Fic: Since You've Been Gone
Title: Since You've Been Gone
Continuity: Marvel Comics 616
Characters: Captain America, Iron Man, Jean Grey
Rating: PGish
Summary: Captain America had been dead. Things had changed.
Warnings, Disclaimers: I don't own the characters.
Word Count: ~2300
Notes: Many thanks to likeadeuce and ilyena_sylph for looking this over and encouraging me. Any remaining mistakes are my own. Written for harmonyangel's birthday.
Steve Rogers had been dead.
He hadn't been dead before. He'd been presumed dead a few times, and he'd had many brushes with death, but this had been the first time he had died. Things had changed since he'd been gone. He should have been used to this. It defined him, really, being part of another time. He had gone through it once before.
But this felt different somehow. The world had changed on him again, because of his actions. The Post-Civil War World... the world after his death was a strange place. Different, somehow, yet still familiar.
He had hoped when he'd come back that he would have found it a better place than when he'd left.
At least this time he didn't have to deal with knowing that almost everyone he'd known, everyone he'd cared for, was dead.
He wasn't sure if that made it better or worse.
~*~
Tony had been glad to see him. Everyone had been glad to see him. If Janet had had her way there would have been an incredible celebration. Steve was fairly sure that there would be one - Janet had been very determined, and she'd been recruiting among the other Avengers (one team of them, anyway) when he'd left to go figure things out.
He made his way to Nick Fury's office. Tony's office, now. It was hard to imagine Tony Stark as Director of SHIELD (it was still hard to imagine anyone besides Nick Fury in that position) but it was just one of the many changes.
"Can I talk to you?" he'd asked. Tony was sitting at his desk, immersed in some sort of paperwork, but he looked incredibly grateful to see Steve. Whether that was because he really wanted to talk to Steve or because he didn't feel like dealing with all the paperwork that came with his new position Steve wasn't sure.
"Of course," Tony said, flashing him a grin that made Steve feel better about his decision to talk to Tony. Tony almost always had that effect on him. Even in the hardest times he had never truly been able to give up on Tony, and Tony's presence had always helped him. That had been the hardest part of the Civil War, not being able to fight on Tony's side but instead fighting against him. "Take a seat," he added, gesturing to a nearby chair.
Steve sat. He knew that he needed to talk to Tony, there had been so much going on that they had to discuss, but he still wasn't entirely sure how he could bring it up.
Tony raised an eyebrow at him. "What did you need to talk about?" he asked. "I know that things haven't been easy since you got back, but now that you're here maybe you could convince the others to come talk to us and we could be a fam - a team again."
"I'm still not sure how I feel about that," Steve said slowly. "I certainly don't want to restart anything, but..." he sighed. "Let me go talk to them. Maybe after I've convinced them that I'm actually me and not just some scheme of yours we can work out a compromise of sorts."
"I've tried to do the right thing by them," Tony said quietly. "I tried to do the right thing with everyone." He wouldn't look Steve in the eye as he said it. Steve wondered if that meant that Tony didn't actually believe what he was saying, or if he felt guilty about what he had done.
He should believe Tony. He had always been able to believe in Tony Stark before. Or trust Iron Man anyway. Or at least Steve had been able to trust his own judgment about things. Now he was just confused. He wanted so much to be able to trust Tony again, to believe in him...
"I know," Steve told him, hoping that he sounded sincere. Maybe then he would be able to believe it again himself.
"So what did you want to talk about then?" Tony asked him. "If there's anything I can do for you, Steve, just name it." This time he met Steve's eyes and Steve was shocked by the sincerity he could see in them. More than that... the need he could sense in Tony. The desire to truly help Steve. He had been right to believe in Tony. To agree with him.
The things that Steve had been planning to talk about - his isolation, his confusion, his helplessness in this new era - faded away. He wanted to ask Tony for help with it, but he couldn't. Not just yet.
"I just... wanted to thank you," he said.
Tony looked confused. "Whatever for, Steve?"
"For taking care of Bucky like I had asked you to. And Sam. And Sharon. When I was... when I wasn't able to. It helps knowing that someone... that you were there for them."
"I didn't really do much for them. Especially Sharon." Tony was speaking so quietly that even Steve could barely hear him.
"You did your best, though," Steve pointed out. "And you helped them all eventually. They were better off than they would have been if you hadn't been there." He smiled.
Tony looked grateful, and Steve was glad that he had been able to do something to cheer the man up. They were friends after all, and while Tony had seemed to be initially excited to see him upon his return from the dead, he had sunk into something resembling a depression after the initial few days.
Still, Tony didn't respond, and Steve wasn't sure what he should say next. He hated this awkwardness between them, he wanted things to go back to normal. He wanted everything to go back to normal. To how it was before he died. Before the Civil War. Before Stamford.
"I was just wondering," Steve said, "if maybe you had a recommendation for someone for me to talk to. Not a psychiatrist," he said quickly, remembering what he'd been told of Sharon's experiences and role in his death, "but I thought that maybe we... that I... just to get caught up on what has been going on."
"It isn't any easier the second time around, is it," Tony asked.
"No," Steve said sadly. "I had hoped that it would be. Its just different."
Tony nodded. "Maybe you should talk to Jean," he suggested.
"Jean?" Steve asked in surprise.
"Yeah, she came back from the dead a couple of weeks before you did," Tony told him. "And she's certainly been through this a few times before." He rolled his eyes. "Hard to keep track with all the X-People. Always coming back. Just like you," he smiled. "I knew you would come back. I mean, I hoped you would." He paused. "It wasn't worth it you know," he said. "After you were gone, I mean."
"I'll go talk to her," Steve said. He didn't respond to Tony's other comment. He wasn't really sure what to say.
~*~
Jean Grey was living in the newly rebuilt (again, Steve wasn't sure exactly how many times the school had been destroyed, but it was quite a few) Xavier Institute for Higher Learning. She looked glad to see him.
"Welcome back," she said, embracing him briefly and leading him into her personal study. "You look like you've had a lot to get used to." She gestured for him to take a seat on the couch, and she joined him there.
"Not as many years have gone by," he agreed, "but there have still been a lot of changes." He wasn't sure how Tony thought she would be able to help him, even if she had come back herself.
Jean nodded. "I know what you mean," she agreed. "So, Iron Man sent you."
"How did you know?" Steve asked. "Has he sent others to you?"
"That too," Jean agreed. "But you forget," she said tapping her head, "I can read minds, and you were projecting."
Steve wasn't sure how he felt about that. Usually telepaths stayed out of his mind, at least when he hadn't given them permission to be in there.
"I wasn't prying," Jean said. "Its a side effect of coming back. Everything is more raw, more... there. You'll get back to normal soon enough." She smiled. "Besides, I'm sure that SHIELD practically has a class in how many times I've come back from the dead. Although really, those numbers are greatly exaggerated," she added wryly.
Steve nodded. "I've been presumed dead before," Steve said, knowing he wasn't telling he anything she didn't already know. "And being found in the ice... it was still a lot to get used to. But it didn't feel this awkward. No, it always seemed a bit odd," he corrected himself, "but it got easier over time. This just seems to be getting progressively more difficult."
"I've never come back to find that a lifetime has passed... if we don't count getting sent a thousand years into the future, anyway," she added. "Its a big difference coming back to find out that everything you know is gone and most of the people you know are dead versus coming back to find out that while you were gone your husband has gotten into another relationship, or your son has died." Her tone grew wistful at the end, and Steve knew she was no longer talking about him.
"Or find out that you've been replaced," he suggested.
"In more ways than one, sometimes," Jean agreed. "In relationships, on a team, even sometimes your code name." She looked him directly in the eye. "Like Bucky replaced you."
"I'm proud of Bucky and everything that he's done since I've been... gone," Steve said. "I'm proud of all of them."
Jean smiled, a bit patronizingly. "Are you planning on letting him keep the name then?"
He paused. "I... hadn't really thought about that."
"Are you sure?" she asked.
"I would like to keep the name," he admitted. "I've been Captain America for so long, I've never really felt comfortable outside of it. But I don't want to take it from Bucky... although I wish he'd do something about the black in the costume."
"If there's one thing I've learned coming back," Jean said, "its that we reach instinctively for some sort of normalcy in our lives. To reassure ourselves that we're really here and that things truly are going to be okay. Even if its going back to old relationships that we know aren't working, to places that we are already familiar with, to people we know and love. We think we need these things," she stressed, "even if they may not be the best for us. Because we aren't entirely ready to move on. We're too busy trying to reassure ourselves that we have a place to move on to." She sighed. "And then we run the risk of never being able to move on, instead being stuck in the same patterns and..." she trailed off. "But we really aren't talking about me, today. We're talking about you."
Steve had been quiet while Jean had rambled on, trying to absorb everything that she'd been saying. Even if she had been talking about herself, most of it did apply to him as well. He had wanted the familiar, to be a part of a team, part of the Avengers again. To be friends with Tony again, instead of the near enemies they had been right before his death.
"You've actually given me a lot to think about," he said to her, getting to his feet. "Thank you, Jean, and I wish you the best of luck." He held out his hand.
"You too, Captain America," Jean said, giving him a salute before she shook his hand. "And it will get easier in time," she reminded him. She raised an eyebrow. "You know, Tony does feel the same way. About everything."
"Oh." Steve wasn't entirely sure what she was talking about, but for some reason he felt incredibly grateful for this information.
She laughed. "You'll figure it out. Don't worry about it," she said, leading him out of the mansion.
~*~
Steve found himself back in Tony's office.
"I thought we should talk about how you're readjusting," Tony said. "In my capacity as Director of SHIELD I do need to stress the importance of you registering, and maybe we could go over -"
"You mean you haven't registered me?" Steve asked in surprise.
"No," Tony said. "I wanted to give you the choice. We've updated the SHRA and fixed a lot of the things that you were opposed to. I did listen to you, Steve, I really did. If you hadn't..." he trailed off, and Steve could see the pain in his eyes. He hadn't entirely realized how badly Tony had been affected by his death. How badly everyone had been. He had seen the video of his funeral, and the reactions of his friends to his return. But he hadn't entirely understood how deeply they had been affected.
"Died," Steve said. "But I did. And things are different now."
"Can't we just go back to how they were before?" Tony asked quietly.
"No," Steve said. "I don't want things to just go back to the way they were."
Tony looked hurt and betrayed. "But," he protested, but Steve shook his head, effectively silencing Tony.
"I think," Steve said, "I'm ready to get on with my life. Be Captain America again, although I need to talk to Bucky first." He hesitated, not sure he should say the next part. "If you'll be there with me."
"Always," Tony said. "And forever."
Continuity: Marvel Comics 616
Characters: Captain America, Iron Man, Jean Grey
Rating: PGish
Summary: Captain America had been dead. Things had changed.
Warnings, Disclaimers: I don't own the characters.
Word Count: ~2300
Notes: Many thanks to likeadeuce and ilyena_sylph for looking this over and encouraging me. Any remaining mistakes are my own. Written for harmonyangel's birthday.
Steve Rogers had been dead.
He hadn't been dead before. He'd been presumed dead a few times, and he'd had many brushes with death, but this had been the first time he had died. Things had changed since he'd been gone. He should have been used to this. It defined him, really, being part of another time. He had gone through it once before.
But this felt different somehow. The world had changed on him again, because of his actions. The Post-Civil War World... the world after his death was a strange place. Different, somehow, yet still familiar.
He had hoped when he'd come back that he would have found it a better place than when he'd left.
At least this time he didn't have to deal with knowing that almost everyone he'd known, everyone he'd cared for, was dead.
He wasn't sure if that made it better or worse.
~*~
Tony had been glad to see him. Everyone had been glad to see him. If Janet had had her way there would have been an incredible celebration. Steve was fairly sure that there would be one - Janet had been very determined, and she'd been recruiting among the other Avengers (one team of them, anyway) when he'd left to go figure things out.
He made his way to Nick Fury's office. Tony's office, now. It was hard to imagine Tony Stark as Director of SHIELD (it was still hard to imagine anyone besides Nick Fury in that position) but it was just one of the many changes.
"Can I talk to you?" he'd asked. Tony was sitting at his desk, immersed in some sort of paperwork, but he looked incredibly grateful to see Steve. Whether that was because he really wanted to talk to Steve or because he didn't feel like dealing with all the paperwork that came with his new position Steve wasn't sure.
"Of course," Tony said, flashing him a grin that made Steve feel better about his decision to talk to Tony. Tony almost always had that effect on him. Even in the hardest times he had never truly been able to give up on Tony, and Tony's presence had always helped him. That had been the hardest part of the Civil War, not being able to fight on Tony's side but instead fighting against him. "Take a seat," he added, gesturing to a nearby chair.
Steve sat. He knew that he needed to talk to Tony, there had been so much going on that they had to discuss, but he still wasn't entirely sure how he could bring it up.
Tony raised an eyebrow at him. "What did you need to talk about?" he asked. "I know that things haven't been easy since you got back, but now that you're here maybe you could convince the others to come talk to us and we could be a fam - a team again."
"I'm still not sure how I feel about that," Steve said slowly. "I certainly don't want to restart anything, but..." he sighed. "Let me go talk to them. Maybe after I've convinced them that I'm actually me and not just some scheme of yours we can work out a compromise of sorts."
"I've tried to do the right thing by them," Tony said quietly. "I tried to do the right thing with everyone." He wouldn't look Steve in the eye as he said it. Steve wondered if that meant that Tony didn't actually believe what he was saying, or if he felt guilty about what he had done.
He should believe Tony. He had always been able to believe in Tony Stark before. Or trust Iron Man anyway. Or at least Steve had been able to trust his own judgment about things. Now he was just confused. He wanted so much to be able to trust Tony again, to believe in him...
"I know," Steve told him, hoping that he sounded sincere. Maybe then he would be able to believe it again himself.
"So what did you want to talk about then?" Tony asked him. "If there's anything I can do for you, Steve, just name it." This time he met Steve's eyes and Steve was shocked by the sincerity he could see in them. More than that... the need he could sense in Tony. The desire to truly help Steve. He had been right to believe in Tony. To agree with him.
The things that Steve had been planning to talk about - his isolation, his confusion, his helplessness in this new era - faded away. He wanted to ask Tony for help with it, but he couldn't. Not just yet.
"I just... wanted to thank you," he said.
Tony looked confused. "Whatever for, Steve?"
"For taking care of Bucky like I had asked you to. And Sam. And Sharon. When I was... when I wasn't able to. It helps knowing that someone... that you were there for them."
"I didn't really do much for them. Especially Sharon." Tony was speaking so quietly that even Steve could barely hear him.
"You did your best, though," Steve pointed out. "And you helped them all eventually. They were better off than they would have been if you hadn't been there." He smiled.
Tony looked grateful, and Steve was glad that he had been able to do something to cheer the man up. They were friends after all, and while Tony had seemed to be initially excited to see him upon his return from the dead, he had sunk into something resembling a depression after the initial few days.
Still, Tony didn't respond, and Steve wasn't sure what he should say next. He hated this awkwardness between them, he wanted things to go back to normal. He wanted everything to go back to normal. To how it was before he died. Before the Civil War. Before Stamford.
"I was just wondering," Steve said, "if maybe you had a recommendation for someone for me to talk to. Not a psychiatrist," he said quickly, remembering what he'd been told of Sharon's experiences and role in his death, "but I thought that maybe we... that I... just to get caught up on what has been going on."
"It isn't any easier the second time around, is it," Tony asked.
"No," Steve said sadly. "I had hoped that it would be. Its just different."
Tony nodded. "Maybe you should talk to Jean," he suggested.
"Jean?" Steve asked in surprise.
"Yeah, she came back from the dead a couple of weeks before you did," Tony told him. "And she's certainly been through this a few times before." He rolled his eyes. "Hard to keep track with all the X-People. Always coming back. Just like you," he smiled. "I knew you would come back. I mean, I hoped you would." He paused. "It wasn't worth it you know," he said. "After you were gone, I mean."
"I'll go talk to her," Steve said. He didn't respond to Tony's other comment. He wasn't really sure what to say.
~*~
Jean Grey was living in the newly rebuilt (again, Steve wasn't sure exactly how many times the school had been destroyed, but it was quite a few) Xavier Institute for Higher Learning. She looked glad to see him.
"Welcome back," she said, embracing him briefly and leading him into her personal study. "You look like you've had a lot to get used to." She gestured for him to take a seat on the couch, and she joined him there.
"Not as many years have gone by," he agreed, "but there have still been a lot of changes." He wasn't sure how Tony thought she would be able to help him, even if she had come back herself.
Jean nodded. "I know what you mean," she agreed. "So, Iron Man sent you."
"How did you know?" Steve asked. "Has he sent others to you?"
"That too," Jean agreed. "But you forget," she said tapping her head, "I can read minds, and you were projecting."
Steve wasn't sure how he felt about that. Usually telepaths stayed out of his mind, at least when he hadn't given them permission to be in there.
"I wasn't prying," Jean said. "Its a side effect of coming back. Everything is more raw, more... there. You'll get back to normal soon enough." She smiled. "Besides, I'm sure that SHIELD practically has a class in how many times I've come back from the dead. Although really, those numbers are greatly exaggerated," she added wryly.
Steve nodded. "I've been presumed dead before," Steve said, knowing he wasn't telling he anything she didn't already know. "And being found in the ice... it was still a lot to get used to. But it didn't feel this awkward. No, it always seemed a bit odd," he corrected himself, "but it got easier over time. This just seems to be getting progressively more difficult."
"I've never come back to find that a lifetime has passed... if we don't count getting sent a thousand years into the future, anyway," she added. "Its a big difference coming back to find out that everything you know is gone and most of the people you know are dead versus coming back to find out that while you were gone your husband has gotten into another relationship, or your son has died." Her tone grew wistful at the end, and Steve knew she was no longer talking about him.
"Or find out that you've been replaced," he suggested.
"In more ways than one, sometimes," Jean agreed. "In relationships, on a team, even sometimes your code name." She looked him directly in the eye. "Like Bucky replaced you."
"I'm proud of Bucky and everything that he's done since I've been... gone," Steve said. "I'm proud of all of them."
Jean smiled, a bit patronizingly. "Are you planning on letting him keep the name then?"
He paused. "I... hadn't really thought about that."
"Are you sure?" she asked.
"I would like to keep the name," he admitted. "I've been Captain America for so long, I've never really felt comfortable outside of it. But I don't want to take it from Bucky... although I wish he'd do something about the black in the costume."
"If there's one thing I've learned coming back," Jean said, "its that we reach instinctively for some sort of normalcy in our lives. To reassure ourselves that we're really here and that things truly are going to be okay. Even if its going back to old relationships that we know aren't working, to places that we are already familiar with, to people we know and love. We think we need these things," she stressed, "even if they may not be the best for us. Because we aren't entirely ready to move on. We're too busy trying to reassure ourselves that we have a place to move on to." She sighed. "And then we run the risk of never being able to move on, instead being stuck in the same patterns and..." she trailed off. "But we really aren't talking about me, today. We're talking about you."
Steve had been quiet while Jean had rambled on, trying to absorb everything that she'd been saying. Even if she had been talking about herself, most of it did apply to him as well. He had wanted the familiar, to be a part of a team, part of the Avengers again. To be friends with Tony again, instead of the near enemies they had been right before his death.
"You've actually given me a lot to think about," he said to her, getting to his feet. "Thank you, Jean, and I wish you the best of luck." He held out his hand.
"You too, Captain America," Jean said, giving him a salute before she shook his hand. "And it will get easier in time," she reminded him. She raised an eyebrow. "You know, Tony does feel the same way. About everything."
"Oh." Steve wasn't entirely sure what she was talking about, but for some reason he felt incredibly grateful for this information.
She laughed. "You'll figure it out. Don't worry about it," she said, leading him out of the mansion.
~*~
Steve found himself back in Tony's office.
"I thought we should talk about how you're readjusting," Tony said. "In my capacity as Director of SHIELD I do need to stress the importance of you registering, and maybe we could go over -"
"You mean you haven't registered me?" Steve asked in surprise.
"No," Tony said. "I wanted to give you the choice. We've updated the SHRA and fixed a lot of the things that you were opposed to. I did listen to you, Steve, I really did. If you hadn't..." he trailed off, and Steve could see the pain in his eyes. He hadn't entirely realized how badly Tony had been affected by his death. How badly everyone had been. He had seen the video of his funeral, and the reactions of his friends to his return. But he hadn't entirely understood how deeply they had been affected.
"Died," Steve said. "But I did. And things are different now."
"Can't we just go back to how they were before?" Tony asked quietly.
"No," Steve said. "I don't want things to just go back to the way they were."
Tony looked hurt and betrayed. "But," he protested, but Steve shook his head, effectively silencing Tony.
"I think," Steve said, "I'm ready to get on with my life. Be Captain America again, although I need to talk to Bucky first." He hesitated, not sure he should say the next part. "If you'll be there with me."
"Always," Tony said. "And forever."