Raptor of life 14.1 (Patreon)

This is a raw chapter!

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Chapter 14.1

(The Watcher)

NORAD
Colorado Springs, Colorado, United States
Cheyenne Mountain Division
08:15 PM (Mountain Standard Time)

The radar screen was clear. Occasionally, it picked-up a scheduled space launch from Cape Canaveral, Kourou in French Guiana, Jiuquan in China, Baikonur in Kazakhstan, or Kagoshima in Japan. But mostly from Cape Canaveral. On other occasions, they’d pick up high-altitude testing of experimental aircraft, or a trans-polar passenger plane, or a larger-than-normal meteor. And on very rare occasions they could track the atmospheric re-entry of one of the larger pieces of space-trash like defunct satellites past their shelf life.

But tonight, there was nothing being launched, and that was a good thing. When you were a radar telemetry specialist for the North American Aerospace Defense Command, boring and empty screens was the preferred status. Boring and Empty meant none of the members of the Worldwide Nuclear Club was angry at another member. Boring and empty meant that, for tonight at least, there wasn’t going to be a nuclear war.

Senior Airman Jonas McConnel was bored and exhausted. His body just wasn’t adjusting to not sleeping at night. But as a good and conscientious officer he would be damned if he would fall asleep on the job before he reached the end of the week.

McConnel rubbed at his eyes, then yawned. It was during this yawn that a white circle about the size of a grain of rice popped onto his screen out of nowhere, it was surrounded by an off the charts thermal signature. His computer, which thought infinitely faster than he did, immediately labeled the new contact 001-000X.

McConnel reopened his eyes and spotted the white spot on his screen. He stared at it for a moment before realizing what it indicated *Oh shit! How did that get past me?!* The contact’s label caught his attention. The computer apparently didn’t recognize the contact by its radar-return silhouette, which was odd. The huge thermal signature was even more so, McConnel frowned, he immediately entered the command to run the analysis program he and his fellow radar technicians referred to as the dishwasher program. The signal was analyzed over and over, by the program cleaned of chaff and false returns as much as possible to get a better radar-return and potentially to identify the object. The white circle on McConnel’s screen got smaller, but the -000X indicator did not change. The computer still had no idea what this thing was.

He started an impact track and, finally managing to conquer his nerves, hit his comm button. “Control, Station Two.”

“Go two.” The voice of the current duty officer, Lieutenant Selah Williams, came back to him almost instantly.

“Control, I have a re-entry event at 58.139794 by 47.403630, angles 40 and falling fast.” McConnel entered a re-confirm command into his terminal, just to make sure what he was telling the duty officer was accurate. “Contact logged at…” the airman glanced at the time readout in the corner of his computer screen. “Make that logged at 2015 hours.”

“Contact at 58.139794 by 47.403630, angles 40. Copy. Do you have an identification, Two?”

McConnel heard the lieutenant’s voice both in his headset and from outside of it, telling him that she was swiftly approaching his station. He ran the contact through the wash for a second time. Again, the best that happened was that the contact rang back with a better positional fix. That gave them its general size, but by no means identified what sort of object it was.

“Negative. No identification.” As the lieutenant was now standing next to him, McConnel pushed his headset away from his ears to avoid the possible feedback squeal caused by her headset’s close proximity.

“Ma’am, I’ve washed it three times and still can’t tell you what it is.” He tapped a series of commands into his keyboard and a second window opened on his screen that listed the little information he did know.

“It’s reading light and hot, but… I’ve never seen this before. The wash says it can’t be more than two meters long. Irregular return means that we don’t have smooth surfaces; I don’t think this is a missile at all. And the return is pretty soft, see?”

He tapped his monitor screen and Lieutenant Williams helpfully leaned over his shoulder to look for herself. He was quiet for a moment as his duty officer contemplated the information he was feeding her.

“Okay.” Williams said slowly, still thinking. “So, it’s not a missile, and it’s softer than metal. What would your best guess be?”

The phone in Lieutenant Williams’ office rang, interrupting them. She quickly went back to her office. Meanwhile, airman McConnel was observing the situation and it became even more surreal as the contact stopped and began hovering, there was no impact. Then he lost the radar-return. The airman panicked and began looking for it.

“Ma’am, we lost contact!” McConnel shouted.

Williams exited her office and cussed. “Shit! It’s not the time airman, I got the NSA on the line right now! Find it.”

McConnel despaired as the radar-return only showed whitenoise and the screen pixelated. “Ma’am the radar-return is being disrupted by something.”

“Tssk. Well, that’s not good, this is clearly interference.” Williams turned back toward her own station. 

The lieutenant sighed. “I’ll give the CO a call.”

Everyone in the room heard when five minutes later the PA system announced, “Condition set to Alert One. The count has started.” On the digital screen at the front of the room, a map of the western coast of the US and Canada suddenly appeared. The contact was indicated by a small white circle in the Labrador Sea between Newfoundland, Canada and Greenland. A white line showed where the contact had been, while a red cross projected  it’s movement.

# # #

Back with Jean…
Labrador Sea

“Pesky radar signals…” Fortunately, I took a page from Aeolia Schenberg and began to disrupt everything on a two kilometers radius by generating decayed baryonic particles. Orange particles of light spread from my Phoenix aura all over the sea, coloring the waters.

This was made on the fly, I didn’t intend to do it but I felt the radio waves homing on me. I had to quickly find a way to mess with them, as I didn’t want the military from Canada or the US to find me. GN particles were the first thing my inner science nerd came up with; it was something that could cause electromagnetic interference, leaving conventional communication and radar devices useless. I created a particle based barrier to disrupt how radar signals were reflected or scattered on an object, that object being me.

I was surprised to see that the particle barrier actually worked, anyone who says anime doesn't teach you things should be sentenced to watching Boku no pico. I shook my head and focused on the task at hand.

With my life-sight combined with my awareness, I focused on the sea’s depth. It was winter and the surface water was freezing. But the ocean was vast and always in motion, it was quite unlikely that the ocean here would freeze; still there were icebergs floating around and glaciers underwater.

Fish went deeper in the water in cold weather, because even if the surface of the water was freezing or frozen (like on a lake or river) the water below stayed liquid and warm enough. The water was teeming with life, I continued to fly over the water, seeking a certain experimental plane. I found some debris that might have separated from it as it crashed into the water.

I followed the trail and came closer and closer to the coasts of Greenland until I reached the actual glacier and found what I was looking for. The black hull was covered by barnacles, sand and algae. It was no wonder Howard Stark hadn’t been able to find the Cap, the ice was dense around the plane. One of the wings was missing and the cockpit was close to the surface but covered in ice. The radars at the time couldn’t hope to pierce that mass of ice.

Happy to have finally found the Valkyrie I sought with my awareness if there was life inside. I couldn’t be sure that the Cap was still alive, after all many things had been different from my metaknowledge. He was there, it was faint, but I could sense life on the ship’s bridge. I grinned, *He is alive!*

With a gesture of my finger, the ice broke around the vessel, some of the big chunks began to rise to the surface. Then I wrapped up the entire plane’s structure, I didn’t want it to collapse on itself. Lifting the wreck with my TK I took care of flash-boiling the water around it to instantly melt the ice that didn’t want to let me pry the downed plane from its grasp. With a mighty creaking sound the ancient plane came free from the glacier and began it’s ascent to the surface. It appeared out of the water and slowly rose into the air. I extended the GN barrier to the wreck.

The plane was as big as an Airbus A380, I estimated that it had to have had a wingspan of eighty meters and a length of forty. I brought the wrecked plane’s carcass to my level. Water was leaking from the holes, fish and sediment fell into the sea. I quickly entered inside through the side of the plane missing a wing and floated inside.

It seemed that I was inside the hangar section. I wasn’t surprised to see some left over sea life, calamari, manta ray and crustaceans animals, I threw them out of the plane; as I levitated I reached the passenger compartment, then finally the bridge. There were many obstacles blocking my way, rusted pieces of metal blocking each compartment, but nothing that couldn’t be disintegrated.

I didn't think Cap would have been found if I hadn't gone looking for him… he had been a bit further from the coast than I had thought he would be. I smelled the air and deduced that there was a bubble of air that must have allowed the Cap to survive in air, it was full of ice in the bridge though. I turned and in the pilot seat I saw a perfectly preserved Steve Rodgers ensconced in an ice coffin.

He looked exactly like I expected, like Chris Evans from my previous reality. He was handsome, blonde and blue eyed, he would give Logan a run for his money physically. But I didn’t find him attractive in the same way that Logan or Viktor Von Doom were. Strange.

It wasn’t the time to dawdle and look at men, turning my head toward the segmented windshield at the pilots seat; I cleared it with TK, scrubbing the mollusques, algaea and ice. Air rushed inside, the smell of the sea and fish. Just to be sure I spread my awareness all over the sea and wasn’t surprised to find that three aircraft had been dispatched to my location.

For some reason that pissed me off, I cut off the GN barrier and instantly I felt the radar signals reach the hull and be reflected. NORAD was really stubborn. Manipulating the radio waves I broke into their communication and said, “Turn back.” With my TK I grabbed the two manned fighter planes and turned them around, one of them momentarily lost control before righting itself.

I opened a fifty meter portal and made for it. As I passed through, I sent on their radio, “Don’t meddle in things outside of your ken, humans.” With a fist I closed the golden spatial aperture.

# # #

(The Watcher) 

NORAD
Cheyenne Mountain
08:55 PM

“Contact lost, Lieutenant.” Airman McConnel informed his direct superiors.

Captain Wilson, Lieutenant Williams’ immediate superior, and Colonel Mitchell, the commander of the post, looked at the screen with widened eyes. They were already lamenting the fact that they may have a first contact situation on their hands. They had no choice but to bump up that situation up the chain of command.

After recovering from the surprise given to them by contact 001-000X, Colonel Mitchell straightened himself and said to the lieutenant, “I’ll call General Lane, he should be informed ASAP. Compile a report for me Lieutenant Williams.”

Williams saluted. “Sir, yes sir!”

The colonel nodded. “Good.” Then he left briskly as if his pants were on fire.

Airman McConnel sighed, and returned his eyes to the screen of his computer and mumbled. “We don’t get paid enough for that bullshit.”

He was sure that these events were going to be classified and his security clearance raised, it would be a good thing in the long term but a lot of responsibilities. Airman McConnel’s gaze shifted to the lieutenant who finally came at ease and looked at him meaningfully.

The man rolled his eyes and resolved himself to help his superior officer. “Alright, I will give you everything I have, Ma’am.”

She smiled at him, and patted his left shoulder. “Good man.”

“You owe me a beer.” McConnel said as he returned his eyes to his screen.

She gripped his shoulder more amorously, taking care of not letting anyone see her. “That could be arranged.”

# # #

Back with Jean…
Egypt Base
Over the hidden Valley
December 23rd, 1996
5 minutes later

Lugging a big ass wrecked plane quickly through a portal is cumbersome as I had to be careful of the edges. Something bad could happen if someone or something touched the edges of a portal I think. The Valkyrie was now flying over the valley and I closed the portal with a fist, it took me two portals to arrive in Egypt, I used the first to go to the UK, then the second to Egypt over my base.

I wasn’t taking the risk that some super genius could trace my travel through the portal, you never know with Marvel; there were super science nerds like myself everywhere, Otto, Pym, Banner or Stark. All those guys scared me shitless and I hoped that none of them were evil in this dimension. I looked for somewhere to land the wreck, there was a big clearing at the foot of the mountain, if I remembered right there was an exit giving access to the base. I chose to put it there, it was even more accessible now.

Landing, the wreck creaked and everything trembled inside, I had to protect the ice the Cap was in from being crushed by some of the hull falling apart. I saw something fall from the pilot’s dashboard and I frowned. It was a pocket watch, I floated it to me and opened it. It had a woman’s picture inside and lo and behold, it was Peggy. A young Peggy, she was beautiful; I let Goldie absorb the pocket watch inside her hammer space, then turned toward Steve.

I cut the block of ice out of the plane, exploded the windshield and the armored setting for it and exited the plane. As I climbed into the air I noticed all the seafood…

“Waste not, want not.” I scrubbed the hull clean of crabs, clams and oysters and gathered them into a part of the hull that I turned into a rectangular box floating around me like the block of ice containing Steve. I took water out of the atmosphere and salinized it. Hans would be happy with me if I got back to him with this… I hoped.

The man was still sulking about me leaving a dead body in the kitchen, I wanted to take care of things first before getting it squared away. At least he saved the suit for me in the warehouse. As I was too lazy for anything else I portaled with my cargo to the lab directly, I felt Gwen and Peter’s presence. I frowned, those two should be asleep right now.

I shoved the Cap in my medical lab and put the seafood in the forge, I levitated to the 3D printing machine’s room. Inside I saw an eager Peter wearing a black suit with an armored theme, he reminded me of the spiderman from the special reality where he stopped the burglar from killing Ben. The playboy, multi-billionaire kind.

“Peter?!” I asked surprised, *Did I create a monster or something?* I was worried.

“Here!” Peter, who had bags under his eyes and a satisfied smile, turned to me. It wasn’t a costume that he made as I looked intently at what he was wearing, this was power armor.

I chuckled. “Shouldn’t you be asleep or something?” As I approached him, I let my hands glide on the armor and through my power analyzed the components.

Peter blushed as I inspected his work and began cooing at what he’d done. “Err… there are just so many things that I can watch on one of those fancy tablets of yours, you know.” The boy said, he tried to step back but I held onto him firmly.

With puppy dog eyes, Peter tried to tell me to let go. “Jean could you…”

However, a whip like voice rang behind us. “Jean are you flirting with Peter?”

I let go of Peter as if he was scalding hot and turned to see Gwen who looked shocked and somewhat angry. “This is not what it looks like! I was looking at his power armor! Just that!” I said in a panic, I didn’t want to lose my friend over assumptions like this.

Gwen in her green t-shirt and black skirt looked comically unimpressive but the expression in her eyes scared me somewhat. She narrowed her blue eyes at me. “It better only be that.” The blonde threatened.

Catching a break from Gwen’s death glare that slowly eased into the ‘I am mad at you’ stage, I walked up to her and placed an arm around her waist. “C’mon, Gwen… pretty boys aren’t my type, you know that?” She stiffened in my embrace when I touched her.

As for Peter, he mumbled something at my comment, but I didn’t care. I was in no way interested in him anyway.

Gwen calmed down gradually and softened a bit, she still looked between me and Peter; still be wary. She sighed and said, “I don’t know about that, I never saw your type of guy. I think you are into old guys though, that’s why I am calming down and not freaking out about my best friend making moves on my boyfriend.”

“Not too old though!” I answered back, confirming her theory about the type of guy I was attracted to.

I let go of Gwen who I thought looked fine, not even tired even though it was 3:00 AM or so Egypt time, her mind was active and sharp. She was full of energy. This made me frown as I found it weird to see her this peppy at this time of the day.

“Right, so what are you doing?” Gwen smiled at me and now I felt that everything was right in the world.

Then I remembered what I was about to do. “Huh, now that I think about it... I might need your help.”

Gwen quickly placed herself to my side and held on my arm. “For what?”

I grinned at her and flipped my hair behind me. “Speaking of old guys… I might have found one who is still alive and cryogenized in a block of ice.”

Two things happened, Gwen hugged me so fast that she had become a blur, even to me, then she let go of me and jumped up and down. “Let’s go! I need to scan- I mean help this poor soul.”

Then she ran, or more like blurred to the medical lab; that was when I realized that Gwen had become more than I could handle. “Yeah, how generous of you, Gwen.”

Peter stepped next to me, his armored footsteps clearly audible. “Did you see that? She’s been like that since you showed her this place.”

Peter didn’t even get phased by the fact that Gwen’s superpowers were getting stronger and that she had no control over them. The fact that she wasn’t getting tired at all even at this hour? It showed that her stamina was boundless; in response to my worries, Goldie showed me exactly the DNA sequence she introduced into Gwen’s body and I extrapolated how strong she would become in the future.

“I may have made a huge mistake…” I revealed to Peter.

# # #

Medical lab

Gwen scanned the block of ice with a handheld scanner connected to a bigger computer. On the screen it showed a human body inside the still melting block of ice, to my life-sight it was evident that the man inside was alive. But for Gwen she had to do multiple tests with the scanner; Sinister had come up with them, they could detect various life signs, but they were incapable of differentiating between species.

“Too bad those scanners aren’t accurate on what type of people they detect, I would like to be able to detect vanilla humans and metahumans.” I said aloud as I watched Gwen work.

The girl slowly turned around the block of ice, pointing the game boy shaped device at it and reacting to my grievances toward the scanner. “At least they do the job… aha, you were right he is alive but weak. I think you can defrost him, but slowly. It wouldn’t be good to do it in one go, his body has to get used to the temperature difference first.”

“I see, we will do just that.” My right fist glowed in gold and I sent a focused beam of heat that struck the ice.

It was at low power but I could nevertheless see the ice melt even faster. Little by little, mister beefcake was getting defrosted. His head was the first thing that was free from the ice, then his neck and slowly his chest. I levitated him as I ran the heat beam all over the left over chunk of ice.

The last piece fell on the ground and I made it evaporate, I kept Steve floating and his uniform soaking. It looked exactly like his old school Captain America costume I saw in the MCU movies, the difference was that he had more pouches at his belt and a service gun. “Here it is, he is free. Is the medical bed ready?”

I turned my head toward Gwen who had already made the bed with a pillow and medical sheet designed to keep the patient warm. “Yes.”

She had anticipated my demand and used her superspeed to go make the bed. Like I thought, her powers were getting stronger somehow; I decided that I would address her training later.

It didn’t stop me from complimenting her. “You are an awesome assistant, Gweny.”

It was my pleasure to see a cute flush of her cheeks; I then took Steve’s uniform, shield and gun. Gwen and I tried to not stare at the hunk’s tool but it was too hard... but Gwen was worse than I and stood paralyzed. I quickly put Steve to bed and covered him with the bed sheet. I ventilated myself with my hand, “Wew it’s getting hot in here.”

At this, Goldie asked me, [Questioning: A more airy outfit, do you want?]

It seemed that she couldn’t understand some certain nuance of the human language. But to hide my embarrassing mishap I decided to say, “Yes.” I powered down from my Phoenix state and Goldie automatically changed into a black tank top, shorts and boots. She had even styled my hair into a long french braid.

Why did I look like a Lara Croft cosplayer? Narrowing my eyes, I asked aloud, “Are you going through my memories to choose my outfits, Goldie?”

All I got as an answer was laughter in my head, and it confirmed things for me. *Cheeky Symbiote.*

Gwen looked at me from head to toes and harrumphed. I noticed that most of my girl friends and sisters didn’t like that unfair advantage of me never having to take time to change clothes. I rolled my eyes. “Okay, let’s finish this.” I said as Gwen and I began to link the Captain to the ECG and EEG with electrodes placed on his chest and temples.

Fortunately they were the wireless model, without wires linked to them. We placed a water bottle on a table at the bedside, while we were at it, I made a set of trunks for him too and placed his dog tags on it. I took his damp costume and dried it with a thought, same with the weapon, it was a Colt 1911, fairly well used. As I checked the ammunition, I observed that the clip was empty, I was not surprised.

The gun was set to levitate around me, and I moved on to his costume. For it’s age it was well made and armored in the right place, but it could never stand up to today’s standard body armor. Hell, my stuff was light years from what was in circulation in america.

I’m not going to give him my stuff, but I’ll be damned if I left the Cap in a crappy outdated body armor. “I’m going to the design room, Gweny. Can you take care of mister Rogers for me?”

The uniform and shield floated around me like Steve’s pistol.

“Sure, I can.” Gwen nodded and began to take a syringe kit.

*Smart girl… she’s going to take enough blood samples.* I really wanted to see how that super soldier serum worked, was the Oz serum any different from it?

I threw her a thumbs up. “Thanks.” Then I exited the room and roamed the Lab Complex.

As I left I heard the gasp of disbelief. ‘Wait, Rogers?!’ Gwen finally realized whose schlong she had been staring at. It made me chuckle; I saw Peter still in the room with the 3D printers. He wasn’t done working it seemed. I stopped and called him out. “Hey, Pete. Want to design an armor and gun for Captain America?”

He turned to me and let go of the gadget that was in his hands but quickly caught it. Damn he was fast! “So that’s who that guy you brought back is?” Peter asked in shock.

I nodded. “Yeah.”

Peter’s eyes narrowed, he placed the gadget in his hand in his utility belt’s pouch and said. “I’ll do it.”

# # #

(Cpt. Steve Grant Rogers)

Land of dreams

He was still dreaming the same scene over and over, he was running after the Valkyrie bomber on takeoff in the hangar’s tunnel. It was illuminated by lights on the concrete walls and powerful ceiling lamps. The smell of fuel exhaust was high in the air, but Steve ran undaunted but like always he couldn’t catch up to the bomber as it gained speed. A fast car braked and stopped on the tarmac at his side. Two people were inside, it was Peggy and agent Chester Phillips.

“Get in.” Chester ordered and Steve climbed aboard with a jump and the vehicle started at high speed.

They were slowly catching up to the bomber, they witnessed as the automatic doors of the hidden base’s hangar opened, sure to let out the plane. Steve could feel that they were going to be too late and that the plane would take off and Red Skull would lay waste to the United States with this stealth bomber. Then agent Phillips pushed a button under the wheel’s dashboard that they caught up to the plane at great speed. Steve maneuvered himself in a standing position, ready to climb into the Valkyrie.

“Keep it steady!” He said to Chester who kept his eyes on the prize.

“Wait!” Peggy shouted.

Steve looked at her, then she seized his harness and pulled him toward her and kissed him. The Captain looked into her eyes and he saw love, the same emotions that were beating in his chest since he first met her. It surprised him that it was mutual. Peggy looked at him with determination. “Go get him.”

The Captain looked at Chester who was still driving, the man chuckled and told him, “I’m not kissing you!”

Steve ignored this and got himself into position. As they reached under the bomber and used the exhaust ports of the car as scaffold to hold onto, then laid on the car’s hood to avoid the propeller’s blade that scratched his shield. The plane was about to take flight but Steve thought fast and jumped on the landing gear wheel’s just before the Valkyrie cleared the runway.

He did it, he boarded the plane, but it wasn’t time to be happy about it. Steve immediately found himself in the hold with Hydra’s special bombs that were destined to detonate over American cities. As he walked inside the plane, Steve successfully ambushed the Hydra soldiers and operators and killed them. It was a long gruelling series of actions before Schmidt tried to ambush Steve who had arrived at the plane’s bridge.

They exchanged blows, damaging the controls of the bomber during their fight. The man was wiley enough to engage the auto-pilot and began to shoot Steve with his sidearm, which strangely looked like a P08 Luger pistol, but the difference was that it was an energy weapon able to vaporize humans. Steve used his shield to make the pulses bounce off and created a hole in the hull.

Steve frowned and successfully disarmed Schmidt who fought back, the Captain didn’t have any choice but to kick the man and make him fly out of the hole created by his own weapon. Schmidt cried out and passed through the hole sucked by the air pressure and howled as he fell from the sky. Steve took his shield back and then sat himself in the pilot’s chair, sending a transmission to the Captured Hydra HQ.

He always remembered that part of his memories. He always informed Peggy of Schmidt’s apparent death and the status of the plane headed for New York City in order to destroy it. He closed his eyes and sighed heavily, he became aware that he didn’t know anything about this plane and didn't understand its systems to turn it away from its destination.

"I'll-I'll get Howard on the line. He'll know what to do." He heard Peggy say on the radio.

Steve decided right there and then that he had to sink the plane in the ocean, anything else would be too risky. Because the longer they tried to figure a way out for him, was time for the plane to get closer to NYC and might cause more damage.

“There’s not enough time. This thing’s moving too fast and it’s heading for New York. I gotta put her in the water.”

There was a catch in Peggy’s voice. “Please don’t do this. W-we have time. We can work it out.”

There was a long moment where Steve looked at the clouds and sun in the sky. “Peggy this is my choice.” Steve said, before opening and putting his pocket watch on the instruments with Peggy’s picture inside. He looked at it for a longtime before pushing the centre stick forward.

“Peggy, I’m gonna need a raincheck on that dance.” The plane was slowly falling toward the ground, he decided to distract his and Peggy’s mind out of the inevitable.

“What?” Then she finally understood and gave him a time and place for their date.

As he watched he saw the sea and a frozen ice field to the horizon. “You got it.”

“Don’t dare to be late, understood?” Peggy sobbed.

The ice field became closer and closer. “You know I still don’t know how to dance.” Steve spoke.

“I will show you how, just be there.” It was a plea.

Steve wanted to answer it, to promise her that he would come back and to wait for him, but he couldn’t. But what he could do was continue to comfort her even though he was going to die. “Then it’s gotta be something slow.”

The ice field was upon him. “I’m gonna step on your-” he lost contact upon impact. Rather than crashing into the ocean, the Valkyrie impacted the ice field, where the heat of the engines melted the surrounding ice, causing the plane to sink into the ice before it refroze. He lost consciousness.

Steve opened his eyes to a vaulted ceiling and to electronic beeping noises, he shifted his head and didn’t recognize any of the machines around him, he sniffed and recognized the familiar smell of a hospital. He managed to sit up. Looking at the ceiling and the wall he understood that he was either underground or in a mountain facility.

At his bedside was a glass water bottle and a white boxer. He understood that they were for him if he ever woke up. He took the bottle and began to drink the water, he didn’t feel parched anymore. He asked himself what the date was, where was he?

Then the door at the end of the room slid open and a gorgeous redhead, barely a young woman in a scandalous outfit consisting of shorts and tank top entered. She was showing too much skin and Steve barely knew where to look, so he settled on her face. The redhead smiled at him, then chuckled for no reason, or maybe it was at him and his dumbfounded expression. In each of her hands she had his shield and a suitcase.

“Captain Steve Rogers. Welcome back.” She greeted him, as she walked to him the young woman put the case on the ground with his shield.

As she finished, she lifted her head to his and for a long moment they judged each other’s intention. Steve saw that this young woman may be young, but she had steel in her eyes. He guessed correctly that she had killed before, many times. Steve decided to gather information immediately, to know where he ended up and if he was in good hands.

He still thought that he was dreaming, normally his dreams were all about the plane and Peggy. “You have me at a disadvantage. I don’t know who you are.”

“Oh, I am sorry. I am Jean Grey, the owner of this base.” She said with a smile, he looked as she put her long french braid back behind her. He kept his eyes firmly on her face and not on her cleavage.

Now Steve knew that he was still dreaming, women were not placed in positions of responsibility like this in his time. Though he wished they were, the proof that women could be incredible administrators was proved by his own mother and Peggy’s work ethic. Though he still asked himself where this young woman’s mother was? How could she let her stand in such an outfit.

She chuckled again for a moment, before straightening her stance and looking at him seriously. “In this suitcase, there’s your new service weapon, and uniform, Captain Rogers.”

“New…?” A new uniform, what for? Did the war continue? He had hoped that he was dreaming of something different for once.

Green eyes bored into him. “Captain, Peggy needs your help. She has been taken by Hydra’s agents, are you willing to help me rescue her?” There was a plea in the young woman’s voice.

The Captain could feel that she was being sincere and that she had a lot of affection for Peggy. As he looked into Jean’s verdant gaze, Steve didn’t even think, he took off the sheet covering his lower body, he took the boxer and put them on, not minding that he was giving a free show to the young woman. Steve put his shield on the bed, then crouched to open the suitcase.

It hissed open, eliciting a flinch from him. Inside neatly folded was a red and blue uniform, completely different from his usual one, made of something that he couldn’t guess at. He looked at Jean and asked, “How do I put it on?”

# # #

Back with Jean…
Dormitories
Common room
10 minutes later 

Steve was completely different from what I expected; he was a good man, but nothing like the cookie cutter Captain America that was part of SHIELD shown in the MCU or the cartoon. No, there was rigidity, willpower, goodness and honor in him. He believed that people have good and bad inside them and that their actions showed who they truly were.

At the moment he was humoring me, observing my actions to judge what I was all about. The only thing bothering me was that Steve thought that he was still dreaming. As we stopped in the common room, I looked for Chimera. The blonde was playing with Madelyn with her ectoplasmic dragons, unicorns and animals. *Oh she learned how to make new constructs.*

When she saw me, Madelyn gasped and literally flew toward me while avoiding tables and chairs, I opened my arms and received the redheaded missile. “Big sister!”

My arms closed around her and I kissed her between her brow. “Hello, Maddy. How are you today?”

Today she was wearing a ruby red sleeveless sundress and matching sandals; she looked really cute. Madelyn made a sad expression and held onto me tighter. “Great, you are here. You have been busy lately.” She finished her sentence with a whine.

Her mood oozed sadness, she wasn’t even trying to play me; those were her genuine feelings as she loved me unconditionally since the first time she opened her eyes. I passed a hand through her hair. “My bad… I will make time for you okay?”

She nodded and hugged me again. I laughed at her reaction after giving her a sloppy kiss. Then she looked at my side and saw the armored Cap; tilting her head, the little girl let go of me and asked, “Who is he?”

Steve had been looking at Madelyn and I, analyzing our interactions. A smile still tugged at his lips as he watched us.

I pointed my hand at Steve. “That’s Captain Rogers. Captain Rogers, this my little sister, Madelyn.” I said as I introduced the two of them.

“She looks just like you.” Steve commented with his gaze not leaving Madelyn for a moment. The little girl then hid behind me, still looking at him.

“Yes, we get told that a lot. As if she was my clone or something.” I laughed.

Chimera chose this precise moment to walk up to us, looking fondly at Madelyn. Those two had been getting along like a house on fire lately. Madelyn though, was always with my mother or Elektra lately from what I heard, they were teaching her stuff like reading, writing and how to be a good little girl by doing what she was told. *The indoctrination has already begun.*

The Captain placed a hand on my shoulder, pulling me out of my musings. “What are we here for? I thought that we had to save Peggy.”

There was urgency in his voice that I couldn’t dismiss… he was right. I’ve been neglecting her rescue until now for the simple reason that I didn’t feel that it was time. Now that I noticed… it was as if someone was messing with me. I froze when that thought passed through my mind, my hands turned into fists. *Phoenix, she’s doing more than giving hints I see.*

I sighed and nodded to Steve. “Yes, but first we need a pilot. And that gorgeous blonde in the black catsuit is-” I was about to point out Chimera when Steve narrowed his eyes at my second in command.

“A female pilot?” He said with a dubious catch in his voice.

Chimera and I turned to him at the same time, not appreciating the machismo the man seemed to be exuding. It wasn’t even his fault, I realized, he was brought up like that. I couldn’t stop myself from being angry though. “Yes, Captain. A woman can pilot things, things have changed while you were asleep.”

Then there was silence, the man’s worried expression turned into a frown, his eyes shifted to the bar and the fridge, all the different screens present on the walls, the tablets on the tables ready for use. The door swishing open again as it let Fury and Phil enter who were followed by the dad squad.

Steve’s eyes returned on me. “Miss Grey.”

*Nope, I won’t have him put distance between us.* I stepped before him and said, “Call me Jean, Captain.”

The man was finally realizing that he wasn’t dreaming anymore, that everything was real, his senses and the people around him were telling him that he wasn’t about to be stuck in the plane I found him in again. He looked utterly lost when he asked, “Jean, how long was I asleep for?”

His emotions were so raw that they hurt me and it forced me to turn my empathy way down to not be affected by them. Still I decided to give him answers. “Fifty one years. I found you under an ice field off the coast of Greenland. You were frozen in ice, in complete stasis. I think the super soldier serum you were injected with helped you.”

The Captain’s expression changed completely, he looked surprised at first, then sad, he was remembering all his friends, but there was hope still burning inside him that some of them might still be alive as I had revealed earlier to him that Peggy was in trouble. He was about to say something to me when someone interrupted us.

“Grey, what the hell is happening here?” Nick Fury looked at us, more at Steve than at me.

He had without a doubt recognized who he was as he stood there, mouth gaping. I mean the costume was something of a giveaway! For once he had left his black coat in his bedroom and was only wearing clone soldier’s garbs.

“Jean, is he a new refugee?” Phil asked, still frowning at Steve.

I didn’t have time to give a lengthy explanation so I went for the kill. “No, he is Peggy’s boyfriend.”

The two agents exploded in question while the Cap was getting impatient. So it was quickly explained what we were going to do as I made them believe that I discovered where they kept Peggy and that I was going to find her. Nick was adamant about knowing how I found the Captain, while Phil asked loudly in his mind if I had exploited my future knowledge to find Steve Rogers. I found myself forced to nod and he didn’t ask more.

After dropping this bomb on my two favorite agents, we found ourselves in Hangar one, Phil was giving an enthusiastic briefing to Captain America after having shown him his collection card about him. Steve couldn’t deal with the hero worship so I had to keep uncle Phil on the subject of Hydra and how they had infiltrated the USA.

Phil was done explaining and Steve looked sharply at him; there was a bit of heat into his voice as he said, “So it all comes back to this OSS project, operation Paperclip. The country I willingly gave my life for made a deal with Hydra scientists for their knowhow. For what? To be at the top?”

It wasn’t Phil who answered him, but Fury who was leaning against a Samson helicopter; the super spy shook his head and tried to give an excuse. “You don’t understand Captain. After your supposed death, every country was already readying for the next war. The USSR was drunk off its victory in the war and even began research into producing another you, another super soldier. And they succeeded, let me show you the file we had on the Red Guardian later.”

I narrowed my eyes to that, the Red Guardian; his story was connected to Natalia Romanova, the black Widow. The two of them were still alive.

Fury continued with the history lesson. “The world entered what we call today the Cold War. It was an ongoing political rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies that developed after World War II. You should have seen it, now everyone has a weapon comparable to the atomic bomb. It was a nuclear stalemate between “super-states”: each possessed weapons of mass destruction and was capable of annihilating the other.”

Fury moved toward the Captain, and stopped before him; as they stared into each other eyes, the super spy added, “We needed an edge and operation paperclip gave us that. We landed on the moon before anyone else, we created new fighter planes and other wonders of technology. At the time we thought we had it good.” However, Fury’s emotion turned bitter as he remembered his find and how deep Hydra infiltrated the government.

Steve snorted at that. “But now you found yourself full of squiddies everywhere, not only America but in other countries where they had fifty years to spread their poison.”

Fury raised a finger at that, looked for something to say, but couldn’t find any retort, and swallowed his pride to finally recognize that Steve was right. “Unfortunately.” 

I would have laughed if the situation wasn’t so serious. I clapped to get the attention of the testosterone riddled men before me. “Gentlemen, the time to distribute blame is over. Action is needed, now we need to save Peggy; she is the only leverage Pierce and his fellows have over me and would push me into a position that I find... unacceptable.”

Oh boy, there were a lot of things I wanted to avoid, like having to destroy or kill most of the guilty and innocent together. I was tired, really tired of having to kill people...

Chimera snickered nervously, interrupting me. “Yeah, we don’t want the boss to be in Hydra’s hands, I can guarantee that it would be bad for the world.” She said as she thought about what I did to Sinister and his clone armies, at least I identified the feelings coursing through her, I had stopped monitoring her thoughts long ago.

I turned and said sarcastically, “Thank you Chimera.”

The gorgeous blonde simply grinned back at me, I rolled my eyes and returned to trying to keep the boys from coming to blows. Steve was the first to address me, “What does Hydra want you for, Miss Jean?”

Miss Jean? Really? Damn, he makes me feel like an old lady. Fury reacted to Steve’s question, “You didn’t tell him?” finding the fact that he wasn’t informed shocking.

My cheeks colored as everyone’s gaze focused on me. It was embarrassing… “I didn’t have the time…” I confessed, avoiding to stare into Phil’s eyes, he looked disappointed.

I walked toward the Samson and opened the door and climbed inside. Chimera said in fake surprise, “Oh my goodness, the Cap must be thinking he is the only one going to go save Miss Peggy with us as support.”

Turning to Steve, I saw that he made an unimpressed glare targeted at Chimera. “I am right here.”

The woman simply laughed at him, then fled into the Samson and entered into the cockpit to ready it for take off.

Sighing heavily, I decided to give Steve more information. “Well… Steve.” The man turned toward me, raising an eyebrow at my casual use of his first name. I continued undaunted, even smiling. “While you were asleep... the world has become a bit weirder. We have a lot of people who are a bit more super than you’d believe.”

My imagery was so simple that even Steve understood what I was implying. The Captain was thoughtful for one second before his imagination went wild with strong pictures of me in his mind smashing heads and fighting like an equivalent of him. He just couldn’t fathom that there were things even more esoteric in the world such as telekinesis or telepathy.

“Is Miss Jean an enhanced person as well?” He asked as he looked at me.

This time Steve did more than check me out -I had caught him looking into my cleavage- it was as if he was looking at me through a microscope. His gaze focused on my arms and legs, narrowing his eyes as he discovered that my body was more toned than a normal woman’s.

Phil nodded, he was thinking something rude about me being given all the good stuff, if I read his emotions and his eye roll well. He added, “Not just Jean, but most of the women here are enhanced. The other men aren’t, with the exception of Hans and Peter who have extreme abilities.”

I grinned at Steve. “I will show you what I can do on the way, Cap. For now we must go save Peggy, you owe her a dance after all.”

He reacted to this idle comment as if I was standing on his grave. Then he calmed down, rationalizing the fact that I knew that little tidbit because Peggy told me and that I was close to her. He wasn’t wrong, I was close to Peggy and treated her like my grandma, but she would never tell me about her personal stuff like that.

Phil and Nick looked at each other, weirded out by me knowing such things; Phil less so, because he knew about my origins. Steve climbed inside the Samson, still adjusting to the strange machine. Then he put his shield on one of the seats inside. He turned to me, “We must plan more… we can’t just attack this base they hold her in.”

Wow, was he underestimating me? “I don’t intend to attack right away, I will scout first then you and I will take out everyone there, get Peggy and explode the camp.” I had something special made while doing the Cap’s costume, I will use it to send Pierce a message.

I looked at Phil and Fury, intently making them understand that they won’t be coming with us. Phil understood and threw me a thumbs up, completely confident that I could save Peggy. Though Nick Fury just turned heel and didn’t acknowledge me. I made a face at him by showing my tongue, when I was done, Steve smiled at me, I frowned. “Did I say something funny?”

He scratched the back of his head, then went to sit where he had placed his shield. “No, it’s just that your plan sounds simple when you say it like that… you reminded me of someone.”

I scowled at him and crossed my arms. “I hope it’s not Howard Stark.” I huffed.

Leaning in his seat, he grinned, somehow amusing himself by needling me. “Oh, I don’t know about that, you and he have the same… innate confidence.” He played idly with the safety belt of the seat.

I glared at Steve. “That’s rather insulting, Cap.” I didn’t like any iterations of Howard Stark I watched or read about. For an expert engineer and businessman he was rather short sighted and created more problems for his friends than he resolved.

The moment for banter passed and Steve asked, “Are we going right now?”

Chimera must have heard because it was at this moment that the Samson’s engine took life and the aircraft lurched slowly into the air. Eliciting a surprised grunt from Steve. I closed the doors of the vehicle and said aloud to my new companion, “The mission has already started.”

# # #

USA, New Jersey
200 km from Camp Lehigh

We exited the portal and I deployed a cloaking field over the Samson. From the onboard computer I put us at the extreme east of the Wharton State Forest, as far from Camp Lehigh that I could go. I picked up on the link between me and Peggy instantly, they hadn’t moved her at all. The forest was all sprawling park with ponds, rivers and lakes; from on high we could distinctly see some hiking trails too.

“We need to find somewhere isolated to land, the distance between the forest and the camp should be enough for our operation.” I explained to Chimera.

The blonde nodded and made the Samsson gain in altitude, we were three hundred meters in the air and tried to spot an out of the way clearing or plain, even a mountain spot would be enough, but it would be too easy for a satellite to spot us. Contrary to my previous reality, Marvel 1996 was so far a tad more advanced, so I wouldn’t be surprised that the army withheld the good stuff from the populace.

Let’s not talk about those Weapon plus monsters, *I will totally wipe them out later.*

Chimera finally spotted a clearing big enough for our Samson,  it seemed isolated from the park, near a little lake. We landed there without difficulties. The cockpit depressurized and then I was out; Steve looked at me walk out and undid his safety belt and moved to exit his seat, but I raised a hand and told him. “Stay seated.” And I placed myself at his side on the seat next to his.

He looked at me, finding me to be a strange young woman. “So, Steve. I can call you Steve, right?”

The Cap nodded, and I rewarded him with a smile and decided to give him an explanation about what we were going to do. “You see, I am an enhanced person like you. But the difference is that it’s not my body that’s enhanced.” I demonstrated this by letting my astral form step out of my body and be visible for the Cap.

Steve had frozen in his seat, his Capsicle nickname had never been more fitting than right now. Steve stood, his eyes focused on my astral body and slowly he tried to touch my right shoulder but his hand passed through it. He flinched and stepped back.

I wanted to smile at his reaction but it would be mean, so I didn’t. “This is what I call my astral form, I can become invisible, pass through walls…” I said as I waved my arm grandly.

Standing tall before me, the Cap was observing my astral form with wonder. “You are the perfect spy and scout. What I wouldn’t have given for someone like you back in the days.”

“Maybe you had one? Metahumans have existed since the dawn of humanity, in lower numbers though.” Like a certain James Howlett, the awesome Logan.

A flash of something passed in Steve’s eyes, I felt his brain work on overdrive. “Now I understand some of your planning. You intend to infiltrate Camp Lehigh,” I felt a twinge of sadness at this exact moment. This base had a lot of good history with the Cap. He continued speaking, “find where they keep Peggy and look at their defenses.”

Similar plan but I wouldn’t execute it like that. “Hum… Err, it’s mostly like this. But some of the steps are different… I will look at their defenses, and at the same time look for Peggy and portal us where she’s held.”

Steve raised an eyebrow and crossed his arm on his powerful chest. “Portal?”

Why were all his movements emphasizing his masculinity? It was distracting, now I understand how Peggy fell for the guy. When I get them back together I hope Peggy will be patient with him, some of the comments he made to Chimera and I... worried me. I hoped that his adaptation to our era would not be difficult.

My eyes refocused on his baby blue ones. “Yes, Steve. A portal, don’t you think the climate is suddenly different from where my base is located?” I said as I opened the doors of the Samson with my TK.

The wind that struck inside the passenger compartment was cold, showing that we were in the middle of winter. Completely different from the sweltering heat we were in before in Egypt base.

Steve didn’t even shake at the completely different temperature. “Yes it does feel… cold.” 

*Freaking super soldier…* I lamented, he can’t even react like a normal guy would.

Steve’s gaze shifted from the winter scenery to my astral form, a gleam of interest shone in his eyes. “Are you implying that you can teleport?”

I chuckled, there were so many things I could do. “Yes I can do that too, but the phenomena we are talking about is portal manipulation. I can create, shape and control the size and the destination of my portals, I can go wherever I want on Earth.” Instead of explaining further I showed Steve a micro portal, the glowing golden hole in reality was big enough to pass my arm through and the exit portal let my entire arm appear near him and I touched his shoulder with my hand.

*Hmm, it has some potential… Portal combat.* I realized

Steve stayed silent for thirty second or so, watching my astral form and my real body; thinking about the ramification of such power in the hand of a little girl like me. “I understand why Hydra wants you, this is…”

I snickered. “They don’t know about these abilities; I have other more... destructive ones.” I hinted and winked at him.

Steve didn’t look impressed, but somewhat angry. “When this is over, you and I, young lady will sit together and you’ll list all those for me. Going blind on missions isn’t something I am used to doing. Is that clear?” He had tried to look intimidating, but I faced the Phoenix and Lady Death, he looked cute when he was angry.

I shrugged at that. “Sure, Captain.”

He blinked at my reaction, I laughed at his expression and decided to finally go do what we came for. “Please guard my body while I’m out doing some reconnaissance.”

Steve sighed, then took his gun in one hand and his shield in another. “Go, nothing will happen.”

# # #

Camp Lehigh.

I looked beneath me, Camp Lehigh didn’t change from the last time I was there. They still looked undermanned but now that I was there in my astral form and less angry because they captured my mentor, I realized that it was a cover. There were a lot of agents and support personnel present. I sank, lowering myself onto the base helipad.

Looking around me I spotted all the guard posts and cameras; even those well hidden. I roamed around the munition depot and the hangar for the vehicles. Yes it was a hive of activity; it was weird as Xmas was almost upon us. Shouldn’t there be less people here? People who had asked for leave… I guessed Hydra didn’t work that way.

I continued to map the base’s surface in my mind, there was no one sensitive enough to see me like Samira could. Floating to the building with the elevators that lead to the underground bunker and the research facility there; I continued to scan the minds of everyone. I learned that Pierce had raised the security here since my casual dispatch of his men who tried to take my friends and family hostage. There were cloaked guards everywhere on the surface and in the bunker facilities.

He even broke out the experimental weapons and enhanced agents that Hydra was developing. So everyone had energy weapons adapted from the Red Skull’s own, that evil genius was striking from the grave it seemed… then there were the augmented guys, they felt sick and psychotic to my senses. It seemed that the version of the serum they were being regularly injected with was causing their mental capabilities to deteriorate.

Hmm, there were labs here; and some kind of storage floor with decent security. I could feel the cloaked guards moving around the place, it was also almost time for them to switch shifts. I found Peggy on the medical level, guarded by a corridor full of cloaked agents. I laughed at that, they had no idea what I could truly do, hmm, yes I would take Peggy first, then start killing everyone and take the research and important data here.

I returned to my body and opened my eyes to see that the doors of the Samson were open from each side and the Cap was standing, looking outside, he had given me his back. I watched for a long time his muscled and firm looking posterior. *So, this is America’s ass.*

I sent the mental image to Chimera through telepathy. The cockpit’s door opened with a shocked Chimera who looked at Steve’s posterior too, she tilted her head as she admired it. “You are right Jean, this is worthy of being called America’s ass.”

Steve turned to us, and looked at each of us with a glare; I laughed, Chimera did the same. “Okay, girls this isn’t the time. Be serious, will you?”

“Yes, Captain Rogers.” Chimera and I said in sync, but we couldn’t help but laugh again.

He rolled his eyes, I felt that he wasn’t used to interacting with women our apparent age; Chimera may have the body of a woman but she had the same mental maturity as I, I observed. I high-fived her and laughed in sync with her; the Cap looked at us and lamented in his mind that we were unprofessional.

I rolled my eyes at his reprimand. *Fine.* It was time to talk shop anyway, so I stood up and poked Steve in the chest making him look at me.“By the way Steve, there’s four levels to the bunker under Camp Lehigh. A lab facility, a storage one, some kind of hospital and an administrative level beyond the one on the surface. It seems they have a lot of aircraft in the hangar here for some reason…”

He nodded, happy that I finally stopped being a pain in the ass. “Excellent, what about their level of security?”

I showed him my hand covered in a tactical fingerless glove and raised a finger at each thing I observed. “High, there are visible and invisible guards all around; enhanced individuals too but they are mentally unstable. Ah, and they have energy weapons too, like the one you went against in WWII, but those don’t vaporize, they act more like plasma weapons, they burn.”

Looking at him in the eyes, Steve never asked how I knew he encountered energy weapons in the war. He was more focused on the problems I enunciated to him. He sighed and then leaned against the Samson’s right door. “This… we don’t have enough people, us against everyone there? A full team is needed... I wish the guys were here.”

By the guys he meant the Howling Commandos. Chimera looked at me, grinning; the Cap didn’t realize that we didn’t need anyone else. I could take this country if I wanted and didn’t care about destroying it wholesale. But what was needed for this operation was finesse and stealth instead of unstoppable power. No, we would infiltrate the camp from the inside.

I patted the Cap on his armored shoulder pad. “Don’t worry, we are going to come laterally at this problem.” I told him and retracted my hand and turned in the direction of the base that I sensed Peggy was still in.

I conjured hologram constructs between us for Chimera and Steve to look at. “We will get Peggy first, thanks to my portal manipulation this is going to be the easiest part of the operation; then once we retrieved her, Chimera will go back to base with her and put her in medical. After that, you and I will infiltrate the bunker to gather the data and research stored here for intel. I will kill everyone on the way, stop them from ringing any alarms, and plant the fusion bomb to erase this stain from the map then we will be out of here.”

Replaying the holograms for Steve who looked fascinated, Chimera interrupted by asking a question in a hysterical manner, she had begun to shake me. “Boss? A fusion bomb what for ?!”

I smiled sweetly at her, patting her cheek. “Don’t worry ‘mera, it’s completely without fallout, I tested it in space.”

What a big boom it was! I tried to replicate a NOVA bomb from Halo. With Wakandan knowhow, a cluster of nine nuclear fusion warheads encased in a lithium triteride case was a piece of cake. I exploded an asteroid the size of an Independence Day ship with that, you know the Mothership? That shit was 600 km, I had to lift a similar asteroid out of the kuiper belt and do the test near Neptune. My inner scientist was telling me that the explosion could have been bigger if I hadn’t botched the synthesizing of the lithium triteride.

Chimera seemed reassured that I hadn’t just built a bomb without testing it and let go of me. Steve raised his hand and asked, “What’s a fusion bomb?”

Chimera and I looked at each other, then the blonde took it upon herself to enlighten the poor Cap. “Err... how to explain, it’s like an atomic bomb, Cap. However, it’s different as apparently it’s some sort of clean nuke with no radiation fallout.”

Steve looked at me with horror. “Why do you need something so powerful? And on american soil?”

It’s not like they would be able to detect it yet, so I would take advantage of their ignorance. “It’s not powerful.” I said as I took the lunch box sized fusion bomb from Goldie’s hammer space and showed it to Steve. “It’s just enough to take out the base entirely, not the entire state. I did the math. And this is a message for Pierce, you don’t fuck with my friends or grandma.” There, I said it. No one fucks with Peggy, she’s family.

Chimera went to sit on one of the passenger seats near the cockpit’s entrance. She facepalmed, hiding her eyes. “Oh boss, I knew you were pissed… it’s the thing with Sinister all over again!” She said aloud with dread in her voice.

Steve walked up to me and put a hand on my shoulder, it was supposed to be calming but I didn’t know the guy for long so it fell short. “Is there anything I can do to convince you not to do it?” He asked with a soothing voice.

I shook my head and batted away his hand. “Nothing. After this we are going Squiddie hunting with the SHIELD agents loyal to Peggy and taking all those Hydra high command assholes. Peggy will help when I am done healing her.” Oh, I would do better than healing her… I had plans for the rest of the family too.

Steve looked at me as if I was a particularly trying person to get along with. He kept making comparisons between me and Howard Stark in his mind. *Rude!*

The Captain began to tighten his helmet on his head and looked at Chimera and I with a disappointed expression. “Very well, let’s do this, but later we are going to have words…”

Snorting, I crossed my arms and told him bluntly what I thought about his patronizing attitude. “Steve, I respect you... But you are not my dad, okay?”

He tried to retort to that but nothing was said. “...”

I nodded, satisfied that he understood what a bad idea it was to try to convince me to not do something. It was finally time to go. “Let’s do this! Ah! Oh I forgot, take this knife, Cap.”  It was a tactical knife that Goldie stole from SHIELD’s armory, it was one of the first things I thought about for the Cap’s kit. I had transmuted the steel into adamantium, well secondary adamantium to be precise, I had had to work at it to even be able to make the proto-adamantium. A lot of energy was needed for such.

I threw it at him and he caught the knife and its sheath; took the knife out and inspected the length and metal, as well as the balance. 

“This is a good knife.” He said as he began to play with it by doing some kind of unknown kata.

The monomolecular edge on the knife split the air making a tearing sound as it moved. I laughed nervously, I could barely follow the Cap’s movements, he was faster than Elektra sensei. “Yes, I know, it’s really sharp… careful with it. It can pierce armor.”

He stopped, gave me a smile for the first time and said, “Handy.”

Oh god, why are those dimples so perfect? Peggy how could you not jump the guy when you could? Chimera stood transfixed as she watched him. The Cap flinched as he noticed the gazes we threw him and asked nervously, “Let’s go now?”

“Yeah, sure… I am ready.” I told him, fucking attractive super soldier...

“Me too boss.” Chimera said as she had an energy rifle in her hand, I never noticed when she took it from the cockpit.

# # #

(Cpt. Steve Grant Rogers)

The redheaded lassy opened one of her portals, it was big enough for her and Steve to pass through. Steve didn’t show it outwardly but he just couldn’t believe that such things were possible and half thought that he was dreaming still. But the pain he felt when he cut himself with his new knife told him he was being silly.

At least Miss Jean had put on a different outfit, a red leather jacket, and something she had called tactical pants and boots. There was a tactical belt at her hips and a body harness with some kind of pistols in their sheaths which he couldn’t identify the make or model. The shiny and sleek silver pistol in her hand reminded him of Red Skull’s own, able to shoot energy bolts.

“Okay, let me enter first.” Jean said as she made for the portal, but a hand caught her shoulder, she turned to see that it was the Cap.

Lifting her head, she looked at the Captain’s face obscured by his helmet. There was an intransigent expression etched on it. “No, I have the shield and armor, I should be first.”

He was clearly the heavy in the group but he didn't understand why Miss Jean face slacken in anger, he was about to enter the portal when she said, “Fine, okay.”

Steve stopped, he had heard the same tone in Peggy’s voice before; when a woman said ‘fine’ it wasn’t. He turned to Miss Jean and said; “You are important for this mission, all will be lost if you get injured, always expect the unexpected.”

Her face gained more warmth from the frosty expression she had five seconds ago. “Sorry, Cap… I am used to being in charge, you know?”

*Oh, she’s the one who normally gives orders, she must not be used to deferring to someone else. Bucky was a bit like that...* He closed his eyes as he crushed the memories of his best friend seeking to re-emerge, it wasn’t the time to be lost in mourning. Peggy was alive… his Peggy was alive and that was all that mattered to him.

He reopened his eyes and gave the redheaded lassy a smile, nodded and said, “I totally understand. But I wish to impart common sense and experience on you.”

Miss Jean’s face became clouded in thought, reminding Steve of himself, she was clearly reminiscing the past, then she stared up at him with a sheepish expression. “Well, it’s true that I made some questionable decisions before… Okay, I will defer to you for now.”

He became relieved that she didn’t seek to argue with him; he had seen how strong her personality was from her interactions with everyone. They respected her, but Steve couldn’t say if it was out of fear or leadership.

Steve took his pistol from his belt holster and put his shield before him to protect his center of mass and entered the portal without waiting for Jean. He arrived in a hospital room, full of beeping machinery, similar to the ones he saw when he awakened. The walls were white and bland, with only the painting of a flower on the wall behind the medical bed.

The form of a elderly woman was on the medical bed, she had white hair and a similar hairstyle to the woman he kept seeing in his dreams. He didn’t see an old woman but the love of his life. His lips quirked into a smile, Steve was about to walk to her when he felt his female companion arrive behind him, he turned to her, only to see her lunge at him, he was shocked and ready to deflect her assault with his shield when she hit something invisible.

Steve heard a crack and a grunt, the noise of bone cracking, he was intimately familiar with it; then Miss Jean wrenched her hand to the right and he heard another bone crack. The crackling and the visible arcs of lightning running from Miss Jean’s arms to what she was holding in her hand sizzled and little by little a black suited man covered from head to toe in some kind of skintight outfit appeared.

The redhead’s piercing gaze fell on Steve. “Like I told you Cap, there are some invisible guards.” She stood up and dusted her hands.

Steve looked down at the body on the grey tiled floor, lost about what to think. “This isn’t what I expected when you told me that.” An invisible enemy, that was the stuff of nightmares and supposed to stay imaginary in his time. Well, it seemed that Hydra succeeded on the technological front.

Jean put a hand on his gauntlet. “I should have been more accurate, I am sorry.” As Steve looked into her eyes, he saw that she looked apologetic.

He shrugged and his eyes focused on the occupied medical bed in the room. “Peggy is there.” He walked toward it, only to be stopped by Jean.

“Stop.” She said as she placed her hand on his chest as she placed herself between him and the bed. “We must check for traps first.”

Her piercing green eyes were full of determination, Steve felt that she would have her way, whatever he thought. He frowned. “Why would they trap her bed?” To him, it was unconscionable that someone could trap the hospital bed of someone in convalescence.

Jean snorted and looked at him as if he was naive. “Because Pierce knows he can’t stop me with conventional means. If killing Peggy can make me furious and make mistakes…? He would totally do it.”

That spoke of an evil and practical mindset that turned Steve’s stomach. Even Red Skull wouldn’t fall so low. “I don’t like this Pierce gentleman already.”

Miss Jean’s eyes glowed gold, making him flinch a bit. “He is no man, he is just a squiddie that will get burned.” Her voice gained a certain echo as she spoke. She blinked her eyes, then the golden glow was replaced by her normal emerald green orbs.

Miss Jean turned to the bed, and with a sweep of her arms, some kind of golden light covered Peggy and the bed. From under it, there was indeed a box that was turned into dust without fanfare, then Miss Jean walked up to her and put her hands on Peggy’s body. Steve placed himself at her side and looked on in worry at her, then at Peggy who had some kind of mask on her face.

“Is she okay?” Steve asked, his eyes settling on the diminutive form of the love of his life.

Miss Jean growled as she spoke. “They implanted some sort of GPS tracker inside of her and some…” The redhead tilted her head. “...poisoned Capsules?”

With urgency, Steve said, “Can you take them out?”

Jean nodded. “Easily. I just have to teleport them out.” 

Steve didn’t care what, but he wanted the redhead to do something. “Do it, please.”

Miss Jean held her hand before her hand cupped and in a flash of pale blue light, a round and silvery object appeared, it was quickly turned to dust too. Then three orbs full of a dark liquid appeared next in her hand. Those didn’t turn into dust, but were absorbed into Miss Jean’s hands in a golden ooze like substance. “I will keep those, it might come in handy to develop an antidote for them.”

“Alright.” Steve nodded.

The lassy began to disconnect the IV connected to Peggy's left arm, slowly to avoid any surprise. Then she frowned and cursed as Peggy began to seize; she took her hands from her and then suddenly they began to slowly light up with golden ethereal flames that she applied on the older female. Steve almost interrupted her but Peggy didn’t seem to catch on fire and little by little the seizure stopped as Miss Jean’s light fire (?) spread inside his old… flame’s body. *It’s not the moment to make puns, Steve.*

Miss Jean’s fire stopped filling Peggy’s body and retracted inside her own; but Peggy was still positively glowing. Steve could see her arteries and veins highlighted with white light, the light was stronger in her head. Steve wanted to ask questions but didn’t dare interrupt her. For over five minutes, Miss Jean continued to work on Peggy, before exhaling a relieved sigh as she took her hands off Peggy.

“I fixed the damage they had done when they Captured her… you see, Pierce had made his goons inject her with some kind of memory erasing serum that your friend Howard Stark made before his death. It’s not even stable for use from what I’ve seen from the serum’s molecular structure that was still coursing through her body. I... I had to fix her hippocampus, her neocortex and her amygdala from the damage that this corrosive shit had caused. Peggy is allergic to that serum.” Miss Jean said as she turned toward him and her eyes began glowing again.

Most of what she explained passed right through his ears, all he understood was that Hydra goons had damaged Peggy’s brain with some kind of solution to erase her memories but she had a bad reaction to it. Steve understood that people from the nineties were smarter than the people from his era, however, they were prone to dismissing practical solutions to simple problems.

As he mused the difference between the world of now and from before, Miss Jean was caressing Peggy’s brow and musing out loud, “When I get to that Pierce guy, death will be the least of his problems.”

The girl was vengeful and bloodthirsty, Steve was surprised that no one had sat her for a talk about those habits of her. “I think Peggy will want to do it herself.”

She turned and looked at him in the eyes, anger in them; Steve didn’t recoil or show weakness. What she sought in his eyes must have pleased as she smiled predatorily. “And I will help her if that’s the case.”

The man who dated this young woman was in for a rude time; Miss Jean frowned at him, but he decided to not give her the time to get mad. “Is Peggy alright to transport?”

Her facial expression shifted to one that said ‘well played’ and she turned to Peggy who was still in the bed. “Yes, come help me.”

Peggy ended up in his arms and it had never felt so right to have her there, but they weren’t out of the woods yet. Miss Jean took the bedsheet and covered Peggy with it, waved her hand to the naked wall on the right and a portal opened on the Samson duocopter, if Steve remembered the name right. They walked up to it and the door opened, the blonde, Chimera with her rifle in hand.

“Ready the Samson, you are getting out of here with Peggy.” Miss Jean hollered.

Peggy stirred in Steve arms, he walked up slowly to not wake her up yet. Steve climbed the little ramp that morphed into stairs that Chimera activated on one of the Samson interior panels. 

“Sure boss, I had hoped to test my new ectoplasmic constructs, but if we can be back earlier….” Chimera left for the cockpit.

Miss Jean touched another panel, typed a numerical code on the keyboard and the seat at the end of the Samson passenger compartment turned into a stretcher with the seatbelts turning into a harness.

“Put her on the stretcher.” Miss Jean commanded.

He did just as she asked and put her on the stretcher, she strapped in Peggy and touched her one last time with her glowing hands to check on her health. Steve didn’t understand how he got used to the young woman’s ability to do supernatural acts as if they were nothing. He had questions, questions that could wait until after the mission was completed.

Jean exited the Samson and pulled Steve out with her, the two propellers came alive and then the flying craft took off. The redhead waved her hand and a portal opened, big enough for the Samson to pass. Steve looked up with apprehension as the vehicle entered the strange aperture in the air.

A hand touched his shoulder, turning his head he saw Jean smiling at him in reassurance. “Don’t worry, when she wakes up, you’ll have all the time in the world to catch up.”

With a firm nod he said, “Thank you for this opportunity.”

She let go of him, and spent over thirty seconds observing him, the intensity of her gaze was kind of unnerving to Steve.

Miss Jean gratified him with another smile. “The fact that she’s old and grey doesn’t seem to bother you the least.”

Steve fumbled with his utility belt, unconsciously checking his mission-specific equipment. He then looked at the young woman who had been waiting for something to be said. “I dreamed of her for fifty one years.”

Jean tilted her head as she looked at him and stepped back from him as if she had been burned by something and looked on in wonder. “That’s true love I feel from you, you know she never forgot you? She never married?”

*True love? What is she saying?* Steve asked himself if the girl was somehow reading his feelings. *That’s silly.* He shook his head. Then he registered what she had said, if he knew Peggy as well as he did she focused on her career after the war and forgot romance completely. He would have preferred that she had moved on and was happy… “I will make this right.”

At those words, Jean nodded. “I will help you, Steve. You are an alright guy so far. You and her deserve another chance.”

He frowned at her thinking about Peggy’s white hair and the ravage of age on her body. “I don’t know what you could do that could rewind the damages of time Miss Jean.”

With an impish grin, the young woman replied. “Oh, challenge accepted.”

# # #

Back with Jean…
Camp Lehigh
5 minutes later

Exiting the portal, we were once again in the hospital room, I zipped up my jacket and Goldie phased the tactical harness and belt with all my weapons and kit to over my jacket. Steve took his pistol in hand and watched me prepare myself. I looked at the Cap’s body armor, I had made do with the current armor technology I had developed previously for Cindy’s first costume -Which I had subtly upgraded since, without telling her- and it was a tri-weave mesh layer still with the same motility layer and the temperature control; it could resist rifle fire and I added the unstable molecule treatment to it.

It was complicated, yet should be enough, I would upgrade it later as Peter and I didn’t have enough time to make a suit to the same level as ours.

Looking through the wall, I saw that the guards in cloaked suits were still posted there. They hadn’t even changed shifts yet. “When we exit this room, I’m going to make the invisible guards become visible, I will seal the corridor at both entry and exit points with my powers.”

“I am ready.”

I formed a construct in the form of a fist and hit the room’s door, then I sent out an orb shaped photokinetic construct whose sole job would be to make it easy for us to see the suited guys. The only weakness those suits made by Hydra had, was that if they were struck with a specific wavelength of the light spectrum, they were made visible once again, the suit couldn’t bend the light around them.

*Design failure.* I spat mentally with a disgusted tone as I dissipated the fist like construct, the Captain lunged into the hole I made.

Following him, I manifested telekinetic weapons in the form of Sai, they twirled in my hands; Elektra sensei’s memories and my own draconian training with her had prepared me in their use. With a thought I sealed both ends of the corridor while the Cap was being shot at and defending himself with his shield. The orb colored everyone in light imperceptible to the human eyes, but all the cloaked guards were visible now.

I sent a concussive beam at the nearest one who was about to jump Steve, it caught him in the air and slammed him into another dark suited man. As their projectile weapons went dry all of them pulled their energy pistols, but Steve lunged at the guy nearest him and shield bashed him and with a crack he fell dead, with my TK, I pulled the next of them to the Cap who caught him with a haymaker in the crotch.

The noise of something cracking was distinguishable and the man fell too, screaming in soprano. I laughed and jumped into the fray between two of the suited guys, in concert they attacked one low and the other tried to punch my face, lightly jumping to avoid the sweeping kick, I landed on the man’s extended leg and then pierced my other foe’s forearm and sent a debilitating wave of mental energy inside his body, killing him on the spot as I supercharged his nerves and brain. Jumping again, I hit the other guy with a full powered kick to his head.

Snap. To finish him off I stabbed him in the heart with my telekinetic Sai. I felt another one of those suited guys behind me, I was about to move away or send a TK burst when Cap jumped and performed a hook kick that slammed into that guy’s sternum. He aimed his pistol and shot the black suited hydra agent three times, two bullets in the heart and one in the head.

I felt the last guy about to shoot Cap, but before that I threw my telekinetic Sai into his goggled eye which shattered on impact and skewered his head. My Sai dissipated into an explosion that gradually disintegrated the bodies they were planted into; I took a P226 pistol from my holster and walked to each of the still living agents and shot them in the heart and head.

Steve watched me work as I emotionlessly took care of looting the weapons they had, they were an interesting design; I would dissect them later. Turning my head to Steve I said, “We will go to the storage level and steal some stuff there, or would you prefer going after the computers first?”

The cap looked at me as if I was a thief as I looted the weapons and their magazines and batteries. “Shouldn’t we separate, to cover more-”

“No, you’d get killed without my lightwave construct, it’s what allows us to see those cloaked fuckers and don’t look at me like that, I won those weapons by right of conquest fair and square!”

*Oh my god did he just roll his eyes at me?* Cap checked his custom pistol, that no normal man would be able to wield. It was basically ripped off from the .454 Casull Auto from Hellsing belonging to Alucard. It was a bit long, but it did the job.

“Let’s go raid the storage level.” Cap huffed as he waited for me.

“That’s right Cap.” I said as I holstered my pistol and let go of the TK barriers at the corridors ends.

The level after the medical one was the storage one, we took the concrete staircase leading to it, while shining the way with my lightwave construct. Cap was the tank so he went first into them, took care of the visible guards in the stairs by throwing his shield at them, making it bounce and taking them down, it boomeranged back to his waiting hand.

“I like your style.” I complimented him as I took my pistol out and shot the guards fatally.

“Thanks.” Cap gave me a tight nod, this time I didn’t loot the guard but sabotaged the weapons by destroying the containment unit inside the energy weapons, they would explode the next time someone tried to use them.

We arrived at the guarded door leading to the storage level, I skewered the two guards and the invisible one with telekinetic bolts in the brain. Disintegrated the door and casually entered through it followed by Steve striding behind me. There were countless rows of shelves full of wooden cases with serial numbers on them.

I whistled and decided to take everything, but where could I store everything? I mean I didn’t have the- oh sure I did! The UK base was big enough. I opened multiple portals and began to empty the storage level of everything into the UK base’s hangar, fortunately it was empty. Thirty minutes later, the storage level was empty, no one came to interrupt me or take us on.

Frowning, I noticed that the cameras at different angles in the room were still on. “It was too easy.” With a thought I destroyed them, as the boxy fixed cameras turned into chunks… I realized it didn’t matter that they had seen us, the end result of this operation was self-evident. That kind of thing seemed to happen to me a lot, I decided I would dedicate a part of my time to developing electronic and surveillance countermeasures.

Cap took his pistol in hand and loaded a fresh clip into it. “I agree. They must be waiting to ambush us somewhere.”

“Guard my body.” I told him, as I stepped outside of my physical form and spread my awareness.

I phased through the different levels of this bunker and ended up in the command center, there were a lot of people gathered in it, mainly the commanding officers, some were Hydra, some were not. I had begun to eavesdrop.

“Sir, they destroyed the cameras, we are blind.” One of the operators sitting before his console showed the completely dark partitioned screens on the big display before him.

The colonel present slammed his fist on the wall at his side. “Damn it, how did they pass the perimeter? Someone, check the entry logs!”

A female operator said as she was consulting a register. “Sir, there wasn’t anyone stopped at control today, not even for deliveries.”

The colonel looked anguished. “There must be something!”

I scanned his mind and the result pleased me, he was the Hydra agent in charge of this Camp, he was also responsible for the laboratory where they tested their amoral experiments. Everyone here knew what was going on, I thought about sparing the non-Hydra affiliated but this was damning...

The colonel passed his hands through his hair, putting it in disarray. “Shit, send security at them.”

“Everyone?” The first operator asked for clarification.

Their superior officer walked up to them, his face deforming into a mask of anger, replied, “Everyone! You saw it too, right? They killed everyone in the corridors and stairwell with unnatural abilities!”

*How rude! My powers are natural!* I pouted at the metahuman hater.

“E-even… the experiments?” The female operator’s voice quavered, there was fear in her eyes.

The colonel froze, he looked at the woman with a serious expression. “Are we still able to control them?”

She nodded slowly. “Yes sir.”

The commanding officer smiled devilishly. “Send them in too.” Scanning his mind, I saw the unnatural type of enhanced soldiers they had access to, they didn’t even have any sense of morality left or ability to feel emotions anymore.

I chose that moment to return to my body; when I opened my eyes next I decided that it was time to hightail it, but before that…

# # #

(Colonel Thomas Eaton)

Command Center
5 minutes later

“Sir! We have lost the computer network!”

Thomas closed his eyes, a migraine spearing his frontal lobe as things devolved to utter chaos. He had recognized the source of their problem, the young woman’s files had been passed to him by Director Pierce himself. There was no doubt that they had already absconded with their special guest... 

“Can you ask for reinforcement?” He asked Warrant officer Wallace, who shook her head lamely at him.

Things worsened even more as Chief Warrant officer Poole shouted, “Sir we just lost the phone line and the radio!”

“I have no choice then.” Thomas stood up and took a stick-drive from his hidden breast pocket, he walked up to Wallace’s station and slid the device into the console’s port.

The Hydra symbol appeared on the screen, replacing the US Army logo and the Command Center’s hidden satellite uplink activated. Colonel Thomas typed a numerical password and then when access was granted typed a short message: “Guest taken, base compromised.”

“Sir, what are you-” Wallance didn’t have the time to finish her sentence before Chief Warrant Officer Poole shot two bullets in her brain with his service weapon.

“Dispose of her, Poole.” Thomas took the stick-key from the console and placed it back in his pocket.

“Yes, sir.” The young man stood up and began the clean up.

It was however at that moment that something appeared before Thomas on the console, a metallic case, the size of a lunch box, there was a digital screen on its face. A countdown of five seconds slowly passed. The Colonel didn’t even have the time to flee like his instincts told him to when his world went bright white.

# # #

Back with Jean…
10 km from Camp Lehigh

A column of blue light speared the sky as my fusion bomb gift exploded. It was the equivalent of what had struck Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, but the blast was more restrained to the totality of Camp Lehigh’s surface. I smelled the ionized oxygen and watched as the normally invisible neutrons became momentarily present in the light spectrum in a red band in the pillar; then the mushroom cloud was expanding in the sky and the air-blast and shockwaves of the explosion spread to my position. I covered Steve and myself with a solid shield to protect us.

We were waiting on the edge of the forest between Camp Lehigh and the nearest town. What? You thought I would let myself get swarmed by serum altered enhanced psychopaths, cloaked invisible agents and US army personnel just for the fun of it? No, I would leave that for Wolverine and the Thing, those two guys were the kind who wanted to tell a story about shit like that happening to them. To me the objective had always been to take Peggy back, steal stuff and destroy that base.

I turned to Cap who looked with an expression of fear etched on his face, he seemed transfixed. He was terrified, he looked at himself and his shield. “The super soldiers don’t matter anymore.”

At this moment Cap felt utterly lost, not recognizing the environment around him; I truly thought that he would have a panic attack right there. I walked up to him, slowly and put a hand on his biceps. *Oh, it is quite hard.* Shut up, hormones!

Sighing, I gave him the welcome to superhuman society speech. “Cap, the world has changed. Super soldiers, nukes? Those are nothing compared to the threats that will popup in the near future. Cap, you have just become part of a bigger universe, that you never knew existed. So… I advise you to acclimatize to this new era, you are going to see some truly crazy shit over the decades to come.”

Cap looked at me, different emotions passing over his face, they settled on acceptance. He would still have things that would make him wish he had died in that plane. He nodded. “I will take this... under advisement, Miss Jean.”

I smiled at him, opened a portal in the clearing. “Let’s go back to Peggy?”

He turned his face to the golden aperture. “Yes, let’s.”

We walked up to it and disappeared through the tear in space; I had shit to do, squiddies to kill, but first we needed Peggy, and she needed to be on her A-game. I knew what I had to do.