I Thought You Were Different: Part 6

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"Is she on the way?" Steve asked Tony shakily, sitting in the quintet, his hand pressed firmly into the gunshot wound that took you down. It unnerved him how you didn't so much as wince at the pressure, but not nearly as much as the fact that you hadn't opened your eyes yet since he and Tony carried you to the bench where you laid now. You had lost a lot of blood before he could stop it; it still covered his uniform and seeped into the pores of his hands from carrying you. This was all too familiar to him, even with so many years passed; he and Tony had been witness to your near-death on this very same jet, and it was all that Steve could do to keep himself together, and it was only for your sake at that.

"Yes," Tony muttered under his breath. He was feeling much of what Steve was experiencing, his hands wrung so desperately that they were blanched of color and sensation, as if he had worn them down to the bone. His anxiety was whispering to him, just at the edge of consciousness, but he held it back. He wouldn't succumb to it while you needed strength around you. Maybe later it would have its way with him, but not now. "Helen's diverting us to a hospital in the city. Both she and Bruce feel that's best and that they can't do enough at the compound's infirmary."

"Okay...that sounds good. Better."

"This is your fault, you know?"

"Tony, not now..."

"I think now is the perfect time," your father continued on. He wouldn't look up at Steve, his focus on his hands being the only thing keeping him in control. "She told you to go back to the jet. You're not a goddamn super soldier anymore, Steve. One shot in the right place, and you're done. I don't know if she still has...if...if the serum she got is still working, but in that moment, she was right for all she knew. Your ego got in the way and look at where we are."

"I'm well aware of where we are," Steve snapped, his jaw tight with indignation. "I have my hand in her back, Stark, keeping her blood in her body. I haven't seen anything that makes me think that she's healing on her own, and she hasn't opened her eyes once. Don't forget, I know exactly where you are too. You took off for Anthony without any backup when you haven't worn that suit in active duty in years. You didn't wait for us, and both of you could have been killed. Did you ever think about that? That you were risking my son's life too?"

"No, don't you dare twist this on me," Tony warned, finally standing to face him, "I went after your son because he let his hot-headed Rogers side take over! He thought he could find the answers on his own, going to that bunker in Siberia of all damn places! He knows what went down there, Steve, and he knew that they could be there. But fuck it all, right? That's what he got from you."

"You son of a-" Steve began, but both his and Tony's phones buzzed simultaneously to cut him off. It was as if the universe had spoken for you to shut them up. With his hand busy keeping you stable, he looked to Stark to give him the answer. "What is it?"

"Shuri and T'Challa are on the way, too," he sighed. "Banner must have called them. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing."

"Maybe she has an answer to all of this?"

"Maybe...but I'm stuck in a cycle of pessimism right now."

Steve looked down at you, your stillness sending a shiver down his spine, "(Y/N) could have called them before we left. It wouldn't be out of character for her to be working on her own to help me and Buck. She helps everyone, no matter what the cost to her."

"So why is she the one who always ends up suffering for it? What shit law of nature won't give her a break? Hasn't she done and been through enough?"

"For several lifetimes, yeah."

"Well, you'd know," Tony scoffed, "not everyone gets more than one."