Chapter 37

When Steve Rogers opened his eyes, he found himself in a hospital room.

There was music playing nearby, something jazzy and soothing at the same time. He could feel a dull ache in his middle, and another one in his shoulder, and a third one in his thigh. His face felt swollen and sore. Looking around, feeling groggy and a little confused, his eyes fell on Sam Wilson sitting by his bed reading a book.

Steve swallowed in a throat that was inexplicably sore and said hoarsely, "On your left." He squeezed his dry eyes shut for a second. When he looked back over, Sam was smiling at him slowly, relief evident in his dark eyes.

Steve was more than a little relieved to see Sam in return. When the helicarrier he'd been on had plowed into the side of the Triskelion, where Sam still was, he had feared the worst.

"Romanoff?" he asked briefly. Why did his throat hurt so much? He remembered getting shot. He remembered getting beaten about the head. He didn't remember getting punched in the throat.

"Made it out in one piece," Sam answered promptly, closing his book with a snap. "Hill and Fury too. They got Pierce, by the way."

"Captured?"

"Dead. Rumlow too. I barely made it out of the building in time. He didn't."

Steve closed his eyes for a moment, quietly grateful. He couldn't exactly call the events of the day good, but it could have been much, much worse. Sometimes, you just had to take what you got.

"Things are a mess out there," Sam said. "As soon as they got you here, Fury took Hill and Romanoff back out to see who and what they could salvage. Once the helicarriers went down, the Hydra agents scattered like rats. They're rounding up as many agents as they can to go after the traitors, worldwide. What happened here happened in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s facilities everywhere, apparently."

"Barton?" Steve asked, suddenly feeling a spurt of alarm. Had Nat managed to warn him in time?

"Who's that?"

It was too difficult to think how to explain Clint in just a few words, and the ache in his middle was steadily growing; whatever anesthetic they had given him was wearing off quickly. Steve gingerly put his hand on his abdomen, feeling the dry crackle of bandages under his hospital gown. Experimentally he wiggled his fingers and toes. He could still feel everything and move everything. That was good. He'd known guys who'd been shot in the back who hadn't been so lucky.

"Are you uncomfortable?" Sam asked with a slight frown, putting the book down and standing up to bend over him solicitously. "Can I help you rearrange something?"

"Just… making sure everything's still there." His voice was still scratchy.

"Want some ice chips?"

Steve nodded.

"They intubated you," Sam explained, getting a styrofoam cup from the bedside table and handing it to him. Steve took it gingerly because of the IV tube in his arm. "My dad had a hernia fixed a couple of years ago. Swore the intubation hurt worse than the incision. Anyway, far as I know, the only thing you're missing is a couple inches outta your small intestine."

Cold ice melting on his tongue, Steve made a small sound that sounded like "ugh."

"Yeah," Sam agreed with feeling. "But the slug missed your spine, went straight through, in and out. They snipped out the damage and sewed you back up. Pulled a bullet outta your shoulder and another outta your leg. Stitched up a stab wound and some cuts on your face." His dark eyes were concerned. "Your friend do all that to you?"

Steve nodded reluctantly.

"I'm sorry, man," Sam said seriously. "I know you were hoping you could reach him."

Brow creasing, Steve didn't answer right away. Images were floating up from his memory, the last things he remembered seeing before blacking out. Bucky looking at him wide-eyed, with his upraised fist frozen in place as the sparks flew down. There had been — had there? — recognition in his face. For one brief moment he had looked like his old self. Not the sullen soldier who didn't even know his own name, much less Steve's. And then there had been a deafening crash, a long freefall, a hard impact on the water. After that, he must have lost consciousness. But there was one final image pushing its way into his memory.

A metallic hand, reaching out for him through the murky water.

Suddenly Steve felt a surge of wild hope. Had he imagined that? He couldn't have. That had to be real. Could Bucky have survived the wreck of the helicarrier? Pulled his unconscious body to the surface and to safety? And if he had… if he had ignored the assassination orders Hydra had pounded into his head… if he had acted on mercy instead of his programming…

Was it possible he actually had reached Bucky?

"Did you find him?" Steve asked suddenly, lifting his head off the pillow and ignoring the spike of pain that shot through his skull. Bucky really had done a number on him. Gave him a beating unlike anything he'd ever had before. But if Bucky had remembered who he was in the process, it would be worth it. It would all be worth it.

"Barnes?" Sam asked. "Nah, not a trace. He went down with the helicarrier, didn't he? We were lucky we found you." He studied Steve for a long moment, and then blew out a sigh. "I hate to do this to you, man, because I know they're gonna poke you and prod you, but I promised the nurses I'd let them know as soon as you woke up."

"That's okay," Steve said, distracted by his thoughts.

Sam nodded, and pressed a button on the remote by the bed and spoke to someone over an intercom. A few seconds later, a couple of nurses bustled into the room and informed Steve where he was and what day it was and what they had done to treat him, and then peppered him with questions about his medical history and how much pain he was feeling. Steve answered them as best as he could and obediently held still while they checked his bandages and gave him pills to swallow. All the while Sam hovered protectively in the background, but all Steve could think about was Bucky. Was he still out there somewhere? Trying to escape both Hydra and the authorities? Where could he go to be safe from all of them? And how on earth could Steve ever find him again under those conditions?

"The sooner we get you moving, the better," one of the nurses said. "Feel up to walking to the bathroom and back?"

"Yeah," he murmured, barely even registering what she had just said.

"Okay. Let's get you disconnected from all this and give it a try."

Sam stood up. "I'll wait out in the hall. Let Stark know you're awake. Just call out if you need anything, okay?"

"Stark?" Steve asked blankly.

"Yeah," Sam said, pausing by the doorway and looking back. "He came as soon as he heard there was weapons fire in D.C. Showed up in his flying suit not long after your helicarrier went down. He was the one who found you and flew you up to the chopper so we could bring you here."

Sam closed the door behind him and missed seeing the stunned expression that crossed Steve's face. It was Tony who had rescued him? Not Bucky? That metallic hand he had seen in the murky water reaching out to him…

Then it was Iron Man's hand that had pulled him up to the surface. Not the Winter Soldier's.

Suddenly Steve felt like the ground had dropped out from underneath him and he was falling, falling down a deep, dark hole. So he hadn't reached Bucky after all. Bucky had spent his final moments before the helicarrier went down trying to kill his best friend. And whether he had died on impact or survived only to go back to his Hydra masters…

Either way, Steve had failed.

"I know it hurts," one nurse murmured to him sympathetically as the two of them helped Steve ease up into a standing position, the tile floor cold against his bare feet. "That painkiller should kick in real soon, I promise."

He didn't bother explaining that it wasn't the bullet wounds that were hurting him. After everything Bucky had done for him, a lifetime of friendship and respect before anyone else had ever taken Steve seriously, after loyally following him through the ugliness of the war and then suffering through so much at the hands of Hydra…

He'd failed Bucky. The one time Bucky had needed him and not the other way around, and he'd failed.

After the nurses had helped him to the bathroom and then got him settled back into bed, they left the room and Sam came back in, followed by Tony Stark. Steve made a valiant effort to be glad to see them both, although he was fighting the same urge he always got when he'd taken a bad hit: he longed to be alone. To think. To hide his pain from the world until he found a place to bury it again. But there was no chance of being alone here. He'd just have to brace up.

"Hey, Cap." Tony held up his vibranium shield with a scolding look on his face. "You know, these things don't grow on trees," he said with mock sternness. "You should be more careful where you fling it."

"You found it," Steve said, striving to inject the gratitude he knew he should be feeling into his tone.

"Well, when I flew up and Fury and Romanoff told me they couldn't find you, my world-class brain came up with the devastatingly brilliant idea to scan the area for vibranium," Tony quipped. "Found it at the bottom of the Potomac. Of course, you weren't there with it, but I brought it up anyway. Figured you'd want it back." He leaned the shield up against the wall and then surveyed Steve's bruised and battered face for a long moment. "How you feeling?" he asked, shoving one fist into the pocket of his slacks. He was wearing clothing that managed to look expensive even though his vest was rumpled and there were odd, long creases in the sleeves of his button-up shirt. Sweating in a suit of armor must really do a number on imported suits.

"Fine," Steve said.

"Nothing worse than waking up in a hospital," Tony said.

"I can think of one thing worse," Sam said.

"It's the false advertising I hate," Tony continued breezily. "A beautiful nurse walks into your room, and you think she's going to give you a sponge bath and spoon-feed you pudding. Instead she whips out a catheter and shoves it up your-"

"Hey, let's keep things clean for the kiddos, huh?" Sam interjected with a knowing smile, glancing at Steve.

"Thank you, Tony," Steve said with as much sincerity as he could muster. "For pulling me out of the water."

"Oh, I didn't pull you out of the water, buddy," Tony said easily. "Someone else did that. Found you lying on the bank, a good mile away from the wreckage."

"What?" Steve said, startled.

"Yeah. Somebody dragged you up from the waterline. I could see the marks. And there were boot prints leading away into the trees."

It was all Steve could do not to jump out of bed and give Tony exactly the same kind of rough hug he used to give to Bucky, wounds or no wounds. So it had been Bucky after all! Who else could have found him before he sank down to the bottom of the river? Who else would have the strength to swim so far weighed down by his unconscious body? It was like the sun had broken through the clouds, leaving a dazzling band of color across a rain-washed sky.

"I don't know what you're smiling like that for," Tony said. "Whoever it was was a complete jerk. Left you lying there bleeding out into the mud and didn't even call 911, as far as we could tell."

Steve didn't even care. He had reached Bucky. He must have remembered at least something of Steve. A memory powerful enough to persuade him to fight his programming, at terrible personal cost, and abandon his mission in favor of saving the life of his target. It was a big step for him. A huge one. Maybe the old Bucky wasn't back, at least not yet, but there was hope that he could come back.

There was still hope.

"You got me to the helicopter," Steve said to Tony, and he reached out to grip Tony's hand gratefully, glad that he had not gotten his wish to grieve alone after all. "You helped save my life."

"Well," Tony said, assuming a modest expression. "I think that kinda makes us even, to tell you the truth. Romanoff put Hydra's little hit list on the internet along with all of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s files. My name was on it." His smile suddenly faded. "Pepper's, too." An expression of utter self-loathing crossed his face. "And it's my fault."

"Tony, how could it be your fault?" Steve said reasonably. "You couldn't have known. We didn't, Nat and Clint and I, and we worked 10 floors up from where Hydra's helicarriers were parked."

Tony shook his head vigorously, lips curled downward. "I thought I was being careful. I was done making weapons. But when Fury asked… I figured it was safe enough to redesign the engines for the new helicarriers. I didn't know they'd be used to commit mass murder." There was more pain than anger in his eyes, Steve realized.

"It's not your fault," Steve said again. "S.H.I.E.L.D. used to be something good." Peggy's face flashed in his mind: the regret in her eyes when she'd spoken of her creation. She'd suspected something, he realized. She'd sensed something was wrong with S.H.I.E.L.D. And it wasn't her fault or Tony's fault or even Fury's fault.

"S.H.I.E.L.D. got corrupted," he told Tony firmly. "Institutions do. There's no one to blame but Hydra."

Tony did seem a little mollified, but then he shot Steve a slightly accusing look. "Why didn't you call me? As soon as you realized S.H.I.E.L.D. was compromised? I would've helped."

"Why didn't you call me when you were dealing with the Mandarin?" Steve shot back.

"Touche," Tony said after a beat. He took a deep breath. "Okay, time to make a pact. You and me, Cap. From now on, no more going it alone. We seem to attract the same trouble anyway. We're better off watching each other's backs."

"Yeah," Steve agreed.

Just then Sam's phone rang, and when he looked down at the name on his screen, his face fell.

"Who is it?" Steve asked.

"My former commander at the Air Force," Sam said reluctantly. "Probably wants to know how a retired officer managed to get himself televised using a piece of highly classified military equipment that got stolen out of Fort Meade just the other day."

"Tell 'em I made you steal it," Steve offered.

"Oh no you don't," Sam said with a short laugh. "I want credit for volunteering." He accepted the call and strode out into the hallway to take it.

"That was him in the wingsuit?" Tony asked curiously. "I saw the footage. Interesting tech. I'd love to take a look at it."

"He got grounded," Steve said. "The wings must be in the river with everything else."

"But he's still got the designs, right?"

Steve sighed at the canny expression on his face. "Tony-"

"I'm just saying... if he needs it rebuilt..."

"They're gonna arrest him for taking it."

"Well, maybe not. I could have Rhodey put in a good word for him. There were a lot of Air Force officers on Hydra's hit list. Wilson just saved their uniformed backsides. Seems like there's an angle there."

Steve hadn't thought of that - after all, Lt. Col. Rhodes was Tony's friend, not his - but the offer was undeniably tempting. Rhodes was well-respected in the military community and had once been entrusted to personally guard President Ellis' life. His word was bound to mean something.

Tony grinned a little, and seemed to know what Steve's answer was.

"I'll call him," he promised. He shoved one fist into his pocket "So, Wilson... is he an Avenger now, too?"

"He had an outstanding tryout," Steve acknowledged.

"Hey, the more, the merrier," Tony said.

It took a while to extract himself from his excited grandchildren, but eventually Mike left them to resume their play, now supervised by their own parents, and he strode through the knee-deep snow and entered the bunker, dark after the dazzling sunshine outside.

He moved past the British soldiers wearing headsets, deep in concentration as they communicated with the team now inspecting the helicarrier parked just off the coast, and moved deeper into the bowels of the bunker where the barracks were located.

He found Dr. Stacey sitting at one of the tables in the deserted mess hall, her straight dark hair fanning down across her shoulders in contrast to her white lab coat, and she rose to her feet to greet him.

"Agent 45," she said warmly.

"Hawkeye's gone," he told her, closing the door behind him. "Coast is clear."

She smiled in understanding. "Mr. Carter, then."

There weren't many people outside the family who knew all their secrets - most of his twin sister's medical personnel scattered across the globe knew only that the life-saving serum they worked with had been derived from Steve Rogers' blood, and not how that blood had truly been obtained - but Dr. Stacey was a rare exception. A few years back they'd needed someone to infiltrate S.H.I.E.L.D.'s Manhattan facility to ensure that the younger Captain Rogers recovered properly from his long sleep in the ice, and so Dr. Stacey had been fully briefed and then agreed to work undercover in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s medical division in plenty of time to receive him as a patient and revive him. With Captain Rogers' recovery complete, she had since quit her S.H.I.E.L.D. "job" and resumed running her medical clinic in Minnesota, but remained a trusted advisor to the family. With the Hydra Uprising imminent, she had been the obvious choice to station here with the children while most of the family was occupied with more dangerous tasks. Not only for her medical expertise in case the worst happened, but also to provide an emergency exit if needed. Like all of Sarah's magical healers, Dr. Stacey had been recruited from among those who had dropped out of their training at Kamer-Taj for one reason or another, and still possessed her sling ring by conditional permission from the Masters of the Mystic Arts.

After what had happened in Bethesda all those years ago, the family didn't take the safety of their children for granted anymore. With Hydra around, they simply couldn't afford to.

"How did your assignment go?" Mike asked her.

"Boring," Dr. Stacey said frankly. "Turned out my services weren't needed."

"Well, that's the way we like it."

She nodded in wry agreement, but then tilted her head, looking at him, and stepped forward to carefully pull the bandage off his neck. She inspected the wound for a moment, her fingers cool against his skin, and then nodded reassuringly. "Nearly gone," she said, tossing the bandage in the trash. "Can I get you something to eat?" She gestured toward the slow cookers lined up along the counter. "The kids decimated the macaroni and cheese, but I think there's plenty of chili left."

"Maybe later. Where are my parents?" he asked.

Dr. Stacey pointed. "Down that hall, first door to the left. Mrs. Carter was sleeping the last time I checked on them. Your father is sitting up with her."

"Thank you." Mike strode down the hallway and then opened the door, very slowly and quietly, and poked his head through.

His mother was lying asleep in bed. Not in one of the basic bunk beds lined up along the wall for the soldiers stationed here, but a hospital bed that had been brought in for her. A space heater next to her was running at its top setting; the room was noticeably warmer than the mess hall he had just left. Even so, Mom was covered with a thick comforter, and her gray curls were spread across the pillow as her chest moved up and down slowly with every breath; she was soundly asleep.

His father was sitting beside the bed, holding one of Mom's thin hands gently between his own wrinkled ones. He looked up at Mike, and even in the dim light he could see the relief in his father's eyes to see him standing there alive and well.

Slowly, he laid Mom's hand down on the blanket and got stiffly to his feet. Mike opened the door a little wider for him, and Dad slipped out as quietly as he could and waited in the hallway while Mike closed the door carefully.

They waited until they were back in the mess hall to speak; waking up Mom when she was this tired would be unfortunate. Her dementia symptoms were invariably worse the more exhausted she was, as the whole family had learned from experience around the time of her diagnosis.

Dr. Stacey was still in the mess hall, but when she saw the two of them together she excused herself graciously without waiting to be asked, and Mike and his dad sat down at a table and looked at each other.

Dad looked tired, too. Unlike Mom, his mind was still sharp, but Mike could see a change coming over him day by day, slowly but surely. He was more than 100 years old now, and although the super-soldier serum coursing through his veins ensured that he aged more slowly and gracefully than normal, it couldn't stop the inevitable march of time. His shoulders were thinner than they used to be, and they rounded slightly. His gray hair was beginning to be touched by white, and his face was well-lined with wrinkles. He was unquestionably the leader of this operation - no one in the family would dispute that - but Mike couldn't help but wonder how much longer that would continue.

A day might come when that responsibility would fall entirely on Mike and Sarah's shoulders. They knew that Dad was prepared for that eventuality; he had been very careful to make his records of the future as detailed and thorough as possible. Whenever the Prevengers were needed to step in quietly and ensure that world events unfolded as they were meant to, they already had all the information they needed, whether Dad himself was here to help or not.

Even so, Mike hated to even think of the possibility of doing any of this without him one day.

"The great Peggy Carter, sleeping through an operation of this magnitude?" he said lightly, trying to push his worries aside. "Guess there's a first time for everything."

Dad smiled gently, but answered seriously. "She stayed awake long enough to hear your report, and your sister's."

"How is Steven doing?" Mike asked. He still felt sick inside over his nephew's fall. Already he had caught himself looking back at their years of training together, wondering if there was something he had forgotten to teach Steven, if he somehow shared in the blame for what had happened today. He knew that was just his irrational side talking - no one was to blame but the man who pulled the trigger - but it didn't make it any less painful.

"Still unconscious," Dad said quietly. "And Amanda?"

Mike took a moment to answer. "Physically? She's gonna be fine. The blade punctured her lung, but Aliyah got the serum in her pretty quick. She seems really shook up, though. I think she thought she was invincible." He swallowed hard. "And I think she thought Steven was invincible, too."

"He does put off that vibe," Dad admitted.

"Well, he's his grandfather's grandson," Mike said wryly. But he sobered up quickly. "How did Mom take all the news?"

Dad shook his head slowly, his eyes going far away. "About like you'd expect. We told her Steven was shot in the battle, and she managed to remember that I had been shot in the battle, and there I was, standing right in front of her without any bullet wounds..."

Mike blew out a noisy sigh. "Oh, Dad..."

"Yeah. We explained it as clearly as we could, and we reminded her about there being two of me, but I think the time traveling slipped her mind. She got confused. And pretty upset. I kept telling her I was okay now, that it happened a long time ago for me and didn't even leave a scar, but then she got fixated on Steven being in a coma. I think she's having trouble telling the difference between him and the younger me. The two of us sharing a name doesn't help, not to mention the resemblance." He shook his head slowly. "She just... couldn't understand what we were trying to tell her."

"Maybe we should stop making reports to her," Mike said reluctantly.

"It doesn't seem right." But Dad seemed reluctant too. The days when Mom could contribute to Prevenger operations in any meaningful way were more or less over, and the whole family knew it. If all they were doing now was upsetting her, maybe it would be better to simply let her bask in the happiness of her past, where her mind so clearly wanted to linger these days. After all, whether she remembered it or not, her future was secure. Her days were known and numbered. Nothing could change that now.

"Hawkeye headed home?" Dad asked, moving forward with an effort.

"Yeah," Mike said, relieved by the change in topic. "He didn't stay long."

"He was okay?"

"Yep. Not a scratch."

"Good. You know, he never mentioned this whole escapade to me."

"Yeah, and you never mentioned it to him, either," Mike said with a smile. "Look at you both, a couple of militant-minded men infected to the bone with all this hush-hush spy business in your old ages. I blame Natasha Romanoff. She must have rubbed off on both of you."

"I'd like to think Hawkeye and I had some influence on her, too," Dad said calmly.

"A little more than some. He took pictures of all of us, by the way. Hawkeye. On his phone. Sneaky-like, while we were on the helicarrier on the way here. Edwin told us."

Dad frowned. "You didn't have Edwin delete them?"

Mike shrugged. "It's not like he can find much of anything on us; Edwin will see to that. Hacking into his phone would raise his suspicions. Right now he's just curious about us. Can't blame him for that."

Dad's expression grew sadder. "Wish I could have seen him again."

"Well, with any luck you will."

Dad acknowledged it with a gentle smile; Mike knew he shared that same optimism, even though they didn't know for sure whether Dad would make it that long. Their knowledge of the future came to an abrupt halt at the very moment Dad had said his goodbyes to the Avengers and stepped into the Quantum Tunnel for the last time. What would happen after that, they could only guess.

Dad's health might last long enough to get him a reunion with his old friends. It might. Especially if...

Mike was almost afraid to let himself think the thought, but he steeled himself and let it come. It had been many years since he had learned about Thanos and his Decimation, and he knew by now that avoiding the topic wasn't helpful in any way, no matter how painful it might be. They had to prepare for it, because they were the only ones who could.

Dad's health would be more likely to last long enough to get him a reunion with his friends if he ended up being one of the trillions in the universe who were destined to take a five-year "break" from the ravages of time.

Mike was careful not to let the distress show on his face. He couldn't hope for that for Dad. Or for the alternative. When it came to the Decimation, there was nothing for their family to hope for. It was already done. Nothing to change. Nothing to fight. All they could do was make the most of a situation that was too terrible to fully wrap the mind around. As difficult as it had been to throw themselves into Hydra's line of fire just now, it somehow seemed small and insignificant in the face of what was still to come.

"Mikey," Dad said softly, and reached out to put his hand over Mike's. His hand was cool and trembled slightly, but Mike could feel the strength still remaining in his grip. "It'll be fine."

Mike cleared his throat roughly and tried to smile. "You a mind reader now?"

"I think about it too. I have more to lose this time around." Dad's blue eyes were bleak. "But we know when it will end. That it will end."

Mike scratched the back of his neck and sighed. "Yeah. Lucky us."

Sharon's apartment was a bustle of activity.

It hadn't taken long for her Uncle Dave to gather up quite a few of her cousins and their children who weren't otherwise occupied and enlist them to help Sharon pack up her things. What would have been a long, grueling task if done alone was now being completed with lightning-fast efficiency. Already her books and the entire contents of her bathroom and kitchen were boxed up and disappearing down the hall on dollies as fast as they could be stacked up, leaving Sharon free to focus on emptying her closet. If "focus" was the right word for it; it had been a long and exhausting day, and Sharon was practically sleep-walking through the task.

To be honest, she had allowed herself to relax somewhat, despite the fact that if anyone on STRIKE team had survived the battle, they'd be furious enough right now to want her dead. Realistically, they were probably more worried about their own survival at the moment. Every law enforcement agency in the metro area, federal and local, was out looking for them. At this point, they'd be lucky just to escape.

There was a knock on the open door, and her cousin Joe's son, Hank, who was 7 or 8 years old, poked his head into the room. He still held in his hand a handful of paper towels from his assignment to dust the bookshelves.

"Some lady's here to see you," he told her. There was a smudge of dust across his forehead just under his sandy blond hair. "She said her name's, uh... Natasha?"

Romanoff? Curiosity made Sharon suddenly alert, and she told Hank: "It's okay. I know her."

He disappeared down the hall, and a few moments later Romanoff came in, wearing a dirty and scuffed Black Widow uniform, and casually surveyed the boxes scattered around Sharon's bedroom before making eye contact with her.

"Thought you might greet me at the door with guns blazing," Romanoff said wryly. "We're not exactly one big happy agency anymore."

"I heard a rumor it was you who took down Alexander Pierce," Sharon answered. "I think what that makes me is a big fan of your work."

She wasn't sure if she should, but she couldn't stop herself from going on to ask: "How's Captain Rogers?" He must have arrived at the hospital hours ago, not that Romanoff could know that she knew that. But nothing about his fate had been announced on the news yet.

"Steve's fine," Romanoff said, and after a beat Sharon judged that she was probably telling the truth; she had a distinct air of relief about her as she spoke the words.

Sharon nodded, feeling that same relief. "So," she said. "The Black Widow survived the apocalypse." She finished folding a shirt and dropped it into a cardboard box. "Can't say I'm surprised."

"I'm not the Black Widow anymore," Romanoff said frankly. Her words were colored by a strange emotion: half regret, half relief. "I guess I'm not even Agent Romanoff anymore," she continued. "I'm just..." She pressed her lips together, looking down with bleak eyes, before looking back up and finishing softly: "Natasha."

Sharon paused in the act of folding the next shirt, surprised: she'd never seen quite that expression on Romanoff's face before. Exposed. Vulnerable. And not the fake kind either, that calculated, feminine vulnerability she used to manipulate her targets when she was on a mission. With a suddenness born of intuition, Sharon knew: this was the real Natasha Romanoff.

It was the first time Sharon had ever seen her.

"You okay?" Sharon asked before she could stop herself. She had never once thought of Natasha Romanoff as a person who could be hurt, but now that seemed so obviously wrong that she wondered at herself. Her own head was reeling from the destruction of S.H.I.E.L.D., which represented not only the loss of a job but also the most important piece of her identity. How much worse must it be for Romanoff? At least Sharon had a family to support her until she found a new direction for her life. Who did Romanoff have to lean on?

No one. No one but the other Avengers.

"I misjudged you," Romanoff said, ignoring her question. She walked over and sat down on the bare mattress, resting her elbows on her knees. "Before, I was pretty annoyed with you for intruding on Steve's privacy. And then — when everything went south — I kinda figured you, uh..." She sighed deeply. "I kinda figured you were with Hydra."

Sharon was quiet for a moment. "I guess there was a lot of that going around," she admitted. She left her packing and came to sit gingerly on the mattress beside Romanoff. "I wasn't sure what to think about you, either."

It felt a little awkward, this confessional mood that seemed to have seized them both, but also a relief. It was good to have things out in the light for a change.

"I ran into Cameron Klein, trying to mop up that mess out there by the Potomac," Romanoff continued, meeting her eyes again. Her red hair hung down against her cheek like a curtain. "He told me what you did in the operations room. Nothing like a crisis for showing people who you really are. Isn't that right?" She smiled wryly.

"The whole world knows who you are now, too," Sharon said. She'd had a chance to skim some of the S.H.I.E.L.D. documents that had been released to the public, and the full record of what Romanoff had done during her time with the KGB hadn't exactly been easy reading.

Romanoff's shoulders sagged a little, and suddenly she looked older than she really was.

"-you're the kind of person who saves millions of innocent lives even at the cost of destroying her own reputation," Sharon finished deliberately.

Romanoff seemed to straighten up ever so slightly at her words, but her tone was world-weary as she responded: "Not everyone will see it that way."

"Well, take a page out of Steve Rogers' playbook," Sharon advised. "You know, for someone with such a nice-guy persona, I sometimes get the sneaking suspicion that he doesn't give a flying leap what other people think of him."

That got a real smile from Romanoff, one that reached her eyes as well as her lips. "I think you've got him pretty well pegged," she admitted. Then she grew more serious. "Can I ask you a question, Agent 13?" she asked.

"Yeah."

"Why were you of all people given this assignment?" Romanoff asked. Her eyes narrowed slightly, although she didn't look hostile, only curious. "Nick Fury is the most paranoid man on the planet. Yet he put you, alone, in charge of protecting his most valuable asset. How did he know you wouldn't betray him?"

A swirl of emotion filled Sharon, warming her chest and making her head feel light. That was the question, wasn't it? In the end, it really came down to Nick Fury's trust in his predecessor. Aunt Peggy, whose concern for Rogers clearly ran deep even after all these years. She'd just endangered her own grandchildren to fight for Steve Rogers' cause. To help him tear down the very agency she'd spent her life building. And yet her entire family had deliberately hidden themselves from Rogers. They wanted no recognition. No thanks. She didn't understand it, but she had to respect it. If Aunt Peggy wanted to keep her family in the shadows, then that's what had to happen.

"The time for secrets is over, Agent 13," Romanoff said softly.

Sharon took in a deep breath and then let it out. "Not every secret is mine to tell, Romanoff," she admitted. "But I can tell you that my name isn't Agent 13. Not anymore." She looked Romanoff straight in the eye. "It's Sharon."

Romanoff blinked a few times, and then her eyes softened. "Sharon," she repeated with a small smile. "That's a nice name." She brushed her curtain of hair back over her shoulder. "And you should call me Natasha."

They smiled at each other for a long moment, and suddenly the odd awkwardness between them seemed to ease.

"Have you got a safe place to go?" Sharon asked Natasha.

She nodded. "You?"

"Yeah."

Natasha glanced down the hallway, where they could hear cardboard boxes still being shuffled around Sharon's living room. "You're sure all these people helping you move are okay?"

"I'm sure." Sharon took a deep breath and took a risk. "How's Fury, by the way?"

Natasha stared at her. "He's dead."

"Is he? That's not what I heard."

Sharon endured a long moment of quasi-hostile scrutiny, but she didn't look away and finally Natasha dropped the pretense. "Where did you hear that?" she demanded with open surprise.

Sharon smiled mysteriously. "I have my ways. Don't worry. I don't think anyone else knows."

Natasha shrugged. "And I was going to have such a good time breaking it to you," she said with a hint of regret. "Anyway, he wants to see you," she added in a conversational way as she stood up and adjusted her thigh holster more comfortably. "When you're done here. No rush."

"Where do I find him?"

Natasha's face turned unexpectedly mischievous. "Cemetery."

Sharon paused for a moment. "Seriously?"

"Wait until you see the magnificent headstone he bought himself." She smiled slyly. "Just show up there. He'll find you."

"Okay." Sharon's curiosity was piqued; what could Fury have to say to her? He wasn't her boss anymore — in a pretty definitive way — and surely he must have his hands full right now with more important matters than a single former agent.

"Well, I gotta go box up Steve's stuff," Natasha said, but she didn't take a step toward the door, instead blowing out a long, noisy breath. "It's gonna be a job. He owns a ridiculous number of books."

"I've noticed. I think he has a compulsion. Do you have someone to help you?"

"Not a lot of people available at the moment," Natasha said wryly. "Just Klein, actually."

"I have plenty of people helping me. Want me to send some of them across the hall?" Sharon offered.

"No offense, but I don't want anyone touching Steve's things unless I know them."

"You want me to help?"

Natasha only hesitated a moment before nodding gratefully. "That would be great."

TO BE CONTINUED

Author's note: Just two more chapters to go! It's been a long and delightful ride. Thanks for sticking around to the end, and feel free to share your feedback!