It was the worst day of Zelda's life.

First, Pierce had proven that her family was still alive. Then, he'd threatened to kill them if she got in the way of James's mission to capture Steve Rogers. And her compliance hadn't been good enough for him—he'd threatened to kill her family again if she didn't conduct some extra tests and a trial in front of him.

And now, after watching James be electrocuted, after being forced to watch it with a blank expression as if she didn't care and talk in an expressionless voice, after giving Pierce the data and setting James free, James had just shook his head at her, said, "You only had to ask," and walked out.

And when she'd tried to follow, he said, "Go back inside, Bellefleur. I'd rather be alone."

It wasn't the request for solitude that bothered her. It was the use of her last name—the name he'd used until he trusted her.

She only lasted until the subway. As soon as she got on the stupid train, she burst into tears, which caused two women to pat her shoulder, one to give her a tissue, and a man to offer to escort her home. She thanked them all, but she didn't want to go home. She didn't want to go to Schwarma either, though—Zelda didn't know where she wanted to go. She just wanted to go far away, somewhere far enough away that her problems wouldn't be so real.

There was only one place to go if that was what she wanted, but it would be risky.

It would be beyond risky. It could be life-threatening, and not just to her.

But what other choice did she have? It was obvious that James wouldn't forgive her anytime soon, not that she was all that surprised about it. In fact, the fact that she'd half-expected his anger made it worse. She wouldn't be able to approach him anyway, even if he wasn't mad. She was too afraid to risk damaging their relationship any more than she already had…

"I have to go," she murmured, and then she knew what she had to do.

Although she didn't plan to go for long, Zelda walked into her apartment building and knocked on the door across from hers. The moment that Robbie opened the door, she declared, "I have a favor to ask."

"What's that?" asked Robbie cautiously, hearing her tone of voice and seeing the paleness of her face.

"I need you to make sure that James doesn't… well, can you just watch him for me for a little while? I'm leaving for a week."

"For what?" questioned her friend, raising an eyebrow. But seeing the look on her face, he gasped loudly and exclaimed, "Oh, no, honey, what happened?! You can't just destroy my ships like that! And when it just set sail!"

Zelda glared at him, but it was halfhearted. "It's not that simple, Robbie, and I don't have time to explain. I need to go somewhere, now."

Robbie sighed and ran a hand through his curly brown hair. "All right, I'll keep an eye on him. But where are you going?" he added as a shout, seeing as Zelda had thanked him and whirled towards her own apartment.

Hearing this question, Zelda stopped. She thought for a moment—she didn't know any of the details of her trip. She didn't know if the person she was looking for still lived at her previous address… She didn't know anything, but in all honestly, Zelda didn't even care. "I'm going to visit an old friend," she said, just loudly enough for Robbie to hear. Then she opened the door, flew into her room, and started to pack.

The next day, Zelda was in Salt Lake City, Utah. It had been a long trip on plane to the Midwest, and she was ready to find her cousin Ellis. Assuming, of course, that she hadn't moved within the past couple years.

After hailing a taxi, Zelda saw that Ellis had moved. It must have been recently, however, because there was a note on the door that stated a new address, and that Ellis Anne Clemens lived there instead. So Zelda simply returned to the cab and asked to be transported to the address she'd written down on a new piece of paper.

When at last she arrived, Zelda gaped to see the place. It was not a house: more like a mansion, it was that huge. There was a small garden in the front, and stepping stones led up to the front door.

Walking up there was intimidating, to say the least. Zelda hadn't seen Ellis in two years, since she started working for HYDRA. Not that it was by her own decision, of course, but she still worried about how Ellis would take their reunion…

Finally, Zelda rang the doorbell. For a moment, there was no sound—but then, there was, "WORRY NOT, ACCOMPLICE, I SHALL ANSWER!"

The door opened; there stood a man with dark hair, amber eyes, and no shirt. Zelda swallowed uneasily, wondering if maybe she'd gotten the address wrong again, but oh she hoped not, that would be terrible…

"And who are you?" asked the man, running a hand through his hair. "Did I send for you?"

"Uh—probably not. I'm looking for someone who I think lives here… I might have the wrong address, though… Her name is Ellis?"

The man's eyebrows raised, and he held out a finger as if to tell her to wait a minute. Then he leaned back inside the house and shouted, "WENCH! COME DOWNSTAIRS!"

An angry, female voice—but nonetheless very familiar—bellowed back, "Why?!"

"Someone here is looking for you!"

"If it's Tara, tell her that I'll be over in a few minutes to help paint the walls!"

"It's not Tara, dear accomplice, it's someone else whom I know not of!"

There was a heavy sigh, and then, "Dammit, Cliff. Right in the middle of my climax. Fine, I'm coming down!"

Zelda swallowed again. Here it came, if she knew her cousin at all, she was about to get a verbal thrashing. Maybe physical too. But that was what she signed up for. She needed Ellis now more than ever.

She watched, with a little bit of dread, as Ellis tromped down the stairs. Before long, she was in view; her hair was still dark—she hadn't dyed it after all—but it was much longer than it had been a couple years back. Her eyes still contained that knowing spark, letting Zelda know that Ellis's life had progressed rather normally. But those features morphed when Ellis saw her.

Instantly, she was confused, then shocked, and then angry. While exclaiming, "ZELDA PENELOPE BELLEFLEUR!" she bolted down the steps, ran out into the garden, yanked up some marigolds, and started beating Zelda's face with them. She was also shouting some nonsense that Zelda couldn't quite decipher because of Ellis's rapid-fire anger.

"Ack! Ellis! Hold—on!" gasped Zelda, but to no avail.

The man, Cliff, simply watched this with confusion. At last, upon noting that his housemate was beating up his guest with a handful of marigolds, he asked, "Ellis, what are you doing? Why?"

"She's mildly allergic to marigolds!" shrieked Ellis, her eyes narrowed with uncontained rage. Then she whirled on Zelda again. "What are you doing! You disappear for two years and now you just show up on my doorstep without any warning, any message?! I thought you'd died!"

Zelda sneezed twice, seeing as the marigold pollen was now all over her face and she could hardly breathe. Still, she somehow managed to answer, "No. But you might've been if I tried to contact you before."

Ellis groaned loudly and threw her head in her hands. "I don't understand!"

"I don't expect you to. I need to tell you everything—I just… I needed someone, since I—well, I—screwed up. Very badly," murmured Zelda. The memory made tears spark in her eyes, and she tried to wipe them off her face with her sleeves, but it was no use. Ellis saw anything.

With an exasperated sigh, she said, "All right… Cliff, I'm taking my cousin into the lounge."

"So this is your cousin with the awkward name?"

Zelda stared at Ellis. "You told him my name was 'awkward?'"

"As mine is, so yes. Deal with it. And by the way, I ate the Bertie Bott's jellybeans."

"What?! We were going to share them!"

"We were, until you disappeared off the face of the earth!" snapped Ellis, though she didn't seem as angry as before. At least she wasn't beating Zelda's face with marigolds now. "But I'll be nice enough to share a chocolate shake with you."

Zelda blinked. That was the drink she'd ordered at Schwarma the very first day that she'd met James, and that was the stupidest detail to remember, but it set her off to bawling like she had on the subway the day before.

Ellis's anger melted for a moment as she listened to her cousin's distress. After gawkily patting Zelda's back, she said, "Or maybe we should get something a little stronger."

And with that, Ellis helped bring Zelda into the lounge, where she grabbed two wine glasses and brought out a bottle of Pinot Noir. By this time, Zelda had stopped crying—so Ellis used the opportunity to announce, "All right, tell me everything."

Her wine glass in hand, Zelda proceeded to explain everything… from her job at SHIELD to how she was threatened into HYDRA, and how her parents were always in danger because of it. She talked about her most hated coworker, Grant, and how she'd been promoted to supervise James. And she didn't leave out the fact that she had never actually put James under a trial—until Pierce threatened to kill her parents again if she didn't perform one in front of him.

At this point in the story, Ellis's face had become somber. Her rage mostly disappeared—though she grumbled about, "Dangerous, pah, could've at least sent a letter"—and now she mostly felt sorry for her cousin. She'd had a hard two years, and this seemed like the last straw.

"So this… James," murmured Ellis, her eyebrows furrowing. "He doesn't trust you anymore?"

Zelda shook her head. "No… he doesn't. I don't think he loves me anymore, either…"

"Nonsense," said Ellis dismissively, waving her wine glass around. "You've always been so pessimistic. Tell me more about him. Maybe I can help."

A small smile appeared on Zelda's face. Ellis still treated her like a little sister, despite how angry she'd been before. "Well… he's…" With a start, she realized she'd forgotten to tell Ellis exactly how old James was, and how he'd been frozen for the majority of the past seventy years.

Zelda smirked a little, wondering what her cousin would say. "He's not very familiar with modern things. He's also a little older than me…"

"You and your weird attraction to older men. Ugh," groaned Ellis, crossing her arms, never mind the wine glass in her hand. "Remember back in high school when we got that new English teacher? I mean, he was hot, but you didn't have to…"

"I thought we agreed not to bring that up!"

Ellis laughed, then exclaimed, "I'm just sayin'. And let's not forget the lifeguard. Anyways, how bad is it this time? Ten years? Twelve?"

"Eh-heh… Heh…. Erm," chuckled Zelda uneasily. This would either be terrifying or hilarious. Maybe both. "Technically he's ninety-seven…"

"WHAT!" screeched Ellis, spilling her drink on the couch. She glanced at the spill and muttered, "Shit, Cliff'll be pissed." But then she returned to the other matters. "Zelda, you're insane! How have you not been put into an asylum yet?!"

"On the other hand, he looks twenty-seven—"

"I don't care how young he looks, he's ninety-seven Jesus, Zelda, what the hell have you been doing?!"

"Supervising a man who's literally been frozen!" shouted Zelda in retort. "If you'll just listen to me!"

Ellis groaned and flopped backward into the couch. "What do you mean, he's literally been frozen?"

"I mean, he's literally been frozen! For seventy years! HYDRA is an organization bent on creating world chaos! You've heard of Captain America, haven't you? And how he's been genetically enhanced by a supersoldier serum? Well, HYDRA used one too, and that's how they've preserved James for so long. They've forced James to assassinate people who might get in the way of their mission! They've used him, experimented on him, for the past seventy years, and he's been one of my only friends and now I've lost him because of Pierce's threat and that's why I'm here; because I needed to see you, to make sure you were alive, and to find someone else whom I knew actually cared about me."

Zelda finished her rant and realized that she was crying again. She hated doing that, but she couldn't help it at this point. Everything was becoming too much.

There was a moment in which Ellis was completely quiet. Afterward, she moved to Zelda and put an arm around her shoulder. "I'm sorry, Zelda. But all I can give you is advice."

"I'll take it," moaned Zelda. "I don't know what to do."

"Nothing will help you if you don't take the initiative. You're going to have to talk to him yourself, don't wait for him to say anything to you. If you approach him first, then he'll see that you are the one who wants to fix things. Also, be sure to explain things properly. Don't use it as an excuse—he's probably not mad that you had to perform that trial; rather about the way you executed it. So admit your mistake and then ask for forgiveness. That's what I had to do… once."

Zelda nodded, not quite sure what else to say except, "Thanks…"

Another silence occurred, and then Ellis asked, "How long are you planning on staying?"

"Not long," replied Zelda. "If I'm gone for too long, Pierce—my boss—will do something, probably something to hurt James. I'll have to leave the day after tomorrow."

Ellis sighed, but nodded. "As angry as you made me by just showing up here, I'm glad to see you. I really did think you were dead, you know."

"I know… and I'm sorry about that. But there was no other way to keep you safe. And it was selfish of me to come, because Pierce might track me down…"

"Don't worry about it. I'd be glad to hide both you and James from them if it ever comes down to it."

Zelda smiled a little—the best thing about Ellis's promise was the sincerity with which she said it.

Three days later, Zelda had left Salt Lake City and was back in New York City. It was a Sunday, so she still had the afternoon to think of what to say to James when she went to work tomorrow.

When she returned, Robbie was waiting for her in her apartment. Upon seeing Zelda's shock, he only smirked and said, "Well, that's what you get for leaving me the spare key to your apartment, honey. At any rate, I thought you were going to be gone all week?"

She shook her head. "No, I figured I couldn't afford to be gone so long. There are some things I have to do…"

"Yes!" bellowed Robbie, slamming a hand down on the counter. "Yes, there are! Go and fix my ship!"

Zelda only shook her head hopelessly. It wasn't like she could tell Robbie everything—he was too close to HYDRA's headquarters for her to do that. So instead, she meekly agreed and said she'd try tomorrow.

"Tomorrow can't come soon enough," grumbled Robbie as he raided her refrigerator for something to eat.

And he was right—tomorrow didn't come soon enough. Zelda spent the remainder of her Sunday evening pacing, never mind the fact that a new episode of Once Upon a Time was airing… She could hardly concentrate on the show, she was so jittery and worried that James wouldn't believe or forgive her. She didn't know what she'd do if she lost him.

When it was morning, she speed-walked to HYDRA headquarters, wondering if James would actually be there. There was the possibility that he wouldn't go… the thought made Zelda's chest hurt, but she walked through the complex with the mindset that no matter what, she'd try and make things right.

Her fears were proven wrong—James was there, throwing knives at the target, as always. He didn't look at her when she walked inside, but Zelda heard him say, "Robbie told me you were going to be gone all week."

Thump. Another knife in the bulls-eye.

"Yes," replied Zelda simply, though her heart pounded. Did he want her to be gone all week?

"But you're back."

"Yes."

"Why?" he asked.

"I had to see you."

James stopped for a moment, then shook his head as if he didn't believe her. "Why did you leave?"

Zelda looked around to make sure that Pierce wasn't anywhere in the room; or anyone else for that matter. The last thing she wanted was to endanger Ellis now, if her whereabouts were unknown to HYDRA. "I needed to see my cousin."

"Ellis Anne? The one with the weird name?" questioned James as another knife embedded itself in the target.

This made her laugh a little, if only because that was what Ellis had said to Cliff about her—that she had a weird name. Still, she responded, "Yes, her. I had to make sure… nothing had happened to her."

James dropped the rest of the knives in his hand and turned to face her. He looked tired, as if he hadn't gotten any sleep at all. "Did you expect something to happen?" Now he sounded curious.

"Yes." The confidence with which she said the word seemed to astonish both Zelda and James. "Something would have happened to her and my parents if…" She couldn't finish. But that didn't matter—James seemed to know what she meant.

His eyes narrowed. "You only had to ask," he sighed. "You didn't trust me."

"How could I ask that of you?" mumbled Zelda. "I didn't see another way."

"Better that than worrying me about whether Grant had raped you." James picked up the three knives on the floor and threw them at the target, all at one time. Each of them somehow landed within the target area. Then he faced Zelda again; she was staring at him, her mouth slightly open. "It seems we have a lot to talk about. And this time, we won't keep secrets."

Relieved yet worried, Zelda nodded. "No… that we won't."

Now that school is over, I'm able to update every couple days! Like I stated previously, I wish to be finished by the end of May... Do not quote me on this, but I think there will be about seven to nine chapters left. Maybe less. :)

Please leave your thoughts for me; it makes my day to hear from you!