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Deep in the bowels of what Marty would later learn to be a Hydra outpost, a pile of cards landed with a flourish.
“Gin.”
For a moment, all that could be heard across the cell block were carefully whispered swears and the shuff of paper cards.
Marty frowned and threw his cards down in disgust. The 7 of hearts mocked him from the top of the draw pile.
“Goddamnit, Tom” He sighed, slumping back.
Tom MacAnnaly grinned.
“What can I say?” He said, sweeping the cards towards him, “I have my Uncle Thomas’ luck.”
“You’ve got something,” muttered Roth dryly. He propped a leg against the bars, casting a leery eye outward. He was thin, was Roth, even more skin and bones than the rest of them. Dark haired, dark-eyed, and with sharp cheekbones and a sharper tongue. The blue light creeping in from the workyard threw eerie shadows across his face, and when he turned just right, he seemed more wraith than man.
Privately, Marty couldn’t help but agree with him. Thomas MacAnnaly had, somehow, managed to hold on to almost a full deck of cards through the mud, the shit and all the muddy shitholes they had found themselves in- including this one. His cards were dirty, of course- everything got dirty in the middle of a warzone- and foxed around the edges from all the handling. The jack of clubs had been replaced by the joker after a nasty stint along the Magineaux with no kindling, and the 3 of spades was looking a little ragged after Steve Campbell tried to out bluff Tom (and, like all who came before him, fell like Napoleon at Waterloo), but Tom’s cards were, through the grace of God or Satan or somebody, there. Marty watched MacAnnaly shuffle the deck with a victorious smile.
MacAnnaly had smiles like other people collected hats. He had one for every occasion. One for getting into trouble ( and one for getting out, of course), one for wooing, one for cajoling, and, like any smug asshole, one for victory. Marty watched him shuffle the cards once more before folding them up in his handkerchief and sticking them in his shirt pocket with a flourish.
Roberts, stuck in the cell next door, snorted.
“Right,” He whispered, “That’s it for me, gentlemen. I have to get home before the missus comes a-calling.” Roberts jerked his head towards the guard station, sardonic smile on his face. Roberts was dark-eyed and dark-haired, with a sense of humor full of more irony than a foundry had iron. He was a big guy, was Roberts- though not as big as Campbell- with ears like a bat and quieter than a mouse when he wanted to be. He said it was because of growing up with 12 siblings in a house the size of a postage stamp and Marty wasn’t sure he wasn’t lying but he also wasn’t going to question it when it had saved their asses more than once.
Marty snorted, quietly, and watched him roll over. He didn’t know much about being a guest of the Axis Powers, but he was pretty sure they didn’t usually let their prisoners play hands of Gin, no matter how surreptitious. Marty and them weren’t stupid, they kept an ear out for footsteps, were as surreptitious as they could be, but the fact was that these guys didn’t seem to give a flying fuck about anything less than obvious insubordination. That was weird. Weird shit, especially weird shit in the middle of a prison camp with weird glowing Frankenstein lights, made Marty nervous. He sighed. He watched MacAnnaly slip sideways with a thump; he watched Roth settle sleeplessly against the bars, and he ignored the spaces where Simms and Jenkins used to sleep to shuffle restlessly against his own patch of cell.
Two days ago, the Krauts had snatched Jenkins up off the workline and dragged him into the depths of what on the blueprints was probably called a “research building” or “Lab 1” and what the boys called “the Ninth Circle of Fucking Hell”. No one knew just what went on in Fucking Hell, but on account of not a soul going into that building coming back up, and on account of the intermittent screaming, they all agreed Fucking Hell deserved the name. Simms, a transplant into their little group like Roth, hadn’t been seen since dawn a week ago. The more optimistic guys on the workline thought he might’ve escaped. Privately, Marty thought he’d been disappeared into the depths of Fucking Hell- there’d been more and more lately. But then, what’d he know? He thought he’d seen Sarge yesterday and he hadn’t seen Sarge since before this whole prison mess.
Marty shook his head to clear it. The lack of food was probably getting to him. Or the work. Or the frayed-nerve uncertainty of tomorrow. Or- He stopped himself with a terse sigh. If Marty listed all the things in this war that had him going screwy, he really would go nuts. Instead, he rolled over, watching Roth watch the halls like the world’s scrawniest guard dog until he fell asleep.
_
Three days later, Marty wasn’t sure he hadn’t gone nuts. Way across the way, a tiny, beefy figure moved with the kind of purpose he hadn’t seen since Sarge split the crowd at the USO show in France. Marty watched the figure run hither and thither with a concussed sort of fascination. He was light on his feet, this guy. Not too bad at the whole stealth thing, neither. But if this was a jailbreak, Marty mused, he was going about it in a real funny w-
The figure caught in that eerie blue light and Marty froze. There, not 300 feet from the doors of Fucking Hell, stood Sarge’s poor, spangly Steve.
“Tom,” He hissed, smacking MacAnnaly, “Thomas, wake up!” His eyes never left Steve, spangling stupidly in the distance.
MacAnnaly bolted awake with a vicious string of hissing Gaelic before fixing Marty with a glare. Obligingly, his hair stuck up in about six different directions, each of them crankier than the last.
“Look.” Marty pointed in the distance.
MacAnnaly squinted balefully before his face morphed into a shit-eating grin.
“No,” he breathed.
“You don’t think-” Marty began.
“Oh, but I do think.” Said MacAnnaly, “Roberts!” He reached through the bars with a hiss. “Roberts wake up!”
Roberts shook awake like a shot. “What?”
“Look!”
Roberts frowned muzzily across the way, eyebrows crinkling before shooting up in recognition.
“Oh, fuck me, what’s he doing here?”
Marty snorted. “If half the shit Sarge said was true, he’s here to pull Sarge’s ass outta the fire and keel over trying.”
Roth, drawn by the commotion, stared incredulously at the red and blue figure tearing bars off of cages.
“Who’s Hercules?”
“That,” Said Roberts, “Is Steve .”
“Who the hell is Steve?”
Well, Marty would’ve told him, but things turned to bedlam pretty quick after that.
--
“Okay,” Roth stumbled against Marty, who slung an arm around his waist before the poor bastard tripped over his own two feet. Marty’s ankle-twisted over a piece of rubble on the way out- twinged with outrage before subsiding in exhausted resignation.
“Is anyone gonna tell me why we just got rescued by the personification of the American flag?”
Roberts waggled his eyebrows. “Oh, you mean Steve ,” He leered.
“Steve,” MacAnnaly began, and paused, as was the custom, for Campbell to chime in.
The mud squelched awkwardly under their feet.
The trees echoed with the sound of boots, scattered chatter, and the rumble of the casualty truck’s diesel engine.
Far ahead, Marty could just make out Sarge tromping grimly next to Steve-the-Flag and what appeared to be a bunch of officer types hooting and hollering like it was a parade.
The pause stretched like it was getting ready to run a marathon.
“Steve what ?” Roth demanded.
It was then that the boys of the 107th remembered that none of them had seen Steve Campbell since Azzano.
Roberts cleared his throat brusquely. Marty and MacAnnaly shared a look over Roth’s head.
“Steve is Sarge’s...friend.” Roberts began.
“Steve is crazier than a cat in a sack,” said MacAnnaly, almost at the same time.
Roth rolled his eyes- then winced as the head wound kicked in.
Roth was the worst of them with a whack to the head towards the end. Roberts twisted his wrist somehow, Marty his ankle, and MacAnnaly had, yet again, managed to get away without a scratch.
“Fantastic.” Roth had a way of making any word sound like it spent a month drying out in the desert before coming outta his mouth. It was deeply aggravating in a way that made even the most kind spirited men want to deck him. Marty understood the urge. “Why is he here .”
“Essentially,” said Marty, taking pity, “Steve and the Sarge have been pullin’ each other outta fires since they was little on account of how Steve once tried to take on a whole gang of guys for stealing some girl’s doll or something and the Sarge took one look at this pint-sized idiot and said ‘That one. He’s my new best friend’.”
“Pint-sized.” intoned Roth, staring ahead at Steve.
“See that’s the thing,” said Roberts, gesturing, “Apparently he was only yea high-” he stuck his hand up to his chest- “not even a year ago.”
“Skinnier than a rail,” MacAnnaly agreed, “ and more fight than my Aunt Dierdre at cousin Morag’s Christening.”
“That’s a lot, I assume.” said Roth, drier than the Sahara.
MacAnnaly nodded sagely. “Oh, aye. Aunt Dierdre kicked up a fuss so big half the parish ended up with a black eye on the left and the other half had one on the right.”
Marty snorted, adjusting his grip, then winced when his ankle twanged like a bass line in a jazz quartet. Roth was heavy for a skinny ass beanpole. ”Tom, take Roth here.” MacAnnaly, who had been shooting Marty’s ankle looks since before the fighting had ended, moved to take Roth off his hands, but not before shooting another questioning look at his ankle. Over Roth’s head, Marty waved him off. Turning to Roth, Marty said: “Roth, there are whole armies with less fight in ‘em than Steve Rogers.”
“We thought he was made up,” continued MacAnnaly, shuffling Roth’s lanky frame against his own.
“Not made up , per-se,” cut in Roberts, “Exaggerated, maybe.”
MacAnnaly nodded. “Stylized, if you will.”
“No,” Roth said, wide-eyed with insincerity. “Him?”
Looking at Steve, Marty couldn’t really blame him. The man seemed ridiculous even before he started ripping bars off of doors.
“Apparently Sarge had to pull him outta a fight with a guy over the newsreels-”
“And with a guy who stole some kids errand money-” chimed Roberts.
“And those kids twice his size picking on the slow kid-” added MacAnnaly.
“And that packa ingrates talkin’ about those ladies.” Marty agreed. “And this is while he had a list of diseases longer than Roberts is tall. As my Momma would say, Steve has God’s fury and the devil’s own luck.”
Roth contemplated the front of the line. Every so often, a spangly uniform would appear around the edge of the casualty truck.
“Steve’s a stand up guy,” said MacAnnaly.
“He’s also fuckin nuts,” said Roberts.
“That still doesn’t explain why he’s here in the ass-crack of Germany knocking down walls like they’re paper mache.” complained Roth.
Marty, Roberts, and MacAnnaly very carefully didn’t talk about the times when Sarge’s face maybe got mushier than a man usually does when talking about his best pal. Or how Sarge seemed to have four sisters and a seemingly endless stream of dates, but it was Steve they heard the most about. Or how Sarge complained about Steve like Marty’s Aunt and Uncle bickered about each other. Or how, privately, they all suspected that Sarge and Steve were the kind of friends they told stories about on Navy boats- or Greek epics.
They shared A Look.
“Weren’t you listening?” Said MacAnnaly, grinning, “Steve’s feckin nuts .”
“Stand up guy, though,” said Roberts.
Marty nodded. “A real stand up guy.”
Roth groaned.
“Aw cheer up Roth, I bet we’ll be stopping soon.”
___
Later, much later, after joining back up with the Allies and dropping Roth off with his old unit and after a much needed meal and an even more needed shower, the dregs of the 107th held a meeting.
Their meeting space was a little ramshackle. The back end of a storage tent constituted their office. Some crates, their chairs. A single oil lamp gave them enough light to see by. A New York boardroom, this was not, but none of them much liked office work, anyways.
Marty looked at Roberts.
Roberts looked at Marty.
Campbell, who had been unearthed with Brown and Spitz, shifted his weight.
Spitz coughed uneasily, eyes meeting the ground and only the ground except for brief visitations with his boots.
MacAnnaly shuffled his cards idly through his hands, lost in thought.
Brown, who’s hair had gone all the way white since Azzano, cleared his throat.
“So,” He said, before faltering.
MacAnnaly glanced to Marty and shuffled his cards with a flourish. Marty nodded.
“Cards?” He asked, grinning.
The sigh of relief was probably audible from London.
__
Two rounds of cards later and the boys had loosened up a little.
“I heard they’re giving him a whole new unit.” Said Roberts. He leaned back on his makeshift chair, watching.
“Who?” asked Campbell, laying down a card. “One six.” Their card table was less a table and more a crate and a tiny, card-sized picnic blanket.
(This was courtesy of Spitz’ ascot. They’d tried playing without it, but getting cards out of a crate of munitions after you’d dropped half the deck through the slats in a spat was a quick way to latrine duty via the puffed up officer who caught you cracking open a munitions crate at ass o’clock to get at your lost cards. Spitz decided the sacrifice was worth it.)
Marty frowned.
“Spangly-Steve,” said Roberts.
“Hmm.” said Brown. Brown could hide a wealth of information in a single hmm. This one said something like ‘ Isn’t it interesting that that spangly-not-even-a-captain-Steve got a promotion before our own Sarge.’ He laid down two cards. “Two sevens.”
“Bullshit.” said Spitz.
Brown waved a hand at the cards, eyebrows raised. His glasses glinted in the lamplight.
Spitz waved a hand dismissively. “No, not you, Brown, Roberts. Why is that jumped up movie star getting a whole unit?”
Roberts shrugged.” Probably because that jumped up movie star single-handedly staged the largest prison break this side of the war,” He said drolly. He fussed with his cards. “It’s your turn”
Spitz fished out three cards and slapped them down. “Three eights.” he turned back towards Roberts with a frown. “You mean to tell me that our Sarge is going to be serving under the same idiot that tried to go to work while he had pneumonia in the middle of a January blizzard? The same guy?”
“The same guy,” Roberts confirmed.
“Bullshit.” said MacAnnaly.
Spitz waved a hand emphatically. “Exactly.”
“No, your cards.”
Spitz turned, betrayal writ large on his face, only to meet MacAnnaly’s shit-eating grin. He huffed and shoved the whole pile of cards into his hands to begin sorting. “Look, all I’m saying is that Spangly-Steve hasn’t seen a war-zone in his life. Why should he get a promotion over Sarge?”
Brown nodded in solidarity. MacAnnaly laid down his cards.
“Two Nines. And you’re going to hate this next part.”
“Oh what now.” Spitz tried to run a hand over his face but smacked himself in the head with his cards. “Ow.”
MacAnnaly gestured for Roberts to continue.
“Well apparently,” said Roberts with relish, “The rest of the group is also going to be officers. You remember that pack of upper-echelon types that were hanging around Sarge and Spangly-Steve?”
Brown made a noise of dismay.
“No!” breathed Spitz.
“Yes,” Confirmed Roberts, “ they’re packing all of them into some kinda mixed-race international unit.” He laid down a card. “One ten.”
Spitz glanced at his massive hand of cards and very carefully didn’t say anything.
Brown hmm-ed again. This time it went something like: Those idiots won’t keep him very safe. You know what officers are like.
Marty nodded. “Brown’s right. Two Jacks.” Officers weren’t known for their common sense, generally speaking.
Campbell snorted. “They’ll be lucky if they last a month. We’ll be lucky if they don’t lose Sarge off the side of a bridge on accident. One Queen.”
“Or a mountain.” Said Roberts.
“Two Kings.” said Brown.
“Ha!” said Spitz, “I’d hate to be that mountain after Spangly Steve got through with it. Can you imagine? One Ace.”
Admittedly, the idea of a red-faced Spangly Steve stomping over to fight a mountain in his little spangly suit was pretty funny.
MacAnnaly grinned, “If anyone could fight a mountain, it’d probably be that Sarge’s spangly-Steve. Two twos.”
“Bull shit you bastard !” Crowed Spitz. He had the satisfaction of a man who knew his victory was petty but relished it nonetheless. “I have all the twos in my hand!”
MacAnnaly rolled his eyes. “Been waiting on that one, were you?” He shuffled the pile of cards into his hand, small though it was . “That said,” He said, sobering, “I think maybe we ought to have a talk with old Steve and make sure we’re all on the same page.”
Heads bobbed in the firelight. Brown Hmm-ed an entire essay in agreement. It started with ‘Who the hell put him in charge’ and ended somewhere around ‘and our Sarge deserves better than some half-wit officer fresh outta the stage lights.’
“Well then,” Said Marty, leaning forward. The lamplight cast sinister shadows across the planes of his face. “Sounds like we need to go talk to Steve.”
“I’m right here.” Said Campbell, just to be a shit.
--
Sneaking into the officer’s tents wasn’t as hard as it probably should have been.
MacAnnaly had challenged a few baby-faced lieutenants to cards and squeezed them for both their information and their cigarettes. Marty had taken that information and come up with a plan that was...well, at least it wasn’t as crazy as Spangly Steve’s.
Now, they were looking as busy as they could be, Marty limping along in the middle, Brown and MacAnnaly in front, Spitz and Roberts in the rear, and Campbell, giant that he was, next to Marty on the off chance they had to book it- Marty’s ankle wasn’t godawful but it wasn’t rosy, neither.
“Which one was it again?” Muttered Spitz. He was keeping a leery eye out for cranky Sarges and anyone with more swagger in their step than a lieutenant.
“I told you it’s out past the information tent.” grumbled MacAnnaly.
“Hmm,” Said Brown. It managed to convey raised eyebrows and enough disdain to fill a truck, even from behind. In his defense, they’d walked past the mess tent three times already and the cooks were starting to look at them funny.
“Why’d we let MacAnnaly lead again?” said Roberts. MacAnnaly was a lucky sonuvabitch, but his sense of direction was not included in the package.
“He’s the only one who actually saw the tent,” said Marty. Privately, Marty thought the only reason MacAnnaly didn’t spend all his time lost was because he was a lucky sonuvabitch.
“In the dark.” Said Campbell. “For two seconds.”
MacAnnaly sputtered, “I’ll have you know, you Iowan farm-”
“Found him.” Brown interrupted before MacAnnaly could get much farther, and indeed, there, not ten feet away, was Spangly Steve in his red-white-and-blue glory. For some reason, no one had found the poor bastard a uniform that didn’t shout ‘Shoot me, I’m an idiot!’.
They watched him enter a tent not too far ahead.
“There, you see,” Said MacAnnaly, “Just past the information tent.”
“Just past your head.” Spitz muttered darkly.
“Well boys,” Marty started, before they could begin. “Lets go.”
They trooped over to Spangly Steve’s tent like they were going to see Hitler himself. Determined. Brave. Ready to kick some ass or die trying.
Then, they stalled.
MacAnnaly looked at Brown.
Brown stared at Spitz.
Spitz glanced at Roberts, then Marty.
Marty rolled his eyes and walked to the front. Worse than school children, honestly.
“Captain Rogers?” He called.
A blonde head poked out of the tent. Spangly Steve gave them a once over with a split-second flash of the kind of steel you’d need to get into the kind of scraps Steve Rogers did.
“Hey fellas,” His smile was just this side of polite. “What can I do for you?”
“Martin Greene, sir,” Spangly Steve tensed a little and part of Marty wondered why. “From the 107th. We’d like to talk to you about Sargeant Barnes.” He gestured to the guys.
Spangly Steve’s brow furrowed, then cleared. His smile got a little more genuine. “Oh, Bucky’s unit. Come on in.” and he drew the tent flap aside.
“So fellas,” He said sitting on his cot. There wasn’t a lot of sitting room- or room, period-so they all crowded around Spangly Steve like kids with a secret. Even sitting, he was pretty tall.
“What did you want to talk to me about?”
“Well sir,” Spangly Steve flinched again and it clicked. Spangly-Steve was greener than even the greenest officer Marty’d ever served with. Despite Sarge’s stories, part of Marty balked at letting their Sarge go with a guy so unused to command. Officers like that had a tendency to get people killed. “We think Sarge is a stand up guy,”
“A real stand up guy, sir” Chimed Roberts. The 107th had noticed Steve’s flinch and were taking full advantage of it.
“He’s taken care of us since we got to the front, Captain Rogers, sir.” Said Spitz.
“Since basic, even, sir.” This was Campbell.
“Exactly,” said Marty, “And we heard about your new unit, sir, and that you were thinking about picking Sarge-”
Spangly Steve’s expression turned a little less polite at that. Strictly speaking, that last bit wasn’t true, but if Marty had learned anything here on the warfront, it was that where Steve Rogers went, James Buchannan Barnes followed and vice-versa. Even if it took them longer than molasses in January to do it.
“I can’t make Bucky stay with the 107th if he wants to go, fellas.” And, his expression said, you better not try to either.
Of course, everyone in that room knew that technically, Captain Rogers could make Sergeant Barnes stay behind if he wanted to. Just as equally, they knew he never would.
“Sir,” Said MacAnnaly, stepping forward, “May we speak freely?”
“Of course,” said Spangly-Steve, frowning.
“None of us are proposing that you leave Sergeant Barnes out of this new unit. By all rights, it’s an honor afforded to very few of us, being able to work in a unit like that.”
MacAnnaly was laying it on a little thick; especially since none of them would touch that mess with a ten foot pole. Just imagining the shit they were going to get up to was giving Marty stress ulcers.
It seemed to make Spangly-Steve relax, however, because his frown straightened out.
“That said,” Continued MacAnnaly, “ We owe Sarge a debt for pulling our asses out of the fire so many times.”
“Several debts, really,” Added Marty.
“And so,” Everyone twitched a little closer to Spangly Steve, sensing the shift in the air. “We just wanted to ask you a favor.”
“A favor.” Spangly Steve, stupid outfit aside, hadn’t gotten this far by being a complete moron. His face had gone flat in anticipation. “I’m not going to do anything illegal, fellas, especially not anything that’ll hurt Buck’s standing in the Army.”
They all shared a speaking look. None of them missed how Spangly Steve didn't say anything about his standing in the army. Given the stories, Steve Rogers would do anything he thought was right, damn the consequences. And that went double when the Sarge was involved.
“We just-” MacAnnaly paused, unsure of how to continue.
“We just want you to look out for him, sir. He means a lot to us.”
It was Spitz who said it. It tumbled out of his mouth like it had somewhere to be and landed, awkwardly, in the middle of the room. The boys shuffled, embarrassed.
Steve got steely-eyed, determination writ large in the lines of his face. It was uncanny, really, the way he could look like that in such a stupid suit. Most people would have looked like complete morons. On Steve, it sort of made sense.
“Fellas,” he said, “I’m gonna keep Sergeant Barnes alive if it’s the last thing I do, you have my word on that”
To a man, they straightened like they’d been tugged on a string, and God help them, when this spangly idiot talked like that, even Marty started to believe him.
The moment stretched, caught between Spangly-Steve’s devotion and the 107th’s awe.
“Thank you, sir.” Said Marty, hushed.
A familiar voice came from behind them: “Don’t thank me yet, Greene, you don’t even know what you’re getting.”
They jumped, to a man, caught red-handed. Even Spangly-Steve looked guilty.
Sarge frowned, his eyes raking over them in an icy blue flash. “What the hell are you yahoos doing in here, anyhow?” Marty didn’t miss how his eyes caught on Robert’s bandaged wrist and hung on Marty, gingerly keeping his weight on one leg.
“Well, Sarge, we just had to meet the famous Steve Rogers.” MacAnnaly grinned, “Especially after all those stories you told us.”
Spangly-Steve squawked. “Stories?! Buck-”
Sarge waved him off. From the look on his face, Sarge wasn’t buying it, but he was gonna let it slide.
“Sure fellas, whatever you say,” Then, he got the kind of sly look on his face that usually meant he was going to say something crazier than even Steve’s plans. “Greene, report to the administration tent; you’ve been promoted.”
Marty felt all the blood drain from his face. MacAnnaly’s grin got two times wider. Behind him, Brown coughed a cough that on anyone else would have been a laugh. Campbell, Spitz, and Roberts were only moderately more successful at hiding their schadenfreude in front of a superior officer.
“What? But sir-”
Sarge shrugged. “It’s not my call. I’m joining Steve’s new unit and the 107th needs a new Sergeant. Your name was put in the ring.”
What Sarge wasn’t saying was that it was almost certainly him that put Marty’s name in the ring, the rat bastard.
“Aw, cheer up Greene!” Roberts clapped him on the shoulder as the rest of them filed out. The 107th knew how to take an exit when they saw one, and by gum, they jumped outta this one faster than a cat in a bath. “It couldn’t have happened to a better guy.”
“But-” Marty began.
“Well Sarge,” MacAnnaly slung an arm over Marty’s shoulder. Behind him, the tent was empty, save Spangly-Steve, who shared a speaking look with Sarge. “We oughta get going now. Someone’s gotta get Marty here to the administration tent.”
(MacAnnaly getting anyone anywhere was, of course, laughable, but Marty was in no position to argue.)
“But-but-” There was no way they were putting Marty in charge of these idiots. Hell, Marty was one of these idiots!
Sarge nodded, like Marty had said actual words instead of babbling like an idiot. His face was serious, but his eyes were dancing like kids around a Maypole.
“Dismissed, fellas. And Greene?”
Marty turned to him with the despair of a man already at rock bottom. “Sir?”
“Stay off that ankle.”
Marty could only nod mutely, the life sucked from his bones.
MacAnnaly shuffled them forward, still grinning. “Bye, Sarge, Bye Spangly-Steve, sir.”
“Spangly?” Spangly-Steve huffed a laugh at that, like maybe he thought his outfit was stupid, too.
And the last thing Marty heard before MacAnnaly dragged him away was Sarge going:
“Well, you are pretty spangly, Stevie.”
(Seventy-odd years later, after the fall of a multi-national intelligence organization, Steve will sip his morning coffee, stare across the kitchen at the love of his life, and realize this was the 107th’s version of a shovel talk.)