Author's Notes: Can someone send me an avengers prompt or a link. Also, I adore Steve Rogers. He's a heroic war veteran that doesn't know what to do with himself when there's no war left to fight. "Too trapped in a war to be at peace, too damaged to be at war."

Face it, Rogers. Everything special about you came out of a bottle.

The words echoed at him as he stare at the empty walls of apartment. It was days after both men had apologized, but the words would not stop ringing. They would not stop haunting him.

What made you so different? The grotesque red mask snarled at him, silently demanding why you, why not me?

He renewed sketching, his hands flying as fast as lighting, reckless and daring, but he moved with too much pressure forced on, his pencil marking deep and heavy marks.

He was a symbol, not a person, but that was fine. He was fine. He was government property after all, the kind that was lucky to not be locked in a lab, tested, tortured, listed as a failure and then forgotten until they had further use for him. He remembered how well to lie with his mouth, but Peggy had looked right through him.

You could be more, Peggy had urged with wide eyes, as she kept her gaze locked on the drawing of him as a dancing monkey.

He drew Peggy, Bucky, and his team.

He drew them, again and again, until his pencil snapped from the pressure, trying to recapture his family, the ones he would have died for, the ones he had died for, only to reawakened.

You've been asleep, Cap, for almost seventy years, the man said after he had escaped the mockery and lies of the room. His visible eye had roamed over him, making him defensive yet still defeated. I have plans for you, the mans body language had said, his eyes gleaming with triumph as Steve had backed down, allowed them to explain things to him. You're government property, Steve had heard the meanings behind the "offer" for a room, clothes, and technology. You're government property, soldier, and you always will be.

Steve Rogers picked up another pencil, shiny and new, not cracked and broken, and drew Peggy, devoid of madness, face old and wrinkled. Her eyes were soft and sad, but lit with as much of iron strength as the day he had to leave her behind. She seemed to silently repeat the same message trough body language.

You could be more.

How, Steve wanted to ask, could he do that with her, without Bucky, without his team?

You could be more.

He pencil snapped as he drew her imploring smile, and if he coughed to cover the laugh (the sound more like a choked sob), then it was no one's business but his.

You could be more, her words echoed, haunting him.

No, Steve thought what he could not selfishly say out loud, not without you.