Romanogers - Oneshots

See you again

A blinding light fills the room. Steve is dazzled for a second as a shock wave ripples outwards from the centre of their circle, where Bruce cripples in pain. After a second the light dims and he drops to the floor unconscious, gauntlet landing with a crash a few feet away. For a second everyone freezes, before immediately rushing to Bruce's side. Tony jets water all over his right arm, blackened and burned by the sheer power of the stones.

Briefly, their minds forget the entire intention of the moment. They've been waiting at the edge for so long and have finally dived, but no one waits to see if they've hit the water.

And then Clint's phone rings. Its vibrations emanate from the place on the tabletop, over the groans of Bruce and the comforting murmurs of Thor and Tony. Everyone's head snaps towards it. A look comes over Clint's face. An expression of shock and fear replaces concern as he stumbles over and picks it up, staring at the screen and whimpering for a second before swiping across.
"Hi." He swallows. "Laura."

A million thoughts rush through Steve's head in that second, but there's only one clear one.
It worked.

He's on his feet in a second. All he can hear is a rushing sound, the thumping of his heart. He's dizzy with the longing for it to be true.

"Steve?" Tony looks back at him, confused.
"It worked." Is all he says before sprinting out of the doors.
An expression of enlightenment comes over Tony as the cogs turn, understanding clicking into place. "Oh."

His legs are a blur as he runs full pelt down the stairs. He doesn't even take the last flight, instead vaulting over the railing and landing loudly six feet below. He runs to the doors and flings them open, racing out and looking around desperately.

He's searching for the spot, the exact square of grass, where he hugged her, whispered in her ear, held her, as her body disintegrated, blowing away on a nonexistent breeze before comprehension had even begun to dawn. Where the warmth turned to cold ash, dry and brittle to the touch. Where his heart broke.

Eyes combing every ridge of his surroundings, wild with fear and desperation, he stumbles over the grass. They land on her suddenly, without warning. She's just all of a sudden there. Steve freezes for what feels like an hour, though it's barely a few seconds, as all the air goes out of him. Her eyes, clouded with bewilderment, land on him and focus.
"Steve...?" A tiny exhale.

And they suddenly run, flat out sprint towards each other. They collide halfway, bodies melding at once into one as they embrace, arms wrapping around each other in a crushing embrace. At some point they drop to their knees, legs suddenly weak, just as the others burst through the doors.
"Natasha...Oh. Oh God, oh God, oh God. Natasha. Natasha oh my god." He whispers as they rock, heads buried in the other's shoulder.

They extricate their limbs, hands finding each other's faces. He cups hers in his. She looks up at him, eyes wide.
"Steve...It's really you." Her hands rest over his collarbone.
"Nat. Oh my god, Nat." A tear trickles down his cheek, but Steve is not ashamed.
"Do not invoke the lord's name in vain, Steven." She manages to whisper between shakes. He feels his lips crack into a tiny smile, the first in quite literal years. It hurts, and he feels the skin split as the corners of his mouth crease. But the pain is good. The euphoria of just seeing her face again, living, breathing, alive with animation, eyes awake, sparky, is intoxicating. He feels dizzy with it, a million thoughts rushing through his head, like fleeting butterflies, each intangible.

He cups her face, stroking her cheeks, gazing unapologetically, trying to absorb every detail he can, memorise every curve and ridge, all the colours, the tumbling emerald hues of her eyes, the bright white-blonde of her hair...A sight for sore eyes. Her image is a salve on a sore wound. Once it might have been salt, the photographs a taunt to what was so obviously gone. But now it's just a relief to see her.

"I missed you so much. You don't understand how much I missed you."
"I'm glad I'm a revelation and not a disappointment."
"Promise...promise you'll never leave again. Never leave me again, Natasha."
"I hesitate to remind you that the choice was hardly mine."
He laughs then, a sound so foreign, a feeling alien as the mirth rips through his throat and he kisses her forehead.

Her thumb smooths over his face, clean-shaven, and the various scrapes and he's acquired as a result of carelessness in the gym.
"Could have looked after yourself a bit better."
"What, without you to do my laundry?"
She chuckles and he gazes, enthralled, basking in the warmth.
I love you, he wants to say.

"You're getting reckless in your old age, Rogers. Dangerously impulsive. I was just getting used to the beard and then you have to go and shear it all off. What will it be next? Sideburns? Nail varnish?" She shakes her head in mockery.
"To shave or not to shave, that is the question." He quips. Dear god I love you.

And it's only a few seconds after that when the others descend on them both, helping her off the ground, hugging her tight, talking, everyone talks so loud. The group is jubilant in their celebrations at the return of their friend, their sister, and though Steve talks and laughs and hugs right alongside everyone else, he can't help but feel like an outsider in terms of emotion. Sure, he loves her. Just in a way that's unique in amongst all the sibling love.

It's only outside the party when they speak again, having been whisked apart, the group a barrier.

He waits for the bathroom, foot tapping impatiently. Tony might be a genius, but one design floor when it comes to the compound is the seeming lack of toilets. Two on each floor, when each stretches miles, is not enough.

The door opens suddenly and there stands Natasha. They stare at each other for a moment and a current passes between, before crashing their heads together, lips grating immediately as they take each other's faces forcefully in their hands. His thumbs rest on her cheeks, fingers raking through the short blonde tresses while hers cradle his face, crushing him to her further in futile effort to flush their bodies closer.
"You don't understand." He murmurs in between. "The way I missed you..."
"Shhh, Steve."
"I love you more than anything." There's a silence and a hesitance as the kiss slows, Natasha shoving the words out of her mouth in reply.
"I love you."

Their lips meet again and he lifts her, pinning her against the door.
They want it so badly. The grate of the other's skin on there's, the warmth, the dancing electricity, it's the thing they've craved for ages, or no time at all. For Natasha it seems like an hour, though for Steve it's been half a decade. They both wonder in that moment, who got the shorter end of the stick?

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