Fic: A Good Man Is Hard To Find, Captain America, Ensemble Title: A Good Man Is Hard To Find Author: Oneangrykate Fandom: Captain America (w/sundry Young Avengers, as requested) Rating: PG Pairing: Steve Rogers, Bucky Barnes, Young Avengers ensemble. Recipient: for glossing. It was a joy to write this for you. Notes: set sometime between Captain America #25 and #34.
“No,” Eli says when he hears the proposal. “Absolutely not. There are so many ways of that going wrong, and we're not going to risk it.”
Billy just nods and says “okay", and everyone seems to nod in agreement, and instead of rightfully taking this as a sign that things are amiss, Eli takes them at their word and lets himself be corralled into helping Kate pack up her gear out by the Kaplan's front door.
Kate doesn't even thank him for helping, just cuts him off when he tries to return to the meeting. “Sorry, Eli, but I can't let you go any further for a minute there.”
“What the hell, Kate?” Like an idiot, he only then gets it. “That was a ruse?”
“It was a pretty sneaky plan.” Kate must practice in the mirror for hours at a time to make her smirk so aggravating. “Really, I was surprised that you fell for it.”
“So am I! I thought we'd already decided against this. As a team. You know, what we are?” He makes a move toward Billy's closed door.
Kate crosses her arms and stands firm. “This coming from the guy who tends to defy the rest of the team on a daily basis. You're in no position to talk.”
“Don't you think that if it could be done, someone would've tried it by now?” All he can see is a lid of blue light leaking from under Billy's door, and there's a faint, murmuring hum.
“Or maybe everyone else is too busy sulking and/or gloating that they can't see the solution that's right under their noses.” Kate's infuriating when she's right, but she's even more infuriating when she only thinks she is. “And no barging in, either. Interrupting Billy could screw things up and possibly lead to the building imploding. Though he may have been exaggerating a tad on that last part.”
“Because there's no other way that this could go horribly wrong.” Eli thought this was one of the few hard and fast rules of the universe. “This is crazy. Can Billy even do this?”
Kate seems unconcerned. “He said probably.”
“I don't remember him trying a spell this big before. Has he?"
“The way he described it to me, it's more like stringing a couple of small-to-medium-sized spells together. Easy peasy.”
“So that would be a no.”
“Don't be such a grumpus, Eli.”
“I am not being a -I thought we made decisions as a team,” he repeats, seeing as it obviously hadn't made an impact the first, oh, hundred times or so he'd said it.
“The decision was majority rule. There's no need to sulk because you were overruled.”
“This isn't a democracy! Half of us aren't even here, how can that be majority rule?” Cassie's only contact with the world outside the Initiative is a twice-monthly phone call and the occasional weekend leave, which she spends exclusively with her mother. Eli can't blame her for that. Tommy's too busy doing whatever it is he does to show up when they contact him unless it's a dire emergency.
“There's really no need to get all worked up, okay?” Kate's face is getting red. Eli's glad all over again that the rest of Billy's family is out for the day, seeing as Billy and Teddy are used to the two of them yelling at each other. “Look, it either works or it doesn't. If it doesn't work, then no harm done. If it does work, then everyone will be too busy piling on the hallelujahs that even you couldn't stay cranky for long.”
Behind the door, there's a loud crackle that sounds an awful lot like an exploding microwave oven in its death throes. The light grows blindingly bright, then dissipates.
Kate tries to rub the afterburn out of her eyes. “See? You'll have egg on you face when this all turns out perfectly.” She knocks. “Hey, you alright in there? Did it work?”
There's no response for a few moments. “We're fine,” Teddy finally calls through the door. “But things are… you better come in.”
Eli doesn't know what to expect, but he certainly isn't holding out for a best case scenario. He quickly begins to assume the worst when he sees a circular scorch mark ringing Billy's carpet and a dejected-looking Teddy huddling on the bed. “Is Billy okay?”
“I'm fine. More or less, anyway.” Billy's at the window, a bit wan, more propped up by Teddy than standing.
Eli does a double-take at the bed. The kid on the bed has his knees up to his chin and his arms wrapped around them. He watches them all with wide, baffled eyes.
Billy meets Eli's eyes and lifts a wavering hand. “Look, you can't say that it didn't work.”
Eli sighs. “Tell me what you did,” he says, though he has this sinking feeling that he already knows the answer.
Billy wobbles a little as he indicates the boy on the bed. “Everyone, this is Steve Rogers, age fifteen. Steve Rogers, age fifteen, this is everyone.”
At the moment Eli doesn't care how much it makes him sound like Grandma Faith, he has to say it anyway. “Guys, I leave you alone for one minute...”
***
“See, I thought we'd all learned that Young Avengers and time travel don't mix.” Eli's pacing through the scorch marks on the carpet. “That was, like, rule number one.”
“We wouldn't be Young Avengers if it weren't for time travel,” Kate points out.
“And then we almost got wiped off the map by Kang the Conquerer, all because of – wait for it - time travel. It's just bad, bad news.”
Steve Rogers, age 15, looks at them with –the best way Eli can describe it is a painful earnestness in his eyes. “I'm not sure where I am or what is happening, but have any of you seen a quarter? I seem to have misplaced it.”
“Oh my god,” Kate whispers behind her hand. “He's adorable. Though I wasn't expecting him to be so... small.”
“A whole quarter.” Steve looks down into his hands as if the coin could have snuck back while he wasn't looking. “My mother will be so disappointed in me.” Eli had heard the stories, but he had never realized until now how unhealthy Steve really had been before becoming Cap. He looks like a skeletal child. He looks like he could he upturned by a stiff breeze. “I hope I'm not ill and hallucinating again. Last time was dreadful.”
“Will someone give the poor kid a quarter?” Kate hisses.
Eli throws up his hands. “If you have a vintage circa-1930's one lying around in your wallet, then be my guest.”
“Here.” Billy whispers into cupped hands, then offers a burnished coin to Steve. “Is this it? It was lying on the carpet.”
It looks like three Christmasses on Steve's face all at once. “Oh, thank you so much for finding it. I really ought to be more careful.” He surveys his surroundings again, paying special attention to Billy's computer and everyone's clothing. “Though I suppose that's the least of my problems at the moment.”
“Yeah, you must be pretty freaked out, huh?” Billy purses his lips and backtracks. “I mean to say, you must be surprised. Confused?”
Teddy sits down on the bed beside Steve and starts distracting him with a very abridged explanation behind his relocation from 1936 to the present day, leaving out the fact that he'll actually be the guy that they were looking for in a few years. “And, uh, Billy's magic powers accidentally brought you into the future instead.”
Steve seems to accept this pretty sagely. He seems to be trusting Teddy on the basis of their shared blondness alone. “Just like in the serials. Gee.”
“But we'll send you back, we promise.”
“It wasn't an accident,” Billy says a bit snappishly. “Technically, the spell worked. It just...”
“So darling,” Kate coos. "Can we keep him?"
Eli thinks he has a migraine coming on. “Kate, he isn't a puppy. Billy, how is this 'working'?”
Billy rests his chin in his palms, tilting his desk chair back precariously. “Can't I at least get props for accomplishing some major league magic here?” He coughs a little, and tries to hide the faint blue sparks behind his hand. “That wasn't exactly a walk in the park.”
“It's really awesome, Billy,” Kate assures him. “Even if some people can't be impressed.”
“Hey, don't blame this on the killjoy.” Eli can't win. “Billy, I'm not discounting the effort, but what good is a puny asthmatic pre-serum Steve Rogers going to do?”
“Supervillains will be too busy trying to feed him to accomplish any villainy?”
“Kate.”
Billy does look pretty pale. Eli's never seen him overtaxed from spellcasting, but there's a first time for everything. Zapping bad guys isn't really on the same level as pulling someone out of time. “I didn't mean for it to be this Steve, before he was... you know. But I had to focus on Steve Rogers in particular because there have been other Captain Americas, Eli, you should be the first to know that-”
“You know I know that,” Eli mutters, looking away.
“-so when I was concentrating on him I started thinking about him when he was young, and maybe my mind slipped a little too far off track.. So, technically, I did what I intended. Just, um, not exactly.”
“He is pretty puny, isn't he?” Kate shakes her head like a clucking housewife. “Maybe we should feed him. Teddy, can we feed him?”
Both Teddy and Steve perk up at the mention of food. “Is that a good idea?” Teddy asks.
“Why not? I'll have to-” Billy drops his voice “-modify his memory anyway when we send him back. Might as well show him the wonders of the modern kitchen.”
Teddy stands and offers a hand to Steve, who hesitantly takes it. “It's okay, Steve. Wanna have a sandwich with me?”
Steve is obviously trying to look nonplussed, but his face lights up. “That would be, boy, that would be swell. Only if you can afford to share, of course.” He's been cast into the midst of crazy-looking futuristic strangers and he still has his manners.
“Course we can share. C'mon.” Steve lets Teddy lead him out of the room.
He does look like he could use a hot meal or ten, but Eli gets this mental image of one meal becoming three meals becoming an adoption, and he really needs to nip that in the bud. “Okay. Snacktime, and then we send him back. The sooner we don't have to worry about irrecoverably wrecking the timestream, the better.”
“About that.” Billy coughs again. “You're going to have to wait a bit. Two big-ass spells in a row isn't really doable for me yet. I need to recharge.”
“Well, how long until then?”
Billy sighs. “I'm not sure. Several hours, maybe?”
“You should wait until morning,” Teddy interjects at the doorway. “Remember last month? The thing with the tentacle monster from hell? You were a wreck until you got a good night's sleep.”
“I'm more powerful than I was last month, Mom.” It's a weak protest, since Billy's practically sleepwalking as it is. He crosses to the bed and flops down, burying his face in a pillow.
Eli cranes his head out of the doorway and watches Steve utterly destroy a turkey club. “So, where do we keep him until then? Billy, could your family handle another mouth to feed for the night?”
Billy stirs but doesn't answer. Teddy shakes a blanket out and smooths it over him. “I dunno. Mr. and Mrs. K ask an awful lot of questions at the dinner table. This might be too strange for even them to handle.”
“Kate?”
“I'd love to stash him in a spare bedroom, but my dad is actually in town this week. He flips out and threatens to send me to a convent if a boy so much as comes near the building. I know little Stevie's pretty nonthreatening, but I don't think it would fly.”
Eli can forgive Billy and Teddy – the place must be crowded enough as it is- but he's not thrilled with the way the burden of duty is getting handed off. Sure enough, they're all looking expectantly at him now. “Oh, come on. I'm not bringing His Blondness home with me.”
Kate whaps him on the back like some meathead egging on a varsity teammate. “But you have plenty in common! A friendly demeanor, you like the same colors... okay, maybe not the friendly demeanor.”
Eli moves his hands as to push the idea away from him. “No, no. This whole thing wasn't even my idea.”
“It's okay, Eli, we can keep him here,” Teddy offers. “We can hide him under the bed or something, bribe one of Billy's brothers to throw a tantrum so his parents are distracted.”
Kate smiles with clenched teeth. “You're not going to have to do that, Teddy, because Eli's going to take him.” She shoots Eli a don't-say-no death glare. “Isn't he?”
Eli thinks of Mister Aryan Nation back out in the living room, looking lost in the middle of the Kaplan's overstuffed sofa. “I understand, but does no one else really see the big problem with me taking him home?” Eli doesn't even believe he has to say it. As notoriously mushy liberal as Cap was when they all knew him, nobody really knows when it kicked in. “Maybe he won't want to go home with the black guy.”
Kate opens her mouth, but Steve clears his throat and beats her to it. “It doesn't matter to me.” He wipes a crumb from his mouth. “I don't want to be a bother, but I'd hate for you fellas to think I was some sort of-” He trails off. The speechifying will apparently become much smoother in the years to come, but he has enough of it already to look Eli in the eye, painfully sincere. “People are people and you're a-okay by me.”
"See?" Kate chirps.
“All of you are paying for the taxi,” Eli says.
***
He's busy rehearsing how to introduce Steve to Grandma and keeping Steve on the sidewalk when he almost trips over the motorcycle parked outside their building. Steve boggles at it from a respectful distance; Eli sees the Indian logo and groans out loud. The timing is out of a bad Hollywood movie.
“Is this where you live?” Steve asks, but Eli can't answer. He can only stand there and wait as exchanged goodbyes are said behind their front door, as a man hustles down the steps until he spots them.
“Oh, hey Eli.”
Eli tries not to let his shoulders slump. “Hey, Bucky.”
Bucky comes by once a week or so to talk with his grandfather. From what Grandma Faith says, it isn't talking so much as watching television and sharing some companionable silence. He wonders if it's some sense of duty on Bucky's part, to fill in the holes that Steve had left open, gaping like new wounds. He can't quite see him sitting in their kitchen with a dainty teacup like Steve, but maybe he likes picking up where Steve left off. Eli knows that he haunts Steve's apartment, sleeping like a vagrant on the sofa and leaving the bedroom untouched, as empty as a shrine.
He waits for Bucky to keep going, for him to be too busy or too preoccupied and by some miracle not notice the boy cringing behind Eli, but of course he comes closer. “Is that Teddy?” They're getting a lot of that particular confusion today.
Eli doesn't know how Bucky's going to react to seeing Steve, seeing this Steve, but there's no way not to face up to it. “Ah, no. About that,” he starts, but Steve's stepping out from behind him and looking up at Bucky.
“Hello there. I'm Steve, Steve Rogers. Are you a friend of Eli's?”
Eli wishes he could blind himself to the confusion that grips Bucky's face, followed by numbed shock. He wants to close his ears to the hitched breath and the increased heart rate. He turns on Eli, his voice deceptively low. “What did you kids do?”
“Would you believe me if I told you I was dragged into this kicking and screaming?”
Bucky doesn't hear it. He's pushing past him to stare at Steve. His hands clench and unclench uselessly at his sides. “You...”
Steve's trying very hard not to quaver in his worn out shoes. Bucky's face softens, and he takes Steve's hand. “It's a pleasure to meet you, Steve. You can call me James.”
Eli just feels stupid as he explains the story to Bucky. Bucky, for his part, seems to react the same way Eli's seen him react to everything else: with the same look of resigned, weary disappointment in the universe.
“You kids thought this was a good idea,” he says finally, flatly.
“Not all of us.”
"He's scared half to death. He's." Bucky just shakes his head and jams his hands into his pockets. His shoulders hunch so much as to look like a parody of himself.
“I can tell you two are talking about me, you know,” Steve pipes up. “I'm not frightened. Just... a little overwhelmed.”
Bucky looks back at him. “It's alright, Steve. I'd be frightened, too.” He waits until Steve's caught up to him, then walks in tandem. “It's okay. The place I'm staying isn't far now.”
“Is this a good idea?” Eli watches Bucky punch in the security codes. “Letting him see all this?” There are vintage war bond posters all over Steve Rogers' apartment, photographs of Captain America and Bucky in costume, paraphernalia of a past that's still unthinkable to this Steve.
“You really think he'll recognize himself?”
“Billy's planning on wiping all his memories of this anyway.” Bucky tries his best not to flinch, but Eli's deeply regretting saying that as soon as it leaves his mouth. Bucky just swipes a keycard and ushers them through.
Steve seems to be more taken with the size and scope of the kitchen once they enter than any personal items. His heels squeak on the tile when he swivels to take it all in. “You must be quite well off, Mister James.”
Bucky grunts noncommittally and sifts through a pile of takeout menus on the counter. “What're you hungry for, Steve?” When Steve flushes and starts stammering about how he couldn't possibly, James was too kind, he clarifies his statement. “I'm getting food, and you're going to eat it without feeling guilty or offering to pay me back, okay?”
Steve flushes and crosses his arms. “I just can't accept charity,” he mutters.
“It isn't charity if you're among friends, is it?” The way Bucky treats Steve is – Eli's never seen him act warmly toward anyone. At best, he tolerates people, or acts with a cold, ingrained politeness. But he's friendly, almost gentlemanly towards Steve, more protective older brother than anything.
“You'd call me a friend?” Steve asks, as if he can't believe his good luck.
“If you want me to, Steve.” Bucky leans in, gently, brushing Steve's arm with his human hand. “The thing is, I kind of know you.”
***
“This is Swashbuckler to Crankypants. Come in, Crankypants.”
Eli sets his phone on his shoulder and moves into the kitchen. “Kate.”
“Has the package been delivered?” Her voice is hushed and B-movie dramatic. “I repeat, has the package-”
“I can understand a little paranoia, Kate, but can we talk like real people?”
“I am talking like real people. You never know when the Fascist Avengers are listening. Constant vigilance, Eli.” Tony Stark probably has enough on his plate already than to go around tapping their cell phones, but he can hear Kate suppressing giggles on the other end of the line. “How is he?”
Eli takes a peek into the living room. Bucky's moved into the space on the sofa that Eli just vacated. “He's fine.”
“Define 'fine'. You're not scaring the poor boy, are you?”
“Kate.”
“What?”
“Everything's fine. We're eating pizza and watching movies.” Eli is not going to make things worse by mentioning where they are or who they're with. Don't help Eli, don't get to hang out with the guy that Kate calls 'a total retro dreamboat.' “'We're watching Swing Time.”
“Why, Eli, and here I had you pegged for a Gene Kelly sort. Will wonders never cease?”
He's smiling in spite of himself. “Apparently not.”
“Wait, did they even have pizza in the 1930's?”
“He seemed pretty okay with it to me.” Steve had chomped down half a pie all on his lonesome, actually, gesticulating with his mouth full, telling stories that Bucky, at least, seemed to appreciate.
"Are you pissed at Billy?"
"I’m not pissed at him.” Steve's refrigerator is still covered with photographs (Sam Wilson and his girlfriend, a tall brunette Eli doesn't recognize) and post-its (organic milk?, call sam, call sam). One of the post-its is stuck to the tile below; Eli stoops to turn it over. The phone number doesn't mean anything to him. “I'm not pissed at anyone."
"Uh-huh. You could've fooled me. There was practically steam shooting out of your ears when you left today."
He can't blame Billy for it, can't really blame any of them. “I'm not pissed at Billy. Surely he knows that.”
Kate hums over the receiver, the way she does when she knows he's full of crap. “Teddy wanted me to tell you that we're sorry about the attempted mutiny thing."
First thing after they send Cap back, they're all going to sit down and have a long talk about consensus and the moral ramifications of – huh. He's never seen Bucky laugh before.
“Eli?”
“I'm here.”
"We all know how you feel about Cap, and then we went and passed the buck to you, and that was pretty lame of us. So, we're all really sorry and we owe you one.”
"Is that the Kaplan-Altman party line?"
“No. Pretty much. It's just... we all miss him, Eli.”
Eli watches Bucky and Steve crack up again, leaning on each other as they sob with laughter.“That's not always a good reason to do things.”
“Come on, you can't stand there and tell me that the world wouldn't be tremendously better off if Cap came back first thing tomorrow.”
There's no such thing as a quick fix; Eli's learned that all his life. Supposed solutions only open the door to new, more complicated problems. “It wouldn't be that easy, Kate. You know it.”
He expects another sarcastic remark, but none come. “We're meeting at the Kaplans' tomorrow at nine so we can, you know. Send him back. Don't forget to let Blondie get some shuteye.” She stifles a yawn. “He's so. He's so different, isn't he? Hard to believe that...”
“It isn't that hard to believe.” Not from watching him, it isn't. “Night, Kate.”
“Night, Crankypants.”
Eli presses the post-it back onto the fridge after he hangs up. He doubts anyone will ever need it again, but Bucky seems dead set against throwing even the smallest parts of this life away.
“I understand why you kids did what you did.” Bucky sets the empty popcorn bowl down by the sink. “If I'd known that the Kaplan kid was capable of doing it, I would have thought about asking him myself.”
There's suddenly a bright, horrible vision in Eli's head of a ridiculous custody battle if Bucky refuses to let Steve be sent back.. “He can't stay here.”
“Oh, I know. And Kaplan's gonna have to make him forget.” An attempted smile just settles into a grimace. “Brave new world, I guess.”
“I'm sorry we dragged you into this. Sorry you had to see it.” It's beyond mere shame; Eli wants to crawl into a hole right now.
“I'm not.” Bucky nods toward the living room. “I'd almost forgotten how fun he was, you know? You remember all of the noble parts, all of the serious traits. But he was also funny. And kinda sweet.” He shakes his head as to dispel phantom memories. “I never thought it would be this way.”
The one true tragedy of Steve Rogers' life was that he hadn't been able to save Bucky. Even Eli had known that. But then Bucky couldn't save Steve. It isn't ironic, just cruel.
“Eli.” Bucky's back in the present now. “Do me a favor and don't – don't try it again. Don't try to bring him back.. I'd do anything for him to walk through the door right now, I really would, but we don't get to...”
Eli nods. “Let the man rest in peace.” They should have stayed at the Kaplans'. They've been pouring salt into his wounds all night.
“Even if it's what we don't want.” Bucky exhales, then turns on his heel. He's pressed a smile onto his face by the time he rejoins Steve on the sofa.
***
Eli wakes up on the sofa with a quilt pushed over him. His mouth tastes like chalk, and the night is starting to lift from behind the apartment's windows. He must have fallen asleep around the third movie or so. Leave it to Captain America to own every Fred Astaire film ever made.
“Is it true?”
It takes Eli a moment to locate the source of the voice. Steve's curled on a windowseat. Bucky's slumped beside him. Metal taps against the glass when he shifts closer to Steve. Bucky nods, his face in shadow. They're barely more than silhouettes against the window. “It's true,” Bucky says softly.
A framed photograph lies between them. It's face down, but Eli can easily guess the truth it contains.
Steve wipes his hands over his face. “I feel like I know you already. Like I've known you for years, and now you've-” He drops his head. “Everything's happening at once, and now it all has to go away.”
“You'll know, Steve. Even if you think that you don't.” Bucky cups his shoulders and leans in until their foreheads touch. “You'll find me, I promise.”
Eli closes his eyes and turns his face away, pressing his hands over his ears. He doesn't want to hear the rest of what Bucky's whispering to Steve. It isn't for him. He whites out the sound and doesn't remember anything else until he's waking again, Steve tugging at his shoulder.
“Look.” Steve points toward the yellowing horizon, the sun as round and bright as color set in a paintbox. “It's going to be a beautiful day.”