Man Out of Time - A Captain America / Avengers Fanfiction

Chapter 46

Chapter 46

"I've got to go, love," Steve whispered in her ear.

Bernice's eyes shot open, dreading those awful words. Oh, how she had dreaded those awful words, clinging to him late into the night, unable to sleep, until exhaustion had finally overtaken her. He'd gone on missions while they had been dating, casually mentioning he had to go away for a few days and would call when he could. She had seen pictures of the original invasion, grainy security footage from black and white security cameras and fuzzy images shot from cell phones of what he did for work. But that was just some hero on the kid's trading card. Not her Steve.

Even after she had begun to develop feelings for him, those images had seemed unreal. As though it were somebody else's boyfriend on the videos. Not her Steve. It was some other Steve. A bold superhero in red, white and blue armor wearing a mask. The man Jacquie had warned her could get any girl he wanted. Not the sensitive, tongue-tied artist with the sad eyes and the even more tragic past.

But then she had stood on the Statue of Liberty and kissed the man she loved goodbye, her birds-eye perch forcing her to SEE what he did for work. His impassioned visit to her apartment afterward, battered and wounded, and his declaration of love. Three days his souped-up metabolism had cast him into a near-coma so his body would heal, making her see first-hand he could be hurt as badly as any other guy. The fact that all of a sudden she had so damned much to lose!

"Steve, I'm scared." Tears welled into her eyes.

"It's just a reconnaissance mission," Steve said, holding her tight. "The aliens are probably long gone."

"You'll put your armor on before you get there?"

"You have my word."

He should have left right away. Completed his normal routine of a ten-mile run, sparring with whoever was there early enough to help him warm up, and breakfast at Thelma's diner. But he lingered, as reluctant to leave her as she was to let him leave. There was a poignant, almost desperate quality to their lovemaking. As though she might not ever see him again. Was this what all military wives went through each time they sent their husbands off to war? He had warned her of this before he asked her to marry him. That the life of a soldier was hard. But this was the first time she had ever felt it in her heart.

As soon as the doorway clicked behind him, Bernice curled up into a ball and cried.

X

Steve buckled the jump harness of the C-17 Globemaster and closed his eyes, ears popping as the aircraft heaved itself into the air. All around him, a contingent of Marines changing planes at Fort Dix was hopping a ride as far as Camp Pendleton. Or more precisely, they were hopping a ride with the Marines. Their jump harnesses were jammed along the fuselage while, in the middle of the cargo bay, his TAV-8B Harrier II jet as well as some new toys Tony Stark had hybridized with retro-engineered Chitauri technology were strapped to the floor. The aliens had rigged their equipment to self-destruct, but they had underestimated the engineering genius of Tony Stark. And the people he hired.

Like Bernice…

He couldn't help but smile. Bernice. Who would have thought something as simple as saying two little words, 'I do,' would change everything? It felt as though all of the excuses he had made to keep his hopes and dreams realistic so he wouldn't be disappointed in life had suddenly disappeared. She was his now. And that knowledge made him not care whether Nick Fury believed there was something fishy about Natasha or the other Avengers thought he was going bonkers. It felt … it felt as though the load he'd been carrying all these years had suddenly been lifted from his shoulders because now he had somebody to talk to about it instead of simply staring at the empty wall of his apartment.