Nightingale's Song (My MCU #3)

Chapter 9

After the plane landed on top of a large tower in the middle of the city, Anna was taken immediately to a small infirmary. Having been poked and prodded and scanned, she now sat on a table watching the doctor look over all the results. She kept tearing her gaze from him to glance at the equipment around her. There was a good deal of things she'd never seen the likes of. Some she could guess the purpose of, others she had no idea. Medicine had certainly changed from her days as an army nurse.

Finally, the man they called Banner returned to her. She looked him over but saw no sign of the beast she'd heard her captors speak of. In fact, the doctor seemed nervous, almost shy. Anna had taken an instant liking to him as he explained every thing he was going to do to her before he did it.

He tilted his head and gave her a soft smile. "I'm still waiting for the blood work to finish processing, but you are in remarkable health, especially considering where've you been. How long did they have you?"

Anna shrugged. She had no idea even what year it was. She kept track when they first took her, but that had soon grown tiresome. Tony Stark walked in then, his eyes glued to the device in his hands. It seemed they had managed to put a whole computer into something that could be carried around. Fascinating.

"She's been run through every database and nothing. Facial recognition and prints were both duds. Fury thinks she's a spy."

Anna growled at that bit of news and Tony laughed. Even Banner smirked slightly. Tony showed her the tablet and sat it down. "All right, sweetheart. According to this you don't exist, so who are you?"

She looked at him, uncertain how much she should reveal. She'd been hoping Steve would be here. He would have taken one look at her and all this would be settled. It was that desire to see her friend that made up her mind in the end. She signed quickly asking if they knew how.

The two men exchanged a look. "Jarvis, get the male Barton in here," Tony instructed.

"Of course, sir," a voice answered which caused Anna to startle as there was no one else in the room.

Tony smiled. "It's my AI."

She tilted her head in question.

"Artificial intelligence?"

She shook her head as she still didn't understand. Fake intelligence? That didn't make any sense.

"It's a really smart computer," Bruce offered.

She understood that well enough and nodded.

"Is there a lot of that?" Tony asked.

Anna frowned. A lot of what?

"She seems to take a lot at face value. She was very interested in the medical equipment and what I was doing with it. I even explained the things I wasn't using. She seems intelligent but out of touch."

She blinked at them. She'd always been fascinated at the conversations people would have in front of her simply because she couldn't talk. It wasn't as if she ceased existing.

Clint Barton walked in the room dressed in sweats and a t-shirt. "What's up?"

"She was signing." Tony said with a gesture in her direction.

The archer turned to her, the surprise evident on his face. You sign?

Yes. I'm relieved someone else here does. Could you please tell Dr. Banner that I was a nurse before and thank him for explaining everything to me?

"She says she was a nurse before and wants me to thank Bruce for the explanations," Clint dutifully translated.

"Before what? Before when? What's her name? How long was she there? Is there anything else she can tell us?" Tony rattled off.

Clint watched Anna then grinned. "She says to slow down. Before Hydra, everything was different before Hydra. She's been there since the war. And she wants to know where Cap is."

Bruce frowned. "She must mean Loki. If she knows Steve, they can't have held her for long. He hasn't been out of the ice for that long."

Anna smirked but didn't offer any response. As much as she'd heard about these people, she didn't know them. She knew Steve. She wanted Steve.

"You know Cap?" Tony asked.

She nodded once.

"He know you?"

She nodded again.

There was a pause. "Okay. He's at a meeting being diplomatic and what not, but I can get him back here. Who should I say is requesting him?"

Anna thought for a moment before signing.

Clint looked at the others with a shrug. "She says Nightingale."

***

Anna had showered and changed and eaten. She felt better than she had in ages. She was currently perched on the back of the sofa keeping watch on the hallway Clint had told her Steve would be coming down when he returned.

"So who is she? What did Steve say?" Natasha asked.

Anna could feel Tony's heavy gaze on her but she didn't turn to look at him. "That's just it, he didn't say a word. I called and told him that I had someone here who says she knows him and goes by Nightingale. He hung up. Next thing I know, I get a message that him and Agent Oliver are on their way back."

"Girlfriend?" Natasha asked.

Anna snorted a laugh. No, she'd only ever had eyes for one man and it wasn't Steve Rogers. Just then, a familiar deep voice drifted down the hall and she hopped off the couch. She shifted her weight from foot to foot as she waited for him to appear.

"Steve, calm down. We don't know what's going on." The voice was feminine and unfamiliar.

"That's precisely why I am in a hurry, Alyx. I would say it's a trick of some sort but no one knew—" He cut off as he stepped into view, his eyes immediately finding Anna. "It's not possible."

She immediately ran to him and launched herself into his arms. She held him tightly and buried her face in his neck. As his arms wrapped around her in return, she finally let herself cry the tears she tried so hard to keep at bay most of the time.

Steve shifted one hand to the back of her head and made comforting noises as he carried them over to the couch. He sat and settled her sideways across his lap. She kept her face buried against him long after the tears stopped. It had been so long since she'd felt a comforting touch, a gentle hand. For just a moment she could pretend everything was normal, that it had all been a long horrible nightmare.

Finally, she pulled back and looked at him. He gave her that familiar warm smile and she couldn't help but return it.

"How?" was all he said.

"Hydra," Tony answered for her.

Steve's face immediately contorted in anger and concern. "Are you all right?"

"She appears to be fine. Of course, we have no idea what all has been done to her. How long has she been missing?" That came from Dr. Banner.

"She was listed as killed during a medical tent explosion during World War II."

"World War II? You can't be serious," Tony said.

"Is it really that hard to believe, Tony? I'm from the same period."

"Yeah, but she wasn't frozen in the ice."

"Maybe she was," Bruce added with a shrug.

Before Steve could say anything else, she cleared her throat. He looked at her expectantly, those piercing blue eyes of his asking so many questions she wasn't ready to answer.

"Bucky's alive," she said and the room grew loud with voices.