Author's note: "I didn't meant it to be this long but here we are" - a thrilling saga.
Although I hope than an almost 10k chapter is not something you would mind :) Thank you so much for your love, I appreciate it beyond words!
"You're a moron, Steve Trevor." There was the kind of exasperation in Etta's voice that made it hard to disagree with her. He could see her oh so clearly before his mind's eye, shaking her head and maybe rolling her eyes at him for good measure. God knew he couldn't blame her.
Yeah well, what else is new? Steve thought, but somehow managed not to say it out loud.
He glanced up at the yellow light spilling from his living room window, an old receiver of a payphone squeezed between his ear and his shoulder as he shivered in the cold that the glass walls provided zero shelter from, his senses so on edge he could almost hear the wind chase the dust along the pavement outside the tiny booth. The fact that this phone was even working when most of the things in this county didn't was a miracle in and of itself.
A shadow moved behind the curtains, and Steve's stomach twisted into a knot, his gaze glued to the slight sway of fabric. It was so damn easy to imagine Diana move about his scantily furnished place, curious and maybe just as restless as he was. Which made him wish he'd kept it cleaner. Which made him scold himself mentally – for caring and because it wasn't like it actually mattered in the present circumstances.
"Have you or have you not spoken with her?" He asked again, trying not to dwell how oddly comforting it was to hear Etta's voice again, a little relieved by the familiarity of it, a little ashamed of not talking to her more often. Of not talking to her, period.
She huffed, and Steve could hear her move around her apartment – back in London, a few hundred miles and a whole lifetime away from where he was. "I have not, but it's what you should be doing. Instead of calling me at… half past midnight."
Steve winced. "I'm sorry, I didn't realize it was so late-"
"It's not what I meant, Steve." There was a long pause on the line, and after a few seconds, he thought they must have been disconnected, wondering if he should dial the number again or leave her alone. Until she spoke again. "You need to go there and fix whatever happened between the two of you. God knows you've been pining for her long enough."
Steve let out a sharp exhale and rubbed his eyes. "I haven't been…" He trailed off, too tired to argue.
"Is she really there?"
Unless I made her up. "I think so."
"Are you okay?" Etta asked in a different voice, and the simple concern all but snapped him in half.
"Yeah," he breathed out. "I better let you sleep. Thanks, Etta."
"Steve?" She said before he had a chance to hang up. "Take care."
He hadn't seen her in years, refused her offer to help him when the new war started and, technically, he needed someone on the sidelines to help him from the outside. Between the risk of being exposed and a genuine affection toward Etta, it was easier to cut the ties, tell her to stay as far away from this mess as she could. So much easier that way.
"I didn't think you'd come back," Diana said when he stepped through the door some pacing and a million half-formed thoughts and questions later, his insides coiling.
"This is my home," Steve responded evenly as he shrugged out of his jacket that proved being almost entirely useless against the German winters and hung it on the peg by the door, ignoring how dry his throat got in a fracture of a second.
Diana looked around, and in that moment, Steve saw the place through her eyes – without the old books and photographs filling his apartment in London. His grandmother's clock wasn't sitting on the mantelpiece, and a knitted quilt wasn't draped over the back of the couch, and if it wasn't for some spare clothes that he kept in the drawers in the bedroom and several pieces of cutlery in the kitchen, no one would ever guess that anyone lived here at all.
She didn't turn to him when she spoke, "No, it's not."
xoox
It was the light that awoke Steve a few hours later, a faint strip underneath the bedroom door that didn't really bother him, per se, but that was impossible to ignore. All those years of living on his own made him too aware of another person's presence this close to him.
Earlier, it was somehow decided to postpone the inevitable conversation till the morning, on account of how the day was long as hell. However, Diana refused his offer to take his bed, claiming that the couch – old and lumpy and decidedly uncomfortable – would be more than enough for her, thank you very much. He insisted because she was the guest. When he said that, she nearly flinched like he'd struck her, making Steve wish that he hadn't opened his mouth at all.
He didn't have it in him to argue after that, the mere idea of being separated from her by only a door was enough to leave him jittery, twisting and turning in the bed that suddenly got too big and too cold and too hard and—
Steve let out a long breath and rubbed his eyes, his head pounding from exhaustion and a million things that he couldn't stop thinking about. He kicked away the thin blanket that was of little to no help against the drafts snaking in through the cracks in the window frames and climbed out of the bed, the floor freezing under his bare feet. It felt odd to not be at ease here. Diana was right, this was not his home. Yet, it still was the only place where he didn't need to pretend to be someone else, and these days it counted for something.
Steve's hand paused on the door knob, his heart tripping over itself momentarily. Maybe she just forgot to turn the lights off…
Diana was sitting by his desk in the near the window, very much awake. She caught the movement out of the corner of her eye when he stepped out of the bedroom and looked up, and for a long moment, they simply stared at one another across the space that was miles and decades and thousands of words they never got to say.
Her hair was down and falling over her shoulders in heavy waves, the heavy coat that was hiding her armour before draped over the back of the armchair in the corner, and even though the sleepwear Steve offered to her was left untouched on the armrest of the couch – something that he was both grateful for and regretful about - she still looked soft around the edges, a little tired, and so much like what he used to wake up to every morning that it all but left him breathless.
Steve's hands curled into fists at his sides, fingers itching to touch her, run through that impossible mane of hers, feel her again. He felt his cheeks grow hot and dropped his gaze, grateful for the dimness of the reading lamp and the ten feet between them.
Some things never changed.
It didn't come as a surprise that her presence somehow hurt even more than her absence, the dull throb somewhere deep inside him a familiar feeling he was way too accustomed to for his liking.
He cleared his throat and shifted from foot to foot, antsy and on edge, too tired to focus properly on anything, too wired to sleep. Maybe this was why she was up as well.
"What are you doing?" He asked.
Diana shook her head and looked down at the papers strewn over the desk before her – their earlier haul. "Couldn't sleep," she responded softly as though there was someone else she might have disturbed. "So I thought I would…." She trailed off with an uncertain half-shrug. "To be honest, I have no idea what I'm looking at here."
It was late, and his eyes felt full of sand and his head buzzed in that overly-exhausted way that he knew he was going to pay for later.
He should have turned around and gone back to bed right there and then. (He should have found her another place to stay, period.) Instead, Steve ran his hand over his hair, either smoothing it down or ruffling it even more, and walked over to the desk, mindful of Diana's shield propped against one of the chairs and her overcoat draped over the back of it, trying hard not to look directly at her.
Like he could get blind if he stared for too long.
Like she was the sun.
Steve reached for another chair to pull it to the desk, but then decided to perch on the couch armrest instead, leaning forward to study the map spread before her, ignoring the encrypted transcripts for now. They might require some proper brain power he didn't have.
This time around, he had a rule – not thinking about any this at night. Trapped in the never-ending nightmare had a toll on him as it was, the war wearing him thin. Losing the sleep over something he had no control over was impractical at best, and downright stupid at worst. The demons haunting him were no less present when he was awake regardless.
And yet here he was, breaking the rule that saved him from madness and desperation more times than he could count. All it took was for Diana to make an appearance in his life again and turn it upside down like he had no say in it whatsoever.
Not that he ever harboured any illusion that he had.
"It's a maneuver map. Russian. Supplied by the German intel, I believe," Steve explained, finally taking a proper look at what they managed to escape with. "You know, how they plan to move their troops and…" Right, a warrior. "You probably know all about those things."
Diana's finger traced one of the lines, marking the position of the borders of the front. "We do it differently," she offered if a little absently, and he nodded, uncertain if any response was required. Which made him wonder where she was all this time. Which made him wonder, period.
"Yeah, so…" He started again, pointedly keeping his eyes on the map.
He explained to her that with the direction the war was heading, his main job at this point was finding information on the offence planned by the Germans, and clearing the civilians, particularly those doomed to end up in concentration camps, out of the way. Half the time they didn't believe him, sometimes they thought it was a setup, mistrusting of anything by now, too tired to carry on the fight. But there were lives that he saved, and they really and truly counted.
Unofficially, this was what he had been doing these past four years.
Officially, he was supplying the British with scrap of information he could get his hands on, much like the first time around.
Except he never flew a plane again.
"Concentration camps?" She echoed when he finished, confused.
Not now.
There was a lot about his kind that Steve Trevor wasn't proud of, slavery and discrimination being high up on that list, but the camps were undoubtedly the most inhuman and inhumane thing that happened in this world, and to say that he was ashamed to bring it up with someone who used to believe in the goodness of all people was a monumental understatement. At times he couldn't help but think that they didn't deserve to be helped by someone like her after all.
"I'll—I'll explain later."
She didn't press, but her expression remained determined. "Surely there is more that can be done," Diana frowned, studying him pensively.
He rubbed his eyes, feeling the weight of the day press down on him. No, not the day. The past four years that drained him to the core. "I'm only one man," he said, his voice weary. Which wasn't entirely correct, per se. However, his commanding officer didn't know even half of it, deeming Steve as nothing but a spy, and thus eliminating any support in anything else that he tried to achieve.
"Not anymore."
"Why are you doing this?" He asked quietly, meeting her gaze for the first time. "This is not your battle. You don't owe us anything."
She studied him for a long moment. "Because I can help. There's always a choice, right? To do something or to do nothing, it's what you said." Diana repeated his own words to him, the answer he'd long forgotten about. "I can do something."
At last, he nodded. Then turned back to the map. "This is a new one because this area here is still marked as ours."
"Here?" She followed the line he was pointing at, her fingers brushing briefly against his, and Steve jerked his hand away like he got burned – something that surely didn't escape Diana's attention. She drew her own hand back as well and stared straight ahead. "Do you really hate me this much?"
The question felt like a sucker-punch, knocking all wind out of Steve, making his throat close up, the air between them thick and heavy.
"You're hurt," he said all of a sudden.
"What?"
Steve's gaze fixed on a long cut on the outside her arm, running from the wrist and halfway to her elbow, red and raw, no longer bleeding but looking awfully painful nonetheless, his brows furrowed. "How did that happen?"
Diana turned her arm to look at it. "I… I don't know. Must be the glass."
"I'll get something to clean it up," he muttered, getting up, somewhat grateful for an excuse to change the subject. With the way this conversation was going, he wasn't sure he wanted to get to the end of it.
She shook her head dismissively. "It will heal."
"It can get infected-"
"Steve."
As if not hearing her, he crossed the room, which required no more than two steps to get to the kitchen where he kept his first-aid kit – a military bag with bare necessities, at this point. Some gauzes and dressing pads, a strong-smelling antiseptic that burned as hell when it came in contact with the skin and a handful of other things. He couldn't remember the last time he needed to use anything more than a bandage. Maybe he needed to restock it properly, in the light of recent events and—
His fingers clutched the bag as he tried hard not to feel this… this odd warmth in his chest. The ice breaking, his armour cracking, its jagged edges scraping the fabric of his soul.
She was still sitting at the desk – he might never be able to sit on this chair again without imaging her in it, watching him fumble with the zipper with the expression he couldn't quite read. Something between endearment and exasperation and Can you please do as I ask for once? He chose not to think of any of that.
"Steve…"
"Let me…"
He lowered down on the armrest again and reached for her hand, turning her wrist gently and struggling to keep on functioning properly, although it was not the cut itself that unnerved him – on the battle field, he got to see the things he knew he'd need several lifetimes to forget. A person torn apart or turned inside out was not something easily erased from the memory. Right now, though, it dawned on him that he had never seen Diana hurt. Not anything beyond a bruise or a scratch that would disappear before his eyes.
Invincible.
Unbreakable.
A goddess.
It was like everything about this day was meant to be wrong somehow.
"I'm sorry," he muttered when she tensed at the touch of antiseptic to her wound. "We need to… you wouldn't want it to get infected," he repeated, uncertain if it even mattered. Maybe she couldn't be affected by any of that to begin with.
Her fingers flexed a little. He could feel her eyes on him and didn't dare look up. Diana's skin felt smooth and soft and warm against his calloused touch, her pulse tripping ever so slightly under his fingertips, and it was pretty damn hard to pretend that he didn't notice it.
"It will be fine," she said softly, and he wondered if she did it just to fill the pause hanging between them.
Steve wrapped a sterile bandage around it, fighting through a strong sense of déjà vu, his mind springing back to the day on Themyscira when it was him who'd been bandaged in the healing caves underneath the castle. He remembered the scent of some oil, strong but not unpleasant, and a cool touch of an ointment that the woman whose name he never found out applied to his cuts even though she probably didn't have to. He was a prisoner. They didn't have to care.
"Now it will be," he secured the bandage and pulled away from her, finding it hard to keep avoiding looking at her. Such a fool. "How did you find me?" He asked at last, unable not to.
"I wasn't looking for you," Diana replied after a moment of hesitation, and he couldn't tell at once if he was disappointed or relived by her words. "I didn't think you'd want me to. I was looking—I saw Sameer." That would explain in, Steve thought. "He said he hadn't heard from you in a while."
"It's better if they stay out of it," Steve responded, burning with the desire to know if Sami brought him up, or if she asked about him. "All of them, they're better off without being involved again."
"And you?"
A wry smile flickered across his face before Steve could hold it back. "It's not like I have much else to do."
She opened her mouth as if to say something, but stopped herself and simply nodded. "Sami told me about Hitler." Her gaze darted quickly toward the lasso. "I came looking for answers."
And just like that Steve remembered that Hitler was, in fact, expected to be at the mansion this week, expect his plans changed the last moment, which, ironically, played out in Steve's favour – without the Fuhrer, there was less security around. The fact that they managed to get out of there alive was all thanks to the fact that Diana's initial plan sort of failed.
"He's not another relative of yours, is he?" Steve offered. The first joke he'd allowed himself, and he could have sworn her lips quirked a tiny bit.
"It crossed my mind, yes," Diana admitted, not without a hint of amusement.
His eyebrow crept up in genuine curiosity. "Is he?" Diana shook her head, and for a moment, he felt foolish – like he was the one being insane asking that question. As if he hadn't seen her fight an actual god. He cleared his throat. "Hitler is not Ludendorff. It's more complicated than that."
"Than what?"
"You thought that killing Ludendorff would change everything." He stuffed his poor medical supplies back in the bag and zipped it shut, desperate to do something that didn't involve looking at the woman sitting before him, aware all of sudden of the fact that he was only wearing a loose shirt and, well, underpants, feeling oh so very underdressed. "It's different now. Many tried to come after Hitler but this war—it's bigger than just one person. It's politics. Japan in involved. Austria, Russia…" He trailed off with a shrug. "There are people who benefit greatly from this mess."
"It wasn't about Ludendorff. It was about Ares," Diana reminded him.
Steve glanced up at her. "But it's not now, is it?"
She shook her head. "There must be something… something that can be done to stop it."
"There is something. Helping is something."
It felt like a lie even coming from his own mouth, and for a moment, he almost laughed at the absurdity of the situation.
Maybe there was no way out. Maybe they were all doomed for extinction.
"You never answered my question," Diana murmured when he stood up.
"I think we need to have some rest." He met her gaze. Held it, almost daring her to ask him again.
She didn't.
Later, when Steve was dozing off at last, sometime before dawn, he could have sworn he heard the door open and close, half-scared and half-certain that she would be gone when he woke up. However, a few hours later, when the harsh sun streaming through the uncurtained window dragged him out of uneasy slumber and he stumbled into the living room, rubbing his eyes that felt like someone scrubbed them with sandpaper, Diana was fast asleep, curled under her cloak on his old couch.
Maybe he dreamed it up, Steve thought, watching her sleep, her breathing deep and even.
Or maybe he was still dreaming.
xoox
The light was grey when she woke up one morning, just after dawn, to the white noise of a slight drizzle pattering against the windowsill and a palpable absence of familiar warmth next to her. She loved the rain, the soft rustling of it against the streets and rooftops, like a whisper; like the world telling her secrets that weren't meant to be shared out loud. For all the luscious green perfecting of Themyscira, the moodiness of the weather in the man's world fascinated her beyond words.
It was early still, the room veiled with shadows lingering in the corners. Diana rolled onto her back, blinking sleepily, her hand brushing against the cool sheets.
"Steve?" She rubbed her eyes, the fog of a dream she could no longer recall clinging to her brain like a thin film.
Another moment had passed before he appeared in the doorway, sporting a raging bedhead, his smile brighter than sunshine, soft and all hers, and Diana felt her own lips tug up at the corners in response as he crossed the cold room, walking toward her.
"Hey." Propped on one knee, he leaned down to kiss her on the forehead. "Didn't mean to wake you. Sleep. It's still early."
Her hand curled around his wrist. "Where did you go?"
"Coffee," he grinned. "Want some?"
She tugged him down to her with the tiniest shake of her head. "Stay with me."
Steve pushed a strand of hair from her cheek, his smile growing so tender it hurt to look at it, and then slipped under the covers, curling around her like a shell. He let out a breath, folding Diana into a curve on his body, his bare chest warm against her back and his breath tickling her neck. Perfect fit, he would joke now and then, albeit in somewhat… different circumstances most of the time. She couldn't agree more.
He tucked her closer to him, his lips brushing to her shoulder. "Do you miss it?" His whisper was so soft Diana almost missed it. "Your home?"
She did. More than she was willing to admit even to herself. Her whole existence was tied to Themyscira, it was in her blood and bones, maybe someplace deeper than that, even.
She kissed the inside of his bicep that her head was resting on; traced her hand along his arm, lacing their fingers together. Looked up just enough to see a line of his jaw, his face obscured by the shadows. When Steve was this close, she could feel his heartbeat, barely able to tell it apart from her own. Warm and real and solid and alive.
"Sometimes." A pause. "But this is where I want to be," she murmured, feeling Steve's grip on her tighten - a little protective, a little possessive.
"Sleep," he repeated against her temple.
And the rain kept on falling…
xoox
The war was ugly and brutal, and at times, Steve couldn't help but think that mankind had lost its face completely, revealing something entirely monstrous underneath. Half the time, he felt like they was taking one step forward and two steps back, every victory leading to more damage.
More often than not, it felt like they'd already lost.
Steve knew that they would come after him, and when a few nights later they did, he was prepared.
He were done here anyway, it was time to do something with the information he possessed. The Germans decidedly did not like to share. And they certainly had no intention to let Steve get away with it. They saw him, and he had no doubt that it took them no time to single him out among the other officers who had access to the Commander's Office. After all, he was probably the only one who never returned.
"Come on, quiet," he urged Diana as they climbed down the fire escape while the SS officers pounded on his door, yelling for him to open up, the precious papers tucked under his coat and the rusty metal rough against his palms.
"Who are they, Steve?" She asked in a hushed whisper when he landed on the cobbled alley road, drawing her back until their backs were pressed against the cold brick wall.
His eyes darted up and down the alley. They would not be able to cross the city, not with the morning so near. The sky had already started to get pale-grey at the horizon, brushing against the rooftops. They would have to circle it around and hope to fly under the radar of the ever-present patrols. And after that – France.
"Some guys you don't want to meet in the middle of the night," Steve muttered, his eyes darting toward the opposite end of the alley as he started to run in that direction. It wouldn't take them long to break down the door and find the fire escape, but with any luck, he and Diana had a few minutes to put as much distance between them and the Germans as they could.
Behind him, a staccato of her footsteps was the only sound in the stillness of the night.
"But we could just…" She started, nearly bumping into him when Steve stopped at the end of the alley and peeked into the street, illuminated by a row of dim streetlights. "I could…"
Fight, he finished for her mentally.
"No," he shook his head, glancing at her. "Better avoid this kind of attention." He looked past her shoulder, the voices already spilling from the upper floor and into the narrow space between the old buildings. "For the time being," he added under his breath when she opened her mouth to protest. "Let's go."
If they could put a few streets between them and their pursuers, it could give them a chance to form an actual plan. The night raids were a regular thing, these people clearly knew what they were doing, catching their unsuspecting victims off-guard. Unfortunately for them, Steve saw it coming. He tried hard not to think of everyone who did.
"Steve."
In two blocks, there was a busy street, never empty even at this hour, especially with the bakeries and post offices often opening before dawn. In less than 5 minutes, the two of them could get lost in the crowd and be done with it.
Steve snapped his head up when she called his name just in time to see two black figures rounding the corner ahead of them, massive rifles clutched in their hands, their heads turning as they scanned the streets and porches, looking closely into every nook and crevice between the buildings. There were more of them than Steve anticipated, cold sweat trickling down his spine despite the winter chill.
Shit.
"Let me…" Diana started, her hand reaching for the sword fastened behind her back, her shield already clutched in her hand, eyes darting between the alley they had left a minute ago and the two men walking fast in their direction, fading in and out of sight as they moved from one street light to another.
There was no time for another plan, really. There were too many of them.
He turned to Diana, his hand sliding around her waist. "Do you trust me?" Steve murmured and then drew her to him without waiting for an answer, his lips capturing hers, fingers curling around a handful of her cloak, holding her close. She stilled for a moment, surprised, and for a brief second, Steve was overcome with a sudden panic – mistake, mistake, mistake! – certain that he would be the first one to be tossed ten feet into the air. But then Diana leaned into him, relaxing into his touch; her hand found his cheek and slipped around to grip the hair at the nape of his neck.
The world fell away, shattering against the sheer force of Jesus Christ, finally! The German officers walked past them, their heavy boots hitting the pavement with enough force to leave dents in the cheap concrete. Through the blood rush in his ears, Steve heard a faint laughter and a low whistling meant for the two of them, but by then, it hardly mattered. She tasted of warmth and memories, and the sunny mornings on the banks of the River Thames and laughter and light, and he would walk through a thousand wars if he had to just to have this moment back, here, now, his fingers carding through Diana's hair as her lips parted for him, deepening the kiss.
"I think they're gone," Steve murmured soundlessly a long while later, breathless and dizzy, leaning his forehead against her temple for a moment as his heart raced ahead and their breaths puffed out in small clouds.
"What?" Diana looked up, her gaze confused a slightly glazed over. Even in near complete darkness, he could see the colour on her cheeks, and it was pretty damn impossible not to trace her face with his fingers, brush away that unruly curl that kept falling on her forehead.
"They were looking for one man, not for a couple," he breathed out. "They have never seen you, I don't think so."
Her hand dropped to his chest, his skin instantly missing the warmth of her touch. "Right."
She drew back, stepping away from him, and looked away.
And maybe Steve saw too much into something that wasn't actually there, but for just a moment, he could have sworn that a flicker of disappointment flashed across her features, gone before he was sure it was there at all.
He didn't allow himself to dwell on it.
xoox
One nameless village after another, infrequent phone calls with his commanding officer and the rain. The world looked like it was made of grime and sadness and blood and pain, a hopeless colour that left Steve drained and weary, and a thousand years old. A few days on the road, and Steve was starting to feel like his bones were straining under the weight of the things he couldn't fix.
"I'll take the first watch," Diana said from the other side of a campfire, pulling him out of his thoughts.
There were close to the Austria's border, not more than a mile away from what used to be a village only yesterday. The air still smelled of fire and dust and everything Steve chose not to think about when they reached it even though the rain that fell the precious night dulled their intensity. Tried not to think of the life filling it before the bombs wiped the houses off the face of the earth. Diana didn't say anything when they passed it, keeping close to the forest in case someone stayed back to loot whatever was left of it, only her expression froze, grief-stricken for what she couldn't stop.
"You barely sleep." Steve noted – a questions that wasn't a question. On the other side of the dancing flames, Diana's face was streaked with shadows, barely recognizable and entirely unreadable.
It had been a couple of weeks now – a couple of weeks of dancing around one another, pointedly not talking about what happened between them after the first war, pretending, that weird thing hanging between them – unsaid words, unasked questions, the things he wanted to know but didn't dare ask, half-scared that she would answer, half-worried that she wouldn't – didn't exist. Pretending that the kiss in Berlin never happened.
It was odd enough that she hadn't left. There was nothing in this godforsaken land for her, nothing worth fighting for. Steve kept asking himself what was it that kept him going, but the answers never came, and moving forward felt better than doing nothing at all. And so when Diana followed him, he didn't question it. There was comfort to being around that calmed the storms raging inside him even though it hurt as hell half the time. He wondered if this was better or worse than having none of her at all, but this kind of thinking was the path that could lead him to madness.
"They never go away," Diana said after a long pause, her voice so soft that the sound of it was almost swallowed by the crackling of the flames licking the dry twigs. "The dreams. The memories."
Steve pushed another log into the fire, sending a burst of sparks into the chilly night air.
He looked up, wishing she would look back at him, wishing that he could read her, and somewhat grateful that he couldn't, uncertain of what he would see. A reflection of his own life, perhaps.
"Don't let them get you," he muttered, staring into the flames, his voice hollow. He wanted to ask her more, get her to tell him what was it that made her push him away the way she did, take them both apart and put them together, but this time the right way, making sure that all the parts fit. Instead, he uncurled from his crouch and sat down on the trunk of the fallen tree across from Diana, only now noticing that he was shaking from the cold and adrenaline still coursing through his veins. His eyes locked with hers. "It's what they want, but you can't let them win."
"How do you make them stop?" Her gaze on him was almost palpable, making Steve's whole body prickle.
"You don't." He couldn't lie to her. Never did before and wasn't about to start now. "You become friends with them. And hope they'll let you be."
Neither of them slept that night.
xoox
Paris was in disarray.
Under German occupation, it was a ghost of a place it used to be, and there was some cruel irony, Steve thought, to how the last time he'd been there was with Diana as well.
In his mind, the trees along Champs Elysees were in bloom and the cool air was filled with the smell of roasted chestnuts sold on every corner. ("Why would you eat this?" Diana asked when he bought a bag of scalding-hot chestnuts for them, and Steve laughed. "Just try one.") Her hand was warm in his as they walked the narrow back streets and climbed up the Montmartre hill, all the way to the Basilica of the Sacre Coeur and their stolen kisses tasted of promises and something bigger than the world itself.
"You know, people call Paris the most romantic city on earth," Steve noted, standing behind Diana on the balcony of the Basilica, his hands resting on the stone railing on either side of her and the wind kept throwing her hair is his face with every angry gust. Up here, it was malicious and moody, and he moved closer to shield her from it and keep her warm.
Diana snorted, her eyes scanning rows of grey houses stacked along winding streets like domino pieces. "I suppose it means that mankind doesn't know what romantic is." She turned to him, one eyebrow arched, her face so close that their noses touched.
Steve smirked, amused, before leaned in to kiss her. "I suppose you can show me."
But that was then, in another lifetime, in another universe where they made promises they meant to keep and the world was a different place.
Now, the city of dreams was grey and bleak and faceless, filled with screaming and gunfire and blood. It no longer smelled of flowers, but of dust and fear and smoke. Now, he was running – must have been, his own footsteps inexplicably loud and resonating through his body, his lungs screaming for air, even though the whole world seemed to have stopped. Like in a dream, Steve thought if a little absently as his hands moved on the will of their own, pulling the trigger of the heavy rifle, the kickback from every shot pushing painfully into his shoulder, and then reloading it again and again until his fingers were numb. Like moving through water.
The plan formed along the way. After 4 years, France was suffocating under German occupation, running out of supplies and hope. However, the German army was starting to get desperate in the past months, their progress not as rapid as it was expected in the beginning, their losses greater than anticipated and the resistance of the opposing armies far more fierce than they could ever imagine. They let their guards down, Paris being their weakest post – or so Hitler referred to it in one of the letters that was never meant to end up in the hands of a spy.
If they could liberate France, the whole defence strategy of the allies would change.
And there was only one person who could truly make it happen.
He stopped, pushed in the back and to the side by someone running behind him, the blood rush in his ears muting the screams and angry yells and the crumbling of the stone walls somewhere in the distance.
Mayhem. There was no other word for it.
Steve inhaled sharply, hungrily, and turned around, his eyes scanning the crowd in panic, soldiers and civilians, two armies with only one victory ahead of them. All or nothing this time. Paris was not giving up again.
And then he saw her… The lightning snaking along Diana's bracelets, her eyes closed for a moment as though she was calling something from deep inside her, a figure of utter stillness in the chaos that couldn't stop moving, so bright it was almost impossible to look at her without going blind. He didn't remember seeing her do this before, on the night when he died, but he must have, he was thinking now. He must have because the vision was familiar in the way only a memory could be, his own fingertips prickling as though the air around them was charged.
Someone fired at her, and he watched the bullet fly and then disintegrate before it was a chance to reach her, her armour reflecting the light of the faraway explosion. She was a force, infinite power, a goddess made of light, and when she snapped her eyes open, the army closing in on her flew away like a pile of leaves blown off by the wind. The aftershock of it threw Steve against the wall, knocking all air out of him. He gasped, more surprised than hurt, and grit his teeth, his hands slick with sweat gripping his rifle so tight that his knuckles went white.
He aimed and fired again, his mind blank. If they could make it through the next second-minute-hour, then maybe all of this wasn't in vain. Maybe they still stood a chance.
If the French army was surprised by the sudden reinforcements, they didn't seem to care, moving forward, determined and – for the first time in years – hopeful.
"Steve!"
A flash of something bright darted past him, Diana's lasso knocking a soldier that had a barrel of his gun aimed at Steve's head off his feet. He span around and hit the man with the stock of his rifle. Then nodded at her a silent thank you, their eyes locking momentarily.
"Diana!" He yelled, trying to be heard over the sound of gunfire and nodded his head toward the dome of the Pantheon looming ahead of them. "There!"
Almost done…
Almost…
Later, there were cheers and happy tears, and the songs Steve couldn't recognize, their words morphing into the sound that meant happiness, and somehow, it was enough.
He knew he had to make contact with the British, make himself known and accounted for, but the night was deep and black – he'd long stopped counting the hours, and the celebrations around him were intoxicating in the way that only undiluted happiness could be. The city that spend the past 4 years suffocating under the siege could finally breathe again.
"Steve…"
He turned around to see Diana make his way toward him through the crowd, nodding absently at anyone trying to thank her but not slowing down, her eyes fixed on him. The crowd parted before her without even noticing they were doing it, and he watched her move through it in awe and relief. And then she was standing right before him, her hair wild and her chest still heaving as if she could barely catch her breath, and her streetlamps making the star in her tiara glow like it was made of gold.
And then she was smiling at him because they did it again, a little tentative, a little hopeful, her eyes glinting. And someone tried to push a bottle of something that, judging by its smell, was meant to burn straight through a person's stomach into Steve's hand but he was pretty caught up in being too damn happy to see her again to care.
And then her fingers were on his face like she needed to make sure that he was real, and he was breathing her in, and Jesus Christ, he missed her so bad that if he let go of her now, he would probably turn to ashes right there and then.
"Are you okay?" Steve mouthed softly.
She nodded, almost imperceptibly, her nose brushing against his cheek. "Come with me."
xoox
They stumbled into the room, tripping over each other's feet and the threshold, Steve's arms closing around Diana just in time to break their imminent fall, her breath catching, a sharp gasp against his mouth, as her hands gripped the collar of his coat.
The corridors of a small inn that opened its doors to the soldiers amidst the celebration smelled faintly of tobacco and cheap cologne, but inside the room it was all furniture polish and clean sheets and a somewhat stale air of the space that hadn't been aired enough. He didn't care. All he could feel, all he could think of was her, and her mouth on his, and his hands on her body, his heart hammered against the metal parts of her armour.
Steve broke the kiss, breathing hard, his chest heaving and his thumb running slow circles over her cheek.
Diana's fingers curled around one of his wrists, her breath warm on his skin. Her palm on his jaw, she tilted her face, finding his mouth with hers again.
"I'm sorry—sorry for having left the way I did."
"Don't," he muttered, the sound of his own voice drowned in the thump-thump-thump of his heartbeat. "Diana…"
"You wouldn't touch me," she murmured, shaking her head. "Would hardly even look at me."
His hands framing her face, Steve leaned his forehead against hers. "If I did, I would never want to stop."
"Please." She kissed him again, hungrily, desperately. He could taste fear and the salt of her tears he didn't notice until now on her mouth, the need that resonated inside him, the missing that mirrored his own, his own hands skimming over her arms and around her body of their own accord.
Jesus, he wanted her so bad.
"I'm sorry," she repeated, pushing his jacket down his shoulders and tugging at the buttons of her shirt, Steve's lips peppering her face with small kisses until there were no tears left, until he didn't know where his breath ended and hers began.
His fingers slid over the leather and metal of her armour, smooth under his touch, softened by the years of wear and yet as impeccable as the first time he laid his eyes on it in 1918, the memory so clear like no time had passed then.
His jacket hit the floor, Diana's hands fumbling with the buttons of his shirt, frantically and awkwardly in her haste. A low growl formed in Steve's throat, something primal and out of control when her hands ran over his bare chest, her breathing short on his mouth, against his neck, everywhere of his skin. His focus tunneled, his attention zeroing on the almost electric zaps of desire crazing through his body, the need to feel her, be in her, nearly unbearable.
He pressed a kiss to the inside of her thigh as his fingers worked on undoing to clasps on her boots, eyes shut and chest heaving. Sitting on the edge of the bed, she pulled him to her, her eyes black and wild with want, her mouth finding his, hands tugging at his hair, running over his shoulders.
"God, I missed you," Steve rasped, nuzzling into her neck, her hair, a zing of pure fire shooting up and through him mixed with pure elation over being alive. Her nose bumped into his, a little playful, a little seductive. Not that he needed another nudge.
"I was scared," Diana whispered, her fingers threading through his hair, and he could hear the unsaid words that were just as loud. Of the fear he also felt but didn't know how to define.
And then she was inside and around him, everywhere, too much and too little and never enough, his whole universe. He fitted his mouth to hers, swallowing her whimper that morphed into a moan, a fistful of sheets bunched in his hand, his fingers moving over her back and along her thing, pressing it into his.
"I'm sorry," he murmured, dropping soft kisses along her neck when his hips snapped up, filling her to the brim, and her breath hitched audibly, her whole body clenching around him and nearly undoing him in the best way. Didn't mean to hurt her…
"No, don't stop." Her eyes dropped shut as she arched into him, giving in to immense pleasure.
A few crazy collisions, and they settled into a rhythm as easy as breathing. Faster and higher, and over the edge, her hands digging into his flesh, guiding him and following him, breathless and shuddering in his arms. Perfectly here and perfectly his.
His awareness blurred, Steve's hand slid down her side, along her abdomen. His thumb slipped between their bodies, finding the sweet spot, and she stilled beneath him, coming completely undone with a muffled cry into his shoulder, dissolving into the searing pleasure and taking him with her as a lightning of bliss tore through Steve as the universe exploded around him in myriads of colours, Diana's name on his lips and her body wound tightly around him. Perfection.
"Don't go," she murmured a few long moments later, pressing an open-mouthed kiss to his neck when Steve tried to shift his weight off of her.
"I'll crush you," he whispered back, kissing whatever skin he could reach, waiting for his breath to find itself, his head spinning and his mind empty and his body completely liquefied.
She laughed softly at that, turning to look at him, amused. "I doubt that." Which made his grin widen because she probably had a point there. Which made him think of her pinning him down, whatever the circumstances. Which was a very nice idea, all things considered. Her fingers pushed his damp hair from his forehead, trailing along his cheek. "I missed you, too."
xoox
It was like no time had passed at all, his feelings for her as strong as they'd ever been. Like not only his body got stuck in time but the rest of the world did as well. Like there could be nothing else for them, not now, and not ever.
Infinite.
Steve was sitting with his back leaning against the headboard of the bed, staring at his hands resting in his lap like they held answers to all questions in the universe when Diana walked out of the bathroom, his half-buttoned shirt hanging loosely from her frame.
("Why would I do that?" She asked him the first time he suggested she wore a piece of his clothing instead of putting on her own garments.
"Well, it's what people do, sometimes… after…" he squirmed, biting back a laugh.
"After they make love?" She offered helpfully, one eyebrow arched, and Steve chuckled and leaned in to kiss her on the temple.
"Yes, after they make love.")
"Steve?"
"What am I?" He asked in a hollow voice without looking up.
Diana stepped toward the bed and climbed onto the mattress, crawling over the rumpled sheets to him; kissed him on the shoulder and rested her forehead against it when he didn't turn to her, listening to him breathe softly. "You're Steve Trevor," she whispered. "You're loyal. Compassionate. Brave. The bravest man I've ever met."
When he didn't respond, Diana shifted, moving closer to him and tossing her leg over his. For a long moment, she just sat in his lap, her hands splayed on his chest, with only a thin sheet draped over his lap between them, and the ticking of the clock on the dresser uncharacteristically loud as the world shrunk to a few feet of space around them. She cupped her palms over his cheeks, and Steve had no choice but to look at her, eyes dark and stormy. His hands slid up her back, pulling her closer, his fingers pushing through her hair.
"You're my Steve," she whispered, tracing the lines of his face with her fingertips – down is cheek, along his jaw, over his brow.
"If you're going to disappear again, I'd prefer you to do it sooner rather than later," Steve murmured.
She leaned in, their faces nearly touching. Awfully close. "Do you want me to leave?"
He looped a strand of hair behind her ear, his eyes searching her features. "I never wanted it. Not then, and not now."
"I thought I was doing the right thing for you." Her voice was quiet, her fingers tracing idle patterns on his skin. "I didn't think-" Her lips curved as their eyes met. "I didn't think you would be so impossible to get out of my mind." She paused, her smile slipping away. "I never meant to hurt you."
He swallowed. In the dim light of the reading lamp on the nightstand beside him, she looked luminous, almost ethereal. Steve ran his thumb over her cheekbone. "Does it not bother you?"
"Does what not bother me?"
"That you're…" He cleared his throat and then let out a humorless laugh. "That you're you, a daughter of Zeus, and I'm—I'm only a human, if even that."
Her face softened. "You never were only a human, Steve Trevor," she whispered, brushing a feather-light kiss to his cheek. "But maybe you could…" another one to the corner of his mouth, "… show me the differences…" a soft touch to his lips, "… between us. Just…" her voice dropped, "…to make sure."
He could taste amusement mixed with simmering heat rising inside them both on her, feel her melt into him, languid and soft, sweet weight in his arms. Her breath caught when he flicked his fingers, easily undoing the two buttons that kept his shirt in place, palms sliding underneath it. Steve tightened his grip on her, rolling them both over and tucking her beneath him, capturing her giggle with a kiss.
Outside, someone was signing the French anthem, loudly and completely off-key, and when Diana's arms snaked around his neck, he thought he would fight a million wars just so he could come home to her.
xoox
"Steve, what is it?"
Diana glanced at him standing by the window the next morning, the grey light of an overcast day filling the room. Her armour affixed on her body, as familiar and as comfortable as a second skin, she picked up the bracelets from where they fell on the floor the precious night but the stillness of him drew her in, her gaze lingering on his silhouette against a rectangle of light as it followed the line of his shoulders and the taught muscles of his back, his hair still tousles even though he did try to smooth it down at the sink earlier. The memory made her lips tug up at the corners and her heart ache with tenderness.
"It's quiet," he responded absently, his shirt clutched in his hand, the whole of idea of dressing seemingly forgotten for the time being. (She wouldn't mind if he only wore pants for as long as they both lived. Or nothing at all, for that matter. The man had exceptional physique.) "I almost forgot what it could be like."
She put the bracelets down on the side of the bed and walked over across the room toward him, arms sliding around his waist from behind, his bare skin warm against the exposed parts of hers. They had the time now, she thought. A tiny bit of it, perhaps, but still.
"It's not over," he added softly, as though reading her mind. She could almost hear him think. He let go of the shirt he was holding, allowing it to over the back of the chair and his hands closed around hers, thumbs running slowly over his wrists. "Not yet. I'm not sure how it can ever be."
"I'm sorry about these," Diana murmured, brushing a kiss to his shoulder where a few red marks left by her nails stood in stark contrast against his skin, running toward his shoulder-blades and along his ribs.
Steve turned to her, glancing down his back, his confusion turning instantly to recognition. He grinned like a cat that caught a canary. "I'm not," he informed her, looking so ridiculously smug that she would have rolled her eyes had she not been deliriously, unapologetically happy and barely able to contain it. "That was the part that I liked quite a bit, actually."
She arched an eyebrow in response, struggling to keep a straight face. "I'll remember that." A pause. "Did you sleep at all?" Her voice dropped, Steve's breathing steady and soothing against her chest, and easily the only thing she wanted to feel.
He was awake before her, fatigue hiding in the lines around his eyes, behind the veneer of the smile that greeted her, the side of his bed cold enough to imply that it had been a while, and in the brief moment between sleep and wakefulness, with her mind trapped in this odd, undefined state, she was overcome with fear. You can't save everyone, Steve told her on that day in Belgium, before she crossed No Man's Land, and in the light of everything that followed, she couldn't help but hear it as, You can't save me.
She wouldn't ever forget that she never did.
"You know, the last time we—" Steve stopped himself with a sharp inhale. I woke up alone and you were gone." He shook his head.
"Steve…"
He let out a long breath and turned around in the circle of her arms, his hand anchored on her side and his fingers brushing her hair back from her face. She leaned into his touch when he ran his knuckled down her cheek.
"Look-" He started.
"I'm not going anywhere," she said – not a promise but a fact.
Steve swallowed, his Adam's apple bobbing in his throat. "I can't ask you to stay."
"You're not. I can make my own decisions." She tore her gaze away from his, her fingers tracing a faint scar just over just left collarbone. "This is new."
He glanced down. "Things happened. It's been a while," he muttered
"I dreamed about you, every night, for years." Diana let out a small laugh that came out almost rueful, slightly disbelieving. "I would wake up to a rumble of an airplane, except the sky would be empty, or to the sound of your voice calling my name." Her thumb followed the line of his jaw. "I didn't come looking for you but I wanted to. More than anything."
Things happened. She didn't want to miss any more of them.
"Well, we might need to get a thing or two out of the way," Steve responded at last, "but we could make it work, perhaps. If you want to."
Her face split into a smile so wide she thought it might crack in half. "If I want to?" She echoed.
A long time ago, her mother taught her that everything of value came with a price. There was pain in becoming a good warrior, loss in winning a war, letting go of some parts of yourself in growth. Whatever the price there was for being with Steve, she'd pay it a thousand times over.
He laughed – an open, infectious sound that lit her up from the inside.
When the bomb hit the building a few moments later – a parting gift from the Germans – and the force of the blast wave tore them from one another, the last thing Diana felt before the blackness closed over her was Steve's fingers slipping from her grasp.
Not again.
To be continued...
A/N: