AN: I had this idea months before AoU, but oh well. Thank you to @racefunhorsess for the amazing comments and votes!

Peter rubbed his temples in frustration. He closed his dark eyes tightly in irritation, trying to understand what exactly I was saying. "You're crazy."

I stood my ground. This was something that needed to be done. We had to win this war, no matter what. "I'm going to get close to Loki and kill him. It's final."

"Do you hear what you're saying right now?" He questioned and furrowed his brow. "You aren't going to do that. He'll kill you. You're going up against the Trickster God. If anyone were to kill him, it best be by his brother's hands."

"Peter, I understand you're trying to protect me, but I need to do this." If I could do this one job right, this war wouldn't even happen. It'd be over. The Asgardian soldiers wouldn't listen to Red Skull, leaving him powerless over half of the enemy resistance. I ran my hands through my hair stressfully and paced around my room.

Peter opened his eyes and looked at me in pain. A frown settled on his lips as his voice broke, "You're never going to live up to your dreams? You're going to leave me? Leave Steve? You're going to leave everything behind?"

"Don't do this to me. Don't guilt trip me. Not you, of all people..." I trailed off and bit the inside of my cheek. He was right. I was giving everything up to attack someone I had minimal chances of killing. What more could be done? We talked to the U.S. government. They said this was all our fault and wouldn't risk hundreds of soldiers' lives to protect the city. Whatever they had planned, it didn't sound like it would benefit us at all. "If I'm lucky, I'll come back. I don't know what kind of weapon Loki is going to have and what power it contains."

Peter stood up and walked over to me. He raised his voice a bit and used hand gestures to express his concern while talking, "Lilly...there's a difference between all of us going out in a blaze of glory and a suicide mission."

"This whole thing is a suicide mission! It's us against Loki, Red Skull, Hydra agents, and Asgardian soldiers. What about this isn't a suicide mission?" I yelled in his face. He wasn't grasping the idea of dying for the cause. Thousands of lives were on the line, or even the whole planet's population. Saving them was more important than saving ourselves. That was a hero's job.

"Come on! You can't be serious. There are better ways to go about this."

I dragged my hands down my face in frustration. My chest began to ache with the secret I've been holding in for a long time. He didn't understand. Well, of course he didn't. He didn't know. "Peter, what if I can't have everything I dreamt of when I was little? What if fate just doesn't want that for me?"

His shoulders raised and his muscles flexed. He stretched his arms out and nearly shrugged. "You can have anything you want, Lilly. You just got to go out there and grab it. If you want a family, do it. If you want to retire, do it. But for the love of God, don't purposely try to get killed," he stressed. The pain in his eyes traveled down into his body. He started to shake from mixtures of sadness and anger.

"I'm never going to retire. I can't. My powers will just be wasted. I could help people." If I was going to live for a long time, I was going to do things right. Retiring would drive me insane. It almost drove Logan crazy one time. I didn't want to go through that.

He spit back, "What will your future kids say to that? To you never retiring and always having the constant fear their mother will never walk through the front door again? The fear that the last words they say to you is 'Be safe' instead of 'I love you'. I know how much you wanted to be a mother when you were little..."

I stopped him and put a hand to my heart, "Peter..."

Peter cut me off instantly and put his hand out to stop me. "I'm not finished. If you do this, you're never going to have kids. You're never going to have your first kiss with Steve. You two will never be officially boyfriend and girlfriend. You won't be at my future wedding. You won't see my first child being born. You won't be there for them and spoil them..."

As he kept listing things, tears formed in my eyes. He was right in so many ways that it hurt me. It hurt me those things would never come true. One of them is already a reality. "Peter, I can't have kids!" I blurted out.

"...What?" His expression went from angry to downright shocked in a matter of two seconds. His mouth hung open a bit and his eyes lost the fire it held. He had to grab onto the desk next to him to keep from falling over.

I wiped the tears away from my cheeks and sniffled, "Stryker's tests...the immense heat and cold killed all of my eggs. I can't...I can't have children." I looked up to the ceiling to keep more tears from falling, but there was no use. First I lost my parents, then my possible future children all in one day.

"Have you told Steve?"

I shook my head. What, was he insane? "We're not that far into the relationship. I don't wanna ruin anything now."

He put his hand to his mouth for a second, realizing all of the things he said to me hurt me. "Lilly, I'm so sorry. I didn't know."

I kept my eyes searching around the room, finding any place to look at other than him. "It's fine, Peter."

"No, no it isn't. I just...I just said something extremely personal. I shouldn't have. If I would have known..."

I threw my hands into the air and interrupted him, "Exactly! I didn't want anyone to know! The very thing I wanted when I was little is gone. That dream is dead. I wanted to keep it to myself. I wanted to hold it inside until it didn't hurt anymore and I could come to terms with it." Peter's eyes flickered to something behind me. A piece of my stomach lurched and I spun around. Steve was standing in the doorway. He had heard everything. I could see the broken expression on his face. His blue eyes weren't sparkling, but were dark. "Steve..." I didn't want him to find out this way. I wanted to tell him when the time was right. Now was not the time.

Rogers didn't say anything and hugged me. His hands rubbed up and down on my back in comfort and he pulled me in for a tighter hug. I wrapped my arms around his waist and rested my head against his chest. His soft maroon shirt rubbed against my face while my tears stained it. We stood there for a while, holding each other until my tears stopped flowing.  Peter walked out to let us have a moment.

Steve took in a deep breath. His hand gently pushed my hair behind my ear and ran his fingers down my back. He nervously shifted from side-to-side for a second. "I had a dream, dear. You had one, too," he began singing softly.

I sniffled. Is Steve actually singing to me? Since when did he know how to sing?

His voice wavered, "Mine was the best dream, because it was of you." He grabbed my right hand and intertwined our fingers. He backed up and spun me around slowly. "Come, sweetheart, tell me. Now is the time." Steve brought me back to him and put his free hand on my lower back. His ocean eyes stared into mine as he swayed back and forth. "You tell me your dream, and I'll tell you mine."

"Steve Rogers, when did you learn how to sing?" I inquired. "And you can dance?" My hands tingled from the warmth his body was giving off. Steve's touch seemed so soft...so gentle, even with his rough hands.

"I can't dance. Why do you think we aren't moving?" He glanced down at the floor at his feet for a second when he moved slightly. "I used to be in a barber shop quartet. That was a verse of one of the songs we used to sing."

I smiled softly and felt my butterflies in my stomach. Learning something new about Steve was exhilarating and intriguing. It was like going deeper into a cave that got adrenaline pumping into your veins from excitement. "You and Nat must be very competitive on karaoke night."

He chuckled lightly and he lifted one corner of his lips. "I don't usually take part in that."

"Well," I huffed and continued, "you would blow all of them away with the talent you have."

"Nahh," he brushed the comment off and shyly looked away. "That's not my thing. I haven't sang to someone since my last barber shop quartet practice. That was...what, over seventy years ago? Maybe more?"

I was taken aback. In all of the time he's been awake, he hasn't sang to anyone? How could he live with not singing? Everyone in the tower sang almost everyday, whether it be to the whole group or just one person. Not all of them were the best, but at least they had fun with it. "Well, damn. I hope in seventy years I still got talent."

"We'll see. If you do, I'll be surprised because that means you actually acquired some talent along the way," he retorted with a snort. I swatted his arm and almost backed completely away until he tugged me back to him. "I'm kidding, I'm kidding."

We grew quiet and stopped swaying back and forth. I peered down at the floor and closed my eyes. My heart ached as I remembered the conversation with Peter. "So, this doesn't matter to you?"

"What?" Rogers set his hand gently underneath my chin and made me look at him. He lifted both of his eyebrows. "You think I'm going to lose all of my feelings for you because of something like that?" I reluctantly nodded and searched his eyes for an answer. "A family...stability...With what we do, Lilly, it'll be hard to keep that safe. Everyone knows who I am. Hydra's files are out there. They know who you are. It doesn't matter to me if you can't have children. I like you because of who you are. Not what you can or can't reproduce."

"I've just..." I tilted my head and thought about it for a second before finishing the sentence, "I've just wanted a family all my life. And this..." I glanced at my hands, which were cold from my powers. Cold on the outside, cold and barren on the inside. Literally. "It's impossible."

"You can always adopt, Lilly. There are other ways to go about this. When the day comes, you'll know. Just right now, we have to focus on the fight. Loki and Red Skull are planning on destroying everything. We need to stop them."

I nodded in agreement and thanked him for being there for me. I didn't expect him to react that way to my confession, but it felt great to see that he was so understanding. So caring. So comforting. I needed to go clear things up with Peter, though. Then all will be okay.