Author's note: Thanks to distanceincrowdedrooms, Nimrodel 101, Spidershadow 5, Lamarquise, Flickerflame8, LoverGurrl411, MagicLia16, kaufmann .dann, and everyone else who leaves reviews. It really makes a difference! You guys keep me on my toes and encourage me, too.

To LaMarquise, I was aware of Tolkien's service in WWI, but he was also deeply affected by WWII and was apparently horrified by the use of atomic bombs in Japan. He may not have set out to write LOTR as a metaphor for WWII, but I have no doubt it affected his worldview. It was a tough time to be an Englishman. Thanks for your feedback!

And to Flickerflame8, who asked about Clint Barton's backstory: my rule of thumb for this fanfic is to take all movie content as canon, and to use deleted scenes and any knowledge I have of the comics as potential for inspiration or to leave on the shelf as the needs of my story dictate. I'm aware Clint has a different story in the comics, but one of the things I like about the MCU depiction is that he is the only "normal" guy on the OG Avengers team, which really makes him stand out from everyone else who has had bad relationships with and/or lost their parents too early, or has serious trauma from experiments gone wrong or PTSD or time displacement or KGB brainwashing, etc. He even has a normal, healthy romantic relationship. The world is positively full of people like the MCU Clint Barton, and I enjoy portraying him as a note of hope that not everyone has to have a dark backstory!

Chapter 23

The next morning Steve arrived at one of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s outdoor obstacle courses, as instructed, to find Brock Rumlow in a jovial mood as his men were getting things set up.

"I've been looking forward to this," Rumlow said, reaching out to shake Steve's hand in a friendly way. His chin was shadowed with the usual day's worth of scruff. "We've been itching for a good challenge. Ain't we, boys?" Several of the men agreed loudly. They were a boisterous group despite the early hour, laughing and insulting each other in a good-natured way as they arranged the equipment.

"It's gonna be one against two dozen," Rumlow said, squinting at Steve in the bright sunlight, "which doesn't really seem fair to anyone but you, Cap, but we're gonna make do." He laughed easily and so did the other men standing within earshot. Steve couldn't help but smile, too.

"All right. Here's the drill," Rumlow continued. "Ever since New York happened, the whole world knows you're here, Cap... and everyone who's on S.H.I.E.L.D.'s bad side is crapping their pants right about now, wondering when we're going to unleash you. You got a target painted on your back, so whatever weaknesses you might have, eventually S.H.I.E.L.D.'s enemies are gonna work out what they are. Better for you if we find them out first, and maybe you can figure out a way around them before you get into trouble on the field."

Steve nodded. "Sounds good." The Army had never done something like this for him, not in any systematic way. Experience had been his teacher during the war, but already he had learned so much from Clint and Nat about modern fighting techniques that now Steve felt a pulse of eagerness to test it out. He was ready for something new. He was ready for a challenge.

"So we're gonna take away your shield, see how you do without it," Rumlow said. "We're gonna swarm you with numbers. We're gonna use modern weapons against you. Throw some things at you that maybe you ain't expecting. How's that?"

"When do we start?" Steve asked.

Rumlow threw a fist into his face.

Steve had only a split-second to react, and managed to turn his head just in time to turn it into a glancing blow off his cheekbone. Before he could even recover from the shocking suddenness of the attack, someone else grabbed him from behind, wrapping a beefy arm around his throat. Instinctively he planted his feet and jerked his weight forward, slinging the man over his shoulder and onto the ground. Already there were other men getting into his space, with Rumlow throwing a fist into his gut just as someone else behind him kicked the back of his knee, and he staggered for a moment before managing to shove Rumlow back out of his space and spinning to kick back at the assailant behind him.

The next few minutes were a whirlwind of blows, but not more than Steve could handle; so far, they weren't trying anything against him that Schmidt's Hydra goons hadn't already, although he was getting definite hints that at least a few of the men on STRIKE team were real powerhouses and not just cannon fodder, Rumlow himself chief among them.

The STRIKE leader's appearance was deceptive, Steve realized as he blocked a blow and then shifted his weight in an unexpected direction, sending one of the attackers crashing awkwardly into a fellow team member and taking them both out of the fight for the moment. Rumlow wasn't all that big of a guy — particularly in comparison to some of the other STRIKE guys, who looked like they'd been chosen for the sheer visual intimidation factor — but he was making good use of what he had. He was strong for his size, and he was clearly a thinking fighter: A couple of times he called out a single word, and the other men responded instantly with a new strategy that took some adjusting to handle.

After a few minutes of this, Rumlow shouted out, "Halt! Halt!" The men instantly stopped fighting and backed up a couple of steps, and Steve slowly put down his fists.

"So," Rumlow said conversationally as he pulled up his T-shirt to mop the sweat off his forehead. "How was that for starters?"

Steve raised his eyebrows. "Fun," he admitted.

Rumlow laughed. "You hear that, boys? He says it was fun," he called, glancing around at his team, who were all breathing hard from the tussle. Quite a few of them grinned in response. "Looks like they had fun, too," Rumlow said with amusement as he turned back toward Steve.

Then he craned his neck to the side and looked at Steve's cheek. "Look at that," he said in mild disappointment. "I didn't even leave a mark." He glanced around. "Hey guys! I think we can kick it up a notch." He met Steve's eyes. "You can take it, right?"

"I can take it," Steve confirmed. "Just... be careful about how hard you hit. I don't want anyone breaking their hand on my face."

Rumlow laughed easily. "We'll worry about our hands, Cap," he said. "You worry about your face."

If Steve had been hoping for a change of pace, Rumlow and the STRIKE team gave it to him in spades over the next few weeks. After the danger and crisis of the Battle of New York, his S.H.I.E.L.D. training had almost felt like a vacation; Clint and Nat had come to him as teachers, although by the end of Steve's time with them, it had become more of a mutual give-and-take, with them often asking advice from him on how to pull off certain maneuvers.

But it was different with STRIKE team. Rumlow was there to test him. And it quickly became apparent that Rumlow was not the type to do anything halfway. He frequently urged his men to come at Steve with their full strength, despite the fact that some of them were getting injured doing it.

"Come on, Cap. How else are we supposed to find your limits if we don't give you real-world conditions?" Rumlow asked with a shrug when Steve expressed concern. "These guys knew what they signed up for."

He wasn't wrong, Steve knew, but he didn't exactly like it, either. There were days when he was tempted to tell Fury to call an end to the testing and just put him out into the field, where he could be pitted against real assailants, but Fury frequently watched these testing sessions and knew what was happening. He never said much afterward, but if he disapproved of Rumlow's methods he surely would have said something.

One of the biggest challenges Steve faced was finding the correct level of force to use, knowing this was only practice and not wanting to injure the other guys. Rumlow was constantly encouraging Steve to stop pulling his punches, but there was no question of doing that. Instead, he provided full-strength demonstrations on punching bags and sparring dummies, which Rumlow was forced to grudgingly accept.

And STRIKE team played as hard as they worked, Steve quickly learned. There were frequent "decompression exercises," as Rumlow called them with a twinkle in his eye, usually coming in the form of meeting at a nearby sports bar after a long day of hard work. Sometimes Steve joined them, partly because he knew it was good for morale and partly because he enjoyed watching games with company for a change. Natasha and Clint didn't really follow baseball; Clint liked to play it but not watch it, while Nat was bored to tears either way. Rumlow, on the other hand, was a rabid White Sox fan and knew the game like the back of his hand.

But no matter how many times they stayed late to cheer on their respective teams to the very last inning, Rumlow would show up to work the next morning spoiling for a fight as eagerly as Steve was, growing ever more inventive in his quest to find challenges Steve had never yet faced.

"Ever been tased, Cap?" Rumlow asked in a conversational way one day.

Steve shook his head. Nat had once spent a day showing him how to wield a taser rod, although he hadn't felt inspired to work it into his own repertoire. But she had never suggested testing it on him.

"Been wondering if you might be resistant to it," Rumlow said. "Care to find out?"

"I guess I better." Nat had explained that the tech was easily available, and it wasn't unreasonable to think it might be used against him someday.

"It's painful," Rumlow warned.

Steve shrugged.

"Better take a leak first. Some people lose control." A few of the guys laughed, although Rumlow was only being matter-of-fact.

"I'm good."

"Okay," Rumlow said, pulling out his rod and activating it with a crackle of electricity. The other men backed up, giving the two of them space. "Just a little zap, Cap. Three-second interval. Ready?"

Steve braced himself and nodded.

Rumlow stretched out his hand and pressed the taser rod against Steve's bicep.

The pain was instantaneous and extreme. It seemed to last far longer than three seconds, and he grunted involuntarily as the hot lightning coursed through his body, seizing up his muscles. And then abruptly it stopped and he found himself down on one knee, sweaty palms pressed against the mat, panting for breath.

"Huh," Rumlow said, looking at the rod and then Steve with interest. "Guess you ain't immune. Well, good to know."

Steve steadied his breathing deliberately and got back on his feet.

"Again," he said.

Rumlow raised his eyebrows. "Again?"

"Yeah."

"What for?"

"So I can work out how to counter it."

Rumlow blinked at him in bemusement. "You can't."

Rumlow didn't know, couldn't know, the depths of distaste Steve had for that particular phrase, and so he swallowed what he wanted to say and instead replied mildly, "Can't know 'til I try."

Rumlow shrugged one shoulder, and then in a whip-fast motion he pressed the taser rod against Steve's chest.

Again, the hot, blinding pain. Again, his whole body seized up, and it was only when the three-second cycle ended that his muscles would obey him once more. The other STRIKE guys were suddenly quiet, watching as Steve got back to his feet, forcing himself to rise quickly and smoothly even though every nerve in his body was jangling.

"The thing is," Rumlow said, glancing down to check the power level of his rod before meeting Steve's eyes once more, "it isn't just the pain that immobilizes you. The electricity interferes with the signals your nerves are sending to your brain. There's nothing to counter, Cap, nothing to overcome. If someone zaps you, there's nothin' you can do but pray they stop. Better learn how to avoid getting hit by one in the first place."

Steve heard what Rumlow was saying and understood it, but at the same time, he was seeing through a window of possibility. His body could sometimes do more than what he thought was possible. His survival after decades buried under a pile of Arctic ice was proof of that. How did he know he couldn't overcome this?

"Hit me again," he said.

"I don't wanna hurt you," Rumlow said.

"You won't. I can do this."

Rumlow thought for a long moment and finally raised his eyebrows. "Well, you're the boss."

He delivered several more shocks in quick succession. Steve didn't worry about how he looked in front of everybody while he was taking them; he was too busy concentrating on the way the electricity felt shooting through every nerve like liquid lightning. Instead, he just kept getting up every time he fell, eager to once again focus on testing a single muscle, seeing if he could move it despite the overwhelming power washing through his body.

He was just starting to think that maybe Rumlow was right after all, and that this was an exercise in futility, when he exerted a terrible effort and actually managed to make his fists unclench even while the electricity was coursing through him. Filled with elation, he jumped back onto his feet and nodded to Rumlow to go again. This time, he tried swinging an arm toward the taser rod the moment the jolting started.

It worked. His arm obeyed his brain and swept out, making contact with Rumlow's hand where he was gripping the rod. But the pain made him clumsy, and as he pushed the still-thrumming rod away from him, it brushed up against Rumlow's chest instead.

Rumlow barely made a sound, just went down hard on one knee with a strangled grunt.

And then the instant the electricity switched off, incredibly, he got back up. No hesitation, no staggering, no grimacing. He just straightened his shoulders and looked at Steve with a strange expression on his face: not pain, but distance. As if he were a thousand miles away. As if it were someone else entirely who had just been electrocuted. The other men were deathly silent, watching.

"I didn't mean to-" Steve started a little anxiously.

But Rumlow just sighed deeply, his eyes closing momentarily as a faint smile touched his lips.

"Now that's what I call invigorating," he said, opening his eyes and smiling crookedly at Steve.

"You okay?" Steve asked after a moment's hesitation.

Rumlow nodded, although his face was still beaded with sweat. "Fine. You?"

"Yeah."

He smiled in genuine pleasure and slapped Steve's shoulder. "Nice work, Cap. Real nice work. You took a lot of hits and kept right on coming."

"Anyone could do that if they had serum running through their veins," he heard Jack Rollins mutter under his breath, and Steve could see a couple of the men around him murmuring in agreement.

"Of course, you can't always count on spasming in just the right way like that," Rumlow added with a roguish grin, and Steve realized in a flash that the STRIKE leader hadn't understood that his motion had been voluntary, if not precisely executed. But there was no question of pointing that out to Rumlow and the others now; it would sound too much like bragging. Steve had learned what he needed to know about himself, and that was all that mattered.

"Okay, everybody!" Rumlow shouted authoritatively, clapping loudly to get their attention. "Take a break. Back here in 30." Without hesitation the STRIKE team flooded out the door and toward the cafeteria; they'd been working for hours and were more than ready for a break.

Rumlow stayed put, though, and he and Steve watched the last couple of guys file out of the room until the two of them were left alone.

"Rollin's an idiot," Rumlow said then in a conversational tone.

"Not really," Steve said quickly, but Rumlow shook his head and walked over to the bench, gesturing for Steve to join him as he sat down heavily. "A lot of my guys, they don't understand what the serum does — and doesn't — do for you," Rumlow continued. "I took some time to study the old SSR files. Wanted to give you the best tests I could."

Steve raised his eyebrows. "Well, it's working. You've been pushing me."

Rumlow smiled crookedly. "Good." Then he took a deep breath. "You know," he continued, his eyes growing distant, "some guys think pain tolerance is a physical feat. They think some guys can take more because they're bigger or stronger. But they're wrong. It's all up here." He tapped his forehead significantly. "Believe me, I know. My old man, he had a heavy hand. Used to hate it. Hated him. But you know what? He did me a favor."

"Do you mean-?" Steve started, a little stunned at Rumlow's matter-of-fact tone. His eyes flicked down to the scarring under Rumlow's left eye. He'd always assumed that was from an injury inflicted during a mission, but suddenly he realized it might have been from something else inflicted at a much earlier age, and a cold chill went down his spine.

"Grew up in Chicago," Rumlow went on as if he hadn't said anything. "The rough side. Spent a lot of time out on the streets. Not exactly the safest place for a little guy with a big mouth. Like me." His smile twisted sideways. "But thanks to my old man, I already knew the secret: No matter how many times they knock you down, as long as you're still conscious you can keep getting up. Doesn't matter how bad it hurts, doesn't matter if you're bleeding everywhere, doesn't matter if your body is screaming for you to quit. You just keep getting up and coming back for more. Pretty soon even the big guys realize you ain't worth the trouble." He looked over at Steve. "But you already know that. Don't you? The serum, it doesn't stop you from feeling pain."

"No," Steve said quietly. "It doesn't."

"So where did you learn it? The war? Or was it before that, in Brooklyn?"

Steve was quiet for a long moment. "Brooklyn could be pretty rough," he said at last, and then admitted: "Especially for a little guy who... didn't exactly fit in."

"It's a miracle you weren't killed, as little as you were," Rumlow said.

"It wasn't as bad as you're picturing," Steve said quickly, anxious not to sound sorry for himself. "A lot of the time, my pal, my buddy-" He paused, realizing with some embarrassment that he was slipping back into his old vernacular. "My... Bucky."

"Bucky?" Rumlow repeated, looking confused.

"His name was James, but nobody called him that," Steve explained. "James was his dad. So we called him Bucky. Anyway, my mother said he had the second sight."

He hadn't talked about Bucky in a long time; no one here had ever thought to ask about him, not even Nat, and yet for Steve he had been gone not quite a year. Just by speaking his name, he was surprised to feel a kind of loosening in his chest, like a knot inside him was being undone. It was a little nerve-racking and a bit of a relief, all at the same time, and suddenly he found himself aching to say more. When it came to Bucky, there was so much to say.

"Second sight? What's that?" Rumlow asked, puzzled.

"An old Irish superstition. A... sixth sense. Anyway, Bucky always seemed to know when I was in trouble. It was kinda uncanny. He'd show up just at the right moment and sail in with both fists." Steve paused, permitting the familiar sensations of gratitude, guilt and regret wash over him. "He saved me from a lot of beatings."

Rumlow was looking at him with a strange expression on his face. Almost a kind of hunger in his eyes.

"You were lucky," Rumlow said at last. "To have a friend like that." His left eye twitched, further distorting his scarred cheek. "I didn't have anybody. But that was good for me." His voice went harsher. "It made me stronger. The pain, it can't kill you. It brings order. Romanoff knows that, too. It's why she's so good. Why she's better than Barton, and always will be."

"Is she?" Steve asked, surprised. He'd seen Nat and Clint spar enough times, but they were always so playful about it that he had never noticed an obvious mismatch between them. He had no idea what would happen if they ever fought for real. Not that they ever would.

"Oh, yeah," Rumlow said with certainty. "No agent homegrown inside S.H.I.E.L.D. could ever match someone trained by the KGB, or out on the streets like you and me. Barton learned from one of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s best trainers, yeah, but all the methods they use here are... well, they're humane, let's put it that way. But Romanoff, now... she knows pain. Like us. She has an edge to her that Barton could never have. The man grew up running around the corn fields of Iowa like Maria Von Trapp running around the Swiss alps, for God's sake. He wouldn't know an edge if it hit him in the face."

"But Romanoff-"

"Holds back when she spars. Like you." Rumlow looked at him for a long moment. "So. Tell me about your pal. Your Bucky. Why'd he protect you so fierce?"

"I don't know," Steve admitted. "I was never really sure what he got out of it. I mean, he was the guy who had everything, you know? Nice family, good looking, charming." He smiled slightly. The old ladies at church had liked Bucky as much as the pretty girls in the dance halls did, which had always been endless fodder for teasing. Then his smile faded a little. "But I don't know what he got out of hanging around me. He didn't need me. I guess he... just liked me. I was never sure why."

He frowned a little, remembering how much trouble he had had trying to make friends in those days, with Bucky as the notable exception. It was funny how fast that had stopped being a problem after his experiment. But Bucky had never needed a reason to offer him friendship. It had been given freely.

"Hey, Cap. You don't have to ask me why I like you," Rumlow said easily. "I like you 'cuz you can beat the snot outta me."

Steve grinned at him. "Oh, is that how it is?"

"Not a lotta guys can do that," Rumlow said, shaking his head. "Respect, Cap. Respect."

Just then, the door opened and Nat came strolling in, winking slightly at Steve before looking at Rumlow seriously.

"Sorry to interrupt the fun," she said coolly, "but I need to borrow Rogers from you for a minute. Got something he needs to test out."

The "something" turned out to be his new uniform, designed by Julie in Fabrication and Quinn in R&D, with Steve's guidance and no shortage of input from Nat and Clint... some of which had been helpful ("Make sure they put in lots of pockets and pouches for gear," Clint had insisted) and some of which had been less so ("It needs to be tighter," Nat had said repeatedly, each time shooting a teasing look at Steve that made it clear she just wanted to see him sigh in exasperation — which of course, he did).

He liked all the features this uniform had. He liked the way it felt. And he liked the way it looked: navy blue, with a white star on the chest and only a subtle hint of dark red striping on the sides — much more modern and subdued than his stage costume, or Howard Stark's design, or Phil Coulson's iteration that he'd worn during the Battle of New York. But Steve couldn't help but a feel a tiny pang of regret as he looked it over. If he'd worn something like this from the beginning, his old Howling Commando buddy James Montgomery Falsworth would never have taken to calling him "that damn Yankee" with his tongue firmly in his cheek. Tony Stark would never have made a single snarky comment about spangles. And Bucky never would have asked him with that teasing gleam in his eye if he intended to "keep the outfit."

Everyone would have taken him seriously. Which was exactly what he had wanted — craved — his whole life.

Then why couldn't he shake an uneasy feeling that something important had been lost?

"It looks fantastic," Nat said with such warm approval that Steve ignored the feeling with an effort. "It's perfect." She held up her phone and took a picture of him. "Okay, now turn around."

Steve didn't budge, just gave her a long-suffering look.

"Oh, come on!" Nat tilted her head and gave him a pleading, pouty look that somehow managed to tug at his heartstrings even though he knew she was only doing it to manipulate him. "I need to send a picture to the others, and they'll want to see the whole thing."

Steve frowned. "What others?"

"The other Avengers."

He frowned even deeper. "Don't do that."

"Why not?" Nat asked.

"Why would they care?"

"Why wouldn't they?"

Steve sighed, and didn't bother answering. "I'm gonna go test it out with the STRIKE guys," he said. But before he left, he paused and pointed a finger at Nat. "Promise me you won't send that picture to all the Avengers."

Nat sighed. "Fine. I promise."

It was nearly dinnertime by the time Rumlow and the STRIKE team had run through all the exercises they had planned for the day, but Steve declined an invitation to go to the sports bar with them afterward, in the mood for a quiet evening at home instead. He headed to the parking garage and was just about to get on his bike when he heard "Hey, Steve!" behind him.

He turned to see Clint Barton strolling toward him, dressed in blue jeans and a T-shirt, obviously headed home for the day. Their reserved spots were right next to each other, which was good; Steve trusted Clint not to ding his bike with his car door, not only because Clint was nice that way, but also because Clint had a fondness bordering on open affection for his old Ford Taurus, even though Nat was always wrinkling her nose and saying it wasn't anything special. Her Corvette Stingray was parked on the other side of Clint's car, its black paint polished to a high shine as usual.

"Hey," Steve said, glad to see him. He didn't seem to run into Clint as often as he did Nat, now that he had been reassigned.

Clint perched his sunglasses on top of his head. "Rumlow and the guys give you a good workout today?"

"Things got a little intense," Steve said. "But it's good for- Hang on."

Steve's pocket had just started playing music: a comically sped-up musical cue from "The Star-Spangled Man with a Plan." Nat — at least, he assumed it was Nat — had changed his ringtone when he wasn't looking one day, and he hadn't taken the time yet to figure out how to change it back. Grimacing slightly, Steve pulled his phone out of his pocket and looked at the incoming text.

NATASHA ROMANOFF: Breaking news: Gennifer in Purchasing just told me she thinks you're hot.

NATASHA ROMANOFF: Inquiring minds want to know if you think she's hot.

Steve groaned before he could stop himself, and he scrunched up his face as he tried to work out just how he was supposed to answer that.

Clint looked at him in a questioning kind of way. "What?"

Steve sighed and handed over his phone to show Clint, who looked and then laughed shortly as he handed it back.

"Well? Do you?" Clint asked.

Steve shrugged. "I dunno. I guess so."

Clint scrutinized him. "That seems... less than enthusiastic."

"No, she's fine, it's just..." Steve began, and then trailed off.

"Okay, Steve, seriously," Clint said, grabbing both of his shoulders and looking into his eyes for emphasis. "You need to either take Nat up on one of these women she keeps throwing at you, or else tell her to knock it off already. Otherwise she's never gonna let it go. She's made up her mind to get you fixed up and trust me, there's no stopping women when they get into that mode."

"The thing is..." Steve hesitated. "I kinda have been dating. On my own."

Clint looked taken aback. "Have you?"

"Yeah. A little."

Clint frowned. "Well, why on earth don't you tell her that? Maybe she'd actually get off your back."

Steve shrugged a little. "I dunno. I guess... if I tell Nat I've gone on dates, she's gonna want to know how they went."

"Why, did they go badly?" Clint teased.

"No," Steve said seriously. "Well... not that I know of. I guess you'd have to ask my dates."

Clint turned and leaned back against his car with arms folded, exuding an air of expectation. Steve leaned against the car too, and together they watched a car turn the corner and exit the garage.

"So did these girls get kissed, or what?" Clint asked conversationally.

"Yeah."

"I assume you didn't get slapped."

"No."

"Can't really picture anyone slapping Captain America."

Against his will, Steve smiled a little.

Clint grinned back. "So did you like any of them?"

"I don't know." Steve looked down. "Yes. And no."

Clint raised an eyebrow and waited expectantly.

"I liked kissing them," Steve admitted.

"Shocking," Clint said, deadpan.

"But they didn't... get me," Steve continued.

"Didn't get you?" Clint repeated.

"Or I didn't get them."

Clint frowned. "How so?"

"Look, I know I'm kinda... almost a foreigner here," Steve said slowly, "but I've been trying real hard to catch up, and I thought by now I'd be able to find enough things to talk about on a date. Modern things, I mean."

"But?" Clint said expectantly.

"But mostly," Steve said reluctantly, "they wanted to talk about how mean their boss was because the cubicle they got wasn't as nice as what their co-worker got, or how all their friends had the new iPhone but they couldn't afford one yet and how embarrassing it was, or how mad they got because somebody on Twitter said something they didn't like about some political thing."

Clint pinched the bridge of his nose and assumed a weary expression. "Oh, man."

"I don't mean to put them down," Steve said quickly. "They were all real nice girls, I think they were good people, I just..." He paused, trying to think how to explain. "Look, I got fired from one of the last jobs I had before the Army, down at the old cannery in Brooklyn, because I had to go home early one day when I had a bad asthma attack and my boss didn't like it. I had to pay my rent late that month and my landlord gave me grief even though he still hadn't fixed the electrical short in my kitchen. And I was going without sugar because I'd used up my rationing stamps too fast. So when they're talking about how far their cubicle is from the window, I just... don't know what to say to them."

"I know what I'd say to that," Clint said, rolling his eyes.

Steve scratched the back of his neck uncomfortably. "It felt like I was dating girls who were too young for me. Except they weren't. And yeah, technically I'm an old man, which is hilarious, but it was really only a few years ago for me that-" Steve stopped himself, realizing he was dangerously close to complaining. He took a deep breath and pulled himself back with an effort.

"Anyway, even before I joined the Army, the kinds of things I thought about... I was worried about governments collapsing, and bombs falling on civilians. I was worried about not getting into the Army, and what might happen if I did get into it." He sighed ruefully. "Trust me, nobody wants to talk about things like that on a date."

Clint shook his head vigorously. "Okay, Steve, here's the thing you need to understand," he said. "The pool of women you're choosing from? They're all single women in their 20s living in Washington, D.C. There's a certain type of woman who does that, okay? They probably all worked in government or for a grassroots organization or a campaign or something, am I right?"

"Yeah," Steve admitted.

"Yeah. These are career girls, they're ambitious, they live for the job. So their boss picking on them, their iPhones, their Twitter, that's their whole world. Anything that threatens them socially threatens them existentially. And you're right, they're not necessarily bad people because of that, but you have to understand, that kind of woman, they're not looking for a husband and kids and a white picket fence, at least not at this stage of their lives. I mean, I assume... that is what you're looking for, isn't it? The domestic life?"

"I... yeah."

"Okay, so forget about dating women who live around here. Next weekend, get on your motorcycle, take a ride out to the country, go into a diner or a ranch store or something like that, and pick up women there."

"Country girls?" Steve said skeptically. "I'm a city boy. Always have been."

Clint shook his head. "It doesn't matter, Steve. The point is, if you get a girl who knows how to drive a tractor or pick rock out of a field or bottle tomatoes, you get a girl who's actually made contact with reality at some point in her life."

Steve looked down, suddenly filled with confusion. What Clint was saying made a certain kind of sense. But then again, why should a career woman be incompatible with him? Wasn't that what Peggy had been? He had never minded her unusual choice of occupation; in fact, he had admired her passion and determination to succeed in the face of so many obstacles. What set her apart from the women he'd been dating recently?

Maybe it was because Peggy had joined the war effort not because of any personal ambition, but because after her brother was killed in action she felt called to contribute all her heart and soul to the same cause. And she had said a few things during their time together that had made it clear to Steve that she did have family on her mind... at least once the war had ended.

And in the next instant Steve realized — Peggy had spent her childhood in the English countryside, only coming to London as a young woman. Did that make her a country girl, or a city girl? A domestic woman, or a career woman? Or some unique blend of all those things?

And why, he wondered with mounting frustration, despite forcing himself to accept on a daily basis the fact that Peggy was lost to him, was he still holding her up as the measuring stick for every other woman he met?

"It probably doesn't even really matter what kind of woman I find," Steve said slowly. "I'm not exactly in a position to start a family."

Clint creased his brow, suddenly looking confused. "Why not?"

"This job," Steve said, surprised by his surprise. "Any day now Fury will start giving me missions. And then I'll get called up at any time, day or night, and be gone for weeks at a time. Maybe never come back one day. It's not exactly the ideal arrangement for a family."

Clint was silent for a moment, and then said with a shrug, "Could be."

Now it was Steve's turn to crease his brow. "How?"

Clint turned and dropped a hand on Steve's shoulder. "Let me let you in on a little secret, Steve. Working for S.H.I.E.L.D.? It's not like enlisting in the Army, where once you're in, you're pretty much stuck dancing to someone else's tune. Here, you have the power to walk away. Which means that if you work your tail off, if you make yourself invaluable to them..." He quirked an eyebrow at Steve. "Fury and Hill will bend over backwards to keep you happy. If you tell them you need this or that or the other thing to make it easier to live the kind of lifestyle you want to live, they'll make it happen for you. They don't want you jumping ship and going to the CIA, or the FBI, or back to the military. Agents at our level of training, people they can completely trust? They're not easy to find. It's not like they have another Clint Barton or Steve Rogers just waiting in the wings to take our places if we get too demanding. You catch what I mean?"

Steve thought about that for a long moment.

"Even if that were true," he said at last, "it seems like it would be awfully hard on the wife."

Clint shrugged again. "Depends on the woman. Some of them, they might look soft on the outside, but they have a backbone of steel. You just have to find one of those. They do exist."

"I know," Steve said softly.

"You want me to tell Nat to cool it with throwing women at your head?" Clint offered. "She'll do it if I ask her."

Steve considered that for a moment. "Not really," he said at last. "It's kinda nice that she cares."

His apartment wasn't far from S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters, but when Steve got home and pulled his phone back out to charge it, he saw that he had already missed a couple of text messages from an unknown number.

212-555-3335: This one is about 10 times better than the last one.

212-555-3335: And by 10 times better, I mean 100 times better.

Steve frowned in confusion, and typed in a response.

STEVE ROGERS: Who is this?

212-555-3335: Tony Stark. I got your number from Bruce.

Steve noticed then that it was actually a group message, and that Bruce and Clint were in on it, too. Quickly, he added Tony as a new contact and then replied.

STEVE ROGERS: Oh. Hi, Tony.

BRUCE BANNER: i like it too its very nice

STEVE ROGERS: Like what? Did I miss something?

TONY STARK: The uniform.

A photo popped up in Tony's message window. It was the photo Nat had taken of his new uniform earlier that day. Steve felt his jaw drop open, but the next thing Tony posted was even worse: a photo of the back of the uniform. He realized in an instant that Nat must have taken another photo after he'd turned around to walk away from her.

Scowling, Steve tapped a few buttons and got into his message stream with Nat.

STEVE ROGERS: Stark and Banner just told me they like the new uniform.

NATASHA ROMANOFF: See, Steve, I told you so.

STEVE ROGERS: You know what, Romanoff?

NATASHA ROMANOFF: Don't be mad.

STEVE ROGERS: You promised me you wouldn't do that!

NATASHA ROMANOFF: I said I wouldn't send it to ALL the Avengers.

NATASHA ROMANOFF: I didn't send it to Thor.

STEVE ROGERS: You've got to be kidding me.

NATASHA ROMANOFF: No, really. I don't know his phone number.

NATASHA ROMANOFF: Do you?

STEVE ROGERS: I'm not talking to you right now.

NATASHA ROMANOFF: You just did.

STEVE ROGERS: Go away.

NATASHA ROMANOFF: You're cute when you're mad. Hey, you never answered me about Gennifer. So what do you think?

Steve sighed in exasperation, and saw a new message pop up from Tony. He tapped back into it.

TONY STARK: And when I say it's 100 times better, I mean it's 1,000 times better.

Steve hadn't like the previous uniform all that much, either, but for some reason he couldn't stop himself from typing back:

STEVE ROGERS: What was so wrong with the last one?

TONY STARK: Let's just say it didn't play up your best asset.

STEVE ROGERS: Huh?

TONY STARK: I'll explain when you're older.

STEVE ROGERS: Bruce, please translate.

BRUCE BANNER: oh I'm going to stay far far away from this one

BRUCE BANNER: im going back to my lab

BRUCE BANNER: lets just pretend this whole convo never hapened

CLINT BARTON: Knock it off, you guys. Siri is reading these texts to me while I'm driving, and you guys are about to make me wreck.

TO BE CONTINUED

Author's note: There you go, an extra-long chapter! But I didn't see a good place to cut it in half. Let me know what you think, particularly about this take on Brock Rumlow. The movies don't give a lot of insight on what kind of person ends up in Hydra, how they are indoctrinated, recruited or trained, etc., so I started with the assumption that, as with some real-life cults, some adherents would be conditioned by their own families from a young age. I pictured Rumlow as being raised in an abusive way for a particular purpose: to prepare him for the kind of fanaticism and violence that Hydra requires from their top agents. I figured his sadism would lead him to admire, in some twisted way, Steve's gift of being able to get up and come back swinging no matter what gets dished out to him... even though they stand in opposition when it comes to moral questions.

And/or let me know what you thought of Steve's interactions with the various Avengers in this chapter. Those are a bit more fun to write than Rumlow's sadism. :-D