Chapter three: Hey, did you hear about what happened to Emma?

Emma sighed as she filed away paperwork for SHIELD. While she did work for this top secret division of the government, she didn't do much besides paper work. She hadn't even been on a mission yet. She supposed it had something to do with her heritage. The Director, Nick Fury, is the only one that knew about her grandfather as he had been told by Peggy when Emma had joined SHIELD. He did what he could to keep her safe which she had found rather annoying.

As she returned to her desk, she found Agent Coulson sitting at her desk. He wasn't frowning or smiling which was his usual resting face. Emma raised an eyebrow at him. Agent Coulson was one of her few friends that she had here but today he wasn't particularly friendly.

"Phil, how are you today?" Emma asked, smiling at him.

"Emma, how was your weekend? Anything exciting happened?" Phil asked with a knowing look and she gulped.

"Well, I caught up with an old friend, spent time with them then just hung around the apartment. Nothing too exciting," Emma said with a shrug of her shoulders.

He opened a folder that he had been holding and handed her some photos. The first photo she saw was of her Steve at Coney Island, eating cotton candy. The next one was of Steve putting her in a headlock and ruffling her hair.

"Care to explain that?" Phil asked.

Phil was a huge fan of Captain America and she figured it wouldn't take him long before he figured something was up but she didn't think it would take him this long.

"What? Is SHIELD stalking people now?" Emma asked with a snort.

"You know, with being who he is, that there would be agents following him," Phil told her.

"Yes, but did they really have to take pictures of him like he's some sort of movie star because he isn't. He's a hero and he should be treated as such. He's needs some sort of privacy. I mean, he just woke after being frozen for 70 years for Christ's sake! He's a fucking person and doesn't need this shit!" Emma snapped and immediately regretted it.

The hurt look on his face disappeared as soon as it had appeared. He grabbed the photos and placed them back into the folder.

"He needs to be protected," Phil said.

"From what? He can handle himself as you very know. Who's going to harm him? Unless you know something that I don't know," Emma said but not as angry as she was before.

"How do you know him?" Phil asked, ignoring her question.

"I'll answer your question if you answer mine," she said stubbornly.

"I think this conversation is over," Phil replied before leaving her office.

Growling, she followed the man out the door. Despite the fact that she was short, she managed to catch up with the man who was quit faster than she was.

"Something's happening. Tell me what's going on," Emma demanded as she followed him.

"You're not cleared for that," Phil told her.

"Well, you know that's not true. You know who my grandmother is," Emma growled at him.

Just as he was to retort, Maria Hill walked up to them; interrupting their conversation. Out of the corner of her eyes she could see Phil's shoulders sag in relief and she couldn't help but glare at him.

"Emma," Maria spoke to her. "Director Fury would like to see you in his office. Now."

"This isn't over, Coulson," Emma said, pointing a finger at him before following Maria.

"What was that about?" Maria asked her.

Maria was another friend at SHIELD, to the surprise of many. Emma was meek and mild, except when she was angry of course, while Maria was strong and level-headed.

"Oh, you know how Phil is. So closed up about everything," Emma said pouting slightly.

"Well, so are you, aren't you?" Maria asked her.

"I am. . . not," Emma said and she was suddenly unsure. "Ok, so, maybe I am a little but not as much as Phil is."

"You're both rather stubborn," Maria said and Emma couldn't help but agree with her.

"So, do you know what Nick wants?" Emma asked her friend.

"Nope, he just asked me to send for you," Maria said and Emma sighed.

Her heart was racing slightly in her chest as she walked with her friend to the director's office. She thought about all things she could have done and she wondered if it had anything to do with Steve. No, that couldn't be it. He had been aware that she was going to go meet him. They arrived in his office to find him staring out the window with his hands behind his back; his usual stance.

"Ah, Agent Carter, how was your weekend?" Nick asked as he turned around.

Emma narrowed her eyes at him, that was as close as joke as she had ever heard him get and she wondered for a moment if she was in the right office. She didn't start speaking until Maria left the room.

"It went great, Steve welcomed me with opened arms. Well, not really but he let me into his apartment and we talked for a long while. We spent the weekend together and he's even letting me call him Gramps. In private, of course," Emma told Nick with a smile on her face.

"That's great, Agent Carter," he said with a slight smile on his face. "Now, for what I actually asked you in here for. I have a mission for you."

"What?" Emma asked in surprise.

For as long as she worked at SHIELD, which was only one year, she had been stuck in her office doing paperwork. She never thought that Nick would ever send her out on a mission.

"You heard me, Carter, do I have to yell it for the people in the back? I am sending you out on a mission," Fury replied.

"Thank you, sir. What's the mission?" she asked.

"Well, actually, I have two missions for you," Nick said and her eyebrows raised further. "One I will tell you about now and the other I'll tell you about when you're ready.

He pulled out a folder and laid it across his desk in front of her. She looked at the photo of a small, glowing box in awe.

"This is called the Tesseract. It was Hydra's secret weapon back in your grandfather's day," he explained to her. "Howard Stark fished that out of the ocean when he was looking for Rogers. He thought what we think, the Tesseract could be the key to unlimited sustainable energy. That's something the world sorely needs."

"What do you need me to do?" she asked.

Later that evening Emma caught up with Phil in an elevator with a smile on her face. She was very grateful that she would be working with Agent Coulson on this mission and she hoped he would accept her apology.

"Hey, Phil," she greeted with a smile.

"Agent Carter," he returned the greeting with a head nod.

"Listen, Nick just briefed me on the Tesseract," Emma told Phil. "And that I'll be going with you to collect Stark."

"Fine," he said without even looking at her.

"Look, Phil, I'm sorry I snapped you. I didn't mean to but I do think that Steve needs some space. He needs to get acclimated to this era and with SHIELD breathing down his neck is not helping anything. He's not a hero from a book, he's a person who just went through hell and back. If you really want to know what I'm keeping from you, come to my office," Emma ended as the door to the elevator opened and she stepped out.

He followed her to his office and she sat down in her office chair while he sat down in front of her. She began tapping her pencil on the desk and looked around the room, wondering how to tell him.

"Well?" Phil asked.

"Phil, I can trust you, right?" Emma asked him.

"Of course you can," he said. "Whatever you're about to tell me, I promise I won't say anything."

She then proceeded to tell him about how she was related to Captain America and she thought that he was going to pass out, seeing as his face had just turned a milky white but he kept his cool and tried not to grin from ear to ear.