The Triskelion
Washington D.C
U.S.A
09:00
(Excerpt From A Conversation Between Agent Patel And Director Fury)
Patel: I'm sorry sir, but you're requesting I do what?
Fury: Take over the Lazarus Project - and it's not a request.
Patel: With all due respect, sir, you know my skill-set and it's better suited to tasks that aren't watching a ninety-three year-old man defrost. You need me out there - in the field.
Fury: That ninety-four year-old man is a national hero. And your skill-set is the exact reason why I picked you to head the project. This is your assignment. Romanoff and Barton will be just fine without you - and you can rejoin the team once you're finished.
Patel: We don't even know if he's going to wake up - he was frozen for sixty-seven years! It's a miracle he's even alive.
Fury: And you're going to keep it that way. And once he wakes up you'll be right there to transition him into the twenty-first century.
Patel:...I'm his babysitter…
Fury: No, you're head of the Lazarus Project - report to Agent Hill for a full briefing on the position and what's expected of you. I'm looking forward to seeing great things Agent Patel.
Patel: Yes sir.
Fury: Why is it whenever she says "Yes Sir" it kind of sounds like "Fuck You"?
Coulson: Practice I think, sir.
Chapter One
Watching A 93 Year-Old Defrost
"What the Hell are you doing Anderson? It's too soon!"
Poppy Patel's lightly accented words were punctuated by the sharp click of her heels against the polished floor as she strode into the med-bay. Doctor Anderson, her second on the Lazarus Project, looked up at her from the other side of Captain Steve Rogers body.
The American hero and icon lay naked in a medical pod save for a strategically placed sheet across his groin - Poppy had decided that the war hero and first of the superheroes deserved at least that much to preserve his dignity and 1940's sensibilities. Yes, she was stereotyping with that assumption, but in her defense she wasn't aware of many guys from 2012 who would be comfortable with their junk on display either.
"He started to react to outside stimuli," Anderson explained over the ever increasing beeping coming from the machines set up around the room. "I thought maybe it would be a good opportunity to allow him to awaken naturally."
"A good opportunity?" Poppy's head whipped around from where she was studying on of the monitors to stare at him incredulously. "We only narrowly saved his extremities from frost-bite two weeks ago! He's only just started maintaining a steady core temperature this last week!"
"His brain activity levels are off the charts," Anderson replied defensively.
"And his heart-rate's dangerously climbing," Poppy shot back as she approached Captain Rogers head, "Hit him with the sedative."
"Are you sure that's a -" Anderson argued before Poppy cut him off with a raised hand and the intensity in her dark eyes.
Watching Captain Rogers' eyes move rapidly beneath the bruised skin of his eyelids for a moment, Poppy looked back up to confirm that Anderson was following her orders. The older man, while obviously wanting to argue the matter further, was nonetheless slowly releasing the high-powered sedative into their patient's bloodstream. Keeping her eyes on Captain Rogers' face, Poppy listened as the beeping of the heart-rate monitor decreased until it was at a steady 50 beats per minute. Once she was reassured that he wasn't about to relapse into cardiac-arrest, Poppy let the full force of her gaze fall onto Anderson.
"I'm only going to say this once," Poppy's words were even as her eyes tracked the bobbing motion of Anderson swallowing nervously, "If you ever go against my direct orders again, you'll be gone faster than you can spell S.H.I.E.L.D. - understood?"
"...Understood."
Resentment settled into the lines of Doctor Anderson's face, the older man unappreciative of the situation Director Fury had placed him into. Answering to a precocious girl no older than 26 years old with an ego to rival Tony Stark's. He was an expert in his field with over 30 years experience under his belt and she was a mere child playing at things she had no right to meddle in.
"I still don't understand why Fury placed you in charge to begin with," Anderson muttered as Poppy began to walk away, "Rank amateur."
"This rank amateur has an IQ of 186," Poppy replied lightly over her shoulder. "And it's a good thing Director Fury put me in charge, otherwise right now Captain Rogers would be dead and you'd be known as the man who murdered America's first superhero. Have a good night, Doctor Anderson."
With those words Poppy exited the med-bay, leaving Anderson to stare down at Captain Rogers as the realisation of what had almost occurred broke through his animosity towards the project leader.
Meanwhile Poppy grit her teeth and inwardly congratulated herself for not losing her temper and kicking the arrogant fool in the face. Heading towards the training rooms she wondered if her usual sparring partner was back from assignment - she could do with hitting something.
Walking through the halls of S.H.I.E.L.D was always an experience. Poppy was notorious within the organisation and it showed in the reaction of her colleagues. Some would discretely side-eye her as she walked past, others openly staring, in some cases conversations would trail off only to pick back up once she was deemed out of earshot. The exact circumstances of her joining S.H.I.E.L.D. were classified, tied up with so much coding that only the highest level personnel had access to it. Unfortunately, the downside to her origin story not being public knowledge was that the rumors were rampant.
It shouldn't come as much of a surprise that people in the intelligence business loved to gossip. Didn't make it any less irritating though.
"What happened? Someone take the last bagel in the caf again?"
Glancing next to her, Poppy saw Agent Natasha Romanoff had fallen into step with her, the red-headed woman's heeled boots making no sound at all against the polished floors. That being said, they would have gone unnoticed regardless with the way Poppy was slamming her own feet down. There was something satisfying about the echo of her footfalls reverberating down the corridor, she imagined Anderson's face to be on the bottom of her shoes.
"If only it were that trivial," Poppy replied, a hint of a smile pulling at her full lips.
Poppy didn't have many friends, in fact she could count them all on one hand, and the ones she actually trusted completely were less than that. On that list Nat would probably be one of the top names. While not trusting the older spy unconditionally - Poppy didn't think she would ever be able to do that - she had certainly shared more with her than anyone else. And in turn Nat had done the same. Both women had similar enough backgrounds before coming to S.H.I.E.L.D. that there had been a common-ground they had both lacked with anyone else they had encountered.
Both had been expected to be someone else's ideal of perfection.
"Well, let's get on the mat and you can tell me all about it," Nat's voice was playful as the two women approached the training rooms. "And then I'll catch you up on what you've missed out on with Clint and I."
"Alright," Poppy replied as she shucked her jacket and started unbuttoning her shirt as they entered the locker-rooms, "But I go first."
An hour later both women sat next to each other on the blue training mat, skin glistening with sweat as they sipped from water bottles. Tugging her hair-band out in a fit of frustration Poppy exclaimed, "So while you've been hanging out with Tony Stark and Clint was at Ground Zero for human-demigod First Contact, I've been watching a 93 year old defrost. That's bullshit."
"Don't forget the part where you put misogynists in their place on a daily basis," Nat pointed out with a mischievous grin. "But if it makes you feel better you've probably seen more of Captain Rogers than anyone else - from what I heard he kept his pants on even when the magic happened."
Eyes widening at what Nat was suggesting, Poppy swallowed down the laughter that bubbled up her throat and instead replied with a smirk, "I take it you mean when Erskine executed Project Rebirth and injected the good Captain with his super serum - not when he was injecting his super serum into others?"
Both women stared at each other impassively before tipping their heads back and shaking with laughter. The only thing missing from the scene was Clint shaking his head at the two of them while failing at hiding the grin on his own face. Something that would continue to be missing for a while since he had been reassigned to the Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S. facility after finishing up in New Mexico.
"P.E.G.A.S.U.S., Rebirth, Lazarus… S.H.I.E.L.D. sure likes their 'Projects' huh?" Nat commented thoughtfully once they'd sobered.
"Don't forget the acronyms," Poppy pointed out wryly, "sometimes I feel like I'm living a campy 60's spy movie."
"Don't mention that to Coulson - he'll never shut up about the 'good old days'," Nat warned as she rose to her feet in one fluid motion, extending the hand not holding her water bottle out to Poppy.
Grasping the offered hand Poppy allowed the older woman to pull her to her feet. "Oh I already know about his obsession with 'the classics'," Poppy replied as they left the mat and headed towards the locker-rooms. "I've already caught him gazing at Captain Rogers more times than I'm comfortable with a grown man doing. If it weren't for the fact that he's Level 8 I'd be able to scare him off, instead he just stares through the glass like an orphan from a Dickens novel."
"Has he shown you his trading cards yet?" Nat raised a perfectly groomed brow over her shoulder as she stepped into one of the shower cubicles
"The trading cards were...mentioned."
The running water wasn't loud enough to cover up the sounds of Nat's amused chuckles.
It had been 3 months since Poppy and her team had relocated Captain Rogers to the New York S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters after getting him physically stable. Now it was just a waiting game for his mind to heal - if it did heal.
After much thought she had come to the conclusion that waking up in New York might help alleviate some of the stress of essentially coming out of a decades long coma. Common sights and sounds to play a somewhat small comfort on the man's possibly damaged psyche. While Midtown was located in a completely different island to Brooklyn, Poppy felt it would still be more familiar than D.C. - even though she couldn't stand New York City, too many bad memories.
Since her arrival she had practically lived in Captain Rogers' observation room, and not entirely due to her dedication to the project. The few times she had ventured outside of the building Poppy had donned a photostatic veil in case she was recognised. New York had been her father's domain after all and Midtown was too close to comfort to his labs in the upper West Side - labs that were still active according to S.H.I.E.L.D. even though her father had since relocated to Los Angeles 7 years ago.
With Nat having been reassigned to Russia a month ago and Clint still stuck at Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S., she'd had nothing but work to distract her. Well, work and a particularly attractive agent who was perfectly eager to help her with stress release.
"God… you're beautiful…" Agent Daniel's' voice was low and husky as he gazed down at Poppy, her hair falling across her face and curling over her shoulders and down her chest.
Tossing her head back to look at the ceiling as she continued to roll her hips, Poppy replied through gritted teeth, "Stop talking - you're ruining it."
In response Agent Daniels leaned down and buried his face against her chest, lips fever hot against her skin as his fingers dug into her thigh while his other hand tangled in her hair. Poppy tried to lose herself in the sensations once again, but Agent Daniels had successfully ruined it by bringing her back to reality. There was one condition to their arrangement and that was no talking.
It took a lot for Poppy to be able to shut her brain off, to quiet the constant whisperings that spun around like a twisted whirligig of equations and probabilities. Now hyper aware of all outside stimuli, the feel of the wall rubbing against the exposed skin across her shoulders and lower back, their harsh breathing filling the small supply closet, the wetness of his lips on her skin.
If anything the frustration she was supposed to be working out was now threefold due to the fact that she had been so goddamn close.
So goddamn close and she knew that there was no going back thanks to her hyperactive brain.
When her phone started ringing, relief flooded through her that she wouldn't have to wait out the next ten minutes until Agent Daniels finally finished and she could leave. Normally Poppy would have just taken off the moment it went south, except she wasn't sure how long she would be stuck at the New York facility for and she didn't have the patience to organise a new arrangement with someone else. There was no doubt Fury already knew and disapproved of the fraternization, but since New York cut off her usual MO of just pulling someone at a bar he would have to deal with it.
Shaking off Agent Daniels' clutching hands Poppy uncrossed her legs from around his waist and dropped onto the floor. Bending she pulled on her panties and jeans, digging her phone out of her jacket pocket and swiping the screen, ignoring the forlorn look Agent Daniels was giving her as he tucked himself back into his pants.
"Agent Patel," Poppy answered the phone, tucking it between her ear and shoulder as she buttoned up her jeans and stuffed her feet back into her boots.
"Finally!" Anderson cried exasperatedly down the line. "You need to get up here right now! He's woken up!"
"Goddammit!" Poppy hissed into the phone, shouldering her way past Agent Daniels she had enough sense of mind to shoot him an apologetic look on her way out. "I'm on my way - try and keep him contained."
Feet pounding against the floor Poppy took off at a run towards Captain Rogers observation room, hoping Anderson and the others on the team hadn't managed to fuck up all her hard work.
Just as Poppy reached the door to the observation room it burst out into the corridor, she narrowly avoided being between it and the wall it slammed into by throwing herself aside. Looking up through her hair she watched as a disorientated Captain Rogers stepped through the hole in the wall. Bright blue eyes searched desperately around him and locked onto Poppy's dark ones. For a moment everything was still as the two of them stared at each other until Steve took off in a dead sprint down the corridor the way she had came.
"Captain Rogers!" Poppy called out after him, but she knew it was no use. In that moment she had seen it - he was terrified.
Climbing to her feet she gave chase after him dialing Anderson's number as she went, "I'm going after him," She told the doctor, "Alert the building we've got to make sure he doesn't leave."
"Already done - it looks like Fury's been notified also."
Stuffing her phone back in her pocket, Poppy groaned "Of course he has," putting on an extra burst of speed as she saw Captain Rogers round the corner ahead.
"CODE 13 - I REPEAT ALL AGENTS CODE 13."
Captain Rogers led her on a good chase through the facility, thanks to his head start he managed to stay just out of her reach though. Poppy found this incredibly frustrating as she'd never encountered someone she couldn't outrun thanks to her father meddling with her genetics. The young woman wasn't entirely sure how to react to a challenge she wasn't 95% sure she could come out the victor in.
Reaching the ground floor, Captain Rogers seemed to put on even more speed as he shot across the cavernous lobby, weaving between people with all the grace of a drunk on the walk home. Halfway across the room Poppy bellowed out, "Captain Rogers - stand down!"
Amazingly he paused, shoulders going stiff as she witnessed him physically stop himself from standing at attention. Everyone in the lobby seemed to part between them and time stopped, until one agent decided to get brave and approach Captain Rogers. Spooked, the historical super soldier once again dropped into a dead sprint, hurdling the security barriers and slipping through the glass doors and out into Midtown New York.
Vaulting over the security barriers herself while staff stared helplessly on, Poppy once again pulled out her phone as she emerged onto the busy street watching in horror as Captain Rogers dashed right into oncoming traffic. Phone forgotten she rushed after him, making a rude hand gesture as the cabbie she bolted in front of lay on his horn. After a block of of dodging traffic Poppy realised where Captain Rogers was headed and made the decision to dial Fury who was no doubt on the ground already with other agents.
"Agent Patel, nice of you to check in."
"There's no time to be cute sir," Poppy replied, the only indication of her physical exertion was that she was breathing slightly faster than usual. "Captain Rogers is heading towards Times Square - think you can cut him off."
"On it. Do you want to handle this or should I?"
"I'll do it, Sir - it's my Project after all."
As always Times Square was packed with people. It was a little concerning though that barely anyone paid attention to the tank of a man being chased by a small Indian woman. Poppy expected at least a few looks and shouts of indignation, but instead it was as though nobody wanted to be the one to notice it happening. People just flowing around them like water.
Captain Rogers finally came to a stop in the middle of Times Square, turning in a circle as he looked around in awe-tinged confusion, giving Poppy enough time to finally get within speaking distance to him. As she approached the blond man, four black SUV's pulled up around them agents pouring out in their black suits to hinder any attempt at escaping.
Out of the biggest vehicle stepped Nick Fury in all his eye-patch wearing, black leather glory, the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. managing to look both approachable and terrifying. "At ease, soldier," he called out to Captain Rogers, motioning to Poppy to 'handle this'.
"Captain Rogers," Poppy kept her voice soft and her actions slow and deliberate, treating the historical soldier like one would a spooked animal. "I apologise that your awakening has been a rough one - it wasn't meant to go like this. We were hoping to ease you into everything."
"Ease me into what?" Captain Rogers demanded, his eyes hard as they stared down at her while his chest rapidly rose and fell.
"You've been asleep," Poppy decided frankness would be the best route here. Any more subterfuge and they would lose the man's trust completely, with little to no chance of rebuilding it. He had awoken in a strange place to find people monitoring him and been chased through the streets of New York, she was honestly surprised he was even giving them the courtesy of an explanation. "For almost 70 years."
Emotions flashed across the older man's face as he processed her words. Disbelief, denial, anger, and lastly sorrow. Poppy instantly knew that this was a man who didn't hide his emotions well, and the grief he was now feeling for the loss of his life as he knew it was plain for anyone who cared to look. It almost felt as though she were intruding on something private, something she wasn't supposed to see - that no one was supposed to see.
Averting her eyes, Poppy was unsure about how to proceed. While she knew the theory of grief counselling - she had added a degree in psychology to the collection - Poppy had never really needed to put it into practice. She could barely maneuver her own emotions, let alone someone else's, and this situation obviously required more tact than she was willing to admit she had. No one had ever accused her of being comforting nor empathetic.
After a long pause, she tentatively asked, "Are you okay?"
It took long enough for him to answer her that Poppy was starting to question whether he had actually heard her. Eyes searching the crowd, Captain Rogers replied as though he were trying to convince both her and himself.
"Yeah…yeah I just…" and then in a voice that sounded like his heart was breaking he added, "I had a date."
