Steve knocked on the sliding glass back door, the blinds coming up and the door opening a moment after to reveal Sam.
"Hey, man."
"I'm sorry about this," Steve said honestly. "We need a place to lay low."
"You seemed like the best option."
"Everyone we know is trying to kill us," Natasha told him.
"Not everyone," he said, standing to the side and letting them in, looking both ways before closing the door and lowering the blinds.
***
"Sorry I didn't have anything that fit you better," Sam apologized as she walked into the kitchen wearing an oversized black Star Wars t-shirt and some jeans that she had cut at the bottom with the belt she had from the lost and found, her long brown hair down and drying, starting to curl just a bit.
"It's fine. Thank you."
"The jeans are my sister's, but she won't miss them. It's the closest thing sized for you I had."
"I promise, Sam, they're fine."
"Okay," he nodded, going back to making the pancakes on the stove while Annabelle sipped the glass of orange juice he laid out for her.
"Thank you for letting us in," she said after a few minutes. "It means a lot."
"No problem." The room was awkwardly silent. "You know, that one on one I offered doesn't have to be an official thing. We can just talk."
"I'm fine, Sam. Really."
"You guys just had a building dropped on you, you're on the run, pretty much everyone you know is trying to kill you, and you're fine?" She nodded. "Annabelle, a normal person wouldn't be fine with all this and at your age-"
"Why do you keep bringing up my age? So what? I'm fourteen. Tons of kids around the world live in war zones. I... I'm lucky. My age doesn't affect my ability to understand what's going on."
"I know you understand, but that doesn't mean you're coping."
"I am. Okay, I'm fine. Really. I'm healthy, I'm not depressed or suicidal, I don't have panic attacks-"
"Are you sleeping? Nightmares?"
"Here and there," she admitted. "Nothing I can't handle though. Besides, doesn't everyone get nightmares? You know, the ones about going to school naked or something?" she smiled as he turned to face her.
"I was talking about nightmares about the war or a battle."
She looked at him, her tongue wetting her lips. "I'd be more worried if I didn't get them."
He looked at her for a minute longer before sighing and nodding, putting the pancakes on a plate. "I'm sorry for pushing. It's just a habit."
"It's okay. I get it. I would push someone like me too."
He hummed. "Go ahead and fix yourself a plate. I'll go get them." She nodded with a small smile and he turned, walking out of the room. Her smile fell as soon as he turned his back and she closed her eyes, quickly opening them again and putting some pancakes on her plate and pouring a puddle of syrup, Natasha, Steve, and Sam coming back in after a minutes.
"These are nothing like the collision mats we had during the war," she told Steve with a bite in her mouth. "These are amazing." Steve and Sam laughed while Natasha gave a small smile.
"They're my mama's recipe. You won't find a finer pancake."
"Oh, I believe you," she said as she took another bite. They each made a plate before launching into discussion.
"So the question is, who at SHIELD could launch a domestic missile strike?" Natasha asked.
"Pierce," Steve said after a minute.
"Who happens to be sitting on top of the most secure building in the world."
"But he's not working alone."
"Obviously not. If Hyrda's doing everything that Zola said, they have to have tons of people in multiple departments. That way if one was discovered somehow or something else happened, the whole operation wouldn't be a waste."
"And you have Zola's algorithm on the Lemurian Star," Steve pointed out after his sister.
"So was Jasper Sitwell," Natasha said, making Steve take in a deep breath.
"So the real question is, how do the three most wanted people in Washington kidnap a SHIELD officer in broad daylight?"
"Preferably without dying or attracting a lot of attention," Annabelle added.
"The answer is, you don't," Sam said, walking around the kitchen island and into the dining room where they sat. He put a file on the table.
"What's this?" Steve asked.
"Call it a resume." They stood and looked at the picture on top of the file.
"Is this Bakhmala? The Khalid Khandil mission, that was you?" Natasha asked. "You didn't say he was a Pararescue."
"Is this Riley?" Steve asked of the man standing beside Sam in the photo.
"Yeah," he said quietly.
"Heard they couldn't bring in the choppers because of the RPGs," Natasha continued. "What did you use? A stealth chute?"
"No. These," he picked up the rest of the file.
"I thought you said you were a pilot," Steve said after a minute.
"I never said pilot."
"True," Annabelle nodded as she went through their conversations again. "Just talked about flying. A logical conclusion was pilot though. This, on the other hand, is much cooler." Sam chuckled.
"I can't ask you to do this, Sam," Steve said after another moment. "You got out for a good reason.
"Dude, Captain America needs my help. There's no better reason to get back in." It was Annabelle's turn to chuckle.
"Where can we get our hands on one of these things?" Steve agreed.
"The last one is at Fort Meade behind three guarded gates and a twelve inch steel wall." Steve and Annabelle looked at Natasha who only shrugged.
"Shouldn't be a problem," Steve told him before dropping the file back on the table.
"Well, what are we waiting for?" Annabelle asked. "We got a bird and a serpent to catch."
YOU ARE READING
For Better or For Worse - Book 3 (The Winter Soldier)
Fanfiction"I need to see what I think of the world first. It may be a new world, but in some ways it's still the same." Annabelle woke up in the twenty first century after spending almost seventy years in ice. Not only is she thrust into a new world, she also...
