Serbia

Fall 2016

With a final spin, Nadine's elbow connected sharply with the final mercenary's face. He staggered with a winded grunt and, grabbing the back of his head and fluidly hooking her foot around his, she sent him stumbling right into Steve's low swing, his forearm connecting with the man's chest and throat with all the gentleness of an iron bar.

Unsurprisingly, the mercenary dropped like a stone, hitting the concrete floor with a dull thud.

"That's the last of them?" Natasha asked to confirm, already sliding her batons back into their holsters on her back. That alone made it clear it wasn't much more than a rhetorical question, really. It was fairly obvious they'd taken care of the entire trafficking crew.

"Looks like," Sam replied over their earpieces even as Steve hauled the unconscious man over to his piled fellows where Nadine, almost immediately joined by Natasha, was already making quick work of restraining them.

A moment later the former paratrooper landed next to Natasha, the couple exchanging a brief, searching look that Nadine easily recognized.

Steve was currently looking at her the same way.

Satisfied she'd similarly made it through the fight with little trouble as she met his eye back, his lip quirking at her playfully challenging smirk, Steve straightened, giving the warehouse a final surveying look as the sister spies finished up with the mercenary crew, taking in the unconscious huddle and the half dozen truck-loads worth of gun and even a few light rocket crates.

"Call it in, then," Steve concluded briskly with a look to Natasha. With a sharp nod, the former redhead-turned-blonde split off to send in the tip to the proper authorities. "And let's pack it up."

They moved like a well oiled machine; even if it had only been their first rogue mission, the four of them worked well together. They always had. Within minutes they were onboard their Quinjet and lifting off even as somewhere, teams were undoubtedly scrambling into action with the hope that today might just be the day they catch up with and maybe even capture any one of them.

A forlorn hope, really.

They were just too good, if Nadine said so herself.

As the Quinjet's engines settled into a steady hum around them under Natasha's efficient hand and Nadine took a seat at the comm console, a faint blinking icon caught her attention. Taking quick note of the time, she couldn't help a small grin. Three messages.

Right on schedule.

"Everyone's checked in?" Steve asked softly as he leaned over her shoulder. Nadine spared him a quick glance before nodding, returning to her reading.

"Wanda's good—the food's growing on her, apparently," she added with a fondly exasperated grin. Steve shook his head, a crooked smile of his own forming.

"Good," Natasha piped up dryly from the pilot's seat. "As much as I don't mind Edinburgh this time of year, I'm glad popping in on her once when she missed check in got the point across."

"You think she knows we know she and Vision have a thing going?" Sam piped up with a chuckle at Natasha's poorly hidden, if exasperated amusement. Natasha shrugged.

"Probably," Natasha dismissed with a wave. "I should hope more than just the enunciation lessons stuck." Nadine restrained the urge to roll her eyes.

Steve was not so disciplined.

"She said those have been helpful, by the way," Nadine broke in, interrupting Natasha and Sam's banter, "she said to tell you you were right that an American accent is far less conspicuous up there than a Sokovian one." Natasha practically preened, shooting a grumbling Sam with a smug grin.

Not that he seemed particularly put out given the way his dark eyes were laughing. Absently shaking her head at their antics, Nadine turned back to the console, bringing up the next message.

"It sounds like Ebere is finally satisfied that Pietro's made a full recovery," she continued once she was sure the interruptions were over with for the time being, "and interested in studying his Enhancement further. She's requested that he hang around a little longer it seems." Steve chuckled.

"I imagine Nina's excited by that prospect?" he offered with a wry grin at Nadine.

Her nose wrinkled at the teasing, but bringing up Nina's message, Nadine hummed in confirmation, unable to entirely suppress her own chuckle.

"I'd say," she retorted dryly. "Apparently after her work with Shuri looking into her own Enhancement, she has some ideas she wants to look into with Ebere; something about it making the perfect topic for her final paper. She sounds almost more excited about that than the idea of her boyfriend sticking around." Steve chuckled again as Nadine glanced up at him, taking in the amusement written on his face at the news.

Not that she wasn't also appreciating the view; even with the grim cast that always seemed to shadow his features these days, she had to admit going rogue looked good on him.

Sure enough, she'd been right about the beard. Even still filling out as it was now that he'd finally decided to commit to it, it worked for him. Especially now that he was starting to wear his hair just a bit longer on top of it.

But then a searching light appeared in his eyes as they caught hers.

It wasn't hard to decipher what he wanted to know.

Her wry grin softened.

"She visited them last weekend," Nadine continued with a reassuring smile. "T'Challa got him and Iris settled in a place of their own—a small farm, if you can believe it—not far from one of the smaller towns just outside the Golden City. They wanted to be able to see the stars." She stood, curling her arms around Steve's waist as the nervous tension bled from his frame at both her words and her touch. Automatically, his hands rose to rest on her hips.

"He's doing well," she continued, smiling warmly up at him, "His three-month assessment earlier this week was perfect according to Nina, and she says all trace of his programming's influence is gone and there's still no sign of regression or deterioration. Shuri's confident in calling the procedure a complete success and Nina agrees.

"He's...he's happy," she concluded definitively, searching Steve's features as relief and satisfaction and pure, unadulterated happiness at the news played across his features.

"Good," he breathed, leaning forward to brush a tender kiss against Nadine's gently smiling lips.

"It's about time."

A/N: And so, my lovelies, over 576,000 words, 1000 (exactly!) Word pages, 142 Chapters + Prologue & Epilogue, and almost three years later, we have reached the conclusion of The Ghost.

And oh lord, I still can't quite believe it's officially complete! lol!

Thank you so much for reading! It's been quite the ride, and I hope you all enjoyed reading The Ghost as much as I did writing it!

Please take a moment to vote and comment! I'd desperately love to hear what you thought!

If you enjoyed, be sure to spread the word to anyone and everyone!

If you haven't yet, be sure to check out the companion to this story, Haven! It takes place in the same story-verse as The Ghost, and is where Iris first made her appearance and captured the heart of our beloved Bucky! So why not check out her story!

Looking for even more Bucky? Be sure to check out Dear Bucky, documenting the letters sent back and forth between our beloved Bucky Barnes and his little sister Beatrice!

And finally, as far as MCU stories go, if you're in the mood for some Loki, A Child of Two Worlds is a wee little one-shot turned four-shot all about our favourite God of Mischief's origins.

And what's next, you might ask?

Well, coming (hopefully) soon is the Mini-Sequel to both The Ghost and Haven. So keep an eye out for Mist, featuring our sweet Nina, Iris, Shuri and more!

And if you're curious about what other stories I have planned for this series after that, be sure to pop over to my In The Works book where I've posted (rough) summaries and blurbs and even some Sneak Peeks for pretty much all of my upcoming MCU (and more) stories! Be sure to check them out!

To wrap up this last of my super long A/N I just want to Thank You all again. I truly don't have the words to describe just how honoured I am for everyone who read, voted and comment on my not so little (and rather time intensive and steadily growing) bit of fun. It really is unbelievable, the support and encouragement I have received over the course of posting this story. I truly did not expect for it to evolve the way it did and I'm so grateful you all came along for the ride!

It means so much to me to share my stories and see other people enjoying the stuff that comes out of my overactive imagination.

I hope you'll leave me some lovely votes and comments if you enjoyed, which I hope you did! :)

And one final time, Thank you all. I hope our *virtual* paths cross again.

Happy Reading, my lovelies!

DarkLadyAthara