Sign of the Times

11

Steve flew the Quinjet toward mountains. Bucky and Connie sat behind him.

"What's gonna happen to your friends?" Bucky asked.

Steve stared ahead, heavyhearted. He sighed and shook his head before saying, "Whatever it is... I'll deal with it."

Bucky looked thoughtful before saying, "I don't know if I'm worth all this, Steve."

Connie glanced at Bucky. "Yes you are. HYDRA stole us and made weapons of good people."

Steve glanced around at Bucky. "What you two did all those years... it wasn't you. You didn't have a choice. Goes for you as well, Connie."

"But I did it," Bucky said.

Connie took Bucky's hand and squeezed it gently. He rested a gentle hand on her stomach and they shared a smile.

HOSPITAL

Rhodey laid inside an CT-scanner. He was in a blue gown covering his body. Tony paced up to Vision who watched Rhodey grave-faced.

"How did this happen?" Tony asked.

"I became distracted," Vision replied.

"I didn't think that was possible."

"Neither did I. "

Tony left Vision looking in on Rhodey. Along the corridor, Tony spotted an equally concerned Natasha.

Tony and Natasha stood on a balcony looking towards a row of trees.

"The doctors say he shattered L4 through S1," Tony said. "Extreme laceration in the spinal cord. Probably looking at some form of paralysis."

"Steve isn't gonna stop," Natasha told him. "If you don't either, Rhodey's gonna be the best case scenario."

"You let them go, Nat."

"We played this wrong."

"'We'? Boy, it must be hard to shake the whole double agent thing, huh? It sticks in the DNA."

"Are you incapable of letting go of your ego for one goddamn second?"

"T'Challa told Ross what you did, so... they're coming for you."

"I'm not the one that needs to watch their back." She walked away.

Tony activated holographic images appearing on his wrist device and asked, "What am I looking at, F.R.I.D.A.Y.?"

"Priority upload from Berlin police," F.R.I.D.A.Y. replied.

"Fire up the chopper." Tony flew over a stormy sea in the chopper. He looked surveillance images on a tablet computer.

"The Task Force called for a psychiatrist as soon as Barnes and his wife were captured. The UN dispatched Dr. Theo Broussard from Geneva within the hour. He was met by this man."

"Did you run facial recognition yet?"

"What do I look like?"

"Uh, I don't know. I've been picturing a redhead."

"You must be thinking of someone else."

"Must be."

"The fake doctor is actually Colonel Helmut Zemo, Sokovian Intelligence." Tony projected the image. "Zemo ran Echo Skorpion, a Sokovian covert kill squad."

"So, what happened to the real Broussard?"

"He was found dead in a Berlin hotel room. Where police also found two wigs and facial prosthesis approximating the appearance of one James Buchanan Barnes and one Connie May Barnes, nee Donovan."