Author's note: Thank you sooo much to everyone who reviewed the last chapter. As a reward, here is a nice looooong chapter for you! I hope you enjoy it.


Unit 5: cell phones and the internet and Rule 34 (Oh my!)


Learning targets: The student will. . .

—Make more cinnamon rolls. Make all the cinnamon rolls. Oh god, such delicious cinnamon rolls.

—Stop calling a cell phone a "Telephone".

—Learn how to use the phone, camera, and search apps

—Send a text message

—Oh my god learn how to type already!

—Ok, fine, learn voice-to-text. It's easier anyway.

—Find information on the internet. For example, the phone number for Raymour and Flanigan

—Learn what the hell the internet is.

—Stop gaping. It's unbecoming.

—Learn how to avoid accidentally visiting porn sites

—Stop choking and turning such adorable shades of red

—Learn how to clear the internet browser history

—Not be such a complete dork at the library. Honestly, it's embarrassing.

—Ok, fine, be a dork. Be an adorable, embarrassing dork. That smile is worth it.


(July 1, 2012)

The next morning, he is up early to put the cinnamon rolls in the oven and cut up weird fruits. He irons his shirt and pants while they bake, until the apartment is filled with such a delicious smell that he has to stop and go to the kitchen just to breathe it in. While he's there he grabs an apple out of the basket on the counter to tide him over because he's STARVING.

He hears a knock on the door just as he's pulling the pan of cinnamon rolls out of the oven, so he goes to answer it with one dishtowel still wrapped around his hand and another under his arm. He thinks it's awfully polite of her to knock when she could obviously just come on in like she did yesterday.

"Hey," she says breezily, holding out a couple of bags to him on her way in the door. He quickly tosses the dishtowels over his shoulder so he can take them. "Brought you some sh—stuff I thought you might like."

"Really?" He peeks in one bag and discovers a sketchpad, which he eagerly pulls out. Underneath are several pencils, an eraser, and even a pack of colored pencils! "Thanks," he chokes out in surprise.

"No prob. Look in the other bag too."

He tucks the sketchpad under his arm and digs in the other bag to find a file folder, and a clear plastic box containing a watch with a round, white face and big black numbers. He looks up to find her grinning cheekily at him.

"Now you'll always know what time it is," she says. "No more excuses."

"Ok, thank you." Even though he knows she meant it as a joke, he's surprised at the thoughtfulness of the gift. He can't help but smile at the idea of having a real sketchpad and pencils. "What's in the file folder?"

"Info about your friends."

His smile abruptly falls. His friends. His friends are gone, and even if they are still alive, they won't be the same. Nothing is the same. Why did he even want this information anyway? Why did he want to torture himself by confirming how they had all moved on without him?

When he looks up to see if Hill has noticed his distress, she is frowning at him. "Hold still." She leans in and brushes her thumb against his cheek. "Is that powdered sugar?" she asks, inspecting her thumb then popping it into her mouth.

Embarrassed, he tries to subtly wipe away the bit of powder left behind on his cheek, but she obviously hasn't noticed because she is already pushing past him toward the kitchen, wide-eyed. "What is that amazing smell?!"

Quickly Steve sets the file folder and other items down on the coffee table, and follows her into the kitchen while trying to rearrange his face into a more upbeat expression. He doesn't want her to tease him about his puppy-dog eyes again, but it's hard when he doesn't even know what they look like.

"Cinnamon rolls," he says as he moves past her to get out the plates.

"Where did you get them? Did you buy them at the mini-market?"

"No, I made them." He sets the plates on the table and pulls out knives and forks.

"Made them?" she demands. "The refrigerated kind? I didn't see you buy those."

"No, we bought the ingredients," he says while he sets out the silverware.

"Wait. You MADE made these? Like, from scratch?"

"Yes."

Her wide-eyed look of awe is sort of unnerving. He ducks his head shyly and keeps moving around the kitchen, taking out the orange juice he squeezed and the bowl of unfamiliar fruits he sliced up this morning, while she continues to stare at him in obvious shock.

"I told you I could cook," he says, almost defensively, without making eye contact. He folds up a dishtowel and uses it as a pad under the pan of cinnamon rolls on the table. He can see out of the corner of his eye that she is still staring at him while he dishes up a hot, gooey roll for each of them and slathers on the powdered sugar icing.

"You can sit down," he says, and she drops bonelessly into a chair, gaping at the cinnamon roll like she's never seen one before. Well, maybe she hasn't. How would he know?

He sits down too, and starts pouring orange juice.

"I don't remember buying orange juice," she says without taking her eyes off the cinnamon roll. Is she drooling?

"We bought oranges," he reminds her. Yes, she's definitely drooling.

"You—you made fresh-squeezed orange juice?"

"Yes," he says hesitantly. Is there some other way to get orange juice? Maybe they have big machines that make it out of fancy chemicals now. He has no idea. "You can eat it now. I think it's probably cool enough."

She doesn't say anything, just picks up the cinnamon roll, ignoring the knife and fork, and takes a small bite. Her eyes slide closed while she chews slowly. He watches with growing anxiety. Maybe they're horrible. They looked like they had risen all right, but he was really just guessing about the yeast.

"Oh. my. god."

"Do you like them?"

"Oh my god. Marry me."

"What?!" Instantly the tips of his ears get hot and he knows they must be bright red. Why can't his hair be longer to hide them? Surely it must have been longer when they dug him out of the ice, right? Did someone give him a haircut while he was unconscious? And why has he never wondered about that before?

"These are aMAzing." She takes another bite, then another, all the while making soft moaning noises that almost sound indecent. "I've never tasted cinnamon rolls like this. So good!" Another bite, then she repeats, "I can't believe you made these from scratch!" He's a little annoyed by it because he did tell her he could cook, but at least she's not talking about marriage anymore so that's good.

Her cinnamon roll has almost disappeared before he even takes a bite of his, then she gulps down her orange juice and takes another roll. He shakes his head and starts on his before she can eat them all.

When she has finished the second roll, she starts piling pieces of the odd fruits on her plate. "Oh, that's right, you haven't eaten any of these. Did you try them yesterday?"

"No, ma'am." He doesn't tell her he was saving them for her. That might come off as a little sappy.

"Ok, tasting party!" she exclaims with apparently genuine enthusiasm. "Try this one first." She holds out a piece of the fuzzy green fruit that has a bird name (Osprey? Emu?).

He takes it and inspects it closely. The fur looks. . . furry. Not really like food, but she seems to think it's edible, and it was sold in the produce section of the store, so it must be food.

Finally he puts the piece in his mouth and just tastes it for a moment. It's. . . not bad. A little slimy, but the flavor is pretty good. He chews it up, and finds the fur and seeds get stuck in his teeth.

"What do you think of the kiwi?" Hill asks eagerly.

Right, kiwi, not emu. "Um. Not bad."

"Next time cut the peel off. Helps with the texture."

Oh, right, he remembers now that she said she usually cut the fur off. "Ok, I will."

"Here, try cantaloupe next." She hold out a piece of something pale orange. He remembers the large fruit it came from was full of slimy seeds that he didn't know what to do with. He finally ended up mixing them in with the fruit, but he sees that she has picked them out and set them aside, so that was obviously wrong.

He takes the fruit and sniffs it before popping it into his mouth. This one is. . . disgusting. Yes, that's the only word for it. It's all he can do not to spit it out. He looks up to discover Hill smirking at him.

"Don't like that one, huh?"

"Not really, sorry."

"You don't have to apologize to me. I hate cantaloupe." She picks the rest of the pale orange pieces out of the fruit bowl and sets them aside with the seeds. "Try pineapple." She is holding out a piece of pulpy yellow fruit on her fork, and he's not sure what to do. Does she want him to eat it right off the fork?

He settles for pulling it off the fork with his fingers and inspects it. He hadn't been sure what to do with the greenish rind, but she has cut it off. It smells good, so he takes a careful bite, wary now after the cantaloupe.

Pineapple is amazing! He decides it's probably the best thing he's ever tasted. Well, maybe not as good as peanut butter (which he never even got to taste until after the serum because of his allergies), but definitely up there in the top ten.

"Better?" Hill asks with an amused twinkle in her eye.

"Wow, that's really. . . good!"

"Just good?"

"Great. Amazing. Delicious. Yeah, all those."

This gets an honest-to-God laugh from her, which makes him smile. It's nice to be able to make her laugh, because he wasn't sure it was possible.

They keep trying different fruits. He likes:

Mango
Nectarine (exactly like a peach but no fuzz? Perfection)
Dragonfruit
Guava

He doesn't like:

Starfruit
Papaya (slimy and disgusting!)
Passionfruit

Hill doesn't like parsnips or turnips. She would have starved to death in his neighborhood in the 1930s.

When they finish with the tasting party, Hill takes another cinnamon roll and devours it without even putting it on her plate, then licks each of her fingers with her eyes closed and an expression of pure bliss on her face. With her last finger in her mouth, she finally opens her eyes and notices he is watching her.

"Um. . . yeah," she says with a sheepish grin. "Do you mind if I take a couple of those cinnamon rolls home with me? I have a colleague who would love one."

"Sure, no problem."

She pries two more cinnamon rolls free from the pan and wraps them up in foil, then tucks the package into her backpack. " Ok, let me just wash my hands and we'll get started. I hope you charged your phone."

He doesn't know what that means. While she is washing her hands, she turns her head and obviously notices his quizzical expression because her mouth twists. "You didn't charge your phone, did you?"

"I'm sorry, Ma'am, I don't know. I mean. I'm not sure. Um."

She snorts. "Ok, it's probably still got some juice left because I don't think you've used it much, right?"

"No, Ma'am, just to call you."

"Go get your phone and charger and we'll get started then."

". . . Charger?"

"That cord."

"I'm sorry, Ma'am, I don't think there was a cord. You just gave me the telephone."

"Really?" Her voice is skeptical. "Let me see."

"Ok." He obediently trots to his bedroom and fetches the telephone from the nightstand, but there is no cord that he can find. When he pushes the button, the window doesn't light up. How much is he going to be spending on batteries if they die that fast? And how do batteries fit in something small anyway?

He takes the telephone out and hands it to her. "Sorry, it's not coming on."

"Battery's dead, which is why you should be charging it," she says. "Where's the box it came in?"

"Oh. I put it in with the cords and stuff." He digs through the box of random junk he didn't know what to do with and comes up with the little black box. He hasn't even opened it, so he has no idea if it holds a charger, which as far as he knows is something to put under a fancy plate. Bucky's ma had a set that she used for holiday dinners. Bucky always groaned when his ma told him to set them out because he knew it meant they would be washing twice as many dishes.

Hill takes the little box and opens it, and pulls out a black cord attached to a small silver box with a plug on it. This she plugs into the wall next to the table, then beckons him over.

"See here?" she says, pointing to a small slot on the bottom of the telephone. "Plug the charger in here. You do it." She hands it to him, and he pushes the tab on the end of the charger into the slot. The phone rewards him with a soft beep, and a picture of a battery appears in the window.

"Ok, we're in business," Hill says briskly. Steve stifles a sigh of relief because at least it's not broken. He misses having equipment that he knows how to fix. He can take apart and put back together an SCR-536 handie-talkie, but he has no idea what to do if there's a problem with the telephone.

While she fiddles with the phone, he stacks and clears the dishes, then takes the washrag and wipes off the table. She drags her chair around so they are sitting side by side and sets his telephone on the table in front of him.

"Ok, time to learn how to use the phone," she says, rubbing her hands together. "Go ahead and unlock it."

"I already know how, ma'am. I used it to call you, remember?" After he says it, he realizes that maybe reminding her of that isn't such a good idea. He quickly unlocks the phone so she knows he's not trying to get out of the lesson.

"That's good, but there's a lot more it can do."

He also knows it can track him, but he's not going to mention that. "Like what?"

"Well, first off, there's a camera."

"There is? A telephone can take pictures?"

"It's a smart phone, or cell phone, not a 'telephone', and yeah, it can take pictures. See? Just push the icon that looks like a camera." She points to a little picture of a camera, and when he taps it, the window goes dark. He has a sudden lurch of anxiety that maybe he broke it.

"What happened?"

"Here." Hill picks up the phone and holds it horizontally, and suddenly he's looking at a view of his mother's chair by the window. His eyes go wide.

"See? Just tap here and it will take a picture."

He's too busy staring at the miniature living room on the window. He can see everything: the file folder laying crookedly on the coffee table with the sketchpad and pencils stacked on top, the pile of library books on the side table, the corner of the sofa, the sunlight coming in the window, Hill's backpack abandoned by the door. How does it do that?!

"Go ahead, tap it," Hill says with a note of amusement in her voice. She's laughing at him again. Great.

He carefully taps where she indicated, the phone makes a noise like a shutter clicking, and the picture freezes and disappears.

"Ok, now look at this." Hill taps the corner of the screen, and the photo appears in the window, a frozen image of his living room in living color, sharper and clearer than any photograph he has ever seen.

"Wow," he breathes.

"Ok, now take a picture of me," Hill says, tapping the screen again and pushing the phone into his hands. He fumbles with it a minute before getting it oriented properly. He has been told he has a photographic memory, but he has never held an actual camera before.

"Ready?"

"Yep." She smiles for the camera, a genuine, friendly smile, and it is gorgeous. He stares at the window, mesmerized. It's a wonder anyone draws anymore, if they have cameras that can do that. "Go ahead," she prompts him through clenched teeth. Her smile has faltered a little. He quickly taps the icon to take the picture before the smile can disappear, but he's too late. It has lost some of its luster, and in the resulting photograph, she looks awkward and frozen.

"Let me see," she says, reaching for the telephone, so he reluctantly hands it over. "Ugh. No." She taps the bottom of the window, and the picture disappears. Then she holds up the phone facing toward herself, smiles and taps the screen, but the smile is different this time, not so genuine and easy as before.

"Selfie," she says with an almost embarrassed expression, showing him the picture. It's nice, but he wishes he had been quicker in capturing the real joy he had caught a glimpse of earlier. "You try it."

"Ok." He holds up the telephone the same way she did, and now his own face is reflected in the window like a mirror. He blinks at himself. His eyes. . . have they always looked so sad? His eyebrows are pulled down at the outside, and there is a pucker between them. No wonder she called them "Puppy dog eyes". He tries to smile like Hill did, but his eyes don't change no matter how much he tries. Finally he taps the button anyway and takes his own picture. He wants to erase it immediately just like she did, but it won't change the truth that is written all over his face.

Hill pulls the telephone out of his hand and pushes the button at the bottom. The little pictures (icons, she called them, as if they are religious relics) reappear in the window. "Let's see. I think I'll show you the map app next. You're gonna need it if you don't want to get lost all the time."

Yes, not getting lost is a good idea. Unfortunately his photographic memory doesn't extend to street signs and directions, although he can usually get around using landmarks that are seared into his brain. Could get around, that is, since all of his familiar landmarks are long gone (He can feel the little pucker between his eyebrows, now that he knows it's there, but he can't get it to smooth out).

"Ok, tap the map icon," Hill says, pointing it out, so he does, and suddenly he's looking at a map of his street. "Now scroll south and you'll find Brooklyn."

Scroll? How exactly? And which direction? Terms like south and north don't mean a whole lot to him, but he's reluctant to admit that to Agent Hill.

"Go ahead," Hill prompts, pointing at the screen.

"I'm sorry, Ma'am, I'm not sure. . ." He trails off, thinking the next words out of her mouth will be to call him an idiot.

"Oh, sorry," Hill says with a look of chagrin. "Scroll like this." She slides her finger up the window, and like magic, the map moves upward. He tries it, moving in the same direction, and suddenly recognizes the name of a street, Olive Street! And there's St. Nicholas' church, where he would sit with Bucky in the last row, trying not to fall asleep during Mass.

"Recognize that?" Hill asks, and he nods enthusiastically.

"I went to Mass there with Bucky."

"You can zoom in if you want a streetview." Again her words make no sense, but she clarifies before he has worked up the courage to ask. "Like this." She puts her finger and thumb on the screen and spreads them apart, and suddenly the view enlarges and changes to what looks like a real picture of the church in full color, which looks almost exactly the same as he remembers it. He gapes at it wordlessly, lost in memories. The carnival on the church lawn where he accidentally ate crackerjacks and broke out in hives. . . Playing stickball in the parking lot and Bucky breaking a window. . . Trimming the hedges to help pay for the window because he refused to let Bucky take the rap alone.

"Well, anyway, we'll practice with the map more tomorrow," Hill says abruptly, tapping the home button. The church and street disappear and he doesn't know how to get them back. "I need to show you how to text."

"Text?"

"Yeah, like this. Open the messages app. It looks like a speech bubble."

"Umm. . . Ok." He taps the speech bubble, and what looks like a tiny little typewriter appears in the window. How is he supposed to type on keys that small?! He can barely type on a regular typewriter.

"Start typing my name and it will pop up."

". . . okay," He starts to type, very slowly and carefully. The letters appear in a little box above the typewriter as he types.

A . . . f

No, that's not right, and he doesn't know how to fix it.

Hill reaches over his shoulder and taps on the little X. The f disappears. He tries again.

A. . . g. . .w

Shoot! He tries to tap the X, but gets the l instead. Now it says

Agwl

He bites his lip and tries again, this time managing to hit the X, but the next hit is the m, so now it says

Agwm

He bites his lip harder and tries again, this time hitting the X until the wm disappear. He keeps typing, even though he can feel Hill's impatient eyes boring a hole in the top of his head. His ears are burning like they're on fire.

Ag. . . e. . . m

"Goddammit!" he mutters in frustration, and then instantly remembers he is in the presence of a lady. "I'm sorry," he says quickly. "I mean darn it." He glances up to see that Hill's face is a contradictory mixture of annoyance and amusement. Oh, God, he hopes she doesn't start laughing at him, or he might throw the phone across the room.

"Sorry. They didn't teach us boys how to type in school," he mumbles.

He hits the X again, erases the m, and tries again, this time hitting the n. Suddenly Agent Hill's name appears below the box, much to his relief.

"Just tap my name and it will put it in the address box."

He does so, and a new box appears. "There, I did it," he says, trying to hand the telephone to her, but she pushes it back to him.

"No, no, that was just the address box. Now you need to type the text."

"What do you mean?"

"Like this." She takes out her own telephone, taps the screen a few times, and suddenly his phone makes a dinging noise. Words appear in the window.

This is a text. Now send me one.

He glances up at her, bemused. Ok, he can do that, even though he doesn't understand why he would want to. Maybe he can do that. Tucking his tongue between his teeth, he starts trying to type.

T. . .g (no, delete that). . . h. . . o (shoot! Delete). . . i. . . s. . .space. . .o (Argh! Delete). . . i. . .

"Maybe I should teach you how to do voice to text," Hill interrupts his efforts in a dry voice.

"Huh? What's that?"

"See the thing that looks like an old-fashioned microphone? Tap that."

He does so, and a little squiggly line appears at the bottom of the screen. He looks up at Hill quizzically. "What do I do now?"

The words What do I do now appear in the box. He blinks at them in surprise.

"It can understand me?"

Those words also appear in the box, so now it reads What do I do now it can understand me.

"How do I get it to stop?"

What do I do now it can understand me how do I get it to stop

Hill laughs. "Tap the microphone again."

What do I do now it can understand me how do I get it to stop tap the microphone again

He taps the microphone and the squiggly line disappears, thankfully. Typing on the tiny typewriter is difficult, but he's not sure the microphone is any better.

"Now hit send."

"I don't want to send you that nonsense," he protests, but she waves him off.

"It doesn't matter. It's just to try it out. It's not like I don't already know what it says."

"Ok, fine." He taps the send, and the phone makes a buzzing sound. The words turn blue and pop up in the window above the box, then Hill's phone dings.

She turns her phone around to show him the words have appeared on her screen. "See?"

"Ok, that's interesting, but is it for people who are deaf or something?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, why couldn't we just talk to each other?"

She pulls a face. "Ugh, talking on the phone? No thanks. I'd rather text anyday."

"But if we're in the same room—"

"This doesn't just work when we're sitting in the same room," she clarifies. "You can text someone on the other side of the world."

"You can?"

"Yep. Watch this." She taps her phone, then says into it, "Hey Tony where are you question mark."

She shows him the screen where it says

Hey Tony where are you?

"Tony? As in, Tony Stark, Howard's son?"

"Yep."

A few seconds later, her phone dings and words appear on the screen.

Budapest. You?

"You just got a message from Budapest? As in Hungary?" Steve asks incredulously. The last time he was in Budapest was during the siege and it had been mostly flattened. He supposes it must be better now, right?

"Yep." She says into the phone, "Greenpoint" and shows him the screen.

Greenpoint

"Wow. That's. . . sort of like magic."

"No, it's science," Hill says matter-of-factly. "No big deal."

Her phone dings again, and he catches a glimpse of the screen before she turns it away.

Fun! Are you going to take him to the park to play? Maybe put a backpack leash. . .

Hill makes a little squeaking sound and yanks the phone back, but the damage is already done. He knows that a) she has been complaining to Howard Stark's son about having to babysit Steve, and b) she was joking with him about Steve getting lost. So much for Operation Get Agent Hill to Like Me.

Jaw clenched and throat tight, Steve picks up the pile of plates and goes to the sink to start washing up.

"Oh shit," Hill mutters. He just ignores her while he starts the water in the sink. He could leave, he thinks while the sink fills. Fury doesn't own him. He has money. He could get a motorcycle and just take off. Get a motorcycle how exactly? the Bucky-voice in his head chides him. You don't have a license and you can't even use a debit card. Not to mention he doesn't know where he's going or how to access his money and they can track his phone so he can't actually get away from them anyway unless he leaves it behind.

"Steve. . ." Hill says from behind him. He doesn't turn, just squirts in the soap and starts washing dishes. Her chair scrapes as she gets up, then he hears her footsteps clicking across the hard kitchen floor toward him. "Steve, I'm sorry."

"Don't bother," he grinds out through gritted teeth. "You can go, you know. I don't need babysitting."

She appears at his elbow. He reaches around her to stack a plate on the towel to dry. "Steve. . ."

He keeps washing dishes, hoping she'll go away, but she doesn't. "Steve, look at me."

He doesn't want to, because if he does, she'll see how much she hurt him. He knows the pain is written all over his face. He can feel it in his puckered eyebrows, in his burning eyes, and his clenched jaw, and in the lump in his throat and his hunched shoulders.

Hill sighs. "Ok, fine, don't look, but at least listen. I did feel that way, but really, I've gotten over it and I'm sorry. And Tony—he just says stuff like that. He doesn't have any mouth-brain filter. He doesn't mean it, or at least he wouldn't if he ever met you."

Steve keeps his gaze trained on the plate he's scrubbing, but he watches Hill out of the corner of his eye. She is chewing her lip. She seems sincere. And really, she's his only lifeline in this unfamiliar and often hostile century. What is he going to do without her?

He swallows hard and says, "Ok," without looking up. It's the best he can muster, so he hopes she'll accept it.

"Ok? Yeah, good. Will you come back and sit down so we can finish our work?"

Steve is done washing up the dishes now, so he has no excuse left. He shrugs and dries his hands on the way back to the table. He's determined to master this, determined not to need babysitting, although he hears an echo of Bucky's voice in his head: I gotta follow ya around all the time to keep ya outta trouble, punk? At the time, Steve chafed at Bucky's nanny-ing. Now he would give anything to have it back.

He sits back down at the table and she hands him his phone. Hers she drops into her pocket, in case Tony Stark sends her another disparaging message, he supposes. Probably for the best. Steve doesn't want to hate the guy before he even meets him.

"Ok, let's check out the internet," Hill says with forced cheerfulness. "Hit the icon that looks like a rainbow G. That's googol."

As far as he knows, googol means ten to the hundredth power, but that doesn't make sense in this context, so he doesn't say anything. He finds the G and taps it, and the screen goes to white, with the word "Google" (not googol) in the middle and a little box below it. The typewriter appears again. Oh, no, not more typing!

"Google is a search engine." Hill may as well be speaking Greek.

"Ma'am?"

"I mean, you can use it to search for anything you want to know."

He still doesn't understand what she's talking about, and his face must show it, because she laughs and clarifies further. "Think of it like. . . a library card catalog containing every piece of information on Earth."

He can feel his eyebrows climb. "Everything?"

She shrugs. "Pretty much. What would you like to know?"

Everything. So many things he can't possibly narrow it down to just one.

When he doesn't say anything, Hill continues "How about. . . Stark tower?"

"Ok," he agrees. Tony may not have made much of a first impression, but Steve is still curious about Howard's son.

"Good. Here." She pulls his hand with the phone toward her mouth and says "Ok Google." The phone beeps and funny rainbow lines appear on the screen. "Stark tower Manhattan."

It beeps again, a woman's voice says "Searching," and suddenly the funny lines are replaced with words and pictures, of one of the tall towers he had noticed on his way into New York (was it only four days ago? It feels like a lifetime).

"All that information is in the phone?" he asks in awe.

"No, not on the phone; it's on the internet. It's like the world's biggest library. This is Stark Tower."

He squints at the little pictures. Hill taps one and it gets bigger, fills the whole window with gleaming chrome and glass. "And watch this. Ok Google. . . Ironman."

The picture disappears and is replaced by pictures of what looks like an automaton in red and gold. It looks like. . .

"Is it flying?!"

"He—that's Tony—and yes, he can fly." She slides her finger up the screen and more pictures appear. She touches one of the pictures, this one with a little triangle in the middle, and it fills up the window. Then she turns the phone sideways, taps the triangle, and it starts to move, like a film reel but there's no film reel. Ironman zooms across the screen with a trail of bright yellow light, to delighted shouts from people watching on the ground.

Steve whistles in amazement. "Wow, that's. . . impressive."

Hill flashes a grin. "I'm sure he'd be happy to know you think that," she says, and then hurriedly reassures him, "Don't worry, I'm going to tell him."

Steve's not sure Tony Stark would care about his opinion, but who knows? He wants Hill to show him more, maybe what Tony looks like—does he favor his old man?—but she has already cleared the screen and moved on to something else.

"Here's the number for Raymour and Flanigan," she says, tapping the screen.

"Why would I want that?"

"Oh, I don't know, in case you decide to get the chair in the color you actually wanted."

"I told you it's fine. Red is fine."

"But you wanted blue."

"I don't care," he says in his most convincing tone, because there's no way he's going to call them and complain, but she still looks skeptical.

"All right, all right. Anyway, you can find it again if you want it. Now, what else do you want to know?"

He could look up anything. The wide open possibilities are overwhelming, so he decides to play it safe and settle for something familiar. "How about the Howling Commandos?"

"You do it. Remember how to start?"

"Yes." He holds the phone up and says "Ok Google. Howling Commandos."

The phone beeps obligingly, the woman's voice says "Searching", then pictures appear on the screen. The first few are photos he recognizes—himself and the Commandos in the field. Bucky and Gabe laughing together. Dum Dum with that ridiculous hat that he never took off, even to sleep. Peggy Carter and Jacques in a jeep. Then he spots the fourth photo and his heart practically stops. The picture shows himself, Morita, and Dum Dum practically naked, engaged in what could be described as an orgy. Some long pink arms that look like octopus tentacles are wrapped around them all.

"What the hell?!" His face is on fire and his hands aren't working right. He doesn't want Hill to see that picture. Even though he's sure it's not real, Hill won't know that. How does he get rid of it?!

"Oh!" Hill grabs the phone from his hand and hits the home button. "I may have forgotten to warn you about something."

"I swear, ma'am, that NEVER happened!" he chokes out.

"Don't worry, I know. Somebody photoshopped it. I should have warned you about Rule 34."

"What—what does that mean?"

"If it exists, there is porn of it." She taps the screen with her thumb a few times, then hands the phone back to him. The offending picture is gone. "I turned on safesearch. I can't guarantee it will catch everything, but it will help."

"But how did they get a picture of something that never happened?!" he cries, distressed.

"Photoshop. Image manipulation. They probably put your faces on someone else's bodies. Everyone knows it's not real."

"But—but why?"

Hill shrugs. "Rule 34. That's just the internet for you. I told you, everything is on there, good and bad. You just have to be your own filter. What would you like to look up next?"

"I think I'm done," he says, putting the phone in his pocket. He doesn't want to accidentally stumble into something like that again, especially not with a lady watching. The internet suddenly seems less like an amazing opportunity to learn about the modern world and more like a pit of vipers. One wrong move and you're scarred for life. It makes him feel self-conscious and vulnerable, knowing that people out there are getting their jollies from naked pictures altered to look like him and his men.

Now she is laughing at him. Well, not laughing out loud, but she's definitely smirking. "Ok, fine, but at least let me show you how to clear the history. That way if something else shows up later, you can delete it."

"Ok." He hands her the phone and she hits an icon that says "Settings".

"See here? Just tap "Clear history" and it will erase the records of any websites you've been to."

"Can we do that now?"

The smirk is back. "Sure." She taps the words and a message pops up that says "history cleared."

"You said records? Who has the record of. . . websites? . . . I go to?"

"Just on the phone. Don't worry, we won't be tracking you. Search away. Really. As long as you're not watching, I don't know, snuff porn or something like that, it's fine."

"I'm not going to be looking at pornography," he assures her.

"I wouldn't care if you were. Honestly. It's not a big deal."

It may not be a big deal to her, but it is to him. He wasn't raised that way. Bucky and some of the fellows had pictures of pinup girls taped to their lockers or tents, but never him. For one thing, Peggy woulda killed him. And for another, it was disrespectful of the other women he worked with, to treat them like objects only valued for their looks or their bodies when their minds were so brilliant.

Hill is watching him closely, lips pursed. "Are you ok?"

"Yes, I'm fine. It's just a little. . . weird is all. I don't think I like that anyone can see pictures like that, even if it's not really me."

"Sorry. I wish I could do something about it, but that's the internet. Free exchange of information, even if you don't approve."

"I'm not a. . . prude."

She holds up her hands. "I don't want to know! Time to change the subject. . . Um. . . Did you finish those books I gave you?"

"Oh. . . yeah, I'm done with them."

"What did you think? Ender's Game is my favorite."

He chews his lip. "I didn't exactly get that far."

"You didn't read them?" she says in a scandalized voice. "Why not?"

"They're sort of. Well."

"Sort of what?"

"Depressing."

"Oh." She goes into the living room, picks up the stack of books, and flips through them. Her lips twist. "Yeah, I guess I can see what you mean. Do you want some different books?"

"Sure, thanks."

"You said you wanted to go to the library, right?"

"Yeah, I'd like that," he says hopefully.

Hill picks up her backpack and pulls her keys out of the front pocket. She heads for the door, so she must be ready to leave already, which means he'll have the rest of the day to kill by himself. Plenty of time to fail to figure out how to use the movie player, and burn things in the microwave oven, and be too scared to cross the street, and—

"Well, come on then, let's go to the library," Hill says impatiently, making a little shooing motion.

"Right now?"

"Don't you want to?"

Steve almost trips over his feet rushing to the door. "Well, yeah, but I thought you had to get back to work." He shoves his feet into his shoes, not bothering to tie them in his hurry to get ready before she changes her mind.

"Eh, Fury can go fu—can just wait for a while. We gotta get you some better books. And then later after I leave, you can walk down to the mini-market and get over your irrational fear of debit cards."

Oh. Debit cards. Great.

Hill takes him through familiar territory on the way to the library, and he can't help but point out a few places he recognizes. Most of his stories end with "and then I got beat up," which makes Hill snort in amusement.

They end up at the Arlington branch, which is the same branch he and Bucky spent so much time in as kids. It looks almost exactly the same, even the smell is the same. It's like being transported back to his childhood. He grabs Hill by the arm and hauls her to the back tables where he sat and read books about medieval art while Bucky tried to pick up Lizzie Peterson. Except now there are little TVs on the tables with typewriters attached, and every chair is full.

"What books do you want?" Hill asks, steering him toward the fiction stacks.

"I don't even know. Just something not so. . ."

"Depressing, I know," Hill says. "Here, try Harry Potter." She hands him a book with a picture of a boy riding a broomstick like a witch, which looks interesting.

"What's it about?"

"Magic and shit."

"Oh." He flips it over and skims the back, but Hill is already moving on, so he tucks the book under his arm and scrambles to follow.

She pulls another book off the shelf and holds it out to him. "If you like that, you might like Lord of the Rings too." Two more books follow the first. "It's a trilogy," she says matter-of-factly, and heads for the next shelf.

Steve stops dead in the aisle and stares at the author name on The Lord of the Rings. JRR Tolkien? "Hey, is this a sequel to the Hobbit?!" he asks, probably too loud for the library but he's so excited he doesn't notice that people are looking at him.

"I guess so. I haven't read it since I was 12."

"When was it written?"

"I have no idea. Did you read the Hobbit?"

"Yeah!" he says with a huge grin. "I read it in college when it first came out. I think I got it right here at this library."

Hill has that funny little smile on her face again, the one he doesn't quite know how to interpret. He thinks maybe she's laughing at him. "And I take it you liked it."

"I loved it so much I made Bucky let me read it out loud to him. He complained but I think he liked it because he never told me to stop."

"What a good friend." Hill has several more books in her hands, which she sets on the top of the stack he is already carrying. The top one says Charlotte's Web and there is a picture of a pig and a little girl in dungarees on the cover. "All right, let's get out of here. I gotta get back to work."

He's disappointed, but what did he think, Agent Hill was going to sit down and let him read The Hobbit sequel to her? Of course not. She has important work to do, and he. . . has to take a field trip to the mini-market. Oh boy. His life is so exciting he can hardly stand it.


July 1, 2012

From: Deputy Director M. Hill

To: Agent P. Coulson

Subject: Oops

I accidentally introduced S. to porn. Thanks, Internet.

M.


From: Agent P. Coulson

To: Deputy Director M. Hill

Subject: Re: oops

He was in the army. I think he's seen porn before.

P.


From: Deputy Director M. Hill

To: Agent P. Coulson

Subject: Re: re: Oops

Gay Hentai porn? Based on his reaction, I think that one was a new one for him. Poor S. I deflowered Captain America.

M.

p.s. I left you a little gift on your desk.


July 1, 2012

To: Director N. Fury

From: Deputy Director M. Hill

Subject: Progress Report, day 5

Introduced S. to internet. May have opened a bit of a Pandora's box with that one. Not sure he's ready for that level of information about the 21st century. Puppy dog eyes at an all-time high. Gave him files on his friends, which I'm sure won't help. Took him to the library and got him some nicer books to try to cheer him up a little. He still hasn't gone to the mini-market or tried out his debit card. I give him a C- for homework.

M.


To: Deputy Director M. Hill

From: Director N. Fury

Subject: Re: Progress Report, day 5

No need for letter grades, just tell me when he's ready for active duty. I have an idea in mind for him.

F.


To: Director N. Fury

From: Deputy Director M. Hill

Subject: Re: re: Progress Report, day 5

Cut the guy some slack. He's still adjusting to this century, all his friends are dead, and by all rights he should be too. I think he's earned a break.


This message has not been sent yet. Are you sure you want to delete it?

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To: Director N. Fury

From: Deputy Director M. Hill

Subject: Re: re: Progress Report, day 5

Noted.

M.


To: Deputy Director M. Hill

From: Agent P. Coulson

Subject: Thanks!

Delicious but gooey. My keyboard is sticky now.

P.


To: Agent P. Coulson

From: Deputy Director M. Hill

Subject: Re: Thanks!

Thank S. He made them. Dang, the boy can bake.

M.


Author's note: I hope you enjoyed this chapter. If you're so inclined, leave me a review below. I appreciate it!