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It’s whispers, at first.
Little glances, when he walks to and from Bucky's room in the palace; words, exchanged just low enough that Steve can’t hear them.
It’s T’Challa, who’s expression grows darker every day that Steve and his team remains, and it’s Wanda, who looks at him in an odd way that he can’t begin to understand.
He doesn’t have time to question it, though.
Too much stuff is going on at the same time, his friends are free but bitter from their imprisonment and the lies the media and Tony keep pushing, and Bucky and Shuri are whispering to each other when Steve isn’t in the room, and everything is moving way too fast and not fast enough at the same time.
Then Natasha arrives.
T’Challa’s face grows even darker when she’s brought in, but Steve is glad to have her there.
Natasha understood the truth behind the Accords, and decided to stand with them against it, in the end. She understood that she had been fighting on the wrong side – it’s more than he can say for Tony.
Natasha is all half truths and mystery, but she’s the first to ask the question out loud, the first to form words out of all the shadows.
“Steve,” she asks, when the door is closed, and everyone is in the living room together. There are plates of strange food in front of them that Steve still hasn’t gotten used to. “What happened in Siberia?”
Steve doesn’t know why the room goes quiet when she asks this.
He doesn’t know why Wanda turns to look at him in the eyes, or why Clint and Scott’s argument just fizzles out, or why Sam’s face goes all pinched.
They’ve all asked him this before, and he’s given them the same answer every time.
“Tony came to get us,” he says. “Zemo orchestrated a fight between us, and we fought. T’Challa gave Bucky and I asylum.”
It’s the same answer to the same question.
It’s not a lie. It’s what happened.
But nobody seems happy with the answer, least of all Natasha.
“What about Tony?” She asks, still looking at him in that penetrating way of hers. Steve doesn’t like it one bit – she’s looking at him the way she usually looks at her marks. “What fight did he orchestrate? Did you... did you hurt Tony?”
“We both hurt each other,” Steve says, and he can’t help looking away from her unnerving eyes. “He took Bucky’s arm. I hit him with the shield. We both did, and said, things we probably shouldn’t have.” He shakes his head, and glances back up at her. “He was even shouting things at me as I left. Told me I wasn't worthy of the shield – so I left it behind.”
There is more silence at this, and this time Steve glances around.
Natasha is frowning at him, and it makes Steve feel uncomfortable.
“Why are you looking at me like this?” he asks, annoyed. “He started it. If he hadn’t tried to tie our hands in red tape, none of this would have happened. The safest hands are our own.”
“Right,” Sam says, turning to look at Natasha. “Tony went looking for a fight, after lying to me about wanting to fix things. This isn’t Steve’s fault.”
“Right,” Natasha echoes, and she smiles. It looks a little weird, but Steve forces himself to match it. “Sorry, Steve. I just... I’ve been hearing things.”
“What things?” Scott asks, looking at her nervously. “Cause I’ve also been online, and there’s some crazy rumours–”
“You shouldn’t trust everything you read,” Steve says, chidingly. “Tony owns the media. It will always paint him as the good one and make us out to be devils.”
“Right,” Scott says, and he smiles awkwardly. “Hank always said the same thing, sorry. It’s just... weird, how silent Stark’s camp is being.”
“Good,” Clint says, stabbing his cabbage... thing a little aggressively. “Maybe by the time he shows his face again, I will have lost the urge to punch those perfect teeth of his off his face.”
“He’d deserve it,” Wanda says, and just like that, the tension is gone.
Steve should probably try to stop them from piling on on Tony like this, but it’s the most comfortable he’s seen his teammates be since they made it to Wakanda.
What’s wrong with indulging, just a little?
He doesn’t see the look Natasha and Clint exchange.
He doesn’t see the internet tab Scott shares with Sam, and their expression as they read.
He doesn’t see the look on Wanda’s red eyes as everyone’s secret thoughts spill uninvited in her brain.
It’s Natasha who breaks the news.
Or rather, it’s Natasha who turns on the channel breaking the news.
She has the remote in her hand, and when Steve sees Pepper Potts, fully clad in black, standing on the main stage, he almost asks her to change the channel.
Then, they get a close-up to the grief in her eyes, and the words die in Steve’s throat.
'Tony Stark dead at 42', reads a banner right under Potts’ chin, and then everything is static.
He’s still as a statue, unable to move as the room explodes around him.
Words, from the room and from the television, keep breaking into the utter confusion of his brain, but none of it make sense.
None of it makes sense.
Dead, he hears.
Volume, he hears.
Failed attempt to revive, he hears.
What the fuck, he hears.
Coma, he hears.
Hypothermia, he hears.
Shield, he hears.
Vision, he hears.
Steve, he hears.
Left behind, he hears.
Steve, Steve, Steve.
That shield doesn’t belong to you. Tony’s parting words as Steve started to leave. You don’t deserve it. My father made that shield!
“Steve!” Sam says. He’s standing in front of Steve, eyes wide and panicked, hands still shaking him. “Steve, what the fuck? You said he was fine. You said he was fine!”
“Yes,” Pepper Potts says, from the screen. “Warrants for the arrest of Steve Rogers and the Winter Soldier have been issued, alongside their existing ones and the ones for the aiding and abetting in the escape of the so called Rogue Avengers. SI and Tony’s family can only hope that politics is kept out of this so that the two fugitive can be prosecuted and charged at the full extent of the law. Thank you.”
Questions are asked in and outside the television, but none of it make sense.
None of this is right.
What does Pepper mean, Tony is dead?
Tony’s not dead.
Tony can’t be dead.
“He was fine,” Steve insists, as Natasha mutters in Russian under her breath, and as Scott is breathing harder and harder, and as Clint is standing stock still in the doorway. “He was fine when I left. He was talking, he was fine. He was fine.”
“She said he was stuck in a dead suit following your attempt at murdering him,” Clint says. His voice is quiet, and even without turning around, Steve can feel his eyes on the back of his head, burning. “That he had already succumbed to his injuries by the time Vision located him. What did she mean by that, Steve?”
“There was– he was fine,” Stee insists. “He was breathing, he was talking–”
“Steve–”
“No!” Steve insists, turning to face his friends – his team – head on. “You know Potts doesn’t like me- she has never liked me. She’s trying to... I don’t know what she’s trying to do. But I didn’t kill Tony." Dead. Tony Stark dead. "I didn’t hurt him, not like... not like she’s saying. Tony was fine when I left.” He looked around the room helplessly, while a voice inside his head screamed dead, dead, dead. “You have to believe me. Tony was fine.”
Natasha’s lips are pursed. Clint’s expression is blank. Sam looks lost. Scott looks horrified. Wanda looks confused and uninterested.
Tony is dead.
“You...” Sam swallows. “You swear.”
“I swear,” Steve says, turning to look at his friend. “You know I wouldn’t. Tony’s my friend.”
“Was,” Wanda corrects.
Dead.
It’s like a gunshot in the room.
It’s impossible to fall asleep, after that.
Steve tries. He spends the entire night trying.
But every time he closes his eyes, all he can see is Tony.
Tony, working while Steve draws in a corner, after ‘complaining’ that he didn’t want anyone in his workshop.
Tony, stealing food from his plate, joking that he believed Natasha had put something in his.
Tony, trusting him implicitly on the battlefield.
Tony, whining that he had work to do when Steve dragged him to another movie night.
Tony, telling the team what would happen if any of them touched his arc reactor, as a show of trust.
Tony smiling, Tony laughing, Tony teasing.
Tony, before everything went wrong.
Now, all he can see is Tony, during that fight.
Tony, and the rage in his eyes when he looked at Bucky.
Tony, and the betrayal in his eyes when he looked at Steve.
Tony, and his sanity snapping when he realised Steve hadn’t told him... everything.
Tony, and the pain in his eyes when he said, “He killed my mom.”
Tony, and the fear, the terror in his eyes when Steve had raised that shield.
But he hadn’t hit him, he forced himself to think, shaking his head. For a second, he too had been blinded with rage; for a second, he had been so angry about Tony ripping Bucky’s arm off, and almost aimed for Tony’s head but he hadn’t.
He hadn’t.
He had hit his chest, and he had his armour there, and he had been fine.
They had both been fighting to kill. Tony had been trying to kill both him and Bucky, Bucky specifically.
Steve had lost his head a little, and maybe he had attacked him the same way he’d normally attack an enemy, but he hadn’t hurt him.
He wouldn't.
Tony had his armour. Sure, Steve had a Vibranium shield, and Tony’s armour had taken a beating after Berlin, but it... It...
It just wasn’t the same!
That final hit would have taken off his head, but Steve had aimed it at his chest so... so Tony was fine. Tony had been fine when Steve had left him.
He had been talking!
He hadn’t been moving from his spot, but he had been talking, and he had been taunting Steve, and he had been fine.
He had been fine!
Then why do you need to repeat it to yourself?, asked a voice that sounded terribly like Howard’s. Why can’t you bring yourself to believe it, Steve?
Tony was so much like Howard, it took Steve’s breath away sometimes.
Tony was dead. Howard was, too.
He looked like the man. He sounded like the man. He even blustered like the man.
Sometimes, Steve would look into his eyes, and he would see Howard in them.
He would see his past, the life he had left behind, that he still missed to this day.
But then he blinked, and it was gone. Then Tony spoke, and Steve was once more alone in a time far away, surrounded by people and things he didn’t know and could never truly trust.
Was it Howard in his head, now? Or was it Tony?
An old ghost, or a new one?
It wasn’t his fault.
It wasn’t.
Steve had only been protecting Bucky.
He had just–
He doesn’t even see Clint come in.
One second Steve is sitting on his bed, trying to make sense of his thoughts – of the fact that Tony is gone (dead) – and the second, punches are raining down his face, and the archer is on top of him, angry and unforgiving.
Steve doesn’t even protect himself. Can’t protect himself.
Even before he hears his own voice drifting from the living room, even before he hears that damned “He’s my friend”, he knows what every hit is for.
Clint and Tony have always had an odd and peculiar relationship.
“You bastard,” Clint rants, when Sam finally pulls him off him. Steve’s injuries are already healing – Clint is not strong enough to hurt him. “You fucking liar! You– You’re a murderer, Rogers.”
“I didn’t,” Steve says, because he has to say this. He has to make them understand, that despite what it looks like, despite what it seems, he didn’t kill Tony. He couldn’t have. “He was fine–”
“You hit him in the chest!” Clint says, spittle flying from his mouth as he tries to wrestle himself free of Sam’s arms. “You know what that does. You know what happens when someone goes for Tony’s chestpiece. You–” He struggles even more violently than before, nothing but utter disgust in his eyes.
Tony has (had) a way of looking at Steve that makes him feel like he doesn’t matter and like nothing he could ever do will amount to anything.
He had first seen that look on his face on the Helicarrier and that, more than anything Fury had shown him, had convinced him that Tony was nothing like his father.
Howard had never looked at him like that.
It’s the same look Clint is giving him right now – only, worse.
It burns.
And yes, Steve knows that Tony’s chest is... was messed up.
Tony had told them during different debriefs over the years, explaining reactions to HYDRA operatives, or potential attack plans involving said chestpiece.
And Natasha had shown them. The pictures of Tony’s chest they weren’t supposed to know about, the secrets recovered from Afghanistan that SHIELD never told Tony about.
He remembers his horror at words like ‘diminished lung capacity’ and ‘artificial ribcage’, his recoil at Natasha’s passive assessment that going for Tony’s chest was the easiest and most permanent way to ‘put him out of commission’.
He remembers the fights in which he put himself and his shield in front of Tony’s suit of armour, just because a hit had been aimed straight at the reactor – at his chest.
And then he remembers the way everything, eventually, yields to Vibranium.
He remembers the pieces of the bunker falling under every hit from the shield. He remembers the way even Bucky’s arm creaked under a distant hit from the weapon.
And he remembers the rage, the velocity, the strength, and the distance in his hit against Tony’s chest.
“I didn’t–” he says, because he has to say that. Because he can’t believe it, he can’t think it.
But he can’t unthink it.
He can’t unsee the horror in Tony’s eyes as he raised the shield, as he aimed it, as he made it connect with his chest.
He can’t unsee the broken line in the armour, the deep cut.
He can’t unsee the bounce of Tony’s body against the hit.
He can’t unsee the gasp from his lips, the widening of his eyes.
He can’t unhear the bones’ crunch under the creaking of the metal.
“He was fine,” he says, and even his voice doesn’t have the strength to come out steady.
Clint snarls at him, furious, and Steve can’t even flinch back.
People sometimes looked at Tony’s smart, or Bruce’s genius, or Natasha’s cunning, and thought that Steve is stupid.
That Steve didn't know things, didn't understand stuff.
Steve might not be as smart as they are, but he’s not stupid.
He can’t do maths the way Tony or Bruce do, but he understands the physics of his shield.
He knows how much damage a hit can cause. He knows what a certain velocity can achieve. He knows how far he has to throw to have the thing fly back to him.
People say that his shield doesn’t make sense, but it makes sense to Steve.
He knows what his shield can do.
He knows what he can make his shield do.
He knows.
“He was fine when I left,” he whispers.
“Stark killed my parents.” Wanda is the only person standing at the door, now. Steve can still hear the sound of fighting in the background, can hear Natasha and Sam’s raised voices in the background. But Wanda is standing at the door, looking at Steve in a way he doesn’t like. “And then he started pretending he was a hero. To make him pay, I became a villain; until Pietro, and Clint, and you. Then I decided to become a hero, like you.
“But you’re not a hero, are you Rogers?” She says it so matter of factly, it makes the spear in his chest sink even deeper. “You are even worse than him. Stark at least didn’t know who he hurt with his weapons. You knew, you made him know that you knew, and then you killed him for looking for his revenge. You’re worse than him, and you are even worse than me. You wanted him dead.”
“He was fine when I left,” Steve says, looking up at her, hoping to let her see, make her understand. Surely, if she can see his mind, if she can read his intention–
“You knew what your hit would do,” Wanda says, and now she looks disgusted by him. “You knew he wouldn’t be able to fly, from the pain and from his broken armour. You took the Quinjet, and told T’Challa that Stark was fine. Then, you left him there alone, and told everyone that he was fine. You might not have meant to kill him, but don’t try to lie to me or yourself: you didn’t want him to survive.”
“No,” Steve says, because she’s wrong. She has to be wrong, there is no way that Steve meant... that Steve... “No, you have to believe me, he was–”
Wanda doesn’t let him finish.
She closes the door.
Steve doesn’t foresee Wakanda arresting him.
He should have.
With all of his teammates avoiding him and looking at him with nothing but discuss, he should have known he was out of allies anywhere.
If the closest things he had to a family wouldn’t believe him, why would a man who hasn’t hidden how unhappy he was with Steve being in his country?
T’Challa doesn’t even listen when Steve tries to explain, when he tries to tell him that he thought Tony would be okay, or when he asks for Bucky (there were two warrants, Potts had said).
Nobody listens.
Vision doesn’t listen, when he helps bring Steve from Wakanda back to New York.
His lawyer doesn’t listen, when he tells Steve to take a deal.
The jury doesn’t listen when Steve tries to explain, tries to make them understand.
Natasha, Clint, Sam, Scott, T’Challa: none of them listen when they are summoned and asked to give statements.
Potts and Rhodes don’t listen when they make their own impact statements, looking at him like they want to physically destroy him and kill him.
Helen Cho doesn’t listen, as she gives a devastating account of every single injury Steve and Bucky caused and the slow and agonizing death that they ‘left’ Tony to fall to.
The media doesn’t listen, as they pant him to be a monster and traitor for the world, forgetting every thing Steve has done for them, every time he has nearly died for the world, for them.
The judge doesn’t listen, when he condemns Steve and sentences him to life.
Nobody listens.
When Thanos comes, nobody is ready.
They don’t even have time to think about taking Steve out of prison: the Titan makes quick work of them all, and nobody is able to stop the snap.
Earth falls, and so does the Universe.