warning: flashbacks, references to past MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe) events/movies, depression/depressed character, unhealthy coping, grieving, supportive friends, mentions of past and slight current male/male (Steve/Klaus)

enjoy.


The Valkyrie

March 4, 1945

"Steve, is that you? Are you alright?"

Despite the burst of static from the radio, Steve can hear Peggy's voice clearly.

"Peggy, Schmidt's dead!" he tells her.

"What about the plane?" Peggy asks.

"That's a little," Steve glances around the plane, eyeing the hole in the side uneasily, "bit tougher to explain."

"Give me your coordinates; I'll find you a safe landing site," she orders, confusion blurring the crisp undertones of her accent.

"There's not going to be a safe landing." Steve pauses, able to hear Peggy gasp softly. "But, I can try and force it down."

"I'll get Howard on the line; he'll know what to do." There is steely determination in her voice. Steve can imagine her beautiful brown eyes glinting stubbornly.

"There's not enough time. This thing's moving too fast, and it's heading for New York." Steve shifts the controller, pointing the plane down towards the ice. "I gotta put her in the water."

"Please, don't do this," Peggy tells him. Steve swallows roughly as he hears her voice break. "We have time. We can work it out."

"Right now, I'm in the middle of nowhere. If I wait any longer, a lot of people are gonna die." A sea of white, ice, comes into view of the plane. Steve gazes down at it sorrowfully. "Peggy, this is my choice," he tells her. When she doesn't reply, he repeats, "Peggy?"

"I'm here," Peggy says, voice airy in slight disbelief.

"I'm gonna need a raincheck on that dance."

He can hear her sniffle.

"Alright. A week. Next Saturday, at the Stork Club."

He can picture her now, standing alone at the bar, hair in gorgeous waves, stunning in the same red dress she wore at the bar in London, trademark red lips.

"You got it." Steve gives her an unseen nod.

He saw a future with her, can see a future with her. He would take her back to Brooklyn. They would get married in the same little church his parents married in. Nik would be his best man-

His best friend's desperate scream echoes through Steve's ears as Nik falls into the vast, snowy beyond, body growing smaller and smaller until he disappears completely, Steve still clutching to the train, frozen in shock, mind unable to process what just happened.

"Eight o'clock on the dot. Don't you dare be late!" she attempts to chide him playfully, voice betraying her woeful emotions. "Understood?"

"You know, I still don't know how to dance," Steve remarks wistfully.

Nik had attempted to teach him, but he was at no fault that Steve had two left feet.

Oh god.

Steve thinks back to the last time he saw his best friend before his deployment.

At the World Expo. Nik dressed dapperly in his uniform, cap placed at a jaunty angle. His striking blue eyes crinkling as he flirted with both their dates, his sandy curls mussed from their carefully-groomed style when he lifted the cap. His wickedly-endearing, handsome smirk, the deep, lilting tones of his accented voice when he told Steve, Don't do anything stupid before I get back.

And Steve had told him, How can I? You're taking all the stupid with you.

Steve doesn't know how he can live without seeing Nik's face every day, just as he had for the last twenty years.

He didn't get to tell Nik that he loved him, that he loved him as more than a brother, that he had loved him since they were fifteen.

"I'll show you how. Just be there." Now, Peggy makes no attempt to hide the pain in her voice, her quiet sniffles amplified by the radio.

Steve watches as the ice grows closer, a blinding field of white spread out in front of him.

Is this what Nik saw as he fell?

He closes his eyes and accepts his fate.

To Peggy, he speaks again, "You'll have the band play somethin' slow. I'd hate to step on your-"

"Steve? Steve? Steve?"

XX

New York

May 3, 2012

In the aftermath of the Battle of New York, Steve quietly returned to his apartment on the Lower East Side.

He hasn't dared to return to Brooklyn in the few weeks since he woke up from the ice. There isn't anything left there for Steve. Fury told him that both the site of the former tenement where Steve and Nik were born and the apartment that they had rented since 1936 were famous New York landmarks. Most of Steve's belongings ended up under the care of the Smithsonian.

All Steve has remaining of his original belongings was whatever Peggy had managed to secure from the SSR archives when she had founded SHIELD.

All of Nik's belongings from their apartment and from his army quarters had been sent up to his sister Bekah in London in after his death. Bekah herself had passed away in 1996; Steve doesn't know if she had had any children.

Outside his window, the city is beginning to rebuild. It always does.

Steve is tired, aching, and bruised. There is a nasty wound on his abdomen that is beginning to heal, and most of his other injuries have already begun to fade.

It can be after any other battle in 1944 with the Howling Commandos celebrating in a pub, Dum Dum loudly bursting into a drinking song, Monty and Morita making sly digs at each other, Gabe and Dernier holding noisy discussion in French, and Steve and Nik reminiscing about some old memory from Brooklyn.

Except it isn't.

There is a sharp knock on Steve's front door, and he goes to open it.

"Hey, Cap." Agent Forbes smiles at him tiredly, her hair pulled back in the same ponytail from yesterday, albeit with the blood and gore. She is dressed comfortably in jeans and a loose white top with a green cardigan. "Heard you took off after the Battle."

"Agent Forbes," Steve greets her politely, although in confusion. "How are you?"

"God, we fought aliens together. Call me Caroline." At that point, Agent Forbes Caroline holds up a heavy plastic bag of white container and tells him, "I brought takeout. Hope you like Mexican."

"Oh." Steve is unsure how to reply. "Thank you, but I'm actually not hungry."

"When was the last time you ate?" Caroline asks him pointedly.

He really can't remember. "Shawarma after the Battle," he admits truthfully. "But, really, you didn't have to go through the trouble."

Caroline's eyes narrow. "Cut the shit, Captain. I know that your supersoldier body means that you have a supersoldier metabolism. I also know that you haven't eaten in about twelve hours. If you were a normal human, after all that physical exertion, you would have fainted. Now, open the door and find me plates."

Stunned, Steve steps aside, letting her enter and watching as she begins to rummage through his mostly-bare kitchen. He closes the door and wades into his living room, taking a seat at his kitchen counter.

He is not sure what to make of Caroline.

When he first met her aboard the helicarrier, he had almost underestimated her from her lithe, petite frame, blond curls, fair skin, and cerulean eyes. She had seemed stolid and obedient, a good soldier.

Now, Steve realizes that he had only been seeing what Caroline wanted him to. During the Battle, she had fought with deadly grace and near-perfect aim. Her silence and fluidity, both in and out of combat, made her a formidable ally in Steve's eyes.

But, the real Caroline Forbes that Steve had caught brief glimpses in during the Battle and is seeing now seems to be confident and fierce but also, as seen by Steve in her interactions with Barton, loyal, protective, and, caring.

"You okay there?" Caroline asks him as she plates something wrapped in a tortilla.

Steve thinks about offering to help, his ma raised him a certain way after all, but is pretty sure that she will refuse him. "Fine," he tells her slowly. "Just a little tired." Steve flashes her a poster-boy smile, one of his many expressions that he had time to perfect during the USO tours.

"I'm a spy, Steve," she tells him bluntly, "I spent two months undercover as Stark's PA when he thought he was dying. I know deflection and deception like the back of my hand. So tell me honestly, how are you really?"

There's something about Caroline's honest nature, and the fact that Steve is a very shitty liar (always has been), that compels him to blurt out, "Not good."

Awkwardly, he attempts to clarify, "I'm really not good."

Caroline raises an elegant eyebrow expectantly, waiting for him to explain.

Steve sighs. "When I put the plane in the ice, I expected to die. But then I wake up in a world that completely alien to me, and everyone I ever knew is dead or near close to it." He takes a deep breath, realizing that he is about to say what he has never admitted to anyone. "There were some days after I woke where I couldn't get out of the bed. I would just lie there; I had no energy to do anything."

"Depression," Caroline surmises softly.

"Yeah." Steve nods. "No one ever really discussed mental health or considered it to be an actual condition in my time. There was always an asylum and electroshock therapy."

Something about the mention of electroshock therapy has Caroline swallowing roughly, face contorting into a bitter expression. Before Steve can ask her about it, her face smooths out, and she is speaking again. "There are therapists to help with that now. There are also anti-depressants and other meds. You're not alone. There are so many people out there in the world who also suffer from depression. Hell, Stark, Banner, Clint, even me, we all suffer from our own traumas and pasts."

Steve smiles slightly in understanding, though there is still a glimmer of sadness in his blue eyes. "I know," he tells her. "But that doesn't make it any easier."

Instead of responding to that, Caroline silently hands him a plate, not forcing him to elaborate on his previous statement, which Steve really does appreciate.

They eat in relative silence, Steve taking tentative bites of his taco at first. It is an unusual taste for him after the bland food that he cooks for himself, the spiced meat and cheese together with the creamy guacamole and sour cream, but he finds himself liking it.

"Did SHIELD ever set you up with a therapist?" asks Caroline, polishing off the remains of her burrito.

"No," Steve says, staring at his empty plate mournfully. "There wasn't enough time. They were too busy making sure that I didn't accidentally offend anyone and get into a bar fight."

Caroline smirks both at his comment and his expression, handing him another foil-wrapped item. "That's a quesadilla," she tells him. "Eat up; it's delicious. Just meat and cheese."

"I know what a quesadilla is," Steve comments reproachfully. "I'm from Brooklyn. I grew up in a neighborhood with Mexicans, Italians, Greeks, Irish, just name it."

While he wolfs down his quesadilla hungrily, Caroline begins to talk. "I managed to convince Fury to give the Avengers-"

"Hold on." Steve holds up a palm to gesture Caroline to pause. "Are we really calling ourselves the Avengers?"

She shrugs. "It was Stark's idea originally; he did some interview with it, and, now, the media is beginning to throw it around. It's not as bad as some of the other names the media has tried."

"Like what?"

"They tried calling us the Defenders. Like the Defenders of New York City."

Steve snorts good-humoredly. "The Avengers is catchy. Definitely better than the Defenders."

Caroline nods distractedly in agreement. "Right. So Fury has given us all two days then he wants us back, all of us, to debrief. Then, come Monday, Stark, you, and I are heading to DC to meet with the President."

He nods in understanding. "Alright."

"After that, well, Fury will want you to join up with SHIELD, run missions and things like that. But, before all that will come a psych evaluation…" Caroline falters upon seeing Steve's hesitant expression. "They can help you, Steve. Trust me, SHIELD will help you, or at least keep you busy. Even if it is not done out of their personal concern, you are a valuable asset to SHIELD, and they will take care of you because of that."

Steve still doesn't speak; he does not know how to respond. Finally, he tells Caroline, "Thank you."

"For what?" Caroline smirks. "We saved the world less than twenty-four hours ago. You deserve this; we deserve this."

"Yeah, yeah," he replies offhandedly.

Caroline places their dishes in the sink, rinsing them off, and then in the washing machine, setting it for a cycle. "Hey," she says softly as she comes to Steve's side. "Stark's going to come to you about building an apartment in his Tower. Tell him yes. He's going to be going through some tough times in the next few months; he needs this to keep himself distracted. I know that Pepper will ask you the same thing soon."

There's an ugly tug of guilt in his stomach. "I practically accused Tony of not knowing what sacrifice is. I owe it to him," Steve answers bitterly.

"Hey, hey." Caroline rests a hand over Steve's forearm. "You were not the reason he flew through the wormhole; none of us are. He was forced to make a choice, and so he made the one he thought best."

"Thanks." Steve pauses awkwardly before continuing, "Thanks for everything."

"Any time, Rogers," Caroline says as she heads out the door. "I mean, we are going to be fellow Avengers together."

The door closes with a noisy bang behind her, and Steve is left in the apartment, the silence that follows almost unsettling.

Maybe, Caroline's right. Maybe, it will all get better. At least, it's time for Steve to try anyway.

XX

Wyoming

March 9, 2013

"Hey, Cap!" Barton says, "Got another squad heading your way."

"How many?" Steve asks, peering down the ledge, Caroline by his side.

"I count seven," Barton replies.

"I got it. Go radio-silent," Steve orders.

"Copy that."

When the quiet click indicates that Barton has gone offline, Steve turns to Caroline. "Get to their computer system and wipe their hard drive clean. If AIM plans to rebuild, we want to limit their resources as much as possible."

As the sound of footsteps grow closer, they share a glance. Steve counts down. One. Two. Three. He gives Caroline a slight nod.

Immediately, he drops into the formation of men, barely giving an operative a chance to sputter, "Hey! It's Captain Amer-," before Steve knocks him out with a punch to his forehead.

With swiftness, Steve clubs one on the head who drops like a stone, sweeps another off his feet, head-butts another, elbows two more in the gut, and dodges a punch from the final operative. He then picks the man and flings him to the floor, effectively knocking him unconscious. Within moments, all men lay incapacitated on the floor, groaning in pain or clutching bruised limbs, before anyone had a chance to draw a gun.

"Barton," Steve speaks into his comm, "got any more fun heading my way?" When Clint fails to respond, he tries again. "Hawkeye, speak to me."

"Rogers." There's Caroline speaking through now on a separate commlink. "Wiping the computer infrastructure."

"Good," Steve tells her affirmatively. "Any news on Barton? His commlink's down."

"He's probably just preoccupied," Caroline suggests distractedly. "Give him a few minutes."

"When you're done, check him out," Steve orders. At the thunderous roar of footsteps, he freezes, attempting to identify the number of men. He estimates at least twenty. "Widow, I've been made. Got twenty heading towards me."

"Do your thing, Cap," she says. "We'll be there in ten."

Steve lifts his shield from its hook on the back of his uniform and slides his right hand through the straps. Clutching the shield tightly in front of him, he charges into the incoming crowd of men.

He barrels through the formation, knocking men off their feet and sending them flying into the walls of the tunnel.

In the confusion and yelling that ensues, Steve dodges most of the blows aimed towards them or deflects them off his shield, using it to force his way to the end of the tunnel.

When he reaches a corner where pale light, natural light, illuminates the darkness, he looks up and predictably finds a grate set in the ceiling of the tunnel. He can hear the groans of the men recovering from his attack but doesn't spare them a glance.

Instead, he crouches down, brings the shield over his head, and jumps.

He crashes through the grate, the metal flying through the air from the impact until it lands in the snow, crumpled. Steve himself dives to the right and lands on his feet. Immediately, he breaks off into a run.

Dashing past the trees, snow crunching below his boots, he clears the forest in minutes and arrives at the extraction point where Caroline and Clint are waiting.

Clint is leaning on the petite blonde, an arm slung around her waist for support, and he has a bruise on his jaw and the beginning of a black eye.

"What happened?" Steve asks in concern.

"Ran into a few problems getting to the extraction point. Caroline found me," Clint tells him gratefully.

"And the mission?"

"Successful," Caroline drawls lazily, tilting her face up to the darkening sky. "Now, STRIKE's going to go it and clear everything out before setting the explosives up."

Steve nods silently, glancing around the clearing as they wait for their ride.

XX

Triskelion

Washington DC

March 10, 2013

"There's not much to say," Hill declares immediately as they enter the debriefing room. "It was a standard op, in and out, no casualties. Successful." She smirks a little, one of the few expressions of hers that Steve has been gone recognize as pride.

"So we can go?" Clint questions, holding an ice pack to his jaw.

"Yeah," Hill replies.

Clint stretches out his legs before limping out of the debriefing room. Caroline rolls her eyes at him as he leaves.

"Come on," she tells Steve as Hill begins to exit the room. "I know a good Indian place while you're in town."

"Nah," Steve says, pasting a convincing smile on his face. His heart aches, the sorrow and grief that is especially fresh on today's date threatening to overwhelm him. and Steve is glad that he is in Washington DC today. He doesn't know what he would do if he was anywhere near Brooklyn. "I'm good."

Caroline isn't fooled, proven she smiles at disbelievingly at him. "I know your refusal of my gratuitous offer has nothing to do with a sudden dislike of Indian food, because last time you finished a dish of palak paneer all by yourself. And I had ordered it extra-large." She sighs, tiredly running a hand through her disheveled hair. "I know what day it is. I know my history; I'm good with dates. So, tell me, what's wrong?"

He smiles a little now, genuinely, at Caroline's stubbornness. "It's my best friend's birthday, the same best friend that I couldn't save from falling off a train."

Immediately, he can tell by Caroline's frown that he has said something that she takes offense at. "Stop, Steve, stop," she orders. "I know that your SHIELD therapists told you this all time: his death wasn't your fault. There was nothing you could have done."

"I could have paid more attention to our surroundings and stopped the HYDRA agent from sneaking up on him," he counters bull headedly.

"No, Steve," Caroline rebuts him coldly. "Sergeant Mikaelson's death was not your fault. I know you stopped seeing the therapists after they declared you okay for field work, but they were right about you. You have a savior complex. You need to save everyone, and if you can't, then it's your fault."

"Caroli-"

"You have to hear this, Steve. You can't save everyone; their deaths are not on you." She gazes at him with hardened eyes. "I am older than I look, not as old as you but still old. I cannot remember the first twenty years of my life aside my flashes and scraps of distorted memory. Before SHIELD, I was an assassin, a killer. The earliest solid memory I have is shooting a target point-blank between the eyes." While her voice does not grow louder, it is dripping with anger. "I did so many things I am not proud of to survive. I took so many lives, but I had a rule, no collateral damage. There was a reason I gained the reputation I had as the Black Widow. My ledger is dripping red, but I do what I have to do to sleep at night!" Having hissed that last statement, she shuts down, eyes blanking, pale mouth still twisted in an ugly frown. "I'm sorry," she says, brows furrowing slightly. "Today should not be about me; it should be about comforting you. Forget what I said."

"Caroline," he tries to interrupt again, mind turbulent with her admissions.

"No, Steve, let's not talk about it," she says, kinder this time. Craning her neck all of a sudden, she sniffs her SHIELD jumpsuit, recoiling immediately, and laughs. "Shit. That was me all along. I thought you were the one who stunk, with your super-soldier sweat. Shit. I need to take a bath."

He stares at her blankly, mouth tripping as he assesses how to respond. Finally, he eloquently sputters, "What?"

"Right," she says, avoiding his gaze. "Go shower, get changed, and meet me in the lobby in ten minutes. Dress nicely."

"Where are we going?" he asks hesitantly.

"To drink to the honor of your dead best friend," Caroline tells him bluntly before trudging quickly from the debriefing room.

In the silence that follows her absence, Steve's gaze returns to the wall, analyzing the cracks and stains.

He doesn't feel like Captain America right now; he feels small, smaller than Steve Rogers was before Dr. Erskine found him in waiting room across the street from the World Expo.

XX

Triskelion

Washington DC

March 10, 2013

When Steve arrives in the lobby, freshly showered, from the room he's residing in, he's dressed in what he perceives to be nicely in a dark blue button-down and jeans. He avoids glancing down at his shirt and flashing back seventy years to Nik by his side in the trademark blue coat.

Caroline appears moments later in a similar outfit of a white floral button-down and jeans, hair falling loosely in her face as she steps out of the nearest elevator.

"You cleaned up nicely," she comments, though it sounds listless to Steve's weary ears.

"Not as prettily as you do," he remarks in return.

"Don't tell lies, Steve." She laughs. "It doesn't suit your age."

She appears to have forgotten the incident in the debriefing room, but Steve knows better, knows that she's a master of deception.

"Thanks," he says dryly. "Where to?"

"I know a place," she tells him as they stride out of the Triskelion.

A five-minute taxi ride later, and Steve and Caroline are seated in small but quaint Indian restaurant, digging into biryani.

"So, tell me about him," Caroline says as she takes a bite. "Who was the mysterious Sergeant Mikaelson of the Howling Commandos, American war hero?" she asks in a playful tone.

"Technically," he corrects her, grinning at her antics, "he was Sergeant Mikaelson of the 107th Infantry Regiment. But before that, he was Niklaus Ansel Mikaelson from Brooklyn, my best friend." Ignoring the slight twinge in his heart, Steve allows himself to recall the familiar crooked smirk. "Everyone called him Nik."

Too busy reminiscing, Steve misses Caroline's slight wince at the nickname, her eyes growing troubled for a moment. Then she beams mischievously at him. "You look like you're in love," she remarks freely, carelessly. When Steve fails to respond, her eyes soften. "You loved him, didn't you?"

He breathes deeply before speaking. "It was a long time ago, and I never told him, but, yes, I loved him."

She senses his reluctance to elaborate, wisely changing the subject. "So, Nik Mikaelson. The ladies must have loved him."

"Yeah, dames always flocked to him," he says, slipping into his old Brooklyn accent and slang naturally. "Something magnetizing about that ridiculous accent and the stupid face and those eyes."

"Yeah, I heard he was quite a looker." Caroline forks a piece of chicken and swallows it.

"He was very much a pretty boy," Steve admits, "but it was more of his eyes. They were gorgeous. Large and wide. But the color I always couldn't do justice to. They were this deep, deep dark blue, striking and flecked with grey. He'd glance at you with those eyes, and you would feel compelled to do anything for him. They were the reason I got stuck riding the Cyclone at Coney Island."

So Steve talks and talks, weight lifting from his chest with each word he spills about Nik, each complaint, each regret. The mostly one-sided conversation carries on late at night, all the way to Steve's hotel room until Caroline is forced to leave to prepare for another mission.

In the end, Steve can feel that aching beginning to heal, just a little bit.


drop a line below if you enjoyed this chapter. if you have any questions, comments or suggestions, you can also PM me or find me on tumblr princess-of-the-worlds where i cry over klaroline, stucky, and all things in between.