He exhales a faint laugh at that last part. "Yeah. Makes things easier and more complicated."
But he can't smile when he says it. Even if Olivia tells him he couldn't have known. Even if she echoes Natasha - none of that is your fault, Steve - he can't make himself believe the words. With each other until the end of the line. He sees Bucky's face, ragged with exhaustion from Zola's experiments, lit by flames from the factory floor. No! Not without you!
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But he can't smile when he says it. Even if Olivia tells him he couldn't have known. Even if she echoes Natasha - none of that is your fault, Steve - he can't make himself believe the words. With each other until the end of the line. He sees Bucky's face, ragged with exhaustion from Zola's experiments, lit by flames from the factory floor. No! Not without you!
"He would have looked."