2014-06-18 - The Dream Never Dies

The mission had gone wrong in one important respect. Captain America had been gunned down by the Red Skull. The body was recovered, the mission completed. There was a funeral.

Lots of people came to make eulogies, little speeches, quiet talks to the casket, talks to each other at home as the event was televised and the country mourned.

...

So why was Steve sitting in a chair off to the side, watching the funeral? Steve might be pretty disoriented about that as well, since the last he remembered was getting shot and FEELING himself being gunned down.

The goth girl sitting next to him says, "It's really sweet what some of them are saying..." Didi says idly.

Steve Rogers, not Captain America... he wasn't dressed in the flag any more, instead he was dressed as he always saw himself... that poor boy from Brooklyn. Even his physique was gone. He looked much like he always saw himself.

Dressed in a stained blue shirt and a common pair of paints. He had no muscles he almost looked week. A poor boy from Brooklyn. Child of two Irish immigrants that couldn't stop yelling at each other for one reason or another.

He looked at Didi... he could feel who she really was and asked, "Is Bucky okay? Did the Avengers make it through?"

This frail boy who just died only cared about that. Did everyone else make it?

Didi looks over at Steve. "Seems that way. They've been speaking at your funeral for quite a while - one after the other." She looks Steve over. "Honestly, I'd have expected you to keep the other look. I mean.... you are a hero." She looks around. "Feel like getting out of here? You know the gist of what's happening."

The Frail Steve looked at Didi, he could tell she was Death herself and said, "I was never a hero, ma'am. I just did what was right. As any American"

He pauses when he says that, "Like any person would do. Any decent and honest person would do. I never saw myself as a hero ma'am."

The frail man looks back at Didi and said, "I already cheated you out of me once; from what I'm told. Super Soldier serum plus freezing. No, not the right term. Tony called it Cryogenics. He told me that my cells didn't die because the freezing didn't happen right."

He looked at Didi, "Is it actually time for me to go? Because I kept telling myself I was back for a reason."

Didi looks at Steve curiously. "You didn't cheat me. Honestly, I let you stay. Think about it. People do die of being frozen. We've talked before, you know Steve. Back when you were frozen - you just don't remember it. Most people don't remember encounters with me well."

Death pats her lap a bit. "Well, it's not like you having come back from that cold sleep didnt result in you doing a lot of good for the world. Would you consider that a good enough reason? I mean... you saved the world more than a few times. Touched the lives of others. Were an inspiration. And despite what you think, you were a hero. You're just modest." She takes her umbrella and taps your shoulder. "It suits you though. My brother would say it's iritating - but I think it's sweet."

Steve looked at himself and looked at Death and considered all she said to him. He considered all the things he did as Captain America. His form didn't change, he still saw that weak man from Brooklyn. This was his identity and it would stay his identity for all his days. Even if those days had ended.

He smirked slightly and said, "Namor told me once that we would all be judged by Poseidon in the end. But from everything I've seen your not Poseidon. And your the Christ and your not the Trinity."

He looked upon Didi and said, "But you are Death."

He then decides to sit himself on Death's lap and asks, "So am I dead? No coming back?"

Death smiles a bit. "I'm over Poseidon's pay grade. Eventually I'd have to take him too. But I'm honestly not here to judge anyone. I'm just the end results of what happens. Not what happens after I happen, and not any sort of test to see if you're worthy or not of... whatever." She shrugs. "I'm not Christ or a Trinity - I've met them though. I meet everyone."

She stands up and walks over to you, offering her hand. "Let's take a walk, okay?"

Then next thing Steve knows, the two of them are walking through Central Park. "Just curious - if you could come back, would you want to? You wouldn't want to see any sort of 'final rewards' that are waiting for you?"

"I was glad to come back and do what I needed to," He then looks over to Didi and says, "But if I'm not needed anymore: I could go."

Huh? (Type "help" for help.)

Steve looked at the girl by his side. This lovely goth girl who was walking to him with through Central park. It looked to him as it looked to him in his childhood. Not the modern version with bridges and roads going through it. It was a pristine park, the very idealistic version of Central Park that he had through out his childhood.

Even the very smell of the park was the same. Every last bit of the Central Park of NYC was the same as he remembered from the 1920s and 1930s

He smiled at Didi and asked, "Is it all so wonderful? I don't have to leave, do I?"

In the back of his mind he wondered about Didi because of her clothing and her paleness. But even in all of that Steve didn't care. He was finally home. He was safe.

He was where he always wanted to be.

Death shrugs a little. "It could be. This is actually the real world though. Just being seen through how you like to see things. You're a bit of an idealist, you know." She stops when she sees a hot dog vender. "But if you're asking if things will be perfect when you go to ... wherever you go... What if I said it was? What if I told you that what happens after I send you to where you go next is peace and love and perfect bliss beyond your wildest imagination, forever. Then I said you could go back. Would you want to?" She walks over to a hot dog cart to get a couple of hot dogs, then hands one over to Steve. She munches on her hot dog and frowns a bit. "It's so much better when alive and can actually appreciate the taste - last time I was alive for a day though, I got drugged by a psychopathic clown. Nothing got to die during all that time. What a mess that was."

She looks back at Steve. "Hey... too bad that didn't happen when you got shot, huh? Then again we wouldn't be having this great conversation."

Steve takes a bite of his own hotdog and no taste comes for a moment. He finishes the dog all the same because that is what he does. Even when he hates something he just eat it, the complaints come later.

He considers Didi's words careful and he as a single question to ask. But it's not a question he wants to ask yet. He then smiles and says, "Yeah a lot of people told me that. I'm an idealist. A luddite. A... well if there was a word or a phrase for me I'd like it to be, 'A man who never gave up.'

He looked at Didi and said, "I sort of remember you now. I looked at you the day that Baron Zemo launched that rocket and me and Bucky stopped it. You waved to me as we went up."

Steve was starting to figure it out, he was starting to see the truth and then he asked, "Who are you?" He was still Steve Rogers, he'd accept who ever she said she was.

Didi smiles a bit. "Well... I was in there with you watching, but no, that was just you hallucinating actually me waving. And yeah, we've met a few times. Couple of times when you almost died, we played a really long game of Monopoly during your little frozen stint..."

She pauses and adds, "Not for your life or anything - I was just keeping you company." She pauses. "Once when you were born... and once during the experiment that made you Captain America. It wasn't really a death but it was a rebirth of sorts." She shrugs again.

She then says. "You pretty much got it back at the funeral. I'm Death. You know. The Grim Reaper. Never really cared for that name though."

She looks around and the world changes to a black room with a couple of chairs. "Too many distractions. I just want to get to know you before you get going to where you're going." She sits in the chair. "I really -am- curious about the answer to that question - that you have not answered. If you could know for sure that where you're going after I send you on your way was endless, perfect, flawless love and bliss and happiness forever? What would you choose to do? I had once asked another guy. You probably havent heard of him, but he was President of your country once, just not in your universe - Lex Luthor - I asked him the same question, and was curious about the other end of the spectrum. Not that there was really any difference between people. Not when you got right down to the core of things. There's always the same drive that anything living has. But the details and reasoning for the choices always differ. What would you do?"

Steve Rogers looked at Death, Didi, the Grim Reaper, whatever she wanted to call herself. He loved her. Because even thought she had basically proven and disproven herself in his eyes... he was Steve Rogers.

Steve lowered his head, and said, "You've always been over my shoulder haven't you. You were the girl I waved at as I ended up in that US front for the Super-Solider program. Project: Rebirth.

He sat down in the chair the new black room provided and said, "You were the nurse who whispered in my ear when I was injected with that serum and then bombarded with Vita-Rays."

And you were with me every single mission that I did with the Invaders. That girl and woman I always saw in the side of my sight, the one who was always there." As Steve talked the chair stayed but the memories became real: Him getting the serum and him fighting in World War 2. Him falling in love with Peggy Carter and the realities of war dividing them.

Then he was back and he did so much good, only to be killed by his own mortal enemy. An enemy that shared his face, "It's over. I've lived too long and I've seen too much. It's over."

His mind flashes back to what he has already seen and he says, "Take me away, let my legacy survive."

And yet in that moment of acceptance he feels a tug."

He feels the tug on one he loved trying to pull him back through science and asks Death herself, "Ma'am, would you be offended if I said no to you? If I thought I had more to do?"

Steve kneels himself, a bent knee that he would never give to anyone except Death herself, "Can I do just a little more before you take me?"

He then stands again, his ethereal form growing muscles and his clothes changing into the Flag, the flag that he had rejected time and time before and still accepted as his own, "Take me when it's right. But is it right now? I have so much more too do. I... would never question the order of things."

Captain America now stands proud, "But I don't think I'm done yet. If you are okay with that, ma'am."

Death smiles a bit. "Well... I mean.. yeah, all that's true. Technically." Being omnipresent meant she was prett much everywhere. But she didn't want to say that. The poor guy looked so hopeful.

She pats her lap. "Actually yeah, you are going back. And no, I'm not offended. But I'll be seeing you around. Sorry that you won't remember this."

Much different reaction than Luthor.

"In any case, I'm glad we got some stuff clear."


 * BZZZZT!* "Again! CLEAR!"


 * BZZZZT!* "Okay, we have a pulse, put him in the solution again and tell Fury that Lazarus has risen.