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breakinglight11) wrote2021-04-12 10:56 pm
breakinglight11) wrote2021-04-12 10:56 pm
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“His Part to Play” - 16. Maria
Forever Captain:
“His Part to Play”
By Phoebe Roberts
~~~
Summary: “Steve Rogers has retired to the 1940s to build a new life with Peggy. In leaving behind the mantle of Captain America, at last he’s got a measure of peace. Still, Steve will never stop feeling the responsibility to step up as a hero— except he's not sure how much power his actions have at this point in the timeline. Somehow he must reconcile his new life and identity with the responsibility and burden of being a hero out of time.”
Previous chapters:
1. Lost Time
2. Building
3. Reaching
4. Bonds
5. Ghost
6. Stag Night
7. Wingmen
8. Mr. Carter
9. Smoke Gets In Your Eyes
10. Suiting Up
11. On Maneuvers
12. Waiting
13. The World’s Oldest Battle
14. A Pinch of Salt
15. Elizabeth
Chapter summary: As time goes on and Steve begins to see events he recognizes, his worries return about his impact on the progress of the timeline.
“His Part to Play”
By Phoebe Roberts
~~~
Summary: “Steve Rogers has retired to the 1940s to build a new life with Peggy. In leaving behind the mantle of Captain America, at last he’s got a measure of peace. Still, Steve will never stop feeling the responsibility to step up as a hero— except he's not sure how much power his actions have at this point in the timeline. Somehow he must reconcile his new life and identity with the responsibility and burden of being a hero out of time.”
Previous chapters:
1. Lost Time
2. Building
3. Reaching
4. Bonds
5. Ghost
6. Stag Night
7. Wingmen
8. Mr. Carter
9. Smoke Gets In Your Eyes
10. Suiting Up
11. On Maneuvers
12. Waiting
13. The World’s Oldest Battle
14. A Pinch of Salt
15. Elizabeth
Chapter summary: As time goes on and Steve begins to see events he recognizes, his worries return about his impact on the progress of the timeline.
~~~
16. Maria
Fatherhood may have aroused his worries for the future, but Steve found more than anything, it grounded him in the present. Elizabeth was so full of energy and curiosity, and she lived only in the moment. Her joy, her sadness, her love, her need, all of it held him there with her, and it left him too busy to dwell. It was the first period in his life since the war that the days seemed to go quickly by.
The truth was he liked being Grant Carter, Peggy's husband and Elizabeth's dad— not quite a regular guy, but close enough to make no matter, about whom the most remarkable thing was he was a stay at home father, maybe in a bit better shape than most of the fellows in the neighborhood. There was more to his days than just the weight of responsibility, and at last, he found his thoughts no longer drifted quite so frequently back to his previous life.
It wasn't that he never thought of it, his time in the twenty-first century, his old comrades and friends. He could never really leave them behind, not when they'd meant so much. But he was fully in this time now, moving forward on this path, with a sense of place and purpose that had so long been missing. There were things to do, panels to sketch and dinners to make, pigtails to braid and raised garden beds to build, pick up games and fishing holes and movie dates and mystery novels, people to love and care for and protect. Amidst all that, the ghosts just didn't haunt him as they used to. He was so present, in fact, that he was actually able to be surprised by the oncoming march of the future.
His first awareness came innocently enough. Peggy had just returned from a business trip with Howard, where she'd been serving as his government liaison for a consultation he'd been called in on. They'd attended a reception in the evening, and when Peggy had refused to let Howard tell people she was his date, he immediately went on the prowl. Apparently at the reception he'd zeroed in on some frosty blonde with her hair in a chignon and a king's ransom of diamonds on her neck. He introduced himself with studied casualness, expecting the usual flutter in response. But far from swooning, she'd taken one look at him and already had his number.
"Of course, Mr. Stark," the girl had drawled. "Yes, when you're new money, you make sure everyone's heard of you."
Howard wasn't thrown for more than a moment before firing back. "How about Hitler and Mussolini? You heard of those fellas? Because they heard of me. And if they hadn't, you can bet we all wouldn't be here for drinks and dancing."
But the young woman didn't bat an eyelash. "I'm afraid I keep a better class of company, sir. And I suggest you do the same."
He spent the whole night trading barbs with her, by turns storming off in a huff and chasing her down for yet another round. And even after they parted, his eyes followed her around the room wherever she went.
"Can you believe that?" Howard had groused. "Where does she get off, talking to me like that?"
Peggy couldn't help but laugh at him. "Oh, you love it."
"Damn but you may be right." He glowered at the very thought. "I don't know whether to tell her to go to hell, or come to dinner."
"Knowing you, Howard," Peggy had told him. "You'll likely do both."
Steve was listening with half an ear at this point; Peggy took a perverse sort of joy in rolling her eyes at Howard's exploits, and he presumed this was no different. "So who is this girl, who can resist the charms of Howard Stark?"
"It's not as rare as one might think," Peggy sniffed. "In case you've forgotten. I didn't speak to her myself, but apparently she's from some very posh, high-society family."
"Oh, yeah? Anyone I've ever heard of?"
"Maybe if you've been reading the society pages. The name was Carbonell," she told him. "Maria Collins Carbonell."
A beat went by as Steve took that in. His head lifted. Peggy eyed him. "What?"
He stared. She raised a brow. "You know something."
He hemmed and hawed. She regarded him sidelong. "Steve," she said, sternness in her voice. "I know you can't tell me everything. But when your face does anything approaching what it just did, you can't expect me not to ask."
He swallowed hard, all attempt at a poker face abandoned. "She's the one."
Peggy gaped. "What?"
"The one, Peg. The one and only, the last one— the one for him."
"Steven Grant Rogers Carter," she said slowly. "Are you telling me not only that there exists a woman to make an honest man of Howard Stark, but that she walks the earth in our own time?"
He couldn't help but grin. "Lucky guy. No time travel needed. Although…" Steve winked at her. "The right girl is worth skipping around a little."
"Well, we all knew that." She came in close and snuggled into his lap. "What's she like? This legend of a woman?"
"I never met her," Steve said. "I'm as curious as you are."
Peggy chuffed into his neck. "Mrs. Howard Stark. Now this I've got to see."
The truth was, Steve actually knew very little about Maria. Tony had rarely brought up his father except to rail, and his mother only when he was drunk and maudlin, like at the end of the night on Thanksgiving or Christmas. Of course a man's troubled reminiscences of his parents weren't going to be the same view a contemporary would have. But Steve would never forget what the man said, at the most desperate point of his conflict with Tony, when they had been literally reduced to trading blows. When that raw look came into his eyes upon learning the truth of what happened to his parents.
"I don't care," Tony had said. "He killed my mom." Even in the heat of the moment, it was not lost on Steve that he invoked her to the exclusion of Howard.
It wasn't just that he wanted to know who that woman was. Howard and Maria were a known element from his previous life. A benchmark in the flow of time as he knew it. The thing about returning that weighed the heaviest on his mind, persisting even to this day, was his uncertainty about what his presence here meant for the progress of the timeline. Would he do something to interfere, for well or for ill, whether he intended to or not?
And then there was the question of if he had a responsibility to. Marriage to Howard might very well be the signing of Maria's death warrant. What were the odds she'd become the Winter Soldier's target any other way? Did he have some kind of moral obligation to warn her away from bringing Howard into her life? But in this different timeline, he had no way of knowing if that threat still loomed. What if things were different now, and in interfering, he destroyed Maria's life and happiness in some other way?
And then there was Tony, who would never exist if his parents never came together. Among countless smaller effects, what would it mean for this reality if Thanos would someday be there and Tony was not? The endlessness of possibility was enough to stagger him. There could be a thousand permutations still within chance, and he did not believe for a moment he could keep a handle on any of them.
Only one thing was certain. Time was marching onward.
~~~
Next chapter: 17. Swinging for the Fences
16. Maria
Fatherhood may have aroused his worries for the future, but Steve found more than anything, it grounded him in the present. Elizabeth was so full of energy and curiosity, and she lived only in the moment. Her joy, her sadness, her love, her need, all of it held him there with her, and it left him too busy to dwell. It was the first period in his life since the war that the days seemed to go quickly by.
The truth was he liked being Grant Carter, Peggy's husband and Elizabeth's dad— not quite a regular guy, but close enough to make no matter, about whom the most remarkable thing was he was a stay at home father, maybe in a bit better shape than most of the fellows in the neighborhood. There was more to his days than just the weight of responsibility, and at last, he found his thoughts no longer drifted quite so frequently back to his previous life.
It wasn't that he never thought of it, his time in the twenty-first century, his old comrades and friends. He could never really leave them behind, not when they'd meant so much. But he was fully in this time now, moving forward on this path, with a sense of place and purpose that had so long been missing. There were things to do, panels to sketch and dinners to make, pigtails to braid and raised garden beds to build, pick up games and fishing holes and movie dates and mystery novels, people to love and care for and protect. Amidst all that, the ghosts just didn't haunt him as they used to. He was so present, in fact, that he was actually able to be surprised by the oncoming march of the future.
His first awareness came innocently enough. Peggy had just returned from a business trip with Howard, where she'd been serving as his government liaison for a consultation he'd been called in on. They'd attended a reception in the evening, and when Peggy had refused to let Howard tell people she was his date, he immediately went on the prowl. Apparently at the reception he'd zeroed in on some frosty blonde with her hair in a chignon and a king's ransom of diamonds on her neck. He introduced himself with studied casualness, expecting the usual flutter in response. But far from swooning, she'd taken one look at him and already had his number.
"Of course, Mr. Stark," the girl had drawled. "Yes, when you're new money, you make sure everyone's heard of you."
Howard wasn't thrown for more than a moment before firing back. "How about Hitler and Mussolini? You heard of those fellas? Because they heard of me. And if they hadn't, you can bet we all wouldn't be here for drinks and dancing."
But the young woman didn't bat an eyelash. "I'm afraid I keep a better class of company, sir. And I suggest you do the same."
He spent the whole night trading barbs with her, by turns storming off in a huff and chasing her down for yet another round. And even after they parted, his eyes followed her around the room wherever she went.
"Can you believe that?" Howard had groused. "Where does she get off, talking to me like that?"
Peggy couldn't help but laugh at him. "Oh, you love it."
"Damn but you may be right." He glowered at the very thought. "I don't know whether to tell her to go to hell, or come to dinner."
"Knowing you, Howard," Peggy had told him. "You'll likely do both."
Steve was listening with half an ear at this point; Peggy took a perverse sort of joy in rolling her eyes at Howard's exploits, and he presumed this was no different. "So who is this girl, who can resist the charms of Howard Stark?"
"It's not as rare as one might think," Peggy sniffed. "In case you've forgotten. I didn't speak to her myself, but apparently she's from some very posh, high-society family."
"Oh, yeah? Anyone I've ever heard of?"
"Maybe if you've been reading the society pages. The name was Carbonell," she told him. "Maria Collins Carbonell."
A beat went by as Steve took that in. His head lifted. Peggy eyed him. "What?"
He stared. She raised a brow. "You know something."
He hemmed and hawed. She regarded him sidelong. "Steve," she said, sternness in her voice. "I know you can't tell me everything. But when your face does anything approaching what it just did, you can't expect me not to ask."
He swallowed hard, all attempt at a poker face abandoned. "She's the one."
Peggy gaped. "What?"
"The one, Peg. The one and only, the last one— the one for him."
"Steven Grant Rogers Carter," she said slowly. "Are you telling me not only that there exists a woman to make an honest man of Howard Stark, but that she walks the earth in our own time?"
He couldn't help but grin. "Lucky guy. No time travel needed. Although…" Steve winked at her. "The right girl is worth skipping around a little."
"Well, we all knew that." She came in close and snuggled into his lap. "What's she like? This legend of a woman?"
"I never met her," Steve said. "I'm as curious as you are."
Peggy chuffed into his neck. "Mrs. Howard Stark. Now this I've got to see."
The truth was, Steve actually knew very little about Maria. Tony had rarely brought up his father except to rail, and his mother only when he was drunk and maudlin, like at the end of the night on Thanksgiving or Christmas. Of course a man's troubled reminiscences of his parents weren't going to be the same view a contemporary would have. But Steve would never forget what the man said, at the most desperate point of his conflict with Tony, when they had been literally reduced to trading blows. When that raw look came into his eyes upon learning the truth of what happened to his parents.
"I don't care," Tony had said. "He killed my mom." Even in the heat of the moment, it was not lost on Steve that he invoked her to the exclusion of Howard.
It wasn't just that he wanted to know who that woman was. Howard and Maria were a known element from his previous life. A benchmark in the flow of time as he knew it. The thing about returning that weighed the heaviest on his mind, persisting even to this day, was his uncertainty about what his presence here meant for the progress of the timeline. Would he do something to interfere, for well or for ill, whether he intended to or not?
And then there was the question of if he had a responsibility to. Marriage to Howard might very well be the signing of Maria's death warrant. What were the odds she'd become the Winter Soldier's target any other way? Did he have some kind of moral obligation to warn her away from bringing Howard into her life? But in this different timeline, he had no way of knowing if that threat still loomed. What if things were different now, and in interfering, he destroyed Maria's life and happiness in some other way?
And then there was Tony, who would never exist if his parents never came together. Among countless smaller effects, what would it mean for this reality if Thanos would someday be there and Tony was not? The endlessness of possibility was enough to stagger him. There could be a thousand permutations still within chance, and he did not believe for a moment he could keep a handle on any of them.
Only one thing was certain. Time was marching onward.
~~~
Next chapter: 17. Swinging for the Fences