"Sure you don't need an extra hand?" Sam asked over the line. Even though Steve knew he couldn't see him, he still shook his head.
"It's not gonna be a fight." he assured his friend, hearing his scoff from the other end.
"Whatever you say, man." his tone made it clear he didn't believe him. From what he and the other Avengers had come up with plan-wise, it didn't seem like it was going to be too hard to get into the Hydra facility and retrieve the scepter. Their plan was to come from the woods, use the cover of the trees to mount a surprise attack on the facility. No one would see them coming.
"Where'd you say you got the tip from again?" he found himself asking. Sam never did mention how he found out about the scepter being held in the Hydra facility a few weeks prior. Not that it completely mattered since his information had been correct, but for some reason Steve felt that his friend was keeping something from him.
"Just from someone I ran into while chasing down another cold lead." he answered airily, sounding sarcastic enough to tease Steve about the supposed mission he was on: tracking down Bucky while Steve handled Avengers things. But still, Steve pushed for an answer.
"Sam…" he trailed off, adapting his Captain-tone. He heard him pause for a moment before taking in a deep breath.
"Sure you wanna know?" the way he sounded was enough to make Steve's ears perk up. What wasn't he telling him?
"Of course." he responded quickly, a rock of nerves solidifying in his stomach. Who was his source? Was it going to affect the op or make them doubt the solid tip Sam had gotten?
"...It was Q, man." Sam finally spoke, his voice heavy.
At the sound of Q's name, Steve braced himself for the pang of sadness to strike through his heart as it almost always did whenever he was reminded of her. But instead of sadness, it was concern. Worry.
"Q?" he repeated, wanting to make sure he had heard him correctly, "When did you see Q?"
"...A few weeks ago." the pauses kept getting longer before answers, which was understandable. Sam had kept a massive secret from him for a few weeks. He knew where Q was - or had been, for several weeks and instead chose to tell him about Loki's goddamn scepter.
"Sam - what? Why the fuck didn't you tell me this?" Steve pressed the phone against his ear a bit harder as if that would help him hear his friend's explanation better. Sam let out a heavy sigh before going with the truth,
"She asked me not to." he admitted, "I'm sorry, Cap. I should've told you. That was my bad." Although he was grateful for Sam's apology, he had more questions he wanted answers to. Answers Sam could probably (hopefully) give.
"Where was she? Is she okay? What is she doing over there?" he shot off his round of questions like bullets from a chamber. This was the first time he could get anywhere close to a vague update and location on her.
"Somewhere outside of Sokovia." Sam tried to answer them as best as he could, but it just gave him more questions. He certainly didn't expect her to be all the way in Eastern Europe, that's for sure. She had never left the country before, now suddenly she was a world traveler? "I guess she was at the facility for some time trying to take down whatever Hydra operatives were there…" Right, Fury had mentioned something like that to him while they were standing at his grave after SHIELD had collapsed. Steve had said no, so it made sense that he had turned to Q, but why had she taken up the mission? Before he could ask, what Sam said next made him pause, "She looked...bad, Cap. I think Hydra got to her for a few days." His heart began to sink, joining the rock in his stomach. The thought that she had been under the hands of Hydra for even just an hour was enough to make his throat tighten up with worry. He only got a glimpse at what Hydra did to Bucky...if they had done anything remotely similar to Q...he wasn't sure anyone would be able to stop him from doing something in return.
Sam's words settled on his shoulders for a long time. It was all he could think about. Imagining the terrible, horrible things she had been put through at the facility. No longer did Sam's secrets matter; the only thing that mattered was that Q was okay. She was alive, according to Sam, but he stressed that she didn't want him to know about what happened. Steve couldn't understand why, but hell, he didn't understand a lot of things Q did.
Even so, Q's intel was right. The mission to retrieve the scepter proceeded as planned. Unlike he thought, it did turn into a firefight, almost as if they were expecting them. The snowy mountain forest of Sokovia was one thing to get through in order to make it to the facility. The armed guards dressed in camouflage and using Chitauri tech on them didn't make it any easier. Steve disarmed one of them, taking his motorcycle and using it as a vehicle to get through the forest a bit faster while Nat and Clint hijacked a rover and Tony and Thor stuck to the skies. Hulk was more than happy to just bust through trees, knocking down whatever was in his path - guards included.
Using his shield, he was able to quickly knock out whoever tried to come at him, defending himself from the blasts and weaving his way through the trees and over the small hills of snowy forest floor. Loud energy explosions echoed around him, paired with the screams and yells of those being taken down by any one of the Avengers. He never really saw what each of them were doing, trusting that it was what he had told them to do before they jumped into battle. Banner let the Hulk take over in an effort to take out more guards and bunkers. Per usual, Nat and Clint were paired together; they worked off each other much better than any of the other Avengers. Thor was tasked with clearing as many as the sniper towers he could. And since he was another one with the capability to fly, Tony was to get to the facility.
"Shit!" Tony's voice filtered through the comm in Steve's ear.
"Jar." he immediately responded without even thinking, but left no pause for anyone to call him out on it, "JARVIS, what's the view from upstairs?" he asked quickly while glancing around to keep an eye out for any camouflaged soldiers coming his way.
"The central building is protected by some kind of energy shield. Strucker's technology is well beyond any other Hydra base we've taken. Loki's scepter must be here. Strucker couldn't mount this defense without it." JARVIS explained. The others chimed in with their comments about the scepter and how they had clearly lost the element of surprise. Something they were banking on when they touched down in the mountains.
Getting to a path that seemed like a road which led straight to the facility, Tony's voice filtered through his ear - finally getting a chance to call him out.
"Wait a second. No one else is gonna deal with the fact that Cap just said 'jar?'" he asked, almost goading the others to join in on teasing him for the comment.
"I know." Steve sighed, narrowly avoiding a blue energy blast that struck the tree diagonal from him. Coming up on the path was a large armoured military vehicle, filled with a large group of Hydra soldiers who were armed with Chitauri tech. Pitching his body forward, Steve flipped himself over the motorcycle handles and launching it at the vehicle. As he landed on his feet, the motorcycle slammed against the truck, sending it and the men inside flying. Taking a moment to catch his breath, he looked toward the direction of the facility.
"Just slipped out." he sighed dejectedly, almost hating himself a bit for that being his immediate reaction to a curse word. He hadn't thought about his and Q's little game for a very long time, even during times when other Avengers would let a few curse words slip. Maybe it was because she was on his mind - what with the facility where she had been held in being so close.
"What does that even mean?" Tony asked, not letting it go, "Jar?" he repeated what Steve had said in an almost confused tone. Steve didn't feel up to explaining it, he didn't have the heart to talk about his former ex-girlfriend in the middle of a fight.
"Like a swear jar." Luckily, he didn't have to. Nat had filled in for him in the vaguest way possible, even though she knew the full story behind it, "Put a dollar in the jar once we're finished here, yeah, Tony?" she added, letting her tone make it clear not to push the conversation further. The topic seemed to drop, which Steve was grateful for, and he refocused on taking out whatever soldiers had survived the crash so that his mind wouldn't go to Q.
The firefight continued, going as most missions with the Avengers did - smoothly. Until, Steve felt a strong gust of wind against him and the next thing he knew, he was in the air. Luckily, he was able to rotate his body rather quickly so he landed on his feet rather than on his ass, but still it was startling. He hadn't been knocked off his feet that quickly or aggressively in a long while. His eyes were already flicking around the immediate area to see who or what had managed to surprise him in such a way. But there was nothing surrounding him except trees and snow and unconscious or dead Hydra soldiers.
"We have an Enhanced on the field." Steve relay the message to his other teammates quickly. He had read about the testing Hydra had done in the base during the recon meeting, but never seen it first hand. And he hadn't quite seen it first hand yet either. Just felt it.
"Clint's hit!" Nat's voice answered him, unconcerned with the Enhanced and caring more about her friend. He heard her ask for someone to take care of the bunker that was no doubt shooting at them, then a loud explosion followed making it clear that someone had.
Focused on getting closer to the facility, Steve used his shield to take out some of the soldiers who were advancing toward him. Tossing it like a boomerang, he was able to bounce it off one and then another before it came hurtling back to him. In one smooth motion, he launched himself in the air to catch it - spinning as he did so the force of the shield coming back to him wouldn't knock him sideways, before bringing it down hard against a still standing soldier. Explosions continued to echo around him, missed shots setting trees on fire or grunts of pain coming from the hits he delivered.
"Stark!" he called out as he slid down enough to swing his shield and knock one soldier off his feet before pushing himself up to swing back at one behind him, "We really need to get inside." he grunted out.
"I'm closing in." Tony assured him and a few moments later he informed them that the, "Drawbridge is down, people." A loud force of energy shook the ground enough to make Steve glance over to see Thor a few yards away from him.
"The Enhanced?" Thor questioned as Steve jogged up to him. He let out a sigh, looking around at the damage Thor had done - taking out a large group of soldiers with just a hit of his hammer,
"He's a blur." Steve shook his head, "All the new players we've faced, I've never seen this." he glanced around the rest of the forest as if the Enhanced would suddenly appear, "In fact, I still haven't."
"Clint's hit pretty bad guys." Nat got their attention, "We're gonna need evac." He shared a look with Thor, who nodded,
"I can get Barton to the jet. The sooner we're gone, the better. You and Stark secure the scepter." Thor delegated and Steve nodded in response,
"Copy that." he agreed, watching as a large group of soldiers, tanks and other guards came running up the hill. All of them formed a line as some sort of defense, but Thor saw it as nothing but something that amused him.
"Looks like they're lining up." Thor commented with a slightly joking tone. Steve huffed and then shrugged,
"Well, they're excited." he quipped, getting in position. Thor and he had practiced the move for a long while, seeing that it was easier to take out a large group of enemies at once rather than expending the energy to take them out one by one. He twirled his hammer in a fast circle while Steve raised his shield up. With a hard hit, Thor used the shield as a launch pad, bouncing the lightning energy off it so it reverberated further and stronger than normal. It knocked all of the soldiers off their feet and managed to flip the tank over onto it's back.
"Find the scepter." Thor directed before spinning the hammer enough to let it take him into the air.
"And for gosh sake, watch your language! Might have to give a dollar to the jar." Tony chided teasingly in his ear. Steve sighed heavily, knowing he had just subjected himself to a boatload jokes at his expense. And it wasn't like he was about to admit why he had said what he said; that would just make it entirely worse
"That's not going away any time soon." he muttered to himself before taking off down the path he had just cleared with Thor.
He wasn't sure what he was expecting when he got to the facility itself. Almost all the guards on the outside had been taken out by Tony so it was relatively easy to get into the building itself. It was cold, much colder than it was outside in the snow, and eerily quiet - probably because of Tony. As he explored the facility, his thoughts couldn't help but turn to Q. Where had she been kept? What had they done to her? Just imagining her stuck in a place like the facility was enough to make his stomach churn and his heart ache. Why had she even come there in the first place? She wasn't a field agent, much less wanted to be one either. Did Fury coerce her into doing something she didn't want to?
A thousand unanswered questions ran through his head as he walked the halls of the facility, easily taking out whatever guards had been leftover. Questions he'd probably never get the answers to; Sam only knew so much and Fury had disappeared into the shadows around the same time Q had. He would have to suffer in the unknown. Just like he had been doing since she had left him.
Staying hidden in the shadows, Wanda watched the man dressed like some sort of American symbol explore the facility. He looked familiar. Possibly because she recognized him from the television: he worked with Stark...the Avengers. But that was the man in the uniform. She somehow knew him on a much deeper level too.
From the woman they had kept in the facility, she realized. The woman she was able to use as a toy. Her mind was full of various memories of the man currently exploring the facility. Memories she had used to her advantage in order to break the woman down enough for von Strucker to continue his experiments. Though he never got the chance to because their security measures were breached and the woman was taken away. Something Wanda was punished for.
Not that that mattered. What mattered was the man in front of her. She wondered if he cared for her as much as the woman cared about him. Itching for a quick peek, Wanda felt the tendrils of energy twist out of her fingertips. But before she could do anything von Strucker revealed himself, coming up the stairs without knowing that the man was there. Kicking out a guard, the man's action was enough to make von Strucker stop. The two men came face to face and both paused in a tense silence. She knew he was going to give up, but there was no way she was going to as well. Not with her brother still out in the mountain forest. This was their chance at freedom.
"Baron Strucker. Hydra's number one thug." Steve casually greeted the monocled man. At his title, von Strucker gave him a slight smile,
"Technically, I'm a thug for SHIELD." he corrected him while they circled each other.
"Well, then technically you're unemployed." he raised his eyebrows before continuing with his line of questioning, "Where's Loki's scepter?"
"Don't worry, I know when I'm beat." von Strucker tilted his head to the side, both of them facing each other, "You'll mention how I cooperated, I hope." he tried to bargain with Steve, who wasn't one to take plea deals from Nazis.
"I'll put it right under illegal human experimentation." the words tasted sour in his mouth when he realized that Q was in a place where people were experimented on. Had she been experimented on too? "How many are there?" he asked with a lift of his chin. Before von Strucker could answer, a woman melted out of the shadows. Red energy snaked out of her fingers, twirling its way toward Steve.
Instinctively, he lifted his shield, even though he knew it wouldn't do any good. He wasn't sure what happened next, but the world shifted enough for him to feel off balance. A large cloud of the red energy pushed him down a flight of stairs with more force than he thought it had. Quickly rolling to his feet, his eyes landed on the woman again with her long, stringy brown hair and her eyes lined like a raccoon. She stared him down, watching as he climbed the stairs back up to where she was with von Strucker. Though somehow she managed to scurry back away from his grasp, letting the red tendrils slither their way toward him before shutting the large steel doors in front of her. With a blink of his eyes, the woman was gone, escaped before Steve could lay a hand on her.
"We have a second Enhanced. Female. Do not engage." he said into his comm, unsure what the woman could do, but knowing it wasn't good.
"You'll have to be faster than -" Steve quickly cut von Strucker off with a well placed stomp to his shield so that it bounced off the ground and hit him directly in the head, knocking him out. The glass of the monocle clattered to the ground with a ting!
"Guys, I got Strucker." he communicated to his team, eyes on the unconscious Hydra scientist at his feet. Maybe he could tell Steve what exactly he had done to Q.
Waiting for von Strucker to wake up, Steve stayed in the back of the transport vehicle with him and two other guards that were on his side. The van and the guards were sent to take von Strucker to the separate quinjet that would transfer him to whatever jail he would rot in for the rest of his life. Steve didn't know the specifics, all he wanted to know was what the hell he did to Q.
Impatient, he kicked his foot out and jostled the Hydra scientist awake. Blinking a few times, von Strucker came around and noticed where he was: handcuffed to a bench, sandwiched between two burly guards with guns that didn't answer to him. He let out a low chuckle, even though the situation was far from funny, before his eyes landed on Steve.
"You hurt a lot of people." Steve said lowly, getting straight to the point, "A lot of innocent people."
"The same argument could be made for what you did in World War two, Captain." von Strucker responded smoothly, lifting his chin up a bit defiantly, "How many died in the crossfire as you tried - and failed - to rid the world of Hydra?" he asked with an eyebrow raise. Steve ignored him and the guilt that was inching closer, ready to drape around him like a cloak of darkness.
"You had a woman, one you were experimenting on." he prompted, "She was a former SHIELD agent." he tried to be more detailed without giving away too much. He didn't need von Strucker to know how important she was to him in case there was something he didn't know about, something to be used against him. But it was enough to pique his attention. Good, he knew who Steve was talking about, "What did you do to her?" he asked straightly, not in the mood for games. And he didn't have much time either; he could hear his teammates in his comms discussing meeting at the exfil point - Tony had the scepter.
"The same thing I did to the others who are now gifted. Unlocked her potential." von Strucker answered evenly, scarily, like the villain he was. Steve repressed the shiver going through his body. He hated how von Strucker sounded as he talked about Q, like she was a victory for him, "But she was taken away before we could really see what she how it affected her. Pity, really." he finished with a disappointed sigh. Steve leaned forward, wanting to ask how what affected her and where she was taken, but the crackle of his comm got his attention.
"Rogers, where are you?" Nat asked, "We're waitin' on you." While her tone was light, it held a bit of weight to it. He knew he was out of time. He couldn't keep them waiting. It would cause more questions he didn't - couldn't answer. His time with von Strucker was up.
Unbeknownst to Steve, he was a lot closer to Q than he had been in over a year. At least in the same country. Getting adjusted to being a "super soldier" was taking a lot longer than she thought it would. And it wasn't an immediate change either. She didn't wake up one day and miraculously become a super soldier. Whatever was in the serum that was pumped into her hurt. It made her stomach roll, her muscles ache and her head pound. Sometimes, she woke up with splitting headaches while other times she could barely keep water down. She was so tired all of the time too, but couldn't sleep because nightmares of her time strapped to the chair haunted her.
Days turned to weeks and slowly, they were able to figure out just how her body had taken in the serum. While she didn't have super speed or super strength, she was able to heal a bit faster than normal and Dawson had came to the conclusion that it also meant her aging had slowed down. Her mind was sharper too, being able to recall whatever she had read or seen or heard. Her senses were turned up, allowing to be aware of a lot more than she normally was. She might not be a full super soldier, but she was close enough to one. Which was a weird transition.
"I mean, your brain waves look the same as last week." Dawson commented while his eyes stayed on his tablet, "Still having a baseline that's super high in the gamma frequency." he showed her the screen and she let out a sigh. A sign that her brain function was at peak mental state; a simultaneous processing of information from different parts of the brain. She wasn't even doing anything, just sitting in silence with wires attached to her head. "What are you thinking about?" he asked, turning the tablet back to himself. She shrugged, letting her hands fall in her lap.
"Nothing and everything." she admitted, earning a slightly amused scoff from him. She grumbled to herself, trying to ignore him; it was the truth.
Her brain was going a mile a minute trying to take in everything that was going on: the sounds of the ocean behind them and Dawson tapping at his tablet, the smells of the salty beach air and the lingering scent of popcorn, and even the way the adhesive of the stickers on her head felt and the feel of the blanket covering her lap. And those were just presently, at that moment, things she had to deal with, not even going into the way her mind was associating certain things with past memories or even her constant thoughts about Steve.
Taking in a breath, she refocused on quieting her mind, wanting to get the hang of dealing with everything going on inside her head. Try and categorize it as much as she could. The sounds, scents and feelings of her surroundings into one part of her brain, the memories and random thoughts into a separate part. Ones to focus on versus ones that weren't that important.
Dawson's loud cheer of success made her suddenly jump. She must've gotten her levels down quite a bit. Having been so focused on calming her mind down, she didn't even realize how literally quiet it had actually gotten. She might have gone too far and the consequences of it came speeding at her like a bullet train. All of a sudden, she was assaulted with all the different sounds, smells and things touching her. A sharp sting cut through her head from one temple to the other, causing her to cry out in pain and reach up to rip the wires off her head - as if they were burning her, even though they weren't doing anything at all.
"Shit, are you okay?" he asked, all traces of celebration gone from his voice. She winced and went to rub at her temples, trying to focus on one thing as the aggressive headache started to fade.
"Yeah, I just….this is a lot harder than I thought." she sighed, keeping her hands at her head and slumping down a bit. She knew it would take a bit to get used to everything, but at some points it was just too overwhelming.
"Is there anything I can do?" he was trying to be helpful, she knew that, but it was also weird for him to be helpful when it wasn't directly serving him.
"I'm okay." she waved off his offer and then shook her head a bit as if that would help her re-center, "I think I'm done with this for today." she twirled the wires in the air, letting them wrap around her fingers. She was tired of feeling like a lab rat for the time being.
Moving from the couch, she exited the living room to go to her bedroom and left Dawson in the living room to record their data. Previously, that would be something she would have control over - not wanting him to fuck it up, but currently, she just didn't have the strength or interest in it to do so. She just wanted to be alone, somewhere where there wasn't a bunch of different things to focus on.
Enough time had passed since she had gotten back to the beach house that she was allowed to move back to her bedroom. Regaining her sense of privacy allowed her to feel a bit more comfortable and being comfortable was an important step in dealing with her newfound abilities.
Not that she was sure there was any use to them. Sure she could heal from a paper cut much faster than before, and maybe live past a certain age, but the mess inside her head was one she was still trying to figure out. At the very least, she understood why Bucky was acting on such high alert when he rescued her. There was so much going on, it was hard to determine what was important to focus on versus what wasn't. If Hydra had used a similar serum on both of them, then the side effects had to be the same - or at least close to it.
Going into the cabinet under her nightstand, she pulled out a bottle of whiskey. Advanced healing aside, she had experimented enough through the past weeks to know just how much alcohol was enough to dull the mess inside her head. She couldn't get as drunk as she once could, (though she was working on it), but she could at least get a little buzzed, which was all she needed at that point.
The cold wind nipped at her cheeks as she settled herself on the deck chair outside of her room. Winter had supposedly passed a few weeks before, but there were still plenty of cold spring days. Though she started running a bit warmer than she had before, she still wrapped a long cardigan around her out of habit. The ocean waves crashed against the shore on the otherwise cloudy day while her thoughts turned to Steve.
They almost always did whenever she tried to work through what she suddenly was considered: a super soldier. Either because she missed him or because she was relating his super soldier-ium to hers. And sometimes it was both. He could be the one person who could really, genuinely help her through this - having been the original super soldier. Maybe he had some trick to help with certain things, even though she already knew firsthand how he dealt with the things inside his head.
Still, it'd be nice to at least talk to him about it. There wasn't much they had in common before, but this was now one massive thing. Something she never thought they would share in common and certainly not the best thing to be able to relate with either. But maybe he would have some advice at least.
With that in mind, her hand slipped into her cardigan pocket to pull out her phone. She went into her recent calls, seeing all the missed ones from Steve since she had left New York. His voicemails were still there, but it had been a while since she had listened to any. Instead of bringing her comfort, they just hurt her. There were so many times he had tried to make contact, extend an olive branch of sorts, and she had just completely ignored him. Which was a guilt she'd have to live with forever.
Before she knew what was happening, her thumb had tapped his contact name. The screen faded into one that showed a call being made. To Steve.
A/N: A cliffhanger! I really didn't plan to write AoU - and still don't, but I think it gives a good timeframe for everything! So these next few chapters will have mentions/references of AoU and miiiiight lead to something between two certain characters...what are your thoughts/theories? I hope you enjoyed this chapter and a little Steve update! Please don't hesitate to review! I really love hearing all of your thoughts. As usual, thank you so much for reading!