Moments later...

"...I know I'm asking a lot," Cap spoke into a microphone which was connected into the HQ's PA system. "But the price of freedom is high. It always has been. And it's a price I'm willing to pay. And if I'm the only one, then so be it," he paused. "But I'm willing to bet I'm not."

Steve unpressed the microphone's button and straightened up. The group had infiltrated into the communication's room at SHIELD HQ and Steve had promptly made an announcement for all SHIELD employees revealing the truth about HYDRA's infiltration and some of the people involved, while simultaneously trying to encourage anyone willing to support his cause, all while Roxanne, Sam, and Hill covered him.

Ro couldn't help but glance back at Steve and give him an admiring smile as he finished his speech. Something about the way he spoke to others, while always remaining realistic and grounded, was also encouraging and exceptionally inspiring. He truly seemed to have a gift.

"That was," she cleared her throat and looked down sheepishly, "that was a great speech, Cap."

"So, did you write that down first, or was it off the top of your head?" Sam teased with a slight smirk.

Steve gave both of them a soft smile. However, the moment was interrupted when a plethora of gunshots was heard coming from another, distant room, followed by various alarms heard both outside and inside the quarters.

"Uhm, I know I'm new at this," Ro stated nervously as she looked around the room, "but that didn't sound good."

Agent Hill, now sitting at one of the desks, tapped a few keyboard keys and looked at a few of the monitors in alarm. "They're initiating launch."

_______________________________________________________

Steve, Sam, and Ro bolted out of the building, racing towards the bay. Once there, they ran past dozens of quinjets parked on the runway, and saw from the distance three colossal vehicles resembling aircraft carriers slowly rising from the ground.

"Cap, how do we know the good guys from the bad guys?" Sam asked.

"If they're shooting at you, they're bad," Steve replied.

"Oh, that's helpful," Ro quipped, although a slight tremble in her voice denoted her anxiety. "Where to now?"

"Get to your stations before they get too far!" the Captain commanded.

The trio reached the end of a tall platform, and one of the helicarriers was ascending just underneath. Without losing momentum, Sam activated the engine of the jetpack he was wearing, and out of it sprouted a pair of metal bird-like wings. As the man jumped off the platform and began to glide towards the sky, Ro's jaw dropped in amazement. She hadn't gotten to talk to Wilson all that much up to that point, and therefore never got an explanation as to why he was nicknamed 'The Falcon'. But now she knew.

Steve jumped down and used his round star-spangled shield to cushion his fall as he landed on the runway of Helicarrier Alpha. The arachnid girl spotted the carrier that had been assigned to her, Charlie, across from it. She threw a web which stuck to a large structure nearby, and began to swing herself to reach the vehicle. Her danger tingle suddenly went off mid-swing, and just then, a rain of bullets began hailing towards the three heroes. Ro lost balance and focus and fell onto the runway, narrowly avoiding getting hit.

"I found the bad guys you were talking about!" Sam exclaimed through the comms as he flew avoiding the missiles being fired at him in the air.

As the bullets ricocheted off his shield, Steve dashed to where Roxanne had landed and crouched himself over her, covering himself and the girl from the attack.

"You alright?" he asked her once the fire seemed to have ceased.

"I think..." Ro began, but trailed off as a telling sensation shot from the back of her neck. "LOOK OUT!"

She sprung up and shot another web at a guard who was aiming his gun at the pair from behind, pulling him hard face-first into a nearby crate. A second tingle warned her of another guy coming at Steve from his blind spot, and she swiftly sent a flying kick that knocked the goon cold before the Avenger even spotted his presence.

Steve rapidly looked from the two unconscious HYDRA soldiers to Ro. "That was impressive," he panted. "How'd you do that?"

She grinned nervously. "My powers include really, really good reflexes."

"Hey, Roxanne," Sam called over the comms. "How are you going to get to Charlie? I could pick you up and drop you off, but these guns aren't making it easy."

"Don't worry about me," Ro replied. She gave Steve another look, and he nodded reassuringly. The two began running in separate directions, dodging and shielding themselves from incoming shots, respectively. "I'm on my way to Charlie right now, and I have my own ways of getting there. Just focus on taking down Bravo."

Roxanne arrived at the edge of Helicarrier Alpha, and Helicarrier Charlie was only a short distance away. She needed to get on before it got any higher or farther, or else, she'd jeopardize the mission. She jumped up as far as she could and released a string of web. The web stuck to the underside of the helicarrier just as it began accelerating upwards, pulling Roxanne with it.

Ro swung herself forward like a pendulum, bringing herself closer to the helicarrier. At the highest point of her swing, she released another web with her free hand and cut the previous web. She repeated the process until she was able to stick herself directly to the helicarrier's underside. Unfortunately, she made the mistake of looking down as soon as she secured herself.

"Aw, crap!" Ro exclaimed, squeezing her eyes shut and turning away from the absolutely stunning view she had of D.C. The view had been so stunning that her limbs locked up and her stomach churned.

"Seda, is something wrong?" Hill called through the comms, jolting her out of her disorientation.

"Uh, no," Ro lied. "I'm fine. I've got this."

Roxanne kicked herself for forgetting that she was still afraid of heights and for failing to account for how far above the ground she was going to be. If she had, maybe she'd still be able to move.

"Alpha, locked," she heard Steve's voice through the comms, indicating he had successfully placed the chip in his respective helicarrier's port.

"Come on, Ro," she muttered to herself. "Don't let this stop you. You NEED to do this." She repeated those three sentences to herself several times, sometimes even imagining her birth father saying them to her. With each repetition, she resolutely crawled her way to the top of the helicarrier.

"Bravo, locked," now Sam confirmed through the earpiece, meaning Roxanne was the only one left.

She pulled herself onto the top of the helicarrier where several armed HYDRA soldiers began firing at her. She dodged the bullets, but the heavy gunfire forced her to take cover behind some crates and tall structures that were nearby, keeping her from advancing to the control room. Thinking fast, she pulled two smoke bombs from her utility belt and threw them into the group of soldiers. With the smoke obscuring their vision, the soldiers stopped firing, allowing Roxanne to make quick work of them.

"Seda, you're the only one who hasn't locked," Agent Hill urged through the comms, "how are you doing so far?"

Meanwhile, Ro was taking care of two remaining guards who had fired at her. She used her webs to pull the gun away from one of them, and used it to swiftly knock the two of them out. She checked her surroundings, and the coast now seemed to be clear.

"Okay, I'm almost at the control room!" she said through her comms as she threw the gun overboard and ran towards the door that would lead her to the inside of the carrier. "I just need to get to—"

She abruptly stopped talking when the familiar warning sensation tingled up her neck. Before she got a chance to check her surroundings, an unknown force pulled her from behind and threw her all the way across the runway, landing hard against a railing, which narrowly stopped her from falling off.

Recovering quickly, she looked up to find a now maskless Winter Soldier glaring menacingly at her, his long dark hair blowing in the wind. Behind him, the other guards began hurriedly evacuating the ship as they got onto a small quinjet that was parked nearby.

Fear paralyzed Ro as her gaze locked with the Soldier's ice cold, dead-looking eyes once again. Seeing the Soldier's full face made Ro realize just how inhumanly empty his eyes looked. It was like they were both looking through each other.

She took notice that his left arm, made entirely out of silver-colored metal, was now on full display, as opposed to how it had remained mostly hidden beneath his jacket sleeve last time she faced him. And it felt like the perfect complement to his machine-like stare and demeanor.

"Seda, you okay?" Hill called remotely.

"I've got company," the girl replied breathlessly, without taking her eyes off the fearsome man in front of her. "It's our old friend."

"Cap, Falcon, get to Charlie," Hill ordered. "Seda has been intercepted."

Roxanne didn't want to need Steve and Sam's help to finish her part of the mission, but she knew she had almost no chance of beating someone who rivaled Captain America himself in strength, speed, and skill by herself. She was going to need all the help she could get if she was going to even survive this fight. Besides, as terrible as her odds are, she wasn't going to let them stop her from giving this guy one hell of a fight.

She screamed out a battle cry as she lunged at the Soldier and swung her fist at his face. He caught it before it could make contact, so Ro sent a kick to his ribs, which he blocked with his bionic arm. He tossed her onto the floor and sent a downward punch her way, but she rolled away and jumped up before it made contact, causing him to drive his metal fist into the runway.

The Winter Soldier pulled his fist out of the crater he had just created and threw another punch at Roxanne. Ro ducked and rolled away from him. As she did, she heard the tell-tale clatter of a small electronic object being dropped on the floor. Ro turned her head towards the sound and saw her computer chip sitting on the runway roughly two feet from the Soldier.

Seeing Roxanne's alarmed expression, the Soldier followed her gaze to the chip. Despite his expression remaining unchanged, the Soldier must have realized the chip's importance because he quickly lunged for it. Just as quickly, Roxanne tackled him away from the chip, a particularly difficult task considering how much lighter Ro was compared to the Soldier. Even though she felt like she had smashed into a brick wall afterwards, Roxanne successfully prevented the Winter Soldier from taking the chip. The man retaliated by grabbing her by her uniform, his hands dangerously close to her neck.

In the time it took Roxanne to gasp what she was sure was going to be her last breath, she looked up just in time to see Sam and Steve land on Helicarrier Charlie's runway.

"Steve!" she cried. "Grab the chip! Grab the chip!"

Before she could say or do anything else, the Winter Soldier tossed her off the side of the helicarrier, making her scream. Fortunately for Roxanne, her enhanced reflexes kicked in just in time for her to shoot a web onto the helicarrier's underside before she fell too far. She was too focused on pulling herself back onto the helicarrier to think about what might be happening on Steve and Sam's end, but she could hear what sounded like a fight going on above her. Ro was halfway up when she saw Sam plummeting past her with a wing missing from his flight suit.

"Sam!" she shouted. Without missing a beat, she dove after Sam and grabbed him, using her free hand to shoot another web at the helicarrier. She turned her head just in time to see her web fail to reach its target.

"We're going to die!" she thought to herself just as Sam pulled a cord on his flight suit and deployed a parachute.

The pair's fall slowed down slightly, and Sam held on to Roxanne more firmly. With hardly any balance to keep, they finally landed, roughly but alive and in one piece.

"Why didn't you tell me you had a parachute!?" Roxanne asked Sam as she got up and walked off the pain.

"Oh yeah, sorry about that, I got a little bit distracted falling to my death," the man replied in a heavily sarcastic tone.

Wincing slightly, Ro looked up back to Helicarrier Charlie, which was now considerably higher than when she first got on. In a desperate attempt, she threw a web up at it with as much strength as she could, but the silk string predictably missed the hovering vehicle by a large margin.

"Damn it!" she exclaimed. "I can't reach it anymore."

"Cap? Cap, come in. Are you okay?" Sam asked through the comms.

"Yeah, I'm here," Steve replied. "I'm still on the helicarrier."

"Did you grab the chip? Is it still in one piece? I didn't break it, did I?" Roxanne demanded, not even bothering to hide the worry in her voice.

"Yeah, I got it, and it's not broken. Don't worry about it. Where are you guys?"

"I'm grounded; the suit's down. Roxanne is with me, so she's stuck, too. Sorry, Cap," Sam explained.

"Don't worry. I got it," Steve reassured them before cutting the call, presumably to finish the mission.

Ro couldn't help but blame herself for their current situation. If she hadn't jumped off the helicarrier, she'd still be able to help Steve. If she hadn't looked down and froze, she would have gotten her chip into the control room before the Winter Soldier tried to kill her.

But all things considered, maybe this had been for the best. At least, Steve was a lot less likely than her to fail and screw up the mission entirely. She hoped.

Before she could further dwell in her disappointment, however, she and Sam got a call from Agent Hill over the comms.

"Falcon? Seda?"

"Yeah?" Sam replied.

"What's up?" Ro added.

"Rumlow's headed for the Council. He's got two accomplices with him," Hill relayed.

"We're on it," Sam affirmed before turning to Ro. "Come on."

"Right behind you," Ro agreed and followed him back inside the building.

_______________________________________________________

Moments later, Sam and Ro entered an empty office located on the 41st floor, as the SHIELD agent had indicated to them. They looked around and listened for any sign of the enemy.

As Roxanne crossed the room, her danger senses suddenly went off, and she instinctively turned her head towards the direction it came from, in this case, the main entry door. She placed herself beside it with her back to the wall, in a spot where she couldn't be seen from outside the glass doors. Sam did the same thing from the opposite side, raising his eyebrows questioningly at the young woman. Ro nodded, wordlessly confirming that someone was coming.

"We're on 41, headed toward the southwest stairwell," a man's voice was heard coming from outside, accompanied by the sounds of approaching steps.

When the door opened at last, a short-haired tan man in a bulletproof vest entered the room, pointing his gun forward as he walked. He then turned to where Sam was, and the latter didn't waste a second before punching the HYDRA agent's face, knocking him down.

The two men that were following who Roxanne guessed was Rumlow instinctively pointed their weapons at Sam, but the girl thought quickly and disarmed them with the help of her webs before they got the chance to shoot, and threw them away from the men's reach.

As the leader got up and faced Sam, the two others glared at Ro. Her frown deepening, she took a battle stance, prepared for the attack. The henchmen exchanged a look that was slightly confused at first, but quickly transformed into mocking grins. They charged at the spider-powered girl just as a fight broke out between Wilson and Rumlow.

The shorter of the two threw a knee kick at Ro's middle, which she was able to dodge and throw a punch at his face. As she did this, the taller one took advantage and pushed the young woman to the ground, though she managed to jump back up quickly, avoiding yet another kick.

Although she held her own, Ro soon found herself getting overwhelmed by the pair's clearly superior combat skills, which seemed to make up for what they lacked in strength compared to her.

She tried throwing her webs at one of them, although it only managed to hit the man on the shoulder without actually adhering him to anything. This made the other one have a realization, and he quickly twisted Ro's right arm behind her back at the same time he grabbed the left one tightly, effectively restricting both her wrists.

Ro grunted as she struggled to free herself, once again. The man in front of her seized the opportunity and landed a hard punch on the girl's stomach, which caused her to fall to her knees out of air, and the two comrades broke into a guffaw.

"Cap could've gotten any of the Avengers to back him up, and this is what he brings along to try and defeat us?" the man who stood behind Ro and still held onto her wrists asked derisively between laughter. "How sad is that?"

Roxanne bit her bottom lip as she fought the urge to cry. Although this hadn't been the largest number of goons she had faced, it was always during times when she had to take on someone better trained than her in hand-to-hand combat that she struggled the most. That had been her biggest mistake facing the Winter Soldier. Her recent failure and worrying about how Steve was doing weren't helping her performance either.

"Hold on," the shorter henchman said as he knelt in front of Roxanne and grabbed her face, getting uncomfortably close as he examined it, a position that brought back nasty memories for the girl. "I know this one." He looked at her for a few seconds and then snickered mockingly again. "It's none other than Arachne!"

At the mention of that name, Ro felt her blood begin to boil inside her. Heaving, partly because of the punch to the ribs and partly due to the growing anger, she looked up at the HYDRA men with an enraged expression.

"Rumlow, you seeing this?" the one restraining Ro addressed his leader, who was still battling against Sam. "Rogers got help from Franco's little pet project!"

Rumlow pushed Sam against a wall and turned his head to look at the kneeling girl. He grinned wickedly and let out a scoff. "So that's the so-called future of HYDRA. She's even more unimpressive than Pierce made her sound." He turned back to Sam. "And I thought Rogers was an idiot for going to you for help. He must be ridiculously desperate to have to depend on her."

"Seriously, do you ever shut up?" Sam retorted in annoyance as he pushed his opponent back and resumed fighting him.

"I heard she didn't even have the guts to kill the Vidal Francos when she had the chance," the goon behind her remarked as he tightened his grip, making it increasingly more painful on the young woman.

"We have no use for cowards like her," the front henchman, who had gone to retrieve his gun, declared in a more serious tone as he lifted Ro's head with his pistol's barrel.

The young woman's angered scowl momentarily turned into a panicked expression, but the guy's face then changed back into a confident, perverse smirk as he slowly lowered the weapon. "Then again, maybe she can be fixed. The Soldier's been acting up lately; maybe Pierce won't mind trying out a new asset." He once again knelt down in front of Roxanne, placing a hand on her head. "I bet El Encantador will be thrilled to see you again."

That did it.

The thought of getting dragged back to her ex and his devil of a mother—and seeing the same smug expressions on their faces that she was seeing on these men—was the last straw that made Roxanne enter an irate state.

Gritting her teeth, Ro lunged forward and smashed her head into the man's nose, wrenching herself free from the other henchman's hold. She swept the leg of the man behind her with her own, and as he hit the floor, she grabbed him by the ankle and threw him hard against the other guy, sending both of them flying across the room.

As the man who had been restraining Ro recovered, he looked at his partner and saw he had landed unconscious, blood dripping from his nose. Before he even had time to get back up, "Arachne" launched herself to where he was and grabbed him by the collar of his uniform, holding him up against one of the walls as fire practically erupted from her eyes.

Unbeknownst to her, Sam and Rumlow were watching this with mouths agape. The former turned back to look at the villainous agent with a satisfied expression.

"Unimpressive, you were saying?" Sam asked smugly as he tilted his head towards Roxanne. Rumlow simply responded with an irritated growl as he resumed their scuffle.

Roxanne continued to glare at her adversary and shouted, "You tell that son of a b!+(# to go straight to hell! He knows what he did!"

She threw the man next to his unconscious partner and continued, "Take your friend and haul your @$$es out of here before I—"

The back of her neck began to tingle before she could finish her threat. She looked up and saw one of the helicarriers in flames plummeting straight for the building.

"Sam!" she cried as she turned and ran. "Sam! We gotta go! Now!"

Meanwhile, Rumlow had just knocked Sam down and was standing over him with a gloating grin.

"You're out of your depth, kid," he bragged just as Roxanne ran past him. She had just enough time to grab Sam and help him to his feet before the helicarrier crashed through the windows and buried Rumlow and the other two under a wave of debris.

"Please tell me you got that chopper in the air!" Sam called over the comms as he and Ro continued to outrun the rubble.

"Sam, where are you guys?" Natasha answered.

"41st floor, northwest corner!"

"We're on it. Stay where you are."

"Not an option!" Sam shouted as he and Roxanne jumped out the window. The helicopter had just arrived at the floor below them, and both Ro and Sam reached for it. Ro managed to grab onto the landing skid, but Sam missed. Thankfully, Ro grabbed him before he could fall any further.

"41st floor! 41st!" Sam shouted, holding onto Roxanne for dear life.

"It's not like they put floor numbers on the outside of the building," Fury replied from the pilot's seat.

"Hey, Natasha! Heads up!" Roxanne called before turning to Sam. "I am so sorry about this."

Before Sam could ask her what she was sorry about, Roxanne tossed him onto the chopper's passenger area, making him scream. Natasha caught him and pulled him further in.

After Roxanne pulled herself into the passenger area, Sam glared at her and deadpanned, "Don't ever do that to me again."

As the helicopter flew away from the crumbling building, Natasha pressed her comms. "Hill, where's Steve? You got a location on Rogers?"

Ro's eyes widened in fear and realization. "Oh my God, Steve!" She looked out of the chopper's open door and saw as all three of the helicarriers continued to burn and fall into pieces. "No, no, no, no, NO! He must still be on Charlie!"

"Charlie? I thought he had taken care of Alpha," Natasha questioned.

Unable to hide the tears already rolling down her face, Ro covered her mouth in anguish for a moment before answering. "He's only there because I failed to do my part of the mission!" the desperation in her voice increased. "He could already be dead, and it's all because of me!"

Sam and Nat exchanged a look, both visibly uncomfortable and unsure of what to reply.

Just as Natasha was about to say something to Ro, the rookie gasped loudly as she looked on at the falling pieces of carrier Charlie, which was levitating above a river. "I think I see him!"

Holding onto a handle on the inside of the passenger cabin, she got her head out of the door slightly to have a better look, and she was able to make up the shape of a man that was falling into the water along with several large chunks of debris.

"STEVE!" Ro shouted as she jumped down and out of the helicopter without a second thought.

"Wait!" Natasha tried reaching for the younger girl to stop her, but it was no use.

Ro threw a string of web up at the chopper to slow down her fall, and soon landed right at the outskirts of a wooded area that surrounded the river Steve had fallen into.

She began to run toward the river, without any thought other than getting Steve out. Despite possessing above average speed, she felt like her legs were moving painfully slowly as she heard her heart pounding in her head, all the while praying that she wouldn't arrive too late.

Just as she was a few couple of meters away from the riverside, she saw a figure emerging out of the water. Startled, she stopped in her tracks. The figure turned around and was revealed to be the Winter Soldier, who seemed to be dragging someone with him as he swam to shore.

At this sight, Ro panicked. She looked around frantically, and not knowing what else to do, she hid herself behind a sturdy nearby tree before she could be seen. Oh, no! Had the Soldier gotten to Steve before she even got the chance to try and save him? Was she going to have to fight against that terrifying man once again? At this point, it seemed clear that fleeing him might be her best chance because with her current skills, she stood no chance against him in a fight.

As the swimming noises got closer and closer, Ro discretely turned her head to try to take a peak at what was happening, taking extra caution to remain unseen.

Arriving at the riverbank, the soaked soldier stepped onto land, dragging an unconscious and equally sopping Steve by the uniform with his metal arm. He stopped and placed the blond man beside a stretch of woodland.

The hidden girl held her breath as she observed the scene attentively. Cap was out cold. Both men had cuts and bruises on them, but Steve was in significantly worse shape with a swollen black eye and blood on several body parts.

The Soldier looked down at Steve. Grabbing hold of one of her smoke bombs, Ro watched closely, awaiting for what the standing man's next move would be, mentally preparing herself to throw the bomb at him, grab Steve, and run as far away as she could at a moment's notice.

Suddenly, water spilled out of Steve's mouth, and he began breathing shakily, though he remained otherwise unmoving. Roxanne felt great relief at the knowledge that he wasn't dead, but now, she had to focus her attention on the Soldier in case he made any sudden moves.

No such moves happened.

As Ro watched the long-haired man from afar, all she could see was him staring blankly down at the fallen Captain. To her surprise, she found a hint of expression on his face. Not the rage or emptiness she had previously seen in him while they fought.

He seemed conflicted. Confused.

Looking down at Steve with his brow slightly furrowed, he seemed as if he had no idea what to do next. Almost like he didn't even know why he had just done what he did in the first place.

Seeing the Soldier like this completely took Roxanne aback. Out of the times she had run into this man so far, this was the first time he even came close to seeming, well, human.

The Soldier then began looking around, and the young woman quickly hid back behind the tree, tensing and hugging herself, in hopes that she hadn't been noticed by him yet. After a few seconds passed without the sound of approaching steps and without a single tingle warning her of danger, she slowly and timidly started to stretch her neck to look back at the spot, only to find Steve lying alone on the ground and the Winter Soldier walking away.

Ro then cautiously walked around the tree to face where the injured Avenger was lying, and after making sure the departing Soldier wasn't looking back, she walked forward.

Ro knelt beside Steve, placing a hand below his head and lifting it carefully. From up close, his battered face looked worse than she had thought. Looking at the rest of his injuries, she gasped as she saw what very clearly looked like a bullet wound on his torso, which she hadn't noticed before. She gently put his head back down and took off her SHIELD jacket, placing it on top of the bleeding wound and pressing slightly.

"Oh gosh, now what do I do, what do I do!?" she thought to herself as she began to internally panic once again, realizing she had no first aid knowledge and, therefore, no idea of how to proceed in this type of situation. "He almost drowned, so maybe I should try giving him CPR?" She soon realized that Steve was indeed breathing, so CPR was unnecessary. "Don't know how to, anyways."

Before her anxious train of thought could keep running, it was cut short by the sound of an incoming voice through the comms. "Roxanne! Were you able to find him?" she heard Natasha asking.

It took Ro a few seconds to react, but she finally responded. "Oh, yeah, yeah. I found him. He's unconscious but breathing. Should I do anything?"

"Just stay right there," Nat replied calmly yet firmly. "We'll send EMS to your location right away."

"Okay," Ro confirmed absentmindedly as she looked back in the direction where the Soldier had departed. He was nowhere to be seen by now, and the girl couldn't help but wonder if it had been a mistake to let him get away.

She couldn't have taken him out, but maybe she should have followed him. She tried telling herself that staying by Steve and helping him had been the best thing to do.

But the scene she had just witnessed left her with just so many questions.

_______________________________________________________

After Steve had been taken to the hospital, Ro had met with Hill, Fury, Sam, and Natasha for debriefing. She had expected to receive a massive chewing out, at least from Hill, for freezing up and failing to complete her part of the mission, but everyone barely acknowledged it. She also called Camila to let her know that she was still alive and that she was staying longer in D.C. to tie up loose ends. Of course, she left out what exactly those loose ends were.

After retrieving her limited belongings from Hill's car, the agent offered Ro two options. Staying at SHIELD HQ was, quite obviously, off the table, and it was going to be a while before she could get an official answer as to what would happen next regarding her future aiding the Avengers or the now former SHIELD agents. So, the young hero was offered either to be returned to her home in NYC or to get a hotel room in D.C. paid for her in the meantime in order to remain close by, just in case. As much as Ro would've loved to return to her family and tell her parents the truth about what she had been doing in Washington, she ultimately accepted the latter option.

She couldn't leave the city before talking to Steve again first.

Three days later, Roxanne fidgeted nervously as she stood just outside the hospital's entrance. She was informed that Steve was going to get discharged today, and she offered to be the one to meet him at his exit and walk him home. Even though Natasha and Sam had suggested she accompany them to visit Steve during the previous days, Ro decided that it was probably better to wait for him to be fully recovered before she spoke to him again.

Because what she wanted to talk to him about wasn't going to be easy.

Even though she had tried to, she just hadn't been able to shake off the thought of the Winter Soldier ever since the day of the mission. She kept thinking about what that HYDRA goon had said about him "acting up" lately and how they intended to "fix" Roxanne so that she could potentially replace him.

Steve had previously told her that he didn't believe his friend, Bucky, had become the Winter Soldier out of his own free will. That they probably would've done the same thing to her that they did to him had she not gotten away from HYDRA.

"We can create the ultimate human weapon; an upgraded model that will put HYDRA's outdated tools to shame!"

"I'm afraid you're not going to have much of a choice, but don't worry. If all goes according to plan, you won't even remember any of this."

"The higher-ups wouldn't even have to scramble up my brain every time they'd wanna send me to end somebody!"

"We ended up fighting HYDRA together. Up until now, I thought he was dead."

"Maybe Pierce won't mind trying out a new asset."

All these phrases kept echoing inside of Roxanne's head over the mental image of the Soldier's confused, unsure expression as he pulled Steve out of the lake. The one time there was anything other than emptiness in his face was the time when he did something good. When he saved the life of someone he had known in a time long gone by. And although he clearly didn't know why he had done what he did, something inside of him, perhaps at the very core, had moved him to do it.

Ro was beginning to think that maybe it hadn't been the Winter Soldier who had rescued Steve at all.

Maybe that had been Bucky Barnes.

As Ro pondered on this, she felt the nearby hospital door slide open and looked up to find Steve walking out of it.

Taking a deep breath, she began to approach him with a timid wave. When he spotted her, a small yet warm smile crossed his face, which had healed significantly ever since the last time Ro had seen him, with only a few fading bruises remaining.

"Roxanne? Hey," he greeted her once she stood in front of him. "I wasn't expecting to see you here."

"Steve, first of all, I wanted to say I am so, so, so sorry. If it hadn't been for my stupidity and horrible fighting skills, you wouldn't have had to take care of..."

"Hey, hey, hold on a minute," he gently interrupted. "Look, I can understand why you would think that what happened to me is your fault, but you should know that I don't blame you for it. No one does. I know we were asking a lot of you, and we probably shouldn't have done so in the first place."

Roxanne cringed at this statement and looked down in embarrassment.

"Okay, that sounded bad," Steve admitted as he continued. "What I mean is, it wasn't very fair of us to demand an Avengers-level performance out of you on your first real mission, especially when you were recruited for it on such short notice and without any proper training. So, I understand." He paused for a moment and his expression softened. "Besides, all things considered, you didn't do half bad. Sam told me how you didn't hesitate to jump after him to try and save him when you didn't know he had a parachute."

"He told you that?" Ro looked up and asked him.

Steve nodded. "And also how you, in his own words, 'kicked some serious STRIKE @$$' when you two fought Rumlow and his men."

Ro let out a chuckle at this statement. "I guess I didn't leave such a bad impression on Sam as I had thought, huh?"

"I think you're growing on him," Steve noted. His expression then became more solemn. "Also, I shouldn't forget. It appears I have you to thank for getting me out of the river just in time."

The young woman's smile faded as she gazed wide-eyed at Rogers. "They, they told you it had been me?"

Steve nodded and held Ro's gaze expectantly. Somehow, he didn't appear to be entirely convinced of this, and the girl's startled reaction to his statement seemed to back up his suspicions.

At the debriefing, Ro hadn't, at any moment, claimed to have been the one who rescued Steve directly. Her official report had been that she found Steve by the shore, and stayed by him until the paramedics arrived at the scene.

She had failed to mention the Winter Soldier's involvement in Steve still being alive. She had failed to mention the Winter Soldier at all. After what she had learned and seen up until this moment, she felt that she could and should only touch this subject with Steve, and no one else.

It was time for her to do so.

"I'm gonna have to correct you on that one," Roxanne stated, then continued hesitantly. "I think you deserve to know the truth, Steve. It wasn't actually me who saved you from the river. I, uh, I actually saw the Winter Soldier take you out of the water. He, he stayed long enough to make sure you were still breathing, and then, he walked away."

Steve kept looking the girl straight in the eye for a few more moments. Somehow, he didn't seem to be surprised when he heard this. He looked down with a pained and troubled expression and sighed, shaking his head slightly.

"Yeah. That's what I had thought," he muttered, almost to himself.

Worry took over Roxanne once again. "God, I made another terrible mistake, didn't I? Should I have followed after him? Or maybe tried to stop him?"

"No, no," the captain quickly reassured her. "It was probably for the best that you didn't." He gazed off sadly. "My friend may still be in there, but that doesn't mean he's not also a dangerous adversary. Even for me."

Steve began to slowly walk off, lost in thought, and Ro followed after him. A few moments of silence passed, as the girl worked up the courage to form her next few sentences.

"Steve," she began as she walked beside him, "ever since that day, I've been waiting for a chance to ask you something. I know we've only just met, and if I'm overstepping any boundaries, I completely understand, and you don't have to tell me anything if you're not comfortable."

He then stopped walking and turned to face Ro with an intrigued expression. She took a long, deep breath before she finally let out the question.

"Could you please tell me more about your friend? About Bucky?"

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Although Steve, understandably, showed hesitancy at first, he accepted the girl's request after a while. As the pair walked through the city, the war hero spent the rest of the afternoon reminiscing about who had once been his brother in arms with bittersweet nostalgia. All the while, Roxanne listened attentively.

As the conversation reached its ending and the two arrived at the front of Steve's apartment building, before Roxanne headed off, Steve asked her for a favor in return: to meet with him the next day at the entrance of a nearby cemetery, which coincidentally turned out to be the same one where Ro and Hill had discussed the former's recruitment a few days ago.

The next day at around noon, Ro headed to the agreed meeting point. As she walked, she kept on thinking about everything Steve had told her about his friend the day before. She hadn't been able to stop thinking about it ever since the two parted ways. Although she didn't want to claim to have gotten to know Bucky through the stories Steve told her, she couldn't help but be saddened about the life that had been lost to HYDRA.

Not unlike how her birth parents' lives had been lost to HYDRA. Sure, they technically didn't kill Bucky like they did Fred and Debra Brooks, but that didn't mean that they hadn't taken his life.

Roxanne couldn't help but see herself and her own siblings, especially Camila, in Steve's Bucky stories. She couldn't imagine what her life would be like if Camila hadn't followed her to the abandoned warehouse and brought her home that night. Sure, her sister pushed her buttons and got on her nerves on more than one occasion, but there was no one else in Roxanne's life who she trusted and confided in more. Once upon a time, Steve and Bucky had that, too, and HYDRA just cruelly took it all away along with everything else that made Bucky human.

Seeing Steve again after literal decades seemed to have brought back certain memories in the Soldier that everyone had assumed long gone at this point. A faint reminder of who he used to be had resurfaced, even if at a subconscious level.

Could that person possibly be recovered? Roxanne honestly didn't know. All she knew right now was that she couldn't just leave things as they were.

Rounding a final street corner, Ro at last arrived at the cemetery's address and found Steve at the entrance waiting for her. The two greeted each other.

"So, was there something you wanted to tell me?" she asked him.

"Yes. I promise I'll be quick," he replied. "I'm meeting some people inside in a bit."

He took out an object out of one of his jacket pockets and handed it to Ro. It was a disposable flip phone, the kind which she hadn't seen anyone use in over half a decade. The girl examined it and then looked up at Steve with a confused expression.

"Why are you giving me this?"

"Okay, I'm aware this probably isn't the most conventional way to give someone your phone number," he admitted with a shrug. "But I'm still taking baby steps when it comes to technology. Besides, this way might be a bit safer in the long run."

Ro opened the flip phone and pressed a few keys to open the saved contacts. There was a single phone number saved under the name "Steve Rogers."

"You're giving me your phone number?" she asked him with wide eyes.

"Yup. Look, I get it. Fury and Hill, they're genuinely good and trustworthy people, but they're not exactly the most approachable. It might take some time for the dust to settle, and I understand if you would like to return to your family for a while and think things through. But whenever you feel ready, you can give me a call. I'd feel honored to oversee your training so we can officially welcome you into the team."

Ro felt her legs going numb and her jaw slowly dropping as she stared at Steve in disbelief for several seconds without saying anything or moving.

"Uh, Roxanne?" he tried calling her attention after the silence and staring became a little too uncomfortable.

She blinked a few times as she attempted to pull herself back together. "Sorry. It's just... I just... a-are you serious?" she was able to ask amongst startled stammering. "You really want me to become an Avenger? After what happened?"

"Roxanne, I already told you. None of us blame you for what happened," he reassured once again. "You may still be a little green when it comes to combat, but during the mission, you displayed nothing short of bravery and potential to become a great hero, which I'm sure you'll achieve with the proper time and training. Most importantly," he smiled warmly at her, "you proved yourself trustworthy."

The girl's flustered expression fell and she avoided the man's gaze. "That's actually what I wanted to talk to you about. Kinda. I mean, it's because you find me trustworthy that you were willing to share more about Bucky with me yesterday, right?"

Steve gazed at her, looking somewhat puzzled.

Ro searched her words for a bit, before deciding to simply say what she was thinking. "Now that I know who he used to be, and what happened to him... I can't help but feel like I want to help him. I know I don't know him at all, not the way you did, and who knows if the friend you know is even fully there, but, if there's even the slimmest of chances that there's still good inside of him... we can't just leave him alone."

As he listened to Ro, a moved smile spread across the Captain's face, and his eyes watered slightly.

The girl let out a sigh. "Steve, I know what it's like to have everything taken away from you. After my parents died... I was so lonely, and scared, and confused. I can't imagine how much worse that would've been if, on top of everything, I was in an unknown time period with no memories."

Steve looked down. "I know all too well what that's like, too."

The two then shared a sympathetic look with each other.

"I met my adoptive family, the Garcías, two years after my parents died," she continued. "I can't imagine anything better that could've happened to me, especially at that time. I thought I'd never have a real home again, let alone a family, but life gave me a second chance. And after witnessing Bucky save you, despite maybe not fully knowing why, I can't help but think that perhaps he deserves a second chance, too."

Steve's smile faltered as he thought about this some more. "You know he still could be dangerous."

"Yeah, I know," she agreed. "And I have no plans to try to fight him off again. I promise I'll be careful, and I'll try to keep my distance as much as I can. But in case I do find him," she gestured with the hand that held the old cellphone, "is it okay if I call you? That way you could bring backup, just in case. Who knows, maybe he can be convinced to accept our help. To find himself again."

Steve was now at the point of tears, which he tried to blink off, although one got away in spite of his best efforts, and he promptly wiped it off. "It's worth a shot, isn't it?" He gave her a sincere look. "Thank you, Roxanne. Thank you for understanding that I can't give up on Buck so easily."

Ro blushed lightly and looked down sheepishly. "Thank you for helping me understand." Her expression became more serious. "I can't guarantee anything, though. I'm not exactly a detective, but I can give it my best shot."

"That's more than enough," he responded warmly. "And I'll also call you on that number from time to time to check in. I'll search on my part as well. Don't worry if you aren't able to find him. Just promise me that you'll tell me in case you get any sort of lead and that you'll keep in touch."

"I promise."

Steve offered Ro an outstretched hand, which she gladly took and he shook gently, effectively granting his blessing. "Good luck out there, Seda."

The girl gave him a thankful nod. "You too, Captain."

As their hands separated, the pair exchanged a final congenial look of mutual understanding and comradery before going their separate ways, with Steve heading inside the cemetery and Ro walking away from it, thus beginning her search.

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AUTHOR'S NOTES: I'm very proud of the art for this chapter, not gonna lie :D

This chapter was such a pain for Julienne and I to write for a NUMBER of reasons, but we're so glad to have finally gotten it out! Shout-out to her for helping me out with certain parts in which I got stuck, i.e. the action sequences xD

I know there's plenty of CA:TWS fans out there, and hopefully Roxanne's addition to that story did the movie justice and didn't feel too out of place. Figuring out natural and organic ways for a new character to fit into a pre-existing story is probably one of the most fun yet challenging parts of writing these OC-insert stories, and this chapter might be the first one to do so THIS heavily, why with the majority of it straight up being the Sedaverse version of the film's final act, from Roxanne's POV of course. Let me know what you think of it!

And by now, it's hopefully become a bit more clearer why it was so important for me to establish Roxanne's backstory and past with HYDRA. Her motivations and understanding of certain things probably wouldn't have made much sense if I had started this story in 2014, now would it?

This time I can ACTUALLY say that the next chapter won't take as long, because thanks to my co-author, there's already a pretty solid first draft, which is a huge head-start! We'll see how long I can keep the streak though, haha. I'm sincerely hoping future delays won't be as long as this most recent one!