Washington ⇻ The Winter Soldier [2]

chapter three

Alison was disoriented at first, distracted by the feeling of imminent fire, then her eyes widened, "We've got a missile coming!"

Both Natasha and Steve turned around to face her, "What?"

"We have to go!" Alison pleaded, motioning to the door, which had begun to close rapidly.

"I am afraid I have been stalling, Captain. Admit it, it's better this way. We're both of us...out of time."

Steve tried to stop the door from closing by throwing his shield but failed by a small margin. While he and Natasha looked for shelter, she pulled out the lighter from her pocket flicking it on enough to ignite her arm,

"Get ready to run once it blows!" Alison shouted, "There's bound to be-"

The missile hit, the impact decimated the building, but as Alison absorbed all the fire into her own orbit, Steve and Natasha were able to get away from the area in time for Alison to redirect the fire exclusively to Zola's servers. Her own little act of vengeance for what he'd done to Winter and Bucky.

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Five hours and two stolen vehicles later, Kae, Steve, and Natasha were all in front of an apartment building with Steve knocking on the door,

"Are you sure he's going to be okay with this?" Kae asked skeptically, "You met him two days ago."

Nevertheless, a black man answered the door with a calm, "Hey, man."

"I'm sorry about this," Steve apologized, "We need a place to lay low."

"Everyone we know is trying to kill us," Nat added.

The man paused for a bit, then moved to let the three of them enter his home, "Not everyone."

Kae smiled and thanked him, "Do you have anything to eat? It's been a while."

"I haven't made anything yet..." he trailed off, seeming to recognize her, "Aren't you Legion? Are all the Avengers going to show up at my house?"

"Hopefully not," Kae smirked, "That'd mean something a lot more than the corruption of SHIELD."

That seemed to silence him for a while, as he led her to the kitchen, "I'm Sam by the way."

"Kae," the blonde held out her hand for a handshake, "I can cook if you want to monitor the supers?"

"Don't you count as a super?"

"Not right now, no," Kae replied, "I'll try not to break anything. And I'll pay you back for the food later."

"Uh..." he hesitated before nodding and exiting the room to monitor her friends.

Kae let herself relax for a while, her body going through the motions of mixing flour, eggs, and milk. The near-silence was calming and allowed her to think of how to breach the topic of Steve to Winter. She was almost done flipping yet another pancake when Winter herself decided to speak up,

"I need to tell Steve about Bucky," she started, "He'll freak out if he finds out mid-battle."

Kae nodded her head, "You should. After breakfast?"

"That sounds like a plan," Kae could tell that Winter was nodding from where she was in her mind.

Half an hour later, Kae had four plates stacked with pancakes balanced on her arms, two of them being enough for supersoldiers (just another incentive for Winter to talk to Steve), "I made breakfast!"

Sam was the only one to acknowledge her presence, with a weird look at the two huge piles as he took one of the regular human-sized ones, "Thanks. Where'd you learn to do the-" he motioned to her balancing act.

"I waitressed the summer before senior year," Kae informed him as she set down the other plates and sat down.

"So," Natasha began, "the question is: who in SHIELD could launch a domestic missile strike?"

Steve replied almost immediately "Pierce."

"Who happens to be sitting on top of the most secure building in the world," Nat deadpanned.

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

"So was Jasper Sitwell," Nat pointed out.

"So, the real question is: how do the two most wanted people in Washington kidnap a SHIELD officer in broad daylight?" Kae frowned, "Assuming you don't want Gen performing a quick kidnapping."

"The answer is: you don't." Sam dropped a file in front of Steve.

"What's this?"

"Call it a resume," Sam said, Kae picking up a photo of him and a group of other soldiers.

"Is this Bakhmala? The Khalid Khandil mission, that was you," Natasha said after looking over Kae's shoulder at the picture, turning to Steve, "You didn't say he was pararescue."

"Is this Riley?" Steve asked.

"Yeah."

"I heard they couldn't bring in the choppers because of the RPGs," Nat narrowed her eyes at the photograph, "What did you use, a stealth chute?"

"No," Sam handed Steve another file, "These."

"I thought you said you were a pilot?" Steve questioned.

"I never said pilot."

"I can't ask you to do this, Sam. You got out for a good reason."

"Dude, Captain America needs my help," Kae snorted at Sam's words, "There's no better reason to get back in."

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

"The last one is at Fort Meade, behind three guarded gates and a twelve-inch steel wall," Steve looked to Natasha and Kae, who quickly gave Winter control.

"Shouldn't be a problem," Winter said, "But I need to talk to you first, Stevie."

Another chapter! Yay! I asked this on the most recent chapter of Sokovia, but I figured I'd ask it here, too; what is your perception of each of the Legion girls? I want to know what y'all think of them and see how it differs from how I try to write them. As always, I hope you enjoyed and that you will all have a wonderful week.
~ Aria :)