I told you I was coming back! I'm sorry I've kept you all waiting for so long but hopefully that's over now! Re-watching the MCU in the build-up to Infinity War has given me major motivation for writing so I hope you all like this chapter and if you do please, please leave your reviews, favourites and follows!
Washington D.C. 2014.
I've grown used to surprises and unexpected twists in the day to day routine of life. However, despite Fury's death and STIRKE's new found cockiness I hadn't expected to receive a text warning at 10am the same morning informing me that Captain America was now wanted by SHIELD and was top of their list. Had it been anyone else, I would have believed it instantly, but as I shrugged my jacket over my shoulders, planning to head to the Triskellion myself, a million questions were racing through my head.
I stuffed my phone into my pocket and made a mental note to call Natasha as soon as I was in my car. My apartment building was empty, it mostly housed people who worked part time or lived off welfare checks so more often than not, the halls were empty, and the foyer was unmanned. That day was no different.
Until…
I stepped out into the street, heading for my Maserati that was parked in the shade on the other side of the road. Something peaked my attention and as I turned to my left, I felt bile rising in my throat. It was like being back in one of my nightmares as I saw the soldier striding down the path in broad daylight, as if no one else could see him. But he was looking right at me, heading for me. His face was concealed differently to how I remembered as a child, but I just knew it was him, there was no doubt.
I shot back into the foyer of my building, planning on using my knowledge of the building to my advantage. I was on the fourth stairwell floor when I heard the door on the ground floor fly open. I knew I shouldn't have stopped to look but all of my trained abilities were getting away from me and I was running purely on human instinct. I grasped the metal railing and peered over the edge my breath hitching when I saw him staring back up at me, a bullet pinged off the metal as he shot one round at me and began to chase me up the stairs. My phone suddenly began to ring in my pocket and I checked the ID before answering Natasha's call.
"He's here." I gasped.
"We're ten minutes away." She answered simply.
"We?"
"Steve and me. It's a long, story. We'll explain when we get there."
"If I'm still alive."
"You better be." I couldn't help but gasp a laugh as I cut the call off.
My apartment building was ten floors high before you could get out onto the roof, and I found myself counting down the floors trying to drown out the steps of the soldier behind me. When I got to my own floor I flew out into the hall and ran down to my apartment door, if I'd counted correctly then he was only two floors behind me and he would cover that ground in no time. I slipped inside my door and silently latched it, immediately opening the door that led out to another fire escape. I retrieved my weapon and clipped it to the top of my jeans and also grasped my grappling wire. It was made from reinforced steel and was definitely strong enough to strangle someone with, provided I was able to get close enough to the soldier to do so.
Suddenly there was a bang at my door, then a second. I pulled my gun from its holster and aimed it directly ahead of me, then I heard someone else's door open and a brief crack of gunshot. The silence that followed thereafter was deafening until another bang came at my door, I could hear the hinges giving way and I double checked that the safety was off as a final bang came and the door gave way. I instantly set off a round and turned my back to jump from the window onto the thin metal stairs. I heard the ping of metal on metal and winced when I felt the shift of weight on the stairwell as he began to pursue me once again. A few more bullets bounced on the metal surrounding me as I pulled my weight up the side of the building.
Three floors to go, two, one.
Relief flooded me as I reached the roof, the air was cooler and there were no civilians nearby who could get hurt. My breath was burning in my lungs as I faced the stairs and waited the few moments before he stepped up onto the gravel, not even breaking a sweat. I heard his boots crunch into the gravel and seeing him for more than a split second was a shock to the system. I suddenly felt like a cornered girl in Belarus once again.
"Eto bylo dolgo." I spoke between gasped breaths. Hoping for a response of any kind. He didn't reply but continued to step towards me with his rifle raised, the sight would be pointed directly at my forehead, a clean simple kill with minimal blood would be what he was looking for, especially if he was expected to bring my body back to whoever had ordered this assassination.
"You don't remember me, do you?" Again, no response. It was then that an idea suddenly struck my mind. I hadn't taken to homing in the skills Doctor Montgomery had forced out of me as a child. But it was like riding a bike, once you knew how to do it, it was simple and as I reached out, I was met with the same white noise as I had when I was a child. There was one difference, however, amongst the same seven words that I remembered, my face was now in with the mix. It was a recent photograph, a surveillance image that confirmed my paranoia that HYDRA had been following me all this time.
I quickly glanced over my shoulder and my stomach dropped when I saw the drop off the edge of the roof down to the side alley below. He took another step forward but before he could do anything else, I quickly released my hook and it shot towards him, wrapped around the barrel of the rifle and I yanked it from his grip. In the few seconds he spent looking down at it, I covered the ground between us, doubling up the rope in my hand. I pushed all of my weight against his chest knocking him backwards, I knelt into his shoulder joints, preventing even the metal arm from lifting and pressed the rope into his exposed throat and started counting. 1 minute, that's all needed to hold him down for before he would lose consciousness. I knew I had made myself the promise that I would kill him the next time I saw him, but Steve was in trouble, right now I just needed to get the hell away and figure out what was going on with the only two people I could consider as allies.
As I reached 45 seconds, I felt his muscles relax and I released the pressure momentarily. Admittedly, I surprised it had happened quicker than I'd anticipated. The one-minute mark had been a guess at best, but I knew the soldier had been enhanced through experimentation in the same way I had. I made to return to my feet when the soldier suddenly sat up, wrapped an arm around my waist and shifted his weight until I was pinned down onto the rooftop, his knee was now on my chest and it felt like a concrete block crushing my lungs. I couldn't see the eyes that haunted my nightmares in the past couple of days, only my reflection, struggling in the black goggles he was wearing. This time he didn't hesitate as he plunged a small blade into my abdomen. The pain was searing hot and took over all of my senses as I jut managed to fumble in my pocket for a small disc. I could feel blood pooling under me as I heard a horn sound from the alley ten floors down.
I pulled the disc in my palm upwards, and pressed it against the metal of the arm, causing a continuous stream of electricity that rendered the arm useless and would burn the flesh with pain. I forced myself to my feet, reached for my grappling hook, it untangled itself from the rifle and I swung it around a large metal pipe and without looking, I propelled down the side of the building, falling the last few feet as the soldier severed the wire from the roof.
I scrambled to my feet and yanked open the backdoor of the inconspicuous pickup truck Steve was driving, he had already sped away by the time I slammed the door.
"Are you okay?" Steve questioned. I glanced down at my side where my hand had been pressed. Blood was red on my palm, but the pressure was helping calm the bleeding slightly.
"Great. I don't suppose there are any towels in this car are there?" Natasha slipped her jacket off, unzipped her striped hoodie and handed it to me as I pressed it down onto my abdomen and shifted myself against the door, so it was kept firmly in place.
"Thanks. So, Steve. I hear you're a wanted man."
"SHIELD's been compromised. The STRIKE team is dirty and so are countless others. Fury told me not to trust anyone before he died, currently, I only trust the two of you."
"You know you're up shit street when you can only trust two assassins." Natasha joked. I couldn't help but smile as Steve pulled onto the freeway and we headed for New Jersey.