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| My Shoes Keep Walking Back To You; 05/24-afternoon-(Steve, Sharon, James) | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Sep 10 2014, 08:01 PM (567 Views) | |
| Steve Rogers | Apr 20 2015, 07:48 PM Post #61 |
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The Man Behind the Shield
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Peg had been unforgettable. Unquestionably. Perhaps it was because of that that Steve was finding it hard to get his mind to accept the idea that she could possibly have passed, to where forgetting could possibly apply. She’d been indomitable, unchangeable in any of the parts that had made her who she was, however many years she’d accumulated. Now she was gone though. Really gone. But he couldn’t feel the loss. Like a wound that wouldn’t start to hurt until the numbing agent wore off, at this moment it was something he knew intellectually, but couldn’t quite feel. It would come, though. For now, Steve did what he could, and what he knew, and drew Sharon back into his arms, murmuring her name. He could guess - though in fact he didn’t need to guess - what it had done to her, to lose her aunt in the middle of this. What it was doing to her now to have to drag that hurt back up to the surface, and pass it on to him. She pulled in tight against him, arms folding tightly around his chest, head in against his shoulder with a familiar warmth. As if it had eased the pressure on some kind of tourniquet around his emotions, soft sorrow leaked in around the edges of the comfort that came then. Steve let it came, not trying to fight it. “Steve,” Sharon murmured back at him, pulling in still closer. “Aunt Peggy never forgot you," she told him, voice low. He shifted his head, tilting his jaw so that he could lay his cheek on top of her head where she’d tucked herself against him. Saying nothing, because he knew Sharon would know he was listening without him having to say as much. “Even close to the end, she remembered those days with you in France, during the war,” she continued, leaving what had to be the other side of that coin - the parts of her life that Peg hadn’t remembered by then - unspoken. “I think she'd want you to know that.” He was silent a moment longer, holding Sharon tightly, eyes open to the wall but seeing into the past that still felt as near to him as yesterday. Nearer, in fact, when yesterday had been another day in the room with white walls, best sooner forgotten. France though, and Peggy, with her hair flowing back over her shoulders from under the beret she’d insisted on wearing, and her lips twisted into that determined line, only to quirk back into a flash of smile in the brief moments between when she first caught him watching her and when she’d begin to tell him to get on with being useful. “She blew me away,” Steve said out loud, breaking his own silence finally, still resting his cheek against Sharon’s hair and looking into the distance. “I didn’t know there were women like Peggy in the world.” He thought about that a moment longer, and about the girl he’d loved, and the woman who’d lived her life while he’d been frozen in the ice, who’d still found a way to be his friend - and all too often, his call to sense and reason - when he’d reappeared in it so much later, then added quietly, “I still don’t think there are very many.” If any at all. Peggy Carter was one of a kind. Unforgettable “I promised her I wouldn’t die on her again,” Steve heard his own voice saying after that, surprising him just when he thought he’d fallen back into silence. The words were spoken though, and they were his, and as he remembered making that promise, he tightened his arms around Peggy’s niece once again. “I hope wherever she is now, she knows that I didn’t.” |
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| Sharon Carter | Apr 21 2015, 01:40 PM Post #62 |
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He Who Hesitates Is Toast
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The clearest, most present memories from her childhood were growing up on Aunt Peggy's stories from the war. Hours spent listening to that remarkable woman describing it in a way that had made it seem like a grand adventure. Making the little girl that Sharon had been feel like she'd been there, too. Next to her great aunt, fighting those fights. Winning those battles. Not until she was a lot older had Sharon realized how much Peggy Carter had censored from her time fighting with the French Resistance in World War II to the little girl who'd hung on her every word. Things you couldn't, and shouldn't, tell a child no matter how eager she might be to hear it all. The darker details, the reality of what war was really like. Death and blood. Fear and sacrifice. It hadn't mattered. Sharon had been hooked from the beginning and that never changed. Even when she was old enough to understand the darker, unspoken side of those stories Peggy had told her and those old newsreels they'd watched over and over again until Sharon could practically recite them word for word. It had set the course of her own life and she'd never regretted the choice she'd made to follow in Peggy's footsteps. And it had brought her here, now, with the man she'd seen first in Aunt Peggy's newsreels long before a young, fresh from the Academy SHIELD agent had stumbled into him in person. The man that Peggy Carter had loved for that brief time while the world was burning around them. He might be the most infuriating man she'd ever met, and the most stubborn, and she might tell him that every chance she got, but he was also the kindest and the most honorable and she'd never had to wonder why Peggy Carter had loved him. Or why she'd never forgotten him and those days in France, even when almost everything else had faded away from her memory. Aunt Peggy, Sharon thought, would want him to know that. Steve was quiet, processing his own thoughts and feelings, as she kept her arms around him, kept him close. Let him keep her close in a way that she wished could've always been this easy. It was a lot - Sam, Peggy, all that they'd gone over and all that was still left. “She blew me away,” Steve said out loud, breaking his own silence finally, still resting his cheek against Sharon’s hair and Sharon's lips quirked up at the corners. “I didn’t know there were women like Peggy in the world.”, he continued as her hand stroked slowly over his back. Aunt Peggy had that effect on people, all of her life. A determined presence and practically a force of nature and she didn't give a damn what anybody else thought when it came to following her own way. “I still don’t think there are very many.” Her arms tightened gently, briefly, around that broad chest. "No. Aunt Peggy was an original." For that time or any time. If she managed to be half of who and what Aunt Peggy had been, and managed it with a fraction of the grace, Sharon would be satisfied. "She followed her own conscience and her own way and she did what she wanted to do with her life on her own terms." And she'd loved every minute of it. There wasn't a better way Sharon could think of to live out the years any of them had. “I promised her I wouldn’t die on her again,” Steve said then, hold on her tightening. The words brought a soft knot of mingled fondness and sorrow to her chest. It was just like Aunt Peggy to make him promise something like that. Or to order him to. “I hope wherever she is now, she knows that I didn’t.” "If I knew Aunt Peggy at all," Sharon began, lifting her head a little, faint smile on her face, "I don't think she'd have it any other way but to know." When it came to Steve, Peggy wouldn't take no for an answer. She never had. Another few moments of silence while Sharon let that knot fade a little. Let Steve absorb as much as he could, before she pulled back ever so slightly. Enough to have a good view of his face. "Are you okay?" she asked in quiet concern, "We don't have to do this all at once, Steve. I know it's a lot." And she'd never expected him to be invincible. Unbreakable. To be the man that could shoulder anything, no matter how heavy or how painful, without breaking. She knew better. She'd always known better and she didn't expect him to be that now. |
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| Steve Rogers | Apr 25 2015, 09:30 AM Post #63 |
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The Man Behind the Shield
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It wasn’t hard to remember Peggy, as she’d been when he’d first known her. She was a dynamic, vibrant force that had practically branded herself onto his consciousness right from the very first moment he’d met her. Forget Captain America - Steve Rogers had still felt like the twenty year old kid who didn’t have the first clue about how to talk to girls. Especially girls like Peggy Carter. He hadn’t known there were girls like Peggy Carter. Seventy years on, he still didn’t think there were many. Peggy’s niece - who might have shared some of her aunt’s looks, and a few of her quirks, but who was one of a kind all in her own right - tightened her arms around him. “No. Aunt Peggy was an original.” Steve found a smile - a quiet one, tinged with sadness, but a smile nonetheless - tugging at one corner of his mouth, and nodded. Original. Yes, that was Peg. ”She followed her own conscience and her own way and she did what she wanted to do with her life on her own terms.” “She really did,” he agreed, letting his fingers stroke Sharon’s shoulder absently, thinking of the girl he’d known in France. She was someone who would have stood out even in the new, different country that he’d found himself in after the ice. In the America that he and Peggy grew up in, it was even more incredible to think of everything she’d been and done. And he… he’d promised her he wouldn’t die on her again. The words came out before he knew they were there to say, and in saying them, he had to hold Sharon tighter. She’d made him make that promise after Sharon.. after they’d both thought that Sharon was gone forever. He’d made it solemnly, intending to do everything he could to keep it. He had kept it - but Peggy couldn’t have known that, could she? He hoped that wherever she was now, she knew that he had followed that promise. “If I knew Aunt Peggy at all," Sharon began, lifting her head a little, faint smile on her face, "I don't think she'd have it any other way but to know.” A faint smile of his own somehow finding its way back into place, Steve nodded. “No. She wouldn’t have, would she?” She’d have made it her business to know, and when Peggy Carter did that, Peggy Carter always found out exactly the information she was looking for. Another silence fell then, but it wasn’t an unwelcome one. Something more like a quiet space to let himself think, and to let what he knew so far trickle into something that felt real, however painful that reality might be. It lasted until Sharon eased herself back, tilting her face up to his with a look that he thought he recognized as gentle scrutiny. “Are you okay?" she asked in quiet concern, "We don't have to do this all at once, Steve. I know it's a lot.” Steve met her eyes quietly, seeing the love and concern that were threaded through their familiar blue. For a moment he didn’t say anything, but held her gaze, making himself take the time to consider her words properly. Only after that did he shake his head. “I don’t think I know how to do it any other way,” he told her, fingers tightening again around hers. “I can’t sit here, or go out there, wondering if there’s something else I haven’t heard yet, that could change everything.” The truth he could find a way to deal with, however hard it might be. The uncertainty though… no. He’d had enough of not knowing, and not being able to do anything but wonder. He’d had five years of it. “I need to be able to know I know it all, however much there is,” he said. Making it as simple as that, because in the end, it was that simple. |
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| Sharon Carter | Apr 26 2015, 03:34 PM Post #64 |
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He Who Hesitates Is Toast
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Peggy Carter. An original. Someone who'd lived her life on her own terms in a time when that was practically unheard of. Aunt Peggy had done it with nerve and with class and with style and with an unwavering belief in herself. There never had been and never would be a better example that Sharon thought she could've tried to follow than the one her great aunt had set for her. “She really did,” Steve agreed next to her ear, his fingers sliding over her shoulder and, if she had to guess from the tone of his voice - fond and maybe a little far away and with the hint of something like a smile in it - remembering. Remembering that girl he'd known then, in the middle of a war. In circumstances that would always make those memories sharp and clear and vibrant. Aunt Peggy would like that, too. She'd be proud of that, in the same way she'd always been proud of the part she'd played, there in France in the forties. The mark that she'd made, the impression she'd left. The difference she'd helped make when a difference was desperately needed. It wasn't even a surprise she'd asked Steve not to die on her again. Sharon could hazard a guess as to when and why that had come up. There'd been a lot of loss, even back then, and of course Steve had made that promise. Done everything he could to keep it, even when it had seemed like he hadn't. But if she knew her Aunt Peggy at all, she knew that. Wherever she was Peggy Carter wouldn't have it any other way. There was a smile there for that. Faint but making its way to Steve's face all the same as he nodded. “No. She wouldn’t have, would she?” Her own smile, still holding that note of sadness years later for the Aunt she'd been closer to than her own parents, stretched a little wider. You didn't keep anything from Peggy that she wanted to know. Information was what she'd done, and she'd been very, very good at it. "Not in a million years," she murmured before lapsing into quiet. Not an empty quiet, but one that just wasn't filled with words or that needed them. At least not for a little while. Not until she'd ordered her thoughts again. Compartmentalized it all back into the spaces it was supposed to fit, now with the reality of Steve's presence added in. Steve, who'd spent all that time locked away, not knowing any of this was happening around him, in the world outside. He'd done it before, of course, but that didn't mean it was easier a second time and Sharon found herself easing back. Just far enough to see his face. His eyes. They'd always been the windows into what he was thinking, if she could decipher it at all. He was an incredible, strong, determined man, but he was still a man and this was a lot. Most especially all at once and they'd only covered the proverbial tip of the iceberg. He didn't need to force his way through it all. Not right now, an hour or two out of that cell, at most. Certainly not for her or for some standard he thought he needed to live up to. If he needed time, she'd make sure he had that and she'd also make sure he was reminded now and then that he might need it. The blue eyes that met hers were steady. Thoughtful. Her free hand lifted to brush the side of his neck, palm curving over that warm column as he shook his had and gave her the answer she'd already expected. “I don’t think I know how to do it any other way,” he told her, fingers tightening again around hers. “I can’t sit here, or go out there, wondering if there’s something else I haven’t heard yet, that could change everything.” Sharon nodded slowly, understandingly, still holding his eyes. Gather all the information, deal with the situation. They'd both lived by those rules, more or less, for a very long time. They'd always tried to deal in reality. It might not be easy, but it was always easier than the unknown. “I need to be able to know I know it all, however much there is,” he said simply and not at all unexpectedly. It was how he'd always been and, even if she might worry about him trying to take on too much right now, she also trusted him to know his own mind and his own limits. Most of the time. "All right," she agreed with a nod of her own, a return squeeze of his hand and using her other one to reach across for that folder on the bed to pull it closer. The time to bring it in had probably come. "It's all in here, beginning to end." For just a moment, the present seemed to fall away and it was five years ago and they were sitting in one of the briefing rooms up near the bridge, about to put their heads together over some piece of intel. A bit of a mission log. Trying to pin down one more Hydra base. Combing through notes to see why the last mission didn't go as planned. "Let's see if we skipped over anything and work through it from there," Sharon suggested, shifting around so that they could both read what was written on the first page as she opened up that folder. Pausing, she glanced sidelong at the man she loved, and had lost, and had found again, then tightened her fingers on his again. Took a deep breath and rolled her shoulders - a habit that had hung around from her days at SHIELD before diving into some task or other for the long haul. With Steve right there next to her. They'd get through it. All of it. |
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| Steve Rogers | Sep 14 2016, 05:50 AM Post #65 |
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The Man Behind the Shield
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Was he okay? It was a genuine question, not a leading one. He could see that much in her eyes, unless Sharon had gotten much, much better at disguising her intentions from him in five years, and he didn’t think that was true. No, she was concerned, and could he say that she might not have a right to be? The least she deserved, the very least, was that he gave her question a serious consideration. Was he okay? Could he do this all at once? Now? He met her eyes, felt her hand moving to his neck, warm and present and ready to justify an excuse, if he wanted to make it. But he shook his head, like perhaps she’d known already that he would. He would be okay for this. He would make sure of that, because he didn’t know how to do this any other way but all at once. He couldn’t sit here with her, knowing that he was choosing not to know, anymore than he could have left this room right now, wondering if there was something out there that he could run into that would change everything he thought he knew. She nodded. Of course she nodded - this was Sharon, and she wouldn’t really expect him to try to do anything that she couldn’t have managed herself. She couldn’t have gone out without knowing she’d found out everything she could about what she was going into, not in that million years she’d just mentioned for Peg. Wherever they might have disagreed, this wasn’t something he had to explain to Sharon. Not that that would stop him, both because it had been five years, and because he had to say it out loud, for himself, as much as for her. He needed to be able put the words to it exactly. He needed to be able to know the truth. However much there might be. It was as simple as that - and yet it was still, Steve had to admit, something of a relief to find that Sharon was seemingly disposed to treat it as that simple. “All right," she agreed with a nod of her own, returning the pressure of his hand on hers, but reaching with the other now for that folder she’d laid down beside them before. “It’s all in here, beginning to end.” Steve watched the folder as she brought it in front of him, tracking the external details carefully. The thickness of it, the obvious weight. Printed information, rather than in one of those god-forsaken electronic tablets that had been permeating S.H.I.E.L.D. before he’d left. That could have been security protocol, but it felt more like she’d remembered how much he disliked those things. She’d laughed at him for that enough over the years, after all. But this was paper, solid and tangible like information should be. “Let’s see if we skipped over anything and work through it from there," Sharon suggested, adjusting herself so that the pages inside were easily visible from where they rested on her lap as she opened the cover. “Okay,” Steve replied, answering that pressure he felt from her hand against his fingers with a tautening of his own. Without thinking, he straightened up for a moment, stretching his neck first to one side, then the other to ease the tension in it, then only caught himself when he heard the sound of Sharon breathing out, and felt the way her hand moved against his as she moved her shoulders. Her ritual, just as he’d been doing his. It was familiar, and at the same time, it was new all over again. Steve paused a moment, before he looked down at the page, and glanced toward the woman beside him. She was here, next to him. She was going to be here for as long as… forever. She’d agreed to that. They could do this. He looked down, stilling the rest of his thoughts into that place you learned where you were ready to assimilate whatever information you needed to learn, as quickly and completely as you needed to. The words already began to jump from the top of the page as he focused on that first page. Report on the So-called Inferno Incident. Cross-reference - X-factor; Cross-reference ‘Westchester facility’, Cross-reference, Rogers memorial bills. There was more. Steve Rogers breathed in slowly, letting his fingers twine more tightly with his fiancée’s. “Well, here goes,” he said. [Fin. Continued for both these guys in We Said Goodbye, We Say Hello] |
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3:32 AM Jul 11