Realization came in waves.
When Sharon Carter first opened her eyes again, the first thing she saw was the night sky full of stars.
But the stars were wrong. No longer could she spot Orion's Belt or Cassiopeia. In there place was unfamiliar clusters of stars that burned duller than she thought possible, as if they were mourning a loss.
"Am I dead?" Were the first words to leave her lips. Only then did she deign to look around her. Before she had been on her way to New York, attempting to find Fury and alert him to the arrival of the Mad Titan.
Sharon had never even made it that far, the derilect sign ahead of the road proudly claiming she was now entering Edison.
She reached for her weapons, noticing she only had her gun and her blade.
She was alone on the road, no cars around her. It was as if no one had touched the road for sometime. Sharon couldn't wait there, so she walked.
She had only been walking a couple minutes when the portal showed up. Golden around the edges, Sharon peered inside and froze at what she saw.
Steve Rogers stood in the center of destruction, his shield cut to strips as he stood off against Thanos. He was alone, but not for long.
More golden portals opened up around him, hundreds of people starting to spill out. Sharon automatically stepped out of the portal, drawing out the sword Natasha had given her for their anniversary, right before she had left to go find Wanda and Vision.
As everyone stepped out of the portal and stepped behind Steve, Sharon looked around for her girlfriend. She was the only Avenger who looked to be unaccounted for.
"Avengers, Assemble!" Steve roared, drawing Sharon out of her daze and pushing her forward. She wasn't going to die, and niether was she about to let anyone else do the same for her.
As the first alien reached her, Sharon jumped at it, managing to strike it in its flank. The alien screamed, and whipped around only to have her sword impaled in its monstrous head.
Sharon continued forward on the battle field, fighting for every inch she was trying to gain. She recognised none of the bodies lying on the ground. It gave her hope for Natasha, that once this was over with that they would be reunited.
She couldn't tell how long the battle had lasted for. It could have been anywhere from ten minutes to twenty hours. All she knew was that it had ended with her hugging Sam Wilson in her arms as they watched Tony Stark take his final breath.
"What happened?" She whispered to Sam, only to have Steve look at her. He looked tired, tears running down his face as he moved away from Pepper Potts and a teenage boy.
"Thanos." Steve took a shaky breath. "Thanos happened."
"Where's Natasha, Steve?" Sharon asked, gripping onto his shoulder and pulling him into a hug.
She could feel the bigger man deflate in her side, sucking out any hope Sharon had had of seeing Natasha again.
"I'm sorry, Sharon. She died getting the Soul Stone. Clint was there with her."
Sharon took a deep breath, and clung tighter still to Steve. She wouldn't cry. Not here. Not now.
"She died protecting the world. Us."
****
It had been a week since the Battle of the Gauntlet and Sharon hadn't let Steve out of her sight once.
The blond man had become quieter, more introspective of himself. He only talked when spoken to, and even then he was liable to ignore you unless you were Sam and Bucky.
Sharon knew it was only a matter of time until he did something.
It got worse after Tony's funeral. Steve had burst into tears as they had laid out the wreath in the water. He had ended up staring at the wreath until it floated out of sight and then disappeared into the house.
It took another two days until she realised what Steve would do. The look on his face as he stood on the transporter was carefully neutral, attempting to hide his something from the rest of them. She knew Bucky had seen it too.
When it was her turn to talk to Steve, to see this old man who in another lifetime might have raised her, she understood. He had seen another shot at life, and he had taken it.
"You have another shot, Sharon. Take it, I'm begging you." Steve whispered in her ear, squeezing her hand in his before kissing her on the cheek.
He died that night in his sleep. Bucky had been the one to find him, had told Sharon that he had had tears in his eyes and a smile on his face.
She wasn't going to let him die in vain. She wasn't going to let Natasha's, Tony's, or Steve's sacrifices be wasted.
Sharon Carter was going to live.