To Love Is To Destroy

Chapter 3

Phil Coulson never considered it odd that he hadn't met his soul mate yet. The world had gotten bigger, and people were older when they stumbled across The One, as his mother liked to call it.

He'd had the talk. When the war was over, people turned to progress, as civilization was wont to do. Scientists learned more and more about the bond, though no one knew exactly how it worked. By the time Phil was ten, they'd quantified it to an exchange of hormones, but no one had gotten the mixture just right.

At the time, Phil remained content to read his dime novels and comics, draw his own shaky lines. He played army, because his dad was in the army, or had been, and to a ten year old, that was the coolest.

Because his dad had first-hand stories of his hero, Captain America. Phil spent his weekends at his dad's shop, feet dangling off the work bench and handing over tools while Ray Coulson told his son stories of the First Avenger. He spent the weekends helping his dad fix up shop. He would pester his mother after his dad's visitation with more and more old war stories. At last, she relented and took him to Boston, where he was allowed to remain in the library, watching all the old film strips they kept.

He stared at the tatty projection screen, enraptured as he watched the Stefan Roosevelt talk about the war effort on stage in Peoria. He watched the attempts to take the bridges in Operation Market Garden, eyes peeled for the Commandos in the middle of the fray. He remained there until closing, when his mother carried him home.

He plastered his walls with bond posters scavenged from antique shops and people's cellars. He spent his milk money on action figures and army men, staging battles atop the faded quilt on his bed.

When Phil Coulson was ten, soul mates were something in the hazy future. It was something that seemed very far away indeed, when one dropped in on HYDRA operatives at the Captain's side, shoulder to shoulder with Bucky Barnes.

He tucked himself in with his favorite figure at night, a cherished Christmas present that his mother would later admit took a big bite out of her sewing money.

Eighteen inches tall with actual hair and hand painted features, he became a constant companion. His mother sewed the good Captain several uniforms over the years, including a dress uniform. Phil carried him to school, tucked into his satchel, a talisman against the regular world. He lived as a good toy should -- well loved by his boy.

His knees hit the linoleum as his books went sprawling.

"Lookit the baby," someone said, and Phil turned his head, scrabbling for his papers. "He's still carrying around dolls."

Oh no, Cap!

"Don't you touch him," Phil snapped, his glasses hanging half off his face as he whirled around.

He snatched his backpack out of Ritchie Mullins' hands, tiny fist balled up and swinging before he realized it. He connected with Ritchie's stomach, catching the bully by surprise and knocking the wind out of him.

Cap was safe, and Phil scrabbled together his books while Mullins got his bearings. The bigger boy, built like a truck with a punch to match, was up again and Phil stuffed his books in his bag before they began circling each other.

They were in the hallway that led to the gym, the crumbling old pre-war school large and sprawling, and no teachers could see. Phil had long ago learned to take care of himself, however.

Students meandering by could sense blood in the air. Like prepubescent sharks, they circled closer, their voices dimming to a dull roar. Adrenaline rushed into Phil's ears, his heart pounding.

Then, the chant started.

Fight, fight, fight!

Mullins swung, a haymaker that hurtled toward Phil's head. If he'd learned anything in the fourth grade, it was to stand your ground, but don't be there to take a punch if you didn't have to. He ducked beneath it, using his smaller size to drive a shoulder into Mullin's gut.

Ritchie went down, Phil landing on top of him. A stray punch got Phil in the lip, and he barely felt the warm trickle of blood. He proceeded to yell and then ram his fists into Mullins' face as hard as possible.

The crowd of children parted, letting the basketball coach through. Phil felt himself rise, yanked up by the scruff of his neck as the coach shook him bodily.

"Coulson!" he snapped. "Principal's office, now. You too, Mullins."

Phil stumbled backward, bleeding like a stuck pig. Mullins shuffled off, and Phil grabbed his bag as the crowd dispersed. The coach looked at him with a critical eye.

"You have a hell of a punch, kid," he said. "You ever think about boxing?"

"No sir," Phil said, trying his damnedest to not bleed on his one good school shirt. (A failed attempt, if a valiant one.)

"Come talk to me after school tomorrow," he said, his beady eyes flicking up and down Phil's slight frame. "I'll teach you a thing or two, and you might actually avoid the fights if they realize you're a scrapper. Here."

He took out his handkerchief and blotted Phil's lip, letting Phil press it to the split. He steered Phil toward the principal's office.

Phil plopped down on the worn wooden bench outside while the coach went in to make his report first. He tossed a baleful glare at Mullins, but the kid was too busy trying to see out of an eye that was already swelling shut.

He opened his backpack, shuffling through his books, and ran his thumb across Cap's chest after checking for battle damage.

Glad you're safe.

Phil was sixteen before the thought of a soul mate began to plague him. He checked his wrist every day, to no avail. No thin, spidery script like the handwriting of god, no flat newspaper tintype to tell him what fate had in store for him. He often lay in bed, wondering what they'd look like.

Would they like him?

His mother warned him -- just because you were soul mates didn't mean you were tied together forever. Soul mates could reject you. Fate could be changed, the cards shuffled, the deck redrawn. Phil swallowed at it, the whole thing seeming scary.

He remembered how his mother rubbed her own wrist as she spoke. He wondered if her name had ever appeared on his father's wrist like his had for hers. It was supposed to work like that, but Phil didn't trust it.

He'd seen what happened when another name appeared during the marriage. Marriage itself couldn't even supersede the Bonding Laws. If someone's name appeared on your wrist, you were allowed to annul all current ties to be with that person, if they agreed to Bond with you.

He shifted on his bed, laying back and thinking about all the things he'd heard about Bonding. His hand rubbed at his sternum, tracing up and down forming chest muscles.

Bonds were supposed to be deep, deeper than anything. Thinking alike, enjoying that closeness. He ached for something like that, in the way that teenagers did; it all seemed awfully poetic to him.

Still, what would his soul mate be like?

He was still rubbing his chest through his t-shirt as he thought. His eyes idled over an old bond poster, yellow at the edges and curling at the corners where the tape gave over to age. Stefan Roosevelt stood in a heroic pose, shield in front of him, rendered with an artist's loving hand. Blue-grey eyes traced Stefan Roosevelt's face, and his thoughts turned somewhere they'd never gone before.

He noted how Stefan's jaw cut a sharp corner toward his chin, the curve of his neck. His lips were firmed in a scowl, but Phil wondered if they would be pliant, giving under his. How his neck slid down to his shoulders, inviting touch although he might be met with a questioning look.

He soaked the poster in, the cant of the soldier's hips as Stefan demanded he support the war effort. There was even a hint at what lay beneath the suit, shadows and smoke and mirrors, but for sixteen year old Phil Coulson, it was more than enough.

This was somehow different from his imaginary war games as a child. Nascent longing bloomed, formed in the way he envisioned finding Stefan after a long mission, both of them filthy and tired. Stefan cupping the back of his neck, leaning in to kiss him. Something fired in his brain, blowing his pupils wide.

"Almost lost you out there today, Phil," he said, large, nimble fingers bumping under his chin and lifting it so that Stefan could get at his mouth. Phil melted into the kiss, nipping at Stefan's lip. He could still smell the smoke on both of them.

"You wouldn't lose me, sir," he said, and his voice didn't do that obnoxious cracking warble it did when he tried to talk to girls at school. This was Stefan. He'd known him all his life.

There was nothing to be afraid of.

Stefan smiled, sinking into the folding camp chair and pulling Phil between his knees.

Phil pressed against him like a cat.

His hand crept to the fabric of his pajama bottoms, worn and soft from many washings. His ragged fingernails caught the hem, but he shifted, sliding his hand into his underwear. His awkward strokes made him gasp, trying to hide the sound from his mother --

-- and they evened out, Stefan's capable hands taking over. He stroked Phil, rubbing his thumb across the tip.

"I missed you," he whispered, pulling Phil close so that he leaned against the inside of one of Stefan's broad thighs. "Missed this."

"We've never..." Phil started, only to whimper as Stefan leaned in and kissed his neck. "Never done this before."

"Wanted to," Stefan growled, and Phil's hips jerked. "Wanted to ever since you came with me through Prague. Phil..."

Oh, that was more than enough. Phil came with a cry, his spunk splattering his own fingers, painting his chest as he heaved for breath, pulled from the fantasy with the wet reality that he'd need another shower before bed. He lay back, stunned in his own cooling mess as his eyes refocused on the poster opposite.

Phil Coulson came to the realization that he was more than a little bit in love with a dead man at the age of sixteen. He sighed and looked at his wrist, hoping that his soul mate would understand. No name yet, but that would change soon.

It had to.

Phil was twenty-six when he and Marcus joined SHIELD, upon invitation of the current director, one Patricia Carhold. Marcus got in based on bloodline alone, but Phil made the cut on his own.

Phil, in his research, recognized her. She had been touted as Stefan Roosevelt's girl, in more than a dozen footnotes in history.

Phil was almost jealous, until she took him under her wing, showing him how to make a proper cup of tea and how to kill a man with a stapler in almost the same breath. In that moment, Phil Coulson could brag that his boss was the coolest woman alive.

She was a no-nonsense kind of woman. Curt, almost to the point of being rude with her abruptness, she put up with no one.

Phil had somehow caught her eye.

She called him into her office late one night, and he walked in, coffee in hand, ten minutes later. She nodded to the chairs in front of her desk, and he sank into one, his cup between his palms as he waited.

"Where did you get your pin?" she asked.

Phil, not connecting the dots for a moment, looked down at his lapel. The shield shined under the careful pass of his cloth earlier today, the kite shield his preferred choice. It was small, discreet enough to not draw attention.

"I uh...I go looking for memorabilia," he admitted. "He's my hero. Has been since I was a boy. Is it against regs, ma'am?"

"No," she said, sipping at her mug of tea. "I just have something to show you."

She pulled out her keys, unlocking the bottom most drawer of her desk. She pulled out a framed photo, setting it between them. Phil caught his breath.

"I see you know who it is, even without the serum," she said, a carefully manicured nail stroking down the side of the thin face. "Stefan was...a good man."

It punched him in the gut, how lost Patricia sounded when she said it. He'd never heard that tone from her, not ever. He swallowed, studying Stefan. There was a curious draw about his face, even then, and Phil looked up to see Patricia smiling at him.

"I thought you might understand," she said. She reached back in the drawer and came up with a file as thick as his forearm. "I'm old --"

"Hardly," he said, and she smiled again.

He didn't think of her as old; while thick grey streaks wound themselves into her hair, all it did was highlight the determination that shone in her eyes. She wasn't the Iron Lady of SHIELD for nothing, and Phil loved her, in his way.

"I am old, Agent Coulson." His title made him pay attention. She slid the file over. "It's time I left the legwork to someone who's younger."

He took the file, holding it in his hands. It was weighty, with a symbol he recognized on the front.

"Strategic Scientific Reserve?" he asked, his thumb brushing the faded ink. "Is...this what I think it is?"

"It is indeed, boy." She drained her tea mug and stood. "That is every scrap of information that I could gather -- legally, illegally, willing and unwilling -- about Stefan Roosevelt and his whereabouts."

Phil felt as though there was a large stone in the center of his chest.

"I needed to find someone with the same drive, the same passion. Someone needs to bring him home." Her back was straight, but he could see the way the years bowed her all the same, in the tired lines of her eyes. "I can't...do it anymore. I'm an old woman, my boy."

Phil set the file on the desk with care and deliberation before he rose. He met her gaze square in the eye.

Her voice took on the familiar abrupt tone she took.

"He never found a soul mate. Never Bonded with anyone," she said. Phil's breath did a curious stutter. This was something that no one else knew, he was sure. "He always wondered if the serum tampered with it. I assured him it didn't. I didn't get long enough to tell him that I wished mine had been him."

Phil glanced away, embarrassed for her. Then again, hadn't he wished the same thing? Didn't he wish for it even now, in the deepest part of the night where secrets breathed while the world slept?

"At the very least, you can bring him home for a proper burial," she said. Phil shook his head, and she shushed him by reaching out and straightening his lapel.

It was, in fact, the most overt affection she'd ever shown him. He couldn't help the warmth that welled up in his chest, and he reached up to cover a hand with his own.

"Ma'am," he said, his voice quiet. "Rest assured. I'll find him. I'll bring him home."

"I know you will," she said, reaching up and cupping his cheek. She smiled at him. "I don't know how long I have, but I'll wait as long as it takes."

"You've got plenty of years left in you, ma'am," he said, flashing her a smile. "Enough that you still make the recruits swoon."

"Now you're full of it," she said. He laughed, and so did she. "I do have a few secrets up my sleeve. I'll stay around as long as I can, for Marcus as well as for you. You mustn't ask questions. That's all I ask."

"You have my word, Director. I'll find him."

"That's why I assigned it to you, agent. Now hop to it. And send Marcus to see me when you get back to the dorms."

"Yes, ma'am." He stayed still long enough to consider telling her, but cowardice won out. He scurried from the room with the file clutched to his chest.