WandaWidow - Book 1

Chapter 15 - Old Habits (Part 1)

The journey to the old S.H.I.E.L.D. base was quiet. Steve and Natasha were piloting the jet up front, Sam was still quite tired so wasn't speaking much, and Rhodey and Wanda didn't know what to talk about so mostly sat in silence too.

Wanda was nervous about doing a good job, but couldn't air out any of her concerns as Natasha was busy with Steve, so instead she fidgeted with her hands. About 45 minutes into their hour flight time she heard Natasha and Steve get up and join the rest of the team outside of the cockpit.

"Everyone know what their job is?" Steve asked.

Rhodey, Sam and Wanda all nodded in agreement.

"Good. On paper, this should be a pretty straightforward mission. The guys there should be friendly, but HYDRA is complicated and they have a lot of loyalty in the shadows so just make sure to watch your six. We're about 10 minutes out."

Again, the group nodded.

"When we get there Nat, Wanda and I will meet up with the security leader who should be showing us around the inside of the base. I would like you two to scout the area as discussed, but one of you keep close by at all times," he gestured to Sam and Rhodey, "I just have a weird feeling about all of this."

"Can do, Cap," Sam agreed.

"Good, we should be almost there so take a breath and get your heads right," Steve suggested before walking back to the cockpit.

Natasha lingered and walked to Wanda, leaning in she quietly asked, "How are you doing? All okay?"

"I'm just a little nervous."

"I got you. It'll be in and out, and you'll be with me the whole time."

Wanda nodded, "I want to do a good job."

"I know. Just do what Steve says and it'll be fine. That's all you can do."

Natasha gave Wanda's hand a little squeeze before walking back towards the cockpit to join Steve.

A few moments later they were landing at the base. As Steve had mentioned they met up with the squad leader who introduced himself as Officer Cooper, and he brought them inside. As they entered Wanda turned to see Sam and Rhodey taking off. Sam flew off into the distance out of sight, whilst Rhodey hung by and stayed near the base.

Once they were through the main entrance they went down a large elevator a few floors. Everyone was a little quieter than Wanda expected, but at the same time she didn't really know what to expect. After a few moments the elevator stopped and Cooper turned and gestured to Natasha that this was her floor, she thanked him and walked out, Wanda followed close behind her.

"Meet you downstairs when I'm done," Natasha addressed Steve. He nodded in reply before the elevator doors closed again and he descended further into the base. When the door closed Natasha then spoke to Wanda.

"That guy is weird right?"

The comment put Wanda a little at ease and she laughed, the two women headed together down the long corridor.

"Where are we going?" Wanda asked.

"Officially I want to get a look at the cameras."

Wanda looked at Natasha coyly, "Well, what unofficially are we doing down here?"

"Cooper was off, and I want to make sure that's just a personality trait and not something else."

"So you're looking into him?"

"Him. His team. This base. Yeah, I want to make sure we have the whole picture."

They had arrived at the comms room, and the door was unlocked so they just walked on in.

"Convenient," Natasha smirked.

Natasha started pulling up files and camera footage, and directed Wanda to keep an eye on the entrances and exits with her for any sign of Rumlow and his crew. They watched the whole time and didn't see anything happening.

"This doesn't make sense. If they didn't get in through the doors, and there was no report of damage to the outside, how did they get in here?"

Wanda wasn't sure if Natasha wanted her to answer, but guessed not as she turned back to the system she was at and began working through files on the base itself. Wanda kept an eye on the screens, trying to find anything useful in the cameras.

As Wanda watched, Natasha began to read aloud from the files on her screen.

"This was an old military base before S.H.I.E.L.D., then when they took it over this was a pretty sweet gig for an agent who didn't like to do much. Basically security for old files and equipment. They did a lot of testing here on HYDRA tech, but most of it just went into storage which is apparently on the 10th floor. That's probably where Steve is. Then when S.H.I.E.L.D. ended they hired private security to keep an eye on the place. That's where Cooper comes in."

Natasha paused, "Cooper seems like a pretty normal guy. Was a standard beat cop, discharged from the force, divorced, a kid, took a job in security and ended up leader of his own unit."

Wanda had watched the time around when the break in happened a few times over and hadn't seen anything so rewound the footage back further. She accidentally overshot it a little and ended up around midnight. On the screen she could see Cooper scanning himself into the base.

Natasha turned and noticed him on the screen, "Is that Cooper?"

"I think so."

"When is this?"

"12:23am," Wanda stated, "Why?"

"He isn't stationed at this base."

"But he's here?" Wanda didn't follow.

"He's here as a responder to what happened, but he doesn't work from here. It says so in his file. Why was he here last night?"

"Do you want me to follow him?"

"Yeah. Keep an eye on his movements and let me know where he goes."

Wanda did just that while Natasha returned to her screen.

"Okay, I found him again. He's in the elevator, the same one we just were in and he's gone down, 7, 8...10 levels. No wait. 11. I can't see where he went after that," Wanda stated.

"11 levels? Are you sure about that?"

"Yeah, I counted the lights."

Natasha without another word to Wanda put her hand to her ear, activating her comms.

"Steve? You there."

A few seconds of silence and Steve answered, "What did you find?"

"Nothing of interest, can't see how these guys got in," she asked casually, "Can I just check what floor you're on? We're coming down."

She heard some mumbling in the background, and then Steve came back. "11."

As soon as he said it, all of the lights went out in the room that Wanda and Natasha were in.

"Steve?"

"Lights are down here. I--"

Steve was cut off mid sentence, by the sound of a thud and gunfire.

A/N: This is a bit of a shorter one! Sorry - I will be uploading the next part tomorrow instead of Tuesday!