Into the Ring

Chapter Eighteen-Discovery

*Jo's POV*

It takes me at least a minute of clinging onto Steve like a child for me to control the emotions whirling inside me like a sandstorm. Both of us are crying and god it's pathetic, but neither of us care. The joy and relief coming off of Steve and the same emotions in me are so strong it's impossible to keep all of it inside us.

"Rogers, we all want a turn. Hands off." Natasha's voice drifts over and he reluctantly lets me go and swipes a thumb across my cheeks to catch some tears. Natasha has a soft smile on her face as she waves the rest of the team forward. I run to Sam and it must be a soldier thing to lift me up, because he does so before spinning me around.

"Just want everyone here to know that I called it!" He says and brings laughter back to the team and gets a slap on the back of the head from Bucky.

Tony accepts me and rubs a nearly shaking hand over my hair. "Stop scaring us, kiddo. We're old men now." He whispers and I resist telling him that of those old men there are two unaging super-soldiers. I lend him a little of my strength to steady him before we part and make a point of looking into his amber eyes.

"Next time, Iron Dad." He sighs and smiles before clearing his throat and stepping aside to reveal the man I'm most anxious to see. Finally, I'm faced with Peter last and it's the one that matters the most. While the rest of us are holding our tears in, mostly, Peter has tear tracks on his cheeks and red rims around his eyes. Always said he felt more than anyone else. He smiles a watery smile and sniffles slightly. I shake my head.

"Peter...I'm so sorry." A few tears escape my eyes. "I didn't mean to put you through this. Any of you..." I trail off when he steps forward and crushes me to his chest

"I'll take whatever you throw at me as long as you come back to me in the end, Jo." He tells me, then pulls away and frames my face with his hands. His thumb grazes my scar and wipes away a few tears before he presses his lips to mine. My arms wrap around his neck to keep him close. We part only when we hear Shuri's voice and I bring the little bracelet she gave me between us.

"Not exactly something I wanted to see, but glad your memory is back. I found out what the problem was if you're interested!" The little hologram tells us. "Come down to the bottom level of the lab." Her figure disappears and I turn with Peter's arm settling around my waist.

"I love you." He murmurs into my ear and my arm wraps around him as well. My eyes scan my family as they all do their best to keep themselves together.

"Phew, we've all gone a little soft, haven't we?" The group chuckles and sniffles softly.

"We heading down, Jo?" Steve asks and I get a distinct feeling that he's coming whether invited or not. I glance at Peter and he tugs me a little tighter against him to say he's coming.

"We are. You all can come if you want." Natasha chuckles again and everyone turns to her in surprise. Laughter from her is a rarity.

"Don't think you're leaving our sight for a while, Jo." She tells me with uncharacteristically soft eyes. I nod in understanding before Peter and I lead the charge back into Shuri's lab.

"What's going on?" I question once the group has gathered at my back. Shuri turns from her computers and blinks at the small army suddenly in her lab. I shrug helplessly. There was no stopping them. She walks towards us and tugs the floating hospital bed forward before pulling up a hologram of my brain on top of it.

"I was looking at things from a science perspective," She says and rounds the hologram to stand by my side, "when I should have looked at it from a psychological perspective." Her bright eyes turn to me but she sighs when she sees I don't understand. "With Sergeant Barnes, his memories were skewed purposefully and by others. Your memories were locked away by your subconscious because of an emotional overload. That's why you crashed!" She tells me excitedly, thrilled at the revelation of new information. She's a lot like Peter, really. When I don't seem excited enough, she puts her hands on my wrists over the bangles. "You remember when I told you the brain has more than four million years of memory in it?" She asks urgently with bright eyes.