bakerstreet | Vegas

Vegas

The { WAKING UP IN VEGAS } meme

Shut up and put your money where your mouth is
That’s what you get for waking up in Vegas

:::
Sin City – the entertainment and gambling capital of the world. There’s something hypnotizing about the glitz and glamour in this den of excess and greed. You can be anything or anyone you want to be in America’s playground, but there are consequences to every action. Too bad the tequila, the showgirls in feather boas, and Celine Dion seem to make you forget all of that.

HOW TO PLAY
1.) This is the easy part – leave a comment with your character, canon, and any preferences you may have in the subject heading.
2.) Look for partners-in-crime/sudden marriage mates/fellow performers – tag other characters. Choose a prompt or run around the city doing your own thing.
3.) MY GOD WHAT HAVE YOU DONE
4.) Have fun, but please remember that you are liable for any lost property, destroyed buildings, or potential lawsuits that follow your stay in Vegas.

1.) YOU GOTTA HELP ME OUT / IT’S ALL A BLUR LAST NIGHT
Ugh, where in the world are you? This doesn’t look like your hotel room, and these definitely don’t look like the people you were hanging out with last night. Wait, why is there a monkey in the bathroom? Why does everyone keep you calling you the Duchess of Devonshire? Who the hell ordered all of these tanks of helium?! ~~Oh god did you put this all on your credit card?~~

2.) I LOST MY FAKE ID / BUT YOU LOST THE MOTEL KEY
Technically, you’re not supposed to be anywhere near the casinos for several more years. But that’s what you’ve got a fake ID for – let’s just hope it lasts you the night.

3.) GET UP AND SHAKE THE GLITTER OFF YOUR CLOTHES NOW
Las Vegas is your stage – whether you’re a world-renowned performer or just launching your career or are simply one of the myriads of sequined contortionists performing in the latest Cirque du Soleil show, you know the backstage hijinks better than anyone else. Do you love the lights or are you getting a bit jaded for having to do this night after night?

4.) WHY ARE THESE LIGHTS SO BRIGHT? / DID WE GET HITCHED LAST NIGHT?
There is a wedding band on your finger that wasn’t there last night. Were you eloping on purpose or did the third bottle of tequila convince you that this strangely-confused Elvis would be a perfect marriage mate? Better yet, how in the world is the honeymoon going to top this?

5.) DON’T CALL YOUR MOTHER / BECAUSE NOW WE’RE PARTNERS IN CRIME
The crime of the century is about to go down in Vegas and you are at the center of it. Will you get away with cheating the system and getting away with millions, or will your face end up plastered across the news station for entirely different reasons.

6.) GET SOME CASH OUT / WE’RE GONNA TEAR UP THE TOWN
Someone has a birthday/retirement/engagement, and you’ve decided that the best way to celebrate is through Smirnoff, dancing ladies, and overpriced restaurants. Well, no city knows how to party like Vegas – lets just hope everyone gets through the nice in one piece and with their credit still somewhat intact.

7.) WILDCARD
Hey, it’s your money. Do whatever the hell you want.
And remember - what happens in Vegas, stays on YouTube.

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"...okay. Good." He didn't even really want to marry Zemo anyway and from the sounds of it Zemo didn't want to marry him at all. Bucky lowers his head again and touches the ring on the hand in his lap. It doesn't feel weird because he can't feel that it's there. But he can see it standing in stark relief against the black and gold of his arm.

Maybe Zemo didn't mean anything of what he said after he'd had that second bottle. Bucky's just overthinking it. He glances up only to realise Zemo is staring at him, and then he quickly looks away and stops wringing his hands, reaching up to adjust his shirt collar to hide a warm spot which he presumes is showing up dark on his skin.

Bucky will change his tune once he sees the extent of Oeznik's trolling when they get there, with the flower petals and champagne and the deep red curtains and all the rest of it. But for now he's just looking out the window trying to ignore the way Zemo is looking at him.

"Mm." It isn't-- so easy as that, that Zemo didn't want to marry him at all. It's complicated - a twisting mess that he can't begin to unravel without sour memories or irrational fears griping at him... and very rational ones. Bucky will leave one day. Possibly when he comes to his senses, or simply when he has to.

Marrying only to lose it again certainly hadn't been a dream of his.

And marrying someone who insists he only did it to stop a tantrum throwing baron, even less.

Then again, perhaps that hadn't been the whole truth, with that look he'd given when Zemo suggested they take off the rings.

He's-- tired, and hungover, and for once, off-kilter enough to not know which move would be the best to make in the long run. Maybe if there weren't nerves creeping under the surface he'd be able to be a bit more... logical about his next step. Or about talking about it. But now is not the time, either way.

He lets out a sigh, directing his eyes elsewhere. Idly, he toys with the ring on his own finger for a second, still not quite used to the slight weight there, the feeling of it any longer.

"I wonder, James," he starts after a stretch of silence. "Do you ever miss your... captivity? The world is so open and there are so many choices to make, ones you were denied a majority of your life... Is there any part of you that misses-- simpler times?"

He thinks he knows the answer. Bucky has seemed to follow orders rather easily at times, slipped into the role of a soldier like it was a well-fitting glove.

Zemo hadn't thought he'd miss his own cell. It had been maddening. Sometimes he thought he felt his sanity slipping further and further away, left with only himself and ghosts and no relief, even with the books he'd been allowed to collect. His whole world was a tiny little room beyond the news he'd hear of what disasters were happening outside. Then he'd had reason to leave again, assisted by the very man who now wears his ring...

Who he thought would kill him at the end of it all. Zemo had been ready for that, more than prepared. Of course he'd been wrong about Bucky being a heartless murderer, someone who would take delight in ending the life of a man who wronged him.

Now, sometimes he misses that nice, little cage. Not enough to actually go back, of course, not while he has reasons to be outside of it for now.

There's a correct answer to that question and a wrong answer. Just as there is only one correct answer to whether he's still having nightmares, how does he feel about HYDRA, whether he wants to go back to 'that old life' even though there hasn't really been much of a choice about that. He shoots Zemo a wary look, wondering if that's really what he wants to hear - the same old recycled shit he told his therapist over and over and over again trying to convince her and himself that what he says mirrors what he thinks.

He probably doesn't want to hear the emotionless, deadpan delivery of overly-used lines. He's pretty sure Zemo would feel insulted, and more miffed than Dr. Raynor if he tried.

"Yes," he answers truthfully, breaking eye contact and turning to look out the window again. He can see a plane the size of a little balsa toy model ascending into the skies.

"I'm. Grateful for everything everyone has done. Steve and-- Sam. T'Challa, Shuri. Ayo. I wasn't-- in a good place." This much he can acknowledge. This much he has worked through, and come to accept. The rest, however... still a work in progress.

"But I was only ever good, for that." The killing, the destruction, seeing some of those missions through. He lowers his gaze back into his lap and he can't help but go back to fidgeting with his ring. "It's what I was made for. And..." He doesn't seem to want to admit it, tugging on a bit of his trousers covering his knee, smoothing his hand down a few inches over that silky smooth fabric, swallowing the lump in his throat. He gives Zemo a small little shrug.

"I miss pulling the trigger. I miss my late night talks with Zola. He just--" He knew how to play him. How to pull him apart and piece him back together, all the nice words to say in the cruel world he'd foisted his little toy soldier into. "I know he didn't mean it-- well, he did, but. He was good to me."

It isn't the words in the end, just like how Zemo doesn't need to use any words anymore and he still has a hold on the soldier. Zola had done it with a finely-tuned carrot and stick recipe, rewriting the narrative of torture and experimentation and conditioning to the point where Bucky had felt rescued, empowered, had a purpose. Zola genuinely cared about the success of his Winter Soldier program and for all those years it had felt like Zola genuinely cared about him. Zemo of course has... Finesse. Sticks are beneath him. Zemo does carrots and Turkish delights and cherry blossom tea. That makes him more dangerous than the traditional carrot and stick approach - not that Bucky can always see it.

"You know, someone could fry your brain a hundred times. But the one time he's been standing there for hours helping to reattach your arm and you flinch from a burn and he pauses, asks if you're okay-- I don't--" Bucky slides his right hand into his hair, trying to unpack something he's never touched, and he looks frustrated and confused. It made perfect sense to Zola because this is exactly what he wanted. This is probably how they're breaking other people right now who've been held captive in some no name bunker. He's not stupid, it's not like he doesn't know how this works. But having been through it himself is- just different.

"I never... wanted to be free," he hears himself say, relaxing his grip and combing his hand through his hair. It's a loaded question Zemo has asked, and clearly more than a little stressful to think through. "But I don't want to go back there like this, either." Like Bucky, he means. Or James. Whoever he is. If they can just kill him and take the Soldier, they can have the Soldier back in his little ice box, do whatever they want.

Zemo, for his part, is quiet. He lets Bucky talk and hangs on every word that passes his lips, files it away. In the end, it's easier to focus on the mess they've all left behind -- from HYDRA to Steve Rogers to the Wakandans, no matter what their intentions were in the beginning. Neither the Winter Soldier nor the man who's fidgeting beside him like he'll crawl out of his skin are complete men. One was a weapon, one doesn't know what he is or who he should be.

While he had been thinking of his own captivity, how part of him misses the solitary confinement, his thoughts are sharply directed elsewhere. Is there a twist of disgust or pity at Bucky's confession? Or a twisted sense of satisfaction that he was at least partly right, in ways? There's a longing to be that good soldier, to carry out his orders as told and please his master.

But there's also a man underneath all that, that Zemo is unexpectedly fond off, even now and even with the taint of HYDRA all over him, of serums and experimentation. "It's a smart tactic," he answers after a moment.

"It's human nature after so much pain and torment to seek out the one bit of kindness offered to them. Perhaps, in Zola's own way, it was even genuine at times." Perhaps just not in the same way Bucky felt about it.

"It is natural that you would long for your old life, but you are free, James. Another choice forced upon you that was not yours to make. Whether you believe it or not, it is for the best in the end. HYDRA... is despicable, to say the least and I would not let you return to their hand. Of course, that hardly means you can't find... someone or thing new to serve, find a new cause to believe in." And Zemo would be lying if he said he hasn't enjoyed a very willing bodyguard since they've been out.

He shakes his head and slides his hand over after a moment, resting it carefully atop Bucky's right hand. "While you're with me, I do intend to help you find some sort of purpose if I am able."

It probably would have been better to talk in therapy, like what therapy is actually meant for, than talk to Zemo. He's not exactly some uninvolved third party in all this. But he doesn't want to make Dr. Raynor's life difficult - as far as he's concerned, she's just there to tick boxes, make sure she's not sending some nutjob out into the world who could go postal at any minute, and he's not that kind of crazy. He's not stable by any stretch of the imagination, but he's not violently unstable. The bullet hole in the wall that's being properly replaced right now aside...

"It was real," Bucky protests quietly. The man had a dozen other schemes for taking over the world and he didn't need to put the effort into one test subject, but he did. "You've been good to me too. That's real." And unlike that cone of silence he keeps over HYDRA, he'll insist upon it if he ever gets whisked away and questioned. Zemo's been nothing but good to him. No stick, no scars, no cruelty or cruel words ever used.

Although he is a little delusional about being able to singlehandedly stop HYDRA or anyone else from taking his Soldier away from him.

The car slows to a stop and Bucky sits for a while, looking down at their hands. Zemo's matching ring. God, that was a terrible idea. He should have been more insistent on saying no. What a mess.

"Well. We should. Probably get on that plane. I'm sure you'll be bored enough on the flight to find me something to do or some government to destabilise," Bucky jokes.

"Of course." It was real, to Bucky at least. Zemo isn't entirely unfamiliar with manipulation tactics, what HYDRA would employ, but... it doesn't matter in the end. Zola isn't keeping Bucky up late at night with talks or concern. He's with Zemo.

As for whether he's delusional -- perhaps. But he also singlehandedly toppled an empire of superheroes. He shouldn't be underestimated. He's possessive enough to want to keep Bucky with him for a bit longer at least, even if it would have been so much simpler to leave him and his cat behind in Vegas.

"You are not wrong," he agrees. They need to be on that plane... though the joke has him shaking his head for a moment, lips curling into a wry smile.

"I think all I will be doing is sleeping, James." Though as he slips out and they make their way around the car, he does pause to give Bucky a look.

Much as he could leave the earlier conversation behind, bury it before things get... even more strange between them, Zemo decides against it in the end. "You know, James... You have been good to me as well. Far better than most lately. I... am not certain I told you last night that I am grateful for it. But I should have."

Somewhere in vows he can scarcely remember.

Sleeping's good too. Bucky already got plenty of that this morning. He'll likely just brood by the window and look at the clouds. Try to ignore all those old troubling thoughts about HYDRA that Zemo stirred up like a hornet's nest. He busies himself grabbing the bags out of the boot, though he does stop and linger when Zemo gets his attention.

He's not sure he's been that good, honestly. Steve's been a nuisance sometimes. And Bucky feels like a burden from time to time. Still, he appreciates Zemo saying as much, even though he is wont to brush off sappy sentiments.

"I don't think you meant any of what you said last night, but. Being good to other people... I think that's what I-- should be." Doing good things, or at least trying, for a change. He's done enough bad to last several lifetimes.

Picking up the bags, he starts over towards the plane. There's no Steve in his pocket that he needs to be gentle about, which does make things easier being able to bound up the stairs and put the bags away before settling down in his favourite window seat.

"It's kind of weird being in a plane without Oeznik."

"What did I say that felt untrue?" There's another curious look before he turns towards the plane and starts towards it. There's no sense in debating what Bucky should or should not be doing -- not if it gives him some sort of peace in between the violence they're both sure to come face to face with again. Retiring is a pleasant thought in theory, but they both know there's work to be done still, things that will require their attention.

HYDRA never goes away entirely after all.

"Miss his company already, do you?" And no doubt, Steve's. The fact that Bucky had thought to sneak that cat in his pocket in the first place... well, it was honestly a bit amusing. Attachment could be bad for them, but there seems little harm in letting Bucky have his pet if he's responsible for it...

Or Oeznik, as the case may be.

"We'll see him on our return... I'm certain he'll be rather eager to know how the honeymoon went."

"You... talked a lot more than usual." Please don't make Bucky repeat back some of that. He's too old and conservative to let those kinds of words taint his lips.

"Was a nice wedding though. You made it through the vows without throwing up. And you got my finger on the third try." That's Bucky's standard for 'nice'. Someone who's willing to stick with him through the hard times and say so with a straight face without vomiting all over the altar. And apparently it's forgiveable to not be able to find his ring finger the first time around. (All these vibranium fingers you know, they all look the same. It's fine.)

"He just. Is always there. Seems to know what I want." It used to be a little weird? Bucky would turn around and Oeznik would be standing there with a pair of clean pants or a glass of water. Sometimes he has advice. Sometimes he has food. After a while it gets weird when he's not there. Bucky's never seen him angry, or frustrated, or sick. The worst he's seen him is when he's a little tired, that's all. How does someone always have their shit together - and keep Zemo and Bucky and Steve in line like that?

"Don't encourage him on this honeymoon talk. We should-- take these off like you said."

"And so that made it, all of it, untrue?" Because he talked more than usual...

He settles in his own seat, leaning back a bit... as he tries not to frown at the recount of their 'nice wedding'. Ah, yes, not throwing up on the altar. He scrubs a hand over his face as he lets his eyes drift shut for a moment. "I was at my most charming, I see."

No sense in bringing up Oeznik's irritation with Bucky at the moment, not when it likely extends to Zemo as well for this mess. Or any off the clever nicknames he's come up with for the soldier. "I never have to encourage him on anything, James. You should know Oeznik better than that."

If he wants them to remember their poor decisions, he will certainly remind them as he sees fit. "You didn't seem all that enthusiastic to remove them earlier."

He looks down at his own ring again but he doesn't quite make any move to take it off. "Was it all simply to humor me, James?"

"No. You said you couldn't remember much. You were pretty drunk, so. I didn't want to hold you to anything anymore." At least, after he was certain that Zemo genuinely had a bit of a blackout. It's probably for the better - the number of things he thinks Zemo wouldn't want to remember currently outnumber the number of things he probably should remember.

Bucky flinches and panics a little bit at that call-out. Yeah, he'd reacted when Zemo suggested to take them off. But it was a kneejerk reaction and he'd hoped it would have gone unnoticed.

"Um. Yeah." He clears his throat and flexes his hand, studies the ring for a bit before looking out the window again. "Like. Ninety... Eighty percent." Bucky is starting to get restless and uncomfortable in the suit again. He unbuttons another button and tugs his shirt open a little more. Is it just him or is it a little stuffy in here?

Does much ever escape Zemo's notice? Especially when it's about something, or someone, he prides himself in knowing deeply.

"That would mean twenty percent was genuine," he points out, a wry smile twisting his lips. Hopefully the remark won't result in any more buttons being undone or it may turn into a strip show soon.

... That may be better than an actual talk.

Bucky leans forward to take the jacket off, leaving himself in just the vest and he folds up the sleeves of the shirt, trying to ~~buy himself time~~ make himself comfortable.

"Mmmno." Bucky clears his throat again after that came out unnaturally high in pitch. "No." He makes a face and scratches at a scab on the side of his forehead. "I jussssst. Um. You know, it was. Nice. To be wanted. In that way. To have something- normal. Ish." It's really hard for Bucky to do this. To connect with people. He's always going to have to lie, to some extent, about who he is, or what he's done. He'll never have this kind of normal. And it was nice, even for just a brief moment, for Zemo to have known everything there was to know about him and still want something like that kind of connection with him.

Even though he clearly didn't mean anything he said and didn't really want any of it and Bucky was just-- hopelessly stupid enough to believe otherwise.

"I didn't-- I mean if I knew you didn't want to-- that you were completely flat out drunk, I would have. Just risked it and brought you back to the room."

Edited 2022-01-09 17:27 (UTC)

Is that the impression he gave? That he hadn't wanted it at all, rather than it had been a very... poorly thought out plan for both of them? He frowns, brows furrowing in thought as Bucky stumbles his way through an explanation -- one that Zemo is trying to be patient through. It isn't something either o them are accustomed to after all, connecting in... this way. In a way that makes a mess out of so many things.

"Marriage is a complicated topic for me, James," he starts slowly. "I married the love of my life, and had a family that I adored... then I lost it in the blink of an eye. You've known loss in your own way. You know that it never truly leaves. When I close my eyes, at times I can still see their bodies as I dug them out of rubble, I can still feel--"

How cold, how stiff, how lifeless they'd been. "My point is... it isn't a simple matter of want. If it were, then... there's hardly any point in pretending that I don't want you, James. I think it's rather obvious it's quite the opposite at this point."

He shifts a little in his seat, twisting to face Bucky a bit more properly. "My every intention had been to join my family as soon as my work was complete, and you know that. The prospect of-- starting again, in any sense... I suppose I feel guilt."

Which isn't terribly easy to admit, but-- shouldn't one at least try to be honest with their spouse? "It feels almost disrespectful in a way. And-- please, don't insist that my wife or my son would have wanted me to continue on and be happy without them. Those are empty platitudes. The dead have no real voice. No wants or desires. And truly, they may despise me as much as they may despise The Avengers for the death and destruction they brought to our home. I've had plenty of time to consider many different possibilities while I was in isolation these years."

It's all speculation though. What-ifs. "But I can also admit that-- there's something deeper between us than I intended, James. I'd also be lying if the prospect of you being-- mine isn't appealing."

On many different levels.

Bucky goes quiet, which is not that unusual for him, but he's listening, processing, trying not to interrupt. Sometimes he wonders what other people see when they look at Zemo. Do they think about everything he's lost, how he felt those losses? Do they even see him as a person? Or is he just some nameless, faceless evil entity that took a wrecking ball to the senseless violence they were enacting? Maybe Zemo isn't the best person, morally. He's not like Steve. Nobody is like Steve. But it's easy to be in Zemo's shoes and genuinely believe that the world was better off without the Avengers, without scientists and their endless pursuit of weaponising people, and it gets easier by the day to see the world the way Zemo does the more time Bucky spends with him.

"Well." He doesn't know what Zemo wants to hear. What would be the right thing for Zemo to hear. Bucky's lost good people, sure, but not his own wife and kid. He never had that chance to live out that white picket fence life or bring the American Dream into fruition before Zola sunk his teeth and claws into his lab rat. He's not sure there's any going back from here, about what they've both lost.

"I don't know your wife. Or your son. What they would have wanted. But. Right now it's what you want that's important. And-- it is as simple as want. And if you want to pretend this never happened, or sign some papers, we can do that. And... we can figure this out. What... you're doing. What I'm doing. And if you're sober and you... really want something then we can. Revisit this." Bucky presses his lips into a thin, flat line and waves his vibranium hand in a vague gesture of a nebulous, ill-defined, whatever 'this' is kind of gesture. Probably not marriage. Something more than an attack dog, hopefully, and probably something less than marriage. He's a pretty good bedwarmer too, and he can handle a pretty rough fucking. There should be some grey area between attack dog, bedwarmer, fucktoy and spouse.

Bucky does realise that he's not factoring himself into this. What he wants. He doesn't think it's that important, really, and also, he doesn't know what he wants. He would like to stick around, either way, in any capacity Zemo would have him. Maybe that's not a good way to live, but. He wouldn't know. It's the only way he's lived when he wasn't on his own. And it's kind of hard to do this when they don't like themselves very much.

"Or we can just. You know. Leave it..." Bucky awkwardly backtracks, because he doesn't know what Zemo wants and he's second-guessing himself. Waiting for Bucky to figure out what he wants, Zemo will be waiting a long time. But what's done is done and trying to undo these messes is not as easy as just making an appointment in an office, paying five hundred bucks and signing a few pieces of paper. Plus, paperwork means paper trail. Who knows what will be waiting for them if they returned to Vegas so soon after leaving.

Zemo would like to think he has done things always for the betterment of others in the long run, even if that meant not always making decisions that would leave you at peace at night. He has done many bloody or nasty acts that he's not taken pleasure in, but had absolutely been necessary. From his perspective at least. Well-- perhaps his family had been a mix of what needed to be done and a more personal sense of justice. Revenge. He won't pretend he hadn't done unforgivable acts, even if they had been necessary.

He's an easy man to make into a monster, in others' eyes. People will always believe themselves better, that they would never sink to such levels or do any of the more regrettable choices he'd made.

But it is... refreshing, for once, the way that Bucky seems more obliged to look at him like a man, to treat him as one rather than a monster. He'd have every reason not to, of course.

... And he isn't certain what he wants to hear either, if anything could truly be said. But he can focus on Bucky stammering through what response he can give. "Papers would... be an issue, James. Hardly a way to keep a low profile, having to go through any legal means of separation."

Then again, the same could be said of the marriage in the first place. "And I am not certain I can simply forget it."

Which really just leaves one option, doesn't it? Leave it, see what happens. "Whether we have rings or not, James, we are together in this... until we are not, of course. However this ends-- we'll be separated some day. I'm prepared for that." But that doesn't mean he's... happy about it, or welcoming it anytime soon. Or even inclined to give into that instinct that told him to leave the minute he woke to his drunken decisions.

"You still haven't quite said what you're happy with..."

Maybe that's what it takes to commiserate. Just sharing one's space with another monster, who had been easy to scapegoat as the problem with extremists and their violent aspirations, who was easy to hate. It's far easier to get rid of a couple of troublemakers than it is to address the mistakes and the ideologies and the hubris that created these monsters in the first place. Just as it is easy for Zemo to blame Stark or the Avengers or whatever for what happened to him, and for Bucky to say it was one lone mad scientist in a field of 'I was just following orders' Nazis.

"I'm-- pretty sure we set off a flag somewhere." Someone would have had to enter their union into a database and if 'James Buchanan Barnes' didn't set off any alarms, 'Helmut Zemo' certainly would have. Their stay in the Alps might have to be longer than either of them were anticipating.

Ah, well, more time for Zemo to get that additional Japanese bamboo tube water fountain feature built out in the frozen over backyard, so there'll be something ~~to fall asleep to~~ of interest to look at from the sun room... Because since when does Zemo know when to stop?

"I'm not," he admits, refusing to look at Zemo because it feels weak, and petty, and unpleasant. He'd rather look out the window and watch Vegas shrink into the distance. "I don't want to leave." He finally has something nice for himself, even if this is something that everyone else finds rather horrific. "I want to stay - with you. And Oeznik. Steve." The only life he can go back to is the one where he's alone in his apartment sitting on the floor - if they don't throw him in a cell as far away from Zemo as they can put him and try to 'rehabilitate' this mess that everyone has made of him. It's just another prison that doesn't look like a padded cell and it won't do anything for him other than make him even more miserable and withdrawn, having to listen to another parade of experts telling him what he should think and how he should feel and what his own experiences are supposed to mean to himself. He's done with this carousel ride. And unlike Steve he doesn't get to just step off wherever he wanted to in a moment of time where he thought he could have been happy. He doesn't have one of those. All he has is-- this.

"I don't know what that looks like." He doesn't want to think about it too hard, honestly. "I just-- want things to stay, the way they are."

It's a rather difficult situation, what they're in. Oeznik's concern, his advice haven't fallen on deaf ears. Those words still ring in his head -- Bucky can't be his reasons to continue on just as he can't be the sole reason Bucky makes an effort to climb out of bed in the mornings... it's not healthy. It's not-- fair to either of them. But all the same, there's a part of Zemo that recoils at losing it.

He's been a dead man walking for so long that the first chance at any sort of life has left him a bit greedy, whether guilt eats at him for it or not. He hadn't intended one night of relief to snowball into what they have now, so that... soothes that somewhat. Vaguely.

And it's somewhat reassuring that Bucky doesn't want to leave, even if things feel like they've become a bit of a mess, become too-- real, perhaps. Too close to actual feelings.

"I don't see things changing any time soon, not as long as we're careful." Avoid being found, taken. Their luck will run out eventually, but... they can prolong it, perhaps.

Bucky turns to face Zemo, and searching eyes seem to consider for a while before he breaks eye contact and looks back down at his lap again. Whatever Vegas was, it wasn't careful. That's no way to live a life, to always be looking over their shoulders, to always have to hold back and watch their step. They might have both lived that life for several years, but sooner or later he doesn't doubt that Zemo would tire of it.

For now, though... he should probably let the baron sleep.

"Get some sleep," he encourages Zemo quietly, turning back to look at Zemo although he can't quite lift his gaze up past Zemo's chest. "Everything will be fine."

They will both tire of it, eventually. But there's hardly any solution that won't end... poorly, to say the least. No deals he could strike to maintain freedom when he's still the war criminal who killed a monarch, whether intentional or not. But there's no sense in debating it or focusing on it in the moment.

"I'm hardly a child, James. You can't be any more certain things will be fine than I am." And most likely, it will not be.

Still, he shifts a little to get more comfortable, closes his eyes. Sleep does sound far more inviting than anything else at the moment, anyway.

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