Prompt: James was 5 when his mother sacrificed himself, and he hates the people who came back because he didn't get his mother back.

Steve sat there silently after Tony's funeral staring off at the water. Nothing had been the same since he lost Natasha, losing Tony made it seem like everything was falling apart. He may have gotten everyone else back, but at what cost?

Steve loved Natasha. God, he loved her more than anything in the world...well almost everything. There was one thing-one person who held a place in his heart, probably even more so than Natasha. Maybe it was because he was part of Natasha.

Their 5-year-old son James Rogers.

James was born nine months after the battle at Wakanda, he was the sunshine in his parent's life. The one thing that kept them going even when it felt like the world was against them. They loved James with everything. So when Clint announced that Natasha was gone Steve couldn't handle the pain, the pain of having to go home and tell his son that his mom was gone. How can you do that to a kid?

"Daddy?" Speaking of, James had come out of Tony's house and sat beside his father.

"Hey, buddy." He smiled down at him. James with his bright red hair that resembled Natashas so much. He was such a mommy's boy. He adored Natasha with everything he had. They were best friends. He couldn't watch him grow up without her. "Were you hanging out with Morgan?"

"Morgan said." He answered. "Morgan dad is gone."

"Yeah, he is buddy." He sighed.

"Why?"

"Because he saved a lot of people. Made sure that Morgan would grow up in a safe place. Morgan's dad was a hero."

"But you and mommy are heroes and you still here." James pointed out. Steve sighed and took James in his lap. James wasn't understanding that his mother wasn't coming back, he thought she was on a trip.

"Buddy. Your mommy loved you. She adored you. You were her world." He said.

"When she comes home, daddy? I miss her." He said.

"I know buddy, I know you do. But James, we talked about this." He took a deep breath. "Mommy isn't coming home. Mommy did a great thing to keep you safe, mommy saved the world."

"No daddy." He said. "Mommy told me she would never leave me."

"She didn't leave you, James. She is still here, just in here." He tapped into James's heart. "Mom is gone, James. she is in heaven now with uncle Tony."

"But uncle Tony is dead," James said and looked at his father seeming to understand. A tear came out of the young boy's eye and slid down his cheek. " I want my mom."

"I know but she saved a lot of people, James, she saved everyone's life, a lot of people here would be gone if it wasn't for your mom."

"I don't care about them. I want my mom!" He cried and the young boy finally understood that his mother wasn't coming home because he broke down crying and all Steve could do was hug his son. No one could say anything to cheer the two up, they just lost the most important person in their lives, how could they move on? It hurt too much.

5 years later.

Steve and James moved away, they couldn't stay around the same place for too long without being reminded of Natasha. It was painful, and even if James was so young when it happened, it seemed to have ended his childhood. He grew up fast, faster then Steve would have liked.

He was now ten, and for the first time in five years, he would be going back to Tony's house where pepper and Morgan still lived. Everyone wanted to meet up, Steve couldn't deny his missed his friends, and Morgan and James should finally reunite after so long. They stayed in touch over electronics and were very close but they haven't seen one another in forever.

"I don't want to go, dad," James said as the pulled into the driveway. James remembered being here and finding out the horrible news that just ruined his life.

"It will be nice to see everyone, last time we were here no one got to meet you. I'm sure you'll want to meet you, aunts and uncles." What Steve didn't know was that he hated them. The people were responsible for his mother's death. Or so he believed. He hated them.

James watched as his father walked up to the front door and smiled greatly when he saw Pepper open the door. James stood against his car not caring to go and say hi. That's when Morgan came out with a smile on her face.
"James!" She called out and walked over to him. Morgan and James were connected, they understood one another, and she was probably the only person he was excited to see.

"Morgan." He said giving his friend a hug. "It's been a while."

"Yeah, it has. You're so y'all." She smiled.

"Your hair is shorter now." He commented.

"James, you look like your mother, you grew out your red hair and your eyes are so green now," Morgan said.

"Dad said I look more like my mom that he is surprised I have any of his DNA." James laughed. About three years ago he chose to grow out his hair like he had the last time he saw his mom because that was the way she liked it.

"Do you want to come and meet everyone? I realized you haven't met any of them. Even uncle Clint and he was your moms-"

"I don't want to meet any of the Morgan," James said.

"What why? They are family!"

"No I had a family, and they are the reason it's broken," he said and Morgan's face immediately softened.

"James-" before he had a chance to reply James was speeding again.

"Morgan I don't want to talk about it. Do you have food? I'm starved." Morgan knew better than to push her friend so she nodded her head and nodded for James to follow her inside.

James followed her into the living room and noticed all the family photos. There were no new ones, only the old ones with Morgan and both her parents. Another reason James hated everyone who came back. They ruined not only his but Morgan's family.

"James?" James turned at the sound of his father's voice. "Come here I want you to meet a few people." It wasn't up for debate because Steve walked back into the kitchen before James could even say anything. He looked at Morgan who gave him a sympathetic smile and shrugged.

Walking into the kitchen James was surrounded by a lot of people that he didn't know, people he didn't want to know. He recognized them of course, who wouldn't? There was Falcon, Winter Soldier, War Machine, Scarlett Witch, Hawkeye, Spiderman, and a few other people.

"Hello James," This was his aunt Pepper, probably the only person here he actually liked. When his mother died, before him and his dad left Pepper was so attentive to James, he really loved her. That's probably why morgan and he got along so well.

"Hi aunt Pepper," James smiled giving her a hug.

"I missed you, look how tall you've gotten." She smiled, Pepper looked at him as his mother used to.

"Hey James," James turned around to see Falcon, starting to talk to him. "I'm Sam," James didn't reply only stared at him. The others noticed and Bucky spoke up.

"I am James too," He smirked. "I grew up with your dad a long time ago." No response.

"James," His dad warned but James still didn't say a thing.

"You look just like your mother." This was now Clint speaking. James couldn't even believe that he had the nerve to speak to him. Of course, he knew the story, everyone did. "I knew your mom for a very long time. I cared about her so much."

"Is that why you let her die? Because you care about her?" he spits out.

"James," Steve said and was about to move in to talk to James but Clint held his hand up to Steve.

"You know your mom, all she did was talk about you. Never stopped talking about how much she loved you," Clint said. "She really wanted to come back to you."

"So why did you let her die," he asked.

"I didn't want to. But your mom is stronger than me and she had to be the hero for you-"

"I didn't want her to be a hero. I wanted her to be my mom." Tears were taking over Clint's eyes.

"James it wasn't his fault." His father said, he knew how hard Clint took Natasha's death.

"Yes, dad it was. Why are you defending him? Why are you taking me to a place with a ton of murders," He asked and his dad looked at him confused. "I lost my mom because of them! All of them!"

"Your mother did it for them, so they can live their lives, James."

"I don't care about them!" James let out. "What about her life! I lost my mom. I had to grow up without my mom all so they could live! Morgan lost her father!"

"James," This was Morgan now.

"No! Don't even try to deny that you don't hate them. Because if they had just have stayed dead our parents would still be alive." James yelled. "I don't want to be around people who are responsible for my mother's death."

"I know it hurts James," Bucky started.

"No, you don't. You don't know what it's like. I lost my mother. I lost the one person who promised she would leave me, she promised that she would come back. She promised to be there when I started school. She wasn't there. She is gone. I never even got to say goodbye." A tear fell down. "The only thing I got was pitiful glances, fake people who think they understand me, nightmares, and a father who pretends he's okay but I can clearly hear him crying every night."

Everyone looked at Steve, they didn't know he was still taking it this way. They didn't know a lot of things about the Rogers family apparently. Steve only kept his gaze locked on his son.

"I don't want to get to know them. What I want is my mother. What I want is for her to keep her promises, I want her. I just want my mother back." Morgan tried to reach out to James. "Don't," He shrugged her off before walking out the back door leaving everyone silent.

No one knew what to say. This couldn't have been easy for James, but his mother was a hero. She did all of this for him. What the adults didn't understand was that he didn't need her sacrifice, he needed her.

"Steve?" Pepper asked once she set Morgan to her room. "Is that true?"

"I-uh." He didn't know how to answer. "I didn't know he was listening,"

"Why didn't you call us?" Bucky asked.

"Because I needed to handle this on my own. I needed to be there for my son, but even when I tried doing that it wasn't good enough." He turned to put his hands on the counter and looked down.

"He's a goddamn lot like his mother," Clint said.

"that makes it so much harder. He does everything to his mother's standards. The boy acts like his mother all the time and knows he took her death so hard, I just didn't know he still was." Steve said. "You know he started to dance? I was confused when he wanted to, but when he said he wanted to do ballet I understood."

"He's trying to keep her alive," Pepper said. "When Tony... When Tony died, Morgan lost her spirit, she just wasn't the same. But then she started going into that garage and slowly she became the person she used to be. Keeping them alive helps them live."

"Losing Natasha was one of the hardest things I ever had to go through. I thought nothing would ever be that hard, that was until I had to tell him that his mother was gone. James depended on his mother so much I wasn't sure if I could do it. Raise him. I couldn't move on from Natasha ether. " Steve said. "When I am alone I think of all the things I should have said to her, I never said goodbye, I should have told her I loved her-"

"She knew," Wanda spoke up. "She knows. I think you two had a way of speaking without words. Can I talk to him?" Wanda asked looking out the window to James where he was sitting by the dock. Steve could only mutter an okay before she left the kitchen.

"I don't want to talk to you," James announced when she arrived at the dock. "I don't want to talk to anyone."

"I know how you are feeling James." He looked over at her. "To lose your parents."

"You lost your parents?" He asked.

"I lost them, I was a little bit older than you. Because of the bad choices that people made. I blamed a lot of people. Mostly Tony Stark. I hated him so much," James just listened. "I lost my brother too. I blamed a lot of people but mostly Clint."

"You hate him too?" James asked.

"I did." She said. "He was the reason my brother, my best friend was dead. Because my brother wanted to be a hero. I never felt so alone. "

"What made you stop hating them?"

"I knew my brother. He was a hero. It's what he was meant to be. He died doing what he loved, although I wanted to hate Clint I knew that he wouldn't have wanted me to live my life like that." She explained.

"It hurts," James said.

"I know. Some days are harder than others. Some day you feel like the entire world is against you. I know you are angry with all of us, but we loved your mother. She was the type of person who never forgot about someone. She was there for everyone else because no one was there for her."

"Sometimes I wish that it was him. Does that make me a bad person?" He asked.

"No, it makes you a person who loved his mother so much. Who cared about, who never doubted her, who believed she deserved more." Wanda looked down. "No one is going to replace your mom, no could. We are forever grateful for what she did for us, and we are grateful for you because you have to go through this for us to live."

"It's just not fair."

"It never is. Here." James looked up at Wanda who was taking her jacket off. "I think you should have this." he was confused. "It was your mother." James took the jacket in his hands and looked down at it. "She let me use it on a mission once and then I gave it back because it wasn't mine. She gave it back before the whole battle at Wakanda but I kept it away because I couldn't ruin it. When I came back and saw that she was gone, I could never bring myself to wear it. But it was like I had to wear it today. Maybe so I can give it to you."

"It's a girls jacket." He muttered.

"Yeah what else was she gonna wear?" She joked, and for the first time, James finally smiled. "Besides if she wore your father's jacket there's a high chance we would lose her in it." Now she got a laugh from him.

"I am sorry I yelled."

"Don't be. We understand." There was another set of footsteps on the floor now and Wanda moved away probably going back inside. Someone sat next to him, it was his father. He looked down at the jacket before smiling.

Steve didn't say anything. He just offered him a peanut butter sandwich. James gave him a confused look and his father shrugged. James took it and quietly ate it.

"So Thor is coming. We have to return some infinity stones."

"You still have those?" James asked.

"Yeah, who knows why. I guess no one wanted to time travel again." Steve said. "But I am going back in time."

"Please don't," James said looking at him, every worried.

"Don't worry, I am just putting them back. But James, I want to try something. I want to know if you're willing to hear me out." Steve explained to him his plan, his plan of bringing his mother back. James looked down and sighed.

"It's not fair." He said. "I miss her, I do. But I can't do that. Morgan doesn't get her father back, I would just like to see her again." He said. "I want to be able to bury her," Steve could only look at his son. "I don't want her to be in pain. When she died Uncle Bruce told me if we brought her back she would be in constant pain, with a lot of nightmares. I don't want her to go through that."

"Are you sure?"

"I miss her dad I do, but I'd rather miss her than watch her be in pain." James had grown up so much.

"She's so proud of you."

"How do you know?" He asked.

"Because you are exactly like her. I am pretty sure she loved herself." James laughed. "I am going to come back to you, James."

"I know. You have to. Because I don't know what I am going to do if you don't." The father and son duo sat there eating their sandwiches and watching the water. They were in pain, but they would try and move forward together.

Steve found Natasha's body, as disturbing as it sounded, and they had a funeral for her. It was nice to finally have closure. She had a beautiful funeral.

Steve and James continued to travel the world, living like their mother was still there. James was now super close to everyone, especially Clint who told him all about his mother when she was young. And when James soon reach the age of twenty-five, he proposed to Morgan. They had been dating for ten years prior. Both knew that their parents were watching.

They had two kids. Natasha Virginia Rogers, and Anthony Grant Rogers. Steve was beyond proud of how far James had gone, he always was proud of James.

As time past, Steve grew old. He died at the age of 89, well more like one hundred and who knows how long. James was devastated but he knew that his father was finally being reunited with his mother.

"Took you long enough," She would say.

"Yeah well I like to make an entrance," he would smirk back.

"Come here solider." They would finally be happy. In the end, that's all James wanted. With his family and his parents reunited He was no longer feeling that pain of grief.