When Time Collides ★ [2] ✔

Rise Until Lambs Become Lions

And then I saw a quinjet bustle towards us across the sky. I frowned. Everyone was on the ground, even the Hulk. So who was piloting the jet?

I watched the straggler clones around me look to the jet and raise their metal fists into the sky before being destroyed by Cap and Thor. My eyes widened. 

It was Ultron. Ultron was flying the quinjet!

"Get down!"

Gunfire ripped the peaceful silence as the aircraft soared over our heads. Bullets riddled the ground. I leapt behind the courtyard statue for cover as Thor and Steve jumped the other way. I heard the cracking and splitting of stone.

Dust circulated around us as the quinjet flew away. I was trembling terribly. My heart was beating so fast that it felt like it was going to escape my chest. And then my legs flared in agony. The statue had toppled on top of me.

"Andi!"

I coughed, waving away dust. "Here..."

Steve raced to my side. He briskly lifted the statue and rocks from my legs. He held out his hand and I took it, him carefully pulling me to my feet. "You okay?"

I looked up at him, staring into his worried eyes. And then, for the first time, I accepted what I saw there. For too long I'd tried to push it away, to run and hide from what was truly there in fear of what could be and of my heart being broken again. But I couldn't run any longer. There was something there. We both knew it. We both had known for a while. And it was time to stop running.

"Ever since I laid eyes on you in 1942, I wanted to know you," he began. "Our first drink together. Our first fight. I wanted a friendship with someone that I could hold onto for a lifetime. I wanted someone I could trust, to put all my faith in. I found her: you.

"You've been with me since the day I became Captain America. You've been with me through some of the hardest times in my life. You still stand with me today through everything; New York, HYDRA, Insight, Ultron. You played an important role in moulding me into who I am today. And I've never been more grateful for that.

"I've never had someone more close to me like you, and I can't bear to be without you." He took my hands in his. "You've always told me that I'll understand someday. I understand today. I understand where we stand. I understand how I feel about you. I understand us. I've never understood anything better."

I smiled lovingly as he cupped my scarred and dirty face in his gloved hands. "You've lived thousands of lives, changed so many for the better. If I could do the same, I would love you in all of them. If I could live a thousand lives, I would make you mine in all of them." He brushed away a strand of flaming hair from my face. "I've never loved you more than I do right now, right this second. And will never love you any less right now, right this second."

For the first time in too long, I was listening to what my heart was telling me. It was telling me to take a leap of faith. It was telling me to follow it, no matter where it went. My heart had been telling me what I should do since day one, since the day I'd met the man who rose from a lamb into a lion.

I loved him. I'd loved him from the start. And I'd love him to the end as well.

I edged closer to him as I looked up at him. "I love you, Steven Rogers."

"My heart is, and forever will be, yours, Andromeda. I love you."

As chaos and pandemonium raged around us, our worlds collided with the affectionate and gentle touch of our lips. I gently intertwined my hand with his perfect hair as my other cupped his cheek. His hands hugged my waist and the small of my back.