The Cross of Hopeful Sorrow

07

Steve and Natasha pulled up to outside an abandoned military base where the signal led them to.

"This is it," Steve said.

"The file came from these coordinates," Natasha noted.

"So did I."

Later that night, they walked around the base trying to pinpoint where the signal came from.

Steve continued. "This camp is where I was trained."

"Changed much?" Natasha asked.

"A little."

Steve had a brief vision of his smaller self running past them as he was getting trained with other soldiers.

"Pick up the pace, ladies!" Sergeant Duffy ordered. "Let's go! Let's go! Double time! Come on Rogers, move it!" His former self stopped and stared at Steve as he was now. "Come on! Fall in! Rogers! I said fall in!" Present Steve watched nostalgically as the former Steve ran off.

"This is a dead end," Natasha said. "Zero heat signature, zero waves, not even radio. Whoever wrote the file must have used a router to throw people off." Steve noticed a building ahead of them. "What is it?" He walked over to the building.

"Army regulations forbid storing ammunition within five hundred yards of the barracks," Steve replied. "This building is in the wrong place." Steve opened the lock with his shield and they entered. They turned on the lights and notice it was a S.H.I.E.L.D. office.

"This is S.H.I.E.L.D.," Natasha stated.

"Maybe where it started." They entered a room where they found old framed portraits of Howard Stark, Peggy, Helen and Colonel Chester Phillips.

"There's Stark's father."

"Howard."

"Who are the girls?" Steve didn't reply and turned away to walk further down the room, but was stopped by a massive bookshelf.

"If you're already working in a secret office..." Steve began as he pushed the bookshelf and slid it open to reveal an elevator behind it. "Why do you need to hide the elevator?" They went down the elevator which took them to a room with old-looking computers.

"This can't be the data-point, this technology is ancient." Suddenly, Natasha noticed a small flash drive port. She placed the flash drive in it which then activated the ancient computer in the room.

"Initiate system?" the computer asked.

Natasha typed using the keyboard as she said, "Y-E-S, spells yes." Natasha smiled as the old computer started to crank up. "Shall we play a game?"" She turned to Steve. "It's from a movie that..."

"Yeah, I saw it," Steve interrupted. Suddenly, they heard an accented voice speaking.

Dr. Arnim Zola said, "Rogers, Steven. Born, 1918. Romanoff, Natalia Alianovna. Born, 1984." They saw an old camera moving above them as it analyzed them.

"It's some kind of a recording," Natasha noted.

"I am not a recording, Fräulein. I may not be the man I was when the Captain took me prisoner in 1945, but I am." The computer screen showed an old photo of Dr. Arnim Zola.

"Do you know this thing?"

"Arnim Zola was a German scientist who worked for the Red Skull," Steve replied. "He's been dead for years."

"First correction, I am Swiss. Second, look around you. I have never been more alive. In 1972, I received a terminal diagnosis. Science could not save my body, my mind, however, that was worth saving on two hundred thousand feet of data banks. You are standing in my brain."

"How did you get here?"

"Invited."

"It was Operation Paperclip after World War II," Natasha said. "S.H.I.E.L.D. recruited German scientists with strategic value."

"They thought I could help their cause. I also helped my own."

"HYDRA died with the Red Skull," Steve said.

"Cut off one head, two more shall take its place."

"Prove it."

"Accessing archive." The computer screen showed them old footage of Johann Schmidt/Red Skull, of the original S.H.I.E.L.D. founders. "HYDRA was founded on the belief that humanity could not be trusted with its own freedom. What we did not realize, was that if you try to take that freedom, they resist. The war taught us much. Humanity needed to surrender its freedom willingly. After the war, S.H.I.E.L.D. was founded and I was recruited. The new HYDRA grew. A beautiful parasite inside S.H.I.E.L.D. For seventy years HYDRA has been secretly feeding crisis, reaping war. And when history did not cooperate, history was changed."

"That's impossible, S.H.I.E.L.D. would have stopped you," Natasha told him.

"Accidents will happen." The computer screen showed them that HYDRA had killed Howard and Maria Stark, making it look like a car accident along with the recent death of Fury. "HYDRA created a world so chaotic that humanity is finally ready to sacrifice its freedom to gain its security. Once the purification process is complete, HYDRA's new world order will arise. We won, Captain. Your deaths amount to the same as your lives; a zero sum." In anger, Steve suddenly smashed the computer screen. "As I was saying..."

"What's on this drive?" Steve demanded.

"Project Insight requires insight. So I wrote an algorithm."

"What kind of algorithm?" Natasha asked. "What does it do?"

"The answer to your question is fascinating. Unfortunately, you shall be too dead to hear it." Suddenly, the doors started to close. Steve tried to stop it by throwing his shield in between it, but he was too late.

"Steve, we got a bogey," Natasha warned. "Short range ballistic. 30 seconds tops."

"Who fired it?" Steve asked.

"S.H.I.E.L.D."

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

Steve noticed a small opening on the ground. He threw the metal door aside and just as the place exploded, he threw himself and Natasha into the hole and protected them with his shield. Steve managed to get them out from under the building rubble just as STRIKE agents arrived to roam the area for them. Natasha was in his arms.

Rumlow noticed a footprint in the dust and said, "Call in the assets."

---

At his home, Pierce went to his kitchen to get a drink when he saw the Winter Soldier and the Angel of Death sitting behind him with their guns on the table.

His housekeeper, Renata, called out, "I'm going to go, Mr. Pierce. You need anything before I leave?"

"No," Pierce answered. "Uh... it's fine, Renata, you can go home."

"Okay, night-night."

"Good night." Renata left. "Want some milk?" The Winter Soldier and the Angel of Death didn't reply. "The timetable has moved. Our window is limited. Two targets, Level Six." He poured himself a glass of milk and went over to join the Winter Soldier and the Angel of Death at the table. "They already cost me Zola. I want confirmed death in ten hours." Just then, Renata interrupted them as she entered the kitchen.

"Sorry, Mr. Pierce, I... I forgot my phone." She noticed the Winter Soldier and the Angel of Death.

"Oh, Renata. I wish you would have knocked." Pierce picked up the gun from the table and shot and killed her.