The Ghost [Marvel | Steve Rogers]

Chapter 33

That didn't make it any easier to possess. If anything, it left the slender book feeling as heavy as the car she sat in with Sharon Carter where it was safely tucked away in her jacket. And with each passing moment while they waited for some sort of sign, the odd smatter of quiet small talk passing between Nadine and her unexpected companion, it only seemed to grow heavier.

Mercifully the signal that their wait was over came far sooner than she had cautiously hoped.

Just over an hour after picking up Sharon, the agent's phone buzzed softly, and a look of relief softened her face as she pulled up the incoming text.

"Steve's made contact," she confirmed softly, though Nadine truthfully didn't need it. Who it was had been plain to see without even seeing the message. Sharon's reaction had spoken volumes. Not to mention that she promptly started the car.

But old habits—and cautions—died hard, and Nadine grabbed firm hold of her relief, restraining it as she fixed Sharon with an assessing look.

"And you're sure it's him?" Nadine asked the younger agent softly. Sharon spared her a brief, unreadable glance from the message she was typing back. Looking back to her phone, she nodded absently before hitting the send button and handing the cell to Nadine. Nadine nearly blinked in confusion at the nonsense collection of characters on the screen even as the analytical part of her rationalized that it must be a code.

As Sharon eased the car from where they'd parked down one of many quiet side streets that littered the outer boroughs of Berlin, Nadine's eyes narrowed as she automatically started puzzling it out. There was something vaguely familiar about it if she was deciphering it properly. Evidently, it was clear that she was not immediately familiar with the code.

"It's an old Howling Commandos code," Sharon finally said, confidence in her assessment clear in her voice and amusement faintly visible in her eyes as she spared Nadine another glance. She efficiently guided the car onto the main thoroughfare that they'd come down when they'd slipped out of Berlin proper. "Aunt Peggy and Steve apparently worked a few of them up with Stark's dad back during the War. She taught me a couple of them when I was a kid." The corner of her lip quirked sadly. "Kept me occupied for a lot of rainy afternoons when my parents had to work weekends." Nadine looked up, a small, nostalgic pang beneath her breastbone; she'd done the same with Nina, really, occupying her daughter with puzzles and codes she'd grown-up with to keep Nina occupied on so-called boring afternoons. Sharon's head canted minutely, undoubtedly refocusing from the fond memories of her recently passed aunt. She met Nadine's eye for a brief instant, a faint grin surfacing.

"That I know many of them came up in conversation with Steve at the Reception," she explained. Somewhat unnecessarily, but Nadine didn't mind. The pair of them had fallen into a surprisingly easy companionship in their brief time waiting for Steve and Sam to reach out to Sharon as Sam had apparently intimated they would back at the JCTC once they'd gotten somewhere safe and secure.

And suddenly it clicked with Nadine and she only barely restrained an exasperated huff, a soft, sharp exhale escaping her instead. Of course. In their lessons to Nina and the twins, Natasha and Nadine had spared some time to teach them about what Nat had fondly referred to as 'old-school' techniques; codes and ciphers and methods of transmitting and conveying them that, in the modern age, were often considered obsolete if they were remembered at all. But that didn't stop such methods from being effective. Nat's use of such methods had been key in tracing her location and thus that of Ultron's base of operations after the redhead had been kidnaped by the sociopathic robot, after all. If Nadine's memory served, Natasha had brought in several of Steve's old Howling Commandos codes as case studies.

Sure enough, once the memory surfaced, the pattern to the message that had been hovering just beyond the edge of Nadine's mind slipped into reach. And now that she knew what she was looking for? It all fell together rather quickly from there.