Marlena stared down at Bucky's sleeping figure with tear-filled hazel eyes. She ran her hand gently over the side of his face, being careful not to wake him. At first glance, he looked so calm and so peaceful, but Marlena knew not to be deceived by his appearance. Not only could she see the pain he was in even as he slept, but she could feel it too. It radiated off of him in horribly intense waves, despite his state of consciousness.

Wanda had come to Marlena about two hours ago after the incident had happened. She had explained everything to her older cousin; she had explained his attempt, her promise, and the way he had cried himself to sleep in her arms as they sat together on the floor inside the weapons room. Steve had carried him back to Wanda's room so he could sleep, and that was where Marlena was now.

Marlena sat on the queen-sized bed beside Bucky, her back pressed against the soft cushion of Wanda's headboard. She wiped her face as a few stray tears managed to make their escape. She had been trying not to break down since Wanda had told her what happened, but as the time passed it seemed to become harder and harder to keep her composure. She hated seeing the person she loved the most in so much pain—she hated that his pain tortured him to the point of him not wanting to live anymore. Marlena wondered what she was doing for him that was so wrong—she wondered what she could've done better to help him.

His selfishness regarding his attempt to end his life angered Marlena greatly, but her determination and her will to make sure it never happened again seemed to outweigh that anger tenfold. She loved Bucky more than her own life and always would no matter what happened between the two of them; the video Ross had shown her the day before was proof of that. Of course Marlena was still incredibly upset over the revelation of how her father had actually died, but she was willing to look passed the face behind the mask in order to look at the facts. Bucky was not responsible for her father's death, but Hydra was. Both were victims of the organization, as were so many others.

Marlena had never hated Hydra so much in her life—not even when they had taken her and turned her into yet another one of their puppets. It was only now as she sat gazing down at the broken shell of the man she loved that she realized just how much she hated Hydra. They had broken him, but Marlena would not let them destroy him. She refused to sit and watch as the very people Bucky had spent so many years fighting against took control of him again. Marlena would help him—Marlena would do whatever she could do in order to see the light shine in his blue eyes again.

Beside Marlena, Bucky began to stir in his sleep. Marlena watched as his blue eyes slowly fluttered open, and a small smile pulled onto her face. Quite a few more tears fell down her face but she quickly wiped them away before placing her hand back down onto Bucky's face. The gesture startled him slightly, as he wasn't fully awake, but Marlena did her best to calm him down as quickly as she could.

"It's okay, Bucky," she spoke quietly to him. "You're okay."

Bucky looked up at the sound of her voice, his eyes brightening slightly as he met her hazel ones. "Marlena," he breathed out.

"Hi, sweetie," she greeted him as she ran the pad of her thumb over his cheek.

In a single instant, Bucky's mind had taken him back to everything that had happened earlier. His eyes began to well up with tears as he thought back on what he had almost done—the pain he had almost caused—and he began to feel the overwhelming amount of regret.

"I'm so sorry," he said to Marlena as the tears began to flow out of his eyes.

Marlena only let out a sigh and held her arms out to Bucky, to which he responded to immediately. He hugged her small body as he cried with his head pressed against her chest. Marlena held him tightly in her arms, her cheek pressed against the top of his head. She held him as if she were terrified to let him go, and a part of her was; a part of her was terrified that if she did so it would be for the very last time, and the mere thought of it nauseated her.

The tables had turned on the couple, however. Marlena was no longer the one who needed saving; Marlena was no longer the one being held as she cried herself to sleep. Instead, Bucky was now the one who needed saving; Bucky was now the one being held as he cried himself to sleep. He was one of the strongest people in the world, yet he was also one of the most vulnerable.

"I'm gonna do whatever it takes to help you, Bucky," Marlena told him, a few of her own tears making an appearance. "You won't have to feel like this anymore, I promise."

"I'm sorry," he repeated. He couldn't seem to find the right words needed to say what he truly wanted to say to her. His brain was stuck in a constant loop, leaving him in a very apologetic state.

Marlena frowned and hugged him closer to her. "Don't apologize; you have nothing to apologize for, James."

"There's so much," Bucky responded, though his voice was barely above a whisper.

"No there isn't," Marlena told him as a few tears fell into his hair. "You don't have to apologize for being unmade; you don't have to apologize for being broken; you don't have to apologize for being in pain; you don't have to apologize for being human, Bucky. You have every right to feel what you feel, okay?"

Bucky let out a breath in response and pressed himself further into Marlena as the tears began to flow faster.

Marlena sniffed and ran her hand gently through his hair. "I swear on my life I will never ever leave you to deal with this pain alone, James Buchanan; you don't have to fight this battle on your own. You may see yourself as a burden, but you're not—not to me, or Wanda, or Steve, or Tony, or anyone. I need you to understand that."

Bucky looked up at her, his blue eyes glistening with tears and pain. He couldn't think of the right words to say to her, so instead of speaking at all he elected to go with a different response. He leaned up, bringing his right hand to Marlena's face before gently pulling her down toward him. Their lips met in a desperate, but loving kiss, one they hadn't shared since before Bucky turned himself in back home.

"I love you," Bucky said as he pulled away from her.

Marlena gave a small smile and wiped his face with the pad of her thumb before leaving him to fall back into his previous position against her chest. "I love you, Bucky. Never ever forget that, okay?"

Bucky only nodded and grabbed her hand, intertwining their fingers together. Despite what little comfort she presented him with at the moment, he was just glad to have any at all.

Several more minutes passed between the two of them before the door to Wanda's room opened. Marlena looked away from Bucky—who was just about ready to fall back to sleep—and towards the door to find Wanda poking her head through, while Steve and Sam attempted to make their way passed her.

Marlena raised a brow and laid her free hand down on Bucky's head, her fingers moving gently through his dark strands. "Hello," she greeted her friends.

"Can we come in?" Sam exclaimed from his spot behind Wanda.

Wanda rolled her eyes. "It's my room, but yeah, can we come in, Mar?"

"Like you said," Marlena chuckled, "It's your room."

Wanda smiled and made her way into the bedroom with Steve and Sam following closely behind her. She moved to sit down on the bed beside Bucky and Marlena, and while she was careful with her actions not to wake him up, Sam didn't seem to care about whether or not he did so. He plopped down on the bed in front of Bucky and Marlena, eliciting a quiet groan from the super soldier.

"Is he sleeping?" Sam questioned Marlena. "He's an ugly sleeper."

"He can also hear you," Bucky muttered as he opened his eyes to look at Sam.

"Great, now that you're awake I can do this," Sam exclaimed before smacking Bucky over the head, earning a glare from Marlena and Wanda.

Bucky frowned and tightened his grip on Marlena; it was as if he was now looking to her for some sort of protection, almost as if she were his safe haven, despite how small Sam's gesture had really been. "What'd you do that for?"

"Don't think I don't know about that little stunt you tried to pull earlier," Sam spoke sadly, though he tried to conceal his emotions. "Wanda told us what happened."

He would never admit it out loud, but Sam did love Bucky. Bucky was a royal pain in Sam's ass majority of the time, but that didn't mean he wanted to see him gone. Learning about what Bucky had tried to do earlier upset Sam more than he thought it would have, and seeing him now—seeing him alive—relieved him greatly.

"Oh," Bucky sighed. "I'm sorry—I really am."

Steve then sat down on Wanda's bed. "How are you doing, Buck?"

Bucky shrugged as he looked at Steve. "I guess I'm okay for now."

"You guess you're okay?" Sam scoffed. "Where the hell is Stark at? We need to do this and we need to do it now."

"Do what?" Bucky asked as he finally sat up, though he kept his hold on Marlena's hand.

Before anyone had the chance to answer him, Tony came running into the room.

"I'm here!" he exclaimed. "Is it too late? Has it went down yet?"

A confused expression fell upon Bucky's face. "Has what went down?"

Tony seemed to let out a sigh of relief as he laid his eyes on Bucky and he slowed to a walk as he approached the bed. "Good, good—I'm on time."

"Can someone explain to me what the hell is going on?" Bucky questioned, seeming almost desperate.

"Today in court when Wanda was witnessing for you, she could hardly speak, because halfway through she started sobbing," Steve answered him. "Sam and I wanted to know why, so while Tony was taking care of your paperwork, Wanda told us."

Sam let out a sigh. "She told us that you had been thinking about some things—things such as the lack of hope you have in yourself and the fact that you didn't believe you were worth freeing or saving. She said you thought the world would be better off without you; she said you thought the people you loved would be better off without you."

"Which, by the way, isn't true," Tony added as he clamped his hand down onto Bucky's shoulder. "With the help of our little witchy friends, Marlena and Wanda, we're gonna show you just that."

"I don't believe I'm following where you're going with this," Bucky said, his voice slightly hoarse.

"Just trust us, okay?" Marlena spoke softly to him, resting her free hand on his other shoulder.

Bucky glanced back at her. "Do I have a choice?"

Sam laughed and shook his head as he moved to grab Wanda's hand. "No, you don't. So sit down and shut up for a few seconds, would ya?"

Bucky simply rolled his eyes at Sam and watched as Steve moved to grab Sam, while Tony shifted behind him in order to grab Marlena as Wanda did so from her opposite side. He was unsure of why they all needed to touch each other, but he thought better than to ask; he knew he wouldn't receive an answer, and if he did it would've been a smart ass answer from Sam.

"So, do you trust us?" Marlena asked him as she leaned forward, squeezing his hand reassuringly in her own.

"Uh, I guess, but I won't lie and say I'm not terrified."

Marlena smiled and looked down at her free hand, which was now engulfed in the blue haze of her energy. She raised it slowly toward Bucky's head, careful in her haste not to startle him. He saw the glowing blue out of the corner of his eye and he opened his mouth to protest, but before he could do so he was met with a sensational feeling.

Bucky clamped his mouth shut as the negative emotions inside him seemed to dissipate. The weight of whatever Marlena had done completely engulfed the emotions, replacing them with something else—something else that he couldn't seem to put his finger on. The emotions he now felt were all the same, yet they were all so different. Bucky could feel the distinction in each of them, but he could also feel the similarities. Regardless, whatever he felt made him feel good inside—it made him feel a sense of comfort he didn't think he had ever felt before. It was overwhelming, but in a good way.

"What is that?" Bucky asked as he turned his body to face the five people sitting behind him.

"That is the way Steve, Sam, Marlena, Tony, and I all feel about you," Wanda explained to him with a small smile on her face; she could feel that it had worked just by looking at him.

It didn't take very long for the realization to hit Bucky; what he had felt and still felt was love, multiple variations of love. "Love. . ."

"You think you're a burden; you think our lives would be better if you weren't around, but you're wrong, Buck—you're so wrong," Steve told Bucky, who was now beginning to tear up, though they were tears of happiness rather than sadness as they had previously been.

"We all love you so much, and to see you gone. . .well let's just say there are no words to describe just how horrible that'd be," Marlena told him with a soft chuckle, delivering another squeeze to his hand.

Sam leaned forward in his seat. "Uh, how about we speak for ourselves here."

Wanda shot him a look. "You were just thinking about how Bucky was a royal pain in your ass, but you loved him and didn't want to see him gone."

"Damn telepaths," Sam muttered as he crossed his arms over his chest.

Bucky chuckled and shook his head. "Thank you."

"And just know that we're all gonna be here to help you fix what's goin' on in that freaky little head of yours," Tony then chimed. "The twitches are probably gonna be doing most of the work, of course, but we're gonna do our best to make you happy again, Metallica."

"As we are going to do with you, too, Marlena Claire," Steve said.

"I think Tony's the one we really need to worry about here," Marlena chuckled as she glanced over at Tony.

Tony narrowed his eyes at her. "Says the one stealing my prescription medicine."

"It was one time," Marlena defended herself. "And I only took like two."

"You took four, you dirty little thief; I know this because I counted."

"Wait," Bucky interrupted. "Why did you steal his medicine, Marlena?"

Marlena pursed her lips. "I'd rather not kill the good mood we've created here."

"Did you try to. . ." Bucky trailed off, unsure of how to continue.

"No, never," Marlena said with a shake of her head.

"Why don't we just leave the pills alone and go out for food or something?" Sam suggested. "I think we could all use a good night out with each other."

Tony scoffed and shook his head. "Forget about the food. I think we could all use a good month long vacation; these last few months have been so horrible. We all deserve some time away from the hectic commodity of life."

"And where exactly are we going to go?" Wanda asked Tony with a raised brow.

"First we head up to Coney Island so Barnes here can propose to Marlena like a normal fiancé does, and then we head down to Rio where I pretty much own an entire island, but I promise it's very lowkey," Tony answered her. "Metallica and Clair de Lune can plan their wedding in the comfort of my island mansion."

Sam laughed loudly, while Marlena fell back onto the pillows and Bucky facepalmed.

"Fiancé? Wedding?" Steve asked with wide eyes. "Am I missing something here?"

"You didn't know?" Tony asked with a mocking gasp. "The two lovebirds are secretly engaged and have been since we showed up at Barton's homestead."

"You think you know a guy," Steve muttered with a shake of his head, though he smiled when he looked at Bucky. "Congratulations, pal."

"Wait," Marlena spoke before Bucky had the chance to respond to Steve. "How the hell did you know about that, Tony?"

Tony shrugged and smirked. "I'm Tony Stark, cupcake—I know everything."

"Did you know you're an egotistical pain in my ass?" Wanda remarked.

"Wow, I can't believe I actually care about all of you idiots," Bucky said with laugh.

Marlena smiled and moved to wrap her arms around his shoulder, craning her head to look at him. "Better believe it, Barnes."

Bucky merely laughed, and before he even had the time to think, Wanda was joining in on the hug, wrapping her arms around the soldier's waist.

"No matter what happens, just know that you'll always have us," she assured him, and he smiled down at her.

"Yes," Sam spoke up. "Even though you get on my everlasting nerves, I'm not gonna leave your side."

Tony gave the top of his head a few awkward pats. "I think I'm kind of obligated to say that I'm gonna be there for you considering I blew your arm off, but I also paid for your new and improved one, so in reality I'd say we're quite even. But I'm still gonna be there for you regardless—if I'm not, your little wifey might kill me and we all know just how crazy she can be."

"You haven't seen crazy just yet, Stark," Marlena smirked.

"Crazy as they might all be, they're all right," Steve said to Bucky. "We're always gonna be here, so you have nothing to worry about. We're with you 'til the end of the line, pal."

"And roll credits," Tony chimed, earning a laugh from Bucky.

Every last one of them were right, though, just as Steve had said they were, and Bucky knew this just by the feeling that still lingered inside him. The people that surrounded him now were his family, albeit there were quite a few missing. It was a very small and a very broken family, but it was still a family, nonetheless—a family he was very blessed to be apart of. His actions from earlier now seemed so stupid and so selfish as he gazed around at the adoring faces of the people who annoyed him and angered him, but who he loved all the same. Bucky would be okay; he wasn't sure how long it would take to completely get to that point, but he knew he would be. The mere thought of it gave Bucky back the slightest bit of hope he thought he had lost so long ago, and he grasped onto it as tightly as he possibly could. Bringing him back again would be a very time consuming endeavor for them all, but Bucky knew that as long as he had them—as long as he had Marlena—he could be happy the way he always wanted to be. He could finally be free—free of his torturous demons, free of the agonizing pain, free of the tremendous fear of a possible relapse—just as he had always dreamed of being.