He smiled as he crept into the bedroom. Emily had fallen asleep while reading again; she was curled on her side, glasses askew, and her finger marking a spot in her book. Steve dropped the shield, the thud dulled by carpet, and moved towards her. He carefully extracted the book from her grasp, marked the page, and set it on the nightstand before crouching beside the bed. Slowly, he reached up and stroked from where her shirt - one of his, he noted - was rucked up around her waist, following the swell of her hip where his fingers caught on the lacey embellishments of her panties, down her thigh…
"Mmm...you're home," she sighed, eyes fluttering open to meet his. "I missed you."
"Missed you too, Sweetheart," he replied, moving to sit on the bed in the curve created by her body. "I'm sorry it took so long."
"It's fine, got some reading done," she said, her eyes drifting closed again as she yawned. Her hand rested on his thigh. "Come to bed."
Steve quickly shed his uniform, giving his girl a weary smile when she chuckled at his impatience. He crawled into bed, sweat and soot be damned, and pulled Em back towards him until her back was flush against his chest. He tucked a leg between hers and slipped a hand under her shirt, fingers skating up to circle her nipple. She groaned and gently pushed his hands away before turning to face him.
"Tired," she muttered into his collarbone.
"Okay," he said into her hair. Her breathing was lulling him to sleep when he noticed someone at the foot of their bed.
"I'm gonna need you to come quietly, Cap," Rumlow said, leveling his gun on Emily.
Steve held out a hand and moved to block her as he spoke. "You don't have to do this, Brock."
"Orders are orders," he replied. Steve's heart started to race as the other members of the STRIKE team filed in behind him, their guns drawn.
"Steve?" Emily said, her voice shaking. He couldn't risk looking back at her but touched her leg.
"It's going to be okay," he lied, eyes darting to his former team members who were circling the bed. "Everyone is just going to take a minute and think about what's going on."
"You're wanted for questioning," Rumlow stated. "S.H.I.E.L.D.'s calling you in. And this time you're not gonna get out of it so easily."
Emily shrieked as she was pulled out of the bed, and Steve lunged towards the man. He was brought up short by the quick movements of the team he'd trained with who positioned themselves between him and his girl. She struggled against the man who held her until he was able to turn her enough to wrap an arm around her throat.
"Don't do anything stupid," Rumlow advised as Steve watched in horror Emily's face turned red as she struggled to breathe. "Put your arms out." He could see her eyes starting to glass over as she dug at the man's arm, trying breathe. Steve thrust his arms out and was unsurprised when the reinforced handcuffs he'd managed to escape earlier were placed on him.
"Give her to me." Steve had to fight the urge to lunge forward when Rumlow pressed a gun to Emily's temple. "Don't do anything stupid, Cap."
"Steve - " Em said.
BANG!
He jerked awake and rolled out of the bed, grabbing his shield and crouching beside underneath the window. Outside, he could hear a woman yelling at her kids for slamming the door.
Sighing, Steve sagged against the wall and rubbed a hand down his face. A quick glance at the clock showed him that he'd only been asleep about 45 minutes.
Natasha and Sam had left for Fort Meade just about an hour before. After a bit of a tense discussion, Steve had been left behind - though the likelihood of the military catching them during the theft wasn't high, there was enough of a risk that they hadn't felt comfortable with them all going and risking capture; from behind bars, they couldn't take down Hydra.
Steve, with a capture or kill order out on him, had been chosen to stay back. Sam was needed to identify where the wings were, and Nat would be the one actually retrieving them. Besides, she'd pointed out, the public was more likely to believe the American hero who had fought and sacrificed so much in the struggle against Hydra during World War II than a former spy. Of course, that would require Steve outing himself as the original Captain America...
OOO
Emily could feel it. And every day it was worse.
It was harder to get out of bed in the morning, and she dreaded opening her eyes only to see the concrete ceiling above her. Living in an underground bunker, while safe from air raids, meant seeing very little sunshine, breathing recycled air, and - try as they might to light the area - living in semi-darkness. There was no escape from the near constant buzz of people - those representing the SSR, US and British militaries, various scientific fields, and the odd politician who managed to wander in. The secretaries and phone operators - the women she had been billeted with - often leapt out of bed at all hours of the night to answer the telephone that was mounted to a pole in the middle of the room, a notepad sitting beside it, before the sprinted out of the room to deliver the message.
"Ya get used to it, eventually," Annie, one of the operators, said when she heard Emily huff as the phone once again started to ring.
There would be days where she forgot about eating anything until her hands started to shake. More often than once she had to fight the urge to fly into a rage when someone annoyed her, and she daydreamed quite a few times about smashing everything in sight. At other times, it took everything to keep herself from crying.
It had been almost six months since she'd gotten here, and she was losing hope that she might get back home.
Emily really wished that she had access to her prescribed anti-depressants.
"I can't deal with this anymore, Harthorn!" Howard snapped, throwing his pen down. Emily started; she didn't think she'd done anything to draw his attention - she'd been rewriting his scribbled notes for over an hour with some assistance from the lab techs.
"Do what?" she asked.
"This," Howard said, gesturing at her. "I don't ask for much from you" - ha, Emily thought - "but I can't handle your moping!"
"My 'moping'?" she repeated.
"I didn't hire you for your pretty face - Peggy wouldn't let me - but it was a nice bonus. And now you're just here, scowling every day." He looked around at the techs who seemed awkwardly frozen, unsure of what to do. "My secretary and I are trying to have a private conversation here - scram!"
There was a flurry of movement as the men vacated the lab, leaving only Emily and Howard.
"Look, I -" she started.
"I'm not gonna talk to you about your fella," he cut her off. "If you want a sympathetic ear, go to one of the other girls. And if it's that, or being homesick, I understand - I didn't ask if you wanted to come, if you wanted to be so far from your family. But damn it Harthorn, snap out of it!" Emily sat silently, a bit stunned as he continued his diatribe, and swallowed hard to keep herself from tearing up. "There's a war going on and everyone's got to do their part. Mine is figuring out how the hell HYDRA's gotten so far ahead of us with their tech!" he shoved one of the files containing reconnaissance pictures off of the table.
They waited in silence, watching one another for a long moment; Howard was breathing hard as he reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a package of cigarettes. After taking one for himself, he offered one to her; with a shaking hand she took it and, after he lit it for her, took a long drag. "I'm not picking those up," she said finally, nodding to the pictures on the floor.
Howard nodded, glancing over at them before leaning against the lab table. "I don't do emotions."
"Understandable. But I don't apologize for having them."
"Alright." They quietly smoked for another minute before he cleared his throat. "You're not...do I need to worry about finding another secretary?"
Emily started and frowned. "Are you firing me?"
"No, but I can get you on a plane home tonight if you want… if you wanted to get back to your family. I'd make sure you have a good severance package."
"You're sweet," she smiled, standing up and sweeping a hand down to smooth out the wrinkles on her skirt. "But as long as you're not firing me, I'm sticking around." Once she'd grabbed her notebook and papers, she walked out of the room, only pausing just outside of the door. "What do you think of time travel?"
"Time travel?" he asked.
"Yes."
"It an interesting theory. Might be something I could look into once this is all over. Why?"
"Just wondering if you thought it was possible."
He glanced at the pictures on the floor and shook his head. "Hard to say what is and isn't possible these days."
OOO
The sound of people laughing and talking loudly over the music was a bit overwhelming, but Em felt herself getting lost in it. After so long without a drink, the beer she'd shared with the girls was making her feel light headed and giddy.
And the dancing…
The floor was covered with couples doing the jitterbug, laughing as they bumped into one another in their exuberance. A few of the girls who had invited Emily to tag along had paired up and were on the floor, laughing and whirling. When one of the remaining girls grabbed her hand, she let herself be pulled out as well.
She smiled - really smiled - for the first time in what felt like ages. And she laughed until she was out of breath and her face was flushed with happiness.
The band played on and Emily found herself dancing with new partners. More often than not, they didn't speak while dancing, too intent on catching their breath and laughing. After a few songs, she retreated to the bar to get a drink only to be pulled back out as soon as she was finished.
Eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we shall die.
There was something nihilistic about the club - outside, rubble still cluttered the streets from the most recent bombings (Germany had launched Operation Steinbock - the 'Baby Blitz' - which Em vaguely remember lasting until some time in May), and everyone knew that there was a possibility that their partner could die but chose not to care in that moment. Instead, they focused on how their hearts were beating in time with the drums and the alcohol coursing through their veins.
OOO
Her days fell into a new rhythm: she would wake up and get an idea of how Howard had passed the evening, attend and take minutes for the morning meeting, present him with an overview of what was required, and then assist him in whatever way he deemed necessary at that time. Around five o'clock she would confirm his evening plans. If he didn't need her - which was more and more recently - he would dismiss her for the day and Emily would join the group of girls getting ready for the nightly trip to the club.
They went around London, rarely going to the same place twice in a row.
She danced with British men in the Royal Air Force, Royal Navy, and the Territorial Army, American men in the Army, Marine Corps, and Navy, and even a few in the Eagle Squadrons (she felt a pang of sadness when she 'remembered' that Garrett in this history had been a member of the Squadron).
"I need you to file a flight plan for me," Howard said one evening as she was preparing to leave.
"Alright, where are we going?" Emily asked, retrieving a pencil and piece of scrap paper from the lab table.
"Italy. And you're staying here."
"Excuse me?"
"I can't be responsible for bringing a civilian into a war zone."
"You're a civilian," she pointed out. Howard smiled sadly and walked towards her and, once close enough, he put his hands on her shoulders.
"I told you before, there's things happening on the Front that you shouldn't see… things that I want to keep you from seeing."
It was on the tip of her tongue to say that she knew what was going on in Italy, that the bloody campaign was far from over - Mussolini may have been captured and an armistice negotiated with the Allies, but the war was far from over. The Allies had secured southern Italy, but in the north Mussolini was still operating as Hitler's puppet. Within the next month, Hitler would be recalling troops from Africa to shore up the German borders and the Allies faced an uphill battle to break through the line, which they wouldn't accomplish for the next few months.
The Italian Jews were being rounded up and placed in concentration camps, joining the Allied prisoners of war and political prisoners; the deportations to the extermination camps in central and eastern Europe were beginning.
And in the midst of it all, the 107th Infantry Regiment was fighting against HYDRA. And James "Bucky" Barnes - Steve's best friend - was a POW. He, and members of his division, was being experimented on.
As much as she wanted to be there, to see what was happening, to see Steve again, she knew that she would be more of a hindrance than a help.
But that didn't mean she couldn't wish Steve luck as he started to next phase of his life.
"Alright," she agreed. "But I need you to do me a favor."
OOO
Emily, at first unsure of what to do with her free time - the first she's had since arriving in the past - decided that two things were of utmost importance.
She rented a room outside of Central London, far enough from Whitehall that she wouldn't have to see the war rooms, but close enough to get back if she needed to. It wasn't a five star place by any stretch of the imagination but she reveled in the ability to sleep without phones waking her, and - while her landlady did talk about the war - it wasn't the sole topic of conversation.
With sleep, sunshine, and time to breathe, she felt less overwhelmed, less apt to scream and cry at the slightest provocation. She started to feel human again. And it was becoming clear that Em - try as she might - wasn't going to be able to get home through her own means. Jane's research was cutting edge in the 21st century, so there was no way she - a trained historian - was going to be able to crack astrophysics in the 1940. And, even though she hadn't had contact from the future since that night in New York, she was optimistic that Jane and Tony were making headway into getting her home.
With the knowledge that things would (hopefully) soon be righted, Emily decided to take advantage of the opportunity that was being afforded to her and do what she loved: learning about history.
Emily invested in a few good notebooks and spent mornings clipping news articles, pressing them between the pages where she made notes and tried to place the events into the broader narrative of history. It was fascinating, seeing the things she'd only read about playing out in the newspapers, and she started to play a little game with herself; she would end her research notes with a guess at what tomorrow's headline would be.
She also started to keep a personal journal. Unable to speak to anyone about what was going on, it felt nice to vent. Her hand was often smeared with ink by the time she was finished writing, blurring her words, but just writing it was comforting.
Other than her project and a few things she needed to do for Stark Industries, Emily enjoyed two and a half weeks of vacation.
She felt a small thrill when she read about the daring raid to rescue a group of American POWs.
When Emily received a telegram saying that Howard was on his way back with a few friends, she felt balanced enough to go back to the bunker.
So when she met Steve as he stepped off of Howard's plane, smiling and holding up her note with a warning to be careful that Howard to pass along for her, Emily was ready to face what was coming - ready to support Steve as he finally became the Captain America she knew and loved.
Author's Note: Never abandon, just delayed!