His Oracle

Chapter 5 - A friend

I fell asleep in the back seat and wake up to it being morning and the truck stopping. We walk up to someone's back door and dad knocks. "Hey man." A guy answers. "I'm sorry about this. We need a place to lay low." Dad says. "Everyone we know is trying to kill us." He looks at all of us. "Not everyone." He lets us in. While mom and dad shower the man stitches me up. "I didn't catch your name." He looks up from the stitches. "Sam, and you?" I smile. "I'm Natalia." I look back at mom and dad talking. "Their daughter." He almost looks stunned. "Wait.. you're the Oracle?" I smile. "Yeah." "Wait they had a kid together?" I laugh "a long time ago." He finishes up my stitches finally. "You hungry?" I nod. "Starving." He smiles and makes food. "I made breakfast.. if you guys eat that sort of thing." Mom and dad laugh.

-A little while later-

"So, the question is: who in SHIELD could launch a n
ntmissile strike?" Mom asks. "Pierce." I speak up almost instantly. "Who happens to be sitting on top of the most secure building in the world." mom says. "But he's not working alone, Zola's algorithm was on the Lemurian Star." Dad says. "So was Jasper Sitwell." mom continues. "So, the real question is: how do the two most wanted people in Washington kidnap a SHIELD officer in broad daylight?" I laugh a little. "Sorry." I look back with a straight face. "The answer is: You don't" Sam interrupts. "What's this?" Dad and I say. "Call it a resume." Sam says. "Is this Bakhmala? The Khalid Khandil mission, that was you." Mom looks at dad. "You didn't say he was para-rescue?" Dad looks at the photo. "Is that Riley?" Sam nods. "Yeah." Mom looks at Sam. "I heard they couldn't bring in the choppers because of the RPGs. What did you use, a stealth chute?" Sam smiles. "Nope. These." He hands dad another file. "I thought you said you were a pilot?" Dad says. "I never said Pilot." Sam laughs. "I can't ask you to do this, Sam. You got out for a good reason." Dad adds. "Dude, Captain America and THE oracle needs my help. There's no better reason to get back in." I smile at dad. "Where can we get our hands on one of these things?" Dad looks back at Sam. "The last one is at Fort Meade, behind three guarded gates and a twelve-inch steel wall." Sam shrugs. "Shouldn't be a problem." Dad smiles.

Dad, mom, and I are on the building watching Jasper, while Sam is down on the ground watching Jasper coming out of the meeting. We listen to Sam over the ear piece who finally calls Jasper. "Agent Sitwell, How was your lunch? I heard the crab cakes here are delicious." Jasper looks around. "Who is this?" He replies. "The good looking guy in the sunglasses, your ten o'clock." Sam says. I look at dad at roll my eyes. "Your other ten o'clock." I smack my face. "He's an idiot" Mom laughs. "There you go." Sam waves. "What do you want?" Jasper says. "You're gonna go around the corner, to your right. There's a grey car, two spaces down. You and I are gonna take a ride." Sam says. "And why would I do that." Dad looks at me. "You're up kid." I grab my sniper and set it up on the ledge and turn the red dot on aiming right at his chest. "Because that tie looks really expensive, and I'd hate to mess it up." I follow him all the way until Sam brings him up to the building. Dad grabs Jasper and throws Sitwell across the roof. "Tell me about Zola's algorithm." Jasper looks at me. "Never heard of it." Dad pushes him up against the ledge. "What were you doing on the Lemurian Star?" Dad pushes him again. "I was throwing up, I get seasick." Jasper smiles. "Is this little display meant to insinuate that you're gonna throw me off the roof? Because it's really not your style, Rogers." Dad let's go and pats his suit. "You're right, it's not. It's hers." I walk up behind dad and kick him off. "That's my girl." I smile at mom when she says that. Sam flies back up bring Jasper with him and dropping him off on the roof while he lands. "Zola's algorithm is a program...for choosing Insight's targets!" He says before mom or dad could even get close to him. "What targets?" I say. "You! A TV anchor in Cairo, the Undersecretary of Defense, a high school valedictorian in Iowa city. Bruce Banner, Stephen Strange, anyone who's a threat to HYDRA! Now, or in the future." He says. "The Future? How could it know?" I say again. He just laughs. "How could it not? The 21st century is a digital book. Zola taught HYDRA how to read it." I look at mom and dad. "Your bank records, medical histories, voting patterns, e-mails, phone calls, your damn SAT scores. Zola's algorithm evaluates people's past to predict their future." I grab ahold of him. "And what then?" Jaspers eyes go wide. "Oh, my God. Pierce is going to kill me." I grab ahold of his jacket and yank him. "WHAT THEN?!" I yell. "Then the Insight Helicarriers scratch people off the list. A few million at a time." I look at mom and dad horrified. "I'm on that list. They are going to kill me because I betrayed Hydra." Mom grabs me. "Nothing is going to happen to you. Steve, Sam. Let's get out of here." Mom grabs me and Sam and Dad take ahold of Jasper.