April 18th 2017
Avengers Compound Shooting Range
Steve hated guns. He hated any kind of weapon really, apart from his shield. He was quite attached to that thing. He rarely ever carried a weapon that wasn't his shield, unless it was a very high stakes mission, like extracting Ember, which turned out to be not so high stakes as he thought it was going to be.
No matter how many therapy sessions he would go to, the sound of gunfire would always remind him of his final mission with Bucky where he fell from the train.
At first, the flashbacks were vivid, and would often end with him sweating, trouble breathing, and occasionally panic attacks. With help this managed to just become small flashes in his brain whenever a shot gets fired, and it's a lot better now that Bucky is actually back in his life and not just a distant memory of the friendship they used to have. It didn't change the fact he detested firearms.
He had a small pistol in his bedside drawer, just because he was paranoid that someone was going to kill him in the middle of the night, and a select few he kept downstairs he would only take on missions with him if absolutely necessary. Otherwise he stayed away from them.
Also getting shot so many times really fucking annoyed him.
And now that he had to teach Ember about how to properly handling a gun, he was pretty sure she was gonna accidentally shoot him through the abdomen or some shit.
"Can you not touch it, please." He pushed her hand away as she reached for one of the larger weapons in the room.
He really cared about her, he did. But that didn't change the fact she was fucking annoying.
"But that one looks cool."
"It's dangerous, Rose."
He didn't even understand why she needed to learn how to shoot. The girl could fire fucking fireballs from her arms like a goddam dragon, what use was a little metal thing that shot out more little metal things to her on the battlefield when she could do that?
He tried to talk her out of it, and he tried to talk Tony out of it. Tony was adamant she learned how to shoot properly, just incase she ever needed to know. Steve would've thought that due to Tonys over protective nature towards Ember he would've said no to the idea automatically. But apparently not.
And there was no hope in talking Ember out if the idea, either. She claimed shooting a gun was gonna make her look badass.
Didn't change the fact Steve despised guns.
"Bla, bla, bla." Ember rolled her eyes, reaching for the gun again.
"Stop touching them!" He snapped, slightly angrier than he wound ever deliberately mean to be towards her.
Exasperated was the only word Steve could use to describe this training session.
"Okay, okay," She rolled her eyes, putting down her outstretched arms. "Sorry, sorry."
Steve sighed.
"I'm sorry." He stretched out his arms to rest delicately on her shoulder, pissed at himself for lashing out at her.
He tested the waters of how she reacted with his hand on her shoulder, and since she didn't move, he moved the palm of his hand to cup her cheek, his thumb gently stroking her soft skin.
He hadn't properly seen her since their date. Steve was just bombarded with stuff and he ended up on calls with the senator, and writing emails (they fucking sucked, Steve would much rather beat up another red alien HYDRA dude than send another goddamn email) and he had no time to even pass Ember in the hallway never mind talk to her about their date.
And where they stood after their date.
Steve's eyes locked with hers.
"I'm sorry." He whispered again, his thumb still gently stroking her cheek before letting his arms fall to his sides.
"Stop apologising."
"No."
"Yes. Shut up."
"I don't wanna shut up. I wanna apologise." Steve said, talking a step forwards, and Ember simultaneously talking a step back, the action repeating itself until they hit a wall.
"But you don't need to apologise."
"Yes. I do."
"No you don't it makes you sound like a dork."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
"Well I'm your dork." He grinned.
She skipped over the your part, the word and meaning behind the word scaring her.
"Is that supposed to be you flirting or?—"
"I dunno," He smiled again, "Does it work?"
"Maybe. That's quite a change in our dynamic though, the flirting is supposed to be my thing."
"So you're mad at me now for flirting with you?"
She tried to take a step backwards, his towering height making her feel smaller than usual.
"Am I making you uncomfortable, Princess?" He chuckled, snaking his arms around her waist.
"Don't call me Princess."
"Okay then," He teased her, by bowing, "My queen."
"You're an ass."
"Your ass."
Again. She skipped over the your part.
The feeling of having to agree to that sort of commitment made her feel queasy. It's not that she would want to see other people. It's that this was all moving very fast. In the few 'relationships' (if you could even call them that) she had in the time she went... blowing up peoples houses, (she really had to find a better word for that) she met a few guys. Most of them only lasted a few weeks with her, they said she was too much to handle and didn't appreciate not knowing where she went during the day, but the majority were just one night stands. A way for Ember to do something that took her mind off of the stress taking down corrupt rich businessmen gave her.
None of that had been serious.
She didn't actually know if she had ever really been in a serious relationship before.
"You okay?" Steve asked.
"Mhm?"
"You look kinda pale. Is the gun stuff freaking you out?— We can just go and do something else."
"Do something else?" She smirked.
"Ember." He warned.
"You're no fun." She pouted.
"Soon, I promise— I just want it to be special."
Special. She had never had a guy tell her he wanted their first time together to be special before. Steve's genuine gentlemanly traits were going to be hard to get used to. She was used to doing this fast, watching them crumble and fall apart in front of her, and moving onto something, or someone, else as a distraction.
"Something is bothering you, talk to me." He pleaded. "Have I done something wrong?"
She chuckled, she had shown him too much vulnerability already, and she couldn't let him see any more.
"Even though I call you an asshole all the time, you're actually one of the few guys left in the whole who aren't actually assholes."
"Probably because I'm not from this time." He mirrored her laugh, but the smile didn't reach his eyes. There was something she wasn't telling him, and he wanted to know exactly what that was.
"If you could, would you go back? I know you lost a lot of people when you decided to be an asshole and crash your ship."
"An asshole? I saved New York." He laughed.
"You didn't think to, I dunno, cut the wires on the fucking bombs?"
"Then there would be no one to fly the aircraft."
"Just fly the thing in a straight line dude, you can't crash into anything when you're in the sky."
He rolled his eyes with a laugh, and snaked his arms around her waist once again, pressing a kiss to her forehead. She was still pressed up against the wall, and Steve decided to use this as an advantage to get her to talk.
"You changed the subject of the conversation. I want you to tell me what's wrong."
"Nothings wrong, Rogers. You're reading too much into things."
"Yeah? Well you're hard to read."
"Maybe I make myself hard to read on purpose."
"Well maybe you should start telling me when somethings wrong. Is it because I snapped at you earlier? I told you I'm sorry—"
She shook her head, "Steve nothing is wrong."
"Yes there is." He replied softly, "I can just tell, you have this look in your eyes that isn't really there often."
She sighed. Maybe if she tells him he'll just shut the fuck up. Or if he doesn't shut the fuck up, she will build that freeze ray and he can be frozen for another seventy years.
"I've just—" She sighed.
"C'mon, Em. You can talk to me."
Em. The casual use of her nickname made her feel butterfly's. Gross.
"It's just, I've never really done this before."
Ew. Opening up. Showing vulnerability. She wanted to dig a hole and die in it.
"What? The shooting thing? I told you we don't have to." Steve panicked.
She couldn't help but laugh. He was an actual idiot. Ember knew it was something he was never gonna grow out of, despite being over one hundred years old.
"No, not the shooting thing."
"Then what's wrong?" He delicately ran his hands up and down her bare arms, trying to make eye contact with her, but she wasn't having it, her gaze was focused on something at the other side of the room, stuck there purposely so she didn't have to look at him while she spoke.
"I've never really, y'know. Been in a real relationship before."
Steve just smiled softly, an understanding look in his eyes.
"Every guy I've been with was just a one night stand, or they got bored before I could actually call them my boyfriend. Or one guy— I met him at a bar and we went back to his place. Turned out he was the son of the dudes house I had scheduled to blow the next morning— Got out of that place as soon as I could, it was a shame he was hot—" She closed her eyes and shook her head, "Sorry I'm rambling now..."
"Hey," He raised his hand once again to cup her cheek, stroking her skin with his thumb, "It's okay to be scared."
"I'm not scared." She lied.
"Yeah?" He chuckled again, this time the smile did ready his eyes, "Well that's okay too."
"I've just never had someone.... Never had someone—"
"Care about your before?"
"Steve I didn't even have a mom growing up, never mind a stable relationship. This kind of... Commitment, is strange, and new, staying in this compound is really changing me, and I don't even know how I feel about it anymore."
Steve felt a lump in his throat. He knew she hated it here, but he didn't want her to leave. As much as he was against it at first, he wanted her to be part of this team, she would be a good addition to the avengers. She would be a good addition to his life.
"Hey, I'm not going to hurt you." He promised.
"I'm not worried about getting hurt, Rogers. You're a literal walking teddy bear. I'm worried that I loose myself in this lifestyle."
"I won't let you loose yourself, Em."
"You barley know me." She said.
Ouch. That hurt.
"I barley know myself."
"I think I know you better than you think, sweetheart. But if there's still some self discovery you have to go through, I wanna help you with that."
"As what?"
"Well, if you're open to it. As your boyfriend doesn't sound too bad, huh?"
"Rogers— I dunno," She teased, "You think you can handle being my boyfriend?"
"I'm sure it's a lot of work," He grinned, "But I'm up for a challenge."
—
A/N
awww they're cute. and messed up. and have absolutely no idea what their doing. but they'll get thereeeee... i hope.
i also just wanna take a quick minute to explain some stuff incase it doesn't come off in my writing (i hope it does but idk)
ember is very independent, but also has very little idea of what she's doing, or what she wants in life. she lost two years of her life and barley remembers it at all, and that kinda fucked her up a bit. she's loosing herself in the compound, and she's loosing the ember we all met in chapter one. lokis offer really made her think about what she could get from life if she really wanted it, and steve's feelings for her, and her feelings for steve, make her question that yet again. she doesn't really know what stability is, or what it feels like. and she doesn't know if she wants it, fearing it could just constrict her to a life she doesn't know if she wants.
also steve hating guns is important. remember that