High Altitudes and Higher Tensions
Olivia stood to the side of Maria as the woman spoke to Phil in a hallway of the base. Natasha had gone to interrogate Loki, and Maria had asked her to accompany her quickly before she returned to Steve. She had hoped that going with Maria would help her learn a little more about whatever weapon she and Natasha appeared to have picked out for her. She really wasn't comfortable with the thought of having any kind of weapon on her, but from what she could tell of what they had been saying near the end, it seemed they really had taken into account how she felt about combat in general. It seemed like they really were trying to be considerate of her own personal beliefs and she hoped the women had found some kind of object for her to use that wouldn't push her past her boundaries.
If she had thought it would be as simple as overhearing Maria asking Phil to get this weapon for her, or whatever the FF-03 prototype was, it could never be that easy. Instead, Maria had begun speaking to Phil using what seemed like serial numbers or a categorizing system for the weapons SHIELD utilized. She was good at math, but it felt like there was absolutely no rhyme or reason to the numbers given to certain weapons.
Phil, to his credit, didn't quite seem surprised with the weapon being described to him. He was nodding along as though it made perfect sense that that would be the weapon she would use. She hoped it was another good sign that whatever it was would actually be something she would be willing to touch. Of all the people there besides Steve, Phil had appeared to be the one who understood her and her preferences more than anyone. He had designed a uniform for her that was perfect for her terms of simplicity, practicality, and modesty. He seemed to have researched the things she hadn't been fond of on her last uniform and even the trouble she had with her basic army garb, and went out of his way to make something for her that he hoped she would like. The fact that he seemed to think this was a fitting weapon for her at least reassured her somewhat.
"Do you think you can get it?" Maria was asking Phil when she brought up the FF-03 prototype, "Will it even work for this project?"
Phil nodded in consideration, and Olivia could tell his mind was already racing with ideas, "It would actually be perfect," he told them, "We've been trying to figure out which weapons we could have fixed the FF-03 to, and yours would actually be a great fit."
"Think you can get it for us before Agent Romanoff cracks Loki?"
Phil actually laughed at that, "If I know Agent Romanoff, she's probably already cracking him at the moment. But I have the clearance and the authorization, shouldn't take long to get it working," he smiled at Olivia, "It's about time you got a shield like the Cap."
"Is THAT what we've been talking about?" Olivia looked between them, not really sure why Maria wouldn't have just said it was going to be a shield...though why would she have called it a weapon then? While she knew Steve could use his shield as one when he hurled it like a discus, it usually was looked at as more of a protection.
"Not quite," Maria told her, "Not quite a shield."
"Then what is it?"
"It's..." Phil began, but Maria reached out to put a hand on his shoulder to quiet him, shaking her head. He started to nod instead as he realized, "A surprise. But I think it will suit you."
Olivia shook her head in a manner as though to say 'of course it is,' and let out a sigh, "If you say so. I trust your judgment, Phil."
"Why do you trust him but not Agent Romanoff or myself?" Maria asked, sounding mock-offended.
"Phil designed this," she gestured at her uniform, "And it really is wonderful, Phil, thank you so much for it," she moved to give him a hug to show her appreciation.
"Oh my God, this is happening," Phil's eyes widened as he muttered out those words. Major Williams was hugging him!
Olivia gave like chuckle as she pulled away, "You created something that did suit me," she paused as she heard her words, "Pun not intended, but still fitting. If you could design this, then I trust whatever you work on next will be something equally as wonderful."
"I won't let you down," Phil beamed at the praise.
Maria good-naturedly rolled her eyes at Phil's enthusiasm for the task. They had certainly been right, even if he hadn't had the clearance, Phil would have found some way to get his hands on the FF-03 just because it would be beneficial to Major Britannia.
"Speaking of letting down," Olivia eyes widened as she thought of something, "Your cards! I feel as though every time we try to sign them something comes up. If you have them on you, I can sign them right now."
"Yes!" Phil suddenly shouted, before clearing his throat and trying to play it cool, "I mean, yes, I would appreciate that, very much," he pulled a small deck from his pocket, handing them over to Olivia to look at as he began to pat himself down in search of a pen.
Olivia took a moment to look at the cards in question. It appeared he had only brought with him the ones that pertained to either her or Steve. There were quite a few of Steve, though she was rather surprised that there WERE, in fact, three cards for her. She smiled gently as she saw what they were. There was one of her in her military garb, the brown ones she and Peggy wore, though it was only from about her shoulders up. There's another one that had her shaking her head when she saw it was her standing in the uniform her country had designed for her to be paraded around in. And there was another one of her in just the basic army guard, the brown leathers that always seemed too big for her.
But it wasn't just those, those were the only three where it was JUST her. There were four others where she appeared along with others, five if she counted the one of her and Steve and all of the Commandos together. There was one of her and Peggy, her and Bucky, her kneeling by the bedside of a wounded soldier she had helped tend to in a tent.
The last one was the one that had her smiling the softest, it was a picture she didn't know anyone had taken, of her and Steve, just smiling at each other. It was clearly a private moment between the two of them, the emotion reflected on their faces and in their eyes as they gazed at each other said as much. Oddly, she didn't feel annoyed or irritated that the moment between them had been shared with others, as it actually reminded her of when a film crew had tagged along to get bits and pieces of her time with the Commandos and when she had been pulled close to the front lines. They had said that they really enjoyed catching the smaller moments between her and Steve and even those of the Commandos 'off-duty' because they gave the world hope and something to smile about in the darker times.
"I...um...pen," Phil looked as though he was about to turn down the hall to go find a pen when Maria cleared her throat and held one up for him. He quickly snatched it from her with a small thanks and held it out to Olivia, who chuckled but began to sign the cards.
"All of them or just..." she held up one, not sure if he wanted pen marks on on everything given how long it had taken him to collect.
"I can have more than one?" Phil seemed completely shocked by the fact that she would be willing to sign more than one card.
So Olivia laughed and made sure that she signed everything but the Commando card, the coloring was too dark to make out pen on and he wouldn't be able to see it. She held the cards back out to him along with the pen, "I can go see if I can find Steve, send him your way to sign the rest?"
"If it's not too much trouble," Phil spoke a little breathlessly as he looked down at the cards with wide eyes, touching them so gingerly and gently one would think they were a treasure.
Olivia gave him a nod, looking at Maria to give her one as well, before she turned to head down the halls in search of Steve. She missed him terribly, and she could really do with a hug after the small breakdown she had had with Natasha and Maria. Being around someone else going through the same as her made feel less alone and comforted.
"What?" Maria looked over at Phil when he made an odd choking noise, staring at one of the cards.
Phil just held it up, "We're friends!" Phil seemed inordinately pleased that Olivia had signed the cards in different ways, as Major Williams, as Olivia, as Major Britannia, but the one he was most excited about was the one where she signed it 'your friend Liv.'
"...I'm friends with Major Britannia..." Phil repeated, straightening as though there was a shock through his system, "...I think I need to go lie down."
Maria chuckled and shook her head, reaching out to pat him on the shoulder, "After you get her the FF-03," she reminded him, "She may be your friend, but you don't want to make the Captain an enemy if you don't get her a way to protect herself."
"On it!" Phil called as he turned and strode the opposite way down the hall, intending to do just that.
~8~
Steve stormed down the halls of the base, heading straight for the lab. He really hated to admit it, it was making his skin crawl to admit that Tony had been right, but he was also a man of honor. Tony deserved to know what was going on, as did Bruce, and what he had found in the hull of the ship was not something he could abide by. He hoped that he could get to the lab, show them what he had found, and that they could come up with some sort of way to confront Fury about all of it. But as he grew closer and closer to the lab he could hear more voices spoken within, Fury was already there.
"...been wondering the same thing about you," Tony was responding.
"You're supposed to be locating the Tesseract," Fury chastised.
"We are," Bruce's voice reassured him, "The model's locked and we're sweeping for the signature now. When we get a hit, we'll have the location within half a mile."
"And you'll get your cube back, no muss, no fuss," Tony agreed, and Steve could see just as he stepped into the lab the man turning a monitor to show Fury he had to finally hacked into all of the secret files SHIELD held, "What is PHASE 2?"
Steve had the answer to that in his hand, and so he threw what appeared to be an assault rifle powered by the Tesseract, reminding him far too much of the HYDRA weapons, onto a table, startling Fury, Bruce, and Tony into turning around. He was quite sure that the anger he felt burning within him at his discovery was displayed in every facet of his face and body language. Bruce actually took a step back.
"PHASE 2...is SHIELD uses the cube to make weapons," Steve stated, looking to Tony, "Sorry, the computer was moving a little slow."
He turned his attention back to Fury, an expectation on his face demanding an explanation for all of this. Since when did SHIELD take a leaf out of HYRDA's book use the Tesseract to make the same weapons their enemy had made. There had been an entire war that proved why it was not a good idea to make weapons of such a sort. He and Olivia had almost given their lives to stop HYDRA from doing this, and now SHIELD had taken up the mantle?
He was giving Fury two minutes to explain himself before he went to find Olivia and get them off the base himself.
"Rogers, we gathered everything related to the Tesseract," Fury began to explain, though it sounded more to Steve like he was reaching for excuses, "This does not mean that we're..."
"I'm sorry, Nick," Tony cut in, moving the computer to show Fury the files he had right in front of him, all the plans SHIELD had for the weapons. The plans that showed how to MAKE them as opposed to how Fury was trying to spin it as though they'd just collected them over the years. As much as he didn't appreciate Captain America, he wasn't about to let the man be conned by Fury's words. Of everyone on that base, he and the two super soldiers were the only ones who actually knew the true damage that the Tesseract could do when powering weapons. His father had studied it in-depth, he knew almost everything about the Tesseract from his first hand notes. This was far too serious to let SHIELD to try to cover it up, "What were you lying?"
Steve shook his head at Fury, seeing the plans with his own two eyes, "I was wrong, director. The world hasn't changed a bit."
He and Olivia had nearly died to stop these weapons being used. He was NOT about to let SHIELD lead them to their death again. Just as he turned to leave the room, Natasha and Thor stepped in.
"Did you know about this?" Bruce demanded of the Black Widow.
Natasha fell seamlessly into soldier-mode, not answering Bruce's question but responding to the clear anger in his voice, "You wanna think about removing yourself from this environment, doctor?"
"I was in Calcutta, I was pretty well removed."
"Loki's manipulating you," she reminded them, she had only just finished her interrogation and informed them all that Loki meant to trigger Bruce and release the Hulk on the ship. Right now and it was her priority to make sure that didn't happen.
"And you've been doing what exactly?"
"You didn't come here because I bat my eyelashes at you."
"Yes, and I'm not leaving because suddenly you get a little twitchy. I'd like to know why SHIELD is using the Tesseract to build weapons of mass destruction."
"SHIELD is what?" another voice spoke as Olivia stepped into the room, the smile that had been on her face from her brief meeting with Phil falling as she caught the end of that last sentence.
Steve immediately made his way to her side, "Exactly as he said," he told her, a grim quality in his voice.
"But you can't!" she shook her head, looking to Fury, "Have you learned nothing from the war?" she began to shake her head, unable to help but think back to the bodies, to the fallen on the field, to all the destruction that the Tesseract powered weapons of HYDRA had done. And now SHIELD was doing the same thing?
Steve quickly wrapped an arm around her, knowing exactly where her thoughts had gone, his had gone there too.
"We fought an entire War that showed exactly why you should never do such a thing," Olivia continued, though her one hand reached out to grip around Steve's arm for more support, "Why would you ever..."
"Because of him," Fury cut in, pointing a finger at Thor.
"Me?" Thor seemed stunned.
"Last year earth had a visitor from another planet who had a grudge match that leveled a small town. We learned that not only are we not alone, but we are hopelessly, hilariously, outgunned."
"My people want nothing but peace with your planet."
"But you're not the only people out there, are you? And, you're not the only threat. The world's filling up with people who can't be matched, they can't be controlled."
"Like you controlled the cube?" Steve scoffed, if they had just left the cube alone none of this would be happening right now.
Thor seemed to be of the same mind, "You're work with the Tesseract is what drew Loki to it, and his allies. It is the signal to all the realms that the earth is ready for a higher form of war."
"A higher form?" Steve shook his head at just thought of a war being worse than one they had fought in.
"This is exactly why Dr. Erskine never shared his serum with any of you," Olivia told Fury, "Because you would have done the same thing. You would have used it to make soldiers and not cared about making the bad worse."
That was all she could think about, how grateful she was now that Dr. Erskine had never allowed his serum to fall into the wrong hands. Though she had never thought SHIELD would become the wrong hands. But if they could take the Tesseract and make the same exact weapons HYDRA had made, knowing the destruction that could come from it, she could only imagine what they would have done with the serum. She couldn't help but picture in army of Hodges, marching around and causing havoc instead of people like her and Steve who just wanted to help.
"He forced our hand," Fury continued to defend, "We had to come up with something."
"Nuclear deterrent," Tony scoffed, for once Steve could agree with the sentiment, "Cause that always calms everything right down."
"Remind me again how you made your fortune, Stark?"
"I'm sure if he still made weapons, Stark would be neck deep..." Steve began to speak.
"Wait, wait!" Tony cut in, "Hold on! How is this now about me?"
"I'm sorry, isn't everything?"
Olivia shook her head at the bickering between the two men, moving over to the screen that had the information on the SHIELD-made HYDRA weapons.
"I thought humans were more evolved than this," Thor began to speak.
But Fury rounded on him, "Excuse me, did WE come to YOUR planet and blow stuff up?"
"Did you always give your champions such mistrust?"
"They aren't champions..."
"Are you all really that naive?" Natasha huffed, "SHIELD monitors potential threats..."
But Bruce scoffed, "Captain America and Major Britannia are on a potential threat watch list?"
"We all are."
"Major Brtiannia," Bruce repeated, gesturing to the least threatening of them all, trying to show how absurd that was.
"That is not your concern, doctor," Fury tried to cut him off.
The bickering and the arguing behind Olivia got to be so much that she couldn't even make out a single word each of them were saying, it was so jumbled and mashed together. She turned around to look at them, unable to tell who was even arguing with who.
She stuck her fingers in her mouth and made a loud, shrill whistling noise to silence them all, "If you are all quite finished!" she fixed them all with a firm look, "Thor," she turned to him, "Correct me if I am wrong, Norse mythology was not something I focused on, but Loki is an embodiment of mischief and strife yes?" Thor nodded, "Then what do you call this?" she gestured around at all of them, "Right now, we cannot afford to lose control of our tempers."
Thor snorted, "You speak of control, yet you court chaos."
"It's his M.O, like she said," Bruce spoke, trying to keep calm, agreeing with her words, "I mean, what are we, a team? No, no, no. We're a chemical mixture that makes chaos. We're...we're a time bomb."
"You need to step away," Fury began.
But Tony wouldn't let up, going so far as to reach out and put a hand on Steve's shoulder just to irritate the man more, "Why shouldn't the guy let off a little steam?"
Olivia shook her head at his action, another stark difference between he and his father, her experiences with Howard were that he at least knew when to quit and when to be serious, when he was going too far.
"You know damn well why!" Steve snapped, shoving Tony's arm off him, "Back off!"
"Oh, I'm starting to want you to make me."
"Tony," Olivia cut in, moving to try and stand in between the two men, but they were nearly face-to-face so she could only stand by their shoulders and reach out with a hand on each of their chests to keep them from coming to blows.
"Big man in a suit of armor," Steve didn't back down though, "Take that off, what are you?"
"Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist."
"I know guys with none of that worth ten of you."
"Steve!" Olivia huffed.
"Yeah, I've seen the footage. The only thing you really fight for is yourself. You're not the guy to make the sacrifice play, to lay down on a wire and let the other guy crawl over you."
"I think I would just cut the wire," Tony said simply.
"Always a way out...you know, you may not be a threat, but you better stop pretending to be a hero."
"A hero?" Tony finally seemed to be affected by Steve's words, "Like you? You're a lab rat, Rogers. Everything special about you came out of a bottle!"
"Enough, both of yoU!" Olivia snapped, shoving her way in between them and pushing them both apart so they were at a full arm-length out on either side of her, "You," she turned to look at Tony, who seemed moderately surprised by how forceful her push had been, "Do not get to say such things about Steve. You weren't there, you didn't get to know him before the serum. I did. And I can tell you everything special about him comes from his heart first and foremost. And you," she turned to Steve, "You don't know his life, you don't know what he fights for, and you don't know the sacrifices he may have made in the past. You do not get to determine someone else's worth."
Her words to Bruce came back to her in that moment, how she preferred to get to know someone for themselves. And she realized she was guilty of not doing that. She had read about Tony, but instead of actually trying to get to know him for who he was and what made him tick, she had constantly been comparing him to his father. But as she spoke to Steve, she realized she didn't know his story either, she didn't know his life, what made him who he was. And that wasn't fair to him.
"We all need to remain calm," she continued to speak, she could almost feel the tensions rising and the situation escalating.
Just because she didn't have any formal medical training didn't mean she didn't recognize what was happening. Hysteria could come in many forms, right now, with tension so high among a group of people in a small space, things could only get worse. Someone had to keep a level head and keep everyone else from breaking. And she was the medic, it was her job to treat breaks.
"You people are so petty...and tiny," Thor laughed.
"You are not helping," she called over to him.
"Yeah, this is a..." Bruce tried to laugh.
"Agent Romanoff, would you escort him back to his..." Fury began.
But Bruce cut in, "Where? You rented my room."
"The cell was just in case..."
"In case you needed to kill me, but you can't!" Bruce shouted, "I know! I tried!" they all fell silent at that, "I got low. I didn't see an end, so I put a bullet in my mouth and the other guy spit it out! So I moved on. I focused on helping other people. I was good, until you dragged me back into this freak show and put everyone here at risk! You wanna know my secret, Agent Romanoff? You wanna know how I stay calm?"
"Doctor Banner..." Steve spoke, stepping up, a little more in front of Olivia when he saw what Bruce was doing, why Fury and Natasha had their hands on their guns, "Put down the scepter."
Olivia looked around, seeing them all tense and on the defensive, while Bruce genuinely looked startled to find that he did have the scepter in his hand, not even seeming to realize he'd picked it up in the first place. So she stepped around Steve and moved forward cautiously, catching Bruce's eye as she reached out to gently take the scepter from him and place it back on the table it had been examined on.
A moment later one of the computers beeped and Tony stepped to it, "Got it."
"Sorry, kids," Bruce tried to smile at the others, "You don't get to see my little party trick after all."
"Was that the program to find the Tesseract or another hack?" Olivia looked at Tony.
"I'm pretty sure I wouldn't set something to beep and alert other people if I were trying to hack into a system," Tony muttered.
"You have located the Tesseract?" Thor straightened at that.
"I can get there faster."
"Look, all of us..." Steve began.
"The Tesseract belongs on Asgard," Thor argued, not even letting him finish, "No human is a match for it."
"Tony!" Olivia called as the man moved to leave, "You are NOT going alone."
"Really?" Tony scoffed, "Are you going to stop me?"
"I will," Steve stepped up to support her, "Put on the suit, let's find out."
"I'm not afraid to hit an old man."
"No one is hitting anyone," Olivia called out as she stepped forward and over to Tony, "Loki has already proven himself to be clever and dangerous, he wouldn't have left the cube unprotected. If you go, you take a partner with you, or you go through me."
Tony laughed at that, "Through you?"
But the way he reacted to her words told her he wasn't going to actually fight her over this. While he appeared to have no issue fighting Steve, whether it was because she was a woman or something else, he didn't appear to want to go to battle against her.
Before Tony could continue speaking or Steve could step up to say something else, Bruce let out of started crying, "Oh, my God!"
Not even a moment later everyone was thrown to the ground in every direction as something happened to the ship. It was as though an explosion of some sort had gone off or something had rammed into the side of it. Olivia managed to pick herself up, quickly rushing to the nearest person, who happened to be Tony, to make sure he was alright, looking around at the rest of the room to see if anyone else had been injured in the attack. She could see Steve, Fury, and Thor, but there was an opening in the floor and she couldn't see Natasha or Bruce.
"Put on the suit!" Steve called over to Tony as he picked himself up.
"Yep!" this time Tony didn't hesitate to agree with the man as he turned to head out of the lab to go prep.
Olivia hurried over to Fury's side, seeing the man gripping at his middle and wincing. She quickly knelt beside him, reaching out with steady hand to lightly press against his middle, understanding, when he let out a small hiss, that his ribs had either been bruised or cracked.
But Fury ignored the pain, tapping the comm. device in his ear and calling out, "Hill?!"
Olivia looked at Steve as the man hurried over to help Fury to his feet. Over the comm. they could hear the sound of utter chaos coming from the Bridge. While Maria hadn't responded directly to Fury, they could still hear what she was saying to the other agents.
"Turn up that engine! Number 3 engine is Down! Can we get a run in? Talk to me."
"Turbine's loose," an agent spoke, "Mostly intact, but it's impossible to get out there and make repairs while we're in the air."
"We lose one more engine, we won't be. Somebody's got to get inside and patch that engine."
"Stark!" Fury barked out, "You copy that?!"
"I'm on it!" Tony replied back over the comm..
Olivia looked up at Steve, "A ship this size, he's going to need help."
Steve nodded, understanding what she was saying, a turbine the size that would be needed to lift this craft into the air would be more than what the Iron Man suit could probably handle. But that combined with someone with super strength, it might stand a chance.
"You help Tony," Olivia stated, "I go to the Bridge, it sounds like that was where most agents were, they could be injured."
Steve wasn't pleased that they would be splitting up once more, but if it was a choice between her being near a large spinning blade, or surrounded by other SHIELD agents to help protect her, he would pick the latter, "Be careful."
She smiled at him, leaning in and quickly kissing him, "Don't kill Tony," she said in response, before the two of them hurried out of the room, Olivia helping carry along with her.
Whatever had happened, it was clear that Loki had made his next move.
A/N: Coulson just keeps finding his way into scenes lol :) He's just so much fun to write, it breaks my heart to think of what happens to him next :(
I couldn't really see Olivia getting into arguments the same way the others did in the movie. She's spent her life being the one that makes sure others are ok and trying to keep things calm, that I couldn't see her just bickering that way. I felt she'd be more the one trying to get everyone focused. She did not like what Tony had to say about Steve, but equally Steve had said some hurtful things about Tony. So it was a pickle for her to try and call them out for what they both were doing while not trying to take sides :/
Some notes on reviews...
I agree. I think that's something to explore with Olivia, how it is good to know how to defend herself but that others need to respect how and when and IF she uses her knowledge. We all want to see powerful women kicking but, but not every powerful woman wants to. There are different ways to be powerful and important outside of violence or fighting, so it will be interesting to see how Olivia balances that and what her 'weapon' will be ;)
Lol, we'll actually see a bit of a 'girl's night' type thing in Ultron. There's quite a few hours before Tony's party ;) ;)
I look forward to the day Olivia and Strange can meet, hopefully Avengers 4 will help that happen ;) Or, you never know, will Olivia be deemed a 'criminal' in IW? Will she end up going with Tony into the ship? We'll have to wait and see :) But that is something that I really wanted to touch on. People see Olivia and think about how she was part of the Erskine experiments and assume it MUST mean she should be a fighter, that they don't really look at WHY Erskine picked her. With all the slack he would have gotten for picking a woman who would never have been allowed to fight in the war in the first place, WHY a woman and why her? He had his reasons, she proved what they were, others just need to accept it ;) But I agree, I can see quite a few similarities between her and Strange :)
Gotcha ;) I had so many movie-stories to update, since I'd missed posting nearer to when the movies came out, that I try to get them up sooner than my Lord of the Rings story. I aim for posting these movie-stories everyday, because I have about...8 more to go and I really want to get caught up by the end of the year lol :)