The reaction to his deliberate leak about his path surprised him. Multiple entities moved to cut his path. Police, state troopers, several military vehicles, all moving to cut his path.
At first glance, it didn’t exactly look like a problem. If a few SHIELD agents were calling in personal favors.
The problem, when he hacked their devices to find exactly who called, he failed to find any. Every single time, his tracking led to someone in the command chain, who seemed to give the order without any rhyme or reason.
Meaning, they had a secret communicator.
One benefit of dealing with state-level government organizations was that, for his current loadout, their digital security measures might as well not exist. Hacking their security cameras had been trivial.
What he saw concerned him greatly. Every single person showed the same pattern. They were working on something before they stopped, checked some kind of innocuous device like their watches, cufflinks, even wedding rings in a move that looked innocent.
Then, every single of them gave a reasonable excuse to break the conversation, from suddenly remembering an urgent meeting to excusing themselves for an emergency bathroom visit, walked to a place not covered by the security cameras, returned a minute later in a hurry to give the order. It didn’t look like someone calling in favors.
It looked like someone activating sleeper cells.
“Get ready for a harder ride, people. We have been detected,” he said as he activated another panel.
“Is that a radar?” Melinda asked, surprised. “And, we have company. Take a left turn. We have to lose them in a forest.”
“You lead, I drive,” he offered as he took a sharp turn. He had already decided against driving to Washington. Not because he decided against saving Fury, whom he hardly liked. After realizing the other faction was not limited to SHIELD, his opinion of Fury dropped even lower.
He still preferred him alive. No matter how bad the mess was, at least he was confident that Fury didn’t belong to the faction that casually nuked cities. And, the current situation was one of the situations where even a poor leader was better than no leader. At least, the loyalists wouldn’t lose their time deciding on who would be next.
Phil would be the next reasonable candidate, which he didn’t want. He loved the guy, but he was a horrible candidate to clean up that level of infestation … rebuilding after the mess fit his skills better.
The current situation required a butcher.
As he drove, he noticed Jemma was panicking. He turned enough to catch Skye’s gaze, and smirked. “I remember someone calling me paranoid for having weapons in my car,” he teased.
Skye smiled despite the obvious danger. “Fine. I might have underestimated the complications of spy life a bit. But, cut me some slack. I’m not even officially an agent.”
He chuckled even as cut and weaved through the forest roads, glad for his Driving skill, which, combined with his supernatural reflexes, allowed him to travel smoothly; though smooth part mostly relied on the suspension he had reinforced to the absurd degree while building his gateway car.
Riding through the forest helped them to ditch the aerial threats, both the helicopters and the jets that were scrambling toward their location.
At the same time, he was using his Radio Waves Ability to communicate with his computer hidden in the car, which then communicated with his nearest base. He expanded the search for suspicious activities with similar parameters.
Under his mental order, his supercomputer designed a quick heuristic code, hacking the organizations in question whenever a police car or military asset suddenly started operating under new orders.
The program checked the chain of order, and flagged the originator, further flagging it if the originator gave an order that wasn’t fully in his authority.
He knew that it was rough and inaccurate, and not all of them would be a part of the conspiracy, but his Spycraft knowledge was comprehensive enough to include counter-intelligence operations, and it told him that an expanded list like that was still worth its weight in gold.
He collected it, because it wasn’t hard for his infrastructure now that he had a direction to look for, and he could dump the extended list to the one responsible and let them clean.
Dodging the official army tools was easy, but soon, his satellite picked something else. Some kind of a stealth vehicle that was moving far faster than standard-issue stuff.
He directed his own automated stealth vehicle to capture a scan, which showed the presence of a small strike team, eight people, mostly usual people wearing exoskeletons that was obviously reverse engineered from Chitauri tech in a hurry, and led by some kind of cyborg.
He took a sharp turn just as they appeared, their machine gun opening fire. While avoiding them, he let them drive him toward a cliff, which could reasonably protect them from their ranged attack.
It was a good test for Skye, and also with an enough gap for him to set a hidden gate, use it to travel to Washington at maximum speed, help Fury, and return in quick order after he had dealt with the hostiles.
“Alright, what do you say if we bait them on the ground and take them down,” he suggested.
Melinda nodded. “How?“ Jenna asked, only to gasp when he crashed against the cliff full speed. But not before casting Stamina Blessings to each of them. He had inertial dampeners in the car, but he didn’t want to run them at full power.
Since he could cure even the worst injuries, he didn’t mind taking some risk.
“Well, it wasn’t as terrible as I feared,” Skye muttered, patting herself.
“Stumble out like you’re hurting, maybe even roll on the ground. Don’t worry, they must have orders to take us alive, and if they open fire, I can activate shields.”
“That’s an impressive loadout,” Melinda said. Then, she paused. “Does Professor even take SHIELD seriously?”
“Frankly, nothing about what I saw told me that he does,” he responded even as he acted the wounded driver, walked to the other side, and made a show of pulling Jemma from her seat, like she was already unconscious. “Finally in my arms, beautiful,” he teased.
“R-really, here?” she whispered. “After ignoring me all this time.”
He smirked, saying nothing as he opened the trunk, and passed weapons. An energy based sniper rifle for Melinda, a tranquilizer pistol for Jemma.
“No weapons for me?” Skye asked.
“No. It’s the perfect time for you to test your powers in real action. We have worked enough, and if you accidentally use too much power, I’m here to heal.”
“Are we trying to take them alive?” Jemma said, suddenly relieved.
“Unless they force our hand, yes. We need to be able to interrogate them.” He looked at Melinda. “Do you need an exosuit?”
“No. Just switch me to Agility boost. I’ll operate better with my full mobility.”
“Fine,” he said, then threw a large bracelet. “This is a shield generator, just in case. We will wait until they drop. Melinda, you have the command, and I’ll sneak out to take over their helicopter. We need to make sure they can’t retreat alert the rest.”
She nodded, then froze. “No,” she gasped as she watched six of the eight drop.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, surprised.
“That’s the Winter Soldier,” she said. “He’s a mysterious super-soldier assassin who appears and disappears with no pattern. He’s … dangerous.”
“Dangerous enough to take down Captain America easily?” he asked.
That made Melinda pause. “Not that dangerous … I think,” she said. “We don’t have real data, but they should be in similar range.” She looked at him carefully. “Is it good news, or bad news?”
“Mostly good. Skye and I could take him down if we work hard enough. Meanwhile, Jemma will take over their helicopter and prevent the communication.”
“I … I can do it,” Jemma said, confident.
He wouldn’t be as confident if it wasn’t for the fact that he had already hacked their helicopter, and currently using it to delivering a false report about driving closer to Washington DC. Exoskeleton and shield generator would keep her safe.
Not to mention, Jemma wasn’t exactly a terrible shoot. She was bad compared to Melinda, but Melinda was the kind of spy that scared the other spies. Hardly a fair benchmark.
“How are we going to do it?” she asked.
“You will be the main attacker. I’ll use my flames to prevent his counter attacks, but otherwise, fight as you’re alone.” She nodded, and they rushed toward the Winter Soldier, while Melinda used the stun function of the energy rifle with impressive efficiency. He had sparred with her, but she was even more impressive in the field.
It helped that she had the advantage in gear. Its scope automatically mapped the weaknesses of the exoskeletons by connecting to the computer in the car. The fact that they were mostly Chitauri tech made the task easier.
When Skye and him caught up with Winter Soldier, Melinda had already taken down two, and forced the other three into cover. Meanwhile, Skye was already in the combat range. The Winter Soldier’s attack was professional, devastating, and utterly merciless. Without her exoskeleton, Skye would have had a broken neck.
But, he didn’t intervene. There was no better way to improve than actual combat, and unless Winter Soldier was holding back to an unbelievable degree, he could contain the situation easily.
A battle against a professional super-soldier assassin, where he could protect her, was too good of an opportunity to be wasted.
“Be mindful of the distance,” he said. “If you can’t keep him occupied, I can’t deliver the takeout punch.”
With that, he approached from the side, throwing several bolts of fire, splitting his attention so that Skye could find her balance. After a minute of fighting, she did, her movements flowing smoothly.
She timed a palm attack just when the Winter Soldier was delivering a punch with his machine arm, her vibration power invading its structure, destroying its internal electronics. Just like that, the Winter Soldier found himself fighting with one arm.
Instead of continuing to assist Skye, he switched his direction, and took the soldiers in the cover. Reading the change, Melinda changed her position, and assisted Jemma from the distance.
Ten seconds later, the only fight was between Skye and the Winter Soldier. He retreated, keeping the distance, acting exhausted. It didn’t convince Skye even a bit, but it was enough to make the Winter Soldier believe that if he could take Skye, he had a chance to reverse the situation.
The exchange continued, every minute making Skye a better fighter, allowing her to integrate all the techniques they had practiced. Admittedly, her style of fighting was simplistic, but it was effective.
The biggest challenge in martial arts wasn’t to touch the opponent, but positioning one’s body in a way that leveraged their body weight, multiple muscle groups, momentum, and gravity to deliver attacks with sufficient momentum.
Skye didn’t need that. Even the most off-balance palm strike from her was devastating due to her power, and the only reason the Winter Soldier was still up was his incredible endurance.
The man fought like a desperate machine. He didn’t want to imagine how he was trained. But, his desperation paid off. Skye overextended, and the Winter Soldier immediately jumped forward, ready to use his legs to trap Skye’s neck.
Even with the exoskeleton, it would have broken Skye’s neck. Which was why he rushed forward, throwing him on the ground with a spinning kick of fire, maximizing the coolness effect.
“Be careful about protecting your head and neck,” he reminded Skye, even as he took the Winter Soldier into a submission hold.
“Don’t tell me you could have taken him down all this time,” Skye asked.
“No,” he lied. “He wanted to kill you as a gambit, which left an obvious weakness for me to benefit from. He gambled on me not being fast enough to take advantage, and failed.”
“I have much to learn.”
Melinda walked to her. “Skye. You have just fought the Winter Soldier. He’s the bogeyman, killing everyone he had gone after with almost perfect record. The fact that you had the upper hand against him merely after a short training, even in an advantaged scenario, is incredible.”
“Really? Incredible?”
“Yeah. We can arrange it if you want to be an Avenger incredible,” he responded even as he reached the mask. “Let’s see who you are, buddy—“ he said as he pulled the mask.
And froze.
He recognized the face. But not from a database, or from his past. No, he recognized him from pictures Steve had shown him after a sparring session.
James Buchanan Barnes.
Bucky.
Admittedly, he wouldn’t have recognized him without the perfect recall from the Mind Palace trait, because the differences were striking. The man in the pictures was happy and smiling, while this man had a steely, expressionless face, with marks of time.
Not seventy-years of damage, but enough.
His first reflex was to believe he was a clone … but he didn’t want to take the risk. Not when Steve appeared from the past. Instead, he applied a careful chokehold to put him to sleep.
“Do you recognize him?” Melinda asked. “He looks familiar, but…”
“I can upload a photo of him to the server and check,” Jemma suggested.
“No. Don’t do that,” he said. “I have an idea, but it needs confirmation. Luckily, we’re driving toward someone that can confirm.”
Jemma nodded. “What’s next?”
“I will use their helicopter to fly to DC. Using their own vehicle will allow me to approach unnoticed. Meanwhile, you’ll take him with you and drive to a small town in Maryland, and find a nice cave away from civilization. I’ll make sure that he’ll stay unconscious. Under any circumstances, don’t let him wake up,” he said.
After that, he did two things. First, he slapped him moderately hard using Snap Out of It ability, which dispersed mind control and brainwashing, and noticed it was effective. It didn’t disperse the effect completely, but confirming that it existed was enough.
Because at the same time, he was running the scan results against Bucky’s medical records, and it confirmed. Facial recognition, dental records, even his bones showed the marks in the exact spots Bucky’s history showed broken bones.
Either someone went to a lot of trouble to clone Bucky and fake his identity, or he was the real deal. In both cases, it was better to break it with Steve present. If the guy had been alive for almost seven decades, used as a brainwashed assassin, he couldn’t imagine it being easy to process.
If he were fake, Steve would have the personal details to reveal it.
He put him to sleep, while he also dismantled most of the electronic devices in his body, which ranged from trackers to suicide triggers. He removed most of them and repurposed a few to ensure he stayed asleep.
They put the captured soldiers in a cave, safely secured and hidden in an emitter, to be picked on later. After discussing some other details, he took the helicopter, while the girls drove away. He knew that they would be secure.
On the helicopter, it was easy to fake the reports of a chase, especially when he could coordinate it with their satellite reports. He also took that as a lesson. Digital surveillance was effective, but it also had many vulnerable points that could easily be manipulated at the most critical times.
Using their helicopter, which had all the permits necessary to fly to any state he wanted, he reached Washington in two hours. He could have pushed faster, but the girls needed time to reach Maryland, and he hacked the hospital, so he knew Fury was still alive.
No need to hurry up.
He parked the helicopter near the city, sent a report about stopping to engage the targets between Philadelphia and Atlantic City, and left.
The hospital was easy to reach. But, when he sneaked into the hospital, he found something wrong. Fury was not alive.
Fury was also not Fury. It was some kind of android, with realistic skin and blood. And, since he had already met Fury and knew that he wasn’t a robot, it suggested that it was some kind of decoy.
Fury staged his own death. Or, at least, took advantage to switch after the attack.
He sighed. It wasn’t that the plan was bad, but once again, Fury had played it paranoid rather than keeping his inner circle in the loop, which had a significant opportunity cost.
He approached Natasha, who was standing in a corner without a security camera out of sheer habit. “Hey, sexy,” he said as he raised his cap. She looked at him, surprised.
"Don't say anything. Just listen."
She gave a subtle nod. "That's not Fury on the table. It's a robot with synthetic skin. He’ll probably fake his death soon."
Someone else would have missed Natasha’s anger, but he did not. If he hadn’t already shattered her loyalty to SHIELD, that alone would have been enough. Not informing Steve was understandable. Steve was many things, but a good actor was not among those.
Not informing Natasha showed a deep lack of trust. Knowing Fury, it was not toward Natasha, but a general state of distrust, but it still hurt.
Natasha didn’t ask whether he was sure or not. “What else?”
“It’s very complicated, but I need you to find a reasonable way to convince Steve to follow you without letting the other SHIELD agents realize anything out of the ordinary. Maybe something about a call to Tony or something? Be in the underground parking lot, column G, in exactly twenty minutes.”
It was perfect for her to operate, and for him to steal a car, make a few modifications and change the plates just in case.
They arrived at the meeting spot just in time, avoiding all security cameras as he expected. Working with professionals was always a delight.
“Can we finally talk about what’s going on? Fury is upstairs, fighting for his life, while you are dragging me along—“
“That’s not Fury,” Michael said as he stepped out of the shadows. Watching Steve jump in fear was fun, as he was probably the only one that could ambush him from such a close distance.
“Michael,” Steve said, relieved, then his words registered. “What do you mean that’s not Fury?”
“It’s some kind of lifelike robot, Fury is using to fake his death while he searches for the one who tried to assassinate him,” he said. “But, ignore that. We have something more important.”
“More important than the attempted assassination of the SHIELD director?” Natasha asked, surprised.
“Yes,” he responded. “Now, get in the car. Believe me, I wish I could explain, but I can’t. You have to see it.”
Unlike the previous ride, theirs was calm, as their enemy was trying to prevent him from entering Washington, unaware that he had succeeded.
On the way, they didn’t speak much. Steve was clearly struggling to accept the emotional whiplash, and they respected him enough to process it. Especially since he would soon get a bigger one.
With their enemy convinced that they were near Philadelphia, arranging a meeting in the Maryland wilderness was easy. Melinda and the others were already in the cave as he had asked.
"Inside," Michael said, trying to prepare himself for what was about to happen…
Regardless of the truth of the matter, it wouldn’t be pretty…