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January 11th

Maggie walked up to the dam service door and silently pushed the gate. It opened without resistance, although creaked as it went, and she summoned a blade into her hand. She entered slowly and quietly, listening for signs of people. Not far in she heard voices speaking, and although they weren't speaking particularly loudly, their voices carried.

Maggie counted the voices. There were five voices, but she only recognized three: Steve Rogers, Maria Hill, and Nick Fury.

She kept to the shadows, quiet as they spoke, trying to listen in on their conversation. Through the plastic she could see six figures. A redheaded woman was being helped by what appeared to be a doctor as Fury was laid in a hospital bed, telling the group about all of his injuries. Maggie found herself barely paying attention to their conversation instead taking in Fury's state herself.

"Can't kill you if you're already dead," Fury said drawing her from her thoughts, "Besides, I didn't know who to trust."

"Speaking of not knowing who to trust," Maggie said stepping through the plastic with her hands raised, "Anyone know where a girl could get a meatball sub around here?"

Maria Hill and Fury raised their guns immediately. Fury began to lower his gun but Maria's remained trained on Maggie.

"I come in peace," she said softly, "and I have a peace offering."

"What kind of offering?" Hill asked.

"Intel," she replied, "that I think all of you will want."

"And why exactly should we trust you, Annie?" Maria asked, "Or is it, Anya?"

"Neither," she said, "And both. Those are the names they gave me. But once upon a time—" She looked at Steve who was watching her cautiously, "My name was Margret Hargrove. And for a brief, shining moment, Future Mrs. Barnes."

"Maggie," he said walking over to her in three long strides. He pulled her into a hug as he continued, "is it really you?"

"It is," she whispered as she hugged him back, "Or at least I think so anyway, my head is still a little muddy."

"But you remember who you were?" he whispered questioningly as he held her tight.

"I—"

"This is all very sentimental," said the man Maggie didn't recognize, "but is anyone else a little suspicious of how she just wandered her way in here?"

Steve stood back and looked over Maggie cautiously.

"How—" he began but she interrupted.

"I put a tracker in Fury's food when we went for lunch the other day," she replied and pulled the tablet from her bag. She took it over to Fury as she continued, "It's secure, no one else can access the frequency unless they know what to look for."

"You put a tracker in one of my meatballs?" Fury asked taking the tablet. She smiled leaning against the end of his bed. She took the tablet back and pressed several buttons before the blinking faded on the screen.

"Good thing I did, you would have been toast before you even got to Steve's," she said with a gentle smile, "I disengaged the tracker so it should leave your body in the next day or so."

"How do you know how to do that?" Romanoff interrupted. Maggie hesitated. She was sure they had an idea of who she was already, but admitting it to them… It scared her.

"Hydra taught me," Maggie said as she turned to face Natasha.

"You know they were just trying to kill us, right?" Natasha responded, "I have a hole in my shoulder right now because of them."

"Of course, they were," Maggie replied. She sighed and sat on the edge of Fury's bed, "It's their mission. Hell, it's meant to be my mission. All of you are uncontrollable variables, fortunately for all of you—and unfortunately for me—I'm also an uncontrollable variable."

"And what exactly are they planning?" Fury asked.

"Exactly?" she repeated, "What they're exactly planning, I don't know. I can only really guess that they want to take over everything, to control the world. They once told the Winter Soldier and I we were to bring peace to the people. That we killed those who threatened that peace. And you, Nick—" she said looking at Fury, "—were my most failed mission."

"Only my friends call me Nick," he replied, and she sighed.

"Of course, Fury," she amended.

"What does that mean? What do you mean by being an uncontrollable variable and why was Nick your most failed mission?" Hill asked, and Maggie looked at her. Hill's weapon was still trained on her, and Maggie nodded.

"Smart, for one, but if I was with Hydra, they would have been here at least three minutes ago," she said, "To answer your questions, for nearly twenty years, Fury was one of the shots I consistently refused to take. Even this time around I could have, and I didn't."

"When was that?" Maria asked.

"The morning he and I went for sandwiches. I had my rifle trained on him. His office is in perfect line of sight from the Washington Monument and with it being closed it's pretty easy to get into…" she trailed off turning to face Fury, "I had you in my sights, my finger was on the trigger, and yet I couldn't pull it. The next day you took me under your wing to help me learn and didn't ever ask why I was so lacking on common history. You began triggering memories I didn't know I had."

"Still," Maggie continued looking first to Fury then to the rest of the people there, "I don't expect you to necessarily trust me or really believe a word I say at this point, but I'm trying to do the right thing for the first time in 70 years. I'm here as a friend, trying to help—" her voice wavered as she looked down, "—and as a woman who needs a little extra help trying to save her own stupid man."

"Bucky?" Steve asked and she looked up at him.

"Couldn't save him then," she said, "gotta try harder now."

Maria Hill and Fury looked at one another as Maggie focused on Steve. Fury nodded at Maggie's wrists, pointing out the handcuffs. Maria nodded in acknowledgement, lowering her pistol. The other man standing in the room looked to where they were motioning and stared at the cuffs.

"Maggie, it's not—" Steve began but Sam interrupted, stepping closer to her.

"Are those handcuffs?" he asked, and Maggie looked down at her wrists then turned to Sam.

"Oh, yeah," Maggie replied, "I can make a pick, but I knew there was a fight coming so I figured I'd save as much energy as I could and just find something to undo them later."

"What do you mean make a pick?" Sam asked.

"Azrael has the ability to use the iron in her own blood to create weapons in a fight," Natasha quipped, "or at least that's what I heard when I was younger."

"It's very exhausting," Maggie countered, "It requires a lot of my own energy."

"So you still have handcuffs on because you couldn't take them off I get that, but," Sam started again, "but why were you wearing them in the first place?"

Maggie hesitated, then looked at Steve.

"He… Didn't want me to leave," she replied finally.

"He locked you up?" Steve asked, his cheeks flushing in anger, "so you couldn't escape?"

"Well, no," she began, "he cuffed me to the bed, but he must have broken them when he drugged me, because when I came to earlier, they were already stretched." Steve brought his hand to his forehead in exasperation.

"He locked you up and drugged you? Mags that's…" Steve trailed off.

"I know!" she said, "It doesn't look very good for him but he's in there I know he is! I'm pissed at him too but… He needs help first. Then an ass kicking later. Or something like that."

"He doesn't just free people he locks up," Natasha quipped.

"He's not a monster," Maggie countered, "not when the conditioning wears off. Even with him doing that to me, he left me a note saying not to come after him. Then there was one at the door that said he knew I wouldn't listen and to just be careful. He wanted me safe, he wanted Hydra."

"Miss Hargrove," Fury started, and she turned to him.

"Maggie, please," she replied. He sighed.

"Maggie, your boyfriend isn't your boyfriend anymore," Fury continued, "he's a trained assassin."

"So am I," she replied, "Hydra's Angel of Death, Azrael, remember? When I failed, he was sent in to fix my mistakes. Briefly we were sent on missions together, but the closer we were, the more we failed. And here we are. If you don't trust me, then at least believe there's some good left in him."

"I'd rather trust you," Fury replied.

"Then trust me," she replied leaning toward him, "trust me that he's not beyond hope."

"I don't trust anyone," he stated.

"I know," she said sitting back, "by the gods do I know. I remember a time I hacked your comms to protect you and you argued with me about it for fifteen minutes before you eventually thanked me."

"Ah," he said, "so it was you in Belfast and Bucharest?"

"I vaguely remember them both," she replied with a sincere smile. Fury looked over her and nodded.

"So, what's your plan," Natasha asked, "you're just going in with us and going to fight the Winter Soldier yourself?"

"I'll be honest, I hadn't thought much past this," she said looking to the ceiling in thought, "I was hopeful, but not very confident in this going well. Pierce runs Hydra right now but take out one head and others are sure to take his place, so as much as I want to just go after him it will only partly help. Hydra needs to be destroyed in one fell swoop.

"The Winter Soldier is only a puppet directed by Hydra," Maggie continued, "If you take control of Hydra, you can take control of him and cut his strings. Still, me encountering him during the fight may not be the best. If he remembers me, he'll probably let me go, but he'll be pissed as hell. If he doesn't remember me… Well, I really don't want to kill him."

"What do you mean if he remembers you?" Steve asked, "he seemed to remember you pretty well about two hours ago."

"Two hours ago, he hadn't failed to kill you yet," she replied looking at him, her face blank of emotion, "did he seem familiar with you at all?"

"No," Steve replied, "he did however seem incredibly familiar with you."

"They hadn't reset him yet," she said with a sigh, "but they will have by the next time we meet. Pierce wants me dead. Not only am I a liability, but I insulted him, as did Bucky by taking me from him. Bucky killing me while he has no control over himself is the perfect opportunity for Pierce's spite."

"Rewind," Hill stated, "He took you from Pierce?"

"I was meant to kill Fury," she said, "instead I protected him. Pierce was furious when he found out. Threatened to reset me and—"

"What does that mean?" Steven interrupted, "You've said it a couple times and I don't know what that means."

Maggie sighed.

"The Reset is what they do after every mission," she said her voice going monotone, "they strap us to a chair and using this machine they scramble our brains until we can't think straight. While in that state they can use a set of code words on us that control us. The problem is, we're so conditioned to the code words that even without the scramble, we still have no choice but to obey commands once the words are uttered, we just take longer to fight back when we have no memory."

"Does it hurt?" Sam asked. Maggie looked at him.

"It's the worst pain I've ever felt," she replied, "by the way, I'm Maggie, and you are?"

"Sam," he replied holding his hand out to her. She hesitated, before standing and shaking his hand with a smile.

"Nice to meet you Sam, I wish it was under better circumstances," she commented her voice turning somber as she continued, as if she was detaching herself from her words, "the only way I can describe the reset is everything burns, starting with your scalp. But its not actually your scalp, its far deeper than that. Your body rakes with pain. It feels like millions of worms are crawling beneath your skin and you just want to rip it off, but your body is tied down and there is no way to stop it. You can only give in and hope it ends soon."

"I can't even imagine," he replied, "I'm sorry that happened to you."

"You would have thought that after I remembered the pain each time, I would have done my job better," she said forcing a chuckle, "but I suppose I'm a glutton for punishment."

"Sounds to me like you sacrificed yourself for others," Steve said, "That says a lot about you still."

"You're biased," she replied, "but just as much as I sacrificed myself for others, Bucky sacrificed himself for me. When we worked together there were a lot of missions, I got that he also had to do to try and keep me safe. They would have reset me a lot more had it not been for him protecting me." She turned to Fury.

"He tried to keep me away from you, Fury—"

"Nick," he corrected.

"I thought only your friends called you Nick," she replied with a grin, "are we friends now?"

"Seems like you need some," he replied, "I don't trust you, so there's no need to be so smug."

"Trust inherently comes with friendship," she countered.

"Don't make me regret my words, Hargrove," he said in disdain.

"I would never, Nick."

"Look, we'll see what we can do about your boyfriend," Nick continued on, "but as you said Hydra is the main goal and I think I know exactly what they're planning. Let's get Nat patched up and then we'll all talk. Besides—" Fury looked at Maggie, "—Seems like you and Cap have some catching up to do."