Agent Mikaelson

Chapter 10: Arnim Zola

Hope's POV:

We walk halfway into the room and the lights turn on, revealing an old computer with monitors everywhere. "This can't be the data point, this technology is ancient." I say. "Hope." Nat says. I look at her and she gestures to the desk. I then see the very new flash dock.

I take out the drive and plug it in. Everything in the facility starts to boot up. More lights come on, revealing how big the room truly is. The computer in front of us comes on. "Initiate system?" It asks. Nat types in 'yes.' She then looks at us. "Shall we play a game?" She then laughs.

"It was a from a movie that was from-" "We know, we saw it." Steve says, referring to the times spent in either my apartment or his, catching him up on movies. We look back on the screen. Green lines appear, forming a face. "Rogers, Steven. Born 1918." Steve looks shocked.

"Romanoff, Natalia Alianovna. Born 1984." I hold my breath. "Mikaelson, Hope Andrea. Born 1990." "What the hell?" I say. "This is some kind of recording." Nat says. "I am not a recording, fraeulein. I may not be the man I was when the Captain took me prisoner in 1945. But I am."

A picture appears on another monitor. Steve looks horrified. "You know this thing?" I ask. "Arnim Zola was a German scientist who worked for the Red Skull. He's been dead for years." "Correction, I am Swiss. Second, look around you. I have never been more alive."

Well I could just unplug him, but that's a whole different topic entirely. "In 1972, I received a terminal diagnosis. Science could not save my body. My mind, however, that was worth saving. On 200,000 feet of data banks. You are standing in my brain."

"How did you get here?" Steve asks. "I was invited." "It was operation Paperclip after World War 2. SHIELD recruited German scientists for strategic value." Nat explains. "They thought I could help their cause. I also helped my own." He says. "Hydra died with the Red Skull." Steve says.

"Cut off one head, two more shall take its place." "Prove it." "Accessing hard drive. Hydra was founded on the belief that humanity could not be trusted with its own freedom." Videos start playing on one of the monitors. Steve, Nat, and I study it. I can't believe this is still around.

"What we did not realize was that if you try to take that freedom, they resist. The war taught us much. Humanity needed to surrender it's freedom willingly. After the war SHIELD was founded, and I was recruited." Great so SHIELD didn't do background checks. That or they're idiots.

"The new Hydra grew. A beautiful parasite inside SHIELD. For 70 years, Hydra has been secretly feeding crisis, reaping war, and when history did not want to cooperate, history was changed." "That's impossible. SHIELD would have stopped you." Nat says. "Accidents will happen."

Pictures of Howard Stark and Fury cross the screen. I glare. They killed Fury. "Hydra created a world so chaotic that humanity is finally ready to sacrifice it's freedom to gain its security. Once a purification process is complete, Hydra's new world order will arise." Steve looks pissed.

"We won Captain. Your death amounts to the same as your life. A zero sum." Steve then punches the monitor, shattering it. He comes on another monitor. "As I was saying..." He trails off. "What's on this drive?" Steve demands, done with Zola's little game.

"Project insight, requires insight. So, I wrote an algorithm." I step in. "What kind of algorithm, what does it do?" I ask. "The answer to your question is fascinating. Unfortunately, you shall be too dead to hear it." He says. Sirens go off and the door to the elevator starts to clothes.

Steve throws his shield at it in an attempt to stop it. It bounces off and ricochets off the walls, back into Steve's hand. Nat's phones beeps. "Steve, Hope, we've got a bogie. Short range ballistics, thirty seconds tops." "Who fired it?" Steve asks. "SHIELD." My eyes widen.

"I'm afraid I have been stalling Captain." I grab the drive. "Admit it, it's better this way." We are all frantically looking for a way out now. The grates on the ground. Steve rips the metal off, revealing a hole. "We are, both of us, out of time." Nat and I race over.

When the bomb hit's I'm too far away, I'm not gonna make it. When the flames hit me I activate my backup plan. I mutter the spell under my breath before I am being flung through the air. I hit something hard and unmoving and everything goes black.

Steve's POV:

It feels like hours before I am able to pull the last of the debris off of Natasha and I. I have no idea where Hope could be which causes panic to flood my senses. There's a very high chance that she's dead. I shake my head, no time to think about it now.

Men will be flooding this place soon enough. Natasha groans and sits it. "Where's Hope?" She asks. I shake my head. "I don't know." She then spots something over my shoulder. "Steve." I turn and see a bloody hand laying limp on a slab of concrete. No. The two of us race over to her.

Her face is bloody and half of her body is covered in concrete. I use what strength I have to push it off of her. I check her pulse. Nothing. "Steve, we gotta go." Natasha tells me. "What about her? She's not breathing." I say, panicking. She can't be dead. She just can't

"Yeah, we need to go. Grab her, she'll be in transition when she wakes up." She tells me. "Transition into what?" I ask. "A vampire." I can't believe I forgot about the consequences of her death. I scoop her limp body into my arms. "Let's go." I see men start to search where we were.

I know where we need to go.