Oh, That's How It Is

                                                    “…The price of freedom is high.                                                                                                       It always has been.  And it’s a price I’m willing to pay.

                                                            And if I’m the only one, then so be it.                                   But I’m willing to bet I’m not.”

It's nice to know Steve cares, though. Tony's never been good at telling when epople care genuinely. He'll put his all into something trying to win them over - why else would he have spent so many hours fixing Cap's suit? - but he can never tell if his affection is returned.

He doesn't really understand why he's having such a visceral reaction to Tony being the one giving up prematurely, but he knows deep in his bones that he has to turn it around as soon as possible.

@captainbrogers

There was something that hitched in his breath, a struggle to breath with the cold air that went through his lungs. The struggle had been that he was without the funds to stay in a proper place but he was still looking for the proper place. He had found an abandoned building but he was certain that someone had given his whereabouts to the remaining fractions of SHIELD. He was laying against the wall, a window just above him and trying to look like he hadn't been there. Like he wasn't hiding in the cold exposed building that had decayed over time.

The sound of footsteps seemed to indicate someone was there and he watched in a sideways glance toward the doorway. He was watching now certain that over the course of time...he'd passed over a timeline that had exposed him to many different people he'd met over time. Some of which he knew were after him. He took in a deep breath. He would just have to watch who would find him.

After all, just because he knew that Hydra had been dismantled doesn't mean there weren't agents left. Those same agents that had dressed him in the garbs of leather that he had left which were tattered and torn from his battle with Captain Barnes. Just another example of timelines meshing and changes coming that were a result of the multiverse being opened by several incidents of the course of time.

Steve prowled the hallways of the warehouse after he'd been sent this way regarding certain anomalies in the area.

"Something's alive," Hill had told him. "And we need to know what it is. Especially given the situation.

Multiverse rips, body doubles, the whole thing made Steve wonder why he hadn't actually just retired already and left the world to the younger generations to start taking care of. But here he was, working his ass off tracking down anomalies even though everything seemed to be an anomaly these days.

This whole debacle had been… Well, he wasn't comfortable not know what had happened. This wasn't the first space that had felt off to Steve, though this was the first one that had any evidence that somebody was existing here. Whether it was hero or villain or civilian or… or even of this world, Steve wasn't certain. At least their voice was human. And familiar, though that did little to assuage his caution.

Steve took a deep breath and readied himself for whatever confrontation was about to happen. He checked the grip on his shield and made to turn the corner and reveal who was siting there.

"I could be asking you the same thing," Steve called back, raising his shield properly as he finally got a good look at the other man. What he saw made him halt his steps, his jaw and shield arm dropping in unconscious surprise.

             The little guy from Brooklyn who was too dumb not to run away from a fight.