Author's note: First of all, I'm really sorry for taking forever and a half to post this. I did some travelling for something like a month and no writing was done in that time. I do plan to be more consistent with the updates as much as I possibly can :) And second, I'd like to thank everyone for being kind and for the love this story received so far. You're wonderful!
Dig in!
It was a widely known truth that noticing changes in the others was infinitely easier than seeing them in yourself.
It took Steve a few years to take note that something was off. A few more to get worried about it, the way anyone would get worried about the fact that they'd stopped aging. It was easy to brush off Charlie's quips (Not having to fight for your life is good for you, man) and Sameer's comments (You're just jealous) for a while, and quite frankly, it was hardly a matter of concern for Steve in the years following the war, not when he was too busy putting together the pieces of his shattered life.
Charlie moved back home eventually, driven away by the memories he didn't want to hold on to, and even though his letters remained fairly frequent for a while, the bond was not the same. And Steve couldn't blame him. As close as they were at some point, the war was something one wouldn't want to remember for too long. If there was a part of the world he could run away to, he wasn't sure he wouldn't do so in a heartbeat.
Sameer was still around, but he pulled away as well, putting a wall between the past and the present, and his new life was drastically different from what it used to be that it was hard to keep up.
There was a knowing look in Chief's eyes, the one that made Steve's stomach twist with unease. Like he knew something or could see right into his very soul. However, he never said anything, and Steve never dared ask, fearful of the answers, and then the Chief was gone, too, sailing back to his homeland in hopes of finding a place he could call his own, the torn-apart Europe no longer having anything to offer him.
And this was how Steve Trevor found out that he was terrible at moving on.
The 20's came and went without his noticing, the post-war life taking shape around him, his hopes and dreams finally having a chance to come true. He hadn't noticed most of it, what with being focused single-mindedly on making it through one day at a time until he'd lost the count of them, until they started to blur and bend around him, the time no longer bearing any meaning.
The 30's brought more hassle, the dull pain inside him finally turning into a throb he could almost ignore if he put some effort into it. A decade and a half – that was how long it took him to stop listening for the conversations around him, his ears straining to catch the familiar husk of her voice, the soft accent seared into his memory; that was how long it took his heart to stop wearing itself thin and his throat to no longer go dry at the sight of dark-haired women on the streets of London, and then Paris, and Brussels, and wherever else he happened to be.
Steve Trevor was nothing but unrealistic. He never blamed Diana for leaving. As much as it hurt to admit it, he knew better than anyone that there was little he could offer her, aside from his endless affection, but what value did it have, really? Which didn't mean it stung any less, making him feel like missing her was driving him man more often than not. Understanding was one thing. Accepting… well, it turned out that accepting her decision was something else entirely.
Something that kept him so occupied that he barely even noticed that at the age of 51, he didn't look a day older than 35.
Until he did.
Until he found himself in the bathroom one night, staring at his reflection and unable to recognize the face looking back at him. The features were all in place, as familiar as ever, but the total sum of them wasn't adding up. He touched his cheek, feeling the prickly stubble with his fingertips, and the man in the mirror did the same. His hair was supposed to be streaked with grey, the lines around his eyes were meant to be deeper. It scared him, and yet there was something comforting in being suspended in time. After all, this was what his life had been for the past fifteen years – feeling like the time had stopped.
Ironically, he never got around to fixing his watch. Couldn't even look at it anymore after Diana spent several months wearing it on her wrist. It was bad enough that his clothes and his bedding smelled of her for so long Steve started to think at some point he was losing his sanity, that her very essence seeped into his very skin to stay there for eternity, his mind trapped in the endless loop of memories he wanted to hold on and to forget, all at once.
And so his once most prized possession remained shoved into the drawer of his desk as Steve tried with little success to ignore a twinge of sorrow in his gut whenever he saw it.
This was not how it all was supposed to end.
When the Second World War rolled around, he accepted it with numb resignation, finally admitting to himself that deep down that he never truly believed that killing a god of war was not going to fix mankind. After all, gods or no gods, people were making their own decisions, and sometimes they had to pay for them.
xoox
"Dance with me," Steve asked. He was standing by the stove in a sunbathed kitchen one morning, and Diana didn't resist when he set down the spatula and pulled her to him, surprised and curious.
His arm wrapped around her waist and his hand curled around hers, and his face was so close that their noses were almost touching, the blue of his eyes so mesmerizing it left her transfixed.
"But there is no music," Diana pointed out, one eyebrow arched.
The corner of Steve's mouth curled up, his fingers flexing on the small of her back. She could feel the warmth of his touch through the thin fabric of her shirt spreading all over her, the hardwood floor warm beneath their bare feet.
"Of course, there is."
And before she knew it, he was humming something under his breath, a tune Diana never heard before but the sound of which reverberated somewhere deep inside her, his body moving ever so slightly, and hers following suit. She could feel his heartbeat her was so close, could feel his breath on her cheek as she rested her forehead against his temple.
It was early still, her mind somewhat hazy around the edges, and her lips stretched into a smile on the will of their own. This was ridiculous, and silly, and it made no sense, and yet, she knew deep down that she wouldn't want to be anywhere else but here, swaying to something that wasn't even music, all because there was nothing quite like the contentment of being cocooned in the comfort of Steve's closeness.
Diana looked up, her gaze skimming over his bedhead and a faint shadow of stubble dribbling from his cheeks. Solid and warm and alive, and so incredibly off-key it was making her heart almost burst with tenderness.
"Steve?"
"Mm?"
He was watching her quizzically, expectantly, his body still rocking almost imperceptibly in place, and his half-smile was pulling her into a vortex of something that she couldn't put into words because they simply didn't exist. It wasn't meant to be defined, she thought absently. It was meant to be felt.
Unable to say anything, she reached to brush Steve's hair back, smoothing it down at his temple, taking in his features, trying to memorize them with her fingertips.
"Where have you been my whole life?" He whispered, a little puzzled, a little mesmerized.
"You know where," Diana murmured back even though he clearly wasn't expecting an answer.
She rested her cheek on his shoulder and closed her eyes. With Steve Trevor, she could dance for a hundred years - barefoot, in the cramped kitchen, with no music playing, and her soul would sing and soar every moment of it.
xoox
Themyscira was the same.
And yet it wasn't.
Crossing the barrier around the island felt like a touch of electric static to her skin that made the fine hairs on Diana's arms stand on end. And then all she could see was the outline of the cliffs that she knew like the back of her hand, every nook and crevice of which she could wade through with her eyes closed.
This was the place she called home for as long as she lived, a place that was her entire world, and she rarely, if ever, wondered about what lay beyond it, always content with what she'd had. And how could she not be? How could anyone not be? She was always content, happy as one could ever be.
Looking at the familiar landscape and the turquoise waters surrounding her, she couldn't help but feel a pang of longing in her chest. She missed Themyscira the way one would miss something that was a part of them, flesh and blood, and she suspected that in many ways it was. For all of them. And she realized with a start that when she left this place nearly two decades ago, she never expected to come back, half-fearful to face the people who undoubtedly thought of her departure as betrayal, half-certain that she would never find her way back, through the barrier, to a place that didn't technically exist for everyone else.
Hence the drifter and not a motorboat – she knew the navigation equipment would not work here, Steve told her. His compass went ballistic when he was trying to figure out his location, and she didn't want to get lost, even though a part of her almost wished she'd never find her way back. Maybe it would be better, Diana reasoned with herself, if Themyscira remained hidden, if in her mind, it stayed that magical place where, as a girl, she thought anything was possible and the world was a magical place.
Her mother was waiting for her in the same harbor where they said their sorrowful goodbyes that left Diana's heart so heavy in her chest she thought she was crumble under its weight. Thought the boat might sink, taking her and Steve to the bottom of the ocean, although those were the thoughts she only barely allowed herself to sink into.
Hippolyta's arms closed around her the moment Diana stepped onto the wooden dock, fiercely and protectively, and like she was gone for a hundred years. Or like she'd never left at all. And for a long moment, it felt like she hadn't. Her mother's face was exactly the same, if only the lines looked deeper than she remembered, but maybe it was the light. Maybe it was in her head. Sixteen years was a blink for them, a moment to pass without anyone noticing. Yet, Hippolyta's hands on her cheeks and the smile that she was trying and failing to hold back were giving away the cautious hope she was harbouring for her daughter's eventual return.
She drew back then and looked Diana up and down properly, taking in the unfamiliar clothing, her loose hair falling over her shoulders and a smile that mirrored her own, trembling and teary.
"I'm back," Diana mouthed almost soundlessly, somewhat scared of breaking the moment, and Hippolyta nodded slowly, as though also uncertain as to whether this was real or not.
Her eyes flickered behind Diana's shoulder like she only now noticed the boat that swayed ever so slightly on the waves lapping against the gravel shore, like a whisper.
"You're alone."
The statement caught Diana off-guard for a second, and she glanced behind her for a moment as if to make sure that she didn't accidentally bring someone else with her. If only by sheer distraction.
"Yes," she turned to her mother again, her head tilter to her shoulder. "Should I not be?"
"Your friend…" Hippolyta started and stopped herself; cleared her throat, her face turning into a familiar mask that was meant to keep her feelings in check. "The one who left with you."
It wasn't a question, even though it sounded like one. It made Diana flinch inwardly, as thinking about Steve Trevor always did. If time was supposed to heal all wounds, it was sure taking longer than usual with her. Time was an odd thing, though. She was not used to being concerned about it in any way whatsoever, and yet the rest of the world was obsessed with it. Enslaved by it, even. Outside of this place, life was nothing but a race against time.
Diana didn't know how they were doing it, even though sometimes she wanted so badly to understand it. There was something about the sense of belonging, or lack thereof, that simmered in the back of her mind no matter how much she tried to push it away. She wasn't one of the Amazons, not entirely, but she wasn't one of the people either, and even though it didn't really matter in a grand scheme of things, she wondered sometime just what exactly was her place in this world, which ultimately left her with a sense of profound loneliness.
As for Steve Trevor… She had spent so much time teaching herself not to think about him that her mother bringing him up knocked the ground from beneath her. Of all people in the world, Hippolyta was perhaps the last one she'd ever expected to even think about him, what with how their first meeting went. All the more puzzling was a flicker of sorrow on her mother's face that mirrored her own. She didn't ask anything, though. Didn't comment on Hippolyta's unasked question.
He was better off without her, without all of this, in the world that was his own.
In all the years growing up here, Diana viewed herself and her people as protectors. Never once did it occur to her that they could be dangerous to the innocent. And that night… that night sixteen years ago, she could have killed him. Could have snapped his neck without even noticing. She could still feel his pulse against her forearm, his breath on her skin and his eyes wide and surprised. Never scared. This was what frightened her the most. He was not worried, trusting her completely, the way she used to trust him – blindly, with her body and soul, and everything in-between. What right did she have to put him at risk?
The only problem was that his absence left a hole in her very being, and there seemed to be no way to mend it. Breath after breath, one day at a time, she hoped that he was having the kind of life he deserved, loved and wanted and happy. And if she tried real hard, she could almost forget the way her heart ached with every beat still, like she'd only seen him yesterday, her memories of their time together as fresh as ever.
Maybe some wounds were never meant to heal.
"I kept it the way it was when you left," Hippolyta said when Diana stepped into her chambers, her eyes taking in the same bed she had for a long as she could remember, the same comforter thrown over it, her vanity table untouched, and the endless ocean outside the window so blue it hurt to look at it.
Diana took mother's hands and gave them a squeeze. "I missed you."
Hippolyta hesitated for a brief moment before pulling Diana into a tight embrace. "Welcome home."
That night, she fell asleep to the sound to waves lapping against the rocks below and the tears drying on her cheeks, unsure of what she was crying for – her relief over being able to come back, or the fact that the home didn't feel like home anymore.
xoox
It was the same, and yet as different as it could be, Antiope's death still looming like a gaping hole that threatened to suck them all into the void of desperation, the kind of loss that would never go away. In the time that Diana was away, Artemis took Antiope's place, but she was cautious to become a true replacement. Everything was different, not quite right in the way that was hard to define. Years and centuries of training for a hypothetical threat made the real one feel all the more ominous, looming before them – a when, not an if anymore.
They asked Diana to step up, help train the warriors now that she knew what was on the other side of the peace many of them hoped would last forever. But tempting as it was, she wanted to be one of them, not above them in any way that mattered. She wanted Antiope to be proud of her, not to take her place.
She was watching the training one day from the ledge above the training grounds, the late afternoon sun burning her skin and her breath still short from her own several hours of dodging arrows and deflecting the blows strong enough to shatter steel. Her shield was hanging behind her back, her sword – not the 'god-killer', but one of the many they had in their armoury – resting at her hip while her eyes followed the movement of the other Amazons, graceful as an intricate dance.
She felt Hippolyta appear at her side rather than saw her, her mother's glance also following the attacks and blows and elaborate maneuvers.
Diana's fingers tightened on Antiope's diadem that she was holding in her hands, tracing the star on the front, the smooth metal warm in the sun.
"I hope I'm worthy of it," she murmured, more to herself than to Hippolyta whose eyes darted down almost on instinct.
"You always were," her mother said, equally proud and wistful in the way that Diana wasn't used to.
"Why didn't you tell me the truth? About Zeus, and Ares, and me." She turned to Hippolyta, not curious so much as weary, the need for answers pressing down on her.
"The truth can be a burden, Diana. I didn't want you to carry it the way I had to."
Diana opened her mouth to protest, to claim that she had the right to know, had the right to be prepared for what was waiting for her on the other end of the journey she'd started on a moonlit night because she couldn't resist the call of the man's world, a sense of betrayal still running like electric current beneath her skin.
Would it have changed anything? She didn't know, no matter how much she tried to imagine it. Probably not. It would probably only complicate things in certain ways, but then there was an issue of honesty, of honour that was engrained into her since birth. By her mother, no less. That part stung the most, perhaps, a dull ache that made her question everything else she knew about the world, about the Amazons, about herself.
Still, she nodded, the words dying on her lips. What was done was done; all they could do now was live with their choices.
"Antiope would be honoured if you took her place," Hippolyta noted, an unexpected edge to her voice that made Diana's mouth go dry. "Nothing would make her happier than if you did so, Diana." A pause. "But would it make you happy?"
Diana shook her head. "I am not Antiope. I don't know if I'm suited for it."
Hippolyta's eyes remained locked on the warriors. "It's not what I asked."
Diana turned to her, a slight frown creasing her brows. "I don't understand…"
At last, her mother looked at her, unfamiliar uncertainty pooling in her gaze. "This is your home. This will always be your home. But they need you more than we ever will."
The moment felt surreal. "I don't belong in the man's world."
It was odd to say it out loud, the truth that she kept turning in her head and rearranging it like a puzzle that still formed the same picture in the end. Said to another person, it felt more final somehow. Real like never before.
Hippolyta's features softened.
"Maybe so. But this," her gaze dropped to the women below them, her voice breaking ever so slightly, "will never be enough."
"I should go back there," Diana looked away as well, feeling like they were walking on eggshells around something important but unsure of what it was, and scared to find out.
"Diana," Hippolyta called after her, making her daughter stop and glance back. "He was meant to come back."
The words landed on her like blows she was too slow to deflect, too dumbfounded to even try. "You should know better than to believe in fate," Diana shook her head.
"You should know better than not to."
xoox
There was no such thing as fate, that much Steve Trevor was sure of. If anything, he found the notion childish, if not entirely ridiculous. Fate implied that free will didn't exist, that every thought, every move was set in motion by something beyond his comprehension, and the idea made him feel powerless. If everything was predetermined, if there was no way to break out of this circle, then what was the point? What was the point of waking up in the morning, of going through motions? If there was no way to change the things and fix the mistakes, then what was the point of living?
Instead, he found solace in the opposite. Solace and hope. He hoped that the nightmare the world had plunged itself into had a better outcome than what everyone was fearing. That they were not, in fact, doomed.
And maybe there was no fate, but there certainly was some cruel joke to his situation.
Oddly enough, the hardest part of not aging was staying unnoticed, moving around before anyone could suspect anything, walking away, severing every bond he would form in the brief moments when he wasn't on the run from himself. Pretending someone else more often than not. Funny how he used to imagine that once the cannon stopped piercing the sky, he wouldn't need to be a million people at once anymore, and yet now it was all he could be for as long as he existed, however long that might be. Sometimes, it scared him, this half-living. Other times, he felt safe, protected from the heartbreak and pain by refusing to feel anything at all.
The real problem was getting some sort of new documents every now and then, moving up his birth year. Sure, he could pass for a 35-year old at 40, but not at 50. This was bound to raise some questions sooner or later, and the world was already jumping from one hysteria to another without so much as a second thought. The last thing he needed was to attract unnecessary attention.
It was the gas, Steve figured. Must have been. How else was he supposed to explain what was happening to him? He pushed the words 'gods' and 'magic' out of his mind – not because he didn't believe it could be the case (and how could he not, after everything he'd seen and been through?), but because taking that road hurt more than he could handle most of the time. Because it made him think of something beyond his comprehension.
And what did it matter, really? Knowing wouldn't change anything, wouldn't make it any less insane in the world where being frozen in time was anything but normal. He wondered, if a little absently, with the apathy of someone who accepted their life as it was, if knowing the truth would make any difference, if it would make him more accepting of what was happening or plunge him deeper into ever-consuming dread. There probably was no right answer here, and Steve was not interested in looking. Not yet, at least.
Not that it was his priority right now, anyway.
The Germans again, and Steve couldn't help but see the awful irony of the situation.
The new war was brutal, and at times, it felt worse than the first one, even though he could probably chalk it off to the novelty of a new experience and the fading memories from a decade and a half ago that sometimes looked like wilted flowers pressed between the pages of a book than a recollection of something real. Unfocused. Granted, he didn't want to remember it, more than pleased to let go of whatever memories were still clinging to his mind like a thin film. But that was the danger, he figured. People were prone to forgetting their mistakes. Maybe this was why the world was falling apart all over again.
Most days, he wanted to give up. Walk away and never look back. Most days, it seemed like the only thing he could do. Knowing that it was the one thing he knew how to do best made it easier to breathe when his chest was tight and his throat dry from fear and desperation.
Like now when he was walking down the corridor toward the office of Commander Himmler, a man who was considered Hitler's 'right hand', the German uniform stiff on his body and cold sweat trickling down his spine. This was no longer about winning – personally, he's long lost hope for that, what with the world managing to corner itself into the kind of situation there didn't seem to be an escape from – but about surviving. And if he was lucky, if his calculations were correct and the Commander was taking his usual lunch break with his second-in-command downstairs, maybe there was a chance Steve could sneak a peek at the plans, or letters, or anything…
His father passed away five years ago, several months before the war broke out again, peacefully in his sleep, believing that the world he was leaving behind was a good place. At times, Steve thought that not disappointing him was the one thing that kept him going. At times, it seemed like enough.
He turned left, listening carefully for voices or footsteps, the doors on either side of him closed and holding nothing but silence behind thick wood panels. He could have been breeding goats right now, he thought, feeling the fine hairs on the nape of his neck stand on ends. He could have been doing anything – god knew, he didn't owe this world a single thing.
If he was caught now, if his story wasn't plausible enough, he would never leave this building, this village, this damned land.
A quick glance over his shoulder to make sure he wasn't being followed—
Something barreled into him from the side, pushing him into a dark alcove, and Steve's heart leaped into his throat, nearly chocking him, a rush of adrenaline making him weak in the knees. Deaf from the blood rush in his ears, he reached instinctively for his gun, only to have it knocked out of his hand not a second later, a sharp pain spreading from his wrist and up his arm. It took him a moment to realize that something sharp and cold was pressed to his throat. A knife.
And in the next second, it all faded away—
He knew that feeling, knew the smell that wrapped around him like a cloak. In the darkness of the alcove, the air was heavy and thick, and with his eyes not yet used to the dimness, Steve felt like someone pulled a bag over his head and he was suffocating. This was the same feeling he'd had on the streets of Paris and in the alleys of Madrid when he would catch a whiff of the same delicate scent that lingered in his apartment and on all of his clothes for months after Diana had left, the very same one that made him think he was losing his mind when he chased after strangers only to see that they were not who he was looking for.
Right now, he was once again feeling like someone pulled him underwater, the air nowhere to be found, and the tip of the blade at his throat had oh so little to do with it.
Steve blinked, his vision adjusting to the semi-darkness and his heart pounding so loudly he was certain everyone in a ten-mile radius could hear it, alarming and rapid, and like it was going to break through his ribcage that grew too small for it by the moment.
A pair of black eyes stared back at him – the exact same one that used to hold his entire universe where stars were forming constellations with the pull of magic coursing between the two them, an electric current that left sizzling sparks along his skin. He blinked, desperate to shake off this odd affliction. Of all the times, of all the places—
"Steve?"
The blade was gone and the hold on his arm he didn't even notice released on instant.
The familiar husk of her voice rolled down him like a tidal wave pulling him into the depths of something dark and bottomless.
Her own name died on his lips, the word refusing to claw itself out of his throat. Her gaze was confused, her wild hair tied at the nape of her neck and the ever-present armour hidden under a nondescript coat. In the corridor, he wouldn't have looked at her twice.
Except it was the only thing he could do now, stuck in déjà vu that was playing on endless loop. None of this was real, couldn't be, and yet he didn't want it to be anything but.
Diana.
She took a half a step back, pressed against the opposite was of a niche that was barely enough to fit them both and stared back at him like she was seeing a ghost – a feeling Steve could relate to all too well. He blinked, expecting her to disappear the way she did in his dreams, no more corporeal than a fantasy. Instead, she came into focus, all angles and edges in the shadows, her face unreadable, and the only thing he wanted to look at.
The questions swarmed in his head, forming and falling to pieces without registering with him, half-words dissipating in his mind as he struggled to draw in a shallow breath. Here, of all places…
"I don't…." Diana started, a frown forming between her eyebrows, her eyes scanning his unchanged face, the same lines she used to trace with her fingers as if to sear the image of him in her memory for the centuries to come. She shook her head, and Steve had to swallow a sharp laughter that bubbled up in his chest – a bitter sound that would slash through the air and have this house of cards crumble before his eyes if he allowed it to escape. "How?"
"None of this came with instructions," he found himself responding in a chocked whisper, his vocal cords still refusing to cooperate. She was looking at him like she was seeing a ghost, and he couldn't blame her. With how he was only half-living, Steve felt like nothing but a phantom himself. "What are you doing here?"
His tone wasn't unkind, but it was hardly welcoming, and Diana's eyes narrowed ever so slightly. She tipped her chin, composing herself, and there was only so much he could do not to reach over and tuck a strand of hair that escaped her hairdo behind her ear, his fingers itching to touch her, make sure she was real.
"I came to help."
At this, his lips curled into a humourless smirk that felt sharp at the edges. We don't need your help, he wanted to say. I don't need your help. The last time she helped, she left him with a hole in his soul so big it threatened to turn him inside out with every breath he took. Talking to her now, being this close to something that he used to want more than anything in the world, breathing the same air as her was making him nearly rip at the seams.
A sound of footstep around the corner broke the spell, snapping him back to reality. Steve inhaled sharply, his gaze darting around their hiding place as a dozen comments died on his tongue.
"Come on," he muttered, slipping back into the corridor and making a beeline for the room at the very end of it, guarded by massive doors, not needing to look behind to know that Diana would follow, swift and soundless as a shadow.
"What are we looking for?" She asked in a hushed voice the moment he locked the door behind them, his own eye darting around the office. Heavy mahogany desk. Bookshelves lining the walls. Dark-green curtains, thick enough to block out the sunshine, currently pulled apart to reveal a wide balcony.
Steve hesitated, his thought-through plan nowhere near to be found, wiped off by the sound of her voice.
"Um… maps. Transcripts of phone calls," he muttered. "Notebooks."
It took him so long to get here, a few months of lingering close to Himmler, studying his habits, looking for a chance to do something… He walked straight to the desk and checked the drawers. Locked. He grabbed a letter-opener. It was a matter of a few seconds, almost too easy. The man trusted his posse though, to a degree. They feared him too much.
"This?" Diana asked from across the room.
Steve glanced up, and nodded – she was holding a stack of blueprints of sorts. No time to go over them now but this was the only chance he'd ever get. They knew him, they saw his face, and he was never coming back – might as well not hold back. There was a phone book in the bottom drawer, and he reached for it. Two rolled up maps and a calendar with some markings that might require some decoding, but this again was a problem for later.
"Steve."
"One second," he muttered, flipping through a handful of papers and trying to focus. There was no need to loot the entire office if only he could find something that was actually useful.
"Steve, someone's coming."
That got his attention alright.
Across the room, she was standing with her ear pressed to the door, an armful of something he hoped was of help cradled to her chest. Their eyes met, and she nodded ever so subtly, her eyebrows pulled together in concern. And now he could hear it too – faint voices, far enough, but approaching. Granted, they could be heading to one of another half a dozen rooms but Steve wasn't going to take his chances.
The gears in his mind shifted.
He crossed the room in two strides, and then cursed under his breath – the balcony would be an easy escape, however there were two officers smoking in the back garden, and there was no way that someone escaping the Commander's office would go unnoticed.
"Here?" Diana pointed at the window that faced the side of the house, and he gave her a curt nod.
"Can you take these?" He asked, his eyes darting toward the papers she was holding.
Without another word, she shifted the whole load in one arm and pushed the window. It didn't budge, the handle either stuck or broken. The voices grew louder. "Stand back," she mouthed without a sound, and then her elbow rammed into the glass before Steve realized what she was doing, letting the chilly March air into the room. It smelled like wet soil and snow, biting at their cheeks.
Shit. Too much noise.
His head snapped up, the voices on the other side of the door sounding alarmed now. The doorknob jiggled, and he thanked all powers-that-be for remembering to lock it, ignoring the pounding and the loud discussion about whether or not anyone had a key.
"Just hold on to—" Steve started when Diana pushing a few pieces of broken glass out of the way and looked outside, assessing the situation for a moment. However, she simply stepped onto the ledge and then jumped before he had a chance to finish his thought, landing gracefully on the frozen ground below, somehow missing a patch of thorny bushes, bare this early in the season, and then looked up at him, still standing in the second-floor window. "Or you can just do this," he muttered and grabbed the gutter pipe with a free hand, hoisting himself up on the windowsill and sliding without much grace along the wall, his own precious haul held close to his chest.
"Well, this was easy," Diana said once he reached the ground, just as all hell broke loose around them.
xoox
There was no stopping anyone this time around, no trying to, either, and the best Steve could do – the best anyone could do, really – was develop an escape plan. Hence breaking into the offices and hanging on to the snippets of conversations and hunger for any information he could use against the enemy. The idea came to him a couple of years ago, when it became apparent that he couldn't keep his own identity without turning into a lab experiment.
He pushed the door open held it for Diana as she stepped into a small apartment he was renting on the outskirts of Berlin (the one rented by 'Karl Werber'), trying not to dwell on how exactly they managed to get out of Himmler's mansion in one piece, his ears still ringing with the wails of sirens and the yells of the men.
"How do I know it's really you?" Diana asked when the door closed behind them, the silence of the room suddenly so loud it made his head hurt. She was still holding back, finally able to catch her breath and assess the situation, eyeing him with suspicion.
"You don't," Steve caught her gaze a held it, momentarily forgetting how to breathe. He set the papers down on the desk, the need to go through them falling back, not at all urgent all of a sudden. "I didn't ask for any of this, and I don't have to prove anything to you. Not anymore."
"It's not possible."
Then go, he wanted to say. Don't believe it. I wouldn't either.
Steve grabbed the lasso she set down on the rickety chair by the door, her shield still held in her hand like he was a threat, albeit a minor one, and let it unravel as he grabbed one glowing end of it, holding on tight even though it felt like it could burn his fingers off. Gritted his teeth for a moment, willing his voice not to break.
"My name is Captain Steve Trevor, former pilot with American Expeditionary Forces, Serial number 8141921. When you pulled me out of the water at Themyscira, I thought I was dead and you were an angel." She was looking at him like he was a ghost. The way Steve looked at himself in a mirror. His voice dropped, the burning in his hand forgotten. "The beauty marks on your shoulder form a Lyra constellation. When I told you that Eskimo people have 50 words for snow and wondered why we don't have as many for love, you said it was because love went beyond words. Do you remember that?"
He was standing so close now that he could feel the warmth of her body and see a faint dusting of freckles on her nose, her eyes dark and bottomless, and Steve was suddenly reminded of how much he wanted to see her, the force of missing and longing and everything he'd spent years learning to ignore feeling like a sucker punch to his gut, knocking all wind out of his body.
Diana was looking back at him, and it was so hard not to touch her, not to pull the pins out of her air and let it fall down her shoulders because it wasn't meant to be contained. Steve clutched the lasso tighter to stop himself from doing just that for he knew he would cease to exist.
"For years, I was looking for you in every face around me," he continued in a strained voice, "until they were nothing but grey mass. Until I couldn't tell them apart." A pause. "Is this enough proof for you?"
"It wasn't easy for me either," she breathed out, and he almost missed it, the words drowned by the hammering of his heart against his ribs.
"You sure made it seem so," he couldn't help but mutter back, the bitterness of the words tasting foul in his mouth.
Diana bristled at the accusation, lips pursed into a thin line. Raised her chin, holding his gaze, her eye narrowed ever so slightly. "What was I supposed to do?" She demanded, half-defensive, half-pleading. "You don't know what it was like…"
"Because you wouldn't tell me," he interjected, and shook his head, disgusted with his outburst. Stupid. He thought they were past this, thought he was past this, after all this time…
"What if I hurt you? What if I really hurt you, Steve, what if I-" Diana cut off and swallowed, her breath catching. "How would I live with myself if that happened?" She searched his face for a long moment, a storm of emotions crossing her features, vulnerable and unguarded. "I only wanted you to be happy," she whispered when the silence grew so thick and heavy it could be cut with the knife.
Steve dropped the lasso that stopped glowing instantly. A dark coil at their feet.
"I was. And then you left."
To be continued...
A/N: This fic will actually pick up pace from here, so hopefully it'll be more fun to follow!
Feedback is much appreciated :)