heroic_jawline | Entries tagged with steve's sadness errands

Peggy's funeral was on a beautiful morning, crisp air and a blue sky in October.

Steve didn't see any of it. He was locked in on putting one foot in front of the other and not breaking down in front of a cathedral full of strangers: thousands of people crammed in to pay their respects for all of the aspects that the vibrant, complicated, world-changing woman Margaret Carter had been.

Steve and the rest of the pallbearers (he was shouldering her up front, on her left. It felt correct.), made their way down the center aisle, and he was doing okay right up until he saw the photo they'd chosen to feature on the altar: Peggy from probably 1945 or so, leaping out of his memory and into sepia tones, staring back at him fiercely.

Chin up, now, Steve, a voice that sounded like hers chided in his head. Fifty feet to go. Twenty. Time to put the casket onto the catafalque, step away, let her go.

His mouth wobbled when his hand brushed against the Union Jack covering the casket as he made his way back to his seat, sliding in between Sam and Tony. His Tony. The other one was somewhere else in the press of mourners and hopefully far enough off that no one was going to notice that there were two Tony Starks at the funeral.

Steve let out a slow breath and blinked his reddened eyes. Thank God he didn't have to speak.

( Where everything is sad and awful. )

[OOC: Continuing from here.]

To call the Macau mission a shitshow was probably an insult to shitshows.

The Avengers had been chasing hints of HYDRA trying to get its hands on chemical and biological weapons for months now, and the rumor of a warehouse in Macau had been the first solid, actionable lead they'd had on it. Tony'd begged off coming because of a test he had for some kind of interactive virtual reality program--binarily augmented something something--and so Steve had led the rest of the team into a trap.

The trap they'd anticipated. The HYDRA base being five sublevels under a fireworks factory, though, had made for a two day long fire when HYDRA had blown the facility up.

And the Chinese government had yelled--publicly, loudly, pointedly--through all of it: about American invasion under the guise of Avenger intervention, about overreach, about the lack of solid evidence of HYDRA even being involved. Steve had sat through five briefings, seven press conferences, and three "call Captain America, personally, a tool of American propaganda to his face" meetings.

He was finally, finally back somewhere he could change out of his uniform, take a shower, and read any messages that hadn't been sent by Maria Hill on his phone.

That was when he realized it was now Friday and he'd missed his appointment with Peggy.

"Shit," he said with feeling, tossing his shield into the corner of the room and listening to it clang.

[OOC: Establishy!]

"We're terribly sorry, Captain Rogers," the receptionist said, and she was very sincere about it. It just wasn't at all what Steve wanted to hear today. "We're going to have to reschedule you."

"But you rescheduled me to today from last week," Steve said

She nodded, glancing at her computer screen. "And I apologize, but the family really thinks it's better at this time keep her visitor list contained."

"I've been coming every week for years now," Steve said, sounding frustrated.

"You'll really have to reach out to them, I'm afraid," the receptionist said.

Steve blew out a breath and nodded, keeping his frustrations to himself. "Maybe I'll see you next week," he said quietly. "Thank you."

[OOC: Establishy, NFB!]

Steve came into the shop and let his shield drop to the ground with a muted clang. He wiped at the dust on his face, then squared his shoulders with visible effort and called out, "Tony? You around?"

Another lead, another fruitless Bucky search, this time in stupidly muggy Singapore. Steve needed a shower, a pizza or three, and a nap.

And a hug, but he was kind of hoping he wouldn't need to ask for one of those.

"I'm back!" he added a little needlessly.

After class, Steve had put on his dress blues and headed to the section of Arlington Cemetary devoted to the fallen of World War II. He hadn't been looking for particular names--he'd just felt a sense of duty to acknowledge the depth of sacrifice they had made.

He'd run into a few veterans in their nineties visiting friends and relatives with their kids and grandkids. It still took his breath away to see how frail his contemporaries were now, but he put on a polite smile, listened to them reiminesce about buddies and battles and terrible, terrible food, and then made his way back to Fandom as quickly as he could.

He was now in the kitchen looking discretely around for the Thor-enhanced bottle of booze. "JARVIS, can you be a pal and tell me where it was stashed?" he asked.

[OOC: For the roomie and epic SP.]

"Hello, again, Captain Rogers," the front desk assistant greeted him. Her eyes slid over to Steve's friend and widened slightly in recognition. "And...guest. Peggy will be so happy to see you both."

Steve smiled back over the bouquet of lilies he'd brought. "Hi. Is it a good day?"

The assistant nodded cautiously. "So far."

Steve took a deep breath and walked towards Peggy's room. "She'll love to meet you, Tony," he said earnestly. "It'll be nice."

[OOC: For his partner in sadness errands!]

Steve had done a fair number of difficult things in his life: growing up sickly and with a big mouth in the Great Depression hadn't exactly been a fast track to a life free of bruises. Fighting in a war hadn't exactly been a lark, and that train in the Alps...even now, his mind skittered away from reliving that, and his crash of the Valkyrie.

But he could feel his hands shaking as he faced this closed, plain, wooden door in a building that smelled like heavy-duty cleaners, dying flowers, and baby powder. He blew out a breath, squared his shoulders, and opened the door. She'd been waiting 70 years. How he felt about this was immaterial.

"Steve?" came a quavery voice from an old woman in the bed before him, and for a moment he could feel his heart crack in two. This was what had happened to his vibrant, beautiful knockout of a dame? Time was horribly cruel.

"Hello, Peg," he whispered, coming closer.

"It's been so long," she managed through tears.

He smiled through his own. "I couldn't leave my best girl," he said, reaching out to take her hand. "Not when she owed me a dance."

[OOC: Yes, I'm terrible. In my defense, the Russos started it.]

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Steve Rogers

Entries tagged with steve's sadness errands

London, England [Sunday morning, NFB]

Avengers HQ, Friday morning, Upstate New York [NFB]

Peggy Carter's Assisted Living Facility, Wednesday morning

Stark Industries, Saturday afternoon

Above Stark Industries, Monday night

Peggy's Assisted Living Home, Saturday afternoon [NFB due to distance]

Nursing Home, Washington DC (Sunday afternoon)

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