73 Years Earlier and a Reality Away...

When Peggy Carter initially heard the knock at her door, she didn't think anything of it at first. She merely assumed it was a delivery and opened the door without much thought. A delivery though it was, the arrival was something she never thought she'd see again. She opened the door to reveal the man she had thought she had lost five years ago standing in front of her. He looked older than she had remembered. Not by a lot, as so much of him was still enhanced and preserved by the serum flowing through his veins. But in his face, he looked as though he'd weathered a thousand storms. Yet even still, his eyes softened as soon as he saw her. Her entire body frozen in disbelief, all she could do was blink back the tears that had immediately formed in her eyes upon first seeing him.

"S-Steve?" she stammered.

In that moment, he rushed to her and held her tight, stroking her hair as she sobbed into his shoulder.

"How can it be?" he heard her say. "It can't be you!"

He released his embrace to pull back and look down at her. "It's me, Peg'," he assured her. "It's me, I'm okay."

"How?" she said, shaking her head and refusing to let him go. "We searched for you. For years we searched!"

Steve chuckled slightly, at a complete loss of how to explain to her the way in which he presently with her now. How could he explain that the Steve she had tried to recover was still frozen in the Arctic somewhere? He opened his mouth, yet no sound emerged to vocalize the decades of stories he had to tell her. Instead, he simply pressed her back into his embrace as he repeated, "I made it out. I'm here now. I'm here with you."

That night, Peggy willed herself to stay awake for fear that this had all been a cruel dream. That maybe if she let herself drift off, she would awaken to find the space in her bed alongside her that Steve was presently occupying empty. So she simply turned on her side, riding the waves of exhilaration surging through as she watched him sleep by her side. Steve, on the other hand, hadn't had a more restful night in years. When he woke up, for once he didn't feel disoriented as to his location. It had taken every ounce of courage he possessed to come back to this time and place, as well as months of indecision on his Quantum Realm quest to return each Infinity Stone to their proper place. When it was over, he was at a crossroads. A flick of his wrist meant the difference between returning back to Bruce, Sam and Bucky waiting for him at the mobile quantum accelerator station in 2023, and coming here to Columbia Heights in 1950. Though he still felt uneasy about his choice, he felt content resting in the comfort he presently felt: This felt like home. Maybe this could work after all. He turned his head to see if Peggy was still beside him, but found himself alone. He could hear her gramophone playing music from the living room, so he rose and got dressed.

Peggy, meanwhile, was preparing tea for them both as she was reflecting on the whirlwind that had been the past twenty-four hours. Yet gone was her unquestioning exuberance, for just like the tea that was presently steeping in the kettle, she began ruminating in the stories Steve had told her explaining his sudden reappearance in her life, and certain details weren't adding up. Suddenly, she started to feel an uneasy sense of dread as she started to believe that perhaps she had been too naive and eager to accept this man, letting her guard down too soon because of what she had simply wished to be true.

Just when these thoughts were beginning to grow into a panic, Steve entered the kitchen, and in spite of her growing doubts, Peggy couldn't help but smile upon seeing him. He gave a sideways grin, his eyes traveling up and down her form as he said warmly "Good morning."

She felt herself blush as she returned his greeting, and for a moment they both stood there bashfully like shy teenagers. Eventually, Peggy waved off the awkward moment, saying "Oh what are we doing? Come now, have a seat. I've made Ceylon tea. Do you want any?"

"Absolutely," he replied, sitting down at her dining room table. She poured them each a cup and sat in the chair adjacent to his. He took a sip, gazing her all the while. Gesturing to her already made-up appearance, he asked, "You been up long?"

"Oh…yes," she answered, pouring a bit of milk into her own cup. "Hardly slept at all."

"Oh, I'm sorry—"

"No don't be," Peggy said, waving off his concern. "It's not every day that a loved one comes back from the dead." Taking a sip from his cup, he grinned at her, and her eyes searched his to make any sort of sense about his reappearance. This felt like her Steve… but nagging questions persisted as to his authenticity. Her gaze fell down to the contents of her cup as her index finger began nervously tracing around the porcelain handle. "Explain it to me again because I just can't quite wrap my head around how miraculous your story is. Who found you?"

Steve took a deep breath and shrugged. "I…can't really remember all of it. The amnesia makes things hazy. The last thing I remember was going down in the plane, and then I've got flashes of getting dragged out of the wreckage. After they cleared me from the hospital, I lived for awhile in a little town outside of Ottawa.

Peggy raised an eyebrow. "Ottawa…"

"And like I said," he continued, "It wasn't until I had gone into town and caught sight of that old USO comic book that it all came rushing back to me. Lehigh, Erskine, Bucky, Red Skull…all of it."

"The comic books that I had decommissioned after your disappearance?" Peggy asked, trying to keep her voice level to disguise her skepticism at his story.

He paused at this, considering his next move. "I'm…not sure. This was a small town, not much movement. It could have been old stock."

"Hmm," Peggy mused. "I just suppose I didn't realize Canadians were such avid Captain America enthusiasts. Someone in these past five years surely would have recognized you up there, eh?"

Steve set his cup down and folded his hands, suddenly overcome with dread. Peggy wasn't buying any of his act. In desperation, he reached across the table to take her hands in his and pleaded, "Look, I know this is hard to believe. It's a bit hard for me to believe myself. But all that matters is that we're here now."

"See you keep saying that but…I'm not sure how I explain to the world that Steve Rogers has miraculously returned." She pulled her hands away from his grip. "I go into the office tomorrow and tell my staff, what? That Captain America has somehow evaded our first class search and surveillance efforts? That he managed to enter the country unnoticed?" She narrowed her eyes and cocked her head to the side. "How did you get here? Where's your car? Maybe you took an airplane? …or did you walk all the way from Ottowa?"

Steve's pulse raced as he tried one final plea. "…Peg'…"

But in a flash, she had reached for the small wooden tea box on the tray, flipping open the lid and producing a small hand pistol she had concealed inside. She rose her feet so quickly that her chair toppled over behind her. With the pistol pointed right between Steve's eyes, she said through gritted teeth "Who are you really?"

Steve remained seated, raising his hands in surrender slowly. "Peggy," he began.

"You don't get to call me that! You're not Steve! Who are you?"

"Peg', please," he begged. "I promise you, I am who I say I am." He slowly rose to his feet, his hands still raised defensively. "I'm just not from this time."

"What— what are you talking about?"

He took a deep breath and bowed his head in defeat. "This was a mistake," he repeated under his breath. Looking back to her, he said, "If I explain anything, it will completely change the course of your history. Me coming here at all has done enough damage." He then started to back away, despite Peggy's pistol aimed unwaveringly at his face. After a moment when he was convinced she wouldn't fire, he lowered his arms. "I'm going to leave before anything else changes. For your sake, please stop looking for me, alright? They'll find me soon enough when the time is right." He took one final look at her before turning towards the front door. "'l love you," he said.

He then heard the click of Peggy pulling back the pistol's hammer as she commanded, "Take one more step towards that door and I swear to God I'll shoot!"

He couldn't help but smile. "Given prior history, I believe you would."

Her aim still focused directly at his chest, she walked around so that she was standing between him and the door. "You honestly believe I'd let you leave after all this time without so much as a single answer? I'm the director of S.H.I.E.L.D.! How could I be expected to let…whatever you are simply disappear? Start talking. Now."

"This is going to sound ridiculous," he sighed.

"I can handle ridiculous. Speak."

Steve looked at her for a long time, debating on how to begin. Finally, he raised his hands protectively once more, saying "I'm going to reach for a device on my wrist, alright? It's going to set off a reaction, but I need you not to get startled, alright? Can…can you lower the gun please?"

Peggy only blinked at him, communicating an "Absolutely not" with her fiery glare.

"Alright," he conceded. Then, slowly, carefully, he sharply tapped the face of the device wrapped around his right wrist, setting the nanotech suit Tony Stark had designed for him. The white, red, and black form-fitting suit expanded in a second over his body, and Peggy leapt back in alarm when she saw it.

"Don't get scared! It's alright!" he reassured her. "It's just a suit." Touching the breastplate of the design, he said "You want to know how I got here? This is it." Peggy's eyes were still wide in confusion, searching his face for answers. "I'm from the future," he said. "There's still a me out there frozen in the ice. I can show you exactly where, if you'd like. They don't find me until the year 2011."

"What?" she breathily asked, finally lowering her gun and releasing the hammer. "What do you mean?"

Steve sat her down on her sofa and began explaining in the vaguest way he could muster how his suit operated. He showed her his last remaining vial of Pym particle and told her that it could take him to any time he wished as long as he had a specific time and coordinates that he could enter his wrist monitor. He painstakingly chose every word in effort to not tell her anything that could alter her decision making and therefore cause a ripple effect throughout the course of her history, but he eventually realized that he couldn't make any of his story make sense without telling her when S.H.I.E.L.D. found him and how the Avengers came to be. He then gave her very basic, rudimentary details about the Infinity Stones and the aftereffects of Thanos's Decimation that had required him to travel back in time in the first place, and everything that had led up to the moment he decided to come here to her home.

During his speech, Peggy listened attentively but struggled to comprehend all of it. Once he had finished talking, she found herself speechless and unable to come up with a fitting reply. She only gingerly touched the material of his suit, running her fingertips down his arm until reaching the cold metal of the quantum monitor on his wrist. "I told you the truth would be hard to believe," he said.

Peggy chuckled. "I believe it more than that nonsense you were feeding me about Canada." She looked up at him and teased, "You always were a dreadful liar."

He gave a slight laugh at her remark, but grew solemn as he gazed upon her face. Laying a hand alongside her face, he murmured, "I'm just so glad I got to see you one last time."

Peggy balked at his and recoiled from his touch. "Pardon me! You think you can just show up at my doorstep, enter my home, share my bed, tell me stories of aliens and the apocalypse and time travel, and then just leave?"

"Peggy," he sighed, "My job was to undo the multiple realities we created. I came here selfishly, knowing full well that while I repaired six realities, I'd be creating another one by coming here." Again, he took his hands in hers earnestly. "But it's not too late. Just forget this happened. I can leave and everything can be the same."

But Peggy only shook her head. "If you hadn't told me all of this, your being here at all would have still fundamentally changed who I am." Suddenly, her back grew very straight and her eyes were downcast as she said, "You really think I'm that base that I wouldn't notice that you didn't tell me anything that happened between now and that war you spoke of? I'm not alive by the time that all occurs, am I? That's why you told me. I didn't live to see you again?"

He shook his head sadly. "You did. But not for long."

Peggy leaned back against the back of her sofa as she took this all in. She was quiet for a moment while she contemplated, then at long last asked him "Was it a good funeral?"

"It was beautiful," he answered, leaning back alongside her with his arm pressed firmly against hers. "The Queen was there." His jaw was set and his gaze was set firmly ahead as he painfully revealed, "And your family too."

Peggy sharply turned her head to look at him when he said this. When he finally returned her gaze, his eyes were sorrowful. "So," she asked him, "You're telling me that if you stay…" Her voice trailed off, leaving the remainder of her question unspoken, though Steve's expression told her everything she needed to know: If he stayed, she would never meet the man she would eventually marry, never have his children, and any other variety of things that happened in the world Steve was from. After another long, contemplative moment of shared silence between them, Peggy asked, "They would have still happened in your world, right? You coming here wouldn't change that?"

"No, it wouldn't change that," Steve replied before fully understanding her meaning. Once it finally hit him what she was asking, he sat up, looking at her earnestly. "…Peggy, no."

"You chose to do this—" she protested.

"I know I did, and it was wrong. I can't stay," he insisted. He procured the vial of Pym particle and held it up once more. "I can go back using this last particle, get more, come back right before I knock on your door and undo all of this." He shook his head sorrowfully. "My directive was to go back to my time."

"And didn't you?" Peggy countered. Steve hesitated, uncertain of how to respond, and ultimately running his gloved fingers through his hair in exasperation, completely at a loss of what to do.

Peggy sat by his side quietly for a moment, allowing him a chance to arrive at a decision. But when he remained silent and undecided, she offered "If your theory is correct, we're living in a reality apart from the one you knew before, yes? And there is no way in which what happens here can impact that one, correct?

He closed his eyes and shook his head. "…yes."

She leaned close to him, saying softly, "I don't meant to offend, but your world sounds like a bit of a disaster. If I had the chance to go back armed with the knowledge of what it might take to make the world a better place, I would like to think I would do something about it. Since you're here already, that is," she said with a shrug and a warm smile. "And perhaps if you wanted someone to help you, I think you have a powerful ally who could secure you any variety of resources to make that a possibility."

"You would…be okay with that?" he asked, his brow furrowed.

Peggy smiled again. "I'm in the business of saving lives, Steve. Weren't you as well?"

But he only shook his head. "And…what about us?"

Her eyes grew distant, considering this question. At last, she asked, "Was I happy in your world?"

"Very. You lived an incredible life."

Peggy gently took his right hand in hers, saying, "I'd like to think that that version of myself would support me choosing another path, especially as this path was not afforded to her." She sharply tapped the wrist monitor just as she had seen Steve do earlier, causing the suit to retract back into the device. She then turned his hand and unlatched the buckle, freeing the device and placing in on her coffee table. After a moment, Steve placed his Pym particle next to it, and the two of them looked at the items, weighing the gravity of the choice they were about to collectively make.

Steve looked at Peggy. "You're sure?" he asked her one final time.

Her eyes gleamed. "You owed her a dance, didn't you?" She then rose, heading to her gramophone which had long since come to the end of the record she had been playing. She replaced the needle down precisely, and the sweeping melody of the brass and string introduction in Harry James and Helen Forrest's "It's Been a Long, Long Time" reverberated throughout the room. She offered a hand out to him. "Dance with me, Steve," she said.

With such love in his eyes, he reached out and took her hand, vowing to hold it through all of this new life's important moments. He held her hand through their first dance that day, and held it again at their first dance as husband and wife. He held her hand tight moments before Peggy delivered the orders for their task force to extract a comatose Bucky from Hydra headquarters in Siberia. He held her hand as they broke ground on the Triskelion, a monumental expansion for S.H.I.E.L.D. that occurred nearly three decades before it was built in Steve's former reality. He held her hand before Peggy took the stand to testify in the People vs. Arnim Zola, the case that killed Hydra's infiltration of S.H.I.E.L.D. from the source. And he held her hand tighter than he ever had before when he was by her side as she delivered their baby.

A daughter. They named her Maria. The name came from Peggy's grandmother, though their close friend Howard Stark would often joke they had named her after the latest in a long string of girlfriends, this one also named Maria. From the moment he saw her, Steve was in awe of his child, and in that moment for the first time felt secure in his decision to stay in the past. How could he have missed out on something so perfect, so precious? He couldn't imagine any reality without her.

Maria's face quickly began to take shape as the unmistakeable, perfect amalgam of her parents: Peggy's hair and cheekbones, Steve's blue eyes angular jaw. During Peggy's pregnancy, Bucky had voiced some concern for the couple about the Super Soldier Serum that he and Steve were augmented by, and what lasting effects might continue for the offspring of either man. Yet Steve noticed nothing explicitly different or enhanced about his daughter as she grew — she was simply his beautiful, happy girl. Maria was raised between that beautiful house in Columbia Heights and the halls of the Triskelion. As the daughter of the Director and the organization's most senior Field Agent, she was constantly doted upon by the agents and personnel working within the building, a living symbol of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s future and next generation. This also demanded that she remain on her best behavior, as her mother wouldn't permit anything less when she was around her colleagues. Yet her disciplined and demure, "speak-only-when-spoken-to" demeanor would completely evaporate the moment her father or her beloved Uncle Bucky would enter the room, freshly returned from a Field Op. With boundless energy and an overactive imagination, she played and pretended and raced through life, wreaking havoc with her childhood friends on the schoolyard, with her family in her backyard, or alone exploring and getting lost amongst the winding halls of the Triskelion.

Yet what had gone unnoticed by the girl was her father's increased observation of her as she grew in age. Around age 10, he began noticing that there would be certain expressions she'd wear that gave him a peculiar sense of deja vu. Years later as he drove her to her middle school, the way she teasingly called him "Cap'" made his smile fall.

"Dad?" she asked. "You okay?"

"Yeah," he replied, shaking it off. "Just… thought of something else."

Maria snorted, leaning back in her seat. "You're getting senile, old man. Your mind's starting to go!"

He scoffed back with a smile, "Easy now," though inside he was jarred by the unmistakeable sense of familiarity her voice had triggered.

It had been eighteen years since Maria had been born when Steve began to lose track of the amount of times he had wondered or asked aloud why it was he and Peggy had named her "Maria." Today, when he asked again, Peggy replied while sorting paperwork at her desk, "My grandmother, remember? Though to ask Howard, he'll say we named her after his wife. Speaking of which…" Peggy's voice became muffled and distant as Steve's mind became consumed in his own thoughts: Maria's intense, icy stare when she'd be concentrating on homework, the sideways smirk when she had said something clever, even the tone of her voice… She was nearly an adult now and a disruptive thought plagued him ever since she had graduated high school…

Maria Hill…

No. How was that possible? The timing made no sense. If that was the case, she would have been far older in his original reality. And furthermore, how would she have been there at all? This was a reality of his own making - Maria Hill lived apart from this world.

"Steve? STEVE!" Peggy's voice sharply cut through his thoughts. He blinked, focusing again on her and asking her to repeat her question. "I asked you to remind me to pick up a gift for the Starks' baby shower this Saturday."

"Oh. Right," he replied, still somewhat distantly.

Peggy clocked his odd behavior, and decided in that moment what work she had left could wait until tomorrow. She stacked the remaining papers and stood to collect her briefcase. Steve silently followed her as they headed to their car together. On the way, Peggy gave him a sidelong glance. "In terms of shower presents… you don't happen to know if the baby will be a boy or a girl, do you? Might help a great deal."

Though Steve usually refrained from answering Peggy's questions about the future, this time he answered listlessly, "Boy. The baby will be a boy."

When their car entered the driveway that evening, they hadn't even come to a full stop before Maria came racing out of the house toward them, letter in hand.

"I GOT IT!" she cried. "I GOT IN!"

"What?" Peggy asked, stepping out of the car once Steve brought it to a stop. Maria raced to her side, excitedly shoving the letter into her face. Calmly, Peggy moved it away from her, reading the contents as a smile started to spread across her face. Suddenly, she embraced her daughter. "Oh, my darling!" she cooed.

"What's this?" Steve asked as he exited the car.

"Camp Lehigh!" Maria cried, shifting her weight from foot to foot as she struggled to contain her joy. "I made it in! Look!"

Peggy held out the letter to him, and his heart sank as he read her acceptance letter. "Ms. Maria Rogers… …pleased to inform you…Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division's original and premiere training facility… report to camp promptly on September the 14th… training will commence…"

"I…I didn't know you applied," Steve said, feeling as though his words were caught in his throat.

"What, did you think I was gonna be a receptionist at the Tri', working summers and weekends for the rest of my life?" said Maria. "No, it's official! I'm going to be a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent!"

Steve reeled at this news, as it seemed to confirm his fears. Peggy's brow furrowed at his bizarre reaction, and Maria suddenly grew somber. "Dad, what is it? Aren't you happy?"

Steve shook his head. With as much joy as he could muster, he quietly said, "Of course I am, sweetheart. Of course I am," and pulled her into a tight hug.

She seemed to be satisfied with this, as only moments later, Maria had turned back to her mother, asking, "Can I call Samantha and Terry?"

The word "yes" had barely escaped Peggy's lips before Maria was already bounding back into the house, so she called after her "But only if you call James afterward, otherwise you know he'll never forgive you!"

Once they were alone, Peggy turned to her husband, whispering urgently, "Alright, explain yourself. What was that? You knew she had applied for Lehigh! I told you over the satellite phone while you were in Laos in February! What is going on with you?"

Steve's breathing was short as he tried to calm the many thoughts whirring through his head simultaneously. None of this made sense. There was no way he was right. But just as he had held her hand through all the other important moments they had shared, Steve took Peggy's hand and said softly, "Peg', something's wrong."