Hello Captain (Steve Rogers)

Going in

I felt the surge in my adrenaline when the Quinjet jolted us; Natasha was switching it over for a vertical landing. She landed the aircraft smoothly and opened the ramp for us to offload. Jake and Mike went out first, checking the perimeter. The rest followed when he gave the all-clear. Natasha and I were the last ones off the jet.

"I bet I get more guys than you today," she said, giving me a sassy smirk as we walked down the ramp.

"I'm not taking that bet. What do you think I am, some kind of rookie?"

"Nope, just wanted to see what you would say." I gave her a look and she shrugged. "Ready to decide which kids are your favorites?"

"I don't have favorites, Nat; we're all on the same team here, you know?" I said, exasperated.

"I have favorites," Natasha said, arching an eyebrow at me. "Their names are Glock and Luger."

I snorted, but didn't bother to respond to that. Nat was doing her best to goad me today and I wasn't taking the bait. "Divide up into your teams, you know which one you're on." The men nodded and quickly moved to stand either by Tony or behind me and Nat. "Those of you with me, let's move out! We're burning daylight."

"McCartney, lead our guys to the observation point and I'll meet you there. Cap, let me know when you're in position."

I signaled my agreement as we turned and headed out, the men falling in behind us.

"Roger that, Stark. Fall in behind me and move out!" Jake ordered, heading the other direction.

We jogged at a normal human pace to our predetermined strike point.

"Natasha, let Skye know we're approaching the target, so it's time for her to go to work."

"Roger that, Rogers," Nat said with a smartass grin, having already switched to the channel Skye was on. "Come in Skye. Yes, that's how I always talk to him."

"Romanoff!" I glared at her, but it was true. She really did talk to me like that, only not over our coms when it wasn't just the Avengers.

"You ready to do your thing?" Natasha motioned for us to halt, so I slowly stopped. "All right. We're on Channel 7 if you need to reach us and remember the whole team will hear you, not just us. Romanoff out." Natasha switched back over to our channel before speaking. "Camera's are capturing loop, so stay put for 90 seconds."

I glanced at my watch, signaling Nat when time was up. "Clear. Heading to target." We started jogging again, this time only stopping when we reached the wall around the base. "Tony, we're in launch position."

"Go ahead, Cap," Tony said.

I nodded to Natasha and crouched slightly as I laced my fingers together. We'd practiced this maneuver before, but had never done it on a mission. She took out her guns and backed up for a short run before I launched her easily over the wall. I heard a couple shots before she spoke.

"Courtyard clear, heading to the gate."

I ran around to meet her while my men followed behind, keeping an eye out for sentries. The gate slid open easily and I went in first to keep guard while the men all ran in and took cover.

"Tony, we're in," I said, looking around.

"We are, too. I'm not seeing anyone moving around on this side, are you?"

"Not very many," Natasha said as she took out another guard who walked too close to where we were hiding. "I'm not liking the looks of this, Cap."

"Me neither. Clear the outbuildings and then head for the main building, like we planned. Mike, Jerry, sweep the perimeter, check the vehicles."

"Copy that, Cap."

They peeled off to do what I asked as we moved to the outbuilding. The door was unlocked, so I went in, leaving Natasha to cover me. The others headed over to the other two sheds on our half of the compound, splitting up to clear them. I took out four total, piling them up at the doorway.

"Clear," I said, leading Nat over to where our men had met up.

"Perimeter clear," she said. "Reports?"

"Vehicles clear."

"Shed one clear."

"Shed two clear."

This was too easy, it had to be a trap of some sort and I knew we were all thinking it. The radio chatter from Tony's group was coming up the same way, except for the main building.

"Cap, I got a lot of heat signatures coming from that main building."

"And here I was starting to think we had the wrong address," I said, just as men started pouring from the doors and windows of the building like rats deserting a sinking ship. We took cover as they started to open fire and I charged the machine gunner pinning down Jake. Natasha and the others covering me as I took him out. The rest all became a blur as we fought back.

For the most part, things were going as planned, but I suddenly found myself hard pressed to keep our part of the charge moving forward. I was the target of another concentrated attack, they were pinning me down under their fire. Natasha picked them off when she got a shot until she had taken out all of the snipers.

We could hear fighting on the far side of the base as Tony's group was working their way towards us. Nat and I concentrated on working our way to the reinforced concrete main building, both of us covered by my shield.

"Steve, incoming from behind you!" Natasha cried as she reloaded.

"Where's these guys come from?" I asked as they started firing RPG's at me.

We'd cleared those buildings, there shouldn't have been anyone there to fire at me. I tossed Natasha out of the blast radius before bringing my shield up to deflect most of their rounds into the building, bringing down a section of the wall and spitting concrete at me. I positioned myself for the next round as my team starting picking them off.

More RPG's came from two directions, forcing me to move quickly to deflect them. I almost got them all away from me when one slid past my shield by millimeters, hitting the concrete next to me and exploding. Pain ripped through my body and I gritted my teeth, trying to keep my shield up and stay upright. I missed the next RPG and the resulting explosion threw me into the concrete wall behind me.

"Cap, watch out-" was the last thing I heard before I felt the bomb going off. The ground disappeared from under me and I tried to bring my shield up to cover me, but I was too late. Concrete buried me and all I saw was blackness. The pain was intense, worse than anything I'd ever felt before. I fought to stay awake but I just couldn't...the darkness was calling my name.