#nevertame

WELL,   THIS  IS  ONE  WAY  TO  DISCOVER  A  MUTATION.

steve just wishes that this  hadn’t  been the way.   he wishes he hadn’t just lost several years of his life witnessing his daughter very nearly get hit by a car,  can’t help but feel an incredible sense of guilt for allowing it to happen   (  how could he  possibly  explain this to his husband  ?   say,  babe,  our  kid  might  have  super  strength  !   i  let  her  run  in  front  of  a  car,  and  she  just  stopped  it  in  its  tracks  !  )

and even then,  he  still  wishes that bucky were home,  because he’s about a hot second away from a panic attack and he’s certain the last thing this driver needs is to witness the retired former captain america getting ready to cry over his super strong daughter.

he tries not to look so pained   (  like  he’s  the guy behind the wheel  )   as he picks peggy up into his arms,  holds her closer than he’s ever held her before,  because next time he might not  be  so lucky.   next time he’ll blink and something  worse  will happen to her.

her middle name is sarah,  for his mother,  and it’s  fitting.   peggy is just like steve,  almost cut from the same cloth even if they aren’t related by blood  ;   and steve has always been just like his mother,  and she was one of the strongest people he’d known before tuberculosis took her from him.

a few years down the road,  steve knows this means she’ll want to make a bigger difference in the world.   she’ll want to stand up against the bullies,  too,  even if the bullies are aliens from an entirely different galaxy,  or bad people from a different dimension.

his and bucky’s nurturing have raised a girl who is exactly like the  both  of them,  and by extension she’s just like his mother,  and that means that steve knows he won’t be able to stop her.   he would be a hypocrite if he did.

he holds her that much tighter because it hits him that she’s going to grow up and get thrown into a world where she could very much get hurt,  and he wishes desperately that the three of them could stay this way,  this age,  forever.

“  ——  you did  !  ”   he finally musters the strength to say,  presses a careful kiss to her temple.   he shoos the driver away after the umpteenth apology,  doesn’t have the emotional strength to hear it one more time,  hardly has enough to assure him for the umpteenth time that  he’s  the one who’s sorry,  and did the car sustain any damage  ?

for almost hitting a child,  though,  that driver was right to decide to cut and run.

“  i’m so glad you’re safe,  honey,  ”   steve continues once the driver has driven away,  is quiet,  almost sounds tired,  like the way he’d sound after crying,  even though he’s still withholding his tears.   “  next time,  make sure you look both ways across the street,  okay  ?   we don’t want the drivers to get hurt,  either.  ”

he turns,  makes way for their house,  carries little peggy’s ball beneath his other arm.

BUCKY  SHOULD  KNOW  THAT   steve  is  most  certainly  going  to  protest  bucky’s  pleas,   just  as  he  ought  to  know  that  steve  doesn’t  give  up  on  anybody.   the way steve sees it,  he’s not betraying anybody.   he told tony and natasha exactly where he stood,  and that’s just the way the cards fall.   if he were to give up on bucky,  turn him in,  sign the accords  ——  now,  that  would be a betrayal.   he’d be betraying himself,  all that he stands for.   and whether or not bucky agrees with him matters little to the fact that he’d be betraying his best friend,  too.

he cannot possibly let his best friend die  ;   cannot possibly turn him in,  let him be killed by people who refuse to see the whole picture.   and he cannot possibly be the one to kill him,  for the very thought tightens his chest so uncomfortably that he can scarcely breathe,  makes his eyes sting with tears that he blinks back very quickly,  because he has to be the one to stand firm,  can’t have a full - blown anxiety attack about the situation in front of bucky  and  sam.

he wants so badly to get through to tony  —  because he  knows  they were so close to reaching an agreement,  had he not been holding wanda inside the compound like a  prisoner,  making her feel like she’s a  monster  to be feared when she’s just a kid  —

he was so ready to come to an agreement,  because even if he firmly believes the accords won’t work,  he cares deeply for his friends just as much as he cares for his own beliefs,  and he was willing to find a compromise.

but,  then,  first they disagreed  ——  and now he and sam are on the run with someone who is perceived to be a fugitive,  and he wants to believe that if he calls tony to  explain  everything will be put back in order,  but he has to be realistic.   even if he did get through to tony,  he would have to get through to t’challa with little to no evidence   (  for now  ),  and then he would have to get through to the secretary of state  ;   and steve  knows  he’s on that man’s shit list,  now.

there’s no easy way out of this,  but he does know that bucky is innocent,  and he has to clear his name.   he would sooner die than let bucky be killed for something beyond his control  ;   than kill bucky himself.

he stands,  tall,  firm.

“  you’re  not  right,  ”   he answers,  resolutely.   “  we get rid of that book,  burn  it,  and that fake doctor,  and hydra’ll have nothing on you.  ”

he approaches bucky without even so much as a  hint  of hesitation,  releases his metal arm from the hold it’s been stuck in.   this is bucky.   he knows he won’t hurt him.

“  we’re going to fix this whole thing,  and then we’re gonna get out of here.   i’m not killing you,  buck.   we’re getting through this,  together.  ”

he settles his hands upon bucky’s shoulders,  holds them firmly,  grounds him.   finally,  his voice softens,  as though maybe sam won’t hear.   truth be told,  sam has likely turned away already,  likely isn’t listening.

AFTER  BEING  ALIVE  FOR  AN  ENTIRE  CENTURY,   steve  had  thought  he  would  have  known  exactly  what  he  wants.   he’s survived two massive wars,  thought it would be all over after the first,  has been fighting to stay alive and to save the world once again for the past decade.   and,  he’s  tired  ;   so,  genuinely tired.   he may be able to heal more quickly than the average person,  but his body can only endure so much,  and his mental capacity even  less  ——

he still misses peggy more than he can bear,  never wanted to have the body of a late - twenty - year - old whilst carrying one of the loves of his life inside a casket.   natasha is dead,  and she shouldn’t be,  and she won’t come back,  and she was the only one he’d been able to confide with some days.   tony is dead,  and steve can’t help but think he had never truly been forgiven for failing their team so  badly  all those years ago.

and for all the fighting he has done to subdue the winter soldier,  to  wake  bucky  up,  to  stop  thanos  before he did anything to harm bucky,  to bring bucky back to this world   ——   because he’d never fully processed how to live in a world without bucky,  and once he realized he didn’t have to,  he fought like hell to make sure it never happened again   ——   he’s hardly had the chance to even hang out with bucky,  just like old times.   god,  he misses his best friend,  perhaps more than he misses peggy.

and that’s where this all gets complicated:  because after seeing peggy in her office when he was back in time he wanted nothing more than to have her in his arms again,  to dance with her and grow old with her.   but bucky is his  best  friend.   bucky’s had his back from the very start,  and he’s always had bucky’s,  even at the cost of other friendships.   and he misses his sense of humor,  his warm smile,  the way they used to curl up on the couch together through a bad night,  going on double dates despite winding up solely attached to his hip  ——

bucky’s his best friend,  and he still  loves  him,  and if he hadn’t have died,  would he have even promised peggy a dance  ?   bucky’s his best friend,  and he’s still  here,  the two of them have given everything to  be  right  here.

bucky knows him better than anyone.   and as bucky stands before him now,  telling him to  try  to  come  back,  steve knows that he knows this could very well be their final goodbye  ;   that bucky thinks this is the end of the line.

steve realizes,  in this moment,  that it’s really  not  all that complicated.   it doesn’t  have  to be the end of the line.   he can’t bear to leave bucky behind.

he settles his hands upon bucky’s shoulders,  gives them both a firm squeeze,  offers a reassuring smile.

“  don’t worry,  buck.   i’ll only be five seconds,  just like doctor hulk says.  ”

HE  HEARS  ZHONG  HUI  BEFORE  HE  SEES  HIM   ——   and  it  makes  mitsunari   harrumph  !   from  his  seat  by  the  campfire,   feigning  an  annoyance  far  more  amplified  than  he  actually  is.   perhaps he  was  beginning to miss this man’s company,  irritating as it was.   as far as he knows,  it’s just because he enjoys  teasing  him so.

that’s certainly far from what’s  actually  put a real sour look on his face far before the exaggerated look he’s replaced it with  ;   but he hasn’t been able to stop thinking about lord hideyoshi’s ailing health.

the fact of the matter is,  they’ve been in this world far too long  ——  and mitsunari’s greatest fears have begun to be realized.   the fact of the matter is that if hideyoshi doesn’t recover,  mitsunari will have to watch him die all over again.

“  ————  you know,  shiji,  ”   he speaks as though nothing bothers him.   he learned how to do that at too young of an age.   “  i never realized you were so  concerned  about the state of my face.   do you think of it that often  ?  ”

he rubs his hand together,  warms himself in front of the fire.   with everything going on,  perhaps shiji’s face is one of the few he can handle being around.   akkorо̄’s,  too  —  he  longs  for akkorо̄,  but he’s seen the way he looks at that wei general and he knows his time has far passed.

“  if i’m  pouting,  at any rate,  it’s only because you’re  disturbing  me,  ”  he finally answers,  flatly,  because if he lets himself emote he’ll very likely get  upset.   and if that happens,  this insufferable man will  never  let him live it down.

“  for,  here i thought i would have another  moment  to myself before i am to resume my work.  ”   and it’s worth noting that he  could  excuse himself to do just that right this moment  ;   for anyone else,  maybe he would have.   even if mitsunari doesn’t want zhong hui to know what troubles him,  even if he has come to enjoy mercilessly teasing him,  few others will be able to keep his head afloat as effortlessly,  too.

i’ve  been  busy,   you  know.   but,  you  could  always  join  me.

“  join  you  ?   in doing  what,  exactly  ?  ”   and he  does  detect a note of hopefulness,  and for a moment,  mitsunari thinks he may see an opportunity to  tease  in the horizon,  and so he fully turns himself to face the other man,  begins to await his answer;  but,  not before adding:

“  if you mean for me to switch my allegiances,  you’d  better  be pulling my leg.  ”

THE  ONLY  REASON  ISA  EVEN  KNOWS   he’s  been  broken  and  repaired  once  is  because  of  little  ienzo’s  drawing.   it had made him wonder at the time if ienzo used to speak more,  back then.   if watching the housekeeping android being smashed to pieces had caused the child to become more withdrawn than before,  or if ansem had scared him into this long before that.   it enrages him to think about it,  surprises him still that he is so capable of  feeling  such anger  ;   almost wishes ansem had survived the bullet he only just placed into his chest so that he could put another one next to it.

father,  ienzo calls him,  and isa thinks he’d die for this child,  now,  human or not.   he’s been deviant for all of an hour at most,  and he would do anything to ease his fears and protect him from such a cruel world.

i’m  …   frightened.   where  are  we  going  to  go  ?   are  we  being  chased  ?

isa swallows,  tries to maintain his calm demeanor as he leads the boy away from the bus station they’ve just been dropped off at.   it’s dark,  which is ideal for a very obvious android wandering around with a human child  ;   but it’s cold,  which means they cannot possibly remain outside for long.

“  not while the authorities haven’t learned of y  —  ansem.  ”   not his father.   not ever,  and not anymore.   he has to remind himself he’s still speaking with an understandably frightened child,  however  —  softens his voice.   only for him.   “  we have time to figure out where we’re going,  little one.   we’ll find somebody who can help us come morning.   in the meantime  —  we should find someplace to spend the night.   aren’t you cold  ?  ”

if there’s  anything  he will pat himself on the back for now,  it’s that he managed to swipe ansem’s wallet off his corpse before they’d made a run for it.   a motel wouldn’t be the most low - profile place to stay,  but at least he knew he’d have the money for it.

still,  an  android  booking a room with a human child at this hour would with absolute certainty arouse suspicion.   he has no choice  —  he’ll have to get rid of his l.e.d.   he can’t possibly rely on his hair to cover it up forever.

on the other hand  —  he spots a run - down house fenced in.   it had to be abandoned.   perhaps squatting there would be safer,  so long as there truly was nobody else with the same idea.   down the street he sees a laundromat  —  perhaps with a change of clothes,  especially for him to appear more discreet.   next door,  a drugstore.

ienzo must be getting hungry.

he kneels down,  suddenly  —  takes the young boy by the shoulders,  firmly,  grounding him   (  maybe grounding the both of them  ).

“  we have to do everything we can to remain out of harm’s way.   and i will do everything in my power to protect you.   even things i may not be the most proud of.  ”   he wishes it wouldn’t have to come to  that.   for as much resentment as he bears toward ansem and humans like him,  he truly does not wish to harm anyone.

still,  he is about to sacrifice everything for ienzo.   he can’t risk losing him,  can’t risk being taken from him.   they have to  survive.

WE  WERE  FRIENDS  ONCE.

the use of past tense makes zishang’s blood run cold.   he hates this,  all of this.   he hates that zhongquan has felt utterly alienated from their family and has every  right  to feel that way.   if he had it his own way,  he’d have personally seen to it that xiahou ba would be safe  ——  he likes to think that maybe he still  could  have,  that if he’d just had the chance to go to his father he would have  understood.

his father wouldn’t have killed his best friend,  right  ?

he loves his father,  but lately zhao has been thinking that maybe he would have,  just like he killed everyone else who were known to be close to cao shuang.   and shi  agrees  with their father,  and his  mother  agrees,  and so does gonglü,  and zhao doesn’t understand why he seems to be the only one here that doesn’t get it  !

if it weren’t for the fact that he felt his life was threatened,  ba wouldn’t have betrayed the sima family.   right  ?

he swallows,  tightens his grasp around his blade,  sorrow and anger and fear making his blood pumping hot once again.

we  were  friends  once.

“  you’re still my best friend,  you know that  ?  ”   it’s spoken in a harsh whisper,  one loud enough that hopefully ba will hear  ---  but gonglü,  who stands not that far away,  will miss.   zhao feels his eyes sting,  hot tears prickling,  and he  doesn’t  ever cry until he thinks about losing the people that matter to him most.

he grew up with ba.   the bond the two of them shared oftentimes felt stronger to zhao than it felt with his own brother.   ba always had his back,  and he can’t blame him now for defecting to shu.   few others value living even half as much  ;   and zhao would give anything for him to remain alive in this moment.

if he doesn’t act now,  he knows gonglü will act for him.   despite being behind him,  zhao can almost feel him raising his axe for the kill.

“  i - i would have  protected  you,  even from my father  !   i don’t  blame  you for leaving.   i just wish you’d  told  me.  ”   he swallows down bile and takes a breath to quell the anxiety attack that’s just pushing at the seams.   he certainly can’t do  that  in front of everyone,  but his brain may not provide him with an alternative.

he raises a hand,  feels the need to reiterate his signal to his men to hold their positions.   don’t  you  dare  lay  a  finger  on  him,   jia  chong.

“  i’d let you come back home  ---  no questions asked.   with anyone wanting to say a word about it answering to  me.   but if not,  just  ---  just do me a favor and get outta here,  will you  ?  ”   he’s pleading.   and maybe that’s why gonglü holds his attack.

it’s why he’s doing all of this  ;   why he stayed with xemnas,  who still trusts him implicitly,  why he asked even to become vexen again and rejoin the organization,  why he and even procured another replica body to send to radiant garden in secret.   he’s allowed himself to become a puppet,  one for xehanort to manipulate as he pleases,  to walk all over him just as he had the moment isa had become an apprentice to a missing ansem.

he allowed himself to become a puppet,  just as he’d allowed himself to be experimented on if it meant going into the basement where the girl had been,  to see if he could find anything down there in the meantime.   he never told lea,  back then,  why he’d told them to keep watch upstairs while he’d gone down there with xehanort  ;   likely never will,  just as he doesn’t think it’s likely he’ll ever get a chance to explain to lea why he’s fighting against them now.

if this kills him,  then at least he’ll free the people he’s hurt of their suffering.

he casts his thoughts aside for the sake of lea in front of him now,  watches silently as lea inspects isa’s handiwork,  watches the soft gasp,  the gentle touch to their own face,  the way they angle the mirror away to look at him  ------

the way they surge forward,  kiss him like they know this is a parting gift,  like they’re begging him not to go,  kiss him so fiercely that isa feels that pain twinge his heart again and consume him with such a sadness that he almost thinks he’d do anything to make it stop.   isa spent an entire decade unfeeling,  cold,  save for  anger,  and now that he can feel once more he can hardly handle it.

he missed being human,  still misses being human,  but he hates the way that he can no longer compartmentalize his emotions,  that he can’t dismiss them,  even as a nobody.

saïx is nearing the end of his time and he’s become more human than he ever thought he could be.   isa has found his way into the husk that saïx used to be and breathed life into him.

lea kisses him,  and isa can’t stop himself but to kiss them in return,  gloved hand cupping their cheek,  eyes closing to blink back the stinging feeling in his eyes.

if  you  haven’t  found  her  by  now,   then  come  back  to  the  people  who  are  still  here.

he feels lea’s breath against his lips as they speak,  and he grows solemn again,  shakes his head.

“  it stopped being about finding  her  a long time ago,  ”   he answers,  tone tinged with regret.   he wants to tell them so badly the truth  ---  but he doesn’t know who’s  listening.   just because they’re sat upon the height of the clock tower doesn’t mean isa is not being  spied  on.   xemnas may trust him implicitly but he can’t guarantee  xehanort  does,  too.

“  after we lost roxas,  ”   and  you,   “  and after we were all defeated before  ...   i had to find a new purpose.   this is that purpose.  ”

finally,  he leans back,  regretfully away from lea,  yet he doesn’t break his firm gaze.   “  i had to get stronger.   obtain more power.   i was promised as much were i to return to the organization.  ”

he rises to his feet,  slowly.

BENEATH  THE  TEARS  THAT  STAIN  HIS CHEEKS,   his  face  turns  red  from  embarrassment  over  being  called  out.   he swallows thick,  checks himself,  regains his composure.   cao pi’s words  anger  him,  but only  partly  because the man can’t help but be an asshole all the time.   most of all they make him angry with  himself,  because he knows he’s better than this   (  but all the same,  he’s so  tired  ).

he’s barely gotten any rest since their worlds have collided,  likely will have trouble doing so even still once orochi has been slain and everything returns to normal  —  if  it ever returns to normal,  if they’ll even remember what has transpired after all is said and done.

his  hideyoshi was dead,  the battle of sekigahara mere days away when his world was ripped apart,  and he still carries the knowledge that if he returns,  he may very well be days away from his own end.   he’s crossed paths with the hideyoshi that orochi pulled from a different timeline,  a hideyoshi who was far healthier in both body and mind than when mitsunari last saw his own when he was still on his feet.   bright - eyed,  eager for the future,  on his way to seize odawara and unify japan.

mitsunari misses those days.

he thinks that maybe if he had been pulled from that same time,  he would be able to handle everything that’s gone on to this point,  would be a bit more arrogant and cocky   (  he still acts arrogant and cocky,  but maybe he wouldn’t feel so close to defeated,  either  ).   maybe a younger version of himself would have been able to handle the horrors he’s seen marginally better  ——  the awful things he’s had to do while under orochi’s leadership,  to gain da ji’s trust  ——  all of the blood that has been spilled and the death he’s had to witness which somehow seems far worse than anything he’s ever had to do in his own timeline.

he used to fight for an honorable cause.   orochi is pure evil.   and even though the two of them have finally broken free from his grasp,  mitsunari still cannot shake the disgustingly grimy feeling that covers him from head to toe.

and now cao pi’s been injured,  the memory of the man catching a blow to his arm still ingrained into his brain,  and if he’s angry at anything else it’s at the fact that he’s come to care  so  much about this prick that the thought of the blow being fatal sent him into a spiraling panic attack.

his teeth are clenched,  jaw unbearably tight as through tears he takes the gentlest hold of cao pi’s arm and wraps cloth around it and a makeshift splint he’s procured,  fumbling fingers tying the cloth off once he’s finished.

i  still  possess  one  arm  and  one  blade,   do  i  not  ?   i  remain  more  capable  than  most  here.

“  have we  truly  set the bar so low for our own troops  ?  ”   mitsunari asks sardonically,  tone still laced with attitude even in spite of his most recent meltdown,  in spite of the tears that still make his eyes sting.

dry  your  tears,   my  lord.   weeping  ill  suits  you.

he swallows thickly,  the sleeve of his robe wiping hot tears away and drying his eyes,  face heated all over again to be reminded that he’s out here  crying  in front of  anyone  else,  let alone in front of cao pi.

“  i must be exhausted,  ”   he mumbles irritably,  tries not to make the sniff that follows sound so  pathetic.   “  at any rate,  i still must insist you sit tomorrow out.   capable though you may be,  we’ve just taken a massive risk in our most recently act of  betrayal.   i don’t advise following that up with  avoidable  risks,  no matter how minor.   if anything happens to you now,  this will all fall apart.  ”

he cannot lead them.   and he knows from experience now that he  shouldn’t.

he hasn’t let go of cao pi,  although his hold has transferred from the injured one to the uninjured wrist,  just ghosting over his hand.