This means war

Chapter 10

A deafening silence weighed heavy on everyone in the spacious room. Joseph, Steve, Bucky, Nat and Laila sat in a circle eying the pictures carefully. A faint rustling pierced through the silence. Joseph raised his dark eyes from the pictures to the source of the noise, Bucky.

Bucky wordlessly rested his head upon Steve's chest and let his eyes fall shut. The constant pounding of Steve's heartbeat soothed his anxiety. All the thoughts swimming in his head slowly lost their volume and all that he could hear was that constant sound. Steve thoughtlessly run his fingers through Bucky's hair, recognizing the action as Bucky being anxious.

Joseph sighed. Those two really were in love.

A piercing beep echoed through the room, pulling everyone out of their thoughts. Laila stood and walked to her three-screen computer setup. Her fingers tapped at the key board furiously and tapped on the screen a couple of times.

"I analyzed the angles each picture was taken from and tapped into the security footage in those locations. These are our culprits." Images of men popped up onto the screen. Everyone stood and placed themselves in a place they could clearly see her screens. "These individuals are not connected to any criminal organizations. Two have a record for misdemeanors but nothing that would get them prison time. There is no apparent connection between them, so I suspect that they were selected at random. Looking into their history and affiliations I don't think they could know about your identities." Footage of the individuals putting an envelop into public lockers and pulling out duffle bags of what must have been money played on the screens. "I think they were contacted at random and offered money for taking pictures and they accepted. These are their addresses."

"Bucky and I will go pay them visits," Nat stood up. "We'll contact you once we catch all of them."

Bucky undid his bun and let his hair fall into his face. Steve squeezed his hand, "Be careful."

"I will," Bucky squeezed his hand back before stepping out the room with Nat.

"Who in S.H.I.E.L.D would have a motive to do this?" Joseph inquired.

Laila tapped at her keyboard and several profiles of agents popped up onto the screen. "It's hard to say, but these people have been reported to be dissatisfied with the agency. Kristin believes he should be S class, but Sarah won't give her the title, she thinks Sarah is belittling her and would do anything to prove she's good enough." Laila paused to explain, "She had a complicated upbringing. Tristin wants bigger missions, but Sarah doesn't trust him much. It goes on and on but none of these motives seem big enough to stir up something."

Steve's eyebrows furrowed as be went deep in thought. All the previous missions he's been on replayed in his mind, nothing seemed particularly suspicious. He tried to remember all the things he's seen around the agency, all the hushed conversations, all the schemes. But none of those seemed relevant to the situation. He sighed, "How's Kevin?"

Laila turned on her chair, "Not to well unfortunately. His injuries are grave. It's worse because he seems to have something, he wants to tell us desperately, but he can't speak, and both his hands are broken so he can't write. Helena told us that the doctors said that he might have suffered from psychological damage due to the trauma."

"Kevin, suffering from trauma? Really?" Steve asked in disbelief. Kevin had a mind of steel, nothing ever got to him. He had a very rough and unfortunate upbringing which left him unable to feel emotions. Nothing ever got to him anymore. He once got abducted and it took them three months to find him. Steve had expected him to be traumatized after having being tortured everyday for so long but Kevin had just shrugged it off saying that he'd been through it so many times before it didn't really bother him. What exactly had happened on this mission that gave Kevin Psychological trauma in just a couple of days? Was this connected to his own situation?