a/n before u read this chapter
i blame my messy writing for the confusion. everything u read in the flashback was true. garrett and ward manipulated her into joining hydra, and then when she realised what was going to happen to her, she didn't want a part of it and wanted to leave, but they forcefully wiped her and gave her powers. what TONY saw, was a bunch of jumbled up videos, what he could make up from them was that ember had involvement with hydra, and his conclusion was that she was spying on them all along
July 4th 2017
Avengers Compound
"I told you I'm fine, Natasha." Steve said.
Although he wasn't fine. He was limping with two shots to the abdomen, blood dripping all over his fingers he was using to put pressure on the wound.
"I told you not to go on that mission." Natasha scolded.
When Ross took her away, Steve was a mess. He had been through breakups before, but there was nothing that compared to this.
He trashed everything he could find that reminded him of her, throwing it violently into the hallway and finding pleasure in the pain he felt from seeing all of her belongings crash and shatter against the hallway wall.
Then he didn't move it from the hallway. Her wrecked things just lay there. Pictures, clothes, clothes that were Steve that he had memories of her wearing, books, toiletries, her perfume, shampoo, anything Steve could find that reminded him of her. He even went and bought entirely new sheets because everything just smelled of her. Anyone else was too scared move it for him while he was in the compound. He was unstable. They didn't know what his reaction would be.
When he got home from his mission, all of her stuff was gone, and the hallway had cleared. People grew tired of stepping over her stuff all the time.
A part of Steve disappeared when he stood on the steps of the compound, watching Ember being dragged away by armed men in protective clothing, and driven away.
He watched the car drive down the long road of the compound until it disappeared completely from sight. He thinks he cried. He couldn't quite remember.
His change in attitude hadn't gone unnoticed.
He stopped eating, which was highly unusual since, due to the serum, he ate a far lot more than the average person.
He was sleeping less. This wasn't as big a change, considering he already dealt with insomnia and various PTSD symptoms because of well, he's a man out of time, PTSD is expected, but sleeping for more than an hour had been even harder lately. The empty side of the bed just felt wrong. She was supposed to be there. And the fact that she wasn't just brought back all of the pain.
Which brought him to the mission. He had gone so long without doing an actual proper mission. He needed a distraction.
So he went ahead with the plans and left for Serbia.
The mission was a disaster.
He wasn't in the right. mindset for it at all. The stakeout went awfully. He kept falling asleep, waking up and feeling completely out of place, forgetting where he was, forgetting where he left things, and not knowing the time or day until he checked his phone.
And on the last day, he decided to just go for it. He infiltrated the enemy base, on his own.
That wasn't the mission. He was to report back and a team would go out and take it down together. It was not a one man job, not even for a super soldier.
He got shot. Three times.
Once in the shoulder, and twice in the abdomen.
There was the fear that he was gonna bleed out the whole flight home. For the first time in an incredibly long time. He genuinely didn't think he was going to make it home without passing out due to blood loss, and then crashing the plane because of it.
A part of him didn't care if he died.
He didn't have Ember anymore, and his brain was struggling to find any other reasons to why he should live.
"You're going to the infirmary."
Steve viscously shook his head, and began to limp in the direction of his room. Or at least he was pretty sure it was his room, he couldn't properly tell, his mind was fuzzy and his vision was blurry.
"No I'm not." He replied.
"Yes, Steve," Natasha walked up and grabbed his (non bleeding) arm, and led him in the other direction towards the infirmary.
"No. Romanoff let me go." He insisted, using the little strength he had left to pull himself away from Natasha.
"Steve you're killing yourself, can't you see that?"
He was well aware. And he wasn't exactly bothered about it.
"I'm taking you to the infirmary."
July 4th 2017
Avengers Infirmary
It was a lousy 99th birthday.
He was still waiting to be discharged from the hospital. He was connected to some sort of tube injecting shit into his bloodstream, and no matter how hard he argued that this stuff didn't work on him because of the serum, the doctors didn't listen, stretched him to the tubes, and told him to lay down in the bed.
He was trying to find the tv remote that he had lost somewhere in the thin, shitty hospital duvet. He was having no luck.
He heard a few soft knocks on the door. Bucky and Natasha stood in the doorway, smiling at him softly, a little cupcake with a single candle in her hands.
"Happy Birthday, soldier." She smiled, walking closer to him and sitting on the chair next to the hospital bed, Bucky just behind her, standing at the side of the chair.
Steve chuckled and mumbled a 'thanks guys.' But he couldn't work out if he imagined saying it, or if it had actually happened.
Natasha held the cupcake out to him, and Steve blew out the single candle.
"We couldn't fit 99 on the cupcake, old man." Bucky grinned.
"You're older than me, punk." Steve retaliated, feeling a real smile form on his face for the first time in weeks.
"I made sure the party got cancelled." Natasha said in a soft tone, "Tony wanted it to go ahead, but considering you're in here and I think he just wanted to use it as an excuse to get wasted and forget—"
"Yeah," Steve interrupted. He didn't want her to say it out loud. It hurt more. "I get it."
"How are you?" Natasha asked, "All things considering."
They both knew Nat wasn't asking about the injuries.
Steve shrugged, "I dunno. In a way I feel like I'm mourning someone."
"Well," She replied, "In a way, you kinda are."
"You'll be okay, pal." Bucky spoke, "You got us."
Steve nodded. "Yeah." He said, "Yeah, I do."