The Winter Files

by Servant of Fire

AU/ AU Hiatus. After the R-Fall, John learns that Sherlock is alive, and learns the true nature of the young beginnings of the consulting detective when Captain Steve Rogers shows up at the doorstep of Baker Street with a file from SHIELD containing Sherlock's service record, and a file for one Sergeant Barnes, that he needed Sherlock , and now John instead, to help him find...

6. Chapter 6 Infiltrate

Chapter 6: Infiltrate~

Natasha Romanov was the ultimate spy. She had secrets, and knew secrets so deep that even the dead didn't know they were hiding. So she wasn't surprised when Fury called her in, wanting her to infiltrate Steve's mission to Ukraine, concerning Holmes and Barnes.

"So it's pretty serious if you don't trust the Captain with it?" she laughed, strolling into the outdoor cafe where Fury was hiding in plain sight, drinking a soda, and reading a magazine.

Fury looked up, and swallowed.

"As serious as world domination."

Nat raised an eyebrow.

"Ooh, sounds spooky!" she teased, and plopped down at the table, with the fruit smoothie she was drinking. This looked like the rendevous of a man and and his teenaged daughter, not of the world's chief secret intelligence officer and his highest ranking spy.

" Only because it is. Very spooky. But Nat, it's not that I don't trust the Captain with it...It's that I do. I trust him to do the right thing, and sometimes the right thing will get you killed..."

" Especially if Hydra gets to the Winter Soldier and wipes his brain again, right?"

"I'm actually more worried about the Winter Soldier's potential successor."

"Oh, yeah, Holmes on mind-control would be a world's worst nightmare..."

"Well, see it's like this. Barnes is dying...He might not have more than a month or two if my leads are right..."

"Cancer, or is it just 'cause he's old and been out of kyro for too long?"

" Worse. It's the location device that they bugged him with back in the day. Our level GPS was a Jules Verne fantasy back then, so they had to improvise a little bit. The thing that they bugged Barnes' with, the thing they used to relocate him anytime his head started to clear up, and he started to act of his own volition,... Whatever that thing is made out of is killing him, slow and painfully. Unless they can get it out, which would be a horrific procedure, he's as good as dead."

"Why send Cap after him in the first place, if that's how it stands?"

"Because the Cap's not going alone. John Watson's going with him..."

Nat shook her head, lips forming the shape of the word "OH", like she was a naughty little kid let in on the world's dirtiest secret.

"So you want me to infiltrate, make sure Barnes gets to Watson?..."

"It's time to see if Sherlock Holmes' faith in the X Doctor was well founded. Let's see if he's got the skills, and if he does, he's one of us..."