Chapter 7

Sean rolled up to the runway with Steve in the passenger seat of his truck. They parked and grabbed their stuff, mainly just changes of clothes and toothbrushes stuffed in duffel bags. The only item other than that was Sean's sword.

"You still have that thing?" Steve asked.

"Well, after seventy years, you get kind of attached."

Sean slung it over his shoulder along with his bag and they proceeded. Off in the distance, they could see Agent Coulson standing in front of the ramp of the quinjet.

"Forewarning, this guy is a huge Captain America fanboy. I thought he was geeky with me, and I'm not even the title character," Sean explained.

"I'll keep that in mind," Steve smirked as they crossed the hot tarmac of the runway.

Coulson smiled and held out his hand for Steve to shake. "Phil Coulson, it's an honor, Captain."

"Pleasure," replied Steve.

"Please, we're short on time," said Coulson as he ushered them into the quinjet.

Steve and Sean sat in the chairs on the left, while Coulson sat in a communications chair. Sean produced a glass tablet and pulled up all the information on the other recruits. "Fury didn't have to tell me, cause I'm pretty sure I already know, but he's putting a team together and I'm fairly certain that he wants you as the leader."

Steve's eyebrows rose in surprise. He hadn't been out of the ice for a month yet and he was already leading a team of enhanced individuals. Sean handed the tablet to Steve and let him read and watch while Sean checked his gear.

As he was cleaning his sword, Coulson took off the headphones and moved over to Steve. "So this Dr. Banner was trying to recreate the serum they used on me and Sean?" Steve asked.

Coulson nodded. "A lot of people were. You two were the world's first superheroes. Banner thought gamma radiation could hold the key to unlocking Erskine's original formula."

"Didn't really go his way, did it?" asked Steve as he watched the Hulk rip apart a tank.

"Not so much," Coulson smirked. "When he's not that thing, though, guy's like a Stephen Hawking." At Steve's confused glance, "He's like a smart person."

"I gotta say, it's an honor to meet you officially. I sort of met you, I mean, I watched you while you were sleeping," Coulson gushed.

Steve looked down awkwardly. Great job, Phil, thought Sean.

"I mean, I was-I was present while you were unconscious from the ice. You know, it's really just a-just a huge honor to have you on board." Coulson verbally stumbled as Steve rose and put his hand on the hull of the jet, looking out of the window. Coulson mimicked the action opposite him.

Quality save, Sean thought again.

"Well, I hope I'm the man for the job," said Steve as he stared towards the horizon.

"Oh, you are. Absolutely. Uh, we've made some modifications to the uniform. I had a little design input," Coulson assured.

"The uniform? Aren't the stars and stripes a little...old fashioned?" Steve asked. Sean snorted. Steve had no idea. Sean had seen pictures of the new uniform, and he felt bad for Steve.

"Everything that's happening, the things that are about to come to light, people might just need a little old fashioned," Coulson replied.


The quinjet landed smoothly on the SHIELD carrier's runway, and Sean hit the button to lower the ramp. Stepping off, they were greeted by a redhead with a red tank top under a black leather jacket on top of jeans.

"Agent Romanoff. This is Captain Rogers," Coulson Introduced.

"Don't forget Lieutenant Rogers," Sean reminded.

"Ma'am," Steve said politely.

"Hi," was all Steve got from Romanoff. "They need you on the bridge, they're starting the phase trace."

"See you there," said Coulson before heading towards the bridge.

"You know you don't have to ignore me every time you see me," said Sean as he crossed his arms.

Romanoff just rolled her eyes before walking with Steve, Sean behind them.

"It was quite the buzz around here, finding you in the ice. I thought Coulson was gonna swoon. Did he ask you to sign his Captain America trading cards, yet?" she asked.

"Trading cards?" questioned Steve.

She nodded. "They're vintage, he's very proud."

Steve looked up to see a middle-aged man with slightly gray hair and a grayish-brown suit on top of a purple shirt awkwardly avoiding the ship's personnel as they walked past him. He stood out like a sore thumb. "Dr. Banner!"

Banner looked up and approached. "Oh, yeah, hi. They told me you'd be coming," he said as he shook Steve's hand.

"Word is you can find the cube," Steve remarked.

"Is that the only word of me?" asked Banner quietly.

"Only word I care about," confirmed Steve.

There's that natural leadership of his. Maybe this won't be so hard after all, thought Sean as he stood next to Natasha.

Banner nodded. "Must be strange for you, all of this," he said, gesturing around him at the men working and jogging in formation.

"Well, this is actually kind of familiar," Steve replied.

"You forget we were in the army for 2 years during World War 2," said Sean as he held his hand out to Banner.

"So things haven't changed?" inquired Banner.

Sean shrugged. "Just the technology."

"Gentlemen, you might wanna step inside in a minute. It's gonna get a little hard to breathe," informed Romanoff.

They heard alerts going off as men began to strap down the quinjets and a metallic noise followed by the hum of power flow.

"Is this a submarine?" Steve started walking towards the edge, and Banner followed.

"Really? They want me in a submerged, pressurized metal container?" asked Banner skeptically.

Natasha smirked as she looked at Sean. "Your brother's an old man."

"So am I," he reminded.

Sean watched as Steve and Banner saw the blades begin to rotate as they rose out of the ocean. As the helicarrier began to ascend from the water, Sean heard Banner yell something over the wind.

"Oh no, this is much worse!"

Steve looked back at Sean, who simply shrugged and jerked his head towards the bridge, where Natasha led them through the metal hallways and into a large room. The entire wall in front of them was made of glass, clearly for viewing. There were rows upon rows of people in blue SHIELD tech uniforms sitting at computers, all monitoring various statistics about the carrier. Raised up on a deck in the center was a large conference table, and behind that, Fury was standing at two control panels with handles, a hand on each one.

Sean watched as Steve took in the sight before him. He'd never seen something so organized. Maybe he lost that bet with Fury, Sean thought. Sure enough, when Fury turned around, Steve walked up to him, pulled out his wallet, and handed the man a ten dollar bill. Fury took it and Steve walked past him to stand on the walkway.

Sean definitely didn't miss the look Maria Hill gave Steve as she studied him. He doesn't even have to try anymore, does he? Sean mentally sighed.

Fury approached Banner and held out his hand. "Doctor, thank you for coming."

Banner took is sheepishly. "Thanks for asking nicely. So, uh, how long am I staying?"

"Once we get our hands on the Tesseract, you're in the wind," answered Fury.

"And where are you with that?" Banner asked.

Fury pointed to Coulson, who was monitoring a section of the SHIELD staff. "We're sweeping every wirelessly accessible camera on the planet. Cell phones, laptops, if it's connected to a satellite, it's eyes and ears for us."

Sean watched Steve's judging expression. Clearly, he thought it was a breach of privacy mto monitor one's phones and cameras like that.

"That's still not gonna find him in time," stated Romanoff from one of the desks, where she was looking at a photo of a man with brown hair and a large nose.

"You have to narrow your field. How many spectrometers do you have access to?" asked Banner.

"How many are there?" Fury returned.

"Call every lab you know. Tell them to put the spectrometers on the roof and calibrate for gamma rays. I'll work out a tracking algorithm and basic cluster recognition. At least we could rule out a few places," replied Banner. "Do you have somewhere for me to work?"

"Agent Romanoff, would you show Dr. Banner to his laboratory, please?" asked Fury.

"You're gonna love it, Doc, you got all the toys," she said as she passed him, leading him from the room.


"I mean, if it's not too much trouble," Coulson said politely.

"No, no, it's fine," Steve replied.

Sean chuckled. Coulson had finally worked up the courage to ask Steve to sign his Captain America trading cards.

"It's a vintage set. Took me a couple of years to collect them all. Near mint. Slight foxing around the edges, but-" Coulson was interrupted by alerts going off at one of the nearby stations.

"We got a hit. 67% match," the agent at the desk announced. "Wait, cross-match, 79%."

"Location?" asked Coulson as he walked over.

"Stuttgart, Germany, 28 Konigstrasse."

"He's not exactly hiding," remarked Coulson.

Sean looked at Fury. "Captain. Lieutenant. You're up."

Steve and Sean nodded and took off to the armory. Sean grabbed his suit and quickly put it on, the familiar gray and blue sending a reassuring feeling as he strapped on his sword. Steve took longer, approaching the glass display case that his new uniform was being kept in.

This one was almost as spangly as the one they'd worn during their war bond campaign back in '43. The shield noticeably comforted Steve as he placed it on his arm, however.

"Feel good?" asked Sean.

Steve nodded. "Pretty nostalgic."

Sean laughed. "You got that right, pal. I haven't suited up with you in seventy years."

The brothers were interrupted by Natasha when she poked her head in. "I'm gonna be on the jet with you two, Sean, can you fly while I run copilot?"

Sean nodded and they followed Natasha down to the hangar.


Sean was flying slowly through the clouds as to not alert Loki to their presence. When they were directly over the demonstration Loki was having, Sean opened the ramp, and Steve jumped out. He landed directly in front of an old man that Loki was fixing to blast into oblivion with his staff, reflecting the damage back at him.

"You know, the last time I was in Germany, and saw a man standing above everybody else, we ended up disagreeing," Sean heard Steve say through his comm.

"The soldier. The man out of time," laughed Loki in response.

"I'm not the one who's out of time," Steve enlightened as Romanoff dropped the quinjet's gun and used the intercom. "Loki, drop the weapon and stand down."

They were answered by a shot from Loki's sceptre, and Sean quickly swerved left to avoid it. He kept an eye on Steve through the fight. He was still using a '40's boxing style, causing him to get thrown around a lot by the Asgardian.

"Remind me to teach him martial arts when all this is over," Sean said to Romanoff, who simply nodded.

"Guy's all over the place," she said, referring to the multiple Loki's they could see in the courtyard.

Suddenly, Sean heard AC/DC's Shoot to Thrill playing in the background of his headset when a voice spoke. "Agent Romanoff, you miss me?"

Sean rolled his eyes when their screen said in large red letters 'PA Override', but Natasha just smirked. Shoot to Thrill was now playing full blast as Stark in his red and gold suit came into view. He blasted Loki, sending him flying, before landing and training his weapons on him. "Make a move, reindeer games."

Sean let out a bark of laughter. Loki did look somewhat like a reindeer with those big ass horns on his helmet. The Asgardian held up his hands in surrender. "Good move," Stark said as Steve joined him after retrieving his shield.

"Mr. Stark," Steve said.

"Cap'n," Stark acknowledged.

Sean took this opportunity to ease the jet down in the middle of the courtyard, allowing Steve and Tony to get Loki on board before they took off again.

"He saying anything?" Fury asked over the radio.

"Not a word," replied Natasha.

"Just get him here. We're low on time."

Sean put the jet on autopilot and joined Steve and Tony in the back.

"Stark, we've never met. Sean Rogers," he introduced, offering Tony a hand.

Tony took it, shaking with his large, metal hand. "I know who you are. My dad would never shut up about the two of you."

Steve held up a hand, a signal to stop. "No small talk for now. Something's not right here. I don't like it."

"What? Rock of Ages giving up so easily?" asked Tony.

"But I don't remember it being that easy. This guy packs a wallop," Steve said.

Tony looked at Sean and smirked before turning back to Steve. "Still, you are pretty spry for an older fellow. What's your thing, pilates?"

"What?"

"It's like calisthenics. You might have missed a few things, you know, doing time as a Capsicle," Tony joked.

Steve looked at him, utter disdain on his face. "Fury didn't tell us he was calling you in," Sean said, trying to ease the tension.

"Yeah, there's a lot of things Fury doesn't tell you," Tony said as a thunderstorm suddenly materialized.

"Where's this coming from?" asked Natasha.

The three of them turned to look at Loki, who was staring at the sky with a look of fear on his face. "What's the matter? Scared of a little lightning?" asked Steve.

"I'm not overly fond of what follows," came the reply.

Steve and Tony looked at eachother warily at the Asgardian's cryptic statement. Sean's eyebrows rose in recognition. "Oh, shit. I know what's coming."

As if on queue, something impacted the jet, and caused major turbulence. Sean moved back into the pilot's chair and resumed control of the jet, making sure it didn't fall out of the sky.

Tony put his helmet on and opened the ramp. "What are you doing?" Steve asked.

Tony stopped as a blonde man with a red cape and a black leather tunic landed on the ramp. He had a large, rectangular hammer in his hand, which he used to bat Tony aside, him landing on Steve, before grabbing Loki by the neck and flying out.

"And now there's that guy," Tony remarked as he stood up.

"Another Asgardian?" asked Natasha from the copilot's chair.

"Think that guy's a friendly?" asked Steve as he stood.

"Doesn't matter. If he frees Loki or kills him, the Tesseract's lost," Tony said as he walked towards the back of the jet.

"Stark, we need a plan of attack," Steve cautioned.

"I have a plan, attack," Tony said as he flew out of the jet in pursuit of Loki.

Steve sighed angrily and grabbed a parachute from the wall. "I'd sit this one out, Cap," cautioned Natasha.

"I don't see how I can," replied Steve, strapping on the parachute.

"These guys come from legends, they're basically gods," Natasha emphasized.

"There's only one God, ma'am. And I'm pretty sure he doesn't dress like that," Steve said as he jumped out the back of the jet.

"True that," Sean said as he made a U-turn in the jet to follow Stark.

Stark's location was changing rapidly, Sean realized. He must be in pursuit of Thor, who can also fly, he thought.

Finally, they came to a halt amidst a large clump of trees, and Steve was slowly closing in. By the time Sean had the jet on the ground, the three of them seemed to have sorted things out, and they once again put Loki in a chair.

"Thor," Sean said.

"Ah, the man with the sword. You will forgive me, I have forgotten your name," said the blonde Asgardian.

"Sean Rogers. The guy with the shield is my brother, Steve," replied the brown-headed super soldier.

"I am honored to meet you," Thor replied.