TEN YEARS FROM NOW
ANTARCTICA
2:17 PM GMT
The interior of the alien structure was cold. That was to be expected, of course, being in Antarctica, but it was a different kind of cold—not the frigid iciness of the landscape outside, but rather the climate-controlled cold of a sterile facility.
SHIELD agent Grant Ward had shed his heavy parka and several layers of insulation upon entering the newly discovered facility, but he had kept his last sweater to guard against the remaining chill. Now he crept cautiously down corridors that had the feel of antiseptic research space. The markings on the walls were in an alien script that his companions believed to be Kree, but to Ward they just looked like gibberish. He was a field agent, not a science expert.
Behind him, agents Jemma Simmons and Leopold Fitz crept carefully along behind him, each holding electronic scanning devices that resembled common tablet computers, but which Ward knew were much more sophisticated. Fitz was doing his best to interpret the alien markings using SHIELD's linguistic database, but he kept making clucking noises and muttering that he couldn't really be sure about the results. He thought the markings indicated space for biological research, but it was equally possible that they were entering the sewage plant instead.
At the end of the corridor, they came to a door with markings they hadn't seen before. Fitz consulted his tablet.
"Best guess," he said, "is 'restricted access.'"
"Meaning that it probably won't just let us in," offered Ward. "We'll need explosives from the bus."
"I don't think that will be necessary," said Fitz, fishing around in his equipment bag. "We may not know much about the Kree language, but the Iron Man Files have plenty to say about Kree locking mechanisms."
From his pack, Fitz produced a small, metallic disc and magnetically affixed it to the keypad beside the door.
"This should override the lock," he said.
Fitz activated the device, and its face lit up with glowing progress indicators. A moment later, a soft beep announced its success, and the door popped open.
Like something out of Star Trek, the doors were designed to slide into the walls, but they halted just an inch or two apart. Ward muscled them open far enough for the three agents to enter the room beyond.
Inside, a maze of test tubes, blinking readouts, and incomprehensible devices created a mad scientist's playground. Carefully, the three agents split up and crept through the rows and aisles. The equipment would all be carefully examined and catalogued by a pure research team later, but for now their job was to conduct a preliminary survey and determine if anything required immediate attention.
As Ward moved cautiously among the banks of unidentified equipment, he came upon a discovery that brought him up short.
"Hey, guys!" he called to the others across the room. "I think you'd better see this!"
Simmons jogged over to where he was standing in front of a long metal tube, about the width of a man, set into the wall. There was a clear face on it, and beyond the glass (or whatever substance it was made of) lay a large, blonde haired man dressed in the unmistakable costume of the original Captain America.
For a moment, they just stared, unable to believe what they had just found but equally unable to deny the reality of it. A moment later, Fitz joined them. He, too, stared in awe when he saw what had captured their attention.
Simmons was the first to recover.
"I think we'd better call this in," she breathed in her mild British accent. "Top priority."
"I think this is about to get interesting . . ." said Fitz with equal awe.
"We're about to go down in the history books, guys," said Ward.
Earth's Mightiest
#1
The Choice
"Beliefs are choices. First you choose your beliefs. Then your beliefs affect your choices."
-Roy T. Bennett
2 MONTHS LATER
WASHINGTON, D.C.
9:14 AM
The Marine Corps VH-60N transport helicopter was cleared to approach the White House from the north. Unusually, the president was not on board.
Washington, D.C. airspace was tightly restricted. Normally, the only aircraft permitted anywhere in the vicinity of the White House or Capitol Hill were military aircraft carrying the president or vice president. Security considerations were paramount, and aircraft could too easily be turned into flying bombs to permit any exceptions.
Except this one. This flight had been authorized by the President of the United States himself. The U.S. Secret Service had strongly objected, but he hadn't cared. This was a moment in history.
President Anthony Stark stood on the south lawn of the White House, waiting to greet his new guest as the helicopter touched down. This was, itself, highly unusual. The president did not wait to greet other people—other people waited to greet him. But again, this was an exception, a moment that had never come before and would never come again.
The helicopter door slid open, and Steve Rogers stepped out into the bright, Washington sunlight. Across the lawn, press pool photographers snapped pictures of the moment and continued to do so as he approached the president and shook hands with his old teammate for the first time in a decade.
"Tony," said Steve. "Good to see you." He glanced around, taking in their surroundings. "You've done pretty well for yourself."
"Steve," said Stark. "You're looking pretty spry for a guy who was born in the nineteen twenties." He turned to the man standing next to him, dressed in a dark suit and bright blue tie, similar to Stark's. "You remember General Ross, the vice president."
"I remember," nodded Steve. "Congratulations on the vice presidency, sir."
Ross scoffed as they shook hands.
"Oh, Tony here deserves all the credit," he said. "I'm just an old warhorse, not a politician. I just go where I'm ordered and do what I'm told."
"I'm sure there's more to it than that, sir," Steve smiled.
Stark turned to Ross.
"Would you mind giving us a few minutes alone, Thaddeus?" he asked.
"Absolutely," agreed Ross. He turned back to Steve and nodded. "A pleasure, Captain." Then he turned and walked toward the portico entrance to the White House.
Stark raised a welcoming arm, directing Steve toward the side door that he knew led directly into the Oval Office. His old friend was wasting no time displaying the trappings of his office.
Reverently, Steve preceded Stark inside. The Oval Office was much as Steve remembered it from previous visits, though he noted with mild dissatisfaction that Stark had altered the color scheme. The rug, sofas, chairs, and drapes were all beige now, giving the room a more drab feeling than he remembered. The two main doors had also been altered at some point. Since its construction, the two doors that led to the outer office and the corridor had been of the same design as the walls, creating an odd blending effect. Now they looked like actual doors, complete with white, molded doorframes.
Stark noticed him studying the doors.
"Yeah, the old ones were too art deco for me," he said, moving to one of the guest chairs arranged in front of the large, wood desk. "Every time they closed the doors, I felt like I was being sealed in. Now I can at least see where the out holes are." He motioned for Steve to sit in the other chair.
"The technicians at the outpost wouldn't tell me much about what happened," Steve said as he sat.
"Yeah, my fault." Stark raised one hand as if to accept blame. "I thought it would be better coming from someone you know. Being a Cap-sicle twice in one lifetime is a lot to take in."
"So what exactly did happen?"
"Well," began Stark, clasping his hands together, "you went missing, to start with. We don't know exactly when because someone took your place. We eventually discovered that a Kree soldier had been surgically altered to look and sound like you, but by then the damage had been done."
"What damage?" Steve asked with alarm.
"Let's just say that having Captain America publicly lead a revolt against public safety didn't help soften government policy toward superhumans."
"What exactly does that mean?"
Stark sighed and leaned back in his chair.
"The halcyon days of superheroes are over," he explained. "There was a disaster in Connecticut. It wasn't the first, and it wasn't the worst, but it captured public attention like nothing else had before. It woke us all up to the fact that superhumans, all superhumans, are dangerous. Whether through deliberate crimes and acts of terrorism or through tragic accidents, they all have the potential for loss of life on a massive scale.
"Laws were passed. SHIELD was brought in to administer and enforce them. Superhumans are tightly regulated now. The days of running off half-cocked are over. No one moves anymore without authorization and proper training."
Steve was beginning to look concerned.
"And the Avengers?" he asked.
Stark looked away, unable to meet Steve's eyes.
"I'm afraid the Avengers disbanded shortly after the new laws went into effect. I wasn't available to run the team in any capacity anymore. Carol tried to take it on, but between Connecticut and the revelation of you as a Kree agent, the public just wasn't having it anymore. No one wanted to cooperate, least of all the government. Entire states and countries started to pass laws prohibiting the activities of unofficial superhumans in any form."
"You let the Avengers disband?" Steve was angry now, as Stark knew he would be. "What do you mean you weren't available?"
Stark raised both hands in an expression of surrender.
"One of the things the president did after the revolt was put down was appoint me director of SHIELD," he said. "There was no way I could split my time between that and being an active-duty Avenger."
"You said 'put down'," growled Steve.
"Poor choice of words." Stark slapped his thighs and stood, sighing as he did so. Slowly, he began to pace around the room.
"Some of our friends had to go to prison after it was all over," he admitted. "That was non-negotiable. You don't get to openly defy a Federal law and resist Federal law enforcement and then just walk away, Steve. You know that. When the police tell you to come out with your hands up, you come out with your hands up. That's how it works.
"Over the years, I've worked to get them all released. It hasn't been easy, but I did it. Everyone is out now, one way or another. Most of our friends chose to quietly retire and have their abilities repressed. In a few cases, like Hercules, exceptions were made and they were allowed to go home on the condition that they never return."
Steve looked like he wanted to say something, but Stark pressed on.
"Every superhuman is required to register with the Federal government and given three options." He held out his hand and counted on his fingers. "First, they can be trained by SHIELD and work in some level of law enforcement; second, they can voluntarily submit to ability suppression therapy to prevent them from injuring anyone through unauthorized use of their powers; or third, if they refuse both of those, they can go to prison. That's the way it works now."
"So that's why the Avengers disbanded," said Steven angrily. "It wasn't about you being 'unavailable'. None of the others wanted to operate the team as an arm of the U.S. government."
Stark shook his head.
"That's only partly true. I was busy running SHIELD. You were gone. Thor disappeared before registration ever became an issue—he reappeared eventually, but he was more concerned with the welfare of Asgard than reforming the Avengers. No one has seen him in years now. Hank and Jan were . . . reluctant to work for the government, so they retired. Carol has always been a good soldier, but the public just wasn't supportive. That wasn't a lie.
"But the good news is that you're back now. With Captain America, the real Captain America, to lead it, I would not be opposed to giving the Avengers another shot."
Steve allowed the remark about the "real Captain America" to pass without comment. He could imagine the explanation. When he had disappeared before, in the waning days of World War II, the U.S. government had attempted to place other men in the role of Captain America several times, but with little success. Most of them had met with ignoble fates of one kind or another, and Steve had no difficulty imagining the same thing had happened after his most recent disappearance.
Instead, he asked a different question.
"What makes you think I'd be willing to operate under government oversight?"
Stark didn't miss a beat.
"This time, leading the Avengers comes with a fringe benefit: you will be the highest government authority over registered superhumans in this country, second only to me. You authorize deployments into the field, and you oversee training programs."
Steve studied him for a long moment.
"You want Captain America to publicly legitimize your policy on superhumans," he said, simply.
Stark's pacing had taken him behind the heavy, oak desk that dominated the room. He turned to look out the floor-to-ceiling windows at the rose garden beyond.
"I'm not going to deny that there are some public relations advantages to having Steve Rogers take a high-level position in my administration," he admitted. "But I can honestly say there's no one I trust more to oversee superhuman policy in this country."
"What about SHIELD?"
"SHIELD will remain the enforcement arm for unregistered superhumans, though the Avengers will have jurisdiction over Omega- and Alpha-level threats." He paused for a moment. "You wouldn't really want responsibility for tracking and arresting superhuman fugitives, would you?"
Steve thought about that. He would have no problem hunting down superhuman criminals, but people who were just trying to help? Heroes who were criminals only because the law said they shouldn't use their powers without official government approval?
Steve shook his head.
"No, I wouldn't," he said, softly.
Several minutes passed in silence, as the two old friends considered the situation.
"I'm still not sure about working for the government again. That doesn't usually work out well for me," said Steve, breaking the silence.
Stark nodded.
"You don't have to decide right now," he said, reassuringly. "Let me show you a few things first, give you something to think about."
The president stepped over to a side door that opened into a short hallway and reached inside for something leaning against the wall.
"For starters," he said, "I think this belongs to you."
Stark turned and Steve saw that he was holding his shield—Captain America's shield. He offered it to Steve, who stood and gratefully accepted it.
Steve took a few test swings with it. The balance was perfect. This was his original shield, forged of a one-of-a-kind mixture of vibranium and adamantium. He would know it anywhere.
"Hello, old friend," he mumbled. Then he looked up at Stark. "Where did you get this? It wasn't in the facility where they found me."
Stark smiled, somewhat grimly.
"When you were replaced, your double took it, probably because there was no way to duplicate it. We took it from him years ago, and we've had it ever since. What we didn't have was you."
Steve nodded appreciatively.
"Thank you, Mr. President," he said.
Stark chuckled.
"I don't think I'll ever get used to that."
The phone on the desk chimed, and Stark reached over to activate the intercom. Steve noted that the button he pressed was set off in red, unlike any of the other buttons. He surmised it was for security or military communications, and a moment later he was proven right.
"Yes, what is it?" asked Stark into the intercom.
"This is Security Station One, sir," replied someone on the other end. "I apologize for the interruption, but Icarus just passed by here headed in your direction."
"Understood. Thank you." Stark terminated the intercom.
"Who's Icarus?" asked Steve.
"You're about to find out, Captain Rogers," Stark said, smiling. "Just remember: she's nineteen years old and the U.S. Air Force works for me."
Before Steve could ask what he meant by that, the door to the corridor burst open and a thin, young lady with long, brunette hair and stylish glasses exploded into the room. She had vaguely Asian features, but also bore a noticeable resemblance to Stark himself.
"Dad!" she exclaimed. "Is he here? Did you see him? Can I meet—"
She stopped short when she saw Steve standing off to one side, his shield still on his left arm.
"Whoa . . ." she whispered.
Stark stepped forward, an amused twinkle in his eyes.
"Captain Rogers, I'd like you to meet my daughter, Paige."
Since when did Tony have a daughter? he thought, quickly doing the math. How did I not know about that?
Momentarily taken aback, Steve recovered quickly. He put his hand out in greeting, and she quickly shook it.
"A pleasure to meet you," he said, politely.
For a moment, she was silent, as if in awe. Then the floodgates opened.
"I have so many questions!" she practically squealed. "How long were you gone? Do you remember what happened? Is it weird to be back? Is this what it was like the first time they found you? Are you going to be a superhero again? What's your favorite candy? Can I get—"
The president, gently but firmly, placed a restraining hand on her shoulder.
"Why don't we let the captain get settled in a bit before we ask him too many questions," he said. "I already asked him a big one, and he has a lot to think about right now."
"Did you offer him the Avengers back?" she asked without missing a beat. "Is that what he has to think about?"
Stark's face darkened, slightly.
"Young lady, have you been reading my confidential briefings again?" he asked, sternly. "That's technically a Federal crime, you know."
Paige smiled, sweetly, and leaned in to kiss her father on the cheek.
"I'm sure you'll pardon me," she said. Then she turned and rushed to the portico door. "I'll meet you on the helicopter!" she said over her shoulder.
Steve looked quizzically at Stark.
"The helicopter?"
"She read the briefing," he explained. "I thought I'd show you the new Avengers facilities before you make up your mind."
"What facilities?"
Stark smiled again. To Steve, he was looking more and more like the proverbial cat that ate the equally proverbial canary.
"You'll see," said Stark.
The flight from Washington, D.C. to New York City was relatively short, especially when helped along by presidential priority and Stark-designed improvements to the aircraft. Once in the city, they flew among the tallest of the buildings, weaving back and forth. Paige seemed to enjoy the ride, peering eagerly out the window, though Steve was sure she had made the flight numerous times before. Stark himself chatted happily about minor news events, sports, and other inconsequential matters. For his part, Steve sat quietly, waiting for Stark to make his pitch. He wasn't disappointed.
At length, Stark pointed out a tall building that was coming into sight. Steve noted with some satisfaction that the stylized Avengers A adorned the top floor, marking it as their destination.
"Stark Tower," said Stark, proudly. "Ninety-three stories of office space and residential apartments, topped off by three levels of state-of-the-art headquarters facilities for the modern super-team. It was originally intended as prime office and residential space in midtown, but no one wanted to move in because they were afraid it might be attacked by aliens. So I figured, why not fill it with people who might be attacked by aliens?"
Stark chuckled. He loved telling that joke. He had been telling it for years, in fact.
"Paige actually lives here during the summer, when she isn't at MIT," he continued.
"She doesn't live at the White House?" asked Steve, surprised.
"It feels too much like a museum," said Paige from her seat near the window. "And all of my equipment is here. This is home."
"Equipment?" Steve asked.
Stark beamed, proudly.
"Paige has always had a talent for computer programming and robotics," he said. "I taught her everything I know. She's getting her Ph.D. right now."
"It's really just a formality," said Paige, happily. "I already know all the material. I just need my official credentials."
"What are you planning on doing after you graduate?" asked Steve.
She looked proudly at her father.
"I want to work for my dad. I want to be part of what he's doing to protect people."
The helicopter set down on the rooftop helipad without incident, and the three passengers exited the craft. Steve noted that neither the Secret Service agents who had accompanied them nor the Marine Corps honor guard that was part of the helicopter's crew went into the building with them.
"Stark Tower is easily the most secure building on the planet," Stark explained, "surpassing even the White House and the Pentagon. There's no need for bodyguards here."
"How is that possible?" asked Steve, incredulously.
"I'll show you. But first, I'd like you to meet the team," said Stark.
"You already have one picked out?"
"Think of them as your first recruits. I didn't want you to start off empty-handed."
They walked in through a pair of sliding glass doors, and Steve found himself in a fully equipped rooftop gymnasium. Along one wall, another set of doors, these made of solid metal, were labeled "combat training", while another led to a locker room and shower facilities. At the rear of the room, opposite the doors to the helipad, was a set of doors that looked like they led to an elevator or lift.
Stark spread his arms, taking in the entire facility.
"This is the training area," he declared. "Fully equipped and state-of-the-art. I know how important training is to you, so I spared no expense. Everything is rated for use by even someone as powerful as Thor."
Standing in the middle of the room were three individuals, all dressed in variations of standard SHIELD combat uniforms. They watched patiently, waiting to be acknowledged.
The first was an athletic-looking man dressed in purple-and-black. He wore purple sunglasses and sported a spiked hairstyle. The bow and quiver full of arrows he carried marked him as an archer, and he reminded Steve of his old teammate, Hawkeye, though this man struck him as more intense and militaristic. Stark introduced him as Trick Shot, though he assured Steve there was no relation to the original villain.
Standing next to Trick Shot was a young, black woman wearing a curious-looking collar around her neck that must have been some kind of tech. Stark introduced her as Syren, explaining that she was an accomplished combat expert and a highly-regarded field operative for SHIELD. She had been outfitted with a sonic projection collar that gave her a powerful sonic scream, affording her an additional advantage in combat.
Finally, the last team member was a giant of a man in terms of both height and muscular bulk. He, too, wore what resembled a large SHIELD combat uniform, this one in black and bronze to match his skin tone. His face resembled that of a bull, complete with horns protruding from the sides of his head, a result of the same genetic mutation that gave him the power and ferocity of a raging bull, according to Stark. He was introduced as Rampage.
All three greeted Steve respectfully, if a bit warily. He could see them sizing him up, trying to decide if the renowned Captain America lived up to his reputation.
"And now for a little demonstration," said Stark. "Trick Shot, shoot me."
Trick Shot didn't hesitate. He immediately drew and notched an arrow, aiming it at the president. Stark saw Steve tense up and prepare to intervene, but he held up a hand to indicate that Steve should do nothing.
Trick Shot let the arrow fly, but just before it struck Stark it was halted in mid air. A familiar green and yellow figure materialized out of nowhere, holding the arrow fast where it had stopped.
"Vision!" exclaimed Steve, suddenly delighted to see a familiar face. Stark and Paige smiled.
"Good morning, Captain," said Vision, lowering the arrow and returning it to Trick Shot. "I am pleased that you have agreed to join us here today. President Stark has informed me that you are considering the position he has offered you. Please allow me to say that you would be a welcome addition."
"Vision is in control of the mainframe here," Stark explained. "This isn't really his body. It's a solid holographic projection he can use to appear anywhere in the building. It's basically the same setup he had after Morgan le Fey destroyed his body, except now he can actually interact with the world in his holographic form."
"It would be more accurate," said Vision, "to say that I am the mainframe. I am regrettably restricted to the inside of this building, where the holoprojectors are, but I am fully at your disposal."
"It's good to see you in any form, Vision," said Steve, smiling. For the first time, he was beginning to feel a bit more optimistic about the situation.
Stark held out his hand to shake Steve's.
"I'm going to leave you in Vision's hands now. I'm afraid I have to get back to Washington," he said. "Command and Control is one floor down, along with some office and work space. The Quinjet hanger is another floor down, along with a variety of scientific equipment and lab space, and the team's living quarters are on the next floor down.
"Take your time, look around, and when you're ready, let me know what you decide."
Steve felt a little overwhelmed as they shook hands. Then Stark kissed his daughter goodbye and went back outside to the helicopter. In moments, it was airborne.
Several hours later, Steve sat alone in Command and Control, a large room filled with complex computers and communications systems, all far more advanced and user-friendly than anything the team had at its disposal before his disappearance.
After Stark had left, he had spent some time interviewing the three recruits Stark had left him. They all seemed to be acceptable candidates, but he was a bit concerned that they all had extensive SHIELD backgrounds and had served in SHIELD's Operations Division. The uniformity of mind and experience was troubling. In his experience, the best teams were always made up of a variety of viewpoints and life experiences. Still, given the new requirement for proper training and government accountability, that was probably to be expected.
With that done, Steve had tried to access information on his old friends, teammates, and allies. There was frustratingly little to find. The files were all there, to be sure, but the vast majority ended with their arrest and incarceration in a facility designated only as "42". In nearly every file he looked up, there was an additional notation of the date they elected to undergo superhuman ability suppression therapy and retire to civilian life. After that, the file offered no additional information, and when he tried to access information on Facility 42 he found that it was classified above even his new security authorization. A few of his old friends and acquaintances were still listed as "at large", which predictably provided little information for Steve to use in tracking them down, and a few files were almost completely redacted.
"Vision," he said aloud to the empty room.
Obediently, the Vision's holographic projection appeared nearby.
"Yes, Captain?" he said.
"These files I'm looking at—what security level are these individuals' current contact information classified at?"
"That information is classified 'eyes only' for the director of SHIELD," replied Vision.
Steve gritted his teeth in frustration. What he wanted was to talk to someone about his options, someone who had lived through the last ten years and seen what had gone on, someone he trusted to not have an ulterior motive. Unfortunately, all of his old friends and comrades were unreachable and untraceable, at least not without extensive legwork and investigation. They certainly weren't available to just sit down and have a cup of coffee with.
He could feel the hand of Tony Stark leading him to only one, unavoidable option: take the job or else be completely alone in the world.
Behind him, Steve heard the automatic doors slide open. A pair of light footsteps approached.
"Any luck?" asked Paige, peering over his shoulder at the large computer display.
Steve half-turned in his chair.
"Any luck with what?" he asked, reflexively.
"I figured the first thing you'd do is try to look up some old friends," she said. "It's what I would do if I woke up in the future."
Steve grunted.
"Unfortunately," he told her, "all of my friends' current contact information is classified."
Paige scanned the list of files he had pulled up.
"Wow," she said. "Didn't you have any friends who weren't Avengers or superheroes or something?"
Steve shook his head.
"After I was pulled from the ice, my life basically revolved around the Avengers," he admitted. "I tried to have a relatively normal side to my life a few times, but it never really worked out. I don't think I ever put down any real, personal roots anywhere after the war."
Suddenly, a thought occurred to him, and he sat straight up in his chair.
"Wait," he said, quickly keying in search parameters. "There might be one person . . ."
Sure enough, when he pulled up her file, it included current contact information. He was relieved to see she was still alive, and still living in New York. SHIELD still kept tabs on her as former Avengers support staff, but they considered her low priority.
Without another word, Steve rushed out of the room.
Behind him, Paige cursed, silently. Her father had apparently not known about this person, and it was too late to security lock her personal information now. She stepped up to the computer monitor and entered her own login. Bringing up another screen, she double-checked the security lockouts on all of Steve Rogers' significant past associates and verified they were all still intact. She briefly considered adding security lockouts to every known past associate, significant or otherwise, but she decided that such thorough measures would look suspicious. What would he think if he found he was locked out of contact information for everyone he had ever met?
The Vision's holoprojection stood nearby, silently watching.
"Vision," she told it, "let me know when Captain Rogers returns to the building."
"Acknowledged," it nodded before promptly vanishing.
Then she keyed a priority command into the room's workstation before hurrying from the room.
Sometime later, Steve found himself sitting on a sofa in an old, Victorian townhouse in Greenwich Village. It reminded him a bit of Doctor Strange's home, which he knew was somewhere nearby, though he couldn't quite remember where, for some reason.
As he sat, enjoying his surroundings for perhaps the first time since he'd been awakened in Antarctica, Peggy Carter bustled in from the kitchen carrying a tray, upon which sat a sea kettle, two cups and saucers, and a plateful of scones.
"So, let me get this straight," she said as she laid out the tea and scones. "Tony Stark himself has offered you a job in his cabinet, a job with vast influence over superhuman policy and will allow you to keep being Captain America, and you come to a long-retired switchboard operator for advice on whether you should take it."
With a contented sigh and an amused grin, she sat down on the sofa opposite him.
"Only Steve Rogers," she said.
"You know you were always more than a switchboard operator to me," he told her, sipping his tea.
Steve had known Peggy Carter since World War II, where they had served together in Paris. Even after he had been pulled from the ice in New York Harbor years before, they had remained close despite the now-apparent age difference—had had skipped several decades of history, but she had come the long way around. Still, he considered her one of his closest friends, and there was no one whose advice he trusted more.
She smiled, thinly.
"What did you really come here to ask, Steve?"
Steve looked away, as if staring at something only he could see.
"What's it been like?" he asked, at length. "These last ten years or so? What was it like to live through it?"
"I won't lie to you," she said, sadly. "It's been frightening. First Stamford, then the fighting over the Registration Act, and then to find out that the whole time you hadn't been . . . you. It was enough to shake anyone's faith."
Steve's mood darkened considerably.
"That may not have been me fighting the Registration Act, but I'm not sure it wouldn't have been if I'd been . . . me, if that makes any sense."
"I know," she said with that sad smile again. "And that was the hardest thing to try to explain to people. To them, genetics and species were all that mattered; they didn't care that he was doing exactly what you would have done in his place."
"And since then?"
She sighed.
"Public trust in independent superheroes has steadily eroded over the years," she told him. "People don't even call them superheroes anymore. Mostly, they're called unlicensed superhumans or vigilantes. The public wants superheroes to be answerable to a higher authority so that when something goes wrong or mistakes are made, someone can be held responsible."
Steve shook his head in bewilderment.
"Anyone who's been involved in field operations of any kind," he said, "knows mistakes are inevitable. Decisions have to be made in fractions of a second, and no operation goes off without any kind of error."
"But you have to remember," she said, gently, "most people today have never been involved in field operations. The war is over, and the draft is long dead. The majority of people don't choose to serve their country or anything greater than themselves now. They don't have that firsthand experience, and they're pretty unforgiving of failure."
Steve got up from the sofa and began pacing the room.
"So everyone works for the government now?" he asked her, sounding more bitter than he intended. "For Tony Stark?"
"I know how much you value your independence, Steve," she tried to soothe him. "But it's the only way you'll be allowed to operate now. If you don't work for the government, you'll have to either retire and work a normal job or be a vigilante fighting SHIELD at the same time you're fighting criminals."
She fixed him with a penetrating state, made no less powerful for all the time that had passed since they'd last seen each other.
"So let me ask you," she said, finally. "Who do you want to spend your time fighting?"
Agent Ward found himself in a large, mostly empty parking garage about ten blocks from Stark Tower. The contact hadn't arrived yet, but that was okay with him. He preferred to arrive early so he could familiarize himself with his surroundings anyway.
After the mission to Antarctica, Ward had requested a temporary assignment to stay close to Rogers when he reentered society. It was a delicate situation that SHIELD Command was watching closely, and Ward himself was one of the agency's most skilled and trusted operatives, so it was easily granted. Ward had to admit, however, that his interest was not purely professional. However good that might have sounded to Agent Coulson, it wasn't the real reason. Deep down, Ward hoped he might get a chance to test himself against Captain America, to really see just how extensive SHIELD's training and conditioning was against the Living Legend of World War II. That might be pride talking, but Ward regarded it as healthy pride.
One by one, four other agents entered the parking garage and took up position in different parts of the vast cavern. Ward nodded at each one as they entered, recognizing them from his mission briefing (which had, itself, consisted only of the identities of the other agents assigned to his team and instructions to report to this location as quickly as possible for a full briefing from a high-ranking SHIELD asset). None of them said anything aloud to each other, merely keeping each other within a clear line of sight.
At length, their contact appeared, flashing the appropriate code on her small flashlight. At her signal the agents converged on her, and as he drew near, Ward was surprised to recognize her as the president's daughter. He knew her from news footage, but he had never realized she was a SHIELD asset.
Quietly, he listened to her explain their mission.
There had been no time for detailed planning.
Paige had made an immediate request to SHIELD for undercover field agents. Although not officially a government agent, her security clearance was high enough to get her a team of five agents before thirty minutes had passed. Not wanting them to be seen at Stark Tower, she used one of her father's private exits to bypass the security detail that was assigned to escort her whenever she left the building.
At the appointed time, she met the agents in a quiet parking garage several blocks away. They were all appropriately nondescript, each dressed in unremarkable street clothes and wearing stylish sunglasses to hide their features.
"Make it look random," she told them after she had explained what she needed. "And remember—this is Captain America we're talking about, the real Captain America. So it won't be easy, and he isn't likely to be gentle."
The agents nodded, saying nothing as their training dictated.
Paige brought out a thin tablet computer displaying a map of the city. Two markers indicated specific locations within the city. A bright, blue line traced a route along the city streets that joined the two locations.
"This is where he is now," she said, pointing to one marker, "and this is Stark Tower, where he'll probably go back to. When he starts moving again, this will give you his real time location as he goes. You'll have to pick an appropriate location based on which way he goes, someplace he's likely to pass by."
She tapped the screen, lightly, and several more markers appeared around the map. The first markers had been red, but the new ones were all green.
"I've taken the liberty of identifying a few likely locations," she explained, "but you'll have to make a big enough scene to attract his attention. No other SHIELD-authorized operatives are anywhere nearby, so you shouldn't have any surprises."
The lead agent nodded and took the proffered tablet.
"We understand, ma'am," he said, and she marveled at how unremarkable even his voice was. "We'll take care of it."
Without another word, the agents turned and left through a nearby stairwell, leaving Paige alone.
Pushing away her uneasiness, she turned and headed back to Stark Tower.
Inside, Ward was elated.
Once clear of the parking garage and their contact, Ward led the small group into a side alley where they could confer privately. Better to plan the specifics of their operation away from the contact, giving her as much plausible deniability as possible as well as minimizing the risk of her revealing operational details to anyone else.
Ward wasn't sure why SHIELD would initiate such an operation with the express intention of attracting the attention of someone as high-profile as Captain America, but long experience had taught him that it was not always his place to understand. He was a soldier, and his duty required him to follow orders.
Still, it appeared he would get his chance to face Captain America in combat. If only for that reason, he was content not to ask too many questions.
An hour later, Steve hugged Peggy goodbye and stepped out onto the street. It had been good to see his old friend, and he'd been happy to see that she was doing so well, but he was no less conflicted about his choices than he had been before. It still seemed to him that there was no good choice: he could sign on with Stark and become an official government agent, go on the run and operate as a criminal vigilante, or quietly retire. Leaving the United States wasn't even an option for him: "Captain France" just didn't have the same ring to it.
He chose a different route back to Stark Tower than the one he had taken earlier in the day. Although he hadn't been a SHIELD agent in many years, the training and field experience in counter-espionage stayed with him. He avoided predictable routes whenever possible, sometimes without even thinking about it.
Steve had been walking, lost in thought, for about twenty minutes when a flurry of activity caught his attention.
Down one street, as he passed, a noticeable crowd had gathered in front of a building about two blocks away. Steve stopped to look and saw two NYPD patrol vehicles parked just off the sidewalk, lights flashing. Several officers appeared to be directing the crowd back, away from the building.
Realizing something was wrong, Steve changed course to investigate. He was wearing civilian clothes so as not to draw attention: a t-shirt, jeans, comfortable shoes, and an old Brooklyn Dodgers baseball cap pulled low on his forehead. Although he had left his Captain America costume behind (he hadn't even worn it to the White House earlier in the day), he had learned long ago to never go anywhere without his shield. He had managed to locate a canvas bag large enough to hold it before he left Stark Tower, and he carried it even now.
As he approached, Steve could see the building was a bank. It didn't take much to imagine what must be happening inside, but he pushed through the crowd to the nearest police officer anyway, just to be sure.
"What's happening, officer?" he asked, fighting the urge to request an official status report.
The officer looked askance at him, but something in Steve's demeanor must have convinced him to answer anyway.
"Looks like a robbery gone bad," he said, hastily. "Just stay back on the street and let us handle this."
Concluding that was all the information he was going to get without identifying himself, Steve pulled back and slipped out of the crowd. Looking around, he picked another building a few doors down and approached it. In the alley on the south side, he found a fire escape that would afford him access to the roof. His enhanced leg muscles allowed him to reach the bottom of it on the first jump.
Once on the roof, he removed his shield from the canvas bag and strapped it over his shoulders like a backpack. Then he looked around.
Steve was on a roof four buildings away from the bank the police had blocked off. Along the way, he saw, the buildings varied in height, though not so much that he didn't think himself capable of vaulting across the differences.
With a trained eye, he gauged the drop to the next rooftop. He felt confident that he could make it and roll to absorb the impact across his entire body and knew that, in fact, he had made similar leaps repeatedly in the past without a second thought, but he also knew that he had been in cryogenic suspension for the past ten years. Dr. Simmons had put him through several rounds of tests at the facility in Antarctica to make sure his physical abilities were still at the same level they had been before, but this would be the first time he had used them in the field.
Steve swallowed back a mild sense of apprehension, backed up several steps to get a good running start, and ran toward the edge of the roof.
He made the drop easily, tucking and rolling as he landed before coming back up to his feet. Everything seemed to be as he remembered it. With growing confidence, he ran toward the next building and leaped up to it, easily clearing the edge. He crossed two more buildings in a similar manner before he reached his destination. Once atop the building that housed the bank, Steve was careful to stay back far enough to not be visible from the street.
Like most buildings in New York, there was a roof-access doorway that would allow him to enter from above. He was gambling that the bank robbers, whoever and however many of them there were, wouldn't be expecting anyone to enter from the roof, but it wasn't a bad gamble. If Stark was to be believed, vigilantes who travelled by rooftop were virtually unheard of now, and the police hadn't yet had time to arrive in large enough numbers to mount an assault on the building.
Steve approached the door and, kneeling beside it, listened intently. Over the years, he had noticed that the super soldier serum that was the source of his physical abilities hadn't just enhanced his speed, strength, and reflexes—it had enhanced everything, including his senses. While not enhanced to the level of, say, Matt Murdock, they were still significantly more sensitive than the average person's. That fact often gave him a major advantage that his foes knew nothing about.
After satisfying himself that no one lurked on the other side of the door, he stood to one side and used his shield to bash the knob off the door. When there was no reaction, he gripped the door by the now-empty hole and wrenched it open, splintering part of it, and proceeded cautiously through it and down the stairs, his shield held protectively before him.
Still nothing. Was it possible that the robbers hadn't posted a sentry at the bottom of the stairwell? That seemed too good to be true, but Steve had no idea how sophisticated these robbers might be. It was possible that they were professionals with a good approach to security and a solid escape plan, but it was equally possible that they were nothing more than amateurs having a good day.
Like most buildings in this part of the city, the upper floors were devoted to residential apartments, so Steve was grateful to find no one else in the stairwell that ran from the roof to the ground floor. The last thing he wanted was for any civilian residents, unaware than an armed robbery was taking place downstairs, to be caught in the crossfire as he approached.
Carefully, he descended the five floors to the ground and approached the door that he knew led to the floor that housed the bank. Using his enhanced senses again, he listened and detected some light shuffling on the other side. While there was no sentry stationed inside the stairwell, as Steve would have done, the robbers had apparently put someone in the hall that led to the stairwell. Steve knew there was no way he could slip through the closed door without alerting the man on the other side, so the only option was to lure the man inside the stairwell and hope that he could take him out before he could alert the others.
Intentionally making noise to alert the sentry now, Steve climbed the stairs at a run and took up position on the second landing, directly above the door to the ground floor, and smoothly removed his shield, holding it in one hand. Then he threw it at one wall, angling it carefully to ricochet off the other two and return to him. In the process, it made several loud clanging noises that echoed off the walls of the stairwell. Then he put his back to the wall behind him and waited.
It paid off.
After a moment, the door on the ground floor eased open, and the sentry stationed in the hall outside crept in, his sidearm carefully preceding him. As soon as he cleared the landing above, Steve charged the railing, stepped up to the top rail, and leaped over it. In mid-air, he brought his shield to bear in front of him and cannonballed into the man below. He went down before he ever knew what hit him.
As he stood over him, Steve noted that the man had never fired a shot. For that to be possible, his finger would have had to be off the trigger and outside the trigger guard. In his experience, it was unusual for amateurs to observe that kind of gun safety, which meant that these robbers were likely professionals. He would have to be cautious. Nothing in the way he was dressed hinted at anything other than a common resident of the city, and a quick search of the man's pockets turned up nothing useful—no wallet, no keys, and nothing that might reveal his identity. To Steve's trained eye, the man seemed too clean. Again, the careful exclusion of anything that might identify the man was the sign of a professional.
Based on where the stairwell was and how the rest of the building had been designed, he was reasonably certain that the stairwell door would not open directly into the bank lobby. It was more likely to open into a hallway, but he still took a moment to listen again at the door for any telltale signs of people on the other side.
When he was satisfied there were none, he eased the door open and stepped through.
Steve found himself in a short hallway that turned a corner at the far end. A few feet away, two doors led to a pair of restrooms with a drinking fountain in between. On the other side of the hall were three more unlabeled doors, presumably leading to storage closets or utility rooms.
His first order of business, he knew, was to cut the electricity. It wouldn't produce pitch darkness in the middle of the day, because banks had expansive windows that made it easy to see in from the outside, but every advantage was helpful.
On a hunch, he tried the closest unlabeled door. Locked. Not wanting to risk the sound of his shield impacting the doorknob, Steve grasped the knob in his hand and, using his enhanced strength, twisted it hard. The knob snapped, and Steve prayed it was not so loud as to alert anyone. He pulled the knob off the door and unlatched the door as quietly as he could. Then he pulled the door open and stepped inside.
As luck would have it, Steve had guessed correctly on the first try. The fuse box was mounted on one wall. He opened it and made a quick decision. He needed to disable the power in a way that would not be easy for the robbers to fix, so he drew back his shield and smashed it into the box. It exploded in a shower of sparks, and the lights instantly went out.
Without wasting an instant, he wrenched the shield out of the fuse box and stepped back into the hallway. Spying the restroom doors as his only option for concealment, he quickly stepped into the women's room, gambling that if the robbers had the presence of mind to position someone at the stairwell door, they would also have already checked the restrooms.
Sure enough, when he heard footsteps pass the restroom door moments later, they went right past and directly to the utility room door. Knowing it would take a moment for whoever had passed him to check inside the utility room before he suspected anyone might be in the hallway, Steve stepped out of the women's room and approached the utility room.
This man was dressed just as unremarkably as the first and carried a sidearm as well. Steve approached him from behind, stepped as silently as his training had taught him. When the man finally turned away from the fuse box to look out into the hallway, Steve struck him squarely in the face before he could react. The man slumped to the floor, unconscious. A quick search of his pockets revealed nothing.
Steve's suspicions were mounting, but he pushed them aside for the moment and stepped back into the hallway. He glanced up and briefly considered using the drop ceiling as a crawlspace to sneak farther into the building, but quickly rejected it. There was no way that framework would hold his 220 pounds, and the most likely result would be a massive crash as the ceiling gave way beneath him. Steve wasn't afraid to die for a just cause, but he had little interest in committing suicide by stupidity.
There had to be another option.
Ward knew that two of his men had been taken out already. He expected no less from Captain America. In fact, he would have been severely disappointed if either his man at the stairwell or the man he'd sent to investigate the power outage had apprehended him. He was still hoping to get a shot at him, personally.
Ward had rounded up all of the bank workers and customers in the main room and made them sit with their backs against the teller counter. He had deliberately allowed the workers to trigger the silent alarm. The whole point of the robbery was to draw attention, after all, and he wasn't going to accomplish his mission by keeping the whole thing a secret. As a SHIELD agent, he had no intention of hurting any of the civilians or detaining them any longer than necessary, but he also knew that the appearance of hostages would give him an advantage. He just hoped no one would call his bluff.
With two of his men out of action, Ward kept the remaining two in the main room with him, ostensibly to keep an eye on the hostages. There were about a dozen of them, all told, and they seemed appropriately subdued by their situation. No unexpected heroes there.
Ward looked out toward the lobby and the hallway he had sent his man down several minutes before. He couldn't actually see down the hall because it turned a corner and ran down the length of the building to his right, behind the reinforced work area for the tellers. Still, he knew Rogers was down there, somewhere, and must have come down the stairwell from the roof. Costumed types loved coming in from the roof, he knew. They thought it was unexpected and clever, but they all used it so often that it was actually quite predictable.
Would he come barreling down the hall, shield forward, in a full frontal assault? Would he simply step out and offer himself as a more valuable hostage to save the civilians? Would he try to signal the police somehow? Would he try to distract them? Ward didn't know, and the anticipation was exhilarating. This was what he loved: the anticipation of the coming fight.
Far to his right, at the rear of the building and far from the lobby and hallway he was carefully watching, Ward heard a muffled shout, as if from outside. Curiously, he glanced in that direction, keeping his weapon trained carefully on the hallway. There was a window there, at the far end of the room, that looked out on the alley behind the building.
In an instant, he realized his mistake, as the shield of Captain America suddenly filled the window and impacted against the glass, sending an explosion of shards into the room.
Oh, shit . . .
Realizing that it would be almost suicidal for him to walk openly into the bank proper, Steve had elected to do the most unpredictable thing he could think of: retreat.
If his opponents were as professional as he suspected, he knew they would be aware of his presence in the hall and expect him to approach from there. He also knew that a bank like this one would likely have as many windows as possible for maximum visibility in case of a robbery, which would hopefully include one in the back wall that might offer him an unexpected means of entry.
Like most buildings in New York, the bottom floor was given over to a business while the upper floors were probably residential apartments. In this case, Steve remembered seeing a sign for a health and fitness center on the second floor. He had rushed back up to the second floor and sprinted into the workout area, vaulting the customer service desk in front in one, smooth leap. The club's employees looked alternately alarmed and awed, but no one attempted to stop him. He saw a few of them glance, wide eyed, at the shield on his arm and guessed that, even after his long absence, they knew what it was and who he must be.
Racing to the rear of the building, Steve had crashed through the window that he knew must lead to the fire escape landing. He had vaulted the top rail and caught himself with his free hand, halting his forward momentum and sliding down the vertical railing before catching himself again on the bottom landing. The full force of his momentum swung him down under the landing and through the window directly below the one he had just come through. With the speed and force of an Olympic sprinter, he hurled into the bank with his shield held protectively before him, sending a shower of shattered glass into the room.
He had no more than a split second to take stock of the room he was crashing into, but years of training and experience meant that it was enough.
As he landed, he rolled to absorb the shock and also to keep moving and maintain the element of surprise. There were three men standing around the room, all armed and dressed similarly to the first two. As he came out of his roll, Steve threw his shield at the man farthest to his right, scoring a direct hit and knocking him instantly unconscious. The shield bounced off the man's head, bounced again off a nearby wall, and ricocheted back toward Steve as he continued his advance into the room.
The startled robber to Steve's left was trying to bring his weapon to bear when Steve barreled into him. He thrust his left forearm under the man's chin, impacting hard and knocking him backward, while he caught the returning shield with his right hand. The man sprawled backward, instantly unconscious, and Steve quickly rolled to his feet to face the final armed man.
To his dismay, he found that the final man had had the presence of mind to grab one of the hostages and was even now pressing his weapon against her temple. The terrified woman clawed desperately at the man's forearm, which was wrapped around her throat, but to no avail.
The two men stared intently at each other, measuring the other's resolve.
"Let her go," said Steve, knowing it was a non-starter even as he said it.
"Drop the shield," the man countered, unwaveringly.
Steve clenched his jaw in frustration. After everything he had done so far, he had no real choice.
Ward could feel the woman's panic as he held her tightly against him, and pushed back against a wave of guilt. He had no intention of following through on his implied threat, but for the sake of the mission, he couldn't appear to go down easily.
After a moment, Rogers dropped his shield, face down, in front of him. Ward let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding.
"Kick it away," he instructed.
Reluctantly, Rogers obeyed, kicking it off to his right. Ward noted that he was careful not to hit any of the hostages with it in the process.
"It's down to just you and me, Rogers," he said, releasing the woman to rejoin the others. Slowly, deliberately, he released the magazine from his weapon, allowing it to drop to the floor, and emptied the chamber. Then he tossed the weapon aside.
"Let's see how good you really are," he said, and dropped into a fighting stance.
Steve was confused. What was the other man playing at? He had just given up a clear advantage, but for what? A one-on-one fight? Why?
Regardless, Steve was only too happy to oblige.
The man came at him first with a basic right hand lead, which Steve blocked easily. That was followed by a left hand strike, also blocked, and a sweep with the right leg, which Steve smoothly dodged.
There was almost no force behind those blows, Steve noted. Either his opponent wasn't taking the fight seriously, which he doubted, or he was probing him, testing him.
With hostages in the room, Steve wasn't willing to play games.
He responded with a left hand strike of his own, which was blocked, and then immediately spun around into a roundhouse kick that he planted firmly on his opponent's chest. The man stumbled backward a step, but didn't go down. Instead, he was ready for Steve's follow up.
As Steve threw a powerful right hand strike, his opponent ducked beneath it and then came up to tuck his shoulder under Steve's armpit. He used the resulting leverage to lift Steve off his feet and flip him over backward, but Steve reached back and grabbed him by the belt of his pants, pulling him along as he went. The result was that when Steve landed on his back on the carpet, his opponent landed on top of him, facing the ceiling.
From the bottom, Steve reached forward with his right arm and wrapped it around his opponent's throat, locking him into a headlock. At the same time, he wrapped both lets around his adversary's waist, securing himself tightly to his opponent's back and giving him nowhere to go. Once locked in, he tightened his grip around the man's throat, denying him oxygen. He knew it would only be a matter of time until he lost consciousness.
Ward cursed himself for a fool. Not only had he allowed Rogers to misdirect his attention and surprise him from behind, but he had also allowed him to dictate the terms of their engagement by turning it into a grappling match. He couldn't hope to match the super soldier's sheer physical strength—no unenhanced human could—and that left him with few options at this point.
Few, but not none.
Rogers' hold had left both of Ward's arms free. He probably didn't think it was an issue against someone with considerably less physical strength, but Ward had no intention of wearing himself out by straining against muscles that could throw a motorcycle overhead. Instead, he reached down to the pouch at his waist and fished out the compact can of mace he carried for emergencies.
Reversing his grip on it, he reached back and sprayed it directly in the super soldier's eyes. He was under no illusion that something so simple would do more than startle someone like Rogers, but he hoped it would at least loosen his grip long enough for him to wriggle free.
It worked.
For just a split second, Rogers' iron grip slackened, and Ward wrenched himself loose, rolling nimbly to his feet and spinning to find that Rogers had done the same.
They were back to square one.
Steve wasn't surprised that the man had resorted to cheating at the brink of defeat. His exact method of cheating had been a bit of a surprise, but he had expected some sort of last-second gambit.
As the two faced off against each other again, Steve heard a click followed by a louder double-click from behind his opponent. Glancing in that direction, he saw that one of the hostages, a thin man with slicked back grey hair and a salt-and-pepper moustache, wearing an expensive suit, had retrieved his adversary's discarded weapon and clip. As Steve watched, he turned to bring the now-loaded weapon to bear.
His opponent had heard it, too. Instantly, he spun toward the former hostage. There was no doubt he possessed the speed to cross the short distance and disarm the man before he could fire, but Steve's own speed, was superior.
Before the man could take a step, Steve lunged forward and grabbed him by the arm as he turned, restraining him. The man tried to pull free, but the extra second was enough time for the now-armed hostage to bring his weapon fully to bear and fire.
The bullet struck Steve's adversary in the left shoulder, knocking him backward and spinning him further around. As he went, Steve interposed himself between him and shooter, holding up his hands to urge the former hostage to stop firing. The shooter hesitated, keeping his weapon trained on the man, but did not fire again.
Steve turned to check on the man he had been fighting only moments before. He lay on the ground, bleeding, but to Steve's trained eye, the wound was not fatal. He still wasn't sure what the man's motivation had been, but whatever it was, it hadn't claimed his life.
Steve looked into his still-conscious eyes, searching, but the man offered nothing but pain and determination.
Behind him, Steve heard footsteps approach. He looked up and found the armed former hostage standing nearby. His weapon was lowered, but in his other hand he held Steve's shield. Behind him, the other hostages had gathered around. All of them looked at Steve with a mixture of gratitude and awe.
"Are you really him?" asked a well-dressed, middle-aged woman, tentatively.
"Of course it's him!" said a nearby man, himself middle-aged and bearded. "Didn't you see what he did?"
The first man, the man who had retrieved the gun, offered him the shield.
"Thank you," he said, almost reverently. Steve looked into his eyes and saw equal measures of respect, awe, and hope, and he suddenly understood how deep this man's need for a hero was. As he accepted the offered shield, the symbol of all he stood for, he looked around and saw similar looks in the eyes of all the others.
"That's what I'm here for," he said.
The gathered crowd outside had been even more enthusiastic than the poor souls he had rescued. From his first appearance at the doors of the bank, his shield borne proudly on his arm for all to see, they had erupted in cheers. Even the police seemed happy to see him, despite the fact that he had upstaged the SWAT team that was on scene by then.
Since then, all the major news networks had featured wall-to-wall coverage of the reappearance of Captain America. What began that morning as a noteworthy story had been transformed into a media frenzy by his successful thwarting of a major bank robbery. The events of the day had been covered and recovered in every imaginable detail, and every analyst who could find a camera and a microphone had an opinion about where Captain America would go from here. Most people seemed to assume that President Stark had offered him a job during their meeting at the White House that morning, but opinions differed on what exactly that job might be. Everything from Secretary of State to a five-star military commission had been floated, but there was little consensus. The one thing everyone agreed on was that something big was coming.
After he had returned to the tower, Paige had followed him around and chattered happily about all the attention he was receiving and the universe of options in front of him, while carefully emphasizing her hope that we would assume command of the new team of Avengers. Eventually, when his mood proved melancholy, her enthusiasm had waned and she had left him alone in Command and Control. Before she left, she flagged all the media coverage for him in case he changed his mind, but he ignored it all. She also set a bowl of Mike & Ike Root Beer Float candies on the workstation counter for him—they had been his favorite in the 1940s.
Even as every cable network ran retrospectives on Captain America's illustrious career, both during World War II and after he had been found by the original Avengers, he kept it all turned off. He had no interest in rehashing the past, and he had only slightly more interest in learning about all the various individuals who had tried to take up his mantle over the years.
He was still deeply troubled by his options. The current state of the country seemed dire from his perspective, even more so now that he had seen the people's hunger for a hero firsthand. He had never been entirely comfortable with all the adulation that had been heaped at Captain America's feet over the years, but he had come to regard it as necessary and healthy for the American psyche over the years. People needed heroes to show them a better way to love, an ideal to strive for, a tradition to live up to. This new era of government-approved agents seemed too vulnerable to hijacking by private agendas for his taste. Control at the top gave those in power the ability to shape public opinion instead of responding to it, and in the wrong hands that could be dangerous.
Which brought him back to Tony Stark.
It was true that he and Stark were old friends and teammates dating back to their time together as Avengers, but it was also true that they had been at odds over the years as often as they had been in accord. Stark's first instinct was to bend the world around him to his will, either through technological, financial, or legal means. He usually had good intentions, to be sure, but he also had more potential than anyone else Steve knew to use those good intentions to pave the road to hell. In the past, they had always been on equal footing, but accepting Stark's offer would mean placing himself in an explicitly subordinate role. Could he do that? Could he function that way? What would happen when they disagreed?
On the other hand, what Peggy had pointed out earlier in the day was still true. He knew he couldn't give up being Captain America altogether. The day's events had proven that, if nothing else. The need was too great, and it was too much a part of him to ignore. That meant that if he wasn't going to accept Stark's offer, he may as well pack up and start running from the authorities now. He was all too aware that his own actions at the bank were a violation of the Superhuman Registration Act for anyone without a government stamp of approval. That wouldn't stop him from acting in an emergency, of course, but did he really want to spend his time running from the law?
He didn't sleep much that night, dozing only fitfully in Command and Control, unwilling even to occupy the apartment that had been set aside for him downstairs. Doing so would feel like a concession to what now felt like a foregone conclusion. Fortunately, lack of sleep didn't take its toll on his enhanced body much, certainly not to the extent of a normal person, so the morning found him feeling not much worse for wear, despite his mounting frustration.
Around mid-morning, Steve heard the doors behind him open. From the monitoring equipment all around him, which included internal security monitors, he knew the entire team and the building's support personnel were on site, but no one had disturbed him since the night before. Evidently, Jarvis was not in residence, or Steve would have been offered food and refreshments at some point during the night. As it was, only one person seemed likely to intrude on his solitude.
"Hello, Paige," he said without turning to look. Her light footsteps approached.
"Morning, Cap," she said in that cheerful tone that only young women could master.
Steve grunted. He felt like a caged animal, denied any operation but cooperation with his masters. Reflexively, he glanced at a side screen that displayed the brief message he had received from Stark the night before.
"Can I announce your new job?" it asked, simply, but the subtext was undeniable. You have no other choice, it seemed to say.
Paige followed his gaze and seemed to know what he was thinking. Instead of responding, she reached over and tapped a series of commands into the main console before him. The large display changed from small, muted images of various stages in Captain America's career to a single, large image of what looked like a disaster area. An overhead view, probably from a helicopter-mounted camera, showed an area of devastation about two or three city blocks in diameter. Crumbled buildings and walls were everywhere, and smoke and dust filled the air. At one edge, moving east, a large, humanoid figure moved with violent purpose, tearing chunks out of the ground and knocking down structures. Smaller figures, people, were fleeing the area, no doubt in fear of their lives.
It got Steve's attention.
"I thought you should see this before you made a decision," Paige said, quietly.
Steve quickly sat up and keyed the audio, all frustration gone now. As he always did in emergencies, he focused on the matter at hand.
". . . the scene between Webster Avenue and Park Avenue as a large, orange monster, tentatively identified as a troll, runs rampant through the city, destroying buildings and vehicles seemingly at random as it calls out for Thor, the legendary God of Thunder, who has not been seen in New York for almost a decade. Police have begun cordoning off the area, as authorities . . ."
Steve muted the audio again, having heard enough. The moment he had been dreading was finally upon him, the moment where he would have to make a decision and fully commit to one choice or the other. Despite that, he felt strangely calm. The clarity he always felt in emergency situations had taken hold, and all he saw now were operational considerations. The choice was clear, and at least for the moment, he felt no ambivalence.
Off to the side, another monitor called for his attention. It displayed current government activity on SHIELD-designated communications frequencies and specifically flagged any emergency response transmissions for his review. Steve recalled that his new position gave him authority over Omega- and Alpha-Level threats and emergencies, per Stark's briefing the day before, and he was sure a troll tearing up the Bronx qualified. Keeping the news reports silent, he keyed the audio for the flagged SHIELD priority channel.
". . . target is moving northwest in the direction of the police precinct and the Cross Bronx Expressway! Request immediate interdiction!"
"Acknowledged. Rapid response team is en route, alpha-priority. ETA is ten minutes. Continue crowd control measures and await arrival."
"We don't have ten minutes! That overpass doesn't stand a chance against that monster! We're about to have mass casualties!"
Steve triggered the signal override and activated his audio pickup.
"Terminate SHIELD response," he said into the audio pickup, allowing his normal command tone to come through. It was an authority that came naturally to him. "Evacuate the surrounding buildings and establish a perimeter at a radius of six blocks. Do not engage the hostile."
"Who is this?" demanded a female voice with a command tone of its own. "What's your authorization?"
Steve took a deep breath and gathered himself for the moment of truth. His next words would dominate the news cycle for days to come, played and replayed by every news station, variety show, and podcast imaginable. There was no going back after this.
"This is Avengers Director Steve Rogers, ultraviolet priority. I am declaring an Alpha-Level Emergency. Fall back and await further instructions. Avengers deployment is under way."
Before anyone could respond, Steve cut the transmission and silenced the audio. Then he triggered the building-wide intercom.
"All active-duty field personnel, report to the Quinjet hanger for immediate deployment. This is not a drill."
His voice rang through the halls and rooms on every floor, alerting everyone in the building that the team was about to go operational. Behind him, he felt Paige beaming at him with pride. The electricity in the air was palpable.
"I repeat," he said, "Avengers assemble!"
END