Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

 There are forms for everything when it comes to SHIELD, and whatever forms SHIELD doesn’t have, Stark Industries does. Darcy has to sign her name so many times she starts doubting how it's even spelled, staring at the five letters that make up her first name and sincerely doubting their order.

 Among these forms are plans, backups, backups for the backups. There are plans in place for everything from a(nother) alien invasion, residency changes both intergalactic and international, time travel, what to do when faced with your identical clone, and even what to do in the event of a carnivorous plant outbreak.

 Darcy really hopes some of those are hoaxes, some hazing for the new kids, but given that while she and Jane technically work for Stark Industries, SHIELD is just as involved since it’s Avengers-adjacent, she signs them, putting Jane down as her emergency contact, and packs up to move to New York.

 Moving is chaos. Moving is hell. Doing it in the swamp-ass weather during what New York jokingly calls "summer", Darcy comes to understand that she did something heinous in her past life and that moving herself, Jane, and all their lab equipment both up in the tower and down into the basement, was her punishment.

 "Why are labs always in basements?" she groans, shoving a machine harshly against the wall. She either doesn't notice, or doesn't care that the bright red sticker with 'fragile' in large writing flutters to the floor with the motion. "Couldn't we set up in the lobby, not thirty-five floors down?"

 "It's only twenty floors," Jane mutters absently, not looking up from the screen she's been glued to since it kicked on.

 "I need coffee."

 At that, Jane perks up. "Oh, and poptarts. Name brand only."

 Darcy spares her a withering glace, full of pity. "Jane. We're in New York, New York on the payroll of one Tony friggen Stark. We can afford gourmet poptarts now."

 "There are gourmet poptarts?"

 "Oh, I guarantee someone on TikTok has done that." Lighting fast, Darcy whips out her phone. "Give me two minutes to check. Then maybe get some of the goons pretending they’re not checking out our lab to help haul this stuff. I’m not built for hard labor.”

 Jane rolls her eyes, turning back to the screen. She jots something down on the clipboard in her hands, and Darcy asks whoever’s listening up there for patience. Stark gave them tablets to use for a reason, and the reason is Jane’s chicken-scratch would make a doctor question if there were even words written if presented with a sample of her writing. Darcy’s come close to cracking the code- she knows the “secret” codes Jane uses for all her stuff, the problem is reading the damn thing- but even she still has to ask for translations.

 Maybe Thor doing some Asgard-magic stuff for Allspeak or whatever he calls it to her head wouldn’t be a bad idea. If nothing else, she could maybe finally translate Janes notes for the logs (notes about how Asgard magic could possibly be used for human travel, ironically). Darcy knows Jane won’t ever do it herself, which is half the reason she’d put in for an assistant in the first place.

 Darcy’s since stopped her own studies temporarily, suddenly unsure about a career in politics, or even politics adjacent since… well, everything really. The government’s actions in recent years have lead to Darcy questioning everything, from the way the country is run, to their place in the universe, to what she can do to make things better. For Jane, for the Avengers, for herself, for people in general.

 She’d never given it more than a passing thought before. Logically, she knows they’re a small speck of dust floating through space in the grand scheme of things, but it took aliens destroying London, and oddly, meeting Tony in person for her to really stop and think.

 If Tony ever finds out he inadvertently changed the entire course of Darcy’s life he’d never let her forget it, and the man’s full enough of himself as it is. Darcy doesn’t really feel like contributing to that. I mean, the man already got Pepper Potts to be with him, it doesn’t really get any better than that. He’s peaked, and it’ll be a hellish day for all of them if he ever realizes that.

 Because with Tony came files. So, so many files, and data that actually caused her old computer to brick itself, only able to be read on the computers Tony had dropped off with their new contracts. And suddenly, the people she’d admired from afar were very real villains that were interfering directly with her life. And she does mean her life- Darcy had been followed around far too many times than she is comfortable with, and more times than she’d known about. She found her own file in the data dump Tony dropped off, and to her surprise, her threat level had been one higher than Jane’s. Hence why they work for Stark Industries specifically, and not SHIELD.

 On paper, Jane’s a scientist who assists Tony with research and development that furthers the study of otherworldly matter.

 (“Oh my god, Jane you’re an alien scientist for Iron Man.”)

 And on paper, Darcy is “Lab Assistant.”

 (“You couldn’t put Alien Scientist Wrangler? I guess people really do mellow with age.”

 “JARVIS, change Lewis’s title immediately. And put her in charge of naming things from now on.”)

 She’s been with Jane for years now, neck bent, head bowed as she watches screens for Jane. She can disassemble and reassemble any equipment in the lab in under an hour, and move the entire thing in two days barring travel time. She knows how to harass Jane into sleeping at normal times, and eating something that at least resembles food. She routinely hacks into SHIELD's computers just to prove that they can’t keep her out. Against her will, she began to pick up math and astrophysics just by basking in the glow of the geniuses she feeds and waters and walks.

 And now, some part of her, a part of her that’s getting bigger, has started to look up at the skies as well. And wonder.

 She won’t be a lab assistant forever. She shouldn’t even still be one, not since she finished up all her Gen ED classes, got caught up in an alien invasion, kept Jane from falling apart, freed Erik, moved them back across the pond… and just kind of kept being Jane’s assistant. No one has asked her to her face what she’s still doing with Jane, but Darcy knows she won’t leave Jane until forced.

 And amazingly, Jane won’t tell Darcy to go unless she really has to.

 She’s satisfied, even happy with life right now. But she’s starting to wonder about the next steps.

 So Darcy pulls out her phone, hip propped up on a desk that wobbles, and searches “gourmet poptarts” while Jane mutters about updates, BIOS, and pretends she knows how to connect the computers to the network.

 The scene has escalated by the time Tony walks in with Bruce: Darcy is laying flat on her back on the no longer wobbly desk, a random shunt of wood serving as a balance, her phone held over her face as an impossibly beautiful woman explains how to use pie crust and homemade filling to make your own poptarts. And Jane is on the floor under the desk on her knees, a defeated look on her face, an outdated HDMI cable wrapped around her fist and snaking up her arm to tangle around her shoulders. She’s shaking a fistfull of cables at Darcy, who only smirks.

 “I told you if you started doing it alone I wouldn’t bail you out. Manage your own cables, Foster.”

 “I’ll get a new assistant,” Jane threatens, no heat in her voice.

 “No, you won’t.”

 “No, I won’t,” Jane immediately agrees, tossing the cables at Darcy. “I’m just going to make you do it.”

 “I always do it,” Darcy says, huffing. “That’s why I told you not to. You always get them tangled.”

 “Why are there so many cables? I thought we were in the wireless age!”

 Lazily, Darcy removes one hand from her phone and uses it to point at Tony. “He’s the computer guy. Have him do it.”

 “Uh, I’m the boss. I don’t hook up computers.”

 Now Darcy does look up, if only to give him an amused look before going right back to her phone. She’s deep into baking TikTok and she doesn’t plan on getting up if she doesn’t have to. The lab might be air conditioned, but it’s still swampy out, and the sweat under her breast band hasn’t quite dried yet.

 “Pepper’s the boss and we all know it.”

 Tony nods once, sharply. “Good, so long as we’re all caught up. Hand me those cables.”

 While Tony gets them online, JARVIS helpfully providing an assist when needed, Darcy sets about getting them all dinner, mentally calculating how long it’s been since Jane ate, how long they’ve been in the building, and how much more equipment they have to hook up. New Lab Jane is stubborn, basically deaf to anything other than the sounds of machines powering up, and Darcy’s not fully confident she could get anything in her that’s not some form of pastry for the next thirty-six hours.

 She’s almost happy that Tony is assembling the equipment at lightning speed, but she realizes the error in having three scientists in one room vs only one assistant when she spots Bruce reading one of Jane’s papers. He’s pointing to something, gesturing excitedly, and Jane’s face lights up. Then Tony notices, and all hope of feeding Jane something with protein in it goes out the window when he swaggers over, trying desperately to act like he’s not interested.

 “Oh no,” she manages, and gets to her feet, but it’s too late.

 Three pairs of excited, almost manic eyes pin her in place, and she doesn’t even try to argue with them.

 “I’ll make you guys coffee if you all drink a glass of water first, and eat the sandwiches I’m about to go upstairs and make you.” Three heads bob as one, almost like an agreement, but none come back up from the paper as she walks out the door. “You owe me,” she says to no one, aware they’re not listening.

 They haven’t even set up their living quarters yet, but arranging her clothes and music is infinitely more appealing to her than zip tying cables and translating Jane’s ancient runes she insists are handwriting. She’ll slap some sandwiches together, make them drink some water, and get started on making her place home.

 Since she’s feeling nice, she might even get Jane’s started too. She might need to, otherwise the other woman would live out of her carry-on for weeks, and there’s only so many times Darcy will wash someone else’s laundry if she’s not sleeping with them. Last time Darcy had attempted to let Jane manage her own time, at Jane’s insistence, she’ll add, Jane lived off orange fanta, stale poptarts, and two clean shirts for almost two weeks.

 At least now she gets paid to babysit. And the room was free, so she can actually save for once. And maybe, just maybe, she’ll figure out the rest of her life while Jane cracks intergalactic space travel for humans.

 After a week, Jane is satisfied with the state of her lab, and Darcy is comfortable in her quarters. The colorful space is an eclectic mix of rock and roll and what her first roommate had called “90’s witch aesthetic", ruthlessly organized into cheerful chaos. The never-once-used labeled kitchen containers she’d bought once a whim might have two year old, clumped together sugar and assorted spices of unknown expiration dates in them, but they’re proudly displayed on her counters nonetheless.

 She has kitchen counters, and an actual kitchen, with an actual stove, oven, full sized fridge, and eating space. Darcy prays to the gods of DoorDash and UberEats most of the time, but she admires the lovely granite countertops anyway. The fridge is certainly the biggest and cleanest smelling fridge that’s housed her leftovers in recent memory. The entire space is almost too much for just Darcy, but she loves it. Her stuff used to be crammed everywhere, but now it all has space to breathe, with an extra room to boot.

 She’s about 99% sure Jane will take over the spare room when Thor isn’t around, and it suits them both down to the ground.

 Since Jane hasn’t bothered to do it properly yet, Darcy sets about unpacking the other woman’s things. She doesn’t put them away- that feels like a step too far- but she lays it all out and puts the suitcases away in the massive hall closet Jane’s quarters boast. The kitchen is even bigger here, and Darcy knows full well it’ll remain entirely empty, most likely for months, until Jane gets sick of stealing Darcy’s leftovers and starts ordering her own.

 A box of cereal (Frosted Flakes), an ancient summer sausage still in it’s plastic wrap, and what most likely used to be an orange greets Darcy from the depths of the single box marked ‘kitchen’ she found among Jane’s things. She’s pretty sure the cereal was actually hers originally, but she sets it on the counter for Jane anyways and tosses the orange in the trash on her way out. Jane will have to put her clothes away in order to use her bed, and Darcy made sure to spread all her important notebooks on the couch to ensure that one or the other will be dealt with before Jane sleeps.

 Jane’s apartment is bigger and altogether more grand than Darcy’s, which is fair. Jane is the super amazing, brilliant scientist with like twelve degrees that was hired to work with Tony Stark and the Avengers themselves, as an expert in her field.

 And Darcy’s a Lab Assistant.

 And without her, there would be no scientists to assist in the lab. So she’ll take the smaller place, two floors down from Jane, collect her check, and bask in the glory that is living rent-free in New York City.

 Practically skipping into the elevator, Darcy comes face to face with Clint Barton.

 “Oh hey,” she says, like she knows him. She’s got a killer smile, Clint notes. “Barton, cool. I was wondering when I’d meet you. Darcy.”

 He knows who she is, of course. No one is invited to live in the building without a screening so thorough even Nat calls it excessive, so he knows about Darcy. He wonders if she knows he followed her around in New Mexico for a while on Coulson’s orders: they’d been curious about the girl who whipped up a fake ID so good it almost passed their screening in under two hours with almost no supplies.

 Darcy’s been on SHIELD’s radar for a while. He followed her, pointed an arrow at her friend, and complied a file on her. Since she’s friends with Stark, she probably knows that, and she still smiles at him.

 “Clint,” he says, taking her offered hand. “Nice to meet you.”

 “Nice to not be stalked by you. Thanks for not shooting me in New Mexico, by the way.” That smile never fades. “Going down?”

 By the time they get to the labs, Clint’s decided he needs to be friends with Darcy. As if sensing Clint making a connection she isn’t privy to, Nat is already waiting for them, her fake, people pleasing smile on her face as she introduces herself.

 It takes less than five minutes for the smile to become genuine.

 “Jane Foster, you put that Fanta down right now and drink some water, or I’ll make you do another TikTok dance with me.”

 Jane glares from across the lab, two uncapped pens twisted up into her hair and dangling above her neck. Tony has to dodge the exposed sharpie in her bun to avoid getting yet another black streak across his face, which he does without breaking his stride. Bruce is hunched over a desk, staring intently at a beaker that appears to be completely empty except for something shimmering faintly inside. He doesn’t even blink when Darcy slides a wrapped sandwich towards him.

 “You wouldn’t,” Jane says, eyeing Darcy warily.

 One pen cap located, Darcy gently extracts the writing instruments from the bird’s nest on Jane’s head. “Wanna bet? Drink up, cupcake. Then, food. Then you can science some more. TONY-” she snaps, so suddenly the man in question actually leaps into the air at the sound, “you will NOT mix those solutions before you’ve leveled out your blood sugar. Eat the damn sandwich.”

 Tony opens his mouth.

 “I have Pepper on speedial.”

 “You can’t do that.” Affronted, Tony scoffs. “You wouldn’t.”

 “Can you watch all of your shiny toys at all hours of the day? All of them, even your cars and your suits?”

 Tony stills. Glares. And accepts the sandwich.

 Natasha is already smiling. “How do you get into his garage? He blocked off my last path and I haven’t found a new one yet.”

 With a careless shrug, Darcy gives both Nat and Clint a cold water, offers them their choice of snacks. “I don’t even know where it is yet,” she says. “But I’m crafty, and I’m tenacious when proving a point. I’d get in. Plus, it’s a threat I knew he’d take seriously.”

 “Pepper or threatening his cars?” Clint asks, mouthful of the best chicken salad sandwich he’s had in a long time.

 “Yes.”

 Delighted, Natasha loops her arm through Darcy’s. “Oh, we’re keeping you.”

By the end of the month, she’s met almost everyone. Fury dropped by to greet them, bringing Sharon Carter, who he called a ‘liaison between SHIELD and Stark Industries’, which Darcy thinks is a fancy title for “one of the few people permitted to go into both companies”, but it’s cool to meet so many badass people. She makes a point to make friends with the custodians and cafeteria workers as soon as possible, knowing they’re the true backbone to the entire place. She’s nearly got the names of all the front desk people down, Bruce has stopped trying to write his own notes and handed them over for her to organize, and Tony gave her a raise when she took over his space after finding a moldy pizza still in the box.

 She finds out later the raise came from Pepper herself (who is just as gorgeous and out of Tony’s league in person as she is on camera) when Pepper heard Darcy got Tony to clean it up himself.

 “I had a killstick USB and threatened to start plugging it into random ports if he didn’t throw the trash away.”

 Pepper had burst into bright laughter right there in her office, and authorized the raise before Darcy got back to the parking lot, where Happy had dispatched his best driver to bring her back to the tower.

 “I still need to meet Sam in person,” Darcy muses, absently crunching on a carrot stick. Jane is fussing with a machine that she has no business fussing with, and Darcy lets her. Thor is upstairs, debriefing people on super secret things that blah blah, above Darcy’s pay grade. As long as Jane and Thor are allowed time together, Darcy won’t complain too much, but Jane needs to do something with her hands while she waits for him to be done. “We managed a vague hi in the background of Nat’s video call, but it’s better to meet in person.”

 “Says the child of the digital age.”

 “I’m not wrong.”

 “Have you met Steve yet?”

 Darcy gives Jane’s free hand a carrot, watching with satisfaction when Jane absently begins munching on it. “No, have you?”

 “No. Thor says he’s nice.”

 “Has anyone ever accused Captain America of being mean?” Darcy wonders, calculating the chances of getting more water in Jane before Thor whisks her off for who knows how long.

 “He can be a little shit,” offers a new voice from the door. “But I can’t say mean is ever anything I’ve heard attached to him.”

 Sam Wilson comes in with a smirk and a jaunty two-finger salute. “Sam Wilson, in the flesh.”

 “And much prettier in person,” Darcy quips, wiggling her brows suggestively. “Don’t tell Nat, but I think you might be a contender for The Prettiest Avenger.”

 Darcy can tell she’ll vibe with Sam just fine by the way his laughter fills the space around them.

 “Oh, you want pretty? Steve’s got these eyelashes on him…”

“None so pretty as my fair Lady Jane,” Thor booms, and Darcy is scooped up in a hug before she registers he’s in the room.

 With a squeal, a bounce, and a well-timed catch, Darcy wiggles up and around for a proper hug, all arms squeezing, ribs cracking, and the smell of true leather flooding her nose.

 “Everyone can be The Prettiest Avenger,” Darcy says, kicking her feet into the air. “Oh man, I missed you, Mighty God of Thunder.”

 “I missed you as well, my little Lightning Sister.”

 He says it, and he means it, but Thor is already setting Darcy down, eyes locked on Jane. Darcy steps aside with ease, already trying to put her back between the passionate reunion that’s about to happen. It’s sweet, it’s incredibly touching, and it’s something Darcy doesn’t ever want to accidentally witness again.

 “You can meet Steve today too, he’s behind me.” Sam jerks a thumb over his shoulder. “We just got back and he wanted to dump his stuff first.”

 Darcy wants to tell Bruce if he doesn’t look away now it’ll just get worse, but some things you just have to learn through on the job experience.

 She does take pity after a minute, and risks Jane’s wrath to remind her and Thor both that “There are apartments with doors on them upstairs. The doors even lock!”

 She doesn’t notice the doors opening, that soft whoosh of air from the automatic lock releasing. She doesn’t see the form of a man fill the door way, doesn’t see the way he freezes. Doesn’t notice that every muscle has locked in place, a hand keeping the door from closing. Doesn’t notice that his eyes are locked onto her.

 Sam turns, partially to avoid the PDA, partially to give Steve shit for lagging behind him. He turns, and he can’t see anything but Steve. Steve, who is paler than a sheet of paper, his eyes a sharp contrast to the lack of color in his face. Sam starts forward, following Steve out the door before either of them realizing they’re moving, before Steve fully gets his feet under him again, pitching against the wall like a sailor being tossed around on his ship. Sam gets a hand around Steve’s bicep, grips hard.

 Steve’s shaking.

 “Steve?”

 He’s been through it, and Sam can only imagine about half of it. He doesn’t know shit about politics or having super powers, but he knows a panic attack when he sees one. God knows Steve Rogers has plenty of reasons to break down, or shut down, or break the world in grief, but in the scant few years Sam’s known him, he’s never seen Steve even come close to this. He’s shaking so violently his teeth are clacking, clutching the smooth, slightly curved wall like a life vest as he gasps for air.

 Eyes wide and wheeling, Steve sucks in a ragged breath and folds at the knees.

 Sam hits the ground with him, his hand going from Steve’s arm to his wrist before folding their hands together.

 “Okay,” Sam says, and tries to ignore everything else. “You’re okay. Can you feel my hand? That’s my hand in yours. Feel that wall under your other hand, the way it curves out for some damn reason? Deep breath in, nice and slow.” He ignores the head that peeks out of a neighboring office, hopes to everything that Stark keeps his mouth shut for one damn minute. “Out through your mouth, count of four. Nice and easy.”

 Steve manages a breath. Then another. He clutches Sam’s hand in his. Has a split second to hope he’s not hurting him and sucks in another breath.

 There’s a low whining sound trying to fill the space, and it takes him a minute to realize it’s coming from him. His lungs burn with the effort of not gasping the air in fast, his hand shakes in Sam’s. The bend in the wall seems to bow in and out, like the building is breathing with him even as it all spins around him.

 It’s probably less than two minutes, but it feels both like forever and no time at all before the ringing in Steve’s ears fades enough to fully register Sam’s voice, to process the words and follow the instructions. He’s a soldier. He can follow orders.

 When it all stops swirling, when his serum spiked body filters the anxiety and adrenaline out, Steve is sweat-stuck to the cool wall that is now at his back, one clammy hand clamped in Sam’s, the other clenched into a fist so tight he feels his bones start to heal from the pressure breaks he’d caused.

 He manages another breath through lungs that feel like they’re full of glass.

 “Salt helps,” Tony says, quiet and serious and clipped. “Or ice. On the tongue.”

 “Go get some,” Sam says, not looking at him. “And don’t-”

 The lab doors open again, the chatter of many people leaving at once approaching, and Steve’s on his feet so fast he knocks Sam on his ass.

 Tony’s never seen it in person before, the mask that Steve can pull down over himself. His dad talked about it sometimes, when it was late enough and he had too much alcohol in his blood and too little sleep under his belt. The realities of war, the harsh truth of life, losing friends, looking death in the face every day does something to people.

 He’s seen that look in the mirror before, the last ditch attempt for a clutch of control just before everything shatters.

 Steve paints a pleasant look on his face, polite but disinterested, with a faint layer of fatigue coating him. And Tony notes that he won’t look at Darcy.

 “-to meet you finally,” Darcy is saying, just to Tony’s left, and Steve can’t even manage a glance. He’s got his hand fisted again, blood blooming between the knuckles. “I think that’s all the Avengers, unless you’ve hiding some secret team we don’t know about.”

 “Not that I know of,” Steve manages, and to anyone who doesn’t know him he almost sounds normal. “Sorry,” he says around a yawn, “we just got back and we’re… pretty beat.”

 “Want food?” Darcy offers, because she’s from somewhere in the South, and she always offers everyone food in the lab, despite the fact that there shouldn’t be food in the lab. She’d erected a Snack Shrine in the corner, and stolen one of his deprogrammed failure bots to re-code it to serve as a Snack Handler 2.0, who follows errant sandwiches around and beeps at the scientists until they clean their stations, ensuring no contamination happens.

 Tony’s miffed he’d never thought of that, and a little sour Darcy managed to find a use for four bots he’d declared useless, programing them herself when everyone was behaving enough for her to take her eyes off them.

 Steve manages to decline the offer to join them, hiding his bloody palm at his back until Darcy is safely in the elevator.

 “You didn’t say it was nice to meet her,” Tony notes, all the subtlety of a bull in a china shop.

 “Knock it off,” Sam snaps, but Steve’s breath catches on what sounds dangerously close to a sob, and they all fall silent.

 “I-” Steve tries, voice cracking, before clearing his throat and trying again. “I know something that’s going to happen,” he says, voice thick. “I can’t stop it, and I can’t tell you what it is.”

 “Steve-”

 “What do you-”

 “I need to go,” Steve says, abruptly pushing off the wall. His long legs eat up the space easily, and he strides to the stairs, all put throwing himself up them. “I can’t be here.”

 “Wait! Steve, will you wait a damn minute-”

 “Woah, woah, Spangles, talk first, leave second.” The scientist in Tony is trembling. Something is in the air now, he can feel it. He can practically taste it. But past that, once his mind really focuses, he knows whatever it is needs to be discussed before Steve disappears. “What’s going to happen that you can’t tell us about?”

 “I can’t tell you.”

 “Why can’t you stop whatever you can’t tell us about?”

 “I can’t tell you,” Steve repeats, more firm. He stops at the landing, hand braced on the wall. He doesn’t see the smear his already drying blood leaves on the brick. Doesn’t see anything but those bright blue eyes, that smile that knocked him off-balance as easily as the first time. His system is already revving again, the panic that wants to build burning off almost as fast as he realizes he cannot be anywhere near Darcy until it happens.

 “Okay, stop, stop.” Panting slightly after the six floor run up, Tony puts a hand on Steve’s shoulder in a poor attempt to keep him in place. “You can’t tell us.”

 “No, Tony.”

 Tony stares him down, searching for something, and stays quiet. Sam blows out a breath.

 “We just got home,” he says, half groaning. “Can you give me ten minutes to pack some clean clothes?”

 Steve seems to snap out of something, eyes in focus for the first time since he’d bolted out of the lab. “I’m not asking you to come with me,” he starts, but Sam waves it off.

 “You never do. Can I at least ask where we’re going if I don’t get to know why?”

 “He can’t tell us,” Tony says, still staring Steve down, “because it hasn’t happened yet.”

 “Tony.”

 It’s meant to be a warning, but it comes off too close to a plea.

 “...if you start talking about time travel being real, I might need to renegotiate my salary.” Sam starts up the stairs, intending on exiting and using the elevator up to his quarters, but stops two steps up. “That form,” he says, whirling around. “Wait, shit, that’s real? You guys can travel through time?”

 Tony steps closer to Steve, eyes never wavering. “No human has ever been recorded successfully traveling through time. Closest anyone’s ever come is Capsicle here, and he cheated by freezing himself, so it barely counts. He’s a living fossil, not a time traveler.” Steve looks away first. “But Darcy.”

 And suddenly Steve is standing straight, chest to chest with Tony, eyes blazing.

 Undeterred, Tony continues. “But it hasn’t happened yet. And you can’t be here when it does happen. Because… Actually, I don’t have a because. Why can’t you be here when it- whatever it is- happens?”

 For a long, tense moment, Sam thinks Tony and Steve are about to get into another brawl, and there’s no kind Wakandans around to help mediate and cut through confusion this time. Just two veterans, a scientist with a new hypothesis thrown at him, and Darcy somehow caught in the middle.

 Then Steve relaxes an inch with the slow breath he lets out. He steps back, wiping the completely dried blood off his hand.

 “Because I can’t promise I’d be able to just stand by and let it happen. But it did- does- it will happen. It’s coming, and I can’t be here when it does.” He turns his back on Tony, setting off back up the stairs at a jog. “If you’re coming with me, let’s go. I’m leaving in five minutes.”

 Sam barely hesitates, just long enough to exchange a look with Tony, before opting to exit the stairwell and aim for the elevator as planned. “Can an argument be made for ten? I need ten, Steve. And the next time Bucky vanishes out of wherever we leave him, can we just let him ?”

 “I’m taking one of the jets.”

 “Bring it back in one piece,” Tony calls out, watching both men vanish, and lets his mind whirl.

 Time travel. He’s sure of it. It’s possible, in theory, but aliens were just a theory until Loki, until Thor. Lots of things were just theories until they weren’t, and now they need to be regulated. There’s protocols for things, Pepper says, and she wants him to play as nice as possible with the government, mostly because it gives Pepper a headache to deal with when he doesn’t. So in the approximately thirty thousand forms everyone had to sign in order to work with him, or SHIELD, there’s one explaining what to do in the event someone experiences time travel.

  “Something’s going to happen. I can’t tell you what it is, and I can’t stop it.”

 There are some things, certain things that have to happen. Timelines are fragile, and ever changing. What would happen if someone gets wormholed back in time and accidentally changes history? There are rules (“Laws, Tony,” Pepper says with exasperated fondness. “They’re laws. ”) to follow in the unlikely scenario. It essentially boils down to say nothing, do nothing, change nothing.

 Only intervene if absolutely necessary. Don’t reveal more than absolutely necessary. And never, ever, stop something you know happened in the past.

 Tony doesn’t have all the answers, only a half formed idea based off his best guess, but his best guess is very, very good. So when Sam and Steve pile into a jet and take off less than an hour after returning home, claiming a sudden lead on a wayward Bucky, Tony stays. He stays in the lab, watching Darcy and Jane both like hawks. He stays in the empty office next door pointedly, always popping in to annoy Darcy and accept her food bribes in exchange for sitting still while Jane works. He stays and looks over Jane’s work (and gets sucked in, every time), stays later than he means to, stays with Banner for dinner as they tackle an equation that takes up three white boards and four pots of coffee.

 He stays during movie night, which Darcy declares mandatory, even getting Natasha to join and stay for the entire thing. He stays during the great paper purge, a week long excursion that involves Darcy nearly tying Jane to a chair and forcing her to learn how to use a tablet. He stays during the tests with Thor and an absolutely beautiful man named Heimdall that triggers every single one of Tony’s insecurities.

 And because he stays, he’s there when it all goes wrong.

 The exact moment the explosion builds in the lab, hundreds of miles away in a safe house, Steve drops his head into his hands and closes his eyes. When the blast knocks Banner back hard enough to turn him green, Steve breathes deep and pretends his hands aren’t shaking when they get the alert from the tower. As Jane scrambles up, clutching a bleeding head, Thor runs forward.

 Steve turns his head to the sky, the sun drifting down through the clouds for just one second, and feels it on his skin. Behind him, the jet whines to life.

 Darcy slips through Thor’s fingers, the half formed wormhole pulling her back. Tony knows, he knows he can’t, but he reaches for Darcy anyway, diving forward to try out of sheer instinct.

 By the time their ears stop ringing long enough to hear the alarms blaring, Clint bursts through the door at a run. The smoke curls up from the floor, floating through the air and around the negative space of where Darcy used to be.

 “What happened?” Natasha demands, eyes stinging in the acrid air.

 “Darcy?” Jane’s voice is loud and thin, bordering on panic. A trail of blood trickles from her ear.

 “Heimdall!” Thor bellows to the ceiling, crossing to Jane. “I need you!”

 By the time Thor has Jane in his arms, Steve is in the air, the jet pointed towards home. The time it takes him and Sam to arrive is just enough for the chaos to thin. Wounds, minor that they are, are treated, and Tony’s cheek stings from the slap Jane had delivered.

 “You knew,” she spits. “Why else would you have been hanging around the lab so much, poking into my work? You knew something would happen.”

 The sheer terror in her eyes, the shake in her voice, in her hands, has Tony quiet.

 “I knew,” Steve says, keeping Jane’s gaze when she whirls on him. “She’s safe.”

 “You haven’t even been here-”

 “For the entire time Darcy has been here,” Natasha says, and it’s neither a question nor a statement, but a simple fact. “You’ve been gone the entire time.”

 Something deep in Steve’s chest breaks open, an old wound that never had the chance to close, much less scar.

 “I know Darcy,” he says, and it stops Jane dead. “She doesn’t know me yet. Now, I mean. I think. I don’t know how it all works, but she- we.” He stops, heart stuttering, feeling the weight of all those memories flooding back into him, everything he’d worked so damn hard to push down bursting to the front of his mind in bright, bold technicolor.

 Jane visibly works to gather herself, sniffling hard and shoving at her hair. “Talk.”

 Steve sits, hands folded between his knees, elbows resting on his thighs, and tries to balance the necessary and the personal.

 “I first met Darcy in Brooklyn,” he says, and it’s easier to speak to the floor. “She was bruised and bloody, soaking wet from the storm, and unconscious against our front door. I couldn’t wake her up, and I wasn’t strong enough to get her inside alone. I had to get Bucky to help.”

 Bruce sucks in a sharp breath. “When was this?” he asks, ice pack still pressed against his head. “Darcy said she’s never met you. She-she said she did a-a paper on you in school or something, that’s it.”

 So Steve talks, the past and secrets unraveling around them in the present.

 And meanwhile, in 1942, one Steven Grant Rodgers, charcoal clinging to his fingertips, nearly jumps out of his skin at the loud thump that sounds outside of his door, and opens it, shrieking out a cuss that coulda made Bucky blush at the sight of an unconscious woman sprawled on his stoop.

Chapter Text

 When Darcy was in high school, she wrote a paper on Captain America. Specifically, on Captain America’s pocket watch.

 Her American History teacher was a pill, and more than a little sexist, and he loved everything to do with World War II. He also had a soft spot for any Captain American lore, Coulson on steroids, and was known to give out extra credit to anyone who could provide any trivia he either didn’t know about, or correct him- with proof- on anything he’d said.

 Darcy, who’d mostly slept through the class, wrote an entire five page essay detailing how the glimpse of a photo of a dark-haired woman in Steve Roger’s pocket-watch/compass combo during a black and white war film didn’t mean that Rogers and Peggy Carter were romantically involved. Darcy went all out on that paper: she researched cameras in the 40’s and how film degraded over time to explain how the blurry, extremely quick shot could have looked different in person. She cited interviews with people who’d been rescued, members of the 107th, even quoted the Howling Commandos themselves, none of whom could attest to the identity of the woman.

 “A woman he knows back home.”- unknown soldier was the only quote Darcy could dig up about the whole thing at first, before the rumor about it being Agent Carter began. Peggy Carter was a very well known face during the war, Darcy argued, so surely someone would have recognized her if they’d seen it. Therefore, there’s a very large chance that the famous “Picture of Peggy” that all her history textbooks referenced, and her teacher liked to quote, was entirely incorrect.

 And the most damming evidence had come from Peggy Carter herself, emphatically denying that the photo was of her in a “rare public appearance” interview in an early episode of 60 minutes.

 Darcy had felt vindicated that she’d been proven correct by the woman herself, and turned the paper in with full confidence.

 She got a C.

 Outraged, Darcy had gotten her parents involved, who pointed out- like Darcy had- all the inconsistencies in the textbooks, and the fact that Peggy Carter herself had been asked point blank if she was the one in Captain America’s compass, and she’d laughed and said: "Definitely not.”, and when pushed had added that as far as she knew, it was a woman Steve had known back home. So, her parents said, arms folded, how could a teacher know more than the rumored woman, who squashed the rumors instantly.

 Mr. I-know-more-than-you refused to change her grade, changing the reason from “all the books say it’s Peggy, so it’s Peggy” to “you did not cite approved sources, and no, YouTube doesn’t count.” and was smug all year when the school sided with him. Darcy still gets angry thinking about it, which she does a lot. Where was the justice for fifteen-year-old Darcy, diligently doing research in fucking MLA format, which no one uses anymore, and citing all her sources, only to be told that her source- which again, was Peggy fucking Carter- didn’t count because someone had put it up on YouTube?

 Jane knows all about the paper. She’s heard the rant many a drunk nights, the first one in New Mexico, on the roof of that old diner, spiked hot chocolate and an illegal fire pit between them. Jane, bless her, shares Darcy’s rage. Every time Darcy tells the story, she agrees that the grade was bullshit with all the repressed anger only a scorned student can manage.

 Darcy spent two full weeks studying Peggy Carter’s face- the top of her head and edge of her forehead specifically, trying to match it to the glimpse of the photo inside the compass. She spent an equal amount of time staring at Captain America, both in class and on her own during the research. She stared at before and after comparisons, and dug up every photograph she could of pre-serum Steve in hopes of it being one her teacher hadn’t seen before, and thus worth a few extra credit points. She’d whined to her stepdad that the inside of her eyelids was starting to become sepia toned, and that every blonde man looked like Steve Rogers, every brunette looked like Bucky Barnes, and her auburn-haired best friend was starting to resemble Peggy.

 Her parents had gently pried her away from all the screens and set her outside to recharge for a bit, whispering worriedly about her as she starfished in the yard, muttering about height differences and how idiot men always seem to be in charge of everything.

 The worst part was no one agreed with her. Her parents, friends, colleagues, and even Jane all agreed that she deserved a better grade based on her arguments, her research, and the sheer dedication involved. But they also all agreed that it has to be Peggy, because who else could it be?

 “Even Peggy said that it’s not!” Darcy would always say, only to to be met with a different argument every. Single. Time.

 “Probably to not hurt her husband’s feelings,” her mother said. “Who could stand knowing that they stole Captain America’s lady love? They’d compare themselves all the time!”

 “War does strange things to people,” her stepfather said.

 “I bet she’s lying,” her friends said.

 “You’re just wrong,” her teacher said.

 “If not Peggy, who?” Jane said.

 “I’m sure it’s Peggy,” everyone said. “There’s no one else it could be.”

 Outnumbered, beaten down, and just plain tired of having the same arguments over and over again, Darcy had eventually given up. Even further research, years later (what a fun night with Jane that had been: a visit to Colorado, a bag of brownies and several hours of staring at more pictures of Peggy and Steve, printing them all off to compare and drool over) did nothing to support her hypothesis. She was downvoted in every forum, argued with in every comment section, and even banned from certain Captain America fan sites.

 Occasionally, when she’s got nothing better to do, she’ll run another search for fun. Not about the woman in the watch, since everyone but Darcy and Peggy Carter agree that it’s Peggy Carter, but about the life Steve Rogers had before he became Captain America. Poor, sickly, with a golden heart, a fast mouth and sometimes even faster fists, Steven Grant Rogers became a slight fascination of hers. She put it down when she and Jane moved into the tower- figuring that Captain America’s had enough of his life blasted for everyone to see and he doesn’t need his sort-of coworker dredging up bad memories on top of it- but it still lives in the back of her mind, and the rant about that C grade is always primed and ready.

So when Darcy wakes, confused, bruised, and without her glasses, she’s pretty sure she knows exactly who she’s looking at.

“Hit my head pretty hard, I guess,” she says, frantically praying she’s just seeing things. “Can I have my glasses? I don’t think I’m seeing too good.”

 The thin guy hovering a few feet away hands them over immediately and backs away hastily, but Darcy can see him just fine once she slips her glasses on and, yep. She’s definitely either dead or suffering the effects of a really bad concussion.

 Because she knows that face. She knows it so, so well.

 “Steve?” she asks, hoping she doesn’t sound too hysterical.

 Across the room, pre-serum Steve Rogers (bad sign), dressed in what can only be described as a period accurate outfit (worse sign), gives her a confused look, immediately looking away when she sits up (probably not a good sign).

 “Do I… know you?” he asks the wall to his left, the tips of his ears going bright red.

 The hysterical laugh bursts out of Darcy, and draws enough concern from Steve for him to make eye contact with her. Darcy yanks her glasses off, swipes at the tears wanting to build in her eyes, and shoves the lenses back on.

 Not a trick of the light, and as she wakes fully she can tell she’s not concussed. Stiff, sore, and feels like she fell off a truck, but her head is fine. She thinks.

 “No,” she manages, and tries to breathe without crying. “Oh my god, no, this is bad.”

 “We can get you help. Bucky will take you to the police if…” Steve stops and visibly swallows, steeling himself. “Were you attacked, miss? I’m sorry we didn’t have more than that old blanket to cover you. Bucky helped me get you in here. We couldn’t just leave you outside in the rain.”

 With shaking hands, Darcy pulls the blanket that had fallen off back up around herself so she can stand. She feels like she needs to stand, like she can’t be sitting as her brain races to catch up with the facts. Because there are facts here, no matter how much her mind is desperately trying to deny it.

 But then Bucky Barnes walks in, and Darcy knows she’s in serious trouble when she catches a glimpse at both of his perfectly normal, flesh and bone arms.

 Deciding she does actually need to sit, Darcy sinks back onto the couch and wraps the blanket even tighter.

 “You’re safe,” Steve is saying, and Darcy can barely hear it over the ringing in her ears, “and we’ll make sure you stay that way. We’ll get you home, miss. I promise.”

 Clutching the blanket like a life-line, Darcy blows out a breath and tries to remain calm.

 “Yeah, I don’t think that’s gonna be possible…”

 Steve’s not normally one to call a lady a liar, but even he has to admit “I’m from the future” is a lot to swallow. That’s crazy. The stuff of comic books and a small child’s wild imagination.

 “Or the experiment of three brilliant scientists over seventy years in the future,” Darcy calmly says, digging through the giant bag she’d appeared with that she insists isn’t luggage, but a normal every day bag. Steve’s never seen a bag that big that doesn’t include the entire family’s wardrobe, but he’s also never been privy to the inside of a woman’s bag before. Not that many women can afford the luxury of a bag right now anyway, much less a very nice looking leather one.

 Steve really wants to argue the future thing, because how can you not argue about that, but the things Darcy pulls out of the contraption she calls a handbag is starting to make him wonder.

 Bucky isn’t shy- never is around gorgeous dames- and reaches for some of the more odd things currently being lined up on their dusty floor. He picks up a contraption that looks straight out of Journey to the Center of the Earth and examines it in the dim light. It flashes and winks as it’s turned, a small rectangle covered in the brightest pink either of them has ever seen, small gems hanging from the corner in a small chain.

 “The hell is this?” Bucky asks.

 Darcy plucks the rectangle from Bucky’s hands and taps the black bit in the middle.

 And it lights up.

 “What the f-”

 “It’s like a movie screen.” Fascinated, Steve leans forward, examining the bright box. It kind of hurts his eyes to look at, but he’s completely taken by the image of the strange woman in his living room appearing in full color behind a bunch of smaller squares, her face next to another woman’s, both smiling. “What’s it do?”

 “It’s my whole life in the future, but right now it’s a paperweight.” Darcy gives the small box a forlorn look. “I guess I should turn it off. I don’t have a way to charge it.”

 “But,” still confused, Bucky takes the box again, turning it over, “what is it?”

 “It’s, um, a portable communication device.”

 “Like the radios the military uses?”

 Darcy purses her lips, and the artist in Steve can’t help but notice how beautifully colored her face is with her impossibly red lips (too dark to be natural but he’s never seen a shade of lipstick that color before either), the dark brown hair that looks black in the shadows but highlights with red and gold when she moves into the light. Long, dark lashes frame deep blue eyes, partially hidden by large framed glasses that are nothing like he’s ever seen before, designs and colors swirling around the plastic.

 A lot of things about Darcy are like nothing he’s ever seen before.

 “Sure,” Darcy says, plucking the device out of Bucky’s hand and tossing it into her cavernous bag. “We can go with that. I’m pretty sure I’m not supposed to tell you too much about the future- accidentally changing shit and all that. There are things that I know about that I’m not allowed to tell you, or anyone. I don’t want to, like, accidentally kill my grandpa or something.”

 Steve pauses mid reach for the item in front of him, which no matter how he looks at it, looks like some kind of gun.

 Just who had he let into their apartment? This woman, curvy, foul-mouthed, wearing what she insists are normal clothes and not underwear like they’d initially thought, and talking about the future, now casually mentioning she might accidentally kill someone?

 “Is your grandfather a terrible person?” he asks slowly, hand still frozen in midair. “Are you actually an spy of some kind, sent on a mission to take him out?”

 The smile that spills across Darcy’s face makes her eyes sparkle, even as mischief fills them.

 “No, he was cool. Actually, if it’s 1942 Gramps might not even be born yet.” A thought occurring, Darcy cocks her head at them, now curious. “If you don’t push the button on the side of it you can pick it up, it won’t hurt you. What month is it? It doesn’t feel like summer.”

 “Is it a gun of some kind?”

 “It… it’s not not a gun.”

 Steve decides not to risk touching the not-gun and drops his hand back into his lap.

 “It’s September,” Bucky says. He gives the growing pile at their feet a long look before turning it on Darcy herself. “What don’t you have in there?”

 Either not hearing Bucky or choosing to ignore him, Darcy’s hands dive into her hair, giving the river of dark waves a shake. “Augh, it doesn’t make sense. I was in New York City in May and now I’m in Brooklyn in September? Seventy years in the past?” She gives Steve a helpless look, accidentally touching the rapidly darkening bruise on her temple and wincing. She’s got small cuts all along her jaw, and a deep gash on her arm that she’d patched herself with something pulled out of her bag that had almost instantly stopped the bleeding. “I don’t understand, I moved not only in time but changed places?”

 Steve can’t help himself. “Time travel not an everyday thing in the future, then? I thought flying transportation, holograms, and time travel would be standard in the future.”

 Even confused and tired, Darcy manages a laugh. “Not so much. The Jetsons lied to you, dude.”

 Busy checking himself out in the amazingly clear folding mirror Darcy left on the coffee table, Bucky doesn’t look up when he asks “Who?”

 Darcy blinks. “Oh, this is going to be so hard. Not one of my pop culture references are going to make a damn bit of sense to anybody.”

 That stings almost as much as realizing that she must have screwed up the experiment somehow. Maybe she walked in at the wrong moment and dropped something. Maybe the lab hadn’t been as clean and sterile as it should have been, and something had gotten into Jane’s carefully calculated solutions. Or maybe the stars weren’t in correct alignment, or maybe the magic was screwy, who knows. Darcy’s still about three PhD’s short of figuring it out, so she’s just not going to worry about it.

 The only thing she needs to focus on right now is surviving in 1940s America, not irreparably damaging the space-time continuum, and figuring out a way to get back to her own time without accidentally spilling secrets that aren’t supposed to be known yet.

 She goes back to digging her bag, trying to catalogue everything she has with her. Thanks to SHIELD, she has an emergency kit zipped into a hidden pocket of her purse. Thanks to Tony’s inability to be one-upped, she actually has two, one absolutely crammed full of identical one inch cubes of varying materials, and a note in Tony’s slapdash writing informing her if she doesn’t have a rehydration gun, she can add a drop of water to whatever she needs.

 Darcy never thought she’d be grateful for Tony’s love of Megamind, but as she pulls both kits out to examine them, she’s never loved the idiot more.

 “Damn you, Tony,” she mutters. “I think you might have actually managed to save my life here.”

 SHIELD’s survival kit is standard: full of things that would be useful if she were anywhere else but Brooklyn, such as money that hasn’t been printed yet and is therefore useless to her, reusable matches (actually useful, she takes those out), a fire-starter kit, fire blanket, a pocket watch/compass combo, antibiotics, needles and thread, a med kit, epi pen, nylon hose (might be useful, not that Darcy plans on wearing them), a pen with endless ink, a homing beacon that doesn’t even turn on, a compass, flares, a mini notebook with waterproof paper, and an ID making kit with supplies to make it country-appropriate on quick notice that unfortunately seems to require a computer.

 She’s going to have to talk to Coulson about making it time-appropriate as well, not that she has a clue how to do that. But either Fury or Coulson can figure that out, they don’t pay her enough to do all their work for them.

 Steve’s still eyeing her taser, though not as warily as before.

 “It’s not a gun that shoots bullets,” she assures him, trying to re-cram everything back into SHIELD’s kit and wonders what they hell they thought she’d be up to that she needs a random Rubik's Cube for. “It’s for self-defense. It… shoots electricity, sort of, and can make a person’s body lock up so it stops them and lets you get away.” She doesn’t have a way to charge it though, so she’s only got one shot with it if she ever needs to pull it out.

 Steve’s been pretty careful to keep his eyes on the stuff she’s putting on the floor, or on her face, but now he glances at her legs, bare under her shorts, nicked and scratched to hell from the explosion. She’s wet from the rain still, and keeps the blanket draped over her shoulders, but there’s not much she can do about her clothes. A spaghetti-strap tank top and shorts that stop mid-thigh aren’t at all appropriate for the time period, but the only other thing she has with her is the oversized men’s button-up she’d tossed on unbuttoned to hide her pale shoulders from the summer sun on a lunch run, but it’s currently drip drying in the corner.

 “Are you sure you’re not in trouble?” Steve asks her, so serious and concerned she understands instantly why he was chosen for the serum. He might not have the stature he has in the future, but that intensity in his gaze tells Darcy that he meant it when he promised to keep her safe.

 “Other than being too far in the past, I’m okay. These,” she waves a hand vaguely at her wounds, “are a result from the accident that sent me here. No one did this to me on purpose.” Now she sighs, a faraway look in her eyes. The air around her turns sad as the situation fully settles on her.

 She’s alone, far away from home, and she has no way of getting back. The only thing she can do is trust in the Foster-Banner-Stark band to undo this mess and get her back before she does something terrible to the timeline and ruins all of everything forever.

 “No pressure, Jane, but I’d really like to go home soon.”

 Always able to make women smile, Bucky paints an obvious leer on his face. “Doll, if all the women in the future look like you, I’d be eager to get back there, too.” He gives her an over-the-top wink that makes her giggle, and shoots Steve a look he can read without words. He answers with a look of his own.

 Of course they’re going to help her. It’s not even a question.

 “Well, being found by the two most handsome fells in Brooklyn isn’t the worst thing that’s ever happened to me, even if you’re both about eighty years too old for me.” She fake pouts, giving Steve a wink. “Which is just a damn shame. Can I have some water?”

 Bucky cackles as Steve stands to get her a cup. He wishes he had something nicer to offer her, a glass rather than a dented mug with chipped paint, water not leftover from the kettle this morning that’s vaguely brown if not boiled first, but she takes it with a a simple thank you. And promptly dunks her finger in the mug to flick the water onto one of the strange cubes in front of her.

 The cube suddenly expands, the small square almost instantly becoming a thick-looking blanket that’s the length of the entire couch with a zipper running down the middle.

 He should probably be afraid, or at least suspicious, but it’s just so cool that Steve doesn’t find either in him. Just wonder, and a child-like joy at the time traveling beauty in his living room. It’s a living comic-book right in front of him, and he can’t look away.

 Bucky picks up the Rubik’s Cube and turns it over. “What does this turn into?”

 “Nothing, actually. It’s a game. You try and get all the colors matching on each side.”

 Darcy pulls the now full-sized sleeping bag into her lap, debating on wearing it and stripping out of her still damp shorts rather than wearing them and possibly getting a rash. Maybe she could wrap the blanket around herself as a kind of skirt? She’s not particularly modest, but given the very real chance that she could actually see both Steve and Bucky again at some point in the future, she’d rather not traumatize them by stripping to her underwear in front of them (thank fuck her emergency underwear stash had come with her, though she only has the sports bra she’s wearing). They were already so scandalized by her shorts stopping above her knee that they’d though she’d already been in her underwear when they’d taken her in.

 “I work with some really dumb smart people,” Darcy says, and knows they don’t understand the fondness in her voice. “Sometimes something brightly colored and simple is the best way to entertain the most brilliant minds.”

 As she goes through Stark’s emergency kit, which snaps directly into the designer bag Pepper had gifted her for “surviving 30 straight days of Tony without yelling or crying”, she finds Jane’s chicken-scratch on the inventory list too. And though it’s useless to her at the moment, the sight of her old red iPod, earbuds neatly wrapped around them, a sticky note with “in case of musical emergency- Jane” on it nearly brings her to tears again.

 She wants to go home.

She hasn’t even spared a thought for everyone in the lab, she realizes with a jolt. Were any of them injured? What if Jane is hurt? What if Bruce Hulked Out because the other guy tried to protect him? She’s just been thinking about herself during all this, wavering between mentally scolding the team for letting this happen to her and hoping they’ll appear to save her. What if they can’t because Darcy screwed everything up by getting sucked into the wormhole/ portal/ magical light beam bridge/ stargate when she probably shouldn’t have even been in the lab in the first place?

 Come on, they even sent Darcy out to get them all lunch rather than ordering in like usual. Of course they wanted her out of the way. Lab Assistant. College Dropout. And now, Accidental Time Traveling Idiot.

 Who blundered into Captain America and the Winter Soldier’s apartment and is currently sitting on their living room floor, in what they thought was her underwear, bleeding on their already worn rug and dripping on their floor.

 She is so getting fired when she gets home.

 “Let me finish drying off and I’ll get out of your hair.” Suddenly frantic, the air too tight and stale, Darcy starts cramming what she can back into her purse. She hasn’t even really begun going through the Stark Kit, but she can finish it later. She’ll leave the sleeping bag, they can have it, but she needs to get out of here before she breaks everything worse than she already has. If her shoes are dry she can leave now, she’ll cut up the thin blanket in SHIELD’s kit and make a wraparound skirt and go… somewhere. Anywhere else. She can’t be here, what the hell is she thinking?

 “What?” sounding sincerely stunned, Steve jumps to his feet so fast he knocks the stool he’d been perched on backwards. “Now? It’s the middle of the night.”

 “Not a great neighborhood,” Bucky aids, brow furling. He drops the Rubik’s cube. “And doll, you wouldn’t get far dressed like that.”

 Steve throws him a sharp look that’s promptly ignored. The last thing they need to do is scare the poor girl, but Bucky continues anyways.

 “Stay here for now. You’ve got nowhere to go. Me and this idiot can keep you safe and dry for the night.”

 Darcy knows they can, and would, but the thing is she can’t stay with The Winter Soldier and Captain freaking America. She knows them in the future, sort of, though she’s never met Bucky before. Doesn’t that mess with all the timeline stuff she’s not supposed to mess with? She met Steve and he hadn’t recognized her. She’d barely even been a blip to him, her offer of food brushed off with a fake yawn and zero eye contact with no consideration at all and he pretty much immediately left the building.

 Surely if this was supposed to happen he would have known her. But he hadn’t even looked at her. So clearly, obviously, she’s not supposed to be here.

 And Stark’s kit is chock full of goodies that don’t need electricity according to the inventory: sewing kits and medicine and a weird amount of lace. Surely she can trade or sell it, get some period accurate money and hitch a ride to somewhere no one knows who she is and she’s not in any danger of hurting any timelines.

 A gentle hand on her uninjured shoulder jerks her back to the present, and the thought of the 40’s being the present makes her head swim all over again.

 Steve’s eyes are impossibly kind when he crouches in front of her, his hand ever so gentle on her skin. “Please, Darcy,” he says and fuck, she can’t say no to those damn eyelashes. “You’re wet and injured and lost. We can help. Let us help you.”

 People aren’t kind like this anymore. Darcy’s not sure they ever were in the first place. She might be looking at the last truly kind person in the world, and he’s not even become a war hero yet. Not even really grown into the man she knows he can be, and it stuns her to think that this Steve in front of her hasn’t even started really helping yet. And yet here he is, insisting on helping her.

 Past, present, future, Steve doesn’t know her. But he’s helping her.

 Steve stands and offers her hand up. She takes it, surprised to note that she’s two inches taller than him because he pulls her up with ease, even if he has a wheeze to his breath that reminds her of her brother’s asthma. Has he always been unnaturally strong for his size? Not everything incredible about Steve had come from the science; most of it had to be home-grown first.

 “Just for tonight,” she agrees, because it is still raining, and she does ache in a vague sort of way that’s only going to get worse.

 Steve gives her hand a reassuring squeeze. “We’ll figure out the rest in the morning,” he says, eyes never leaving hers. “I promise.”

 In the future, throat sore, head beginning to pound, Steve pauses.

 How much does he tell them? Not everything. He can’t. Some things are just too personal to say, even to the people here who clearly all love and are worried about Darcy. But his entire life, his whole life has been dug through until there’s nothing but bedrock left. There are museum exhibits of his private life, his old sketches that used to be passed around and mocked now displayed behind bulletproof glass with pride. The death of his mother, that horrible time in his life, nothing more than a footnote in history, deemed almost unimportant.

 He doesn’t know the logistics of the time issue that brought Darcy to him so long ago, but for him it was both long ago and just a few years, and so even though everyone in this room has known Darcy longer, he knew her first, and they are only entitled to so much.

 He’ll tell them what he can, not that he knows much, but he can at least assure them that Darcy was cared for the entire time she was with them. That much, at least, they are owed. But the rest is just for him.

 It’s Tony who speaks next. Steve isn’t sure the other man has blinked since he walked in. He sounds almost too calm, eyes more than a little maniac.

 “How long does Darcy stay with you?”

 “Almost a year. Closer to ten months.”

 “What happened to her?” Natasha demands, hands clenched into tight fists.

 “... she vanished. One day in June, I turned around and she was just gone.”

 Jane’s breath shudders. Thor’s hand moves to her back and he pulls her in for a hug, eyes troubled. Would the time be different for them, or would it pass the same? Would they miss almost a year with Darcy while he and Bucky had almost a year with her? Would they be able to get her back?

 What if Darcy didn’t come home the night she disappeared? Steve had always just assumed the people in her time had managed to bring her back, hence her disappearing, but what if she went somewhere else? Another time, another city? What if more time had passed in the future? What if she missed more than ten months?

 What if they never got her back at all and those two minutes in the hall had been his last chance?

 “Then we have ten months to bring her home,” Tony announces, standing. “I suggest we get started. Lewis is the only one around here who knows how to make a decent cup of coffee and keep all this- this junk,” he delivers a kick to the machine to his left, which sparks on contact, “running. We need her back.”

 Thor speaks to them all, but looks at Jane when he promises to speak with his people and acquire their aid due to the possibility of magic being involved. He disappears in a flash of light, a quick kiss to Jane and a hard look to Steve before he goes.

 Darcy is loved everywhere she goes. In just two months of working in the tower, she’s got an entire room full of people, from scientists to super soldiers to heroes and gods willing to drop everything and focus on one singular goal: bringing her back to them.

 There’s months worth of stories he could tell them, details they’ll probably want to know eventually, but for now everyone stands, wipes their eyes, consults their notes, and gets to work.

Chapter Text

Darcy quickly figures out that there isn’t enough space for three people in the tiny apartment Steve and Bucky share. Bucky works at the docks, which means he’s usually up around the time that college Darcy would have been crashing into her bed, and sleeps a good part of the day. There’s a skinny bed in the one bedroom that Bucky and Steve each use: Steve sleeps in it when Bucky has a shift and takes the couch when he doesn’t. But now with Darcy sprawled out on the slightly sagging, just this side of too short couch, Steve opts for the floor and a blanket.

 Darcy does not like this arrangement.

 She really doesn’t like that no one mentioned it before they’d all turned in.

 “You could have told me I was taking your bed!” is the shouted greeting that’s waiting for Steve when he opens his eyes, along with one irritated looking brunette sporting an impressive scowl.

 Usually it’s Bucky yelling at him, huffy about him getting into another scrape, or exasperated that he’s been feeding the stray cat that hangs around the building despite the fact that being near the orange tabby sends his asthma into overdrive. But right now it’s Darcy, the large white shirt she’d arrived with now dry and buttoned up to just under her collarbone, a beige skirt he recognizes as the one Rebecca left behind in place of her shorts, feet bare. Her toenails are painted a bright purple.

 “Sleeping on the floor can’t be good for you,” she’s saying, frowning as she eyes him. “And it definitely can’t be comfortable.”

 It’s not.

 “It’s fine.”

 That would probably have been more convincing if his hip hadn’t decided to pop loudly as he stood.

 “Okay, well now I definitely have to figure something out because you can’t be sleeping on the floor.” Determined, Darcy marches into the kitchen. It’s a small apartment, so it’s a short march, but the skirt flows nicely around her legs when she whirls around. It’s just the right amount of dramatic. “I can sell a few things and maybe get a place of my own, or a hotel. Hostel? No, boarding houses, that was the thing. It’s a boarding house, right?”

 The answer comes immediately and in unison, Steve’s voice floating out from the bathroom.

 “Absolutely not.”

 “There is one, but you’re not setting foot in it, doll. It’s overcrowded right now.” Bucky frowns down at the plate of overcooked eggs he’d managed to slap together. “You’d be sharing a room smaller than this with more people.”

 Steve splashes some water on his face at the kitchen sink and breathes deep, clutching the counter for balance so he can inhale as much as he can. Some of the breathing exercises he does to manage both his allergies and his asthma feel like he’s just breathing over and over again, like he has to remind his body what it’s supposed to do, but he does them religiously all the same.

 “But,” Darcy tries to protest, gesturing around the apartment.

 “It also has fleas,” Steve added, letting out a sharp cough. “Some of the borders left because they keep getting bit.”

 He’d done a week’s worth of work at the launders’, washing and drying and ironing and folding clothes and had been extremely grateful not to handle any of the flea-infested bags. He’d thought his hands would fall off from the dry, cracked skin and all the scrubbing, but he’d made enough money to buy new pencils and start selling his sketches again. Mostly the newspapers buy them, hoping to add something with cheer to the news, post something that’s not about the war, the death toll, the battles won and lost. Sometimes he’s able to haggle with businesses for goods, designing new signs or ads for the newspapers as needed, or even doing street portraits, but most of their money comes from Bucky’s dock job.

 If he wasn’t so sick all the time, he could work too. He’s small, but he’s fast, and stronger than he looks. His lungs just aren’t up to most physical labor, and his allergies are many and strong. He’d been laughed off the docks when he’d tried to apply there, and he can’t handle the smoke of the steel mills. Thank goodness the women around here seem to have that in hand, but it did leave him without that option too.

 He could probably type and greet people, but no one was willing to hire him for front desk work, and he’s sick so much that when he does manage to find a job, he can’t really keep it.

 Bucky moving in had saved both of them when things got really tight. When the draft began, they’d both braced, but so far Bucky hasn’t been called. He’ll go to fight, absolutely no question, but there’s also no doubt that Steve can’t afford this place on his own, not with the medicine he also needs. Bucky had considered just volunteering and sending Steve his pension- it would cover rent and give Bucky enough to live off- but he’d no more than voiced the thought when Steve had been hospitalized for near-constant asthma attacks.

 The weeks it took him to recover depleted their already measly savings, and Bucky nearly lost his position at the docks with all the shifts he missed trying to keep Steve breathing, even with the neighbors helping medicate and feed him as he wheezed away. Now he’s unwilling to enlist unless there’s enough for Steve to live off of before he goes.

 Steve can’t say he wouldn’t do the same if the positions weren’t reversed, but it’s killing him knowing that Bucky is choosing to stay behind because of him.

 Steve also can’t say that he wouldn’t volunteer himself, but he’d been 4F’d every time he’d tried to enlist.

 “God damn it. I’m not willing to sleep with fleas, no matter how cheap the room is.”

 Since they’d discussed it while Darcy slept, Steve is quick to offer: “You can just stay here.”

 For some reason, Darcy looks sincerely shocked at that.

 To her, it makes complete sense to say no. Even if she took the whole ‘rupture in the space-time continuum’ thing out of the equation, the logistics just don’t work with three people in such a small space for an undetermined amount of time. She’s pretty sure the entire apartment is smaller than the living/kitchen area in her quarters at the tower, and even with just her and what’s in her bag added, it’s crowded. It sort of reminds her of her first college dorm room, with Janet, the roommate from hell and her collection of vintage dresses that all had to be hung up in special bags (which to Darcy sounded like an excuse to take both closets, which she did).

 But there are other things to consider too. The first thing is that nowhere in any history report or in any talk with Coulson, the ultimate Captain America fanboy, was it ever mentioned that Steve Rogers had lived with a woman other than his mother. Though to be fair, it’s never been mentioned that he lived with Bucky for a time either. Just goes to show, sometimes the history books really can get it wrong. That does start to get into the whole space-time continuum thing again, but Darcy feels like she’s playing with fire the longer she stays.

 The second thing is, Darcy knows a lot of things that happen in the future. Like. A lot. She’s already blurted out probably a lot more than she should, but there’s a non-zero chance that she’ll totally spill the beans on something that really shouldn’t be known yet. Showing at-the-moment civilians in 1942 her cell phone is probably a violation of some rule or another, she’s sure, but it had proven her story.

 But Steve and Bucky are right in one thing. She doesn’t have anywhere else to go.

 “If- if I stay, what would that look like? Like, how would we do this?”

 Bucky pushes his plate away with a yawn. He looks ready to sleep soon, and Steve does have one drawing for the paper to finish shading. He was going to do that while Bucky slept for his shift tonight, maybe drop it off and get some groceries with the pay. Hopefully something more than just eggs and oatmeal this week, but they don’t know how to cook much else.

 “Bucky gets the bed, you take the couch, I’ll take the floor when Bucky works.”

 “Absolutely not. I’ll sleep on the floor.”

 Everything in Steve is insulted at the thought of making a woman sleep on the floor while he’s comfortable on the couch.

 “If you think I’m going to let you do that,” he starts, but Darcy gets right up in his face to cut him off. She’s slightly taller than him and angles her face down to look him in the eye, and it’s not condescending or mocking at all, but challenging and stubborn. He lifts his chin and meets her gaze dead on.

 “I’m not going to bum around your house and kick you out of your bed, either of you, so you can just forget about that right now, Steven Grant Rogers.” The shock of her using his full name stuns him quiet long enough for Darcy to steamroll right over him. “I have a perfectly good sleeping bag that I can use, you fit on the couch better than me, you need the extra support, and this is your home. I’m a guest- no, not even a guest, I’m some weird time traveling trespasser you’ve been incredibly kind to, and I am not about to kick you out of your own bed, got me?”

 “You are a guest, and I’m not going to make you sleep on the floor,” Steve argues, shooting Bucky a quick look. He’s ignored, his best friend leaning back to watch the show with his arms behind his head and a growing smile on his face. “How you got here doesn’t make a lick of difference-”

 “I could probably destroy all of time and space if I do something wrong, so how I got here definitely matters-”

 “But I will not,” Steve finishes firmly, like she hasn’t spoken, “let a lady sleep on the floor. I won’t do it.”

 Ohhh, she could box him around the ears (as her grandmother used to say). Because coming from anyone else, it would be sexist at the very least. But Steve is pure gentleman all the way through, firm in his convictions, and Darcy does have to consider the time she’s in. Some dudebro on the subway tries to “offer the lady a seat” and she’d probably be irked depending on the jackass level and amount of “m’lady” involved. But Steve refusing to let her sleep on the floor feels sincere. Almost sweet, if Darcy wasn’t so irritated at him.

 “We can swap like you and Bucky do,” she counters. “If you’re working, I take the bag on the floor. If I get a job, I’ll take the couch. And-” she holds a finger to his lips to stop the protest, “-whoever is on the floor sleeps in the bag for warmth and more cushion. If you’re on the floor, you’re in the bag.”

 A brow raises, mouth pulling down under her finger.

 “That’s not negotiable. If I get the couch, you get the sleeping bag, otherwise you’ll find me on the floor right next to you.”

 Bucky starts to say something, but chooses to slurp up the last of the milk instead, trying to hide his grin.

 “...fine,” Steve says around her finger.

 “Good. Now that that’s settled, I’ll go through the rest of my stuff and see what I can pawn for some cash. I can’t stay locked up here forever, but I should lay low so I’ll need a few things. Oh, and I guess I don’t have an ID…” She spins on her heel and sashays to the couch, grabbing her bag and tossing it onto the table as she sits, muttering to herself as she goes.

 Steve is still standing where she’d backed him into the sink, blinking up at the ceiling and looking vaguely like he’d been whacked with a frying pan.

 “Make sure you get potatoes and coffee when you go out,” Bucky tells him. He drops his dishes in the sink, claps a stunned looking Steve on the shoulder as he passes. “I’m going to bed.”

 He hits the head, then pauses in the doorway of the bedroom for a moment, looking back at the scene: Darcy pulling stuff out of the endless pit that is her bag and piling things on the table, Steve eyeing her warily as he joins her.

 “I could probably get some money for this, right? I’ll contribute to the groceries too, and the bills, or I can make some simple foods.”

 Back to being offended, Steve blanches. “You’re not going to spend all your money on us,” he tells her. “If you want to help you can, but we’re not going to-”

 “Help, my ass. I’m going to pull my weight, and don’t you pull the gentleman shit on me again, Steve, or I’ll put you on the couch in your sleep.”

 He likes the little spitfire, he has to admit. A looker for sure, and seems like she won’t take too much of their crap, or at least she’s able to hand it right back to them. Steve looks like he still hasn’t recovered from her being so up close and personal with her earlier, even as they delve into more bickering.

 He collapses onto the bed, already feeling sleep creeping in, and smiles. Having Darcy here is gonna be fun.

 The tennis shoes look a little weird with a tea-length skirt and everyone seems to notice. When she and Steve head out to run some errands, Darcy draws quite a lot of attention while trying very hard not to draw any at all.

 When the third man turns his head to watch her pass, Darcy admits to being unnerved, and upset that she’d talked herself out of bringing her taser. She left the bag as well, choosing to stuff her pockets- thank Thor the skirt fit (after a quick seam rip, a sacrificed hair tie, and a safety pin, apparently Bucky’s sister is slimmer than Darcy) and had pockets- with what she’d culled out to try and sell.

 She’d initially been annoyed that Steve was refusing to let her go anywhere alone, but logic was starting to set in. Now that they’re actually out walking in the day, it’s a little more crowded, and not only would she have been hopelessly lost after a mile, she isn’t going unnoticed. She’d taken off all her makeup and done her best with the clothes, but it was a smaller neighborhood, and a new face on the arm of a well-known face stood out. People keep greeting Steve by name and shooting her curious looks.

 Trying to be casual about it, Darcy slides her arm through Steve’s and leans in to whisper.

 “Should I have, like, a cover story?” She’s not sure what the protocol is for a woman living with two men in the 40’s, but she doesn’t really give a shit if people whisper behind their hands about her. Hopefully, given that it’s the city and the current state of the world, no one is really going to care too much, but she doesn’t want to cause trouble for Steve or Bucky.

 Steve shifts his sketchbook to his other arm, freeing up his right to take Darcy’s arm properly. She’s still got visible scratches on her face, but the the rest are hidden by the longer sleeves of her shirt, even partially rolled up as they are. He can feel a small scab on her thumb as they adjust their hold on each other and takes care to not put too much pressure on her injures.

 “Not a bad idea,” he admits, glancing around now too.

 He stands straight as the sight of two men passing them, sure he’d seen them a block back but going in the other direction. Had they doubled back for some reason? They give Darcy a long, slow look as they pass. Steve gets a dismissive smirk, and he’s sure one of them turns to walk backwards, watching Darcy as they walk on. He tightens his grip on Darcy slightly and hopes she hasn’t noticed. Hopes they don’t try to pick a fight. Bucky is getting some well-earned sleep and isn’t around to back him up. The best he’d be able to do is buy Darcy some time to get away.

 He’s pretty sure she’d jump right into the fight herself rather than run anyway, and that’s definitely not the kind of attention they need right now.

 They trek down to the paper office mostly unbothered otherwise, Darcy wandering around curiously as he negotiates prices with the ad clerk, and they come up with a story that explains a girl living with them that doesn’t arouse too much suspicion. They land on her being a surprise daughter of an estranged cousin of Bucky’s who recently passed, and had come looking for Rebecca, not realizing she’d married and moved.

 “Got my luggage stolen right off the train,” Darcy adds with a dramatic pout. “But lucky for me, good ol’ cousin Bucky couldn’t stand to turn a poor gal out into the cold and offered to let me stay until everything settles down.”

 They have to walk all the way downtown and hop the subway, but they make it to a clothing boutique that’s known to buy used clothes and supplies in good condition. Sometimes they give cash if they have it, but mostly it’s ration cards nowadays. Darcy considers trying to get a job for half a second, but if anyone asks her to produce any kind of ID she’s screwed. She can fake a modern ID well enough with a computer and some time, but she’s out of her element with paper and ink.

 Thankfully the tiny, stern woman behind the counter seems interested in Darcy’s offerings. Her gold plated nametag says Maude, her more salt than pepper hair is ruthlessly scraped back into the tightest bun Darcy has ever seen, and doesn’t smile once as she picks through the bobbins and lace Darcy offers.

 She has no idea why the hell Tony’s emergency kit contained multiple spools of thread and lace, but it’s saving her ass right now so she’ll think about later. If she ever gets home she can ask him herself.

 Maude takes the lace and bobbins, offering ration cards for both. The needles are in higher demand, and Darcy has a ton of them, so she gets cash for those. The needles from SHIELD’S kit are basic needles of varying sizes, one hundred in total, but the ones Tony packed look different and she only hands a few of those over, hoping no one really notices they don’t go dull for over a year no matter how much they’re used until she’s long gone. She’s also not going to ask why Tony invented such a thing- useful, don’t get her wrong, but was he bored one day and just decided to make needles that last almost forever? (Probably.)

 The happiness about the money dissolves as soon as she sees how fast it goes. Though the prices aren’t what she’s used to, and she struggles to adjust for the inflation of her time, she understands when there’s only just enough for what you need.

 She gets a basic pair of shoes and makes a face at the small heel, but wears them out of the store. She hides her sneakers in the box, and barely puts up a fight when Steve insists on carrying it.

 “Hopefully I’ll draw less stares once the clothes are right.” Self conscious, reeling from how fast the money went, she adjusts her glasses and doesn’t hear Steve mutter. “Are my glasses wrong? Please tell me I don’t need to get new ones, my prescription is wild, even Tony said that ‘Stark insurance is pretty good, but your eyes need to be fixed’, so I doubt I’d be able to see out of anything I bought now.”

 “They’re fine. Stark?”

 Momentarily distracted by the burgundy dress she’s completely fallen in love with, wishing she could take a picture with her phone, Darcy gives a distracted hum. It’s getting more common to see women in pants around this time, but most of what’s offered for women at this discount boutique across from Maude’s is skirts and dresses.

 “Like Howard Stark, the inventor?”

 Darcy’s head snaps up. “Howard- oh my god, Howard Stark.”

 She’s an idiot, holy shit. Tony Stark isn’t alive yet, but his father Howard is, and he’s already known as a brilliant risk-taking scientist. She doesn’t know shit about what he’s working on right now, or even where he is, but he’s here. He’s in this time period and maybe she can get him to help her… if she can get to him. If nothing else, he might have a way to contact current Stark Industries or something.

 She’s seen all the Back to the Future movies. She knows the trope of writing a note in the past for the present to find.

 Delighted, a little more steady with the idea, Darcy wraps both arms around a very startled Steve, catching him in a full body hug.

 “You’re a genius, Steve,” she crows, and presses a quick, barely-there kiss to his cheek out of sheer joy. “Howard Stark, of course! That has to be it.”

 His cheek is warm where she’d kissed him. He does his best to ignore it. “What has to be what?”

 Darcy doesn’t appear to hear him, taking her clothing choices up to the front and paying. She’s bright and excited now, eyes practically sparkling, and she takes his hand to pull him out into the street with her.

 “I can’t believe I didn’t think of that. He’s still alive, and it’s years before Tony, but if I find a way to talk to him… Well, I’d have to prove I’m, ya know, but I think I could do that. I’ve got stuff he would know isn’t from here.”

 “When does he die?” Steve asks in complete innocence.

 The question stops her dead in the middle of the sidewalk, and Darcy feels a cold sweat start down her spine. Shit, this is probably a space-time thing, something that would have her arrested on site if she mentions, or a thousand other horrible things that could land her in a deep dark pit, buried in a SHIELD jail and forgotten about.

 Unsure of everything, suddenly aware she’s still holding Steve’s hand, Darcy murmurs an apology to the woman trying to scoot around them and backs away, unable to meet Steve’s eye.

 “Not for a while,” she says quietly, letting go of Steve. “It’s tragic, but it’s years off yet.”

 Should she say something? Tell Howard? She can’t tell Steve, so she definitely can’t tell Howard, even she even manages to find and talk to him. How would she even begin to explain that?

 Steve frowns. “An accident or something?”

 “Or something,” she agrees, hugging her arms, the slight chill in the air she’d been enjoying now biting through her clothes.

 “Oh.” Steve says, and she thinks of Bucky, asleep in a small bed, eating overdone eggs, fluffing his hair in her mirror and fascinated by the Rubik’s Cube.

 Thinks of years of torture, a metal arm, bullets he puts in his best friend. Thinks of Tony and Captain America against each other, the team divided until Wakanda steps in, The Winter Soldier and Bucky blurring, and the horrible, sad, terrible things the Soldier had to do.

 “Darcy-”

 “I know something that’s going to happen.” Her voice is steady because she forces it to be. If she keeps her head down, Steve won’t see the frustrated tears building. “I can’t tell you what it is, and I can’t stop it.”

 Because she can’t. If she has any hope at all of getting home, to the right home, the right New York, in the right timeline, with the right people, everything has to happen the exact way it did before. Not just Bucky and Steve becoming the soldiers they do, doing everything- everything- that they did, but all of it. The war. The bombings. The deaths. Even Peggy goddamn Carter in that fucking watch and Steve going into the ice and waking in a strange world to find everyone and everything he’d known to be relics of the past.

 Would it change things if she talked to Howard? Got help from someone? Maybe. Is it a chance she’s willing to take to get home? Maybe…? She might have already borked things by being here period, after all. If she’s careful and changes little else between now and whenever she manages to talk to Tony’s father, she might just make it back.

 She doesn’t realize she’s digging into the gash on her arm until Steve pulls her hand away.

 “Howard Stark travels around as far as I know,” he says, wiping an honest-to-god handkerchief on her fingers to dab up the blood before pressing it against her arm. When Darcy risks a glance, he meets her gaze. “If you know where he is, I’ll do whatever I can to get you to him.”

 What if this is the wrong thing? What if getting to Howard somehow changes something in the future, and not for the better?

 Because not everything is Back to the Future. Some of it is Back to the Future Part II, when Biff gets the almanac and screws up everything and it takes two movies to put it all back right.

 She doesn’t know what the right answer is. She doesn’t even know if there is a right answer. It might not even be possible for her to get back to her time at all. But she nods at Steve, unable to find her voice, and allows him to take her hand and her bags both, and lead them home.

Chapter Text

  The thing about being an Avenger is, there’s always more to do. Everyone has something else to do besides saving the world, but everyone available drops what they’re doing and heads out when the call comes. A confirmed Hydra base always gets some attention, and when Bucky (who apparently objects to staying in Wakanda to heal and sort through his memories) is rumored to be involved, Natasha and Steve both gear up. And with Natasha comes Clint, though Tony elects to stay behind and monitor things; aka Pepper showed up and forced him to sleep.

 No one wants to say it out loud, but Tony’s thrown himself into getting Jane’s machines up and running again with such determination that they’re all beginning to worry. A bit. A little. It’s not unusual for Tony to be up for a few days straight, sinking his teeth into some project or another, but his mania has been focused singularly on righting the lab for the past two months.

 No one wants to talk about how it’s been two months since Darcy vanished, either. They talk about repairs and cleaning, they discuss shifts to take to make sure the scientist trio sleep, they briefly consider ignoring summons to keep working, and ultimately decide against it. Darcy would want them to keep working, but she would also expect them to keep working as a team, not just concentrating on getting her home.

 Their obligation is to the world, not just Darcy.

 It’s a little easier to get everyone out of the lab for breaks with Steve’s assurances that Darcy is safe with them, though all the way back in the past. Even Bruce comes out to the Hydra base to work out some frustrations.

 “Darcy would know how to get Tony to chill out,” Natasha says on the way home. Clint, almost asleep beside her, startles awake in the turbulence. “It doesn’t feel right without her, and she wasn’t even there that long.”

 Steve closes his eyes and pretends to sleep so he doesn’t have to see the covert looks everyone is pretending they aren’t throwing him.

 Bruce ruefully examines his broken glasses. “She’d also remind me to leave these back at the tower before going green. I need to stop doing that.”

 “Best way to calm Tony and Jane’s nerves is to get Darcy back,” Clint says, fighting a yawn. The fight had lasted almost two days, and then they’d had to stay and help mop up as a sign of good faith for the country they kind-of, sort-of ignored the visitor laws for.

 Captain America usually hangs back for that. The team had at some point decided Steve was in charge, but some countries get a little squirrely when dealing with him. Natasha can usually speak whatever language they need to, and Bruce is great at diplomacy if he’s calm, so he hangs back to deal with wounded or radio ahead. Sometimes he even gets to nag Bucky onto the jet, trying to get him to say why the hell he’d run off this time. Sometimes he even gets an answer, but mostly Bucky just gets antsy “sitting around meditating or whatever”, and goes looking for a fight.

 He aims for Hydra for the most part, so no one complains too much. Except Shuri, getting annoyed that Bucky comes and goes rather than healing entirely before leaving, thus interrupting the process, “and making it longer! Knock it off and stay put!”

 Bucky wasn’t here this time, already vanishing before they’d arrived. He’s the one that had raised the alarm about this place, but he’s been hard to catch up with this time around.

 Unable to help himself, Steve asks “Anything from Thor?”

 “No, he’s still trying to meet with the Norns. His father is…” Nat trails off, frowning.

 “Busy?”

 “Asleep,” Clint says, closing his eyes again. “Odinsleep is a real thing, apparently. Thor can’t come back or see the Norns until he’s awake. He’s stuck for now, and Foster is starting to get antsy.”

 Bruce snorts. “Just starting to? Neither Thor nor Darcy are around. I think she’s surviving entirely off coffee at this point. She’s not even sweetening it anymore, she’s drinking it black.”

 Probably a bad sign.

 He’s tired, he’s hungry, and he really wants a shower. But Darcy is important to him, and Jane is important to her, and Steve feels a kind of responsibility. And maybe just a little bit guilty. The way he smells makes him shower and change before heading down, but the thought of Darcy and her insistence on feeding people makes him swing by the kitchen on the way, a plate of sandwiches balanced on his hand.

 Jane doesn’t look up when he comes in, tapping away at the tablet in her hand. The first tap is firm, but the second and third taps are rapid and angry. He sets the plate down and turns to her, stopping when she growls and tosses the tablet onto the table, slamming her hands down on either side when it lands.

 “Fuck,” she says, and doesn’t look at him.

 Steve waits a beat. When she doesn’t say anything else, he nudges the plate closer.

 “She’ll be real angry if she comes back and finds out you haven’t been taking care of yourself.”

 He leaves it at that, but makes a point to grab two of the sandwiches and dig in. Jane turns to look at him through the curtain of her hair, and he wonders if he’s about to get the slap she gave Tony right after the accident. He’s pretty sure the only reason he hasn’t gotten his yet is because Jane is too angry to even look at him.

 Now that he thinks about it, this is the first time they’ve been in the same room since it happened.

 Jane eyes him, but straightens and reaches for the plate.

 “Have you been avoiding me?”

 “Not on purpose.”

 She narrows her eyes.

 “You’ve seemed… focused, the past few months. And I’m not looking forward to being on the receiving end of your wrath,” he tells her honestly. The slap probably wouldn’t even hurt him, but he’s seen first-hand how much righteous fury can spill from petite women. Darcy is a sight when she’s steamed. “But I’ll take it if you need to give it to me. It’s only fair.”

 For a moment, they both chew in silence, thinking.

 “You didn’t say anything to stop it from happening because you wanted to avoid a paradox. I’m a scientist,” Jane reminds him, like he could forget she’s just as brilliant as Banner and Stark. “Once I got over the shock and fear and anger, I understood, sort of.” She drops into the empty desk chair beside him with a sigh. “I don’t want Darcy to be gone, and I really didn’t want to be the person to tell her parents she’s missing, but if it all happened seventy years in the past, you couldn’t stop it from happening in the present.”

 Steve realizes he hadn’t spared a thought for Darcy’s parents, which adds more guilt and shame.

 “I… didn’t trust myself,” he admits. “If I’d been here when it happened-”

 “You would have tried to stop it,” Jane finishes. “Yeah. Once I got done wanting to kill you two, Tony told me. I know.”

 “Did you apologize for hitting him?”

 “He wouldn’t let me. Said he probably deserved it for one reason or another.”

 “What did you tell her folks?”

 “The truth. I couldn’t lie to them. Her mom cried, her dad- stepdad, I couldn’t get ahold of her deadbeat father- yelled and threatened to come up here, then he cried too. I can't blame him, but it was awful.”

 The silence that falls is awkward. Steve had been so desperate to leave when he’d seen Darcy that he’d run out without really introducing himself to Jane. This is the first time she’s looked at him since the accident, but it’s also the most they’ve ever spoken in general, and they don’t have much in common.

 But they both care about and miss Darcy, so they’re here, eating sandwiches in the lab and listening to the hum of the computers and machines around them.

 “What are you and Darcy doing right now?”

 “Now?” He has to think about it. The accident that sent Darcy to him had happened back in May, but she’d arrived in September, and for her the trip had been instant. He’d wondered about that, but anything that can send you back years in the past isn’t going to stop and match the months up. “Thanksgiving, or around then. We didn’t have any family to visit, and Darcy would have stood out too much even if we did. We stayed in, had some Thanksgiving rations. Bucky worked at the docks. I think that’s around the time I worked at a grocer’s, before I got really sick again.”

 “And Darcy?”

 “Most of October and November, she just stayed in. She’d go out on the porch, or down to play with kids in the street sometimes and earn a little babysitting money, but she didn’t want to mess with timelines too much, or impact people’s lives enough that she would be missed if she just vanished one day. She cooked for us, and cleaned the place top to bottom, and made us drink clean water. Some of the moms in the building paid her in food to babysit while they worked sometimes. She made us eat a lot of vegetables.”

 “That sounds like her. She can’t help but take care of people. I can’t believe she stayed in the whole time, though.”

 “She didn’t. She got bored quick. No amount of worrying about screwing up the future was going to keep her inside during the holidays.” Because it’s Jane, and because the memory makes him smile, Steve tells her. “We went dancing a little before Christmas.”

 A wistful, soft smile comes over Jane. “She loves Christmas.”

 “She does,” Steve says with a smile, and remembers.

 The entire space-time continuum could collapse if Darcy isn’t careful. Stepping out into the world she’s in could irrevocably change the entire future, or even spit her out into a parallel world, or a million other things that could go wrong if Darcy speaks to the wrong person, or does the wrong thing and draws the wrong kind of attention. She knows this, and she’s been very, very careful to keep herself inside and away from everyone and everything when possible. Which is, she’s pretty sure, what she’s supposed to do in this situation.

 So here Darcy is. Sleeping on the floor in 1942 and listening to Steve snore softly on the couch. Doing the right thing.

 The thing is, doing the right thing is so boring Darcy could scream. Watching over kids almost old enough to not need it in exchange for potatoes and beans, then cooking said potatoes and beans isn’t enough to fill her day.

 She’s not much into The Scene, whatever The Scene is nowadays. Or, back home, she supposes. Any give Saturday night, Darcy is in her PJs, eating cold pizza, and bingeing a tv show she’s seen a hundred times. It doesn’t take much to convince her to go out with friends, but she’ll never initiate it on her own on purpose unless it’s someone’s birthday.

 But two months of nothing except reading on the porch and playing hopscotch in the dirt with kids is two months too many, Thanksgiving had sucked, and she’s not about to sit around and miss Christmas too, even if it is currently three weeks off.

 “Okay, I need to go do something fun,” she abruptly announces the next evening.

 Bucky is prepping for a third date, combing his hair and shining his shoes, going out dancing with a girl up the block. He’s trying to talk Steve into going with him- apparently his date might have a friend- and Darcy decides she’s coming too.

 She can’t dance worth spit, but sitting on the sidelines and sipping root beer or cream soda or whatever the hell sounds infinitely better than sitting inside and counting all the water stains on the ceiling again (12- one of which looks like Abe Lincoln next to a horse) while they go out. Steve, at least, usually comes back, but Bucky usually is gone till morning.

 “Really?” Steve looks up. “The furthest you’ve ever gone is downtown, and only once.”

 “I’m going crazy.”

 “Sweet. Looks like you’ve got a date after all, Rogers. Suit up, we’re hitting the town.” Bucky bumps shoulders with Darcy and waggles his brows. “Put on your dancing shoes, doll. We’re taking you out tonight.”

 She hasn’t gone further than across the street since she decided to wait and see if she just kinda… blips back into her time the way she’d blipped into this one, a deep anxiety waiting the further up the block she goes (and she doesn’t have a way to get to Howard Stark, much less talk to him, if that’s even the right move), but she’s been working on it. Keeping the timeline intact is quickly losing against her need to go out and look around, and her basic need for a little human connection that’s not two men that have lived in each other’s pockets since they were in single digits.

 Bucky has an in at some kind of club that’s supposed to have some good music and the possibility of alcohol, with a rumor of a dance floor big enough to chase away the war-time blues that engulfs the daytime. The girl he’s been with lately told him about it and invited him and Steve along. Darcy could blend in with a group of people her age. Getting lost in a crowd would be okay, right?

 Fuck it, even if it’s not she’s so bored it would be a welcome break, and Thanksgiving had been a sad affair compared to what she’s used to.

 Everything kind of is, and thinking that makes her feel like a dick. And even worse, she’s wondering what Christmas will look like while she’s here.

 There’s a war going on and Darcy’s complaining that she’s bored and that the holidays weren’t great. Steve and Bucky have been giving her food and shelter in exchange for very little, and she’s bitching because she misses the internet and only had one book in her bag, which she’s already read four times since she landed.

 It’s not like she’s super useful around the apartment either. She’s not a good cook at the best of times, but she manages simple dishes and has only singed her eyebrows once (light match first, turn gas on second, and she learned that the hard way, but her brows grew back fine), and she has been cleaning out of sheer boredom, but honestly? Darcy thought accidentally traveling through time would be a little more interesting than this.

 “I’ve never gone dancing,” she tells them, because she doubts drunken twerking after finals freshman year with her at-the-time girlfriend (and the messy breakup that followed) really counts. “It’s not really a big thing in the future, so if I don’t go now, I probably won’t ever.”

 “Well, we can’t have that,” Steve says, and startles Bucky by standing to get ready without a fight.

 So they go out dancing, although “out” is stretching it: the club is barely half a mile away, and Darcy still has to readjust her mind when she steps out. Even putting on the burgundy dress with it’s tea-length hem and belted waist isn’t enough to stop her from picturing a modern club with thumping bass and flashing lights. Doesn’t help matters that she can’t help herself, and turns her phone on for the first time in over a month to snap a picture of herself before powering it down and putting it away again. It’s not until they walk in, the air slightly hazy with cigarette smoke and trumpet music playing that she remembers when she is.

 At least Steve’s perked up a bit. Working at a grocer’s is giving them a little room in the budget, and is forcing them to eat better since they have more access to fresh foods, but he does need a little fun in his life too. Bucky’s just happy he’s convinced Steve to come with him for once, even if Darcy had done most of the convincing by agreeing to come along.

 Darcy can feel herself relaxing a little as they get deeper in. There are enough people here that no one looks at her twice, and the cigarette smoke is faint, which means it won’t bother Steve’s asthma too much. Bucky’s date Clara is a cute blonde with big brown eyes and freckles splashed across her face who looks happy enough to see them. She gives Bucky a quick kiss, Darcy a quick hug, and Steve a quick smile.

 “My best pal Steve, and his date, my wayward cousin Darcy,” Bucky introduces them, smoothly sliding an arm across Clara’s shoulders. “These two are attached at the hip, so I thought I’d bring ‘em both.”

 “I love your dress.”

 “Love your shoes,” Darcy manages, before Bucky whisks Clara away to the dance floor.

 Steve watches them go. “Sorry,” he says. “Bucky’s mouth likes to move before his brain can catch up sometimes. I’m sure someone will ask you to dance.”

 Darcy blinks at him, mouth turning into an exaggerated frown. “You’re sorry you’re my date?” she asks, and a small part of her actually is kind of hurt before she remembers who’s standing beside her. He’s got Peggy Carter- or whoever- to look forward too in a few months, of course Darcy’s lacking. “Aw, come on. I know I’m a weird shut-in, but I thought we were having fun!”

 Pure male panic blooms across Steve’s face. “I- no! I just meant you don’t have to be my- I swear I didn’t mean-”

 Taking pity on him, Darcy clears her face with a laugh. “It’s fine, I get it. I wouldn’t be my first choice either.”

 Beet red, Steve mutters something about getting them some waters, and beats a hasty retreat.

 Probably shouldn’t mess with him too much, but he’s got the love of his life around the corner, and Darcy can at least make sure Steve is sure-footed enough to give her a good time. Peggy was a total badass, and Steve is amazing, but Darcy can help him build up his confidence with women a little. And maybe when she gets back, they’ll be friendly enough that she can tease him about this “date” they went on way back when.

 “I meant it when I said I’ve never danced. I’m probably not any good,” she says when he comes back. But the music is good, and though the fashion feels strange, it’s nice to get dressed up and go out with friends.

 Because despite her best efforts to just fade into the background, Darcy is most definitely friends with these two goons. Bucky is a shit, but Steve is twice as bad and she vibes with them like she never thought she would. It was inevitable, she figures. She is sharing a tiny apartment with them both, and stumbling around each other in the mornings makes awkwardness take a backseat through necessity.

 Though the day she’d had to explain modern birth control to them, showing them the mark on her arm from her implant to explain why she hasn’t needed menstrual products will forever live in her head as one of the single most memorable things that’s ever happened to her, up there with tasing the God of Thunder himself.

 Bucky’s out a lot, either at work or out on a date, but the tales he brings home with him are entertaining. The leftovers he shares with them from the date are usually even better. And she’s fine with silence, really, but too much of it drives her crazy, and she’s practically worn their radio and record player both out trying to fill the space with noise. Steve doesn’t seem to mind, and honestly it’s nice, picking a record out together, letting it play while he sketches and she tries to find something to do. She usually gives up halfway into a chore and pesters him to see what he’s working on, and he pretends to fight it, but always caves and shows her.

 The music picks up a while later, the stage now holding a guitar player and a large man settling behind a drum kit. Bucky and Clara take their positions again, grinning at each other. Steve clears his throat.

 “Well, since this is a date… would- would you like to dance?” he asks, and braces himself for the kind rejection he knows is coming.

 In answer, Darcy takes his hand and pulls him out onto the floor. “You brought this on yourself,” she warns him, just before a blast of music plays.

 It quickly warms with all the bodies moving, but Darcy sticks close to Steve. One hand in hers, the other at her waist, Steve casts his mind back to the lessons his mother had given him. Standing on her shoes, the music pumping behind them, Mom counting the steps as they moved.

 “One day your girl is going to ask you dance, and you’re going to want to make sure you know how.”

 Darcy is taller than him, just a little, but it doesn’t seem to bother her in the slightest. She steps on his foot three times in five minutes, and bumps into the couple behind her when she spins out, laughing it off both times and spinning clumsily right back into his arms. Her smile doesn’t drop once.

 They applaud the band at the end of the song. Darcy tries to act like she’s not gasping for air, but whew, that was a workout. No wonder dancing is slash was a whole event. Steve grins at her, a little flushed, and she decides she could use a real drink to calm her pounding heart.

 “What are the chances of me getting some booze here?” She’s more than old enough, but if they ask her to prove it…

 Clara’s eyes go sly. “If you come up with me to the bar, they’ll serve us without asking. They never ask pretty girls their age.”

 Bucky gives Steve a nudge. “We’ll grab a table and let the ladies grab the drinks. Nice moves, by the way. You two looked good out there.”

 His foot kind of hurts from Darcy’s last stomp, but spinning the prettiest girl in the room across the floor is worth any price. He still can’t believe Darcy had agreed to dance with him in the first place after he’d so spectacularly put his foot in his mouth. Who would ever be upset at having her as their date?

 A more mellow song plays, and they wind their way through the people milling around.

 Steve hears it first.

 “I said no, Jerry. Let me go.”

 “Aw, come on Marcie, don’t be like that. We’re just having some fun.”

 Across the way, a man leers at a woman. He’s bigger than her by a few inches, though a little shorter than most people in here. The woman is small, maybe Steve’s height, and blocked in by a meaty arm propped on the wall behind her. They’re tucked away in a corner, almost hidden by a booth, and not making much noise, but the woman’s eyes are almost yelling.

 By the time Darcy and Clara approach with drinks, Steve is in front of them.

 “The lady said no.”

 Jerry turns, face pinched and sweaty, and laughs in Steve’s face.

 “Oh screw off,” he says, and grabs the woman before she can run, yanking her forcefully into his side. “What’s it to you, pipsqueak? Jealous I got a girl and you don’t? Scram before I knock your lights out.”

 Jerry’s only got about four inches on him, and he doesn’t appear to be entirely sober. He’s cocksure, and to his mind has already dismissed the little guy in front of him. He doesn’t see the punch coming, and that’s entirely why it lands.

 It’s mostly shock that has him dropping Marcie’s arm, and she takes the advantage and runs.

 Unfortunately, he does have both height and weight on Steve, and his punch hurts a lot more than the one Steve had thrown. Steve goes down after two hits, and isn’t fast enough to get his feet under him when Jerry stands over him to deliver more blows. Bucky’s already there, but Jerry’s solid, and it takes a good amount of strain to throw him off Steve. People have noticed the commotion and begin to rush in, and in the chaos Darcy is pushed to the front of the crowd.

 Jerry almost lands a gut punch on Bucky, but they both slip in a spilled drink and go down hard as the crowd pushes in. Bucky is momentarily lost in the throng, trying to scramble to his feet and push everyone back at the same time. Jerry’s already up again, and he charges at Steve like a bull, face an alarming shade of red.

 “You know how long I worked her, you asshole? You ruined my night and now I’m going to take it out of your hide.”

 Tasting blood, feeling it drip down his temple, Steve braces.

 Jerry goes down hard a foot from him, slamming his face on the ground and revealing Darcy standing behind him, foot just coming down from a kick. She has two glasses, one balanced in each hand, and a look of pure fury on her face.

 The place falls silent around them, and this is not what Darcy had in mind when she wished for a little excitement. The best option now is to make a quick exit; even if the police don’t show up, the asshole currently on the floor might have friends who want to jump in, and they’re not equipped to do more than shove a drunkard around right now.

 But she couldn’t walk away anymore than Steve could. And just as Thor and Nat have both told her, a large opponent goes down easily when the base is attacked. A swift kick to the back of his knee had sent Jerry to the ground like a felled tree.

 Darcy downs the glass of whiskey in two quick gulps, handing the now empty glass to a stunned looking girl beside her. The other she upends over Jerry’s head, sending him sputtering. She hopes the stains never come out of his shirt. Wishes she’d brought her taser.

 “No means no, asshole.” She gives him a swift kick on the shin for good measure, satisfied with the howl of pain he lets out.

 Bucky’s already pulling Clara out the door. Aware of the eyes on them, Darcy makes a show of walking up to Steve and taking his hand, lacing their fingers together with her shoulders back.

 “Mind escorting a lady out? Some people just don’t know how to behave.”

 Bucky opts to walk Clara home and make patching Steve up Darcy’s responsibility.

 “Doll, you’re one terrible wingman.”

 “She’s never going to forget this date, so I’m actually a great wingman,” Darcy corrects, waving him off.

 “Yeah, right. I’ve got a lot of smooth talking to do if I’m going to get past their- her doorway tonight.”

 “I have every faith in you,” Darcy tells him dryly, and Steve snorts out a laugh that makes his head throb.

 They watch the pair disappear down the street before Darcy turns to him, hands on her hips. “Okay, let me see the damage. Inside.”

 “I’ve had worse,” Steve tells her, blood staining his teeth.

 On a sigh, Darcy herds him upstairs and thinks fondly of the silent elevators in the tower as they troop up to the third floor. If nothing else, being here is excellent for her cardio, but she misses the convenience of ordering dinner and having someone else make it for you, misses the internet, and reliable electricity and being able to wear pants in public without it being mildly problematic.

 “I’m sure you have, but I still want to see.”

 Steve offers her a sullen look. “I couldn’t let him-”

 “Of course you couldn’t,” she says easily, handing him a clean dish rag. “That’s not who you are. Press this against your lip. I’m going to change and then we’ll fix you up.”

 Bucky will be able to smooth things over with Clara, he’s sure. He’s a charmer. He might be annoyed that another night out with Steve had ended with a fight, but Steve also knows Bucky had started across the floor too, the second he’d realized what was happening. Steve’s just faster.

 He’s also aware if Bucky hadn’t been there to bail him out, like usual, it wouldn’t have gone over so well, but he’ll recover like always. Steve’s pretty sure they won’t see him till morning.

 He probably ruined the night for Darcy though, and that does sting. They’d only managed a single dance before it had all gone to hell.

 Steve runs his tongue along his teeth, tasting the blood, and remembers him and Darcy spinning around on the dance floor.

 Worth it.

 The bathroom door opens with a bang, Darcy emerging in the oversized shirt she’d had on her when she arrived, the top three buttons undone, and a pair of wide-legged pants she’d bought from the men’s clothing store. The red dress she’d worn is draped over her arm, her hair bundled on top of her head, glasses firmly in place, dark lipstick still painting her mouth.

 She really is beautiful, but Steve keeps the thought to himself. If all the women in the future are like Darcy, he can’t wait to see it.

 He gets to see the first aid of her time up close and personal, and isn’t fond of the stinging antiseptic she drips on a piece of gauze before touching it to his lip. He flinches back. Darcy holds his chin in her hand, eyes never leaving his face.

 “Hold still.”

 “Seventy years later and they still haven’t figured out how to make this not sting?”

 He gets a smile at that, so he stays still, letting Darcy cup his chin in her hand and tilt him this way and that until she’s satisfied. She’s very close, leaning in to gently dab the blood away, using her thumb to catch any drops that escape.

 “How’s the head wound?”

 The bleeding has already stopped. “It’s fine,” he tries to insist, but Darcy’s already leaning in.

 “Tip your head down, I need to see if you broke skin when you hit your head.”

 Obediently, Steve bows his head forward, hyper aware of Darcy’s chest brushing against the top of his head as she leans to check him over. Her fingers run gently through his hair, pausing every now and then to press gently.

 “Okay, I’m not a medical person, but in my highly professional opinion, you will be fine,” she says and releases him.

 Steve raises his head. “I’m sorry.”

 Darcy pauses in the middle of digging through a smaller bag that came out of her massive one. She says it’s an emergency kit, and it’s different than her purse. She actually has two of them in there, one from a group of people she won’t name, and one from someone who has to be one of Howard Stark’s descendants, not that Darcy ever says much about that other than the name Tony.

 “Sorry? What for, putting that guy on his ass?”

 Steve shrugs. He’s not really sorry about that part, but he’s sorry it ruined the night.

 “You don’t have to be sorry for that. You did the right thing.”

 He waits, but the rest of the lecture doesn’t appear to be coming. Instead, Darcy pulls tiny, almost invisible strips of clear material off a big square and motions him forward. “Here, I don’t think you need stitches, but we should put something on those cuts so they’re not just open.”

 Aware that Steve doesn’t have a scar on his temple or his lip, Darcy applies the butterfly bandages with extreme care. Such a handsome face deserves her best efforts, even if she thinks a scar or two would add character. Can Steve in the future even have scars? Does he just fully heal on his own? He’s been in the hospital a few times, so she’s not entirely sure. Regardless, the man faced down a jerk of epic proportions to save a woman and was punched in the face for it. The least Darcy can do is make sure looks as handsome as possible before meeting Peggy sometime next year.

 “I ruined your night,” Steve tries to insist.

 “When did you do that? I had a great time.”

 Steve doesn’t appear to know what to say to that, and silently lets her apply the bandages to her satisfaction.

 But when she’s done, instead of leaning back, or standing and gathering the trash, Darcy cups his face in both of her hands and gives him a long look. Her eyes are serious and dark, and the blue is deep and easy to get lost in behind her glasses, and holy hell he can’t think of anything except how pretty she is when she’s this close.

 And then she smiles and everything just drops away.

 “Thank you for a wonderful time tonight, Steve,” she says with the utmost sincerity. “I had a fun dancing with you, and I’m proud of you for doing the right thing and helping that woman.”

 She thinks it’ll be okay. This is normal after-date behavior right? Buck’s doing god-know-what with Clara (and probably also the fella Clara stays with, and Darcy doesn’t know why they think she hasn’t picked up on that yet), so a kiss on the cheek to a brave Steve who’d stood his ground against someone bigger than him shouldn’t be too big of a deal.

 Her lipstick leaves an imprint on his cheek and she wipes it away, slightly embarrassed at the mark and ignoring the spark that had jolted through her lips on contact.

 “You’re a good man, Steve,” she says, and hurries to gather her stuff. “You get the couch tonight.”

 “Hey-”

 “Getting punched in the face means you get the couch.”

 “Bucky’s not coming back tonight,” Steve says, slightly dazed. “I’ll take the bed, you get the couch.”

 Darcy nods, carefully putting her trash in a ziploc bag and dumping it in her purse. Drunken bar fights were one thing, but she’s pretty sure her futuristic trash leavings wouldn’t be a good thing for people to find. Going out with people to avoid cabin fever, yes. Letting people see medical advances seventy years too early because she threw it away in the regular trash like an idiot? Absolutely not. Plastic goods are getting more common now as most of the steel and metal are used for guns and shells, but she’s not sure about the backing of thin, clear, flexible plastic bandages that will absorb into skin eventually and leave no trace, clearly labeled with Stark’s logo.

 Might be a bit too much for anyone to know about yet. She probably shouldn’t have used them on Steve, but what is she supposed to do, just let him bleed and get an infection? The man ran to the defense of a woman he didn’t even know, she’s not going to let him suffer for that.

 How could he already be Captain America before he ever even entered the program?

 “You really think I did the right thing?”

 Stunned, Darcy turns back to Steve, finds him still sitting at the kitchen table.

 “Of course I do.” You try four times to volunteer because you want to help. You put a plane in the ice to save the world. You don’t even get much time with the woman whose picture you carry around behind enemy lines but you love her all the same. “You’re Steve Rogers, and you always help. It’s just who you are. Helping people is never wrong.”

 For a long moment, neither of them say anything, both lost in their thoughts. The creaky pipes in the building bang as someone in another apartment runs the water.

 Steve kicks off his shoes and starts undoing his cuffs. Some of Jerry’s blood, and some of his, has marked the sleeves and he should soak them before it stains.

 He pauses just inside the bathroom, casting a look back.

 “Darcy?” He waits until she looks at him. “I had a great time tonight, too,” he tells her, and lets it hang before stepping in to clean that jerk’s blood off his good shirt.

Chapter Text

 Bucky brings home a cold at the beginning of December that he shares with them. Three sick people in a place with only one bathroom is not a fun time, and Darcy kind of wants to murder him for about week, especially when Steve’s lungs attempt to fully give up on him. They’re constantly boiling water to keep the air moist in hopes of coughing up the crap in their lungs easier, and Darcy has to brave the streets alone with Bucky’s coat and Steve’s scarf to get them groceries because she’s the only one that can breathe out of her nose.

 She’s fairing slightly better than they are- slightly- so she’s also been in charge of making sure they both stay hydrated and fed, even if she has to basically spoon feed a weak Steve broth.

 “I demand to return to modern medicine,” she says, but the snow blowing in and the sharp cold outside has reclogged her nose and it comes out more like “mobern mebibine”. The only answer she hears on her way to the bathroom is Steve wheezing out a breath in the corner.

 She sheds the now wet clothes while standing in the clawfoot tub and simply turns the shower on full blast. The water doesn’t really get hot enough to steam for more than a few minutes, and the colder it gets outside the less hot water they have, but her fingers are numb and she needs to warm up. The water pressure is so bad she only has to lean her head to the side to avoid getting her hair wet.

 There are hairdryers around this time period, but none of them hold a candle to her Dyson air wrap and also kind of scare her, and god, she misses her modern toilet and the endless hot water at the tower. And dishwashers. Christ on a cracker she misses dishwashers.

 Bucky slips in and snags her clothes off the floor. 

 “Gonna hang these up for you, doll.” He sounds like cookie monster fucked a cheese grater to make his vocal chords, but it’s an improvement. He coughs once, twice, before leaning and spitting something into the toilet. “Holy hell.”

 “At least you can talk now,” she offers. “Did you guys drink that tea I made?”

 “Yes, and I think it was gross but I couldn’t really taste it. Did I look this bad yesterday?”

 Darcy makes some kind of noise of agreement that’s covered by the squeak of the handle being turned. Steve should really steam it up, his lungs aren’t doing well and he’s already missed two days of work that are very clearly turning into three, which means she can’t linger.

 Uncaring that Bucky’s still standing there, Darcy leans around the curtain to grab a semi-clean towel off the floor. If he gets a show it’s his lucky day, but she’s not even sure he notices; he’s too busy coughing into the sink again.

 “How’s Steve?”

 Bucky makes a face and spits again. It’s disgusting sounding, and the gob that comes out of his mouth looks even worse, but when he speaks again he sounds more normal.

 “Not great. Paulie offered to front us a little and grab him some medicine.”

 Paulie is Clara’s boyfriend and “Bucky’s new friend.” Darcy’s head is way too stuffed with cotton to remember the period accurate term for poly relationship, or if Bucky had outright told her that, or if she just caught on early. Either way, Paulie and Clara have been extremely helpful the past week but the debt is going to rack up fast if they don’t do something. Two families she used to “mind the kids” for have moved out, and anything willing to hire her has needed an ID, which she hasn’t really figured out yet.

 Steve and Bucky both have missed work being sick, and while Bucky might be able to cling to his job if he works tomorrow, they all know Steve’s gonna be out on his ass after today. He’d already missed a few days his second week (asthma attack), and had been sent home early twice for “moving too slow”, and now he’s missed most of this week. It’ll take a miracle for his boss to not hire some stronger guy, especially with the good pay and overtime hours he offers his baggers.

 There aren’t many jobs around here. Everyone is working, so no one is hiring, and what few jobs are hiring, Steve can’t do. He tries, and he’s a damn hard worker, but his body and lungs just can’t keep up with him. He can lift heavy things, but not continuously, and he can walk a fair distance but running or biking are out of the question. He’s allergic to both cigarette and factory smoke, as well as cats, dogs, bird feathers (they have to get special pillows for him because he’s allergic to the down), chemicals that appear to be in every single cleaner, milk, peanuts, and soy.

 He wants to enlist and do his part, and to him the only way to do that is to join the fighting. They all know he tried under another name again. They all know he was turned down again, another 4F stamp on his file.

 And Darcy knows what happens the next time he tries.

 But she can’t think about that now. Right now she has to get dressed, stealing a pair of Bucky’s wool socks and buttoning her shirt up all the way. It’s always cold now, the thin apartment walls still letting the cold creep in despite the windows being shut tight and the furnaces on. Steve is perpetually wrapped in a blanket and shoved into the sleeping bag, propped right against the furnace to keep him warm.

 “Hey, champ. You alive?”

 The sleeping bag shuffles. From inside, there’s a cough, and a moan.

 “I’m gonna take that as a yes. Hand, please.”

 Movement and rustling noises, then, knowing the drill, a hand appearing.

 It’s not cheating to give sick people modern medicine, right? Tylenol has been around forever anyway, so this is, like, barely any kind of Doctor Who messing with the past BS. Sure, it’s Stark enhanced Tylenol, with extra goodies mixed in with some vitamin C on top, but come on. It’s not like she’s curing cancer.

 Plus, her head hurts, and if she’s going to take some good meds for it, then damn it, so are the boys. And they can shut the hell up about how it tastes. This is the last of it anyway.

 Darcy deposits two pills into the waiting palm, then hooks the fingers around the mug of water. She’d mixed the last of the electrolyte powder into it, not that Steve is able to taste anything right now. If he’s going to get super serum later, what harm is a little boost to his immune system beforehand? If anything, she’s doing those scientists a favor by making him stronger a few months early.

 “Drink all of it,” she orders, coughing into her own hand as Steve’s retreats. She points to Bucky without turning. “You too. Passing out from dehydration isn’t gonna do anybody a damn bit of good.”

 “Nag, nag.”

 “Drink the fucking water, Barnes.”

 He does, sticking his tongue out to prove it before flipping her off.

 “You see what you’ve left me out here to deal with?” she hisses to the lump that is Steve. “He’s your friend, do something about him.”

 Steve unearths himself enough to offer her a slow blink. He’s paler than last time, and Darcy’s heart sinks at the sight.

 “He’s your cousin,” Steve wheezes out, breath way too fast. “You… do… something.”

 His forehead is alarmingly warm under her hand, and it sounds like he’s having trouble breathing in a different way than normal.

 “Fuck,” she says. “Steve, I think we need to get you to a hospital now.”

 “Sure, sweetheart,” he slurs, pushing at the blankets and shivering. “Hot. Off.”

 She turns to call for Bucky, and Steve coughs again, and again, that awful rattling wheeze at the end of each breath.

 “Easy, easy.” Darcy sits him up and strips the sweat-soaked shirt off him, easing him into a dry one that Bucky offers. “I’ve got you.”

 Steve coughs hard, and then can’t catch his breath, body and shoulders shaking with the effort. He gags and spits, face red, lips white. He tries to say something, but they don’t hear him over their frantic movements, getting him dressed for the cold. Opening the door and swearing at the sight of the snow coming down thick around them. Paulie helping muscle Steve down three flights of stairs, and into a friend of a friend’s car willing to drive him. Darcy’s muffled shriek when she slips on ice, twisting and landing badly on her ankle.

 It’s all a blur, only the sharp pain of her ankle and the snow melting in her shoes to remind her that it’s real. The wait in the hospital feels like an eternity, but it’s only an hour before a doctor briskly informs them that Steve has viral pneumonia, likely due to the cold and his own weak immune system.

 “It’s good that you brought him in. We’ve caught it early, and he’s much stronger than he was last time, so with luck he’ll be home in time for Christmas.”

 “I want to see him.”

 Steve doesn’t die of pneumonia in 1942. He doesn’t even die in 1943 in a plane crash in the ocean.

 It still doesn’t do anything to quell the panic climbing up Darcy’s throat.

 The doctor tuts at her over his clipboard. “He’s resting, and he’ll continue to rest comfortably under our care. You can return tomorrow, during visiting hours, but for now I’m afraid I must ask you to leave.”

 “I’m not going anywhere-”

 “Darcy-”

 “The best thing you can do for him is go home and rest, otherwise you’ll find yourselves admitted right beside him.”

 She tries protesting again, but her throat betrays her by coughing instead, and deep down she knows the doctor has a point, so they go home. They had a ride to the hospital, but not from, and it’s a long, painful walk to the subway station, where Darcy drops in the last of the cash for tickets home.

 “Here.” Bucky loops an arm around her waist, practically carrying her out. They make the trek from the stop and up all the stairs leaning on each other. They manage to get inside and shed the wet outer layer and their shoes, dropping them in a careless pile near the door. Too tired to care, too cold to go too far, they collapse onto the couch together. Darcy props her swollen foot on the coffee table and manages to pull the blanket over both of them before they both fall asleep sitting upright, and aware that the apartment is far too quiet now that the wheezing has stopped.

 Darcy spends the next week convinced she’s killed an American Icon.

 She desperately wants to see Steve and knows that even just a look at him would quell the anxiety that still hasn’t ebbed. But the snowstorm they’d rushed to the hospital in stays for two days, and then then snow is too deep to really make the walk, even if Darcy’s foot was up the task.

 Bucky gets back to work the morning after they drop Steve off, and he pulls overtime so they can make rent for the week. They have absolutely no idea how they’ll pay the hospital bill.

 Not for the first time, Darcy wishes she had access to her bank account, or could spend the cash in her wallet that had come with her. But even if she could find someone willing to take it, a dime printed in the 1980’s, or a new twenty could easily disrupt everything she’s fought so hard to keep together.

 Of course, none of that is going to matter if Steve dies because Darcy shouldn’t have given him modern Tylenol and antibiotics.

 Why did SHIELD have three separate forms about how to avoid leaving DNA behind for a clone of yourself to be grown and not a pamphlet about What to do if you find yourself in the past: modern medicine and you.

They’re not surprised when the grocer sends them word that they have to let Steve go, but not giving them his last week of pay is devastating. And leaves them short.

 “We’re gonna have to make up the difference somehow,” Bucky tells her tiredly. He’s just back from another double shift, so tired he’s actually eating the glue-y oatmeal Darcy had managed to pull together from their sparse cabinets. Bucky is thrilled they’re out of vegetables, but they’re down to oats and a half bag of beans. “We don’t have enough to pay the bill and rent.”

 “We’ll figure it out,” she tells him. “Eat your oatmeal.”

 When he’s asleep, she wraps her ankle with electrical tape and hope it holds. Of all the things to not appear in either of her emergency kits, somehow Tony and SHIELD both had failed to include any kind of ace wrap, so she makes due. It’s not cute, but she wears the wool socks too, thinking of the now melting but still ankle deep snow outside. She takes the burgundy dress, as well as the other nice one she’d never worn out, folding them over her arm neatly, and shoulders her bag before stealing Bucky’s coat and heading out into the cold.

 The wind has died down, but the air still bites.

 “Holy fuckballs, why is the past so damn cold?” Darcy mutters to herself, neatly dodging half melted piles of slush on her way to the subway station.

 Presentation is half the battle, so she takes care to keep herself clean (even if she is mildly scandalous by wearing thick wool pants instead of a dress), and takes the time to apply her lipstick before her stop. She hopes no one comes to check tickets before she has to get off- she’d had to hop the divider when no one was looking, unable to pay for a ticket, but if this works she should be able to pay for the return trip.

 The boutique is only a few blocks away from the stop, and Maude is just as stern and unsmiling as she remembers, but she buys the dresses for cash, and it’s not nearly enough to pay Steve’s medical bill. She also buys most of the other things Darcy offers- the last of the needles and thread, the silver bracelet she’d found in a side pocket, the diamond earrings (last year’s birthday gift from Jane, and it hurts her heart to offer them) she’d taken out of her lobes this morning. It’s almost enough.

 But when Darcy offers Maude her purse, she shakes her head. Darcy nearly bursts into tears right there and has to speak around the catch in her throat.

 “It’s designer from New York City,” she says, trying and failing to hide her desperation. “Please, I’ll take anything for it. Real leather, Italian made, silk lining, and it’s one of a kind.”

 Created just for Darcy, by Pepper and the designer themselves. She’s 100% sure it cost more than Jane’s old van. Surely it’s worth something.

 Maude gives her a long study. “Girl, I can’t pay for this. It’s too nice.” She shuffles around to Darcy’s side of the table to present her with a handkerchief and leans down to whisper. “Go up two blocks, then three over. Brownstone house with blue flowers out front. Ask for Renee, and tell him I sent you. You understand, girl?”

 It’s nearly enough to make the tears fall, but Darcy gets to her feet. 

“Thank you.”

 Maude nods once, facial expression never changing. “Go now,” she orders, and Darcy scurries out as fast as her ankle will allow.

 Renee proves to be a tiny man with a large beard and rough hands who speaks even less than Maude when she introduces herself. His eyes, hidden by two large bushy brows, light up when they see what Darcy is offering.

 She thinks his hum is pleased, and he waves her into the brownstone behind him, leaving the door open for her when he enters.

 Following the silent stranger into a house she doesn’t know without anyone knowing where she is probably isn’t the smartest thing she’s ever done, but desperation drives her forward. At least it’s warmer in here, so if she’s about to get murdered, she won’t die freezing her ass off.

 A very tall, rail thin man with a seriously impressive handlebar mustache makes his way down the stairs and extends a hand to her.

 “This is the young lady Darcy with the excellent bag? Very good. I am William Bennett, lover of all things beautiful. And you, my dear, have one very beautiful bag.” He bends at the waist to kiss her knuckles, offering her a beaming smile when he straightens. “I assume you are here because you wish to sell?”

 Hope clamps her throat shut, so she nods.

 “Excellent. Maude is a lovely dear who keeps an eye out for beautiful things. If she cannot buy them, she sends them to me. Would you like to come in a discuss terms over tea? Or perhaps cocoa?”

 They sit in front of a roaring fire, sipping cocoa with marshmallows, and Darcy can almost feel her toes again. She ignores the way her ankle throbs, angry at the miles she’d trekked today.

 “I must confess I’m surprised that you would part with such a beautiful item, but I am happy you are so that I might own it.”

 “It’s one of a kind,” Darcy tells him. “A… well-off friend of mine gifted it to me before I came here. She’s friends with the woman who made it as well. It’s Italian made, if that matters.”

 It appears to, as William beams. “Wonderful. I would very much like to purchase this. Would you accept seventy-five dollars?”

 Haggling is something Darcy is good at. She excels at it. But she also knows it’s best not to overplay, lest you risk losing the buyer entirely. William already knows she’s desperate, so he came out of the gate with what he’s willing to pay. And seventy-five dollars on top of what she got from the dress will pay both rent and the hospital bill (rumored to be almost forty dollars total) easily, making Bucky’s pay more than enough to restock the pantry.

 “Seventy-five and a ride to the hospital,” she counters. “I want to visit a friend.”

 William blinks, and for a moment she’s afraid she’s asked for too much, but he simply smiles before reaching over the table to shake her hand.

 “I accept. Renee, bring my wallet and fetch the car. You will be taking our friend Darcy to the hospital once she finishes her drink.”

 By the time Steve realizes it really is Darcy limping around the screen she’s got her arms around him in a fierce hug.

 “What’s wrong with your ankle?” he demands, voice muffled by her hair.

 “You look so much better,” she says, and immediately panics him by bursting into tears.

 He’s not good with tears, and he has no idea what to do with a sobbing woman clinging to him, but the angle they’d landed in is hurting his neck and can’t be good for her ankle, so he has to do something. He manages to maneuver them around until he’s upright and in a better position to wrap his arms around her, and simply holds her.

 “It’s okay, Darcy,” he murmurs to her over and over again, until she stops shaking. “It’s okay. I’m okay, really. The doctors say I’m getting better faster than they thought I would. I’ll be home soon, promise.”

 There’s a wet patch on his shoulder when she pulls back, but she keeps one hand in his, even as she turns away to swipe at her face.

 “God, sorry. That’s been building all week. I’ve been so worried I accidentally hurt you with the medicine or something.”

 “If anything, I think you giving it to me helped me fight it off for so long.” The doctor has been amazed at how well his lungs have held up considering his asthma, his past with Scarlet Fever, and apparently his blood work had looked much better than the last time he’d been admitted.

 Darcy blows out a relieved breath.

 “Are you okay?” he asks, unable to stop himself from squeezing her hand.

 The laugh she barks out is a little wet. “You’ve been in the hospital for a week and you’re asking me if I’m okay?”

 “I mean… the hospital isn’t bringing me to tears, and I’m the one in here. Plus, I’m not the one limping. What happened?”

 “Ugh, this is what I get for coming to visit you? Sass? And to think I brought you a present.”

 Her being here isn’t the present?

 “What is it?”

 “I know how boring being in the hospital can be, and you’re probably gonna be in here a few more days.” Darcy digs into the pocket of Bucky’s coat and produces his sketchbook with a smile. “I figured you’d want something to do. And!” She releases him to hand over a freshly sharpened pencil, as well as the nub of his charcoal pen, which instantly covers her fingertips.

 “You’re not going to tell me what happened to your ankle, are you?”

 “Nope.”

 “Or how you got here?”

 “None of your business, Rogers. Do you like your present?”

 “Yes,” he says, wishing she’d take his hand again, aware she’s just not going to answer him. “Thank you, this is great. I can only read last week’s newspaper so many times, and the only card game my nurse knows how to play is Gin Rummy.”

 Darcy purses her lips in thought. “I really only know Go Fish and Old Maid, but if you’ve got cards laying around somewhere, I’ll kick your ass at-”

 Behind her, a nurse clears her throat. Darcy snaps her mouth shut and aims her most charming smile at her.

 “Hello! Can we have a deck of cards if we promise to be quiet, please?”

 “I promise she’s house trained,” Steve adds. The backhanded smack Darcy delivers to his chest without looking makes him laugh and cough at the same time.

 “He might pee on any newspaper you leave out, but I’ll keep him from biting the other patients.”

 They’re pretty sure she only gives them the cards to shut them up, but they get them all the same. And Darcy wasn’t kidding, she kicks his ass at Go Fish five times in a row before they switch to Old Maid, and she proves to be better at that too.

 Steve starts to teach her poker, but the afternoon dose of his medicine makes his head fuzzy, and he has to put the cards down for a short nap. He fully expects Darcy to be gone when he wakes, but she’s still there when he opens his eyes, playing solitaire on the empty bed beside him. And there she stays every day he’s in here. He doesn’t sleep more than an hour in the afternoons anymore, and though his lungs feel tired, he feels better than he did last time every time he opens his eyes. Every day he gets a little stronger, his breathing a little easier.

 And Darcy is still here like always, counting cards in a sunbeam.

 “Hey,” he says, and she smiles at him.

 Later, he’ll draw her just like that. Sitting cross-legged on a bed, back hunched, face turned towards him and smiling, glasses perched on her nose, the queen of hearts in her hand. He gives it to her for Christmas, because he does make it home in time but doesn’t have the money to purchase what he’d originally planned.

 He’s shocked when he walks in to a decorated apartment.

 Popcorn is strung together and draped along the walls, along with interlocking paper rings twisted artfully across the ceiling. The floor shines like a new penny, obviously freshly mopped, and there’s a cheerful tablecloth checked with red and green on the kitchen table. Bing Crosby’s White Christmas plays on the radio in the corner, and the music beckons him in further.

 They have a ham dinner with potatoes and gravy waiting, and there’s even a Christmas tree in the corner, covered in tinsel and more paper rings, complete with an angel topper that looks to be made out of folded, fluffed paper.

 “It’s toilet paper,” Darcy explains. “And the rings are construction paper, but the dinner is the real deal.”

 For a moment, Steve is speechless.

 “Don’t ask her about the burn on her arm,” Bucky says, and is promptly whacked.

 “Darcy, this is incredible. You did all this?”

 “Every damn bit,” she confirms proudly. She hasn’t stopped smiling since he walked in the door, reaching over now to fuss with his shirt. “Bucky paid for most of it, but I made it, right down to the stupid gravy for the potatoes. I wanted your first day home to be perfect. So you two sit your butts down and let me serve this right.”

 And serve them she does. Darcy slices the ham up and plates it, adding scoops of potatoes with some gravy, peas and carrots, even a fresh baked roll to their plates before handing them over. She restarts the music before she sits, and then they dig in.

 “Amazing,” Steve says with his mouth full.

 “You’ve been eating hospital food for two weeks. Anything would taste amazing after that.”

 “No, this is good. This is really good,” Bucky says, practically nose first in his plate. “I can’t remember the last time we ate like this.”

 Neither can Steve, and they all eat more than they should before moving to the couch for presents.

 “It’s not Christmas without presents,” she says, practically bouncing. She’s wrapped her gifts to them in newspaper, and they tear into them like little kids, delighted.

 “Yes,” Bucky crows, opening the Rubik’s Cube. “I was afraid you’d sold this too. This thing is so cool.” He’s also presented with a large jar of his favorite hair wax, which he immediately applies.

 Pink and pleased, Darcy accepts the light kiss to her cheek Bucky gives when he hands her her gift: the softest scarf she’s ever held in a deep shade of maroon.

 “Clara made it, but Paulie bought the wool and I had to help her untangle it all, so it’s from all three of us.”

 “Give them both a big ol’ kiss for me and let them know I love it. Thank you.”

 She opens the drawing next, delighted at the sight of it, and he gets a long hug, topped with a kiss to his cheek that burns like a brand.

 He can still picture her sitting on the bed next to him, or the floor when the bed was taken, every day for a week. A pack of cards or a book in her hand, always smiling at him when she realizes he’s awake. She was always there, and she was always smiling.

 If he hadn’t gotten so sick, he could have gotten something better, something nicer, like that gold locket hanging in that store window he’s been eyeing. He got the job at the grocer partially to pitch in more, and partially to save up specifically for the necklace, or at least one like it. And after all she did for him, for them, the best he can offer her now is a sketch done from a hospital bed.

 She’s smiling sincerely, and clutches the drawing to her chest possessively when Bucky leans over to look at it, but it could have been more. It should have been more.

 The pocket watch he opens proves to also be a compass, and Darcy explains he most likely wouldn’t even manage to destroy it no matter what he does to it, and she’s included a new sketchbook as well. The etchings on the watch are beautiful, the shape of an eagle formed in the silver, the wings raised and encompassing the entire front.

 He barely manages his thanks before she shoots to her feet and retrieves the pink square that had fascinated them so much that first day, doing something to make it light up again.

 “Come here, both of you,” she orders, and pulls them both flush with her, shoulder to shoulder to shoulder and raises one arm high above her head. “I’m probably not supposed to do this, but fuck it. Say cheese.”

 “You’re taking a picture?”

 “Wait, how does that work?”

 “Show me how, I want to do one.”

 This is definitely a violation of some kind of time travel law, but Darcy doesn’t care. You always get pictures at Christmas, no matter what. She shows Bucky how to press the button, then how to adjust the zoom when he gets a shot of just her shoulder, and now she has a photo of her in full 1940s glory on her new iPhone. There isn’t anything that works as a tripod, but she sets the timer and carefully balances the phone on three stacked cans, praying it works as she rushes stand in front of the tree, one arm around Steve’s shoulders, the other giving Bucky bunny ears.

 Her battery is dipping under thirty percent by the time they’re done, but in the end she has several priceless pictures, and one of Steve and Bucky together that she vows to print off for them both if she ever gets back to her time. Bucky is on the couch, smiling at Steve perched on the coffee table, both of them mid-word, mouths smiling when she snapped the shot. If it wasn’t for the Rubik’s Cube in Bucky’s hand, you would almost think it was a perfectly normal picture taken from their past.

 Are there even any pre-war photos of them together that exist anymore? And if there are, do they even have copies? She takes one more of them together, just in case.

 Bucky goes to visit Clara and Paulie afterwards and cheerfully tells them not to wait up for him, and Darcy turns the camera to Steve one more time.

 She catches him in the middle of sketching in his new book, head turned towards her, eyes slightly distant, a smile half-formed on his face. It’s a good picture, and Darcy backs them all up into a password protected folder before powering her phone down again, thinking not for the first time how lucky Peggy Carter- or whoever it might be- is to have captured the heart of Steve Rogers.

 Also not for the first time, she thinks it’s just cruel that Steve finally finds someone to love just to have it all ripped away from him. It’s just not fair. He’s the best man Darcy’s ever met in her life, and he’s only going to get better, his heart even bigger, and he deserves the love of a lifetime. If anyone deserves a happily ever after, it’s him.

 “Bucky told me you sold some things to pay my hospital bill,” Steve says in the sudden quiet.

 It’s an understatement to say the least. Not only is Darcy’s bag gone, but most of the things that were in it are gone as well, the leftovers scattered around the apartment. She’s wearing a new dress, green and slightly ill-fitting, obviously mended and too thin for outside, and both of her nice dresses as well as her earrings are gone.

 She paid his bill and their rent for the month, and used what was left to make his homecoming a Christmas to remember. And all he had to give her was a sketch done on the paper she’d brought him and a sagging couch as a bed.

 Every day for a week, trying to hide the fact that she was limping, Darcy made her way to the hospital to keep him company, even if she just played cards while he slept. Bucky came with her twice and fell asleep on the floor both times, exhausted from all the overtime. He has a drawing for every day she came, and pages upon pages of quick sketches of her, and at least two of Bucky asleep with his face mashed against the floor, Darcy posing beside him. He drew her in that red dress, unable to color it but shaping it from memory all the same, unable to forget the feeling of them spinning together on the dance floor. The dress she’d sold to help pay for his treatment, rent, and their Christmas (because Bucky ratted her out- she’d paid for everything).

 “Sure,” she says, like it’s nothing. “I couldn’t just let you not breathe. Just do me a favor and never scare me like that again. I’m way too young to have a heart attack, and the world needs more people like you.”

 She slips her communication camera device back into the clear plastic bag she’s using to hold what she didn’t sell, placing that inside the now empty emergency kit, seemingly unbothered by the chill in the air, the water stains in the ceiling, or the fact that even now, his breathing is tight and slightly wheezy and he’s already ready to lay down.

 He takes both of her hands in his, bringing them up to press a firm kiss on her knuckles.

 “I think the world needs more people like you, Darcy,” he breathes, and she’s stunned into silence. “You’re incredible. Thank you. This is the best Christmas I’ve had in a very long time.”

 He wishes he could take another picture. This moment, when the world is quiet, and the music is playing softly, Darcy’s hands in his, and her smiling that amazing smile at him is worthy of a picture. He wants to remember it forever.

 And he thinks he will. He’ll always remember the exact moment he fell for Darcy Lewis.

Chapter Text

 The world keeps turning no matter what time she’s in, and the New Year comes and goes. Celebrations are happening despite everything, even if they are a touch more somber than usual, and the news comes out that they’ve canceled the World Fair. It’s when the calendar changes from 1942 to 1943 that Darcy really has to sit down and have a real come-to-Jesus moment with herself.

 It’s been over four months since she crashed into Steve and Bucky’s apartment. And now that it is officially 1943, Darcy knows there is a large, invisible timer that has appeared in the air that only she can see, counting down the days left until Bucky and then Steve go to war.

 There is no guarantee that she’ll make it home at all, much less before they go.

 In just a few short months, weeks really, Bucky’s birthday will be pulled and he’ll be called to the front lines. He’ll have to go to training, then overseas, and then… and then. Steve doesn’t know it yet, but he follows Bucky across enemy lines. He tries to enlist again, and succeeds this time, being enlisted in a special program that gives him the serum.

 And Darcy has to face it. There’s a very real chance she’ll still be in this time when Steve goes into the ice.

 She still isn’t sure how she came to be in the 40’s in the first place, whether it be the experiment going wrong or the universe deciding to fuck her specifically or some kind of Asgard magic fuckery, but the time for hiding and hoping she’ll be sent home soon is long over. The time to assimilate into the culture fully is upon her, and that includes the first, crucial step: finding a real job.

 She’s avoided it so far, desperately trying to avoid a paradox situation, or ripping a hole in time and space itself, and to her mind the best way to do that had involved not going out and avoiding being noticed by anyone that might miss her if she vanishes, or question where she’d come from in the first place. Steve and Bucky know she’s from the future, and she’d stressed to them over and over again the importance of her not being noticed in any meaningful way.

 That damn paper on Steve’s watch had involved a lot of research, and she’s not an expert on this time period by any stretch of the imagination, but this year she knows pretty well. Nowhere was it ever mentioned that Bucky and Steve had shared an apartment, much less had a female roommate, so Darcy had done everything in her power to make sure no one really looked at them twice.

 But no one had been able to confirm where the watch itself had come from in the first place either, and so Darcy is sure that she was supposed to give it to Steve. She’s here and she had it, and now he does like he’s supposed to. The world hadn’t ended when she’d done that, or when she’d gone out dancing. Nothing had exploded or combusted when she’d gone back to Maude, or met William and Renee. The people in the building know her on sight if not by name, but everyone is so busy and in their own heads that she gets a polite smile or nod when they see her. No one approaches her other than the kids that run amok while their parents work, sensing a sucker willing to play with them for a few hours, or their mothers, willing to bake her bread in exchange for keeping an eye on the kids.

 Even if she was still worried about accidentally being put down in a history book, the fact that Steve and Darcy rely on Bucky’s wages, and that they are about to go away, can’t be ignored. They still have time, and it hurts her heart to keep it from them, but she knows it’s coming. Winter is still here and cheerfully spits out icy rain and blistering winds, and Darcy has to steal Bucky’s coat every time she goes out.

 So she’ll go job hunting, announcing her intentions over breakfast the morning after Paulie and Clara break it to Bucky that they were moving back West to care for Paulie’s ailing mother before he’s called up.

 “They’re gonna get married before he goes,” Bucky tells them, and he is a little upset but he keeps it together using the exhaustion from last night’s shift. “That way Carla gets the benefits and can take care of his mom. We said our goodbyes last night.”

 Steve seems more upset than Bucky.

 “They’re just gonna leave you?” he demands.

 “What are they gonna do, take me with? It’s not that serious, punk. I figured this would happen sooner or later.”

 Steve frowns at that. “You did?”

 “I mean, yeah? They were fun, don’t get me wrong, but they weren’t a forever type deal for me. We were just…”

 “You were still together,” Darcy says at the same time Steve protests, “But you really liked them.”

 In answer, Bucky shrugs and doesn’t look at them, his voice a little bitter. “Sure. But there will be others, and they’re doing what’s best for them, going where they need to go. What am I gonna do, stop them?”

 Steve still doesn’t look thrilled, only insulted that someone could dump his best friend, but drops it and turns to Darcy.

 “What kind of job?”

 She has no fucking idea.

 “I’ll figure it out, but I can’t keep mooching off you guys. I want to believe that everyone back home can actually get me home, but it’s been months and I’m still here.” Appetite gone, Darcy shoves her eggs towards Bucky, who immediately adds them to his plate. “There’s every chance that I’m just here now, and I might have to just… live out my life.”

 She curls into herself, hand resting on the scar on her arm. Her fingers pick at the shape under her sleeve, and she remembers going shopping with Steve, buying that red dress and accidentally picking the wound open in the alley when it fully hit her that it wasn’t just Bucky back at their place, but the Winter Soldier as well.

 It hurts knowing that she has to let that happen, so she tries not to think about it. She might just burst into tears at the kitchen table.

 “You don’t know that,” Steve tries to assure her. “You said you work with really smart people. They should be able to get you home.”

 “Yeah. But they also might not be able to. It was an accident that I was sent here in the first place.”

 She swallows hard at the thought and tries to keep it together. She could survive in the past if she has to, but she really, really doesn’t want to. She misses modern conveniences too much, and she desperately wants internet access back. She hasn’t so much as touched a computer in months. Will she even remember how to work all of Jane’s machines, or will that knowledge fade more the longer she’s here?

 Is that knowledge now useless because Jane won’t be born for another thirty years? Will Darcy be an old woman the next time she sees a young Jane Foster again?

 Will she never get to give Steve and Bucky pictures of themselves before everything happened?

 “You’re always welcome with us, Darcy.”

 Pulled back from the edge of her anxiety spiral, she meets Steve’s earnest gaze, and it’s enough to have her eyes mist over.

 “As long as we’re here, you’ll always have a home,” he insist, and doesn’t understand why it looks like that comforting statement breaks her heart.

 “Fuck,” she sobs out. “I’m fine, I’m fine. Just the thought of being here forever and knowing what I know. I just…” Miserable, tired, and missing the barely contained chaos that was her life in the tower, Darcy sniffs and wipes her nose. “I really want to go home, but I’m not even sure that’s possible anymore.”

 The silence that falls after is heavy. Bucky’s eyes have been locked on something over Darcy’s left shoulder as she spoke, but now he looks directly at her, something dark on his face.

 “Knowing what you know,” he repeats. “You know how the war ends.”

 Darcy flinches.

 “Bucky, don’t,” Steve tries, but he keeps going.

 “Do we win?”

 Darcy bites her lip and says nothing.

 “If I’m not drafted, I’m going to join the fight. Paulie’s going over there next month and people are dying, so if you know something-”

 “I can’t tell you,” she says, not looking at them.

 “You do know,” Steve realizes, momentarily stunned and wondering why it never occurred to him before. “Is… do we stop them? How long does the fighting last?”

 “Don’t ask me that. You know I can’t tell you.”

 “Can’t or won’t?” Bucky demands. “Because you say you know things, but you’re not doing a whole hell of a lot to stop any of it.” Darcy slams her fists into the table when she snaps her gaze to his, sending the dishes rattling.

 She stands, shoving her feet into her shoes and plucking the coat she and Bucky share off the rack in the corner.

 “I’ll be back later,” she says, and slams the door behind her.

 Less than a second after she’s gone, the boys look at each other in disgust, uncomfortable, embarrassed, and annoyed at both each other and themselves. What the hell is the matter with them? Darcy has stressed since day one that she can’t reveal the future, any future, to them without risk of bad things happening. She’s been vague on what things could happen, and what she has told them neither of them really understands.

 But the part where Darcy’s entire world could crumble if she messes with the past too much sticks with them. They know that, and yet they demand answers from her?

 “Just because your boyfriend and your girlfriend are both moving away doesn’t mean you get to be a dick to Darcy,” Steve says.

 “You jumped in fast once I started asking.”

 Miserable, cursing himself, Steve lowers his head to the table and begins to gently beat it against the grain.

 “We are such assholes.”

 “...yeah. We are.”

 She’s six blocks away before the cool air begins to calm her pounding heart. It’s another block before she remembers to close the coat around her, and she curses forgetting her scarf, shoving her trembling hands deep into the pockets.

 They have a right to know. It’s their life, their friends lives, their world, their time. She’s just a trespasser here, barely even a guest, and she knows the future. Steve goes into the ice thinking Bucky has died, and Bucky is tortured for decades. Hydra grows in secret. Thousands upon thousands of people die. And Darcy wants to keep that all to herself on the off chance that she gets back to her time, maybe?

 Can she really stand by and say nothing while all those terrible things happen? Doesn’t she have a responsibility to stop it? To try?

 Or is her responsibility to make sure it all happens?

 There would be repercussions for letting time simply flow as she knows it, but they’re known. Has she been sent back for a reason, and if so is the reason to stop it or let it happen? Is there even an answer to these questions?

 She doesn’t want Bucky to get captured and tortured. She doesn’t want Steve to miss out on the life he should have had with Peggy, or whoever else may be in that photo. She doesn’t want Steve to wake seventy years later, alone, confused, and thinking everyone he’d ever known is dead. Doesn’t want him and Bucky on opposite sides of a war they’d never signed on to fight decades after WWII ends.

 Hell, when it comes right down to it, she doesn’t want them to enlist given that it’s the start of it all, but not only is it not her place to make that choice for them, stopping them would mean…

 It would mean Tony’s parents live a little longer. It would mean Steve wouldn’t be Captain America. Would there even be the Avengers in the future in that case? Would some super powered being have taken over Earth without the Avengers around to stop them? Thor will still be banished to Earth. Bruce still has the incident with the Gamma Rays. Nat will still be in the red room. None of them will come together if too much changes.

 Even if they did, it wouldn’t be the same. It wouldn’t be Steve in the uniform. The serum will be developed and used, but without Steve there, would it be worse? Will they pick a man based on strength alone instead of heart?

 Is she just being selfish, trying to cling to a future that shouldn’t be just because it’s the one she knows? Or is this why she was sent back, some cosmic mission to ensure the safety of this timeline?

 Jesus, listen to her. This isn’t the Twilight Zone. But it does figure that a lab accident doesn’t give her special powers, it just fucks with her sense of time.

 The wind picks up, and Darcy shivers.

 She’s not going to find any answers out on the street, but she can’t face the boys just yet. They still have questions, and Darcy isn’t sure she has the answers anymore. If they ask again, if Steve pleads with her to know how it all ends when Bucky’s birthday is called, she’s not sure she’d be able to refuse him.

 She’s further away than she thought, and since the clouds above threaten to bring more snow, she turns to head back.

 And sees the sign in the window.

 Seeking Typists for temp work. Inquire within.

 Oddly, she hears her grandmother’s voice in her ear, reciting the story everyone her age hears when searching for their first job. “When I was your age, I just walked in and asked for a job. I didn’t leave until I had one.”

 She goes in, and quickly learns that computer keys are differently spaced than typewriter keys, and she makes mistakes, but her speed is impressive enough that they agree to give her a spot anyway. They hand her a little card with a time and date, and give her directions to the library that’s two stops away on the subway, telling her to report at the time listed.

 Darcy isn’t sure what the answers are, but she knows she can’t just keep waiting around. If she needs to work and get her own place, she will. If it means saying good bye to them early, if it means being entirely on her own, she’ll do it, no matter how much the thought scares her. No matter how much she doesn’t like it.

 “Darcy!”

 Startled out of her thoughts, Darcy jolts, squinting through the softly falling snow.

 “Steve?”

 Breathless, cheeks and ears flushed with cold, Steve hops the puddle of slush to land directly in front of her.

“What are you-”

 “I’m sorry.” Gasping a little, his breath visible in the cold air, Steve offers her her scarf but doesn’t get any closer. “I’m sorry. We just… I was an asshole. You’ve told us so many times you can’t- I should never have pushed you. It wasn’t right. Bucky’s just scared for Paulie. We’re both scared for everyone, and I’m sorry.”

 Eyes wide and serious, Steve wraps her scarf around her neck when she doesn’t reach for it. She hesitates, wavers, and wars with herself.

 If she tells Steve he does make it into the Army, that he does go to fight, that he and Bucky fight together, would that be okay? Would a piece of the truth change too much?

 “I think we’re doing the right thing by fighting,” Steve continues, “and I want to do my part. I will do my part,” he corrects, and she sees the Captain in there now. It’s always been there, always ready to come out. He just needs the chance.

 If she tells him what happens, would she be taking that chance away?

 “You will,” she says, so, so softly. “You will do your part, Steve. And it’s incredible. You’re incredible.”

 “I am?”

 Even as a tear falls, she smiles. Feeding a stray cat he’s allergic to until it was adopted. Stepping in to save a woman he doesn’t know. Giving a stranger a home. Stuck in a hospital bed and still drawing portraits for Christmas.

 “Oh, Steve. You’re one for the history books.”

 He steps closer now, a hand to the back of her head and tipping their foreheads together. He has to stand a little on his toes to meet her halfway, his hand warm against her scalp.

 “That’s enough. Don’t tell me any more.”

 Snow lands in her hair, comes down around them silently and melting on his hand. It feels like the whole world is gone, just the two of them on a blank canvas in a silent world. Their breaths mingle, eyes closed, and they just stand there for a minute. Still. Quiet. Leaning on one another.

 “I promised I’d get you home and I meant it.” Now Steve’s voice is quiet, and it breaks the spell. Someone else crunches through the snow behind them, not even giving them a glance. Across the street, a dog barks. “Home is where what happened, happened, and if we do too much you won’t get back. I shouldn’t have pushed you, and I won’t do it again.”

 Is this the right thing to do?

 “Okay,” she says, and it feels like lead in her chest. “Thanks, Steve.”

 Determined to make everything normal again, she takes Steve’s arm.

 “I got a job. Let’s go rub it in Bucky’s face that he’s not the only one making money around here anymore. I might even be able to buy my own winter coat soon.”

 Face set, Steve squeezes her arm once. “Bucky also owes you an apology.”

 “Maybe. He did have a point. I do know, but if it changes things, it might not be for the best. There are some bad things coming. Terrible,” she says, and chokes thinking of it all, “but what if something even worse happens because I stop it?”

 What if Steve and Peggy never meet, never have a love story for the ages because of her? What if Bucky dies because Steve isn’t there to rescue him? What if she’s already screwed up her timeline so bad she can never get back?

 “What if we go get some pie?”

 Thrown off, the anxiety that wants to bubble up dying down, Darcy can only blink at Steve.

 “Pie?”

 “Yeah. Apple pie. Nice and warm, freshly made. What if we buy ourselves a slice of pie and a milkshake to split?” He nods to the diner across the street, busy with people stopping in to try and wait out the snow.

 Now that he’s mentioned it, she can’t not notice the scent of apple and cinnamon wafting through the air, and her stomach rumbles.

 “I did just get a job,” she says, the smile blooming slowly. “You really should take me out to celebrate.”

 He smiles back, and it loosens the weight in her chest a bit.

 “And the best part? We don’t tell Bucky we did it. We’ll just come home smelling delicious and he’ll wonder what we were up to.”

 That gets a real laugh out of her, and she squeals when they dash across the street, dodging mud puddles and growing piles of slush. It’s more water than snow falling now, but they hang on to each other, breathless and smiling when they burst through the door.

 “Apple pie, please,” Steve calls, hustling Darcy to a booth. “We’re celebrating.”

 He takes her coat like a proper gentleman, hangs it up on the offered hook with care, and makes a show of taking her hand to deposit her into her seat. It’s sweet and silly, and Darcy suddenly feels less soggy and sad when he sits across from her. She takes a napkin and dabs it at her hair, and doesn’t know why she did when it instantly gets soaked. She can practically feel her hair curling in the damp.

 They split a large piece of pie, and wow they do not make them like this anymore.

 “I think you might have ruined store bought baked goods for me,” she says around a mouthful. She can feel the gooey filling around her mouth, the flakey crust stuck to her lips. It’s delightful. It’s downright heavenly. “How can I go back to discount bakery cakes after this?”

 “I haven’t been here in years. I used to come with my mom all the time.” Twirling his fork, Steve glances around. “Not much has changed, actually. I thought it would look different when I got older, but it’s all the same. The floor is even still a little sticky in all the same spots.”

 “Back home, you know a spot is gonna be good if the tables are clean but the floor is sticky. A sure sign you’re about to eat the best food of your life.”

 He passes the milkshake to her. “Tell me about it, your home. Not the… nothing you can’t tell me. But something.”

 It makes her think. Because yeah, some of the problems of this time seemed to have bled over into Darcy’s: too many people with not enough money, corruption, greed, war, secrets, bigotry. Hell, her mother marrying her black stepfather caused a mild scandal in their tiny southern town in the early 90’s, and her brother adopting a baby with his husband had caused mixed reactions decades later. When you really stop to think about it, at the core they’re not too terribly different. But still.

 “I miss the people. I miss my friends. Jane, my boss? Sort of, I mostly take care of her. She’s a brilliant scientist, a total genius. She’s wild, she will live off poptarts and coffee with no sleep if I don’t watch her, but she’s always down to watch a movie and eat pizza if she’s not stuck on a problem.” Darcy leans in, taking another sip of the milkshake before passing it back to him. “She built all of her machines from scratch, and she was right about all her work because the government tried to swoop in and stop her. But she kept going anyway. And now, she’s going to break the barriers of how people can travel, I just know it.”

 She has to heavily edit a few things, and she skirts around the Stark name as much as she can, but it’s nice to freely talk about her life before. How she went to work for Jane and took a break from college after everything that happened, what it feels like to not be afraid that a hairdryer will electrocute you because you know about safeties that aren’t installed yet, the ease of information at your fingertips and the dangers of it. Her brother living a perfectly normal life with his asthma, even able to play football in college, and the way people look at them weird when they don’t call each other stepsiblings despite the obvious skin tone difference.

 “It’s not perfect by a long shot, but it’s home. All the people I love are there.” Accepting the straw, she takes another sip of the milkshake. “Tell me about your mom.”

 Steve blinks, startled. “My mom?”

 “You never talk about her. You don’t have to. I was just curious.”

 He’s quiet for a moment, and tries to remember the last time he’d thought of something about her other than the way she’d died.

 “When we first moved here, we didn’t have anything. Mom worked long hours at the hospital as a nurse, and I was with Bucky’s family a lot. Sometimes for days at a time. But whenever we had the money, no matter how tired she was, she’d come get me and we’d have burgers and fries, and split desert.”

 A slice of apple pie and two forks, and two milkshakes if they could afford it. He was never able to finish his, and after they figured out milk made him feel a little sick, they started splitting one instead so he could still indulge. It didn’t matter the season, the weather, or how long she’d worked that time. If they had the money, she took him here to eat. If they had an argument, if he was fresh out of the hospital, or coming off another asthma attack, she would box up the pie and bring it to him when he felt better.

 After she died, he just never came back.

 But he hadn’t even hesitated to bring Darcy in, offer her pie after a fight, and as a celebration for her job. And now when he thinks back to his mom, splitting a slice with him, it doesn’t hurt. It’s a happy memory.

 Darcy’s lipstick staining the straw red as she smiles at him with it clamped between her teeth is another.

 He doesn’t know what happens in the future, and he won’t ask Darcy again, but he hopes there are many more happy memories with Darcy ahead.

 It’s still wet outside, outright raining now, so Steve gets out his sketchbook and pencil.

 “Put your elbow on the table, and your head on your hand,” he instructs, already seeing the image in his mind. “Tilt your head towards me and put the straw like you had it. Yeah.” He does a quick warmup sketch before starting a rough outline. It’s not going to be a clean drawing, and he doesn’t have time to make it as detailed as he wants, but it’s too good to pass up.

 Darcy smirks at him over the now empty glass. “Are you drawing me to avoid going outside in the rain?”

 “I don’t need an excuse to draw someone as pretty as you, sweetheart.”

 He doesn’t look up as he says it, though the tips of his ears go red, and Darcy is sure she feels her heart fall out of her chest and land right at his feet. She’s quiet as Steve finishes the drawing, though she coos over it appropriately (and privately wonders why no filter on earth could make her look as good as Steve does with a pencil and some paper). She shrieks and laughs when they both tie bags over their heads and run out into the rain, hands linked and hoping for the best.

 Steve whoops like a little kid when he’s splashed by a puddle thanks to someone on a bike that whizzes past, and splashes her too when she laughs at him. Sometimes fat snowflakes land on their shoulders just to melt a few seconds later, and the streets are quickly becoming mud where they’re not paved, but they run through it all the same.

 And she looks at Steve, water dripping down his face, hair plastered to his head, mud halfway up his legs and thinks that she is in quite a lot of trouble, and just as quickly reminds herself that nothing can happen. That the love of his live is just around the corner, and no matter who it is, she cannot be in the way when he meets her, him, or them.

 They arrive home looking like drowned rats, and beam at Bucky when he lets them in.

 “Where have you two been?” he asks, trading their coats for towels. “It’s been hours.”

 “Oh, I got a job. I’m going to help type up the library’s card catalogue from handwritten cards for a few weeks. Also, you’re a douchebag.” Darcy shimmies out of her pants right in the living room, stepping into her spare pair before reaching up to unbutton her shirt. Bucky looks down, ashamed, and Steve turns and quicksteps into the bathroom, face aflame before Darcy’s shirt hits the floor. “There’s shit I’m not going to be able to tell you. You know that. I can’t mess with the past.”

 The coat in Bucky’s hands bunches before he smooths it out.

 “But it’s not the past, Darcy. It’s happening now.”

 And… yeah. There’s not really a way around that. If Darcy cuts herself in this time, she’ll bleed just the same as she would in the future. People live and die every day, but if she changes the world that was, her world will be gone forever. It’s selfish, but she wants her world back, and there isn’t a guarantee that she would change the future for the better, no matter how much it would benefit the past.

 She pulls one of Steve’s sweaters over her head- slightly tight in the chest but soft and cozy- and feels better in fully dry clothes.

 “I know. Unfortunately, that doesn’t change anything.” She’s thought about this on the way home, and steps closer to him, speaking low. “You get called up, Bucky. In just a few weeks.”

 Bucky’s gaze locks onto hers.

 “There is nothing I can do about that. Thousands of others are called up right along side you. I know so many things that are going to happen this year. I can’t tell you what most of them are, and I can’t stop any of them, no matter how much I might want to. And it’s not fair of you to put the pressure of stopping an entire war on my shoulders. To me, this is already done. It is all a forgone conclusion. What happens tomorrow was written in my history textbook twenty years ago.”

 She can’t stop anything from happening. She’s just one person, and it all already happened in one way or another.

 “What I said this morning is true. I don’t have any promise that I’ll get back home, even if I do everything right. Not that I have a guide for this. I’m the first person in history to ever travel back in time. In all of humankind, all of recorded history, there’s just me and I am doing my best. You and Steve? You need to fight. You need to join up and do the right thing, because to you, there’s not another choice. You both want to do your part. Well, you do. Both of you do. And I’m still going to be here while you do, trying to figure it out, only I’m going to be alone. So don’t you dare judge me for making sure this trip happens the way I remember it. The way that I’m sure it’s supposed to happen.”

 Bucky lets out a long, gusty sigh.

 “Damn it, doll, you make a good point.”

 “I make several actually, you asshole.”

 “Yeah.” Bucky sighs again, eyes thoughtful. “Yeah, okay. A few weeks?”

 She nods, as unsure as ever if it’s the right thing to do, but fuck it. If they both go, and they do, she can send them both as healthy and as rested as she can make them. She can give them every advantage she knows of to help them fight that won’t change the future. Darcy doesn’t know much of anything about details of WWII battles anyway, but she can arm them with what she does know.

 “I’m dressed, Steve, you can come on out.”

 “I’m naked though,” Bucky calls out cheerfully, and they cackle when Steve’s hand appears through the bathroom door to flip them off.

 When they’re all dry and warm, Darcy gathers them at the kitchen table.

 “I think you both need to know. Bucky is drafted in a few weeks. I don’t know the exact date, but it’s coming.”

 “What about me?” Steve asks, ever willing.

 “You’re a special case, and no, I’m not going to elaborate any further, so please don’t ask me to. But I will tell you when it’s time for you to sign up.” She knows the date, the place. She’ll tell him when and make sure he’s accepted. In the meantime, she’s going to make sure they are both healthy, well-rested, medicated, and loved, and send them off in the best shape she can.

 Bucky’s brow furrows. “He can’t enlist though, he was 4F’d. They won’t take him. Steve, your lungs just aren’t up to it. You can’t- we talked about this. I’m sorry, you’re just not up to it. I know you would, but-”

 Darcy ignores him and turns to face Steve fully, reaching to cover his hand with hers.

 “You’re gonna do great things, Steve. You will. But I might be left behind when you both go just as much as I might vanish one day, so I need to start really planning what my life is going to be like just in case. A job is the first step. I need money, and a plan, and for you to trust me.”

 “Of course,” Steve says instantly, and it humbles her. “I trust you, Darcy.”

 She’ll work as a typist for a while, and see what she can save. She will need things to blend in better, no doubt about that. Unfortunately, that means she’ll have to spend her money on a few more clothes, since she’ll be out in the world now. A mother and three young boys moved into an apartment on the bottom unit, and has been asking around about paying someone (cash, not food) to watch the kids while she works in the evenings and her husband serves. Wrangling three kids can’t be much different than wrangling Tony, who’s practically three toddlers in a trenchcoat by himself. And the extra income will mean better food and regular asthma treatments for Steve when Spring rolls around, ensuring he’ll be stronger and healthier when he’s accepted into the program that Summer.

 Thor Almighty, does this really all happen this Summer? It’s no time at all.

 Will she be here to see it? Will she be back in her time before it happens? Will she be stuck to wait for over seventy years in hopes of seeing the people she loves again?

 Bucky goes to work, and Steve and Darcy to bed, and she still doesn’t know. January passes into February, and no answers come forth. She works at the library three days a week for a dollar flat, but her speed nets her a side gig for a law office that shares the building, bumping her weekly pay to one dollar fifty, with a fifty cent bonus when she signs on to work part-time. Babysitting is sporadic and usually settled at the end of the week, but it’s never more than a dollar at a time.

 But still, it’s enough to make their living more comfortable. Darcy buys a plain bag to replace the one she sold, and puts everything from her time in there to enure it’s never out of her sight. It pains her, but she also buys two work dresses, two new skirts, a pair of rain shoes, her own coat, and even a set of gloves. The rest she puts away in her wallet, replacing her modern money with the correct bills and coins.

 She’s going to have to do something about an ID soon. If she’s here much longer, she’ll want to open a bank account, once she can without a man’s signature. She’s lucky she was hired for the library essentially as a temp, and got her law office gig through that, but eventually she’s going to need at least a birth certificate if she has any hope of a normal life in the era her grandfather is currently toddling around in, somewhere in the Louisiana bayou.

 Maybe a little later in life, she can invest in stocks she knows take off and at least live out the rest of her days in comfort while she waits for her friends to be born.

 Steve complains about the vitamins she forces on him, and he doesn’t like the way the “new inhaled treatment” for his asthma tastes (an inhaler, she’d recognized, and both signed him up for the trial and paid for it), but slowly his breathing starts to get easier, his endurance better. He gets a job touching up damaged paintings through William, who is delighted to see her again, hiring him on the spot to touch up an accidentally damaged portrait of William’s father, and then commissions a drawing from him when he flips through Steve’s sketchbook.

 And then March begins. And then Bucky gets drafted. And Darcy is still here. 

Chapter Text

 Bucky’s departure to basic training leaves a sizeable gap in the apartment. Even knowing that he’ll be able to come home for a visit before shipping out, they feel odd without him. Suddenly there’s one less plate of dinner to serve up, less laundry to be done, and with Steve getting the bed permanently, Darcy is now reliably on the couch every night.

 “You take the-” Steve starts, and Darcy doesn’t even let him finish.

 “Hell no, that is your bed.”

 “Most of the money for rent is coming from your pay, not mine. You should get the bed.”

 Darcy merely raises her dukes and refuses to back down. “I will fight you on this.”

 “I’ll fight dirty.”

 “I’ll fight dirty-er.”

 The old fight is the same, and Darcy wins just like always. And still, it’s odd without Bucky in the background, watching them bicker with amusement.

 He was gone a lot before this, but it’s different now. When Bucky used to step out with a date, there was always a (small) chance he was coming home. If he had a shift at the docks, he wouldn’t go out unless he knew he had the next day off, eating meals with them and messing with the Rubik’s Cube to unwind. Once Darcy cracked and broke what she’s sure is gonna be a couple of laws or something (are there even time-traveling laws? Probably. Did she really pay attention when the SHIELD agent oversaw her paperwork? Not really) and told them they would both serve, Bucky had worked as much as he could to save some cash before he was called up.

 Steve handles the departure well enough and they all cry like babies when he goes and don’t even pretend they’re not, but Darcy’s heart hurts.

 It’s almost time for Steve to get picked for the serum program, which means it’s almost time for Bucky to get captured, tortured, and turned into the Winter Soldier. It’s almost time for Steve to meet Peggy.

 She’s trying not to think about that, but she can’t help it.

 As much as she loathes to admit it, everyone in her past (her future?) had been right. It’s Peggy in the picture. It has to be. It’s almost April now, and for all of the months Darcy has been here (seven, it’s been seven months and she’s trying not to think about that either), she’s never seen Steve talk to a girl that wasn’t hanging off Bucky’s arm, an elderly woman, or a mom with kids.

 And though she’s pretty sure she’s seen a man or two glance Steve’s way, he’s never really looked back that she’s seen.

 He’s interested in women for sure, but for some reason there doesn’t seem to be a lot of female interest in him. And Darcy knows for a fact that Peggy Carter is one of the few women, if not the only one, involved in the serum program. She does know that Peggy is the only woman he spends any significant time with after the serum outside of the dancers in his show, and it’s well-documented that Steve couldn’t talk to any of them. The dancers had always been much more open to interviews, and they freely talked about how nice Steve was, but so painfully quiet and withdrawn that they didn’t know much about him. They hadn’t even realized he’d left to rescue Bucky’s unit until stage call, and Steve had been well into enemy territory by then.

 She supposes there’s an off-chance that he had some secret, fast and intense fling with a dancer that never spoke about it, but she doubts it.

 And if she still has lingering doubts about it being Peggy, she squashes them ruthlessly down. Anyone lucky enough to be with Steve should be singing it from the rooftops, not hiding it. She has no idea why Peggy would have lied for years about being the woman in the photograph, but it’s looking more and more like she did. Pride? Trying to let Steve die with at least some privacy intact? To smooth some imaginary ruffled feathers on her husband?

 She’ll probably never know, if she’s honest. Every day that passes convinces Darcy more and more that this is the life she’s going to lead now: living a life over forty years before she’s born. So she plans for it, tries to get used to it as she and Steve try and get used to the apartment without Bucky.

 She goes to work. She babysits the three boys in their building until their mother arrives home early one day, eyes rimmed red, and presses five dollars into Darcy’s hand, thanking her for her time, and telling her that her services won’t be needed anymore.

 “We’re going to move in with my parents,” she tells Darcy, tears falling freely. “My husband...”

 Darcy presses the five back into her hand, understanding instantly, and holds her while she cries, feeling horribly guilty.

 All across the world, women and children of all sizes and ages are getting the same news. There’s nothing she can do about that, and she knows it, but it doesn’t erase the feeling of guilt that burns in her stomach. It keeps her up at night, staring at that water-stained Abe Lincoln and his misshapen, water-stained horse.

 Steve helps their neighbor- Sarah- pack, Darcy entertaining the boys as their solemn faced grandparents arrive.

 Dinner that night is quiet, Darcy and Steve both lost in their own heads, until Steve speaks.

 “Remember how fun Coney Island was?”

 They’d splurged on tickets and travel, and taken Bucky to Coney Island a few days before he left. Darcy had pushed for it hard after learning that they hadn’t been since they were very young, and she’s sure, she’s positive, that it was mentioned at some point that they had gone as adults. Even if it hadn’t been, if it was one of those little facts her brain likes to make up sometimes, they’d needed the day of fun and laughter, coming home covered in sand and slightly sunburnt.

 “I remember you puking up your weight in cotton candy after you and Bucky went on that spinning death trap, yes.”

 And going to the beach after, all three of them sitting in the sand and watching the sun set over the water. Darcy had completely killed her phone’s battery by discreetly taking pictures of the two of them, then the three of them. She even has one of her and Steve, side by side against the railing of the pier, the Ferris Wheel looming beside them, arms linked, both their mouths and teeth stained pink from the sugar.

 “It was fun,” Steve protests, fighting a smile.

 Sometimes Steve likes to remind her he’s a thrill seeker. Watching him and Bucky run to every single ride had been a good reminder, even when Steve stuck his entire head in a trash can to puke before popping right back up and running straight to the next one.

 Darcy had stuck to the Ferris Wheel and games, winning them both strangely shaped stuffed animals while they screamed their heads off on the coaster.

 She’d discovered a slightly out of focus picture Bucky must have taken of her and Steve laughing at dusk, the sunset exploding in orange and pink steaks behind them when she went to copy the photos over to the locked folder. Steve is clutching the wonky banana in a Dapper Dan-looking hat she’d won him, Darcy howling with laughter beside him, bent a little at the waist, one hand on Steve’s shoulder for support. Steve is smiling, eyes closed, clearly caught in a blink with his head tipped back, and Darcy’s mouth is wide open, face red with laughter, and they’re standing right next to the trash can.

 She’s pretty sure it’s her favorite picture from that day.

 The picture of the three of them watching the sunset, exhausted and sunbaked, is a close second. She’s the only one looking at the camera, probably because she was the only one aware it was being taken, but even if she needs to crop herself out of it first, she’s determined to get it to Steve somehow. Him and Bucky, side by side, totally relaxed? Yeah, he needs it.

 If she has to wait seventy years to get it to him, she will.

 If she has to live here, she will.

 “We should do something fun again,” Steve is saying now. “Go out dancing again, maybe?”

 Darcy stands to gather the dishes. Steve stands with her, collecting his own plates, and she’s pleased that he ate the veggies and beans both, and that his water glass is empty. He needs more vitamins she’s sure (thank you TikTok for informing her about how nutritious beans are), but they can only do so much without Bucky’s income to supplement them. At least he takes his inhaler with little complaint these days, which is seriously helping his breathing.

 Now that the weather’s warmed, Steve’s got a side gig of setting up on a scenic spot with his sketchbook, selling his pencil drawings and portraits for ten cents each. Very few people turn it down, and he’s not only bringing in decent enough money, his sketches are becoming more and more realistic the more he does it. It’s impressive, it makes him happy, and it helps the budget while he improves his art skills.

 Breathing a little easier, a little more meat on his bones, able to support himself by doing something he loves. Steve’s been carrying himself a little taller, his shoulders a little straighter, and Darcy can’t help but notice it. He’s growing into himself, the outside stretching a little to match the inside, and it’s only a matter of time before the woman in the watch finally sees him.

 Does he meet the mystery girl before he leaves? Is it really not Peggy?

 She hears Jane in her head as she runs the water: If not Peggy, who?

 Whoever she is she’s coming soon, and Darcy feels like she’s done her part. Steve is healthier than he’s been in a long time, and though he still gets tongue tied around pretty people, he rarely crams his entire foot in his mouth anymore. If their “dates” count, he’s even got successful dates under his belt now. He can’t cook without burning things, but he cleans up after himself, he’s incredibly polite, thoughtful, sweet, and has a heart that could engulf the world. Whoever he loves is going to be swept completely off their feet while Darcy has to learn to live without him.

 Trying to get away from that line of thought (save it for the 3am existential crisis, Darcy), she asks Steve, “Why the sudden urge to do something fun?”

 Steve gives her a look she can’t read. “Your birthday is coming up. We should do something for it.”

 It’s jolt, realizing he’s right.

 April Fool’s Day. Her birthday. She’ll be one year older in a year she’s not even supposed to be alive in. Somehow, that isn’t a paradox or a world ending event of some kind (she hopes, but it would be just her luck that all her careful planning and tiptoeing around the future means jack shit because she ages). Despite the fact that she’s in the wrong time, it still moves forward, and she’s just as powerless to stop it as she was in the future.

 Her birthday. Steve wants to take her dancing for her birthday. Two months after that, Steve will be heading to a secret military base to be voluntarily experimented on. He agrees to it. He wants to do it. And at some point between then and going into the ice for decades, he falls in love.

 How the fuck is she supposed to do this? Letting Bucky go had hurt but letting Steve go is going to kill her. Not only is the love of his life just a few weeks away, she knows he never comes home again. And she can’t tell him any of it anymore than she can deny him any of it.

 She’s not just watching the timer count down the days until Steve signs up, she’s watching her time with him come to an end.

 She fakes a smile before she turns to the sink and tells Steve that they should do it, that dancing sounds fun, and pretends she isn’t crying into the dishwater.

 It’s taken him months of saving and sneaking around, but Steve finally has enough saved up.

 The gold locket he’d wanted to get Darcy for Christmas is long gone, but he’s been eyeing another one that looks like it might suit her better. Silver with squared edges and pretty filigree all around, attached to a long silver chain. Carved in the center is a single flower, (a lily, he thinks maybe, but isn’t entirely sure), with mother-of-pearl petals and stems and an embedded pearl in the center.

 It’s incredibly expensive, an indulgence he has no business even looking at much less buying.

 It’s perfect.

 They’ve both been working overtime hours to make up for Bucky’s departure. Darcy’s been bumped up to four days a week at the law office, typing up court cases and notes. She’d netted a small pay raise after a month, meaning their rent is covered so long as she has the job, and William has been generous with the projects he finds for Steve to do, paying him well and sometimes sending him home with food to boot.

 Steve is pretty sure William hired him because he didn’t bat an eye at doing a pencil portrait of him with Renee, their hands intertwined and loving looks on their faces. He has continued to be summoned for painting touchups or portraits of their friends as well, including a handsome man who disappears into the bathroom and comes out as a stunning woman and asks for a self-portrait as herself.

 Darcy knows he’s been setting up in the park on the weekends and selling his drawings, but she doesn’t know he’s also been working as a paper boy in the mornings, folding and delivering newspapers to stands before the sun rises, and returning home before she wakes to make them breakfast with an extra dollar a week to his name. That money he’s been carefully squirreling away, and today he finally has enough.

 Just in time too, as Darcy’s birthday is less than a week away.

 Before he’d left, Bucky had warned him “Punk, if you don’t ask that girl to be yours you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.”

 Watching the necklace being carefully cleaned and deposited into a nice red box with velvet lining, Steve doesn’t plan on regretting any of it.

 Darcy had promised him he would serve. It might not be alongside Bucky and she’s silent on the specifics, but he does his duty, he does the right thing and joins the fight, and he wants to ask her to be here waiting for him when he gets back. She thinks she’s being sneaky, beefing him up and pumping him full of vitamins and medicine, but damn if it isn’t working. Steve hasn’t felt this good in years. He’ll put up with the foul tasting inhaler if it means he can ride a bike again.

 If it means going dancing with Darcy and not being winded after one song.

 “What are you planning?” Darcy asks him suspiciously the night before her birthday.

 Steve immediately drops his gaze to his plate.

 “Nothing. Not planning anything.”

 Darcy laughs. “You’re not slick, Rogers. What are we doing tomorrow?”

 He scoops up more beans and refuses to meet her eye. “You’ll just have to wait until tomorrow.”

 “What if I don’t want to wait?”

 He shrugs, grinning when Darcy throws a stray kidney bean at him. She throws another when he doesn’t crack, shrieking when he scoops up a spoonful and flings it back at her, and then it’s war. Mashed potatoes are flung, beans go bouncing, and Steve winds up with a smear of gravy under his ear, Darcy with a bean mashed into her hair. She wields a handful of potatoes and raises it warningly at Steve.

 “I have mashed potatoes and I’m not afraid to use them.”

 Unarmed, backed into a corner with Darcy advancing on him, that spark of mischief in her eyes, Steve does the only thing he can. He grabs the cup they keep under the faucet to catch the drips and flings it at her. She yelps, swearing and laughing all at once, and Steve moves. He catches her by the waist, intending on swinging around her to avoid the potatoes still clutched in her hand, but Darcy’s fast, and Steve has the distinct feeling of potatoes being smashed into his hair and a hand fisting in the back of his shirt to hold him in place.

 “Gotcha you little-”

 “In my hair, how dare you-”

 It’s not clear who slips in what, but something smooth is under their feet and they both land on the floor in a laughing tangle of limbs, Steve just barely managing to get his hand under Darcy’s head so it doesn’t bounce off the floor.

 “Ow,” Darcy says, and Steve raises up on his elbow instantly, worried he’s crushing her, but she’s laughing. “Aw, I just cleaned the kitchen.” Not really annoyed, Darcy shoots him a glare.

 “You started it.”

 “Did not.”

 “You hit me with a bean!”

 Glaring at him from her position on the floor, dark hair spread under her, Darcy points at him accusingly.

 “You won’t tell me what you’re planning for my birthday, and I know you’re planning something. You’ve been leaving the house in the mornings and trying to be sneaky about it.”

 Busted, Steve can only grin down at her.

 “Not telling,” he says, and laughs when she sticks out her tongue.

 She’s got a smear of gravy across her glasses, a dollop of potatoes on her chin and she looks incredible. Steve can feel the glob she’s smeared onto his head starting to drip onto the floor.

 He can’t help himself, reaching up to wipe the carnage from her face and Darcy’s grin fades when his fingers linger around her jaw.

 “You never could walk away from a fight,” she says, and Steve can’t look away from her.

 Sprawled on the floor beneath him, food all across her face and hair, staining her clothes, smeared across her glasses. She’s beautiful, she’s amazing, and Steve wants her so badly it hurts.

 But he’s going to do this properly, so he untangles his limbs from hers and pushes himself up, holding out a hand to help her stand.

 They’ll go out. A proper date that’s just them, with dancing and dinner and gifts. He misses Bucky, he won’t lie, but he’s also never been more grateful for his friend’s absence. He’s going to take Darcy out, and they’ll have a great time because they always do when they’re together. They’ll dance and drink, and maybe even get a slice of pie afterwards.

 Does he give her the locket first so she can wear it out, or present it to her at the end of the night? What if Jerry is lurking around again? What if he gets into another fight, this time without Bucky to back him up? What if someone else sees Darcy, beautiful, curvy, foul-mouthed Darcy, and dances with her all night, leaving him on the sidelines to watch?

 Darcy winds up the hand towel and snaps him with it and he jolts.

 “Ow!”

 “Go wash the potatoes out of your hair. I’ll clean up if you leave me some hot water.”

 “That actually hurt,” he says, rubbing the sore spot on his hip.

 “Aw, poor baby. Should I kiss it and make it better?”

 Steve violently beats back the completely un-gentleman-like response that almost comes out of his mouth. He brushes past Darcy loftily, completely missing the flush starting to creep up her neck, and shuts the bathroom door smartly behind him.

 “Just for that, I’m using all of the hot water,” he calls, and yelps when Darcy deliberately turns the kitchen sink on mid-shower. He curses, hastily washes his hair in the now-icy spray, Darcy cackling in the kitchen, and thinks that he wouldn’t mind if every day is like this.

 It’s honestly the start of the best birthday Darcy has had in years. There are no “jokes” pulled on her with fake gifts or people pretending they forgot her birthday until she cries (she was seven and her stepdad’s sister is a huge bitch), and best of all, Steve wakes her with a grin and presents her with an honest-to-god cake.

 “You made me a cake?” Touched, Darcy examines the slightly misshapen, lumpy yellow cake with wide eyes. “Steve!”

 “I can’t promise it’ll taste like the cakes you had back home, but there’s actual sugar in it.” (Thank you, William.)

 It’s a little gritty, but she doesn’t tell him that, and eats the cake while still half out of her sleeping bag, dressed in only an oversized shirt. It’s been so long since she had something sweet- the apple pie with Steve being the last time- and even accidentally discovering a small pocket of flour isn’t enough to dim her mood.

 Steve is desperately proud of himself, and Darcy can’t help it. She wraps him up in a full body hug before deciding to indulge in a long shower. It’s her birthday, and there’s a rumor they’re going out dancing, so she intends to be squeaky clean and well-groomed. She wants to look her best for the night out on the town Steve has planned for them.

 God she misses her skincare and razors, her fancy body wash that smells like vanilla dragonfruit and makes her ever so slightly sparkly. But she uses the small cake of soap and carefully drags Steve’s face razor over her legs, because it’s her birthday and she’s going to be leg hair free, damn it, and she still refuses to wear pantyhose or nylon stockings.

 The blue dress she wears out doesn’t hold a candle to the burgundy one from last time, but she’s every bit as beautiful as she was then, and she smiles just as wide when Steve whisks her out onto the dance floor. It’s not jazz this time, but what Darcy assumes is the 40’s version of rock music, and the beat actually makes her move her feet. She doesn’t bump into anyone this time, but she keeps a grip on Steve all the same.

 He’s not about to complain.

 “Please don’t let me fall flat on my face,” she leans in to murmur, slightly breathless after dance number five, and Steve laughs.

 “I’ve got you, sweetheart,” he breathes into her ear, arm tightening around her waist as the music slows.

 The lights dim a little, the voice singing gets a little softer, and around them the throng of moving people slows to a gentle sway. Darcy steps even closer, leaning down slightly to rest her head against Steve’s as they spin. She feels him press into her, and tries to ignore the way her heart begins to pound, but doesn’t release him or step back.

 It’s her birthday. She’s allowed to want, today of all days.

 She can want Steve, and she can admit she wants Steve. It’s okay to admit that, so long as she never says it out loud or acts on it.

 Because Steve wears his heart on his sleeve, and Darcy’s noticed the way he’s been looking at her. How can she not when she looks at him the exact same way? It’s flattering, and more than a little humbling, to know that Steve has a crush on her. If she’s honest, it takes her breath away. But not only can nothing happen between them- space-time continuum and all that- Darcy knows whatever he thinks he might be feeling for her right now will pale in comparison to what he feels for the person in the watch.

 And honestly? It’s none of anyone’s business who Steve loves. Not even hers.

 So Darcy indulges in one slow dance with Steve. Just one. Her first, and her last. When the song ends she deliberately steps back and exaggeratedly fans herself.

 “Hot in here.”

 Steve’s smile could melt anyone’s heart. “Wanna grab a milkshake?”

 She does, and it’s her birthday, so they do. Strawberry this time, splitting a small size so Steve doesn’t feel ill afterwards. No rain or snow beats down on them, but they linger all the same until the staff starts pointedly cleaning up and they walk home arm-in-arm.

 “Best birthday,” Darcy declares as soon as they get home. She immediately kicks off her shoes.

 Low heels or not, dancing for a few hours in them and then walking all the way up to the diner and then home again had not been fun. She feels like her soles are crying and misses both her sneakers and her memory foam shoe inserts.

 “It’s not over yet,” Steve says quietly, and when Darcy looks up from gathering her comfortable clothes to change into, he’s holding out a red box.

 “What is this?”

 “Open it.”

 The gasp that comes out of her when she does is involuntary. The necklace sits on a black velvet backing, and it’s so pretty Darcy is almost afraid to touch it. It’s absolutely gorgeous, and she suddenly understands why Steve has been sneaking out and hoarding money.

 He’s been working extra to give her a birthday present, and she is in so much trouble.

 “Holy shit, Steve,” she says, lifting it carefully from the box. The flower stands proud in the middle, the mother-of-pearl shining in the light. “Oh my god, this is beautiful. Where did you even… How did you even-”

 “I just…” Suddenly shy, Steve doesn’t look at her when she stands, but hugs her back when she wraps her arms around him. “I wanted to give you something that is as beautiful as you are.”

 Fucking christ, she is in trouble.

 Because this can’t happen. No matter what she’s feeling, no matter how delicately Steve clasps the necklace around her neck, no matter how long those eyelashes are, no matter how much she wants to just bend down and kiss him, it cannot happen.

 When Steve takes her hand and finally meets her eye, Darcy’s heart sinks into her stomach. Her hand shakes in his.

 “Darcy,” he says, and she knows what he wants to say.

 “Don’t.”

 It come out desperate and sounds almost like a choked sob.

 Steve understands instantly, but fire rather that hurt flares in his eyes.

 “Why? Why not?”

 “We can’t, Steve.”

 “We can,” he insists, and doesn’t let go even when she looks away. “Darcy, I’m crazy about you. Nuts about you. You’re amazing, you’re like no one I’ve ever met and you- you don’t tell me I can’t do things. You find ways to make it possible and you’ve never doubted me. You swear like a sailor and play music too loud and shed hair all over the place-”

 “Steve, please.”

 “-and I can’t keep pretending like I don’t feel the way I do about you,” he continues, and now she does look at him, stunned into silence and tears forming. “I’m not good with women, but I’m not stupid. I know you feel it, too.”

 Darcy can hedge the truth. She’s had to, given the situation. She can talk around it, hide it, and even avoid talking about it altogether. But she can’t lie to Steve. She won’t, not even now. Not even when it might hurt less if she does.

 “Of course I do.”

 Her confession is almost silent, barely an exhaled breath, but he hears it. He always hears her.

 He hears her now, and he kisses her.

 And oh, what a kiss it is. His mouth is sure and firm on hers, one arm circling her waist to pull her in, the other cradling her jaw, holding her in just the way she likes. It’s like a livewire under her skin, electricity she feels down to her toes, and Darcy is only human. She kisses him back, of course she kisses him back, and he surges up into her, the kiss becoming deeper and a little frantic.

 It’s a kiss you read about in storybooks, the kiss the music swells for in a movie. It’s everything Darcy has ever wanted in her life, and Steve is warm and real under her hands.

 It takes everything in her to pull away.

 “I’m sorry,” she says, because this is all her fault and it’s only going to hurt them both. “I- we can’t. I can’t.”

 Steve steps back now, two full steps away and she feels her heart go with him.

 “Darcy,” he says, and he sounds heartbroken and confused. “I’m crazy about you.”

 It makes her smile even as the tears trail down her cheeks.

 “We can’t.”

 “Why?” he demands, a bit of anger breaking through now. “I don’t understand. I’m not imagining this-”

 “You’re not, you’re not imagining it, Steve please-”

 “-and this is real. What’s between us? It’s real, Darcy. We can make it work, we can be together. I want us to be together.”

 “I know something that’s going to happen. I… fuck it.” Laugh bordering on hysterical, feeling like she’s going to throw up, Darcy collapses onto the couch and clings desperately to her self-control. “Fuck it. I will tell you, but I won’t stop it. I refuse. You deserve it. If anyone deserves it, it’s you.”

 Steve doesn’t move, hands fisted at his sides, and says nothing.

 “The love of your life is right around the corner, Steve,” she tells him through numb lips that can still taste him and a wobbling chin. “You meet them in just a few weeks, and I can’t- I won’t get in the way of that.”

 Even if it’s not Peggy. Even if it’s no one the history books know about, or someone they got all the details wrong on, Steve deserves it. There has to be a reason no one ever came forward and told the world Steve loved them, and no matter what the reason is, it happens. Steve loves them, and loves them so much he carries their photograph around on his person while he’s at war. He has the watch in his hand when he’s saved from the ice, and it’s empty when they find it, the picture having long since dissolved in the water, but whoever they are, Steve deserves to love them without anyone in his way.

 No matter how much Darcy wishes she could kiss him again, no matter how much her heart begs her to say yes and throw herself into his arms, she will not take this away from him.

 “Whatever you might feel for me now, you feel so much more for them, and you deserve that, Steve.”

 She might not ever make it home, but she also just might, and she could vanish the same way she appeared: suddenly and with no warning. What kind of relationship would that be? She can’t do that to Steve any more than she can be in the way when he meets her- whoever her, or he, or they might be.

 “You enlist in June,” she continues, desperate now. Steve looks shattered, and he won’t meet her gaze, and Darcy almost can’t swallow around the lump in her throat. “At the Stark Expo in Queens, you enlist, and then you meet them. You’re almost there, Steve. They’re just around the corner.”

 Steve shakes his head, and it shatters her when she sees him swipe a tear away. She shoots to her feet in a panic when Steve stalks back towards the door and flings it open.

 “Steve-”

 “You’re wrong,” he says into the dark. He doesn’t turn to look at her.

 She almost can’t speak. Her throat is clogged with the tears she’s fighting- and failing- to keep inside.

 “I’m not,” she manages, voice breaking. “You meet the love of your life in just a few weeks.”

 And now he does turn, he does look at her. The look on his face shatters her heart all over again.

 “I met you months ago.”

 He stalks out into the night, closing the door softly behind him, and Darcy collapses onto the couch with a sob, her hand doing nothing to muffle the wail that climbs up her throat.

 It’s the right thing, and she knows it. It’s what’s supposed to happen.

 History says Steve Rogers carries a picture in his watch, and though the glimpse on that war film was brief, Darcy knows it to be true. And no matter how much she might long for it to be her, she’s been very, very careful to only have her picture taken when she’s the one holding the camera. It’s not hard when getting a picture taken is a formal event, and with her phone now dead and no way to print pictures off even if she wanted to, Steve doesn’t have a picture of her.

 So it’s not her. It can’t be. And however much it hurts- and oh, does it hurt- Darcy knows she did the right thing.

 Heartsick, desperately missing home, Darcy curls up on the couch fully dressed and lets it all out, crying until she’s empty, and falls asleep with the locket clutched tightly in her hand.

Chapter Text

 Darcy doesn’t insult Steve by asking if he wants the locket back, but she doesn’t take it off either. It means too much to her, and she’s afraid if she takes it off she’ll find herself back in the future without it. She hides it under her shirt when she comes home, tucking it under her collar before coming in the door so he doesn’t have to see her wearing it. Not that it matters because Steve barely looks at her for days, doesn’t speak to her unless he has to for twice as long.

 She goes to work, and the store. She stocks up on flour and coffee and potatoes, and buys what veggies she knows he likes. Steve will eat almost anything you put in front of him, but she’s careful not to ply him with too many things he doesn’t enjoy eating. She gets another babysitting job for three dollars a month, but she mostly rocks a newborn to sleep in the afternoon while his exhausted parents work extra shifts- his mother at the factory, his father at the docks- and keeps an eye on his big sister as she plays with her friends in the park.

 It’s easy to avoid each other despite the small apartment, so they do. Steve scores a job at the newspaper office designing logos and shading comics that offers enough for him to pay for his inhaler on his own, and the first time he speaks to her other than a “thank you for dinner” or an “excuse me” as they pass each other is to tell her she doesn’t need to put that money aside anymore.

 Darcy’s getting real sick of crying over this, so she just nods.

 “Okay. Thanks for letting me know.”

 Breakfast is awkward, the air heavy despite the radio playing faithfully in the background. Darcy still cooks for them both, and they leave for their respective jobs around the same time, but Steve never comes back before dark anymore. She doesn’t know if he’s setting up to do portraits still, and aware that she’s lost the right to ask, Darcy starts making dinner later in the evenings so it’s not stone cold when he comes back.

 Also aware that he’s trying to avoid spending too much time alone with her, and not really ready to be around him much either, Darcy makes sure she’s either asleep on the couch, or fakes it until he turns in for the night, turning her back to the common areas and staring at the spots where the couch is getting threadbare until his door shuts.

 Spring blooms around them as April crawls by, and Darcy’s hayfever is almost as bad as Steve’s, though her eyes don’t well up as much as his does, and she misses Benadryl almost as much as she misses her computer. Instead, her nose constantly drips, forcing her to invest in a handkerchief of her own so she doesn’t sneeze all over the reports she types up. She doesn’t know what Steve does to manage his allergies, and fights the urge to fuss over him. It’s not her place anymore, if it ever was in the first place.

 None of this is her place. She’s been invading since day one, and now she’s messed everything up.

 She walks home alone, makes dinner alone, and gets ready for bed alone. Some mornings she even wakes alone, finding the bedroom door open and the room itself empty, Steve having long since vanished before she opens her eyes.

 After a few weeks, she tries to ask him what he’s drawing, but he just shrugs and doesn’t answer her. She mentions making baked potatoes for dinner, his favorite, and he doesn’t show until long after she’s “asleep” on the couch. Once, he creeps in quietly and she actually is asleep, and she wakes to the smell of whiskey before he washes up. He sleeps a long time the next day, and this can’t keep going.

 “Hey, we should-” she tries, intending on discussing grocery shopping, but he’s already down the stairs and gone by the time she looks up.

 April is more than halfway over before Darcy decides that’s enough, sadness and anger warring in her in equal measures. Something has to give, and Steve isn’t going to be the one to bring it up.

 When Steve comes in the door tonight, she’s sitting at the table waiting for him.

 “We need to talk.”

 For a second, she thinks he’s going to turn and walk right back out the door. But Steve’s no coward, so he blows out a breath before nodding and stepping inside.

 “Okay,” he says, and sits down across from her. He glances at her and away again just as fast.

 “I’m sorry,” she says, startling him. “I’m sorry that I hurt you, and I’m sorry that I’m still hurting you.”

 He shrugs, still unable to look at her fully, and she sighs.

 “Since we can’t seem to talk to each other anymore, there’s not really anywhere we can go from here. So I think I should move out.”

 Now he does look at her, eyes snapping to hers in shock.

 “What?”

 “I think you need me to move out,” she says, and swears she isn’t going to cry this time. “I think I need me to move out. This sucks, Steve. You won’t look at me, or talk to me, and we just keep avoiding each other. We both have enough money saved to make it through June. I should look at getting a place of my own before you go anyways. I can get a head start on that.”

 “You don’t know that you’ll still be here,” he starts, then cuts himself off. “Damn it. I don’t want you to just leave, but-”

 “-it’s hard having me here,” she finishes. She lets it hang for a moment before continuing. “It’s hard for me to be here. It’s been hard from day one, because you’re amazing, and I knew just weeks into staying with you that it would be hard, but now you won’t even look at me. If we can’t be friends anymore then I can’t keep taking advantage of your hospitality.”

 “Darcy-”

 “We’re not acting like friends anymore. We’re strangers who share the same space, and it’s killing me as much as it’s killing you. There’s a place near the law office that’s renting. I think I’m going to take it and put us both out of our misery.”

 “I don’t want you to move out.”

 The sorrow that’s lingered around them both bursts out of her as anger. She’s tried to be understanding, she’s done it his way, and she’s suffering too. He’s not the only one who’s hurting over this, and she’s sick of it. All of it. She wants to go home, she wants to wear jeans and a modern bra, and she wants her fucking friend back.

 She’s most likely not going to get any of it. She’s probably stuck here forever and now her last few weeks with Steve are going to be silent and awkward? She’s done everything she knows how to do and this is her thanks? Cooking the food, cleaning the apartment, paying the rent, keeping the future from falling apart, and he wants to dictate what she can do after weeks of not even looking at her?

 “Well, we can’t always get what we want,” she snaps, and now the tears that threaten to build are ones of frustration. “I don’t want to be trapped seventy years in the past, I don’t want to remember all I learned in school about this war and watch it play out in front of me, and I certainly don’t want to stay in a small apartment with a man who won’t even look at me. I’m sorry that I broke your heart, but damn it, Steve, I broke mine too. I did it because I had to, because it’s the right thing to do, and you don’t get to punish me for that any more than Bucky did.”

 She has to pause to drink, wetting her uncomfortably dry throat. She won’t cry again. She won’t let herself.

 “I didn’t mean to fall for you, and I can’t say I’m sorry I did, but I am sorry I hurt you- hurt us both. I miss my friend, but if it hurts too much for me to be here, I’ll go.”

 Steve considers her for a moment, then reaches for her cup and takes a swig of the water.

 “I don’t know why you’re so sure you know so much about what happens to me in the future, but I promised I won’t ask, so I’m not going to. But would it really break everything if we were together? Would you not be able to go home again?”

 “I don’t know that I can go home at all, but yeah. I’m very certain things would be different.”

 “Different isn’t always bad.”

 “No,” she agrees, “but it could be, and I’m not about to risk the lives of everyone I love just because of my own selfish wants. I won’t do that, Steve. Not even for you.”

 The silence that falls is uncomfortable, but this needs to happen. They either talk about this now, or they go their separate ways. Darcy has to live under the assumption that she’s going back, partially for her own mental wellbeing, and if it turns out she can’t, she still needs to make sure her friends that aren’t even alive yet have a safe future to grow up in. The only way she knows how to do that is by making sure that the future she remembers is the one that happens.

 And the only way she can do that is by making sure the past stays the same as well.

 Steve doesn’t have a picture of her. She’s been very deliberate about that, and until it’s necessary for her to get a photo ID, no pictures of her in this time will exist at all, no proof that a girl from the future lived in the past. So it’s not her in the watch. It can’t be.

 She gave Steve the watch, but she’s not the one in it.

 Which means Steve’s real love is out there waiting for him, and by god, she’s put too much work in now to trip at the finish line. If she can send him off to the program, she can go about her life. Whatever it might look like, whenever her life might take place. Because no matter the time, she and Steve can’t be together. He practically ran out of the building when he saw her, no fake aw-shucks smile and a bogus yawn will fool her after living with him for months. She can look back and confidently say that Steve of the future had been desperately trying to get away from her.

 Even in the future, Steve can’t stand to be around her anymore. So she’s just going to pull the plug now and find a way to live out her life quietly, and let him achieve the greatness he’s always been meant for.

 No matter how much it hurts, and it does, Darcy knows the best thing for Steve is for her to just disappear. Into a wormhole, into the future, or into the city, it doesn’t matter. He can enlist, become the Captain, and then she can try to move past it all.

 “Fuck,” Steve swears, and it startles her. “I- I’m sorry. I couldn’t see past my own ass for a minute there. There’s more at stake than just you and me, and even if there wasn’t, you’re right. We can’t go on like this. I miss my friend too, the fun we used to have. Not being around you has sucked.” He takes a deep breath, then another. “But it’s not going away, Darcy. I can’t just stop feeling the way I do about you.”

 You will, she thinks. When you meet them, you will.

 “I know,” she says quietly, because it hasn’t stopped for her either, and she’s aware it won’t for a very long time. “I wish… It doesn’t matter what I wish.”

 If the circumstances were different, maybe…

 No. Who is she kidding. Steve deserves much better than her, and he finds it. She only hopes she can salvage their friendship, or at least make it less awkward for them to coexist in the tower together when she gets home. If she gets home. But in order to do that, she has to make right now work. Which means they can’t keep avoiding and ignoring each other.

 “It does matter,” Steve insists. “What you want matters.”

 “Not when the entire future of the whole world and every single person I know is at stake, no. The only thing that matters now is you enlisting in June.”

 “...I almost asked why, but I know you won’t tell me.”

 “Sure won’t.”

 “Why June specifically?”

 That’s when Erskine is in Queens, searching for people for Project Rebirth. It’s when he and Bucky travel to the canceled World Fair on a double date and Steve slips off to try for a fifth time to enlist, and is caught.

 “Because that’s when it happens,” she says simply. She doesn’t elaborate further.

 It’s the first time she’s seen him smile since her birthday, even if it’s still a little sad, and she pushes the thought out of her head so she can smile back at him.

 “Stay,” he says, and reaches for her before he stops himself, his hand stuttering in midair before he drops it back on the table, just shy of touching her. “If I go in June, then you should stay and keep this place. At least stay until then and save some money in the meantime. I- I can’t promise I’ll be around like I was before. It’s not going to be like it was before, and we both know that. I need time, and a little space, I think, but I’ll stop deliberately avoiding you. So please, don’t leave. Stay until June. Give me time. Give us time. We’ll find our feet again.”

 It would be better if she left now. It would be smarter if she left now. But not only does she not want to leave, she’s not confident that Steve will be able to keep up with his inhaler, meds, doctor’s visits, and rent all on his own. He’s healthier now, filling out a little and breathing better, but if she leaves him to his own devices, he might accidentally undo all her hard work. What if he gets sick again? What if he has another asthma attack and doesn’t have his inhaler? What if he doesn’t enlist in June for some reason? He wants to enlist, to fight, more than anything, but what if he can’t? What if it all falls apart because she leaves now?

 Is she strong enough to stay? Even for just a few more weeks?

 April is mostly over. The air is turning muggy and humid. The number of weeks Steve has left until everything changes and the future gets set in motion is in the single digits now.

 They can last a few more weeks together, right?

 “Until June,” she says.

 Darcy offers her hand, an almost-real grin plastered on her face. Steve gives it a long, unreadable look before taking it.

 “Until June,” he agrees, and they shake on it.

 “And we’re still friends?” she presses, even though the word tastes sour on her tongue. But she’ll take being Steve’s friend over being nothing to him, or worse, the bitch that broke his heart while forcing him to eat spinach.

 Steve barely hesitates.

 “Always.”

 It won’t be like it was before. Darcy’s not stupid enough to think that. They’ll probably never get back to what they had before, but it’s better than nothing, better than it was just this morning, so she’ll take it, and she’ll be grateful that the little time they have left together won’t be spent in silence.

 It gets… not easier, because it will never really be easy, but it does get better.

 Steve does the grocery shopping with her and insists on carrying most of the bags home every time. They have conversations about nothing important, and huddle over Bucky’s letter to read it together, before rushing to the calendar and marking off the days he’ll be able to come for a visit before shipping out. His visit will coincide with the Stark Expo in Queens, and they make plans to meet up there.

 Darcy gets a side-eye from Steve, but he doesn’t say anything about her predictions coming true, nor does he ask any questions. No matter what he’s feeling, Steve always keeps his promises, and now he can take her to see Howard Stark like he vowed to do all those months ago.

 It’s a jolt to realize that she’s about to come face-to-face with Tony’s father, and she’s not really sure she can handle that, for a variety of reasons.

 May brings with it the heat New York is known for, and the humidity almost knocks Darcy flat. Her hair is constantly in a bun, or drawn back into a ponytail, because any style she even attempts will wilt after about a minute outside. Not that being inside is much better, even with all the windows open.

 Steve takes to wandering around in an undershirt, Darcy switching back to her tanktop and shorts, and they both try not to sneak peeks as they also try not to melt into the furniture. She makes them paper fans, and they lay on the smooth floor and fan each other, while Darcy tortures them by discussing her favorite Ben and Jerry’s flavors.

 God she misses air conditioning.

 She misses the weirdest things. After months of cleaning by hand, her list expands to include vacuums, dishwashers, and Tony’s stupid fancy ovens that self-clean and dry themselves. The radio is okay, and she digs the record player, but she misses her music so much she finally cracks and turns on her old iPod, playing her old college playlist until the battery runs out.

 It’s the perfect weather for it- humid and hot- but even though they never speak about it aloud, it’s understood that there will be no milkshakes in their future. It’s not right to go without the other, but they can’t bring themselves to go together, either. It feels too much like a date. It’s too personal, and even though it’s getting easier to be around each other again, that’s a step too far for them both. So they wet the kitchen towels and drape them over their faces and necks, and stick near the windows in hopes of catching a stray breeze.

 It’s so hot that she can’t even bring herself to care that someone could see her in her modern garb from the street, if anyone cared to look up. But no one does, and it’s too damn hot to be in skirts and button ups, and she’s not about to wrestle herself into the undergarments she finally caved and bought.

 She missed the corsets being mainstream by a few years (thank fuck), but the girdle is a torture device and she refuses to wear it, same as she refuses the pantyhose. She’s already going to have to get her bras custom made, she’s not about to shell out to be doubly uncomfortable.

 Who the fuck is gonna make her wear that stuff, anyway? Darcy never thought she’d miss modern bras, but she’s genuinely worried she’ll be around to see the bullet bra come to be, and with her magnificent chest that is just a disaster waiting to happen. She’s pretty sure her boobs could actually qualify as a weapon of mass destruction if she gets within ten feet of one. Or take someone’s eye out.

 She wakes up today, the last day of May, to find Steve perched on the coffee table, sketchbook in hand. It’s the first time he’s done that in weeks, and for a moment she just blinks up at him and frantically hopes she wasn’t drooling. Again.

 “Did you know you talk in your sleep sometimes?” he asks without looking up. He doesn’t stop sketching when she sits up, blinking blearily and blowing her hair out of her face.

 “Sometimes,” she says, fumbling for her glasses. “My college roommate used to complain about it. I used to yell out Italian swears and scare her awake, but only during finals, or when I was super stressed. What did I say this time? Anything interesting?”

 “Something about cheese, and then you swore at math. I didn’t catch most of it.”

 “Sounds about right. I keep accidentally learning advanced math via osmosis through the people I work with. I actually only understand about half of it, but my brain likes to make me dream about star clusters sometimes.”

 He gives her a weird look.

 “Not on purpose,” she says around a yawn. “I can’t help what I pick up on, but you try doing your English Lit homework around someone ranting about The Uncertainty Principle for the millionth time and see if you don’t learn a few things. Particles this, atoms that, why won’t this equation carry over, Darcy how the hell do I upgrade my RAM and why is the computer beeping at me?”

 “I literally have no idea what any of that means.”

 She’s saved from trying to figure out a way of explaining it by Steve turning the sketch towards her.

 It’s her, asleep on the couch with one arm raised above her head, hair askew, mouth open. Her foot is propped up on the arm of the couch, the other on the floor, and the sleeping bag bunched up around her waist, halfway kicked off. Her visible leg is bare, the bag covering her thighs, and her face is mashed against the fabric.

 “You’re getting really good at portraits. I swear Jane has a photo of me exactly like that on her phone. I think she might actually have several, and one where I’m cuddling one of Tony’s robots.” She leans in to study the drawing. “The shading is amazing. It must have taken you ages.”

 Steve goes all pink and pleased, that killer smile of his blooming across his face. Darcy has to look away so she doesn’t do something stupid (like kiss him) before her brain is fully awake.

 So things improve, but they don’t get better either. She talks, Steve listens, and they don’t touch each other. Sometimes they even tease each other and laugh like before, but it’s not really like it was. When they walk home together, both make sure their hands are in pockets. They don’t link arms, there’s no more holding hands, and they both pretend like it’s not hard to not reach for each other.

 Darcy works as many extra shifts as she can, and accepts an offer to babysit for a woman across the street from dinner till bedtime, when the mom gets off her factory shift, and is easily able to bring her other charges over as well. The two little girls play together happily, forming a fast friendship, and the newborn is content as long as he as an arm to nap in. She even gets permission to use their better oven and finally caves and learns how to make bread.

 It’s surprisingly easy, and weirdly fun, and Darcy considers it- like her job- to be another start in putting down roots, and really living here.

 It all adds to her savings, and soon she’ll have enough to afford a place of her own. Maybe she’ll go back to NYC, camp out in a prime location before it becomes stupid expensive to live there. Would that be a bad idea or a good one? She’s still not sure about it, about any of it, and now the burning question is: does she stay here after Steve leaves?

 Considering she’s barely two weeks away from it, perhaps the more pressing question should be, does she attempt to get help from Howard Stark? Would that screw things up if she did? Would it even work? Would she even be able to get to him, and would he even believe her if she could?

 She mulls it over as May comes to an end, knowing she has to make a choice, and soon.

 And then suddenly it’s June, and they’re on their way to Queens, to Bucky, and the Stark Expo.

 Her stomach won’t stop jumping the entire subway ride. It’s not a terribly long trip, and Steve is bouncing with excitement at seeing Bucky again for the first time in weeks, but she gnaws her fingernails the entire way.

 Should she try talk to Howard? She’s still not sure. Everything she’s confident enough to live through is about to come to an end. Thanks to her research, she knows a lot about Steve’s past/present, but he’s about to become part of Project Rebirth, and that’s where a lot of her knowledge ends.

 She’s about to be flying blind. Would it be better to have a copilot, or would it make things worse because Howard knows and even works with Steve?

 “He says he’s bringing some friends,” Steve tells her for the third time, and she stuffs her hand in her pocket to stop from chewing her nail any more.

 “Of course he is. Bucky makes friends everywhere.”

 Out of the corner of her eye, for a split second, she sees a flash of gold. Bright gold, flashing in the lights of the subway car.

 “I think he’s got a date,” Steve continues, pulling out the letter. “Maybe two.”

 Darcy blinks, and the color fades. When she focuses on where she’s sure the light came from, there’s nothing there.

 But something stirs in the air.

 “Yeah, that sounds like him,” she says distractedly. “Did you see that?”

 “Hm?” Steve looks up. “See what?”

 “I don’t know, it was like a flash of light or- nothing,” she decides as the train pulls to a stop. “This is us. Let’s go see our idiot.”

 Steve takes the stairs two at a time, and Darcy pauses to watch him. He’s a little winded when he reaches the top, sure (so is she), but he’s not wheezing or gasping for air by the time he hits the street. His cheeks are flushed, and he’s not so pale as he was when she first arrived in September.

 Almost a full year ago. Ten months, to be precise. It’s nothing, in the grand scheme of things. Barely a blip on the radar.

 It’s been everything to her. Despite all the pain, all the heartache, it has been worth it to watch Steve grow into the man she used to read about in school. The man very few people could see inside him before the serum.

 Has she done enough? Has she done the right thing by staying with him? Telling him about the future? She didn’t tell him anything important- surely Steve knowing how a phone works isn’t going to make a hole appear in the universe or anything. Surely giving him a nudge towards his future is allowed. Even if it isn’t, it’s too late now. Everything changes tonight, for better or worse. The future Darcy’s fought so hard to keep is now set in motion.

 He’s changed, but he hasn’t. He’s still Steve, but he’s a little more confident now, a little healthier, and Darcy refuses to let the clench in her stomach and the stutter in her heart stop her from touching his shoulder and pointing out the recruiting office across the plaza.

 This happens. No matter what, it happens. This is what the future needs, and more, this is what Steve wants.

 And this, at least, she can give to him.

 “Tonight,” she reminds him. “After the Expo.”

 The smile dims slightly, becomes more serious. Steve studies the poster displayed across the way, watching a couple of guys put their faces in the uniform and smile before wandering in. Another man stands where they stood, staring at his face reflected back at him, but shakes his head and takes off in the other direction.

 “They’ll let me enlist?”

 “They almost don’t, but someone talks them into it.” She won’t reveal too much, but she’ll tell him this. “You’re gonna be great, Steve. I have every faith in you.”

 She gets a smile, but his eyes stay locked on the recruiter, now talking with the men who’d wandered in.

 And Darcy sees it again, that flash of gold out of the corner of her eye. But this time when she turns to it, it grows brighter, then brighter still, and she doesn’t understand how no one else is bothered, how no one else can see this on the dark street, until she registers who’s standing in the beam of light. Until she recognizes the bright white light that had swallowed her ten months ago.

 Heimdall’s golden eyes lock on hers and she knows.

 Darcy’s heart threatens to beat right out of her chest. She reaches back for Steve as Heimdall reaches for her, her hand just brushing his fingers, just closing around his when Heimdall speaks.

 “You’ve done a great service for the world, Miss Lewis,” he says, his voice an incredible timbre that seems to go directly through her chest. She doesn’t understand what he means, but she knows why he’s here. She’s been waiting for this, hoping and wishing and praying every day for months, but it can’t be here. It can’t be now. “I’m here to bring you home.”

 This isn’t how it’s supposed to go. There suddenly isn’t any time, and she thought she’d have tonight, at least, to say goodbye. To them both, Bucky and Steve at the same time. One last look. One last night.

 She’s not ready to go.

 She turns, fast, and manages to say “Steve.”

 By the time he turns, his fingers just beginning to curl around hers, she’s gone.

Chapter Text

 It’s all the same.

 It’s an instant trip home, same as it was to the past, and Darcy blinks away the spots in her vision to find herself on top of Avengers/Stark tower, in the dead center of the helipad on the roof. Natasha and Maria Hill are chatting as they make their way to the door, and Darcy can’t find her voice or her bearings to call out.

 Luckily, Natasha senses someone behind her and turns.

 It’s not often that the Black Widow herself is surprised, and it’s even more rare that she shows it. But her face is a picture of pure shock when she turns around, hand hovering over her gun, and finds not another idiot in all black trying to break in, but a pale, shaking Darcy Lewis, eyes as wide as saucers.

 For a long second, everyone just blinks at each other. Then, Natasha moves.

 “Get Jane Foster,” she barks at Maria, already running inside. “Now.”

 Darcy manages a step forward, then another, but then the world tips on its axis and she nearly goes to her knees, her purse dropping from her shoulder. Would have, if Natasha hadn’t gotten there first and caught her, lowering her down gently.

 “Oh my god. It’s okay, Darcy, you’re okay.”

 She can’t hear most of what Nat is saying, but her voice is soothing. Darcy closes her eyes and lets it all wash over her: the sounds of the traffic, the wind blowing by, the feel of her hair whipping around her face and getting stuck to her eyelids. The helipad smells like asphalt and jet fuel, and Nat’s leather jumpsuit is uncomfortable under her cheek, but she curls up in Natasha’s lap all the same and clutches her.

 Hesitating briefly, Natasha begins to card her fingers through Darcy’s hair.

 “I’m home,” Darcy croaks, though it comes out more like a question.

 “You’re home,” Natasha confirms, prodding Darcy’s head gently. She doesn’t see any injuries, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t any. “I’m going to bring you inside now, okay? Hang on.”

 In any other situation, being princess carried inside by Natasha would probably be a dream come true, but right now the world is spinning, so she just closes her eyes and lets herself be transported. She’s not sure she could get her legs to work right now anyway. Every part of her seems to be shaking.

 When the doors close behind them, the feel and sound of the wind shutting off helps Darcy get her bearings a little, even as her ears begin to ring.

 “Nat,” she starts, but her throat clicks shut.

 She will not cry. She won’t. Not all over Natasha, who’s been through a lot worse than some time travel and a little heartbreak.

 “Almost there,” Natasha assures her, seemingly unaffected by carting Darcy’s limp body around. “JARVIS, open the elevator.”

 “The medical team has been alerted and is awaiting your arrival.”

 Oh god, she’s about to be poked and prodded and interviewed and then locked up to be studied as a specimen, or worse, fired and told to leave immediately because she fucked up the entire timeline. Her whole body trembles the entire trip.

 But it’s all the same. The walls of the elevator are still impossibly shiny, the ride smooth and almost silent. JARVIS relays instructions on the way down, sounding the same as ever, and Natasha refuses to let her walk, even when the doors ping open, depositing Darcy directly onto a bed. She’s promptly swarmed by medical staff.

 “Miss Lewis, do you know where you are?”

 “I need your arm-”

 “-look at the light, follow the pen-”

 “-levels look good, but-”

 “-get samples for-”

 She’s poked before she realizes what’s happening, her blood drawn and put carefully into tubes, and then the shaking gets violent. Darcy almost shakes right off the table before Natasha snarls at them and the medical staff all take a collective step back.

 Her teeth begin to chatter, not from cold but the shock of it all, and a blanket is finally draped over her.

 Jane comes in at a dead run. The sight of her sprinting down the hall through the glass walls makes Darcy sit up, some warmth finally seeping back into her.

 “Darcy!”

 She tries to call back, opens her mouth and tries to say Jane’s name, but a strangled breath escapes instead.

 Jane doesn’t appear to care and launches herself into the bed with Darcy, rocking the entire thing back a few inches. They tangle around each other, clinging tight, Jane stroking Darcy’s hair even as she bursts into tears.

 “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Jane sobs, and pulls away enough to frame Darcy’s face with her hands. She can’t seem to let go for too long, and pulls her in for another hug. “Oh my god, Darcy, I’m so- are you okay- I’m so sorry. The experiment, the magic, it all went- the Norns shouldn’t have done this- god, I’m so fucking sorry. You’re here, you’re home, oh my god.”

 She babbles in between the sobs, patting Darcy down for injuries and holding her close, rocking them both back and forth. Darcy’s arms seem to weld themselves around Jane, small, wiry Jane with dark circles under her eyes who won’t let go of her either. It’s really her, that faint scent of coffee and pastry wafting up, and none of it’s changed.

 Jane feels a little thin, and Darcy is able to glean something about the Norns and Asgard and magic and destiny, but she just buries her face in Jane’s shoulder and lets it all wash over her.

 It’s all the same.

 Natasha and Jane look the same, if a bit tired. The medical lab where she’d had her very invasive physical upon being hired is still too bright, too sterile, and behind glass walls that don’t make a bit of sense for a medical station. Susan Cho ushers the staff out and even she’s the same, her dark eyes giving Darcy a once-over before stepping out to give them privacy.

 “You’re here,” Jane sobs into Darcy’s hair, and it makes the tears prick in Darcy’s eyes. “You’re really back.”

 She’s home. She’s really home.

 She almost wants to ask what’s different, because surely she changed something, but how would anyone she asks know? If they grew from the past Darcy was in, this could be a completely different timeline, and that could either be really bad or really good, but she’s not in the mood to find out. Tony’s suit could be more gold than red. Bruce could be purple.

 It might not be her Jane clinging to her.

 “-been months,” Jane is saying, and Darcy studies her face carefully but sees no differences.

 She finally finds her voice, aided by the water Natasha offers her, and clears her throat.

 “How long?” she asks, because the air outside hadn’t felt like Summer, and something tells her it’s not June. Has she been missing for longer than she’d been gone?

 “Four months,” Natasha tells her. “It’s September.”

 “...oh,” Darcy manages, and it starts the shaking up again.

 The accident had occurred in May, but she’d appeared in the past in September. Now it’s September again? It doesn’t make any sense to her, and it raises more than a few questions she has no idea how to answer. Is it some kind of full-circle thing? She appears in September in the past, then in the future too? How could she have lived in the past for ten months but only have been gone for four?

 She’d aged up, in the past. Her birthday had happened. Does that mean she’s younger again, or-

 Fresh panic spurts in her chest. If she never had her birthday, does that mean her locket is gone? Her phone? The pictures? Did none of it happen at all? Was it all a simulation, a hallucination, a dream, a brain injury? Has she been in a coma the entire time and the past few months were just been something her damaged brain cooked up?

 But when she fumbles for her necklace, her fingers close around the familiar shape, the smooth feel of the silver resting under her thumb. Trying to control the tremble in her hand, Darcy brings the locket up to inspect.

 A square edged silver locket with a mother-of-pearl flower greets her, and she doesn’t know if she’s relieved or scared to see that it’s the same too.

 Through the glass, she can see people piling out of the elevator only to be stopped by Susan and Maria’s impenetrable wall. Tony and Bruce appear to be trying to argue their way past without success, and Clint is plastered to the wall behind them, relief evident on his face. Towering above them, Thor stands silently in the back, eyes on Darcy and something that looks like guilt written on his face.

 And they all look the same. Like Jane, they all look tired, but also just how she remembers them. Tony, in particular, has a I-haven’t-slept-properly-in-a-week vibe about him that’s probably about to become her job to sort out.

 She’ll talk to them all, eventually. She wants to. Eventually. But for now, she turns to Jane, to Nat, both guarding her and forming a barrier between her and the crowd outside. When she’s more sure-footed, she’s going to have a very long talk with whoever designed this damn lab and force them to have an exam while people mill about outside, see how they like it.

 She doesn’t ask where Steve is. She’s not sure she’s ready to know. There is a non-zero chance he’s still avoiding her, not that she can blame him, but she can’t think about him right now.

 Overwhelmed, eyes gritty, head pounding from the tears she refuses to let build, Darcy stands.

 “I’m not staying in here,” she announces. “I’ll do the interviews, or a report, or whatever, and I do want to see everyone, just… not right now. Not yet.”

 Jane frowns, brow furrowing. “There might be-” she cuts herself off, beating the scientist back to let the friend take point. “JARVIS, is she clear?”

 “I do not detect any unknown or dangerous particles or substances either on, in, or emanating from Miss Lewis. She is clear to return upstairs to her quarters. I will relay her wishes to the others, and request they return some other time.”

 “Good, because I want a long, hot shower, and my own clothes.”

 She’s escorted the whole way, Natasha a little ahead of them to clear the path, Jane stuck to her side with an arm around her shoulders. Darcy keeps her head down and quietly counts the steps to the elevator, to her quarters, and finally, finally her bathroom.

 The lights feel too bright against her eyes, but the massive glass shower with its five showerheads looks like heaven, and exactly how she remembers it.

 Natasha deposits Darcy’s bag on the counter. She hesitates, then spins and gives Darcy a quick, firm hug. “I’m glad you’re home,” she says. “I’ll keep everyone out until you’re ready.”

 Jane stays, hovering in the doorway until Darcy shoos her out. “I’m gonna be awhile, but I’ll want food when I come out.”

 Jane leaps at the chance to be useful. “What you do want? I’ll get you anything.”

 “Something terrible for me that’s overly greasy, and that I don’t have to cook.”

 “Comfort food, got it. Coming right up.”

 She expects to linger in the shower, to bask in the heat and lather herself with her name brand products. She steps in, fully intending on doing just that, but the water is almost too warm, the pressure too good, and none of her shampoos smell right. Her moisturizing body wash feels like heaven against her dry skin, but she can’t bring herself to do more than a perfunctory scrub before she’s stepping out again.

 The towels are too big, too soft, and too thick when she wraps one around herself. The smooth floor feels strange and too warm against her feet, and she asks JARVIS to turn off the warming feature for now. The mirror takes up the entire wall behind her sink and it’s too ornate, to shiny, too new. Her electric toothbrush is too loud in her mouth, but she uses it all the same, relieved to find the toothpaste a serious step up from the past few months.

 She dims the lights, and it helps. Her Dyson Air Wrap feels familiar, at least, and she takes her time using it on her hair despite knowing she’s not going anywhere for a while. Even with lingering over her skincare routine, too many months unused and it kind of feels like her skin is crying, she’s still padding out to the kitchen in under an hour, her clothes draped over her arm. She leaves her purse on the counter to go through later, but she plugs her phone in to charge before leaving the bedroom.

 Jane is accepting several bags from a suited up Tony, and the picture is so bizarre a genuine laugh bubbles out of her. Tony’s eyes snap to her, his suit opening to allow him to step out, but he doesn’t come in any further than the doorway.

 “Hey kid.”

 “Did you pick up takeout in your suit?”

 “Fastest way to get it,” he says with a shrug.

 Jane places the bags on the island. “I didn’t know what you wanted, so I just kind of got everything.”

 It smells amazing, and as her stomach unclenches she realizes she’s not just hungry; she’s starving.

 “You got me curry from Foo Yung? That’s across the river!”

 Tony jabs a thumb over his shoulder at the iron exoskeleton in the hall. “Three minute trip in the suit.”

 “We also got pizza, pad thai, Italian, Chinese, sushi, tacos, fried chicken, and shawarma,” Jane lists, removing everything from their containers. “Sweet and sour pork, curry, alfredo with chicken, nori-”

 Darcy reels Tony in for a hug before he can fully back out the door. He’s stiff under her hands for a minute, but relaxes and gives her a quick squeeze back.

 “Glad you’re home, kid. There’s an expensive bottle of liquor in one of the bags, too. From my private reserve. All yours.”

 She holds out her dress and shoes. “Here, I figure you want to run a few tests on these. I don’t really want them back.”

 She half expects Jane to go with Tony once she’s settled since there’s science involved, but Darcy’s grateful that Jane merely ushers Tony out and settles in beside her to dish out the food, cracking the bottle open and pouring generously into two glasses. And she’s eternally grateful when, after two slices of pizza, most of the curry, and at least two glasses of whiskey have been consumed and the tears finally push out, Jane merely sinks to the floor with her, and holds her while she sobs.

 Steve easily finds Bucky perched on a log in the middle of the Canadian Wilderness after months of not knowing where he is at all. Something about how easy it is to find him after weeks of no signs makes him and Sam both pause.

 He’s got a Rubik’s Cube clutched in his metal hand, back unguarded, and doesn’t look at them when they cautiously approach.

 “I saw Darcy.”

 Behind him, Sam blows out a breath. “I’ll give you two a minute,” he says, and quietly steps away.

 Steve settles beside Bucky, ignoring the damp that seeps into his pants, and thinks that Bucky’s disappearing act suddenly makes a lot more sense. He’d never been sure how to bring Darcy up, and Bucky hadn’t mentioned her. He’s always figured it was a memory that just hasn’t returned to Bucky yet, and he’s been warned about tossing too many memories at him.

 “When?”

 “Couple months ago. I thought it would be funny to walk into the tower around the time you got the alert I’d dipped from Wakanda again.” He examines the cube in his hand, turning it over and over again. None of it is solved, but he spins the sections one handed, solving it quickly before messing it up again. “I was gonna go right up to your place and eat all your food. Had a one-liner prepared and everything. But Darcy was outside.”

 They’ll discuss him leaving Wakanda for the nth time later. Bucky’s already heard most of the lectures anyways.

 “You prepare your one-liners now?” Steve asks.

 Bucky finally looks at him.

 “Why the hell was Darcy at Avengers Tower?”

 So he does remember her. Or, he’s starting to.

 “She works there, and stays in one of the apartments.”

 “So you two-”

 “No. Whatever you’re thinking, no. I didn’t know she was there because I was chasing you, and by the time I got back, she’d already moved in.”

 Bucky’s look turns incredulous. “You haven’t said a damn thing to her, have you? About any of it? You never mentioned her to me either.”

 “I stayed away until she disappeared.” He still can’t shake the guilt over it. How had Darcy managed for months? He’s barely been able to sleep for weeks with this weight on his chest, and it had just been one thing he knew. He can’t imagine having studied the war in history class and then having to just watch it all happen. Having to let them go, knowing what she knew. “I couldn’t be there when it happened.”

 Just in his peripheral vision, he can see Sam patrolling.

 Something crawls into the underbrush. Behind them, a woodpecker bangs away on a tree. Sam steps in a fox hole and swears, kicking a pile of leaves before moving on.

 Bucky solves the cube one more time before offering it to Steve. “I know the feeling,” he says with a gusty sigh. Steve takes the cube, rubbing his fingers over the stickers just beginning the peel at the edges. “When I saw her… You know, there’s been this block that no one could figure out, in my mind. Shuri’s people have been working on it, figuring Hydra targeted the years we were friends hard to hide them away. She’s been trying to remove it for months. But nothing worked. It was like there was a wall there that no one could get through, not even me.”

 Finished with the perimeter, Sam lingers on the edge of their vision. Close enough to jump in if something happens, but far enough away to give them some privacy.

 Steve’s told Sam bits and pieces about Darcy, mostly because the other man didn’t pry, but no one but Bucky can really grasp the entire situation. As nice as it has been to finally talk about it, about Darcy, only Bucky can really grasp what’s on Steve’s mind. Another solider out of time, another forgotten footnote in history. Another person who cares for Darcy and had to let her get taken.

 “Then I saw Darcy,” Bucky continues, his flesh and bone arm coming up to rub his forehead. “She didn’t see me, but I saw her, and I swear to god I felt that wall come down. Everything just flooded back. Not just us three crammed into that apartment, all of it. Getting captured, the chair, even some of the missions they’d purposefully erased or blocked off. It all slammed into me at once.”

 Horrified, Steve lays a hand on Bucky’s shoulder. “Oh god,” he says, and Bucky nods.

 “Yeah.” His voice is gravely, and cracks slightly. “Yeah. I think… I think Darcy was too careful, and it saved me.”

 “What do you mean?”

 “I mean, she was so careful not to be noticed in the past that Hydra didn’t know to erase her. They blocked that part of my mind off because the memories kept filtering through, but like seeing you, seeing her, seeing someone alive from the past- coupled with all the work Wakanda has done- it unblocked it all.” The laugh Bucky gives is humorless, but when he looks at Steve he looks like Bucky. “She didn’t know me, and I was too freaked out to stay, so I just booked it before she spotted me. Stole a car, hopped on a train, jumped off someplace random. I had to get away. It was all- it is all-” he trails off, but Steve understands.

 “I had a panic attack when I saw her,” he admits, handing the cube back. “Sam had to get me through it, and then I ran too.”

 “I didn’t know serum-enhanced people could have panic attacks.”

 “Me either. I don’t recommend them.” Steve feels something release with the breath he blows out. “She saved me, too. She’s the reason I’m Captain America.”

 “Yeah, there’s no way she didn’t know about that. Oh my god, and she even told you where to go, when to try and enlist again, of course.”

 “More than that,” Steve admits, hand fisting and unclenching. “She got me healthy enough for Erskine to take a second look at me. I’m not sure I would have been picked for the program if she hadn’t done that. She paid for my first inhaler, kept me- kept us both fed and rested, poured medicine from her time into me. She even stayed with me after- after her birthday. She could have moved out, but she stayed, kept cooking, kept encouraging me, even though it had to be hard. God, it had to be so hard for her. But she did it anyway.”

 Because Darcy would never run from a fight, or back down from doing the right thing no matter how much it hurts. Darcy is the reason Bucky’s memories are returning, and she’s the reason Steve is here now, enhanced and strong and finally able to put bullies in their place. Able to protect people. Able to help.

 He’d told her he wanted to fight, and she’d made sure it happened, even knowing what she knew. And now he and Bucky are finally side-by-side again. And once again, Darcy is making sure they’re healthy and whole.

 The quiet falls again, the wind rustling the leaves. Sam abandons them for the jet, disappearing inside with a finger to his ear.

 “I remembered she arrived in September, so I figured if I stayed away until then, she’d be gone.”

 Steve ignores the clench in his chest. Even knowing that Darcy had to go, it had been almost impossible to leave knowing the accident that takes her, injures her and the others was coming. But it had happened, and he’d had to let it. What happens in the past happens, and Darcy had drilled it into them that changing the past would lead to an unknown, unstable future. It’s still not a comfort, knowing he did the right thing.

 Or, what he hopes is the right thing.

 “Yeah,” Steve says to the ground. He feels tired, suddenly, a bone-deep fatigue that’s been following him around for months. “She’s gone.”

 “Not anymore,” Sam corrects from beside them.

 In tandem, Steve and Bucky’s heads whip around. “What?” they say in unison.

 “Clint just sent word. Darcy arrived home yesterday.”

 Steve is on his feet in an instant.

 “We’re going-”

 “Jet’s already warming up.”

 He’s halfway up the ramp by the time Bucky’s got his feet under him.

 “I see that hasn’t changed,” he mutters, amused. He knows all about Steve and Darcy and their love that could not be. As much as he respects Darcy for keeping to her mission- and keeping the future together is a mission no matter what anyone says, and also begs the question of who sent her on said mission- he still has hope that those two will be able to figure it out.

 If anyone deserves some happiness in this fucked-up world, it’s those two.

 Sam watches Steve go. “Yeah, I kinda got that vibe. He didn’t say outright- he’s actually been tight-lipped about a lot of it- but I picked up that he cares for her. A lot.”

 “Oh, that punk is just down to the ground in love with her. Has been since the 40’s.” A thought occurring, Bucky turns to study Sam. Steve clearly told him a few things, and obviously trusts him, so he wonders. “Did he tell you about the picture in the watch?”

 Sam hits the button to make the ramp close, the jet whirring to life around them.

 “What, the ‘Picture of Peggy’? He went off on a rant about it, annoyed that no one listened when Peggy said it wasn’t her. He spent all night muttering about history books and spreading misinformation, but never said anything else, and I didn’t feel right pushing. Not even Natasha has been able to get more out of him.”

 Bucky barks out a laugh. It feels strange to laugh again, the sound unfamiliar coming out of his mouth, but he remembers how. He can laugh again, and that alone is amazing. He rubs the Rubik’s Cube between his fingers, tossing it up and catching it again, remembering the one Darcy got him for Christmas decades ago.

 “He’s got a point. Not only was it never Peggy, it wasn’t even a damn photograph.” He grins, remembering Steve sweating over his sketchbook, filling endless pages of the same face, determined to get it just right.

 “I love it when history gets it wrong,” Sam says, half-sarcastic. “What was it, a draw- oh.” He pauses, a soft look coming over his face. “Aw, that’s kinda sweet, actually. He drew a portrait of her, and carried it around all that time. And explains how he goes through sketchbooks so fast; he’s still drawing her.”

 Bucky merely grins at him, buckling himself into the seat as Steve attempts to break the sound barrier to get them back, and says nothing.

 “What do you mean The Norns did this?”

 Thor resists the urge to step back. Darcy may be small, but she is mighty, and she’s bested him in combat before.

 She doesn’t appear to have her taser on her, but her eyes spew fire when she marches up to him, completely unafraid, and pokes a finger into his chest. He has to look down at her, the jab does nothing to him, and yet he’s very aware of the danger he’s currently in.

 “I mean exactly that,” he explains patiently. Darcy narrows her eyes at him. “They were drawn into the lab by the magic, as I explained when Jane was allowed to experiment on it. You caught their attention.”

 Darcy vaguely remembers something about that. The Norns were interested in Jane’s science, and curious to see if it would meld with their magic. Thor had mentioned, briefly, that someone might watch over the experiments to see what would happen, but Darcy had assumed the all-seeing Heimdall would just be watching from up high.

 Apparently not.

 “And they just took me?” she demands, voice growing even louder. “They didn’t ask, or-or even warn anyone? Just-” she snaps her fingers “-boom, in the past with you? What the actual fuck? That’s not okay. Not at all.”

 “The Norns do as they wish, and it is not for us to stop them.” Thor throws a glance to Jane, but as warned, she’s on Darcy’s side and does not come to his aid. “It was always your destiny to do this-”

 “According to who?” Darcy interrupts. “They don’t get to just decide that shit for me.”

 “But they do. The Norns control the destiny of humans, both as a collective and individuals. They acted according to your destiny.”

 Destiny? Darcy was plucked from her time, thrown over seventy years into the past, broke Steve’s heart, and had hers broken because three magical beings that live in the basement of the world just decided that that’s what was supposed to happen?

 “They don’t know what I’ve been through,” she spits, and now Thor does take a step back when she advances on him. “And people I don’t even believe in don’t get to just kidnap people and do what they want with them. That’s not how that works.”

 “But it is,” Thor says, gentle and firm at the same time. His heart aches for Darcy, for what trials she must have gone through. Matters of the heart are indeed intense, and being out of time, displaced in the universe is a jolting, life-altering process.

 He would know, and even though his worked out for the most part, he can’t fault Darcy for her anger.

 He’s surprised to find he’s angry at them as well. Darcy is a kind soul, and she cares for everyone around her. She does not deserve the heartache that surrounds her, the grief and fear she’s suffered through for months.

 “This didn’t just happen to me,” Darcy says, and he hates that her hands are shaking. “My parents freaked out when I didn’t contact them for months. Jane had to tell them I was missing. I missed months of not just my life, but theirs too. And what’s worse? No one even asked me! I was just taken. I didn’t have a guide, or a hint, nothing. I had to figure it all out on my own, not knowing if I’d even make it back at all.”

 To everyone’s discomfort, Darcy’s eyes fill.

 “I thought I’d never see anyone again,” she says, swiping at the tears dripping down her cheeks. “I was terrified I’d mess something up and screw up the whole future, or that the last time I spoke to my mother was the last time. Why the fuck would they even pick me?”

 “Because it was always meant to be you,” Thor says simply, wishing he understood it more.

 The Norns had offered an explanation, or what they considered an explanation. The thread of fate around Darcy is bright, and when they’d tugged on a knot, what was meant to be simply came to pass. Jane’s experiment had merely opened the door to allow them to do so.

 Darcy absorbs this with an unreadable expression on her face.

 “Heimdall said I did the world a great service,” she says, staring him down, more fierce looking that Sif. “What does that mean?”

 That, at least, he can answer.

 “You kept this world and this time safe. You made sure the past remained unchanged, or kept something from changing in the first place. I don’t know what,” he says before she can ask, “for the Norns did not tell me. There was only so much they were willing to share, and I risked angering them by pressing. But rest assured, your efforts have been noted, and your reward will come.”

 “I don’t want anything from them,” Darcy snarls, and Thor understands completely.

 Sometimes fate interferes with plans. Sometimes the path under your feet is unwelcome, but that does not mean it is not needed. He regrets, deeply, the pain that Darcy has suffered, but also knows that there is nothing to be done about it now. He can’t claim he is unaffected by it: the Norns taking his friend for unknown reasons had shaken him, and he’d been thrown out of their domain when he’d demanded more answers.

 Darcy’s anger is not unwarranted. The pain she feels is very real, and everyone had suffered in her absence.

 “It may not mean much, but I am sorry this happened to you, my Lightning Sister. If I had known…”

 “You would have had to let it happen, the same as I had to let Steve sign up for the serum program, so put that away. I’m angry at them, not you.”

 Darcy might not be able to see it, but Thor does. He can see so clearly why the Norns chose her.

 Darcy with her large heart, her quick wit, and willingness to care for others, who does what is right even when it is hard, who stands her ground even when afraid, is exactly the kind of guardian this timeline needs.

 It’s Jane who speaks next, voice quiet. “Do you want to talk about it? Not for a report,” she hurries to add when Darcy’s gaze slides to her. “Just talk. It couldn’t have been easy.”

 “There’s nothing to talk about. I lived in the past for almost a year. I worked and cooked, and I fed Steve and Bucky vegetables, gave them medicine, fell in love, and watched the world suffer while I did nothing to stop it.” Uncomfortable, she folds into herself. Her locket winks in the light when she reaches up to fiddle with it. “I had to just sit by and watch as horrible shit happened because I wanted to get home to my time. It was awful, it sucked, and if it ever happens again, I’m finding a way to the basement of the world and punching the stupid Norns in their fucking faces.”

 Thor can’t exactly blame her for that, and he knows the Norns take no offense at her anger. They can’t, knowing that this is the exact reaction she would have upon arriving home. The Norns are, were, and always will be. They are him, they are Jane, and they are Darcy, so they feel as she feels now.

 But the thread of fate is still being spun, and though she doesn’t fully understand it yet, Darcy is the reason the thread is currently unknotted.

 Something about the way Jane hesitates draws her attention.

 “Steve-”

 “I don’t want to talk about Steve,” Darcy says, fast as a whip. “I did my fucking job, and I filled out that stupid report, but I don’t want to talk about Steve.”

 That’s hers. Her own private heartache. Jane knows, because of course she told Jane, but she’d vowed it would be the only time she spoke of it. Neither SHIELD nor Stark Industries need to know about her and Steve. No one does. Hopefully, if she keeps it close enough to her chest, the sharp ache in her chest will fade to the dull throb it was before.

 Steve’s not even here. He’s still out hunting for Bucky, and she’s not sure she can handle them all being in the same space again anytime soon.

 But even as she thinks that, JARVIS announces the arrival of the jet on the roof, containing Sam, Bucky, and Steve, and Darcy’s heart drops before bouncing back and lodging itself in her throat.

 Her hand closes around the locket.

 “I should go,” she starts, but Jane’s hand comes down on her shoulder.

 “No,” she says, and something about the way she says it stops Darcy in her tracks. “You really shouldn’t.”

 Everything in her trembles.

 “I can’t.”

 “You can. Oh Darcy, yes you can. He’s been waiting for you.”

 Thor taps a finger under her chin to force her head back. His smile is soft when she looks up at him.

 “You are one of the kindest, most caring people I have ever met, Lightning Sister,” he tells her with the utmost sincerity. “You are as strong as a warrior, as brave as a solider, and as fierce as a mother protecting her young. The Norns would not have chosen you if they did not think you would succeed.” Both hands on her shoulders, he bends slightly and makes sure she holds his gaze. “You deserve your happiness. And I believe he is right upstairs. Go to him. He has been waiting for your return just as we have, and longs to see you just as much as you long for him.”

 For one moment, Darcy is frozen.

 She doesn’t believe in half the stuff Thor just told her. Threads of fate, destiny? Ten months ago, four months ago, she would have called it all total bullshit. All knowing, powerful beings plucking her out of time? Yeah, right.

 But.

 But they had. They did. And now after years of waiting, months of wondering, she and Steve are in the same place, at the same time. Is she really going to pass up this chance?

 She hesitates, dithers, and then swears, spinning on her heel and bolting out the door. She slides into the elevator just as the doors close, and orders JARVIS to take her to the roof.

Chapter Text

 Steve pushes the jet to its limit. Sam and Bucky can deal with the extra turbulence, and he doesn’t care who knows that he’s rushing back.

 Darcy is at the tower.

 After months, years of waiting and wondering what could have happened, if he’d ever see her again, Darcy is at the tower. The Darcy he knows, the one who knows him. The same woman who sold her belongings to pay his hospital bill and make Christmas happen, who downed a glass of whiskey and emptied the other over a jerk’s head. Who told him he could do anything, who believed in him when not even Bucky did.

 Darcy is at the tower right now, and she’s waiting on him.

 It doesn’t matter if something has changed, if his feelings are no longer requited. He just needs to see her. He has to see her.

 Bucky is calmly sitting behind him, exchanging glances with Sam they think he can’t see, but he just doesn’t care. He’s waited years for the chance to see Darcy again, and then months more when he realized it wasn’t his Darcy yet.

 Staying away had been one of the hardest things he’s had to do in a long time, but now Darcy is back and the time for waiting is done. He thought it would be months yet before she came back, and there’s no doubt a fascinating explanation for the time warping, the time travel, and the whole mystery, but Steve finds he just does not care.

 He doesn’t care about anything except seeing her.

 He’s forced to focus when landing the jet, angling just right to land on the clamps Stark had installed. There’s nothing he can do to speed up the docking, the safety checks. He goes through the shutdown on autopilot, mechanically hitting the switches and locking the clamps on the wings, dropping the landing gear and waiting for the landing pad to rotate them into take-off position for the next mission.

 And then he sits, staring blankly out the window as the engines shut off and tries to calm his heart pounding in his ears.

 Bucky waits a beat, then two.

 “You’re not gonna make her come onto the jet, are you?” he asks. “Cause you know she’ll climb the damn wing if she thinks you’re avoiding her.”

 “I’m not avoiding her, I just need a minute.”

 Bucky gives him a not-so-gentle slap on the back of his head with his metal arm. “Punk, you’ve both been waiting for this for far too long. Don’t wait any longer just because you’re a wimp.” He grins. “Plus, I wanna see her too, and I can’t until after you two have had your reunion. Don’t make me wait too long.”

 Sam doesn’t say anything, though his face says plenty, and Steve finally stands, pushing past them both to open the ramp.

 New York is noisy as always, the sound rolling in despite how high up they are, and the wind whips around them as they disembark. Steve doesn’t know what he’s feeling. Nervous, sure. Anxious, of course. Eager, most definitely. His nerves aren’t enough to make him slow down, and he practically leaps off the jet before the ramp is fully down.

 And freezes at the sight of Darcy bursting out of a door to spill onto the roof. Her hair is down, loose around her shoulders. She’s wearing a plaid button up over a tank top, and it reminds him of the first time he’d seen her, all those months ago. Years. Decades. And yet, standing before him, she’s exactly the same as she was.

 For a moment, no one moves.

 Blue eyes meet blue. Darcy’s eyes are wide behind her glasses, chest heaving with the frantic run up the last few flights of stairs, too impatient to wait for the elevator. Her hair whips around her head, tangling easily in the wind and sticking to her lips. She doesn’t notice. The sounds of the city fades. Everything disappears except them.

 The sunlight winks off her locket, still clasped around her neck, the mother-of-pearl flower standing out against the silver. Darcy takes one step forward.

 “Steve,” she says, breathless. And she smiles.

 And then Steve is running.

 Darcy doesn’t meet him halfway. Steve is already more than halfway to her by the time she convinces her legs to move. But she runs too, face splitting open with that killer smile he knows, the smile he’s seen in his dreams for months, years, and he feels it echo on his own face.

 They collide with ease, Darcy leaping up to throw her arms around his neck, burying her face in his shoulder, and he catches her with one arm around her waist, the other coming up to tangle in all that amazing hair. Her legs wrap around him for balance, but he’s solid, his grip sure, and he’s convinced he’s never going to be able to let her go again.

 It’s Darcy, warm and real in his arms, laughing into his ear. Just as he remembers her, but this time he’s strong enough to lift her up and hold her tight.

 “Hey sweetheart,” he breathes in her ear, and feels her smile against his skin.

 She pulls back enough to frame his face with both of her hands, and they’re both crying a little when they lock eyes, but Darcy just laughs joyfully and presses her forehead against his.

 He’s careful when he sets her on her feet again, not because he thinks he might hurt her, but because he can’t convince his hands to release her. His fingers refuse to detangle from her hair, his palm possessively spans her back, and he is completely unable to step more than an inch back.

 Darcy’s smile never fades. He has to look down at her now, but she looks at him the same way she always has, and it makes his heart sore in all the best ways.

 “I thought it would be weird,” she says, dropping one hand from his face to clutch at his side. He releases her hair to tangle his fingers with the hand resting against his cheek, leaning into her gentle touch.

 She’s exactly the same, but he’s so much different than the Steve she knows. Taller, broader, with scars that aren’t visible but that he carries around all the same. It’s been decades, years, just a few months since they saw each other last and so much has happened in the meantime.

 But she looks at him like nothing has changed, even as she has to tilt her head back to look at him.

 She doesn’t let go either.

 “You thought what would be weird?” His fingers trace her hand of their on volition, his lips brushing against her palm as he speaks.

 She’s still smiling up at him, and he can’t stop his own grin.

 “Looking up at you. I thought it would be weird, but I see you in there.” She bounces up on her toes and he leans down so their foreheads touching, hands still tangled, bodies still pressed against each other. They share the same breath, noses brushing, and Steve can’t look away from her.

 “Had a little growth spurt,” he says, and she laughs.

 “You’re still my Steve,” she breathes, and his heart stutters in his chest. “Just as I remember you. Well, sort of. Your outside just matches what was always inside now.” She moves like she’s going to kiss his cheek, head tipped, eyes shining like she has countless times before.

 Steve has other ideas, and angles to catch her lips with his.

 Darcy squeaks, laughing through her nose before wrapping her arms more firmly around his neck and pulling him down. Her mouth is just as warm as he remembers, and that spark, that familiar tingle shoots through his limbs when they wrap around her. It’s almost odd for a moment, having to bend down to meet her, but he simply sweeps her off her feet and all but crushes her to him.

 They’re here. They’re both here, in the right time, in the right place. There is no future to try and desperately keep together, no past that they have to adhere to. No matter what he looks like now, he’s still Steve and this is still Darcy, and she’s just as beautiful, just as kind and caring and wonderful as he remembers.

 After all this time, his heart never wavered. He understands why she said no, why they couldn’t be together in the past. He might have stayed with her, might never have signed up. He would have been content with a simple life with her, and the serum would have been used on someone else. But the past is now finally the past, and here, now, Darcy kisses him back with wild abandon, her fingers fisting in his short hair and pulling as she gives as good as she gets.

 When she pulls back, breathless, eyes sparkling, she doesn’t go far and he does not let go of her. He’s not sure he’ll be able to ever again.

 He returns her grin, eyes crinkling slightly in the corners, before pressing quick kisses to her nose, her chin, both cheeks, her forehead, and finally her mouth again when he finally convinces his arms to unlock and allow her to step back.

 She doesn’t go far, threading their fingers together and glancing up at him with what looks like wonder.

 “You really are tall now. They must have stretched you like laffy taffy.”

 It gets a laugh out of him, and he kisses her again, and again still before releasing her to let her greet Bucky, who’s been awkwardly hovering in the background.

 “Look who it is,” Bucky drawls, and is promptly tackled. It actually knocks him back a step. “Oof. Hi doll, missed you too.”

 “I like your arm,” she says, and Bucky throws his head back and cackles, every trace of awkwardness now gone. Darcy laughs, loudly, when he spins her around, feet kicking in the air. When he places her gently down, she wastes no time in reaching back to thread her fingers through Steve’s again and gripping them tight.

 They have an audience, Steve realizes, and finds he doesn’t care. Jane is smiling wide, a hand to her heart and the other in Thor’s, and it’s actually nice to see his friends happy for him, even if Natasha does look a little smug. Bucky perks up at the sight of her, and ambles over for a greeting. He gets a solid punch in the arm, and Tony immediately begins talking in a fast, almost nervous clip, but gestures Bucky towards the door.

 Bucky is home. Darcy’s hand is in his. He doesn’t care who sees the happy, dopey grin on his face, so long as this content feeling doesn’t fade.

 “You’re still wearing the locket,” he says.

 “Never took it off,” she tells him, propping her chin on his arm to gaze up at him. “This guy I care a lot about gave it to me. It’s my most prized possession.”

 “Oh yeah?”

 Her free hand comes up, thumb flicking the catch to open it.

 Pre-serum Steve, perched on the coffee table in their old apartment, sketchbook in hand, looks out at him. Christmas, he remembers. He’s drawing in the sketchbook she’d gotten him, the first of many portraits of Darcy he’d used to fill those pages.

 He doesn’t know why he’s surprised, but he is. Darcy has never cared about looks, or superpowers, or power in general unless it’s being used for evil. She fell for him long before he ever had the serum injected in him. She made it very clear that turning him down had hurt her just as much as it had hurt him.

 And yet the picture of him before everything still rocks him.

 Darcy really, truly cares about him. Not Captain America, him. And she’s printed off and carried a piece of him around, planted squarely against her heart.

 He kisses her again, because how can he not, and he ignores the wolf whistle Bucky- or maybe Tony- lets out. He kisses her hard, pressing them as close together as physically possible, and tries to convey everything he’s feeling with touch. Darcy knows him so well, she can probably tell what he’s trying to say, and she kisses him back just as desperately.

 When they break breathlessly apart, they’re alone on the tarmac, the door just shutting behind Jane.

 He takes the watch out of his pocket, pressing it into her hands. The same watch she gave him for Christmas, the same watch he carried with him all over Europe, through the program, and even into that cold, icy water. He’d never let go of it, never left it behind. His own locket, with its own picture kept safe behind the frame.

 “It was never Peggy,” he tells her, the words spilling out as he opens it for her. “It was never even a photograph.”

 The original sketch is long gone, but Steve’s had time on his hands. The new drawing is more detailed, a realistic pencil portrait of Darcy in all her modern glory. Her hair is down, wavy and wild, and her glasses are perched on her nose. Her smile is wide and beaming, and Darcy feels her entire body tremble.

 When she looks up, Steve is looking right at her, in the same way he always has. He has to look down at her, but the look in his eyes is the same as always.

 “Steve-”

 “It’s you, Darcy. It was always you.”

 Their next kiss is slow, deliberate. Steve takes his time with it, kissing her gently. Thoroughly. She presses tightly against him, angling her head just right, and they both marvel how, despite everything that’s changed, nothing really has. Darcy and Steve, as they always were, but finally, finally together.

 Darcy pulls him inside, her hand firmly in his. Neither of them can stop smiling, even as the elevator doors close around them.

 “Welcome home, Steve.”

 He’s addicted to kissing her, amazed that he’s allowed, astounded that any of this is real. Darcy is here, and he’s allowed to kiss her, to hold her like he’s always wanted to. And Darcy is holding him right back, kissing him right back.

 So he kisses her again, and again, smiling wide and laughing with her.

 “It’s good to be home,” he says against her mouth, and they both know neither of them are talking about the tower.

Seven Months Later, in April

 Darcy opens her eyes and sees herself looking back at her. She blinks, and she’s older, then younger, then the same, and she’s got a fairly good idea of who she’s looking at.

 “Greetings,” says the being with her face, and Darcy crosses her arms, unimpressed.

 “Yeah, hi. I was wondering when you’d face me.”

 The younger smiles. “The time was not right,” she says, like it’s an answer.

 She’s already sick of the conversation, and it hasn’t even really started. Or has it already ended? She knows who’s before her, even as the forms change, and she’s pretty sure she knows why she’s here-wherever here is- now.

 “Decided to reward me after kidnapping me?”

 The older her, white streaks shining in her hair, tilts her head, face impassive. Darcy hopes she really does look that cool when she’s older: this her looks like the witch little Darcy had always hoped to be.

 “Your destiny was always to travel to the past. We simply made sure it happened as it should. The science of your time was most helpful in that.”

 “Yeah, cool, great. You didn’t have to scare my parents.”

 Younger now, and looking a little startled, Young Darcy blinks at her.

 “My life wasn’t the only one affected by my disappearance,” Darcy explains, fighting her temper. “My parents were terrified. I vanished for months without a word because you pulled some magic bullshit and upended everyone’s life, not just mine.”

 Her mom, her stepdad, even her bio dad had understandably freaked. She’d missed her brother’s anniversary party with his husband, and months of time she could have spent with her nephew. Hell, she’d even missed Jane’s birthday, not that Jane had felt like celebrating.

 “You don’t get to just pull people out of their time and put them somewhere else because you feel like it.”

 Darcy and Darcy square off, one angry, the other impassive.

 “We are the keepers of fate,” she says, a little less calm, and Darcy scowls. “We do as we see fit. Your destiny-”

 “Isn’t for you to decide.”

 Older now, and angry, Darcy squares her shoulders. “Oh, but it is. You did your duty well, but you do not speak to us that way. We are all that was, all that is, and all that will be. The knot in your thread of fate has been undone thanks to us, and you will not disrespect us. Guarding the thread, making sure it weaved correctly so that we did not have to cut it does not grant you the right to speak to us as you have.”

 “I’ll speak to you however I damn well please. You scared my mother. You made me miss moments I’ll never get back, and you never even asked. You just took me.” Resisting the urge to stomp her foot, Darcy throws her hands up. “I don’t even follow your religion, or faith, or whatever the hell it is. I didn’t even know you were real until after I got back, and you think it’s okay for you to interfere in my life, in my family’s life without so much as a by-the-way? Fuck you. You don’t get to make people’s decisions for them based on a string only you can see, and toss them in another time without warning.”

 The older Darcy stays, but now has a calculating look in her eye.

 For a second, Darcy’s convinced she’s about to be struck by lightning or something. Thor had warned her that the Norns don’t do well with tempers and demands, but screw that. These people had messed with everything, not just the past. Not just her life, or Steve’s.

 Her mom had cried, and it’s all their fault.

 Then Older Darcy inclines her head, and something in the air lifts.

 “You would have gone, had we asked,” she says. The certainty in her tone makes Darcy a little uneasy.

 “Guess we’ll never know.”

 Younger Darcy giggles, skipping up to her. “I know,” she says, and takes Darcy’s hand. “I’m you, after all.”

 Darcy watches her shift to Present Darcy, a serene look crossing her face. “We are real, whether you believe in us or not.”

 “Real, sure. But I’m not a big believer in gods. Superheroes, aliens, yeah, okay. Been there, done that. But not gods. You’re just beings more powerful than me, and so far I’m not a big fan of how you use that power. You could have told my family, my friends, that I was okay. You could have told me I wouldn’t be stuck in the past forever, but you didn’t. You just did as you pleased, and everyone-not just me, everyone- suffered in the meantime.”

 “Believe or not, that is your right. Belief cannot be forced, and humans, we have learned, are stubborn and unpredictable. They often surprise us.” She smiles. “You are… not wrong, and we will take your words to heart. We will remember the lesson you have taught us.”

 She stands before Darcy, older now, and presses a kiss to her forehead.

 “Fate comes whether you are ready or not, and you cannot always be asked. But had we, you would have, and that matters. It is something to think on. The time you live in is safe thanks to you. There are people with you whose fate you changed, and they will never know what you saved them from. Wake now: your reward is waiting. Happy birthday, Darcy Lewis. And thank you.”

 When she wakes, blearily blinking up at the high ceiling, Darcy is left with the distinct impression that she’s forgetting en epic dream. The images of past, present, and future her are already fading, as well as the space they were in, but she remembers enough. It’s all murky and more than a little confusing, but the feeling that it was important doesn’t fade.

 Turning to grab her glasses and noting that Steve’s side of the massive bed is empty, Darcy’s hand punches something solid.

 “Ow, fuck. What the hell?”

 A giant pearl sits, gleaming in the low light atop her nightstand, covering the entire table top. It’s perfectly round and smooth, standing easily four feet high and across, and when she tries to lift it, she can’t. It’s too heavy, and she has no idea where it came from at first, brain still trying to wake up.

 How is it not rolling off the nightstand? How is the nightstand not crushed under the weight of it?

 Is this her reward? Seriously? This thing has got to weigh a couple hundred pounds, and it’s freaking huge. A quick search on her phone has her knees wobbling, mouth dropping open.

 Large pearls like this are incredibly rare. And incredibly valuable.

 Did the Norns seriously just give this to her, or is this someone’s idea of a weird birthday gift? She could see Tony or Clint giving her something this random, or Bucky, but she has no idea where they’d even find something like this, or how they’d get it in here without waking her up. She’s not that deep of a sleeper.

 Steve is at the stove when she wanders into the kitchen, and throws her a panicked look.

 “No, go back to bed!” He hurries over, steering her out of the kitchen. “I’m not done yet, and you’re getting breakfast in bed today.”

 The smell of bacon wakes her up faster than a strong cup of coffee, and she tries to twist out of Steve’s grip, the pearl in their room momentarily forgotten.

 “Technically, I already had my birthday,” she reminds him, and he sighs.

 “Don’t start that again. Bruce and Jane are still arguing with Tony about whether you actually aged in 1943.”

 “Tony still thinks I didn’t, but says this birthday doesn’t count since I already celebrated. I think he just likes to annoy Bruce and try and get him to Hulk Out, which scares my new underlings-in-training.”

 Another one quit just yesterday. She’s had to drop to part-time work in order to focus on school, and it apparently takes four people to do her work, not that they can ever keep that many assistants before Tony or Jane or even Bruce (who is very specific about how he drinks his tea) drives one of them off. But a double major of Astrophysics- going for her PhD- and Computer Science- she’s aiming for a Masters Degree in that- is time consuming. She has a vested interest in studying space-time travel now. She wants to have the ability and knowledge to help anyone else that might be “chosen” like she’d been.

 “Yeah, well, I say we celebrate your birthday, so you’re getting breakfast in bed.” He bends to kiss her. “So go back to bed.”

 Darcy twines her arms around him, leaning in and deepening the kiss. “Only if you come with,” she purrs, laughing when Steve hauls her up with one arm.

 “You’re a menace, sweetheart,” he mutters against her mouth, hands dropping to cup her ass.

 “The bacon is burning,” Darcy says, noting the smell. JARVIS won’t let the place burn down, thankfully. Steve’s suite is easily double the size of Jane’s, with wide (and bulletproof) windows, and several times larger than the place they’d shared with Bucky in the past. It’s way too nice to ruin with Bucky’s cooking attempts, but Steve is barely any better, despite his best efforts.

 Steve still doesn’t release her. “I have more,” he says, and makes her laugh. She wiggles down anyway, and watches his ass disappear behind the island counter.

 “So, there’s a giant-ass pearl on my nightstand. Did you put it there?”

 The bacon is actually smoking faintly, and Steve frowns down at it, wondering if it can be saved. The pancakes are a little wonky looking, and the eggs are slightly too runny, but he could have sworn the bacon was cooking well. At least the toast is perfect, though that probably has more to do with the fancy toaster being hooked up to JARVIS more than his own culinary skills.

 “A pearl? No, your gift is on the table. There’s a pearl in the bedroom?” Deciding he doesn’t mind over-done bacon, he adds most of it it to his plate. Darcy knows her gift is a portrait of them together (she’d not only posed for it over several days, she’d requested it), carefully drawn and painted by Steve himself. It just got back from being framed and sits propped against the coffee table, still wrapped in paper. She’s already picked a spot for it above the fireplace, next to all the framed photos she took in the 40’s.

 “Huh. I guess I didn’t realize the Norns would give me goods- valuable ones- as a reward. I kind of thought bringing me home to be with you was the reward, but a pearl that size is uh, worth a lot.” Pouring herself a massive cup of coffee, Darcy shrugs. “Whatever. Maybe they’ll leave me alone now, and I guess I can’t be too mad if they decided to make me rich. That thing is worth, and weighs, a ton.”

 It had sucked, disappearing from this time, missing out on weeks and months of celebrations. She’d missed her nephew’s first steps, her parents had been sick with worry, and she’s eternally upset that she’d missed the goop that had fallen from the sky as a failed evil scientist experiment and briefly stained the city- plus Tony’s suit and weirdly the Hulk- pink.

 Tony still occasionally dons the pink suit. He’s been half joking about adding sparkles and a butt bow to it and hiring it out as a sort of stripper gram.

 But she’s here now, home safe. They all are. Bucky’s mind gets clearer every day, the Winter Soldier becoming something in his rearview that he can finally acknowledge, but also move past. He’s even started up a nice situationship with Natasha and Sam both, happily bouncing between their apartments after missions despite having a (also massive) room at Steve’s place.

 And she’s got Steve, even if he does burn the bacon. They’re free to be together, to love each other, and they’ve barely spent more than a week apart since she returned. She still has her own place a few floors down (with duplicates of all the photos on her walls as well), but she mostly uses it to study, or as a crash pad for her and Jane when Steve and Thor are gone on missions.

 Tony hadn’t stopped her pay while she was missing, and had even added the extra six months when he realized how long she’d spent in the past. She’d even gotten a huge bonus, though she suspects that was Pepper’s doing, since it also came with a new designer purse and her first pair of Louboutin’s. Between the Stark Industries tuition reimbursement and the pearl, Darcy is looking at getting her degrees for practically nothing, with a considerable amount leftover, and that’s almost enough to make the advanced calculus class she’s currently suffering through worth it.

 But being home, being able to be with Steve is the real reward, no matter how cheesy it sounds.

 “Your parents called,” Steve informs her, presenting her with slightly overdone, lopsided food she knows will taste just a little burnt. She gives him quick kiss before digging in. “They’ll be here tomorrow, with your brother, his husband, and that adorable kid of theirs in tow.”

 “I’m guessing my sperm donor made excuses?”

 Steve pulls a face. “He did.”

 Mouth full of almost-too-done bacon, and used to her bio dad canceling last minute, Darcy shrugs. Her stepdad has always been there when it mattered, ever since she was eight, so it’s nothing new. She grunts a greeting to Bucky when he barges in.

 “Oh, bacon!”

 Steve smacks the metal hand away. “Make your own.”

 Already chewing on a piece, Bucky steals Darcy’s coffee. “And burn the place down? No thanks. Sam can’t cook either. He tried to make me eat cream of wheat from the box this morning. I hate that shit.”

 “Natasha’s a great cook,” Darcy reminds him. “Have her cook you both breakfast instead. She’ll do it if you buy the ingredients. You can’t steal my coffee on my birthday, give it back.”

 Nimbly, Bucky steps out of range of her grabbing fingers. “You already had your birthday, this is just a bonus. It’s not like you’re turning 27- it’s 26 again for you. 26 2.0.”

 “You’re not allowed to talk to Tony anymore.”

 He vanishes down the hall with a shrug, taking her mug with her.

 Steve continues to prove he’s the perfect boyfriend when he presents her with another mug, perfectly doctored to her taste. He does steal one of her less crispy bacon pieces, but he pays for it with a deep kiss, and hauling the giant pearl (“Wow. Look at this thing.”) into the closet next to the safe. It’s too big to actually put in the safe, so they leave it on the floor for now, next to her pile of shoes. She’ll have to ask Pepper about getting it appraised later.

 Thor and Jane arrive later in the afternoon, followed by Tony and Clint and a cake-carting Natasha, and soon the apartment is crowded and loud, everyone hanging off the furniture and eating the expensive sushi Tony had delivered. He might not think it’s really her birthday again, but that doesn’t mean he’s about to let the party be boring. Plus Thor has easily housed three entire rolls by himself, and doesn’t appear to be slowing down.

 Pepper just sighs and asks how much the catering bill was.

 “I plead the fifth. And don’t ask about the open bar, either. What? She’s a Stark Industries employee, I’m allowed to expense it to HR!”

 Darcy, hand firmly in Steve’s, just laughs. “And here I thought it wasn’t my real birthday, but you’re still going all out.”

 “Don’t start that again,” Clint signs, mouthful of cake, but it’s too late.

 “If you already had your birthday, then-”

 “She wasn’t gone for a full year, so-”

 “No, no, I’m not having this argument again. If April happened-”

 “So, what, she’s 27? Or is this year longer for her?”

 “Age is just a number,” the 97-year-old Steve says, and Bucky laughs.

 “See what you started?” Clint elbows her gently, watching the argument devolve with a smile. “They’ll be at this all night, now.”

 Darcy just cackles, warm from the very nice whiskey in her system and the sight of her friends sprawled out everywhere, totally relaxed. “As long as they can do science tomorrow, I don’t care how long they argue. They have reports to type up, and no, Jane, I’m not doing them for you. Again. I have my own homework to do.”

 “I’m not doing my reports.”

 Darcy pins Tony with a look. “I’m not doing your reports either.”

 Tony’s mouth opens.

 “And no making the new assistants do them either. They report to me, so I’ll know. I know how to get into your garage now. Don’t make me hurt you- and by you, I mean your cars.”

 His mouth clicks shut. Darcy nods, satisfied.

 “Geez. Can’t even stop working on your birthday,” he mutters, pouring Pepper a glass and stealing a kiss from her when he hands it over.

 “I thought it wasn’t my birthday.”

 “Well, it’s not. It’s just part two of-”

 “Oh my god, are you really trying to-”

 “Think about it! If she-”

 Darcy settles back into Steve’s chest, curling up with a grin when his arm drapes around her to hold her tight. He has his own glass in hand, mostly for the taste, and is firmly on the side of it being Darcy’s birthday no matter what kind of paradox her turning 26 twice might create.

 He’ll take any excuse to celebrate her, and says so.

 “I agree, my brave Lightning Sister should be celebrated. Her name day is very important.”

 “She already celebrated!”

 “This coming from the man that has week-long celebrations that destroy his house every year,” Bruce says, gesturing with his own drink.

 “That’s different. It’s all one big party. I’m not trying to claim two birthdays in one year.”

 “Claiming? It’s April first! It’s her birthday, case closed,” Jane declares from Thor’s lap.

 The argument becomes loud, punctuated by laughter as Tony flails about, trying to make his point. Bucky sides with him just to be a shit, and Sam sides with Steve just to egg them both on. Natasha rolls her eyes and escapes to talk with Pepper and Maria instead, electing to ignore them. Thor polishes off two more rolls, sharing bites with Jane, and Bruce gets into an ill-advised chugging contest with Clint, losing epically.

 Darcy watches it all, Steve’s arm around her, and thinks that it really is good to finally be home.