The four women arrived together on the quantum tunnel platform, and Wanda was surprised to see Clint was still there with the quinjet. He looked up casually at their return, not seeming to have much faith in their success, but he was proven wrong by the sight of his dead partner.
"Natasha!" Clint screeched as he bolted up the side of the platform to envelop Nat in a loving hug. "Natasha, I can't believe they did it. I can't believe you're back... I'm so fucking mad at you for beating me. You know that?"
"I love you too, Clint" Natasha admitted quietly, holding onto Barton with all her strength. After a few moments, he finally released his grip on her and turned to the others. "Any luck getting the Soul Stone out?- Kayla-"
He saw her on the ground, shaking violently, thin as a rail. Carol hoisted the woman to her feet and held her up easily. "We've got to get her to a doctor. Call Banner, now!"
"No, I need to see Steve." Kayla choked out, but the words put a strain on her already weak throat, and she began to cough as she stumbled.
"Doctor, now!" Carol repeated and Clint got in the quinjet, calling Bruce as he got situated into the pilot's seat. Wanda came on the other side of Kayla and helped carry her in and they gently deposited her in a seat as she continued to shake, staring ahead like she'd seen a ghost.
As Clint took them into the air, he pulled up Bruce on the quinjet's live stream, "Banner, we need you, what's your twenty? We're picking you up."
"What's happened?" Professor Hulk asked as he sat down the chopsticks he'd been eating his dinner with. "I'm at my lab... what's happened?"
"Kayla's been compromised. She's been depleted of the serum and she's dying. We need you, Bruce." Natasha cut in, and at the sight of the redhead, Banner's mouth opened in awe.
"Natasha? You're- you're alive? I tried so hard-"
"There's no time for that now, we need you or she's going to die. She already thinks she's lost the baby..." Natasha spat back, and Bruce could see she wasn't being nasty, she was terrified.
"I'll bring my bag, meet me on the roof in ten minutes."
"We'll be there," Clint answered as he switched off the screen. "How's she doing back there?"
"She's not bleeding?" Wanda said questioningly, unsure of how to describe the zombie-like trance Kayla had fallen into. "Kay... Kay! Snap out of it!" Wanda snapped her fingers in front of Kayla and the woman grabbed her slender hand quickly, looking up at her with sunken, tear-stained eyes.
Clint landed the quinjet on the roof of Bruce's lab and Banner sprinted into the jet, dropping his bag as he knelt beside Kayla. "What happened?"
"I got the serum sucked out of me. It's like getting hit by a bus." Kayla groaned and Bruce pulled out a syringe and filled it with her blood before pulling out his stethoscope and doing tests. "Bruce... Bruce the baby..."
"One thing at a time Kayla, I'll get to it."
"Her. It's a girl. That's what Schmidt said. Johann Schmidt. The Red Skull. The man who tried to fucking kill my husband in 1945!" Kayla snarled toward Clint and the archer didn't even look over his shoulder.
"He didn't give us a history lesson while we were there. We never even got a name. How's she lookin Doc? We should be back at her house in about twenty minutes." Clint called over his shoulder.
Bruce pressed the stethoscope to her stomach, listening closely before he pulled it away slowly, "The heartbeat is faint. She's still with us now, but, I don't know if she'll make it. We need to get you to an actual hospital with specialists. Take us to the hospital instead of the house. We don't have time."
"What about Steve?" Kayla coughed as Clint started taking the jet down in front of the closest hospital he could find.
"I'll go get him, Banner and Nat can take you to get checked out. Go!"
Banner scooped up Kayla and carried her through the hospital doors, yelling that he needed a doctor fast.
Steve hit the ground running as fast as he could with Tiffany and Sandra chasing after him into the hospital. Once inside, he looked around with wild, terrified eyes until he saw the receptionist's desk. The woman behind the computer looked up at him without haste, asking who he was here to see.
"My wife. Kayla Rogers. She was brought in by Bruce Banner. I doubt you missed them." He retorted quickly, grinding his teeth as the young woman with pink streaks in her blonde hair tested his patience.
"I need to see an ID please." She asked with absolutely no recognition of the man before her.
"He's Captain Steven Rogers. Captain America? We need to see his wife!" Tiffany screeched, but the girl behind the counter just shrugged and rolled her eyes.
"No ID, no admittance."
"Hi, I'm Sandra Ellis, former First Lady of the United States, is this enough identification for you to let my son-in-law see my daughter?" Sandra slapped her driver's license on the counter harshly, causing the girl to jump and look quickly from the card to the woman who'd handed it to her. She handed the ID back to Mrs. Ellis and gave them all badges.
"She's in Intensive Care. Top floor, they'll get you a room number up there." The girl mumbled, but Steve was already sprinting toward the elevator, pushing the button frantically until it broke.
Mathew Ellis walked up beside Steve and placed a solid grip on the soldier's shoulder, "She's gonna be okay Steve. My daughter is the strongest woman I know. She's alive, that's what matters. You have a healthy son at home with your best friend. Everything is going to be fine."
Steve forced a smile at his father-in-law and the elevator dinged and he held the door open and allowed Matt to lead the way. The Former President pushed the button for the top floor, afraid Cap would break it and they'd never get to Kayla. Sandra, Wanda, and Tiffany scuttled into the elevator as the door began to close.
Steve tapped his leather shoe against the floor of the elevator as the five stood in silence. Mathew tossed his arm around his wife's shoulder and Sandra stared up at the ceiling, silently praying that their daughter would be alright. Tiffany had both arms wrapped around Wanda's torso, leaning into the taller woman as she fought back tears. Wanda didn't bring any attention to the comfort she brought the little brunette, wiggling her free hand to pour a feeling of calm over Tiffany.
The moment the doors opened, Steve bolted out into the corridor, spinning around frantically for someone he knew. He caught a glimpse of green by the nurse's station down the hall. "Bruce! Bruce- where is she?" As Steve skid to a stop next to Banner, he looked around again until he saw a familiar redhead seated next to a hospital bed behind a closed door.
"Cap... Steve, there's something you need to know..." Bruce tried to get the soldier's attention, but he was drawn to the closed door. He was focused on one thing, and one thing only. He flung open the hospital door and almost fell to his knees when he saw her.
Kayla was hooked up to tubes and IVs. Her long hair was stuck to her sweaty, thin neck as she rested with her eyes closed. She wasn't even aware that he was there.
"Kay?" Steve whimpered as he approached, and two nurses tried to usher him out after breaking into the hospital room.
"She's sedated. We were afraid she'd have a heart attack at the rate she was going. Her body is struggling." Natasha explained quietly. She still wore her Black Widow uniform, and there was still dried blood on the back of her neck. When Steve finally met her eyes, he found hers welling up, "It's... been a minute." Steve passed the nurses trying to get the man's attention and pulled Natasha into his arms, holding her roughly against his chest as he cried into her neck.
"It worked. You're back. She saved you." Steve cried against the Black Widow, not loosening his grip on his partner and friend. "I'm so happy you are here."
"She shouldn't have come to save me. There's something you need to know, about Vormir. About the Stonekeeper-" Natasha was cut off by a doctor in a long white lab coat floating into the hospital room.
"Sir, she can only have one visitor at a time, I'm going to need to ask you to leave." The doctor told Steve firmly, and he let go of Natasha to stare daggers at the doctor. He was about to threaten the dark-haired man when Natasha interrupted him.
"I'll go. He's her husband. I... haven't gotten a chance to tell him how she's doing." Natasha stammered, backing out of the room to join Wanda, Tiffany, and Kayla's parents.
"Mr. Rogers I presume?" The doctor changed his tone as Natasha clicked the door closed behind her. "Your wife's in pretty rough shape, Mr. Rogers."
"Captain." Steve corrected, his eyes locked onto his sleeping wife's face, "Captain Rogers. What can you tell me about her and the baby?"
The doctor took a deep breath but kept his face neutral as he watched Kayla alongside Steve, "Her body is shutting down. We are doing the best we can, but she's very weak. I don't understand how this happened. Doctor Banner deals with things... beyond our expertise. The redhead's been tight-lipped. I'm not optimistic about her chances Captain."
"And the baby?" Steve choked out, a tear falling down his cheek as his heart plummeted.
"The baby's too small. If she doesn't make it, neither will they." The doctor said evenly, knowing the information wasn't what the burly man wanted to hear.
Steve nodded, swallowing back his tears, "I understand. Will she wake up? Can I talk to her?"
"We'll wake her up soon. Now that you're here she should calm down. She's been crying for you since they brought her here." The doctor said, writing something on Kayla's chart as he left. "Let us know if you have any questions, Captain Rogers."
"Thank you, sir," Steve mumbled, taking Natasha's seat next to Kayla. He grabbed her hand and rubbed the skin on her knuckles near the IV. With his other hand, Steve rubbed his face roughly before smoothing back his messy hair. "Hey, Kay. I don't know if you can hear me, but, I hope you can. This is what we always worried about with the serum. You always said that they would want to run tests on you and that you'd be a lab rat and here we are." Steve squeezed her hand a little tighter and felt her bones crack beneath his touch. He pulled away, realizing he'd hurt his wife and put his face in his hands as he sobbed. "I'm so sorry Kay. I'm so sorry I let this happen to you. I promised I'd protect you and take care of you and all I did was fight and fight and now you're here and I don't know if you'll ever get home. I'm so scared Kay. I'm so scared."
"I did this." Kayla croaked, and Steve's face rose so quickly it made his head spin. Kayla coughed a little and pulled her head to the side to get a better look at Steve through her bloodshot eyes. "I never should have taken the Soul Stone. But I don't regret saving Nat. I just didn't think... I didn't think Steve."
"Shh, honey, it's okay, it's okay." He cooed to the sick woman as he leaned forward to smooth away some loose hair. "You're gonna get better, baby. You'll get better and then we'll live a normal life. No more fighting. No more Avengers. Just you and me and the kids like I promised."
Kayla began to cry as her eyes looked up at the ceiling and her monitors began going crazy, "Steve- he's going to kill us all. He- he took the Soul Stone, and he drained my super-soldier serum, and- and he's going to come for us, for me, for James, and then you- he's going to kill you, Steve-"
The doctor came in as Kayla began to cry, and Steve held onto her hand, even though he could feel her bones cracking even more as she wept, "Who is, Kay? What are you talking about?"
"Sir, we're going to need you to leave." The doctor ordered, but Steve planted his feet into the tile, unwilling to leave his wife's side and follow orders. His blue eyes bore into Kayla as she winced in pain, trying to elicit an answer from her.
"Kayla, who are you talking about?"
"The Stonekeeper. He was Johann Schmidt. And now he has my serum. And an Infinity Stone."
Author's Notes:
FernieRee: I know... I know... even I feel bad for the baby.
amberhardy: Steve and Schmidt will meet again, but not for quite a while. I agree- it's not as simple as Steve just returning the stone and forgiving Schmidt for everything that happened in the forties. I'm really excited for everyone to read what's coming for Steve because I wanted to push him to his breaking point and act like a normal human who is hurting and frustrated and I'm really happy with how it all turned out!