Torunn knew that she was giving James some weird looks, but she couldn't help it. For the past few weeks she'd been working with a naive teenager trapped in the man's body, and he looked exactly the same now as he had five minutes ago. "So you're really the proper James Rogers of this world?" She'd already asked him that twice already, but felt like she needed to ask again because he he'd only given a grunt and a nod instead of a proper answer.

James sighed, and then turned to look at her with less exasperation than she would have expected. "Yes, I'm the James that's supposed to be in this world. I'm just a bit, uh… do you think jet lag applies when you go back ten years and then forward again?"

Torunn laughed. "I'm not sure if anyone's ever asked that question before." Then they were both silent for a minute, and Torunn had to force herself not to twist her hands together nervously. Why would she be nervous? Well, there was the part where she hadn't spoken to the real James in an uncomfortably long time. She cleared her throat, and decided to go for a distraction before the subject of their communication could get brought up. "So did you go to the world the other James was from? What was it like there?"

James tilted his head to the side to think for a moment. "It was strange," he said finally. "It was like the colors of the world itself were brighter than anything here. Like they were all the same as the colors here, but more vibrant. It felt almost blinding until I got used to it. And I didn't feel like cowering in fear in the presence of my mother. And my father was still alive, and probably one of the stupidestly noble people I've ever talked to before. You were there, younger of course. You were very different, and yet somehow the same. And that version of you made me realize that I have been a total moron for a very long time." He turned to face her more fully, resting his hands on his thighs. "Torunn, no matter what you say to this, I have to tell you the the truth. I'm in love with you. And I have been for almost longer than I can remember. I just- I just needed to say it out loud."

He closed his eyes, and waited for Torunn to respond to that bold declaration. Last she'd heard, he was dating some chef. And there was the fact that they'd barely spoken ever since Torunn had been disowned by the Avengers. "Why would you just tell me that now if you've really felt that way for years?"

James shrugged, and peeked his eyes open to look at her. "I don't know. I guess I was being a bit of a coward. I was afraid of everything between us being changed and ruined, but in the end it's only made me miserable, and our relationship was ruined by other forces anyways. You don't have to feel the same way, Torunn, I just wanted you to know how I feel.

Torunn took in a deep breath, and then slowly let it out. "You know that no matter what happens, I'm most likely going to outlive you by thousands of years, right? We're not even the same species. And the last boyfriend I had dumped me like a hot potato as soon as he realized that I'm not just some perfect hero like I pretend to be. Are you aware of the fact that I'm not perfect, James?" If he'd just been idealizing her all this time, then it meant he loved the idea of her more than the actual person.

James hesitantly reached out to take one of Torunn's hands, and she let him do it. "I don't care about that. All the good things and bad things and in between things are what make you who you are. You're perfect for me."

Torunn gave his hand a gentle squeeze. "I don't know if I can use the word 'love', at least not right now. It feels like we're still so new to each other, even after growing up side by side. But I do have strong feelings for you, James."

"What kind of feelings?" he asked in a whisper.

Torunn leaned forward. "I kinda feel like I want to kiss you," she whispered back. Then she reached up to grab the back of James' head to pull him forward so that they could actually kiss. It wasn't perfect, of course. And there was still so much else to deal with. She hadn't heard anything about James breaking up with his current girlfriend, which would need to be dealt with. And Torunn did still feel a bit raw about how things ended with Victor, considering the fact that he had proposed and she had said yes and had wanted to marry him.

But she wanted to at least try this out, and see where it went. She wasn't giving any eternal vows to anyone anytime soon, and there was still a lot to catch James up on about the past few weeks. Hell, they might not even live long enough to try out a serious relationship if they didn't manage to fight off the being who wanted to destroy everything. Those were all problems for later, though. They could wait at least a couple of hours. For now, Torunn just wanted to sit with James and enjoy having him back in her life.

,,,

James felt like he didn't want to let go of Torunn ever again, though after a few long seconds, she did pull away from him. She was still grinning, though, which was probably a good sign. Wanda snorted from where she was still sitting. "Someone better clean up that mess."

Torunn's face went slightly pink as her eyes flicked down to the tea that had spilled out onto the carpet. "Ah, I'm sorry, I'll get it. It was just that, uh, well I'm glad that you're finally back!"

James reached up to scratch at the back of his neck. "Sorry, didn't mean to be such a distraction to you." Then he let out a loud sigh as he realized that he had a lot he needed to explain about the past couple of weeks, and that he probably wouldn't have a lot of time to talk to Torunn about anything. "Once that's cleaned up, we need to get back to the tower. I need to talk to my parents." He saw the slight grimace on Torunn's face, and his heart started beating faster. What if Steve Rogers' fate from the other world had happened here and-?

"I'm really sorry, James," she said quietly. "Your mom really fought with him about it so that he wouldn't go, but he learned from your counterpart that an old friend of his is still alive, and felt like he had to go out right away to look for the man. He promised that he'd be back by the time you got back, but he had no way of knowing that Wanda would figure things out so soon after he took off."

James' shoulders slumped down. "It's fine. Bucky's a cool guy, and deserves to be rescued. And there's all the other Avengers to talk to as well. I didn't really need to see my dad specifically."

They took a cab back to the tower, and quickly found Natalia. She took one look at James, and then pulled him into a hug, whispering to him in Russian even though she knew he wouldn't understand any of it. He got the general idea, though. He was eager to return the hug. They weren't generally a particularly physically affectionate family, and he wasn't going to turn down the opportunity for comfort while he had it.

Once everyone had settled down on the couches on the common floor, James cleared his throat and began explaining a few things he'd seen in the other world. Not all of it, of course, because there were parts that just seemed like they would be demoralizing to say out loud to these people, but a lot. Including the fact that if everything happened in a similar way to how it had in the other world, they had about a decade before a giant alien decided to come to Earth and mess up everything.

Natalia frowned at the news. "Well at least we have more time to prepare than those in the other version of this world. I suppose this means that at least some good has come from your disappearance, though I can assure you that there is not much. We all missed you here, James."

Eventually, Natalia got up to go track down the other Avengers and let them know that the missing teen had been returned home safely. Torunn and James were left sitting opposite each other, and presumably Torunn was feeling just as awkward as James was. He opened his mouth to say something, anything, but his throat was suddenly far too dry, and he couldn't force any words out of his mouth.

Luckily, Torunn had something to say of her own, and she cleared her throat once. "I missed you a lot while you were gone. I know that we've been friends for a while, and I know that you don't have many of those. But I also know that I somewhat took advantage of that fact. I didn't treat you very well at all. More like you were a loyal pet following me around than an actual person, and that was wrong of me. It was easy to see you like that, because it's how most of our fellow Avengers see you and I. But that doesn't make it right, and I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm sorry. For all of that. For making you think that you had no one to go to with your frustrations but a woman who is twice your age and has a tenuous grip on her control of reality."

James furrowed his eyebrows as Torunn started to speak, but he let her get through all of it. It was obviously something that had been on her mind for at least a little while, and he didn't begrudge her the chance to get it all out before he responded. "I've never seen it that way. Honestly, I didn't. I know that sometimes it felt like I was just begging for scraps of your attention, but that doesn't change the fact that I enjoyed being friends with you."

There were a few seconds of silence before Torunn hesitantly spoke again. "The other James said that he's madly in love with the Torunn of his universe, and that he couldn't imagine there possibly being a world where that isn't the case."

James could feel his face heating up, but he wasn't going to just run away from this, even if he couldn't get any indication of Torunn's feelings just by looking at her face. "He's probably right," James admitted quietly. "I know that we're still young, and it probably sounds stupid to say something like this, but I don't think I'll ever feel about anyone else in my entire life, the way that I feel about you."

Torunn ducked her head down, letting her hair fall forward enough to curtain around her face and block off her expression. "I really, really missed you while you were gone. Definitely a lot more than I ever would have thought to be possible. It's really true when they say that you don't know what you have until it's gone. I had no idea how much you meant to me until suddenly you were out of my life. I thought I was going to die when I first realized that you were missing. You've always been a constant in my life, and the idea of you just being gone seemed so impossible, and so awful." Then she abruptly looked up at James again. "I know that I love you, because we're Avengers together, and that makes us family, but I'm starting to think that the love I feel for you isn't… familial. Peter's my best friend and I love him, but it isn't the same thing that I feel when I think about you." She gave James a long look before continuing. "The other James wanted to 'date' me in exchange for cooperating with us getting you back, and we didn't really date at all, but it did get me thinking about what it might be like, if I were to date the real you."

James' eyes widened, and he felt like his heart was beating so loudly that surely everyone in the entire city could hear it. "And what did you think about that idea?"

"I thought that it sounded really nice, and that it's something I'd like to try."

James grinned, and leapt over the coffee table between them so that he could pull Torunn into a hug. "I'd really like that too. I really like you!"

Then Torunn leaned back to look James in the eyes. "There's a lot we have to talk about," she said in a more serious voice. "What happened last year… something like that can't happen again. I know that you just want to protect me, but I can look out for myself, and what you did was revenge more than anything. I don't want you to think that just because our relationship has changed, you have permission to act even crazier than before."

James gulped, and then nodded once. "I know. Everyday since I did that, I've regretted it. Even the James in the world of villains has never killed anybody before."

Torunn ran her hand through his hair in a comforting manner. "I believe you. Don't worry, everything is going to be okay."

,,,

Tony looked back and forth between Torunn and James, one eyebrow arched. "What?" He put his mug down while it was still mostly full of coffee, which was immediate proof that he'd genuinely been taken aback by the announcement that he'd just heard.

Torunn cleared her throat, and shot James a slightly annoyed look before turning back to Tony to try speaking in a gentler way. "Technically, you're both of our guardian, even though obviously James was raised by his own parents, and we've never been made to feel like siblings, and-"

Tony held up one hand, and Torunn immediately stopped talking. "So you're asking me to dissolve my guardianship of James?"

James nodded. "I'm not saying that you're a bad guardian, or anything like that, but you have to admit that it's a little strange that you're still legally my guardian even though both of my parents are alive and mostly capable of serving as my parents. And if they're my parents according to the law, too, then it would just make it easier for Torunn and I to be together."

Tony picked his mug back up to take a long sip from it. "I see." He stared at them both for a long few seconds before shrugged. "Alright, why not. You've got weird enough childhood stories as it is, so I'm sure that telling your kids you got new guardians just to get laid won't even make them bat an eye."

Torunn gently punched Tony in the shoulder (even by Midgardian standards). "Don't say stuff like that, it's gross." Then she gave him a hug. "But also, thank you for agreeing to this."

Tony shrugged. "Yeah, yeah, gratitude, gratitude, whatever." He gave Torunn a fond smile. "You know that I just want you two to be happy, right?"

"Thanks." Torunn and James spoke practically at the same time.

,,,

James grinned as he watched Torunn wave her sword around for the cheering civilians that were standing all around them. It was the first time in a while where he'd actually been allowed to walk with the other young Avengers in a parade, because it was the first time in a year that he'd been allowed to go out on a mission with them.

Some of the other Avengers had verbalized their concern that James and Torunn's relationship would mess with the team dynamics, and that James would make too many mistakes his first time back in the field. But everyone (including James) had been pleasantly surprised to find that that wasn't the case. They were both able to act professionally and fluidly with the rest of the team rather than only focusing on each other.

Once everyone had retired back to the tower, James grabbed Torunn to pull her aside. As soon as they were in a room with no one else in it, they exchanged a few kisses before settling down onto the couch in there to watch a movie together. James hoped that the alarm wasn't going to go off to send them all out on another mission, but he also knew that even if that did happen, he and Torunn would still see each other out there, and would come here and see each other again at the end of the day. "Is it weird to say that I'm almost glad to have been sent to a scary alternate future where everyone is villainous?"

Torunn laughed. "A little. But it's alright. I'm sorry that you had to deal with all of that, but I guess that I'm a bit glad about it too, because it made me realize a lot of stuff about myself, and about you, and about how I feel about you. Now shut up so we can watch the movie."

James silently nodded, but didn't turn to look back at the screen. He was too busy looking at Torunn, and he knew that he had to have a pretty sappy look on his face, but he didn't care. He was happier than he could ever remember being before in almost his entire life, and everything was just perfect.