Chapter 8
Nick stared down at the letter on his desk. He was willing to concede that he had acted rashly in the face of Harry Potter and the myriad of powers that he was displaying, but surely this was an overreaction in kind.
Damn it. He paged Sitwell and took a seat behind his desk.
"Sir?"
Sitwell was a bad, rat-faced man with beady eyes hidden behind thin wire frames. He did the job and did it well. Nick didn't particularly like him, but there weren't many out there that Nick did.
"Where's Captain Rogers?" he said, resigned to a disappointing answer.
"He signed out a few hours ago," Sitwell said without pause. He always seemed to have his finger on the pulse of office gossip. "Why, sir?"
"Never you mind," Nick growled. "Dismissed."
As Sitwell left, Nick stared back down at the letter on his desk.
… and so, it is with regret that I have to offer you my resignation.
Yours sincerely,
Steven Grant Rogers
Nick thought about the twitch of annoyance on Phil's face when he'd discovered Nick's latest plan to bring in Potter. It had failed abysmally.
Perhaps it was time to listen to his underlings and attempt a new tact. Better late than never, after all.
Phil was going to be smug and pleased in equal parts, at least until he discovered that Fury had unwittingly run off his hero.
It was definitely time to brush up on the legalities surrounding the Avengers Initiative and see if he could get the World Security Council on board.
"New brief for you, Agent Romanoff," Phil said, stepping into pace with Natasha as she exited the compound cafeteria. "I think you'll like it."
"Anything would be more exciting than acting as Steve Rogers's security detail," she drawled. "You'd think the man hadn't decimated the German forces with little more than a motorcycle and a dustbin lid."
Phil bit back a snort and ushered her into the nearest meeting room, glad he'd been able to catch her on base. When she wanted, she was impossible to find.
"Even considering that his neighbour turned out to be Harry Potter?" Phil asked, stringing the conversation along as he secured the room.
Natasha smirked. "Even then. Potter's a boring guy. He liked to bake and visit libraries. Not exactly living the high life."
Phil tilted his head to one side, acknowledging her point, even though baking and books seemed the ideal way to spend a free afternoon. He swiped his ID card against the holodesk. A blue screen shimmered into life.
"Aural recognition," a neutral voice prompted him.
"Agent Philip Coulson," Phil said.
"Confirmed." The hologram reformed into his remote desktop. Phil tapped a file named Water Spout and opened it, flicking the image of surly middle-aged man toward Natasha.
"How's your Russian, again?"
"Очень смешно, Фил. Мы оба знаем, что русский - мой родной язык."*
"Не в соответствии с личностью, которая настраивается для вас, это не так."
"Bah! Мое понимание языка нюансов."
"Excellent. Ever heard of Georgi Luchkov? He's a big-time arms dealer operating out of Moscow."
"Nyet."
Phil raised his eyebrows, but was unsurprised. Luchkov had only surfaced in the last five years, and prior to this assignment, they'd done their best to keep Natasha out of Russia. The Red Room would be chomping at the bit to get their prized agent back in their grubby paws. With the political circumstances as they were today, however, sending her in was worth the risk.
"We want to know who he's working with, where he's working from, and who's supplying him with his weapons. He's managed to get his hands on some of Stark's old stock. We need to shut him down before Stark finds out and does it for us, possibly causing an international incident along the way."
Natasha nodded her understanding. "It's all very well and good rushing guns blazing into Afghanistan…"
"But the Russians won't stand for it," Phil finished.
Clint was having the kind of week that made him want to hang up his bow and retire to the farm in the countryside.
Phil's 'friendly' wizard had caught him red-handed and read his mind, leaving him with a splitting headache that had lingered for days. He'd then missed his first shot in years thanks to the bugger, in some convoluted plan of Fury's to bring Potter down. And now?
Now, Captain America had very decisively packed his bag onto the back of his motorcycle, donned a leather jacket (but not a helmet), and headed East out of town. Clint had followed him in a SHIELD Jeep until he'd reached the Interstate 280. The Captain had left with the look of a man who didn't plan on coming back, not for a good, long while.
"Balls," Clint moaned to himself. He glanced at tall, dark, and silent sitting next to him in the Jeep. "Shotgun not telling Fury that Cap's done a runner."
His fellow agent turned and looked at him with a frown. "You're the more senior agent."
"God, you're a dull one," Clint remarked. "What was your name again? Weird?"
"Ward," the agent replied.
"Alright, Ward, here's the plan. I'm going to scribble down the message on a piece of paper and throw it from thirty meters away into Fury's office. I'll then dive out of the closest window, using a grappling hook to slow my descent. Meanwhile, you'll have kept the engine running. I'll scramble into the backseat and you'll gun the engine. We'll burst out of the compound and you'll drive away as far and as fast as possible. Got it?"
"Confidential information is not to be written down on hard copy," Ward said. "And that plan breaks several guidelines suggested by SHIELD's Health and Safety Handbook."
Clint turned to stare at him, incredulous. Ward was focused on the road, hands wrapped loosely around the steering wheel, his expression blank. Then he flashed a grin in Clint's direction.
"In fact, I'd say you'd be much better off tying the message to an arrow and firing it through his window."
Clint cackled. "You bastard. You had me, there."
"I'm still not telling Fury," Ward said. "I'm not sure he's ever heard of the saying 'don't shoot the messenger'."
"Oh, he's heard of it," Clint muttered. "He just doesn't hold to it."
Sunrise over the Grand Canyon was one of the most beautiful things Steve had ever seen. The brilliant molten gold of the sun bathed the sandstone cliffs with sunlight and turned the clouds that drifted overhead a vibrant shade of pink. Blue sky backlit the view and Steve knew he'd be content to stay in the moment forever.
He picked up his paintbrush and began wetting his watercolours, hoping to capture the feeling of the crisp breeze and cool air, a stark contrast to the warming sun on his face.
Steve wasn't the only artist awake to soak up the morning rays. A photographer had found himself a niche to lay flat along and was taking several long-exposure pictures. A painter was mixing oils and adding colours to an enormous canvas. She'd been here the day before, too.
They'd exchanged a few words, but Steve enjoyed that the three of them seemed to be in silent agreement that they would focus on their artwork rather than start up a discussion.
There was one person that Steve would have liked to have shared the moment with, but he'd not heard from Harry since that fateful day a few weeks ago. It was a shame, as it had been Harry that had encouraged him to embrace the twenty-first century and explore the world he found himself in. Hopefully Steve would be able to give him the painting, if he ever saw Harry again.
A dash of indigo capture the melancholy that Steve was feeling; the bittersweetness of this perfect moment, yet lacking in someone to share it with.
With the sun fully risen, the moment was lost. In a few hours, the canyon would be swarming with tourists. Steve set aside his painting to dry and sat into the folding chair he'd brought. He closed his eyes, resting for just a moment…
A booming rumble that shook the air and the clang of metal on rock startled Steve awake.
"What?" he spluttered, looking around. A glance at the sun told him he'd not fallen asleep for more than half an hour.
Before him was a shiny red and gold robot. Steve rubbed his eyes before remembering that he was in the future and this robot was actually a person—the son of someone that he knew, or rather, had known.
"Mr Stark?" Steve asked. He got to his feet, ignoring the curious gazes of his fellow artists. "It's Mr Stark, right?"
"Got it in one, Rogers," the robot said. The faceplate snapped up, revealing a man that looked painfully like Howard Stark, but even older, crow's feet in the creases of his eyes and weariness to his gaze that Howard had only walked the edge of on his most trying days.
"I, er… what are you doing here?" Steve asked, baffled.
"Found your friend," Stark said. "A mutual friend of ours, I suppose."
Steve had no idea who he was talking about, unless…
"Harry?"
"Right on the mark," Stark replied. "And as this is all very highly confidential, get your spangled red, white, and blue arse into gear and meet me back at your motel. There'll be a limo there waiting to bring you back to my hotel, because your place is, hmm, how should I phrase this? A shit hole."
"Excuse me?"
"You heard me. You're staying in a motel, Rogers. A motel, when you could be living the life of luxury on Uncle Sam's dime."
"My motel is perfectly fine," Steve said stiffly.
"Uh huh, sure it is. I don't want to get fleas. My suit costs more to dry clean than you can afford. So, like I said, get back, get in the limo, and we'll talk about the very young, very attractive Gandalf that you've been keeping to yourself."
Before Steve could argue further, the faceplate on Stark's suit snapped down and he sprung into the air, taking off like a bullet.
"That's really something, isn't it," the painter said, watching the suit arc through the air.
The photographer was grinning. He'd been taking pictures of the two of them the entire time.
"This is my lucky day," he said. "Cheers buddy, whoever you are. Better not keep Stark waiting, if I were you."
Steve sighed as he began packing up his gear. For some reason, he'd expected Tony Stark to be less of a whirlwind than his father, rather than more. He was obviously a man that had never wanted for a single thing in his life.
Or perhaps that wasn't entirely true. Steve swallowed. He'd been given very little on Stark's time in Afghanistan, but he'd do well to remember that Stark had spent three months captured by people who wanted him to build them weapons. In the end, Stark had blown his way out of there and completely restructured his company so that it no longer produced anything that could hurt another person.
The person that Stark pretended to be and the person he was had the potential to be two very different entities. It was just hard to remind himself of that, when he was looking at a stranger with Howard's face.
A/N: Thank you to my reviewers: Outofthisworldgal, fandomsneverdie, AnimeFreak71777, E Chickarita, Separ, Wasabi Sauce, fanficnewbie, kirsty21, marsolino, Vladimir Mithrander, mithrilandtj, Manga reader 125, buterflypuss, Astarein1999, mooneysfate, retired10, Amnesia777, W1986, animeromance1972, Fyreheart, Sugar0o, MargaritaS, Silvermane1, and Kiochii.
Vladimir Mithrander - I'll certainly be changing up the events in Winter Soldier and the subsequent repercussions, never fear!
retired10 and Amnesia777 - Thank you for letting me know the POV shifts worked, I very much appreciate it!
animeromance1972 - Yes to all your questions! (Mild spoilers if you read their review.)
Sugar0o - I love Larry Lovegood and cackled when I read that.
To the guest that asked for Harry to have an immortal animal companion - I'll have a think about it. But I think you'll find that Harry will find other immortal companions along the way. I'll say nothing more!
No Harry in this one… but more characters are moving together and meeting each other! What do we think about Steve quitting SHIELD? Harry's arrival has already put a spanner in the works. Preserving the timeline is for pussies! Now, who else can I introduce?
(Also, if you like preserving the timeline, that's your prerogative. I just prefer to change it up.)
Lots of people are angry at Steve… I hope you can forgive him! He's made a mistake but he's aware of his error and wants to correct it.
I've had a few questions on my timeline. To clarify, Harry arrived in the Bahamas in early 2012 before Avengers: Assemble. I've been specifically vague because I don't want to count down to the start of the Avengers movie/keeping track of dates is difficult. Assume Harry spent a few weeks travelling the States and a few more pretending to be Steve's neighbour. Perhaps it's March or perhaps it's April… to tell you more would be to give the game away!
I've also had some requests that Harry pull some pranks on Fury, Marauders style. I have to say I'm tempted! Maybe in a few chapters' time…
*Russian to English Translation
"Очень смешно, Фил. Мы оба знаем, что русский - мой родной язык."
Very funny, Phil. We both know that Russian is my mother tongue.
"Не в соответствии с личностью, которая настраивается для вас, это не так."
Not according to the identity that's being set up for you, it's not.
"Bah! Мое понимание языка нюансов."
My grasp of the language is nuanced.
"Nyet."
No.