My appreciation to all the readers pushed up the reader numbers, and also everyone who put this story on their favorites and alerts list. I'd also like to thank the readers who posted reviews, including Zekkers, OCDgirl326, the real vampire, Beloved Daughter, Qweb, Jelsemium, Arrows the Wolf, chelseymyranda, Adamantium Rose, Courtney, gryffindorgal87, goldenpuon, LEPrecon, Guest, Marianne Silver, Pocket Bug and Kelly Jo.

Special thanks to Guest, who pointed out my Chapter 46 had been overwritten by Chapter 47 in time for me to put out a desperate call for help to my readers…

And super-duper extra special thanks, accolades, and gratitude to both OCDgirl326 and Pocket Bug, who both fortuitously downloaded a copy of this story to their e-readers before I accidentally overwrote Chapter 46. I wrote and reposted a –new- version of that chapter, but it lacked the immediacy of the original (and now that I have it in my hands, I can see what I wasn't able to recreate). I tend to live in the moment along with my characters as my stories unfold, so going back to rewrite a chapter can be like trying to go back to your high school prom and relive it. You kinda sorta remember the big picture, but a lot of the tinier details get lost because it's just a memory... I will now go back to it and try to reconcile the two versions.

Thanks for reading!

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Chapter 48

Bernice stared at the clock. Three forty-five. Ten minutes since the last time she had looked at the clock. She looked at her watch, hoping the clock in the laboratory had stopped and it was really time to go home, although she wasn't looking forward to that, either. Where was home? Her old apartment, which Steve had made obstinately clear he did not wish to live? Or the sterile flat he'd carved out for himself, only the red, white and blue of his down comforter giving the place any color? She looked at the clock again. Three fifty. One hour and five minutes until she could blow this joint and go home to stare at the clock, instead. Waiting for Steve to call her.

She checked her cell phone to make sure it hadn't rung when … when she had sneezed? No missed calls. He'd warned her he might not be able to call until they got the mission finished, but waiting was killing her!

"Look look look look!" Huojin laughed. "Look. Here it is again!"

"Brain fart!" the engineers cheered.

Every engineer in the Stark Industries advanced weapons development group huddled around Ralph and Huojin, throwing in their two cents while they searched alien videos for 'flinches' and 'brain farts.' Flinches were when something triggered a deeply rooted survival instinct that caused an alien to suddenly cast off whatever program was controlling it and, just for a second, act confused. As though it had suddenly woken up and didn't know where it was. Flinches tended to happen more often with the lower brain function Leviathans. As though the animals had only been needed to be trained to act as warships and not have their higher brain functions completely overwritten.

Brain farts, on the other hand, were when a higher functioning Chitauri drone got conflicting information, often because one human came to the aid of another. Something in their program didn't seem capable of processing that act. Brain farts were accompanied by the peculiar two and a half second delay. It was as though their brains seized up with conflicting commands until some baseline function hit the CTRL+ALT+DEL button inside the creature's heads.

It wasn't foolproof, of course. Sometimes Leviathans had brain farts, and sometimes Chitauri drones flinched. But overall, it did seem like there was a quantifiable pattern to the alien's behavior now that they knew what they were looking for. They even had one incident where a Chitauri flinched when a mother turned on a drone that had been about to attack her young son. The mother hit the alien with a taser, shocking it. After overcoming the jolt of electricity, the alien had gotten down on one knee and reached towards the child.

The others swore the alien had been reaching to finish the child off, but Bernice was the only one who knew of Steve's attempts to reach out to Count Rugen through his art. She could swear to god the creature had recognized the child was, well, a child. Was this what had happened with Count Rugen, Steve's alien friend? Unfortunately, a passing National Guardsman shot and killed the alien, so they would never know what the creature's intention had been. But it made Bernice wonder. Given the right set of circumstances, instead of killing the drones or triggering whatever kill feature caused them all to drop dead, maybe they could somehow simply awaken them?

She looked at her watch again. Four fifteen. Forty five more minutes until she could bow out of this three ring circus. Although Ralph and Huojin had given Bernice credit, the conversation amongst the engineers was now so technical it surpassed her capacity to follow it. Ralph and Huojin were disheveled and wearing the same clothes they had been wearing when she'd left Friday afternoon.

Had it really only been three days? God. In three days she had gotten married, known more bliss than she had ever felt in her life, known more sorrow than she had felt since the day her mother had died, and now felt so anxious it felt as though she were about to burst.

She looked at the slender golden ring on her left hand. The only tangible thing she had to remind her that she hadn't just awoken from a dream. Nobody here had noticed. And after the third degree she had gotten from Jacquie and her family, she had opted not to volunteer the information. At least not today. Let Huojin and Ralph have their moment in the spotlight. God only knows the two had earned it. She'd just been the one to notice a pattern. They had done all the work.

So much for geek girl superhero sidekick…

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The clackity-clack of the subway as it pulled out of the station left Bernice staring forlornly down the darkened tunnel. She had gotten off this station a couple of times, always on a Saturday morning when it was full of happy people off to enjoy their day off at the park or wherever else people went on Saturday mornings. Like most subway stations on the fringe where the Lower East Side of Manhattan turned into the more industrial Far East Side, it had the tattered appearance of a mangy dog. Graffiti with gang insignias covered the walls, leaving less actual wall space than paint. The concrete floor was stained with lord only knows what substance and reeked of urine. Scattered on the benches were street people, moving from station to station to avoid the late-November cold as the MTA police told them to move along.

The street had an ominous feeling as she stepped away from the buzz of yellowed fluorescent lights, her suitcase dragging behind her like an anchor. It wasn't really all that late, just after 7:00 p.m., but this close to the winter solstice it got dark at 4:30 p.m. Some of the store fronts had colorful Christmas lights highlighting merchandise they wished to sell, but most had already closed for the day. Iron bars pulled across storefronts to prevent vandalism conveyed far more clearly than any gang graffiti ever could that this neighborhood was a hostile place to those who wandered around unwary. Cold bit at her neck and fingers, making her wish she'd worn her heavy winter coat instead of the fashionable pea coat that was only adequate for the first chill of autumn, not the winter weather which had rolled in over the weekend.

Why had she come back here? She should have just swallowed her pride and spent the night with Jacquie. But they had said some hateful things to one another last night, Jacquie upset she would ditch her to find another roommate with no notice. Looking at things from Jacquie's perspective, Bernice couldn't blame her. When it had been her in those shoes after Mike had dumped her, Bernice had been afraid she would end up in the street, unable to afford rent. She had been lucky Jacquie had been willing to move in with her. She'd promised Jacquie she would continue paying her share of the rent until she found another roommate, but money really wasn't the issue. Bernice had been seeing Steve for months and hidden the truth from her best friend.

It's classified...

Bernice had grown up in a family where those two horrible words were a final ultimatum on what could, and could not, be discussed. Jacquie didn't understand. Even now that Jacquie had caught an eyeful when Steve had showed up at their apartment last week wounded and still wearing his Captain America battle armor, Bernice couldn't enlighten her as to why her husband of two whole days had just abandoned her to fly to the other side of the planet.

A figure stepped out of the shadows, reminding her she was supposed to pay attention in neighborhoods like these to what was going on around her instead of sinking into her own thoughts. She stepped to the furthest corner of the sidewalk, trying to skirt around the shadowy figure before he could get any closer.

"Bernice."

Bernice looked at the shadow figure, eyes wide with terror. She increased her pace, moving as quickly as she could dragging a suitcase without breaking into an outright run.

"Wait."

The bright lights of Pankration gleamed at the end of the block like a beacon, the only building in the neighborhood that was well-kept, well lit and free from iron bars. Rodriguez and the other gym customers would still be there, the gym open to 8:00 p.m. on week nights. Should she drop her suitcase and make a run for it?

"Get away from me!" Her heart raced as she began to run.

"Bernice! It's me!" the shadow called. "Mike. Please! I have to talk to you!"

Bernice stopped. Trembling. And not just from the cold. This was not the Mike she had once loved, but a creature with a dangerous, desperate edge. His eyes were wild, as though he were a wild horse who had spotted a cougar, as he approached her as though he were approaching an adversary.

"A-are you s-s-stalking me?" Bernice stuttered. He was dressed weird. In one of those dark hoodies and puffy down jackets with a sports team logo on it like the gang kids liked to wear, as though he were trying to fit in down here so he wouldn't stick out like a sore thumb. Not the upscale dress Mike usually preferred.

"No, please, Bernice," Mike said. "We need to talk."

"We have nothing left to say."

"You don't understand."

"I do understand," Bernice shouted, her terror of a moment ago transforming into anger. "You dumped me a year ago almost to the day without so much as a second glance. And now that your hot little piece of law firm tail isn't turning out to be everything you thought she would be, all of a sudden you want back into my good graces?"

"That wasn't why I broke things off," Mike said. She could barely see his face, so dark was the street where they spoke and the shadows cast by the hoodie, but she could hear the emotion cause his voice to warble.

"It doesn't matter," Bernice said. A year's worth of hurt feelings and anger boiled in her veins as, finally, she found the voice to say what she had really been feeling all this time. The words Jacquie had told her again and again over pints of Cherry Garcia and more boxes of tissues than she cared to admit.

"It doesn't matter what you have to say. You think I don't know you dumped me because I wasn't good enough? Well guess what? I don't care! I don't care if I'm good enough for you, or the partners at your law firm, or anybody else. Because you know what? I'm good enough for me! Got that? Me! I'm good enough for me!"

Mike stepped back as though he'd been punched. Bernice moved away, her spine ramrod straight as she tugged her suitcase and began to pull it towards the gym.

"Bernice, please," Mike called. "That's not why I came. Please. Just hear out what I have to say."

"What?" Her nostrils flared as she glared down at him as though she were Lady Justice herself, pointing the sword of truth at somebody she had found lacking. Mike gestured towards the gym.

"You've got to get away from this guy," Mike said. "You have no idea what you've gotten yourself into."

Bernice leaned back, arms crossed. So we were back to that, were we? Like it or not, Steve had to maintain his cover and she needed to make sure nothing … or no one … she brought into their lives put that at risk. The price was too high … for Steve … if his cover was blown and he needed to sell his gym and relocate all because someone had blabbed. The poor man had finally begun to settle into someplace after getting ripped out of his own time and dropped into hers. She tapped her foot. Waiting to hear what rubbish Mike had say so she could humor him and get him the hell out of her hair.

"Like what?" she asked.

"Whatever he's into," Mike said, his voice a whisper. "He's into it deep."

"Oh," Bernice said, highly amused. "How so."

"I hired a private investigator to follow him," Mike said. "The cops told him to back off. Or else. God only knows how deep this thing goes. He's got the biggest gangs in town at his beck and call, and a couple of dirty cops. I tried digging into his past, but until last year this guy didn't even exist! He's a frigging ghost!"

"You might say that." Bernice's hand tapped on her forearm, waiting for him to finish so she could get on her way. "Anything else you think I need to know."

Some part of her registered the cell phone buzz in her pocket. She reached in to get it, but Mike grabbed her arm.

"Don't you get it?" Mike shouted. "He's Al Qaida or something! Has to be. You don't just get a whole fake background manufactured out of thin air like that unless there's big money someplace hiding behind it. You've got to stop thinking with your pussy and start using your brain, Bernice!"

Bernice only hesitated for a moment, just long enough for her brain to ask 'did he really just say what I thought I heard him say' before she slapped him.

"We're done here," Bernice said, her chin jutting out the same way Grandma Peggy's had done every time she put someone back into their place. She turned and walked away, dragging the suitcase behind her.

"I'm not done with you yet," Mike shouted.

"Oh, yes, you are done!"

Mike grabbed the suitcase and yanked the handle out of her hands, dropping it upon the ground. He grabbed her arm, tugging her towards the alley.

"You and I are going to go someplace where we can talk."

"Like hell!" Bernice shouted. She kicked at him, trying to break free. He was twisting her arm. And hurting it.

Shadows erupted from the walls of the alley. Dozens of them. Mike froze as the Dominicans Don't Play gang sauntered around him like a pack of wolves on the hunt. All of a sudden, Mike was no longer an alpha male, or even the beta, but prey. Out of the light of the street, they were little more than playthings for the real predators in this neighborhood. The gangs. These weren't the thirteen and fourteen year olds Steve mentored at his gym, trying to steer them towards a better life while they were still impressionable. These were the hard cases. The kids with crosses tattooed on their fingers indicating how many men they had killed or stabbed.

"Whoo-whee," the leader whistled. He sauntered up to Bernice. "What do we have here? A little lover's quarrel?"

Bernice gave the gang leader a look her grandmother would have been proud of. Fierce. And unafraid. Only she knew it was a crock of shit. Her knees were shaking. But she kept it from showing as she neither glared, nor flinched, at the leader of this gang. What was it Steve had said about them when she'd asked why he bothered taking the time to mentor the younger kids? Gang members were like a pack of dogs. The only way to deal with them was to treat the alpha with respect, but show no fear or the pack would be all over you tearing you apart.

"My friend was just leaving," Bernice said, forcing her voice to remain even and calm.

"He didn't look too friendly," one of the other gang kids said. He made strange hand signals to the other gang members that Bernice recognized as a type of sign language, but could not understand it.

"Naw, he kinda looked like he was trying to drag you into this back alley and have his way with you," the gang leader said. "Didn't it, boys?"

"Yeah," several of the gang members said. They closed ranks around the leader as though from some unspoken symbol. The wolf pack closing in for the kill.

The leader grabbed Mike by the throat of his hoodie, twisting it as he lifted him up onto his tiptoes and got right into his face.

"You leave Steve Rogers wife alone," the gang leader hissed. "You mess with her, you mess with the Dominicans. You got that?"

Several gang members made a motion as though they were stabbing someone in the gut. For the first time, Bernice recognized the skinny shadow that had been hovering inches from the leader of the gang. Lupe. The skinny kid Steve had been mentoring on how to use the still rings and gymnastic equipment to build up his body so he wouldn't get pounded on in the boxing rink by the bigger boys, who all outweighed him.

"W-w-wife?" The look of betrayal in Mike's eyes as they met hers was priceless. That same look of betrayal that had once been in her eyes the day he'd told her she wasn't good enough and kicked her to the curb.

Bernice smiled. She pulled off her glove and held up her left hand, the slender, precious symbol of Steve's love for her shining in the dim light of the alley like a beacon of hope. She held it in front of her as though it were Steve's Captain America shield. Fending off the unwanted attentions of a man she simply wanted gone.

"We got married," Bernice said, her voice dripping with venom and honey. "Some men like to plan a wedding. Others … just do it."

Mike's mouth opened and shut like a fish.

"Go on!" the gang leader said, releasing his grip so Mike nearly fell. "Get the hell out of here. Before I change my mind and shank you just for the hell of it."

Mike backed out of the alley, staring at her standing there dressed like Jacquie Onassis in her pretty little pea coat and beret, the gang kids guarding her like junkyard dogs a strange juxtaposition in this run down old neighborhood. She waited until Mike turned tail and ran before turning to the gang leader to thank him.

"Thank you, um, I'm sorry. I didn't get your name."

"Vasco," the gang leader said. "Lupe's my little brother."

Bernice turned to Lupe and gave him a smile. For reasons only she knew, Steve had taken a special interest in the kid. Teaching him how to stay calm so he wouldn't have so many asthma attacks and helping him line up medical care at the local clinic to get an aspirator, which the kids mothers' insurance didn't cover.

"Steve's done okay by my little brother," Vasco said. He made a hand signal to the other gang members. As if on cue, they began to fade back into the shadows from which they had come. Vasco shrugged. "Lupe's not like me. He's real smart. Steve said if he can keep his nose clean, maybe he'll help him get into college. Make something of his life."

"You can all make something of your life," Bernice said. "It's just a matter of choice."

Vasco gave her a crooked, regretful kind of smile. The kind someone gave you when you had just given them bad news and then tried to say something hopeful. Like when a doctor told you that you had cancer, but then tried to convince you a 30% survival rate really wasn't all that bad.

"I've done time," Vasco said. He shrugged. "Twice. Even if I get all straightened out, no one's going to hire me. But Steve said we can be like Batman and shit. Patrol the neighborhood, make sure our little brother's don't get fucked with while he helps them learn to take care of themselves and shit the right way. We … I don't know. I figure it can't hurt nothing. Steve's okay."

"Thank you," Bernice said. She held out her hand for Vasco to shake. Vasco looked at her a moment as though it were a trick, then took her hand.

"It's real nice meeting you, Miss Bernice," Vasco said. "Lupe's had a lot of nice things to say about you. Welcome to the neighborhood."

Vasco backed away, never turning his back on her, until he faded into the shadows completely and disappeared. Junkyard dogs. Made wary by a life that had shunted them aside and given them the shaft. But even they had hope. If not for themselves, then for the ones that weren't so hardened that maybe they could make it out of here. For the first time, Bernice truly understood why Steve was so determined to help these kids, even though it caused his business to dip into the red ink.

Bending down to grab her suitcase, she made her way to the shining beacon that was Pankration. Steve's monument that anybody, even a gang kid, could be more. It wasn't until after Rodriguez had helped her carry her suitcase up to the apartment and closed the gym down for the night that she remembered to check her cell phone for messages.

"Damn!"

At least she had Steve's voice to listen to over and over again until she fell asleep, telling her that he loved her.

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