Ch. 2
As Alma stared at the two men in front of her, she could tell almost instantly that they were U.S. military from their bearing and posture. They were about five or six inches taller than her and each had at least good sixty pounds of pure muscle on her. She knew the situation could get ugly real fast. She kept her gun trained on the taller one, his blue eyes narrowed in concern.
She sighed. "I'm not going down without a fight. At the very least, I'm sending one of you to the morgue and the other to the hospital," she bluffed.
Steve raised his hands slowly and gave her a wide smile. "Whoa. Whoa. We're not here to hurt you. We just came for some information."
Sporting the stubbly beginnings of a beard, it took her a moment to place him.
"So, it's everyone's least favorite Boy Scout. I didn't recognize you at first with that pathetic attempt at facial hair," she snarked, returning her weapon to the holster underneath her sweater.
He rubbed his chin and gave his trademark boyish grin."That was the idea."
She waved over to Sam. "So, you must be his wingman."
Sam flashed her a brilliant smile. "I like to think of him as my wingman."
The agent smiled at that. "You, I like."
She pointed at Steve. "You . . . Well, if I saw someone set fire to you on the street, I'd roast marshmallows in the flames."
"What? Are you Hydra?" Steve asked as he tensed.
She shook her head. "Hell, no. You think Hydra are the only people you've pissed off? You've been crossed off everyone's Christmas card list for that little stunt of yours. Dumping all of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s secrets onto the internet like that. S.H.I.E.L.D. got declared a terrorist organization because of what you did. I thought you guys were military sent to bring me in."
"We're not," Sam said with a reassuring smile.
She glared at Steve. "Did you give any thought about what you were doing before going straight to the scorched earth option? How many dozens of operations were botched because of your stunt? The hostage situation in Bogotá? The human-trafficking ring they were about to bust out of Taipei?"
Steve's eyebrows furrowed. "What was S.H.I.E.L.D. doing about that?"
"Loki's spear went missing. Probably your Hydra pals. Someone tried to reverse engineer it. Think of it. Living dolls ready to do your bidding. You want a soldier, an assassin, an escort for the night? You choose. Fully compliant and obedient. Thanks to you uploading all our intel, they knew that S.H.I.E.L.D. was closing in, so they liquidated their entire stock of guinea pigs. Seventy-six men and women slaughtered in a warehouse," she bit out.
Steve winced at her words. "Hydra was going to kill millions," he insisted.
She rolled her eyes. "Yes, and the only way to stop them was to expose everything. Or was it? Do you know how many assets, how many informants for S.H.I.E.L.D. got their throats slit over what you decided to put on the internet?"
"The secrets that S.H.I.E.L.D. was hiding jeopardized thousands of lives."
"You know for a 95 year old, you are surprisingly naïve. You don't think the Americans kept secrets from the Nazis in World War II? " she argued.
"That was different. That was war," Steve maintained.
"You don't think we're in a war right now?" Her lip curled in disgust.
"Look," Sam broke in with a grin. "We just need some information. Will you help us?"
Author's Note- I hope you're enjoying this story. Thank you for the reviews, PMs, follows and favorites! I love knowing that you are interested in the story!
I've written another Captain America story (nearly 80,000 words and counting) that you might like to check out. It's called "The Captain's Bride".