Fic: The Prices We're Willing to Pay (Prologue & 1/?)
Title: The Prices We’re Willing to Pay
By: TriplePirouette/3Pirouette
Spoilers: AU of the Infinity Saga and Phase 4.
Disclaimer: They're not mine.
Distribution: AO3 Anyone else please ask first :)
Story Summary: Inspired by Multiverse of Madness. What if it had all gone differently, and Peggy had nothing left to lose?
A/N: Yes, this may be another WIP. (I KNOW, I know…) For Steggy Week Day 6: What If…? I wrote this right after I saw Multiverse of Madness. I can’t get this idea out of my head. When I do write it, it will be short scenes from each movie/important continuity spots with a lot of space for either the reader to fill in their own thoughts or for me to go back and add scenes in afterwards. “Dates” are signified by what movie in the order we’re looking at an AU of…
~*~
Prologue: What Have you Lost?
(Multiverse of Madness)
She turned, livid. “How dare you, Strange!”
“The Peggy Carter I knew…”
She shook her head, eyes wild. “That woman is gone. That life is gone. I have given ev—” Her chest heaved with emotion and she took a deep, shuddering breath. “I have given everything for this universe. My family, my friends. Steve and I fought—”
“And don’t you think he’d—”
“I don’t care!” She bellowed, the blue flare of power rising from her fingers as her feet left the ground. “I don’t care,” she whispered, lowering herself. “You don’t know what it was like, losing our whole lives to try to destroy Hydra only to find out it had never really been gone. To find out the horrors we fought so hard against had taken hold here in the future. To lose everything and still fight and then…” Tears fell from her lashes, her chin wavered but she continued. “You don’t know what it was like, feeling his lips on mine one second then feeling their absence as he ran to the edge of that cliff.” She stepped towards him, her eyes boring into his. When I woke up with that stone in my hand and my husband gone, I had nothing left to lose.”
He stood tall against her. “You enslaved a town!”
“I gave myself what I deserved!” Her anger radiated off of her in waves, crackling through the air like fire. “I gave everything for this universe! And I’ve never gotten a single thing back.” The laugh that fell from her lips surprised them both, but she kept chuckling until she was nearly manic. “How am I supposed to live off of hope and getting a pat on the back for doing good?” She doubled over, tears spilling from her lashes. “How- how was I supposed to stop him?”
“Creating a child, creating a fake life out of thin air—”
“It was real!” She bit out, standing up with a sneer on her face. “I couldn’t throw myself off that cliff because that child was real. Then, there, in that moment I was carrying Steve’s child.” She didn’t stop even though Strange sunk back, surprised and full of sadness for her. “Our baby was real right until the moment Thanos came back and bombarded us with explosions.” Her voice softened. “There was so much blood. I didn’t realize what had happened right away. Not for days, really. I didn’t know the pain wasn’t just from being thrown around trying to save humanity.” Her tears fell heavy now as she stepped back. “I lost everything saving humanity. Everything.”
Strange took a slow breath. “I’m sorry for that, Peggy, I truly am.” He held out a hand. “None of us have gotten through this without loss.”
She looked at him and his hand for a long second, even thought about taking it, but she’d come so far, and she wasn’t going to let this opportunity pass her by. Her smile was twisted as he felt his feet lift off the ground and he struggled against invisible bonds. “And what have you lost, Sorcerer Supreme?”
~*~
Chapter 1: The Hero Origin Story
(Captain America: The First Avenger, part 1)
“Perhaps you’d be more comfortable—”
Erskine’s words died on his lips as they noticed the commotion in the viewing area, as MPs rushed the area, and the Generals rallied to fight a man in a suit.
There wasn’t time for a plan or ideas, no time to even think before the shots started to bounce wildly off machinery. By instinct only, Peggy turned, pushing Steve in front of her and to the relative shielding of the pod he was destined for in just a few minutes.
Breathless, he tried to switch their positions so that his back was the one exposed, but he only managed to struggle them sideways in the little pod. “Agent Carter,” he huffed out, unsure what he was going to follow it up with.
“Stay down!” She ordered, pressing his head against the padded bed and turning to pull her gun from her hip.
Before she could pull it out, an explosion rocked the facility, tumbling them back in the pod. They gripped each other tight as the brightness of the explosion faded, the pod closing in on them.
“What’s happening?” Erskine weakly called out.
“It’s damaged!” Stark’s voice was likewise scratchy. “Was there anyone in there?”
Peggy, groggy from the tumble back, shook her head and tried to bang on the glass, the space tight but not unmanageable. “We’re in here!”
“Hold tight,” Stark yelled.
“You ok?” Steve asked, wiggling in her arms.
“Fine. You?”
He didn’t get to answer. Another explosion bounced the whole apparatus and power surged through the cords. Needles that had been meant for Steve’s arms pressed in, preprogrammed to spill their precious elixir the moment the touched flesh. Instead of the meat of the biceps, the rows of needles found their spines and one thigh each of Steve and Peggy as they laid sideways. They both jolted at the sensation, surprised and scared.
Peggy’s breath shook, and she wasn’t sure if she was holding harder to Steve, he was grasping tighter, or they’d both simply latched on for dear life to the other as the bright light of the vita rays started to bounce around in the pod.
“Turn it off!” They heard Erskine shout.
Stark sounded nearly as panicked as they felt. “I can’t. It’s not responding!”
“Pull the plug!”
“That could kill them, too!”
It felt hot, like a million suns burning her skin, like a million needles in every inch of flesh, like her bones wanted to explode from her body. Suddenly, it felt like there wasn’t enough space, like there wasn’t enough air. She held tight to Steve, eyes pressed closed against the light.
She’d been prepared to die in this war, but she never thought it’s be like this.
The light and heat melted away, but it still felt too tight, too small.
She could feel Steve breathing against her, but somehow, they’d shifted and her head was cradled against his chest. She blinked her eyes open and couldn’t see a thing, but felt the rocking and grunting of the men outside trying to pry the doors open.
Steve’s voice was breathy and tired. “Agent Carter?”
“Call me Peggy,” she whispered, realizing this his chest was no longer the bony, frail thing she’d hugged to her to save him, but rather quite large and rumbling under her cheek. “If we manage to survive this, I think you can call me Peggy.”
“We’re… we’re gonna be ok.” He didn’t sound nearly as convinced as he wanted to be, she was sure.
Her hands shifted a little, taking in the muscle at his hips that hadn’t been there before, spanning inches that didn’t exist before. “You’re larger,” she whispered.
His hand ran over her arm, and she flexed under the tickling sensation. “I think we both are.”
Her breaths were finally slowing, and she began to relax in his arms, the yelling of the men outside less and less of a worry. “That why it seems so small in here?”
“Guess so.” He shifted under her. “This… this is going to sound weird.”
She laughed a bit. “Try me. I highly doubt anything you say right now would surprise me.”
“I can smell you.”
“You’ve surprised me.”
“No, no I…” She could feel the heat travel up his skin as he stuttered. “I haven’t been able to smell much of anything since I was ten, and you… you smell nice.” His chest moved against her. “I can take a deep breath, too, without coughing.”
She smiled against his chest. “I’m glad something worked, then.”
Without preamble, the pod tipped again. The doors tilted open with a creek and Peggy and Steve spilled out to the floor. They both looked up, surprised at the fire and ash around them.
Erskine and Stark looked down at them, just as amazed.
“It worked?” Stark asked, pulling off his goggles.
Erskine smiled. “It worked.”
“Peggy…” Steve mumbled, reaching out. She turned and looked at him just as he looked down and saw his own arm.
He was enormous, busting at the seams of his clothes, and as she reached out, she heard the own cloth of her shirt tear. She looked down at where her arm had bust through the fabric, the ripple of her bicep showing through.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Part 1 - Written for the 2021 Steggy Secret Santa event for Bri, @fantastic-fantasy-fanfics. I hope you enjoy! Wishing you a joyous and healthy new year! So happy we met through the Steggy fandom!
In addition, there’s a Spotify playlist link included at the beginning of the story, which I’ll also post on Tumblr separately.
This story also fulfills the Steggy Bingo Bash 2021 prompt “Steve is a super shitty cook” and Steve Rogers Bingo 2021 “Slow Burn”.
Summary: “The war is over, and Steve Rogers and Captain Peggy Carter are celebrating their first Hanukkah together. They are finally sharing a home, albeit Steve’s small apartment in Brooklyn at the moment. Steve cooks dinner with the help of Mrs. Friedman, his elderly Jewish neighbor, who is like his own grandmother. Jarvis drops by with a gift from him and Ana.”
This morning was being specially awful, Subaru was recovering from a hangover so his usual aloof attitude turned into a grumpy attitude. On his way to the band rehearsal, he decided to grab a coffee and eat something trying to improve his humour… As if.
He put on a cap almost covering his eyes and a mask, hoping to don’t be bothered by anyone until he arrived to the studio. When he got in line for the coffee, he noticed that he forgot his glasses at home and wasn’t wearing contacts either. Shit. Whatever.
When a tall pompous guy approached him to tell that Baru was “taking his place”, he just looked over the dark circles under his eyes and said in a harsh tone (the same kind used to pick up an unknown number call). took a deep breath. It wasn’t worthy picking a fight that early.
“Huh?!! Excuse you!! I can’t see you name written here.”
“It wasn’t my intention taking your place. I am sorry.” he answers politely and takes a step back.
The true was he couldn’t see shit even if it was written there.
“Anyways, it’s just coffee. Be gentle and give priority to elderly people.”
Taking his cellphone from his pocket, he starts scrolling the news feed distractedly hoping that it makes the line go faster.
