Losing him was blue, like I'd never known
Missing him was dark gray, all alone
Forgetting him was like trying to know
Somebody you never met
Adelaide Herrmann has so many secrets and is good at hiding all of them.
Only one person knows the real Ad...
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"Hey, man." A guy stood in the door way, confused by what he saw.
"I'm sorry about this. We need a place to lay low."
"Everyone we know is trying to kill is." Natasha said.
"Not everyone." He stepped aside and let them in.
Adelaide took over the guest bathroom, turning it into her own clinic with a simple first aid kit.
"Adelheid Schmidt." She turned to see Steve in the doorway.
"Rogers, I..." Adelaide's voice stopped before she could let it quaver.
"Who knows."
"Nat. And now you." Adelaide said. "Fury did."
"I'm sorry. But you can trust me." Steve told her.
"We're not friends, Rogers. I don't trust you." Adelaide snapped.
"We're a team."
"You killed my father." She accused. "Because of people like you, I lost my family and home."
A silence settled over them.
"Before the second war, my father sent me and my mother to Russia. There we were captured by the Red Room. He wasn't always a murderer."
Although he saw the resemblance, Steve also saw how different Adelaide was to the man she called father.
"You should check on Nat." Adelaide said.
She sat alone on the tiled floor. She remembered Rue, who was still at S.H.I.E.L.D. unknowing of this information they had found.
Although there was only pain in her body, Adelaide refused to let one tear fall. She held herself up against the counter, and leaning up against the wall she opened the door to the bedroom.
"I made breakfast. If you guys eat that sort of thing." Sam said.
Adelaide hobbled into the kitchen. "Awe, and he cooks."
- - -
"So, the question is, who at S.H.I.E.L.D. could launch a domestic missile strike?" Natasha asked.
"Pierce." Steve said.
"Who happens to be sitting on top of the most secure building in the world." Natasha reminded them.
"But he's not working alone. Zola's algorithm was on the Lemurian Star."
"So was Jasper Sitwell." Natasha said.
"So, the real question is, how do the three most wanted people in Washington kidnap a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent in broad daylight?" Steve asked.
"The answer is, you don't." Sam dropped a file in front of them.
"What's this?" Steve asked.
"Call it a resume." Sam said.
"Is this Bakhmala?" Natasha asked. "The Khalid Khandil mission, that was you?"
"You didn't say he was a Pararescue." Adelaide looked at the picture.
"Is this Riley?"
"Yeah." Sam confirmed.
"I heard they couldn't bring in the choppers because of the RPGs. What did you use? A stealth chute?" Natasha asked.
"No. These." He handed Steve the file.
"I thought you said you were a pilot." Steve said.
"I never said pilot."
"I can't ask you to do this, Sam. You got out for a good reason."
"Dude, Captain America needs my help. There's no better reason to get back in." Sam said.
"Where can we get our hands on one of these things?" Steve asked.
"The last one is at Forte Meade. Behind three guarded gates and a 12-inch steel wall."
Steve looked at Natasha and Adelaide. "Shouldn't be a problem."
- - -
"Tell me about Zola's algorithm." Steve demanded. They had trapped Sitwell on a nearby rooftop.
"Never heard of it." Sitwell said, returning his glasses to his face.
"What we're you doing on the Lemurian Star?" Steve demanded.
"I was throwing up. I get seasick." He tripped, almost falling over the edge. "Is this little display meant to insinuate that you're gonna throw me off the roof? Because it's really not your style, Rogers."
"You're right. It's not." He smoothed out Sitwell's suit jacket. "It's her's."
Steve stepped aside and let Natasha kick Sitwell over the edge. "Oh, wait. What about that girl from Accounting, Laura...Lillian."
"Lip-piercing, right?" Steve asked.
"Yeah, she's cute."
"Yeah. I'm not ready for that."
Sam returned Sitwell safely to the roof, scaring the information out of him.
"Zola's algorithm is a program for choosing Insight's targets."
"What targets?" Steve asked.
"You! A TV anchor in Cairo, the Under Secretary of Defesne, a high school valedictorian in Iowa City, Bruce Banner, Stephen Strange, anyone who's a threat to Hydra. Now, or in the future."
"In the future? How could it know?" Steve asked.
Sitwell laughed. "How could it not? The 21st century is a digital book. Zola taught Hydra how to read it. Your bank records, medical history, voting patterns, emails, phones calls, your damn SAT scores! Zola's algorithm evaluates people's past to predict their future."
"And what then?"
"Oh, my God. Pierce is gonna kill me."
"What then?" Steve asked.
"Then the Insight helicarriers scratch people off the list. A few million at a time."
