47 – The Cost of Saving the World – May 3, 2016
"This is for dropping a building on my face." Steve's eyes widened as a knife slid forward from one of the metal extensions on Brock Rumlow's right arm. He was already bruised from being tossed into a wall and kicked several times. Rumlow had changed and not for the better. The knife was aimed at Steve's head, and his heart skipped a beat as he realized Rumlow was perhaps better prepared to fight him than they had imagined. He ducked to the right not a second too soon as the knife buried itself in the concrete wall behind him. The wall cracked under the weight of Rumlow's metal-clad fist. As the concrete shattered, Rumlow was momentarily distracted, and Steve took the chance to elbow him in the neck. Rumlow wavered, and Steve managed to rip off one of the metal arm extensions. Now they were on more even ground. Rumlow recovered quickly though, and another knife appeared at his left arm slashing at Steve's neck. He could feel the wind of it as it cut through the air a fraction of an inch from his neck. He spun away as Rumlow aimed for his chest next and then grabbed Rumlow's arm when he was clear of the knife, swiping the metal extension off and kicking him hard in one smooth motion. Rumlow went flying, hitting a table and shattering it.
As Steve strode toward him, Rumlow got to his knees and reached up to remove the helmet he'd been wearing as part of his Crossbones identity. He dropped it to the ground, not concerned about hiding anymore. Steve reached him, grabbing the straps on his shoulders and giving him a shake. Now, as he got a glimpse of Rumlow's face for the first time since the fall of the Triskellion, Steve saw why he wore a mask. Rumlow's face was badly burned, warped and stretched like melted wax. His left ear was deformed, and his cheeks were crisscrosses of angry red skin.
"I think I look pretty good, all things considered." Steve didn't bother trying to argue that Hydra had gotten Rumlow into that mess. Rumlow blamed him, and he blamed Sam. He blamed everyone who'd fought against Hydra that day.
"Who's your buyer?" Steve asked, jerking Rumlow by the straps.
Rumlow just looked up at him, unfazed. "You know, he knew you. Your pal, your buddy, your Bucky." Steve tensed at the mention of Bucky.
He gripped Rumlow harder, leaning closer as if he'd somehow misheard the words. "What did you say?"
"He remembered you. I was there. He got all weepy about it. Till they put his brain back in a blender." For a moment Steve forgot to breathe. He knew he shouldn't be listening to Rumlow, that he was just distracting Steve from questioning him, but he found he needed to hear what Rumlow had to say. "He wanted you to know something. He said to me... 'Please tell Rogers. When you gotta go...you gotta go.'" Something in Rumlow's eyes changed as he spoke his next words. "And you're coming with me." Rumlow had something in his hand, and Steve realized a moment too late that it was a bomb.
For a second, Steve thought he was dead. Rumlow pressed the release on the bomb, and fire rushed outward in a deadly inferno. He didn't have time to move, didn't have time to think. He felt his uniform start to singe, but then suddenly the heat was gone, imploding on itself. Rumlow screamed in pain as the fire consumed him. Steve turned to see Wanda standing there, struggling as she controlled the blast, kept it from engulfing them. She twisted her hands and the blast and Rumlow were thrust into the air, away from the crowded street. Then it veered left into a tall building, shattering glass and consuming several floors in flames. "Oh my god..."
Wanda fell to her knees beside him. She gasped at the sight of the flames, lifting a shaky hand to cover her mouth. Her eyes reflected horror as she watched the flames rise. She'd saved his life. She'd saved the people on the streets, but...
"Sam. We need…fire and rescue…on the south side of the building." He started toward the building, his body aching from being thrown around. "We got to get up here." His mind was still trying to process the fact that Rumlow had nearly killed him. He'd taken his own life to do so too as if that were worth giving up to kill Steve. Now other people had been hurt because of him, and Steve hadn't been able to stop it. Sam was already in the air, trying to find entrance to the burning building. Natasha was on the ground, clearing the perimeter. Wanda stood in shock but a moment later followed Steve as he entered the building. People screamed around them as they made their way up. Fire alarms blared around them, adding to the chaos. They took the stairs, weaving through the rush of people. They still had several stories to go, and Steve's heart pounded as he thought of the trapped people. "Sam, what's that status?" he asked.
"Two floors on fire. We've got trapped civilians on the 9th floor. I'm evacuating the 10th."
"This shouldn't be happening," Wanda moaned.
"Hey, it's not your fault," Steve told her as they passed the 6th floor. "We weren't expecting that." Nothing that had happened today had been what he'd been expecting. They'd come to Lagos on a lead for Bucky but instead had found themselves finally catching up to Rumlow and preventing him from escaping the city with a biological weapon. He didn't know who the buyer had been, didn't know who Rumlow had been working for. Somehow it was as if he expected Steve to come. He'd been ready for him. Perhaps he'd been trying to draw him out. He knew that Bucky was Steve's weak point, and he had used that to distract him. Maybe Steve would have noticed the explosives had he not hesitated at the sound of Bucky's name. Right now they needed to stay focused on evacuating the building.
He didn't need to read the number on the doorway to the 9th floor; the heat from the fire blasted outward, and Steve kicked in the door rather than twisting the knob. An overturned cabinet hit the floor, and Steve realized it had been blocking the doorway. He heard coughing and turned to Wanda. "Can you get the smoke out?" he asked her, trying to keep her focused.
Wanda nodded before pushing at the smoke with her red energy, sending it out the shattered windows. As the room began to clear, Steve moved inward, following the sound of coughing. He found three people huddled behind a desk. "Come on," he told them. "We need to get you out of here." He led them to the doorway, making sure they were strong enough to head down the stairs on their own before turning back to the room. The smoke had cleared somewhat, but fire still burned. Wanda used her energy to push down on the flames, effectively putting them out. Sirens rang outside, heralding the arrival of the fire trucks.
"I've got everyone out. What's that status down there?" Sam asked.
"Still evacuating," Steve said into the comm. "Wanda's putting out the fires."
"I'm going to check the floors above, make sure nobody's trapped."
"Fire response is here," Natasha said. "And the local news."
Steve inwardly cursed. The media wasn't going to see a disaster caused by mercenaries. They were going to see the Avengers, and they were going to ask why they had let people die. Maybe they should ask that. Steve had failed these people today, failed his team. This shouldn't have happened.
"Steve." He turned to see Wanda staring at a corner of the room. She'd put out most of the fire, but now she stood frozen. "Steve." Her voice was close to breaking, and he realized why a second later as he joined her. There were bodies crushed under broken ceiling. Several of them looked as if they'd been badly burned. Steve put an arm around Wanda and forced her to turn away.
"Nat, we're going to need the EMTs up here on the 9th floor," he said into the comm.
"You've done enough," he told Wanda. She wouldn't look at him, so he gently took her chin. She hesitantly met his eyes, and he felt a tear hit his hand as it slid down her cheek. "Hey. This wasn't on you. Go help Nat keep the crowds calm. I'm going to see if there's anyone else."
Wanda nodded, tripping from the room. He heard her let out a muffled sob, her footsteps clattering on the stairs. He found seven bodies, and Sam met him after checking the other floors to report that he couldn't get through some of the rubble.
"We've done what we can do," he told Steve as the EMTs arrived on site. The structure was still unstable but Sam was right; there wasn't anything more they could do.
Back on the quinjet, they were silent. There wasn't really much to be said. They'd delivered the biological weapon back to the Institute for Infections Diseases but the workers there only looked at them like they had no business being there in the first place. The center was a wreck, but there was nothing they could do about that either. It was when they were halfway home that Steve realized he hadn't checked his phone since before they'd gone on mission. He had three missed calls from Aspen and several texts. He bypassed the texts and called her.
"Thank god! I saw the news," she told him. "What happened? Is everyone okay?"
"We're okay," he told her. He couldn't muster anything but a flat, dejected tone. "We're on our way home."
"Bucky?" There was hope in her voice, but also fear. She was probably thinking he'd reverted back to the Winter Soldier.
"False lead, but we did find something. Rumlow was there with a group of mercenaries. He was stealing a biological weapon from a disease center in a military compound. Probably planning on selling it. We stopped him, but... Well, he had a backup plan. People got hurt. Not us. We were lucky." Especially him, thanks to Wanda. He glanced back at her. She was staring at her lap, hands laid out as if they were weapons she wanted nothing to do with.
"I'm on the first flight home," Aspen said. "I'll see you soon."
"See you soon."
…
Wanda locked herself in her room the moment they got home, and Steve could hear her crying. He pressed his head against the door, feeling her pain and wondering if he should try to talk to her. In the end, he let her be alone. She needed time to grieve, and he was too tired and disheartened to find the right words to comfort her.
Natasha was talking rapidly on the phone to Tony who had called the second they'd landed. Steve pulled out his phone and saw that he had several missed calls from the ex-Avenger. He was glad Natasha had answered her phone because listening to Tony berate him for what had happened was not what he needed to hear right now. As he walked into the living room, he stopped short, his heart lifting for the first time in hours.
Aspen stood in the doorway, suitcase in hand. She dropped it and ran forward, flinging her arms around him and burying her head in the crook of his neck. She didn't say anything, just held him.
"What are they saying?" he asked after a moment. He hadn't had the chance to check the news, but he knew the pictures and videos would be everywhere now.
"They know that Rumlow was there and that you stopped him," she said, pulling away so she could look him in the eye. Her green eyes were wary, and he knew not everyone was painting them as heroes. Hell, he didn't feel like a hero right now. People had died. They might have stopped Rumlow, might have recovered the biological weapon, but in the end it hadn't been an entirely successful mission. "No one knows the whole truth though, so they're guessing at details. Basically they know you were there and that people died. It's not really clear where the blame is being placed yet."
Steve laughed humorlessly. "That's all it really comes down to."
"Have you talked to Tony?" she said it casually, but he could hear the underlying tension in her voice.
"Not yet. Have you?"
"Yeah, he called me while I was driving back here. Asked why I hadn't been there." She sighed, running her fingers through her hair.
"You know, for being retired, he certainly likes to jump on any excuse to pass blame around." He felt a wave of irritation though he knew it wasn't really Tony he was angry with. Taking a deep breath, he tried again. "But he's right. We messed up."
"What went wrong?" she asked him, guiding him over to the couch. His suit still smelled like ashes, but he couldn't find the energy to go and change. The acrid smell reminded him of the people who had died, and it felt like disrespect to try to wash it away.
"Rumlow caught me off guard," he told her, flashing back to their fight. "We fought. I had him, but he distracted me. He brought up Bucky and how he had remembered me before they'd scrambled his brain again, turned him back into the Winter Soldier. Rumlow had a suicide bomb." Aspen closed her eyes, and a wave of panic washed over Steve as he realized just how close to death he'd been. "If Wanda hadn't been quick enough…"
Aspen was quiet for a moment as they contemplated what could have happened. "So Rumlow's bomb started the fire then?"
"Wanda accidentally crashed him into the building when she was trying to get the explosion away from me. She saved my life and the lives of the people on the streets around us, but people died anyway. I didn't hear the count."
"It hasn't been announced yet," Aspen told him. "I heard on the news that very little information is being given out, but Steve, it could have been so much worse." She took his hand and held it tightly. "I could have lost you."
It was the risk they took, but it had been close this time. He'd let himself get distracted, and he'd missed the bomb. "I've gotta stop looking for him," he said quietly, more to himself than Aspen.
"Rumlow would have sold that biological weapon to someone who would have killed even more people," Aspen told him firmly. "More people would have died. You went looking for Bucky, but you stopped a threat we've been chasing for a year. Rumlow was never going to stop. He knew you had him cornered and tried to take you down with him. If the guilt should be placed anywhere, it's on him. This has nothing to do with looking for Bucky."
"If he hadn't brought up Bucky, I might have noticed the bomb. If just the mention of Bucky can distract me that easily… We've been looking for two years. He doesn't want to be found." He had to know Steve was looking. If he had his old memories back, then why would he keep running? Steve hadn't allowed himself to think of the simple possibility that Bucky didn't want Steve to find him. "I've got to stop looking."
Aspen opened her mouth to argue, but Steve spoke over her. "Can you see if you can get Wanda to talk?" he asked her. "Right now she could really use a friend."
Aspen nodded, and Steve got up. "I'm going to shower and change," he told her. There was still dried blood on his hands, and the smell of ashes was making him feel sick all of a sudden. It reminded him that though they'd succeeded in stopping Rumlow today, people were dead because of them.
…
Aspen tapped on Wanda's door. "It's me," she called out softly. A moment passed before she heard a click as the door unlocked. Wanda was sitting on her bed, knees up to her chin, arms wrapped protectively around herself. Aspen could tell she'd been crying. She came over, sitting on Wanda's bed and putting her arms around her. Wanda leaned into her, her tears starting again. Aspen noticed she had a picture of her and Pietro sitting next to her on the bed.
"He should have been there," Wanda said, her voice trembling as she spoke. "He could have gotten everyone out in time. People die around me, Aspen." She reached for the frame.
"That's not true," Aspen told her. "It's not you. It's the job. What we do…it's not without risk. We save lives but sometimes we can't… I wish it could be different. People might call us superheroes, but we're not invincible, we're not perfect. Part of being a superhero is learning to live with that."
"And what if I can't?"
"Then maybe this life isn't for you. Maybe you walk away and find something else that you can live with. I don't say that to sound harsh. I just don't want you to put all this on your shoulders. It wasn't a solo mission. You think Steve, Sam, or Nat feel any less guilty? Don't bear that guilt on your own. For what it's worth, I think you were meant for this life. You're compassionate and strong. Don't ever forget that. Pietro would say the same."
Wanda set the photo down and turned to wrap Aspen in a hug. "Thank you," she said softly. "I want to be an Avenger. I just need some time."
Aspen held her tightly before letting go. "Of course. After my dad died, I felt like it was all my fault. I felt like being involved with this life was the reason he died. Then I realized it was never about me. Those events had already been set in motion a long time ago. Rumlow was already planning his attack. That had nothing to do with our team."
Wanda placed the picture of her brother down on her nightstand, wiping a sleeve against her eyes to dry them. "It shouldn't hurt so much that people are calling us out, blaming us, but somehow it still does."
"That's because – no matter what the world thinks, no matter what people say – we're still human. We still care what other people think of us. We still want to be liked. Being in the spotlight is bittersweet. We get praised and glorified and thanked, but we also get criticized and vilified and blamed. Being a hero isn't about always being liked. Sometimes doing the right thing means not everyone is happy. And the inevitability that someone is going to get hurt is always there. We'll get through this though. We always do. If we have to bear their deaths on our shoulders then we will. But we do it together, not alone. Together we can make it through anything."
Wanda gave her a watery smile. "As long as we're together, I think I can bear it."
"That's what friends are for," Aspen told her. "You never have to be alone."
