#epiones scream when she was hit ...

[echosdevil]

ELEANOR MATSUURA as EPIONE

Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021)

[hiraeth-doux]

illusions of the sunlight

summary: “Revived here, he belongs to this island, Diana. He can never leave again.”

Hades returns Steve Trevor to Diana, but there is a catch - Steve is now bound to remain on Themyscira forever. 

... or is he? 

AO3

Veld, 1918

“So, this is what people do when there are no wars to fight,” Diana says as she tries to keep a serious face.

Sprawled on her stomach next to Steve amongst tangled sheets, she watches him in the dim light of the dying fire, and for a moment, she sees the man he had been before the war had left its mark on him, a mark that she fears will never be erased completely.

Steve blinks at her. It takes him a second to realize that she is teasing him, and then he laughs. It’s a beautiful sound, so joyous it makes her heart ache, and it strikes Diana then that in the brief time that they’ve known each other, she has never seen him so relaxed, so content, so unguarded. So oddly young.

He lifts his hand and traces his thumb along the ridge of her cheekbone.

“Among other things,” Steve notes, and this time, the smile springs across her face as well.

The snow is still falling outside the small window, thick flakes that make everything look surreal; the chilly wind rattles the glass in its frame and whistles under the roof. But the room above the inn is like a whole different world, and despite everything that has brought her here in the first place, there is nowhere else she’d rather be.

Her eyes find his, and for the first time since they have met, Diana wishes for so much more than just peace.

London, 1918

Grief manifests itself differently in different people.

All around Diana, people are celebrating and mourning, and she can no longer tell one from another. Standing in front of the commemoration wall in the centre of London, her eyes glued to the photograph of Steve and the easy smile on his face she barely recognizes, she allows the sounds of cheering and crying to wash over her until they fade into a background noise and she is left alone with her thoughts and the weight of loss heavy on her chest.

To the right from her, Etta stands with a handkerchief clenched tightly in her hands, her eyes red-rimmed and glistening with unshed tears. Every time she tries to speak, her lips tremble and her breath doesn’t seem to know where to find itself.

Sameer’s lips are pressed together but there is so much pain in his eyes that Diana can’t seem to look at him without being sucked into the ocean of sorrow. Ever the amiable one, he hasn’t said but two words in the past few days, and somehow it makes this alien world look even more unrecognizable to her.

Charlie is angry. All the rage he has carried within him through the war is bubbling up at the surface and spilling over the edge. He has the gentlest soul Diana has ever seen, but it is dripping with so much helpless fury and resentment toward everyone around him now that she fears he might never find the good parts of himself again.

Chief is quiet. Has been quiet since the night Steve died. Unlike Sameer who seems to have retreated into himself, Chief doesn’t try to mask his sadness. Yet there is resignation in his eyes, too; acceptance that the others have yet to find.

Diana wants to help them ease the burden of their loss, but the truth is that she can’t even help herself.

Themyscira, 1921

The island is smaller than she has remembered, and for a moment, Diana can’t help but wonder how this place used to encompass her entire world and feel like it was enough. She looks at it now and can barely imagine taking a few steps without falling off the edge of it and into the clear blue water.

It is, perhaps, that she knows now that there is more to the world than a piece of rock in the middle of the sea. She will never belong here the way she always thought she had, and the realization echoes with a pang of sadness in her chest. Yet, she doesn’t belong in men’s world either, and it makes her feel so lost that it is almost too much to bear.

Her mother meets her at the dock when she returns. Surrounded by half a dozen guards, she waits for Diana to step off the boat and move into her arms. She holds her tight and whispers a quiet Welcome back into her ear.

And something that simple brings tears to Diana’s eyes.

---

They never ask and she doesn’t volunteer more than she is willing to tell.

The pain of loss is still raw, her soul still aches for Steve more than she ever thought it could. It flares up in the moments when she least expects it and leaves her gasping, disoriented. She misses him desperately, to the dull throb deep in her bones, and she doesn’t understand how she can love someone she barely knew so fiercely.

The training ground is quiet and empty in the soft pre-dawn haze. Soon, the space will be filled with the best warriors she’s ever known. These days, Diana prefers the solitude of training on her own before everyone else is up and the wisps of morning fog still cling to the grass.

She swings her sword once, twice, deflecting an imaginary attack. Her muscles scream in exertion, her breathing heavy, and for a moment, all feels the way it used to—

“Diana!”

Her name carries across the vast stretch of the field, oddly loud in the early-morning stillness.

Diana snaps her head up, and there is Venelia standing on the cliff above her, her sword drawn and her expression troubled.

“Come. There is a man, down on the beach--”

Diana doesn’t hear the rest, the words swallowed by the wind.

With the pounding heart, she starts to walk, and then run, and then sprint so fast that it feels like she is flying.

---

They stand in a group that parts for her when Diana steps onto the sand, her chest heaving and her sword still clutched in her hand.

He lies on his back, half in the water, the waves lapping against his legs.

A strangled sob rises in Diana’s throat when she drops her sword and falls down to her knees beside him. Her hand hovers over his face, reaching forward and retreating for a few long moments before she brings herself to touch him, scared that he might disappear before her eyes if she does.

Steve’s skin is warm when her hand brushes against his cheek, his eyes closed, and her fingers tremble when they slide under his chin, searching for a pulse. For a moment, she can’t feel anything, and the sense of dread that settles over her makes her want to fold in on herself and cease to exist. But the moment passes, and then there it is, faint and weak, but real.

A shaky breath stutters out of her chest.

“Steve…”

His body jerks and convulses as he comes to with a coughing fit, spitting the water from his lungs and gasping hungrily for air.

There are a dozen women standing around them, their hands on the hilts of their swords, but when he opens his eyes and looks at her, they might as well be the only two people in the world.

“Steve,” she repeats, feeling like she is drowning in the blue of his eyes.

“Hey,” he croaks and offers her a weak smile that makes something snap within her. Something that has been holding her together all along. “Ow,” he winces when she grabs him and gathers him against her, stiffening in her arms.

“I’m sorry,” she murmurs into the crook of his neck, but when she tries to ease her grip, he doesn’t let go.

---

Steve is alive.

Diana remembers the fire that took his life three years ago with startling accuracy, so bright in the ink-black sky that it hurt to look. The scream that ripped out of her throat still lives deep inside of her, the memory of the sound of her heart splitting in half.

She runs her hand through his hair as she watches him sleep, careful not to touch the cut just under his hairline so as not to disturb him. His chest is rising and falling slowly, his lips slightly parted. He looks exactly the way he did on the morning before he died, and for a split second, Diana is back in that small room, waiting for him to wake up and smile at her like he did at night.  

She doesn’t know what this means. Doesn’t know what has brought him back or how, but it doesn’t matter. Be it a miracle or the act of magic, she will take it and she will be grateful for it with everything that she is.

“Diana…”

She looks up to find Epione standing in the doorway.

“He will be alright. You should rest.”

Diana nods but doesn’t move, and after a moment, Epione leaves without another word.

When she turns to Steve, she finds him blinking sleepily at her, and she can’t tell if he even knows that he is awake. The thought makes her lips tug upwards at the corners.

His fingers brush against her hand, and she grabs it with both of hers and lifts it to her mouth to press a kiss to his chapped knuckles.

“Stay,” he asks, his voice nothing but a whoosh of breath.

She ends up sleeping next to him on a cot too small for two people, and for the first time in years, she doesn’t dream of his plane engulfed in flames.

---

Steve doesn’t remember dying but he does remember saying goodbye, which is an odd feeling when the woman he said it to is standing right before him, warm breeze tangled in her hair, her smile the most beautiful thing he has ever seen.

Odder still is knowing that he is back in the place where the journey that had set him on the path that led him to his death had started both a week and several years ago.

It would feel like a dream, Steve thinks, if it hasn’t been for the bandage covering a gash on his forehead and a dull throb in his hip when he walks.

The sun is sinking into the ocean, and for a while, the quiet whisper of the waves hitting the sand is the only sound around them.

He turns to Diana. “So, Paradise island, huh?”

He knows that the war is over, that it has been over for a while. That Diana has put an end to it like she said she would, and looking at her now, Steve can’t imagine doubting her even for a moment. Where does that leave him, though, is another question altogether.

“I don’t know what to make of it,” he tells her honestly, although whether he is talking about his miraculous resurrection or about being madly in love with a goddess he doesn’t know. Either. Both. It all feels a little overwhelming.

Diana steps closer to him. She brushes his hair back from his forehead, careful not to touch the stripe of gauze, her eyes roaming over his features with the same endless wonder he first saw when she pulled him out of the water back in 1918.

“You’re alive, Steve,” she says. Her hand slips to rest on the back of his neck, and he instinctively ducks his head closer to hers until their foreheads rest together. “You’re alive because you deserve to live.”

It makes no sense to him; it goes against everything that he has ever known about the world and the rules it exists by, but that he would be brought right back to her doesn’t surprise him. Where else would he want to be?

His hands curl over her hips, drawing her closer. “I missed you,” he tells her, watching another smile break across her face, and when he kisses her, it feels like coming home.

---

The bright blue water stretches all the way to the horizon, brilliant in the sunlight. Somewhere out there is man’s world that is no more familiar to Hippolyta now than it was before it rejected the Amazons and pushed them into exile.

She has always known that the island would never be enough for Diana, but she also knew that her daughter would return sooner or later, drawn to it the way they all were. What she could never foresee was that Diana would bring a piece of that other world with her.

How odd, how unfathomable it is that she would give her heart so fully and so completely to a man. And how wonderful is the light that he brings to her daughter’s eyes that has never existed there before.

“Is he well?” Hippolyta asks when Diana walks over and pauses next to her, her eyes also trained on the expanse of the sea.

“He is healing,” Diana responds. “He doesn’t understand how, and neither do I.”

“Your patrons are indebted to you for defeating Ares,” the Queen says without turning. “And they always repay their debts.” There is no easy way to soften the blow of the words she says next, “Revived here, he belongs to this island, Diana. He can never leave again.”

“Will you allow him to stay?” Diana asks quietly after a moment.

This time, Hippolyta looks at her. “I wouldn’t for anyone else,” she says and they both know that she means it. Aside from the time when she chose to keep the story of Diana’s birth a secret, they have always been honest with one another. “But you have earned this. And he makes you happy.”

It’s not a question but a fact.

“He does,” Diana nods.

Hippolyta studies her for a long while, taking note of the girl she has raised and the woman Diana has become, and her chest constricts with fierce pride even though there is a bittersweet edge to it.

“Then it shall be enough.”

---

Hades.

Her mother doesn’t need to say the name for Diana to get the answer she’s been asking for. It’s only by the power of the God of the Underworld that the dead can come back to life.

She lays out the truth to Steve that night. The room is flooded with silver moonlight and her head rests on his chest while his fingers thread idly through her hair, and despite the twinge of uncertainty in her heart over how he will take her words, she feels content. He is quiet while she speaks, his heartbeat even and measured under her cheek.

“I understand that this is not a perfect resolution--” Diana starts.

Steve takes her hand that has been drawing idle patterns on his skin and winds his fingers through hers. “Do you want to be with me?” He asks.

She looks up, and the answer has never been more clear.

“Yes.”

He smiles at her. “Then it’s as perfect as it can be.”

She doesn’t know if he truly grasps the concept of forever and the full truth behind her words, but she has missed him so badly and if this is all they can get then she’ll take it.

A thousand times over.

Themyscira, 1940

The news of another war does not surprise Diana. Ares might be dead but his legacy, deeply rooted in the hearts of some people will live on for the rest of eternity.

It doesn’t surprise her that they would want to give in to hatred and greed and violence, but it feels like a blow that knocks the ground from beneath her feet anyway. The memory of the previous war is still fresh in her mind, and the anger rises inside of her in a tidal wave.

And for the first time in her life, Diana wonders if they deserve the help she can offer. If it is worth her effort when they will tear at each other again when their recollection of loss and blood and despair starts to fade.

She quells the thought, disgusted with herself for giving in to the burning in her blood that she has inherited from her father. The same one that had called to Ares to destroy mankind for simply being.

“You are going,” Steve says quietly, and she wishes she didn’t have to.

“I am.”

Diana moves to him and frames his face with her hands, her thumb stroking his cheekbone.

“I wish I could come with you,” he admits, and she knows that even after everything he’s been through, he means it.

“Me, too.” She brushes his hair back from his face and he leans into her touch. Nearly two decades later, and she still finds it hard to believe that she has got him back. “But I’m glad that you can’t,” she adds, and he laughs a little.

“You’ll have to be a hero for both of us then.”

Diana feels her lips curve into a smile. “Deal.”

 Themyscira, 1946

The second time she returns to the island, it is not her mother and the royal guards but Steve who appears from the early morning fog when her boat breaks through it.

Diana’s heart lurches at the sight of him waiting for her.

She refuses to think of it, least of all say it out loud, but the whole time she has been away, part of her feared that she wouldn’t find him here still when she came back.

The thought feels foolish when his arms close around her, and she never wants to let go.

“Good to have you back,” Steve whispers into her hair, and her smile grows so wide it threatens to split her face in half.

She has missed her mother dearly, she has missed her sisters, but she is grateful for this moment with him. Diana tucks her face into the hollow of his neck, and they stand at the end of the old dock as wisps of fog curl around their feet.  

Themyscira has never felt more like home.

Themyscira, 1918

Antiope’s blood soaking the sand is the brightest shade of red Diana has ever seen.

This is the first time she has faced death and the shock of it renders her paralyzed. The bodies of her sisters are covered with scars and painted with memories of battles that took place long before Diana came to exist. She used to admire and envy them, dreaming of her own victories.

Seeing the aftermath of the carnage that unravelled before her eyes only minutes ago is something else entirely and the enormity of it is unbearable.

“No!”

Menalippe’s scream breaks through the haze in Diana’s mind.

She looks up to watch the other woman race across the beach, but by the time Menalippe reaches them, she is too late.

Themyscira, 1967

Steve lands gracelessly on his back with an undignified gasp, and not even the soft grass of the training field softens his fall. The sun is beaming blindingly in the bright blue sky above him, a disadvantage that he knows will cost him the victory – not that there were many of those to speak of.

A shadow falls over him. He grabs onto the offered hand and lets Menalippe haul him up to his feet as he tries not to feel too sorry for himself.

For a moment, they merely look at each other, and he is acutely aware of the silence that has fallen around them. Her eyes are narrowed against the glare of the sun, and Steve knows that she hasn’t forgiven him for bringing death to the island the first time they met. Maybe never will.

He can’t blame her.

“You’re a good warrior, man,” she says at last, quietly, and for the first time in years, a small smile crosses her face. It is gone before Steve is sure he has even seen it, but it feels like a start.

“Thank you, General,” he says sincerely. “Coming from you, it means a lot.”

Diana walks over to him when Menalippe leaves to resume the training.

“You’re laughing at me,” he tells her accusingly when he catches a glimpse of a smile on her face.

“Am not,” she shakes her head, but her smile stretches out wider.

Steve huffs as he rubs his thigh, certain that he will have a limp for at least a week. Diana’s arm slides around his waist and she rests her chin on his shoulder, and the comfort of it is enough to soothe his bruised ego.

 Themyscira, 1990

She finds him in the caves under the infirmary one night, the sound of her footsteps echoing under the high ceiling as she descends the steps polished smooth over the centuries.

Steve is sitting in one of the pools, his face streaked with pale blue light looking eerie, almost translucent. The same light casts oddly shaped shadows on the uneven, sloped walls, and for a moment, it almost looks like they are moving in some sort of intricate dance.

He looks up when Diana steps into the light, and for a brief second, she is back in 1918 and it is not the man she loves that looks back at her, but a lost soldier who is trying desperately to find his way in this world again.

Steve watches her disrobe and leave her garments on top of his own pile stacked up on one of the rocks. The water is pleasantly warm when she steps into it, blue light swirling around her skin.

“Thought you’d be here,” Diana smiles.

There are questions on her tongue she knows not how to ask. He has been jittery and caged-in lately; she can see it in the way he carries himself, the nervous energy radiating off of him. It shouldn’t surprise her, perhaps, that he has grown restless of the world that is not truly his.

They stay quiet for a while, her body nestled against his chest, cradled in the circle of his arms.

“Are you happy here, Steve?” She asks eventually.

“I have you,” he responds, which is a good answer, one that makes something warm unfurl in her chest, but is also not an answer at all.

Diana knows that he means it, that being with her makes him happy, but for the first time, she wonders if maybe it is not enough.

London, 2001

Just once, just this one time, Diana begs and pleads, and at last, her pleading is heard.

Steve is allowed to leave, but only for a while, and only because she has done everything that Hades has asked for. Diana doesn’t regret the deal she has made, not for a moment.

London greets them with grey skies and torrential rain. She watches Steve pause in the middle of the sidewalk and tips his face up, the look on his face one of absolute delight, and she can’t help but laugh, ignoring the odd glances cast their way.

This is where it has all started, and standing in the middle of a busy street in the centre of London all these years later somehow feels like they have made it full circle.

She doesn’t argue when he makes an ice-cream shop their first stop, foul weather be damned.

Belgium, 1918

The fire burns bright high up in the black sky, and looking at it makes Diana hurt in places that she never knew existed.

Steve is dead, gone to a place where she can’t follow him, and the pain of it is so consuming that it nearly snaps her in half.

Diana screams until it’s the only sound she can hear, but it doesn’t make the ache of loss go away.

Paris, 2018

She dreams of that night sometimes still. Of the plane soaring into the sky before she can stop him and the fire of the explosion that shines brighter than the sun, making the darkness around her seem deeper when Diana wakes up in the dead of the night with her heart racing and her eyes stinging with tears.

Yet, unlike the first few years after Steve’s death, all she has to do now is roll over and reach for him, and there he is, by her side where he belongs. And even now, nearly a hundred years later, it still feels like a miracle beyond her wildest imagination.

She strokes his hair while he sleeps, her fingers tracing the lines of his face, careful so as not to wake him. He hasn’t changed much, frozen in time by the grace of old magic that she doesn’t understand, and she says a silent ‘thank you’ for the years they have had together, and those still to come.

I love you, she thinks. I will love you for as long as I live.

---

“How long do we have?” Steve asks her one night as they walk from the Louvre back to their apartment on the other side of the Seine and the first snow starts to fall.

His question is not unexpected, but it catches Diana off-guard, nonetheless, making her chest constrict momentarily. She can’t remember the last time he has brought this up, and it leaves her with a pang of sorrow in the pit of her stomach.

It won’t be long, but they are not there yet. Not quite, even though part of her can feel it already, and she wonders if he does, too. But the time moves differently for gods. It can be a month, or a decade, or much more than that. She will know when her deal with Hades is up, but for now—

“Enough,” Diana responds.

They are not there yet, she reminds herself. Not tonight.

She turns to Steve and reaches for his hand, weaving her fingers through his. Even after all those years, the way he looks at her still takes her breath away.

She smiles. “We have time.”