Stained (N.R)

Chapter 10

Just as I finished my words, the three of us came to a stop by a fenced off, abandoned army camp. 

"Vintage." I scrunched my nose.

"Is this it?" Steve furrowed an eyebrow.

"The file came from these co-ordinates." Natalia frowned. 

"So did I." Steve muttered, looking at a sign which read, Camp Lehigh. 

Natalia and Steve looked around the barracks whilst I tried to trace suspicious movement from air on Jupiter's back, watching as the two wandered around campus, trying to find any sign of life. 

Suddenly, Steve seemed to notice something. He raced towards one of the buildings, Natalia followed behind, motioning me to land next to them.

"Army regulations forbid storing ammunition five hundred yards from the barracks." Steve murmured as we stood in front of a locked door. "This building is in the wrong place."

He slammed his shield into the lock, breaking it.

I withdrew Jupiter, exchanging him for Diana instead as we made our way down a set of stairs to a basement designed like a military office. Shelves and chairs were in perfect rows, ancient computers sitting on white office desks, a familiar eagle with its signature neck cramp was pasted on a wall. 

"This is S.H.I.E.L.D." Natalia sounded amazed

"Maybe where it started," Steve took in the rows of orderly equipment as we crossed the room.

"A place of formalities," I rolled my eyes. "As stiff as it is now, no fun, no entertainment. Guess somethings never change."

"This is not a matter of fun." Steve snapped, looking at three pictures on the walls."

"Not to the pawns of the chess game," I shrugged, looking at the three portraits. "To the player which directs the pieces, it is the greatest entertainment of the time."

"Howard was not a pawn," Steve gritted his teeth. "None of them were."

"Argue your cause again, Rogers. Why are your freemen comrades hiding an elevator in a secret office." I pointed at a large grey metal bookshelf, directing Diana to shred the thing, exposing a set of elevator doors hidden behind. 

Steve didn't answer, stepping in the elevator, his face stoic as stone. Natalia sighed as she walked past me. "Maybe this isn't the best place to start an argument, Katyusha."

Natalia easily broke the passcode, and a few seconds later, the three of us were standing in a room filled with the components of a giant computer on a white dais.

"This can't be the data point." Natalia examined the computers. "The technology is ancient."

Then, she saw something out of place, a USB portal, sitting on a dusty table. She tapped the hard drive with her fingers, and with a second of deliberation, plugged it in. The computers immediately started, the machines around them whirring in sync. An ancient box camera raised its head painfully slowly, seeming to gaze at all three of them. 

A green line of words appeared on the brightened screen. Initiate system?

"Y-E-S spells yes." Natalia joked, typing in the letters and pushing the enter button. "Shall we play a game?"

She looked at Steve, "Its from a movie that...."

"Yeah, I saw it." Steve interrupted, nodding to the computer. 

"I didn't," I perked up. "What is it about?"

Just as Natalia was about to reply, but the screen glitched weirdly, showing a distorted face in green. "Rogers, Steven." It whirred. " Born, 1918."