96 Alexander Pierce

When Steve and Natasha arrived at SHIELD Headquarters flanked by the STRIKE team, the mood inside the building shifted palpably. Conversations died mid-sentence. Keyboards stopped clacking. Agents and analysts turned to look at them. Some with curiosity, others with unease. Captain America and the Black Widow were legends in this building, but today, they were being treated like suspects.

The echo of their footsteps down the main corridor seemed louder than usual. STRIKE agents boxed them in, walking too close for comfort with their shoulders rigid and their hands near their weapons, ready for a confrontation any moment. This didn’t feel like an escort but an arrest. Everyone watching knew something was off. This wasn’t how SHIELD handled its own. You didn’t parade top-level agents through the halls like prisoners unless you wanted to send a message.

The closer they got to the executive floor, the colder the atmosphere grew. Like the building itself was turning against them. Every security checkpoint they passed, every sideways glance from a surveillance officer, was another reminder: they weren’t walking through home turf anymore. They were walking through a battlefield, they just didn’t know where the bullets were coming from yet.

Steve glanced at Natasha once. She didn’t say a word, but her eyes flicked toward a camera overhead, then back to the STRIKE agents ahead.

She knew.
He knew.
They both knew.

SHIELD was no longer safe.

When they finally reached the executive floor, Secretary Pierce stood just outside his office, shaking hands with a young blonde agent. Steve stopped short.

He recognised her immediately. It was his neighbour. The girl who had smiled in the elevator, chatted about laundry days, and warned him about nosy tenants. The same girl who, just last night, had drawn a weapon and rushed in to help when Fury was shot in his apartment.

Steve’s shoulders tensed. The neighbourly smile she wore had been a cover. And Steve had trusted it. Even if he understood why she had to be there, it didn’t make the deception any less personal.

Natasha noticed his posture stiffen. She leaned in close, speaking low enough that only he could hear.

“Be civil,” she said in a warning tone. “Agent 13’s one of the good ones. She’s not part of whatever this rot is.”

Steve didn’t respond, but his frown deepened. Natasha rolled her eyes, “And try not to scowl like a five-year-old who just got told Santa isn’t real.”

He exhaled sharply through his nose, half sigh, half pout.

Pierce gave Agent 13’s hand a final squeeze and let her go. “You did all you could, and for what it’s worth, you did your best,”

The agent nodded and shook his hand. “Thank you, sir.”

She turned and spotted Natasha. “Agent Romanoff.”

Natasha offered a small smile. “Sharon.”

Her eyes flicked to Steve. “Captain Rogers.”

Steve didn’t return the smile. He nodded, voice flat. “Neighbor.”

It came out colder than he intended, and Natasha gave him a swift, subtle nudge with her elbow.

Agent 13 didn’t flinch. She gave a curt nod and walked past them.

As Steve and Natasha continued to the Secretary’s office Natasha warned “Behave, or so help me I’ll start embarrassing you in front of the grown-ups.”

Steve shot her a glare that had the energy of a sulky teenager.

Alexander Pierce stood just inside the threshold of his office and extended a hand as Steve approached. "Ah, Captain Rogers," he greeted, "Alexander Pierce."

Steve clasped the offered hand firmly. "Sir. It's an honor."

Pierce gave a nod, the kind that came from a man used to commanding rooms without ever raising his voice. “The honour’s mine. My father served in the 101st. He used to keep a photo of your unit framed in his study. Said you boys were legends long before the war was even over.”

Steve smiled sincerely. “He sounds like a good man.”

“He was. Stubborn as hell.” Pierce said, stepping aside and gesturing them both in. “Come in. Let’s talk somewhere a little more comfortable.”

Natasha followed silently as her eyes scanned the office, looking for exits and weak points.

Steve followed Pierce into the spacious office. Warm wood panelling, leather chairs, and a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows, while the other side of the wall was covered by a large screen that provided real-time updates on SHIELD missions.

On a credenza by the far wall, something caught Steve’s eye. A framed photograph showed a younger Nick Fury, standing beside a just-as-serious but slightly less weathered Alexander Pierce. Steve walked over and picked up the photo.

“That was taken five years after Nick and I met,” Pierce said, approaching from behind. “Back when I was stationed at the State Department in Bogotá. ELN rebels took the embassy. Security managed to get me out, but they held hostages.”

Natasha had already settled into one of the leather sofas, appearing completely relaxed. Her legs crossed, one arm draped across the backrest, but her eyes were moving, subtly taking stock of everything: door locks, sightlines, security cameras.

Pierce stepped up beside Steve as his gaze lingered on the photo. “Nick was deputy chief at the SHIELD station there. He came to me with a plan. Wanted to storm the building through the sewers.”

He chuckled quietly, as if amused by the memory. “I said, ‘No, we’ll negotiate.’”

Steve turned toward him curiously.

“Turned out the ELN didn’t negotiate,” Pierce continued, “They issued a kill order. We lost contact. Panic in the control room. And then… radio silence.”

His hand hovered over the photo but didn’t touch it.

“They stormed the basement. Found nothing. No hostages. Just empty space. Turns out Nick had ignored my direct order and led an unauthorised op on foreign soil. Saved the lives of a dozen political officers.”

He looked Steve dead in the eye now. “Including my daughter.”

Steve nodded slowly, placing the photo back on the credenza. “So you gave him a promotion.”

Pierce smiled, faint and nostalgic. “Yeah. I did. Sometimes, you gotta break the rules to do the right thing. And I've never had any cause to regret it," Pierce stated firmly

Behind him, Natasha’s gaze narrowed ever so slightly.

Pierce got strait to the point. “Captain, why was Nick in your apartment last night?”

Steve didn’t flinch. “I don’t know.”

Pierce tilted his head, studying him like a puzzle piece that didn’t quite fit. “You know it was bugged?”

“I did because Fury told me about it,” Steve replied, a bit guarded.

Pierce’s frowned. “Did he tell you,” Pierce asked carefully, “that she was the one who bugged it?”

He lifted a finger and pointed it toward Natasha.

Natasha didn’t even shift in her seat. She just arched an eyebrow with the kind of chill that could frost glass. She wasn’t offended. She wasn’t threatened. She was assessing. Calculating. Waiting to see how far Pierce would go with his little play.

She didn’t speak. Because she didn’t need to.

Steve already knew all of this. He remembered the night vividly, not because of the bug, but because of the company.

He, Natasha, and Harry had spent an entire evening turning that apartment into a surveillance masterpiece. It started as work, but somewhere between the third slice of pizza and Harry bragging about how the MI6 had the best surveillance, It had turned into a competition. Steve had walked them through old WWII tricks the Axis and the Allies used. Microphones behind baseboards, pressure sensors hidden in the carpet. Natasha countered with KGB methods such as hollowed-out power sockets, voice-activated transmitters tucked into lamps. And Harry, in his usual dry British fashion, had explained how unique MI6’s quartermaster or Q as they called him, had turned everyday items into surveillance devices.

They had laughed all night. He couldn’t remember the last time bugging a place had felt more like bonding than paranoia.

But none of that showed on his face now.

Steve met Pierce’s gaze with the calm, unreadable stare of a man who had faced down gods and monsters.

Pierce looked for a reaction but found none.

Pierce turned toward the wall-mounted monitor and tapped a control on his desk. The screen showed security footage of figures in black who moved like shadows across a deck that Steve and Natasha instantly recognised.

"I want you to see something," Pierce said.

The image zoomed out slightly to reveal the unmistakable hull of a high-tech vessel.

“What is that?” Steve asked, keeping his tone just curious enough.

“The Lemurian Star,” Pierce replied.

Steve raised an eyebrow. “The Lemurian Star?”

“One of SHIELD’s ships. Attacked a few days ago,” Pierce explained, his eyes never leaving theirs.

He reached into a drawer and slid a slim file folder across the table toward Steve.

Steve picked it up without hesitation, flipping it open. Natasha leaned slightly forward beside him as her eyes scanned the report that detailed, in sanitised bureaucratic phrasing, the very mission they had executed. Every line was like watching their own footprints in wet cement.

“Are we supposed to know about this?” Steve asked coolly.

“Not likely,” Pierce said with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “But here’s what makes it interesting: The assailants used tranquillisers made with a unique blend of chemicals that you can’t find in any market, black or white. There were no bullets. No explosives. All non-lethal takedowns. A very considerate operation.”

 Natasha tilted her head, feigning curiosity as she glanced back at the monitor. “So, what’s the plan here? You want to find the people who hit the ship and bring them in?” She leaned back in her chair, arms loosely crossed, a smirk creeping across her lips. “Well, you’re in luck. Steve and I make a hell of a team. We’ve even taken down aliens, you know, a whole army, actually.”

Pierce twitched. “This isn’t a joke, Agent Romanoff." After a pause, Pierce asked forcefully. "I wanted you here to ask if the Avengers had anything to do with the attack.”

The friendliness was gone.

“What do you mean, sir?” Natasha asked smoothly. She played the innocent well. It wasn’t the first time.

Pierce’s gaze moved between them. “When we analyzed the chemical composition of the tranquilizers used on the Lemurian Star, we found something interesting.”

He turned the monitor again, bringing up a chemical diagram.

“It’s a similar to Tetrodotoxin B,” Pierce said, each word slower, heavier. “Developed by Dr. Banner. A compound that reduces the human pulse to one beat per minute.”

Steve and Natasha stared at the chemical diagram stoically. Tetrodotoxin B was the same chemical that they had used to fake Fury’s death.

Steve and Natasha exchanged a long, unimpressed glance before Steve finally said, “Are you saying the Avengers acted like... pirates? Really?”

Pierce didn’t blink. “The prevailing theory is that the attack was a covert operation aimed at acquiring highly sensitive data regarding Project Insight.”

Natasha leaned back in her seat with a scoff, folding her arms as if this whole conversation had just nosedived into lunacy. “So let me get this straight. You think the Avengers suited up, hijacked a SHIELD battleship in the middle of the ocean, used experimental knockout drugs, neutralised over a dozen agents non-lethally, and downloaded classified intel… because we had nothing better to do?”

Steve let out a low whistle. “Pretty elaborate. I mean, I guess we could’ve just sent Stark an email.”

“Oh, please,” Natasha added, rolling her eyes. “Stark could hack your entire network in under ten minutes. He probably already has. The only reason he doesn’t poke around in SHIELD’s dirty laundry is because Harry convinced him not to. You think we needed a full-blown heist to learn about Project Insight? We’ve got gods and super-soldiers on speed dial.”

She leaned forward slightly and threatened. “If we wanted to know what you were up to, Mr. Secretary, you wouldn’t even know we were looking.”

Pierce’s jaw tightened ever so slightly.

Pierce’s eyes fixed on Steve. “You want to know why we’re even having this conversation?” he stated. “I didn’t take a seat on the World Security Council for prestige. I took it because Nick asked me to. Because he and I were realists. We understood the world doesn’t change just because you wish it would. Sometimes, to build something better, you have to tear down what’s broken. Project Insight was our answer.”

He paused, and for a brief moment, “And now, my friend is dead because of it.”

The air turned heavy.

“Captain, you were the last one to see him alive. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. And I don’t think you do either.” He leaned forward slightly. “So I’ll ask again, why was he in your apartment?”

Steve held his gaze. “He told me not to trust anyone.”

Pierce's eyes narrowed. “I wonder if that included him.”

There was a beat of silence before Steve answered, quiet but firm. “I don’t know. But those were his last words.”

He stood. So did Natasha.

“Excuse us,” Steve added.

They turned to leave, but Pierce’s voice rose behind them.

“Captain.”

Steve stopped at the door and looked back.

“Somebody murdered my friend,” Pierce said, his voice low and dangerous. “And I will find out who. If someone tries to stop me, they’re going to regret it.”

Steve nodded slowly. “Understood.” He turned and walked out.

Natasha lingered for a beat with her hand on the door.

Then, casually, almost like an afterthought, she looked back at Pierce.

“You know,” she said, “you never told us how you knew Fury was killed because of Project Insight.”

She let the question hang in the air, unblinking.

Pierce didn’t respond.

Natasha offered the faintest smile, one without warmth, and gently shut the door behind her.

Once they were back in the corridor, “they’re on to us,” Natasha muttered under her breath, glancing over her shoulder. “Where’s your shield?”

“In the hospital,” Steve replied quietly.

Natasha didn’t miss a beat. She pulled out her phone and typed a quick, coded message to Harry: “SHIELD compromised. Recover Cap’s shield from the hospital.”

As Steve moved instinctively toward the elevator, Natasha snagged his arm and pulled him back and directed them to the staircase.

“No elevators,” she said firmly. “We don’t want to fight in a steel box with one exit.”

Steve nodded grimly and checked the hallway. Security cameras tracked their movement now. He could feel it.

By the time he turned back, Natasha had already popped open a panel in her belt and pulled out a compact grappling hook and was hooking the line to the upper railing of the stairwell.

Steve scanned the hallway again. “They’ll try to intercept us on the lower levels.”

“Let them try,” Natasha said, already tying off the rope. “Middle floors will give us more breathing room.”

Without hesitation, she leapt, Steve grabbing the line behind her. They rappelled down fast. The rope hissed as it burned past the railing. They landed hard, knees bending into a crouch.

Natasha left the rope dangling—it would buy them time. Confusion was an ally now.

Footsteps echoed above. Orders barked. The chase had begun.

Natasha handed Steve a handgun. He took it without hesitation.

“In case we need to shoot our way out, we can get out from the north side garage,” she said, already reaching down to her ankle and pulling a smaller sidearm free. Steve checked the clip, slid it into place with a sharp click, and nodded. “Emergency staircase on the north side?”

“Yep,” Natasha confirmed, already moving.

Above them, the sharp sound of boots hitting metal rang down the stairwell. A SHIELD tactical squad had swarmed the upper levels faster than expected.

“Go,” Steve said.

No more words. The two bolted through the hallway. Sirens started to whine faintly through the building, and red security lights pulsed overhead. SHIELD may be compromised, but it was still home turf. They knew this place like the back of their hands and it worked both ways.

Midway through their sprint, a chilling voice rang out across the facility’s intercom.

“Attention: Captain Rogers is withholding critical information regarding the death of Director Fury and has refused to cooperate. As difficult as this is to accept… Captain America is now considered a fugitive from SHIELD. Do not let him leave the premises.”

Steve’s jaw clenched as the words echoed around them.

“How do we know who’s with SHIELD and who’s with the parasite?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” Natasha admitted, not slowing her pace. “We run until we can figure it out.”

They burst through the door to the north emergency stairwell and froze.

The entire landing was swarming with SHIELD agents in full tactical gear. Fiberglass shields at the ready, shock batons drawn. The stairwell had become a blockade.

For one breathless moment, no one moved. The agents stared at Steve Rogers and Natasha Romanoff.

“I guess that answers your question,” Natasha murmured, her voice flat and devoid of emotion.

The batons lit up, electricity crackling and dancing at their ends like angry serpents. “Captain Rogers. Agent Romanoff. You are ordered to surrender immediately.” One of the soldiers demanded.

Both Steve and Natasha dropped into their respective battle stances. The lead agent gave a shout, and chaos erupted.

Steve and Natasha launched forward in perfect sync. The cramped confines of the stairwell worked in their favor, limiting the number of agents who could engage at once. It turned the wide-eyed swarm into a funnel of bodies, and that was all the opening they needed.

Steve hit the first wave like a wrecking ball. With no shield, he used his body like one, parrying batons with his forearms, disarming agents with sharp, surgical strikes. He lifted one agent clean off the ground and hurled him down the stairs, clearing a path. A baton swung toward his head, but Steve ducked and slammed an elbow into the attacker’s chest, driving him into the wall hard enough to rattle the lights.

Natasha was a blur beside him. She dove low, slid across the floor beneath a swing, and came up spinning, snapping a baton out of an agent’s hand and flipping it midair before cracking it across his helmet. She vaulted off the stair railing, used a soldier’s shield as a springboard, and kicked two agents back in one motion.

One agent tried to sneak up behind Steve. Natasha saw it before he did. She whipped her borrowed baton across the agent’s knee, dropping him, then turned and shouted, “You’re welcome!”

Steve grunted as he caught another attacker by the vest and used him to block a taser burst. “I had it.”

“Sure you did,” she quipped, cartwheeling over a railing to land two levels down, flipping an agent flat on his back.

Their rhythm was devastating. Natasha would duck just as Steve’s punch sailed overhead into someone’s gut. Steve would pivot and knock aside a baton before it could hit Natasha’s blind spot. It was graceful, brutal choreography.

The agents kept coming, relentless, desperate, but it wasn’t enough. Not here. Not against them.

By the time the pair kicked open the door to the sub-level parking garage, the stairwell behind them was littered with groaning, unconscious bodies. Helmets cracked, shields dented, batons scattered like toys.

Steve glanced back up the stairwell and exhaled. “That all of them?”

“For now,” Natasha said. “But we need to move. Backup’s coming, and I’m not in the mood for an encore.”

Steve made a beeline for the nearest SHIELD vehicle, yanking open the driver’s side and ducking underneath to hotwire the ignition.

“Steve,” Natasha called, grabbing his arm before he could spark the wires together. “Come on. I’ve got something better.”

Before he could protest, she pulled him toward a side corridor. They sprinted down the narrow hallway, and came to a reinforced security door. Natasha swiped a keycard without breaking stride.

Steve raised an eyebrow. “Why hasn’t Pierce revoked your access?”

Natasha smirked as the door beeped and unlocked. “Who said it was my access?”

The door hissed open, revealing a hidden hangar bathed in white light. Inside sat five quinjets, lined up like sleeping beasts, ready to be unleashed.

Steve blinked. “How long have you had access to this?”

“I don’t like being trapped. So I planned a few exits. Just in case.”

Without further hesitation, Natasha led Steve toward the nearest quinjet. The alarms continued to scream while red lights flashed in violent pulses overhead. The door hissed open and the two Avengers vaulted in, Steve taking the co-pilot’s seat while Natasha slid into the pilot’s chair.

“Open the hatch!” she barked, as she tapped the consoles to start the jet.

But the console flashed red. “Access denied. SHIELD Headquarters is in full lockdown. You are not authorised to initiate takeoff.”

Steve looked out the cockpit window where rows of SHIELD were pouring into the hangar, flanking their position. “We’ve got company.”

He flipped open the weapons panel and engaged the targeting system, switching the onboard Gatling gun to non-lethal. The weapon dropped from beneath the jet's belly and began to spin, the soft whirrrrr growing into a deadly hum.

“How are we supposed to open the hatch?” he asked.

Natasha didn’t miss a beat. “Avenger override. Potter, Harry J.”

The system paused, then responded in that infuriatingly calm mechanical voice: “Please provide the security override code.”

The quinjet’s engines roared to life, vibrating beneath them. Steve’s finger hovered over the trigger. The agents raised their rifles.

“B.I.V.Z.6.4.3.,” Natasha enunciated clearly, eyes on the roof.

“Code accepted. Disengaging roof security hatch.”

With a mechanical groan, the hangar’s massive overhead doors began to retract, letting in a shaft of sunlight. But it was too slow.

“They're gonna fire!” Steve warned, and then he did before any of them could act.

The riot suppressor cannons blazed to life, raining down rubber pellets across the hangar floor. SHIELD agents dove for cover, some thrown backwards by the force, others knocked out cold by the impacts.

“They’ve sealed the perimeter!” Steve shouted. “We’ve got less than thirty seconds before they cut power to the launch bay.”

Natasha gritted her teeth. “That’s all I need.”

Once the hangar roof yawned open wide enough, Natasha didn’t wait. She gunned the engines, and the quinjet shot upward like a bullet, slicing through the narrow opening with inches to spare. The jet roared into the open sky, leaving SHIELD’s chaos behind.

The second they cleared the airspace, Natasha hit a switch. The quinjet shimmered, and its frame vanished into the clouds as the camouflage mode engaged.

Steve exhaled deeply and finally leaned back into his seat. “I can’t believe we just did that.”

Natasha gave a short chuckle as she adjusted their heading toward Manhattan. A beat passed before Steve asked, “Okay, but seriously, how did you have that access code?”

Natasha didn’t even look at him. “Harry had Stark install a backdoor access key into SHIELD. Just in case the parasite ever turned SHIELD into a trap for the Avengers.”

Steve blinked. “He what?”

“Also lets him override any internal security protocols,” she added casually, toggling the autopilot. “Hallways, bunkers, files… coffee machines. It’s a very broad override.”

Steve turned to look at her, half amused, half annoyed. “And no one thought to tell me this existed?”

Natasha smirked. “Harry said you didn’t need it. He figured if the parasite ever came for you, you’d just fight your way out like you always do.”

Steve raised an eyebrow. “That sounds less like Harry and more like Stark.”

Natasha finally cracked a grin. “You’re not wrong.”

They both continued their friendly banter, now more relaxed then just a few minutes ago, as the jet raced through the sky towards its destination.