Disclaimer: I own nothing.
A/N: This story is movie-verse. It should be about 5-6 chapters total and will contain slight spoilers for the various movies. Each chapter will be a different character/pair of characters. First up: Steve.
Steve Rogers grew up believing in the loyalty and honor of soldiers. His mom told him stories about his father and he knew from a young age that what he wanted more than anything was to be a soldier.
He never could have expected how he would get there.
A lot of people tell him he is brave for going through with the super soldier experiment, for rescuing the men from the HYDRA base, for flying a plane into the ocean to save a city, and for many things he's done since he was brought out of the ice.
He doesn't think of it like that.
Steve's never considered himself to be brave. He's just always done the right thing and if that means laying down on a wire or staging a solo rescue mission then so be it.
Agreeing to participate in the super soldier program wasn't an act of bravery. It was simply his only chance to be able to fulfill his dreams. Selfish ambition and nothing more.
He isn't brave.
Bravery was what he saw in the men he had lost on the battlefield. It was Bucky and Peggy in the war and in the future it was Tony Stark flying a nuke through an inter-dimensional portal knowing he had very little chance of coming back out of it.
Steve Rogers may be a super soldier. But he is afraid of so many things and has so many demons waiting at the back of his mind he doubts he will ever be able to agree with those who praise him for his bravery.
Inside he's still just a kid from Brooklyn, too dumb to back down from a fight.
Steve finds it funny that bravery is seen as such a "heroic" trait because he loves to see it the most in people that are completely ordinary. He goes for walks around the city sometimes and smiles whenever he sees people asking for signatures or holding picket signs. He thinks those people are brave for standing up and doing work that needs to be done regardless of how it may affect them personally.
He doesn't know why he can't seem to put himself in the same category even though he goes out and fights to change the world in different ways.
So Steve fights and bleeds and has a few close brushes with death and all the while he never quite believes that he's a hero.
However, to the rest of the Avengers and the rest of the world as well, Steve Rogers is more of a hero than anyone and whether he believes he's brave or not, he always will be in their eyes.
To them it doesn't matter that he's afraid because he pushes it aside and fights anyway. Steve Rogers is loyal and brave and has more honor than half of SHEILD put together. And he will always be their Captain.
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