INFERNO │ Marvel

6 - Two Birds, One Soldier

Amelia had knocked on Sam's door, deciding to be the first to greet him as the one who knew him the best so that he wouldn't turn them away right off the bat. All three of them were covered in ash and dust from the previous explosion and Nat had blood running down the side of her face. Amelia just really needed a cup of coffee to bring her energy levels back up. When Sam answered the door, it was clear he had just been on his morning run.

"Hey, Amy," Sam greeted. "Hey, man."

"I'm sorry about this," Steve sighed. "We need a place to lay low."

"Everyone we know is trying to kill us," Natasha added. Sam's eyes shifted between the three of them.

"Not everyone."

Amelia had gone to wash first, ditching the hoodie she had been wearing and, yet again, keeping on Tony's shirt that had been underneath. She washed the dirt from her face and brushed her hair before tying it up. After that, she had given Steve and Nat free reign of the bathroom and went to the kitchen to be with Sam.

"So what are you feeling for breakfast? Eggs?" he asked.

"Eggs are good," she responded. "Maybe some toast. And coffee. Please. I'll help you make it. And. I promise I'll pay you back for all this, Sam."

"You don't need to," he reassured her. As she got to work on cracking some eggs into a pan, he took a moment to analyse her. Considering the weekly sessions that she attended with him, he was good at reading her. "You gonna tell me what's going on, firebird?"

"Don't go all therapist on me now, Sam."

"I'm asking as a friend," he corrected. She sighed in frustration.

"I just thought things were going ok for once," she admitted. "After the whole Mandarin thing, I thought I could finally catch a break. Working for SHIELD kept me feeling sane for a while. Now that's over. Just feels like chaos follows me wherever I go."

"Chaos follows everyone in some way or another," he told her. "The question is, do you fight it or do you run from it?"

"Well, you've stumped me there," she chuckled. "Neither are good options. Whether I run or fight, it just never ends."

"Do you want it to end?" he asked. "Seems like you love being Inferno, but you hate what it means."

"It means being a hero," she explained, her voice quiet. She kept her eyes on the eggs she was frying. "And being a hero means risking everything. I don't know if I'm prepared for that."

"Yet you keep being a hero anyway," he stated. She looked at him then. "I think your heart is already telling you what to do even if you don't realise it yourself, Amy."

"Thank you, Sam," she said, giving him a kind smile. She then gestured to the cooking eggs. "Why don't you go get those two? I'll finish this off."

They had all soon gathered in the living space, Sam making himself some toast in the small kitchen and Amelia sipping on a coffee while the other two sat at the table with food.

"So, the question is, who at SHIELD could launch a domestic missile strike?" Natasha asked no one in particular.

"Pierce," Steve said.

"Who happens to be sitting on top of the most secure building in the world," Amelia added. "Even Stark Tower isn't that heavily fortified."

"But he's not working alone," he continued. "Zola's algorithm was on the Lemurian Star."

"So was Jasper Sitwell," Natasha pointed out. Steve's eyes widened.

"So, the real question is, how do the three most wanted people in Washington kidnap a SHIELD officer in broad daylight?"