#post ca:cw

Meeting the Avengers by firstpynch

Pairing: Steve/Tony Rating: G Words: 2,132 Tags: Protective Tony, Sad Steve, Protective Peter

Summary: Today, June 18 2019, is a day that will go down in history because today is the group cheerily being dubbed as the ‘Rogue Avengers’ by the media will be making their not-so-triumphant return to American soil after years of being on the run. Peter was looking forward to it about as much as he looks forward to his visits to the dentist. That is to say, not very much. or, Peter meets the Avengers.

Reasons why I love it: This fic is the beginning of a series, and it kicks it off with some excellent angst. I love how torn Peter is between his excitement at meeting his childhood heroes and his resentment after the Civil War. It got me hooked instantly, and I'd not only recommend this one fic but the entire series, because it's excellent!

May 3rd by nanasekei

Pairing: Steve/Tony Rating: NR Words: 4,818 Tags: Established Relationship, Fluff, Misunderstandings

Summary: “So,” Steve asks, his shy grin clearly nervous, and Tony takes a moment to forget the dinner and the flowers and the world at large to marvel at how insanely good he looks in a navy-blue three-piece suit, complete with an adorable bowtie. “What do you think?” Tony swallows, steering his thoughts back from how fantastic that suit would look on his bedroom floor, and stares at Steve’s expectant face. “It’s… It’s perfect.” He says. And it’s true. It’s perfect, it’s amazing, it’s... Tony has no idea what this is about. -- Having a boyfriend with a superserum enhanced memory certainly makes for a lot of romantic special dates. Sometimes Tony finds it a bit hard to keep up.

Reasons why I love it: Aaaah, this fic is the absolute cutest! It feels like they've already been married for a thousand years. All those little snippets of their relationship make me so happy, I would read a billion more words in this universe. Please do yourself a favor and check this one out, it's so good!

Another Chance (The Complete Honesty Remix) by laireshi

Pairing: Steve/Tony Rating: T Words: 2,721 Tags: Truth Serum, Fix-It, Getting Together

Summary: Steve and Tony talk about what happened in Siberia. The only issue? Steve's under the influence of truth serum, and Tony's forced to accept his answers.

“Something important, Agent?” Your superior halted his presentation with a frustrated sigh, and you silenced the buzz of your phone and re-pocketed it.

“Not at all, sorry, sir.” You grinned.

You loved sending Him to voicemail. Him being Captain Steve Rogers, known hero-turned-fugitive, secret lover to yours truly. He hated being sent to voicemail, always rambled awkwardly until someone, usually Natasha, told him to hang up already, her voice a cackle from the background. But his ramblings were honest, more honest than his phone calls, even at the latest hours of the night when he had you to himself. He was softer then, almost more shy. He could be honest when he knew you’d react and respond at a later time.

So you often intentionally silenced his call, opting instead to play phone tag from across timezones. He was never in the same place twice, and neither were you anymore. Maybe if you’d bother to answer, the two of you could meet up, tag-team a Hydra mission and spend the night wrapped up in his arms like he’d always promised. But maybe that scared you more than you’d admit, so for now, phone tag was the name of the game.

You exited the conference room a half hour later with a stack of manila folders, a recon mission in the Balkans, and a lower level agent chattering your ear off. It seemed fairly self explanatory, in-and-out. Your agency was making a bigger deal of it than it probably was, and you were waltzing down winding corridors with a smug look on your face knowing what was waiting in your back pocket.

—

Your bags were already packed, and you were on a flight Eastward before you could stop for a breather, however, and it was a good few hours before you got time alone again. Throughout the flight, beyond the chatter of your teammates, you looked at the voicemail notification. And, as the you chased the sun to rise again, you unlocked a hotel door room with a keycard and collapsed onto zillion thread count sheets, finally a moment’s peace to sit and listen.

You tapped the notification with your thumb and pressed the phone to your ear, allowing your eyes to slip closed with exhaustion and jet lag as you listened to the dulcet tones of that man’s sweet voice.

“Hey, it’s me… Steve. Think I’ll ever actually talk to you on the damn phone?” He chuckled. “Anyway, I just wanted to call and let you know I’m alive, and I’m thinking about you. I miss you like crazy. How long has it been? Three months? Four? Jesus. War didn’t even feel this long.”

He let out a deep sigh, and you imagined him falling back onto the comfort of his own soft bed, somewhere safe, somewhere warm.

“Okay that’s dramatic. War sucked. But this sucks too. I just want to see you.”

Your stomach ached for him. It had been a while, five months actually, since you last lay your fingers upon that chest cut from marble, since you’d last snuck a kiss between headstones in a Cleveland cemetery. You’d found a few Russian operatives, and Natasha had made the set up. Only a handful of moments, lost like the fireflies between dancing tree limbs, but it had been worth it to feel his arms around you again, his fingertips through your hair and yours clenching the rigid kevlar of his suit.

“I’m in Greece, I think. Somewhere in the Balkans. Hydra mission. Sam said it’s worth looking into, so it’s worth looking into. Don’t worry, we’re being careful.”

You sat upright in your bed, nearly dropping your phone to the pillow below, and you scrambled. There were several seconds left of the call, several before someone eventually cut him off, but you’d listen later. Frantic, you grappled the buttons, punching in his contact to return the call.

Ring. Ring. Ring. You glanced at the bedside table. It was nearing 4AM. If he was there, now, he’d be asleep, or out on the mission.

“Hey, you’ve reached Steve. Leave a message.”

You sighed out a laugh, pushing off from the covers to pace, barbered carpet scratching your aching feet. “Hey, it’s me. I’m in the Balkans. I’m on that mission. I’m annoyed that your phone doesn’t have the option for texting, and I’m even more annoyed that you didn’t wake up to answer my call. It’s 4AM, you’re a hundred. Shouldn’t you be on your morning run? Anyway, call me back immediately. I want to see you. I’m at the…” You read off the stationery on the side table. “Room 704. I’ll be here until noon. Call me back.”

You clutched your phone into your hand and peered through the peep hole of the room, as if he’d listened and appeared like a magician outside your door. No such luck. You pushed off from the door and found the window. The curtain opened to a stunning cliffside view, the sea miles beyond, a vast stretch of nothingness. Just the heavy lids of your eyes, and the panic in your chest that this may just be another missed opportunity.

You rolled out of your travel clothes and brushed your teeth, staring at your phone on the countertop. And then you made your way back to the too-soft bedding for an expertly timed nap.

—

The hot sun fanned your cheeks, undeterred by the cabana umbrella and the ice melting in its glass atop your bistro table. You covered your eyes with a flattened hand, which provided some added shade, but your upper lip continued to bead with brine. Your targets talked a handful of feet away, at their own table, ritzy in linens and rings that clanked when they shook hands.

You’d poured over your book for hours, never reading a word, half-focused on the cell phone beside you, half on the tabletop beneath the Hydra-elite, under which you’d planted a listening device at the beginning of your dip into the pool. You maintained to face away from them, the clear in-ear bugged into your right hand side. They spoke in thick accents, in a language you’d wished you’d bothered to learn more of. You caught the occasion phrase, but knew the recording headed back to your own base in the States would be translated as necessary. You were only there to retrieve the information.

Kids played in the pool nearby, encouraged by their au pair while Mummy got a tan, and you found your focus zero in on them as the third child, a bit older, walked back outside from the restroom. He was lanky, in that awkward phase, and wet hair was beginning to dry in curls around his ears. He wore a white towel, emblazoned with the resorts’ logo, and he brought his hands to his chest to begin to sign.

You recognized it immediately as ASL, one of the few language that had stuck in your training. Your heart trilled with delight as the boy teased his siblings, and then sunk with panic as he turned to face you. He pointed to the device in your ear and you realized the men near you silenced.

“You speak ASL?” The boy signed, and you smiled and nodded, setting your book face-down on the table beside you. You could feel eyes on you from the nearby table.

The boy grinned and pointed at the doors. Then, he signed, roughly, “A big man inside paid me to tell you he’s here.”

Your heart rattled in your chest, and you tried to chuckle away the chill. “A big man?” You signed back, and the boy nodded. With a deep breath, you thanked him. The boy turned and went back to his family, and you made about gathering your things, though the adrenaline of an incoming encounter coursed through you.

Seemingly satisfied by the interaction, the men nearby started their conversation back up, softer than before, a low rumble in your ear, and you glanced their direction through your sunglasses as you stood from your table, flashing a polite smile as one of them caught your gaze and quickly looked away. You left your book, where the pages had already begun to soak in condensation from your glass, and the towel you’d been laying on.

The air conditioner instantly rocked your skin in gooseflesh, nearly freezing the bits of you pooling with sweat, and you let out an exhale the moment you rounded the corner and out of sight of the pool. The secondary lobby area was vast, high ceilings and guests moseying between pillars, and you ducked behind one and removed the throwing star that attached the bits of your sarong to each other. You tucked your knuckles around the two points and prepared for a punch.

At least, you were prepared until a dark hand came out of nowhere and wrapped itself around your wrist. You maneuvered around them, tried to headbutt, but your assailant ducked out of the way with a startled, “Whoa, whoa, whoa! Easy, tiger!”

Sam Wilson grinned back at you, all white teeth and perfect warmth. He ducked his head, waiting for another attack, but instead you put your finger to your lips to silence him.

Then, you put your hand to your in-ear and mumbled, “For the record, I’m using the restroom.” And heard the soft beep of the system shutting off.

Sam waited expectantly, eyebrows raised, and arms outstretched, and you sunk into his embrace. He smelled of coconut and sweat and Sam, and you could have sobbed at the rumble of his chuckle against your cheek. ”How you been?”

You pulled away with a nod, and you couldn’t help but scan the crowd over his shoulder. With every strange face came the twinge of heartache, the twinge of almost-was, of hope. “Good,” you relaxed your shoulders. “You?”

Sam gave you a knowing smirk, crossing his arms over his chest. “Yeah, you don’t care about me.”

“Shut up,” you laughed. “Of course I do.”

He nodded to his right, and you glanced to see the cracked door to a laundry room. The black plaque restricted access to anyone who wasn’t an employee, and your stomach flipped three or four times, imagining what could be just beyond.

“I’ve got eyes on the Hydra guys,” Sam smiled. “I’ll give you guys, what? 7 minutes?”

You shot Sam a look, but couldn’t help the smile that ached at the corners of your mouth. The wingman winked, and stepped aside to grant you access. The linoleum felt cold under your trembling fingers, and you raked them against the surface before pushing. The heavy door swung open just enough for you to slip inside, and you heard it latch behind you.

The room was white, sterile, full of the tumble of several washers and dryers doing their daily turn down services. Washing machines to the left, dryers to the right, and directly dead center, five machines down, leaning against a cart full of white sheets, was Captain America himself. Him.

He pushed off from the cart to stand, awkward, sheepish, hardly recognizable under a growing mop of hair and a full, dark beard.

“Have you always been that tall?” You cocked an eyebrow, the tone of your voice much braver than you felt.

He sucked in his cheeks and shook his head.

The two of you took slow steps toward one another, a scrape of rubber against tiled floors. You fought back the grin threatening to form, and he swung his arm until you were almost at arm’s length, and then he waited for you to take his grasp, and he pulled you in.

He was bigger than you’d remembered, a bear of a man that lumbered his frame around yours, all biceps and pectorals and hair. You raked at the length at his neck and the sides of his face, and he groaned into your neck, and you melted into him as though he were a sponge and you the popsicle in the hot Balkan sunlight.

“Did you get my voicemail?” He asked, knees bent to prop both of you against the only washing machine out of service.

You laughed at that, pressing your lips to his cheek, wherever you could find purchase without a mouthful of hair. The wrinkles at his eyes crinkled, and you kissed them before pulling away to look at him, really look at him, without all the pixels messing up the perfection of it all.

There were greens in his blue eyes, and you saw your admiration mirrored in his own gaze. Both of you laughed, realizing you were doing the same thing, observing one another, being present in the moment, soaking it in. His cheekbones remained high, unaging, and the fur around his lips sheltered the strength of his jaw and softened his fingers. You ran your fingers through it like the coat of a Labrador, and he pursed his lips into the affectionate gesture.

“You like it?”

“Haven’t decided yet,” you pursed your own.

He chuckled, but you watched his eyes darken as his gaze found your lips. He licked his own, leaning forward to nuzzle your nose. You smiled and let you eyes flutter closed, and you sighed as he closed the distance with a kiss.

God, you’d missed that, the way he just gave in. Like every kiss might be his last. It was the gentle intensity of it all, the way he held you around the middle, a large hand reaching to cup your neck and face, thumb circling your cheekbone. It was the rise and fall of his shoulders as he leaned into it, deepened it. It was the press of the small of your back until your abdomens found one another, his carved from marble against your own soft edges.

His beard was the only thing you hadn’t remembered, bristly and soft all at once. It tickled beneath your nose and in the crevice of your lip and chin, but you didn’t mind. It smelled of him, and you couldn’t get enough. When he pulled away to breathe, you dove back in for more, hitting beard when he ducked for a laugh.

“I missed you.” His eyes twinkled mischievously, and his large fingers tucked themselves under your sarong, a graze of skin against your own that sent your back arching.

“I missed you,” you spoke through gritted teeth, clawing at the collar of his civilian shirt. You hadn’t noticed the silky fabric until now, his best attempt at a disguise.

“I don’t have any time,” he said, and you looked up from the navy fabric to see his features fall.

You released his collar and flattened the creases against his collar bone. “If I got injured on this mission, they’d give me a vacation.” You offered it as a ridiculous solution, something both of you knew wouldn’t happen. They’d be suspicious if you got hurt. They’d go looking for him.

“Soon,” he bonked his forehead to yours. “Okay? I promise we can be together soon. I’ll have Nat plan something longer than happenstance.”

You nodded against him, feeling the emotion well. Voicemails were easier. Voicemails didn’t disappoint. The pain of feeling him under your fingertips, of breathing him in, was too much. It wasn’t fair. A soft knock from the doorway beat into your skull, your clenched jaw, your tightened fists. You pushed off from Steve, and his hold on you faltered.

His hand slipped into yours, fingers intertwined, and you led him past the dryers to the door.

“Hey,” he whispered with a gentle tug. You turned to face him, and he leant in for another Earth shattering, knee-weakening kiss. This man, this fugitive, the bane of your existence and the reason you breathe, a sponge to mop you heart that had spilled all over the tile floor.

—

He left you with several mumbled promises and a sad smile. Sam offered the same look of regret, a wave goodbye from across the lobby. You went one way as they went the other. Your mission wrapped up, bad guys on their merry way, information obtained. But the rest of the day, packing your things, the long flight home, it all took a backseat to the veil of heartbreak that lay overhead, the fear sinking into your bones that you’d never be able to be with him, never be able to touch him or kiss him for longer than a moment in time.

You deplaned to more chatter, congratulations on good work. You slipped between coworkers, ordered a ride share home. You unlocked your apartment, did a routine check for intruders, heated up a bag of rice on the stove top, pretended to eat it. Too aching to care.

You showered the sunscreen from exhausted limbs, scrubbed the makeup from your face, rinsing yourself of any essence of him, anything that could have seeped into your skin, and you tiptoed into pajamas and curled yourself under your covers. Relief didn’t find you until you heard the familiar ding of a notification. You scrambled for your phone, discarded on your nightstand the moment you’d gotten home.

1 Voicemail from Him.

You clicked play and laid back against your pillow to hear the low tenor of his voice.

“Hey, it’s me. We just landed in Wakanda. Snuck off to find Buck so I thought I’d call. I’d love to show you this place some day. It reminds me of you. Warm. Beautiful.” He took a pause, his voice low, like he’d been afraid of getting caught. “It was good seeing you today. You looked amazing. Did I mention that? You did. You looked incredible.”

You smiled at his rambling. You missed his rambling.

“I love you.”

You stopped breathing. Three words. You hadn’t said them, not to each other, not yet. You felt them, of course you felt them, but saying them aloud made them real, gave them weight, made the distance hurt more.

“I do. I love you. And I was too chicken shit to say it earlier, but I’ve been thinking it for ages. Probably since the day I met you. I love you.”

You sat upright in your bed. There were several seconds left of the call, several before someone eventually cut him off, but you’d listen later. Frantic, you grappled the buttons, punching in his contact to return the call.

Ring. Ring. Ring. You glanced at the bedside table. It was nearing 4AM.

“Hey,” he answered. There was a smile in his voice.

“I caught you,” you breathed a sigh of relief.