CHAPTER ONE

Dear mother, I love you

Insomnia; it plagued her every night. She continually fought for control over her inability to sleep easy, but her brain simply refused to turn off. Too many thoughts rushed through her mind, too many missions played over and over again. Too many words, too many songs, too many emotions; it was a never ending cacophony of internalized torture that Tegan couldn't pull herself out of. Like the rest of the working class in America struggling to crawl from the blackened, soulless grips of insomnia, Tegan had a job to do. So when the morning came and regardless of however much she wanted to shoot a hole through her alarm clock and struggle with maintaining sleep until she got at least one good night's rest, she just had to throw the covers back and soldier on.

The only thing that made Tegan different from the rest of the middle-classed, unfortunate every-day American was that she knew how to kill a man in twelve different, discrete ways with just her hands.

So once again, she jolted from uneasy, hard earned dreams at the sound of the screeching of her clock that filled her small room. For a moment she laid in bed staring up at the dull grey ceiling above her, wondering if it was the impact of her falling off a building and hitting the ground that woke her up, or if it had been her subconscious waiting for the call of the morning to rouse her from her restless slumber. With her clock on the other side of the room, she curled up in a ball underneath her covers for a moment and drew a pillow over her head. All she wanted was one more hour of sleep, just one more chance to fall back into that same dream and make things turn out differently. But she knew she wouldn't get that. She had a job to do, and no matter how hard she tried to change the outcome of her dream, it was always the same. Finally gathering up the will to get up, she threw back the covers and finally walked to the other side of the room to ruefully punch the 'off' button on her alarm. Squinted, hazel eyes glared at the bright red LED numbers that indifferently told her with odd mechanical enthusiasm that it was five am.

Pulling on her one-piece, form fitting suit and snapping her weapons belt around her waist, she jumped at the sound of a fist against her metal door. Tiptoeing to the only thing that could ever stand between her and facing her day, she cracked the door open and peered out into the brightly lit hallway. She was met with the heavily lined face of one of the many employees that called the Helicarrier home. Straightening up and throwing the door open she greeted the man as he cleared his throat and asked,

"Are you Agent Hollis?"

Looking over her shoulder as if to see if there was anyone else in the room she cocked her head to the side and bluntly replied, "I'm the only person in this room, aren't I?"

Used to her tart replies, the man deepened his frown and replied, "yes. But whether or not you are alone in your room is beside the point, Tegan. You are needed in the meeting room."

It was rare for her to already get a call to duty so early. Usually she had time to at least pee before someone was knocking at her door demanding her presence. Thanking the man for doing his low-ranking job, she missed out on the distasteful look he shot her as she turned her back to him. Her margin of time to prepare for her day was cut tragically short. In a flurry to get out, she slipped her shoes on and didn't even bother to turn the lights off as she left her room.

For as odd as the early morning mission call was, she figured it was something she should have been used to by now, given the circumstances. Still, four years of a third world war raging in Europe and she had not yet gotten into the mode of expecting such premature missions. Tegan always thought that it was funny how the world had fallen into a happy complacent mood after Loki's invasion had been stopped. It was like the earth had sucked in a breath of anticipation and finally cut it loose and the whole human race breathed a collective sigh of relief. To Tegan, there was nothing easy about the world that was left in the wake of the eye-opening realization that aliens were as real a threat as terrorists and shoe bombs. For three months after the attack, everyone was nice to everyone. The homeless were sheltered, governments flourished and everyone was happy. That is until the rise of the Human Alternative Direction and Eradication Series and the Central Forces shocked the unworried population back into reality and forced them to accept that evil still existed on the planet. HADES was a division not unlike the Nazi party back in World War II, they believed in a superior race or man and were hell bent on gaining power through unmatched weapons technology. The Central Forces were simply allies consisting of the formidable powers of Russia, China, and North Korea. No one could really remember how Erik Sunderland and his crazy ideals had gained him enough power in Germany to topple the government, but within a matter of weeks after the unveiling of the newest threat, HADES had power over the German people and war descended onto the world like a flock of starved vultures on a carcass.

As usual, the faces of everyone on the Helicarrier were downcast and grave. The numbers of soldiers fighting against the threat were dropping. It seemed that for every step forward the United Forces took, they were forced to take another two back; and that was enough to put anyone in a downcast mood. Nobody liked to be on the losing team. Tegan, however, was perhaps one of the fewer rays of sunshine (if that was what she could be called). She was no soldier but she too pleasure in the tension of war, she was not the type of person to be put out so easily. As she made her way from her room to the conference room, she passed many familiar faces. Like any other day, they were all busy and focusing on their tasks. The only people that seemed to be sitting around twiddling their thumbs like a group of uselessness were the Avengers –as they'd so affectionately been named by the public. She'd passed a couple of them on her way to the conference room and each time she eyed them with a look of pity. They had become a sad bunch of overrated figureheads since the start of the war and nothing more. The front lines were not where they were; instead they were forced to sit tight, cooped up in the close quarters of the Helicarrier for a 'real mission'. Tegan had been given plenty of missions since the start of the war, so she knew little of what it was like to be forced to laze around and do absolutely nothing while the rest of the world laid down their lives to keep the price of freedom at an affordable cost.

Finally, she pushed open the door to the meeting room and was greeted with the grave, dark-skinned face of Director Fury. He stood quietly at the head of the elongated table flanked by plush leather chairs. The screens behind him, for the time being, were blank; but Tegan knew better than to assume that the Council would not be dropping in on the two at some point in the near future. Sliding in quietly she looked at the circular clock on the wall and smiled inwardly to herself: right on time, as usual. Fury motioned at her to take a seat. She stood still for a moment, debating if this was a test or not before picking a seat close to the middle of the glass and mahogany table. The silence between the two thickened and the inner desire to know what the hell was going on reared its ugly head quickly as seconds later, Tegan coldly blurted out,

"I really hope you didn't call me here just to have a staring contest."

Used to her impatience and tart attitude, Fury waved off her obviously rude remark to walk over to where she was and slapped down a newspaper in front of her and sternly told her, "If I wanted to waste your time, I could."

Reaching up to pull the paper close to her, she looked down at the bolded headline claiming of uncovered rumors regarding future HADES plans. Completely ignoring the warning Fury had just given her, she screwed her face up into a look of confusion and asked, "How did the press get information that we don't even know yet?"

At that very moment, the monitors that had been off flickered on and the shadowed figures of the Council appeared. Both agent and Director turned sharply to view the screens as the man in the middle said, "Director Fury, we apologize for the delay –but you know that security must be tight and therefore our preparations take longer."

Tegan let her gaze slide away from the televisions and up to Fury's scarred face. His lips were drawn into a tight line and his one eye was narrowed. There was nothing, Tegan knew, Fury disliked more than tardiness. Unfortunately, the four people before them were his superiors and the choice of scolding them for their inability to do things on time was lost. Quickly averting her stare before he could feel her looking at him, she waited as the four shadowed figured situated themselves. Finally, they were addressed once more,

"Who is this young woman, Fury?"

Forcing himself to not roll an irritated eye at them, Fury introduced the black haired agent, "this is agent Tegan Hollis. I've called her in to take part in the mission."

Tegan straightened up in her chair as she felt all eyes on her and listened as quietly and patiently as she could as the situation was finally explained to her,

"Agent Hollis: as you might know, two days ago the confiscated armories on the Helicarrier and in other ground S.H.I.E.L.D bases were raided. At first we were not certain of what was taken, but after carefully combing through the inventory it was learned that long-forgotten HYDRA weapons were stolen. For the last two days, it has been unclear as to why they were taken. As far as we were aware, the weapons themselves were not of any use as they had powered down after the attack on the HYDRA headquarters was carried out back in the last world war. However, according to the paper in front of you, it seems that we were wrong. The information in that article," at the mention of the paper, Tegan leaned over to read through the article quickly, almost drowning out what was being said to her as the man in the middle continued on, "has birthed a rumor about HADES and what it plans to do with the weapons that were taken. It claims that they have found a way with the remaining Tesseract energy signature left in the stolen weapons to call back the Tesseract to earth. While we cannot be certain about what they plan to do with the Tesseract once it is within their possession, we can only assume that they will continue to create a new type of weapons that our forces cannot hope of combating. That is where you come in."

Finally, Tegan looked away from the paper and back up at the four shadowed people on the monitors and dismissively replied,

"If you're all so damn knowledgeable about the situation at hand, why am I here? Because it honestly sounds like you all have everything figured out."

Fury stepped closer to her and hissed, "Rumors, agent Hollis. We don't know anything for certain. That's why you're here."

Tegan looked up at Fury to find him glaring at her in the disapproving manner he always seemed to do whenever she opened her mouth to talk. For a moment, she considered arguing back, but settled down into her chair again and looked to the screens once more as the man in the middle cleared his throat and said,

"We have to go now, but Director Fury will finish explaining your mission."

Before either of them could say another word, the monitors grew dark and quiet, and once more it was just the two of them in the room. Eyeing the dark screens with amused interest, Tegan shattered the tense silence in the room with a bitter observation, "they never say goodbye, do they?"

Fury rolled his eye at her and stalked away from her to stand back at the head of the table. Leaning onto the smooth surface to gaze at him better, Tegan asked, "so what's my job going to be?"

Rubbing his face, Fury said, "Your job, Hollis, is to shut the hell up when the Council is talking."

Rolling her eyes right back at him she humorously replied, "I think they liked me well enough."

Gritting his teeth, Tegan's comment earned her a sharp reply, "they don't need to like you. They need you to be an agent. One that doesn't have to comment on everything, one that knows when to keep her fat mouth shut. As your Director-"

Proving to be the ever difficult to deal with agent that she was, Tegan leaned back into her chair and casually replied, "please don't pull the 'as your boss' shit on me."

Pounding his fist against the table, clearly angered with her already (Tegan admired for a moment how quickly she'd gotten him to rise up), "I will pull whatever shit I want with you! Now shut up and let me fill you in on what I was going to ask you to do. If you can't manage that much self control, I can always ask someone else."

Furrowing her brow at the angry one-eyed man, she considered fighting back, but weighed her options and figured that getting out on a mission would be much better than sitting around the Helicarrier going through her same daily routine. So, rather than replying back with an equally raised voice, she visibly deflated and leaned farther into the back of her chair, as if trying to sink into it and waved a dismissive hand, "OK, fine. I'll shut up."

Narrowing his eye at her, Fury lifted his chin and coldly said, "your attitude is going to be your downfall."

Tegan, determined not to say anything now, only gave him a look that rivaled the frost in his voice. For a moment, the two simply stared at each other before Fury finally spoke, "your mission, should I decide that you're going to behave long enough to listen to orders and not do things your own way, would be to infiltrate the base we've located outside of Moscow. There, you would do whatever you could to determine what HADES is doing with those stolen weapons. Regardless of what you find, your only job would be to confirm or dispel the rumors. Should you act beyond that and get yourself into trouble, I will not send anyone to retrieve you and fix your mess. Should you get captured, I will not send anyone to save you, as your presence would just be a liability and I'd rather not lose two agents. Do you think you can do things the way I'm asking you to do for once?"

Tegan swiveled the seat of her chair back and forth, lost in thought. She leaned her cheek against her open palm and thought about all the ways this could go wrong. While she'd been in training as a spy almost all of her life at S.H.I.E.L.D and had been given some of the best training they could offer, Fury was very right about her infuriating habit of doing things how she wanted to do them as opposed to how she was supposed to do them. For the most part, her vigilante actions usually came out alright, but she could clearly remember several times how this had backfired and she'd gotten into major trouble. The few times she did make a cog in the machine she was lucky enough to have extra agents by her side to help her get out of her mess. It would be a first for Tegan to know in the back of her mind that there would be no rescue from her mistakes if she made one now. So lost in her weighing of the pros and cons, she forgot that she had someone else in the room with her until Fury offered her a sharp,

"Do you accept?"

Shaken from her thoughts, Tegan straightened up and narrowed her eyes at the man, "so let me get this straight: you want me to go to Moscow and find my own way to get into the compound that you're claiming is the headquarters to HADES. Once there, I'm supposed to make it past security and God knows what else while traipsing around a building I have no knowledge of to find out if these half-assed rumors possibly created by the papers to generate circulation and reader curiosity are real or not. And let's not forget that if I get into shit I can't fix, or if I get captured, you're not going to send someone in to get me out of there; thus leaving me to my own fate, which you and I both know will not be a quick death."

Fury raised a curious eyebrow and asked, "is this too much for you, agent Hollis?"

Letting out a short, dry laugh Tegan shook her head, "no. It actually sounds like my cup of tea. I mean, fuck, there's nothing else to do here. You're determined to keep everyone that you might need at a moment's notice locked up like a caged lion. Not to mention there's literally nothing on T.V. aside from the constant war news, which I'm getting really sick of listening to. I could definitely use a vacation from this place."

Fury narrowed his eye at her and pointed out, "this is not a vacation, Tegan."

Smiling warmly at the Director and standing up, she grabbed the paper from the table and said, "it'd be a vacation for me. Besides, it's December, right? I love winter. I hear Russia's beautiful this time of year."

"So I take it you are accepting? If so, I will give you the rest of the day to prepare, but I expect you to be in the hangar at four am tomorrow morning. If you're one minute late, I will grab the nearest spy and replace you. Understood?"

Tegan only nodded –did she really need to say anything else? Making her way to the door, she was almost out before Fury's next words stopped her: "your mother and grandmother would be so very proud of you."

Looking down at her feet for a moment Tegan just stood there quietly. Finally she looked back up and shot Fury a question, "sir?"

"Yes, Tegan?"

"Sentiment is not a very fitting hat for you, Director Fury."

Before he could say anything else, she disappeared from the room, leaving a small smile on his face in her wake.

Author's Notes: So. Seven days with no internet (and two more to go) has led to unending planning of a new fanfiction that my friend wanted me to write. I'd be lying if I said when I started this, that I liked Steve as a character. He was legitimately my least favorite character. Why? I don't know. I really don't. But after careful consideration of his character and countless viewings of Captain America, he's grown on me like a fungus. It's been a reluctant love...but here I am writing a fanfiction that revolves around him sort of. Yes, Tegan is a very, very sassy mother fucker. She comes around eventually...I think...maybe? And I know that the first...six chapters will mainly focus on Tegan, but I've never actually made an OC before, so I want adequate time to establish her. They'll at least be exciting? I think? Idk, please bear with me as I write a story about characters (Steve and Tegan) I know little about. Though, I'm super excited to get this written. It'll be fun. AND I PROMISE NO ONE THAT IS TRULY IMPORTANT TO THE PLOT DIES. I can't promise anything for those not important to the plot characters, though. Yes I'm in a 5FDP naming mood. DEAL WITH IT. Also, I'm just going to point out now that this entire story is dedicated to my good friend Mira. She loves her some Steve, and she's had a rough month. Hope you like it bbgirl~ Anyways, thanks for reading, and stick around a while c:

I do not own any Marvel characters, only the ideas and story are mine.

Story title/chapter titles (c) Five Finger Death Punch (Remember Everything)