A/N: Short chapter this time, and I've actually had this written for a while. Trouble was I was trying to move to the next bit also in this chapter, but it wasn't working, and I've now revised my plans, so! Here's this little tidbit, with more to follow (hopefully) soon. Also, I was originally planning one, maybe two chapters in the '40s before we jumped to the main time, 2008 onwards. That plan has been thrown out the window because John Kenway's got shit do. Hope you enjoy!

Chapter Two: The First Avenger (cont'd)

March 20, 1942

John Kenway stepped out of the dark car onto the streets of London, straightening the overcoat he wore against the London cool. After spending most of the last two years carrying out operations in North Africa and the Mediterranean, the lower temperatures affected him more than they once would have. In fact, he hadn't been in London since he had been debriefed after the Erskine operation, a dim spot in his memory since it included the knowledge of Schmidt's survival. Now he was back in the city, standing in front of a tailor's shop in the city center, sent by his superiors to observe a new operation centered around Abraham Erskine. OSS Command had been annoyingly secretive about what exactly was going on and what his orders were, beyond the fact that he would be met by another operative and briefed on-site.

John and the two men who had ridden with him stepped up to the door, and an older gentleman opened it for them. As they stepped through the door, they each removed their hats, following their driver to the back of the shop. A hidden door in a shelf of materials swung open, and the driver and one of John's fellow passengers walked through without hesitation. The second man stopped and caught John's arm. The shopkeeper had somehow disappeared, leaving the two men alone in the room.

"We don't have much time before we need to join the others," the man began. "The project happening today is the culmination of Erskine's work on the super soldier serum. The Allies will soon have their first super-soldier. It's our job to make sure that he's their only one. The project lead, Colonel Phillips, is a Templar, though luckily not connected to Hydra. That particular branch has split from the main body, and the rest of the Templars want them gone as much as we do."

"How, exactly, do you know all this?" John interrupted. "And how exactly are we meant to prevent the creation of more soldiers?"

The other man glanced around, then leaned in close. "My name is Heinrich Amsler. I am a double agent for your Order, working inside Hydra for several years. I was there at Tönsberg when Schmidt recovered a certain artifact, a Piece of Eden he plans to use to create weapons like the world has never seen. Allied Command knows he found something there. What they don't know is that he murdered a group of high-ranking Templars, both Axis and Allied, when they arrived to demand the artifact for their own projects. Schmidt has gone rogue, but we still cannot allow Phillips to have access to the serum either. Once the experiment is complete, I will kill Erskine and destroy as much of the serum as I can. Your job is to secure what I don't destroy and kill me as I try to escape."

John had followed Amsler's words, studying his face and mannerisms for duplicity, but showing no reaction until his final words. "You want me to kill you?" he hissed. "Are you entirely insane?"

Amsler smiled, but there was no happiness in the expression. "I was not always a double agent, my American friend. I was, however, married to a Jewish woman with two beautiful children. One day I came back to my home to find them gone. The Gestapo had taken them, though my Hydra connections had spared me their wrath. A few weeks later, I found their bodies in the garbage pile of the base where I worked. I have no desire to live, only to deny Hydra and the Templars who funded them. With this action, I ensure that this supersoldier will attack Hydra, and I trust you to attack the Templars, mein freund."

John stared at the other man for a moment, his mind drifting back to the girl waiting for him back home… and what lengths he would go to to have revenge should anything happen to her. He quickly decided that dying would be the least of his concerns if it meant his enemies would pay. "Understood," he said, then gestured to the hidden door. "Shall we?"

John was shocked when he saw the specimen Erskine had selected for his first run at creating a true supersoldier. The boy was emaciated, short, and wheezed like an asthmatic. A quick review of the packet of papers being passed around to the observers revealed that Steven Grant Rogers was indeed an asthmatic, along with a host of other muscular, cardiac, and respiratory ailments. In fact, his only qualification for the enhancements appeared to be that he was born on the Fourth of July.

John was ripped from his thoughts as he continued to dig through the pages of information by a familiar, German-accented voice. "Ah, my rescuer! I am afraid I never caught your name, but I am glad to see you here to see the fruits of your efforts!"

John looked up and smiled tightly at the condemned doctor. "Doctor Erskine, it is an honor to be here," he said, "though my work for OSS demands that my name must, unfortunately, be kept confidential. You can call me John."

Erskine raised his hands, a smile still on his face. "Of course, my friend, of course! Come, would you like to meet the subject before we begin."

John nodded, forcing his own smile to relax so that it no longer resembled a grimace. "Of course, doctor, though only if you promise not to vomit on me again. I'm rather more fond of this suit than I was those clothes in Germany."

The doctor chuckled and gestured him onward. "An excellent jest! Now, this is Private Rogers, our subject and soon to be the next generation of soldier."

The doctor had led him to the skinny young man, who despite his physical frailties held himself ramrod straight and looked John directly in the eye. "I'm Private Rogers," he said. "A pleasure to meet you, Mr…?"

"Call me John," the Assassin said. "I work for OSS, Mr. Rogers. You know, if this procedure goes well we could use someone like the man you'll be in the Strategic Service."

"Ah, thank you, sir, but I think SSR already had first dibs on me," he responded.

John smiled down at the man. "Well, if you ever get tired of being a lab rat, just ask someone in intel to put you in contact with OSS staff. I'll be sure to let them know you might call."

Rogers nodded firmly. "I'll keep that in mind, sir." The two exchanged a handshake, John noting how his handshake, like his posture, didn't match his apparent limitations, then John returned to the viewing area as Erskine and Howard Stark led the young man to the coffin-like apparatus in the center of the room.

Once Rogers was inside the device, the lab technicians began rushing about, making sure hoses and wires were connected, until finally the coffin closed around Rogers. Stark started dialing in his Vita-Rays, and serum began to rush through the pipes into the device. Rogers soon began screaming, and Erskine rushed to shut it down until Rogers could be heard yelling something unintelligible to the observers, but nonetheless led to Erskine allowing the experiment to continue. Finally, the light and screams coming from the apparatus came to an end and the coffin opened up once again, revealing a man who looked nothing like the scrawny thing that had entered it mere moments before.

The new Rogers was better than six feet tall and rippled with muscle, to the extent that the only female SSR staffer, who John realized with a start was none other than Peggy Carter, couldn't resist feeling his newfound abs. The reverential moment was shattered by a series of gunshots. Doctor Erskine pitched forward into Roger's arms, a pair of bullet wounds in his back, and several pieces of equipment were destroyed. Heinrich leapt forward, seizing one vial of serum and sending most of the rest flying, then fled the room. In the confusion, John slipped up to the rack of serum vials, and cracked the four remaining vials into a water-tight canister, the insistence with which his boss had forced it on him confusing until now. The serum vials were then smashed on the floor with the others, the canister stowed, and John sprinted for the door, just behind the newly enhanced Private Rogers.

Rogers was fast, and made it up the stairs faster than John could, though apparently not as quickly as Peggy Carter. As they exited the shop, Heinrich was pulling a driver out of his cab while Carter rushed into the street, weapon raised and firing at the cab even as Amsler gunned the engine and rushed towards her. She missed her shots, and Rogers tackled her out of the way. John didn't. As soon as he had exited the shop, he had drawn the 1911 he had carried since Germany, knelt to stabilize his aim, and fired twice at the left front tire. The tire blew, and the car carried sufficient speed for it to slew head-on into a lamppost at the sudden loss of traction.

John rose and rushed forward while Rogers and Peggy disentangled themselves, quickly reaching the driver's door, which remained closed after the impact. He reached for the door handle, but some instinct warned him suddenly and he jerked back, just as a gunshot went off from within the car. The bullet creased his cheek, narrowly missing his eye, but then he heard the telltale sound of a hammer falling on an empty chamber. He moved back forward, pistol leveled at Amsler's head.

"Serum…" the man gasped, his face covered in blood and arm at an awkward angle. "Breast… pocket." John nodded, examining the man. It appeared the crash had injured him quite badly, worse than it probably should have, leading John to believe his excellent shooting hadn't been the sole reason the man had run into a flagpole. John reached in, putting a hand on the pocket and applying pressure, smashing the vial and drawing a gasp of pain from the man. "Promise me… they'll pay," he said.

John looked him in the eye one last time, then noticed that Rogers and Peggy had finally gotten up and begun to make their way over. "They will," he said. "Ruhig schlafen, mein freund." Rest easy, my friend. Then he pulled the trigger, his sights aimed just above Amsler's right eye.

Peggy arrived at his side a moment later, somehow beating the supersoldier in a footrace. "Why did you kill him?" she barked. "We don't even know who he worked for! He could have had valuable intelligence!"

John looked at her for a moment. "He was Hydra. I could have told you that even if I hadn't interrogated him, which I did. And he was a thug, so he knew nothing. As to your first question, the poor bastard was dead anyway. I just gave it to him quicker as a reward for telling me what I wanted to know," he said coldly. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go see if there's anything salvageable from your department's security debacle."

John turned away from the flabbergasted spy and confused supersoldier, making his way back into the shop and down the no longer hidden stairs. People were running around panicking, there was broken glass everywhere, and what few officers still remained were too busy talking to each other, likely about how to cover their own asses, to restore order. Phillips had disappeared, probably calling for reinforcements. "HEY!" John didn't yell often, but when he did people heard him. "You, you, and you," he said, pointing at three random techs, "get the doctor's body off the floor and find something to cover it with. Stark, get your people in order and get the mess cleaned up. I want to know if we have any viable serum left. And one of you," he added, turning towards the small cluster of officers nervously conferencing a few feet away from him, "make contact with OSS command and tell them to get a recovery team in here. SSR's bungled this enough."

One of the officer's chose to sneer at him rather than obey. "That's not your call to make, civilian," he said. "And as this is a British operation, on British soil, the OSS has no jurisdiction to…"

He cut off when John pulled his sidearm from the holster he had returned it to and aimed it at the point of the Englishman's nose, adrenaline from the chase and killing pushing him to rashness. "Do as I say, or I'll save your Army the trouble of court-martialing your incompetent ass," he said quietly.

The second officer went for his own sidearm at the threat to his fellow officer, but the third was faster, his Webley revolver pressing against the back of the other Englishman's skull. "Ah dinnae aboot you, but Ah'd do wot the Yank says," the Highlander officer said quietly, and John flashed him a quick grin.

The second officer gulped and left, looking for a telephone. "I believe I saw one upstairs in the tailor's shop," John called after the other man's retreating back. Turning back to the other two, he realized that his pistol was still aimed at the other officer's face, so he dropped it down and reholstered the weapon. "Apologies, old bean," he said, miming a bad English accent. "Bit of a stressful morning, what?" He grinned when the other man followed his fellow, muttering something about 'crazy Americans'.

"He's right, y'know," the Scot officer said. "You Yanks are all bloody feckin' insane."