Steve's Diary

May 20, 2018

Dear Diary,

Today was the day I decided to make a change.

Bucky wouldn't want me to mope around like this for the rest of my life- I'm sure none of our lost loved ones would have wanted that for any of us... if only they were here to say it directly to us.

I woke up, early as ever, this morning to walk straight to my bathroom with incredible plans for my day, even though it hadn't even been a month since everything happened. I would work out and have a full breakfast and, well, actually talk to everyone around the Avengers Facility.

First, though, something had to go.

—————

I looked at myself in the same mirror I had peered into every morning and barely recognized the man I was seeing. I would peer into his eyes and wonder what he had become. The world used to think so highly of him, and now? What had he - what had I - become? No, no... that wasn't me, it couldn't be, you must have me mistaken for someone else. I would never become unrecognizable to my own two eyes, not while I remembered all that I had and all that had yet to arrive, right?

But, as much as I tried to look past him and ignore that damned reflection I had grown to hate so much, enough had been enough. There was only one way to regain myself from behind whatever show I was putting on in the mirror before me, for me.

I finally shaved my beard.

I cut it short and then shaved it entirely off, leaving nothing behind but skin I hadn't seen in nearly six years. Just then, I peered into my eyes to see that they remained more grey than blue, and would, perhaps, stay this way for a while longer, if not forever, but this was at least a step in the right direction. I was finally starting to seem myself again.

As I wiped the remnants of the shaving cream from my face, almost allowing myself to feel triumphant for a moment, I heard rattling and caught my surroundings beginning to shake and vibrate in their places. They surely weren't doing this on their own, so I decided to throw a shirt on and head out to see what all the fuss was about, just as my old self would have done.

There was this noise coming from above and all around me, and I was soon met with everyone else living in the facility who had been confused about the commotion, too.

Rhodey, Thor, Nat, Pepper, Banner and I ran out and watched as a massive space ship arrived before us, being carried by a glowing Carol Danvers, and was placed gently on the ground before us all.

She looked at us like this was it. Finally, this was it.

The hatch below opened to reveal Thor's friend, Rabbit (I later learned his name to actually be Rocket), and a blue, bald, mechanical-esque woman aiding a feeble-looking Tony Stark down the stairs. I ran to his side, even after everything that happened nearly 10 years ago, and took hold of him to help.

He looked back at her, then at me, breathing heavily and looking like all the life had been sucked out of him.  "Couldn't stop him," he panted.

"Neither could I," I replied.

"Hang on, hang on" he whispered, distraught. "I lost the kid."

"Tony, we lost," I told him.

"Is, uhm-" he turned to look at Pepper as she ran up. "Oh, good-"

"Oh, my God," she started to sob, taking him into a hug. "Oh, my God."

He kissed her cheek, "it's ok."

Once inside, Rhodey took it upon himself to begin the explanation to Tony regarding what had happened in his absence with Thanos on our end.

"It's been 23 days since Thanos came to Earth," he started, pictures of the people we had lost popping up on the hologram screen: Stephen Strange, T'Challa, Hank Pym, Sharon Carter, Scott Lang, Nick Fury, Erik Selvig, Shuri, Hope VanDyne, Sam Wilson, Maria Hill, Peter Parker, Wanda Maximoff, James Barnes.