Steve's POV
A couple hours later, just as I was finishing supper, Skye came to get me.
"Romanoff's on the line for you, Steve."
"Did the latest images come through yet?" I asked, standing up and putting my empty dishes in the bussing box.
"Any time now. You bringing anyone else?" she asked, looking around the room, suddenly seeing she was the center of attention.
"Just McCartney," I said, seeing that he wasn't done eating yet, having just went back for another helping of casserole. "Come in as soon as you finish eating, Jake. We'll be going over the latest images and I'd like to hear your opinion."
"Sure, Cap," he saluted. "Be there in a couple minutes."
After working with Jake for the past month, I had a solid read on him and wanted to know what he thought of the plan. He'd been in the Marines before joining Shield, so he was a decent strategist, and he knew how the enemy would react, having been doing this for several years now.
While all the other guys would fall in with whatever we came up with; Jake liked to know what he was up against ahead of time when it was possible, and I respected that. Phil and May were already waiting for us with Natasha there through FaceTime.
"Hey Nat, are you ready for some excitement tomorrow?" I asked, giving her a grin.
"You bet. I'd be there now if I didn't have to bring the rest of the Strike guys with me. Didn't think Phil wanted that much company on his bus."
"I share, Natasha," Phil said, sounding affronted.
"I know - but I don't trust some of them, so they aren't coming anywhere near you, Coulson. The guys Steve has with him have all been vetted by me and Evans. They're cleared, the rest aren't."
"I agree with Natasha," May said, giving Coulson a look just as Jake walked in. I introduced Jake as my second for our unit and he greeted everyone politely.
"Good to see the rumors weren't true, sir. We need more guys like you." Jake clearly knew who Coulson was, but he just grinned and gave me a look. "Don't worry - I'll keep my yap shut, Cap."
It was a good thing that we'd waited for better satellite feed before finalizing our plans. Hydra had been busy recently, adding in gates, cameras, and more guards - a lot more guards. Skye hacked into their camera feed so we could see what the view looked like from each one.
"Once you guys are in place, I can loop the feed so they don't see you closing in. I don't know how long it will work for; it just depends on how fast they notice it."
"Looks like shift change is at 7 and 7 for the most part. There's the duty roster on that wall there. The camera picks up some of the wall because they didn't want to mount it externally," May said, pointing at one segment.
"Looks like they've added staff recently, that board wasn't made for that many names," Jake said. "They've scribbled them in smaller to make them all fit."
"Those gates weren't on the blueprints we saw earlier," I said. "They've added another section of wall to enclose that field. Must be storing something there they want access restricted to – no exterior gate in that part."
"Can you find any trace of those weapons we saw earlier, Skye?" Coulson asked, crossing his arms and sitting back in his chair.
"I'll need to flip through the feeds. Everyone pick a couple screens to watch while I rewind and fast forward through the past day or so. There's probably not more than a day's worth of footage at any given time, based on what I'm seeing."
We each chose two adjacent cameras to watch while Skye worked her magic.
"Stop!" Phil said suddenly. "Back it up a little bit on cameras 9 and 11. Right there."
"That's a lot of weapons," Skye said. "I wonder where they made them – because it wasn't here."
"She's right; there's nothing to indicate manufacture or assembly. This is a warehouse." May said, tapping the screen that showed a large, open area with large amounts of stacked crates.
"Not warehouse, distribution center." I realized. "If you map out the locations of the other Hydra bases we've taken over the past month, they're all within a day's drive of here."
"Did you find any of these weapons at those bases?"
"No, not a single one," Jake said, shaking his head. "Only regular guns, rifles, that kind of thing. I've never seen anything like those ones."
"Jake, would you say that all the other bases were lightly manned?"
"Yes, we took most of them without even firing a shot," Jake said as he nodded. "Child's play, really."
"I think from the looks of this base," I said slowly, "those were all minor distractions, meant to keep us busy and not focused on the big picture. In 70 years, Hydra's mission has never changed."
"They're gonna try to take over the world, aren't they?" Skye asked, looking over at me with big eyes.
"Isn't that always the evil plan?" Jake said, grinning at her. "I love my job."
"Pretty much," I agreed. "That's why we're called Shield."