Chapter Seven

Harry grinned as Steve brought out two plates of steamed salmon and roasted vegetables. For the first time, Steve had insisted that he could cook the meal all by himself. Harry had lazed around in the lounge, listening to the sound of dishes clanging and the occasional swear word. The resulting food looked delicious; he couldn't wait to taste it.

"This looks amazing," he praised. "And to think, two months ago you couldn't even use a microwave."

For some reason, Steve blushed bright red.

"Ah, well, you've really been a great help to me. I wanted to say thank you. Honestly, Harry, thank you so much. I don't know how I would have managed these last few months without you."

Harry hid his confusion and offered Steve a smile. Neither of them were the type to gush or rehash conversations they'd already covered.

"Not a problem, as I've said before. You've helped keep me sane in a new city, too."

"I just… I just wanted to say it again," Steve said. He was frowning, eyeing their dinner as if it had displeased him.

"Okay," Harry said, flashing Steve a smile and picking up his fork. "As always, you're welcome. I'm glad to be of help."

"Sir, I would really like to register my objection to this operation. If, and that's a big 'if'... if this works, you'll have alienated the one person Rogers has chosen to get close to. This is a mistake."

Nick narrowed his eyes at Phil, fed up with the man's pestering.

"Objection noted. Now, get out of my way."

Clint sighted down the shaft of his arrow. Embedded in the tail was a quick-acting nerve gas designed to incapacitate even the hardiest of opponents, if, for some insane reason, he missed his target.

"Let's see how you like it," he muttered. He relaxed the tension in the string of the bow but kept himself ready to draw, waiting for Fury's confirmation.

Harry cut himself a slice of salmon, dipped it into the garlic butter sauce, and paused with it halfway to his mouth. On his casting hand, the ring he used to detect poisons and other toxins was beginning to heat up. He looked over at Steve, who was staring down at his meal in what Harry now recognised as guilty shame. He looked up when the weight of Harry's gaze settled upon him.

"Er, alright?" Steve said as Harry sighed. He could very well put two and two together to get four.

"You know, Steve, blindly following orders isn't always the solution."

"Now!" Nick barked.

Harry dropped the fork. It clattered onto the plate. His ward scheme had suddenly flared with danger.

"Harry?"

The window shattered. Harry rolled from his seat and onto the floor, ducking the arrow that shot over his head. He cast three spells instantaneously: a Bubble-Head Charm, a Featherlight Charm, and an Imperturbable Charm. The arrow began to hiss, emitting a pale green gas.

A brief skim of Legilimency was all Harry needed to discover that Steve had been complicit in SHIELD's plan to bring him in.

Damn. And he'd thought that they were friends.

"I told you this was a mistake," Phil said, as he watched the cameras they'd installed in the Captain's house. Harry, or the man he was disguised as, was looking at Rogers with disappointment and anger.

"Shut your mouth," Fury hissed. He was rubbing the bridge of his nose. Phil rolled his eyes.

On the screen, Harry was scanning the room. His gaze zeroed in upon the nearest camera.

"You clowns just don't give up, do you? Tell Phil I said hi," Harry said. Phil snorted, glad he'd not been on scene or informed of Fury's plan until the very last minute. At least he could honestly claim he'd not been involved when Harry next appeared to him. "The rest of you can shove it."

He flipped them the bird and teleported away.

On screen, Rogers staggered, then collapsed. The gas they'd released had been extremely potent: Harry hadn't seem affected by it at all.

Shit. Nick had really buggered this one up.

Nick watched as Potter teleported out of Rogers's apartment, having somehow detected the drug they'd convinced Rogers to put in the food, dodged Hawkeye's arrow, and been unaffected by the nerve gas it had released.

Fuck.

He'd really buggered this one up.

Harry arrived in his safe house and groaned at the spike of a headache induced by transcontinental Apparition.

Bugger it all. He should have Obliviated Clint Barton. He shouldn't have trusted Steve when he'd discovered that the man worked for the organisation he'd been trying to avoid.

But above all, he shouldn't have teased SHIELD by joining Phil at Maria's Coffee House. Really, it was his own fault that they'd figured out who he was. He'd been asking for it with his not-so-subtle taunts.

At least SHIELD wouldn't think to look for him here, in the Forest of Dean, Western England. Not until they'd exhausted all their resources in the States. Still, he'd have to be careful to stay off CCTV or create yet another identity.

Bloody interfering American intelligence agencies.

While Tony waited for JARVIS to put the finishing touches on Mark VI, he pulled up the footage of SHIELD's latest faux pas with Potter. The man—wizard?— appeared extremely disgruntled when he realised SHIELD had come up with yet another scheme to bring him under their thumbs.

Skimming through mission reports proved a wealth of knowledge. It seemed that Captain America, a name that had been popping up with increasing frequency on Tony's radar, was alive, well, and none the worse for having taken a seventy-year-long nap. SHIELD had also coerced him into attempting to capture Potter.

Morons.

"I wouldn't believe it if I wasn't seeing it with my own two eyes," Tony mused aloud.

"Seeing is believing, sir."

Tony arched an eyebrow at JARVIS's closest camera and swiped through holographic projections until he accessed his keyboard.

"Let's see if we can't find out a bit more about Captain Spangledpants. J, can you mock up a worm for me? I'm going to see how far into their systems I can get without needing to be on site. Now we know that the ol' Capsicle is alive and well, running operations for the big, bad man in the sky, we might actually be able to get somewhere."

"Your wish is my command," JARVIS replied drolly.

"Hit me up with a classic, J. AC/DC?"

Moments later Tony's workshop began to pulse with the opening strums to Led Zeppelin's Immigrant Song.

"I thought I said AC/DC?" he hollered above the noise.

A notification appeared on his screen.

I THOUGHT YOU WANTED A CLASSIC?

Tony snorted, swiping his hand through JARVIS's message.

"Too clever for your own good. Do you want me to donate you to Google?"

I LIVE IN FEAR OF THE DAY.

"Sassy," Tony muttered and got to work.

Steve stood to attention while an argument raged around him. He'd long since mastered the art of appearing interested in the bureaucracy and politics of the military while in reality being bored out of his damn mind.

"If Harry ever appears before me again, I'm not going to call him in," Coulson said, a mild-mannered man who was all the more intimidating for his quiet, gentle tone.

"This man poses a threat to national security."

"There's no guarantee of that. He has the potential to become a Level Seven Threat, but right now, he isn't one. Respectfully, sir, the only way we'll persuade Harry to work with us is if we stop trying to bring him in and instead try to work with him."

Harry Potter had been Steve's first non-SHIELD sanctioned friend in this century.

Steve had fucked that up.

He'd allowed Fury to strong-arm him into helping bring Harry in. The man had been persuasive, reminding Steve that he didn't understand the dynamics of the twenty-first century and that Fury knew best.

Steve was beginning to realise the world hadn't really changed all that much. Harry had been nothing but kind, welcoming, and helpful when Steve had made his acquaintance and Steve had helped screw him over. He wasn't going to make that mistake again.

"You're both dismissed," Fury growled. Steve realised his argument with Coulson had come to an end. He turned on his heel and marched out the door.

"Captain Rogers, a word?"

Coulson was keeping pace with him, as imperturbable as ever. Steve sighed and ducked into a side room.

"What can I do for you, Agent Coulson?"

Coulson held up a hand and began fiddling with a device. A few seconds later, his shoulders relaxed and he tucked the device into his pocket.

"If anyone watches this footage, they're going to think that I'm asking you to sign my Captain America trading cards," Coulson said. "They're in mint condition, you know."

Steve blinked, trying to comprehend a world in which there were card games dedicated to him. He hated how he'd been put on a pedestal after the Second World War.

"What they will not see," Coulson continued, "is me giving you this phone."

"I already have a cell phone," Steve said, accepting the tech with a frown. It was chunkier than the sleek touchscreen he'd been issued.

"Not this one," Coulson said. "All calls in and out are untraceable. Unless you go waving it around in Fury's face, no one's going to notice that you've got it. My number's already programmed in. We should get lunch off-site one day and discuss our mutual acquaintance."

Steve eyed the phone with the growing realisation that Coulson had given him a very welcome method of contacting Harry and keeping SHIELD none the wiser, not that there was any guarantee he'd ever see Harry again.

"Thank you," he said. Perhaps he'd even take Coulson up on his offer of lunch.

From his pocket, Coulson withdrew a pack of cards and a black marker.

"I'm a big fan," he said. "We ought to solidify that alibi."

"Yes, sir," Steve said, taking the cards.

"Oh, um, you don't have to call me that. Phil will do."

Steve bit back a smirk as the unflappable Coulson's ears turned red. He scrawled his signature on the trading cards and handed them over.

"Call me anytime," Coulson said. "Must be hard, adjusting to the modern world."

"Not as hard as everyone seems to think it is," Steve answered. He eyed the man before him. He'd not been involved in Fury's operation to bring Harry down and had since objected every step of the way. Perhaps he really was an ally. "Thanks, Phil."

For the moment, however, Steve would reserve his judgement. He'd discovered that in the modern world, things were rarely as they seemed.

A/N: Thank you to my wonderful reviewers for the previous chapter: Astarein1999, Amnesia777, Vladmir Mithrander, Wasabi Sauce, marsolino, Fyreheart, maile1, kirsty21, AnimeFreak71777, retired10, hannahsoapy, Sylphrena33, Sugar0o, dead feather, kawilger, and DraaIzilUss.

Sugar0o - Harry's on Team Harry... anything more would give too much away ;)

dead feather - you raise an excellent question, to which my answer is... magic!

This was a bit of an experiment, as the POV jumped around like crazy at the start. Let me know what you think!

Well done to those of you who noticed my not so subtle clues about the cannoli pastries. Did the resulting plan/disaster to bring Harry in go as you hoped?

Just to clarify something - Harry disguised himself with hazel eyes and tawny brown hair after Tony Stark spotted him in that bar and Harry had to abandon his VW van. The person that Steve knows as Harry Weasley looks different to Harry Potter. Now that Harry's in the UK, he's going to have to change his appearance again.