Carmine Jewels ║ Wanda Maximoff

Chapter 3 - Blasts From The Past

The following days were a mess. Every single camera SHIELD had access to was scanning for signs of Barton and his missing group. If SHIELD managed to find them, at least they would have a clue as to where to find the Tesseract. So far, however, the attempts had been futile. Clint and his group seemed to have simply gone up in smoke.

"Nowak. I have a mission for you. Follow me, please."

Coulson's voice drew Keira's attention away from her computer screen. She hadn't been working on the facial scans, although the algorithm was running in the background. No, she used this time to read up on the Tesseract. And as there was only a limited amount of information about it on the internet, she had resorted to SHIELD's files.

However, she had encountered a slight problem. Several of the files were encrypted, forcing her to hack her way through them to access the information. And it had been tricky to access the files without triggering an alarm.

But once she had her sights set on something, she'd do almost anything to make it happen.

She quickly closed down the Tesseract tab, even though Coulson stood on the other side of the screen and wouldn't be able to see what she'd been doing. "Oh? Please tell me it's not another collapsing building." She groaned dramatically, pushing herself away from the desk and standing up.

"I promise, it's not a collapsing building." Coulson replied with a small smile as he turned around and stalked off towards his office. Keira had always liked Coulson. She liked his kind and compassionate nature. Also, he didn't judge people based on their past actions. And that was a rare trait to find.

As Keira had been a part of HYDRA for the majority of her life, it wasn't uncommon for her to earn some nasty glares from the agents at HQ. After the things she had done, many thought she didn't deserve a second chance, herself included sometimes, but not Coulson. No, he saw the person beneath the mistakes, the person you were truly meant to be.

She couldn't help but chuckle when her gaze fell on his desk as soon as she entered his office. When the news of Captain America being awoken from the ice had reached Coulson, he had barely managed to contain his happiness. And with the fact that he had been spending the last couple of years to collect Captain America trading cards, to have his hero awoken again, it would be a dream come true to get the cards signed.

"Still hoping you'll get to meet Captain America?" Keira asked pointedly, nodding towards the cards lying on his desk. Coulson seemed to have sorted them based on their condition. They went from best to better, because considering their age, they were still in excellent shape.

"Oh, I'm sure I will. If you do your job correctly." Coulson replied with a raised eyebrow, used to Keira's teasing about his slight obsession.

"My job?"

"Your job, yes. I need you to go and meet with the Captain. We don't know what's coming but the Tesseract has just demonstrated how little we truly know. So, we need Captain America on our side. Convince him to join, won't you?" Coulson finished with a sly glint in his eyes. He had known Keira long enough to know that she wouldn't back down from a challenge.

"I'll do my best. But wouldn't Romanoff be a better choice though? She's the master." Keira had heard that Natasha had been pulled out of her undercover mission, but she hadn't received any information about whether the redhead was supposed to take part in this mission or not. She bent forward and reached out to pick up one of the cards, but withdrew her hand when she received a light smack on the wrist.

"Don't touch." Coulson reprimanded her gently. "They're in near-mint condition. Don't want grease marks."

"You're such a fanboy." Keira laughed, shaking her head in amusement.