Did we win?

The idea of getting Steve alone was always something that made Tony feel like all the air was sucked out of the room. Over the years he chased it in subtle ways, but he never expected this, never thought it was possible. If everything in the world happened to even the scales, Tony figured waking up in a cold sweat, having his nurse on speed dial and not being able to stomach food for days on end was worth this temporary happiness. Steve made it feel so permanent, but they both knew it couldn’t be. “Now I’m not letting go,” Tony informed him, moving in when Steve did, wrapping his arms around his waist.

“Good,” Tony said in a rush of breath, grinning at Steve despite attempts to keep his face from revealing every thought that went through his head. “I really didn’t want to step to myself. I’m not entirely sure how that would work out. She seemed the type to fight dirty.” He was trying so hard to keep it light, to convince both of them that this was just a couple going on a temporary retreat to get away from the kids, but Steve always brought so much honesty. It made Tony want to do the same thing, rise up to meet him where he stood. “No,” Tony whispered. “I guess it wouldn’t. She’s still a Stark.”

And Steve was still a Rogers, still the man looking at Tony in a way that no one else had before, not really. Tony was never able to break eye contact with him before, and he wasn’t going to start now. “Hey,” Tony said, lowly, hand going to rest on Steve’s arm as his thumb brushed over his cheek, “it’s just me here. We’re okay.” This conversation wasn’t going to be easy with all the comforting words in the world, though, and Tony knew that. He knew there was no way to fix it. He nodded along with Steve’s words, worrying at the corner of his lip. 

“You’re my heart too,” he said, all in a rush, the back of his neck heating up. “I mean, it’s not great, it’s got more holes than cheddar, but what’s left of it, that’s you.” Talking was the last thing Tony ever wanted to do, because he wasn’t good at it. It was significantly easier when they were touching, though, and so Tony’s hand moved up to Steve’s, linking their fingers together. He brought it to his lips, pressing a kiss to Steve’s knuckles. “You’re the last person I’m going to–” Tony swallowed thickly, cutting himself off. “But I’m just your first, Steve.” He thought of an elderly Steve standing in front of him in the workshop, that ring glinting in the light. “If things were different, I’d kill to be the only one that sees that look on your face. You know that, right?” Love is selfish. Inherently selfish, that’s what Jessica said. Maybe Tony had permission to be selfish right now. “Promise me– Promise me, Steve, you won’t bury that with me. Even if I’d like the company … you’ve got a lot of life left. I want you to be happy.”

Finally, Tony looked down, eyes focused on Steve’s hand in his. “That’s all I’ve ever wanted. I know I’ve been pretty shitty about showing it.”

I don’t want you to, Steve thought. Fiercely and with a fire that surprised him, stole the voice right out of him. But it didn’t stop his grip from tightening on Tony’s shoulder, didn’t quell the urge to scoop him right into his lap and press and press and press until their bodies melted together. Until he lost track of Steve Rogers and Tony Stark and everything that went with those names. Until it was nothing but us, left. 

He didn’t do that. And he didn’t say it out-loud either, because he couldn’t. He wondered if Tony really talked too much or if he just spoke too little. If too often the words got tangled in his brain and strangled in his throat. All kinds of words. Three letter words. I am ___. Four letter words. I ____ you. 

“I wasn’t picturing her in your place,” Steve murmured, forcing the words out on an exhale. Otherwise they might explode inside him. “I was picturing you, but... uh, in a dress,” he said, feeling a faint flush creep up his neck. “The Stark I can deal with,” he added quickly. He had been dealing with Starks for a long time now, and they could be exhausting, but... he’s worth it. 

But even if Tony was a girl, he would still be dying. Dying in a way Steve knew all too well. In a way, the way he’d lost Bucky, the way he’d watched soldiers die in the trenches and in the mud -- that was easier than this. It was sudden, sharp, a punch to the gut that left him reeling, but it wasn’t like disease. Mary had wasted away, so thin her skin felt like paper and her bones jutted out at odd angles. His mother had finally become so weak that she couldn’t leave the bed. The smell alone was awful, but the pain he watched her endure for weeks -- that was unbearable. And Peggy. He sat by her bedside and watching the confusion swim in her eyes, watching bits of her float away, scattered on the wind like tiny particles of dust. 

He thought Peggy would be the last person he ever saw die that way. He had steeled himself to accepting more losses like Pietro, broken and twisted bodies given up for a just cause. But Tony always had a way of hitting him from left field, slamming into him at full-speed and stealing the breath from him. Making him realize the orders he was blindly trusting weren’t trustworthy at all. Kissing him and giving voice to this unspoken desire that had been whispering through him all his life. Making it sing each and every time they touched. 

We’re okay.

But they wouldn’t be. This was going to end even worse than Germany and Siberia combined. There was no way around this one, no jumping across the bridge, no out-thinking the flagpole. And if Steve’s hand trembled against Tony’s cheek, well, who could blame him?  “Your heart is perfect,” Steve insisted, voice suddenly strong and clear, even if it was thick with emotion. Maybe it was the kisses on his fingertips invigorating him. Making him sing. He wanted to pour the melody into more kisses, more soft touch, one of the thousand rhythms he still had to learn, but he held himself back. Because he always listened when Tony spoke. Always. 

Even when it hurt. 

“I thought I buried it with Peggy,” he whispered, wishing he could close his eyes and not daring to. Because it felt like tempting God, begging for a lightning strike, looking at Tony and talking about how little time he had to just look at him. “But I didn’t even realize there was something missing until you,” he breathed. His fingers tightened around Tony’s, and he had to remind himself to be careful, that he was stronger than he thought and Tony weaker than he let on. But he felt like he was going to break, crack open and shatter into pieces, or at least this shell that he wore all around him. He thought it was as tough as vibranium, which could take four bullets and Wakandan claws and walk away with only dents and scratches. Tony was the only one who had ever taken the shield from him. It seemed fitting that Tony was the only one to break through the walls around his heart too. 

“How can I promise that?” he whispered. “How can I do that when you’re the first person in over seventy years to make me feel like I have a life?” His entire body shuddered as another piece of his shell fell away. Steve ducked his head, and shook it slowly. “You weren’t. Even when I disagreed with what you were saying, I understood why,” he murmured. It was what made Germany so difficult. It was the first time he had looked across the battlefield and known that he was right but that didn’t mean Tony was wrong. It wasn’t that simple. 

(✉ → Stevie): Yeah, and I’ve enjoyed every moment of it. (✉ → Stevie): I think this is a ‘what came first, chicken or egg’ moment, buddy. I call being the chicken. (✉ → Stevie): Is it anything like Harry Potter? It took 19 hours to get through those. Sharon ate all the popcorn in the first thirty minutes. (✉ → Stevie): Life ain’t fair, and I’m your brother. You’ll live.

He glanced up from the plans in front of him, possible layouts of Red Room bases, any location that might’ve been associated with them in the last twenty years. They had been working for hours, scouring every international database for any hint of their whereabouts. Tracing every suspicious death and every missing child. Every act of terrorism where no one took responsibility. For hours, they only spoke to point out a new lead, another incident, another tack for the map. Until now.

Steve took a breath and straightened up, abandoning the maps and walking around the table towards where she was. “None of this is your fault,” he said, brushing aside newspaper articles about missing children in a remote Russian province. “I said I’d remind you of that, didn’t I?” He leaned against the table, back to the horrors behind him, and stared out the large windows in front of them. “On the front, some guys would wake up screaming. Rocking back and forth, begging for it to stop, and just... screaming and screaming. Like they were being attacked. But they weren’t scared of dying, not anymore. That wasn’t it,” he whispered. “They wanted the killing to stop. They’d scrub their hands raw in rivers and wash bins, desperate to feel clean. We had to keep going, but they... they were a long-time gone,” he breathed. He turned towards Nat. “But you’re still here. You’re not gone, and you’re not hopeless, Nat. You can still go on, and try to find a way to make this right. And you’re not doing it alone.”

There was a small monster issue on fifth street. An experiment gone wrong, as far as Steve could tell. Some kind of mutated bear was on a rampage. But at least it was from this universe, not another one. Steve hadn’t called for backup before diving into the fight, which he was only starting to regret now that he was on his back and those teeth were getting closer. He heard a voice above him. “I’m fine if you skip the jokes!” he called back, getting his foot into the creature’s belly and kicking it back. The bear went flying back, and Steve scrambled to his feet. “You shouldn’t be here. It isn’t safe,” he said to the girl. 

The super-soldier serum was more complex than people thought. It made him faster, stronger yes, but it enhanced everything. Including hearing. Steve was preparing dinner in the Tower, finally sitting down to cross some of the movies off his list, when he heard footsteps behind him. FRIDAY was supposed to keep unwanted guests out, but Steve knew that any system could be flawed. So he waited until the footsteps got closer, and closer, and then at the last second, he grabbed the fish and whipped around -- only to see Wanda standing there.

Steve blinked, and stared at the fish in his hand. “I... probably shouldn’t have used this,” he said, shaking his head and setting the fish down. “Not the most typical weapon, but it would probably make someone stop and think,” he continued, laughing lightly at himself. He wiped his hands on a nearby towel and then turned back to Wanda. “This is the last place I expected to run into you. Is everything okay?” 

They had landed in Sicily. The air was warm, the wind gentle as it skipped over the water and into their hotel room. Steve had decided to take a shower, and when he came out, Tony was already in bed. It had been a long plane ride, and a hard conversation, so Steve was glad to see him taking it easy. But as he quietly crossed the room and slipped on his clothes, he heard the mumbling. 

Is it loving you if I kill you? 

Tony’s mind never really let him rest. Not even when he slept. Steve had known that for years, had a mind that worked the same way, but seeing it now, hearing it -- his heart lurched in his chest. Those words stole the breath from him, sent a chill through his veins. It hurt, hurt like it had when that Kraut’s knife went into his neck, sharp and blinding and all-encompassing. Like it really was killing him. 

“Just a talent I guess,” Steve said, swiping the gauze over the cut above Sam’s eye. “Is this where I remind you that you said ‘I don’t need lessons on how to throw a frisbee?’” he teased. They had been training together, Steve had offered to show him how to utilize the shield. “Technically you were right. Now we just gotta work on catching it.”

What was there to say about Trip? Phil tried to think of the lost people every day, the people he and his team had watched die, but sometimes it just wasn’t possible. There were days were, to his greatest regret, the people who had died while he fought to save lives just slipped his mind. It was sad and - if he was honest - regretful, that it had come to that. “He was a good guy. Funny, but serious when he needed to be. A fighter, but smart too - my daughter adored him.” Phil said with a small smile. “When SHIELD fell… He was one of the few people who remained loyal, even though his mentor was behind a lot of the Hydra infiltration. A good kid.”

Every word was careful and deliberately chosen, and Steve understood that. That was how you spoke when the pain had had time to settle, and the loss became real, etched in stone. These weren’t eulogy words, given too soon after and choked with emotion. They were just as poignant, to be sure, but they were measured, with a steadiness that only came with time. But time didn’t make a loss feel less -- it just made it feel familiar. “He found someone to stay loyal to, it seems,” he said, nodding towards Phil. “I hear you inspire that in a lot of people.”

(✉ → Stevie): I don’t mind it being the three of us. The more people watching our backs, the better. (✉ → Stevie): Sometimes. But he’s real good about knowing that he won’t always, you know? I’m walking a bit of a minefield, these days. (✉ → Stevie): Did you have a personality replacement when SHIELD recruited you? (✉ → Stevie): Best way to win a cold one, though. Still have to remind myself I’m not being watched. (✉ → Stevie): Ma will be glad to hear it, she’s not rolling in her grave. (✉ → Stevie): Chocolate /and/ sympathy. Can’t decide if the lectures win out over that or not. (✉ → Stevie): Yeah, probably. I promised her that, you know. Would’ve done it whether I told her or not, but I said I’d be there to the end. (✉ → Stevie): All grown up, with kids of her own. Been a long time, Steve. (✉ → Stevie): Gabe pulled /me/ into this. He needed someone to commiserate with. (✉ → Stevie): Back to things that would make Ma weep if she heard them, but needs must. Yeah, but you survived that. I had the serum back then too, probably would’ve been fine.

Did Rogers seriously think that since he was finally looking his age that he actually had more wisdom and experience than Loki did? Ridiculous. Even one full mortal life was a mere blink to the existence of a god. “How wonderful for you,” he commented dryly, “And thank you so much for dispensing such wisdom. Truly I should learn from your vast well of knowledge.” No matter how much Rogers had seen and done in his lifetime, it was nothing compared to the knowledge Loki had and could gain over his lifetime. If the Soldier thought he was somehow superior to Loki, he was mistaken.

It would surprise Loki if Rogers really had “retired,” but if so, the thought of him engaging in such typically boring mortal pursuits was worth a chuckle. “Delightful, but I think I shall decline. If I was ever in a different universe, I’m sure I could find much more rewarding ways to spend the time.” He had no desire to fight Rogers in this state, but the man’s words were not something Loki could take lightly. “Still thinking like my brother I see,” he said, though his tone was not as flippant as before, “Believing that I am somehow a problem. I have no problem; I am merely biding my time, but naturally you would view that as a failure because you cannot see the greater picture.” Yes Loki had suffered far too many defeats and setbacks, but he was not about to say so to Rogers. Oh by the golden hall of Valhalla, the man really was feeling his age if he thought to dispense platitudes like that to Loki. “More? What more could a god want than the power and longevity already at my disposal? If you are jealous because your lifespan is so short, do not project that upon me, pretending that my existence is somehow lacking.” Loki scoffed. How absurd.

“You should,” Steve agreed, nonchalantly. He was too old now for grudges, and there was too much peace in his heart. It hadn’t always been easy, transitioning to a life after the fight. Giving up everything to find a life in these years. But it had taught him so much, and for that alone, it was worth it. But Loki... would Loki understand that? From what Thor had told him, in the days after Thanos, when Steve was still young and strong, the mischievous god had changed. Had found something worth dying for. That could be as hard as finding something to live for. 

There were a lot of apologies before the war. Bucky remembered that part before anything else came back. His ma, taking his face in her hands, pressing kisses over his cheeks as he left an envelope of cash on the table in the hallway, not asking questions as to how he got it. Steve when he was high out of his mind with the fever, Bucky forcing him to drink water that was far too warm to be of any benefit. His sisters, when they came to him with a guy that wouldn’t quit or homework equations they couldn’t solve. Bucky never needed any of them, brushed them off easily – but he didn’t realise that he would miss it. Being needed. Being wanted. Being the person that people turned to when they needed something fixed, when they needed someone to rely on.

After D.C., his head was in a hundred and one different spots. He knew Steve would be there, but that didn’t mean he was ready to turn to someone else. By the time he was, it was too late. They’d lost so much time, and now, Bucky wasn’t sure they’d get it back. They had this second chance, but the line they’d promised each other had splintered – at least, that’s what it felt like, sometimes. That’s what it felt like until he was sitting beside his best friend again, and everything slotted into place.

“Yeah,” Bucky said, and for some reason, this Steve – his Steve – saying Mary’s name was enough to make his breath catch in his chest. “I know you would have. Always been real predictable, least to me.” Bucky knew when Steve came back from that final fight that something had changed. They’d lost too much, in the years before the second chance, in the battle that ended it all. “Someone else gets to fight it. Pass the baton – that’s what you did with Sam, right?” Two lifetimes. Bucky felt like he’d lived four, sometimes. His life was a long, tangled wire, easily separated into four sections. Pre war. War. Winter Soldier. After. Sometimes the war and the Winter Soldier melded into one.

Bucky met Steve’s eye, then took the photographs as Steve passed them to him. Bucky’s thumb touched against the outline of Peggy’s white dress. “You did it,” Bucky said, a small smirk coming onto his face. “You managed to get a dame without me setting you up. You can admit it now – I just didn’t know your type.” Clearly. Bucky opened his mouth, and then shut it tightly when the next picture was passed over. “Ma said I never looked so sharp,” he replied. “This … this feel like me, to you?” A part of Bucky wanted to ask if Steve found another Bucky in his timeline. Another part, a stronger part, kept him from asking. “It’s possible because of you, Steve,” Bucky said. “You should’ve had it the first time round. I … I’m glad you got it the second.” He looked over at him. “I think I’ve done the same thing.”

“Meanwhile, you’ve always had a knack for surprising me,” Steve replied, a low chuckle rumbling through him. He coughed a little at the end, but nothing like what he’d once experienced. The orange at Christmastime. The day he showed up in that alley in full uniform, orders received. Azzano. The train. D.C. Bucharest. He had known Bucky like the back of his hand, but still full of surprises. 

Steve nodded slowly, and closed his eyes. It had been the hardest and the best part of his choice. Walking away from a fight, that had never been his style. Stepping back and letting others take on the burden and the mantle, that wasn’t him. “Took you by surprise there, eh?” he asked, smirking lightly. 

“I did,” he agreed softly, staring at the photos. They were all he had left, now that the timelines were closed up. The life he lived was too impossible to stay reality for very long, and he had known that was a possibility while living it. That was okay. A thing wasn’t beautiful because it lasted. Time passing, years rolling by, that was a gift he’d been given. It let him right the wrongs he’d always wished he could. Saving Coulson. Giving Peggy more lucidity towards the end, early detection went a long way towards treatment. And he had found Bucky before Hydra could sink their teeth into him for seventy years. But the genuine article was sitting beside him now. The Bucky who had been with him to the very end of the line, no matter how tangled it got. “It does,” he said firmly. “That’s you. And this is you,” he said, pointing a old, twisted finger at Bucky’s chest. “Even if these eyes don’t work as good as they once did, I’m sure of that.” 

Time – that was an important factor in the universe Nebula and the others came from. The other Tony Stark, their Tony Stark, he died in 2023, a year that Tony wouldn’t live to see. Things would be different in this world if Thanos came to town, if there was even a world left in the aftermath. Tony just hadn’t expected this wrinkle in time. “Nebula said you made it,” Tony blurted out, which wasn’t exactly what he wanted to say. The fact that Tony asked about him would hardly come as a shock, so the response he was looking for was unknown to him. Maybe he was talking just to talk.

“You’re sounding a lot like Back to the Future, Cap,” Tony surmised, not able to break his gaze from the man for a moment. Seeing Steve older was scientifically questionable, but it was also a privilege Tony wouldn’t get. It was a few moments before Tony realised the workshop had lapsed into silence, and he was doing a really bad job of making this seem normal.

What would the other Tony have wanted him to say? Did they find each other after Siberia, before the world ended? “I don’t regret it,” he said. “I – I don’t know what went down between us, where you came from, but … I don’t regret any of it.”  Tony’s gaze dropped to the ring on his finger, his stomach curling, but he managed a wry smirk regardless. “Can’t believe it took me dying for you to get a life, Rogers,” he said, and it sounded almost like teasing. Close enough, at least.

Earth just lost its best defender. He had said that when Tony was just in space, long before he knew what was to come. When what they were facing was only just beginning to be clear, when they only had a taste of the loss they would all face. It tasted like metal. It tasted like blood, bitter and sharp. 

“I did,” he confirmed, hands resting in his pockets. They were old fingers now, and finally felt their age. Everything else had snapped back when his timeline met the moment he had left. All the things he had seen and done in those eighty years had vanished into memory, but he still remained. After everything, he still remained, but he was changed. A different man. “So Nebula’s here? They were wondering...” he trailed off. It wasn’t his place to worry anymore. That had changed too. “Still didn’t watch that,” he replied, shrugging a shoulder.

Shuri nodded. She remembered when Okoye had first brought the news to her after the snap that T’Challa was gone. She remembered being unable to mourn him. She remembered throwing herself into her research to try to bring him back, to bring them all back, but finding nothing helpful, all while trying to lead a country. It had weighed heavily on her and made her much more serious than the playful girl she’d once been. She’d been lucky enough to be able to get him back, others hadn’t been so lucky. She managed a small smile at his joke. “If that was the case, I think we couldn’t let you retire for the rest of your life, even with your old man bones,” she teased. “I am looking into it.” She nodded. “I just wanted to make sure no one else knew the cause of it first. There’s no reason to waste time figuring out what someone else already knows after all.”

An old man was looking at Scott, so at least he knew he wasn’t a threat. Was a 70 year old really gonna call the cops on a thief? No, especially when he wasn’t a violent criminal. The worst he’d get might be a scolding, and at this point, scoldings went in one ear and out the other with him. He was tired of people - probably people like this man - trying to claim he could make his way in life and be successful without theft.

They were wrong. He’d tried to be a good guy, and it didn’t work, and being a thief was what he was good at. 

That was when it registered that the old man was saying his name. “How do you know my name? You my secret grandpa or somethin’? Because I could really use some birthday money.” He said, leaning casually against the back of the truck as if it wasn’t filled with stolen merchandise. “I’m doin’ just fine, but that depends on who is asking.”

It had been a while, certainly, since Steve had last seen Lang. And there was no accounting for the timeline of this universe -- how it compared to his own, whether it was in the past or the future. Based on what he’d seen, it was very similar, the time difference couldn’t have been that extreme. 

But Scott was so young. 

She should’ve focused her powers more. She should’ve sent her quake directly into his heart. Pinpoint accuracy. That was what she was trained to do. She could’ve killed him in an instant, but maybe that just wasn’t who she was. She wasn’t a killer despite the things she might have had to do in the past. She hadn’t been able to kill Deadpool, and that had nothing to do with the fact that Deadpool was unkillable. She could’ve buried him in ten feet of cement, but she hadn’t because some things were more important than revenge. Regardless of what she thought of herself and her own failures, she was a good person and didn’t like seeing people getting hurt. However, the same couldn’t really be said about Captain America here. Deadpool was one thing. Deadpool had been under orders, and it was hard to tell Captain America no when he was supposed to be the good guy. Daisy knew better. He was the bad guy, even if this was in a different universe. She couldn’t help feeling like it was the same here.

He was hiding now. Typical. He was always hiding behind something. A shield. A good persona. A car. She could’ve turned it over on him, but she waited, just for a moment, to hear what he said. It just made her more pissed off, and the ground started to shake around her. “Yeah,” she snapped. “That’s what everyone else thought too. That’s what Coulson thought. I tried to warn him about you, but he believed in you too much. Then you had him killed. You were Hydra the whole FUCKING TIME! AND NO ONE KNEW!” She quaked the car he was hiding behind, throwing it into a wall so his hiding place was gone. “Someone needs to make sure you don’t do that here.”

He had finally found a fight he didn’t want to have. But even so, running away wasn’t an option. This kind of anger, born of grief -- she would level a city block trying to chase after him, he was sure of it. The car flew back, slamming into a wall. He was exposed, and people were screaming, racing down the street. “Stop, please!” he shouted out to her, standing up. He spread his arms wide. “I don’t want to hurt you, but you’re wrong,” he insisted. “I’m not Hydra, I’ll never be Hydra. I would rather die than join them and hurt the people I care about.”