Hi guys! This first chapter is just a backstory and it will go into dialogue without so much description just bear with me :) I hope you like this. I was really trying to dig deep into Steve's character and think of out of the box ideas. Enjoy and don't forget to review!
I know that this is the longest first chapter in the world, but I really wanted to set the story out properly. Please review! This took me AGES to write and I would appreciate it more than anything!
Just to clear things up: Chapters 1 and 2 use italics to show him looking back from the battle in Sokovia. After this, they are used as present day thoughts.
People in this time can't seem to understand me. I walk around and they look at me like I'm some sort of creature from another planet, from Asgard or another mysterious realm, that isn't the same to them. Back when I was born, in Brooklyn, I was accepted as a human. I may never have fitted in, but I was accepted as equal race at least. In the 21st century, I feel like an outsider. I'm here to publicise everything that is great about America, ignoring the things that we have done wrong in the world.
I think the world forgets that I've killed people. As much as I would like to erase the screams that I caught before the lives I took were over, I can't. I never can. Even when I sleep, there is no mercy. They echo through my ears like someone has captured me and is torturing me with the terrors of my past. Now matter how many times people say nightmares are normal, I still feel like they aren't. Rarely have I woken up screaming, unless something dreadful has happened that day or the room gets to cold. When I talk about the ice, when I went under, when I really did die, I tell them that I hit my head. I tell them that the force and impact of hitting the ice instantly knocked me out and I was frozen down there until they captured me. I lied.
I was alive when I hit the water, alive when it broke through the ice and alive when it sunk down to the bottom of the sea. As soon as I had thought about the idea, I was set on it. I knew I would never see Peggy again, never dance with her, never have a date with her, never kiss her again. They seemed like little things to other people, but they weren't to me. So when I pushed the lever forward, I knew it was the right thing to do no matter how much my heart broke because of it. The plane broke through the ice, the windows smashing in the process. I didn't try to leave. I could've, but I knew that the current was too fast and I probably wouldn't have made it...so I let the ice consume me. It was freezing, as to be expected, but, in a way, it was more than that. The ice made it's way into my body, freezing up my lungs, my brain and my heart. The chest was the last thing I felt before my eyes shut, letting the cold take over.
When I woke up, I was so lost, confused and really had no idea who to turn to. Peggy being there was a gift. The rest of the Howling Commandos were long since gone and she was the last one left. I was so happy that she was alive and also that she lead a long and happy life, falling in love with someone that was perfect for her. Seeing her like that only made me think more about how I still hadn't found anyone to settle down with even though I was over thirty years old. Some people don't think that that's an old age to be single at, but for me, all that time in the ice, it feels like forever, especially with this new world I was faced with. I felt so behind and was worried that I would continue to feel that way.
They sent me to a cabin in the middle of nowhere for a few weeks when I first woke up, the stunt in New York deeming me unstable to recover in a city in the fear that I would freak out. I was in the place for days, on the internet, trying to figure out how everything worked. They suggested that I have a person with me to teach me, but I didn't want anyone in the beginning, feeling that I needed to be alone. I cried. I hadn't told anyone, because I felt ashamed of it. I cried, for days on end. I was so scared that the world wasn't going to accept me and they didn't. They really didn't. They couldn't understand how I was here. I was their fascination, their prop that could stand up and do tricks to keep them entertained, to give the illusion of hope.
I felt hopeless a lot of the time in reality, worried that the Avengers weren't going to be able to save the people. That we were going to end up destroying everything that had been built. Tony was a big contributor to helping destroy the Earth, but I let it pass most of the time, not being able to find the energy to argue with the playboy who always seemed to have a comeback.
Meeting Sam helped. He was a therapist at the VA and seeing him helped me gain perspective on life, letting me see how the world viewed me. He basically told me to follow my heart and stay true to myself, but he phrased it in an amazing manner, talking about how I should follow my hobbies and be what I want to be, do what I want to do rather than what everyone else wants me to do. I did consider it for a while...until Ultron was created. Everybody congratulated the Avengers, saying how amazing we all were, but the one person who organised us in reality was Maria Hill. I remember the first time I met her back when Loki had invaded Earth.
I walked onto the helicarrier, completely awestruck by the magnificence of the architecture. There definitely wasn't this type of building work back in my day. The computers were all being used my people touching the screen rather than using a mouse and I had learned that people usually used that type of format now, using their fingers to press buttons. Keyboards were still used, but a fruit named brand that I couldn't remember the name of had created all of this revolutionary technology that changed the world and spared the new era of touch technology. My research into that had not gone too far as I wasn't particularly interested in it.
I walked forward, stepping onto a long platform that led to a window looking out at the sky. I observed the people in their stations all working on the computers. I handed Fury the 10 bucks that I owed him for I was completely surprised.
Whilst Banner and Fury were being introduced, I walked forward, not noticing the glare that I was being given by Agent Hill. I continued to walk, people staring up at me, and I suddenly felt a little self-conscious. Wanting to get away from their stares, I walked quickly towards the window, looking out at the clouds in the sky. It was beautiful. Insanely beautiful. I looked down, seeing the busy streets of Manhattan remarkably still from this high up. I smiled subconsciously at the scene and rested my hand on the bar that was in front of my attached to the floor making sure that there was a small space between the bar and the window for fingers to slip into.
"Captain Rogers?" I heard a female voice call from behind me and turned around to see a woman who I didn't recognise. The woman wore her hair in a dark black bob and had a classic S.H.I.E.L.D uniform on - I had been updated of the clothes that were available for S.H.I.E.L.D agents. The strict looking woman was standing strong, her hands securely attached to her hips, and it was clear that she would kick anyone's ass in two seconds if they tried to make a move on her. If her stance didn't give away that she didn't want to be approached by anyway, the facial expression that she wore wasn't exactly encouraging. She didn't look overly happy to see me.
"Yes, ma'am?" I replied, the dialect from the olden days slipping naturally into my language without a second thought. She looked at me funnily for a moment, the stern expression on her face remaining, though I could see the creases in her eyebrows from where she frowned at me.
"I need your signature." she said, handing me a pen, clipboard tucked under her arm. I accepted the pen, not even daring to even graze her skin incase she threatened to kill me or even worse actually completed the act. Perhaps she was planning to slaughter me with the very pen I was holding. She seemed like a very efficient person. I put those ridiculous thoughts aside as she handed me the clipboard.
"Why am I signing this?" I asked, clicking the pen and waiting for her to give me an explanation to sign the forms. When I looked closer at the title, it actually explained that they were medical forms, saying that if any injury came to you whilst on the helicarrier then it was not S.H.I.E.L.D's fault.
"Health and safety procedure form. Most visitors have to fill them out." she replied, adding the extra sentence perhaps to reassure me that many other people had been here before. I placed the nib of the pen on the line and then suddenly realised that I didn't know what to put. I hadn't even practised writing my name since I had arrived home and I wondered whether that was something that I would've lost. My mind suddenly travelled back to when I was writing a letter to Bucky and I suddenly felt a draft coming across my hand, causing a shiver to run through my body. Whenever there was a draft, I would always get the feeling of being in the ice, hopeless and unable to call for help. I felt like my hand was frozen over like it was in the ice and I suddenly felt a little panicked by the thought.
"Captain Rogers?" Hill asked and I snapped my head up, not realising that I had been standing at the front of the helicarrier, pen in hand, nib on page, page on clipboard, clipboard in hand, looking like an idiot, because I was finding it hard to sign a signature. I couldn't see her for a second, but soon blinked whatever the substance was in my eye, out of it so that I could see her properly. The once uptight and stern expression had now softened, her face still professional and emotionless, but I could see her eyes soften slightly when she looked at me.
I felt something make it's way down my face and lifted my hand up to brush whatever it was off of my face. I pulled my hand back, looking at the liquid that was on it, and I then realised that I had let a tear escape my eye as I thought back to my days trapped in the plane surrounded by cold ice. Forcing myself not to think about it anymore, I wiped my hand on the side of my t-shirt, a small stain showing, and then looked back up at the woman. "Are you alright?" she asked, not sounding genuinely concerned, but asking me in order to continue with the job. It was an 'are you ready to carry on' not an 'are you feeling okay'. I didn't like the over-formal side to her and tried to imagine her in an informal situation, but couldn't envision it in my head.
"Fine, thank you, ma'am." I replied, still saying thank you even though she wasn't actually trying to help me. It was fair enough as she did have a job to do and I was getting in her way. I felt like it was my fault for stopping her in the first place. I quickly signed the form and handed it back to her. She responded with a quick nod and went back to her station, not saying another word directly to me afterwards.
She didn't seem overly happy that the Avengers were here. Maybe she didn't agree with Fury about the fact that we were being drafted in? I put it to the back of my mind as Coulson walked over, an excited grin on his face, as he showed me to where I would be saying.
I was walking down the corridors of the helicarrier, trying to find something to do with myself, when I saw Natasha walking down, heading in my direction. "Romanoff?" I called and she flicker her eyes to look at me, slowing her walking pace as I came to join her.
"What can I do for you, Rogers?" she asked. The name seemed familiar on her tongue and it made me wonder about how long or often the organisation had talked about me. The secrets that they kept made me suspicious of everything they did. The people walking around looked at me like an alien and I didn't like the draw of attention, but didn't complain to anyone about it as it would only cause a fuss.
"If you don't mind me asking, who is the woman with black hair that works by Fury?" I asked her and she raised an eyebrow. I asked her, because I knew that Romaonff was a S.H.I.E.L.D agent and the woman obviously worked with S.H.I.E.L.D, being in the main control room and standing next to Fury.
"Face-like thunder? Eyes that could burn holes through your soul?" she asked and I turned my head, disappointed by the language she used to describe the woman, even though I did agree with her in some way or another with the two suggestions she brought up to meet the woman's description. "That is Agent Maria Hill, Fury's right-hand woman and deputy director." she replied as if she had rehearsed it a thousand times. I could understand why she wanted the clipboard back to quickly when I was crying. My insides tensed at the embarrassing memory and I tried to forget about it. "Why, are you interested?" she asked, smile twinging at her lips, and I shook my head furiously.
"We've...we've only just met...That would be completely inappropriate." I replied. I felt slightly insulted that Romanoff would believe I would immediately find interest in someone after only just meeting them. Hill didn't seem particularly...friendly.
"Don't have a heart attack, Rogers." she told me, placing a hand on my shoulder and patting it. I was never good with woman and I definitely wouldn't immediately fall for someone, not at least without getting to know them first. She struck me as a person that didn't want to get known by anyway. "But if you were, know that she doesn't do relationships. With anyone." she added and walked away briskly, either finding me boring, the topic of Maria Hill boring or too busy with a S.H.I.E.L.D errand to take longer than one minute to talk to me. Personally, I was intrigued to find out how the woman, that I now knew as Maria, had become so closed off to people. Surely she wasn't like that with everyone?
After that, we only spoke a few more times before the battle, all conversations being professional. I wondered whether Maria had a boyfriend, not because I wanted to 'make a move' on her, but to see whether she had any personal connections. I couldn't imagine her with family or friends or even in a social situation with Romanoff, but maybe she was the polar opposite with those types of people in private. For some reason, I felt interested to see what she would be like outside of the confinements of the secretive agency called S.H.I.E.L.D.
As soon as the battle with Loki was over, I was invited to Stark Tower by Tony and spent a couple of weeks there, deciding what I was going to do with my life. I was so confused, trying to find my place with the people of New York. Working with the Avengers to fight Loki made me form friendships with them, me and Stark not getting on overly well, but I still co-operated with him well. Seeing as they were the only people that I could consider friends, I decided to stay at the tower, working for S.H.I.E.L.D and being part of the Avengers team only when they needed me, Stark directing most of the missions for them.
I had an entire floor to use at the newly built Avenger's Tower. I had quite a few rooms, three of them being guest bedrooms that I knew I would never use. I didn't have many personal items as they were all lost over time or thrown away. I had no relatives left. I had no one and nothing, but the tower itself and the people inside of it. On my floor, I also had a bedroom, a kitchen and a living room, my shield usually being left in the living room. I would've preferred my own training room, but Stark insisted that we should all train in the same place and the training room from the battle wasn't destroyed.
I spent quite a lot of time helping clean up the city, trying not to listen to the occasional abuse being shouted at me. I also made many donations towards the fund set up to help rebuild the city and help those who, unfortunately, lost people in the battle. The guilt was consuming me and I couldn't stand by the sidelines watching people getting hurt. It's one of the reasons I decided to stay on at S.H.I.E.L.D, as well as having emotional ties to it. Peggy helped create S.H.I.E.L.D and I felt honoured to serve in the organisation. I have a duty. I have a duty to save the people of this world and try my best to avoid harm coming to them.
So I did. I tried my best. I spent the next few years doing missions, saving people, trying to clear the conscience that was eating me up. Meeting Sam helped me with my guilt, which I never thought anyone would be able to do. He seemed casual and treated me with actual respect, not the respect given to Captain America, 'The War Hero', but respect given to me...Steven Rogers.
I hadn't seen her for years, the memory of her being buried deep into the back of my mind but never forgotten.
I was walking down the hallways, preparing to see a man with top security clearance whose name was unknown to me. I was surprised I hadn't met him before as this man had the same level clearance as Fury, but I guessed that the two of them worked with different people.
Me and Natasha, along with the rest of S.T.R.I.K.E team, were tasked to free hostages aboard a S.H.I.E.L.D vessel from a man named Georges Batroc and his mercenaries. I was fighting with Batroc and with one powerful hit sent him through the wall, bursting into a room where I found Natasha at the computers. She was set with another task of extracting data from the ship's computers for Fury. I was so angry, not even showing most of it with her. I took it out on the punchbags later that day to try and stop myself from shouting at her.
But afterwards, Fury showed me Project Insight and the angry I had for Natasha soon disappeared as my anger was directed at someone else. Nick Fury. He said that S.H.I.E.L.D had designed three helicarriers linked to spy satellites, designed to preemptively eliminate threats. He thought that this was going to protect the people, but it was just going to make them afraid and make them targets. Pointing a gun to everyone in the world, calling that protection? Fury needed a new dictionary.
Something was going on and it wasn't good. I had always believed in freedom, the freedom of man, and I felt that Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D were going against that. I didn't know how I was feeling. It had been two years since New York and nothing had changed apart from the fact that I had grown a lot closer to all of the Avengers, considering Stark as a friend now and not just a colleague. I felt that something should've been different, that I should've found my place by now but...nothing. I was debating in my head if I should've gone back under...but I couldn't, not when there were so many people in danger in the present day.
That night, I got home and a neighbour warned me that there was music playing. Deciding to sneak up on the person inside, knowing that I didn't turn on the record-player I had before I left, I crept round the side of the building, clinging onto the edge of it, hoping that I wouldn't fall. I got to the window, snuck in and picked up my shield, ready for a dangerous encounter, but soon discovered it was Fury. And that S.H.I.E.L.D was compromised. Fury gave me a flashdrive, which I supposed had all the information on it that I needed.
Suddenly, bullets ripped through the apartment building and shooting Fury. I was frozen for a moment as I stared at Nick's body, wondering whether he was going to survive or not, but broke my fear as I heard someone break into the apartment. Thinking it was another threat, I immediately went into defence mode, but I realised it was my neighbour who said she went by the name of Agent 13.
"Tell him I'm in pursuit." I said, when the woman talked about the location of the shooter. I was determined to find the man who shot Fury and make him answer for his crimes, so, in a split decision, I pushed through the window, glass loudly smashing as I hit again it, forcing myself into the next building with another crash. I followed the shooter, who appeared to be a man, and ran faster when I realised that he wasn't purely human. No one human could run at that speed and not get tired out after so long.
Realising that throwing the shield was my best choice, hoping that it would knock him out, I did so, aiming it directly at the attacker. What I didn't expect was for him to turn around and catch it. I noticed that his grip wasn't human, but metal, and it made me wonder whether the guy had been given the choice to have the arm or whether he was experimented on.
I didn't have long to think about it as he threw the shield back over to me and the sheer force of his throw resulted in me being pushed backwards, shield in hands. When I got to his position, he was no longer there and I couldn't see him anywhere. I guessed that he must've been trained to fit in with the crowd and not rise any suspicions, especially to the piece of metal that was attached to him.
I went back to where he was lying in my kitchen, being looked after by Agent 33, and some other agent who were busy trying to get him onto a stretcher. I never thought that anyone would be able to bring Fury to his knees. He was the man in charge, the unbeatable power...and now he was slowly dying.
I made my way to the hospital, travelling in the back of an ambulance to accompany Fury to the hospital. When we arrived, they asked me if he had any family.
"I don't know." I replied, not knowing whether the story about Fury's wife was true or not. If Fury did have a wife, it would make me re-assess him, observing him as a person who cared, not a person who was all about protocol.
"We have an emergency contact on his medical forms. We have already rung her and she will be here soon." the nurse replied, before he turned to leave, but my curiosity got the better of me.
"Excuse me?" I asked, politely. The nurse looked back and raised an eyebrow.
"Yes, Mr. Rogers?" he asked. I didn't remember giving him my name, but he must've known me from the stories. I didn't like that aspect. The legends of Captain America were being told while I was still alive. I must've been the only person to experience that.
"Who is the woman in question that is coming to visit?"
"Her name is..." he said, looking at the medical form to double-check what the woman's name was. "Maria Hill." he added. "Anything else?"
"N...no, thank you." I replied and he smiled before leaving me in the room alone. If anybody was on Fury's contacts, it most likely would've been Hill. Perhaps Hill was the mysterious wife that he was talking about. Hill was his right-hand woman. Even though I hadn't seen her for years, Fury had still talked about her as if she were only in the next room. In reality, she probably would've been on a mission half way around the world.
I stood in the observing room, watching Fury as they attached tubes to his body, the heart rate monitor numbers slowly increase and decrease, but primarily decrease. I thought back to when he first recruited me and how little I trust him, never building on that trust since that day. I found that the worst thing. I wish I could've built trust with him, gotten to know him better, but that wasn't the case.
Suddenly, I heard a huge crash at the door and I spun round, looking at a stressed-out Maria Hill frozen to the spot by the door. She didn't look angry, just up to her eyes with work like I had remembered her from all those years ago. From what I had known, Hill and Fury worked with each other every single day, which must've caused an impact to the woman when she found out that he was dying. Her face was frozen and I could see the faintest trace of tears in the eyes, the drops glistening from the light. Her eyes locked on Fury and slowly she stepped into the room, letting the door close behind her.
She looked at me for a moment, not changing her worried face, before her eyes darted back to where Fury was lying. She walked over and stopped by the window beside me, her lips disconnected to allow for the occasional gasps of breath to be pulled through at the shock of her boss on his death bed.
"How is he?" she rasped, voice soft and quiet, not a quality that I had seen in Maria before. Whenever I had spoken to her, she sounded strong and confident, not weak and vulnerable like she was right now. It wasn't a good change to know she had emotions, especially now that Fury was near death, but I found it surprisingly comforting that she was upset.
"Not good." I replied, not really remembering the details that the nurse had told me. I picked up the clipboard that was on my left and handed it to her, looking at her face as I did. I saw a tear crawl down her face, but I couldn't see her eyes as they were already focused on reading the information that I had given her. It was only a few seconds later that she gave it back to me, picking up all the necessary information in such little time, I thought it impossible to think she actually read any of it.
"He's going to die." she said as if it were a matter of fact. I wanted to argue back and say that he wouldn't and that he still had a chance, but it wasn't going that way. I would just be giving her false hope. The doctors and nurses continued to rush around Fury's body and it felt weird that the room we were standing in felt so quiet and peaceful when the room we were looking into was frantic and loud. It seemed almost too quiet between the pair of us.
She moved back to stand near the wall, not leaning against it, but standing up in a powerful position, her hands gripping as if in an attempt to stop herself from crying. I had expected her to burst down into tears when she entered, but then again...I also didn't because of her usual M.O. I expected anyone who came through that door to break down. I let a few tears escape my eyes while I waited for the doctors to set Fury up, but they had gone by the time Maria entered. That would mean she would see me crying twice, which would've been embarrassing.
"What have you been doing in the two years that I haven't seen you?" I asked, striking up a conversation that hopefully wouldn't hurt her too much. I hadn't missed Hill, I didn't know her well enough to miss her, but it would've been nice to see her after the battle in Manhattan. I leaned to my side so I could turn to look at her behind me and I caught her eyes. A confused expression brushed over her face before quickly disappearing to be replaced with her usual blankness.
"I have been at Fury's side practically 34 hours of the day." I thought she was being stupid for a moment until I realised that it was a joke and gave her a small smile to show that I got it.
"Do you ever get a break?" I asked in a serious manner, but her lips rose in response to the question, which surprised me as I had never seen her smile before. Natasha had told me that seeing her smile was a very uncommon occurrence, so I felt a little privileged that she had let me see her smile.
"Getting a break isn't exactly in my contact. Holidays don't happen either." she replied. She still stood in her standard military stance, the one I had seen her sport many times during my time on the helicarrier.
"Not a single day off?" I asked, completely surprised at how hard the woman worked. I thought my schedule was busy, but hers seemed to be off the scale. I'm sure that even Fury had days off, but his assistant not having any didn't seem very fair.
"Don't look so surprised. We're a spy agency and we get into a routine of our life being work." I would've thought she was lying if it weren't for the truth the I could see in her eyes and hear the sternness in her voice.
"That can't be healthy." I told her, even though I knew that it wouldn't make any difference to how she felt. She probably heard it all the time during her life, most likely from Natasha as they had worked closely together in the past. I wondered whether Fury forced her to do constant work or whether it was her choice. I guessed that it was her choice as she never looked tired or miserable at work, only professional.
When she didn't reply, I didn't turn away, but kept looking at her, eyes trying to understand how she was feeling. Her face was slightly contorted, as if she were trying to fight down her emotions and not let them show. "You don't have to be strong all the time." I said, after a few moments of silence. It related to our last conversation in a way, but I think she realised what I was really saying to her.
"Who would I be if I wasn't?" she asked, moving her head to look at me. The tears that were in her eyes before had now disappeared. I wish I could comfort her and tell her it was okay to show emotion, but I didn't know how to. We didn't know each other well, in fact I hardly knew her at all.
"The real Mara?" I suggested and she furrowed her eyebrows at me. I thought I had offended her, so I carried on to explain. "You always seem to be Agent Hill and not Maria." I realised that that was the first time I had actually spoken her first name. I had never thought about the names that people had been given before, but her name made me think about it. 'Maria' was easy to say and rolled off my tongue quite easily. I repeated the word in my head until I realised that I enjoyed saying her name and the fact there was still a silence between us. I ignored the silence and turned back to Fury.
Seeing him so vulnerable and weak just seemed...wrong. It was wrong to have him being the one lying down close to death. My grip tightened against the ledge I was holding as I saw him getting the help he needed. Weakness wasn't a word in his vocabulary. He has to survive.
"I rang Natasha. She should be here soon." Maria said behind me. The news surprised me as I didn't think Natasha and Fury were that close, but if she called her then they must've been as no one else was called apart from S.T.R.I.K.E who weren't allowed in the room. I didn't understand why they were here exactly. They weren't as close as me and Fury were, so I didn't understand why they decided to visit Fury. Suddenly, the door burst open, similar to how Maria had opened it, and I saw Nat run towards me and look through the window at her boss laying down with a bunch of tubes in his skin.
I only found out that S.T.R.I.K.E were only at the hospital to confirm Fury's death, which made more upset and angry than I was already after HYDRA were outed. After his death, we didn't talk very much, only about how we were going to bury Fury. She didn't want to talk about it very much and I respected that.
After Maria said she need to take Fury, Natasha left the room and I got the dreading feeling that she knew that Fury had given my information, the USB stick, that no one else was meant to see.
After being labelled as fugitives, finding my old army camp, being bombed by Pierce and chased to Sam's place, I was seriously confused. HYDRA. HYDRA was within S.H.I.E.L.D the whole time. They had followed me this entire time and I felt like I could never escape the demons of my past. We crashed at Sam's place, which I felt quite guilty about, but I would make sure that he didn't take the blame if the time came. I remember going to see him at the VA and he made me think about what I wanted to do rather than what the country needed, but I found it hard to be convinced to do my passions as well as serve the country. I was torn between two.
Bucky's appearance completely thrown me, making me completely forget about the fact that Natasha had a bad shoulder injury because of my best friend...well...old best friend.
"It was him." I told the others, feeling frozen to the spot in that moment, yet so exhausted from all the emotions that had been coursing through me. "He looked right at me, like he didn't even know me." I felt so raw and hollowed and Bucky reminded me of my past, crashing the aeroplane. The van did also. The cold air, the handcuffs tightly encasing my wrists like a vice and the steel walls of the van against my back. I almost felt claustrophobic and like I needed my inhaler. I hadn't used it since before I was Captain America at the time when I had asthma. I slowly pushed those thoughts out of my mind and focused on what Sam had said.
"How is that even possible?" Sam asked and I didn't even lift my head to look at him, knowing that he wouldn't mind if I didn't have the energy to. I wondered whether this was what it was like to go through shock. I wasn't shaking, nor did I have any of the other physical symptoms, but I felt that there was a block on m mind that made me feel so empty. "It was like, 70 years ago."
"Zola." I replied, simply, my mind linking together the theory. He had been there at the army camp earlier and he told us about HYDRA. He was also the main scientist at the HYDRA base in 1943 when I found Bucky completely broken, as if he were drugged out of his mind. "Bucky's whole unit was captured in '43. Zola experimented on him. Whatever he did helped Bucky survive the fall." I concluded. "They must have found him and…" What was the end of that sentence? Experimented on him? Changed him? Made his whole life different? Whatever the end of that sentence was...it was my fault that it happened to him.
"None of that's your fault, Steve." he replied and I almost rolled my eyes at how easy people could read me. I always let my emotions show through my facial expression, whether it be my lips or my eyes, and it irritated me that I couldn't hide it. If I felt pain, I showed that pain. I felt grief, I showed grief. I felt heartbreak, I showed heartbreak.
"Even when I had nothing, I had Bucky." I said, thinking back to when my mother had died and how he was there for me.
"We need to get a doctor here. If we don't put pressure on that wound, she's gonna bleed out here in the truck." Sam spoke up to one of the guards. There were only two of them and we could easily take them up, but I felt so hopeless. I was too distracted to even note that Natasha had been wounded. I was about to speak up, but one of the guards pulled out an electrified baton that looked like it could do some damage.
Suddenly, the guard with the weapon punched the other guard in the face and then did a very impressive kick into the guys face. Wow...what? I couldn't tell whether to be impressed or nervous. Whoever this person was, they were very trained and I was worried about whether it was someone who wasn't one our side, but not with HYDRA either. Perhaps they had their own agenda. My suspicions dropped when the guard took off it's mask.
"Man, that thing was squeezing my brain." Hill said and I physically felt my jaw drop a little at the fact that she was here, saving us. She huffed and used her hand to move some hair off of her face. "Who is this guy?" she asked me, gesturing to Sam. My brain hadn't fully kicked into action yet, because it was being too slow.
"Thank fuck." Natasha breathed out with relief, resting her head against the back of the van. Hill smiled as she reached her hands up to tighten her hair. After quickly undoing our feet and hand restraints, she introduced herself to Sam.
"Maria Hill." she said, reaching her hand out to shake his hand when he didn't reply to the question she had asked to me and Natasha. He shook her hand with a small smile on his face. I didn't like the smirk on his face that he gave her, but ignored it when they pulled their hands away. From what I could tell, Sam was a flirt, but didn't actually act upon his flirting or take it too far. I could see the gentleman in him and the lacking capability to be a playboy unlike Tony….even though he does have a girlfriend. I briefly thought of how I would feel if Sam and Maria dated. I wouldn't have minded, but I couldn't imagine them being together. My thoughts immediately went back to Bucky. Whenever my mind drifted, it would always go back to my best friend who was trapped in the mind of the Winter Soldier. He must've felt so guilty for not being able to control his actions, but it must be nothing compared to the amount of guilt I felt for leaving him there to get turned into a monster. He must've hated me.
"Sam Wilson, otherwise known as the Falcon." he said and went back to leaning back next to Natasha. I didn't see her facial reaction, but I guessed it was one of recognition to the reply that she then gave.
"Falcon? As in the EXO-7's? I saw the footage from your confrontation with Barnes and recognised the suit." she replied, which brought up my interest. Did she know that Bucky was the Winter Soldier? Had her and Fury been hiding it? If so, how could they keep it from me?
"Those are the one's." he replied.
"Not that I don't love a good catch up, but is there any chance that we could start escaping instead of letting HYDRA drive us to their torture chambers?" Natasha asked, her tone dry as usual. I continued to stare at the floor, not able to take my eyes off of them, my peripheral vision letting me see what was going on.
"The pick up point is a few minutes away underneath a bridge." Hill said."You and Nat will go first, followed by me and Steve. The pick up is West of here. We should find a car there that is identical to this one. This land is owned privately by HYDRA, so they decided to only allowed one type of car is allowed through to ensure that there would be no intruders."
"How do you know that?" Falcon asked and I knew the answer, no matter how much I didn't want to believe it.
"They had people inside our organisation, did you not think that we had agents within their ranks? We didn't know that it was HYDRA at the time, but I'm glad that we went with the plan to infiltrate the organisation. It's how I got the uniform and got in this stupid truck." S.H.I.E.L.D was just as bad as HYDRA.
"How are we going to.." Falcon began, but soon stopped as Maria pulled out a flame gun, switching it on as Sam realised what she was doing. She first made a whole in the middle of the truck and got a baton out. She pushed it through the hole and clicked a button, causing the baton to click but I saw no changes. "Sam, hold this."
Sam held the baton as she quickly burnt a large ring around the outside. As she was coming close to a full circle, she asked Sam "Have you got it?"
"Yeah." he replied, preparing himself to take the weight of the metal circle. Once the circle was complete, he pulled it up and carefully put it to one side, trying not to make much noise. I noticed that the clicking sound from the baton was the bottom of it putting out clamps to attach to the metal. If the metal circle had dropped, it may have gone under a wheel and the driver would have noticed our escape.
"There are no cameras on the upcoming bridge." Maria informed us, taking control of the situation completely. Hill was headstrong, confident, a leader like me and I wondered whether she would be a better candidate for the Avenger's captain. Maybe after all this, that's what I would suggest to her...if there was an Avengers after this. She pulled out her phone to check it. "The tunnel will also be too dark for the car drivers to see us. Once we get out, we'll wait until the cars have gone and I will put the cameras on a loop allowing us to make our escape. If me and Steve for some reason, don't follow out after you, go West anyway. There is another bridge an extra five minutes away that is the same. We'll meet you at the car." she said, handing the device over to Natasha. The phone must've had the map to the car on it.
The plan seemed simple enough. Slip out of the truck, wait at the bridge until Maria switches the cameras off, get to the car and then drive out. "Don't you need this to turn off the cameras and navigate yourself to the car?" Falcon asked, but Maria pulled out another phone.
"I'm dong it on this. The navigation using that should be easy as it was designed by Stark." she said and I thought about her connection to Stark. How did that occur? There were so many secrets that she was keeping from me, so many answers to question I had that I knew she wouldn't give. Why should I trust her? She set me on edge and I didn't know whether to follow her or not.
Maybe it would be better for me just to go on and get tortured? I was sick and tired of people chasing me. Perhaps if I handed myself in, they would stop all this. They wanted me dead and a part of me wanted to be that way. I had let Bucky get caught up in this, I could've gotten to him before he fell to his death and just saved him. Why didn't I? Why wasn't I quicker? Maybe if I let HYDRA take me then the world would be better off? Some people didn't want me in the 21st century and now I was seen as a fugitive by a lot of people, my image warped by HYDRA and S.H.I.E.L.D. I was just so tired.
I felt like I had lost so many people. I was born in a completely different time and I didn't understand why I was with the 21st century. But I guess that was my problem...I wasn't. My neighbours from the 1940's - dead. Erskine - dead. The Howling Commandos - dead. Bucky…not dead, but lifeless. I had to keep repeating to myself that he wasn't dead. I had gotten used to him being that way for so long and I was still fighting to get my head around it. He was brainwashed, that was clear to tell. There was no way in Bucky's right mind that he would sign up to be part of HYDRA. And he would've remembered his own name, if not me.
"Steve!" Hill stressed from beside me as I watched them prepare to exit through the hole in the bottom of the van. "Ready?" she asked and I didn't respond. I looked up and stared at her. My eyes felt lifeless and droopy. I felt as if I needed to sleep, but I couldn't find myself doing so. I felt so confused, two sides of my brain arguing against each other about whether to trust S.H.I.E.L.D, about who I should trust. Should I drop out of the van? She frowned for a moment at me, studying me for some reason, and I was worried that she had some form of mind-reading ability. A second later, she turned to Natasha.
"Go on with Sam. We'll drop at the next bridge." she said and I was the one furrowing my eyebrows this time. I wasn't confused at her motive. I knew that she wanted to talk to me about something, but that something I was unsure of. The change obviously wasn't in the original plan and I discovered that from the way she looked at me before me left the car.
"What?" Sam asked, shocked that she would suggest for us to split up.
"Are you sure?" Natasha said, the faint beeping on her phone getting louder as we neared the exit point.
"We'll get out at the next bridge. I'll know when the car turns the corner and I have the other phone to block the cameras." she explained, holding up the phone to them. I still hadn't moved from my seat the entire time. "You have five seconds. Ready?" she asked them and they nodded, the beeping almost sounding like a flat-line.
As soon as the beeping turned to one long sound, the van seemed to darken at the loss of light in the tunnel and Natasha quickly slipped out, followed by Sam. Soon enough, the light was back on the road and Maria stood up from where she was crouched over the escape hole.
She looked up at me and I refused to meet her eyes, my gaze solid and steady on the floor. She knew that I was hesitant about going with her, but I didn't want to talk about it. What if she did know Bucky was the Winter Soldier? I felt like I couldn't really trust anyone, but Sam, Natasha and the other Avengers. Sam and Natasha seemed to go along with Hill, deeming it a good enough plan to 'save the World', but I wasn't entirely convinced.
Maria walked over and sat opposite me on the other side of the van where Natasha had been sitting. There was a blood mark on the metal wall behind her from where Natasha's shoulder had bled against it. "You unsure about where you stand?" she asked to which I nodded, still refusing to look up. I felt my eyes well up with tears and I begged myself to try and stop them from falling, but they did so easily without even needing me to blink them out. This was the second time she had seen me crying and she must've thought I was an idiot for doing so.
"Before you ask, I didn't know it was Barnes." she explained, hoping that it would get me to see her side of things. It did and I couldn't tell if it was a good or bad thing. "Fury may have known, but I wasn't 100 percent sure."
That made me raise my eyebrows, but I didn't move my head from where it was glued, staring holes into the floor. "Not 100 percent?" I asked, curious as to whether she had her suspicions.
"I did make a few guesses at who it was, Barnes being at the very bottom of the list as he was classified as dead the last time I checked." she said and I saw her clasp her hands together, resting her elbows on her knees as she leaned forward. "Even if I told you, you wouldn't have believed me."
"I might have." I said, through gritted teeth, but knew it was all lies. I would've thought she was crazy for even suggesting that Bucky was still alive.
"Steve..." She began, her voice soft and smooth bringing me a little comfort and for some unknown reason it seemed to calm me down. "You cannot let yourself stay here. That hesitation needs to go." She instructed me and I nodded, slowly, her words gradually getting through to me.
Something was going on and it wasn't good. I had always believed in freedom, the freedom of man, and I felt like Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D were going against that. I didn't know how I was feeling. It had been two years since New York and nothing had changed apart from the fact that I had grown a lot closer to all of the Avengers, considering Stark as a friend now and not just a colleague. I felt that something should've been different, that I should've found my place by now but...nothing. I was debating in my head if I should go back under...but I couldn't, not when there were so many people in danger in the present day.
"I know." I replied, trying not to sound unsure but we both knew that I was. How could I trust shield? I trusted it the same amount as HYDRA. Perhaps that was an exaggeration.
"Steve, what do you want?" She asked and I was confused for a second. "Once this is all over..." She said, steadying herself as the truck went over a little bump. "What do you want the outcome of all this to be?"
I looked up at her and we stared at each other for a second. Her eyes were a captivating dark brown that stood out from her black hair. I hadn't properly looked at face before, but I noticed the few freckles that were dotted across her cheeks. Her face, free from the make-up that many women wore nowadays, had a few scars on. There was a small one on her chin and a slightly larger one across the left side of her forehead.
Her lips were small and pink, looking untouched and fresh. I couldn't imagine any improvements being added to it, not even the scars. In the past, some people I had been were insecure about their scars, but I never thought it was a problem. Mine would eventually heal over, but some deep one's from before I was injected with the serum stayed. I didn't mind - it stayed as a reminder to never be ungrateful. The scars were the one thing from my past that would never leave.
Her eyes looked to the floor again and I missed the warm, comforting nature that they gave to me. I desperately wanted her to look up again and, fortunately, she did, which relaxed me. Through her eyes, I could see the sympathy that she was giving to me. I doubted that she would say that she felt sorry for me aloud, but her eyes did the talking for her. Her gaze tensed and, in a split second, the sympathy was gone, the professional facade returning to her. I tried to look away but found myself unable to. Her once comforting gaze had now turned cold and intense, making Maria the intimidating woman she would usually act as. I missed the ease that her gaze before gave, but the regain in professionalism refocused my attention to answering her question.
"I want to have Bucky back. And I want everyone to be safe." I replied, our eyes staying strongly connected. She nodded at me and raised an eyebrow.
"You think that staying with HYDRA is going to do that?" she asked. I sighed and shook my head, putting my head in my hands, my warm tears on my cheeks pressing against my palms. I shut my eyes tightly and shook my head, trying to push away the thoughts that were clouding my mind. I was being pathetic and I needed to man up to save Bucky and everyone else in the world. Insight was going to kill so many people and we needed to develop a plan to stop it. I brought my head up and wiped my eyes quickly. She smiled softly at me and I couldn't tell if it was genuine or not. I wanted it to be real.
"Okay. I'll come with you." I replied and she nodded briefly before looking down at her phone to see how close we were to the bridge. The short strands of hair framing her face had fallen across her eyes and I felt the need to tuck them behind her ear to see her face fully. Knowing that it wasn't acceptable to do that, especially when we had only spoken a few times and weren't even good friends, I clasped my hands together to stop myself.
"The bridge is a minute away. Let's get into position." she said, getting up and walking around to the hole in the ground, but the car went over a bump again and she ended up falling forward onto the bottom of the van. I quickly got over to her and put my hand against her arm. She groaned for a second before trying to get up. Realising that my hand was still on her, I quickly retracted it and stepped out of her way.
"Are you hurt?" I asked and she chuckled lightly, shaking her head.
"Just my pride." she replied and I had a feeling she was lying. Hill seemed too stubborn to admit to feeling pain.
After jumping out of the van and meeting the others at the car, we travelled to a secret location, Maria not telling us where we were going. Maria slid the door open and I quickly got out, holding my arms out to help Natasha into the abandoned compound. I was extremely worried out Natasha. She hadn't passed out yet, but I couldn't imagine how uncomfortable the wound must've been. I could see her grit her teeth occasionally on the way, but I could tell she was trying to mask most of her pain. Maria open a barred gate and she led us through a dark corridor, a few blinding lights making the corridor visible. We made our way inside and I saw someone in a suit begin to run towards us. My body automatically tensed, but soon relaxed as I realised that the man was on our side.
After telling the suited man, who must've been a doctor, about Natasha's condition, Maria led us to a hospital bed hidden behind some clouded, white, plastic curtains. She pulled the curtains back and a man I believed to be dead was lying there...alive.
"About damn time..." he began and I bit the inside of my cheek as I tried not to get angry. I was shocked at first, but I couldn't believe that he had lied to us all. Fury and his doctor told us what was wrong and I almost rolled my eyes at the long list.
"Don't forget your collapsed lung." the doctor interjected. I realised that he must've been close to Fury as I came to the conclusion he was only letting people he could trust into the building. Knowing that I had Fury's trust made me feel uncomfortable as I felt that he didn't have mine. I wouldn't put my life into Fury's hands.
"Let's not forget that." Fury sighed. "Otherwise, I'm good."
"They cut you open." Natasha said, not being amused with Fury's lies. I underestimated how much she cared for him. "Your heart stopped." she added, a little bitterness in her tone.
"Tetrodotoxin B. Slows the pulse to one beat a minute. Banner developed it for stress." he explained. "Didn't work so great for him, but we found a use for it."
"Why all the secrecy? Why not just tell us?" I asked, my arms tightening against my chest as I attempted to control my anger.
"Any attempt on the Director's life had to look successful." Maria spoke up and I turned my head right to look at her. She was in a strong stance, hands clasped as she kept her eyes on Fury, not looking at me as she answered. Her emotionless reply cemented my thoughts on her logical way of thinking. She always left her feelings behind, soldiering forward to the next mission with a straight head and without distraction. It was something that I wished I could do, but she must've had a secret switch that she never turned off.
I knew I had to do something, but I hadn't quite figured out the plan in my head. I was sitting my temporary room while Natasha was getting help with her wounds. The room was grey and void of any logos, like the rest of the building, no attention wanting to be drawn to it. There weren't any spare clothes lying around in my size, but I was planning on picking up my old uniform before we went against HYDRA. Deciding that I would take a shower before I went to get the uniform, I began to take off my shirt. I threw it on my bed and went to take off my trousers when I heard a knock at the door, buckling my trousers back up when I heard the noise.
I jogged over, worried it might be important, and quickly opened up the door to see Maria standing there, her hair up in the usual ponytail and a form fitting black top on. I had to stop myself from looking down at her curves. It wasn't that I wanted to look at her in that way, but woman tended to wear tighter fitting clothes than in the 1940's and it was distracting. Everyone seemed to be accustomed to the current style, but I found it difficult to get used to. I didn't complained about it, but I was always slightly taken back whenever I saw someone wearing tightly fitted clothing or a short skirt or a low-cut top. If I ever had that conversation with anyone, especially Tony, I would've been taken as a joke, so I never talked about it with anyone.
Maria's eyes flitted down to my bare chest for a second and then back to my eyes. I had been shirtless in front of Natasha and she didn't mind, although, Natasha didn't seem to mind anyone dressing or undressing in front of her. She had told me once that bodies were just bodies that contained chemicals and reactions. It made me sad that that was the only way she thought about bodies. I wondered whether Maria had that mind-set also.
The woman in question lifted up a set of clothes in her hands and presented the pile to me. "One of the guards found some clothes for you to wear that were in storage. They obviously didn't look hard enough the first time around."
"Why did they look the second time?" I asked, accepting the clothes that she was holding. As I took the pile, my fingertips swiftly brushed the bottom of her hand, a small touch that felt more than it was. My eyes drifted up to hers and she was already looking at me, a small amount of fear playing in her brown orbs. Her eyes looked down again and I took the pile from her, our hand separating. Her warm hands gave the same comfort that her eyes had only a couple of hours ago in the HYDRA van.
"Perhaps they were trying to impress Captain America." she said, a small smile playing at the side of her lips. "Some people haven't lost hope in you." she added and crossed her arms over her chest. I shouldn't have noticed the cleavage that she had now displayed from crossing her arms, but I did without even looking down. The low-cut top made me a little uncomfortable, not that I would've told her. She might have been offended or embarrassed if I did. It made me want to grab one of my shirts and put it over her to cover her up. Not that I could say much as I was still standing in my doorway shirtless.
My mind went to her reply and I was interested to know what she though. "Have you?" I asked, feeling that her answer was more important than everyone else's for some reason. Maria was controlled, experienced and level-headed, but seemed more human than Natasha. I disliked thinking about Natasha in that way, but she never seemed to let her guard down. I could imagine Maria having a wider range of emotions. Then again, I didn't know the woman very well.
She was still for a couple of seconds, playing my question over in her mind, before she answered. "Not at all." she replied and genuinely smiled with her lips before nodding and walking down the corridor. I slowly shut the door and undressed, preparing to get in the shower, the whole time my mind wondering whether Maria Hill or Natasha Romanoff were more human.
We spent the next few hours building up a strategy before taking on HYDRA head on. Any conversation between anyone else was strictly professional, no one having time for heart to hearts any longer. After infiltrating the S.H.I.E.L.D headquaters in D.C and putting in two out of the three chips, I was set on putting the third chip into the last helicarrier to make our plan work, a plan that Maria had agreed with. When we had planned the strategy, I wanted to thank her afterwards for supporting me, but I didn't get the chance to.
Battling Bucky was one of the hardest challenges I had to face during that battle. He was just as strong as me, which wasn't the only problem. I didn't want to fight him, but I had to if we wanted the mission to succeed.
"Thirty seconds, Cap." Bucky was on the lower level firing at me as I struggled to get to the set of computer chips to change one of them. I had never felt so defeated and tired, the Avengers battle in Manhattan included in the ranking. Emotionally, I was devastated, Bucky siding with HYDRA being the start of my problems. Physically, I was exhausted, gun shots from Bucky in my legs and a knife wound to my chest from him too. I had to keep going though, Maria's countdown being a reminder of what I was fighting for. Maria's voice was the only thing I was tuned into, the countdown grounding me to my purpose of being there.
I pushed forward and slumped against the monitor as I pulled out the modified chip that Fury and Hill had given me. I felt a pain shoot through the back of my leg where Bucky had shot me seconds ago. "Stand by." I breathed, holding up the chip to the empty slot. I heard a gun shot go off and a pain strike my abdomen, the feeling causing me to fall down to the floor, the empty slot out of my reach.
My eyes were darting to different spots as I felt the pain get worse and worse making me want to scream out from it. I had been shot many times in my arms and legs, but never before in my abdomen. It was like fire was burning at the lodged bullet in my stomach and tried to breathe as I forcefully pushed the pain out of my mind.
A set of voices were talking through the communication earphone I was wearing, but the pain made it impossible for me to focus. I needed to keep fighting. Like Maria said, people still believed in me. I panted and grit my teeth as I pushed myself by my arms that weren't damaged, a different pain shooting through my chest, one that was caused by Bucky's knife. I heard someone different counting down this time and I realised that it was a HYDRA member working for insight.
"Three..." the man said and I struggled to breathe properly, my lungs begging for air that I couldn't get. "Two..." I pushed against the structure and desperately stretched my arm out to reach the empty slot, the computer chip between my fingers, waiting to be placed. "One..." I gave every last bit of effort to push myself forward and attach the chip into it's place.
"Charlie lock." I reported and slumped down on the floor from the strain of my wounds. The fire had eased, but it wasn't completely out. I felt the need to pass out and blinked as I tried to keep myself awake. I breathed heavily as Maria relayed a message.
"Okay, Cap, get out of there." she said over the comms and I shook my head, tensing my stomach as I tried to ease the pain of the bullet, but it only made my pain temporarily better. I could feel the pain spreading and the pool of blood forming around my stomach. I heard the guns on the ship change direction and I could see one of the other helicarriers point their guns to the ship I was on. I shut my eyes and breathed out one last time as I knew what I had to do.
"Fire now." I told Maria, hoping that she would understand why this needed to happen. I was too injured. I had served my purpose, I had saved them. I was injured, badly, and I doubted that I was going to make it out alive. Deep down, Maria knew that too.
"But Steve-"
"DO IT!" I interrupted, knowing that she was going to argue with me. We needed to take down HYDRA and didn't need to worry about anything else. I struggled to get up, but managed to make myself stand as I prepared for the fire of the other helicarriers. "Do it now..." I said, a little softer, realising that my tone before had been quite harsh. I didn't want her to remember me as an angry human being. I wanted her to remember me positively, as a hero. I never wanted people to remember me like that before, but I wanted her to think of me as a hero being Steve Rogers not Captain America.
Captain America was a lie and not the real me. I wore the mask to show the world that they had hope, but if I had to chose, I would easily chose to be the human I was, not the super soldier I was made into. Images of Erskine flashed through my head when he was dying. He wasn't afraid. He believed in me and I knew that he would've been proud of what I had accomplished to keep the world safe, but I could've tried harder. I knew that.
The serum amplifies everything that is inside, so good becomes great; bad becomes worse. This is why you were chosen. Because the strong man who has known power all his life, may lose respect for that power, but a weak man knows the value of strength, and knows...compassion. His words echoed through my mind as I threw myself at one of the nearby bars to try and see whether Bucky was hurt. Before I could see him, I was pushed against another bar from the impact of bullets from the other helicarriers. As we began to fall towards the ground I heard someone scream. I looked down and saw Bucky trapped underneath a large metal beam, my heart pounding at the sight of my best friend being hurt.
You must promise me one thing. That you will stay who you are, not a perfect soldier, but a good man. The words stuck in my head as I jumped down from my position, causing pain to shoot through me again, and ran to help Bucky.
Me and Bucky got out of there, Bucky not telling me about his whereabouts. I had never been in so much pain before, but I had to save Bucky, not matter what side he was on. It was a weakness and I hated myself for it, wishing that I could be more like Hill. An idea struck me that I should get a lesson or two from her about how she stays so unaffected by what happens to her and those around her.
I was sitting in the med-bay when Sam told me what had happened.
"And you think he pulled me out?" I asked him, sitting up in my bed and had to stop myself from groaning due to the pain.
Sam shrugged in his seat next to me. "He must've. Who else would've been there that soon? My guess is he pulled you out, checked you were breathing and then left before you could wake up."
I nodded and looked down at the duvet I was covered in, the white colour giving me nothing to get distracted by. If Bucky did pull me out, then I needed to find him. Fast.
Hope you liked the intro. This took my a LONG time to do so I would really appreciate the review.