𝐀𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐧𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭 | 𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐯𝐞 𝐑𝐨𝐠𝐞𝐫𝐬

Letting Go

"𝘼𝙡𝙡 𝙄 𝙚𝙫𝙚𝙧 𝙠𝙣𝙚𝙬 𝙘𝙧𝙖𝙨𝙝𝙚𝙙 𝙙𝙤𝙬𝙣. 𝙒𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙄 𝙬𝙤𝙧𝙠𝙚𝙙 𝙤𝙣 𝙨𝙤 𝙝𝙖𝙧𝙙 𝙞𝙨 𝙣𝙤𝙬 𝙜𝙤𝙣𝙚. 𝙄 𝙝𝙖𝙫𝙚 𝙣𝙤𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙩𝙤 𝙨𝙝𝙤𝙬 𝙛𝙤𝙧 𝙞𝙩."

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────  

Seren paced back and forth in front of Chloe's hospital room. She only stopped when she heard her name and this time, for the sake of the situation, she would forgive the usage of the annoying nickname.

"Twinkle Star, how is she?" Tony did a half sprint down the hallway until he reached Seren.

"Just like she's been in the past few days, in and out. She's had to be sedated each time," Seren glanced at the open doorway of Chloe's room.

"Why?" Tony would only peek in slightly for the moment. He wanted the full story before he took a look at the residential kid.

"Because each time she's awake, she freaks out," Seren said with a sigh.

"What does she freak out about?"

Seren felt monumentally guilty each time Chloe had her breakdown as she came out of the sedatives. "We can't quite understand everything she says. She's kind of screaming and crying. The gist I would say is that she says things are so loud and, of course, she's in pain."

"Okay," Tony rubbed a finger over his nose, "What-what exactly happened? What physically happened here? Because I gotta tell you the news is all over the place, and it's all about you and your crew."

"Where do I even start?" Seren let her arms flap on her sides. "S.H.I.E.L.D. is done, Tony. It's over."

"What? What do you mean it's done? How-how is it 'done'?"

"I mean like it's gone," Seren said sharply. "More than that, SHIELD never existed. It turns out HYDRA infiltrated it the moment it was founded all those years ago." Tony's face went into shock but Seren wasn't going to give him the chance to react just yet. "Every base, every mission, was infiltrated from the start so it's very hard to tell what missions were actually funded by SHIELD and which ones were for HYDRA. We fought and then found out that Steve's supposedly dead best friend wasn't so dead in the end. In fact, he's very much alive."

"The Sargeant?" Tony's eyes widened.

Seren nodded. "HYDRA had him for 70 years, brainwashed and committing assassinations."

"Hold on—"

Seren raised a finger to him that she wasn't done yet. "And it turns out that you were right about Chloe's sketchy record with S.H.I.E.L.D. This whole time she and Fury were trying to figure out who within the place was trying to kill her. It's why she was always doing solo missions. It was a cover to be on the run."

"HYDRA?" Tony took the only logical guess.

"Ding-ding, point for Stark," Seren muttered. "They had a second Hivemind tech piece that they implanted on her. I had to fight her—I burned her hand to try to get the tech out of her palm. We fought S.H.I.E.L.D. until it crumbled to the ground. It's gone and now here we are, left picking up the pieces we care about."

Tony's head turned towards Chloe's room. "I see. And the Sargeant? Where's he now?"

Seren shrugged her shoulders. "Your guess is as good as mine. He pulled Steve out of the river and took off. He didn't say a word to me."

"Why would he? You're nothing to him," Tony said matter-of-factly, missing the way Seren glared at him for it. He walked into Chloe's room, leaving her to follow. "Where's Rogers right now?"