We'd gotten onsite fairly quickly, smoke and dust still in the air, a deathly silence lying heavy and thick over everything even with the sirens and screams very much near. We pushed forward into the tunnel, Wanda lifting the collapsed ceiling while Bucky and I shoved bracing into place, creating just enough space to get to those trapped beneath. Sadly, survivors had been few and far between, but the work still needed to be done.
"Sam?"
Like at the earthquake, he'd been scanning the rubble looking for heat signatures, giving us targets to go after.
"Looking," he responded. "Rubble's too thick for me to get a good read. Wish we had JARVIS about now."
No one had questioned our arrival. Or us diving in headfirst to help. We had resources at the ready while they still gathered them together, the fact that we had been nearby just dumb luck. Minutes away instead of hours, though there had been some serious debate about heading to heart Prague while still wanted by the UN. We'd taken a few seconds to decide only to discover that Bucky had already changed course, as if our decision had been foreordained.
Guess it had.
"Dead," Bucky muttered, as he stepped back from the family sedan that had been flattened to a quarter it's original size. "Probably just residual heat from the engine."
"Shit," Sam muttered.
"Does it matter?" Wanda questioned. "We still have to try. Even if we only save one person. We have to keep going."
I nodded in complete agreement, even knowing this search would most likely be a futile one. This kind of battle I had a hard time dealing with. We seemed to lose no matter how hard we worked, no matter how many we saved, those that died weighed heavily on me, making me wish we could somehow prevent the accident from ever happening.
But acts of god were still beyond my power.
Hell, even Thor had his limits.
Could have used his assistance about now, but he still had not been heard from, which could only be expected when you help rule an entire section of the galaxy.
This, however had been no act of god, but a planned out and enacted action. I did not want to say terrorist, since we had no idea who had caused this tunnel collapse, but little chance it had occurred by nartually.
"Military is arriving," Sam warned us, though I doubted they would try to arrest us until after all had been said and done, we would still take all due care.
"Thanks for the heads up." I sighed heavily.
"This feels off," Bucky suddenly grumbled, as he lifted another heavy block of concrete to stabilize the section of roof Wanda had in her telekinetic grip.
"Why?" I asked. We hadn't thought about reasons, just responded to an emergency that had occurred without contemplating the whys of it. We had become well known for assisting in disasters that happened around the globe, so it could be a ploy to capture us, but why collapse a tunnel and kill dozens, if not hundreds, of innocents just to possibly get our attention? That seemed far too callous and stupid even for Ross.
"You know where we are, right?"
I shook my head, other than Prague I had no clue.
"This is the Strahovsky Tunnel."
Shit. Designed to protect civilians in times of war, it could withstand some serious bombing with little more than dust shaking loose and the entire length of it had been brought down in one fell swoop.
I glanced back through the tunnel we had made and others were expanding upon in an effort to clear the rubble and save as many as possible. A major roadway had been blocked by this and every emergency vehicle in the city would be converging here.
"Distraction?" I asked.
He nodded. "I've seen it before. Not on this large a scale, but..."
I could only hope we hadn't been lured into this, but it might very well be possible. While we didn't exactly announce where we went or when, the quinjet was rather distinctive even unmarked. No one said, but they all knew.
A stalemate that could be coming to an end.
"Sam, check the local chatter. See if there could be a bigger target out there."
"On it," he responded, signal breaking up slightly as we pushed deeper into the structure.
Buck grunted in effort as he tore the door off an SUV that had only had it's rear crushed, the passenger compartment mostly intact thanks to the way the ceiling had collapsed, tenting over it. A child's whimper the first sound from within.
"We've got survivors," I bellowed back towards the opening, where crews worked in other areas, making their slow way into the tunnel, removing the rubble with care.
Three men in EMT gear rushed in our direction. I hadn't realized how deep inside we'd gone, several hundred feet at least, the daylight faint and barely visible from where I stood. The LED flashlights strapped to our shoulders far brighter.
The child wailed and Bucky did the last thing I expected and removed the headgear, a worn expression on his face.
He spoke softly in Czech, what I could only assume were soothing words that seemed to work to calm the child, though tears still streaked cheeks along with blood.
I wrenched the driver door open to see a couple in the front seats, neither conscious and reached out to check for a pulse. Both had one, but neither felt very strong. "Alive," I told Bucky with a feeling of relief.
"Might be the only ones." He straightened and looked over the area, Wanda had moved over to us, no longer pushing forward while we tried to save this family.
"I do not see any strong IR readings nearby. He may be right, it may be no more that the vehicles giving off the heat signatures we're seeing." She glanced up at the fallen sheets of concrete. "This had been the only section to fall this way. Unplanned, I think."
A stranger's voice spoke behind us. The EMTs who stared at us, in shock maybe. I looked to Bucky who apparently knew the language that I most certainly did not.
I really needed to start working on that.
All three gasped when they saw Bucky's uncovered face. Everyone knew the Winter Soldier on sight now, and they could probably guess who the rest of us were, but it didn't matter. They could arrest us later, right now we needed to save this family.
Bucky quickly explained the little we knew and then waited for a response. They froze for a moment longer then the one in back shoved between the others to get to the SUV. I ceded my place and turned to Wanda. "Let's make certain this section is stable and then move on."
She nodded, her hands beginning to glow red, a morbid counterpoint to the first bit of positive success in this disaster. I smiled as the small child, maybe two or three years old at most, wailed and reached out to Bucky, the fearsome Winter Soldier, who held out his hand, his cybernetic hand, for the child to grasp onto for a few seconds, more words in a calm soothing tone coming from him.
He stepped to the side as the EMT who had gasped in surprise, slid into place to care for the child. He said something to which Bucky responded then nodded and went to work.
"What did he say?" I asked, curious.
Bucky slid his head gear back into place, hiding his face again. "He asked if I was a father." He shrugged. "I have a weird knack with kids."
I laughed softly. "We could start a daycare, I suppose, when we get tired of this hero gig."
We both heard Wanda laugh at that and headed towards her.
"Cap, I think I got something."
I sighed. I could not get Sam to stop calling me Cap. I had stopped being Captain America the moment I dropped that shield to the floor in Siberia. That mantle had been left behind. I hadn't quite figured out if intended to wear another, but for now I was content to take the time to figure it out.
"And that would be?"
"UN Security Council is in town. They've locked down the building they are in for the time being."
"Which makes them a big target," I stated with a sigh of irritation.
Bucky glanced over his shoulder at me, even with the mask on I could hear the 'I told you so.'
"Warn 'em."
"Cap, I can't. I got about three minutes of chatter then it stopped dead."
"Jammers," Bucky stated, turning about. "Hit'll be soon."
I nodded in agreement. All resources would have been diverted here to rescue any survivors of the collapsed tunnel. Only minimal security would have remained behind and with them locked down tight behind closed doors... "Shit," I muttered.
"Where?"
"The Kongresové Centrum across the river."
"Go," I ordered. "we'll get to the quinjet and be there as fast as we can."
Wanda let the red light around her hands die out and we turned to run back down the tunnel we had made, leaving the rescuers to do their jobs for now.
On my way," Sam assured me.
"Contact Ross, let him know what we suspect."
"Is that wise?" Wanda asked, having no interest in going back to the Raft, for which I could not blame her.
"No choice." If the UN committee could get their asses in gear, help could be on the way in minutes, presuming they believed us, of course.
"And Tony?" Sam asked, sounding as unsure as I felt on the matter.
"Do it."
We broke out into the daylight and ran.
.
.
.
.
Time.
The would never be enough of it.
For ordinary people, at least.
Some of us had too much of it, or had used too little of it, depending on your perspective.
Right now I wished we had a hell of a lot more of it.
Buck and Sam took out the security that came for us, refusing to listen to thing we said, and demanding our instant surrender as soon as we left the quinjet. They didn't hurt them, not really. Just disarmed them and bruised them a bit, probably deeper injuries to their egos than anything else.
Still it took Bucky ripping off the mask and charging inside with weapons borrowed from the security teams to get those inside to realize that we did indeed want them out of that building. A few shots fired into the ceiling along with Wanda using her powers to shove them into motion finally got their attention.
Chaos ensued, but they were moving. I got them out the doors, while Sam encouraged them to hightail it for the grassy area on far side of the parking lot, though I doubted a minimum safe distance could be achieved before the bomb went off.
I hate it when I'm right.
When the time came we had mere seconds of warning.
Sam got out a surprised, "Cap, comms are back up," before the world exploded.
A roar of deafening sound, made worse by the headgear we wore, rumbled out from above and below us. I pushed those I could forward and out the doors even as the rush of compressed air slapped us forward like Mjolnir hitting my shield.
I rolled off the couple I had tried to protect with my body to see Wanda stagger out holding a up a massive shield to protect those still on their feet. It put her in the line of fire, but she refused to move until all those that could be saved had been. Bucky stood nearby, the weapons left behind in favor of preventing a wall from collapsing atop a crowd of people who had been knocked to the ground in the initial explosion.
I got up, groaning and suspecting I had a couple broken ribs for my trouble. I ushered the remaining few who still could stand away as an odd blue glow took over the air and the building began to eat itself. Huge blocks of concrete and metal being dragged back in towards the center. I grabbed Bucky and pulled him away even as the wall he'd been supporting shifted away from him.
"What the hell?" he muttered, bracing against the inexorable pull from what felt like a singularity. Which just should not be possible. Not here. In the middle of a major city.
"Wanda," Sam barked and we turned to see her trying to save a dozen or so people who had been caught in the tidal pull of the wormhole that had opened up in the middle Prague.
She had fallen to her knees, the strain evident in her posture as she fought a gravity well just to save a few more lives. I got over to her and added my strength to hers, held her in place so she would not need to do more than concentrate on maintaining the red energy that might be the only chance they had. Just as it looked as if she would lose, that holding onto the people would do more harm than good, the bluish light died and she had to change her focus to keep from throwing the survivors into the river by accident.
She got them to the ground, alive for the most part, let go of the power and damn near passed out cold from exhaustion.
A deep silence settled over everything for several long seconds, then car alarms began to wail.
She tried to sit up, but I held her in place as Sam and Bucky joined us, to stare in amazement at what remained of the conference center. I glanced over towards the quinjet, which had shifted position, dragged towards the center of destruction by a power that should not have been possible. "You all saw that, right?"
"You mean what looked like a blue, glowing black hole open up and try to eat us, yeah," Sam snarked, the worry and no little fear not entirely covered by the snark.
"Very strong," Wanda muttered as she lifted a hand for help up. Bucky obliged her, pulling her upright with care.
She brushed off some of the dust that had clung to her and squared her shoulders, that glow appearing about her fingers as if she needed to see if she had enough power to continue.
"Wanda, there's nothing else you can do," I told her, setting a hand on her shoulder.
She shook her head in disagreement, but didn't have the energy to speak just yet.
Sirens could be heard in the distance, more rescue personnel drummed up from somewhere and coming here.
Bucky slid his headgear up so I could see the shocked look his face. "That looked like Hydra tech."
I nodded in agreement. Hell, it looked liked the hole that had eaten the Red Skull just before I'd forced that damn plane down into the arctic. "We'll make sure they know."
I glanced behind me, the security personnel and the members of the council and those who had simply worked in the center all watching us. I could practically hear their thoughts, wondering if we had been the one to cause this disaster even though we had done everything our power to save them.
Little wonder given we stood there, faces hidden, dressed in unmarked black uniforms that were clearly military, or military adjacent to say the least. We denied who we were even as we attempted to do what little good we could.
"We should go." Bucky no longer appeared too thrilled with our current situation. Emergency services on the way, probably with a military escort, plus the UN security here watching us with a wariness that even I had to admit could be justified.
Wanda set a hand on my forearm for support. She looked ready to collapse as violently as the conference center had. "No, we stay until we find everyone."
Bucky shook his head slowly, but didn't argue.
"Cap, we've got some of the fire suppression gear in the quinjet."
I nodded. "Get it." Then to Wanda. "You up for some more?"
"Always," she responded, a strength to her words that I had not expected.
Had to admire her for her gumption if nothing else.
"Same routine as the tunnel. Wanda lifts, we prop and triage where we can. And we need to watch for fires and secondary implosions." I fired off the orders as always, but hadn't expected the civilians we'd gotten out to approach where we stood.
"How can we help?" a tiny woman with steel gray hair asked in broken English from several feet behind us.
"Ma'am, there's no need-"
She cut me off with a stern look. "There's every need. Others are within and you are only four."
I couldn't argue with that and nodded. Then we went to work.