Nothing but trouble

It doesn't hurt anymore

Numb and heartbroken Steve watches as the blood-tinged water swirls down the sinks drain. His partner's blood. His friend's blood. His lover's blood. Katherine's blood. It should be him lying cold and lifeless on that table right now, not her. She saved his life and the lives of dozens of civilians caught in the middle of their fight. With no regard for those people's lives the men they'd been after aimed their weapons at the crowd in their bid to give cover to their leader to try and get away. He thought for sure he was a goner when a hail of bullets had sprayed across the busy streets of Seattle. Far more than his shield could ever hope to fend off to protect anyone let alone himself.

As he raised his shield Steve prepared himself to die when Katherine teleported out of nowhere. Putting herself in front of him and all of those innocent people. Without even turning around she threw up a barrier of magic or energy with one hand between her and them. He tried to get past it but it had been no use. Throwing up that barrier had saved his and everyone else's lives on the other side of it. But it made it so he had to stand there completely useless and watch her small body take more bullets than he'd ever seen someone take before. That was the only bright side to this whole disaster of a mission. That in her last act as a hero Katherine had saved them while wiping out Travers and all of his men in front of her.

Clutching the side of the sink in his bathroom back at the Tower Steve braced his weight on his hands as he looked up at his reflection in the mirror. Horrified by the sight he stumbled back. The lower half of his face, neck and most of the front of his suit was drenched in her blood. Hands shaking he tore at it. Ripping it off in large sections until he stood there naked with it discarded on the floor at his feet next to his blood splattered boots. Vigorously rubbing his hands over the skin of his chest he tried to get Katherine's blood off that had soaked through. But it was dried now and it barely flaked off. Stumbling into the shower he turned it to the hottest setting it went to. Pouring soap on his loofah Steve scrubbed and scrubbed until his skin was raw and stinging. Until not a speck of blood was left anywhere on his body and then his legs gave out on him.

Bringing his knees up to his chest Steve sat under the scalding hot water until it eventually turned to ice. Even then he stayed rooted to the floor of the shower unable to rid his mind of the moment the beautiful blue fire in her eyes died away leaving them white and sightless. Finally the cold seemed to sink in when he began to uncontrollably shiver. It was probably a combination of shock and grief just as much as the cold water. Weakly, he dragged himself out of the bathroom, barely towling himself off and fell into a heap at the side of his bed. Having no energy to try and climb the two feet up onto the mattress he just sat there in a daze. Katherine's weak voice echoed in his head. The last words she spoke to him. Her last words spoken, ever. Curling in on himself as one of the most terrible moments of his life flashed through his head, Steve couldn't stop the tears from falling that he'd been holding onto since the second she stopped breathing.

Cupping her face, he looked down into those enchanting whitish-blue eyes of hers that stared up at him. A half smirk on her face as she places a comforting hand on his chest. Right over the white star leaving behind a bloody handprint trying to reassure him that everything was going to be alright.

"It doesn't hurt anymore, Spangles.

I think..

I think I'm gonna be..okay now, Stevie..

I'll be..."

:::::::

There is always a high level of danger on their missions, but that was par for the course otherwise they wouldn't be called in. The Avengers weren't sent to handle simple things that regular police could deal with. They were sent out when things had crossed beyond the normal scope of everyday crime. Everything had started out so smoothly when they landed in Seattle. At first that is. They landed just outside the city about two hours after their little romp on the quinjet. They were being picked up by the team of SHIELD agents patiently waiting for them to arrive on the west coast.