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harley-sunday · 4 years

Text

A Good Man Goes to War [Prologue]

Summary: Starts right after Civil War. Steve Rogers is done being Captain America and quite happy living a quiet life in a safe house somewhere in Canada. Until Thanos goes after the Infinity Stones. What happens when a good man goes to war?

Pairing: Steve Rogers x OFC (f) Could be read as reader insert.

Warnings: None.

Word count: 2K

Entry for @browngirlmagic‘s writing challenge. My prompt was “Demons run when a good man goes to war.”

AN: Uh, so yeah. I thought this would be a simple oneshot, but then the backstory happened and before I knew I was over 12k words in and so had to divide into multiple parts. Oh well. It happens. Also, I have never actually finished a story before publishing it online, so you can expect regular updates :) Third, I used to big a very big Doctor Who fan and so I always wanted to do something with this prompt and so here we are! This is, I think, unlike anything I have written before, mostly because it’s not from a reader’s POV. I like it, and I hope you do too. Please let me know what you think ♥

I don’t do taglists, but if you follow Harley Sunday x Steve Rogers you should see any update I post.

Masterlist

PROLOGUE

He’s not quite sure how he ended up here.

Well, he thinks then, that’s not completely true. He was there when the call was made, overhearing Fury as he asked the person on the other end of the line for a favor. There was some gentle persuasion needed and he thinks he heard Nick say something about a promise made a long time ago, but by then the former S.H.I.E.L.D. director had already walked into an empty conference room nearby and only clipped whispers of the conversation made their way to where he was waiting for a decision to be made.

The call ended soon after and the only thing he was told was that a car would come to pick him up the next morning at 5 AM and not to be late. He just nodded, which, he is sure, surprised not only him, but also Fury, because he was never really the type to agree to something that easily. He remembers being so, so tired, not just because of the events that got him here, but because of everything leading up to that and he thinks that must have had something to do with his compliance at the time.

Nick took him to an apartment somewhere downtown for the night, telling him to leave the key in the mailbox the next morning and to stay inside, reminding him there were people who’d rather see him locked up somewhere. The apartment was more a studio, a single bed hidden behind a room divider in the far corner, a small kitchen to his left and a dining table with two chairs to his right.

He wasn’t really hungry but could do with some sleep and so he laid down on the bed, a piece of paper on the wall next to him catching his eye, the handwriting on it rushed as though it was a warning and he was sure the first part of it was missing from the way the paper was torn.

..when a good man goes to war

He read the sentence over and over again, until he felt his eyes getting heavy, and then he drifted off, a restless slumber that only left him feeling more exhausted by the time his alarm went off.

The car took him to JFK Airport where he boarded a commercial flight to Toronto, and he wondered why he couldn’t have just taken the Quinjet until he realized this was, of course, the safer option. No need to compromise the location of the safe house by showing up in a stealth aircraft just because it would be easier. His disguise that day was a Toronto Blue Jays baseball cap and a pair of glasses and even though there was a little boy eyeing him curiously all throughout the flight, he still doesn’t think the kid recognized him.

A smaller plane waited for him at Pearson International Airport, flying him to Thunder Bay in just under two hours. By then it was past noon and the lack of sleep from the night before started to catch up with him as he wondered how much longer he would have to travel to reach his final destination. There was someone waiting for him at the gate, leading him straight down the stairs and onto the tarmac, where he had to grab his duffel bag from a baggage trolley before following the man to one of the hangars on the far end of the airfield. By then it was raining, the gentle breeze from earlier turning into stronger gusts of wind, and he could see the dark promise of a storm starting to form somewhere on the northern horizon.

Somehow he knew the aircraft in the hangar was a Piper Turbo Arrow, with a range of almost seven hundred nautical miles, and so he tried, rather unsuccessfully, to calculate where that could possibly have him end up, but he was too tired to come up with a coherent answer. The man from earlier, who turned out to be the pilot, took his bag from him then and placed it in the hold, informing him that they had a ten-minute takeoff window or else they would have to wait for the storm to pass, and asked him if he was good to go.

They were in the sky minutes later and with the storm front slightly more to his right, he figured they were flying northwest even though that still didn’t really tell him where they were headed. He must have dozed off at some point, because it felt like only minutes later when the pilot informed him he was preparing for landing even though they had been in the air for almost two hours. As soon as they left cruising altitude they hit a bout of turbulence, the small aircraft shaking violently and the pilot joking that the storm had finally caught up with them. But they made it to the ground safely, the heavy rain hammering down on them once they excited the plane.

He thanked the pilot, grabbed his bag, made sure the phone, of which he had given the number to Tony and Tony only, was still in the pocket of his jacket, and walked over to the main building which, by the looks of it served as both the arrival and departure hall. It was empty except for what he assumed to be a janitor mopping the floors. He sat down on one of the chairs, wondering if there was another flight he would have to take and if it maybe was delayed because of the bad weather. Leaning back in his seat he stretched out his legs in front of him, closing his eyes just for a second.

There was some commotion then, as the double doors opened and a young woman stepped inside, the rain boots she was wearing making a squeaky sound on the tiled floor. She was wearing a long, yellow raincoat, and he thought she brightened up the place instantly. She pulled her hood off and apologized to the janitor for wetting the floor before she made her way over to where he was seated, rambling on about a tree on the road that made her late. She told him she was sorry, that she should have called, but that she didn’t have his number and so that she just tried to get here as soon as possible. He felt some of his weariness disappear from the way she seemed to radiate energy and so he got up instantly and took her outstretched hand, introducing himself as Steve Rogers.

She replied she already knew that, then laughed, almost like she was a little embarrassed, and told him her name with a smile, her hand warm in his. He grabbed his bag and followed her back outside, where an idling SUV, similar to the one Nick Fury used to drive, was waiting for them. He wondered if it was decked out the same way Fury’s was and if so, if she knew how to operate it. He threw his bag in the trunk and sat down on the passenger’s seat, a smile passing over his face when he saw the interior was nothing like Fury’s car, what with an air freshener popped into one of the vents and a tiny stuffed monkey hanging from the rear view mirror.

She put the car into drive and smiled up at him, and somehow he remembers a drop of rain sliding down her face when she told him it would take just under an hour for them to get home. He nodded and leaned back in his seat, enjoying the warmth inside the car and the music she had playing over the radio. A couple of minutes into the drive he caught sight of himself in the window, surprised to see the beginnings of a beard already starting to form. And even though up until now he had always been clean shaven, he decided right then and there he would keep it until, well, things were at least slightly back to normal.

Once they turned off the main road she let him know they were almost there, then, after a few minutes, pointing out the fallen tree that had made her late earlier. She muttered something about having to go back tomorrow to with a chainsaw to clear the road and he wondered just how isolated her place was. As it turned out, very.

Her log cabin was located at the very end of the road, and if he wasn’t mistaken, the last house he saw was miles away, just on the outskirts of town, and they had passed it almost thirty minutes ago. It was the perfect location for a safe house and when he told her so she agreed, even though she did admit it could get a bit lonely in the winter, when the roads would be covered in snow and it could take the snowplow weeks to reach her cabin. She was quick to assure him she liked it that way though, and that she always made sure to stock up well before winter arrived. She promised to show him the greenhouse she used to grow her own vegetables later, but that now what they needed was a some coffee and something to eat.

His stomach growled in response and so he got out of the car, admiring the two story building in front of him. It seemed fairly old, but structurally sound, and he wondered how long it had been hers. It was almost surrounded by tall green pine trees, but behind it he could see a shallow embankment that led to a lake. She motioned for him to follow her inside, out of the rain, the overhanging roof on the back porch already offering some relief. She opened the door and stepped inside, kicking off her rain boots before she lined them up on a shoe rack. Her raincoat followed suit, as she explained that the floor here had heating and so all their wet garments should be dry in no time. She didn’t wait for him, instead made her way to the coffee machine on the counter and switched it on before she walked into the living room, where she muttered something about adding some more wood to the fire.

He took it all in from where he stood, the kitchen to his left, stairs leading up to the second story right in front of him and the living room behind that. He could hear her somewhere in there, the crackling of the fire getting louder as she fed it more wood. He followed her example and untied his shoes before he put them next to hers, his jacket on one of the hooks of the coat rack, the warmth of the floor heating very pleasant.

She told him to sit down, make himself comfortable while she would make him something to eat and he watched her from the couch that was in the far corner of the room, next to the fireplace on one side and some double doors that led to the front porch on the other. The room’s decor simple yet cosy, with candles on every available surface and rows and rows of books in the bookcase across from him. She handed him a cup of coffee then and told him to be careful because it was hot. Another trip to the kitchen brought him a plate with two sandwiches, made with what seemed like homemade bread, and a slice of something sweet for her.

The coffee warmed him up even more and the first bite of the sandwich made him realize just how hungry he was. She let him eat in silence, focused on her coffee and he appreciated the gesture more than he could ever explain.

And so, even though he’s still not quite sure how he ended up here, in this cabin somewhere in Canada, he sure is glad he did.

#Steve Rogers x reader #Steve Rogers fanfic #ayesha1kwritingchallenge #Harley Sunday x Steve Rogers #Steve Rogers

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