**A/N: So I've made a deal with myself to write at least 1,000 words a day. This'll mean getting a new chapter around every 4-5 days. I love getting these out fast so I don't lose interest cause I want this story to show their life together. And I mean everything.

This one's a little short, but there really wasn't a good place to add extra dialogue or fluff. I tried, but you know…

Chapter 20

Panic arose instantly, Steve and Tony making eye contact. "Put on the suit."

"Yeah," Tony agreed, as they all got up. Bethany limped, popping her shoulder back into place as they started running through the halls.

"Hill," Bethany said over the comm. "What's going on?"

"Engine three is down!"

"Engine three. We're on it," Bethany said.

Tony nodded, "I'll meet you there."

Steve and Bethany started running down the halls, chaos flooding everywhere. "I'm sorry for what I said," Steve spoke as they rounded a corner.

"Heat of the moment," Bethany responded, moving her hand to a scanner to open a door. "We're all so stupid, we played right into his hand." She stopped, looking back down the hall they were just in.

"What's wrong?" Steve asked, stopping beside her.

"You go ahead," Bethany told him, taking her earpiece out and handing it to Steve. "You'll need that to talk to Tony. Engine three. Help in whatever way you can."

"Wait! Beth!" Steve called as she ran back down the hall.

Climbing the stairs, pushing around people, she made her way to the detention hall. It was on the other side of the ship, but if Loki was causing all this chaos, it was in no doubt just to get him out. They couldn't lose him. Not now.

She watched as an unfamiliar SHIELD agent rounded the bend, and using her instincts, she caught his arm. The man instantly moved to attack her, Bethany bringing her knee to his stomach, then proceeding in flipping him over. "Shitttt…." She muttered, realizing that the hostiles were in SHIELD uniforms. She moved her hand up to her ear to make communications with the rest of the team, before realizing she gave hers to Steve.

"Fan-flipping-tastic," she moaned. The man on the floor moved to knock her down, but Bethany reacted quicker, giving him a hard kick, pulling up his arms and letting his head hit the floor, rendering him unconscious.

She stood there for a second, contemplating her next move. She was still close to Steve. She could run back to him and get him to tell everyone through the earpiece. But there was still the fact that Loki was more than likely about to escape, and that took precedence.

"I'm getting too old for this," Bethany decided as she took the latter approach. On her way up to the detention level, she encountered more than one hostile slowing her down. Still, with ease, she was able to punch, kick, flip and throw them over rails, clearing the path.

Bethany could faintly hear alarms ringing loudly, feel the ship jostle and rumble, but she didn't question much. Her one goal was to get to Loki. Okay, so maybe she knew that the Hulk had emerged. And yeah, she figured the systems were being shut down and they were losing altitude. But there were hundreds of agents on board. Surely one of them could handle it, couldn't they? She didn't have to hold their hand and walk them through it, did she?

When she finally stumbled into the detention level, exhausted from her small battles and bleeding in a couple places, she frowned as she noticed that glass cell that previously held Loki in was gone. The cage was designed so that if the prisoner tried to escape, it would plummet to the ground. Bethany always thought it was a stupid design, considering they would just lose the prisoner again. It was basically setting them free, if they survived the drop.

Putting her hands on her hips, she looked around the room before letting her jaw drop. She could barely feel her legs, but she pushed forward and quickly moved up to a half unconscious Coulson, blood pouring from his shirt.

Surveying his body, she knew her efforts to stop the bleeding would be futile, a hole directly through his chest. "Hey, Phil," she said, taking his head in her hands. "Look at me."

His gaze was unfocused, but he gave her a tired smile. "Hey Phoenix."

"Don't call me that," she responded, taking his earpiece out of his ear. "I need medical in the detention hall, now!"

"Bethany," Coulson chocked softly.

"You'll be fine," Bethany tried, not believing it herself, but not ready to let him go. "I'm done with losing people I care about. You're… you're like my brother," she realized, holding back a sob.

"Then listen to me," Coulson continued, gasping. Bethany nodded, concern written all over her face. "He loves you, and you love him. Don't make it more complicated than that."

"How do you know that I lo…" she trailed off, letting a breath of air escape. She couldn't say it. Not even now. "How do you know that I feel that way about him?"

"When you talked about him," Coulson shared, body shaking slightly. "It's clear. It's always been clear to me."

Bethany sniffled, watching as his eyes began to glaze over slightly. Coulson was the one person through the years who never hesitated to ask questions about Steve, as if he felt it was his right to know.

"Check mate," Coulson said as he put down his cards. They had just finished an assignment, to which Coulson learned just how skilled of a fighter his S.O. was. He barely had to do anything, which was a slight comfort considering it was one of his first missions and they had no back up. The only reason they got an extraction team was because Bethany had another personal assignment when they got back to headquarters.

"We're playing poker," Bethany reminded, showing her own cards, which beat his out.

He leaned back and crossed his arms. "How is it you always win?"

"When you're stuck on an army base with a bunch of men, you pick up a thing or two," Bethany admitted, collecting the cards. "So you on for another round?"

"Actually," he said, sitting up straight. "I was hoping you'd tell me more about Captain Rogers."

Bethany put the cards down, folding her hands together. "What about Steve?"

"It's just… ever since I can remember, I've admired him. My grandma even knitted me a Captain America doll when I was younger. He's my hero."

Bethany nodded, sighing a little. "He's mine too, Phil."

"So you understand me wanting to know more," Coulson pushed.

"Besides a lot of my stories being classified, the ones that aren't are personal."

"I just want to know what he was like," Phil said with a small smile. "Is he really just as amazing as they say?"

Taking in a deep breath, she nodded. "Even more so. He didn't have a selfish bone in his body. The mere thought of bleeding on anyone was inconceivable to him, which is why Dr. Erskine picked him in the first place. He was good just for the sake of being good."

Coulson's eyes seemed to tinkle. "I hope you don't mind me saying that the reason I asked for you to be my supervising officer was because of him."

"I figured," Bethany said with a smirk. "People don't usually talk to me about him, so I guess… I guess it was startling when you first brought him up, but nice."

"Do you still have hope he's out there?"

Bethany looked at the poker chips stacked in the middle and picked one up, studying it. "I don't know. I do know that I should just accept it and call off the search, but I feel like the second we do that, we'd be so close to finding him. I know the World Council is already done with it. They've been trying to get me to give up all hope for years. They think it's impossible. But it's Steve, so I can't really say."

"I watched some old Captain America reels," Coulson said after taking a sip of his water. "Have you seen any?"

"No," Bethany admitted. "I feel like if I dwell on the past, I'll never be able to refocus. It took a while after he disappeared to get me on my A-game."

"You may want to consider it," Coulson explained. "You're in some of them. Usually in the background. I mean, I didn't notice you at first, but a close up of Captain Rogers' compass showed that it was really you. Blond hair and a giant smile."

"You should come by my apartment sometime," Bethany revealed. "There's lots of that there. A naive smile, or maybe it was flirtatious, I don't really know. But there I am with blond curly hair, full makeup and a perfect smile. It doesn't even seem like me sometimes."

"Were you two a couple?" Coulson pushed again.

"I guess that's the correct term," Bethany sighed.

"I didn't know that," Coulson continued. "I just knew you knew him, and that you were a part of the Project Rebirth team."

"SHIELD has done everything in their power to keep the fact that Bethany Stark and Steve Rogers were a couple out of the light," Bethany explained. "I don't know if that was Howard's doing, so what, but somewhere along the way, I realized that every time something about us would casually make it's way into the world, SHIELD was there to confiscate it. Those old reels though… a couple of SHIELD's directors have offered to destroy them, but I just couldn't bring myself to accept it." She studied his face, before frowning. "Okay, what? What's with the face?"

"I've never seen you like this," Coulson admitted. "You have real emotion in your voice."

"The topic of Steve is an emotional one for me," Bethany said with another heavy sigh. "That's why I don't talk about him."

"But do you think about him?"

Bethany bit the side of her lip, considering her answer. It was at that moment that she realized she did. It had become second nature, everytime she saw an American flag or ate fondue, both of which were often. More times than not she would wake up, trying not to panic, to cry because of a dream where he had guest starred. Some of them were nice, days out having a picnic or cooped up in the lab. Some of them were dirty, reliving his lips on hers, the feel of his muscles and the soft cry he would let out as he reached the highest point of pleasure known to man. But the majority of them were angry filled, aggressive Steves, a Steve that had never existed anywhere but her nightmares.

It was then that she also realized she only had photos of him in her room. They weren't in the living room like her other photos, memories she was glad to share. No, the few photos she had of Steve were by her bedside table, her dresser and even on her bedroom walls. She had never even realized she did that until then, and that she had been doing that for years. It could mainly be attributed to the fact that Peggy had put a framed photo of a skinny Steve on her bedside table one night after crying herself to sleep, and through the years, pictures of him and her would just appear throughout her room.

"Yeah," she finally told him. "He had a huge impact on my life. Someone like that doesn't just disappear from your thoughts. Good people just don't disappear from your life."

Steve unzipped the top of his uniform and took off his gloves, tossing them in Bethany's room before making his way to one of the conference rooms. The tension on the helicarrier earlier was a buzz, everyone worried, but hopeful to fix the situation. Now, it was just plain grim. Everyone was mourning, but wasn't being given the time to do so. They all had things to do, to repair, and they weren't be given the opportunity to just take a moment and reflect on the last few days. Arriving in the room, a suit-less Tony stood in the middle of the room, his arms wrapped around a sombre Bethany.

Steve noticed that she wasn't crying, but the look on her face was confusing. There was clear pain, but there was also anger. Clear guilt and grief and overall hatred. He could only imagine that he had a similar look after Bucky had died. Tony whispered something into her ear before she looked up at Steve.

He gave her an apologetic smile, walking forward. Bethany slipped out of Tony's arms and into Steve's. "I'm sorry," he told her, kissing the top of her head.

"What's the good of having regenerative blood if you can't use it on other people?" She said, her voice breaking. "I want Loki dead."

"I understand," Steve said, remembering telling Peggy that he wanted all of HYDRA either dead or captured after Bucky's fall. "I do, but we can't let it get in the way."
"I'm gonna go see what's holding up Fury," Tony said, leaving the room and giving them some privacy.

"Is it just me, or did he grow up in the past hour?" Steve asked, leading Bethany to a chair.

She sat, running through her loose hair. "He understands the seriousness of it now. Oh, Phil…"

He watched as some tears began to well up in her eyes. He pulled out the chair beside her, moving it closer to her. "We'll get Loki back. We'll get the Tesseract. Everything will be fine."

"You say that like you know for sure," Bethany sniffled. "And maybe three hours ago I would agree, but I don't know now. We've lost more than we've gained."

"What have we gained?" Steve asked, frowning.

"Besides perspective, Clint. Natasha was able to knock him out. He's recovering now," Bethany said softly, blinking. Steve watched as a couple tears fell down her cheek.

"Beth," he said, moving in to kiss the side of her head. "Talk to me."

"Things were just easier when I didn't let people come in. When I didn't let my emotions control me. God! I'm so done with this! With feeling helpless and out of control! I'm done losing people I care about," Bethany cried, wiping a tear off her face.

"At one point or another, everyone dies," Steve tried to console, a hand rubbing circles on her back.

"Yeah, people die. It's the natural order of things. But murder? I just- I can't watch another person in my life get murdered, and not being able to do anything about it."

Steve frowned, tilting her head. "Who else was murdered?"
Bethany's jaw quivered, the lines on her forehead deepening. "Howard," she let out. "They said it was just a car accident, but I'm not so sure."

"What has SHIELD said about that?" He asked, pulling her in for a hug, shocked by her revelation.

"They think it's just grief, but I know they're hiding something from me. What's worse is when I met Tony at the hospital, an old Director of SHIELD- a guy I really hate, showed up to 'offer SHIELD's sympathies', but it felt like more than that. Almost like a warning," She shook her head, trying to get the memory out of her head. "Look, whatever you do, don't tell Tony. It'll just be something else he can hold against me, and I'm not even sure it's true."

"But you really believe it wasn't an accident," Steve pressed on.

"Nothing is an accident. Everything happens for a reason," Bethany said, swallowing the last of her pain. "Always a result of someone's bad judgement."

"I won't say anything," Steve promised. "But you can't keep secrets from him, Beth. They get out, and they hurt people."

"I see it as protecting him," Bethany explained. "Look, every secret I've kept hasn't been with the distinct purpose of hurting someone. It's been about keeping them away from the pain. Not every secret I've kept has been leaked."

A pregnant pause passed before Steve whispered, "Are you still hiding things from me?"

Turning her head, her expression screamed 'yes'. "A lot of it is confidential. The Tesseract was confidential. I don't like keeping things from you, but I'm an agent of SHIELD. It's what we do. It comes with the package."

Steve sighed, leaning back in his chair. "I don't like it, but I guess I'll have to get used to it."

"I've already decided not to keep personal secrets from you anymore," she revealed, placing a hand on his knee. "I know that we need not to only trust in each other, but trust us as a whole. It's something I'm going to work on. But I've been living in secrets for years. It may take a little time."

Steve caressed his thumb over the top of her hand. "That's all I'm asking. It's not going to be easy," he began, his blues eyes shining bright. "But that's okay. If it's not hard, it's not worth fighting for. And it is worth fighting for. Because that's what I want. You. And me. Every day, forever."

"Forever is a long time," she informed him, her expression becoming a little brighter.

"Like I said," he told her, bringing her hand to his lips and kissing it. "It's worth it."

"If you're about done," Fury said walking in, Steve quickly dropping Bethany's hand. Bethany rolled her eyes, watching as Tony strolled in behind her and sitting beside her.

"I tried-"

"Don't worry about it kid," She told him. "Thanks, though."

"Yeah, well I figured you'd need some comfort, and we both know there's no comforting gene in the Stark DNA," he said, with a small shrug.

"You okay?" She whispered, as Maria Hill situated herself beside Fury.

Tony nodded solemnly. "I will be. We will be."

"Damn straight," she said before looking towards Fury.

"So," Fury said, crossing his arms. "Clearly we have some… issues to work out. Firstly, where were you Agent Stark?"

"I was trying to get to Loki," she explained. "It was a distraction, and we didn't see that. Chaos broke, advantages were took. But I… I didn't get there in time. I had to fight off too many of them. Some back-up would've been nice."

"Everyone else was either too busy fighting the Hulk or repairing the ship," Fury said. "We couldn't spare anyone."

"I'm just stating a point," Bethany said with a sigh. "I know things were… hectic." She scoffed at her own words. "70 years at SHIELD and never have we ever been so unprepared to deal with a crisis."

It was quiet for a couple seconds before Fury held up cards Bethany instantly recognized as Coulson's Captain America trading cards. "These were in Phil Coulson's jacket. I guess he never did get you to sign them."

The bloodstained cards were thrown across the table, Steve picking one of them up and staring at it closely. "We're dead in the air up here," Fury continued. "Our communications, the location of the cube. Banner, Thor… I got nothing for you. I lost my one good eye. Maybe I had that coming."

Bethany crossed her arms, feeling a chill reach her bones as Fury walked closer. "Yes, we were going to build an arsenal with the Tesseract. I never put all my chips on that number though, because I was playing something even risker."

There was a brief pause, Bethany giving him a quick nod in approval. "There was an idea-Stark knows this-called the Avengers Initiative. The idea was to bring together a group of remarkable people to see if they could become something more. To see if they could work together when we needed them too, to fight the battles that we never could. Phil Coulson died still believing in that idea. In heroes."

Tony quickly stood up and left the bridge. Bethany's eyes followed him, but knew he needed two seconds to cool down, much like she always needed. "Well," Fury broke the silence. "It's a good old-fashioned notion."

"What now?" Bethany asked. "We can't just sit back and do nothing, can we?"

"We have nothing else we can do," Fury explained. "Not until we get a lead. We're back at the beginning."

"How's the lab?" Bethany asked, sighing.

"Pretty rough shape," Fury answered.

Bethany nodded. "Once Tony cools down, I'll get him back in the lab and the two of us will try to track the cube again. It may be futile, but we can't just sit back and let this happen."

Fury nodded before he and Hill left the room. "What do you think?" Steve asked suddenly, eyes still on the trading card.

"About?" Bethany asked, placing a hand on his hand holding the card in an indication that he needed to stop.

"The Avengers Initiative," Steve said, looking at her. "Was this something you supported?"

"It never got off the ground," Bethany explained. "It sounded like a great idea in theory. In a way, Fury wanted to create an army of heroes he could control. But everyone on his list had flaws. It was shut down."

"But now? I mean, that's why he wanted us here, right?"

Bethany nodded. "After we found you, Fury told me he wanted to try and get the initiative back on board. It had been a year since we found out about Thor, and he made the list with only the drawback of us not knowing how to contact him. For Banner, if he could control the Hulk, he'd be the perfect ally. Iron Man has always been approved, it's Tony they were worried about considering he's not a team player. We've had all the pieces, they've just never fit together."

Steve looked back to the trading cards. "I didn't know him too well, but he seemed like a really good man."

"He was," Bethany said, taking in a sharp breath. "In a way, he was the heart of SHIELD. It's going to be so weird now without him."

"Was he married?" Steve asked, forehead wrinkled with concern.

"Honestly, up until this week I didn't even know SHIELD agents could get married," Bethany said with a small laugh. "There was a cellist though. He… he was crazy over her. Oh god, I hate Loki. With a passion. Brainwashing me is one thing, but murdering Coulson?"

She closed her eyes tight, wishing away the tears before standing up. "Where are you going?" Steve asked.

"To get Tony," she said strongly. "I'm tracking down that son of a bitch if it's the last thing I do."

Tony didn't brood often. In fact, he tried not to show his true feelings. It was something he was sure all the Starks did, it was just coded in their DNA. But some things were just too important to brush off their shoulders.

The last couple of days was a whirlwind, even for him. He realized that his only family member kept a life of secrets from him, that monsters and magic existed and that he had invested too much of himself in SHIELD.

He really didn't want to. Even after he found out that Bethany was a SHIELD agent after he told the world he was Iron Man, he didn't want to have an organization watching his every move.

"It's nothing new," Bethany told him. "SHIELD has eyes almost everywhere. Although, I have pulled some strings over the years so you're life hasn't been on full watch. Just the things that matter."

"Okay, and remind me again why you didn't tell me?"

"Because I'm a spy," Bethany sighed. "That would basically go against my job description."

"So no one knew? Even dad?" Tony said, not believing her.

She rolled her eyes, "No, your dad knew. But up until 1959, your dad and I couldn't be separated."

"This is just so typical," Tony exclaimed. "And everything makes sense. Going away months at a time. I mean, my mom always told me you were in international business."

"In a way, I guess I kinda am," Bethany said, thinking about it.

"Seriously, my childhood makes so much sense," Tony continued, throwing his arms in the air. "I mean, you not aging. Of course you go around kicking ass!"

"Sometimes quite literally," Bethany confirmed. "Look it's no big deal. And I get it, you don't want to do what SHIELD tells you to do. I can't judge you, or say any different. It's up to you, which is why I never got you involved in the first place. But you just made the decision to become the world's new hero, and I don't think you're responsible enough for that. SHIELD is just trying to help."

"Hey kid?" He heard. He hadn't realized he was aggressively staring at the blood stain wall until her voice caught his attention. "You okay?"

"Me? I'm fine."

"Clearly that's not true," Bethany said, taking a couple steps into the detention area, Steve leaning against the railing, his arms crossed. "I get it. Coulson… he just… gets to you. Good people tend to do that."

"He was an idiot," Tony declared.

"Why?" Steve asked. "For believing?"

"For taking on Loki alone," Tony explained, walking towards the newest members of the room.

"He was doing his job," Steve told him.

Tony scoffed. "He was out of his league. He should have waited. He should have-"

"Sometimes there isn't a way out, Tony," Steve said closing the gap between them, while Bethany stayed a good foot behind him, looking at the big empty space where the cage had once been.

"Right! How did that work for him?" Tony said walking past him, really thinking how did that work for you?

"Is this the first time you've lost a soldier?" Steve asked, turning as Tony's back was to him.

Tony quickly turned to face him. "We are not soldiers," he expressed, not yelling but enough for Bethany's attention to turn to him. "I'm not marching to Fury's fife."

"Neither am I," Steve assured. "He's got the same blood on his hands that Loki does, but right now we gotta put that behind us and get this done."

"Fury said the lab is in shambles," Bethany spoke up. "And we'd be starting from scratch, but if we could track the Tesseract before then-"

"He made it personal," Tony suddenly declared.

"That's not the point," Steve said.

"That is the point. That's Loki's point," Tony explained. "He hit us all right where we live. Why?"

"To tear us apart," Steve answered as Bethany walked up to them, leaning against the wall curious as to where this was going.

"Yeah, divide and conquer us, but he know he has to take us out to win, right?"

Bethany scoffed, "Why didn't he just take us out now, though? Wouldn't it save him time in the long run?"

"He wants to beat us," Tony continued. "He wants to be seen doing it. He wants an audience."

With that he walked past Steve again, up the stairs to gain the height. "Right," Steve agreed. "I caught his act in Stuttgart."

Bethany let out a small shiver, "Don't remind me."

"That's just the previews," Tony explained, everything formulating in his head. "This is… this is opening night. And Loki, he's a full-tilt diva. He wants flowers, he wants parades, he wants a monument built to the sky with his name plastered-"

He trailed off, and Bethany couldn't help but shake her head and smile as everything fit together. A warm light for all mankind.

"Son of a bitch," Tony let out, moving to leave the detention level.

"You know," Bethany said as Steve and her followed him. "If Loki wasn't clearly the bad guy, I'd suggest SHIELD hire him as a consultant. He's a genius. He's had this planned out all along."

"Which makes sense why he let us take him," Steve agreed.

"And why he seemed happy to be here," Bethany said letting out a groan. "Remind me next time this happens to make a string map with events to put together. I'm sure we could've figured this out sooner…"

Her pace picked up as she made her way down the hall, leaving Steve staring at her with wide eyes. "Next time?"

**A/N: Nearing the end of Avengers plot, and so soon too! They'll probably be one, maybe two more chapters and then I'm just floating free from there. I want to show more of their relationship developing, Steve getting into SHIELD, them working together etc. I want to stay true to the real MCU as possible, so of course when the time comes, I'll be mentioning the events of IM3, Agents of SHIELD and Thor: The Dark World.

Huge thank you to all of you! And hey listen, I'm still open to any suggestions, plot bunnies or fluff you want. Like anything. There's no promise I'll do them, but more often than not, I will. I've got a couple dozen steamy scenes that I've already written, so there's that to look forward to. But also if you want something simple like, I don't know, going to the beach, or baking cookies, let me know!

xox