from_the_outside | Steve and Sharon

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Steve and Sharon - First Meetings

"It's critical that Captain Steve Rogers adjust to his new surroundings," Fury had said, hands clasped behind his back. He was facing away from her, watching as larger-than-life still frames of Rogers scrolled across the viewscreen.

He couldn't see the way her mouth tightened at one corner. Her tone had stayed dry. "You want me to help Captain America get more American? Sir?"

Let it never be said Nick Fury doesn't have a sense of humor. He does. It's just equivalent to that of a cement wall.

His voice was desert-arid. "I'm assigning you to help him re-acclimate. These next few months may prove to be decisive. I assume you don't want to see what happens if a man in his position, with his abilities and history, fails to recognize a place he once called home. I can only imagine it would lead such a man to paranoia and possibly desperate measures. Do you want to find out, Agent 13?"

"No, sir."

Still, she considers, after a trip home to change, and now making her first sweep of the block nearest Rogers' SHIELD-maintained apartment, he can't be that easy to crack.

She's heard the stories. Captain Steve Rogers was as much a fixture of her childhood mythology as Santa, and, to the young Sharon's mind, far more interesting, due to actually being real. He was a war hero, a soldier on the front lines. A symbol, sure, but she's pretty damn positive there was always a person walking around under that red, white and blue, the star-struck shield.

And that person has seen a hell of a lot worse from the world than faster cars and sleeker tech. Fury's underestimating him.

She won't make the same mistake.

Dressed in sleek black yoga pants bagging loosely against white running shoes, arms bare under a white tank top, hair tossed in a loose ponytail, she looks like every other woman on the sidewalks during a nice afternoon in the city -- a little sweetly disheveled from some post-lunch vinyasa, without working hard enough to ruin her makeup, cheeks lightly flushed and relaxation flowing from every motion.

She'd tried yoga once. Got bored mid-way through the second sun salutation, but then Fury called her in and she'd spent the rest of the day infiltrating a sleeper cell that decided to take matters into its own hands, and she'd felt much better afterwards, so, hell, maybe there's something to be said for this shavasana crap?

It's sunny and warm, and that's as good a reason as any for the aviators she's got on.

Better than showcasing the way she's casing the shops she passes, looking for a certain, particularly recognizable, set of shoulders and the regulation-neat combed hair of American's favorite boy next door.

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It's strange. When he was a kid, you couldn't get him to shut up. He was always taking Bucky's elbow to the ribs to keep his mouth shut in school, always told to mind his place and be grateful. But something's changed since he came off the ice. Maybe it's just a phase. Maybe he doesn't have that much to say.

He looks up quietly, mouth in a frown, line deep between his eyebrows. It's a joke, but it hits a little close to home. Maybe they don't make guys like him anymore; he's heard it before. A little old-fashioned, Gramps, the All-American Kid ...

He smiles tightly, clenching his jaw twice, and huffs out a laugh at her compromise. He'll stay standing until she's seated. "I don't know, ma'am. You look awfully strong. But I guess you've got a deal; at least it'll look like I made the effort."

Back in the golden age of sailing, they called it a lead line. Some poor sailor, hoping his timing would keep pace with the lift of land under the sea, would let out a line weighted with lead, sound the depth beneath their hull.

Inaccurate. Wildly inefficient. But Sharon's always found something appealing in the idea of dropping a lead weight in the water to see whether she's about to run aground or not. As far as direct results go, it's blunt, but effective.

Thus, appealing.

By the mark four, she thinks, pulling out the chair to take a seat, his expression hovering in her head even as her eyes drop away. And shoaling fast.

Seems like a touchy subject. Fair enough -- she doubts even Stark would be able to have much of a sense of humor about waking up seventy years after he was supposed to.

But this is all about reconnaissance. Find a baseline, and figure out how to get him past it. Out into the world, as if that would be an appealing option for anybody.

Fortunately, she doesn't have to think about the morality of that question, or what he'd prefer. None of her orders instruct her to do any coddling of Captain America, whatever her personal opinions might be. "How about another deal?" she offers, crossing one leg over the other, running shoe bouncing lightly in the air.

"I'll tell you my name, and you can use that instead of ma'am."

He takes his seat, blotting at the coffee stain he knows isn't going to go anywhere no matter how much he works at, bending to brush droplets of caffeine off of his shoes. They're new, still hold a lacquer and shine, and that unsettles him on some unconscious level, where the kid from Brooklyn never could afford a shoeshine.

His brow furrows as he looks up, surprised and sheepish. Romanoff had made a casual comment, once -- "ma'am" is dated, awkward, and not every woman likes it. It still baffles Steve as to why, but he didn't survive high school and a World War by not learning to adapt.

"Sounds reasonable," he says, stifling a chuckle. He dries his hands, and reaches across the table. The proffered handshake is modern, the way he rises from his seat and bows his head is not. "Steve Rogers, Ma–mmm, right. Forget I almost said that."

The smile she flashes him is breezy and completely natural, and it widens a hair at both the little inclination of his head and the stumble over that title he can't seem to drop. "Sharon," she says, taking his hand to shake. She's got a good grip: a little firmer, with slightly better leverage (one foot slightly back and flat on the sidewalk, her ankle behind the leg of her chair, her other hand braced on the back), add in the element of surprise, and she'd be able to shift her weight and his, throw him over her shoulder and either make a break for it or find the high ground before he knew what was happening. Especially considering the handy way he's already on his feet, leaning towards her.

If it was necessary.

No threat looms, though, so her grip remains friendly, if strong.

She doesn't continue with her last name. Steve Rogers, boy from Brookyln, man from the past, soldier of World War Deuce, won't like being forced into casual intimacy by the lack of a name he can't attach to Miss, and that's the point. Aunt Peggy would frown. Her parents would disapprove. Fury would roll his...

Well.

Sharon's just paying out the lead line. Letting go of his hand, she waves hers easily: it's forgotten. "Nice to meet you. And I hear soda water does wonders for stains -- but I can't honestly say I've ever tried it. My guess is it'll dry fine anyway."

Such is the benefit of splashing coffee on pants that are already at least marginally a shade of brown.

Edited 2013-07-30 02:40 (UTC)

Sharon might be underestimating Steve's stubbornness. If he wanted to find a way to use an honorific, he could. He would. But in this case, he's happy to let it be. She's got a strong shake and a disarming smile, and for the first time Steve realizes how pretty she is.

Not that he didn't notice the sharp eyes and silky hair the second she bumped into his table (right after admiring gams that went on forever in the split second it took him to look up and away), but his mind has been elsewhere, and in the excitement of the moment ...

He clears his throat and resettles, rubbing the back of his neck. "I'll take a look in the corner market on my way back, but I have been told to update my wardrobe. If I didn't know any better, I'd think you were part of a conspiracy." He smirks fleetingly. "Nice to meet you, Sharon. Did fate intervene on your way to an appointment?"

He points at her yoga mat.

The aviators, pushed up into her hair, make a good headband for the wisps escaping her ponytail, and she squints slightly against the sun as she slides the mat off her shoulder, props it up against her leg, butt of the roll resting on the sidewalk. Her own smile is faint, and fractionally tilted. "That seems like a pretty specific conspiracy to be worried about, Steve. Why, do you need a fashion consultant?"

She lets her eyes track assessment over what he'd picked out for himself this morning, and it's honestly not bad. Men's fashions haven't skewed nearly so far as women's have, and while she wouldn't expect him to pick up skinny jeans or a graphic tee, he looks...totally normal in his khakis and shirt. "You look pretty good to me."

In all honesty, he'll turn heads, but not because of his clothes, or the fact that he's the sort of guy to wear his shirts tucked in and keep his hair combed instead of purposefully mussing it into careful disrepair. It's partially because of his height and size -- those shoulders look like he could cart a tank around on them without breaking a sweat -- and it's partly because of the way he holds himself, a little too conscious of the space he takes up.

Which is a lot, at a table that barely fit his coffee and sketchpad and is now hosting both of them, meaning that her knee bumps gently against his when she shifts to put the mat down.

But it's mostly because, not to put it mildly, he is by any standards unfairly attractive. Long straight nose, clear steady eyes, wheat-colored hair, a strong jawline, plus that self-effacing air that means it's possible he know he's good-looking, but it makes him uncomfortable instead of cocky.

Good. She gets enough of cocky. "Just the opposite. I was on my way back when gravity decided to reassert itself." The smile she gives him goes all the way to her eyes, and she lets it. The best cover is the one that's all truth, and she's not faking anything, here.

Just leaving a few parts out. "It seemed to pick the right table, though. Most people would've tossed their cup at me and screamed about how I messed up their work...so I'm glad to get a reprieve."

Edited 2013-07-30 17:54 (UTC)

"No," he answers quickly, the second the word consultant falls off her tongue. He's heard that word enough from Stark, and is only glad the guy lives a few thousand miles away. He quirks a smile, and shakes his head. "It's part of a larger conspiracy, but I've been told I'm a little old-fashioned."

He stood outside an Adidas for eight minutes once, just staring at a pair of neon green running shoes in the window. Like they hypnotized him, so loud they made his teeth vibrate, and it was the puzzle of the universe in that moment to figure out what they were for or why anyone would want to buy them. Steve dresses in button-up plaids and classic colors, parts his hair, and throws on his leather jacket when he's going out and calls it good.

He's definitely not expecting her to say he looks good -- pretty good -- and it shows. He doesn't bluster or flush, but he looks at her a little sharper, eyes a little wider, and when he feels her knee brushing his he jumps about an inch. He coughs, clears his throat, and grins at the tabletop. "Uh. Thanks."

He's used to getting compliments. Still not used to responding to them, though. It's just like his bulk; you live so many years in one body, you can barely get around in a new model without tripping all over yourself. He has heightened senses, a faster metabolism, stronger reflexes, but it hasn't changed the gawky little nerd from the neighborhood, and until you learn to get around you're going to go everywhere with your flashers on.

"I don't believe that," he says at last. "Nobody could be that rude to someone as ... nice as you are. It's just paper, it'll dry. I can always draw something new."

His eyes linger on hers a beat too long as he says so.

"I don't know," she says. The words are considering while she studies him, foot swinging gently in the air. "We've kinda gotten shoved head first into the future, recently. Maybe a little old-fashioned isn't such a bad thing."

Aliens, Norse mythology come to life, the kind of technology that can be implanted in a human body to keep it ticking. The Avengers initiative isn't just strategy; it's science fiction.

And it's spilling out into the real world in a big way.

She pretends the jump doesn't happen, rides right over the cough and throat-clearing like she didn't hear either, just allows a pleasant curl of a smile that's already fighting to be wider, brighter, when he ducks his head to direct that sheepish grin at the tabletop.

Not good with women, but better than Fury had made him out to be at rolling with the punches. It's not a surprise; there's a reason Steve was picked for the serum. Adaptability, intelligence, a strong moral compass, a deep sense of compassion: she's heard it all.

He'll be fine. Twenty-first century mannerisms aren't necessary, just a basic ability to adjust. He's not going to need any hand-holding. It's the conclusion she's drawn when he looks back up, brushing off her joke, and holding her gaze with his own steady and sincere.

There's a heartbeat before she blinks. Where the hell is a waitress?

"Don't be fooled," she says, wetting her lip and smiling a little more widely. "I'm not as nice as I look. So, an artist?" It's a smooth recovery, but one she shouldn't need at all. Head in the game, 13.

"A hobby? Or something they pay you for?"

Edited 2013-08-01 15:21 (UTC)

The world could use a little "old-fashioned".

"Yeah, I've heard that," he mumbles, picking up one of his pencils to give his hands something to do. "Getting shoved head-first into the future, I mean. I can sympathize."

He frowns at the #4, twisting it between the pads of his fingers and thumbs. The business end leaves smudges of black on his skin, but he doesn't mind. Getting shoved head-first into the future. Yeah, he can sympathize.

He grits a grin. "No, I don't get paid anymore. I used to, but that job was ages ago. I guess you'd call it a hobby now. I'd like to make something more out of it, if time allows, but ... you know how it is," he shrugs, smiling good-naturedly. "And I don't fool easily, ma'am. I mean -- Sharon. Sorry."

There's that sheepishness again, but it only blankets a harder core. Not much gets by him, and he's good at judging character. It comes from a life of seeing both faces of a person: the face they'll show the world, and the face they let slip with someone they don't think is worth their time.

He would. The media circus, all based around the 'man out of time' tossed headlong into a future he never expected, has been blunt and less than tactful, but they're not wrong. If anyone understands that feeling, the one of being faced with a pit where you expected a bridge, it's this guy.

"I bet."

It serves as answer to both his comment about sympathizing, and the assertion that he's not easily fooled.

He's pretty canny, and if his radar isn't pinging an alarm, it's not wholly his fault.

She's very good at what she does.

Which is why she leans forward, folding her arms on the table, and tilts a disarming, I've-got-a-secret smile at him across the short distance. His fingers are blackening with graphite; it's distracting, making her wish she had something to fiddle with, too, and she's not normally a twitchy person. "Habit's hard to break, huh?"

The real question comes with which alarm he should be listening to. The one that goes off every time a pretty girl gives him the time of day? The one where convenient meetings like this one are favored traps of enemy agents? Or maybe the one where she doesn't seem to know who he is, when half of New York stops to gawk when he crosses the street?

He feels a pinprick of nervousness at the back of his neck when she leans in, and it's the kind of feeling he hasn't had since 1943; June 22nd, to be exact, in the back of a new Ford, sitting next to Agent Carter. She could make him sweat more than any experimental procedure ever could.

"My mother raised me on her own," he explains. "You should see my table manners. She was an everyday hero; part of me sees it as honoring her when I remember the lessons she taught me. She'd have me by the ear if she knew I didn't pull your seat out for you."

His mouth tilts to one side. "Just more of that 'old-fashioned' business you were talking about. Funny thing is, she was always so brave and modern when I looked at her. That's what I wanted to be."

"Okay," she says, easily, tucking a loose strand of hair back behind her ear, blithely, purposely taking a common turn of phrase as an actual invitation. "How about dinner sometime?"

Tossed out without expectation or affectation, though she's watching him like a hawk from behind friendly blue eyes and a slight, winning smile. To stick the card on the table, she keeps going, picking up on the offered topic with her own smile edging a little closer to wistful than warm.

Gaze sliding down to the picture she'd commented on, earlier. Almond eyes, a stern expression. "I had someone like that, too. Sometimes I think I'm still just hoping to do her proud."

A blink, and she lifts her eyes back to his face again, the wry tug of her lips quirking a little stronger. "Do you think you made it?"

What did she say?

Everything grinds into a lower gear, and suddenly he's trying to get his bike up a steep hill when it feels like he's moving through quicksand. Time expands, like the blacktop in the old neighborhood on really hot days, and he's seeing every second like they're ten. Those eyes, blue and sharp and maybe a little saccharine, that smile. He memorizes the lines of that smile. It'll be burned into his memory when he looks back on this moment later. The flutter of her eyelashes when she looks at his sketchbook, subtle and not in the same instant, the way she delicately shifts from the present to somewhere vaguely far away.

That pinch at the back of his neck returns, only this time he's hearing the winsome invitation and the sudden dip into familiarity as if they're designed to glut him on some subconscious need, and he's pricked with sudden awareness. She's flirting on purpose.

While he's working out whether he's supposed to answer the invitation and organizing the clues he's gathered, he realizes she's hit him with a more pressing question. One he wasn't paying attention to. With any luck, it'll just look like he's nervous (which isn't too far from the truth). "Do I think I ... ?"

"Got to what you wanted to be." Her eyebrows arch delicately as she prompts. "Like your mom?"

This feels more than a little like a game of tug of war. Rogers is hardly the country bumpkin the media loves to portray him as; those good looks of his aren't corn-fed and wholesome, they're the product of desperation in the face of annihilation. He wasn't naturally gifted with a build like a tank, would never have caught anyone's eye before the transformation.

What he was, before all that, was a soldier.

And a good one, if weak, asthmatic, more compassionate and empathetic than would really be considered ideal.

That's the media's mistake, and Fury's too. Everyone forgets the guy has a brain inside that perfectly crafted head; that he learned to fight on the mean streets and alleys of New York, not at boot camp. That he had to rely on his wits for far longer than his bulk.

Of course he's sizing her up. She'd be disappointed by anything else.

So: tug of war. Or maybe Battleship. Tossing out bombs here and there, at seemingly random intervals, just to gauge his reaction.

Not that she'd say no to dinner. He's pretty cute, after all, and Fury did say to stay close.

But this is more like it: the way his eyes narrow just slightly after they widen. Good. He doesn't trust her; he shouldn't trust anyone, especially someone showing up out of the blue and being this immediately friendly. If she'd been sitting in that chair, she'd have had a gun trained on the interrupter by the time the coffee cup fell over.

Still. He's a solider, not an agent. A little more time around Natasha, maybe, and he'll come right up to speed, but not just yet.

She's curious about his life, and it feels ever so much less like friendly banter and more like she's hunting for intel. He thinks on the question, brow rucking together, and it buys him enough time to shift to a more comfortable position, feeling the press and pull of wet fabric against his thigh.

He eyes the coffee stain, and the hand -- empty, but readied -- beside it.

"I guess I'm still figuring that out, Sharon," he says, with every ounce the same bashful, if not friendly, tone he's been using the whole time. "Both my mom and my dad served. For my father, it was duty. But for my mother, she wanted to help people."

He's got a little of both inside him, driven by that sense of duty and obligation, but stubborn and strong-willed from the need inside of him to do the right thing. He realizes which page of his sketchbook is open on her side of the table.

"Can I ask you a question?"

The look she gives him in response to his answer and question is insouciant, unsuspecting. He shifts in his seat, and she doesn't move in hers -- but that doesn't stop the chain reaction of ready-set-go going off in her head at the way he's just a hair more careful, words a little more guarded. Just by a shade.

Slightly elevated heartrate. A considering tense of leg muscles, core and glutes, in case she needs to move, fast. One arm still lying loosely over the table top, easy to use as a brace. If he came at her, she might be able to unbalance him. At the very least, the table would serve as an obstacle.

Not that she thinks he's going to jump her, but there's a shift in tone, air, mood here, and it's about all she can do not to grin in satisfaction.

Come on, Rogers. Show me what you've got.

Fury will be...okay, furious (ugh) if her cover's blown right away, but she's got no patience for deceiving Steve Rogers. She's got her intel; now it's time to see if he's as good as she thinks he is. "Shoot."

Edited 2013-08-14 21:08 (UTC)

He leans forward in much the same fashion she had moments earlier, and lets the pencil he'd been holding roll toward the sketchpad.

That waitress Sharon had been waiting on shows up, cheerful and bubbly, which quickly turns to an apologetic fussiness when she notices the mess.

"Just some more napkins," Steve tells her, smiling apologetically himself. "And another of what I was having, and whatever the lady would like."

He nods at Sharon, watching her steadily.

Her eyes don't follow the pencil, though she's acutely aware of the way it rolls, almost painfully slow, across the tabletop. Sharp object within reach. Her back's to the door of the cafe, and people keep coming up behind her; it's a good thing to know where such an object might be within reach.

Exhibit A: the waitress with the bizarrely ninja-like ability to appear out of thin air.

Sharon smiles over her annoyance, and reassesses the need to pull out the knife she's got stashed in her rolled yoga mat when she sits back from where she'd realized she'd been leaning in towards Rogers, intrigued. "Large regular, please. With cream."

Her curiosity's piqued now, but she keeps a bland, noncommittal smile on her face as the woman nods, and promises to be right back with their orders and the napkins, collecting the damp and dirty ones as she tucks the order pad into her apron pocket. "Thanks."

Edited 2013-08-14 22:09 (UTC)

Steve, naturally, helps her gather the soiled napkins and empty cup and various other odds and ends onto her tray before she leaves. And then he half-stands, waiting politely until after she's disappeared to sit again.

"How long have you been working with SHIELD?" He's casual in the asking, like he's still placing his order for coffee. Steve's a nice guy, but with an imperceptible shift he goes from mannered smiles and boyish charm to the officer he was all throughout the war, and the unspoken team leader he became in his new assignment here.

It's not difficult to see why he was so good at what he did. The bulk of his proud shoulders help the allusion of imposing power, but it's the seriousness in his eyes that really gets the job done. It's the kind of steel look you'd expect from someone who's ready to remove you at a moment's notice if he doesn't like what you have to say.

Her smile widens, and then, like with Steve, it shifts.

Not just the smile. Everything. From the way she holds herself, from all focus being on him to pushing her back more towards the wall, opening herself up a little further to the street and any possible incoming threat, to the way the vapid half-interest slides right off her face, leaving behind plain satisfaction and something striking close to delighted respect.

She knew it. Coulson would've said the same thing, but then, Coulson was always a little too certain of Rogers' capabilities, and Fury is by nature a paranoid son of a bitch who rarely assesses anyone past potential advantages or dangers. "A lot longer than you, Cap."

There's no chance of her lying. She hasn't been lying this whole time, aside from asking his name, and she'd have done that anyway, meeting outside of work, because she'd think it must get old, being recognized instantly, called by a name that's half your own and half the marketing might of the 1940's American propaganda machine. So she owns up, without even a shade of shame or surprise crossing her face. "But unlike you, I don't have a lot of marketable outside skills."

With a nod to the sketch book, like she's just continuing the conversation. "Seriously, those are pretty good."

He was expecting it, but he can't say he isn't disappointed. Upset, really. Angry, if you want to get down to brass tacks. Ever since they woke him up, SHIELD can't leave him alone. He doesn't know how many times he has to say he doesn't need a damn babysitter before it'll sink in.

And they wonder why he got on his bike after the incident, and got the hell out of Dodge for a while.

His jaw marks a straight line, lips pursed in a tight pout. The more the facade of Sharon chips away, the more frustrated he is that he almost fell for it. Not because he couldn't see it, but because he didn't want to.

"You here to babysit me, or just getting in my good graces before you tell me what you want?" he asks, voice colder, but still hovering at commanding rather than rude.

That frigid tone to his voice doesn't make her look any more impressed. She's been dressed down by Maria Hill and Nick Fury and she told Fury he wouldn't like it, and, look, she's just over the whole thing.

Good idea, poor execution. "Well, that depends."

She looks up as the waitress comes back, smiles as she accepts her cup of coffee, and sets it down as she reaches for a packet of sweetener to stir in. The waitress flusters around for a second, but even she can feel the tension in the air. It translates to awkward handling of the napkins and coffees she's putting down, before making a run for it, leaving Sharon to sip at her coffee, eyes downcast.

That's calculated, too. Cut him out of her line of sight in a slight offering of trust. A split second's all he would need to vanish, or make a move. "You seem like a big boy, and the whole world's seen that you can take care of yourself. You're stronger and faster than me, and you've got experience and training. But on the other hand..."

The cup goes down with a gentle clack against the table, and she follows it to lean slightly towards him. "They formed an entire new branch of the military while you were out. The country nearly tore itself apart over the civil rights movement, and you better believe that shit is nowhere near done yet. One president was assassinated, another impeached. And that's not even counting Star Wars hitting the theaters, or the invention of Google."

She tilts her head, studying him through thoughtful, narrowed eyes. "Aside from orders and missions, how much do you really feel like you know about the world you're in now?"

She's forgetting one important thing.

Steve Rogers doesn't run.

He may not have the hairpin-trigger senses of an agent, but in place of a tightening of muscles, a ready stance, or the overwhelming sense that he's counting potential weapons without ever looking away from who he's talking to, is something a lot more dangerous. Self-confidence, pride, and stubbornness. Never, not once, does he look like he's out of control.

Stark talks to him like he's a two year old anytime technology comes up, but he's not stupid. You show him a phone or a computer, and he'll work out how to use it eventually. Not everything she says is recognizable, but a lot of it is, and it's impossible to tell what hits and what misses. Up until that last question, that is.

That does unbalance him.

"I can see that a lot has changed, Sharon," he replies. "Just as easily as I can see how much is exactly the same. At one time I was a failed experiment; before that, I was just a sick kid. But you know what? People underestimating me sometimes means the difference between victory and defeat, and I'm not scared to take advantage of that."

She leans in, so he does too. They're not toe-to-toe, they're chin-to-chin, and for all his confidence it's easy to see that she's going to match him nerve for nerve. "I'm good at what I do. I'm good at the missions and the orders. But you put me in enemy territory, ma'am, and I'm going to learn how to survive."

It's good. He's pissed off, but not letting it own him; that tone is as level as ever, even if it's dropped a few degrees, and she can deal with that. There was no way this was ever going to be anything but messy, no matter her own personal feelings on the matter, what she'd prefer to do. Orders are orders, and she'll do whatever duty is asked of her.

Even if it's something as idiotic as pissing off Captain America. But she'll do it her way.

Fury would want her to go ahead and disappear. Leave him chewing over the fact that SHIELD is everywhere and could be anyone, but Fury thinks of people as chess pieces often enough these days that she wonders if he's surprised when they break and it turns out they're not made of ivory or stone. "Yeah, you're good." She'll admit that regularly. "Your abilities aren't under question, Steve. And, sure, you'd probably be fine. You're a smart guy, and people like look, even aside from you being every average Joe's favorite hero."

Not really tough, considering the alternatives are Tony Stark -- misogynistic symbol of capitalism -- a big green natural disaster, or a Norse god of myth.

"But I didn't put you in enemy territory, soldier. This?"

She waves a hand around at the street, the cafe; the people walking by, chatting lightly, the kid fixing the bike. "This is not a war zone. This isn't about survival. It's about living."

He's staring her down, but her chin stays up and her eyes stay even, and while her tone is conversational, something in it rings like steel further down. He can push her away, but she won't go far. "Not even you do your best work alone, so I think this stubbornness is a matter of personal pride. Are you annoyed at SHIELD? Join the club. But what's the point in refusing help?"

I didn't put you in enemy territory, soldier.

Soldier.

His jaw is like an L-beam. For the duration of her little speech he doesn't move to interrupt, doesn't look away, doesn't fidget. It could be translated as politeness, or the measured patience of a man who's grown accustomed to squatting in foxholes waiting out the enemy for endless hours at a time.

"I'm still making my mind up about that," he says. This is home. The people around them aren't soldiers or enemies. But the woman in front of him? She's a question mark, along with the rest of her organization. "If SHIELD wanted to help me, why did they send an agent out undercover to get close to me? Is Sharon even your real name?"

She comes at him asking what he knows of the real world outside of missions and taking orders (has the monkey given up its unicycle for a machine gun, ready to fire at the ringing of a bell?), and calls him stubborn for refusing help? Damn right he's angry with SHIELD. He doesn't trust them, and he doesn't trust her. That's something he can make up his mind on without a commanding officer holding his hand.

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