HELSINKI

FINLAND

PRESENT DAY

"Recent documents revealed to the public by the grand jury provide proof of tax evasion, which is reason enough for tort lawyers to proceed to..."

A click. The picture on the screen went black. The woman stood in front of the television and lay down the remote control. Her head began to pound from watching the news all day. She squeezed her eyes tight and yawned. The clock read 3 a.m. – a fitting time to go to bed indeed.

'Not just yet, Amelia...' came out a voice from the semi-darkness of her small hallway.

She spun around, muscles coiled and ready to spring.

He stepped out into the light and held up his hands placatingly; he meant no harm. 'Easy...just thought I'd check up on how you've been doing.'

She threw her head back in relief and groaned. 'Jeez, Marco – have you ever heard of knocking? And don't think you can trick me into believing that you showed up because you were concerned about my welfare. It's been six years.'

'I'm sorry, honey – I was a little tied up in Shanghai.' he spoke, sarcasm in his voice.

She turned away and walked towards the kitchen. 'Literally?'

'Literally.'

'Really,' she said as she began to turn on the espresso machine. 'Who'd you tick off this time – Maoists?' She pointed to the coffee jar and looked at him questioningly.

'Black, as always.' He sat down on a stool in the kitchen and sighed. 'No. To tell the truth, we don't even know who we PO'd so that they would turn us in to the Chinese government. It was slam dunk for them as far as we were concerned. One minute I was escorting our ambassador to Beijing and the next I found myself waking up in a slum of a jail cell next to a Chinese version of Marilyn Manson.'

Amelia looked at him seriously for a moment, and then let out a small smile. 'Whoa there, bubba. One thing at a time. You were convicted...of a crime?'

The man smiled back and nodded. 'Smuggling military aircraft parts across the Nepalese border. Pity nobody told me beforehand that I had a hobby. I would've tried to keep it in check.'

'You and who else?'

'Fury. But the lucky stiff got out earlier than I did. I heard he got some kind of amnesty deal. News spreads fast in death camps.'

'Fury...no, there was no deal. He's gone, Marco – no one's seen or heard from him since you last disappeared.'

The coffee in the pot began to boil.

'He hasn't been in contact with you? With Deacon and the rest?''

Amelia shook her head in puzzlement. 'I don't understand – didn't you contact S.H.I.E.L.D. when you got in – don't you know what kind of pressure we've all been under for the past few years?'

Marco looked down at his shoes, trying to make sense of this new information. 'First place I went to when I got out was here, Amelia. Found out from an old friend where you were and came straight here. I didn't pay any visits to relatives along the way.'

'My place. You came here...oh Lord, Marco. You're a bigger idiot than I thought.'

'I missed you.'

She ignored him. 'Do you know,' she spoke with anger in her voice. 'Do you know that some of them actually think you're responsible for Fury's disappearance? That he "conveniently" disappeared around the same time that you did? Deacon doesn't, of course – and he's still temporarily in charge – so I guess you could say that he's holding the wolves at bay. You should go back, Marco, tell them the truth.'

'And the truth shall set me free? That isn't what got me out of Shanghai, sweetie. I can tell you that much.'

Her face softened. It was a rare occurrence and Marco enjoyed it every time he saw it. 'Six years. Was it really the hell hole they described?'

'Pretty much.'

'I'm so sorry,' she began.

'I thought of you every single day.'

'No, Marco.' she closed her eyes and shook her head. 'I told you before...I can't. Not that way.'

He tried not to listen to her, rubbed his fingers together and looked at them sadly. 'It's funny. Years ago, when my wife died and I had that damn desk job, and nothing to live for...there were days when it seemed so terribly convenient to stick a magnum to my temple and just blow my pathetic life to hell. And then, years later when I actually found myself in that camp – in hell, all I could think about was how to survive. Just keep breathing, just making it from one day to the next. I would've given up my limbs to get back to that desk job.'

'That bad, huh?' she cracked a wan smile.

He nodded.

'How about that cup of coffee then?'

Amelia wrapped the woolen blanket around her and leaned back into the comfort of her recliner. From there, she watched silently as her friend slept peacefully on the bed. She felt a repetitive, annoying tune run through her mind as she tried to think. Six years. It had been six years since Fury had disappeared. Had he really cut a deal with the other side like Marco had said? Rubbish, she thought. He was Nick Fury for God's sake! If anyone was capable of breaking out of a joint like the one Marco was in, it was Fury. Then what had gone wrong? And who the hell had planted the evidence against the two of them?

Amelia found her thoughts wander back to happier days – as they often did when she felt troubled. She could see her daughter trying to mimic her as she kneaded flour to make bread. At the time, it had frustrated her. Flour was sometimes hard to come by, but her daughter had insisted on making bread too. The cement floor would often be littered with splashes of white.

"Out! Go out and play with your friends! Mama needs to make dinner, Ero." she would say, frustrated.

Her daughter shook her head, "no".

She rolled her eyes. "One would think we're millionaires – wasting food like this. Your father works hard to buy us all this...who knows how long it will last?"

Her daughter shrugged indifferently, and thumped the dough particularly hard, causing a cloud of flour to fluff up into the air and make her cough.

"It will last forever!" came up a friendly voice from behind them both. The man kissed his wife and picked up his child as she struggled to get free to continue her dough-pounding.

And just like that – like one sweet kiss goodbye, the thought was gone.

Amelia sighed as she came out of her revelry. Dwelling on the past never did her any good, save to add fuel to the mounting fire. And burn away it did – despite the six year break in revenge. In a way, it was a relief, to abandon all that hate – even if it was temporary. It gave her time to think and to devote her attention to other matters. It made her feel guilty though, for trying to distract herself in this manner. Surely she wasn't doing right by her daughter. But she needed this time to collect herself.

Serving as intelligence in this freezing country wasn't exactly her idea of some R and R, but then again – she couldn't imagine anything of the sort since her daughter was murdered. Still, it was definitely better than some of the other places S.H.I.E.L.D. had stationed her at and it was much preferred to staying back home, in Afghanistan. Everything there was filled with too many painful memories – too many reminders. Her flat in Helsinki was cozy; she could even picture herself staying here permanently, although she knew that would never be. She herself wouldn't allow it. Not without completing what she had set out to accomplish.

The new information on Fury and the arrival of Marco had complicated things, though. She knew she would be ordered to remain on the job longer – probably here in Helsinki, before they gave her what she wanted most. And she was that desperate for it. She would follow the dangling carrots before her – it was what gave her sustenance and the will to carry on.