In London, Kai was wearing a hat with the UK flag on it and was on a video call with his younger daughter, Doreen. After chatting happily for a while, he waved to Doreen as he ended the call.
Kai had dragged Steve to London after he kept pushing off the meeting with Peggy. First, it was SHIELD's mission. Then, he settled in Washington as he moved away from New York. After that, the Tarot incident where they needed to train and be ready at all times.
Steve was extremely scared to meet Peggy. That was where Kai came in. He planned a complete itinerary that Steve will only be gone for about 8 hours if he didn't want to stay longer and can get back to the United States anytime as Kai had hijacked the Avenger Jet.
After chucking Steve in front of Peggy's house like an abandoned son left at the orphanage, Kai left to give him some privacy.
"I've never imagined you as a loving father," Sharon Carter who was sitting next to Kai in the cafe said teasingly.
"Don't pretend, you have my files right?" Kai smiles and cuts off the agent trying to get close to him. A little unfair for Sharon, but he didn't want to get involved with the SHIELD matter.
"Right now, I am just a niece coming to visit her grandmother," Sharon was unbothered by the wall Kai was putting up and tried to drill it anyway. She put her arm up and stretched her back from the long flight.
Sharon wasn't acting under order as even Fury didn't know about the Captain's itinerary, but creating a personal relationship with anyone capable of becoming one of her helpers or assets was SHIELD 101. By keeping the rule close to her, it was understandable how she managed to open a big business in the future even after becoming a fugitive.
"What do you think they will talk about?" Sharon pried again, trying to develop a friendly impression on Kai.
"Don't know. Maybe they'll dance," Kai said mysteriously before he ignored Sharon completely after that.
…
Inside Carter's residence.
"Steve, is that really you?" Peggy asked weakly as she was laying on the bed, seemingly dreaming about her lost lover who came back to meet her. Her hand tried to reach him, in which Steve promptly grabbed it and held it tight.
"I am here Peggy. I am here…"
Steve said with his voice breaking. Seeing the figure of his weak lover that can barely remember him, he couldn't hold back his tears anymore.
"I wanted to talk to you Peggy…and be with you…However…"
During this time he was letting out an immense, bottled-up emotion that he had been feeling ever since he woke up in a strange world, Steve never once let go of Peggy's hand.
Although he always hangs out with Kai, something can only be unloaded by meeting his friends from the past. Only then will he truly integrate himself in the new future he was thrown into.
"I love you Peggy. Even now. I will always be in love with you…" Steve said as he finished his breakdown and recollected himself. He finds out that his numb emotion was finally stirred. Aliens, demon girls, literal gods, ninja nuns…he always faced them with a feeling of unrealness before this.
Now that he thinks back, only then did he realise that he had been shutting the world out. He will always be thankful to Kai for bringing him here, cause this is the moment that Steve Rogers life can finally begin. Not as Captain America, but the real him.
"You will always love me? Even if I am old and wrinkled?" Peggy teases him. Steve smiled and said seriously instead. "Yeah, my love for you will never fade…even if it goes through the cruel passage of time…"
Peggy was startled inwardly as she heard it. Even after seeing her in her old age, he is still in love with her – proving that the Captain wasn't in love with her because she was pretty, but it was true love.
Peggy touched the small, silver bracelet that she was wearing on her left arm, wanting to change its pattern. But she hesitated because she didn't know whether it would be good for Steve or not.
"Are you okay Peggy?" Steve asked as she suddenly became quiet.
"Yeah…I am fine…" Peggy held off the thought and turned back on Steve, hearing his worries and his ridiculous stories.
They talked for hours without realising how much time had passed. Peggy didn't have her dementia anymore after wearing the bracelet, so Steve didn't have to start over his stories.
"Peggy…why…aren't you married?" Steve asked a question that was hidden deeply inside of his mind. He was afraid to come here mainly because of this. Peggy didn't seem to find anyone after him, living her life as a lonely woman.
Sure, she went on a few dates, but she never seemed to be able to get away from his shadow. When she reached 40 she just gave up and focused on her career as SHIELD's director instead.
When Ryan found out about this, he was extremely puzzled. Did his existence cause Peggy to end up alone? Did the Avenger never have to travel back through time? If that was true, then who was the visitor that the Ancient One waited for during the Chitauri war?
He felt pretty bad that he decided to do something about it.
Flashback: One month ago.
Peggy was sitting on the bed and staring at the door, waiting for Steve to come after she wrote him a letter. But some time had passed and he never came.
She lowered her head as she was tired again. Being 95 years old, she could barely keep her mind as it is. The longer Steve took to come, the more plausible for her to lose her memory of him. Desperately, she waited for him to come before the thing she feared would happen. – that she won't remember him anymore.
"I can help you with that."
Suddenly another voice that wasn't hers resounded inside the room.
"Who?" Peggy said weakly as she only moved her head slightly toward the window's direction from where she heard the voice.
Her eyes widened slightly as she saw the number one enemy of SHIELD, the joker with mystical cards, Tarot was sitting at the window sill. The window was still closed and there were no signs of forced entry, so she didn't know how he got here.
"It's me. The good boi Tarot!"
Peggy pressed the emergency button at the side of her bed as she wondered who had betrayed her. Being an ex-director of SHIELD, she possessed a lot of secrets. That was why she need to live like a ghost – a measure for her to avoid being captured by the enemies.
Protecting the world for 50 years and this is the thanks she gets. Living the rest of her life inside a nameless bed.
"Calm down. If I want you dead you'll be dead already," Tarot muttered as he went to sit beside Peggy by the edge of the bed.
"So why do you come for the helpless old lady?" Peggy said calmly as she noticed that no one was coming to help her even when she pressed the button.
She hypothesised two things. It could be that Tarot already cleaned up the 100 protectors agent who didn't know who they were protecting when they were stationed at the area, or it could be that he had a method to block the message, even though the mechanism is mostly analog to prevent it from being altered remotely.
"Helpless? Hardly! You know that even if you pull the gun out from your bed you won't be able to kill me right?"
"I know. But it doesn't mean that I won't be able to foil whatever you want to do with me…by killing myself!"
Peggy pulled out the gun from her pillow and aimed it at her temple.
*Poof*
However when she pulled the trigger, a flower came out from the gun muzzle instead.
"Ta-da!" Tarot said as he clapped his hand.
Peggy knew that there was no escape when she felt the cyanide capsule inside her teeth was gone.
"What do you want to do with me?"
"I am offering you a chance…to rectify your mistakes…" Tarot said as he grabbed Peggy's shoulder. Then, they disappeared from the room, leaving traces of their existence only on the warm bed.
Tarot teleported them into a hidden base where she saw numerous agents working busily inside the base.
"This is…"
"This is SHIELD. Come on, let me show you around."
Ryan didn't kill the agents with the right mindset to protect the earth. Instead, he gave them a chance to strike back.
After explaining to Peggy about the existence of Hydra inside of SHIELD, Ryan gave her a job to do.
"Of course, the job comes with many benefits. Such as…"
Tarot took out a card named the hermit and threw it to Peggy. The card dissipated and entered her body, turning her looks into a 20 years old woman again.
Peggy was extremely startled and checked her body hurriedly. Her wrinkly palm was silky smooth again. Not only that, all of her brain function returned to when she was 20 years old.
"Although you look young again, you will still die when you reach the end of your lifespan…or when you get shot in the head."
"I don't understand! Why are you giving me the lead here?"
After knowing about Hydra that still lurked inside the country, she was extremely depressed as she was one of the people welcoming the German's scientist after the war. Now, the world is in danger…all because of her oversight.
"Well. You can stay here…but I will be gone after this."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Suddenly Bucky interjected from behind Tarot and Peggy.
"Lieutenant Barnes?" Peggy thought she was done being shocked, but then Bucky Barnes appeared.
"Ahh White Wolf. You scared me."
"As if you're capable of being scared," The now complete Bucky said mockingly as he stood in front of Peggy.
"It's nice to see a familiar face," Bucky said to Peggy and held out his metal hand. After learning what had happened to Bucky and the Starks, Peggy doesn't feel like she has a choice here but to accept the position.
"It felt like entrapment," Peggy said as she watched the group of surviving agents trying their hardest to contribute something to Hydra's fall.
"Hey I gave you a choice!" Tarot said playfully. In a month's time, Peggy had led the team of Agent's and rebuilt the new Shield. – which were now called…
"Sir, what's your order?" Victoria Hand asked the legendary Director of SHIELD, the enemy of Hydra, Peggy Carter for her orders on how to proceed.
–Flashback Ends. –
Peggy was silent when she heard what Steve asked. How could she say that she didn't marry because of him?
However, her silence gave Steve the answer he needed. He took a deep breath and sat on one knee.
"Peggy Carter…will you marry me?"
Steve didn't care that she had grown old. He had always imagined getting old together with her. Although only one of them was taken apart by time, he still wanted to be with her..till the end.
Peggy became solemn as he proposed to her.
"The reason I asked you to come here…was because I wanted to ask you to move on, Rogers. My time…has already passed. Yours…are limitless. I won't be the cork to block your future…"
"Peggy…You are my future…in the past…in the present…and us together…in the future…" Steve holds her palm tightly as he tries to convince her.
Peggy knew that she should keep her de-aging a secret. 'But…seeing him up close makes it harder than it should be.'
Slowly, her hand reached the silver bracelet that Tarot made to allow her to project her old self to the world. Then, she changed the pattern on the bracelet slightly, and returned to her old self again.
"What?" Steve's eyes widened as he saw the familiar figure that he had once seen before – in 1941. "How?"
"Being a director of SHIELD, sometimes you stumble onto some weird things," Peggy said as she got up from the bed and approached the frozen Steve. She rested her head on his muscular chest and started to sway.
"You're late…" Peggy said as tears came out from her eyes. Finally her true thoughts came out. Steve realised what she wanted and held her waist with one hand, while the other one pulled her palm in the air before they started to dance.
Steve decided to accept the situation as it is, as he was afraid that this is just a dream.
♫♪♩
A slow tempo music was played by Steve's smartphone as they swayed together inside the small house, enjoying their time with each other.
After the song ended, Peggy pushed Steve down on the bed.
"Now for our dance," Peggy said as she slowly unbuttoned Steve's clothes while being on top of him.
"What…that's what it means?" Steve asked playfully as he reached the bottom of Peggy's old people gown.
Tarot: And then they fucked!
…
"So, Fury couldn't wait any longer," Alexander Pierce said in a calm voice despite the precarious situation he was about to face.
Reading the report on the Lemurian Star attack, Pierce concluded the matter for what it was – a farce.
Tarot will never leave an undercover Hydra alive in every attack he has done. But the Lemurian Star attack has many survivors, showing that whoever attacked them couldn't display the same kind of might as the Hydra's Most Wanted enemy.
However hard, Fury was going to attack him after this, it won't matter any longer.
"Doesn't matter. The Insight Project will be completed tomorrow, thanks to the cooperation from Alchemax and AIM…"
He threw the report away, and contacted the other Hydra head to tell them the good news.
Despite the extreme schedule, Pierce managed to pressure the World Security Council by staging numerous attacks with energy weapons based on what Hydra had accomplished in their research, allowing his Insight Project journey to smoothen and without any budget cuts.
Pierce smiles insidiously as he barks his order for his agents. Knowing Fury, he knew that the man with the eye-patch would never destroy the Insight Helicarrier, rather he wanted to hold this powerin his own hand.
"Don't you get it yet Fury? You're alone now…with no one trusting you…" Pierce chuckled as he gestured to the two Winter Soldiers in front of him to complete their mission and that mission is to –
"Kill the 10th level Director of SHIELD…Nick Fury...and everyone else around him…"
The two winter soldiers approached a team of logistic agent's that will lead them to meet the rest of the crew.
"Sir, Zola is on the line."
"Put him on," Pierce replied. Zola couldn't travel through the internet as Pierce and the other heads won't let him. They communicated through a rotary phone that was installed inside Zola's brain on Camp Lehigh.
"You did not listen to me. Now, Ryan Knight knows our plan," Zola said with German slang.
"What!"
Pierce stood up suddenly and his chair fell backward, producing a loud sound. His eyes shook rapidly as he planned countermeasures. The report said that Ryan was still inside his father's house, and only scratched the initial details of the Insight Project.
But Pierce was sure that if Ryan cracked the algorithm that he was using, the full might of the Avengers would rain down on the nine-headed snake.
"Activate Marcus Knight. Blockade the Knight Manor communication. Make sure that he didn't leave the Manor alive!"
While Pierce was freaking out, the one who controlled Zola smirks in the shadows.
"Now that all the preparation is complete, show me a good performance…Hydra. Squiggle, Squirm, do whatever you can do to the best of your abilities. Come tomorrow, Hydra will be…no more…"
Tim walked into Ryan's room while he was doing an evil laugh, making him frozen in his tracks.
"(Ehem) Your Uncle is waiting for you downstairs. He said that there is something he needed to tell all of us, and asked you to be there," Tim notified Ryan before he closed the door back slowly.
Ryan brushed his clothes in embarrassment before he went down the stairs slowly. There, Marcus was waiting with Hiddle and Tim at the dining table. Hiddle was serving some afternoon snacks to the brothers.
Marcus seemed to just end his phone call and received an initiation order for the kill. However he smiled brightly when he saw Ryan and gestured for him to sit.
"Well. We didn't have much time. So I have to be quick about this," Marcus said with a calm tone as he wiped his mouth with the napkin.
"I was a Hydra member," Marcus made a sudden declaration and continued despite Hiddle's and Tim's shock.
"And I just received an order to kill… all of you. A team of killers will come by to support me in less than 10 minutes," Marcus said with a solemn voice this time.
"Marcus, if you were asked to kill us, then why are you telling us about it?" Tim said as he sipped his warm tea. He believed in Marcus as he won't lie about such matters, even as a prank. Hiddle also sipped his tea, but put his guard up just in case.
"Because, my loyalty to Hydra was shattered when I found out…"
Marcus looked at Ryan, before he turned back to Tim.
"... that Hydra was the one who killed Madeline.."
*Clang* Tim's teacup ear broke when he heard his wife's name.
"What?"
*******************************
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