SENTINEL ↝ MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE [1]

[0]

1961

The manila folder lay open on the table, its contents spread out across the wooden surface. The top of the folder was stamped with ink reading Project Sentinel, the test results and various photographs that had been previously hidden inside documenting a child through his early developmental years, up until he became the teenager that sat at the table, eyes scanning the words on the pages while the two adults behind him continued to discuss their important matters.

Fifteen-year-old James Rogers was no stranger to the whispers that went on between his mother, Margaret Carter, and a close friend and colleague of hers, Howard Stark. The feats the young boy had been able to pull off that even adults twice his age would never be able to accomplish meant a life of solitude for the young boy, with the exception of the odd occasion here and there where Howard would take him out for a "night on the town" where, just for a night, James was able to pretend he was just another kid from Brooklyn.

As he listened to his mother and Howard speak, James's eyes wandered over to the manila folder next to his, one with much less intel filling its contents, the black stamped letters reading The Winter Soldier, something the three of them knew next to nothing about, and it made him all the more dangerous. For years, Peggy and Howard tried everything in their power to track down whatever they could about the unnamed assassin, but all they managed to find were mere whispers of his whereabouts before the trail would go cold, another whisper popping up a couple of years later on the other side of the world for them to follow. They were never quite sure how he managed to vanish from the face of the earth in that time, until Howard cracked the code on the technology used, even creating a chamber of their own to be used by the Sentinel.

"James," Howard finally spoke up, pulling the young boy's attention. "Are you ready?"

James rose from the table slowly, taking in his surroundings one last time before nodding in Howard's direction. "Yes, sir."

"Remember," Peggy reminded her son. "You don't have to do this."

"We both know I do, Mom." James replied. "You need a weapon of your own to be able to take him out if we can find him. This assassin, he's no normal soldier. He's like me, he's like-"

The words fell flat on James's tongue before he could use the word for the father James lost when Captain Steve Rogers crashed a ship into the middle of the Atlantic to save millions, before he was even born, not that Steve and Peggy had even known then that their son was on the way. The world thought Captain America to be their first and only super soldier, not knowing that, while he was certainly the first, he was in no way the last.

James hadn't fully inherited all of what the serum had done to his father in 1943, though the speed and strength possessed by the fifteen year old was enough to make any other soldier look like a toddler. While he'd been raised in the private eye as the only other living super soldier, training to one day become the symbol his father had been, little did they know another was living below the surface, though as a symbol of fear, not of peace.

"He'd be so proud of you, you know." Peggy said, blinking back a tear as she smoothed out her son's shirt, and Howard stepped forward, shaking James's hand.

"We'll see you soon." Howard promised him. "The world may not know the sacrifices you're making today, but they'll never be able to thank you enough for them."

James stepped backwards into the cryogenic chamber, looking up at his surroundings as the glass doorway shut with the press of a button, locking him in place. His eyes met Howard's and he nodded quickly, before giving himself a chance to back out. He knew he was making the right decision, and could only hope that he'd be able to find the Winter Soldier soon, before it was too late.