Ashley and Steve entered the Smithsonian arm in arm, Steve dressed in a cap to disguise himself. Ashley looked around in awe. So many people were milling about, reading the information stands and ogling at the blown up photographs of the man she was linked to - people clearly loved him.
She didn't blame them.
Ashley pulled Steve over to the pre-serum and post-serum exhibit with a massive smirk on her face, especially once she lay eyes on the much skinnier version of him. "Awww! Look at my skinny Steve," she breathed, staring at the picture in disbelief. Steve rolled his eyes and shook his head, tearing his gaze away from the photo in embarrassment.
"Yeah yeah, let's move on," he muttered playfully.
"But I didn't get to look at topless big Steve! I have a huge crush on himmmm," Ashley whinged, jutting her bottom lip out. Steve bit back his laughter and successfully tugged her away, leading her towards another exhibition. "Ooooh! He's cute. James Buchanan 'Bucky' Barnes-" Ashley started to read - but then she froze. "Oh my god! Bucky? Steve, this is Lady Bucky's namesake!" she squealed, slapping Steve's arm excitedly. Steve gave a quiet chuckle back as he nodded.
"Yup, that's the guy," he sighed, staring up at the picture whilst Ashley's eyes quickly scanned over the rest of the information .
"Wait, he…died?" Ashley frowned up at Steve again with sadness lingering in her eyes. "So how did Christie know about him?"
"He…it's a long story - let's just say he's not as dead, or as old as we thought," he told her back with a grimace. Ashley's eyebrows shot up as she squeezed his bulging bicep.
"I'm sure you can tell me all about it at our next dinner," she hummed smoothly, resting her chin on his shoulder.
"Ohhh so now you want dinner too?" Steve chuckled at her. "You're in a better mood, I see?"
"A much better mood," Ashley confirmed with a smile. "Come, I wanna read your fun facts and see if they're actually accurate! Usually it's a pile of crap." Steve allowed himself to be dragged across the large hall to the 'fun facts' tablet. "Okaaay! So, favourite food - hot dogs? Awww Steve, you're so pure!" Ashley laughed, her eyes twinkling.
"Hey, I'm was a simple kid," Steve shrugged with a slight flush crawling up his neck. "Since then I've branched out - obviously."
"Yeah but you still have so much left!" Ashley breathed whilst continuing to flick through the facts, intrigued. "Hm. Favourite hobby…I don't think anyone does swing dancing anymore!" Suddenly, she gave a little shiver and pulled the sleeves of her top absentmindedly.
Steve noticed and shot her a frown of concern.
"Are you cold?" he muttered, "Why didn't you take your cardigan from the car? Do you want me to go back and get it?" Ashley opened her mouth to tell him not to worry about it, before noticing a group of teenage girls walking past wearing 'Captain America' hoodies from the gift shop.
"Ooooh! No, I'm gonna go to the gift shop and get one of yours!" she gasped excitedly, already making her way over.
"Wait! I got it," Steve stopped her before she could, and walked ahead to buy it for her.
He couldn't be more of a gentleman if he tried.
Ashley watched him walk towards the gift shop with a little adoring smile before spinning back around to look at the exhibitions. She noticed a little boy dash towards the mounted replica of Steve's shield with his own little plastic one in hand. He was so sweet - huge rounded eyes and a little freckled button nose with messy strawberry blonde locks. Ashley's ovaries were tingling at the sight of him. She always wanted kids, she wanted so many of them so incredibly badly…but with who?
Well, there was no telling for sure.
As she fell deeper into her thoughts of an uncertain future, she felt the presence of Steve hover beside her. "You okay, Daydream Daisy?" he smirked down at her, causing her to quickly snap herself out of it. She smiled and shrugged, ducking her head in embarrassment.
"Sorry," she winced. Then her eyes darted down to the bulging plastic bag in his hand. "Oh! You got the hoodie?"
"I did…and something else too," Steve began hesitantly, lifting the bag so that she could take it from him. Ashley frowned and glanced inside, seeing the hoodie nearly folded, but with a medium sized velvet box placed nearly on the top.
"Oh god, Steve," she breathed, taking it straight out of the bag. "You wanna propose to me already?" Steve let out a little nervous chuckle and shook his head, holding his breath as she snapped the lid open. Inside, on a velvet cushion, sat a dainty necklace with a silver heart pendant, with the words 'Steve Rogers has my heart' engraved in cursive. Ashley immediately burst out laughing. "Oh you are such a pain! Thank you - I love it," she beamed up at him, running her finger over the lettering. "Aww. Steve Rogers has my heart!"
"Well…does he?" Steve asked her quietly, now standing behind her instead. Ashley recoiled and spun around to stare at him.
"Of course he does," she tutted, nibbling down on her bottom lip. "And if he didn't get that by now then Ashley Darmer has been doing something very wrong."
Then she thought about something else - something that suddenly made Steve's question make sense. "Does…does Ashley Darmer have Steve Rogers' heart?" she whispered up at him. They didn't break eye contact once.
"She does," Steve answered firmly, his plump lips barely moving.
"Oh?!" Ashley couldn't help but giggle in surprise. "Well, I didn't know this!"
"I don't know if you've realised but…I'm not very good at this, Ash. I'm not good with…the ladies," Steve reminded her with an apologetic grimace as he snuck his arms around her curved waist.
"I've realised," Ashley winked back, feeling his grip get a little tighter. "So does…oh god, have you now practically asked me to be your…"
"I mean, if you will, Ashley - yes. I mean I know I'm always busy and so are you, and we can take it as slow as you want - but I just can't ignore when something feels this…right," Steve explained, blinking down at her nervously. He wasn't sure what her reaction would be…almost six months of knowing and dating her felt about right, but then again, who could really tell these days?
But the tears welling up in Ashley's eyes let him know that she'd taken it well.
"Of course I will!" she pouted back, already wiping her eyes. "I have been waiting for you to ask me for ages, Steve!"
"I'm sorry, but better late than never," he shrugged fairly. Ashley nodded quickly in agreement, unable to get the words of happiness out - when suddenly, something started buzzing in Steve's pocket.
It was Agent Hill - this couldn't be good.
"Agent?" he answered the call, causing Ashley to snap out of her lovey-dovey mood and to stare up at him.
"Cap, you're in the Smithsonian right?" came Agent Hill's rather brisk voice.
"Correct - what's going on?" Steve muttered.
"We have reports of a covert HYDRA base located beneath the basement…intelligence suggested it's inactive but we think they've been pushed to used it as a point of contact since the bust," Agent Hill explained quickly. "I'll send over all the mapping information - do you think you could take 'em out?"
"I'm on it," Steve nodded briskly. "Oh, I'm actually here with Ashley-"
"Oh perfect! You two can team up. Like…Mr and Mrs Smith!" Agent Hill suggested heartily.
"Who?" Steve blinked, totally lost. Agent Hill let out a sigh and shook her head.
"Never mind. I'll give you the details, and tell Ashley to wire up cos Louis will be in her ear in a few minutes. Good luck to you both, and be safe," she rushed before dropping the line. Steve sighed and shoved the phone back in his pocket before turning to Ashley.
"Ash, we got a HB20 down below," he murmured as discreetly as possible. Ashley's eyes went wide for a second before she crinkled up her nose in wonder.
"Why do we call it that?" she frowned. "Cos I'm pretty sure a HB20 is a pencil-"
"Alright now, Ash? I need you to focus," Steve instructed her, taking her hand and speedily walking towards the back exit.
"Sorry, sorry," she groaned back. She tended to forget that Steve was a soldier before anything else, and when he was 'in the zone' it wasn't a time for jokes. "Okay, so a HB20 down below. But is it an AHB20 or an IHB20?"
"Well, I can't say I know what either of them mean," Steve told her distractedly whilst simultaneously trying to decipher the quickest way to the basement.
"Active HDYRA base or inactive HYDRA base, Steve - come on. Keep up soldier," Ashley tutted back. Steve stopped walking abruptly and spun around to stare at her smirking face.
"I'm so gonna get you back for that comment," he warned her with those same playful eyes. Ashley nibbled on her bottom lip and raised a careless eyebrow as Steve refocussed on the mission, continuing to pull her towards the lift. There were quite a few people waiting there, so Ashley took it as the perfect time to do nothing but cause more trouble with the man that she could finally call her boyfriend.
She stood in front of him whilst they waited, and threw her arms over his shoulders, biting back the smile once seeing the warning looks growing on Steve's face. He already looked stressed enough as it was, and now she was here to disturb his peace again. Ashley fiddled with the tufts of hair at the back of his head, biting down on both lips and looking dead into his focussed eyes. "Ashley," he warned her quietly after a few seconds, "what the hell are you doing?"
"Waiting for the lift…?" Ashley hummed back with a playfully innocent frown, "what are YOU doing?"
"Well, currently trying my best not to get distracted by your little seductive act," Steve mused with both eyebrows raised, gripping her waist a little tighter.
"Well is it working?" Ashley giggled lightly as she brought her face even closer to his. "Because I think it is."
"Oh no, is this what it's gonna be like for the rest of my life?" Steve asked tiredly. He was fighting everything within him to not give into temptation and kiss her right then and there - but his chosen words had caused Ashley to drop the act abruptly.
"Wait - the rest of your life?" she slowly repeated, dropping her hands from his shoulders so that they were swinging by her side. "You've already written me off for the rest of your life?"
"Well…back in my day, we didn't exactly date for fun - we dated to get married," Steve smirked back, seeing the shock gradually register in her face. "Now, before you get overexcited, I'm not saying that we-"
"Yes, I'll marry you!" Ashley suddenly gasped, causing some people to randomly start clapping around her. Steve ducked his head so that his cap covered his face whilst Ashley gushed her playful 'thank you, thank you's despite the fact that she knew damn well there was no proposal. Even Steve himself struggled to hold back his laughter as the lift arrived and they all stepped in. Ashley was certainly a fun character, and he did like that about her. She really was like a bubblier, softer Christie - they both shared the same amount of witty sarcastic banter.
Once the lift doors slid open on the basement level, Steve led Ashley straight towards the back of the hall where the 'no entry' fire doors stood, still hand in hand. Once they approached the alarmed doors, Ashley turned to Steve in confusion. "So, what do we do now, Cap?" she muttered, aware that there were security guards dotted all over the place. "You don't even have your damn shield to take these guys out!"
"We just have to cause a distraction so that the alarms don't…well, do their job," Steve frowned to himself. "So whatcha got?"
"Well, we can either do a wet floor trick," Ashley thought out loud, "that'll always cause a cleaner or seven to pop out outta nowhere and divert the attention…or, we can do a 'broken-glass-therefore-possibly-missing-historical-artefact' trick?"
"Broken glass sounds fun," Steve mused, eyes darting between each security guard twice over. "Whatcha thinking, flaming rock?"
"Always!" Ashley murmured with a little smile. She clicked her fingers and the hot rock appeared flat in her palm, already on fire and ready for launch. Steve smirked at her and turned away, ready to force the doors open once the commotion started. Ashley took a deep breath in, focussed on one of the glass cabinets, and just hoped that her aim was good enough before shooting it towards the target. Much to her relief, it burst straight through the glass and set off a piercing alarm bell, causing everyone in the hall to panic as the security guards jumped to action. "Love it," Ashley grinned as Steve burst open the back door. They both slipped through with ease and quickly began following the empty set of stairs that were leading downwards.
"Ashley?" came the familiar voice that Ashley both knew and loved in her ear.
"Louis!" she cooed.
"Hey girl, you got two security guards heading your way," Louis quickly informed her, "time to intercept!"
"Steve," Ashley hissed, tugging at his sleeve as soon as she could - but it was too late, the security guards had already met them halfway, and they were clearly confused.
"Um, sorry guys, you can't be down here," the taller one frowned, his hand hovering over his belt. Ashley had no choice but to think on her feet.
"Uh kinda ironic, given the fact that you have an entire freaking exhibition dedicated to this guy," she scoffed, quickly yanking the hat off of Steve's head to reveal his true self.
"Captain America?" the larger guard gasped. Steve gave them a stiff smile, the only thing he could do in such unprecedented situations.
"Gentlemen, there's something we need to take care of down there, and I'd be a lot happier if we could do it without hassle. It doesn't have to get ugly," he told them calmly, asserting that dominance that Ashley was so insanely attracted to.
"O-of course, please go ahead, sir," the taller guard told him, shuffling to the side. He clearly wanted no parts of it. Ashley shot them both a smile and let Steve walk ahead, leading the way between the parted guards and heading down the staircase. As she walked however, she glanced behind her to look at the guards again. The taller one had already continued to make his way upstairs - whereas the shorter one had slowed down, and was placing a finger to his ear.
And she knew that only could mean one thing.
"Gotcha," she muttered to herself, suddenly powering air jets out of her feet so that she was hovering back beside the guard, before grabbing his head in her hands and slamming it against the wall repeatedly. She yanked the earpiece straight out of his ear and crushed it under her foot, before propping the his limp body up against the wall. His buddy poked his head over the railing to see where he'd gone, but when he was met with Ashley's beaming face, he held his hands up.
"Your pal down there is a terrorist, but he'll be fine by the time the police turn up," Ashley beamed, before swinging herself up over the railing and jumping straight down to the bottom of the staircase where Steve was already. It looked as if they had reached a dull disused warehouse or car park, so Ashley sparked a flame so that they both could see better.
"That was real silly of you, you know that?" Steve murmured now that they were beside each other again.
"What was real silly?" Ashley frowned, crinkling her nose up at him.
"Blowing our cover? Ashley, that could've caused way too many problems," Steve broke it down slowly. "They could've gone and warned other people that we were here, they could've-"
Suddenly he stopped talking, hearing voices from behind a door that they were now stood outside of.
"Hang on, before we go in, just so you know - I did that so that I could see if either one of those guys were undercover agents of which one of them was," Ashley hissed to him, prodding his broad chest irritably. "You went ahead, I watched and waited. I got him down as well - not like you'd care." Before Steve could reply, she'd conjured up her palm fire and burst down the door, revealing a small amount of HYDRA agents working in the room. "Ohhhh dear - Diana LaBeau from Statistics? You're one of them too? I expected better," Ashley tutted with a playful frown, before blasting wind out of her palms and scattering them all into different corners of the room, rendering them dizzy or unconscious. She went to restrain one of them whilst Steve did the same to the other, both of them ignoring the standard 'I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING's wails.
"Ash, it's not like I don't trust you," Steve mumbled as he tied the guy up, before punching the next one to knock him out. "I just-"
"It's fine Steve. I know you've been doing this for longer than I have," Ashley spoke over him directly, before shooting him a tight lipped smile before redirecting her focus. "So we have different mission styles, meaning we can't be Mr and Mrs Smith after all - but I'm sure there's other stuff we can do together." Steve frowned at the reference again but said nothing else, just so they could finish the mission in peace.
Within several minutes, an entire government police squad had turned up to arrest the agents, cordoning off the area from where tourists were still attempting to snap pictures of them being taken away. Steve and Ashley were receiving words of praise by the Chief of Police, when they were quickly joined by the museum manager who was shaking his head at the prisoners.
"Well, you've managed to do it again," Chief of Police Romano sighed in relief as the arrested agents were bundled into blacked out police vans. "Thank you both so much. Without you, we'd be completely…."
"Lost?" Ashley finished with a knowing smile, "yes, Romano. We've noticed!"
"Chief, are we taking the manager in for questioning too?" one of the officers murmured out of the side of his mouth, leading the group to glance over at where the condescending museum manager stood a few metres away.
"I think we should just in case - but then I don't want the entire world knowing about HYDRA right now and I doubt Director Coulson would either. If we take him in and we got it wrong, he could come out and blab about everything we asked about - and that's the very last thing we need," Romano muttered back in uncertainty.
Ashley squinted her eyes for a second, before something else flew into her mind.
"Wait, do you guys still have their little ear receiver thingies in those evidence bags?" she gasped. Romano nodded and grabbed the bags from where they had securely been put away, passing them straight over. Ashley took it and emptied one of the little reciever balls into her palm before carefully placing it onto the floor. "Keep an eye on the manager," she whispered to Romano and his partner, before suddenly slamming her foot down on the ball, crushing it.
As soon she did that, the manager winced and grabbed his ear, doubling over in pain.
"Busted! Take him in too," Ashley smirked, before spinning on her heel and flouncing off, having had enough of Washington for one day. It only took a few seconds before she felt Steve's presence behind her, catching up with her in no time as they made their way back to the car.
"Wait, Ash!" he sighed, eventually grabbing her hand and stopping her from walking any further. She spun around to stare at him hollowly, with absolutely no emotion. "I'm…I'm sorry for earlier. I didn't mean to make you feel…you know, inferior."
"I know," Ashley shrugged nonchalantly, sensing that he was at least being honest. "Listen, I get that I haven't been doing this for as long as you have but either way Steve, you have to trust that I know-"
"I do," Steve insisted, still not letting go of her hand. "I just…I promised your father I'd take care of you and I guess I let that show in harsher ways than it was meant to. I promise you, it won't happen again. I won't turn into him." Ashley's face softened immediately and she brought his face to hers, pressing a forgiving kiss to his unsuspecting lips and entangling her hands in his hair.
Clearly he was forgiven.
Once they broke apart, Ashley giggled as she noticed Steve's eyebrows raised in surprise.
"You do the sweetest things for me, Rogers," she told him lightly, swiping the leftover gloss from his lips with her thumb. "I don't even deserve you as a friend, let alone boyfriend. I'm sorry, I can be such a 'do it myself' kinda person - I'm not used to having someone like you there to look out for me by choice." Steve smiled and swiped her curly locks from falling in front of her face to tuck it behind her ear, completely understanding where they both went so wrong.
"Yeah, that makes total sense," he hummed.
"Right? Maybe we need to reevaluate my daddy issues before we do another mission together as Mr and Mrs Sm-"
"Alright, when we get back to the tower you gotta show me this who these people are, because not knowing the reference is killing me," Steve shook his head, opening the car door for Ashley as she burst out laughing in the middle of the street.