Ｒｅｔｒｏｕｖａｉｌｌｅｓ

。⓪②

Sometime around 2016

"Captain." Two hands shake his shoulders. "Captain Rogers wake up."

The figure stirs slightly. Sleeping in is uncharacteristic of him. Normally he'd be up and out, decked in a hoodie and sweats running as if a whip was behind him. If he was back in NY that would certainly be the circumstances we would find him in.

However he is not. He's in a jungle. A jungle where fog clings to the trees and wraps around every stone peak it touches. It is cloying and heavy and it never goes away. It is what hides him. What hides his friend. What shields the panther that protects them both.

"Captain." Steve is shaken for the fifth and final time. He rises cumbersomely, his tired muscles ach with overexertion. Yet upon hearing the name 'Barnes' be mentioned all grogginess dissipates and is replaced by an alert and standing commander.

"T'challa," Steve looks the king in the eye, his attention rapt. "is something wrong?"

"It is your friend, he has awoken and has been mumbling what we assume recollections for the past few hours."

"Could anyone understand what he was saying?"

"He is like a broken record I am afraid. Only fragments and partial pieces are audible, some of which are not even coherent enough to note."

"Let me go see him."

Leading Steve to the room where Bucky resides T'challa drums his fingers against his thighs. The patient's abstract murmurs make him nervous. Beneath the black vibranium suit there resides an heir who has a fear of the unknown. Even still he has to be ready for anything and be prepared to make difficult decisions instinctually regardless of the consequences.

Crossing the entrance Steve pauses to stare at his friend who is bent over by the table, arms in front of him and head down. Bucky's voice is low, his lips are moving with the syllables of a memory, one he is proceeding to repeat over and over as if stuck on a single note.

"Th- the fl- flame." He is panting, sweat beads his brow and his chest heaves with laboured breaths. The captain approaches the sergeant who can sense his advance.

"It burned me Steve." says James. He meets his friend's eyes, pain clouding like cataracts the blue his cerulean globes once held that are now but a dim grey. "It burned the heart out of me."

Steve lays a comforting hand on James' shoulder. "What Buck?" he asks.

"The f- flame."

Numerous people who stand to witness and record the occurrences hold their own estimates. Was what Bucky saying meant to be literal? Was the flame a name of someone? A facility? A faulty mission? Some missing trigger word? What is it... Variables have yet to be expelled but all the same, such is the question everyone is asking.

"The flame what Bucky?" Steve inquires, but his fellow soldier falls slump to the floor.

Three tall figures in black come to collect the suffered soul from off the ground, returning him to where he should appropriately reside; in the cryostat. Watching Buchanan go under is never easy for Steve but he knows it is for the best. For both of them. For everyone.

Steve's sole objective is the safety of Barnes who takes top of the list in his line of priorities. James never comes in second place – always first. It is no wonder Rogers remained a bachelor for so long.

In technical terms he still is, however there is a woman who has begun to play on the dusty, untouched strings that weave his heart. And it is she who he departs to, leaving Bucky behind where his scorching reminiscence can be cooled by frost.