A/N: Hey everyone, thanks once again for adding this story to your alerts. It really means a lot to me. Um, just a fun fact: ever since the chapter with the Furbies ads for Roombas have been popping up all over my computer screen. It's creeping me out. Disclaimer: Trying to stick Chris Evans into a pokeball does not give you the rights to Captain America or any other MARVEL character, it apparently makes you slightly disturbed in the head.
"Agent Kitchen Aid, come in Agent Kitchen Aid," Tony said from over their comms system.
Sam rolled her eyes, a gesture he missed since he was actually out in the field while she was acting as a lookout. Technically speaking, Sam was the one standing in a field. Tony was messing around inside a building.
"Really? Kitchen Aid," Sam asked. "You're calling me a stand mixer?"
"Actually I thought that was a knife set-," Tony started.
"Get to the point Stark," Steve cut in sounding slightly annoyed. Sam couldn't decide if it was because Tony was making fun of her or if it was because he wasn't being serious during the mission.
"Calm down Stars and Garters," Tony replied. "What's the action like out there, Sammie-pie?"
"Nonexistent. Question: why the hell do you keep calling me Sammie-pie," Sam asked. That particular nickname was starting to annoy her. From normal people she might accept it, but from Tony she felt like he was making fun of her.
"Because you bake and calling you Sammie-cake or Sammie-cookies lacks a certain charm. If you want, I can call you Sammie-caramel-covered-onions," Tony said.
"What, you've never heard of caramelized onions," Sam asked with a smile.
"Guys," Natasha said over Tony's response, "you're clogging up the comms system. Can't you annoy the hell out of each other some other time?"
"Sure thing," Tony said. The line went silent and Sam sighed. She was stationed at least a mile and a half away from the nearest team member, Bruce. Normally Bruce was the farthest out so that he could Hulk out at just the right time. Translation: she was as far away from the action as they could get her.
As annoyed as she was, Sam did her best to take a deep breath and focus on surveillance. This was her first day back. Of course they wouldn't let her in the action just yet; they had just barely let her before this whole mess happened. She knew pushing it wouldn't help much.
Sam settled into her spot, binoculars in hand. She was actually at the top of a large hill looking down on some huge complex in the Tennessee backwoods. It looked like some old moonshine facility from one of her old textbooks. They were always stationed way out in the middle of nowhere without any connecting roads. It was at least two miles to the nearest road, and even then it was a little gravel drive through the woods. And by woods, Sam meant forest. There were trees everywhere. The only way she got this high was by following some game trail up the side. In order to get a good view, Sam had to climb.
Climbing trees was not Sam's favorite thing in the whole wide world. Sure, she was from Indiana. Didn't mean she was a squirrel. Scale a building? Sure. Climb a tree? Pass.
Sam had climbed this particular tree about twenty feet up when she decided she had a nice enough view. She wrapped one leg around a branch for support and leaned back against the trunk while quickly surveying the area. There wasn't anyone coming; Sam doubted there would be.
Given the fact that this job was purely to babysit her and keep her out of their hair, Sam whipped out a crossword and a pen. She figured she had at least a good hour or so to commit to being stuck in a tree.
Sam was in the midst of stretching and stifling a yawn when she heard it. There was a rustling nearby. Tensing, Sam pulled out her gun and pointed it in the direction of some bushes. She waited with precise aim as a group of deer ran through.
"Well, there's the highlight of my day," Sam muttered as she set her gun down. She stopped for a second, but she remembered she had turned the speaker off of her comms system. They were still going on in the background, but she had nothing to add. Might as well make sure they didn't hear her wondering aloud what word could fill six letters for "to cause grievance" or if Rebecca Black really deserved to be an answer.
Sam suddenly had a good answer for that six letter blank: annoy. That summed up how she felt right now perfectly. She picked up her crossword and then went to reach for her pen and ended up touching nothing but bark. She checked every pocket, double checked her crossword, and finally cussed. "You have got to be kidding me."
It may have been futile at twenty feet up, but Sam leaned over a branch and stared at the ground. She was sure that she would see the faint white of her pen around all of the leaves and muddy area, taunting her. Life was cruel.
Sam was scanning the ground beneath her when she saw something that caught her eye. A scrap of red was poking out underneath a small bush, exactly near where the deer had run by. She looked at her watch; there was still a lot of time to kill. She figured she could hop down, figure out what it was, and then grab her pen and climb back up.
The term hop is entirely relative. In actuality, Sam maneuvered her way down between branches and may or may not have fallen a few feet at the very end. On the plus side, as she picked herself off the ground she found her missing pen. Brushing off the dirt on her knees, she got up and walked over to where she thought she saw the red. She was almost to the bush when it started moving.
Almost positive it was yet another furry woodland creature, Sam wasn't too concerned. Still, she figured better safe than sorry and ducked behind a tree. The bush started to rise up, and the more she watched the more Sam realized it was a hidden door. The scrap of red was a small flag attached to it to locate it in the wild. It was almost a perfect match for the shirt of the man climbing out of it.
A little late, Sam realized the trail she followed up the hill probably wasn't from a deer. She kicked herself a little. What had she learned in American History? A lot of the old moonshiners in the Appalachian Mountains had secret tunnels caused by mining shafts to escape. Wonderful. As great as this information was, it didn't help her with the hulking man that just crawled out of the earth.
Sam reached for her gun and found nothing. That's when she remembered that she conveniently left it up in the tree. This day was going splendid. The man had nearly reached her hiding spot and there was nowhere else Sam could go without being seen. Sighing, she checked her pockets; she had a smaller pocket knife, some lip gloss, thirty two cents, some extra hair bands, and her pen. Where was MacGyver when you needed him?
Sighing, Sam took out the pocket knife. She normally kept at least three knives on her at all times, but she honestly wasn't expecting much action. As much as she loved her knives, she left them back at the tower to show her good intentions of not causing trouble. If she had kept her gun on her, this wouldn't be a problem.
Big hulking man chose that moment to stumble out near her tree, and Sam sprang. In the end she didn't need the pocket knife. After three concise hits to his groin, stomach and head he was passed out on the ground. She found some zip ties sticking out of his pocket and tied him up quickly before dragging his unconscious body behind another tree out of the way and throwing some old leaves on him.
"Uh, guys," Sam said as she turned her earpiece back on. "We have a small problem."
"It might have to wait," Clint replied. "Half of these guys just disappeared on us."
Sam eyed the tunnel opening in front of her and she could hear the far off sound of feet echoing inside. "Yeah, no, we have a major problem. They're coming out of a tunnel about a mile and a half north of the building. You might want to get up here five minutes ago."
This time Sam scaled the tree in half the time it had originally taken her. Her gun was loaded and ready, but she only had about eight bullets inside. Even if she was a perfect shot, which she only had about an 88% hit rate, there was no way she was going to take them all down.
The earpiece was a buzz of activity as they moved in to attack the building and Steve tried to get someone out to Sam. She figured she could hold them off in the tunnels as best she could before someone got there. All she had to do was stay hidden and confuse them long enough for some back up to arrive. How ironic that the "back up" needs back up.
She waited for the first head to pop up out of the shaft and then fired. She got him by his ear, she thought. It didn't look like a kill shot. It was, however, powerful enough to cause them to duck back into the hole. She quickly jumped into another branch higher up while she had a chance.
As quickly as she got settled in a separate area a man popped out, gun at the ready. While he was facing the other way, Sam shot again. This shot landed in his right thigh, and he went down. He fired off several more shots before retreating. Sam jumped from branch to branch, barely catching a hold of the next one. She slipped on one of the branches and fell, catching hold of a lower limb one-handed. Her head banged into the side of the tree and she scrambled up in an entirely different tree before it was too late.
Two more men climbed out this time, and as Sam fired she managed to kill one man and injure the other in his shoulder. Unfortunately, the second man found her location in the leafy canopy and fired directly at her. Sam ducked and when he was out of ammo she fired again, this time for good.
This time Sam climbed further up and to the left where she was more sheltered. She reached up to her ear to feel for her comms system to ask where the hell everyone else was. Just her luck, it wasn't there. It must have fallen out when she lost her footing.
Cursing, Sam used her remaining three bullets on the next few men to come out of the tunnel. This was it. While Sam jumped once again to a different spot, this time deciding to climb higher up to get out of sight, she considered her options. The gun was now useless unless she decided to throw it at someone. Meanwhile, the men still climbing out of the tunnel looked to have no such handicap; once they realized there was no more gunfire they started pouring out until about fifteen had reached the surface and fanned out, staring up at the trees.
She rubbed her hand over her face and hoped someone would get here soon. They didn't actually have Sam's location. She had just given them a rough estimate, because at the time it wasn't very relevant. Someone would give her hell about that later; most likely Steve. Nothing could be done about that right now.
Sam dug into her pockets. Maybe there was something she could do. Reaching into her pockets she pulled out her hair bands; she could really use a distraction. Unfortunately, even shooting them like a rubber band wouldn't provide much help. But maybe there was a different way to use them.
Sam stretched the hair band across her thumb and index finger, and then grabbed a penny out of her pocket. The last time she had used a sling shot was in a physics class sophomore year; she hoped physics hadn't changed that much. Creating as much tension as she could, she let the penny fly at another tree about twenty yards down. It lost a lot of height, but it still produced an audible noise as it hit the leaves and made them rustle.
It seemed like her plan worked. She heard one of the men call out below and they headed off towards the tree. She waited until most of them were close enough to the other tree, then tried to scurry into the next tree branch. Once she was there, she took out a nickel and tried the same trick. This time she aimed more to the right, making them think she was heading further into the woods.
The group was almost solely focused on the trail Sam had set up and she figured it was now or never. She steadied herself and walked further out onto the limb, stretching to reach the next tree. However, as she got closer to the edge of the woods the trees grew further apart. Sam was having definite issues getting into the next tree.
Taking a deep breath, Sam made a leap of faith. She drew out a long breath as her foot touched down on the branch beneath her and slipped on some moss. Yelping, she grabbed hold of another branch and steadied herself.
It was too late. Someone below had caught her movement. She heard the men move below her. Damn it. Making a quick decision, she climbed higher rather taking chances getting to another tree. Hopefully she could hide from them the farther up she went.
They were around the base of the tree peering up at her; she could see them. They most likely wouldn't shoot directly upward, so she had about twenty seconds or so to get a little higher. Sam could hear them shouting, but she didn't pay attention to it. She was more focused on the tree. Luckily, she was paying attention so she wasn't caught off guard when the branch snapped beneath her; she had climbed too far. She was almost forty feet up in this , this was it.
The shouting beneath her got louder, and then she noticed another noise: wood being snapped in half and the angry roars of something barreling towards them. A darker green blur exploded below her and suddenly the Hulk was tearing through the men like rag dolls. It was heartwarming, yet frightening.
Frightening won out in the end. On his way, the Hulk happened to snap a tree in half, which in turn knocked into the tree she was currently perched in. She heard a groaning sound and closed her eyes, but it was too late. The tree started tilting and Sam decided to work her way further up the tree. She was hanging on to the highest point she could reach as she heard a deep cracking noise beneath her and the tilting motion accelerated until she was hurdling directly at the ground.
When she was only ten feet from the ground Sam leaped out as far as she could and rolled away from the tree. Scratches covered anywhere her skin was exposed, but she was otherwise unharmed. She took a moment to lay there and finish the slide show presentation of her life flashing before her eyes before slowly picking herself up off the ground. She was only twenty yards away from the Hulk smashing through the opposing forces.
Sam decided the best thing to do in this situation was probably to make a quick exit. Hulk didn't exactly need any help. She ran out of the woods and into the taller grass. It was at this time that she decided to remind herself "I'm technically a SHIELD agent". It was important to remember that after, you know, using hair bands and pennies in the field.
"Having troubles," a voice called from above her. Stark was just hovering there in his Iron Man suit.
Sam rolled her eyes and Tony came down to meet her. "Hold on tight. Looks like you're gonna fly," he said with a grin and lowered his mask.
"I- what, no," Sam said as Tony grabbed her and they flew back to the main meeting point.
Sam was used to teleporting. It was an odd feeling, like being squeezed through a cold, dark place. Flying was the exact opposite. She felt completely exposed, probably because she was. It was still in the afternoon so the sky was nice and bright, but it was slightly chilly.
They landed near a very angry looking Steve. "You didn't keep radio contact," he started. Make that extremely angry.
"I'm sorry; my earpiece fell out in the middle of everything and I couldn't reach it," Sam said. That was literally her only tie to the team- her cell phone wasn't on her during missions. No one's were, as they could be distracting or cause too much noise or light.
Steve sighed. "Make sure it doesn't happen again." Then he turned around to help wrap everything else up. They had finished taking over the building and were about to turn it over to other SHIELD agents so that they could leave.
A few minutes later Bruce walked up fully restored. Sam made sure to thank him, or the Hulk really, for his intervention. Bruce simply smiled and told her not to mention it before making sure she didn't get hurt by jumping out of the tree. The rest of the team went about their business. The ride back to the base was relatively quiet, but Sam knew this wasn't the last she would hear about this; just wait until they were debriefing.
Really, Sam couldn't be blamed for any of this. The circumstances were out of her control. Still, it was upsetting that this happened directly after Sam got back. She was sure she could talk them into keeping her in the field, but it would take a little effort.
Sam rubbed at the spot on her forehead where a headache was starting to form. It was going to be a long debriefing.