Chapter Text
2027, Week One, the second time
Even knowing there's only a handful of staff still in the building at this time of evening - none even on the same floor - Annie still winces when the screwdriver slips out of her sweaty palm and clatters loudly, echoing throughout the basement. She runs her palms on her shirt before crouching to pick it up from the floor and rehashing her efforts to remove the panel from the wall.
It's a stroke of luck that this portion of the tower wasn't completely obliterated and rebuilt from scratch like the other 95% of the building, most likely due to being a basement level that has less chance of being destroyed by stray gods or robots or aliens. The drives may actually still be in the beam where they were originally hidden.
~~~
2012, Week One, the first time
"I'm only showing you this since you'll be working hands-on with most of us, so no blabbing to anyone outside of the tower. Need-to-know basis, capiche?"
"Got it. When my parents ask if I got to see where the very important files are stored during my first week of work, I'll pretend I know nothing."
"I know you're joking - which I appreciate, by the way, I can't stand people without a sense of humor - but don't tell anyone who does ask. I don't want any bad guys or genocidal Norse gods getting their hands on this."
"I won't."
"Great," Tony says with a clap of his hands. "C'mere. This panel will normally be screwed into the wall, and, obviously, there will normally be drywall over it, so you're gonna have to remember which part of the wall it's in. If you ever need to get in here, you'll have to tear through the wall to get to the panel. Which shouldn't be too hard, it's not like drywall is made of steel or anything. And don't worry about having to pay for damages or anything, it's not like I can't afford to fix it."
He pauses, hand swiping away a layer of drywall dust that's coating the electronic panel. He blows the dust off his fingers with a puff of breath, but it flys upwards towards his face rather than outwards, resulting in a furiously waving hand attempting to keep the dust from entering his eyes.
"Now, this is the important part, so don't forget. Don't write it down, because I don't want anyone else getting the same info," he says with a finger point in her direction for emphasis, "but don't forget it. I'm trusting your memory here, kid. If you get through the wall and the panel, but don't remember this next part, you're shit out of luck. Got it?"
She nods.
"Good. There's a small patch of nanotech right here," he tells her with a couple taps against part of the I-beam in the wall. "I'm hoping I'll be able to make this stuff work on a larger scale for my suit, but it works just fine for a few inch rectangle of metal that no one will be touching for months or years. This screw right here - the one with the notch facing horizontally, and not vertically - you have to hold your finger against it for five seconds. Your DNA is one of the recorded samples in here, so it'll recognize you and open this compartment."
She frowns. "How did you get my DNA?"
"You drank a glass of water during your interview. A keypad will pop up next. The code is 012940."
He quickly changes the subject before she has a chance to ask any follow-up questions. She stores the mildly concerning comment away for later.
He enters the code after the nanites rearrange into a keypad, and the small compartment slides open with a shink.
"See here? It's on a floppy disk, so you'll have to find a computer with a slot for it. Or get an adapter, or something. Do you know what a floppy disk is?"
"I was born in '89, not yesterday."
"Somebody's in a sassy mood. The floppy disk has all of our personal records on it. Nothing about any top secret missions or anything, I'm pretty sure Agent Romanoff would string me up if I tried to dig up all of her dirt. It also has blueprints for a lot of my work, including the suit. There's also a USB drive in here with a JARVIS backup on it. Just the basic program, it doesn't have any new information that he's stored since being installed in the tower, but it at least gives us a starting point in case anything happens to the current JARVIS. I'll probably come down here at some point to add in any new blueprints I come up with, but that's it in the meantime. Any questions?"
"I don't think so."
"Great. Hopefully you'll never need to think about these again, but like I said, you'll be working hands on with us now. You should at least know that these are here. I'm trusting you here, kid," he repeats. "Need-to-know. No sharing this with anyone outside our circle unless this is dire."
"I know how to keep a secret, Mr. Stark."
"Tony. Eugh, God."
His face contorts into a displeased expression.
"Just Tony is fine. None of that nonsense, if you're going to be the one handling my dirty laundry."
"Hopefully not your actual dirty laundry," she mutters, pointing to what appears to be a pair of pants draped over a chair in the far corner of the room.
"I-"
He pauses, head tilting in a confuzzled look, seemingly equally confused by the sight.
He shakes his head turning back to her. "No. Metaphorical dirty laundry only. I have other people for the actual dirty laundry. No telling anyone," he repeats again with another aggressive point.
She throws her hands up in mock surrender.
"No telling anyone about what?"
He narrows his eyes at her, just slightly. Gauging. After a moment, he gives her a single nod, satisfied.
~~~
She catches the last screw in her hand, dropping it into her pocket before propping the panel against the lower part of the wall. She presses her fingertip against the correct spot until the keypad forms, then enters the code that she committed to memory. It wasn't hard to remember once she realized the code is Maria Stark's birthday.
The compartment slides opened the way she remembers it from 14 years prior. There's now a second floppy disk that wasn't there before, presumably with newer information on it, but everything otherwise looks the same.
"I assume you realize how this looks? You tearing apart the wall of the basement in the middle of the night, and pulling out a mysterious flash drive?"
She startles at the voice, her whole body tensing as the realization she's been caught settles in her.
She recognizes that it's Barnes' voice before she even turns around. He has his arms crossed, and is leaning his shoulder against the door frame. His neutral expression doesn't reveal what he's thinking.
"I promise I wasn't doing anything shady."
"I didn't assume you were. You wouldn't be working here if we knew you might be up to something. And you don't really seem like the type to rip open the wall of your workplace without a reason. What are you doing?"
"Tony put some information on here that I want to put on my laptop. Info about the team - the old team - past missions, et cetera."
"Like what?"
"Files on everyone. Not you guys, just people who were here years ago. Well, maybe there's one about you, I'm not really sure. Tech blueprints. Mission logs. AI backup. I'm gonna put that one straight into the tower's computer system, though. I don't think the whole AI program would fit on my laptop even if I deleted everything else off of it first. Tony left them here, in case of an emergency."
He nods with a purse of his lips, seemingly satisfied with the answer. For now, at least.
"How are you planning to fix the wall?"
She glances down at the pile of drywall laying all over the floor, then looks back to him.
"I'm not sure. No one really comes in here anyway, so I wasn't going to worry about it tonight. I'll figure it out."
He stands back up straight and approaches her slowly, stopping next to her and inspecting the foot-wide hole she dug out of the wall.
She says nothing as he looks over the damage. This is already the longest one-on-one conversation she's had with him, and she still hasn't gauged what she thinks he might say about her tearing open a wall in her work place within a week of starting her new job.
He doesn't seem like a bad-tempered person per se, based on the few interactions they have had. He's always been perfectly cordial with her, he just doesn't seem to react or speak much in general - not unless he has something worth contributing. Most of what she knows about him is either from Steve, Tony, or from listening to the news.
"I can help, if you want," he offers. "As long as you tell me how to get in there myself."
"It's programmed to specific DNA, so I don't know if you would be able to open it without the nanites being completely reprogrammed, and that's not something I know how to do. Only a handful of people had access to these to begin with. So I suppose you would have to cut someone's hand off if you wanted to get into here yourself. Or go dig up a grave, or something."
He quirks a brow at her, and she cringes a bit at her choice of words.
"I can figure it out, I'm the one who did all this to begin with." She gestures towards the pile of carnage strewn across the floor. "I appreciate it, though."
"I don't mind."
"I really can take care of it, but thank you."
A beat of silence passes before he gives a single nod, shoves his hands in his pockets, and turns to leave.
"You know where to find me if you change your mind." He gives her a small, close-lipped smile before exiting the room, the thuds of his footsteps slowly growing quieter as he walks up the stairs.
She looks back down at the pile of drywall and dust scattered on the floor. Maybe she should have accepted his help.
~~~
She said no three weeks ago when a very frazzled Mel asked her to come back to the tower - to work with the Avengers again.
She has no interest in working with someone who works directly under the head of the CIA. Politics are why she left that job to begin with. She would just be walking into a different mess than the one she walked out of, with how divisive the new Avengers team has been.
That isn't to say the team itself puts her off of accepting her old job again. She said yes back in 2012 when the Avengers included a former assassin, a former arms dealer, and an irradiated scientist that destroyed half of Harlem.
But, the public response to this new team has been... controversial, to say the least.
Yelena put up a far more convincing argument than Mel did.
"Annie Nakabayashi."
Annie nearly jumped out of her skin when she walked out onto the sidewalk, with how close Yelena was standing to the door.
"Jesus. Have you been waiting out here for me?"
"Yes. There's this coffee shop two blocks from here with fantastic banana bread, come join me."
"Um... okay?"
It certainly wasn't her brightest moment, following a complete stranger just because she was told to. But, she'd be lying if she said she wasn't curious why a member of the New Avengers personally sought her out.
"So," Yelena begins after they've ordered drinks and food, breaking off a large hunk of banana bread and shoving it in her mouth. "We'd like you to come work for us," she states, voice muffled around her food.
Annie shakes her head. "I already talked to Mel Gold about this last week. I'm not interested."
Yelena's arms flop down on the table, and the frown that forms on her face is akin to a sad puppy.
"Please consider it again. I know Mel wasn't the best person to send to talk to you. She works for Val, and Val is awful. I get it. We don't work for Val, though. Technically. She doesn't get a final say in most of what we do. You wouldn't be working for her either, you'd only have to work with her sometimes. She would mainly just be paying you. We... me... my team..."
She makes a vague gesture as she chooses her next words.
"We want the absolute best. We want someone who knows what they're doing, and we want someone who doesn't work for Val. That's you. You've worked with the Avengers before - you're literally the best option. We need someone who knows how to help us, and who wants to help us, and doesn't have an agenda. Isn't that why you left before? To avoid agendas? You'd get to tell the people with agendas to suck it."
Annie takes a sip of her tea, taking in Yelena's words.
"Look," Yelena continues when Annie doesn't immediately respond, "I know you left your job for a reason. I get it, really. I know I'm basically asking you to walk into a giant, smelly, flaming dumpster fire. But I've seen your work before. I know you're the best, and I know you can do it. Your press conference after Sokovia? You're good. We need someone who's good. Most of the public... they know what our pasts look like. A lot of people don't like us, they don't want to like us. Except for Barnes, people think he's pretty."
She shoves another large piece of banana bread in her mouth.
"We think you can help with that. And we think you'll actually have our best interests in mind. If Val picks someone else to do our PR..." she gives an exaggerated shudder, then smiles again. "I'd prefer not to consider that. I'd prefer you."
"Did you rehearse that while you were waiting outside my work like a creeper?"
Yelena gives her a wide smile, as if she were a child being told she would be going to Disneyland.
"Was it good? Are you saying yes?"
"I..." she trails off.
"Please? It could be a part-time thing, if this is about you keeping your current job as well. We'll work with you, we'll take whatever you're willing to give us."
Yelena clasps her hands together in a begging gesture.
How does a deadly assassin have such big puppy-dog eyes? It's a bit unfair, really.
"You want me full-time, though?"
Yelena nods quickly and enthusiastically.
She would be lying if she said she didn't miss the work sometimes. Her current job is less stressful, but also less exciting. A fair trade-off, she justified to herself when she initially accepted the job.
Working for the Avengers... she loved it. It felt like someone took a knife to her heart when she quit. The look on Steve's face when she said she was leaving made her want to cry. Tony... it didn't show on his face nearly as much, but she could tell he was unhappy, yet also unsurprised.
She took a few days to cry, shut herself in her apartment, sob, shovel down some ice cream, and cry some more before she started looking for a new job.
"I... I have a project I'm supposed to finish next week. I want to see that through first."
Yelena's face lights up. "But you'll do it?"
After a moment's hesitation, she slowly nods.
"Yes, I'll do it."
Yelena first pumps and shouts a loud "yes!", drawing some looks from other customers.
"I knew I could convince you," she states excitedly. "Today is such a great day, we should go get tacos. I know this great place. We can get to know each other, it'll be so much fun."
Her wide smile returns to her face, and she claps and stamps her feet in excitement a few times before exhaling a deep breath and breaking off another piece of her banana bread.
"I have to feed my cat soon, since I've been at work all day."
"That's fine! I love cats, we can stop there first. You can change into a more fun outfit too. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with this outfit, by the way - you look like a badass businesswoman. But it's not a 'going out for a girls night' outfit."
Her margarita hangover nearly made her forget about accepting a new job by the next morning, until Yelena sent her an excited text.
Y: So excited!! Let's get lunch on your first day :)
~~~
It took approximately 15 hours before she was knocking on Barnes' door.
"Hey," he greets her, hair sticking up at odd angles like he hadn't bothered to comb it that morning. He runs a hand through the top of his hair, which does little to actually tame the mess.
"Hey. Would you still be willing to help with the wall downstairs?"
A small smirk appears on his face.
"I thought it would take longer for you to ask."
"Well, it didn't take me very long to remember that I don't know anything about home renovation. I'd probably just make it worse."
He opens the door wider.
"You can come inside. If you're not busy, we can just go to the store now. I just need to grab my jacket."
She steps inside, but stays within a few feet of the door, not wanting to wander too far. She barely knows the guy, and is not trying to get on his bad side already by snooping around his personal space.
"Do you have a car?" He asks as he exits what she assumes is the bedroom, changed and hair more tamed. "I rode my bike today, we won't be able to get anything that doesn't fit in our pockets if we take that."
"Yeah, I have a car. It's down the block on the street."
"You didn't park in the garage?"
"I still haven't gotten my pass for the garage yet. Even if I wanted to pay to park, I wouldn't be able to since the tower garage isn't a public garage."
He frowns, but says nothing further as they exit his apartment.
The trip down the elevator and down the sidewalk is silent too. She hasn't talked with him enough to know the best way to initiate a conversation with him. She's not sure if he's someone who would be put off by her asking personal questions so soon after meeting.
When they climb into her car, she nearly laughs at how much his knees are sticking up when he sits - a result of her moving the seat forward after buying some new furniture and not moving it back afterwards.
"There's a handle underneath the front of the seat, if you want to scoot it back."
She hears the clank of his metal hand feeling around underneath the seat, making a small noise anytime it connects with another piece of metal, before the seat jolts backwards at a speed that makes his eyes widen.
She does huff out a small chuckle at that, and he gives her a bemused smile in return.
"My car just has the little switch on the side of the seat to move it back."
"Sounds like you've got a fancier car than me. I've had this one for years, but it seems pointless to replace it when it still works just fine."
He hums in agreement.
The rest of the car ride is silent after that. Their trip through the hardware store is mostly silent too, outside of her occasionally asking what else they need and him answering. She feels like she's just following him around like a kid would follow their parents around the grocery store.
He waves her off when she pulls out her card to pay, just mumbling something about Army money when she tries to insist that she should pay to fix what she broke in the first place.
The car ride back is silent as well, but it's a more comfortable silence now than the silence during the trip to the store.
When they arrive back at the tower, he hands her the bags of supplies.
"I'm gonna grab some tools from upstairs, if you want to head down and start unwrapping some of this stuff."
She nods in agreement, walking towards the stairs to the basement as he heads to the elevators.
Arriving at the scene of her crime, she sheds her jacket so she's just wearing the tank top underneath, and pulls a hairband off her wrist to pull her hair out of her face and into a ponytail.
After she's removed the plastic from everything they purchased and starts putting the destroyed packaging and drywall into the grocery sacks, she hears heavy footsteps resound from the stairs. When he walks in, he's shed his jacket as well and has swapped his henley for a short sleeved black T-shirt.
"I appreciate you helping me," she tells him as he crouches down to organize all of their supplies.
He shakes his head. "I don't mind."
"Yeah, but you should probably be reporting me for property damage or something. I'm not really doing myself any favors by tearing open a wall during my first week working here."
The corner of his mouth turns up in a smile.
"Yeah, well, I drove a truck through the lobby a couple months ago, so I'm not sure I have any right to be telling people off for property damage. This building has seen a lot worse than a hole in the drywall."
She primarily ends up just handing him tools while he does all the actual work, like a little kid who "helps" their parents by existing in the vicinity of where they're doing all of the actual work.
She's overcome with the urge to ask him some kind of question - any question - to fill the silence. She should get to know him more, right? It's only logical, if they'll be working together.
After considering her options for a few minutes, she finally settles on "why do people call you Bucky?"
"It's short for Buchanan. My middle name."
"I know that much, but why is that what people call you?"
He shrugs.
"I'm not sure. It's just... always been what most people call me, except my parents. It might have been Steve who first started calling me that, but my memories from that long ago aren't the best. I'm not really sure."
She chose wrong, it seems. She should have just asked what he likes to do in his free time.
"So no one uses your first name?"
"Not really. Not my friends, at least. Are you asking which one you should use?"
"I suppose. It feels a bit impersonal to just call you 'Barnes' all the time. And 'Hey You' feels kinda rude."
He cracks another smile as he starts smoothing out the newly applied plaster on the wall.
"You choose. Either is fine."
"Do I only get 'friend' status if I choose Bucky?"
His smile widens.
"I'll be generous and give you friend status either way."
"How kind of you."
"I know, I'm a real saint."
He scrapes the thick layer of plaster down the wall, both hands on the handle of the tool. He presses against it with enough force to make the sleeves of his t-shirt strain on his arms, leaving the newly placed plaster perfectly flat as a result - a perfect job.
"I might actually have to rescind my offer of friendship. I think you might get a big head over it."
His mouth falls open in exaggerated shock.
"I'm incredibly humble, thank you. Hell of a way to talk to the guy that you asked for help."
"I'm pretty sure you're the one who offered first."
His face scrunches up in a pondering expression, and he shakes his head.
"I don't think you're remembering that right. I'm pretty sure I would remember something like that."
"Is that right?"
"It is. Good thing you know a guy who can help you keep your facts straight. I'm not sure how you got by before yesterday."
The smile on her face widens.
"Yeah. Good thing."