this man's eyes were like windows to hell. She reached out with the coffee cup again. "Good stuff," she encouraged.

Like a wild animal, he moved a half step closer, eyes focused on the coffee cup being offered. Parts of his face twitched spasmodically, and he blinked several times.

Behind her, Darcy could hear booted footsteps and the man in front of her tensed, dropping into an alert crouch. She heard Steve hiss orders at the other agents to stand down, and the Winter Soldier relaxed slightly, but didn't rise from his crouch. So Darcy slowly and carefully folded herself down into a cross legged seated position, coffee cup still held out in front of her. Wild animals always felt more threatened if something or someone was looming over them, so she figured the same thing probably held true for the man with the crazy eyes.

"So you know, when your boyfriend spends two weeks not seeing you, you start thinking that maybe there's another woman or something, right?" Darcy did her best to appear completely harmless, not looking at the nearby train wreck of a man. "Imagine my surprise when I found out that it's another man who's taken up all his time. Kinda hard on a girl's self-esteem, you know? I mean, despite my awesome charms, Thor completely fell for Jane. And that's cool and all, good for her, right? Then I get my own blond hunk of loving, and that's just awesome. But now? Now he's cheating on me with a long haired brunette with cheek stubble."

It wasn't her imagination that one corner of the escapee's mouth twitched upward, and for a second, he seemed to really be looking at her and seeing her. Then the madness swirled back in, and whatever had been there was swept away.

"Darce." Steve's voice was low and apologetic. He was inching closer, trying to appear as harmless as possible, but Darcy could see the tensing of the wild man in front of her.

"Uh uh," she chastised softly. "You stay right where you are, Rogers. I'll deal with you a little later." Her gaze moved to the man in front of her. "Hey you. With the long hair. Rock star. My arm is getting really tired holding this coffee out to you. I have terrible upper body strength. You gonna drink this? It's really awesome stuff."

Crazy eyes met hers, swept around the area behind her, then slid back to her. With a soft sigh, he dropped to his butt on the floor in front of her, and his real hand reached out to take the coffee from hers.

Darcy lowered her arm, watching as he drew the coffee cup to his mouth, and took a sip. It was probably too sweet, but Steve did like sweet stuff, so she always had his made as sweet as hers. He completely deserved to lose his coffee for staying away from her for two weeks.

She wiggled her arm to shake it out and dropped it to her side. "Good, right?"

Her new coffee buddy didn't say anything, but kept sipping, eyes now closed.

Her butt was numb by the time crazy guy was done, even though it really didn't take that long. But since she was sitting on a concrete floor, it didn't take long. The funny thing was that no one moved. The S.H.I.E.L.D agents had frozen in place, and even Steve hadn't moved. He was just watching cautiously.

When a hand extended, rather demandingly, Darcy snorted. "You want mine too? I gave you Steve's coffee, because it's the least he deserves after abandoning me for you, right? But you want my coffee now?"

The fingers flexed a little. "Are you making grabby hands at me?" Darcy asked. "I had to wait in line for like ten minutes to get these coffees. I didn't even get to take a sip."

The crazy eyes opened, and the fingers flexed again. Darcy heaved a huge sigh. "Fine. You look like you need it more than me anyhow." She delivered the coffee cup into the waiting hand and then just sat there, watching as he sipped the other coffee. "Dude, you're going to be bouncing off the walls for the rest of the night. Hehehe. Sorry S.H.I.E.L.D agents and scientists. I'm sugaring him up and giving him back to you." She tilted her head to one side. "I'm bad like that, sorry. Hey Rock Star! You gonna go quietly back to your current 'room' now? I'm sure they're trying to help you. They have a funny, sometimes shitty, way of going about it, but the good intentions are still there."

Crazy eyes looked at her over the rim of the coffee cup, swept the area behind her, and finally glanced behind him at the other agents gathered. One corner of mouth quirked up into a smile or smirk or something, quickly hidden by the coffee cup.

He was relatively docile after finishing the second cup of coffee, and allowed himself to be surrounded and led back to a different cell. Darcy watched him go, then stood up in time to be swept off her feet.

"Steve," she gasped out. "I can't…I can't breathe, Steve."

He relaxed his hold somewhat, face pressed into her hair. "You were very brave, but that wasn't a smart thing to do," he murmured. "He could have killed you."

Darcy squeezed him tight, but her thoughts couldn't pull feel of the crazy/tortured eyes that had stared back at her. "He just…he really looked like he needed a friend. Are you sure that's the guy who was cold-blooded killing machine?"

Steve nodded. "Yeah. He's…it's a long story." He took a step back and wrapped one arm around her, guiding her toward the new holding cell. Inside, the man who was the Winter Soldier was curled up on the floor, shivering.

Darcy's first impulse was to yell that he needed more comfort in his cell, but then she saw the mattress. He had simply chosen not to use it.

"He's not cold," Steve reassured her. "He has reactions like this after something that's considered a breakthrough in his programming."

She stepped back from the viewing port and looked up, finally getting a good look at her man. Steve's eyes were ringed in dark circles, and his face was a little gaunt. Why would he be so affected by what happened a former Russian assassin?

"Talk to me, Steve. What's going on?"

His forehead creased, and for a second, tears shimmered in his eyes. "I don't have a lot of answers yet. But his name is James Buchanan Barnes. He died over 70 years ago. I watched him fall to his death. I couldn't save him."

Darcy cupped his face in her hands, feeling disbelief course through her veins. "That's your best friend Bucky? Are you kidding?"

Steve's head moved from side to side slowly. "No. He…he recognized that he knew me. And when that happened, it overloaded his programming, and…" his voice caught thickly. "He's been like you saw him today since we brought him in. Mostly just prowling around like a wild animal. Today was the first time he tried to break out. Natasha has tried to visit with him, and that apparently makes him go beserk, so she stays away now. His reaction to me hasn't been predictable."

Darcy stepped into his space, sliding her arms around him, feeling the shaking. It was killing him to watch his best friend like this. But was that worse than Barnes staying dead, or not?

When she asked him, Steve shook his head violently. "No! Even if this is all we ever get out of him, I'll take it. At least…at least I have him back."

"And maybe you'll stop having nightmares of him falling," she whispered into his chest.

Steve drew back from her. "I can't ask you to stick around for this. It's going to get worse before it gets better, and it's already been pretty bad. It's not fair to you." He was doing his noble, self-sacrificing captain thing, and it pissed her off.

"You can shovel that shit right out of your ass," she snapped at him, socking him in the arm. "He's your best friend, Steve. And he's been through shit even worse than you, apparently. What kind of girl would I be if I let you push me away just because things were going to get tough?" She balled up her fists and placed them on her hips, daring him to try to dump her.

Steve shook his head. "Darce…this is going to require all of my energy and focus." He ducked his head, eyes staring down at the floor. "He needs me. More than you do."

Darcy swallowed hard. He wasn't wrong, but no one should have to go through this experience by themselves, and she felt invested already. She reached out and took his hands, hating that they were shaking slightly. "He needs all the help he can get. I'll be here for you, so you can be there for him, and I'll do whatever I can to help him." Because those eyes….

Steve slumped. "I don't deserve you," he whispered.

Darcy smiled. "I know. It's more like a punishment than anything else."

Darcy wasn't expecting to be pulled into the Winter Soldier's rehabilitation, or was it deprogramming? But the next day, she got a phone call from Steve. Apparently Barnes was so agitated he was in danger of hurting himself, and no one could get near him. One of the scientists had a crazy idea, so an hour after that, she was riding the elevator down to Subsection C, with two pumpkin spice lattes in hand. Well, okay, she actually had a carrier with four, because she wanted one, and Steve should have one too, but the other two were for Mr. Grumpy.

Poor Steve looked pretty rough when she got there, with his hair sticking up at odd angles, and a weary expression that was in every line of his body.

"That bad?" Darcy asked softly, handing him a coffee.

Steve sipped gratefully. "Yeah." He blinked slowly. "I asked Barton if this is what Natasha went through, because she was part of the same Russian spy group. Barton said it wasn't anything like this though. Natasha was raised to be an assassin. Bucky…I don't want to know what they did, but they tore him apart and remade him into the Winter Soldier. So it's much, much worse."

Barnes had heard her arrival, apparently, because he stopped tearing around his cell. Darcy was waved over hurriedly, and peered in the viewing port, only to jerk back in surprise when she looked right into the crazy eyes. He was peering out, and when he saw her, his hands came up, fingers flexing.

Darcy almost laughed. "You got grabby hands again, Barnes."

He frowned. She noticed, but she had decided on the way here that she wasn't going to call him James (as Natasha did), and she hadn't met the part of him that was Bucky, so she couldn't call him that, and Winter Soldier was completely out of the question. So he was Barnes.

Darcy was a little nervous by the four S.H.I.E.L.D agents flanking her when the cell door opened. But Barnes stood a safe distance back from it, focused on the coffee cups in her hands. She made a decision then, and stepped into the cell with him, ignoring the strangled noise that probably came from Steve. She folded herself down to sit on the mattress that was on the floor, and seconds later, the mattress dipped beside her.

She didn't look at him. "Heard you been cutting up today, Barnes. You gonna behave while I'm in here?"

She could see grabby hands beside her, the real one and the cybernetic one, so she lifted one of the coffees out of the carrier and handed it over. She took one, and sat the carrier down on the floor between them.

"I'm drinking this one," she warned him. "Don't be greedy, okay? I brought you two."

He didn't say anything, but had both hands wrapped around the coffee cup, sipping.

"Meet any of the others yet?" she inquired. "Well, yeah, I guess you have. But what about Thor? Have you met Thor yet? He's the God of Thunder. Cool guy. Good for eye candy. I tased him once."

She was aware of his eyes looking at her, and hid a smile. "He was crashing around the desert, all 'Hammer!' and stuff. He freaked me out, so I tased him. That was after Jane hit him with the van. Thor's pretty tough though, so it just knocked him out for a little. It was really hard getting him up into the van. He's heavy. But he looks on me like a little sister now. You know, cuz I took care of Jane after he left. He promised to come back, but he didn't. Not for two years. He had a good excuse though, so Jane only slapped him a few times."

He didn't say a word, just sipped and listened as she rambled, telling him about things in her life, or just aimlessly speaking. It was hard to imagine this was the same guy that had terrorized everyone for most of the day. He was so calm right now. Almost, but not quite at peace. She could still feel tense awareness in him, but not anything close to the hyper activity she'd been called in to help calm.

"You can pretend it's the coffee all you want to, Barnes," she told him at one point. "But I know it's just my awesome self you wanted to see again."

When he finished the second coffee, he actually placed the empty cup back in the carrier. They just sat in silence for a long time. Darcy looked around curiously, not liking what she saw but understanding the reason for it. There was no bed frame, probably because it could be disassembled and used as a weapon. There was a plastic toilet that wasn't attached to any kind of plumbing. It had a water tank on the back, and a dump pedal at the base. She guessed that there was a small hole in the floor under it where waste would be dumped. Nothing big enough to escape through, and no pipes that could be used as weapons. The toilet itself could be used, but it was plastic so wouldn't do too much damage.

"Are they protecting you from yourself, or protecting themselves from you?" she wondered.

There was a quiet snort beside her, and she considered that an accomplishment.

An intercom somewhere in the cell flickered to life, and someone was telling her to come out. Darcy started to rise, but stopped when a metal hand moved to rest on her knee. Not hard, not actually restraining her, but just a quiet request. He wasn't looking at her, staring straight ahead at the wall, lines of his jaw just as impossible as Steve's.

"Not right now," she called to the wall. Then she turned to look at the supposedly broken man beside her. "I'm not having sex with you, Barnes. Just because I'm sitting on your mattress in your room…well, that doesn't mean a thing. Besides, Steve and I are together, and I'm sure he wouldn't like that at all. Plus, not into exhibitionism, and there's people watching, so no."

He turned those haunted eyes on her, and she could see the slightest undercurrent of mirth in them. He found her funny. Good.

She lost track of how long she stayed, but finally had to get up to leave. That coffee had run through her, and she was not using the dump toilet in the corner. Barnes didn't try to stop her this time.

"I'll be back tomorrow," she told him. "So no tearing the place up, okay? Don't think I didn't see all those dents in the wall."

He seemed to be lost inside himself, and didn't look up at her or react. Darcy scooped to pick up the coffee carrier and empty cups, and then stepped over to the door. A half circle of agents, guns trained on the floor but at the ready, stood outside. One of them pulled her out roughly, and then sealed the door behind her.

"Ow," she protested, rubbing her arm. "Jerk. I was fine."

The agent in question raised an eyebrow at her. There was a purpling bruise spreading across the left side of his face. "This was from lunch time," he explained in a brittle voice. "He looked just like he does now, but as soon as the door opened, he was on his way out." He frowned down at her. "I know you and Rogers both have soft spots for this guy, but he's a killer. Don't forget that."

On one hand, Darcy could appreciate his warning. But on the other hand, she had just spent hours in the 'killer's' cell, and didn't have a scratch on her. "He was a killer," she corrected. "Now, he's becoming something else. Maybe if you don't treat him like a killer, he won't act like one."

She found Steve dozing in a chair. The dark circles around his eyes were very pronounced, and she wondered how long it had been since he'd done anything other than nap. That was going to change.

She woke him up, and bullied him out of Area 24. "C'mon Steve. You need to sleep."

He was exhausted enough that he didn't argue, and after getting him back to his place, she bullied him into a shower, and then to bed. He looked so lost, curled up on his side with his head pillowed on her shoulder, and one arm thrown across her stomach. In sleep, the part of him that was Captain America faded, and he was just Steve Rogers. Right now, he was scared for his friend, and he desperately needed her.

She was there every day. The S.H.I.E.L.D scientists speculated that because she had no ties to either of his lives, Barnes felt at peace with her. The two separate lives within him weren't warring with each other when she was there, so he could relax.

She had Steve start coming in with her, and at first it was very tense. Barnes would usually grow very agitated and jump up to pace violently. It nearly destroyed Steve. He would sit beside her, hands balled into fists and hunched into himself as his best friend kept away from him.

Darcy would always chastise Barnes, telling him that it wasn't very nice of him to so obviously not want Steve there.

Violence only erupted one time. Barnes was pacing in agitation, and Steve finally just snapped. "Why can't you just sit and be calm?"

Barnes whirled, eyes narrowed in deadly purpose, and launched himself across the cell. Darcy shrieked, throwing herself off the mattress and rolling across the floor away from the flailing arms and legs of the two combatants.

"Out!" Steve yelled, grunting as he was thrown into the wall. "Darcy – out now!"

No way. She flinched, pressing herself into the wall, but did not move closer to the door. The agents outside wouldn't open it unless she was right up on it, for security reasons. She didn't blame them.

Steve was taking a beating though. He wouldn't fight back, not against his best friend, so kept trying to dodge and slip around Barnes, but in the small cell, that was impossible. Darcy knew that he would be okay, but she didn't want to see them fighting.

"Stop it Barnes!" she called out, and ducked as Steve was thrown into the wall above her head. He fell with a thump right behind her, and she stood in front of him protectively, arms out. She was facing the Winter Soldier now, and it was more than a little terrifying.

"Darcy," Steve hissed. "Don't."

She faced down the assassin, so angry she could barely see straight. "You will not hurt him anymore, Barnes. He's your best friend. And maybe you don't really remember that right now, but I'm betting somewhere deep inside, you do remember. And if you want me to ever, EVER, come back to visit, you'll stand down right now."

She saw the change come over him. The ice blue of his eyes faded into green, and he blinked several times. He looked around at the dents in the walls, the man on the floor behind her, anywhere but at her, and then folded in on himself and sat down abruptly, head in his hands. Another breakthrough, then.

She moved over and sat down beside him, one hand reaching out to rest on his metal arm. She hadn't really touched him before, and a shudder ran through his whole body. Darcy knew it was stupid and foolish, but she couldn't help herself, and slid one arm around his back. Barnes nearly convulsed, bending over to press his face into his legs, entire body shaking so hard it had to hurt.

Darcy bit back tears, and just kept her arm in a loose circle around him. She shared an agonized look with Steve, who did have tears in his eyes while watching his best friend suffer so much. He sat up against the wall, moving slowly so as not set off another incident.

When Barnes's real hand reached out, fingers flexing, Darcy at first thought he was reaching for coffee. But then a choked noise came from the throat of the man beside her, and then again.

"Punk? Steve?"

It was so garbled it was almost unrecognizable, but Steve gasped and scrambled forward. He clasped the hand that was reaching for him, and bent over it, shaking just as hard as Barnes.

Watching both of them suffer through so much emotion torment was painful. Darcy reached out with the hand that was still around Barnes's back, and placed it on Steve's shoulder. They would be okay. It would take time, but they would be okay.

It wasn't completely smooth sailing from that point, but it did get a lot easier. There were days when Barnes would get confused, days when he snapped and shouted at everyone, but he didn't forget who Steve was, and he always wanted Darcy near him.

When he started flirting with the scientists, Steve made a decision, and went head to head with a mostly recovered Nick Fury. "He needs to be out of here. He's told you all he remembers about his employers."

Fury didn't want to bend. "He is a former Russian assassin responsible for hundreds of deaths!"

"He isn't responsible for any of them," Steve corrected. "And you know that. I'm not letting him stay locked up here anymore." He smiled tightly. "He'll be with me and Darcy. We'll keep him in line."

The shocked expression on Barnes's face, when the cell door was opened but not guarded, was worthy of a picture, and Darcy snapped one with her phone. She then made a come on gesture with her hand to the suddenly shy man in the cell.

"What?" she called in challenge. "You don't want to leave?"

He poked his head out cautiously, eyes darting back and forth. There were watchful eyes on him, but no one was holding a gun, and he could easily see that. He could also see Darcy and Steve waiting for him.

"I'm…I can leave?" he asked slowly.

Steve nodded. "Yes. We have to keep you close for a little while yet, but not in here. Not anymore." He grinned. "C'mon jerk. Let's get you reacquainted with the world."

Barnes's first steps outside the cell were shaky, but he rapidly gained confidence, enough to flash a saucy wink at one of the women in lab coats. Darcy just rolled her eyes.

"C'mon Barnes," she ordered. "Let's get you out of here before you get slapped."

He tried to affect an innocent expression, but it only looked devilish, and Darcy figured she was finally seeing Bucky. Such an opposite to Steve's quiet reserve, but also a compliment to the captain's personality. They made a strong partnership.

She threaded her left arm through Steve's, her right arm through Barnes's, and turned away from Area 24 with a light heart.