"Well… there are worse places to be kept."

Evelyn couldn't help but nod in agreement as she turned on the spot slowly, looking up to the decorated ceiling of the theatre. She and Suzanne had been very confused when they had been driven through town and stopped in front of the large building. Suzanne had been the first to see the sign that indicated the building they were standing in front off was a theatre.

Inside, although dark, was still very beautiful and Evelyn couldn't help but wish she had seen a performance here before the war had started. The ceiling had been painted to represent the night sky and to her amazement sparkled slightly with the few lights in the room. Costume jewellery stuck onto the ceiling but still very effective.

And now, sitting on the stage on top of their sleeping bags, they waited…

"I wonder how the boys are getting on," Suzanne murmured, twirling her blonde hair as she gazed upwards, "I hope it's a straightforward mission."

"I do too," Evelyn sighed, lying down on her back and wished for a distraction other than just staring into space, "I can't stand all this waiting while they do the fighting."

"Makes you feel useless, doesn't it?"

"Yep."

They both sat in silence before Suzanne cleared her throat and then made a humming noise, glancing her way, Evelyn could see that her friend was going through some inner turmoil. "Suzanne, is there something wrong?" Evelyn asked softly.

"Well… yes, but I don't want to seem like an attention-seeker-"

"Out of everyone I know, you are the last person I would suspect of attention seeking. Just tell me."

Suzanne hesitated before she spoke, "I'm… I'm scared of the idea that James or myself could die before we get married…. No, not scared. I'm terrified of the thought. It's what I've wanted since I was a young girl."

"That's an understandable desire," Evelyn replied, rolling onto her side and propping her head up on her hand, "Why were you so hesitant about telling me this?"

Biting her lip, Suzanne looked down at the engagement ring on her finger, "I want to get married now… as soon as bloody possible," she muttered, "and I feel selfish because we're at war and people are dying and it's-"

"-Exactly why we could do with a happy occasion right about now," Evelyn interrupted her with a gentle smile, "this doesn't make you selfish Suzanne. I'd be feeling the same if it were me."

Suzanne gave her a grateful smile, "Thank you. I feel better hearing that."

"So… now. We plan a wedding," Evelyn grinned widely, "soon as the boys come back. So we should get down to it."

Looking dazed, Suzanne shook her head and laughed nervously, "What?"

"After this mission, there is always going to be another one. Some evil cretin that needs taken down, or more H.Y.D.R.A scum to kill," Evelyn told her firmly, "You want to get married. We'll do it. I will make it happen."

Suzanne gave her a stunned look before a smile grew on her face, "You're being bloody serious, aren't you?"

"It can just be an intimate ceremony with friends," Evelyn told her excitedly, sitting up straight, "then when the wars over, you can have the lavish, over the top wedding with your families. But at least you'll have this one…we can even have it here," she indicated to the stage, "you couldn't ask for a more beautiful place in short notice."

"You're right…" Suzanne whispered, looking around and the excitement growing on her face, "we can light more candles and set up a temporary alter!"

"And I bet they still have old costumes and set designs here," Evelyn added, "we could make this a wedding for the history books."

The two women looked at each other and then nodded, "Well, we better get to work," Suzanne's voice grew quiet and she gave a soft laugh as she wiped her eyes, "I'm getting emotional already."

Reaching over, Evelyn took a hold of her hand and smiled, "You deserve to feel this way after everything, Suzy, now we have something to look forward too."

"Well, we still have some hours of daylight left," Suzanne said, glancing down at her watch, "How about we look around?"

Evelyn stood up and walked over to the table where they had been left some medical supplies and other necessities. Picking up the torch, she turned and smiled at Suzanne, "You check in here and I'll go upstairs and see what I can find."

"Try finding a dress, hopefully white!" Suzanne called over her shoulder as she walked over to the side of the stage, "I need that the most."

Heading to the stairs, Evelyn was surprised at first as to how dark it was as she turned on the torch but then realised that the windows had probably been blacked out like they had been at the hospital-

"OLIVE! HURRY!" she screamed, causing the older nurse to look up at her "IT'S GOING TO BOMB THE-"

Clutching onto the railing, Evelyn felt her throat begin to close up as she stumbled and forced herself to sit down as she clutched helplessly at her chest. The torch clanging against the stairs as it fell to the ground. Where the hell has this came from? She thought desperately as she continued to try and calm her breathing.

For a moment there, she was back… back to that horrible night. The smell of smoke choking her, the sweat running down her face as they ran for the woods… the screech of a bomb falling through the air…

Closing her eyes, Evelyn put her hands over her eyes and began to count to ten while breathing deeply. "You're okay, you're here… you're not in danger, just breathe…" she whispered, her breathing not perfect but doing better as she tried to focus on just inhaling and exhaling slowly, "you're okay…"

"If you consider talking to yourself okay, then fair enough," a voice said from the darkness and Evelyn heard a chuckle as she slowly lowered her hands and looked up. She knew that voice.

Opening her eyes, Evelyn looked up into the familiar face but then gasped when she seen a difference to the face she once knew. A rather large difference. An eye patch covering one eye and a small scar on his top lip, "Oh my god!" Evelyn cried out, standing up immediately and putting one hand on his cheek, "What the hell happened?"

"Oh trust me, it's not a very exciting story."

Frowning slightly, Evelyn shook her head, "Don't even bother. You tell me what happened right now or I swear to God-"

Thomas O'Crout let out a laugh as he looked down at Evelyn, "Alright, but let's go get Suzanne. I'm not failing on my first mission by letting something happen to either of you."

"Your first mission?" Evelyn repeated, giving him a confused look, "You mean you're Suzanne and I's protection?"

Thomas nodded as they headed back to the stage, "I'm officially a Howlin' Commando once the others come back. Colonel Phillips finally agreed to let me go after I did one last mission for him. Sorry it took me so long."

"I've missed you," Evelyn admitted and smiled genuinely at her friend, "no one else is brave enough to mock me like you do."

"Can you blame them?" Thomas raised an eyebrow playfully, "I don't know many women who would punch Schmidt right in the face."

Evelyn gave a small nod, "True… I am very stupid as well as brave. Thank you for reminding me. So what were you to make this happen?" she asked indicating to his eye, "Brave or stupid?"

"I'll let you and Suzy be the judge of that," Thomas grew serious and glanced at her, "there was another reason for me leaving the army… but I'll explain everything to you and Suzanne. This involves her too."

The smile slipped off Evelyn's face at the sound of Thomas's voice, "You're beginning to worry me… is-is it serous?"

"It was… hopefully it's done and dusted…" he sighed again and rubbed the back of his neck almost nervously, "I have a lot of explaining to do."

After Suzanne's shock had subsided at seeing Thomas as well as hugging him tightly, she had heated up some water and made coffee as well as opening the pack of sandwiches that had been left for them and some biscuits after Thomas admitted he couldn't remember the last time he had ate.

Evelyn's stomach just tightened into worst knots as he ate. The worst scenarios running through her head as she waited to hear what he had to say.

"So… now you're fed and watered," Suzanne broke the silence first after sensing the tension in the room, "what is this all about? How did you lose your eye?"

Thomas leaned back in his chair and looked down at his hands, "Well… it all begins with a secret that I kept from you all since I met you back at the hospital. I'm not a soldier in the army…"

"Your uniform and papers were pretty convincing," Evelyn frowned, remembering looking over his file for any medical issues she should know about.

"I'm in the army… my name is Thomas O'Crout, and all that but I'm not a soldier," Thomas inhaled sharply before finishing his sentence, "I'm a spy for Colonel Phillips. I was shot in the arm so I could be sent to the hospital…. Because that's where I needed to be."

Evelyn shared a confused look with Suzanne, "You….you were a spy and needed some bullets in your arm so you could be admitted into the hospital?" she repeated in a faint voice, "This is like something out of a book."

"We suspected that someone was leaking information to the enemy… and we were right," Thomas stopped, and his one good eye looked at her sadly, "what I'm about to tell you is confidential… no one else can know. Not Bucky, not Steve or James… no one. Can you both promise me this?"

Evelyn hesitated but finally nodded as well as Suzanne. "You can trust us," Suzanne said gently, "go on, Thomas."

"I was to find out about the leak. Try and find evidence if I could," Thomas looked down at his hands and sighed, "Dr Martell, the racist piece of shit, was sending information to the Germans for money. Him and a girl he was with. He got her a job at the hospital pretending to be a nurse so they could run away together after the final pay out and pretend they were killed in the explosion and live a new life…"he glanced up at the two shocked women, "You may not know her, she wasn't in your ward but she wasn't up for cleaning and fainted. A soldier gave up his bed for her?"

…"Clean?" a young woman with red hair repeated the word with a curled lip, "I didn't sign up for no cleaning. I came here to heal the wounded."

Betty narrowed her eyes at her, "And these men didn't sign up to get there legs and arms blown up. You will keep those wards clean or else, missy."…

…"I can't believe we all survived the first day," Emily muttered as she and Suzanne folded a large sheet neatly together, "did you hear another nurse fainted?"

Suzanne rolled her eyes, "She was faking it… did you not hear Betty yelling at her? A soldier with a major concussion helped her into his bed and then sat on the floor. She has no business calling herself a nurse."…

"The evil, traitorous…. Basterd!" Suzanne hissed venomously, "I can't believe that he did that! And to think-"she stopped talking and her eyes went wide as she looked back at Evelyn who had gone silent as she realised the same thing as Evelyn had.

She raised her eyes and looked at Thomas almost desperately, "You mean to say… that Olive-that Olive died… for-for-" her voice grew hoarse as she shook her head, "she died saving a traitor?"

Thomas bowed her head, "I would have stopped her if I could but-"

"No!" Evelyn snapped, "You knew! She would still be alive if you had handled this better! You should have-"

"I should have what?" Thomas replied, his voice hardening, "Demanded she leave him to die with him screaming for help? Stood and explained it all? Because if I did that Evie, then we'd all be dead with them. I had papers that could help end the war! If I died before they could be read-" his voice trailed off and he rubbed his face tiredly, "I wasn't meant to become friendly with anyone… but…"

The anger drained from Evelyn as she took in the broken man before her, "But you did…" she finished and with a heavy heart realised how much it would have hurt him to know this and not be able to tell Emily, everyone knew how close she had been with Olive… then he had to watch her die without being able to save her either. Evelyn felt ashamed for her outburst and sighed "and you didn't have to save Peter and I… you could have just left us in the woods but you didn't," she leaned forward and took his hand in hers, "thank you…"

"I was a shit spy in the end," Thomas gave her a tired smile, "but for the first time in a long time, I had people. People to protect and who also had my back. Phillips wasn't happy when he saw how reluctant I was to get back on the job and spent more time with you all… he could tell I didn't want that life anymore."

Evelyn squeezed his hand comfortingly, "What job did he send you on?" she asked gently, "You said it involved us?"

"Well… after you all left with Steve, I told Phillips I wanted out," Thomas continued, his lip curling at the mention of the Colonel, "he argued but saw I wasn't for changing my mind and agreed to let me go join the Commando's if I did one more job. I didn't know the specifics. My focus was to make sure that no information was leaked from this Operation. It was new and hardly anyone knew about it… it was called Operation Bloodhound."

Bloodhound?

Suzanne frowned, "What the bloody hell did this operation have to do with Evelyn and I?"

"Back in Schmidt's factory… something happened to you after being given that serum Evie," Thomas's voice was hollow as he met her eyes, "you died after that needle went in your neck… you didn't just pass out. There wasn't a pulse, Zola tried to find one. And that son of a bitch broke your arm, we could all hear the bone snap," he went quiet and didn't speak for a few moments while this information washed over the two women, "then next thing you're up and about and in a few days your arm is fine."

Evelyn froze as the words 'Bloodhound' echoed in her head, "Phillips was very curious about what happened," she whispered, "kept asking me questions…and asked Steve if he had recovered anything else apart from the map."

"He asked me if Bucky had been given the same serum," Suzanne added fearfully, "because you and Steve found him in that ward…"

"Dr Erskine had perfected the Super-Soldier Serum but died without passing on the recipe, he didn't even leave it written down in paper, it was all up here," Thomas told them, pointing to his temple, "Zola was trying to copy it and ended up with something completely different, we all knew that after what happened to you… and they thought the answer was in your blood."

"That's why they kept taking samples of blood and running tests on me," Evelyn said slowly, looking down at her arms and remembered all the bruises that had been on her arms after all the needles she had gotten. They had never lasted long.

"When I got to the headquarters for Operation Bloodhound, I knew something bad was happening," Thomas whispered, "especially when they were so open with me. I mean, why would they be happily sharing their secrets about you when they knew we were friends? I was put under interrogation… by men I had trained with…" he shook his head as he indicated to his eye, "I won't go into the gory detail but it ended with me losing my eye as you can see…. But I managed to convince them I wasn't going to betray my country. I was let go and sent to the sick bay… but then it happened."

Suzanne shifted uncomfortably in her seat, "It gets worse?" she asked Evelyn in a hushed whisper.

"One of the supply trucks was followed and H.Y.D.R.A attacked," Thomas looked off into the distance as if he was reliving it, "they came with flamethrowers and torched everything. I guess they didn't want anyone else working on a serum… the paperwork, the vials of blood they were experimenting on… nothing survived. Except for me and another spy," he looked at Evelyn, "and a quickly written letter from one of the scientists explaining how to make your blood into a serum… if they had a lot of it, more than what you could donate willingly."

Evelyn felt as if her heart had frozen in her chest as she swallowed hard, "And what happened to this letter?" she whispered, fearfully, "Has-has it made it's way to Phillips?"

"Are they going to come after Evelyn?" Suzanne asked, sounding just as scared as Evelyn, "Do they know we're here?"

"They probably would be… if that letter hadn't been destroyed."

Widening her eyes, Evelyn looked at Thomas, "You… you destroyed it?"

"I burned the letter, yes… I couldn't live with myself if I put you in danger," Thomas admitted, "not just you… they were going to interrogate Suzanne as well… same as they did to me to get answers. And after losing all their research, I knew soon as that letter was read you two would have disappeared. I couldn't let it happen."

Evelyn thought for a moment before she spoke again, "How did you get away with the other spy there? You didn't… kill him?"

"No, nothing like that," Thomas smiled weakly, "I knew I would be arrested or even killed if they suspected I was choosing you over my job. I knew too much. I waited for the night before we arrived back at camp to make my move. I let the other spy carry the letter, never asked about it but I knew where he kept it on his person… then I made my move."

Suzanne let out a long exhale, "What did you do?" she asked breathlessly, her full attention on Thomas.

"I always carry a little 'extra help' with me for tricky situations," Thomas told them with a mysterious tone, "different pills for different occasions as my old mentor used to say. I waited till he was halfway through a meal before slipping some barbiturates into it when he lowered his guard. Soon as he was asleep, I read the letter, burned it and wrote a new one. Put it back and then pretended to be asleep too until he woke up."

Evelyn felt her eyebrows raise, this was becoming more and more like the thriller novels she used to adore, "And you considered yourself a shit spy?" she asked incredulously.

"I had my moments," Thomas chuckled, "I wrote that the tests were useless and that your blood was only useful to you, that once it left your body it wasn't good for anything. Which wasn't a complete lie. But after the letter was delivered and my associate confirmed I had done nothing to hide the information, they believed that I was one of them and I signed a document that if any of this came to light I would be held wholly responsible and would be considered a traitor to the U.S army and executed. I signed it and left… never looking back. So now you know… and you also know why this has to stay between the three of us."

Evelyn was silent as she tried to process everything that Thomas had told her… to think that she and Suzanne were so close to being tortured and killed… all for a serum that might have not done anything. Just for a small chance to beat the enemy…

It gave dying for your country a new meaning.

"Well, I know it's not considered healthy to have secrets from your future husband…" Suzanne broke the silence first, and Evelyn seen her left-hand clench into a fist, "I'll keep this to myself… if James knew…. He wouldn't be able to let it go."

Bucky and Steve would never let this go either…

Evelyn nodded, "I won't tell another soul…" she whispered, smiling when Thomas gripped her hand tighter, "this stays with us."

"Thank you…." Thomas breathed out and hung his head low, "I don't know what I would have done if you insisted on telling the others this."

"You've saved our lives, Thomas," Evelyn reminded him, "We owe you everything."

Suzanne leaned back in her chair, "Not that anyone would probably believe us if we tried to tell them what you told us," she joked quietly, "it is quite the tale."

"Oh yeah, that's the second favour…" Thomas added, looking up at them embarrassed, "Could we also keep my former occupation just between us? I don't want them all thinking I was only spying on them… especially Jonny… he's become my best friend. Dugan probably would kill me if he thought I was keeping tabs on you gals and his brother."

Suzanne and Evelyn nodded at each other, knowing that it was true what Thomas was saying. "I'll do it on one condition," Suzanne said suddenly, her face growing deadly serious and Evelyn looked at her surprised while Thomas raised his eyebrow.

"Which is?"

"That you'll walk me down the aisle," Suzanne's tone went back to her usual quiet and warm one as she smiled widely at Thomas, "because of you… I won't disappear. I get to stay here with my friends and get my wedding."

Thomas looked happy at her words but his brow furrowed, "Isn't it your father that's meant to walk you down the aisle?" he asked slowly, looking between the two women.

"He will when she has her second wedding," Evelyn joked, "but she's meaning for the small ceremony we're going to have when the boys come back. Incase…" she trailed off, knowing she didn't need to say the reason out loud to Thomas.

He nodded, "I get you… and Suzanne. It would be my honour to walk you down the aisle," he sounded choked up as he grinned, "I never thought I'd be going to a wedding in a deserted theatre."

"Just wait till we're done with it," Evelyn informed him, glancing around the room, "it's going to be perfect."

Suzanne nodded, "Well, that can wait till tomorrow. I don't know about you two but after learning about all of this and my potential death… I could do with a good night's sleep," she stretched out and yawned, "I don't want to start wedding planning after that conversation."

"I second that," Evelyn tried to hold back a yawn of her own but failed miserably.

Thomas stood up and rubbed his head, "Well you two lasses get some sleep, I'm going to keep watch until the back up arrive to keep an eye on the outside," he told them, "I'll see you in the morning."

While Suzanne made herself comfy, Evelyn got to her feet and caught up to Thomas and grabbed his arm, making the man stop in his tracks and turn to her. "Something wrong, Evie?" he asked.

"I just… I just wanted to say I'm sorry for making out Olive's death-"

He held up his hand, "You don't need to apologize Evie, it's a thought I've had myself."

"You're a wonderful and brave man, Thomas O'Crout," Evelyn's words caught him by surprise and she saw his eyes soften, "thank you… for everything. I mean it."

Thomas looked down at her hand that was gripping his arm tightly and he nodded, "You're most welcome Evelyn Myers… that means a lot to hear that from you."

Going on her tip-toes, Evelyn gave him a small peck on the cheek and smiled, "Goodnight, Thomas."