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Bucky managed to avoid Tony Stark’s technological update package for a solid six months before he was finally cornered in the training room one Saturday afternoon.
His first three months at the tower were spent mostly in Steve’s quarters as that was where he was also staying at the time and he wasn’t as comfortable being around the other Avengers as he was around Steve. Most of month four Stark had spent going to various conferences around the world with Pepper before the two retreated to the house in Malibu for a week. Months five and six Stark was still wary of the ex-assassin.
But after six months, Stark had obviously ridden himself of any reservations as he cornered Bucky right after the man had finished up an hour of training with Steve.
Bucky had been told there were some modifications made to his quarters as he had now moved into his own rooms, on the same floor as his best friend but separated for more privacy. Returning there, the soldier had found a new television, an SI laptop, a Starkpad, and a Starkphone. He was okay with the television and the Starkpad as he had used Steve’s several times when he was across the hall. He was well aware of how laptops worked and had used one on several occasions as well so he wasn’t too fussed about that, it could be useful anyway.
The Starkphone, well that he wasn’t as okay with.
He knew how it worked of course but was hoping to avoid having to own one. While he recognised how incredibly useful they could be, they were easily tracked and he didn’t fancy anyone knowing his every move. Besides, he and Steve had grown up without one and he was sure he could continue to live without one in the 21st century as well.
That thought in mind, Bucky tossed the Starkphone into a junk drawer in the kitchen without even turning it on and left to go over to Steve’s place since he was out of apples again and Stevie always had extra.
He made it a week before Steve was able to talk him around to it.
He thought he would end up regretting caving in.
He was pleasantly surprised to be wrong.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-
They were watching a movie when it happened.
Jarvis paused the image at Tony’s demand and the billionaire scanned the faces of his teammates.
“Alright, who didn’t turn off their cell? The least you could have done was put it on silent.”
Bucky didn’t even try to hide the fact that it was him as he shifted to the left a little to retrieve his cell from his back pocket. As he did so, he ignored the groans of “You do realise putting it on silent is an option, don’t you?” from Clint and Tony in favour of frowning at the ‘Unknown Number’ flashing on the screen. Bucky quickly glanced around the room to double-check that everyone was there since they were the only ones who had his number. Seeing it was none of them he warily hit the red button and slipped the cell back into his pocket before turning most of his attention back to the movie.
Clint happily settled back down, waiting for the movie to be unpaused. Everyone else was looking expectantly towards Bucky.
Steve cleared his throat. “So, uh, who was that?”
Bucky shrugged. “Unknown number. Probably dialled it wrong.” The others accepted this as truth and returned their attention to the movie as it started playing again.
That is, until 30 seconds later when Bucky’s cell started ringing again. Stark groaned and threw his head back, Clint started cursing at the ex-assassin, Bruce and Sam looked slightly amused at their reactions, Natasha smacked Clint on the back of the head and Steve rolled his eyes.
“Just answer it, Buck. I made sure Tony made all of our cells untraceable by anyone but Jarvis and that’s only in case of emergencies.”
By that point, the cell was in Bucky’s hand and the same ‘Unknown Number’ as before was flashing on the screen once more. He hesitated still. Sam snatched the cell from his hand from where he sat on the Soldier’s right-hand side and answered it for him.
He realised his mistake almost instantly.
In truth, they all did.
Because they all could hear the other caller when Sam dropped the phone on the table and put it on speaker after his “Hello?” was rudely and loudly interrupted.
“You son of a bitch,” the called practically growled into the receiver. Definitely a female. Definitely angry. “I swear to everything Holy, Agent Curtis, I will kill you if you keep pissing me about like this. First, you’re almost 30 fucking minutes late. Then you decide to fucking hang up on me when I call you to find out where the fuck you are. This is our one shot, we screw this up and we may never get this opportunity again so I swear to God, if you don’t have a damn good explanation then I will make sure nobody ever finds your fucking corpse.”
Several things became obvious to the entire room pretty quickly. The woman on the phone had the wrong number; Bucky was decidedly not this ‘Agent Curtis’ character. Whoever Agent Curtis was, he had pissed off the wrong person. And one of them should probably speak up before she started shouting again.
Steve nudged Bucky’s arm and indicated the cell and his friend refrained from rolling his eyes as he cleared his throat and leant forward towards his cell. He wanted to take it off the speaker and walk into another room to do this but he could see the curiosity of the rest of the Avengers had been piqued already so he would never get away with that.
"Uh, first, that sounds highly illegal. Second, I'd be very interested in how you would plan to achieve such a feat. Third, who exactly is this?"
There was a pause on the line before, “You’re not Agent Curtis.”
“No.”
“Fuck.” The woman sighed and the next words were spoken with resignation. “Who are you?”
“I asked first.”
The line was quiet for a few seconds. “Elisabeth Monroe.”
Bucky glanced up at Steve who shrugged. “James Barnes,” he replied. He paused, considered his next words, then asked: “So who do you work for?”
Elisabeth huffed out a laugh. “Really should have made sure I had the right number before I started speaking, right? If you really must know, Homeland Security.” She sighed. “For the sake of the paperwork I’m going to have to do because of my rookie mistake here, I have to request that you do not reveal any information you learned from this call with anyone else. That goes for you, James, and the others listening in. It’s not that hard to tell when you’re on speaker, you know.”
“It’s not like you revealed classified intel in the 30 seconds you were speaking for.”
“True. Nevertheless, keep your lips sealed and have a nice day, Sir.”
Bucky wasn’t sure what it was that compelled him to call out, “Wait!” but he shocked not only himself but everyone else too. “You, uh, you going to be okay? Sounds like you’ve been left out to dry there.”
“I’m starting to think I have been. Look, unless you’re sitting right next to my good friend Agent Dumbass and could pass on the message that he is a prick, there isn’t really anything you can do. But thanks. I do have to go now.”
“Be careful, Agent. Have a nice day.”
Monroe ended the call and Bucky put his cell away before settling himself back onto the couch.
“What the hell was that?” Tony exclaimed.
Bucky shrugged and asked Bruce to pass the popcorn.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-
An hour and a half later saw Bruce having fallen asleep and Natasha and Bucky watching as Steve played dumb so that Tony and Clint would explain the entire movie to him. Their explanations were always so much more comedic than the movie itself ever was.
That all ended though when Bucky’s cell chirped with a message.
“Someone is popular tonight,” Clint commented as Bucky fished out his cell again.
(9:42pm) You jinxed me.
He recognised the number instantly as the same one from earlier. Agent Monroe’s number.
(9:43pm) Oh?
(9:43pm) You told me to ‘have a nice day’ and then the day just went to shit. I just convinced my boss I didn’t need a hospital. So yes, you jinxed me.
(9:44pm) Why would you need a hospital?
“Okay,” Tony started loudly, “is anyone else going to point out that Barnes has used that cellphone as sparsely as possible for the last few weeks but now he’s texting?”
Bucky glared at him over the top of the device in his hands.
“It took Steve over a month to start texting,” Natasha pointed out.
“I enjoyed how much it irritated the rest of you when I called back instead of texting.”
Tony gasped dramatically and placed a hand on his arc reactor.
Bucky looked back at his cell as it dinged again.
(9:47pm) Curtis was, as I had been beginning to expect, a no-show and I had no other way of contacting his team but through the number he had given me – yours apparently. Like I said, this was our only chance to get the job done so I took a calculated risk and went in to get the job done alone. IT didn’t quite go as well as I had anticipated. I’m considering following through on my threat to Agent Curtis. But now you know about it so…
The others watched in amusement as Bucky raised an eyebrow at the device before typing out a reply.
(9:48pm) So you mean you went in for a raid, solo and likely with inaccurate or incomplete information?
(9:49pm) Essentially, yeah. Like I said, calculated risk.
(9:49pm) That is not a calculated risk, that’s suicidal. Why would you do that? How hurt are you?
“I don’t know if you realise this, Buck, but you’re looking at the cellphone like you look at me after I do something stupid,” Steve said.
Clint snorted. “Yeah, the ‘why-would-you-do-that-you-stupid-punk’ look.”
Bucky just glared at them both.
(10:01pm) Like I said, we had no idea when we would get another chance to put those guys out of business.
(10:01pm) And while it is flattering to have you, a stranger, worry over my physical well-being, I must inform you that I have suffered through much worse than a mere graze on my arm and a mild concussion.
(10:02pm) That brings very little relief.
(10:03pm) Ah, but that implies it does bring you at least some relief. Must go, the boss wants a report and I have an Agent to kill.
(10:03pm) I meant to find, definitely meant find.
(10:03pm) These messages are so incriminating. Please show them to no one.
“That’s it.” The three consecutive chirps of Bucky’s cell were enough for even Natasha to get fed up being in the dark as she gracefully lunged across the coffee table to snatch the cell before returning to her seat where everyone quickly crowded around to read the messages.
“I’m looking her up,” Tony stated before he swiftly left the room. The bang of the door closing behind him in his hurry woke Bruce from his little nap and as he tried to re-orientate himself he noticed everyone crowded around Natasha.
“Did I miss something?”
Bucky just sighed and reached out his hand, palm up and Natasha tossed his cell back to him.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-
Bucky retreated to his own quarters soon after that. He was pretty tired and the idea of sliding into his bed and getting some sleep was incredibly appealing. The nightmares, however, were not. So maybe that was why he did it. Maybe he wanted the distraction. Maybe even though it hadn’t been for long, he had enjoyed conversing with Monroe. It was different. It was easy. It was something a little bit new in his life and he liked that.
So he sent a message to her.
(10:52pm) My co-workers kind of stole my cell and read your texts but technically I didn’t show them to anyone.
(10:56pm) Traitor. You merely make excuses.
(10:56pm) I’m joking, by the way. It’s all cool. It’s probably real difficult to keep a secret from the Avengers. And yes, I know. It wasn’t that difficult to figure it out, Sergeant.
(10:57pm) Good to know.
(10:58pm) Yeah. I also know a couple of excellent lawyers and I’m sure I could convince a jury of my innocence.
(10:59pm) I know who to call if I ever get on the wrong side of the law then. Not that I plan to anytime soon.
(10:59pm) Oh, some time later then?
(11:01pm) That’s not what I said.
(11:01pm) I am aware. So what has you messaging me at this late hour good Sir?
(11:03pm) I didn’t check the time. Sorry. I’ll let you sleep.
(11:03pm) No! No, it’s okay. I’m kind of a night owl anyway. Am I keeping you up?
(11:03pm) I messaged you. Remember?
(11:04pm) Yeah, but you could have just been trying to be polite.
(11:05pm) So did you ‘find’ Agent Dumbass, as you so eloquently put it?
(11:07pm) Nice change of topic. No, I’ll try to track him down tomorrow and give him what for. I did, however, go to his social media to try to contact him. You know, advise him to run and hide. But someone appears to have hacked into his account and messed with it. They changed his icon to something wildly inappropriate and posted some slightly incriminating things also. I may have taken the granted opportunity to report the guy also. What can I say, it’s a petty rivalry.
(11:08pm) Really?
(11:09pm) Yup. I was thinking, the only person I know of capable of that would be a certain billionaire superhero…
(11:10pm) I am not involved.
(11:11pm) That’s too bad. Tell him I like how he thinks.
(11:11pm) Of course you do. I refuse to inflate his ego anymore.
(11:13pm) Hey, I have a question.
(11:14pm) Should I be worried?
(11:14pm) Have you done anything wrong?
(11:15pm) No?
(11:15pm) Then no.
(11:16pm) You had a question.
(11:17pm) What is this?
(11:18pm) A conversation?
(11:20pm) Don’t get smart with me. We talked for the first time when I dialled the wrong number and very nearly revealed classified information to a then-assumed-civilian-now-known-superhero and appeared to have threatened your life. Now we are texting back and forth making pleasant conversation like old friends.
(11:22pm) It’s strange. I don’t use my cell much, Stark called me a technophobe once. But you’re interesting and our conversations are refreshing and simple. Is that weird for you?
(11:23pm) Not at all, it’s a mutual feeling. Shall we continue?
(11:24pm) I think so.
(11:27pm) Okay. Forewarning: I get called away on cases a lot so don’t panic if I fail to reply a few times or can’t pick up a call. Ah, the life of a government agent.
(11:41pm) James?
(11:43pm) Did I say something wrong?
(11:52pm) …
(11:52pm) You fell asleep, didn’t you?
(11:59pm) *sigh* Goodnight James. Sleep well.