Chapter Five: Down Memory Lane
They fell into silence as Steve navigated the truck down the highway. Rebecca chose to sit back and rest while she could. Any moment they could be in another fight or flight situation. The Black Widow, however, was now staring at Steve with a contemplative expression on her face.
Only when they passed the sign that read, "You are now entering New Jersey" did Steve finally speak. "What Nat?"
"I have a question for you, of which you do not have to answer." Natasha gave him a little smirk. "I feel like if you don't answer it though you're kind of answering it, you know?"
"What?" Steve asked giving her a mild look of impatience before turning back to the road.
Rebecca sat up, curious after Natasha's little ramble. Granted this was the longest amount of time she'd ever spent in the other woman's presence but it was the first time she'd ever seen her out of her spy mode and just simply looking curious, enough to ramble even.
"Was that your first kiss since 1945?" Natasha asked, mischief dancing over her face and sparkling in her eyes.
"Oh my God. Natasha." Rebecca could help to giggle a little at the question. It had been the last thing she'd expected the former assassin to ask. Who knew she could gossip just like other women did. She was always so serious.
Steve let out a heavy, almost self-deprecating groan. "That bad, huh?"
"I didn't say that." Natasha protested his conclusion.
"Well, it kind of sounds like that's what you're saying." Steve refuted with a little eye roll.
"Scale of one to ten?" Rebecca asked Natasha, only half joking as she'd be lying if she said she didn't want to know what kind of kisser the great Captain America was. Any straight woman would want to know the answer to that question.
"I didn't mean it like that." Natasha snorted at Rebecca's question. "I was just wondering how much practice you had."
"You don't need practice." Steve shook his head incredulously.
"Yes, you do." "Everybody needs practice." Natasha and Rebecca both argued in unison.
"I can't stand when a guy kisses with too much tongue or an open mouth. I'm either choking or covered in drool." Rebecca explained when she caught Steve's questioning look in the rearview mirror. "There's a certain finesse in the art of kissing."
"Thank you." Natasha pointed at Rebecca who had basically proven her point.
"I didn't do either of those things!" Steve's eyes met Rebecca's again.
"Still, finesse." Rebecca pointed out.
"It was not my first kiss since 1945!" He exclaimed and Rebecca noticed the tips of his ears were red with humiliation. "I'm 95, I'm not dead."
Natasha took his claim with a nod. "Nobody special though?"
Steve huffed out a sarcastic chuckle. "Believe it or not, it's kind of hard to find someone with shared life experience."
Rebecca empathized with him on that. It was hard to have a dating life when she could be sent out on a mission at any time, for any length of time and couldn't explain in detail where she was going to a significant other. She'd had the occasional casual fling herself, but with her lifestyle couldn't manage anything serious.
"Well that's all right, you just make something up." Natasha countered his statement.
"What like you?" Steve replied, sounding a little bitter.
"I don't know." Natasha shrugged, unoffended by the accusation. "The truth is a matter of circumstance. It's not all things to all people, all the time. Neither am I."
"That's a tough way to live," Steve commented with a serious tenor in his voice.
"It's a good way not to die though." Natasha mused lightly.
"You know, it's kind of hard to trust someone when you don't know who that someone really is," Steve added with a pointed look in her direction.
Natasha gave a low hum in agreement. "Who do you want me to be?"
From her vantage point, Rebecca understood both sides of their conversation. Natasha lived her life the only way she knew how to survive. She was a chameleon, blending in with her surroundings as best she could. Where the Captain stood by his morals and beliefs no matter the consequences. He lived his life in black and white, Natasha thrived in the shades of gray.
"How about a friend?" Steve suggested.
Natasha chuckled. "Well, there's a chance you might be in the wrong business, Rogers. Though you've managed to have a couple of friends haven't you Callahan?"
"Not that I can contact them without exposing us, but yeah. Nora, she works in Cyber Crimes and David, who-"
"Is probably hunting you." Natasha interrupted Rebecca with an apologetic glance. "He's in knee deep with STRIKE. David Monroe right?"
"Yeah," Rebecca thought back to David waiting with the STRIKE team to escort her to Pierce's office. "You think he's in on all this?"
"With the way he pants after Rumlow, I wouldn't trust him, Callahan," Natasha warned her, though there was sympathy in her eyes.
"I've known David for years, he wouldn't-" Rebecca shook her head in denial.
"Just be careful," Natasha told her. "I'm not saying he's definitely in with STRIKE but he very well could be."
"God I hope not." Rebecca sat back again, a pained frown on her face.
"He someone special to you?" Natasha inquired curiously and Rebecca even caught Steve's sharp glance back at her at the question.
"No, not for me. It was never like that. Nora though, she's head over heels for him." Rebecca admitted. "I tend to follow Steve's hard to find someone with shared life experience excuse. Sorry, Babe, gotta jet off to Algeria for a month and if things go sideways I could wind up coming home in a body bag. If not I'll be dog tired and need sleep for at least a day when I get back. So don't expect a hot date night any time soon."
Natasha gave a derisive snort at her attempt at humor, but Steve met her eyes in the rearview mirror and she found sympathy and understanding there.
The rest of the drive passed by in companionable silence, each occupant in the truck lost in their own thoughts. For her part, Rebecca was concerned about David. Would he have turned against her? They'd been friends since the Academy. They knew each other. He had to know she wouldn't have done anything that warranted S.H.I.E.L.D. coming after her.
When Steve turned off the main road and the tires of the truck crunched up a dirt and gravel drive, Rebecca straightened in her seat to look out the window. They were approaching a chain-link gate, flanked by two brick pillars, one with an old guard shack attached to it. There were trees and dense forest surrounding them, but beyond the gate, she could see a winding dirt road that led deep into what had to be some kind of compound if she had to wager a guess.
"Did you bring us to summer camp? We're a bit early." Rebecca joked, though only Natasha seemed to find it funny since she chuckled. Steve had a faraway expression on his face as he parked the truck at the gate and shut off the engine.
The three of them got out of the truck, Natasha and Rebecca both armed with handguns and Steve with his Shield. Steve glanced around them again. "This is it?"
"The file came from these coordinates," Natasha assured him.
"So did I," Steve replied, his gaze falling on the faded sign hanging off to the right of the gate,
Camp Lehigh
U.S. Army Restricted Area
"Come on," Steve said to them. "We're losing daylight, and it's a bit of a hike on foot to get to any of the buildings." He informed them.
Rebecca looked over at him, saw the range of emotions play over his face. This was the base he'd trained at when he'd finally enlisted in the Army. This was where he'd been chosen amongst the other soldiers for Dr. Erksine's project. This was the place that had forged Steve Rogers into Captain America.
By the time they reached the first of the brick outbuildings of the camp, the sun had disappeared behind the trees, sinking below the horizon. Natasha, who must always be prepared for any situation, managed to pull a small scanner out of her jacket pocket and was using the flashlight feature to scan the outside of the buildings. The place was quiet and completely deserted by the looks of things and even with Steve speaking softly his voice carried.
"This camp was where I was trained." He stopped walking for a moment to stare up at the empty flagpole with nostalgia sitting heavy in his expression.
"Change much?" Natasha asked, still moving, still searching, though Rebecca wasn't quite sure what she was looking for.
"A little," Steve admitted, not even looking at Rebecca when she stopped beside him. She understood, he was caught somewhere between past and present, memories and current situation.
Rebecca had only been home to Ireland a handful of times since she'd left. She'd even learned to drop her accent at S.H.I.E.L.D. Academy with vigorous speech training. But once she stepped foot on the Emerald Isle, especially around Galway, where she'd grown up, it was easy to drift back into old habits.
"This is a dead end," Natasha announced. "Zero heat signatures. Zero waves, not even radio." She shoved the scanner back into her pocket. "Whoever wrote the file must have used a router to throw people off."
Rebecca sighed in disappointment, but Steve studied his surroundings, brow furrowing when something caught his attention.
"What is it?" Natasha asked, noticing his demeanor as well.
His frown deepened and he began to march towards an old weapons bunker, forcing Natasha and Rebecca to trot after him. "Army regulations forbid storing munitions within 500 yards of the barracks. This building is in the wrong place."
Using his shield, he swung it into the padlock on the door, snapping it cleanly in half to allow them entrance. Their footsteps echoed down the cement steps and when Steve reached the bottom, he hit the breaker switch allowing the lights to click on one by one, revealing a wide open space filled with desks and chairs, the original S.H.I.E.L.D. insignia on the far wall.
"This is S.H.I.E.L.D," Natasha announced, looking around a little bemused.
"Maybe where it started." Steve agreed, looking around suspiciously.
"The phones are seriously out of date," Rebecca commented, noting the old black, spin dial phones on several of the desks. She doubted any of them were hooked up for use.
They continued walking through the bunker, finding a door that led to back offices, which Steve opened and walked through. Here there was more shelving, though the files they once held were all gone. There were three black and white portraits hanging up on the wall. Howard Stark, front, and center, Colonel Chester Phillips to the left and Agent Margaret "Peggy" Carter on the right. The three founding members of S.H.I.E.L.D.
"There's Stark's father." Natasha sounded amused.
"Howard," Steve replied, having been on a first name basis with all of them.
"Who's the girl?" Natasha asked, side-eyeing Steve when she noticed where his gaze was focused.
Rebecca gave Natasha a startled look. Peggy Carter was a legend among S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents, especially the women since she had been independent and accomplished long before women of the time had made such progress. There had also been rumors of a romance between her and the man beside Rebecca, though that had never been confirmed and Peggy had eventually married SSR Chief, Daniel Sousa and they had two children who went on to work for S.H.I.E.L.D. like their parents. Peggy Carter was the kind of Agent most people at S.H.I.E.L.D. strived to be like. She'd been clever, bold and had a list of accolades to her name.
And judging by Steve's reaction with his non-answer as he turned to continue their investigation there might have been some truth to those romantic rumors.
Not that Rebecca had time to explain all this to Natasha, so she offered the other woman a shrug and followed Steve deeper into the bunker.
Steve stopped by a set of shelves, looking around with a curious frown. "If you're already working in a secret office," He gripped one side of the shelving unit and pulled. It made a loud grating sound as it dragged across the concrete floor. "Why do you have to hide the elevator?"
Sure enough, behind the wall was a short hallway leading to two metal sliding doors concealing an elevator. "Wow, this is next level spy stuff," Rebecca whistled.
"You're way too used to tracking marks," Natasha snorted and pulled her scanner back out, using it to hack into the security keypad outside the elevator. "You haven't seen anything yet."
After several moments of beeping and configuring, the scanner lit up with iridescent green light and the doors slid open. The three of them looked at each other and shrugged before entering the metal transport. The doors slid closed again and the elevator began to descend deep underground.
"This isn't creepy at all," Rebecca muttered.
After what seemed like eons but was probably no more than a minute, the elevator finally ground to a halt and the doors slid open with the ding of a bell. There was nothing but pitch black space beyond the doors and Rebecca fought back a sense of unease. She wasn't afraid of the dark per say, but she'd prefer more light walking into the unknown. At least if she could see she'd be more capable of defending herself.
With a small sigh, she followed Steve and Natasha out of the elevator and into the dark. Her unease grew the elevator doors closed again, cutting off what little light they had. She forced herself to keep her breathing even so she could listen closely, but so far only heard the sound of her own footsteps and those of her companions.
Just as her eyes seemed to begin adjusting to the dark, suddenly the lights began to click on, revealing a small room full of ancient computer equipment in the world of technology. There was a layer of dust coating almost every surface as if nothing had been touched in months, if not years.
"This can't be the data point," Natasha exclaimed in disbelief. "This technology is ancient." Realizing what she said and who else was in the room with them, she shot a little smirk at Steve.
He ignored her, looking around the room, checking for access points and escape routes, that would be the soldier in him, though Rebecca was sure the only way out was the creepy elevator. It felt like they'd traveled pretty far underground.
"Wait," Natasha murmured, spying a modern USB hook up amongst the old computer systems. With a thoughtful frown, she pulled out the flash drive from her pocket.
"Can we just agree this place is creepy." Rebecca resisted the urge to shudder when Steve stepped up beside her while Natasha plugged in the drive. "There's just something off about it."
More lights came on and the machines around them whirred and beeped to life. One of the old monitors lit up with the words Initiate system, a robotic voice repeating the phrase, drawing their attention away from the other machinery.
Natasha stepped up to the old keyboard. "Y-E-S." She typed. "Spells yes."
There was a deep hum that reverberated throughout the room as something big began to power up.
"Shall we play a game?" Natasha joked, seeing Steve's blank look, she explained, "It's from a movie that was really-"
"I know," Steve said quietly, the corners of his mouth just barely tipping upwards. "I saw it."
The monitor became a mix of black and green flickering streaks as if some picture was trying to take form but couldn't. "Rogers, Steven." A voice creaked out of the speaker system. "Born 1918."
"Does the computer have an accent?" Rebecca asked. "Sounds German, or Austrian. Slavic?" She looked at Natasha who seemed to share her thought.
"Romanoff, Natalia Alianovna." The computer continued to identify them. "Born 1984."
Natasha looked startled to have been identified by her given name.
"O'Riley, Rebecca Ann." The computer chirped out. "Born 1986."
"O'Riley?" Steven shot her a startled look.
"It's a long story. I legally changed my name." Rebecca frowned. "What is this?"
"It's some kind of recording." Natasha was also frowning as she tried to figure out what was going on.
"I am not a recording, Fraulein." The computer corrected her.
"German." Rebecca mused, at least she'd been right about one thing.
"I may not be the man I was when the Captain took me prisoner in 1945, but I am," One of the smaller monitors lit up with a black and white photo of a small, stout middle-aged man, who'd lost most of his hair and wore thick coke bottle glasses on his piggish face.
"You know this thing?" Natasha asked Steve incredulously.
"Arnim Zola was a German Scientist," Steve explained. "Who worked for the Red Skull." He began to move about the room, inspecting it further. "He's been dead for years."
"First correction, I am Swiss!" The computer blipped out. "Second, look around you I have never been more alive."
Rebecca looked around at the lively machines. "Okay," She exclaimed. "What the hell is this?"
"In 1972 I received a terminal diagnosis. Science could not save my body," The computer began to chirp out its tale. "My mind, however, that was worth saving on 200,000 feet of databanks. You are standing in my brain."
"It just gets weirder." Rebecca did shudder this time. "This is why I never got into hacking."
"How did you get here?" Steve asked, not nearly as bothered by this whole situation as she was.
"Invited." The computer form of Zola answered.
"It was Operation Paperclip as World War II." Natasha was already putting the pieces together. "S.H.I.E.L.D. recruited German scientists with strategic value."
"They thought I could help their cause." Computer Zola continued. "I also helped my own."
"HYDRA died with the Red Skull." Steve snapped, eyes flashing dangerously.
"Cut off one head," Computer Zola reminded them of the old HYDRA mantra. "Two more shall take its place."
"Prove it," Steve demanded.
"Accessing Archive." Computer Zola announced and the small monitor lit up again with a black and white photo of Johan Schmidt. "HYDRA was founded on the belief that humanity could not be trusted with its own freedom. What we did not realize was that if you try to take that freedom, they resist." Footage of World War II began to play, including some of Steve in all his glory. "The War taught us much. Humanity needed to surrender it's freedom willingly."
"After the war, S.H.I.E.L.D. was founded. And I was recruited." Computer Zola informed them, as more footage began to play showing an alarming picture. "The new HYDRA grew. A beautiful parasite inside S.H.I.E.L.D. For seventy years HYDRA has been feeding crisis, reaping war and when history did not cooperate," Stills of the Winter Soldier appeared onscreen. "History was changed."
"Oh my God," Rebecca took a horrified step back, disbelief screaming from every nerve in her body. This couldn't be true. It couldn't be real.
"That's impossible." Natasha refuted the computer's claim. "S.H.I.E.L.D. would have stopped you."
"Accidents will happen." A newspaper clipping announcing Howard Stark and his wife's death flashed across the screen, followed by Fury's file was a deceased stamp across his statistics page. "HYDRA created a world so chaotic that humanity is finally ready to sacrifice its freedom to gain its security."
Natasha's expression of horror mirrored Rebecca's and Steve looked a cross between horrified and livid.
"Once a purification process is complete, HYDRA's new world order will arise." The footage now displayed was more modern, showing three helicarriers with very advanced weaponry. We won, Captain. Your death amounts to the same as your life. A zero-sum."
Steve whipped away from the smaller monitor towards the large main one, plowing his fist into the screen, cracking it into several pieces and the power to cut out.
But it didn't stop Computer Zola who moved on to a different monitor. "As I was saying." It mocked him.
"What's on this drive?" Steve demanded, his voice tight with fury.
"Project Insight requires insight." Computer Zola replied. "So I wrote an algorithm."
"What kind of algorithm? What does it do?" Natasha spoke pressingly, knowing the Captain was close to snapping.
"The answer to your question is fascinating." Computer Zola told her. "But unfortunately you'll be too dead to hear it."
Heavy steel doors suddenly sprung from the walls closing over the elevator, their only escape route. Not even Steve's shield could breach them.
Natasha's scanner device beeped in alarm. "Guys, we've got a bogey."
"What?!" Rebecca's eyes widened.
"Short-range ballistic. Thirty seconds tops." Natasha's expression was tight with alarm.
"Who's fired it?" Rebecca asked. "We're in the middle of nowhere?"
Natasha winced. "S.H.I.E.L.D."
"I'm afraid I've been stalling Captain," Computer Zola sounded amused, as much as a computer could. "Admit it, it's better this way. We are both of us, out of time."
Natasha grabbed the flash drive and Rebecca shot off a quick silent prayer. She was about see her mother again, much sooner than she'd planned on.
Suddenly Steve was ripping up a grate in the ground. Natasha jumped into the small space and Steve shoved Rebecca in after her, before joining them. Natasha hauled Rebecca into her lap and Steve covered both of them, holding his shield overhead just as the world around them exploded in a reign of fire and debris.