Chapter 26 - Steven Rogers
After a quick car ride, Rachel pulls up to the new base.
"They call it the Triskelion," Rachel says, looking over to me in the passenger's seat.
The building is massive. It is a large grey building that splits into two columns midway up the side that meet again at the top. It sits in the middle of the Potomac River, looking out over the capital city. As we get closer, I have to lean forward in my seat in order to see the top. We were sent a packet of information about the new base about a week ago; it included blueprints of the facility so that we wouldn't be completely lost when we arrived.
As we pull into the car park, an agent is standing there to take our car. Rachel puts the vehicle in park, taking a pause in confusion. She sucks in a deep breath and unclips her belt, getting out of the car. She hands over the keys and we walk into the building. We are immediately met by another male agent who nods over to Rachel.
"Captain Rogers," he addresses me. I nod in recognition, keeping my eyes on Rachel as she walks further down the hall.
"Hanger 4," she states over her shoulder, leaving me with this male agent. He leads me through the compound, stopping only when we reach our destination. He opens a door, revealing a room containing my stuff. Most prominently on display is a new suit.
"New standard issue," he says as he walks out of the room, leaving me with the grey and deep blue suit alone. Guess the stars and stripes were a little old-fashioned after all.
I change, making sure every compartment in my suit is secure as I leave the room. The male agent leads me down another series of hallways until we make our way outside. Some of the hangers in this base are outside, the one we are heading towards being one of them. The agent leads me only as far as he needs to. I look ahead and see Rachel standing on a ramp of one of the Quinjets looking over to me. Only the top layers of her long, blonde hair are tied up, leaving the rest of it to hang midway down her back. The light breeze blows it around her face, making her look beautiful. I shake the thought as she sees me coming, cocking her head to the side.
"I love the new suit," she says, looking me up and down. "Very stealthy."
I smirk over to her looking her up and down as well.
"You too?" I ask. She nods.
"New standard issue," she says, placing her hands on her hips. "I guess the one I showed up in is out of date," she smirks as she catches my eyes. Rachel gives me one last look as she turns on her heel, making her way up into the jet. I follow her, quickly meeting up with the STRIKE team who was already strapped in their seats and ready to go. I give them a nod as Rachel and I take seats next to each other.
As we take off, Rachel and I buckle our seatbelts and settle back into the seats. After a while of flying, I notice Rachel bouncing her leg quickly. I gently put my hand on her knee, causing her to whip her head around to look at me. There is a panicked glimmer in her eye which I try to calm with my most reassuring look. She takes a deep breath, shifting her face from panic to professionalism in seconds. She undoes her seatbelt, standing up, and walking over to join the group of men standing around a screen preparing for the mission rundown. I follow suit, making my way over to them.
"Target is a mobile satellite launch platform, the Lemurian Star. They were setting up their last payload when pirates took them... 93 minutes ago."
"How many pirates?" I ask monotonously.
"25," the leader of the STRIKE team, Agent Rumlow, says. "Top mercs, lead by this guy." He pulls up a photo on the screen. "George Batroc. This guy's got a rep for maximum casualties." I sigh, thinking through a plan.
"Alright. I'm going to sweep the deck and find Batroc. Stark, you kill the engines and await further instructions. Rumlow you sweep the left. Find the hostages, get 'em to life pods, get 'em out. Let's move." I say, securing the comm microphone around my wrist.
"Alright, STRIKE. You heard the Cap. Gear up." Rumlow says as I walk out of the group to go secure radios.
"Secure channel seven." I say into my microphone.
"Seven secure. Hey, are you doing anything fun Saturday night?" Rachel asks. I raise my eyebrows, looking over to her with a little surprise on my features. I get my hopes up a little that she might be asking to have dinner together. It's not like it isn't something we haven't done before, but I'd still like to take her on a real date sometime.
"Well, all the guys in my barbershop quartet are dead, so no, not really," I say with a slight smirk as I place the comm in my ear. She chuckles.
"Coming up on the drop zone Cap." The pilot says. I walk over to the back of the jet and hit the button to open the ramp.
"You know, if you ask Kristen out from statistics, she'd probably say yes," she says softly, clearly testing the waters. I put my shield on my arm, masking my disappointment that the date wasn't with her. But she's told me this before. She needs space to work on herself, and I respect that.
"That's why I don't ask," I say, placing my helmet on my head.
"Too shy, or too scared?" she challenges.
"Too busy!" I say, before jumping out of the plane. The cold air bites at my skin and I close my eyes for a moment to adjust. As I get closer to the water, I switch my position so that I dive feet first into the cold water. The water hits me like a sheet of ice, bringing up memories that I have long shoved aside. I shake it off, quickly swimming to the top.
Once I make my way up the side of the boat, I silently land on one of the side decks. I start taking guys on one by one, approaching the main deck with ease. Once I get there, however, I am overwhelmed. I stop fighting when I hear the click of a gun and feel the cold metal at the base of my helmet.
"Don't move! Don't move!" a pirate says in French. I hear a gunshot, cringing away thinking that I was shot. When I don't feel any pain, I turn around to see Rumlow standing there, taking off of his parachute.
"Thanks," I say, tightening my shield around my forearm.
"Yeah, I seemed pretty helpful for that one." He says with a smirk. I offer a short chuckle. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Rachel land gracefully on the deck. I watch her in awe as she takes off her parachute in one swoop and catches up to me, matching my step.
"What about that nurse that lives across the hall from us? She seems pretty nice."
"Secure the engine room, then find me a date. Although, she might think we are dating since we live together." I say, giving my eyebrows a little wiggle.
"I'm multitasking and who cares?" She asks. I catch her rolling her eyes and chuckle as I take off to search for Batroc.
I make my way around the ship, taking on the pirates as they come. I take them down or push them off the side, making a path of least resistance for the STRIKE team and the hostages. I finally find Batroc sitting behind a control panel in a glass-encased office. I keep hidden, hiding behind a wall across the way from them.
"STRIKE is in position Cap."
"On my mark. 1, 2,.." I then throw my shield through the pilot booth. And Batroc is on the move.
"Stark missed the rendezvous point Captain," Rumlow says to me. I stop running, my attention still on Batroc.
"Rach," I say into my wrist com, "Batroc is on the move. Circle around to Rumlow and protect the hostages." I say. Nothing. "Rach?" No answer. Then someone kicks me from behind, making me turn my attention away from the conversation happening over the comms.
Batroc.
We fight hand to hand, exchanging blows. Eventually, Batroc takes a step back.
"I thought you were more than just a shield." He says in French. I sigh, attaching my shield to its hook on my back and taking my helmet off. I toss it to the side, giving him what he wants.
"Let's see," I say in French. He smiles then attacks me. We throw punches back and forth again. I eventually have the upper hand and slam him into a door, knocking him out with one swift punch.
"Well, this is awkward." A voice says. I look up and see Rachel leaning over a computer, smiling.
"What are you doing?" I ask in a restrained tone. The anger bubbles up inside me, realizing that Rachel just endangered the whole mission.
"I'm backing up the hard drive, it's a good habit to get into." She says sassily. "That'll be the next thing I teach you on the computer. It's very important to know." I look up at the screen, trying to figure out what she is doing as Rachel keeps typing commands into the computer.
"You're saving S.H.I.E.L.D. intel." I say, realizing why she is in here.
"Anything I can get my hands on." She says, engrossed in the hack she is performing. I watch as her green eyes flicker across all of the information, their color distracting me briefly from my anger.
"Our mission was to rescue hostages." I say, quoting the briefing that Rumlow gave us on the Quinjet.
"Actually, that was your mission." She says, grabbing the hard drive out of its port. She turns on her heel and starts to walk out, but I grab her by the arm, pulling her back to face me.
"You just jeopardized this whole mission." I see the guilt flash in her eyes.
She starts to frantically explain herself but Batroc gets up, throwing a live bomb at Rachel and I. I knock it away from us using my shield and grab Rach's waist. She takes her pistol and shoots out the window across from us as I jump up onto the computer table, launching us through the glass. The bomb goes off as we cross through the sill, rubble scraping at our heels. We sit behind the wall, waiting for the dust to settle. Rach begins to shake in pain and I stay next to her.
"Okay, that one is on me," she says through gritted teeth.
"You're damn right," I say, clenching my jaw as I get up to finish sweeping the rest of the ship.
The STRIKE team, Rachel, and I finish sweeping the deck. On the plane ride back, Rachel explains to me why she hid the mission from me.
"Fury specifically instructed me to not inform anyone," she says sitting next to me. We huddle over in the corner of the Quinjet, avoiding the ears of both the hostages and the STRIKE team.
"That doesn't make sense, how am I supposed to lead a mission when I don't know what is happening?"
"I don't know, I didn't like it either, but that was my mission," Rach says, a realization changing her tone. "But as a fellow agent, you need to accept that you don't know everything about every mission."
As soon as we get back to the Triskelion, I make my way up to Fury's office with Rachel hot on my heels.
"You just can't stop yourself from lying, can you?" I ask. Rachel follows me through the door and shuts it silently behind us. Fury sighs and turns to face us.
"I didn't lie, Agent Stark had a different mission," Fury says.
"Which you didn't feel obliged to share," I say. Rachel stands silently behind me. I turn around to look at her. Her gaze is locked on the ground, guilt contorting her face.
"I'm not obliged to do anything," Nick says, standing up to meet my eye line.
"Those hostages could have died, Nick. Rachel could have died." I say. I turn to look at her again. She furrows her brows, questions running through her eyes.
"I sent the greatest soldier in history to make sure that didn't happen," Nick says, snapping back at me.
"Soldiers trust each other. That's what makes it an army. Not a bunch of guys running around shooting guns." I say. Rachel is still silent.
"Last time I trusted someone, I lost an eye." I relax back, sensing a shift in tone as Fury sighs. "Look, I didn't want you doing anything you weren't comfortable with. Agent Stark is comfortable with everything," Nick says.
"I can't lead a mission when the people I'm leading have missions of their own," I say.
"It's called compartmentalization," Rachel says quietly, still standing behind me.
"No one can spill the secrets because no one knows them all," Nick confirms, pointing to Rachel.
"Except for you," Rachel says, a little snark lacing her tone.
"You two are wrong about me, I do share. I'm nice like that." Nick leads us out of his office and to the elevators. As we get in, I look around for the buttons.
"Insight Bay," he tells the elevator.
"Neither Captain Rogers nor Agent Stark has clearance for Project Insight." the elevator says as it displays our agent identification photos beside each other. Rachel looks at Fury curiously yet with anger in her eyes. If she doesn't have clearance, then the Avengers don't either. It looks like that scares her. I lean against the railing with Fury on my left. Rachel stands to my left as well, in the same position, but on the other wall of the elevator. I watch her as she keeps her eyes on the ground, waiting for the doors to open. After a beat, she lifts her eyes. I watch them widen. I turn around to see what she is looking at and I am blown away.
"Yeah I know, they are a little bigger than a .22." Fury states. I look again to Rachel, sensing her anger.
"Is this what I've been working in the labs on?" Rachel says, her eyes searching the hanger.
Rachel Stark's POV
"Is this what I've been working in the labs on?" I ask curtly, recognizing the weapons placement on the underside of the new Helicarrier systems.
"Yes. This is Project Insight. Three next-generation Helicarriers synced to a network of targeting satellites. Launched from the Lemurian Star. Once we get them in the air, they never need to come down. Continuous sub-orbital flight, courtesy of our new repulsor engines." he says, pointing to the new engines.
"Tony?" I ask, raising my eyebrow. We start to walk along the launch bay's deck, my eyes taking in the threat before us.
"You both know he got an up-close look at our old turbines. These new long-range precision guns can eliminate 1,000 hostiles a minute. The satellites can read a terrorist's DNA before he even steps outside his spider hole." We stop at the end of the walkway. "We're gonna neutralize a lot of threats before they even happen." Fury finishes.
"You know Nick, at some point you can't keep surprising me, using my designs without my knowledge."
"I thought the punishment usually came after the crime," Steve says, leading the conversation away from my statement.
"We can't afford to wait that long." Fury remarks, looking between the two of us for support.
"Who's we?" I ask.
"After New York, I convinced the World Security Council we needed a quantum surge in threat analysis. For once, we're way ahead of the curve." Fury looks out over his new creations.
"By holding a gun to everyone on Earth and calling it protection," Steve says, his body tense next to mine.
"You know, I read those SSR files. 'Greatest Generation'? You guys did some nasty stuff." Fury says.
"Yeah, we compromised. Sometimes in ways that made us not sleep so well. But we did it so that people could be free. This isn't freedom. This is fear." He says, pointing up at the helicarriers.
"I am very disappointed by the fact that S.H.I.E.L.D.has used my designs without my authorization... Again," I say, looking Fury straight in the eye.
"S.H.I.E.L.D. takes the world as it is, nor as we'd like it to be. And it is getting damn near past time for you two to get with the program." Fury says his patience with our defiance growing thin.
"Don't hold your breath," Steve says, grabbing my hand and pulling me away from the three helicarriers. We take the elevator up to the garage. We look around for my car and once we find it, we head home still in uniform. silence coating the car.
Once we get back, the two of us go our separate ways. I make my way into the bathroom, taking a quick shower. Once I am done, I go back to my room, throwing on an old, slightly oversized t-shirt and pair of jeans. I begin unpacking again, trying to sort everything out. After about two hours, the whole apartment is complete, everything having a place. I head into the kitchen and fill up a glass of water. I take a seat, relaxing back as I take a long sip of water. Steve joins me after a few minutes, leaning on the counter across from me. I start to speak, trying to break the silence between the two of us.
"Steve I-"
"Do you want to go out for the rest of the day?" Steve asks me, cutting my apology short. I looked over to him, realizing he had changed as well. A blue jacket now hung off of his shoulders, covering a plain white t-shirt and stopping just below the top of a pair of jeans. I place my glass down onto the counter in front of me, smiling over at him.
"I would love to," I say, making my way to the door. I grab my tan jacket and walk out the door, Steve turning the lock behind me. I slip my jacket down as we head down to the car park. We hop on the back of his bike in silence. I wrap my arms around his torso, a breath catching in my throat with our proximity. He revs the engine, looking back to see if I am ready. When I nod, he turns his attention forward again, taking off.