Disclaimer: I do not own the Avengers.
Wires Crossed
Prologue:
A fire crackled merrily in the fireplace, casting flickering shadows on the parlor. Its light beat off the looming darkness of the night within the large and silent mansion while Sir Rudolph Beaumont, military man retired, sat in an old leather armchair, basking in the warm glow. Despite the summer night, he kept the flames fed, making the room hellish in its heat. A door opened, and a tall, slim gray haired man entered, bearing a tea tray. He did not wear his coat, but had it instead draped over the back of a chair. Uncharacteristic of a butler, but the sensation of being consumed by a conflagration excused him. The butler brought the tea he carried to the side table next to the great armchair, and set it down.
"Ah, thank you, James. You may leave for the night if you wish."
James nodded, not saying a word, and gratefully exited the stifling room. Sir Beaumont sipped his tea all alone in the mansion, undisturbed by the whispers and groans the old house now made. He only stirred when one of the doors leading to the parlor creaked open again a few minutes after the butler's departure.
"Forget your coat, did you, James? It's still on the chair where you-- mmph!"
A masked man grabbed a pillow from another armchair and pressed it to Sir Beaumont's face, cutting off his air supply. The old man struggled desperately, but his efforts grew weaker with each passing second until he finally went limp. After letting go, the masked man called out harshly in German, and another intruder joined him. Together they began to search the room in a hurried, though orderly way; almost professional in manner. Rather than turning out the contents of drawers, the men leafed through them quickly, and instead of tossing books from their shelves they neatly returned the literature to its rightful place. Clearly these intruders were more than simply thugs from the streets.
The men's search suddenly halted, however, at the sound of footsteps in the foyer. They looked at each other, frozen for a moment, before scrambling to leave out of a back door from the parlor. In the rush, out of the pocket of the first masked man fell a single red glove, unnoticed by either of the two. Just a few seconds after their departure James admitted himself to the room, only to discover the body of Sir Rudolph Beaumont.
A/N: Sorry about the shortness, but it is a prologue-- I promise that the next chapters will be longer!