A/N: Spoilers for Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Everybody dies. That's what life has taught Sharon Carter. Her parents had died decades ago due to a drunk driver. Agents under her command fell while she could do nothing but watch. People she called friends and colleagues died while trying, and sometimes succeeding, to kill others she considered friends and colleagues. One day, she would die as well. And in her chosen profession, it would probably come sooner rather than later. Margaret Carter, her aunt, died in her sleep five days ago.

Though she hadn't spoken much about her time with the organization, Aunt Peggy had devoted her life to S.H.I.E.L.D. from what Sharon could find in the records: There at its birth after the Second World War, guiding it through its turbulent, nascent years during the Cold War, and watching over it as the organization matured through conflict after conflict. It was a testament that a few of her tactical and strategic policies were still in place after all these years and the changes brought by time. Well, had been in place. Yet, she hadn't made many friends during her time in the clandestine organization if the number of people at the funeral was any indication. Or at least friends who were still alive.

Aunt Peggy had understood why that organization that she gave her life to had asked her to retire. After Sharon had entered the organization, her aunt had confided to her that she had been misremembering critical mission intelligence, that the quick thinking which had saved so many lives and planned so many missions had slowed, that she couldn't remember who Captain America was. At the time, he was an almost unbelievable story still buried in ice and Sharon didn't know how much that meant.

Speaking of Steve Rogers, Sharon spotted him the moment he stepped onto the cemetery grounds. Unsurprising, considering that watching him had been her entire life for almost a year. Though, as handsome as he was, he would have turned her head and the heads of plenty of women, and men, without any knowledge of who he was. Her cheeks flushed as she thought back to the last interaction they had before everything changed. She pushed that thought away as he glanced at her twice before making his way to the opposite side of the coffin. That didn't surprise her either since courtesy and politeness ran alongside the Super-Soldier serum in his blood. His friend Sam Wilson wasn't quite as courteous as he gawked at her for a moment before taking his place next to Rogers. She heard Wilson start, "Isn't that—" before Rogers silenced him so they could wait quietly for the ceremony to begin.

It was simple and short, the way Aunt Peggy wished it to be in her last will and testament. Sharon wished it had taken longer since she didn't want to have the conversation with Rogers she knew she'd be having at any moment now. Trading greetings with Wilson, saying goodbye to her cousins, and their stilted conversations with Rogers bought her some time but nothing was going to stop the oncoming conversation so she took a deep breath when she heard footsteps coming towards her.

"Did you know her, Agent 13?"

She hadn't heard his voice since his announcement at the Triskelion, surprising how much she missed it.

"Yes, I did. And I'm not Agent 13 anymore, Captain."

He considered her statement and she knew he wanted to press for more information but he remained polite. "I was never a captain."

"I know you're not a captain." Sharon turned and looked up at him. "You're still the Captain though."

He ducked his head in embarrassment and Sharon again wondered where this man came from. She hadn't wanted the assignment when Director Fury brought it to her. While not on the level of Agents like Romanoff or Barton, she was a more than competent field agent, not someone to be relegated to babysitting, no matter how famous or important they were. However, no one ever turned down a direct assignment from the Director.

Along with the assignment, Director Fury had given her a heavily redacted file which told her nothing about his origins other than an experiment had given him his enhanced abilities. And even that section had been nothing more than ten sentences spread out among the first dozen pages. She assumed most of those pages were scientific in nature. The few sentences visible had told her that the experiment had been done under the command of the Strategic Scientific Reserve where Aunt Peggy had been an Operations Supervisor. Sharon had wondered if her Aunt and Rogers had ever crossed paths and she received her answer when he showed up today.

"Have you found a new job yet?" he asked.

"Strangely enough, the CIA thinks my S.H.I.E.L.D. skillset will translate quite well."

Rogers raised his eyebrows. "You sure you want to join another spy agency?"

"My skills and experience don't lend themselves to much else. Plus, I figure HYDRA can't infiltrate the two largest spy agencies in the world. I might as well give up if they have."

He smiled at her, making her want to smile right back but her training held her firm. "Somehow, I don't think you'd give up that easily."

Her thoughts drifted back to the Battle of the Triskelion: Operations officers frantically trying to rescind the launch order after command and control had been secured, the grunt of the agent beside her as he was hit while they defended the armory, the clatter of automatic weapons fire while retaking the landing pads, and the contoured grip of the HK416 assault rifle biting into her palms as she seethed with rage as she watched the Winter Soldier take off on the only Quinjet not being consumed by flames.

She had wanted nothing more than to lead a squad of men up to those helicarriers so she could put him down. After she put a bullet into the back of Rumlow's head. Sadly, neither chance had come about. All she could do was stare up at the sky, hoping her neighbor from across the hall could save the day and wishing she could do more.

"No," she said as she looked down at the arm of her suit jacket covering the still pink scar near her wrist. "I guess I wouldn't." She supposed she shared that sense of duty with her Aunt. "What about you?"

He scratched his head and looked away for a second before saying, "I've been looking for something."

She didn't need to be a trained operative to know he was lying but she wouldn't dig. Even though S.H.I.E.L.D. was gone and its secrets out in the world, there were still some things that had a place in the dark.

"Well, I hope you find what you're looking for."

He smiled at her again, and not for the first time she thought he could be have been a movie star. "I do too."

They shuffled their feet and minds as they tried to come up something to talk about. She noted Wilson had taken a dozen steps away. She also noted the bulge on his hip underneath his suit jacket. If Rogers didn't mind Wilson was carrying then it didn't worry her too much.

"How's your aunt?"

Her eyes widened in surprise but she shouldn't have been surprised. Rogers had a good memory. Even in her surprised state, her mind had come up with a dozen lies ready to be used. She dismissed them all and words tumbled out of her mouth.

"She's the smartest and most capable person I know. She's my hero." She paused for a second, trying to regroup. "She lived through World War II, helped win the war. She took care of me after my parents died. And I just buried her."

She barely had time to see the look of surprise on Rogers' face before the tears came and blurred her vision. She promised herself that she wouldn't cry today. Load of good that did her. It didn't take long for her to get control back but it wasn't the way she wanted to reintroduce herself to Rogers.

"Sorry."

"No need to apologize." He held out a handkerchief to her. "Here, use this."

She took it and dabbed the edges of her eyes. It came away stained with what little makeup she was wearing. Unsure of what to do, her hand held it limply in front of her chest.

"Keep it. You can return it the next time we see each other."

He ducked his head again when he realized what he had said.

"Thanks." She folded and placed the handkerchief in her handbag, next to a compact pistol.

"I take it your real name isn't Kate Holloway?"

"No," she said, shaking her head. "It's Sharon Carter, though within S.H.I.E.L.D. I have...had different official name. Director Fury didn't want the Carter name used, something about old grudges wasting my time and his." She shrugged. "I'm pretty sure he cared more about his time than mine."

"Fury and his secrets," Rogers said with a chuckle. She joined him in quiet laughter for a few moments.

"How did you know her?"

"She was there when I was...recruited. She ran some of the missions I was on and provided operational support on others." He looked over at her gravestone before continuing. "She was also the last person I talked to before the crash."

It took all Sharon had to not gape at Rogers when he finished talking. Crossing paths with each other was one thing, but being on the radio with him during that flight was entirely different. Aunt Peggy had never been too forthcoming about her work, even after Sharon had joined S.H.I.E.L.D., but she never mentioned that she knew Steve Rogers at all.

"I'm glad I got to see her one last time a week ago," he said. "It was one of her good days."

She blinked twice at this new information. The caretaker Sharon hired, Angela, was good about informing her about everything going on with Aunt Peggy but it sounded like Rogers had been meeting regularly with her Aunt. She blinked twice again as she remembered that Director Fury had requested that he personally vet the candidates due to the stature and history her aunt had within the agency. It seemed like a nice gesture at the time.

How long would it take to find all of Director Fury's secrets? she wondered. Probably for as long as they lived, and even then they wouldn't find them all. For now, all she wanted to do was to talk to the only person who knew her Aunt as she did.

"My parents died right halfway through my senior year of high school. Aunt Peggy came around and told me that she would be there for whatever I needed. We had only met a few times before but there she was, completely self-assured and confident as she always was."

"Sounds familiar."

"I wanted to be like her so much—it might have been the British accent—but I couldn't believe it when she told me shuffling papers in an office was her job."

"Well, there was a bit of that if I remember correctly."

Sharon laughed because it was true. "I still remember her chewing me out for slacking off my first semester of college—grief was something to be conquered for her—then her mouth quirked up when she asked me if I wanted to make something of myself. Of course, I said yes and she handed me a list of classes that would take four years to finish, saying I should take them. I did it in two and a half."

"That's...impressive."

"Also said I needed something physical to balance out all that school work so I started training in Jeet Kune Do." A confused look from him. "Bruce Lee? Enter the Dragon?"

"Hold on. Let me write that down," he said as he pulled out a small notepad and scribbled.

Unable to help herself, she leaned forward and looked down at his notepad, amused to find a mostly untouched list of things he needed to acquaint himself with. Thai food had no line through it and she wondered what it would be like having dinner with him at the Thai restaurant down the street from their old building in Dupont. She couldn't spend too much time thinking about it as he closed his notebook and looked back up at her with a smile as he caught her looking.

"Plenty of things to catch up on and not enough time."

"There never is."

"Speaking of which, know any good Thai restaurants?"

"There's one down the street from our old place," she said with a smile. Her smile only grew when he looked intrigued but he only gestured for her to continue her story, so she did.

"I needed a kick in the ass and Aunt Peggy provided one," Sharon said with a shrug. "Then one day a professor asked to speak with me and she was there instead telling me about an entire world that I didn't know about. There wasn't a question as to what my answer would be when she finally asked." A pause. "She had already left the agency so she must have pulled a lot of strings for her to be the one to recruit me. I think she knew what it would mean to me if it came from her."

Rogers looked over at the headstone and said, "That's my girl."

She blinked twice before glancing to where he was looking then back to his face. It was clear he had lost more than the last person he knew from his time.

Better exfiltrate yourself Carter.

"I, uh, have something to take care of."

He looked over at her in surprise. Maybe even a bit of disappointment but she couldn't trust herself. "Oh, of course. I'm sorry for taking up so much of your time."

Ever the gentleman, he offered to walk her to her car. Wilson took up a position behind them. She saw a figure standing next to her vehicle as they crested a hill and slid her right hand into her purse. She didn't relax her grip on the pistol until Rogers waved and the figure waved back. It turned out to be Natasha Romanoff. Her distinct red hair had been dyed dark brown and she looked like a civilian without her field uniform as she fiddled with something in her hands. Except for the fact she carried herself with the supreme self-confidence that came with the competence their training had left them with.

"Carter."

"Romanoff."

"Good service?"

"Short and sweet. Just how she wanted."

Romanoff nodded with approval then picked up something that had been leaning against the rear bumper of her car. The circular shape of the canvas bag gave away what was inside. She handed it to Rogers and he flipped it onto his back with the ease that only came through regular practice and use.

"We good Natasha?" Rogers asked.

The now-brunette slightly tilted her head for a moment before saying, "Barton says we're clear." Her eyes darted between the two blonds in front of her. "Has he thanked you for finding his toy yet?"

"That was you?" Rogers asked.

Sharon felt the pale skin of her cheeks start to flush. After the helicarriers had been destroyed, she helped with the triage of the wounded as best as she could but found herself pushed out by trained medical personnel, leading to her organizing a leaderless command and control center. Apparently, she had gained some authority with the officers there due to her actions earlier in the day. One of the officers had found footage of two bodies falling from the third and final helicarrier before it went down. Calculations were done and she ordered agents to scour that area of the Potomac River. A few of the officers she placed in command to coordinate the search and rescue operation. Others, she ordered to begin dredging operations since there was plenty of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Stark Industries technology now resting at the bottom of the river. Whoever was left, she assigned to oversee medical and cleanup duties.

Normally that wouldn't have taken up all of the officers in the room but after the day's events that left her as the only person without an assignment which was how she wanted it. Her own mission had to be done alone. Neither of the two bodies had Rogers' trademark weapon on them. It wasn't that she didn't trust the remaining officers in the room. It was that she didn't trust them enough.

She spent the rest of the day and the majority of the next looking at footage until she found a circular object falling among the debris from the final flying ship. Calculating the landing location took longer than she would have liked but her mathematics skills had deteriorated since college. That was fine because it wasn't until the following day that dredging crews arrived, the first of which she commandeered. It must have seemed strange to them that she demanded they dredge an area far away from the main crash sites but they didn't say anything. Nor did the crew say anything when she put herself onboard their ship so she could inspect everything they brought up from the riverbed. Or when she threw a few bits of mud covered metal, one of which being the shield, into a container and then releasing them to another officer.

It was only when search and rescue found an unconscious and wounded Rogers well away from any expected location that she regretted spending so much time looking for his weapon. It also didn't help that no trace of the Winter Soldier had been found. Her eyes widened as she realized what Rogers and his team might be looking for. It made sense since no one else would, or could, do it.

"I didn't know if that fancy bit of metal of yours would rust or not. Plus, I figured you had already survived one bath so another couldn't hurt."

Romanoff laughed.

"Well, it's much appreciated Ms. Carter."

Even Rogers looked surprised that he had called her that. Romanoff chuckled and started to walk down the hill. Wilson nodded at Sharon as he walked past. Rogers said goodbye and followed the other two. She figured it would be a long time before she saw him in person again, probably for the best.

"Ms. Carter," she heard him say as she opened the door to her vehicle. She looked over and he continued, "When I find what I'm looking for, perhaps you'd like to show me that Thai restaurant and we can have dinner?"

A crate of butterflies exploded in her stomach and she couldn't help but smile before saying, "Only if you stop calling me Ms. Carter."

He smiled and nodded. "Deal."

Sliding into her vehicle, she saw Romanoff punch Rogers in the arm and give him a thumbs-up. It seemed as though Romanoff wasn't as cold as everyone said she was. The thought that the two of them could be friends ran through Sharon's head. They could both use some new ones.

A phone rang. It was the wrong ringtone, and it was coming from the storage area in the center console. She examined the phone after fishing it out. It looked like a modified version of a S.H.I.E.L.D. issued smartphone. An unknown number was calling. She pushed the morbid thought that her car might explode at any second from her mind as she slid a finger across the screen.

"Agent 13, glad you finally picked up."

"Director Fury," she said. "You're alive."

"That I am. And I've got an assignment for you."

Sharon Carter took a deep breath and released it. Even though nothing should have surprised her now, she still couldn't believe Director Fury had been alive all this time. She supposed she wasn't quite important, or trusted, enough to be told beforehand. She also supposed that this might not be Director Fury. Through the windshield, she saw Romanoff look back and wink at her. It was all she needed.

No one ever turned down an assignment from the Director and she certainly wouldn't start now.

"What'd you need, sir?"