The next Avenger she met, surprisingly, was Captain America himself. Steve Rogers, the man who was born in the twenties, yet looked not a day over 25. It was certainly a mystery, and one that her clearance level wasn't going to allow her to solve.

He'd appeared in medical of his own volition, although he seemed hesitant to stay.

"Hello... Miss Higgins?"

"Miranda," she corrected. "You can call me Miranda."

He smiled, and it was the sort of smile that she imagined could end wars and make babies stop crying. The sort that made people fall head over heels, nod at him and agree to anything, because how could you resist a smile that pure and genuine and American?

Well, her for one. Thank goodness she wasn't American, otherwise she might not have had a chance.

"What are you doing here Captain Rogers?"

"Steve, please."

"Steve. What are you doing here?"

He smiled at her again, and just no, that smile was not going to be getting him anywhere. She would make sure of that.

"Well, we were fighting some sort of rock creatures, they're all taken care of now," he assured her, like she was concerned about that. "And the one got in a pretty good hit before Iron Man took it down. I thought it would be better to be safe than sorry..." he trailed off.

"And?" Miranda prompted, because she knew that look. It was the look of someone about to bolt.

"But you seem... busy," he said finally, glancing around medical and wincing. She knew why. There were maybe five people being treated in a facility that could easily hold fifty.

"Captain Rogers," she said disapprovingly, taking him by the arm.

"Steve," he corrected, hiding his wince pretty well. Served him right.

"Steve," she continued, leading him to a bed. "You are going to sit your all American arse down right now and let me look at you."

"Yes ma'am," he agreed. She liked that. Maybe not the ma'am part, but she liked him agreeing with her.

"Now, where did you get hit?" she asked him, looking his suit up and down for some sort of zipper or something. How on earth did he get into that thing?

"Stomach," he told her, gesturing to his entire abdominal area. "They... It had very big fist things."

"Right," she said, giving up on the suit. She spoke louder as she walked away from him to the supply closet. "You're going to have to take that suit off... and put these on instead," she continued, tossing the scrubs she'd taken from the closet at him. She pulled the curtain around the bed closed with one good yank. "You can take that off, right?" she added, hovering outside the curtain.

"Yes ma'am."

She nodded her approval, even though he couldn't see it, and waited for him to summon her back in.

She was greeted with a rattle of the curtain, and there was Captain America, no longer in his star spangled suit of glory, but instead, SHIELD issued blue scrubs. He looked just as fine, a thought that she pushed out of her head as soon as it entered.

"Excellent," she declared, motioning for him to lie down. He obeyed, and she lifted the shirt up to see his stomach. It was bruised deep purple and blue, looking exquisitely painful.

She winced for his sake. "Ouch," she muttered, not wanting to touch it. "When did this happen?"

"Half an hour ago?" Steve offered. "It probably looks worse than it is. The serum speeds everything up, including bruising."

She raised an eyebrow at the mention of serum, but that was most certainly above her clearance level. There obviously had to be something that kept Steve alive and looking so young for nearly seventy years, considering his relative age and birthdate, but she hadn't a clue what it could be. This serum was probably the key.

Miranda sighed. It was the worst not having all the information about a patient's medical history because it was classified under a different government than her own that she didn't have the foggiest clue to how it was run. Although to be fair, she suspected the Americans didn't know much more than she did about how it ran, but it was the principle.

"Doesn't it hurt?" she asked, examining his face in case he wanted to lie about it.

"Yes," he admitted. "But I've had worse, and pain medications don't work well on me, so I can deal with it. It won't be for long."

She nodded. There was no arguing with that. This state of bruising shouldn't be evident yet, not for something that happened half an hour ago, so it made sense that the pain would come and go just as rapidly.

"I'd like to get an ultrasound," she told him. "To see if there's any internal bleeding." She frowned. "Which would probably clear up on its own anyway."

She paused, rubbing a hand over her face.

"I need to yell at Fury, or Coulson or someone," she muttered. "This is ridiculous."

"What's that?" Steve asked.

She gestured to him. "You. I don't have any clue about how you work, baselines for vitals, how you heal, hell, if your organs are even the same as anyone else's..." she sighed. "None of which is your fault."

He sat up a little straighter. "You mean you don't know? Well, I mean nobody really knows, but they know some of that at least. They haven't given you access to those files?"

She shook her head.

Steve frowned, and it was the kind of face that could make people cry and criminals turn themselves in. Again, she thanked her lucky stars that she was (mostly) immune to him. "Well that's stupid. How are you expected to treat people if you don't have their medical histories?"

She couldn't agree more, but she simply shrugged.

"I'll tell you," Steve said solemnly.

She grinned at him. "You're a lovely boy," she told him, patting him on the arm before leaving to grab the ultrasound.

While she rubbed gel over his abdomen and pressed slightly too hard against bruised skin, he explained how he came to be, about the war, about how he was too small, too weak, too sick. He explained about Howard Stark and the machine and the serum. He explained about how he was different after, bigger, stronger, about how he rescued his friend and lost him again. He told her about the plane and the ice, and waking up in the future where nothing was familiar.

She finished the ultrasound somewhere around meeting Peggy, but didn't stop. She'd found a liver laceration that was the cause of most of the internal bleeding, and watched distractedly as it shrank before her eyes. By the time Steve got to the train, it was half the size it had been when she found it, and by the time he got to his awakening, it was nearly gone.

When he finally finished up, the liver laceration was gone, the bruising had faded to ugly yellows and greens, and Steve seemed exhausted. Whether it was from reliving all those experiences, or from healing, she couldn't be sure.

She wiped up the gel and tugged the shirt back down.

"You're doing fine," she told him softly. "But you need to rest. You're staying here tonight so I can keep an eye on you. Don't even bother to argue, because I will win."

He smiled at her, but his eyelids were drooping.

"I'll discharge you in the morning," she said, patting him on the shoulder, and he nodded slightly before closing his eyes.

When she returned in the morning, Steve still hadn't woken up, proof that his body was indeed recovering and needed the rest.

When he did wake up, mid-morning, he thanked her for helping him, and they both knew he didn't mean for the ultrasound.

Her clearance level went up again, and no one told her why.