[outlander psl au]

[womanofvalue]

The ground was saturated with so much rain that Peggy thought she might be washed away, but just because the plains were soaked didn't mean that the drills stopped. The soldiers didn't know it yet, but the landings were going to arrive sooner than anyone wanted and that meant no one can be untrained, lest they end up paying with their lives on those beaches. Today, when the fog rolled in, her superiors informed her that she would be running orienteering with her men, eliciting a sharp 'sir, yes, sir' from Peggy before she took the maps to her own private tent in order to brief the Lieutenants.

Leaning over to study the map, her stubborn engagement ring catches her eye. It had managed to escape from where she had tucked it away, just like all her thoughts about Fred. Their engagement was a terse and stressful thing. When she had announced that she was going into the field with the SSR, he had threatened to leave her. It had been her mother that had convinced Fred to wait Peggy out, insisting that once the war was over, things would change.

As much as Peggy was fond of Fred, she was beginning to see the splinters in their engagement turn to wider cracks, chasms so wide that you could lose sight of the love you once shared and guided you towards that engagement. Carefully, she pushed the ring back, securing it with one of her brassiere straps. Snapping her compass shut, she gave the objective and the orders. "I'll be out in the field to keep an eye on each platoon. The first to reach the objective will not run additional miles," she promised.

"The others will be doing laps around the base, respective to their finishing position." Folding up the map, she handed one to each of her four Lieutenants. "Let them look at it for a few hours, then to the navigator." With a few more orders, she allowed them to prepare as she herself got ready. She tugged on knee-high rain boots, an overcoat, and despite the misty fog in the air, she double-checked that her hair and makeup was in good shape.

Several hours later found Peggy in the thick of drills, listening to the shouts of men in the distance as they worked their way towards her and the objective. Standing there with a brolly, she glanced at her pocketwatch and decided mentally that she would see the first platoon in no more than forty-five minutes. Clasping the watch shut, the echo of it was drowned by another sound -- one that didn't belong. The sound of twigs and branches crunching made Peggy reach for her pistol, simply to be ready.

"Phillips?" she called out, thinking perhaps something had happened and she needed to recall her men. She saw the silhouette of what appeared to be a man in the fog and she found herself inexplicably drawn towards him, mainly because it simply didn't make any sense. "Who's there?" she asked, when it was clear that the man she was seeing didn't bear resemblance to anyone on base. This close, she could see that his hair had a strange look to it, not to mention his clothes. "Has there been an accident?" What could have happened to render the man in such a state?

(Peggy also did not need to allow her conscious thoughts to become aware of how handsome the man was, despite the fact she feared she was already a lost cause, given the way she was filled with a renewed warmth and how her gaze lingered)

They were inside a ring of large stones, which she vaguely recalled the locals warning her about. She had paid little mind, marking them perfunctorily on the map before moving on, but now she had to wonder if the talk of strange rituals wasn't at least a little true. Forty-five minutes. She had forty-five minutes until the men arrived, surely she could deal with this surprise in that time.

Comments

[bearstheshield]

"All right," Steve says. He knows how these kinds of missions work and he has to trust her enough to be able to sleep while she takes first shift. If he doesn't, he'll end up bone tired and a liability to both of them when he needs to be fresh to keep them both safe.

As he settles in the passenger's seat of a car that looks like it ought to be in a museum, he faintly thinks that Erskine sounds familiar. Where does he know that name from?

[womanofvalue]

Peggy is already trying to map the route in her head, thinking of when they'll have to make their first stop, imagining that it will be in France once they get off the ferry. There are a few safehouses that she knows they can take advantage of, they can surely take one of those for the night.

Starting up the car, she loads up a bag of weapons, ordinance, and other supplies they might need in the back, donning a hat. "Now," she says, seeing as they're just starting and he won't likely sleep yet, "what on earth does an avenger do for a living?"

[bearstheshield]

"What needs to be done, mostly. Spec ops work, extractions, things behind enemy lines." Steve gives her a mildly sheepish look. "Things like this, actually, even though espionage isn't exactly my thing. I was enhanced by a serum so I'm tougher, faster, stronger than the average soldier. I can take a beating solidly on the chin and get back up so they usually send me in when there's no hope left."

[womanofvalue]

Peggy gives him a curious look, because while it's very helpful, it also seems far, far too convenient. How does a man out of time with all the necessary skills end up here with her? It's terribly odd, honestly, and all with a man who looks like he's come out of a poster to help her with her mission. "What sort of serum?" she asks, a touch wary.

After all, it seems a touch too on the nose as to Erskine's work, but how could he know about this? It's classified and even if he is from the future, he shouldn't know this.

[bearstheshield]

"Some super soldier thing. I'm the only one they've ever used it on. They found the recipe locked away, lost to time. Didn't want to use it on anyone who didn't seem like the right personality type," Steve says.

"The director of SHIELD didn't want to give me many details. Said it was on a need to know basis and the need to knows were him and Tony Stark."

[womanofvalue]

Peggy furrows her brow, not sure how to reconcile any of this. It genuinely sounds as if this serum is a powerful thing, something that Erskine himself would be developing, yet Steve is from the future. If Erskine's formula was to succeed, wouldn't there need to be a subject here? She's been searching for one, for Phillips, to no avail.

Besides, rescuing the man does take priority. "SHIELD?" she echoes. It's a good name, but she has no idea what on earth it might stand for. "I'm not sure what that is. Also, Tony Stark?" she echoes. "Any relation to a Howard?"

[bearstheshield]

"His father," Steve confirms. "I've never met him myself because I think he died before Tony was out of college but that's his name. He founded Stark Industries."

He wonders if the company is around even now. It must be, in some capacity, if Peggy knows to pull the name Howard Stark out of thin air. He wonders if that's the connection, if that's the reason why he's come here to this specific time and place.

"Is he someone that you know?"

[womanofvalue]

"Howard is an integral part of a project that we're working on," Peggy replies, a touch thrown off by the fact that she's talking to a man who knows his son. Truthfully, Howard probably has plenty of children around the world, but none that Peggy has met. "I can bring you around to his tent when we return. In fact, we're going to have to," she says seriously, because Howard will need to work with Erskine to finish the serum.

She takes them towards the back roads in order to start driving a little faster. Every time she glances over at him, she finds her attention lingering, unable to help it. He is an immensely attractive man, after all. "I don't even know that Howard is dating anyone, properly, at the moment. Not for lack of trying," she says evenly. "He enjoys pushing the limits, even with me."

[bearstheshield]

For some reason, the idea of Tony Stark's father getting fresh with the woman in the driver's seat beside him drives Steve insane and he has to tamp down a wave of jealousy. He knows it's insane; he barely knows Peggy Carter and he definitely doesn't have any right to say who she does and does not date. For all he knows, she could end up being Howard Stark's first wife or something (the timing isn't right for her to have been Tony's mother, after all).

"Well, I'm guessing you've never given in, right? He sounds like he's a little busy with a lot of people." And she seems like the type to be a lot more selective than that.

[womanofvalue]

"No, I'm already taken," she says, staring straightforward at the road ahead of her, not sure why she feels such a pang of disappointment to have to set Steve straight about the man waiting for her back home. Ostensibly, at least. When Peggy had left for the field, Fred hadn't been too keen and while she hasn't received a letter ending things, she also hasn't gone home.

She fears that if she does, it's going to be to a conversation that she's been wanting to have. It simply is a terrifying thing, knowing that your safety net might be evaporating on you. Perhaps it's worse, knowing that she's marrying a safety net, at all. "Howard is content to rifle his way through the drawers of the secretaries and the entertainers and the scientists all he likes. Do you not approve, then? More of a one-woman man?"

[bearstheshield]

"I am," Steve says. He has to tamp down his disappointment that a woman as wonderful as Peggy Carter seems to be taken but he's not surprised. She's beautiful and intelligent and has no shortage of bravery, to be on the front lines. Anyone would be lucky to have her in their life as friend or lover and as much as he's drawn to her, he cannot possibly be the only one. Still, there's more than one brief pang of regret that he isn't going to get a chance to ask her out for a drink at the end of all this.

"I think it's fine to date, if you want, but I would rather be a one-woman guy. I want to get to know someone really well if I'm dating them and I want to truly explore whether or not they're going to fit into my life on a permanent basis. It's never casual for me."

[womanofvalue]

Absently, she finds herself pressing a palm to the chain around her neck holding her engagement ring, thinking about the man beside her. She can't explain why hearing him talk about this makes her so viscerally upset, as if there's going to be someone else in that role. She hardly knows him. He's a madman from a field, but he's also the man who willingly threw himself into her mission without a second thought for his own safety, not to mention he'd instantly tried to make himself feel useful.

"Do you believe, then, that there's someone out there for everyone? Some theory that some people are made for others?" She's not sure what answer she wants to hear, but she's not sure that she'd believed it before. She and Fred were amicable and got on well enough, but there was no spark. At times, it was like dating a brother's friend, just to keep it in the family, so to speak. The thought of a lifetime with Fred...

Well, she'd be popping out babies and never going into the field. She hopes the fear and dissatisfaction isn't entirely evident, but she also knows that she doesn't want to marry Fred. She just doesn't know how to get out of it.

[bearstheshield]

"I like to think so. I haven't met anyone yet that sparks for me like that," Steve admits, "But I like to think she's out there somewhere. I like to think there's someone tailor-made for me and I'm tailor-made for her and when we meet we're going to just know. Maybe not immediately or anything like that but...we'll know."

It's a strange conversation to have with someone he's just met but somehow he feels comfortable enough with Peggy to admit things he's never voiced out loud.

[womanofvalue]

The jealousy only gets worse. Peggy feels utterly disgusted with herself, especially when she can lay no claim to this man, but she can't help herself. There's a feeling that she has, as if Steve is more important than ever she knows, and to hear him admit that somewhere out there is the perfect woman to match the other half of his soul makes Peggy feel woefully inadequate to whomever this perfect woman might be. "I think so, too," she says, quietly. "That there's someone out there that perfectly resembles your other half, the one that isn't so much your exact match, but your equal in all things, who understands you and completes you, jagged edges and all." Someone who accepts you for who you are and not the prospect of what you could be, with just enough polish and spit and work.

She drives in silence for a few minutes after that, wishing she had something to cheer her from this strange grief in her chest at sending this man back to a future and some other woman, telling herself that it's just her dissatisfaction with Fred making her feel this way (ignoring that it hadn't happened until now, despite a legion of decent men around her). "Well, lucky her, whomever she is," she says, finally, her words ringing flat.

[bearstheshield]

"Lucky that you found yours," Steve says politely. It feels a little hollow since she is engaged and he hasn't felt this tug toward a woman in a long time but he can't fall for her. She's engaged to someone else, for one, and for two, he's not even from this era. He came here from the future through a set of magic stones. It's a story that's hard to believe for anyone, even someone who's saved the world more than once.

"He's going to be a very happy husband some day."

[womanofvalue]

She doesn't say anything, because the truth is that Fred isn't her equal and he won't be a happy husband unless Peggy stops working and settles down to have his children. She frowns, fearing that it's clear from her expression that she's far from happy, but how on earth does she tell that to a man she's co-opted for a dangerous mission that she intends to help back to his time.

"My romantic life isn't your concern, happy or no," she says, trying to push past her dissatisfaction, pressing down on the gas pedal so they'll travel faster.

[bearstheshield]

"I'm sorry," Steve says. His tone is truly contrite because in spite of being from the modern era, he's an old-fashioned kind of guy. He still pulls out chairs and holds doors for women and he doesn't like to pry. He likes his own space, when he can get it, and it's a precious thing when you're military because you spend so often living out of each others' pockets that you don't know when the next time will come that you'll get a space of your own.

"I didn't mean to poke at your personal life. We just kind of meandered into the subject but it was none of my business. Do you want to switch off the driving and get some rest?"

[womanofvalue]

She could use the rest, primarily because when they reach their destination, she'll be working and translating. "Yes, that does seem the smartest plan," she admits, glad that she's able to fall asleep wherever she's given space to. She still drives until she sees a place to pull over, grateful that it's not too far and it gives them a space to change seats.

"I don't mind talking about my personal life, it's simply not as perfect as everyone assumes," is what she says, while she's making a spot in the back of the car for herself to sleep. "We were sweethearts at school, that's all. My mother wants this for me because otherwise, she's sure there's no other man for me." Truthfully, most days, Peggy would prefer no other man to the future she's staring down.

[bearstheshield]

"Nobody's life is as perfect as you want it to seem on the outside. It's easier now. In my time? Everyone puts their personal business out for the world to see," Steve explains. He doesn't necessarily know how to go about explaining Facebook and Twitter to someone in the 1940s but he thinks that will suffice for now.

"Even the most mundane details have to be presented in a way to make them seem like they're fantastic and beyond belief. It's exhausting."

[womanofvalue]

Peggy rests her cheek on the beddings below her, listening to Steve's voice as it washes over her, finding it more comforting than she would have expected. It's terribly annoying to feel this sort of pull to someone else, especially someone from the future, but she doesn't mind the way that his voice is so warm and soft, lulling her in.

"People should retain their privacy," she insists, even as she yawns, belying how sleepy she is. It's been a very long few days and she's only human, regardless of what her shoulders think. "I value mine more than most," she says, her eyes falling closed as they drive. "Wake me up when we hit the cliffs," she murmurs sleepily.

[bearstheshield]

"I'll wake you, promise." Steve lets her sleep as long as he can, though, because he knows that what lies ahead of them is likely going to be difficult and they're not going to have much in the way of rest from here on out. When they reach the cliffs, he pulls the car over to stop and just watches her for a moment before shaking his head to clear it.

"Peggy," he says softly, gently nudging her shoulder to wake her. "We're here."

[womanofvalue]

She'd been in the midst of a terrible dream; terrible only in that it's the sort of dream a woman isn't supposed to be having and it's not about Fred. There are big hands working her legs open, sliding all over the pale skin of her body, and Peggy lets out a soft exhalation, hearing the man's voice wash over her, a pleasurable thing as she finds herself between sleep and waking.

"Steve," she sighs out with a tiny moan, curling in a little tighter. It takes her a moment to realize that it's not the man in her dream saying her name, but rather, the actual man. She jolts awake, hair in disarray, and stares at him in shock. "We're here?" she asks, when she composes herself.

[bearstheshield]

"We're here," Steve says softly. "You fell asleep." Peggy is flushed and disheveled and Steve has to put out of his mind just how beautiful she looks right now. She's made it clear she's engaged and this is a mission; he isn't going to keep pushing her when she's made it evident that their relationship is going to be work-based and platonic.

"Do you need a minute to get your bearings?"

[womanofvalue]

Peggy needs a moment to ground herself in reality, truth be told. She's a little dizzy and hazy yet, trying to recall that the man in her dream whispering to her and touching her is the one sitting in the Jeep with her, but that it isn't her fiancé. Embarrassed, she hopes she's not flushed too badly as she works to put her hair in a low knot, clearing her throat.

"Our contact is meeting us here, we'll cross over and continue to make headway. The best way to attack the fortress is at night, with you as my backup. I can't have you going in there with me, it might set off alarms," she says. "Seeing as you hardly look conspicuous, with all those muscles of yours, do you?"

[bearstheshield]

Steve looks down at his chest for a moment before looking back at her. "I didn't think the US Army wanted weaklings out on the front lines so I decided to eat my vegetables. Sorry it's not going to help me blend in."

He's not prone to sarcasm or jokes but something about Peggy Carter makes him a little more playful than usual. Without a team to look out for, he feels a little more reckless.