Finally, so freakin sorry for the long delay, I have had one hell of a brain fart and been rewritting this chapter over and over. Its not great and I am very sorry for that! Thank you for all the wonderful messages and as it turns out I am going to keep writing this story the way I want it :D So yay I guess. And now, without further ado here is chapter 3!

Chapter 3 : The Flying Duck

The small blip on the horizon quickly grew into an oversized hunk of metal floating in the water. It was dark, huge and to be frank, ugly as a turd. Not to mention it looked out of place, almost like it didn't belong in the ocean. Not that Steve would complain about staying on it, right at the moment he would celebrate the sight of a wooden raft if it meant getting him out of the sky and planted on something solid, well semi solid. Either way the water was better than the sky, though he preferred solid ground.

It's not something Steve would ever openly admit to being scared of but the last time he had been on a plane it had ended up crashing and freezing him solid for a decade or so. Needless to say he was not all to keen on repeating the process any time soon, or ever. Hence his general discomfort with flying.

Thankfully their flight in had been very peaceful, that is until some maniac of a pilot went screaming by rocking their world as it raced in for a crazed landing. Steve heard the captain mumble a few choice words before turning to Coulson, "Beginning landing sequence, please prepare to disembark".

Steve took one last glance toward the other plane as it slammed into a landing, before turning and moving away from the front of the plane. If they were going to crash he was going to be smart about it. What with the whole seat belts save lives thing.

Coulson followed him practically been on his heels, endearing as it was to have someone so interested in him, Steve was beginning to feel very claustrophobic. Phil was a nice man, though he was positive the man had little in they way of social skills, that or he was just an awkward man when he was excited.

Steve began to sit but Coulson caught his arm, leading him to the back of the plane. "So as soon as we land I will probably have to leave you by yourself", Steve could have sworn he heard a tinge of disappointment in Phil's voice, "but I will have one of my men take you to your cabin and get you situated. I will need you on the bridge very soon, so try to make it quick. Fury is anxious to start your briefing." Steve followed Coulson to the exit and waited with him as the plane landed rather gently to his delight. The large door creaked open shortly after, sunlight pouring in like white paint on a black canvas.

Coulson's slipped on his sun glasses and smiled at Steve, "Welcome to Home Base Captain." Steve followed him off the plane, eyes having trouble adjusting to the lighting. He scanned the deck, searching for the plane that had landed before them, but there were planes everywhere and so many people running around the deck it would be almost impossible to spot it from here.

"Agent Romanoff" Coulson greeted, pulling Steve's attention back, " this is Captain Rogers."

"Ma'am" Steve greeted her, recognizing the redhead assassin from the files, Natasha Romanoff. Bright fire red hair, super tight outfit and stunning features. For some reason she reminded him a bit of Peggy. She had this same air about her, and a crazy level of confidence.

"Hi," She gave a slight smile before turning back to Coulson. Second similarity, quick and to the point. "They need you on the bridge, they're starting the face trace."

Casual Coulson seemed to vanish in an instant, "See you there" he wandered off immediately, leaving Steve alone with Romanoff.

He had intended to only glance at her but a wave of nostalgia hit him and he was left speechless and staring. He couldn't help but see Peggy in her. Thankfully she seemed not to notice his mind fart and started to lead him away. "It was quite the buzz around here, finding you in the ice. I thought Coulson was going to swoon."

Steve gave a nervous smile and looked to the side awkwardly, ignoring her comment. Apparently Coulson's infatuation was well known, perfect.

"Did he ask you to sign his Captain America trading cards yet?"

"Trading cards?" They had made trading cards of him, well his spangled self.

"They're vintage, he's very proud." She smiled and nodded ahead of them toward a very awkward looking man poking around. Steve smiled and jogged ahead of her toward the man. It was Doctor Bruce Banner.

"Doctor Banner!" Steve called offering his hand as he neared. The Doctor was standing near a plane who's crew seemed to be frantically checking the plane for damage. The plane must have been the one that had blown past them in the air, it made sense, if the hulk was feeling claustrophobic Steve would have landed the plane in a hurry too. But the poor doctor looked a mess. He whipped around eyes searching for a familiar face as he put voice to face and name.

"Oh, yeah," Banner took the offered hand in a firm shake and a glance, "hi." Steve was pretty sure he just got the once over by him but brushed off the feeling, "They told me you would be coming." Banner mumbled, still a bit on edge.

"Word is you can find the cube." The doctor was a brilliant man, or so his files said, which probably meant he was an utter genius. Top in Gama Radiation, and he looked the part. Well the part of a genius. He was scruffy and disheveled a regular stereotype. At least the files had gotten that part right.

Banner looked around, grinning slightly. "Is that the only word on me?"

"Only word I care about." The doctor seemed to accept it as the truth and calmed down a little, glancing around at all the planes and people running about. "Must be strange for you" Banner gestured toward the deck, "all of this."

Well it was a step up, at least the doctor was willing to try his hand at small talk, not that Steve really excelled at it but he was willing to give it a try. The doctor was a nice man, so Coulson had confirmed and from what he had read in his file it was true. Whatever else he was capable of could take the back burner.

"Well, this is actually kinda familiar." In fact it was the only thing in this time line that didn't feel wrong. The dirt and sweat, the smell of oil and gas, men running in formation albeit the planes and technology were all upgraded it was still a comforting thing to know that at least one thing was still familiar.

"Gentlemen," Romanoff called, placing a phone he hadn't noticed she had been talking on back in her pocket " you might want to step inside in a minute, it's going to get a little hard to breathe."

At that the ship seemed to come alive as whirring and clanking rang out from below their feet. A truly discomforting thing to hear on any ship. The sounds seemed familiar though, like submarines from back in the day. The ones the Hydra had used. "Is this a submarine"

Banner didn't seem too thrilled with the sound of it, he rolled his head scoffing, "Really? They wanna put me in a submerged pressurized metal container?" Steve followed Banner to the edge of the ship, glancing down as the water began to churn and come to life. The water ripped in large circles, pulling down to reveal large fan blades that looked suspiciously like those on the planes on deck. Steve felt his stomach fall at the realization.

The whirring grew louder as the blades got up to speed and began to lift the giant ship out of the water. Steve backed away from the edge, words escaping him and only one thought on his mind, 'Fuck.'

"Ah nah, this is much worse." Banner's sarcasm was welcomed if for nothing more than to confirm someone else abhorred the idea of being on this giant metal duck. Steve was fairly sure he had just made a really good friend in Banner. He was a weird man, brilliant, sarcastic and had a sense of humor about mostly everything.

Steve reached out and grabbed Banners arm, pulling him back in further and heading back to where Romanoff stood a good few yards away. She seemed eerily calm at all times. Like nothing in the world bothered her. It was a little discomforting. Like she could stab you in the back while smiling and calling you a dear friend.

"We should get inside." Romanoff yelled but was barely heard over the roar of the blades. Steve nodded and glanced to Banner who was still looking dazed.

"Doctor Banner," Banner snapped back to reality and followed close behind Steve. Romanoff lead them into a small corridor that lead to more and more walkways. Steve was positive he was going to get desperately lost in this place.

"Well, in case of an emergency I am not looking for any god damn exits," Banner grinned at Steve, "I'm just gonna make my own." Romanoff twitched, it happened so fast Steve couldn't be sure he saw it. He smiled back at Banner, happy to have him around, it was nice to have someone that could voice your thoughts.

The laughter was short lived though as Romanoff came to a halt by a door, "Rogers, this is your room, get situated and meet at the bridge in 15. Banner follow me."

Banner gave Steve a sympathetic look before turning and chasing after Romanoff.

And just like that they were off. Great, how was he supposed to find the bridge when he wasn't even sure where he was. Steve sighed and entered his new living space. Not as nice as his apartment but at least it was bigger than a cupboard.

It was small, just a bathroom, desk, lamp, alarm and a twin sized bed. One more familiar thing to ad to his list, military style rooming. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad here after all. At least he wouldn't be stuck in a world he didn't belong in, constantly feeling like he was drowning. Perhaps here, with these people he could begin his life again, not that he was jumping at the chance. Fury tended to piss him off, Romanoff was turning out to be scarier than Fury and Coulson was constantly on his heels. Banner was at least fun. The rest of the initiates were still missing and Tony had yet to make his appearance.

Steve sighed heavily and flopped onto his bed a loud crunching emitting behind his ears as his head hit the pillow. He pulled the large pamphlet out and grimaced. It was a guide to home base. Great, it really was huge, 26 pages of huge. He flipped through the pages, several rooms were marked as restricted, others just didn't have a label. Great, way to go and point out the areas they didn't want people. How obvious.

Glancing at the clock he stuffed the guide in his pocket and made his was out the door to meet up with Romanoff and Banner. Hopefully he wasn't too far away.

- Outside the Bridge-

20 Minutes later Steve finally made it the bridge breathing heavily and looking rather annoyed. This place could rot in hell. So many corridors, why couldn't they make them look a bit different so people didnt get lost. But no, everything looked the same, barely anything had a marking on it, and no one thought to put arrows on the walls and title them. Like a nice 'to the bridge' with an arrow showing the way. Geez, this many years in the future and they had only digressed. Even the map wasn't of any help.

Banner was leaning up against a wall glancing out the nearby window, Romanoff pacing anxiously behind him while talking on her phone.

"Well find him already, he couldn't just disappear, someone must know where he went" She sounded rather pissed. Steve would have grimaced but Banner spotted him walking up to him with a grin, "Oh thank goodness, I was beginning to think you had run off and left me here by myself."

"And leave you to the suits? Nah, wouldn't dream of it." Steve returned the grin. Romanoff, turned on her heals, snapping her phone shut without a goodbye and stomping over to him.

"How nice of you to join us Captain Rogers." Banner gave Steve the 'she's pissed' look and stepped aside.

"Yeah, um. This place is really confusing." Steve rubbed the back of his head.

"Right, well you are here now, so lets go." She turned and lead them through the main doors, looking back to make sure they were following her.

Steve made his way to follow her but paused as he came to the railing. This place was impressive. There had to be at least 40 or 50 people on the bridge. Computers where scattered everywhere, people running here and there. There was a first, second and third tier and walkways along the upper dome that surrounded a huge glass front.

Steve turned and saw Banner nervously poking around by a large spherical doorway with guards positioned on either side. He was back to his fidgety old self again. Guess something about suits made him nervous, much to be expected.

"All engines operating," a female officer shouted, "Shield emergency protocol 193.6 in effect, we're at level sir." Steve followed her line of site to Fury, who was standing very dignified on the highest tier overlooking the main decks.

"Lets Vanish" Fury called.

Steve's eye brows shot up. Vanish, like invisibility vanish? Well at least the big flying duck could manage to not draw attention to itself, made things a bit more practical for a secret agency.

"Engage retro reflection panels." The female officer shouted, not but a few moments later a male officer called back, "Reflection panels engaged".

Right so, giant invisible floating fortress...well, Fury won that bet.

"Gentlemen" Fury greeted, calm if not a bit smug. Steve paused next to him, pulling out his wallet and handing Fury a bill and walked past him toward the tiers edge.

"Doctor, thank you for coming." Fury called to Banner who looked like he was trapped again, poor guy, Steve really did feel bad for him. He had spent so long trying to get away from these people only to be dragged back right when he thought he was free. Steve understood the feeling. Always being dragged back into this war.

"Thanks for asking nicely," Banner muttered, "So um, how long and I staying?"

Fury smiled which was actually kinda creepy looking, very unnatural on his features, "Once we get our hands on the Tesseract, your in the clear." Banner seemed to believe it.

He pulled off his jacket and rolled it up. "Where are you with that?" Furry waved the question onto Coulson, whom Steve had not noticed till now.

"We are sweeping every wirelessly accessible camera on the planet. Cell phones, laptops, if it' s connected to a satellite, its eyes and ears for us."

"That's still not going to find them in time." Romanoff rebuffed. She was crouching near a computer screen that bore the face of what looked like the other assassin from the files. Steve tilted his head curious, she must have been his partner on the field, seeing as he was the only thing she seemed to show any real emotion toward.

"You have to narrow your field." Banners voice cut through his thoughts, "How many spectrometers do you have access to?"

"How many are there" Fury's smugness was showing again.

"Call every lab you know, tell them to put their spectrometers on the roof and calibrate them for gamma rays. I'll rough out a tracking antilogarithm, basic cluster recognition, at least we can rule out a few places." Banner barely took a breath before continuing, "Do you have somewhere for me to work?"

Steve's face fell about halfway through that monologue. Was that even English? Goodness, it was times like these that he was sharply reminded that he was only he because of a science experiment. These people were geniuses. And he was...old and strong...

"Agent Romanoff, will you show Doctor Banner to his laboratory please." It wasn't even a question.

Romanoff snapped to attention, smirking at Banner as she passed. "You're gonna love it Doc, we've got all the toys."

And now she's flirting with him. This day just keeps getting weirder and weirder.

Fury turned and walked to his screens, "Whats the update on Tony?"

Steve's ears were on full attention at Tony's name.

"We sent a team out to collect him, but we lost them and we haven't heard from him since. But we believe he will arrive before the night it out" A male officer called back.

"Typical" Fury quipped.

A small smile pulled on Steve's lips. Soon, very soon now.

- TBC

Note:

So sorry everyone for the craptastic chapter. I have rewritten this chapter too many times to count and it still comes out to this. I apologize! I swear things will get more exciting in the next chapter, Tony finally shows up and the reindeer games begin :D