➢𝗕𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗞𝗗𝗢𝗪𝗡➢

『 'Cause even underneath the waves
I'll be holding on to you
And even if you slip away...
I'll be there to fall into the dark 』
―𝘌𝘳𝘪𝘤 𝘈𝘳𝘫𝘦𝘴, 𝘍𝘪𝘯𝘥 𝘔𝘺 𝘞𝘢𝘺 𝘉𝘢𝘤𝘬

⟶𝑪𝒉𝒂𝒑𝒕𝒆𝒓 18: 𝑭𝒂𝒎𝒊𝒍𝒚 𝑹𝒆𝒖𝒏𝒊𝒐𝒏⟵

❝I'm sorry.❞

-𝐎𝐂𝐓𝐎𝐁𝐄𝐑 𝟕𝐓𝐇, 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟑-
𝐍𝐄𝐖 𝐀𝐕𝐄𝐍𝐆𝐄𝐑𝐒 𝐅𝐀𝐂𝐈𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐘, 𝐔𝐏𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐓𝐄 𝐍𝐄𝐖 𝐘𝐎𝐑𝐊

It's insane. Utterly insane.

To have just been merely discussing  Danielle Mairead Rockland, reflecting on the past that could not be undone, the things done by Natasha Romanoff and Steve Rogers―their regret, their remorse... not even seconds later, is that contradicted.

Not even seconds later... does Dani now stand in front of them.

By the bookcases of the Avengers Compound, hair long and dark at both the roots and ends, her pale skin looking olive―both are fleshed out by her eyes.

Those eyes are still a recognizable, distinct, sea-foam green.

The Captain's own baby blue becomes glossy at that.

That it's her. It really is her.

Danielle.

Dani.

... Munchkin.

The brief and substantial excitement in seeing her instantly disappears, however, when her ghastly features touch the light.

When Steve and Natasha, both see and witness the complete, abstract terror on Dani's face.

The trauma, exhaustion, overstimulation, and the Co-Parents non sequentially lock eyes for a split second before focusing back on Dani.

The trio is frozen.

All three are frozen solid in their stance, Natasha and Steve on one side by the table, and a teary-eyed and shattered Dani on the other.

The 'Co Parents' aren't sure of certain boundaries, the current status of their relationship, or if they are allowed to proceed... though the quick revelation and wet-soaked face of their shared child, proves that to be meaningless as Dani strides forward to close the space, vastly.

They do, too.

The child, with a shaky voice, stumbles over her words, or rather startling question, "... Natasha? Steve?"

Is it really them?

Steve experiences a similar thought process as he addresses again, "Dani?"

Oh, my god.

They run towards each other, Black Widow a few feet behind Captain America, and they and Agent Rockland meet in the middle.

Steve's hands are outstretched: Ready to embrace, to hold.

It's been five years, five years since he's seen her...

Natasha peers from over his shoulder, a few feet away as her eyes try and search Dani's.

It's been five years, five years since she's seen her.

Five years later, even more so since they have reconnected, and all the eighteen-year-old can emit are heavy breaths. Her breathing is unbelievably heavy.

So is her heart.

It's broken.

"I-I,"

"I'm sorry. I... I'm so sorry."

Natasha and Steve both soften at her pitiful tone, and the words she chooses to use. The apology.

Because they, too, want to say sorry, need to say sorry. Dani just beat them to it first. She always does.

But then, she starts to spill a jumble of incomprehensible things, things that at a glance do not make any sense―but they do, "She's dead."

An extremely frightened and worried expression overshadows the face of the teenage girl as she rapidly tells them, "She's dead, a-and I killed her. I killed her because she killed him."

"She killed him and he's dead. He's dead and it's my fault. It's all my fault. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

Steve's brow pinches in concern, and with his arms still lifted slightly, cautiously, he takes a step towards her, "Dani. Hey, Honey... It's okay, it's all right."

Another breath hitch is heard in the back of her throat, and Dani gulps fearfully when admitting in a panicked voice that grows even louder, "H-He's d-dead!"

The eighteen-year-old weeps, and the Super Soldier, characteristically, is very used to her anxious tendencies, and thus... able to slip back into his caring ones much easier than anticipated―as it is clear she is freaking out.

So, just as he did when Dani was only seven, hanging off the side of the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier, Steve consoles her with a deep and hushed voice, taking one more step close, "Shh... Shh, you're all right now, Dani, everything's all right."

It wasn't. It couldn't be, but the Black Widow and Captain America are there. 

They are here for Agent Rockland.

She will never be alone again.

Natasha joins in on a three-way hug, putting an arm around Dani's back, who is folded into Steve's chest. The man holds her as if she is the most precious and fragile thing, but also, cannot contain himself in the reality that is he is actually holding her after all these years, after everything.

And he pulls her up and close so that he can bury his face into her hair, take in her scent. She still smells like clean laundry, but she is cold. 

Steve presses kisses onto her head while it dampens when tears prick from his own eyelids.

It is clear, that Dani has been through so much... and right now is entirely broken. She needs people to hold her together.

Hence is the reason why she came home, so Natasha and Steve could do that, and they would, willingly. Because they love her.

And, they're also sorry, too.

Cries that emerge, and ring out of the Avengers Compound office are completely gut-wrenching, horrible, and soon enough Steve can feel himself leaning back at the additional weight of Danielle, who no longer is able to support herself. Her sobs both overwhelm and overpower her.

He takes their embrace to the floor.

A few grunts escape his lips while he lowers himself onto the ground, the blonde's legs extending out in front of him so that she is not lying on hard tile, but instead on his lap. Steve tugs her impossibly further to him.

Dani's head digs into his knees and she opens up her mouth as more agonizingly loud cries escape her lips, ones of grief, anguish, sorrow, and so much pain.

Pain in the loss of Matthew, the death of Deborah Rockland, and so much more anxiety that has been built up... for years. Years of frustration, years of pain, and that all exits from Dani now. 

With people that love her, and that would never judge her.

Steve runs a gentle hand up and down her back, whispering softly as he tries to reassure her, comfort her, and from next to him a tearful-eyed but silent Natasha has kneeled down as well. She is there.

She offers a hand that is eagerly accepted and squeezing it hard the girl is sure to enforce all of her emotional pain there, to inflict it.

Dani just holds on tight, crying even more.

Natasha leans over and strokes her hair, the eighteen year old's grip only tightening, and seated in his own position, Steve never leaves her side. 

He just continues rubbing her back, truly experiencing and hearing all the hurt and torture that his daughter has been through, really so powerful and anguishing that it nearly makes him sick. Like he is about to go and lose his dinner.

The eighteen-year-old hasn't yet.

"I'm sorry," Dani says over and over again, "I'm sorry."

To which Steve soothingly rocks her figure back and forth atop him, bending his arm to rest over her, "Shh, it's okay, Dani. You're okay."

"You're okay..."

❀❀❀

A family reunion is not all it is cracked up to be. Usually, it would be during a happier time, not when half the Planet has been decimated... or when one is crying so hard, it makes them have to throw up.

Nonetheless, being together was the most important part, purely because it was originally promised.

Then when that promise was broken, there was repercussion, resentment... and now it is just the wandering part of the journey. Whether those people―family―would ever take you back? After what you've done...

After who Dani Rockland has become.

She took some time of her own to venture out, to find more about her past and where she came from... who else was also experimented on by her psychotic mother and father.

Dani did just that.

She rose above her previous ashes, became somebody... who was strong, resilient, a leader.

But then it all came crashing down, presumably.

Her emotions irrefutably got the best of her when on the rooftop of the burning FORCE Headquarters, when Deborah had hit home in bringing out Dani's best friend, Matthew.

In fairness, Dani had hit hard too when mentioning Joseph, her biological father, but that was just different. Deborah needed to be stopped.

That was the girl's plan from the beginning, their plan, though it wasn't expected that the woman's life ended right then and there. That she'd be dead and by Danielle's hand.

By her abilities, that just went nuts right after seeing a bullet pierce through her friend's skull. That didn't deserve it, he was innocent.

Dani is not anymore.

She has got blood on her hands, in the sense that she murdered Deborah Rockland, though it was not intended in the slightest.

...Or was it?

A full-body shiver runs down the eighteen-year-old as she hugs the blanket around her tighter, one from her thirteen-year-old bedroom... a fuzzy white one.

Dani admits she feels weird being back in the Avengers Compound when nobody is there, it was like that briefly when the only ones occupying the space were her, Uncle Tony, and her Uncle Vision... but right now it was a different kind of vacant.

Quiet, defeated.

She experiences a bit of that as well in a failure to win, to take down Thanos before he obtained all six Infinity Stones.

Dani holds her breath. Poor Ania. Poor Tarik.

Caitlyn... it was a shame that at least five years had gone by without them in it.

She was the only one who survived. Her and the boy.

On the same piece of furniture she previously was bound to when first being injured by Thanos, Dani's black long-sleeved sweater swipes across her face as her hands go to wipe away at literally nothing―just stress, and shortly footsteps come from the kitchen.

Steve sets down a bottle of water and a Ritz cracker pack gently, before coming over to where the girl sits down on the black couch―eyes still sore from them shimmering. 

To her left, Dani feels the additional weight sink down.

Right as he makes himself comfortable, the SuperSoldier extends an arm out by her and Dani reflexively curls into him, lifting the blanket over the both of them now as her head fits into the space between his neck and chest.

His fingers trace patterns up against her thin back, again, soothingly, and Steve's eyelashes flutter a bit at the utmost amount of peace that infects the entirety of his heart. That swells inside his chest.

His heart... that proves he has longed for this moment again, where he can be with Dani.

The Soldier is inhaling big from his diaphragm when he picks up on the enhanced child's voice with his super hearing, and it is emotion-filled once again, "I'm sorry."

"Me too," Steve says while looking across the room, continuing to run his fingers across her back absentmindedly whilst his tone remains earnest, heartfelt.

Dani sighs once more, in peace, letting a breath out that avows, "I missed you."

The man's stomach muscles engage as he chuckles in response, still honest, of course, "I missed you too, Munchkin. You have no idea."

His lifted spirits cause her to smile, that and the use of her old nickname, and Dani lifts her head off of Steve's chest when admitting sheepishly, "I think I have some idea."

He grins back at her.

Then asks politely, "So, how has life been treating you? You know..."

The somewhat awkward Captain tries to make conversation, and thankfully, his kid is not so shy anymore.

"Yeah. Uh, well, I went to London for a year."

"Oh? And how was that?"

Dani says through her teeth, "Efficient." 

Steve's brows knit.

He swallows dryly before questioning in a low tone, somewhat hesitantly, "You met them?"

"Yep." She inhales, nodding, "They were... well, they taught me how to use my abilities. Control them."

The girl goes on to explain the inevitable help that the Efficient's granted her during her time away, "I'm able to not experience the pain in my muscles or bones anymore, and-and also to be one with my powers in, in using physical attacks..."

"Nice. Anything special?"

Dani purses her lips, "Not really."

Then eyeing Steve, she grins, "To fly."

"Wow." Captain America's teeth are shown in his genuine smile, impressed... before Dani enlightens him.

"Sam was right when he said I could be more powerful than all of you."

Steves purses his lips, "Yeah, he was."

Be it ever so humble. 

A bit of time passes with silence, then both apprehensive father and daughter talk over one another. Interrupt one another.

"I..."

"Did,"

"Sorry." Steve apologizes.

They haven't done this in a while.

Dani mimics it, the courtesy, "Sorry, uh," she continues, "I was gonna say I read your letter."

The man's irises ever so widen as he begins to nod, "Yeah?"

"Yeah..." the girl does as well, she nods, gulping as she suddenly feels dehydrated herself, and to distract herself from emotion she eyes the water he had brought her. "I don't know why I didn't read it sooner, I was just... hurting, I guess, or, not ready to."

Steve keeps an arm around her when he feels her tremble, and from there Dani finally comes to terms with why she acted the way she did. When she was thirteen, trying to be someone she was not, and quite frankly very rude.

Closed off...

"I think, um, I think I was really unhappy... without you and Natty. And I love Uncle Tony so much, he did a lot for me, but no matter what... all the time, I just couldn't stop thinking about you."

Steve's expression is passive and attentive as he reacts to her confession by nodding in understanding, and she carries on with a bit of anxiety because what else would be new, "How much I missed you, and... and how much it really terrifies me to be without you."

Dani is truthful, "It was like not having you in my life during those two years... when I needed you most, was... torture."

So is Steve.

"I felt the same way."

To her surprise, due to childhood trauma, Dani gawks at Steve with astonishment, which fuels her tone, "You did?"

He locks eyes with her, and softly, yet with authority, insists, "Of course. I meant what I said in my letter, Dan. You were the light in a lot of darkness, and when I lost you, it was like I lost the one thing that kept me going."

"But you got one back." Dani contests, clearly mentioning Bucky.

This causes Steve to shake his head, grievously, "I couldn't have both, and that was awful."

"My best friend," he recalls the time of the Sokovia Accords, and then glances at her, "and my daughter. My little girl."

Leading Steve Rogers to declare, without a doubt, "That will always be you, Dani."

He leaves her speechless for just a second, convincing the man to rip his gaze away from her beautiful eyes when he notices them tearing up, and the Captain's voice is deep, and whisper-like again.

"Hey, don't cry."

Eighteen-year-old Dani Rockland shakes her head, "I'm sorry."

Though Steve reaches out, and cups her face with his hand, delicately wiping the tears away, "No. Don't apologize, Sweetie. This is not your fault."

"O-Okay." She stutters a bit, helping out with cleaning her face before her next-to-normal-sounding voice makes sure to mention, "It's not yours either, Steve."

Captain America heaves a large sigh, not in belief, "It's... "

"-Not your fault, okay?" Agent Rockland finishes his sentence before he can even decide otherwise, and in order to fully move on from this Steve can only agree―for Dani would get mad at him all over again.

"Okay. Yeah."

A smile, an authentic, non-tearful one returns to her face, the sight immediately making him content too, and before he can blink she is back in his embrace.

"Oh, and one more thing..." Dani says from the warmth of her Dad's chest.

Steve responds wholeheartedly, "Yes?"

He gives her a quizzical look as she peels back from him, teeth still revealed in a smile, until it drops, "Please, do not grow a beard ever again."

"What? Why?" His brows stay raised in a strange way, almost offended, though he is somewhat grinning in amusement. 

"Did it not look good?"

"It looked... great." Dani has her reasons for affirming, "But don't ever do it again."

She explains in a fixed image of unnaturalness, when really thinking back to how the Captain used to look with thick facial hair covering his face―not to mention, the mullet, "You looked too... rough."

"Okay, fine." Steve agrees, with ease, before lifting his brows once more―compromising, "As long as you never dye your hair like that again."

He refers to the strawberry blonde highlights that have now gone back to normal dark roots.

Dani tips her head down instead, "Dad."

"You looked too grown up." Steve pleads his case, proclaiming with his nose in the air that makes the girl nearly laugh―emphasizing, "Too old."

"Yeah, well, I'm eighteen now so technically you can't tell me what to do." The girl is independent and firm.

Steve challenges her.

"Oh, yeah? Who says that?"

"I do. Because I'm an adult."

"Nope." The Super Soldier moves his blonde head back and forth, instantly in denial of Dani truly being eighteen years old, "No way. Still my little girl."

"Don't break your heart over it, Grandpa, soon enough I'll be callin' you that."

Her tone is witty and warm, but also bitingly cold―familiar in her insults, "Although there'll probably be a few greats behind it."

Steve closes his eyes after groaning, body pressing into the couch―pinching the bridge of his nose, "How many you think?"

Dani looks up to the sky, "Like five?"

"Great." Her father sighs.

Then reopens his irises as they glance at her, "Since when did you get so humorous?"

"Huh?" Dani stands, reaching over to take the water bottle from the coffee table, "I've always been that way. Just too moody to ever show you."

"Yeah," Steve gets up himself, stretching out his aching back from previously holding her―logistically one hundred and seven-year-old back, yikes―and remarks half-jokingly, "Instead I got the brunt of your incredibly resilient personality."

"Uh, one I get from you by the way."

"And I couldn't be more proud."

"For the record, I really liked your hair dyed. You should do it again. Maybe with a little 'chop 'chop,"

A red-haired and gray sweatshirt-wearing Natasha Romanoff suddenly appears in the room, fingers, in particular, splitting into a make-shift pair of scissors as she angles them at Dani's long brown hair.

Steve pretends to roll his eyes, annoyed, "Eavesdrop much?"

"No no! Never! I am NOT cutting my hair."

Dani makes grabby hands at Natasha, shoving hers away and beginning to pet her long locks.

"Oh, come on, Sweets," the woman's playful demeanor is back, "You've had it this way for a really long time."

"And that's how I like it."

"-That's how I like it."

Two voices chorus the same response, and Natasha is the one rolling her eyes now.

She has her hands on her hips, "Clearly, there's some influence from Rogers over there."

"No, there isn't." Dani denies it, defensively, though that doesn't do much.

"What happened to being eighteen?" Natasha questions her, smirking, and Steve is still annoyed.

"No wonder you're a really good spy, Romanoff?"

"It's in my nature." She says back calmy, she and the man making steady eye contact that results in an amount of lightness washing over the room.

The fact that they are sharing a laugh with their daughter again, the two friends are grateful.

Natasha refocuses her gaze on Dani before approaching her, the eighteen-year-old now three inches taller―wow! 

"You look pretty."

"Thanks." The child beams, blushing a little, and Steve watches them with a small smile.

"Any boys?"

His face falls immediately.

"Natasha." He sternly calls out, but is even sterner and in fact dumbstruck to find that his adopted daughter has failed to elicit a response.

Better yet, a 'no' response.

Better yet... a 'yes' response.

Oh, no.

"Silence is a valid option." The Black Widow pertains.

Captain America is strict, "Uh, no it's not. Explain yourself."

Dani crosses her arms over her chest, then begins to skip off, "Mm, don't think I want to."

Natasha almost openly laughs at Steve's both tongue-tied and shocked expression, the teenager denying him like so, it used to be so easy to get her to listen to him... but just now an alert beeps from the holographic gram at the desk, and all three turn their heads toward it.

Natasha goes and checks it out by swiping her finger on the camera footage, meanwhile, Steve has a hand on Dani's shoulder.

"Oh! Hi. Hi!" A man with a VERY weird-looking van pops up on the screen, and it takes a moment for them to register, "Is anyone home? This is Scott Lang! We met a few years ago. At the airport? In Germany?"

"I got really big, and I had my mask on. You wouldn't recognize me."

Steve's face pulls together, "Is this an old message?"

 Natasha has a glimmer of hope in her eyes.

"It's the front gate."

Gears start to turn inside Danielle's head.

She exclaims, "It's Ant-Man!"

"I need to talk to you guys."

❀❀❀

There isn't much talking that goes on when he is let in moments later, just an incoherent form of mumbling as Scott Lang tries to come to terms with what is currently brewing inside his head.

Dani watches him pace with a mild amount of concern, although after her whole breakdown, she isn't too sure if she should be judging others right now.

She keeps to herself as she sits atop one of their high tables, one Ant-Man nearly bumps into.

Thankfully, Steve again, steps in, arms crossed as his brow lifts in worry―forehead wrinkling, "Scott. Are you okay?"

The shrinking―or growing―man immediately stops at the sound of the Captain's voice, and he with his tense arms just says, "Yeah. I'm fine."

Dani doesn't think he looks like it.

Her intuitions are correct when Scott brings his hands to his face in much exhaustion from probably driving to New York all the way from San Francisco. Not to mention the thought bubble he currently struggles with blurting out.

Finally, he does, in an important but oddly specific question, "Have any of you guys ever studied Quantum Physics?"

Natasha shrugs while her hands stay in her pockets, "Only to make conversation."

"All right," Scott looks at her, before laying it out, "So, five years ago, right before... Thanos, I was in a place called the Quantum Realm."

"And the Quantum Realm is like its own microscopic universe. To get in there, you have to be incredibly small. Hope, she's my..." the man suddenly struggles again.

Dani tries to help him out, "Your girlfriend?"

"She was my..." He still fails to define their relationship, without getting into the whole truth.

The eighteen-year-old doesn't see a point in it, articulating again, this time more sternly, "Girl-friend."

Steve sends her a serious look in return, one that tells her she should probably refrain from saying anything else, as it is probably stressing Scott out. Dani does.

He still has some paternal claim over her.

"She was supposed to pull me out." Scott finishes retelling, "And then Thanos happened, and I got stuck in there."

Natasha offers her sympathy, "I'm sorry. That must have been a very long five years."

"Yeah, but that's just it." He tells the three, shaking his head as if he still is fathoming to believe it, "For me, it was five hours."

Dani's head tilts to the side in question, what? How is that possible? Natasha wears a similar look of astound.

"See, the rules of the Quantum Realm aren't like they are up here. Everything is unpredictable." Scott suddenly has an impulse, "Is that anybody's sandwich? I'm starving!"

He strides over to pick up the peanut butter sandwich Natasha had made and hungrily bites into it.

Eighteen-year-old Dani gets off the table she previously sat on, "Uh, excuse me, Mr. Lang... but just what are you talking about?"

"What I'm saying, Dan, is," The man in-between bites, nearly chokes as he readjusts to the much older looking adopted child of Captain America, one that he cannot believe is already eighteen―aged just like his daughter, "That-that, uh, wow, you're old..."

She stares at him weirdly but lets him continue, "Time works differently in the Quantum Realm. The only problem is right now, we don't have a way to navigate it. But what if we did?"

He goes on some sort of scientific tirade, best of luck to Dani in understanding it, "I can't stop thinking about it. What if... we could somehow control the chaos, and we could navigate it?"

An unsure Steve locks eyes with Natasha.

"What if there was a way to enter the Quantum Realm at a certain point in time but then exit at another point in time? Like ... Like before Thanos."

Before Thanos, that is what most latch onto, especially Steve, who transforms Scott's gibberish into English, "Are you talking about a time machine?"

"A time machine?" Dani repeats, admonished and looking down at the idea, though it starts to originate after a few seconds when remembering she is an enhanced teenager with pieces of a sustainable energy source inside her.

Not to mention she can fly, she already did. Flexer.

Scott Lang tries to refuse, "No. No, of course not. No, not a time machine. It's more like a..."

"Yeah, a time machine." He loses that battle, though then tries to explain, feeling he needs to with how bizarre it sounds, "I know it's crazy. But I can't stop thinking about it. There's gotta be some way... There's gotta be... some w... it's crazy."

He decides to give up.

Natasha does not let him, deciding to say, "Scott, I get emails from a raccoon."

"So nothing sounds crazy anymore."

"Oh, yeah." Dani seemingly nods in agreement, almost having forgotten.

Having forgotten that their world has gotten even stranger than she once knew. She missed the weirdest things created being people like her and Steve... the Efficients.

"So, who do we talk to about this?" Scott questions, more than relieved that these Avengers are on board, though is well aware that none of them are experts on Quantum Physics.

That alone, any sort of physics... they need an actual scientist.

A tight grasp of the current situation spikes up inside Danielle, as there was ideally only ONE person in mind who fits the description. Well, two.

But it made the most sense to try him first... Tony Stark.

Uncle Tony.

Dani experiences an intense wave of pain all over again. For a second time.

Maybe, though... just maybe, there could be... a second chance. 

━━━✰━━━

ahhhh the long long awaited Steve Natasha and Dani makeup scene, how wonderful, right?  Sad though because she literally is so broken rn :(.

Must be weird to read them together (and it's weird to write tbh) bc the last time they were all close and stuff was when Dani was eleven in civil war... eek... any who we'll take it at one step at a time, shall we? Best of luck to me as a writer and all. Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter as things are only going to build from here, as it's endgame, and I've got some HUGE things planned for all my characters. ugh, love that.

stay safe & healthy + lmk what you thought of this chapter & if u have any questions: btw Dani and Steve and Natasha have fully made up so thankfully all is good in the world (for now).

kisses, xoxo, Alessandra (dreamkept)

P.S. Keep on the lookout for a new chapter(s) of Metalloid soon! ❤️

K have a great day/night!