RENEGADES | 1

Chapter 7: Computer in the Basement

"Where did Captain America learn how to steal a car?" Evelina asked her boyfriend. "Nazi Germany." He said not taking his eyes off of the road. "Mm." Evelina replied. "And we're borrowing. Take your feet off the dash."

Evelina takes her feet off the dash.

"Alright, I have a question for you, oh, which you do not have to answer. I feel like if you don't answer it though, you're kind of answering it, you know?" Evelina. "What?" Raiding an eyebrow.
"Was that your first kiss since 1945?" She asked.

"That bad, huh?" Steve said looking back at the road. "I didn't say that." Evelina mumbled. "Well, it kind of sounds like that's what you're saying." Steve said. Evelina rolled her eyes. "No, I didn't. I just wondered how much practice you've had." She said shrugging her shoulders. "You don't need practice." Steve objected. "Everybody needs practice." She said crossing her arms over her chest.

"It was not my first kiss since 1945. I'm ninety-five, I'm not dead." Steve mumbled.

"Ok, I'm done with this conversation." Sasha said reminding the two they had an eleven year old in the back seat. Steve looked at her in the rear view mirror.

"You're awfully quiet." He said. Sasha shrugged. "You don't need to talk while observing." She said. "What are you observing?" Evelina asked. "Who." Sasha corrected. "Well who are you observing?" She asked again. "The two of you. Well your relationship." She started. "I get that the two of you are in love but there's a rift in between you." She said turning to Steve. "I've concluded that it was because of the situation with the flash drive." She concluded.

Steve was surprised that the child had learned all that with the course of a morning. Evelina was more understanding though. "She's a S.A.I.T. it's to be expected." Evelina whispered though everyone in the car heard her.

Everything was silent until the three pulled up at the military base. "This is it." Steve said. "I remember this place." Sasha said from behind the adults. "How?" Steve asked. "Field trip." She replied simply before walking towards the building. "The file came from these coordinates." Evelina said. "So did I."

Later that night as they walk around the base trying to pinpoint where the signal came from.

"This camp is where I was trained." Steve said reminiscing all of the time he spent here all those years ago.

"Changed much?" Evelina asked. "A little." He replied. "This is a dead end. Zero heat signature, zero waves, not even radio. Whoever wrote the file must have used a router to throw people off." Sasha notices a building ahead of them. "What is it?" Evelina asks.

"Army regulations forbid storing ammunition within five hundred yards of the barracks. This building is in the wrong place." Steve opens the lock with his shield and they enter inside, when they turn on the lights they notice it's a SHIELD office.

"This is SHIELD." Evelina says looking around. "Maybe where it started." They enter a room where they find old framed portraits of Howard Stark, Peggy and Col. Chester Phillips.

"There's Stark's father." Evelina says.
"Howard." Steve says with a smile. "Who's the girl?" Evelina asks. "That's Margret Carter. She is a founder of S.H.I.E.L.D." Sasha answers. Steve doesn't reply and turns away to walk further down the room and stops by a massive book shelf.

"If you're already working in a secret office..." He pushes the books shelf and slides open to reveal an elevator behind it. "Why do you need to hide the elevator?" They go down the elevator which takes them to a room with old looking computers.

"This can't be the data-point, this technology is ancient." Sasha says. Suddenly Evelina notices a small flash drive port, she places the flash drive in it which then activates the ancient computer in the room. "Initiate system?" Evelina types using the keyboard.

"Y-E-S, spells yes." Evelina smiles as the old computer starts to cranks up. "Shall we play a game?" She asks. "It's from a movie that..." Steve cuts her off. "Yeah, I saw it." Suddenly they hear an accented voice speaking.

"Rogers, Steven. Born, 1918. Fury, Evelina Syn. Born, 1984. Barton, Sashenka Jay-Lee. Born 2001. They see an old camera moving above them as it analyzes them.

   "It's some kind of a recording." Evelina says. "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 shows an old photo of Dr. Arnim Zola.

   "Do you know this thing?" Evelina asked Steve. "Arnim Zola was a German scientist who worked for the Red Skull. He's been dead for years." Steve said still confused on how Zola was still alive....ish.

    "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." Zola said with a proud smirk. "Ew." Sasha whispered.

    "How did you get here?" Steve asked Zola. "Invited." The computer responded.

    "It was Operation Paperclip after World War II. SHIELD recruited German scientists with strategic value." Evelina said from beside Steve. "They thought I could help their cause. I also helped my own." Zola replied the image on the screen flickering.

"HYDRA died with the Red Skull." Steve spat at the man turned machine.
"Cut off one head, two more shall take its place." Zola replied. "Prove it." Sasha said in a daring tone placing a hand on her hip.

   "Accessing archive. The computer screen shows them old footage of Johann Schmidt the Red Skull, of the how the original SHIELD 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, SHIELD was founded and I was recruited. The new HYDRA grew. A beautiful parasite inside SHIELD. For seventy years HYDRA has been secretly feeding crisis, reaping war. And when history did not cooperate, history was changed." Zola responded as the trio watched the images flickered across the screen.

   "That's impossible, SHIELD would have stopped you." Evelina said crossing her arms over her chest defiantly. "Accidents will happen." The computer screen shows them 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 death amounts to the same as your Life; a zero sum." In anger Steve suddenly smashes the computer screen.

   "As I was saying..." Zola continues unfazed. "What's on this drive?" Sasha asked eying it suspiciously. "Project Insight requires insight. So I wrote an algorithm." Zola replied. "What kind of algorithm? What does it do?" Evelina

"The answer to your question is fascinating. Unfortunately, you shall be too dead to hear it." Zola says as the doors start to close. Steve tries stops it by throwing his shield in between it but he's too late.

"Steve, we got a bogey. Short range ballistic. 30 seconds tops." Evelina said starting to panic. "Who fired it?" Steve asked. "S.H.I.E.L.D." Evelina replied although at the same time Sashenka answered with HYDRA. "I am afraid I have been stalling, Captain. Admit it, it's better this way. We're both of us...out of time." Zola says. Steve notices a small opening on the ground, he throws the metal door aside and just as the place explodes he throws himself, Sasha, and Evelina into the hole and protects them with his shield, he then manages to get them out from under the building rubble just as STRIKE agents arrive to roam the area for them.

Rumlow notices a footprint in the dust. "Call in the asset."