Chapter 644:
"New Jersey." Steve said, then remembering they don't have anytime left he said "You said nine minutes, come on."
"Shh, relax. Got it." Kenichi found the signal is coming from Wheaton, NJ and asked "You know it?"
"I used to. Let's go." Steve Rogers said and reached out to pull the drive but Kenichi stopped him.
"You two go and have a look, I am going to hack the rest of it" Kenichi said as he went back to hack the drive
"The Agents will be here in any minute we don't have time" Steve said
"I never said that, you assumed that they would be able to find this place but this place is special and so is this laptop, those agents constantly get pinged at different locations so much so that even if they get this location it won't be long before they get a different location so I have more than enough time to do it." Kenichi explained
"What then they won't find this place?" Steve asked
"They will is just it will take them atleast an hour to do so which is more than enough for me to find everything I can from this drive" Kenichi replied
"Let's go, Kenichi can check the drive while we can check on the location we got" Natasha said to which Steve nodded his head and followed Natasha to get to New Jersey.
"Wait!" Kenichi said as he throws another drive towards Natasha, "Take this, it has the same data as this drive""How?" Steve asks
"Natasha is my girlfriend first than Fury's agent" Kenichi said to which Natasha gave a naughty smile to Steve who looked surprised but couldn't say anything and just follows behind her to get out of there.
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As they drive to New Jersey Natasha asked Steve.
"Where did Captain America learn how to steal a car?"
"Nazi Germany." Steve replied and got a "Mm" from Natasha
"And we're borrowing. Take your feet off the dash. And we wouldn't have to do that if your boyfriend had a car in his safe house" Steve said as Natasha takes her feet off the dash.
"He doesn't need a car because he can travel faster without it, so keeping one would be redundant. He is more of a bike man the number of cars he posses are less than 5" Natasha stated
Steve nodded "Hmm... I prefer bikes as well"
"He likes it because his girlfriends sits behind him and hugs him what about you nobody especial" Natasha asked
"Believe it or not, it's kind of hard to find someone with shared life experience. Atleast not for me" Steve replied
"I know someone with whome you can share your experiences if you want or if not you can just make something up." Natasha said
"I won't lie for relationship and as for your acquaintance I don't know if they are trustworthy for me to share my experience with." Steve stated
"Then you are really going to die alone" Natasha said
"Hey! Who knows maybe I will find someone?"
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The two pull up to outside an abandoned military base where the signal led them to.
" This is it." Steve Rogers said
" The file came from these coordinates." Natasha Romanoff stated
"So did I." Steve Rogers said as they walk under the darkness of night around the base trying to pinpoint where the signal came from. "This camp is where I was trained." Ř
" Changed much?" Natasha Romanoff asked
"A little." Steve Rogers said as he has a brief visions of his former, smaller self running past him as he's getting trained with other soldiers.
"This is a dead end. Zero heat signature, zero waves, not even radio. Whoever wrote the file must have used a router to throw people off." Natasha Romanoff said as Steve notices a building ahead of them. "What is it?" She asks as they walk over to the building.
"Army regulations forbid storing ammunition within five hundred yards of the barracks. This building is in the wrong place." Steve Rogers said as he opens the lock with his shield and they enter inside, when they turn on the lights they notice it's a SHIELD office.
"This is SHIELD." Natasha Romanoff said
"Maybe where it started." Steve Rogers said as they enter a room where they find old framed portraits of Howard Stark, Peggy and Col. Chester Phillips
"There's Stark's father." Natasha said
" Howard." Steve stated
"Who's the girl?" Natasha Romanoff asked but Steve doesn't reply and turns away to walk further down the room and stops by a massive book shelf.
"If you're already working in a secret office.." he whispers and pushes the books shelf and slides open to reveal an elevator behind it
"Why do you need to hide the elevator?" They go down the elevator which takes them to a room with old looking computers.
" This can't be the data-point, this technology is ancient." Natasha said when suddenly she notices a small flash drive port, she places the flash drive in it which then activates the ancient computer in the room.
"Initiate system?" Computer asked and Natasha types using the keyboard.
"Y-E-S, spells yes." Natasha smiles as the old computer starts to cranks up "Shall we play a game?" she turns to Steve "It's from a movie that..."
" Yeah, I saw it." Steve said when suddenly they hear an accented voice speaking
" Rogers, Steven. Born, 1918. Romanoff, Natalia Alianovna. Born, 1984." they see an old camera moving above them as it analyzes them.
" It's some kind of a recording." Natasha said
"I am not a recording, Fräulein. I may not be the man I was when the Captain took me prisoner in 1945, but I am." The computer screen shows an old photo of Dr. Arnim Zola.
"Do you know this thing?" Natasha asked
" Arnim Zola was a German scientist who worked for the Red Skull. He's been dead for years." Steve Rogers replied
" First correction, I am Swiss. Second, look around you. I have never been more alive. In 1972 I received a terminal diagnosis. Science could not save my body, my mind, however, that was worth saving on two hundred thousand feet of data banks. You are standing in my brain." Dr. Arnim Zola stated
" How did you get here?" Steve Rogers asked
"Invited." Dr. Arnim Zola replied
" It's as Kenichi said, It was Operation Paperclip after World War II. SHIELD recruited German scientists with strategic value." Natasha stated
"They thought I could help their cause. I also helped my own." Dr. Arnim Zola said
"HYDRA died with the Red Skull." Steve Rogers said still not believing even after what Kenichi said and seeing Zola in front of him.
"Cut off one head, two more shall take its place." Dr. Arnim Zola said
"Prove it." Steve Rogers said
"Accessing archive." Came Zola's voice and the computer screen shows them old footage of Johann Schmidt/Red Skull, of the how the original SHIELD founders. "HYDRA was founded on the belief that humanity could not be trusted with its own freedom. What we did not realize, was that if you try to take that freedom, they resist. The war taught us much. Humanity needed to surrender its freedom willingly. After the war, SHIELD was founded and I was recruited. The new HYDRA grew. A beautiful parasite inside SHIELD. For seventy years HYDRA has been secretly feeding crisis, reaping war. And when history did not cooperate, history was changed."