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When Natasha looked down at her hands, they were shaking. She wasn’t exactly sure why. The memories felt hazy, fuzzy around the edges in the corners of her vision, like a dream fading away.
“-Loving you guys. Nobody else is. There’s been no official call for Banner’s arrest, but it’s in the air.” That was Hill, she thought, speaking over the crackle of static. Her voice was like an anchor. Tony murmured something. His head was buried in his hands.
Natasha could pinpoint the exact moment everything had gone to shit. The stillness before the motion, the hot, heavy air before the storm. The party. She had been laughing, leading down across the bar and looking up at Bruce through dark eyelashes, wettened lips, and then; movement. Explosions, shattered glass, her body tossed over the bar. A gun had appeared in her hands, and then she was shooting. Each bullet kicked back through her body like a heartbeat. No rest for the wicked , Natasha thought bitterly, of course it would never be that easy.
And then there had been Sokovia. The city in dust with the entire world screaming at their heels. There was nowhere to go, nowhere to hide. For once in her god damn life, Natasha didn’t know what to do next. Her ears were still ringing. Somewhere to her size, slumped up against one of the seats of the quinjet, Banner shifted. He groaned with the ache of his injuries. He’d taken a hard hit, and while the Hulk could handle it, Banner’s own body wasn’t built for violence.
“How’s the team?” Maria’s voice cut clear over the high, sustained whine in Natasha’s eardrums. She looked up from her hands, where she’s been staring since they got on the quinjet. They were bloody. Maybe — she couldn’t be sure of what was real, didn’t know if she wanted to know. Her memory wasn’t a thing she could trust any more, not after Maximoff had pried into it.
“Everyone’s… we took a hit. We’ll shake it off.” Tony said, uneasy. They always did.
Natasha looked over to the front of the quinjet where Clint was seated in the pilot’s chair, body slack with exhaustion. It had been hours already since they’d started flying, no end in sight, nowhere to land. Home was — Natasha swallowed thickly — home was gone. The Tower was all but rubble. The lump in her throat felt more like a swallowed bullet, burning and aching with a deep sense of dread.
Thor, like Natasha, stared down at his hands. They were covered in dirt and blood, like the rest of him. Mjolnir sat on the floor in front of him, neatly between the spread of his legs. He looked more man than God, now. Bruce was still floating in and out of consciousness. Tony hadn’t moved from where he held his face in his hands.
“Well,” Maria seemed equally unsure, “For now I’d stay in stealth mode. And stay away from here.”
“So, run and hide?”
Soldier sat opposite Natasha, his broad, stocky frame hunched over. It took her a moment to realise what he was doing — his gaze fixed on the small cellphone in his hands, face illuminated by its pale, blue glow. The slivers of skin she could see outside the muzzle were sallow, dirtied, tired. He never smiled, Natasha knew even without seeing his mouth. It never reached his eyes. But this was more than just stoicism, she recognised, this was the similar grief and uncertainty and fear that they all felt but tried to hide. His stiff, metallic fingers swept over the keypad.
“Until we can find Ultron, I don’t have a lot else to offer.”
The line went dead with a loud beep. With a heaving sigh, Tony leaned back in his chair, still cradling his head. He rubbed his eyes against the exhaustion that weighed him down. Even from here, Natasha could see the hard set of his shoulders, the tightness in his jaw, how his forehead shimmered with sweat under the dim light. He slammed a fist down onto the table. Bruce jolted.
“Fuck!” He hissed. Cradling his own fist close to his chest, Tony turned to Clint.
“You wanna switch out?”
“You got anywhere to take us?” Clint shot back, running a hand through his sandy, blonde hair, but there was no bite to it. He was just as lost as the rest of them. Tony grimaced.
Natasha blinked furiously. She wanted to scream. She wanted to hit something, throw something, break a wall or a bone or a body. She wanted to go back to the bar, to flirting with Banner, to things being okay if only for a moment.
“I’ll keep looking,” Tony continued, insistent, “There has to be somewhere- some safe house, wherever-“
“If there was somewhere, we would have found it by now.” The vein in Natasha’s forehead throbbed.
“We can’t stay in the air forever,” Tony turned to Bruce, who was looking slightly more conscious. He was still pale and sickly, but missing that faint green tinge now, “Hey, how’s India’s this time of year?”
“I have somewhere we can go.”
Soldier’s voice was raspy, muffled through the mask. Tony turned, then, raising an eyebrow. Natasha straightened.
“Come again?”
Flickering his gaze uneasily between Stark, Barton and Natasha, his eyes were wide and frantic like a cornered animal. Slowly, he reached with both hands to unclasp the mask. It fell into his wide, open palms with a soft click, metal against metal. He croaked;
“I have somewhere we can go.”
—♱—
“Natalia,” A voice said, rough, “ Natashenka,”
Bleary-eyed, Natasha blinked away the last dredges of sleep. There was a firm, cool hand on her shoulder, shaking her awake. When she looked down, she saw the curve of metallic fingers. She fumbled to grab them. They were cold to the touch. Soldier didn’t pull away, instead peering down at her with those pale, curious eyes. He always looked slightly wild, feral, Natasha thought.
Sometime between changing course and landing, she had dozed off. Not fully—never fully, she knew better than to ever leave herself so vulnerable—but the fight had worn her thin like a vellum sanded down, almost translucent. Sleep made her body heavy, made the ache in her limbs that much stronger, bone-deep.
Natasha breathed in heavily. The air was cold and sharp and cleansing. Tony had slumped over the desk, finally succumbing to exhaustion once the adrenaline of the fight had worn down. Bruce was attempting to wake him. The others were already standing, preparing to exit the quinjet.
“Soldat,” she murmured, blinking, “Are we there?”
“We’re at the safehouse,” He said, easing her up into a sitting position. His voice was low, rough, but not unkind, “We’re safe.”
The quinjet door opened with a low shudder, peeling up slowly. Natasha’s breath hitched.
“Where are we?” Clint asked. He was to Natasha’s left, staring out of the open end of the quinjet. Natasha followed his gaze, feeling that same sense of uncertainty. There was a high, bright sun and broad swathes of golden grass. The edges of the clearing faded into dense, tall trees. It looked to be early afternoon.
“Safehouse,” Soldier repeated. He beckoned Natasha up, his metallic hand curling around her bicep. Together, the team stumbled out of the jet. There was a faint-beaten path in the grass that emerged, widening as they trekked. At the end of the pathway, tucked just into the edge of the trees, a house loomed in the distance.
The Victorian-style house had definitely seen better days, but Natasha couldn’t deny the sense of relief that washed over her when she saw it. This was a home, lived in, not just a barren shell for them to take cover in. The wooden panelling at the front of the house was a faded, robin’s-egg blue and the white trim had become muddied over time, but a wickered chair had been tucked cosily beneath the overhang of the roof by the door. The lights were on inside, she noted.
Tony whistled lowly.
“Nice place you got here,” He said, “Since when?”
“A few years.”
Soldier had always been the most private Avenger – even to his name. He was Soldier, or Soldat, or whatever pop-culture references Tony could conjure up that week. Not that he ever seemed to actually understand them. His face alone had been closely guarded, refusing to take the mask off for even a second in front of the others. He’d been on the team for almost two years by the first time he’d taken it off in the privacy of the Quinjet to get his injuries checked.
He paused before adding; “Fury helped me set it up. After I was recruited.”
Recruited , Natasha thought. What a polite way to phrase the disaster that had been Soldier’s rehabilitation process. Before the dissolution of SHIELD, he had been taken in. Natasha herself had only been with the agency for a year, not privy to the details, but she had known enough. It hadn’t been pretty. Soldier was only alive because SHIELD had decided they wanted a weapon of their own.
Moving closer to the house, Natasha realised there was a dog slumped across the front porch. It perked up as they approached, barking loudly before scurrying down the creaky porch steps. The dog, a basset hound with an old, drooping face, sniffed curiously at Thor’s legs.
“That’s Pickles,” Soldier said, lips curving up into the closest approximation of a smile that Natasha had ever seen on him, “Ignore him. He likes attention.”
“Pickles?” Tony raised an eyebrow, pressing, “You have a dog called Pickles? ” He leaned down to pat Pickles on the head as they walked. Contented, Pickles started to drool all over Tony’s pant legs.
“I didn’t name him that,” Soldier rebutted, lips twisting, “That was all Steve. He’s inside. He probably didn’t hear us coming— he listens to a lot of music.”
“ Steve ?”
“Steve,” Soldier repeated, entirely oblivious to Tony’s quirked eyebrow, “We live together.”
As Soldier began towards the porch stairs, Tony turned back. Steve, he mouthed incredulously to the others. Natasha stifled a laugh. The others trailed behind, confusion clear on their faces. Banner still looked half-asleep. Jogging to keep up, Tony pressed further.
“What does he do? Let me guess- Spy. No, Assassin . Vet? Cop?”
“Painter. For children’s books.” Soldier had a seriously impressive poker-face. Natasha wanted nothing more than for him to be telling the truth. Tony squinted, disbelieving.
Procuring a silver key from one of the many, many zippers and pockets on his leather uniform, Soldier unlocked the front door with a click. Pickles followed obediently, snuffling at the Avengers’ feet as they stepped into the house.
The entryway was… nice. She hadn’t been expecting something barren, abandoned, but the undeniable normalcy of the small area was jarring. To her left, pairs of shoes had been stacked up on a rack, and a set of hooks on the wall held various coats and jackets.
The whole house — from what Natasha could see through the open archway into the living room and up the stairs — was lit in a gentle, yellow glow. Her gaze settled on a set of framed photos up on the wall. Signs of life bathed the room in warmth like tiny matches. It was quaint, almost cosy. Neither were words she typically associated with Soldier.
“I’m home!” Soldier called up the stairwell, already shedding his jacket to expose the entire length of his metallic arm. After a long pause, there was the click of a door, and then footsteps sounding out from somewhere upstairs.
“We have guests,” He continued. When he turned back to face the others, there was an unreadable expression on his face. Soldier stepped forward, motioning to the rack of shoes.
“You should take your shoes off. Steve’ll kill me if you bring any mud in.”
With much reluctance, they began to take their shoes off. Natasha knelt, working deftly at the knot of her boots with nimble fingers, eyes straining to focus on the lace cords under the shadows of the others as they fumbled around with their own shoes. It was such a simple thing, but the request alone had thrown her off kilter. Soldier seemed the last person to care about tracking in mud , of all things. When she rose, however, she realised they were no longer alone.
Natasha wasn’t exactly sure what she had been expecting of Soldier’s roommate, but it hadn’t been him.
Steve was tall, taller than Soldier even, and twice as broad. The sheer width of his shoulders was impressive, let alone the well-carved form of his biceps, each muscle defined even in the soft, warm light. And really, holy shit. He was stock-straight, too, spine stiff and proper, and it only made him take up that much more space. He was probably as big as Thor, somehow.
Despite his intimidating frame, his face was gentle. Behind long, light eyelashes, his pale blue eyes met Nat’s own. There was no tension in his body, the square cut of his jaw (Nat could practically hear Soldier grinding his teeth from here). His sandy blonde hair flopped, unstyled, over his forehead.
There was something Natasha couldn’t place about him. Something off. A modern man to the left, the way Natasha felt looking at old photographs of herself. A life that should have been familiar, something with all the signs of normality, but just alien enough to feel wrong.
“You need a haircut,” Steve said by way of greeting Soldier. He reached out and pushed the strands of dark, slightly greasy hair out of Soldier’s face, tucking them behind his ears where the ends brushed at the curve of his jaw. Steve took the moment to cup Soldier’s face, thumbs brushing at his high cheekbones, before tugging him into a tight hug.
And, well, oh, Natasha thought, It’s like that.
Disbelieving, Natasha watched him dissolve. The line of tension in his body disappeared, melted into something soft and easy and comfortable for the briefest second. And then it returned. Like Soldier had remembered where he was, who he was with, why they were there.
“Later,” Soldier said once they’d pulled apart. He glanced back at the others, hovering awkwardly by the doorway, “This is the team.”
Steve stepped forward. He extended a massive, courteous hand. Black and blue smudged all over his fingertips, like he’d been drawing in ink or paint. Maybe painter had been the truth, then. Nat had long since learned that looks could be deceiving.
“I’m Steve,” he said, shaking Clint’s hand first, “Buck’s told me a lot about you all.”
Buck. That was a new one. Natasha shared a look with Bruce.
When Steve offered his hand out to Tony, Tony didn’t take it. Instead, his brows knit together for a brief moment before his eyes widened. He looked back at Soldier – Buck, Natasha corrected herself – gaze flickering between the two like he was struggling to make a connection. He straightened up.
“You’re Captain America,” Tony said, something choked in his voice that none of them can quite decipher. Steve smiled, then, all teeth, not all friendly.
“I’m Steve,” Steve repeated, “I haven’t been Captain America in a long time.”
—♱—
“So,” Bruce started once they had all settled in the small kitchen of the safehouse. “Buck? Is that short for something?”
Like the entryway, there was a quaint, but homely feel to the room that felt entirely incongruous with the image of Soldier that Natasha had constructed. It was long and thin, counters lining both sides, with a screen door at one end that lead out to the porch. Steve had propped it halfway open, letting a soft breeze in to soothe the stifling, thick air of the early afternoon.
Clint snorted into the coffee cup he was cradling. After Pickles had broken the tense silence between Steve and Tony by attempting to climb up Clint’s leg, Steve had offered to draw up a pot of coffee. Stay as long as you need , he’d said, Any friend of Buck’s is a friend of mine . He scritched at Pickles’ head, behind his ears, where he’d plopped down lazily at Clint’s heels.
“You didn’t think his name was just Soldier, did you?”
“He didn’t tell you his name?” Steve glanced back at Buck with amusement, who was heaping sugar into two mismatched coffee mugs. One had the phrase World’s Best Superhero emblazoned across it in a tacky, pop-art font, “You’ve been holding out on them, Jim.”
“Jim?” Tony frowned, “How’d you get to Jim?”
“Buck, Bucky,” Steve shrugged. There was a curl in his lip, restrained, and a glint in his eye that told Natasha there was a story, there, behind the name, “James, Jim, Jimmy-”
“You do not call me Jimmy,” Soldier, Buck, Bucky, James, Jim, Jimmy said stiffly. If Natasha hadn’t known better, she’d say he was irritated, but the relaxed hunch of his shoulders spoke differently, the unfamiliar fondness in his tone.
“I call you whatever I damn want, Buck. My house, my rules.”
They watched the back and forth carefully. It was strange to see Soldier relaxed, so soft where he was often harsh. The guard he’d constructed around himself, keeping the others out, seemed to fall away. They bantered like they’d been doing it for years, a sense of familiarity Natasha wished came so easily to her.
“James,” Steve said, lips quirking, almost incredulous, “You didn’t even tell them to call you James?”
“It never came up,” James shrugged, “When you’re trying to stop the world from ending, there’s usually greater things at hand than what to call me.”
“Tony wanted to ask,” Natasha piped up, unable to hide her smile behind her coffee cup, “He was scared you’d stab him if he asked too many questions.”
“I’d have half a mind to,” Buck grumbled.
Natasha kept her gaze fixed on the kitchen around her. She’s never put much thought into what she thought Soldier’s house might look like, but she’d always figured it would be something barren. No bed, maybe, an air mattress or a couch to sleep on. No TV, no internet, nothing traceable or identifying or compromising. Swept for bugs every day. He’d come from HYDRA, after all. There were risks he couldn’t afford to take.
But this was- this was a home. The small white fridge door had become cluttered with magnets, pinned up papers — photographs, papers, what looked like a hastily written up grocery list.
The screen door swung open a little further, and Natasha heard the soft pattering of something against the tiles. Something brushed up against her leg. Looking down, a white cat was staring up at her with wide, honey eyes.
“Meow,” the cat meowed. It sniffed at Natasha’s leg for a second time before slinking out from underneath the kitchen table, instead splaying itself out onto the tile where the sunlight streamed in through the door. Belly up, it basked in the warmth with a low purr.
“That’s Alpine,” Steve said fondly, peering down at the lazy cat. He toed at Alpine’s side with his socked foot, snickering as she batted at him, “She’s evil.”
Alpine didn’t look very evil to Natasha, but looks could be deceiving.
“Takes after the Terminator over there?”
“She’s only half as spoiled,” Steve quipped.
“You enable her.” Buck hovered over Steve’s shoulder to set a steaming coffee cup in front of him.
Steve leaned back to meet him halfway, exposing the tan length of his neck as his fingers brushed over Buck’s neck and up to his face, pushing his hair back again. He wrinkled his nose.
“Shower,” Steve said pointedly, “You stink.”
Steve turned back to the others with a toothy grin. His nose was crooked like it had been broken and healed over.
—♱—
After coffee, Soldier dutifully retreated upstairs to shower. Natasha stayed in the kitchen with Tony and Bruce, watching Steve rinse out the cups, while Clint paced tight circles around the coffee table in the living room, murmuring something into his cellphone. Thor had left swiftly, almost as soon as they had landed, leaving only Tony, Natasha, Bruce and Clint at the house. Steve had insisted they could stay “as long as they needed”, much to Soldier’s dismay.
“He,” He had pointed an accusing finger at Tony, “Will burn the house down. Within the week.”
He remerged as Steve started on dinner, dicing potatoes and carrots methodically. And- Soldier was wearing jeans, and a henley, with the sleeves bunched up around his elbows to reveal one tanned forearm and one metallic. Natasha bit back her surprise. She didn’t think she’d seen Soldier in anything but tactical gear, even on the one night they’d all but forced him into joining Game Night at the tower. Soldier had kicked her ass at Cluedo. Yellow, Kitchen, Wrench.
From her perch at the kitchen counter, where the sunlight streaming through the screen door had turned a hazy gold that danced across the wood grain, Natasha watched Soldier in the kitchen. He slipped in, tucked the long strands of hair behind his ears, and seemed to pick up where Steve left off seamlessly, mincing garlic. She watched the line of his knuckles, the gentlest she’s ever seen Soldier’s hand. The metal arm was a weapon , she thought, not meant for softness or domesticity. Natasha wasn’t blind. She knew what was love looked like.
Over the hum of the radio, they kept casual conversation. Natasha looked down at the kitchen table. Her hand was brushing against Bruce’s in the close proximity, their chairs tucked together. Glancing up, she met his eyes, and he pushed until their fingers were touching. She knocked his knee, under the table, mouthing knock it off . But maybe the warm summer air and crooning music had eased the tension in him, made the panic Natasha couldn’t seem to shake seem trivial, because he just smiled and twisted their legs together.
“I’ll let you off,” She murmured.
“Just this once,” Bruce grinned.
The meal that Steve and Soldier cooked up was one of the biggest she’d ever seen. They set six places around the small dining room table, six sets of glasses and cutlery, close enough for Natasha’s calves to be pushed flush against Clint’s and Tony’s. Despite it all, despite the fact they were meant to be colleagues and not friends, despite the fact that the world outside that house was about to end and it would be their fault, it was good. Natasha was good.
Natasha tore into warm, fresh bread with her fingers and felt the plume of steam whisper against her face. Clint slipped easily into conversation about Steve’s work as a painter, a children’s illustrator, of all things, and it somehow devolved into recounting the most ridiculous stories from the field, like that time Tony took a tranq dart to the ass like some cartoon character.
“-He just dropped,” Soldier snickered, “Like that. Down. I had to carry him the whole way back to the jet slung over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes.”
“You liked it. Wanted to, even,” Tony insisted through a mouthful of potato, “Hell, you probably shot the damn thing yourself.”
“You wish,” Soldier rebutted, “Pass the gravy?”
Tony passed the gravy. Clint nudged Natasha’s calf with the heel of his foot. When their eyes met, he was grinning. They’re playing nice, his eyes said, they’d known each other long enough to be able to say a lot without saying anything, Never thought I’d see the day.
Tony’s been making heart eyes at Steve all afternoon, Natasha said, leaning to top up the wine in her glass, Look at him.
“-You can ask,” Steve said, when the conversation had quieted down. He took a sip of beer. The condensation was already trickling down his fingertips, “I know you’re curious.”
“Ask what?” Tony played coy, but the look eased away when Steve raised an eyebrow. “Okay, yeah. Sue me. I’m a nosy bastard. It runs in the family. But you’d know that.”
“Mhm,” Steve beckoned, grinning slyly, “Go on, then. We don’t have all day.”
“You’re Captain America. You knew my dad.”
“I did. I was.” Steve cleared his throat. “He was a good man. He was my friend.”
“Were.” Tony, whose favourite hobbies seemed to include digging his own grave and poking sleeping bears with sticks, pressed, “You were Captain America, and then you stopped.”
Steve’s smile wavered, just for a second, but a second too long. There was a tension in his broad shoulders that hadn’t been there before, but he didn’t seem upset. Uncomfortable, just, maybe. Used to questions, not used to answering them.
“Well, I did get frozen for a few years. If you recall.” He sipped his beer, “They weren’t exactly jumping to get me back on the field after that.”
“How’d they defrost you?” Clint butted in, all sheer curiosity, “Hairdryer? Microwave?”
“It was a bit more complicated, but sure. They were scared the freezing process could cause, uh– what was it, Jim?”
“Irreparable brain and nerve damage. Providing you woke up in the first place, obviously.”
“But you were frozen too,” Bruce pointed out, turning then to face Soldier, brows knitted together in confusion.“They told us you had been in cryo but there was no permanent physical damage. They let you back on the field?”
The Soldier stiffened. Not used to all the attention on him, used to shrinking away and disappearing — all spies were, she knew too well – but here he couldn’t hide. He had that look in his eyes again, the same one she’d seen on the Quinjet and the first time she’d met him years before, like a cornered animal scared and looking for something to sink its teeth into. Steve put a hand on his leg.
“Not everyone gets a choice,” He said, something steely in his voice, “SHIELD decided the risk was worth it.”
—♱—
They all split up after dinner. The tension eased, slow like melting ice. Bruce and Tony sequestered themselves upstairs to shower and call Hill, Clint taking another round of laps around the coffee table to call Laura and the kids, wish them goodnight and promise that things would be okay. Nat stayed in the kitchen with Alpine in her lap, hand curled around a glass of wine.
Steve and the Soldier – she should probably start calling him something real, now, like James or Jim or Bucky – were out on the back porch. She spied them through the screen door, their silhouettes fuzzy, illuminated by the pale glow of the yellow porch light.
They talked, voices soft, their bodies leaning into eachother on instinct. and then Steve pressed his forehead to Jim’s shoulder. He fisted two hands in Jim’s shirt. His shoulders lifted and fell, heavy, and for a brief moment Natasha thought he might be crying. He breathed in, slow and deep, as if inhaling the scent of Jim and committing it to memory.
“Don’t you ever,” Steve’s voice cracked, low and thick like something was caught in his throat, “Don’t you ever do that to me again. Don’t leave like that. I lost you once already.”
He murmured something into the crook of Jim’s neck that sounded a lot like Jim , or James , or Bucky , or maybe Please , I love you, Please, Don’t go .
It was there, then, that Natasha realised just how young Steve and Jim looked. Were. Had been.
There was a history between them that spanned years, decades, transcended life and death. So much love lost to time, she thought.
She could see it, she thought. Living here. Being happy. Out on the porch – in the summers, when Jim wasn’t away, they would sit out there in the evenings with citronella candles and a pack of smokes, using an old ceramic mug as an ashtray. They would play cards and eat tinned fruit, sweet and syrupy, and drink the same beers they’d drunk when they were twenty. She could almost feel it, then, the sticky-hot-heavy of the air on her skin, the way it would settle like a blanket, Steve’s flushed face and ears and chest, the soft glisten of his arms in a tank top.
Bucky settled his hand at the nape of Steve’s neck, fingers curling. The real, flesh hand. He smelled heady, like old aftershave and orange peel and the greasy aloe vera lotion he always slathered on after showers. He hummed against Steve’s perfumed skin.
“There’s not gonna be enough room for the four of them,” Steve said into the crown of Jim’s hair, still damp, “There’s a guest room. We can probably fit two of them in there. Someone on the couch”
“We can put Tony out on the porch,” Jim suggested. Steve could only laugh wetly.