The Howling Commandos dragged their battered Captain back to London HQ from another tour of now-burning Hydra bases. They took turns prodding Rogers to food and medical and clean clothes.

"We need to report in," Steve protested, batting away the too-helpful hands that were trying to tug his uniform shirt off. "Bucky, you touch my damned pants, I'll break your trigger finger." The Howlies went still, and he blushed scarlet and looked desperately around the barracks room. Fortunately they were the only ones there-not that that saved him from the leers of his erstwhile subordinates.

"Well," Dugan said, "it does get cold in the winter in Brooklyn."

Jones nodded. "My mama always told me to make sure my good pants were hung up before I went to bed."

"I hardly think those trousers count as good anywhere now," Falsworth observed.

"C'est finis," Dernier concurred.

Morita shrugged. "I bet we could donate the scraps so they can make pants for a couple of youngsters."

Steve glared at Bucky. "Get it out of your system."

Bucky smirked. "Don't you want to look nice before you go report to the General and Agent Carter? We made you eat so you wouldn't spend your time looking for food instead of at the lovely lady."

"Aren't you all just so damned helpful."

Dernier kissed his fingers to him.

Army life had scorched most of the modesty right out of him, but Steve still turned around to drop his trousers and pull on the cleanest pair left in his foot locker. He turned back around once he was presentable.

Bucky patted him on the shoulder. "You go off and do those good officer things with the brass, Stevie. Me and the boys are going to see who's in town."

Steve smiled broadly and slung a heavy arm around Bucky's shoulders. "Not at all, Sergeant, I need my second in command to make sure I don't forget anything. There'll be time for liberty later-but don't let that stop the rest of you," he said to the rest of the Commandos. They cheered and made their noisy way out of the barracks.

"Bastard," Bucky muttered.

"It's OK," Steve said. "We hit all our objectives, so Phillips is likely to break out the good whiskey once we're finished with the reports.

Bucky grinned as they headed down the corridor toward the bigwig's offices. "When did you learn what good whiskey tastes like?"

"Well, it wasn't from you."

They walked past a knot of communications men near one of the meeting rooms. "They say she was out again last night, helping the bomb victims," one of them said.

Another made a dismissive noise. "Maybe she was, but she's a granny by now, if she's even real. Some newspaper man boosting morale."

A third shook his head. "Official dispatch from the overnight crew. She was in the West End, in that outfit that would make a chorus girl blush, helping haul rubble out of the tenements, and looking none the worse for wear for twenty-five years gone."

Bucky raised an intrigued eyebrow at Steve, who shrugged and cleared his throat. "Excuse me, who are you talking about?"

The group of men looked at each other, then the second man shrugged. "Someone from your family tree, most like, Captain. She showed up near the end of the last war, on the Western Front. Led a charge across No Man's Land through the German trenches to liberate a village."

"Wonder Woman," Bucky said softly. "She was real?"

"Huh?" Steve said.

The communications men blinked. "You Yanks have heard of her?"

"There was a comic book a few years ago," Bucky said. "It didn't last long, though, mothers were scandalized."

"Oh, I remember now," Steve said. He cleared his throat. "And I can see why they were scandalized. She wouldn't really have worn something like that in the Great War, would she?"

The third man shrugged. "My uncle said he saw her once, but there aren't any photographs from then. He said there was less of her skirt than the drawings showed."

"She must have had a name," Bucky said. "The comics only ever called her Wonder Woman."

"It might be in War Ministry records, but if anybody knew her name, it never got out to the rest of us." One of the crew checked his wristwatch, then nudged the others. They bade Steve and Bucky farewell and left.

Steve frowned as he led the way on to Phillip's office. "An early test of the Serum? But they would never have tried it on a woman."

Bucky nodded. "Especially not back then. Or even now." He nudged Steve. "Though Carter would make a terrific Captain Britain."

Steve shoved him back, trying very hard not to imagine the Rebirth tank opening up with his and Peggy's roles reversed, him observing and her sweaty and trying to catch her breath-

And speak of the devil and he shall appear. Around the corner towards the General's office he heard Peggy's voice, as well as a couple of others. He hoped he wasn't blushing as he and Bucky turned the corner.

They both paused. "Holy mother of God," Bucky breathed in a tone Steve hadn't heard since the time Bucky managed to catch a glimpse of Cindy O'Bannon without her sweater on.

There was Peggy, of course, who was talking to a short, plump woman with greying red hair in an expensive dress and hat. Behind the plump woman was a tall, slim, black-haired woman in a black trench coat and fedora. She listened intently to the conversation, her weight balanced as if she was ready to run and only needed a direction. Steve's fingers twitched, moving an imaginary pencil to capture the fierce profile.

Peggy glanced over and smiled. "Ah, gentlemen, back alive, though not from lack of trying, I hear."

The plump woman turned and beamed, a merry smile that looked like she would be fun in a pub, holding her own with the drink and leading the singing of a bawdy tune. The tall woman scanned both men swiftly then smiled, but with a shadowed edge.

Peggy looked at the women. "Ladies, may I present Captain Steve Rogers and Sergeant James Barnes of the U.S. Army. Gentlemen, Lady Etta Candy and her assistant, Miss Prince."

Lady Etta, as the plump woman turned out to be, strode forward with her hand out. "Captain, Sergeant, good to see you back. You had us worried for a few hours there."

Steve glanced at a frowning Bucky, then shook her hand. "I didn't know you were in our chain of command, Your Ladyship."

"She is not," Peggy said firmly, though with a fond smile. "However, you can take the lady out of operations management . . ."

Lady Etta nodded apologetically. "Which is a polite way of saying I'm still a nosy parker." She grinned at Miss Prince. "But I do like to keep my hand in." Miss Prince smiled back while Peggy tried to hide a laugh in a cough.

Steve was torn between gawping at Miss Prince or Peggy, though Peggy won. Bucky was staring at Miss Prince like he might walk into a lightpost and not notice-again. Steve forced himself into being mannerly. "You worked in ops, Your Ladyship?"

All humour fled from Lady Etta's face. "The last war. The Great War," she said bitterly. "The war to end all wars. Bollocks." Miss Prince, her own face solemn, put her hand on Lady Etta's shoulder, and Lady Etta patted it.

Bad enough to have lost older family members to that war, Steve thought. How much worse to have fought in it, lost your friends and loved ones in a fight that was supposed to end all that, then to see it come round again, worse than before.

"Carter!" came Philips' bellow. "Find Rogers!"

"Our cue, I'm afraid," Peggy said. "Ladies, we'll talk later. Gentlemen?"

Lady Etta patted both Steve and Bucky on the chest as she walked by. "Do be careful, my lads, I'd love to have you to dinner when all this mess is over."

Miss Prince took hold of her shoulders. "Come along, Etta." She had an accent, but Steve didn't recognize it.

Bucky turned all his charm on. "It was a pleasure to meet you, Miss Prince."

She smiled at him, but again with that edge. "And I you, Sergeant."

Steve just nodded at her and stepped out of her way. How many charming young men in uniform had she met, only to have them be reported dead two weeks later? Even he and Peggy kept saying "after", just in case. Miss Prince paused at his nod, quickly scanning him one more time. It wasn't the look of lewd speculation he'd come to expect, though, but something assessing, like a commander checking a soldier's readiness for battle. She smiled slightly and moved Lady Etta along.

"Wow," Bucky sighed.

"You're horrible, Barnes," Peggy said, searching through some papers on her desk.

"What's wrong, dear?" Lady Etta's voice came faintly from down the hall. She and Miss Prince had paused at what they must have thought was out of hearing range. "Are you remembering our Steve?"

"A bit," Miss Prince said. "Those two young men-they've been touched by Ares."

Steve frowned. The Greek god of war? That was weirdly poetic.

"Really?" Lady Etta said, sounding honestly concerned. "Even after so long?"

Miss Prince's laugh was grim. "It was likely within their lifetime, Etta. His power could touch even babes in arms. It may be that we'll have to wait till all who were alive when Ares fell have died, before his power is gone. But they continue to teach their children that war is glorious, that dying in this carnage is a noble thing."

Lady Etta sighed. "And it's not as if we *need* a god of war to give us reasons to slaughter each other. It's something we're very good at."

After a moment of silence, Miss Prince said, "Let's go find some tea before I go out."

"Hah, I knew I'd teach you that tea is lovely."

"Steve!"

Bucky poked him hard, and he jumped. "You're ignoring the lady, Steve," Bucky said, poking him again. He frowned. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

Steve poked him back. "Just being amazed all over again at how ugly you are, Buck. After you, Agent Carter."

The bombers came again the next night. More fires bloomed in the West End. Even while the enemy planes still crossed the sky, the Howlies went out to fight the fires and help the victims. They went in uniform, to distinguish themselves from any possible looters, though Steve wore his leather jacket over his gaudy stripes.

Steve liked this kind of work, for all that it was horrific. No one had time to point and yell "Captain America!" The most he got was a suspicious stare that quickly went away as he dove into the piles of rubble to brace the heaviest chunks as rescuers dug for survivors. Bucky was practically a bloodhound, the way he could zero in on signs of life, and the rest of the Howlies used their various talents to make everyone's jobs easier.

Falsworth was comforting a young boy who had been excavated from an air pocket in a collapsed apartment block as Dernier tended to the small kitten he'd been curled around. The little boy was trying his best stiff upper lip while the kitten was gently brushed and washed off. A tiny squeak heralded the furry head coming up, and the little boy rushed over.

"Be soft," Dernier said, carefully handing over the kitten. "Could still be hurt."

"Yes, sir," the boy said, nodding quickly.

Falsworth straightened and looked around. "All right, lad, let's see if we can find your people. Were they in the flat?"

A little boy and his scrap of a kitten was hardly a major victory, but it made Steve happy. He looked around himself for sign of someone looking for a lost child. Movement caught his eye. Just outside the lights, a man was surreptitiously shifting rubble. He reached in and tugged on something, then straightened and slipped his hand into his pocket. Steve yanked his shield off his back and flung it. It skidded across the man's shoulder, knocking him to the ground, ricocheted off a chunk of brick and mortar, then clanged off a twisted girder to return to Steve's hand.

Everyone was staring at him. He nodded towards the man struggling to stand. "Looter, I think."

One of the air raid wardens snarled and stomped towards the man, followed by a pair of Home Guard.

Bucky ghosted up to Steve's shoulder. "Think they'll waste a bullet on him?"

Steve shrugged. "He might just be scrounging some cans of food for his family."

Bucky humphed. "Or he might be pulling jewelry off the hand of a corpse."

Steve nodded grimly as he reached around to hang his shield on his back.

"I was going to say that a shield is of little use when it's not in a warrior's hand," came an amused, nearly familiar voice from nearby shadows, "but I think I'm wrong in this case."

Steve and Bucky turned and, for the second time, were speechless at sight of the woman.

Miss Prince smiled at him with amused tolerance, balanced easily on a slide of rubble. She was wearing armor that looked vaguely Greco-Roman, but it was hard to focus on details with so much . . . skin showing. Her shoulders were bare, and the top of the armor outlined the shape of her, well, bosom. The skirt was just some folds of leather that barely came down to mid-thigh. Steve swallowed and brought his eyes back up fast.

"At least you're not squeaking and flinging a coat around me," she said, her eyes going momentarily sad.

"Uh, Miss, uh, Prince?" Steve stammered. Bucky smacked his arm. "Ow! What!"

"Wonder Woman, you idiot," Bucky hissed.

Miss Prince inclined her head. "That's what your newspaper people call me." She smiled at Steve. "And you are Captain America."

Steve tried very hard not to scuff his boot in the dirt. "Yes, ma'am." He studied her again, looking at the less blatant details. "You fought in the Great War?" She nodded solemnly. "But-how? Was someone else working on a Super Soldier Serum? Was it another batch of scientists?"

She drew herself up and fixed him with a stern look. "I am no product of man's science, Steve Rogers. I am Diana, Princess of Themyscera, daughter of Hippolyta, who crafted me from clay and prayed to Zeus to give me life."

Steve frowned and Bucky poked him again. Steve smacked him back. "Stop that!"

"You think letting yourself get shot up with weird chemicals, then shoved into a tank and bombarded with radiation makes more sense?"

Miss Prince-Diana-looked shocked. "You let them do that to you? That's horrible!"

Bucky nodded fiercely. "That's what I said!"

Diana focused on Bucky for a moment and frowned. Instead of turning on the charm, Bucky fidgeted, then nudged Steve. "I'm sure you two superheroes have a lot to talk about. I'll go check on the boys." He quickly walked away.

"Bucky, wait!" Steve called, but Bucky kept moving. Steve looked back at Diana. "I'm sorry, ma'am, he's not normally so-"

A shout went up as a section of damaged facade fell off the bombed-out apartment building and down to the street. Steve instantly had his shield in his hand and reached towards Diana-only to run into the shield on her arm as she reached for him. She gave him a smile as the last bricks settled.

"Old habits, hm?" she said, before she frowned up at the building. "Mr. McNulty," she called to an air warden, "did that collapse hurt anyone?"

"No, ma'am, nothing new!"

Diana nodded, though she still glared at the building.

Steve looked around to see if there was anything urgent he should put his hand to, then went back to staring at her as stealthily as he could. In addition to her shield, she had a sword on her back, and a coiled rope hung on her hip.

"Is that-um-is that really the Lasso of Truth?"

She raised an eyebrow at him, then smiled and patted the lasso. "Yes, it is. Though it is also much more." She nodded at his shield. "How does it come back to you? We have throwing sticks that will return if they don't hit their target, but if I threw my shield, it would stay thrown."

He felt himself blush down to his toes. Bucky would be so embarrassed for him, clamming up when a beautiful woman showed interest in him. He forced himself to think of her as just a fellow soldier. "She's got a perfect aerodynamic shape, and apparently I've got a good eye for angles. I can put enough momentum and spin into her that gyroscopics take over."

Diana nodded thoughtfully. "I'm surprised it doesn't break your hand when it comes back."

Steve smiled ruefully, flexing his hands. "I gotta admit, they're sore for a couple of hours after a fight."

The All Clear siren blared out across the city, and everyone around relaxed a little before going back to the work of looking for victims.

A woman in uniform came over, carefully carrying two mugs as she picked her way over the rubble. "Mr. McNulty said the work was enough for normal folk to cope with, so you two can have a cuppa and a sit down."

Steve started to protest that he was happy to help, but Diana smiled and took one of the mugs. "Thank you very much, miss." She gave Steve a look that triggered long-standing obedience instincts, and he took the other mug with a bashful, "Thanks, ma'am." The woman nodded briskly and went about her duties.

Diana sipped her tea and sighed happily. "It took me a long time, but I've learned to love tea." She nodded to a stable looking hunk of rubble. "Come sit with me." Steve very nearly whipped off his jacket to cover the dusty bricks before she could sit down, but he got hold of himself in time. He did avert his eyes until she had settled herself and rearranged the panels of her skirt. She gave him a pointed look, then nodded at the pile of bricks next to her. He tried not to feel gawky as he sat down.

They drank their tea for a few minutes, both of them scanning the area. A muted call went out from the far side of the pile, and a stretcher came over, at a slow speed indicating that the person waiting for it was in no hurry for anything anymore.

Diana snarled something Steve didn't understand. "They send their planes over with their bombs, intentionally aiming for the innocents. But we send planes back, and we say we're only bombing factories and ports, but the people working there are no more guilty than the ones here."

Steve nodded, remembering the factory at Azzano. "And sometimes the people working there are prisoners." He couldn't help squirming a little as Diana studied him.

"Peggy speaks highly of you," she finally said. "She doesn't do that of many people."

He knew he was blushing. "Peggy's great, um, very good at her job, um-oh, darn it."

She did him the courtesy of not laughing out loud. "She reminds me of my mother, a wise leader and a great warrior." She sighed. "I miss my mother."

"Oh, I'm sorry-"

"No, she is well, she's on Themyscera. But I have not been home in many years."

"Where's Themyscera?"

She leaned back and gazed into the sky. "It's an island in the Mediterranean, the home of the Amazons since antiquity, protected by the gods from the outside world, though man's war found its way in."

He blinked. "You really are an Amazon, like the comics said? But I thought they, um, you, were a myth."

She gave him a patient smile. "So will you be one day, Captain America."

He remembered Bucky helping him with the Greek mythology homework in school and getting distracted by tales of warrior women. ("They beat up all the heroes in the stories," Bucky said, sitting on Steve's once-again-sickbed, bent over a volume of an old Encyclopedia Britannica whose front page wished Queen Victoria a long and healthy reign. "And it says that to be better archers, they cut off their-" He didn't dare use the actual word where Steve's mother might hear and wonder what they were talking about, so he just gestured vaguely at his chest. "So it wouldn't catch in their bowstrings!") He glanced over to confirm that Diana still had-oh, god, she'd caught him staring.

Diana laughed out loud as he yanked his gaze away and stared at the ground in mortification. "Yes, I have heard that tale," she said, grinning. "And, no, it is not true. There are far easier ways to adjust your aim than to cut off part of your body. And it doesn't take too many miscalculations and catching the string to learn them." She tilted her head and watched him as her smile faded. "I know the stories of your courage in battle, and yet you are still innocent in so many ways. You don't belong here."

Steve's head snapped up. "I couldn't just sit around in Brooklyn while everybody else was doing their bit! And with what Dr. Erskine gave me-" He gestured vaguely at his body. "I was useless before, but now I can make a difference."

She frowned. "You were not born like this?"

He laughed cynically. "Not at all. I was scrawny and sickly and expected to die every winter. But there was a program-" He winced. "And I'm not supposed to talk about that." He blinked at the horror on her face.

"You let the men of science change you so much?"

"I was useless before!"

"No one is useless! You may have not been molded to be a soldier, but I'm certain you were not useless." She shook her head. "But you at least seem to have come to no harm. Are there more of you, that were changed?"

He sighed. "The Army wanted more super soldiers, but the program, well, got disrupted."

"Super soldiers," Diana muttered. "Trying to make men even more efficient at war."

Steve frowned and studied her. "Is that what you meant, when you said we were touched by Ares?" She gave him a suspicious look, and he hunched his shoulders. "Sorry, my hearing is really good now, you weren't out of earshot when you were talking to Lady Etta."

Diana sighed and stared at the rubble at her feet for a moment. "I have met men who delight in war," she said, not looking at Steve. "But they are merely savages, reveling in the power to destroy, thinking it makes them stronger and better than other men. Ares would have been proud of them, he feasted on the carnage of nations trying to destroy each other. You were created to be the ideal soldier. More than that, you're meant to inspire other soldiers to emulate you."

Steve shook his head. "I was never supposed to be the only one. I wasn't supposed to some kind of symbol."

"But you are." She gave him a sympathetic smile. "But I'm glad you're the only one. I hate to think of what other kind of men may have been given your power. Why were you the first?"

"Dr. Erskine chose me, out of a platoon of stronger, better soldiers, little, shrimpy me. The night before the procedure, he said he didn't want me to be a good soldier, he wanted me to be a good man."

Diana nodded thoughtfully. "I would like to meet this Dr. Erskine."

"I'm afraid he's dead."

She made a cynical noise. "Of course he is."

Steve stared across the rubble, clasping his hands together hard. "What's wrong with Bucky?"

She did him the courtesy of not telling him he was wrong. She looked around the area and spotted Bucky and the other Commandos on the other side of the ruined square. "Are his ears as good as yours?"

"Nearly," he whispered.

"You said you were the only one in your program," she said more softly than before.

"He was captured. Tortured. Experimented on. By the Red Skull."

"By Athena's spear," Diana snarled. "These Germans and their experiments. So is he like you now?"

Steve so wanted to say No. "Kind of. He heals faster, he doesn't sleep as much." He licks his lips. "He's more bloodthirsty when we fight, and he's got a knife he fidgets with when he's on watch. I think the only time I've seen him relaxed is after a fight."

"Have you spoken to him about this?"

He shook his head.

She hesitated, then put her hand on his shoulder. "I'm a warrior, not a sage. You can do more for him than I can." She glanced Bucky's way again. "The Amazons have trained for centuries for a war we prayed would never come. My mother's sister, General Antiope, taught me everything I know about battle, even though my mother tried to keep me far from fighting. But it's in my blood. Battle is what I was made for.

She gazed off over the rubble. "Even among the disciplined Amazon soldiers, though, there are those whose hearts only truly come to life when they take up arms. There's a fire in them, and their battle cries are as much joy as they are a challenge. Antiope said they're not eager to kill, they just love pitting themselves against others, testing themselves at every opportunity."

Steve shook his head again. "Fighting doesn't bring him joy. He's-he's afraid, but not about the fight. I think he's afraid of himself."

"Were you afraid of yourself, when you changed?"

"I was afraid to move for the first few days, I kept bumping into things and breaking them. My senses were all over the place, I could barely make sense of the world-" He broke off at the look of 'You are being very slow, Steve Rogers' Diana was giving him. "And he's probably going through the same thing."

"And you are probably the only person who understands it."

"He says there's nothing wrong with him," Steve said softly. "He gets mad when I push. Which means he's the one who shouldn't be here, they should have sent him home, no matter how much he yelled about it. But nobody at home would understand what's happening to him, and I bet the scientists would have been more than happy to get their hands on him." He took a shaky breath. "And the idea of doing this without him makes my brain scream."

Diana sighed. "I do wish Etta hadn't explained why I couldn't talk about sacred bands. Things would make so much more sense to so many of you."

They both looked up at a whistle from the other side of the square. Bucky waved for Steve to join the Commandos.

"Looks like I have to go," Steve said, standing up. Diana got to her feet while he was just beginning to offer her a hand up.

"I should continue my patrol," she said. She held out her hand, then took hold of Steve's forearm when he reached for her. "I hope I will see you again, Captain Rogers."

"I hope so too, ma'am. Maybe out in the field."

She shook her head. "I stay in the city, this time. A sword and shield are not much use on the battlefields of this war, and I was always meant to protect the innocent."

Stopping bullies was almost the same thing. Almost. "Good luck, ma'am."

She nodded and stepped away. "Good hunting, Captain."

The Howlies were all giving him approving looks as he walked back to them. "None of you have any class whatsoever," he told them.

"Neither do you," Dugan said, "and it doesn't keep you from talking to beautiful women who aren't wearing much."

Steve ignored him. "What have we got, Bucky?"

Bucky seemed to make a point of turning away from the direction that Diana had gone. "Carter called, we've got orders." His cocky grin didn't reach his eyes. "Maybe we'll get some sleep before they ship us out."

Steve grabbed his shoulder. "I hope so." He didn't say anything else, not in front of the others.

A man fell. Another man's heart went to cold ash. Steve Rogers prowled around London HQ, barely acknowledging the people who tried to talk to him. He turned a corner, and Diana Prince stepped out of a shadow in front of him. He glared at her, and she just gazed back at him, meeting his furious eyes without qualm.

"If you need another warrior at your side for this," she said calmly, "I'm with you."

He'd found the well-buried reports of Wonder Woman's actions in the last war, especially the story of her walking into a German High Command gala with a sword down the back of her dress. He could easily imagine how well she'd fit into an assault on Schmidt's fortress. But he shook his head.

"The innocents still need you. And there aren't any innocents where I'm going."

She studied him a moment, then silently nodded and stepped aside.

Another man fell. Peggy Carter sat in her chair long after Howard stopped trying to get a signal through to the Valkyrie and started mapping Steve's course and arranging for search and rescue-or recovery.

She stood silently and walked out of the room, ignoring the veiled looks from the people around her. A vast fog surrounded her mind; it took all her focus to put one foot in front of the other. If she took a deep breath, she wouldn't be able to let it out without sobbing.

She reached her office on automatic, went in, closed and locked the door behind her.

Lady Etta leaned forward in the visitor's chair. "Oh, my dear," she said, fighting tears.

Peggy hiccuped, blinking hard and clinging to her dignity.

From the other side of the room, Diana stepped towards her and silently opened her arms.

Peggy stumbled forward and let herself cry.