A/N: Okay, folks! Sorry that it has taken me so long to update. It's been a long couple of weeks and my muse disappeared for a bit. Hopefully, I can make up for the lengthy hiatus I took with this extra long chapter. Please let me know what I can do to improve my writing. Thanks!
Into the New World
Chapter 11
Even though it was only seven in the morning, everyone was up and running. The alarms blaring throughout the Stark mansion weren't exactly subtle.
Amanda's eyes sprang open but it only took a second for them to focus. A foreign arm was around her waist. Then it all clicked. She was in the weight room, in the boxing ring, and the arm was attached to Captain Rogers. She started to move and the foreign arm retracted toward its owner. Sitting up, Amanda looked around and Captain Rogers did the same.
Both of them had to go. There was no time to process what had happened; the world was at stake.
Amanda chose not to say anything. She simply stood up, climbed between the ropes and abandoned the weight room. She hadn't even stopped for her shoes.
It took half a second longer for the Captain to process the situation and the obnoxiously loud alarms at such an obnoxiously early hour, but he followed Amanda out the door shortly after.
Steve climbed out of the ring and left the room and he thought he could catch up with Amanda, but the brunette agent that he'd fallen asleep with last night was out of sight.
"Captain Rogers," JARVIS said. "You will find your suit in the closet to your immediate left. Please change and join the others in the surveillance room."
The AI's voice startled Steve, but he quickly recognized it.
"To my left?"
"Yes, sir," JARVIS replied.
Steve didn't remember putting his suit in this particular suit in this particular hallway closet, or any hallway closet for that matter. However, he opened the door and found his suit, helmet, and shield.
"Please, Captain, quickly," JARVIS urged him.
Steve thought he sensed a little bit of exasperation out of the AI's voice, but he couldn't be sure. Could computers sound exasperated?
Steve stepped inside the closet for privacy, and slipped into his suit. A minute later, Steve was following JARVIS' directions to join the rest of the team.
The door to a high security room slid open once Steve verified his identity. SHIELD agents and the other Avengers team members stood around the room while high tech equipment lined the walls.
Steve had thought there was a rush, but they all seemed to be twiddling their thumbs. The alarms were still going off, but no one was moving.
"Ugh, it's just Rogers," Hawkeye announced.
Clearly, they were waiting for someone else.
"What are we waiting for?" Steve asked. He was dressed and ready to go.
"We don't have any orders," Tony said. "Can't go anywhere if we don't know what's going on."
"Or where it's going on," Natasha said.
Tony Stark looked at the man in the American flag suit curiously. Rogers was looking at Amanda, who was staring at the toes of her boots.
Steve tore himself away from looking at Amanda in order to focus on the task at hand. "Shouldn't someone be giving out orders? Someone would have had to raise the alarms."
No one answered him because as soon as he finished his question, the door slid open. Director Nick Fury casually strolled into the room.
The director stopped once he stood in front of the group and looked at them with his one eye.
"Good morning," he announced.
"Good morning?" Bruce Banner asked confusedly from his corner.
"Yes, good morning, team," Fury said again. "JARVIS, full response time?"
"Full team response time: sixty four seconds," JARVIS replied a moment later.
"Sixty four seconds, hmmm, too long," Fury said.
"Director Fury, where will we be off too? Shall we be on our way?"
"Yeah, shouldn't we be in some kind of hurry?" Dr. Banner asked, a vein dangerously starting to pulse in his neck.
"You aren't going anywhere, ladies and gentlemen," Nick said. "This was a test."
A distinct glow of green was clear in Bruce Banner's face and Tony Stark's mask slid back to reveal an equally red face.
"A test?" Tony asked, angrily.
"This was only a drill, folks. A drill all of you failed," Fury announced. "Response time needs to be cut to about nineteen seconds."
"Are you kidding me?" Tony yelled. "I let you use my house for this project of yours and agree to be part of this team and you run a freaking fire drill? At seven in the freaking morning?"
"I have it on good authority that you were already awake," Fury pointed out.
"JARVIS! You and I will be having some words!" Tony said. "Is there anything else you'd like to chat about or am I free to go? I have a company to run."
"You are free to go, Mr. Stark," Fury said evenly.
Tony's mask came back down over his angry face and he began his Iron Man march out of the room.
"I'm glad to see you could control that rage, Dr. Banner. How are you feeling now?" Fury asked.
"Uh, I don't really know how to answer that right now," Bruce replied. "So, I think I'm just gonna go."
Fury nodded and Banner tried as calmly as possible to exit the room.
"Captain Rogers, you were able to find your suit and get here, although, had you been asleep in your room, it would have been much more expedient," Fury said. "Cap, you're dismissed. You, too, Thor."
Steve was confused as hell as to what was going on, but he didn't say anything. He thought interjecting might make the director include more details and embarrass him and Amanda. The captain removed his helmet and silently exited the room right behind Thor.
"Hawkeye, Natasha, you're also good to go," Fury said. "I'd like to speak with Agent Carter."
Amanda wanted to follow behind them. Nat gave her one last sympathetic look as she walked out. The metal door slid shut and then it was just Fury and Amanda.
"Just yell at me, already," Amanda said.
"Why would I yell at you, Carter?" he asked, eyeing her with the one eye.
"Because…" she started.
"Because you were sleeping in a boxing ring with Captain America?" Fury said.
"Uh, yeah, that pretty much covers it," Amanda said.
"I'm not going to yell at you. What I am going to say is, be cautious. Use better judgment that what you showed last night."
"I…"
"Believe me, we can all tell that there is a physical attraction between you and Rogers," Fury said to her surprise and embarrassment. "Don't let it affect your judgment. You're one of the best agents I've got. I can't have either of you compromised."
Fury paused for a moment to let it sink in.
"And before you say anything, I had this same discussion with Natasha and Clint," Fury said.
"Well, last night was an accident…"
"As much as I want to believe that, Carter, I've seen otherwise," Fury said.
"Director Fury, I know how important this initiative is, for us, and the world," Amanda said. "How I feel or don't feel is not going to affect the overall intentions of the work we're doing. Can I go now?"
Fury sat down in a computer chair and looked at her. He knew better, and just because she was saying one thing, didn't mean he believed her.
Amanda waited expectantly for a response. She wanted more than anything to be out of this room.
"Amanda, I'm not saying this to pick on you or embarrass you or make you choose something over another," Fury said. "I'm telling you to be careful."
It was so uncharacteristic of Nick Fury that Amanda was rendered completely speechless. Fury didn't talk about emotions. He didn't talk about what he was talking about. It confused her and Amanda just wanted to go away. She wanted to be anywhere else in the world.
"I have to go," Amanda said.
This time, she didn't wait for a response; Amanda crossed the room and left.
"Doctor Carter," JARVIS' voice startled her once she was out in the hall. "Mr. Stark would like to speak with you."
"Oh, does he now? Where is he?" Amanda asked.
"He's in his lab," JARVIS said. "And he has your cell phone."
"Of course he does," Amanda replied. "Do me a favor; don't tell him I'm on my way."
…
Steve Rogers made his way back to his room. He was a bit stiff from sleeping in the boxing ring and thought maybe he should get cleaned up for the day.
He didn't realize that when he joined the initiative, that there were going to be so many conflicting personalities. Over the course of the last week or so, he'd learned bits and pieces about the others in the group.
As he started to shave, Steve mentally mapped out each of his teammates.
Tony Stark. Steve didn't really know what to think of him. He was the son of one of his good friends from 70 years ago. He was rich and oh, man, was he smart. But the only reason he was part of this was because he built some kind of suit that Steve had come into limited contact with.
Thor. It was hard for Steve to believe that this was truly a god from another realm. But once he started to talk to him more, he was just as out of touch with 2012 as he was. His demeanor and his language…he was definitely from out of this world.
Doctor Banner. His strength came from a military experiment, just like Steve. However, there was some kind of accident and it turned him into this green raging monster that seems to make him more of a liability than teammate. Steve was told that Banner had spent years trying to be able to calm his nerves and keep emotions in check to keep him from becoming the Hulk. However, the simple fact that he had gone on a rampage through the city only a few days ago, Steve wasn't so sure to trust him. He was just grateful that it hadn't happened to him.
Steve finished shaving and got into the shower. He just felt like it was going to be a long day.
…
Amanda let herself into Tony Stark's lab after staring at his back through the glass wall. He had her cell phone in there and was doing something to it. She very much didn't like that. But how much trouble could she have gotten herself into? She had just gotten the phone.
"I wondered when you were going to come in," Tony said. "I thought you might just stare at me."
"Why do you have my phone?" she asked, ignoring his previous statement.
"I have your high heels, too," he said, pointing to another table. "I retrieved them from your makeshift bedroom."
Amanda rolled her eyes.
"How did you know?"
"JARVIS can tell me what time you went in there and can tell me exactly what you all talked about. I didn't see the point in going into that much research," he said, turning around to face her.
He had his normal facial hair, but it was surrounded by a five o'clock shadow.
"You were up all night," Amanda deduced.
"I thought it might be a good idea to find out who tried to make my building go 'boom'," Tony said in a sarcastic tone.
"Were you successful?" Amanda asked as she peered over his shoulder.
"That's how I knew where you were. You looked pretty comfortable wrapped up in Cap's arms, though, so I didn't wake you," Tony said, meeting her gaze over his shoulder. "I asked JARVIS to find you once you weren't answering your cell phone," he said as a response to her dirty look.
"Can we just stick to the point…what did your research show?"
Tony turned back to his computer and brought up a series of 3D images and charts. The room itself began to fill with information. Amanda waited for the man to start walking her through each piece.
"Well, testing the samples…it matches the technology from several decades past," he said with a flourish of his hand to make a timeline move.
"So, Steve was right?" Amanda said, to Tony's dismay. He was not pleased that he had to do all this research to find out the 90 year old man was right. "But HYDRA was disbanded and destroyed. I've done the research about this. It's…"
"Honey, it's similar to that of the technology of HYDRA…the research doesn't lie," Tony said. "But I'm not one hundred percent sure it's HYDRA."
"You seem pretty calm about this," Amanda said. "Did Pepper slip tranquilizers in your tea?"
"With Fury pulling this fire drill shit this morning, I am just not sure that it's real either. And no, Pepper quit slipping drugs in my tea; I started to be able to taste them."
"Do you really think that my boss would have gone to the trouble of blowing up part of your building?" Amanda asked. "Oh, shit, did I have any missed calls? My aunt is probably going crazy."
Tony finally passed the phone to her. There were only the missed calls from him.
Amanda didn't want her to worry, so she dialed the number of her aunt's cell phone and waited for the woman to pick up; effectively forgetting about Tony's statement of Fury blowing up Stark Industries' lobby.
…
The cell phone in her coat pocket began to ring; startling Peggy from her sleep. Peggy desperately wanted to answer it, but her hands were bound behind her.
"Get the phone. Find out who it is," a female's voice ordered.
The man in the room did as he was ordered and he read the caller ID display.
"Mandy," he said around a thick accent.
The female smiled a devilish smile. "Hold the phone up so Ms. Carter can ask her and the captain to meet her for lunch. And if you say anything other than that, you'll die and we'll make sure Mandy does, too."
A/N: Please review. And thank you to all of my wonderful readers. I am truly sorry that it has taken me so long to get this going again.
