The Right Thing
Disclaimer: Yeah, own absolutely nothing Marvel, Agent Carter, Captain America, Disney, ABC, or Whedon-like. Just carving out a bit of the sandbox in which to play. First time playing in this particular sandbox.
"I asked her to turn herself in."
"Hell, I asked her not to run."
Jack gingerly worked his jaw back and forth, working out the soreness he'd never admit to. Somehow, though, he knew Sousa wouldn't ever give him grief about it. Even though he had every right to. "She wasn't ever gonna do either, was she?"
Daniel sighed. "Nope."
Jack matched Sousa's sigh with one of his own as he poured them each a measure of bourbon from Dooley's stash.
The smooth burn as he swallowed and the ensuing warmth low in his belly brought back a visceral memory of another shot—of a glance across a campsite in a wintry Eastern European wilderness. Of the first glimmers of awareness that the woman he so dismissingly called "Marge" when he damned well knew she preferred Peggy—whom he considered inferior by dint of her gender—was far more than he could have ever imagined.
And even after all he'd seen in Russia—the decisiveness, the black humor so common to soldiers in the field, the obvious respect and deference the Howling Commandos—some of the bravest sons of bitches Jack'd ever encountered—the stuff of legend—paid her… her—Peggy goddamned Carter—
Even after bearing witness to some of the toughest fighting and balls out courage he'd ever seen—
After benefitting from some of the greatest kindness ever bestowed on him—
He realized he hadn't known a damned thing about Peggy Carter.
That even Sousa, who'd combed through the majority of her file with a fine-toothed comb, hadn't truly recognized the depths of the woman awaiting the next round with them in the interrogation room didn't do a whole lot to appease him.
What they had before them now, however…
"You thought all along she got this job just because she was Cap's girl, didn't you?"
Jack instinctively bristled at Sousa's tone, even though his conscious mind recognized there wasn't a damned accusatory thing in it. He was simply asking what everyone had assumed.
"Didn't you?"
Sousa shrugged, clearly uncomfortable, but finally said, "Yeah… I guess. When I thought about it at all."
"You telling me you didn't think about it?"
"I was too goddamned busy trying to survive this hellpit, Jack. Just like she was."
There it was again—that note in the other man's voice that Jack had easily recognized from the first. That had needled him into sending Sousa rounding the lockers knowing damn well he'd find a half-dressed Peggy on the other side. And look where that stunt had gotten them. If Sousa hadn't ever gotten a look at Carter's bare shoulders, who knows how much longer it would have taken them to figure out she was the mysterious blonde?
Fresh anger flooded him and he wasn't exactly sure why.
"But you liked her."
Sousa kept his gaze focused on the files before him. "Yeah, I liked her. And so did you."
Again, nothing accusatory in his tone—just offered as a simple statement of fact. Even if he didn't know the particulars, Sousa was well aware things had changed between Jack and Peggy in Russia.
"Yeah." Jack poured them each another shot. "I did." He gestured with the bottle. "And so did he."
Sousa lifted the photo contained within the file—a publicity still of the Commandos extracted from one of the many newsreels screened during the war. Used to boost morale and let both the troops and their families back home know the forces for good were still fighting the good fight. That they were winning and were going to defeat not only those Nazi bastards, but the more insidious Red Skull and his Hydra minions.
In the shot, the Commandos stood huddled around a map and their leader, Captain America himself. With his right hand, he indicated something on the map while in his left he held a pocket watch—clearly a cherished piece judging by how he kept his large hand cupped protectively around it, though whether it was the watch itself that held meaning or the picture so carefully fitted into the lid opposite the face was impossible to tell from the grainy black and white image.
"You know she was initially his superior?"
Jack took the picture from Sousa, focusing not on Captain America or any of the Commandos, but rather, the shot of Peggy that Rogers so carefully protected. He noted the insignia on the collar of the uniform she wore and realized for the first time that during the war she would have outranked most of the men with whom she currently worked—excepting perhaps Dooley. A startling realization reinforced by the extensive nature of the files they were only now privy to for the first time.
"Why were the files we had on her here so damned thin?" he asked as he set the photograph aside in lieu of a different folder, this one filled with more photographs—with Rogers, with Howard Stark, with the Commandos, with Colonel Chester Phillips, for God's sake. There were images of Peggy in the field, much as he'd seen her in Russia, confident in her olive drab and boots, rifle cradled with the ease of one for whom this wasn't an unusual occurrence. Shots of her in a war room, standing before a table of strategic maps and addressing groups of soldiers while Phillips and Rogers stood off to the side and there wasn't a damned face in that photograph that wasn't focused on the uniformed woman before them.
"Scuttlebutt is, it was 'Need to Know' basis." Daniel's tone was dry as he unpacked yet another box—this one marked "1943."
"Well, it would've been damned helpful to know all of this beforehand, don't you think?"
"Would it, Jack? Would it really have made a damned bit of difference how you saw her? How any of us really saw her?" Sousa's voice bounced off the walls, uncharacteriscally agitated. "Any more than we would have believed this guy would ever somehow turn into Captain America?"
Jack stared down at the image Daniel held out to him.
"You know the team found this same picture of him in her apartment? Framed and hidden in a drawer."
Jack took the picture from Sousa and even though he'd seen it a thousand times, same as everyone else in the U.S. had during the war, he studied it as closely as if he were seeing it for the first time. At first glance, he just appeared to be the proverbial 98-pound weakling—the sort of guy that yeah, Jack would have given a fair amount of shit to. Would have mocked mercilessly for thinking he had a shot in hell of fighting on the front or even working an assembly line. Just another 4-F flatfoot, brother—totally useless for anything other than maybe cultivating a Victory Garden with the other housewives. However, Jack couldn't deny that even in the bony shoulders and skinny visage of Steve Rogers there were still the undeniable signs of the man who would become America's savior. They were right there in the determined gaze and the proud set of his carriage—that of a true soldier. Of a true man. He set the picture down beside one he'd just unearthed from the "1943" file box. In this one, the transformed Steve Rogers stood before Peggy in the midst of a muddy Army camp, holding what appeared to be a damaged transmitter up for her inspection. He looked equal parts chagrined and amused while in turn, she looked equal parts annoyed and fond. The biggest thing Jack took away from the picture, however, was the utter respect with which Rogers regarded her and in turn, the absolute calm and certainty radiating from Peggy.
Not so long ago, she'd been respected.
She'd been loved.
The woman in the next room—mistreated by the men she worked with, mistrusted by all, accused of being a traitor—had had the unwavering respect and love of the man who stood above all for doing the right thing at all costs—even that of his life and a future with that woman.
He'd trusted her to understand and forgive him.
Steve Rogers had been known for unshakable honor and impeccable judgment while Jack—
While Jack…
Hell.
"Do you think she's telling the truth?"
Jack considered Sousa's question although really, was there any considering to do? Surrounded as they were by all the photographs and the reports, even with their heavily redacted pages, indicating that "Need to Know" went far beyond his or Sousa's pay grades, despite their current situation. And that Peggy damn well knew it.
He poured them each a final shot. They didn't need to be hammered when they returned to face their… captive? Coworker?
When they returned to face Agent Peggy Carter.
"Yeah, Sousa. I think she's telling the truth. How much she'll be willing to tell the likes of us, however—"
Daniel held his glass up to the light as if the answers could be found in the glimmering depths of the eighty proof hooch. "Not like we've given her much reason to trust us. Even before all this hell broke loose."
"Which means we're going to have to trust her that much more."
Daniel lowered his glass and took a contemplative sip, wincing slightly. "You think it'll work?"
"It's the only shot we've got."
Daniel nodded. "Do you think you can?"
Rather than answer, Jack tossed his drink back and set the glass on the table, punctuating his non-answer with more force than strictly necessary. And he wouldn't ask Sousa the question in return because he suspected he already knew the answer—and he wasn't all that keen to hear it articulated out loud for fear his own shortcomings would be brought to light. Again. Instead, he began assembling the files, even as he acknolwedged in the back of his mind that—like not answering Sousa—he was doing nothing more than delaying the inevitable. Buying time. Peggy Carter scared the crap out of him—for a lot of reasons— but mostly because he was finally beginning to understand how very little he understood her.
"Jack?"
He glanced up to find Sousa waiting by the door, a handful of files in the hand not grasping the crutch. Funny how standing there, crutch and all, Sousa nevertheless radiated the much the same air and manner of Steve Rogers—the proud carriage, the demeanor of a man who would do the right thing at all costs.
"Yeah—I'm ready." But he hesitated, taking a final glance into the file box at the photograph of Rogers holding his pocketwatch—holding Peggy, with her resolute gaze—close.
Carefully, he lowered the lid on the box and lifted his gaze to meet Sousa's.
"You like her, don't you?"
A slight lift of one eyebrow indicated that Daniel had indeed caught the shift in tense from when he'd earlier posed the same question.
"I do. And so do you."
He sighed and nodded. "Yeah."
So there it was. Out in the open. They both liked her. More, he suspected, than either of them were willing to admit. For a lot of different reasons. And it seemed as if they were both increasingly willing to believe in Agent Peggy Carter.
Would they be able to do the right thing for her?
He instinctvely knew Sousa would.
But could he?
The question wound itself around him, gripping him with the same indecisiveness that had held him frozen in the middle of that Russian firefight.
Could he do the right thing when the time came?
Could he?
"Jack?"
He gave the file box a final decisive thump, closing the lid on Peggy Carter's past. "Let's go."