A/N: Okay... this is way overdue. I had lost my way with this story, completely forgetting my direction but then with Agent Carter getting cancelled, all the Cartinelli feels just came flooding back. SO, buckle up, enjoy the ride, because I have direction again.

Enjoy!

Three days. That's how long I sat waiting, longing for something to do, alongside Angie. Boredom was our only visitor in those long hours, and my only entertainment was listening to her recount moments from her childhood. We really got to know each other with her sharing the experience of living in a very strict, bilingual, Catholic home. Her father was from Italy, obviously speaking fluent Italian, and had met her mother while studying abroad. After dating on and off for around three years, they finally decided to get married and chose to stay in America.

I shared my past down to a depth no one in my current life had reached. She was now the only one alive who had heard me recount the story completely of how I came to America, including the death of my brother. No one in the SSR knew that I had ever had any family. They never asked, I never gave and I appreciated that. I find that I don't typically want to bond with people who treat me like I'm incompetent simply because of my gender. But, Angie… Angie was different in the fact that she wasn't a man. It was nice to talk to another woman like I did with her in that dark, drab cell. There was Rose, back at the SSR, but she had her circle of friends and I had my isolation.

I also learned something sitting there in the consistent dark for hours on end. I learned that there were humans beings out there in the world that understood endless suffering and loss, just like I had. For so long, so long, I felt as if I wore the heaviest weight; that no one understood what it was like to constantly lose the ones you love. But Angie knew. She had lost almost as much as I had. She had lost a lover years ago.

Veronica, was her name. She was slightly nervous to admit that, I could see her thoughts in her mind. She feared my judgement, my disgust. Angie didn't know how I felt about her. Something inside me was almost happy that it was another woman, a sort of thrill ran down my spine that maybe, just maybe my dreams would come true. It was selfish to think of myself while she recounted the story, spilling her heart out in front of me, but I found everything about her to be absolutely stunning. Her bittersweet smile when she recounted the good memories with Veronica warmed me to my very core. A particular memory had stuck with her, of a visit to the fair. They rode the ferris wheel at night, and for once they felt safe at the top of the world where no one could see them, no one could find them. The fair was where they had first kissed. In the darkness, she thought she hid her tear from me, but as I saw it slide slowly down her cheek my heart ached for the girl. And that was when I knew. Looking at her, I knew I had fallen. It was like looking at the sunset after not seeing light for weeks. She was overwhelming and I was… I wasn't worthy.

I had done some terrible things in the war, things the dead even feared to whisper. She deserved someone that could be her light in the world, like Veronica had been. Inside of me, there was just a lot of darkness and self-loathing that she didn't deserve to put up with.

On the night of the third day, when Angie was asleep, I heard commotion outside of the door. I had already memorized the guard rotations in the past few days, and the shift switch was typically the only sound we ever heard. But, that was usually two men replacing two previous guards every three hours. Which wouldn't be at this time, when a switch had just happened 30 minutes before. Reaching over the foot between us, I gently shook Angie awake, and to her credit, she stayed silent. There was a scraping against the door and some conversation between the guards that I couldn't quite make out, but I knew it meant trouble for us.

"Peg?" Angie whispered nervously.

"I'm not going to let us get separated, don't worry," I replied. I grabbed her hand, and it was ice compared to my always warm hands. She laced her fingers in mine, a small, but touching gesture. We stood together hand in hand, ready for whatever was to come. The door burst open, revealing the same, familiar man with two lackeys trailing him on either side, taking positions on either side of the door. He moved towards us, a simple glance down at our entwined hands with no reaction, and stopped a few feet away, jamming his hands in his pocket. In that moment, I noticed for the first time a scar starting on his collarbone that snaked down and disappeared beneath his shirt. A few smaller scars also freckled every visible inch of his skin, as well.

"Ms. Carter," he stated. The hand laced in mine began to slightly tremble. "We need Ms. Martinelli for a moment. I know you're probably going to fight me on this, because it's what you do, but it's time to face the facts. And stop fighting this."

"I don't even really know what I'm fighting," I replied, slight anxiety flushing through me. It was true, I hadn't the foggiest on what the whole situation was about. I had thought about it during all of the sleepless hours of the past few days, but I just couldn't come to a conclusion. Something super confidential that the government probably had knowledge of, but chose to keep a secret because they were unable to keep it under control. I had a instinctual feeling it was bad, and that was my reason to fight. Also, Angie didn't deserve this maltreatment; she was just a waitress that happened to cross paths with a somewhat well-known government agent.

"Then why fight? I don't want to hurt you, actually. We just need you to cooperate, then you and Ms. Martinelli are free to go."

"Cooperate? You haven't even asked anything of me yet."

"We need some… information from you." Lying. The hesitation said it all. "Just give us what we want and we won't harm you."

"Why involve her?" I gestured towards Angie. "And also, why can I not remember my capture?"

He began to pace and responded, "She wasn't originally part of the plan. Ms. Martinelli here just happened to find herself in the wrong place, at the wrong time."

Angie snorted. "Typical."

"Now for your memory, that was for precaution," the man said.

"Precaution?"

"You saw the face of one of our men."

"So? I see your men now."

"You knew him, we couldn't risk you escaping and exposing him as a traitor to the SSR." A traitor in the SSR… that would explain so much. It explains why some of the cases lately that I took with targets that should have been easily tracked and caught always ended with a strange dead end. They had been warned, which narrows the pool of traitors. I'd have to piece that together later.

"Alright. Why do you need information from me when you already have a mole in the SSR?"

He paused, caught in his lie. I have to admit, he did have a strong poker face. He brushed it off as if it were nothing.

"Our mole did not have a personal relationship with Steve Rogers, better known as Captain America," he said with a smirk. Next to me, Angie's head whipped to look at me in shock, her hand still in mine. Not many had known for sure about Steve and I, but most had assumed, especially after that horrible radio show. But this man, he was sure of it. His mole must be thorough. Or, he was reporting to someone higher up who knew this information first-hand. Another thing to think over at a later time.

I laughed, an attempt to hide any fact that I might be nervous of what they might do to seize the information they wanted. My heart pounded hard in my ears, deafening in that silent room. "What more could I give you that his files could not?"

"You were there. Not many are still around that witnessed his transformation. We'd prefer to get our hands on Howard Stark for the information, but with your display a few days ago, we decided to hit two birds with one stone, in a sense."

"Meaning?" I asked tentatively.

"We're going to make you into an even better soldier."