In Your Eyes // Steve Rogers

49

I relaxed my struggle. Spider-Boy believed it was over, and fell to his bottom beside me. I hiked my leg to my chest and wrapped the back of my knee around his neck, bringing his head between my thighs. I had him stuck in an arm bar in no time.

"I'll still find out your name," I challenged.

"When you do, are you going to call me?" he choked out.

I laughed. "Why, you need a babysitter?"

"Not cool, Ms. Blake!"

"Hey, I remain Ms. Sapphire until you can beat me in a fight," I warned. I released him, popping to my feet. "Well, I gotta go, Spider-Baby. Do your homework, stay in school, make good choices..."

"At least someone thinks I should do my homework," he mumbled, rubbing at his forehead.

I laughed. I walked away. I learned entirely too quick that he faked his headache. The second my back turned, Spider-Boy tried to swing at me, using a web attached to a pole above my head. I was saved by Steve slicing through the thin material with his shield.

"Clara, go!" he shouted.

I dove through another portal across the airport. Coincidentally, I jumped out in front of an on-edge Bucky Barnes.

"We have to go," he said, after he deduced I wasn't a threat to him. "That guy's probably in Siberia by now."

"We have to take out the flyer's," I insisted.

Steve ducked into our hiding spot. "I'll take Vision, you get him to the jet," he ordered.

"I'm not the one that needs to get to the jet," I said.

"Both of you," agreed Sam. "The rest of us aren't getting out of here."

"As much as I hate to admit it, if we're gonna win this one, some of us have to lose it," said Barton, adding an insight too true for Steve to ignore.

Steve knew that. He dropped his head.

"This isn't the real fight, Steve," assured Sam.

"All right," muttered Steve. "What's the plan?"

"We need a diversion. Something big," said Sam.

"I got something kinda big. But I can't hold it for long!" yelled Scott. "On my signal, run like hell. And if I tear myself in half, don't come back for me."

Bucky squinted at Steve and I, wincing slightly. "He's gonna tear himself in half?"

"You sure about this, Scott?" asked Steve.

"I do it all the time. I mean, once. In a lab. And I passed out," remembered Scott. He shivered, then started chanting, "I'm the boss, I'm the boss, I'm the boss."

Steve waited for Bucky to peer out from behind the trailer, checking for a sign of Scott. Once he did, Steve applied his hand on my waist. He whispered my name in a soft tone.

"Look for my portals," I said, instead. What he wanted to say was goodbye. I didn't. "I'll get you there."

"Clara," he said again.

At Spider-Boy's loud, "Holy shit!" I looked to see the cause. I didn't have to peer around the trailer. A look into the air did it justice.

Scott Lang was no longer smaller than the eye could spot. He was giant, and in his hand, he had captured Rhodey.

"I guess that's the signal," noted Steve.

"Run," I ordered.

Bucky and Steve didn't wait longer. I followed, naturally slower, as I wasn't a super soldier. Running strategically, the two ran straight under Scott's giant figure.

"You wanna get to them?" bellowed Scott.

I spared a glance behind us. The Black Panther was on our tail.

"You gotta go through me!" he finished.

I didn't want to waste precious time making Steve and Bucky run the entire distance. While checking to see if Scott was holding the team off, I sent the two through portals, shortening the distance from what I could see. I didn't have a clear view of the hangar just yet.

Rhodey took notice to our absence. He flew high, spotted us, and came flying. I stopped to fend him off.

A car encased in red wisps flew into his path. Wanda appeared within my sight. She insisted through her body language that she was going to take him on.

In the few seconds I stopped, Steve and Bucky gained a remarkable distance on me.

I barely started to run again when Vision intercepted the path. That time, he used his gem to crumble the pillar near the entrance of the hangar.

Beneath it, I exited through a portal. I swiped it above my head. I opened dozens of portals across the entrance, catching massive chunks of debris and dropping them on the airport.

Steve and Bucky, understanding I wasn't able to help them, sprinted faster to close the gap.

"She can't contain all of it," I heard Bucky say through the earpiece.

"Don't underestimate her," panted Steve.

"No, he's right," I said, straining to use my breath. "Steve, you have to run. You have to keep going and don't look back, okay?"

"What are you going to do?" asked Steve, sounding entirely disapproved.

"The world needs Captain America," I sniffled.

Hearing my tears, watching my body physically weaken under the trouble of keeping an excessive number of portals open, Steve knew exactly what I planned to do.

"No, you've done more than enough for me, don't do this!" he shouted.

"I didn't get it before. But now I see why, Stevie, I see why you did all of this, why you'd go to the ends of the earth for him," I rambled, crying profoundly. "You love him."

"Clara," pleaded Steve.

I tore my gaze from the debris above my head. I threw open a portal in front of Steve and Bucky.

Caught in what I had said, they didn't notice the change in their location immediately. The two whipped around to find me when they did. Steve tried to run for me. I had pushed him too far away to make a difference.

I smiled through my tears. "Which is why you'll understand why I have to do this."

"Don't!" screamed Steve.

"Clara!" yelled Bucky and Sam.

I was left to find them a way out, without interference. It meant burying the remaining debris on the bottom half of the entrance, blocking any footed fighters. There was only one way to do it.

"Clara!" he screamed.

"We'll always have Paris," I whispered.

I know he heard, because instantly, when his mind registered those words, Steve stopped. He froze.

I slammed my eyes shut. I ceased the portals above my head, burying the lower part of hangar entrance, and myself.