Fury was dead. Ace didn't know how to respond. After all her years being apart of SHIELD and answering directly to the man, who'd become a sort of surrogate father figure to her, she felt completely lost.

"Agent LeBeau." She looked up as Chairman Pierce entered her lab. "I received your resignation, and I was hoping I could convince you to reconsider."

"Honestly Chairman this was bound to happen anyway. I haven't felt truly fulfilled or utilized since the incident in New York."

"That's not true, it was your design that gave us the inspiration for Project Insight."

"No! It was SHIELD's perversion of my Helicarrier that gave you Project Insight. The Helicarrier was intended to be a mobile transport of SHIELD personnel and short-range vessels. Not a weapon to terrorize anyone SHIELD deems as a threat." She paused for a second then lowered her eyes. "Sir." Pierce was silent for a long time then sighed.

"I'm sorry you feel that way. I'll file your resignation in about an hour. Please take all the time you need to clear your stuff." And the man walked out of the lab. Ace chewed on the inside of her cheek. There was something that was not sitting right with her about how he worded that. Shaking her head she put the thought from her mind for the moment and went about gathering her things. Really there wasn't too much that actually was hers. Her prized prototype weapon, her personal multi-purpose wrist cuff, that had originally started out as a multi-level atmosphere scanner and still needed to be fixed after taking a bullet on the helicarrier. A couple photos of her family, and her few friends (Clint, Natasha and Steve) and one picture she just couldn't bring herself to part with. Bucky Barns. Steve had told her story after story about his best friend and Ace wished she could have met the man, just once.

After gathering her things Ace took the elevator down, mentally going over everything she needed to do in the next few days. When the doors opened to the lobby she repositioned the weight of the box, and stepped out and smiled weakly at her good friend.

"Steve, what are you doing here?" She asked.

"Uh, Pierce wants to see me." He replied.

"Yeah? I just saw him myself."

"You?"

"He was trying to talk me out of resigning." Steve looked at her absolutely stunned.

"You're resigning. Are you feeling alright?"

"I just haven't felt fulfilled since New York, and with Fury . . ." She couldn't bring herself to say it.

"Oh, Kiddo how are you handling it?"

"It still hasn't fully sunk in yet, you know. I still keep thinking I'm going to get a phone call from him with a new mission, or something he wants me to work on. Why was he at your place Steve? You two never saw eye-to-eye so why was he at your place?" Ace carefully watched his face, as he thought about what answer to give her.

"I wish I could tell you." He finally said, she sighed and nodded. He really did want to tell her but was holding back. Why she wasn't entirely sure but since it was him she'd let it go. "So what are you going to do now?"

"First I'm going to find a place to live, and then I'm going to get a job."

"You don't have a place?"

"Why would I? I was always here, or on a mission. I'll be ok." Ace gave him that smile that she seemed to reserve just for him, then walked to the garage.

On the way to Sam's house Steve looked at Natasha, and made a decision.

"I want to call Ace in on this." He announced.

"Ace? Are you sure?"

"Yeah, she's one of us." Natasha smirked, and pulled out her cell phone.

Ace jumped awake to her phone ringing and groaned pulling it out of her box on the passenger seat.

"Nat?" She asked groggily.

"Hey are you clear of any projects?" That woke Ace up. For Nat and Clint that greeting was code. Ace cautiously checked her rearview mirrors.

"Yes, but I'm meeting two friends at six." She replied, telling Natasha that she wasn't in the building but she was being followed.

"Any way you could cancel your plans? I was wanting to see your new prototype." Translation, Natasha wanted her in on something big.

"Of course. What time?"

"1:16 at Lincoln."

"Got it." The two women ended their conversation and Ace sat her seat up. Time to lose these chumps. She made straight for the mall, reaching in her box for one of her latest gizmos. It was a computer imaging mask that would change her face to look like whoever she wished. The only problem she had with it was that it wouldn't disguise her distinguishable eyes. Ace pulled up to the mall and wasted no time getting out. She stopped into a random clothing store and after appearing to browse for a few minutes grabbed the closest articles on hand and checked them out. After that was a pit stop at the bathroom. She changed her clothes, leaving her original ones in the shopping bag. Unscrewed the vent above her just to throw them off her trail-putting the shopping bag up there to so they wouldn't be immediately alerted to her change in clothes. Quickly she programed the mask to make her look like some plain looking young woman. After testing it a few times around the Triskellion she found that plainness works best in these situations because people stare at ugliness just as much as they stare at beauty. After slipping on the mask and teasing her hair some she stepped out of the bathroom and right past her tail. They glanced at her but she gave the appearance that she was preoccupied with texting someone on her phone.

Next she had to find a replacement ride, and found a navy blue crown vic to use. It took her a few minutes longer than she would have liked to hot-wire it, and could just hear Stark in her head asking if she'd like him to do it. With a sigh she managed to get it going and finally made her way to the national mall and the Lincoln Memorial. Driving in the direction of One o'clock from there, and did this for sixteen minutes until she came to a house. Taking the mask off she walked up to the front door and knocked. The man who answered it looked at her beyond confused.

"I've got the prototype." She informed, and if possible he looked even more confused.

"She's with us Sam." Ace smiled, as the guy let her in and looked at her two friends.

"Are things really that bad?" She asked looking between them and scanning the table they were sitting at, eyeing the breakfast that was sat out.

"Your welcome to have some." Sam told her and Ace practically dove head first into the plate of sausage and bacon.

"Easy now, there's plenty more where that came from." He commented.

"Don't mind her, that's just how she eats meat. We think it comes from her mom's side of the family." Natasha informed, and Ace playfully stuck her tongue out at the assassin. "And in answer to your question Ace, yes things are that bad. Steve decided to contact you because he knows your loyal to Fury and to the team." The mention of Fury made Ace lose her appetite. The two got her caught up on everything they found out.

"So the question is who at SHIELD could launch a domestic missile strike?" Natasha asked.

"Pierce." Steve answered, not needing much time to think about it.

"Who happens to be sitting on top of the most secure building in the world." Ace pointed out.

"But he's not working alone. Zola's algorithm was on the Lemurian Star." Steve reminded.

"So was Jasper Sitwell." Natasha pointed out.

"So the real question is how do the two most wanted people in Washington kidnap a SHIELD officer in broad daylight?" Ace asked.

"The answer is you don't." Sam said and threw a file on the table in front of Steve.

"What's this?" The captain asked.

"Call it a resume." Sam replied. Ace bounced around the table to look at the file with Steve and Natasha grinning at what she saw.

"Is this Bakhmala?" Natasha asked, looking at the photo. "The Khalid Khandil mission that was you?" Sam just gave her a flat stare. "You didn't say he was a Pararescue."

"Is this Riley?" Steve asked.

"Yeah." Their host replied.

"I heard they couldn't bring the choppers because of the RPGs. What did you use? A stealth chute?" Natasha asked.

"No." Ace said examining the file. "These." She handed the others the file. "I want one."

"I thought you said you were a pilot." Steve responded, looking at Sam.

"I never said pilot."

"I can't ask you to do this, Sam. You got out for a good reason." Steve informed using his Captain America tone.

"Dude, Captain America needs my help. There's no better reason to get back in."

"Where can we get our hands on one of these things?" The captain asked.

"The last one is at Fort Meade. Behind three guarded gates and a 12-inch steel wall." Sam answered. The three Avengers looked at each other then back at their host.

"Shouldn't be a problem." Captain answered.