One Single Yesterday - Chapter Two
Aug. 27th, 2013 12:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cassandraoftroyChapter: 2 of 5
Characters: Peggy Carter, Steve Rogers, the Eleventh Doctor
Chapter Warnings: Discussion of PTSD, mild violence
Word Count: ~4900
Summary: Peggy and Steve spend their first night together, and have adventures in the TARDIS.
Master Post
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The charm of watching the cotton wisps of cloud swirl across the face of their world still hadn't palled by the time Steve returned with a sketchbook and pencils, nor did it fade in the hours they spent sitting on the steps near the open doorway, looking out at the planet against its star-speckled backdrop of night. They talked about the twenty-first century, and Steve's new team, and began sharing the things they'd never had time to learn about each other's lives before the war. Peggy didn't even think about how long they'd been sitting together, knees bumping gently against one another's, until Steve pointed out that the line of sunlight crawling across the curve of the Earth had reached America's eastern coast. It was morning; they'd sat up together the whole night through.
As much as she hated to spend a single moment of their stolen time together asleep, her eyes were starting to burn with the need to close them, and she suspected that if she tried to stay up much longer, she'd end up dropping off with her head pillowed on Steve's shoulder. "I'm afraid I won't be good for much if I don't get a bit of sleep soon," she admitted reluctantly.
The Doctor, who until now had politely disappeared into the lower level of the control room beneath the central console, popped his head back up again. "Bedrooms down the hall," he informed them. "Won't be much to see around here for a while; I need to park the TARDIS on the Rift in Cardiff for at least twelve hours to recharge, so you may as well sleep through the boring bits. She should be ready by the time you're up, and then it's off to someplace new and exciting!"
Peggy smiled. He almost seems more eager to be off exploring than we are, as if he didn't bang around the universe in a time machine every day of the week. "Thank you," she told him, taking Steve's hand to let him help her up.
"Not at all," he waved her off. "Can't have you falling asleep in the face of the Face of Boe, or whoever we stumble across. Now off with you!" He made shooing motions with both hands, and she and Steve followed his gestures out the door Steve had used earlier.
The corridors were curious, oddly-shaped passages with junctions that bore no indication of where they led. She could have sworn they'd passed through the same intersection three times before they found the hallway that sported the crew cabins.
Steve opened one of the doors experimentally and peered inside; it should have been unsurprising, that the living quarters of a ship that was bigger on the inside looked like real bedrooms, rather than cramped barracks. There was a carpet, overhead lighting, a spacious full bed, and a large wardrobe against one wall. The opposite door, that Peggy could just spot if she peeked around the door frame, most likely led to the loo. Steve took a step back out of the room and turned to her. "I guess these are the rooms he meant," he observed obviously, shifting his feet with sudden unease.
Realizing the cause of his nerves, Peggy suppressed a smile and instead straightened her spine and gave him a stern look. "Let me make one thing perfectly clear," she told him sharply, "if the circumstances were any different at all, you'd get nothing more than a peck on the cheek and a 'Good night, soldier,' and I'd be off to find my own bunk and see you in the morning." Now she softened her stance and let the gentleness back into her expression. "But things standing as they do, whatever moments we spend here on this impossible ship are all we'll ever have together. I'm not of a mind to waste them on propriety." She felt her cheeks coloring a little at her own bluntness. "I hope that doesn't change your opinion of me."
Steve nearly dropped the sketchbook in his haste to step closer to her and slip reassuring arms around her. "Peggy, there's no way I could think less of you. I mean–" he cut himself off, grimacing. "I mean, I could never think poorly of you. Sorry, I'm still bad at this," he offered with a self-deprecating grin.
An answering smile pulled at her lips, and she let him fold her into his embrace. "Not so bad," she told him, slipping her own arms around his neck. "At least, not as long as you invite me in."
He did better than that, scooping her legs up with one arm and supporting her back with the other, to carry her like a bride over the threshold and into the room. The sound that escaped her as he swept her up was definitely more girlish than military, but she didn't mind much; discipline and decorum could wait until tomorrow. Whenever tomorrow got around to coming – she was in no rush.
He set her down on the bed and sat beside her, the mattress sinking slightly under their combined weight. She didn't feel springs; instead, it seemed to be a firm sort of cushion underneath the bedding. Then she stopped paying attention to the furniture entirely, as Steve leaned in close, and she turned her face to catch his lips with hers.
Though they spent a lovely few minutes getting privately reacquainted, both of them were wearing too much for it to get very far, and when their lips parted again, a faint twinge behind her eyes reminded Peggy that she'd sat up the whole night through. If she were honest with herself, she wanted nothing more in that moment than to curl up against Steve's chest and fall asleep to the rhythm of his heartbeat. "I think perhaps we should look for something to sleep in, since I don't fancy ruining this dress." If the red dress had carried a sentimental attachment before, that value had redoubled after tonight.
Steve nodded, his own cheeks reddening a little. "Right. He said we should help ourselves to whatever we needed, and the ship would keep us out of anything we shouldn't get into." He set the sketchbook on the bedside table and watched Peggy as she rose from the bed and opened the nearby wardrobe.
Inside hung a mixture of clothing, some cut to fit a woman – though the number of trousers she found was a bit surprising – and the rest in a more masculine style. The men's clothes looked a bit too narrow about the shoulders and chest for Steve, but she thought there might be something serviceable for herself among the other lot. After pushing aside a few blouses and jackets, she finally found what she was after: a nightgown of shimmery but opaque blue fabric. It had a silky texture, but wasn't actual silk, and it was lined with bits of lace that she hoped wouldn't be too scratchy. Her eyes widened a touch at how high the hem was. Perhaps its original owner was on the short side? Or that might just be the fashion of sleepwear from wherever – whenever? – this comes from. In any event, she supposed it wasn't as though what the nightgown would fail to conceal was fated to remain a mystery to Steve for much longer, regardless.
Nevertheless, there's something to be said for preserving a bit of mystery. "Go ahead and see if you can find anything that will suit. I'm going to go and change," she told Steve, and headed for the far door. As she'd guessed, it contained the toilet, a shower cubicle, a sink, and a vanity. She reached behind her and unfastened her dress, slipping carefully out of it, and draped it over an empty towel rack before donning the nightgown and going about her evening ablutions. A brief glance in the mirror revealed, to her belated horror, the devastation that her tearful evening had wrought on her mascara. Still, her smeared eyes hadn't seemed to bother Steve any, so she resolved that they were of little consequence. When she was finished, she padded back out to the bedroom, barefoot, her face clean of makeup.
Steve was waiting for her, stripped out of his dress uniform and clad in a pair of tartan-patterned soft cotton trousers with a drawstring waist. At least he found something to sleep in. He turned to face her when she reentered the room, and froze in place, staring at her, lips slightly parted. Do I really look so different without the lipstick and all the rest? she thought, a little put out. She arched a single eyebrow pointedly at him.
In three steps, he crossed the room to her, his wondering look giving way to a wide smile. "I didn't think you could be any more beautiful," he breathed. One arm moved to encircle her waist, while his right hand came up to cradle her cheek.
She let her hand rest lightly on his bare chest, as she'd been so tempted to do that day long ago in New York. His skin was warm and smooth and firm. She smiled. "I'm not going to disappear the moment you turn your back," she assured him, only half-teasing, "and I imagine that mooning over the color of my eyes is going to wear thin for you after a day or two of it."
He leaned down to kiss her, quick and affectionate this time, and the familiar manner of it made her feel warm all over. She much preferred comfortable familiarity to awe. "I doubt it," he retorted, "but I think I can keep from writing sonnets."
"For the best, certainly," she agreed with a hint of mischief. "You're an artist, not a poet."
Steve brushed a stray curl of dark hair behind her ear. "You don't mind, skipping all the proper courtship?"
Slowly, she slid her hands up to twine her fingers behind his neck. "If we had the time, I'd let you spend months taking me to the cinema or to picnics in the park, and let you walk me to my front door and kiss me good-night. But all we have is here and now, for however long this holiday lasts. I want this, Steve – as much as you do. I could never regret what we do together, but I know I'll regret what we don't."
His arms tightened around her, pulling her close against him. "Then I want to give you few regrets as I can."
"Good," she whispered against his neck, squeezing just as tightly for a moment. Then she released him, and when the circle of his arms parted, she stepped back. "Your turn, if you need it," she told him, glancing in the direction of the toilet. "I'll be waiting for you."
However much Steve was reluctant to be parted from her, there appeared to be some things even the serum couldn't help him avoid; he nodded and stepped past her to the other room. When he closed the door, she climbed into the bed. The fabric of the sheets was unfamiliar, but it was soft and warmed quickly to her body. She snuggled down in the bed and let herself doze. It was odd how safe she felt in this profoundly unfamiliar and unusual place; perhaps Steve's presence made it seem less strange here.
Peggy was half asleep by the time Steve returned to the bedroom. He eased himself gently onto the bed, trying not to disturb her, but as soon as he slipped under the sheet, she moved to nestle into the curve of his embrace. He rested his head on the pillow beside hers. "Good night," he whispered.
Her hand, draped loosely across his arm encircling her, squeezed his forearm slightly. "Good night. And Steve?"
"Hm?"
"Still be here when I wake up, please."
He bent his head to nuzzle against her ear. "You too."
"I will," she promised as his eyes closed.
* * *
There was no clock in the room, so Peggy had no idea how much time had passed when she awoke in the dimly-lit bedroom to the restless shifting beside her. The shifting turned into thrashing as she sat up slowly and turned to look at Steve.
His face was pinched with distress, and his uneasy tossing and turning was punctuated by sharp twitches. He was still asleep, judging by the frantic movement of his eyes behind his closed eyelids. Now and then, brief snatches of muttering would escape his lips; most of it was unintelligible, but Peggy, watching his face closely with a mixture of alarm and uncertainty, caught the occasional coherent phrase. "...Morita, back to position..." he murmured urgently.
The Howling Commandos – the war. That was the nightmare he was reliving. She reached a hand toward him to wake him, but pulled away when she noticed the tension visible in his arms and back. The one hand that wasn't covered by the blanket was curled into a tight fist. She'd seen the accidental violence that could result from tapping a soldier on the shoulder when he didn't know you were there; a lance corporal in the unit attached to SSR had spent two weeks in the stockade after reflexively decking his sergeant in the mess hall when the man had come up behind him. "Combat fatigue," they'd called it at the time.
Instead, Peggy slipped silently out of the bed, out of range of thrashing limbs, and crouched beside the mattress, putting her face on a level with his. She watched him for a little longer, trying to decide the best way to handle the situation. The strangled whimpers that filled in the spaces between his muttering told her that she couldn't let him remain locked in this nightmare, but she had to be very careful about how she brought him out of it.
His arm came up to cover his face, and then reached out toward someone she couldn't see. "...No! Hawkeye, look out!" His hand clawed helplessly at empty air.
She had let this go on long enough. "Steve," she called softly, but firmly. "Steve, it's me. It's Peggy. Wake up; you're dreaming."
Some sound must have broken through the grip of his nightmare, as his agitation increased, and a fist shot out to thump against her pillow, inches away from where she leaned against the edge of the mattress. The pillow burst under the sudden assault, and Peggy fought the reflex to recoil. But the exertion seemed to jar him out of his fugue, as an instant later his head jolted up, eyes open. He stared at her for a moment, slowly recognizing her and where he was. "Huh... Peggy?" Then his eyes darted to the pillow he'd destroyed. Bits of fluff clung to his hand and spilled onto the sheets. "What did – oh God, are you okay?" His eyes widened in horror, realizing what he might have done if she hadn't moved.
"Shh, Steve, I'm all right." Now she reached tentatively toward him, stopping a few inches away from his hand to let him choose whether to make the final contact. He did, clinging to her as to a rope over an abyss. She climbed back onto the bed and pulled him gently toward her, so that he was half-lying in her lap. "I'm more worried about you."
The lines of his shoulders and back were still taut as steel cables, but physical contact with her seemed to be relaxing him a little, so she began carding her fingers through his hair. He leaned into her touch, letting a few moments pass in silence before speaking. "It was the war," he began, "and the Chitauri invasion. Sort of mixed together. Energy bolts flying everywhere. Explosions, buildings collapsing. My team in danger – both of them. During the invasion, the rooftop position Barton had taken was swarmed. He jumped – I saw him falling. I didn't know until after that he'd made it. It was like watching..." His throat closed on the name, but she knew. It was like watching Bucky fall.
She felt an answering tightness in her own throat. "So much has happened to you, in such a short time," she sighed. She knew how futile it was to wish she could shield him from any of it; this was a man who had tried to lie his way into the army because he couldn't stand the thought of others fighting in his stead. He would take any danger and hardship on his own shoulders if it meant sparing someone else. But still she wished.
Cheek still pillowed on her thigh, he shook his head. "That's not even..." He took a breath. "I could have handled all that, but... I lost everything. Everything – Bucky, the Commandos, the whole world. You." An arm snaked around her waist, pulling him closer to her. "Everything was so different. There was nothing I could..."
He didn't seem able to say any more, but he didn't have to. There was nothing familiar, nothing he could lean on or trust. He must have felt so alone. She thought of the first week of her posting to SSR in the States, and how unfamiliar the accents, the food, even the air had been. She'd known no one, of course. And being a woman put her at even more of a disadvantage, socially. She hadn't been able to let down her guard for a moment for weeks; it had been exhausting. But even then, she'd known that home and MI5 were waiting for when the assignment was over. There had been no such promise for Steve.
"I'm sorry," she told him, helplessly. "But for whatever time we're given here, you've got me. However I can help."
He nodded against her abdomen, his face half-buried in the blue fabric. "Thank you."
She thought about asking if talking more about what had happened, trying to work through the events that had given rise to his nightmare, would help – but shook her head. He would need to talk those things out, but later. Gradually. For now, reassurance and comfort seemed to be the order of the day, and she could manage those well enough. Nurturing wasn't her strongest skill – she'd have made a terrible nurse – but Steve brought those feelings out in her.
"Think we could try sleeping again?" he asked after another few minutes had passed.
He had turned his face up toward her, and she moved her hand so she could look at him squarely. "Are you ready for that?"
"Yeah. Don't think that'll happen again, tonight. Talking..." He half-shrugged, an awkward gesture in the position he was lying in. "I haven't really talked to anybody about it before. SHIELD had doctors, psychiatrists, but..."
But how could anyone else understand what he'd been through? How could he trust anyone in that strange new future enough to share it with them? "I know," she said simply. "All right. Move over so I can get under the covers. It's cold in here." It wasn't, but he obligingly made room for her, curling around her once she'd slipped between the sheets. This time she turned to face toward him, settling one hand on his hip, and entwining their legs. He slid an arm under their remaining pillow, and together they found their way to a more peaceful night's rest.
* * *
She was glad they'd taken the time that morning to rummage through what the Doctor called the "changing room," a larger chamber within the TARDIS filled with overflowing closets and wardrobes, sporting clothing from countless eras, past and future. At the time, she'd been most pleased by the snug-fitting ladies' top she'd found with the Union Jack emblazoned across the front – Steve had teased her until she put it on, saying that it was her turn to wear her patriotism on her chest for a change – but now, she was much more grateful for the tennis shoes she'd found at the bottom of one of the closets. They made all this running much easier.
"Do your part to keep Station Thirteen healthy!" chirped a recorded voice from behind her. Peggy spared a brief glance over her shoulder as she ran: the blasted machines weren't gaining on them, but they weren't falling behind either. "Recycle your trash for a cleaner tomorrow!" another robot urged her with automated cheer.
Lovely message; if only it weren't us they were planning to "recycle." She kept close on the Doctor's heels. Steve, with his longer strides and enhanced muscles, could easily outpace them both, but he held back enough that they weren't left completely behind.
Which turned out to be fortunate; as they rounded the corner toward the bank of lifts, another four of the sanitation 'bots lurched toward them, claw-arms extended. "Please deposit refuse in the red circle!" one said helpfully. The rim of the cylindrical maw of its matter-to-energy recycler glowed neon red.
"Okay, new plan," the Doctor announced, "let's not go that way. Um." He looked around in urgent bewilderment.
Peggy saw the way out a moment before he did. "There!" she pointed, and suited deed to word, darting to the edge of the avenue and stepping onto the edge of the hydroponic flower-bed to hoist herself up onto the suspended path above them. She felt familiar, strong hands boosting her up, and she clambered easily onto the upper level. Steve helped the Doctor up after her, and then backed up to take a running leap.
"Recycle your trash for a cleaner tomorrow!" The robot's claw-like grasper closed around Steve's upper arm. He struggled, trying to pull away from the rogue machine before its fellows could close in on him.
"Steve!" I can't just sit by helplessly and watch. Not this time. She slipped her legs back over the edge of the catwalk, ready to drop down to help him – but felt a hand close around her own wrist, stopping her. She looked up into the Doctor's face and saw him shake his head.
Fortunately, the cleaning 'bot was no match for Captain America. Steve wrenched away from the robot's grip, tearing its arm off its frame entirely. The claw-arm remained clamped around his bicep as Steve made the running jump to grab onto the railing of the sky-walk. He pulled himself up as the other 'bots converged below him, reaching futilely up at his dangling legs and repeating their amiable recycling slogans.
As Peggy stood up and took a firm grip on her composure, Steve pried the metal claw off of his arm. The pincers came away bloody, but she could see immediately that the wounds they had inflicted weren't deep; with Steve's augmented healing, the cuts would be gone in twenty minutes. Assuming they all hadn't been recycled by then.
"Are we any closer to figuring out what caused these things to go haywire?" Steve asked the Doctor?
Brandishing what he had cheerfully introduced to Peggy as his sonic screwdriver, the Doctor pointed it at the disembodied metal claw and activated the tool, producing a humming sound and a green glow. "No control systems in the arms," he muttered, glancing down at the disarmed robot, still flailing after Steve with its remaining claw, "but now that somebody's got some exposed circuits, we might be getting somewhere..." He aimed the screwdriver at the injured 'bot and scanned again. "Aha! Clever, clever little robots!" he marveled.
"What is it?" she demanded.
The Doctor turned to her and grinned. "The sanitation 'bots are all networked together. It helps them coordinate their clean-up patrols, and," he emphasized, "it allows them to share information about new sources of rubbish. When one of them recycles something new, it lets the other 'bots know, so they learn to recognize it as trash."
Peggy felt the color drain from her face. "But that means... someone must have fed one of these robots a person."
"A corpse, probably," the Doctor agreed. "Unfortunately, these 'bots aren't quite clever enough to tell the difference between living and dead flesh."
"Aren't there some sort of safeguards built into these things to protect against this sort of malfunction?" Steve asked. "I've only worked with Tony Stark for a couple of days, but he's always bragging about the security backups on all his technology."
The Doctor shrugged. "Almost certainly, but it looks like someone overrode them. Which makes sense, if they were trying to dispose of a body in secret."
"So what do we do – can we find the central controls and shut them down, or turn the safety protocols back on?"
"I'm not sure we'll have time for that," Peggy cut in. They followed her gaze to the end of the sky-walk, where a small crowd of the maintenance robots had gathered and were beginning to trundle toward them. The far end of the sky-walk terminated in a shallow stairwell, and she could spot at least two of the 'bots at the base of the steps. The TARDIS was three levels away by lift, and all of the shops – the ones that didn't have recycling 'bots in them, at least – were buttoned up tight by the space station residents that had taken refuge in them. There was no way out. We have to find a way to shut them down or disable them from here.
Her eyes widened, and she spun to face the Doctor. "You said that whatever one of them eats, the rest of them recognize as rubbish to recycle?"
"Yes, that's–" The rest of what he was going to say was cut off as she snatched the metal claw from his hand.
"Steve, come with me, and distract the nearest one." She ran down the sky-walk, toward the stairs. Though she'd taken him by surprise, he caught up with her within moments. She heard the Doctor pelting along behind them, but was too focused on her plan to spare him much thought.
She watched Steve pull ahead of her as they approached the staircase, taking the shallow, terrace-like steps at a gallop. The 'bots at the foot of the stairs noticed him, and began their chorus of "Recycle your trash for a cleaner tomorrow!" while closing the distance toward him. Their treads couldn't navigate the wide steps easily; they were able to lever themselves up, but it was a laborious process.
While one of them was midway through the procedure of trying to heft itself up onto the first step, claws extended toward Steve, Peggy made her move. Blessing the rubber-soled tennis shoes, she ran up to the 'bot and dropped the severed claw-arm into its red-rimmed recycling bin. It froze for a moment while its matter-to-energy converter digested the foreign object, and then the sensor array mounted on the top of its frame swept the area around it in a 360-degree arc, searching. Nearby, the other 'bot that had been struggling to reach Steve did the same.
The two robots noticed each other simultaneously and abandoned their quests to climb the stairs, their treads dropping back to the deck with a thump. They converged on each other, grasping arms extended. "Please deposit refuse in the red circle!" said one. "Do your part to keep Station Thirteen healthy!" intoned the other. And then they started tearing each other apart.
Peggy darted back up the stairs to look across the sky-walk at the pack of 'bots crossing toward them. They had stopped in the middle of the elevated path and were attacking each other, tearing off anything their sharp, powerful claws could grab and stuffing it into their bins. Arms, sensors, speaker-boxes, even bits of frame and treads were dropped into the recycling converters. Looking down at the lower level, she could see that all the 'bots were doing the same, cannibalizing each other and recycling the parts.
It was more than a little disturbing to watch. Even when she looked away from the carnage of metal and circuits, she could still hear the cacophony of rending steel and jolly recycling slogans, the latter fading into distorted wails as the speakers emitting them were converted into energy.
In a few minutes, it was over. The robots that remained were hopelessly crippled, blundering about without arms or sensors, impotently begging anyone who would listen to deposit their refuse in the red circle. Several were tipped over, their treads spinning against empty air. Most had been reduced to nothing more than spare parts.
Her momentary sense of horror at their plight quickly gave way to relief, and she hugged Steve, and then the Doctor, and then Steve again. "Do you think it's over?" she asked the Doctor, lingering in Steve's embrace for a moment.
"I think it's mostly clean-up from here on out," he replied. "That's something the good people of Station Thirteen will have to work out how to manage for themselves for a while."
Steve looked down at the devastated remains of the maintenance 'bots. "After this, I doubt they'll mind too much."
The Doctor clapped his hands together. "All right, kids, back to the TARDIS! It's almost tea-time, and a bite to eat in New France sounds like just the thing."
"Tea-time?" Peggy asked. "Has it been that long since we landed?"
"Well, it's tea-time somewhere," the Doctor retorted. "We've got a time machine. And I'm peckish."
Swallowing a laugh, Peggy raised her hands in a conciliatory gesture. "All right, Doctor; lead the way!"
Next Chapter
Characters: Peggy Carter, Steve Rogers, the Eleventh Doctor
Chapter Warnings: Discussion of PTSD, mild violence
Word Count: ~4900
Summary: Peggy and Steve spend their first night together, and have adventures in the TARDIS.
Master Post
Previous Chapter | Next Chapter
The charm of watching the cotton wisps of cloud swirl across the face of their world still hadn't palled by the time Steve returned with a sketchbook and pencils, nor did it fade in the hours they spent sitting on the steps near the open doorway, looking out at the planet against its star-speckled backdrop of night. They talked about the twenty-first century, and Steve's new team, and began sharing the things they'd never had time to learn about each other's lives before the war. Peggy didn't even think about how long they'd been sitting together, knees bumping gently against one another's, until Steve pointed out that the line of sunlight crawling across the curve of the Earth had reached America's eastern coast. It was morning; they'd sat up together the whole night through.
As much as she hated to spend a single moment of their stolen time together asleep, her eyes were starting to burn with the need to close them, and she suspected that if she tried to stay up much longer, she'd end up dropping off with her head pillowed on Steve's shoulder. "I'm afraid I won't be good for much if I don't get a bit of sleep soon," she admitted reluctantly.
The Doctor, who until now had politely disappeared into the lower level of the control room beneath the central console, popped his head back up again. "Bedrooms down the hall," he informed them. "Won't be much to see around here for a while; I need to park the TARDIS on the Rift in Cardiff for at least twelve hours to recharge, so you may as well sleep through the boring bits. She should be ready by the time you're up, and then it's off to someplace new and exciting!"
Peggy smiled. He almost seems more eager to be off exploring than we are, as if he didn't bang around the universe in a time machine every day of the week. "Thank you," she told him, taking Steve's hand to let him help her up.
"Not at all," he waved her off. "Can't have you falling asleep in the face of the Face of Boe, or whoever we stumble across. Now off with you!" He made shooing motions with both hands, and she and Steve followed his gestures out the door Steve had used earlier.
The corridors were curious, oddly-shaped passages with junctions that bore no indication of where they led. She could have sworn they'd passed through the same intersection three times before they found the hallway that sported the crew cabins.
Steve opened one of the doors experimentally and peered inside; it should have been unsurprising, that the living quarters of a ship that was bigger on the inside looked like real bedrooms, rather than cramped barracks. There was a carpet, overhead lighting, a spacious full bed, and a large wardrobe against one wall. The opposite door, that Peggy could just spot if she peeked around the door frame, most likely led to the loo. Steve took a step back out of the room and turned to her. "I guess these are the rooms he meant," he observed obviously, shifting his feet with sudden unease.
Realizing the cause of his nerves, Peggy suppressed a smile and instead straightened her spine and gave him a stern look. "Let me make one thing perfectly clear," she told him sharply, "if the circumstances were any different at all, you'd get nothing more than a peck on the cheek and a 'Good night, soldier,' and I'd be off to find my own bunk and see you in the morning." Now she softened her stance and let the gentleness back into her expression. "But things standing as they do, whatever moments we spend here on this impossible ship are all we'll ever have together. I'm not of a mind to waste them on propriety." She felt her cheeks coloring a little at her own bluntness. "I hope that doesn't change your opinion of me."
Steve nearly dropped the sketchbook in his haste to step closer to her and slip reassuring arms around her. "Peggy, there's no way I could think less of you. I mean–" he cut himself off, grimacing. "I mean, I could never think poorly of you. Sorry, I'm still bad at this," he offered with a self-deprecating grin.
An answering smile pulled at her lips, and she let him fold her into his embrace. "Not so bad," she told him, slipping her own arms around his neck. "At least, not as long as you invite me in."
He did better than that, scooping her legs up with one arm and supporting her back with the other, to carry her like a bride over the threshold and into the room. The sound that escaped her as he swept her up was definitely more girlish than military, but she didn't mind much; discipline and decorum could wait until tomorrow. Whenever tomorrow got around to coming – she was in no rush.
He set her down on the bed and sat beside her, the mattress sinking slightly under their combined weight. She didn't feel springs; instead, it seemed to be a firm sort of cushion underneath the bedding. Then she stopped paying attention to the furniture entirely, as Steve leaned in close, and she turned her face to catch his lips with hers.
Though they spent a lovely few minutes getting privately reacquainted, both of them were wearing too much for it to get very far, and when their lips parted again, a faint twinge behind her eyes reminded Peggy that she'd sat up the whole night through. If she were honest with herself, she wanted nothing more in that moment than to curl up against Steve's chest and fall asleep to the rhythm of his heartbeat. "I think perhaps we should look for something to sleep in, since I don't fancy ruining this dress." If the red dress had carried a sentimental attachment before, that value had redoubled after tonight.
Steve nodded, his own cheeks reddening a little. "Right. He said we should help ourselves to whatever we needed, and the ship would keep us out of anything we shouldn't get into." He set the sketchbook on the bedside table and watched Peggy as she rose from the bed and opened the nearby wardrobe.
Inside hung a mixture of clothing, some cut to fit a woman – though the number of trousers she found was a bit surprising – and the rest in a more masculine style. The men's clothes looked a bit too narrow about the shoulders and chest for Steve, but she thought there might be something serviceable for herself among the other lot. After pushing aside a few blouses and jackets, she finally found what she was after: a nightgown of shimmery but opaque blue fabric. It had a silky texture, but wasn't actual silk, and it was lined with bits of lace that she hoped wouldn't be too scratchy. Her eyes widened a touch at how high the hem was. Perhaps its original owner was on the short side? Or that might just be the fashion of sleepwear from wherever – whenever? – this comes from. In any event, she supposed it wasn't as though what the nightgown would fail to conceal was fated to remain a mystery to Steve for much longer, regardless.
Nevertheless, there's something to be said for preserving a bit of mystery. "Go ahead and see if you can find anything that will suit. I'm going to go and change," she told Steve, and headed for the far door. As she'd guessed, it contained the toilet, a shower cubicle, a sink, and a vanity. She reached behind her and unfastened her dress, slipping carefully out of it, and draped it over an empty towel rack before donning the nightgown and going about her evening ablutions. A brief glance in the mirror revealed, to her belated horror, the devastation that her tearful evening had wrought on her mascara. Still, her smeared eyes hadn't seemed to bother Steve any, so she resolved that they were of little consequence. When she was finished, she padded back out to the bedroom, barefoot, her face clean of makeup.
Steve was waiting for her, stripped out of his dress uniform and clad in a pair of tartan-patterned soft cotton trousers with a drawstring waist. At least he found something to sleep in. He turned to face her when she reentered the room, and froze in place, staring at her, lips slightly parted. Do I really look so different without the lipstick and all the rest? she thought, a little put out. She arched a single eyebrow pointedly at him.
In three steps, he crossed the room to her, his wondering look giving way to a wide smile. "I didn't think you could be any more beautiful," he breathed. One arm moved to encircle her waist, while his right hand came up to cradle her cheek.
She let her hand rest lightly on his bare chest, as she'd been so tempted to do that day long ago in New York. His skin was warm and smooth and firm. She smiled. "I'm not going to disappear the moment you turn your back," she assured him, only half-teasing, "and I imagine that mooning over the color of my eyes is going to wear thin for you after a day or two of it."
He leaned down to kiss her, quick and affectionate this time, and the familiar manner of it made her feel warm all over. She much preferred comfortable familiarity to awe. "I doubt it," he retorted, "but I think I can keep from writing sonnets."
"For the best, certainly," she agreed with a hint of mischief. "You're an artist, not a poet."
Steve brushed a stray curl of dark hair behind her ear. "You don't mind, skipping all the proper courtship?"
Slowly, she slid her hands up to twine her fingers behind his neck. "If we had the time, I'd let you spend months taking me to the cinema or to picnics in the park, and let you walk me to my front door and kiss me good-night. But all we have is here and now, for however long this holiday lasts. I want this, Steve – as much as you do. I could never regret what we do together, but I know I'll regret what we don't."
His arms tightened around her, pulling her close against him. "Then I want to give you few regrets as I can."
"Good," she whispered against his neck, squeezing just as tightly for a moment. Then she released him, and when the circle of his arms parted, she stepped back. "Your turn, if you need it," she told him, glancing in the direction of the toilet. "I'll be waiting for you."
However much Steve was reluctant to be parted from her, there appeared to be some things even the serum couldn't help him avoid; he nodded and stepped past her to the other room. When he closed the door, she climbed into the bed. The fabric of the sheets was unfamiliar, but it was soft and warmed quickly to her body. She snuggled down in the bed and let herself doze. It was odd how safe she felt in this profoundly unfamiliar and unusual place; perhaps Steve's presence made it seem less strange here.
Peggy was half asleep by the time Steve returned to the bedroom. He eased himself gently onto the bed, trying not to disturb her, but as soon as he slipped under the sheet, she moved to nestle into the curve of his embrace. He rested his head on the pillow beside hers. "Good night," he whispered.
Her hand, draped loosely across his arm encircling her, squeezed his forearm slightly. "Good night. And Steve?"
"Hm?"
"Still be here when I wake up, please."
He bent his head to nuzzle against her ear. "You too."
"I will," she promised as his eyes closed.
There was no clock in the room, so Peggy had no idea how much time had passed when she awoke in the dimly-lit bedroom to the restless shifting beside her. The shifting turned into thrashing as she sat up slowly and turned to look at Steve.
His face was pinched with distress, and his uneasy tossing and turning was punctuated by sharp twitches. He was still asleep, judging by the frantic movement of his eyes behind his closed eyelids. Now and then, brief snatches of muttering would escape his lips; most of it was unintelligible, but Peggy, watching his face closely with a mixture of alarm and uncertainty, caught the occasional coherent phrase. "...Morita, back to position..." he murmured urgently.
The Howling Commandos – the war. That was the nightmare he was reliving. She reached a hand toward him to wake him, but pulled away when she noticed the tension visible in his arms and back. The one hand that wasn't covered by the blanket was curled into a tight fist. She'd seen the accidental violence that could result from tapping a soldier on the shoulder when he didn't know you were there; a lance corporal in the unit attached to SSR had spent two weeks in the stockade after reflexively decking his sergeant in the mess hall when the man had come up behind him. "Combat fatigue," they'd called it at the time.
Instead, Peggy slipped silently out of the bed, out of range of thrashing limbs, and crouched beside the mattress, putting her face on a level with his. She watched him for a little longer, trying to decide the best way to handle the situation. The strangled whimpers that filled in the spaces between his muttering told her that she couldn't let him remain locked in this nightmare, but she had to be very careful about how she brought him out of it.
His arm came up to cover his face, and then reached out toward someone she couldn't see. "...No! Hawkeye, look out!" His hand clawed helplessly at empty air.
She had let this go on long enough. "Steve," she called softly, but firmly. "Steve, it's me. It's Peggy. Wake up; you're dreaming."
Some sound must have broken through the grip of his nightmare, as his agitation increased, and a fist shot out to thump against her pillow, inches away from where she leaned against the edge of the mattress. The pillow burst under the sudden assault, and Peggy fought the reflex to recoil. But the exertion seemed to jar him out of his fugue, as an instant later his head jolted up, eyes open. He stared at her for a moment, slowly recognizing her and where he was. "Huh... Peggy?" Then his eyes darted to the pillow he'd destroyed. Bits of fluff clung to his hand and spilled onto the sheets. "What did – oh God, are you okay?" His eyes widened in horror, realizing what he might have done if she hadn't moved.
"Shh, Steve, I'm all right." Now she reached tentatively toward him, stopping a few inches away from his hand to let him choose whether to make the final contact. He did, clinging to her as to a rope over an abyss. She climbed back onto the bed and pulled him gently toward her, so that he was half-lying in her lap. "I'm more worried about you."
The lines of his shoulders and back were still taut as steel cables, but physical contact with her seemed to be relaxing him a little, so she began carding her fingers through his hair. He leaned into her touch, letting a few moments pass in silence before speaking. "It was the war," he began, "and the Chitauri invasion. Sort of mixed together. Energy bolts flying everywhere. Explosions, buildings collapsing. My team in danger – both of them. During the invasion, the rooftop position Barton had taken was swarmed. He jumped – I saw him falling. I didn't know until after that he'd made it. It was like watching..." His throat closed on the name, but she knew. It was like watching Bucky fall.
She felt an answering tightness in her own throat. "So much has happened to you, in such a short time," she sighed. She knew how futile it was to wish she could shield him from any of it; this was a man who had tried to lie his way into the army because he couldn't stand the thought of others fighting in his stead. He would take any danger and hardship on his own shoulders if it meant sparing someone else. But still she wished.
Cheek still pillowed on her thigh, he shook his head. "That's not even..." He took a breath. "I could have handled all that, but... I lost everything. Everything – Bucky, the Commandos, the whole world. You." An arm snaked around her waist, pulling him closer to her. "Everything was so different. There was nothing I could..."
He didn't seem able to say any more, but he didn't have to. There was nothing familiar, nothing he could lean on or trust. He must have felt so alone. She thought of the first week of her posting to SSR in the States, and how unfamiliar the accents, the food, even the air had been. She'd known no one, of course. And being a woman put her at even more of a disadvantage, socially. She hadn't been able to let down her guard for a moment for weeks; it had been exhausting. But even then, she'd known that home and MI5 were waiting for when the assignment was over. There had been no such promise for Steve.
"I'm sorry," she told him, helplessly. "But for whatever time we're given here, you've got me. However I can help."
He nodded against her abdomen, his face half-buried in the blue fabric. "Thank you."
She thought about asking if talking more about what had happened, trying to work through the events that had given rise to his nightmare, would help – but shook her head. He would need to talk those things out, but later. Gradually. For now, reassurance and comfort seemed to be the order of the day, and she could manage those well enough. Nurturing wasn't her strongest skill – she'd have made a terrible nurse – but Steve brought those feelings out in her.
"Think we could try sleeping again?" he asked after another few minutes had passed.
He had turned his face up toward her, and she moved her hand so she could look at him squarely. "Are you ready for that?"
"Yeah. Don't think that'll happen again, tonight. Talking..." He half-shrugged, an awkward gesture in the position he was lying in. "I haven't really talked to anybody about it before. SHIELD had doctors, psychiatrists, but..."
But how could anyone else understand what he'd been through? How could he trust anyone in that strange new future enough to share it with them? "I know," she said simply. "All right. Move over so I can get under the covers. It's cold in here." It wasn't, but he obligingly made room for her, curling around her once she'd slipped between the sheets. This time she turned to face toward him, settling one hand on his hip, and entwining their legs. He slid an arm under their remaining pillow, and together they found their way to a more peaceful night's rest.
She was glad they'd taken the time that morning to rummage through what the Doctor called the "changing room," a larger chamber within the TARDIS filled with overflowing closets and wardrobes, sporting clothing from countless eras, past and future. At the time, she'd been most pleased by the snug-fitting ladies' top she'd found with the Union Jack emblazoned across the front – Steve had teased her until she put it on, saying that it was her turn to wear her patriotism on her chest for a change – but now, she was much more grateful for the tennis shoes she'd found at the bottom of one of the closets. They made all this running much easier.
"Do your part to keep Station Thirteen healthy!" chirped a recorded voice from behind her. Peggy spared a brief glance over her shoulder as she ran: the blasted machines weren't gaining on them, but they weren't falling behind either. "Recycle your trash for a cleaner tomorrow!" another robot urged her with automated cheer.
Lovely message; if only it weren't us they were planning to "recycle." She kept close on the Doctor's heels. Steve, with his longer strides and enhanced muscles, could easily outpace them both, but he held back enough that they weren't left completely behind.
Which turned out to be fortunate; as they rounded the corner toward the bank of lifts, another four of the sanitation 'bots lurched toward them, claw-arms extended. "Please deposit refuse in the red circle!" one said helpfully. The rim of the cylindrical maw of its matter-to-energy recycler glowed neon red.
"Okay, new plan," the Doctor announced, "let's not go that way. Um." He looked around in urgent bewilderment.
Peggy saw the way out a moment before he did. "There!" she pointed, and suited deed to word, darting to the edge of the avenue and stepping onto the edge of the hydroponic flower-bed to hoist herself up onto the suspended path above them. She felt familiar, strong hands boosting her up, and she clambered easily onto the upper level. Steve helped the Doctor up after her, and then backed up to take a running leap.
"Recycle your trash for a cleaner tomorrow!" The robot's claw-like grasper closed around Steve's upper arm. He struggled, trying to pull away from the rogue machine before its fellows could close in on him.
"Steve!" I can't just sit by helplessly and watch. Not this time. She slipped her legs back over the edge of the catwalk, ready to drop down to help him – but felt a hand close around her own wrist, stopping her. She looked up into the Doctor's face and saw him shake his head.
Fortunately, the cleaning 'bot was no match for Captain America. Steve wrenched away from the robot's grip, tearing its arm off its frame entirely. The claw-arm remained clamped around his bicep as Steve made the running jump to grab onto the railing of the sky-walk. He pulled himself up as the other 'bots converged below him, reaching futilely up at his dangling legs and repeating their amiable recycling slogans.
As Peggy stood up and took a firm grip on her composure, Steve pried the metal claw off of his arm. The pincers came away bloody, but she could see immediately that the wounds they had inflicted weren't deep; with Steve's augmented healing, the cuts would be gone in twenty minutes. Assuming they all hadn't been recycled by then.
"Are we any closer to figuring out what caused these things to go haywire?" Steve asked the Doctor?
Brandishing what he had cheerfully introduced to Peggy as his sonic screwdriver, the Doctor pointed it at the disembodied metal claw and activated the tool, producing a humming sound and a green glow. "No control systems in the arms," he muttered, glancing down at the disarmed robot, still flailing after Steve with its remaining claw, "but now that somebody's got some exposed circuits, we might be getting somewhere..." He aimed the screwdriver at the injured 'bot and scanned again. "Aha! Clever, clever little robots!" he marveled.
"What is it?" she demanded.
The Doctor turned to her and grinned. "The sanitation 'bots are all networked together. It helps them coordinate their clean-up patrols, and," he emphasized, "it allows them to share information about new sources of rubbish. When one of them recycles something new, it lets the other 'bots know, so they learn to recognize it as trash."
Peggy felt the color drain from her face. "But that means... someone must have fed one of these robots a person."
"A corpse, probably," the Doctor agreed. "Unfortunately, these 'bots aren't quite clever enough to tell the difference between living and dead flesh."
"Aren't there some sort of safeguards built into these things to protect against this sort of malfunction?" Steve asked. "I've only worked with Tony Stark for a couple of days, but he's always bragging about the security backups on all his technology."
The Doctor shrugged. "Almost certainly, but it looks like someone overrode them. Which makes sense, if they were trying to dispose of a body in secret."
"So what do we do – can we find the central controls and shut them down, or turn the safety protocols back on?"
"I'm not sure we'll have time for that," Peggy cut in. They followed her gaze to the end of the sky-walk, where a small crowd of the maintenance robots had gathered and were beginning to trundle toward them. The far end of the sky-walk terminated in a shallow stairwell, and she could spot at least two of the 'bots at the base of the steps. The TARDIS was three levels away by lift, and all of the shops – the ones that didn't have recycling 'bots in them, at least – were buttoned up tight by the space station residents that had taken refuge in them. There was no way out. We have to find a way to shut them down or disable them from here.
Her eyes widened, and she spun to face the Doctor. "You said that whatever one of them eats, the rest of them recognize as rubbish to recycle?"
"Yes, that's–" The rest of what he was going to say was cut off as she snatched the metal claw from his hand.
"Steve, come with me, and distract the nearest one." She ran down the sky-walk, toward the stairs. Though she'd taken him by surprise, he caught up with her within moments. She heard the Doctor pelting along behind them, but was too focused on her plan to spare him much thought.
She watched Steve pull ahead of her as they approached the staircase, taking the shallow, terrace-like steps at a gallop. The 'bots at the foot of the stairs noticed him, and began their chorus of "Recycle your trash for a cleaner tomorrow!" while closing the distance toward him. Their treads couldn't navigate the wide steps easily; they were able to lever themselves up, but it was a laborious process.
While one of them was midway through the procedure of trying to heft itself up onto the first step, claws extended toward Steve, Peggy made her move. Blessing the rubber-soled tennis shoes, she ran up to the 'bot and dropped the severed claw-arm into its red-rimmed recycling bin. It froze for a moment while its matter-to-energy converter digested the foreign object, and then the sensor array mounted on the top of its frame swept the area around it in a 360-degree arc, searching. Nearby, the other 'bot that had been struggling to reach Steve did the same.
The two robots noticed each other simultaneously and abandoned their quests to climb the stairs, their treads dropping back to the deck with a thump. They converged on each other, grasping arms extended. "Please deposit refuse in the red circle!" said one. "Do your part to keep Station Thirteen healthy!" intoned the other. And then they started tearing each other apart.
Peggy darted back up the stairs to look across the sky-walk at the pack of 'bots crossing toward them. They had stopped in the middle of the elevated path and were attacking each other, tearing off anything their sharp, powerful claws could grab and stuffing it into their bins. Arms, sensors, speaker-boxes, even bits of frame and treads were dropped into the recycling converters. Looking down at the lower level, she could see that all the 'bots were doing the same, cannibalizing each other and recycling the parts.
It was more than a little disturbing to watch. Even when she looked away from the carnage of metal and circuits, she could still hear the cacophony of rending steel and jolly recycling slogans, the latter fading into distorted wails as the speakers emitting them were converted into energy.
In a few minutes, it was over. The robots that remained were hopelessly crippled, blundering about without arms or sensors, impotently begging anyone who would listen to deposit their refuse in the red circle. Several were tipped over, their treads spinning against empty air. Most had been reduced to nothing more than spare parts.
Her momentary sense of horror at their plight quickly gave way to relief, and she hugged Steve, and then the Doctor, and then Steve again. "Do you think it's over?" she asked the Doctor, lingering in Steve's embrace for a moment.
"I think it's mostly clean-up from here on out," he replied. "That's something the good people of Station Thirteen will have to work out how to manage for themselves for a while."
Steve looked down at the devastated remains of the maintenance 'bots. "After this, I doubt they'll mind too much."
The Doctor clapped his hands together. "All right, kids, back to the TARDIS! It's almost tea-time, and a bite to eat in New France sounds like just the thing."
"Tea-time?" Peggy asked. "Has it been that long since we landed?"
"Well, it's tea-time somewhere," the Doctor retorted. "We've got a time machine. And I'm peckish."
Swallowing a laugh, Peggy raised her hands in a conciliatory gesture. "All right, Doctor; lead the way!"
Next Chapter
