Chapter Text
The restaurant Daniel had taken her to for their anniversary was charming and quaint, with a wonderful atmosphere and even better food. Peggy knew she should be enjoying the rare night off, but she couldn’t shake the tension that had been plaguing her all week.
Everywhere she went, she got the sensation she was being watched. There was nothing in particular she could point to – no glimpses of anyone following her, no sign of anyone lurking in the bushes around their house. Only when she was secure in the bunker the infant SHIELD organization had built did the prickling at the back of her neck ease.
It was beyond merely aggravating. She’d learned the hard way to listen to her instincts when they said she was being targeted, and it had saved her life more than once. Yet Peggy knew if she mentioned it, the men around her would undoubtedly write it off as ‘female hysteria’. Even the ones who should bloody well know better, like Daniel and Howard.
She needed something definitive before she’d be able to get them to take the threat seriously, but the question was how to get that proof.
“… so then Thompson apparently walked right up to the Sasquatch, bold as you please, and demanded that it surrender. Wish I could have seen it, must have been twice the size of him…”
Belatedly what Daniel was saying registered, and Peggy returned her full attention to him. “I’m sorry, did you say Sasquatch?”
There was a rueful smile tugging at her husband’s lips, and he shook his head at her. “Just checking to see if you were paying any attention, sweetheart.”
Flustered, Peggy blushed. “I’m sorry, I know I’m a little distracted. But I’m hardly going to miss you slipping Bigfoot into the conversation.”
“Really?” Daniel’s smile broadened to something truly amused, and his eyes shone. “Because you said ‘mm-hm’ to the mermaid and ‘that’s interesting’ about the alien.”
The blush grew exponentially, and Peggy hid her face briefly in her hands. Then she had to laugh, because it was just so ridiculous. Thankfully he laughed right along with her, and when she reached for his hand across the table, he gave it willingly.
“Is everything okay?” he asked, amusement fading into concern. “Something’s been off all week. I know you can’t always tell me all the details about your work, but is there anything I can do?”
She’d recruited Daniel to SHIELD the moment it was formed, of course, but as he was primarily a desk agent, he simply wasn’t cleared to know a great many of the classified things she worked on every day as one of the directors. It had caused friction between them early in their marriage, but they’d worked it out some time ago.
While it would have been a perfect excuse for her nerves, Peggy had long ago promised herself that she would never lie outright to Daniel if she could possibly avoid it. “It’s not work. Or rather, I suppose it probably is if it’s anything at all, but I simply don’t know one way or the other.”
Seeing his concern turning to true worry, she forced herself to smile and squeezed his hand. “I’m certain it’s nothing, darling. Just my paranoia acting up.”
“Yeah, well, seems like whenever you get paranoid it’s because someone is after you, so be careful.” Daniel was serious, not responding to her attempt to lighten the tone of the conversation, and she was surprised.
Surprised, and rather shamed by her earlier certainty that he wouldn’t believe her. It was moments like this that made her fall for him all over again.
“I keep feeling as though someone is following me, watching my every move,” she admitted. “I can’t shake it, but I also can’t identify what’s causing me to feel that way. My subconscious must be catching small clues that my conscious mind is missing, but that doesn’t help me to determine the source of the problem.”
“And you feel it right now?” Daniel frowned when Peggy nodded. “I’d trust your instincts, Peg. Maybe you should pretend like you’re going to powder your nose, slip out the back and see if you can find whoever’s tailing you. They won’t expect you to leave in the middle of our anniversary dinner, so they won’t be looking for you.”
“They won’t be expecting it because it’s something I shouldn’t do,” Peggy countered. “I hardly seem to get any time with you these days, and we’ve both been looking forward to tonight for weeks. I don’t want to ruin it over something that may well turn out to be nothing at all.”
“Neither of us is going to enjoy ourselves if we’re worried.” Daniel squeezed her hand once more and smiled, then let her go. “Go get ‘em, and by the time you’re done they’ll have brought dessert.”
His confidence in her ability to handle any threat was always uplifting. Not for the first time, Peggy wondered what she’d done to deserve not just one, but two such amazing men in her life. When Steve had died she’d thought her chance at happiness with a man who could accept her as she was had died with him. Also not for the first time, she wished she could introduce Steve to Daniel, because she knew he’d have liked the other man just as much as Peggy did.
Well. Perhaps not just as much, or at least not in quite the same way.
“I’ll be back before you know it,” she promised, rising from her seat and leaning over to kiss him briefly as she walked past.
“You’d better be, because my plans for you this evening don’t end with dinner,” he replied, and winked at her.
Laughing softly to herself, Peggy made her way to the back hall that led to both the powder rooms and the rear entrance to the restaurant. One of the wait staff spotted her and tried to turn her back towards the public areas, but she flashed her shiny new SHIELD badge and the man retreated into the kitchen, wide-eyed.
Out in the alley, the reek of rotting food from the dumpster was overpowering. Breathing as shallowly as she could, Peggy picked her way through the debris littering the area. At the mouth of the alley she stopped just before she would have stepped out of the shadow, and scanned the street at the front of the restaurant.
It was a busy thoroughfare, with people walking back and forth on both sides and cars packed in on the road. A person remaining still would have stood out immediately, and though Peggy watched for several minutes, she didn’t see anyone pass by twice.
That left the buildings across the way. Unless her mysterious pursuer had somehow known ahead of time what restaurant Daniel planned to take her to, it was unlikely he or she had managed to set up in one of the apartments and offices overlooking the street.
The roof it was, then. Peggy went back down the alley to the street at the other end, then around the block so she could cross the road out of sight of the restaurant. She then made her way through more alleys until she reached the building directly across from the restaurant. It was shorter than the buildings on either side of it, which meant someone on that roof would have a better view inside.
Jumping, she managed to catch the bottom rung of the fire escape, and hauled herself up with some struggle. She tried not to think too hard about the state her beautiful new dress was going to end up in. That was what she got for dressing up, but their fifth wedding anniversary had seemed to warrant the effort. At least she’d worn sensible shoes, not heels.
As stealthily as she could she climbed to the top of the building, testing each step to make certain it wouldn’t squeak and betray her. She drew her snub-nosed revolver from her purse, lamenting her inability to carry anything more powerful on an evening out. At least, not without drawing considerable unwanted attention. Depending on who was tracking her, it might or might not be sufficient. Hopefully she’d be able to get a quick look and assess the situation before revealing herself.
At the top she paused, counted silently to thirty, and cautiously poked her head above the edge. Nothing was immediately visible, and she climbed a little higher to get a proper look.
The rooftop was empty as far as she could see. There was a small building at the back where the stairwell door was, and there could have been someone hiding behind it, but they wouldn’t have been able to see the restaurant. Even so, Peggy crept over to it and around to the other side, whipping her gun around the corner first in case someone was there.
It was just as empty as all the rest of the roof. This had to be the right building; when she moved up to the front edge of the roof she could just see Daniel through the front window of the restaurant, but the buildings on either side would be too high to see in.
Had it been her imagination after all? Or had she made too much noise and scared her watcher away? There was no way to know for certain, and that meant she’d just have to continue to feel paranoid until another opportunity to catch her hunter presented itself. Sighing, she lowered her gun, intending to return it to her purse since there was no threat.
A soft thud behind her was her only warning that she was no longer alone. She tried to turn, lifting the gun again, but her unknown assailant was faster. She got a glimpse of a man in a dark outfit charging towards her, and then he tackled her from the side and grappled her into a secure chokehold before she had a chance to even think about dodging.
He was unbelievably strong, and the arm across her throat was so solid it might as well have been made of metal. Fighting for air, Peggy slammed her foot into the man’s kneecap. She felt it buckle, and he cursed as he was forced to release her. Spinning, she punched at him with the hand holding the pistol, aiming for his temple and hoping the weight of the gun would lend her enough momentum to knock him out.
Unfortunately it turned out he was just as agile as he was strong, ducking quickly to the side and raising his left arm to deflect her blow. She thought she heard the sound of metal striking metal as her gun hit his sleeve. He had to be wearing some kind of body armour, though she’d never seen or heard of the like.
Then she was on the defensive again, frantically blocking and parrying his blows and kicks. It reminded her of fighting with that Russian spy, a flurry of attacks almost too quick to follow, except he weighed twice what that woman had and could put a great deal more power into his strikes.
No… it reminded her of watching Steve fight. Too fast, too strong, too graceful to be quite human. It might have been beautiful to witness, if she hadn’t been his target.
With her heart in her throat, Peggy dropped to the ground to avoid another punch, then rolled to get away from the kick he aimed at her. When she surged to her feet again she brought up a fistful of the tarred gravel that paved the rooftop, and flung it straight at his face.
He swore again and turned his head, giving her just enough time to swing the gun around. She squeezed off two shots without bothering to aim; from this distance she could hardly miss.
Except somehow, impossibly, he got his arm up in time and deflected the bullets. His shirt was damaged, but she definitely saw the gleam of metal revealed beneath, and it wasn’t even dented.
That same arm shot forward, and he anticipated her attempt to dodge with contemptuous ease. His hand closed around her throat and he lifted her right off her feet, as easily as if she weighed no more than a feather.
Peggy kicked at him, but already she could feel herself weakening, and her blows seemed to have no effect at all. There could be no question; this man had been treated with the same serum as Steve, or something similar to it. Their enemies had finally managed to duplicate the formula.
His arm was too long for her to gouge at his face, and her nails scrabbled ineffectively at the metal covering his hand. Darkness was closing in on her, and no matter how she strained she couldn’t get a single breath of air past his grip.
Turning, he slammed her back against the wall of the stairwell. He grabbed her shoulder to pin her in place with his other hand, then drew the metal one away just before she would have passed out. Peggy couldn’t do anything but gasp raggedly, drawing in as much precious oxygen as she could, trying not to start coughing as the bruising in her throat protested.
When she was able to focus again, she found her assailant standing with his metal arm cocked back, hand fisted and aimed straight at her head. The threat was clear; he was probably strong enough to dent the concrete behind her, let alone her fragile skull.
“Who are you,” he demanded, the words hardly more than a growl. “Who are you?”
The question made no sense. If this was the man who had been following her, why had he been doing so if he didn’t even know who she was? Could it all be a misunderstanding? Perhaps he’d thought she was someone else. Peggy attempted to answer, but all that emerged was a wheeze. She lifted her hands to clutch at her throat, trying to indicate that she wasn’t refusing to comply.
Her mind was racing, searching for a way out of the situation. She couldn’t possibly shout loudly enough to attract attention from the people on the street, let alone alert Daniel that something was wrong. Her snub-nose was relatively quiet when it fired, something she normally appreciated but at the moment it meant no one below had heard it. Daniel would come looking for her eventually, but by then it would be far too late. Either the man would have killed her, or taken her away.
With a frustrated snarl her attacker backed away a few steps, giving her room to catch her breath. He kicked her gun to the other side of the roof in the process; she didn’t even remember dropping it. Without a weapon, they both knew she didn’t have a chance against him, so he hardly needed to be looming over her in order to threaten her.
The movement brought him into the sphere of dim light thrown by the single bulb over the stairwell. For the first time, Peggy got a good look at him without shadows obscuring his features.
His hair was too long, greasy and unkempt in a way that suggested he might not have seen a shower in the entire time he’d been tailing her. Stubble all but obscured the lower half of his face, thick enough to be more properly called a beard at this point. His eyes looked black in the flickering light… but she knew they weren’t.
They were blue. Even with all the changes, even with the sheer impossibility of knowing she was looking at a ghost, she couldn’t possibly fail to recognize the man before her, and his eyes had always been the blue of a fallen angel's.
It was agonizing to talk, but she forced the word through her damaged throat anyway. It came out as a disbelieving squeak, barely understandable.
“Bucky?”