Infatuation | Bucky Barnes

Chapter Fifty Four

Catherine sat in the living room of the Avengers Compound watching William color. She held Bucky's dog tags in her hand, running her thumb over the raised letters. He had taken them off for their wedding. He wanted to look his best he told her. In the midst of the chaos that day, he forgot to put them back on. She had grabbed them after the fight and carried them for the past five years.

She felt defeated after watching them test the Quantum Realm. It worked, but not the way they wanted it to. The team was spread all over the world. Bruce and Rocket were trying to recruit Thor and Natasha was in Japan trying to find Clint. She stood up from the couch and walked over to William who was focused on his picture.

"It looks good Will." She complimented him. "I have something for you."

William's eyes lit up. "Like a gift?"

Catherine chuckled at his excitement. "Kind of. These belonged to your dad. I want you to have them."

William inspected the dog tags with curious eyes. "What is it?"

"It's his dog tags. He was in the Army with Uncle Steve. You have to be super careful with them though." She explained.

William nodded and she saw Tony approach out of the corner of her. She looked at him surprised. He hasn't set foot in this compound since Morgan was born.  The two adults stepped to the side.

"It's works. The quantum realm." Tony told her surprised.

Catherine felt a gasp escape her mouth. "D-Does this mean..."

She couldn't even finish her sentence. She had tears forming in her eyes. She threw herself into Tony's arms.

"Thank you." She whispered.

"Happy's here. I think it would be best that he takes William to my house. I don't want him anywhere near this place when we start messing with time." Tony explained.

"Okay." Catherine said softly.

Catherine gave Happy a key to her place so he could get William a few things while they were at the compound. She knelt down in front of her son outside. She didn't want to say good bye, but it was safer this way.

"Are you going to get daddy back?" William asked.

Catherine gave him a forced smile. "We're going to try. I need you to go stay with Aunt Pepper okay? It won't be for long I promise."

"Okay. I love you mommy." William said.

Catherine wrapped him in a tight hug she didn't want to lose him too, but the world needed her.

"I love you too Will. So much." She told him.

It took them a day to figure out the linguistics of their plan. They didn't have many Pym Particles, so they had to choose the point in time very carefully. Natasha was the one who figured out that in the year 2012, three of the stones were in New York. They would split up into three teams; Rhodey and Nebula would go to Morag. Thor and Rocket would go to Asgard, Clint and Natasha would go to Benatar and Steve, Scott, Tony and Catherine would go back to New York.

Catherine checked her suit for the thousandth time. She was nervous, incredibly nervous. She honestly felt like she was going to throw up. There were so many things that could go wrong. So many things had to go right as well. She wanted this to work. She couldn't fail again.

"You okay?" Steve asked quietly after his speech.

Catherine looked up at him. "Yeah."

"If this works...w-what happens to us?" Steve asked.