Steve/Clarice
Tony's taking the guys out bar crawling, to celebrate Clint finding the dame whose writing matches the scrawl of, "so what's up arm candy," the fiery assistant who's come along with Thor and Jane to the new Tower and slapped Steve across the chest when they met. Steve's not drinking much, even if Tony said he was paying, and he's still nursing that second bottle of beer when he spots them. They come into the door with arms around each other, with sweat and dirt staining their faces, and the oddest clothes on that Steve's even seen. The man is a veritable giant, at least seven feet six, probably more, and the woman looks tiny beside him. And then she steps away, and he can see that it's not just the comparison, she is short, and skinny as he used to be, and the man pulls her back for a kiss on her cheek, murmuring something in her ear. She laughs, and passes by Steve on her way to the restroom, and her skin is pink, bright pink, and the heated discussion between Tony and Bruce tapers off as she passes them. And as she passes, as he smiles at her and she turns her face away, he sees the black lettering on the pink skin, the words written in a chicken scratch of handwriting, "it's okay cub, I got you."
He feels the man's eyes boring into him, and he nods, and turns back to his drink, and tries not to think about the possessive way the man's eyes had followed the girl to the restroom.
He's still trying when Bruce sits up straight, staring over Steve's shoulder, and he turns his head to see the men standing in the doorway, military uniforms crisp and dark, the guns they hold points out into the room. And the bar goes silent as one man, his face old and twisted by scars, walks to the man sitting at the table with the shoulders wider than the chair he sits on. He slaps a hand down on the table, and Steve sees everyone in the bar jump, and Tony's putting a hand on his shoulder, holding him back, and that mountain of a man simply looks up and grunts. "Victor Creed," the man's got no divisional insignia on his uniform, but there's the officer's growl in his voice. His words are echoed by Clint's hissed intake of breath. "Did you think you would avoid us forever?"
The man, Victor Creed, lifts his eyes to look, not at the officer standing over him, but directly at Steve. Then he looks around the room, at the civilians holding onto their drinks and some onto camera phones, and then back once more at Steve. Steve nods, but the slap from the military man is already being repeated, and Victor's broken the contact. Clint shifts, and Tony's fiddling with the bracelets on his wrists, and Bruce is edging away from them, and Steve is just trying to gauge the conversation.
"Pay attention to me, Victor. You will come with me."
Victor scoffs, and tips back his drink. "What makes you so sure, Stryker?"
He sees the man grin, sees the curve of his lips as he puts his hand on his waist, pulls it back so the butt of a gun shows, gleaming in the half light of the bar. And then he turns, draws it and points it out, at the space that lead to the restroom, a sickening grin on his lined face. "Shouldn't have let that slip of a soulmate go off on her own."
There's suddenly three Avengers leap for the door to the restroom. And Steve's eyes go to the doorway as there comes a groan, but it's not the female one he expects, it's male, and the figure that falls to the ground, hitting the floor of the bar with a thump is male, and big, and wearing military uniform, and Victor is laughing. The girl from earlier, the bright pink girl, she stands in the doorway with a strange looking blade in her hand, twirling it around, and she smiles at the Avengers who have moved towards her, and at the frozen room behind them, and Victor is still laughing.
"Could have told you that wasn't going to work, Stryker." Victor raises his bottle past Stryker's disbelieving face, and indeed, all the other faces, nodding at the girl, who twirls the blade in her hand and then makes it disappear somewhere on her person. Steve can follow the swing of the knife. "Where'd you send them, squirt?"
She shrugs, and smiles at him, that odd twinkle that exists in Victor's eyes echoed in hers. "Usual place." And she laughs too, and walks over with a slow grace and lilt to her hips, casts a look at Steve and Tony, nods at Clint, and places her hands opposite on the table. Stryker leans back, right up against Steve, who puts a firm hand on his shoulder and digs in, holding him there.
"So uh, this is fairly interesting." Tony doesn't have the armour on, but he's got a smirk, and he comes forward wearing it, dragging his hands through his hair and leaning against Victor's table. The other patrons of the bar are shifting even further away, and the soldiers from the door have stepped forward, but they aren't shooting their guns, and Clint has gotten a gun from...somewhere...and is casually holding it at his side. "What's going on, guys?"
"This is none of your business," Stryker says, and Steve can feel him trying to get out from the hold he's got on his shoulder, but he presses down and keeps him there, and growls too. "You are assaulting a member of the United States Armed Forces, and you will release me."
"Steve, is he saying what I think he's saying?"
"You know, I think he is."
Victor and the girl are watching, but they're not saying anything, and they let Tony have his moment. Steve lets the false smile fall off his face as he looks at them. There's no sign of injury on the girl, but it did sound like they had sent multiple men after her, and he can't imagine how someone as small as her could take them down without a single mark on her. She eyes him back, and there's no pupil to her eyes. Just solid, bright, alien like green. Colour right across that makes Steve Blink and take a double look. Nope, still wrong.
"See, what this looks like is the army coming in and arresting mutants without a warrant or reason. And that don't fly with me."
Mutant, Steve mouths at Clint with a question in his eyes, and Clint nods pointedly at the girl, at the pink skin and odd eyes, and that doesn't really answer any of Steve's questions, but it's not possible to ask anything else with Tony continuing and Stryker jerking out of Steve's hands.
"You will turn yourself in, Creed. You're not a man," and Stryker turns his glare on the girl, and he's hard and cold, and wishing death. "You're an animal, and animals don't get soulmates. You'll come to your senses, soon enough."
And then Stryker shoulders his way past Steve and Clint, snaps his fingers at the men and they pick up the fallen comrade as the go. The air inside the bar is still dead, still so tense, but now it's between Victor, the girl, and the Avengers, and Steve can feel it curl around him like a desperate plague.
"You didn't have to do that," the girl says, at the same time that Victor says, "thanks for the back up guys." This close to the two of them, with them talking at the same time, Steve can see just how different they are in age, how much younger she is than him, and he wonders if there's something about being soulmates that will make you willing to be with someone who's all that more older than you.
And then her words register, and his hand goes to the curve of his waist, and he knows she sees, and he's looking at her and trying to think of something to say, but his mind is blank, and he can't think of anything, and Victor is laughing again, throwing back his head and laughing like it's the end of the world. "Nice catch cub," he claps them both on their shoulders as he gets up from the table. "I'll clear things up here with Stark, you get your soulmate talking."
She sits opposite Steve, and he still doesn't know what to say, and she stares him down until his throat is dry and he can see Victor talking to Tony and Clint behind her.
He coughs, and then out comes words, and oh fuck this is the first thing he's saying to his soulmate, and poor girl she's had to live with this her whole life. "So uh I don't really want to be sharing you with him but I get that he comes first, and I'll try to get out of the way, but I would like to at least know your name."
She laughs, and puts her hand on top of his, and says in a voice so different from what she'd talked like before, and it sounds like bells and sweet grass and he nearly falls to his knees in front of her then and there. "He's...He's practically my dad. It's platonic. I'm...I'm Clarice Ferguson."
"It's good to meet you," Steve says, and smiles at her, and then they're both leaning forward, and then his hand is on her shoulder and she's got a hand on his arm, and then their lips are together, and he can taste her on his lips, and she pulls back with a smile on her face, and a flush on her cheeks, and he smiles back with heat in her cheeks.
"So uh... What do you know about alternate universes? Cause this is going to be a long story."