MAILBAG (yes I'm doing it first this time)

Reader 1, Chapter 28

5 (metaphorical) bucks that they crash in that car.

Good guess! But trust me, it's a lot darker than that...

CrazyCountryGirl12

aww!im criying. :(

Wow. Thanks for the feedback! While I hate making people upset, I love that MY WORDS have the power to make people feel such deep emotion. Your response is a really great complement to me, and says I'm doing something right as a writer, so thank you! :)


She looked up from the laptop she'd been supplied, quietly reconfiguring the preferances. A few short cuts here, an installation of a few programs she'd written to increase productivity- things to make her faster, more efficient.

Nick Fury slid into his seat across the desk from her, hands folded, as he scrutinized her carefully.

"Are you ready?"

She nodded. "Anytime. Give me the info, what I need to attack..."

Fury frowned. "There's been a change of plans. We discovered breech- they've weakened their signal. We're going to need to get in closer to the signal- you're going to have to move locations."

She blinked, digesting the information.

"Can you do that?" he eyed her seriously- he": seen her freeze up slightly. She was the most capable person they had- but if she didn't feel capable, he had some who weren't as well versed but more confident.

She swallowed, nodding. "I can do it."

"There is no backing out of this. Once you're dropped- you won't be able to quit. Once the defenses are down, you need to keep attacking- people will die if you botch this."

"I can handle it. The attacks won't let up- I'll keep the security off them. How long will they need?"

"Half an hour at most."

She nodded, seeing the laptop was done being configured and quietly closing it before she stood.

She slid into the back of the black Hummer quietly, mouth set in a firm line as she accepted the breifcase bearing the information she needed.

The commlink to her left crackled, and Fury's voice filled the interior of the vehicle.

"Good luck."

They were gone.

It took over an hour to get there. She couldn't see out the bullet-proof, tinted windows, and it left her alone in her own mind. Everything was whirling through her head, then- the sleepless nights, the nameless pain she felt in flashes but couldn't explain or remember, the way she'd been so horrible to Steve... But the thought of Tony, lying still on a hospital bed, steeled her against all fear and self doubt. She could DO this- Tony would've done it. And she could step in in his stead- and maybe prove to everyone else that she wasn't a traitor.

She felt an eerie calm- the most calm she'd been in the two weeks since she'd supposedly 'returned' from the land of unidentifiable pain. The nightmares weren't haunting her anymore, the exhaustion had slipped away- it was on some seperate tier of existence right now.

It reminded her of something she'd heard Thor say, some Asgardian proverb.

"One does not know the strength they posess until they are called upon to use it."

She was roughly jerked out of her reverie when the hummer came to a stop, and the driver- a lower agent, she assumed, got out. She took it as her cue, reaching for the door handle, but he'd opened the door before she could.

His brown eyes met her own and he looked at her seriously. "Keep your head down." he ordered.

Her eyes widened when, behind him, she saw at least half a dozen SHEILD agents equipped with rifles standing at the ready. A flash of fear hit when she realized she'd been followed by a motorcade- was she really that valuable to the opperation? A splash of fear was erased by grim determination as she was escorted into the middle of the group, towards a concrete building.

The flourescent lights hummed above her as she was escorted into the room, the metal doors sliding closed behind them. There was an observation window upstairs, and two armed guards looked down on them, rifles held idly at their sides.

She completely ignored the desk in the center of the room, taking a seat cross-legged on the floor and opening the laptop. The agents filed in after her, making a perimeter around the room- around HER- before the man with brown eyes, the one who'd been her driver, crouched beside her.

"Are you ready?" his brown eyes were serious but concerned, buzz cut allowing her to see all his features.

She took a breath, letting it out. "Yeah."

She opened Helix- a program Tony had created, had shown her how to use. Normally she'd have felt a pang at the thought of Tony, but not now- she settled calmly down, inputting the information she needed amd begining the attack.

Instantly she was moving- a few keystrokes and she was dodging a firewall, taking the the first layer of defense, the heat sensors.

"Heat sensors are down." she informed the agent who'd been speaking to her. The agent nodded, calmly relaying the information to the strike team.

Instantly she found herself under a vicious counter-attack, and she was left forcing a new firewall into position around her to defend. Even then, it was a temporary solution- at most, she'd have five minutes before her own computer was under attack, her keyboard refusing to respond to her, the strike team in danger...

Until she noticed the structure. It was a basic loop, but if she could ignore the counter attacks, push through until the very end- she could access the temperature controls and overheat the server room, blow out everything... Destroy any security.

"Change of plans. Tell them to hold their position- if I can get through, I can access the temperature controls and overheat the server room. It'll cripple the facility, security will go down- I need ten minutes."

The agent looked pensive before nodding, relaying the information.

She was skirting firewalls, injecting her prescence through false system files, inserting capabilities she shouldn't have had before breaking down the firewall from the otherside.

Her hands were sweaty, mouth like sand paper, and suddenly she found her computer refusing to respond.

She pulled another flashdrive from her pocket- one Tony had created for cyberwarfare such as this. She jammed it into the usb port like it was an epi-pen- she didn't need to worry about not being able to activate it manually, either- it was set to run automatically.

Three seconds, ten... The laptop started responding to her keystrokes again, and she grinned. Tony had made that specially- it automatically attacked the attacker, infiltrating system files and forcing their computer to shut down. Someone in the other facility was really pissed right now.

"Take that, asshole."

She reached a password lock, hitting a few keys and waiting. She'd launched a brute-force attack, the computer trying combinations of anything simultaniously- thirty seconds later, she was through.

From there she was almost in- she was decrypting files, scanning infromation- she'd need it to break through the last few firewalls. Lines of code flowed down the screen, she wasn't a person anymore- she was a machine, a droid responding to the stimulious placed before her.

The agent she'd been speaking to crouched before her, quietly shaking her shoulder. She risked a two second glance at him- she really didn't need this right now.

"How much longer will you need?"

"Five minutes. Don't talk to me."

And she'd dove back into the code, converting a file that struck her as useful from hexidecimal to a more useful format. She transfered it into a regular file, gaping- it was the info she'd needed.

Gunshots echoed in the hallway and her head shot up- she stared at the agent who'd been conversing with her, eyes wide. "What's happening?"

"Don't worry about it. We'll protect you- keep working."

She obeyed without question, breaking the final firewall. She was in. She swore, seeing everything was encrypted. She'd need to decrypt it to see what the hell everything was, and even then, it was a stretch to say she'd be able to figure out the temperature controls in time.

She swallowed as more gunshots sounded outside- the agents in a permieter around her had all tensed, the tension was thick enough to be cut with a knife. She started running every cypher she had, watching the encryption shift from gibberish to gibberish, cursing quietly. She couldn't fail Tony- she couldn't.


"Steve."

The Avengers all looked at their leader, who'd been waiting on orders, on leads abiut Tony's shooting.

Fury's voice had startled them all out of their silence.

"Steve here."

"A SHEILD outpost is under attack- you have approximately two minutes to get there. Fury out."

Steve's eyes hardened dangerously as the coordinates appeared on the dash's GPS. Right now, he really didn't give a shit abkut SHEILD- he wanted info on Tony. But he swallowed his feelongs, forcing himself to drive- innocent lives came before personal vendettas. Still- he couldn't help but keep a white-knuckle grip on the steering wheel as they screeched into the dive, car skidding.

"What's the plan?" Bruce asked from the back, looking dead serious. Natasha's mouth was set in a firm line, and Steve gabbed his sheild from where he'd placed it, loading his handgun.

"Kick ass." was all he ground out. He couldn't sit still and plan for this- rage overrode reasoning, and besides, they didn't have time. He jumped out of the car and kicked in a window before diving in, ready to storm the building- no one was going to die today if he had anything to say about it.


She didn't realize she'd been holding her breath until she heard the startled exclaimations. She looked up at the observation window, shocked to see the two armed guards gone, and the unmistakeable spatters of crimson on the glass, as well as the echoing gunshots.

The agent she'd been communicating with crouched before her, anxious eyes landing on her. "You need to keep going."

She nodded, swallowing back the bile in her throat and turning back to the screen. It'd decrypted everything- she clicked on the first folder she saw, a program that controlled the lighting...

She fucked it up mercilessly before exiting out- let thise bastards work in the dark. She wasscanning the folder names with a critical eye, unconciously flinching as gunshots sounded in the hallway outside her little room.

She found it. The lines of code blurred before her eyes, she was going completely by instinct, now, changing the temperature values. She had to upload the changes, that was it...

She ducked down, shocked into silence as the room was filled with deafening noise, something splashing onto her...

She looked down at the crimson on her skin, horrifed- it was blood.

The agent she'd been relaying information to a moment ago hit the ground beside her, eyes glazed, blood pooling on the floor beneath him.

She saw the two black-clad assailants out of the corner of her eyes and lunged forward, stabbing the enter key. The program began uploading, and the doors slid closed behind the men as they strode purposefully towards her. 73% uploaded. Her hands were shaking as she saw the damage around her the agents who'd been standing guard laid splayed about on the floor, blood slattered the walls like paint. She swore she could taste it.

89%- one of the men moved purposefully towards the laptop, but she lunged in front of it, forcing herself to be brave as she stared death in the face.

The man crouched to stare her down, the five o'clock shadow making his face more sinister. A moment later the butt of his assault rifle connected with her cheek, sending her sprawling.

She landed in the puddle of sticky crimson, feeling it seep into her hair and her cheek sting painfully. She forced her eyes to focus in on the laptop and grinned, seeing the loading bar had reached 100%- her work was done. She forced herself to her elbows, taking her foot and kicking through the screen- they wouldn't force her to undo what she'd done.

"You're too late. Go ahead- kill me." she growled, forcing a smile to her face at their frustration. Her heart was pounding in her chest, she didn't want to die, but at the same time, she welcomed the cold embrace, the escape...The men were facing off angrily- they'd failed at their mission, to kill her before she crippled the facility. She'd done it. But that didn't mean they wiuldn't still kill her out of frustration.

She closed her eyes, taking a breath. Even in what were her last moments, she couldn't help but fear pride seep in around the fear- I did it, Dad. I screwed up, but I did it...

She was staring down the barrel of a gun.

It was at that moment that Steve kicked the door down. Both men whirled- Steve brained one with his sheild, the force of the blow sending the man flying back into the wall to slide down it, unconcious. The second man had his assault rifel aimed at Steve, but Steve ducked under the barrel, taking the man out at the knees and tossing the rifel to the side, fist sinking into the man's face once, twice, three times- he felt the man's jaw break and kept going.

"Steve!"

He couldn't hear her voice over the rage screaming in his head.

"Steve!" her scared tone made him snap back to reality, and he took a shaking breath, looking from his bloodied hands to Amy...

"God..." Steve choked out, reaching out towards her. But it was too late to save her. Now that the adrenalin rush was gone, she could see the full extend of the damage.

Dead. Everyone in the room was dead, all the agents that'd been standing guard over her, the man she'd spoken to minutes before laid dead, blood seeping out of his mouth, unseeing eyes affixed on her...

There was blood on the walls, there was blood on the floor, it was spattered on her clothes, it was soaked into her hair...

She didn't realize she was hyperventilating until her chest started to hurt. She scrabbled backwards onto her backside, into the corner.

The others had managed to catch up to their leader, and Clint looked around the bloodied room, horrified. "Jesus Christ..."

She emptied the contents of her stomach on the floor, retching painfully.

All eyes in the room turned to her.

"What the hell..." Clint stared, Natasha's eyes conveying pure shock...

"Amy..." Steve moved towards her slowly. Tears were streaming down her face, he had no idea what'd happened here, but it was clear she needed help...

"Don't touch me!" the shrill note of fear in her voice made him freeze, and he stared. She looked like a rabbit- eyes wide, panting with fear, chest heaving... She looked like she was going to pass out.

"Amy... Amy, just listen to me..."

"No! I'm done listening! Why couldn't they have just killed me..." she broke down sobbing.

Natasha took a step forward.

Amy scrabbed forward, freeing the pistol from the holster of a corpse and pointing it at them, eyes wild.

"Don't come any closer!" she screamed, eyes wild. "I...I'm not... a fucking... traitor. Don't you fucking DARE act like you care now... I tried, okay? I really tried..."

"Amy. Let's put the gun down, alright?" Steve's voice was steady, but his eyes were anxious. He'd never seen this level of emotion or hysteria from the girl, but he couldn't blame her. She was surrounded by dead people, she believed they'd abandoned her...

"No! For once I have control over something!". Go ahead. Put it in your mouth. Blow your brains out- end it. You really think Tony will still want you after this- after all these people died just so you could break a computer?

She was still hyperventilating, but Steve saw her terrified gaze shift to the gun in her hands, saw the terror in her eyes turn to longing, she wanted it all to just STOP. His blood ran cold at the thought of her ending it.

She took a ragged breath, then another, not sure what the hell to do. She didn't want to hurt anyone, the last thing she wanted was more blood...

Steve stepped forward, and she didn't pull the trigger. The gun was still pointing at him. Too much a a coward to turn it on yourself... her mind sneered.

But all Steve could see were her eyes, filled with tears and begging for help. He knew she wouldn't fire on him, and he quietly took the gun from her hands and threw it aside, pulling her into a hug. She lost it then, breaking down sobbing in his arms as he picked her up and she sobbed into his shoulder.

He looked around at the dead bodies, the unconcious men, disgusted at what she'd had to see.

He nodded to Clint. "Take care of them." he ground out, jerking his head towards the two unconcious assailants. And he left the room, a weeping Amy still on his arms. He was careful not to let any of the anger her felt seep into his posture- he knew Amy would feel it, knew it would only upset her more.

"Shh- shh- I know it hurts, but it's gonna be okay, alright? I won't let anything else happen to you- I promise."