INTERLUDE #18
“WHAT is happening in Minneapolis, Faustus?”
In the command center of his secret facility in upstate New York, the Red Skull and Doctor Faustus are watching live, hijacked security-cam views of the confrontation between the two Captain Americas. A.I.M. techs are working furiously to suppress the feeds from the cams to security firms and local police.
“He’s cracking,” Faustus replies. “I told you he wasn’t ready yet. The reality I set up for him isn’t embedded securely enough. I needed at least ten more sessions—”
“Get him out of there before we lose him, too. Send the recall signal immediately.”
“That may take a minute or two.”
An A.I.M. security specialist enters the command center and rushes up to the Red Skull. “There’s a situation down at the medical bay. Your daughter and Sharon Carter…”
THIRTY-EIGHT
“…YOU remember the Red Skull, don’t you? Do you seriously believe that a psychotic ex-Nazi has our country’s best interests at heart?”
The man with Steve Rogers’ face is trying desperately to make all his conflicting memories add up to something that makes sense.
“No, that’s not…”
Bucky backs off and lets the man stand.
“I can prove it. If you take off your shirt, there are keloid scars all over your chest, right? You’re William Burn-side, and you were really Captain America in the 1950s, but you…had problems, and Doctor Faustus—”
“This is not right. You’re a traitor and a murderer…”
The glazing of Burnside’s eyes lasts two seconds. There is a subtle change when they refocus, as if a switch had just been thrown. Bucky continues, not noticing the difference.
“I was those things, and I’m sorry. But I can help you—”
The movement is so fast that Bucky never sees it. Burn-side may have gone insane, but he had actually been dosed with an imperfect version of a Super-Soldier Serum, that made him incredibly strong and swift.
Bucky finds himself plunging off the roof toward the pavement twenty-five stories below. Burnside screams from the parapet.
“You’re sorry? You should be dead!”
Falcon slams into Bucky fifty feet from the pavement, changing downward inertia into a lateral glide path that has them both tumbling on the sidewalk two blocks from the impact point.
They both roll to their feet amid shocked shoppers entering and exiting the Nicollet Mall.
“Just smile and keep walking,” Falcon says, striding nonchalantly. “And don’t count on me catching you next time.”
“I don’t know how to thank you, Sam—but shouldn’t we be trying to pick up Burnside’s trail?”
Falcon shakes his head; “We have to spin our wheels and wait for Redwing to get a bead on where Burnside is going.”
“Your bird is following him? You knew who he was all along?”
“I had my suspicions. But I didn’t tell you because I thought you might fly off the handle and go after him yourself.”
Falcon stops Bucky before he can say anything.
“If it makes you feel any better, I think Steve would have gone the same route.”
INTERLUDE #19
“HOW did this happen?”
The Red Skull is barely able to contain his fury. Sharon Carter is lying in the corridor outside the medical bay with a scalpel embedded in her abdomen. A.I.M. medical techs and Doctor Faustus are kneeling to attend to Carter as Sin stands nearby, immensely pleased with herself.
“She was trying to escape,” Sin smirks. “Trying to use me as a hostage, but I knew the code phrase Faustus used on her: ‘I don’t believe we’re done with you yet, Agent 13.’ She went all blank-faced and compliant after I said it, so I grabbed the scalpel and stuck her.”
The slap sends Sin reeling.
“You stupid, stupid girl. You have no idea what you have done. Agent 13 and the gobbet of living tissue in her womb are vitally important to me in several ways. I should never have let you live.”
The medical techs lift Sharon Carter onto a gurney and wheel her back into the ICU. Faustus peels off a pair of bloody latex gloves and lets them fall to the floor. There are specks of blood on his monocle and in his beard. He is speaking to Red Skull but looking at Sin.
“She will live. Whether we can save the baby is another matter. The coupling of the wound trauma with an arbitrary and capricious use of the code phrase may have undone months of work.”
Neither Red Skull nor Faustus harbor expectations of contrition from Sin, and they get none.
On his way back to his private suite, the Red Skull notices the hum of electronic activity from Arnim Zola’s lab. Inside, as usual, the robotic professor is plumbing the unknowable with the inexplicable.
“Nice of you to let us know you’re back, Zola.”
Zola ignores him, of course.
THIRTY-NINE
FALCON lays down a full house, nines high, and rakes in the pot. Bucky totals up his losses.
“I’m into you for a hundred and ninety-eight. Is the mook still in the diner?”
The two of them had been holed up in a motel room on the outskirts of Toledo, Ohio, for four days. William Burn-side’s room is three doors down. Burnside has done nothing but stay in his room and eat his meals at the diner across the street.
Sam gets up and peeks through the blinds with auto-ranging binoculars.
“He’s having the liver and onions, with potatoes O’Brien on the side again. A creature of habit is our lad Burnside. Oh, and Natasha called while I was out filling the ice bucket. S.H.I.E.L.D. techs pulled the charred pieces of Arnim Zola’s android body out of the rubble; they say he was plugged into some sort of transference device.”
“I read Zola’s file when I downloaded the A.I.M. dossier through Fury’s backdoor link to the S.H.I.E.L.D. database. He’s a body-switcher from way back, Sam. Nothing but a brain-wave pattern in temporary residence. But why isn’t our Cap doppelganger going home to roost? It’s like he’s hiding out, avoiding his own crew.”
Falcon pulls back from the window and shuts the blinds tight.
“An A.I.M. enforcement team just surrounded the diner. If Mr. Burnside isn’t reporting back to Red Skull on his own, the beekeepers will drag him in feet-first. Redwing will have eyes on him either way, and we win.”
Bucky looks through the peephole in the door.
“Maybe we should be helping him, instead of—”
“Using him?”
“I’m not big on stuff like that, Sam.”
“Bottom line: I care less about him than I care about Sharon.”
Bucky pulls back from the peephole.
“He’s onto them.”
Sam yanks open the blinds. Across the street, they see Burnside get up from his booth and run to the back door of the diner. Two squads of A.I.M. troopers with heavy-energy weapons cut off the alley behind the diner from both ends. There are flashes of bright light, and an unmarked van backs into the alley. One minute later, the van pulls out and proceeds down a side street.
Above, a circling hawk suddenly banks and follows the van.
INTERLUDE #20
RED Skull lets himself into Arnim Zola’s lab. He notes that there is one less “spare” in the row of robotic bodies since the explosion at the abandoned mental-health facility. The absence of a replacement makes Red Skull wonder if Zola is slipping, or whether he is preoccupied with his work on Doctor Doom’s device.
“You might be interested to know that we have our errant Captain America substitute back in custody, if not in willing spirit.”
Unexpectedly, Zola stops what he is doing and regards the Red Skull.
“That makes another of Doctor Faustus’ mistakes cleared up. In the old days, you would not have stood for such incompetence.”
“The old days are over, Professor Zola. And despite his overblown ego, it was Faustus’ control over Sharon Carter that made my overall plan possible. If she were only sti
ll of use to us.”
Zola holds up a glowing vial with steel tongs. Proximity to the vial makes the sinuses contract in the body Red Skull shares with Lukin.
“We need her for one more thing, Herr Skull. That is, if you are still serious about proceeding. And I hope you are not. I am still constructing the platform, and I remind you that we can make only a single attempt—”
“My insolent daughter has left us no choice.”
The Red Skull tugs the mask from his head, and Aleksander Lukin continues with his distinctive Russian accent, “Would you have us stuck like this forever?”
“If that is not a rhetorical question, the answer is ‘no.’”
“Then whatever part of Doctor Doom’s device still eludes your grasp, find it and complete the machine before your leader and I both go insane from our forced proximity.”
FORTY
IN the medical bay, Sharon Carter watches Doctor Faustus enter the ICU through a haze of painkillers.
“You’ve lost your baby, my dear. I am truly sorry.”
Not even the powerful medications can staunch the fierceness of the anger she feels toward Faustus, Red Skull, and all the rest. She strains at her bonds. She struggles to find words vitriolic enough to express what is inside her.
“The Red Skull is incensed. You realize there will be repercussions? Surely, you do. And you know, as well, that they never intended for you to keep the baby. They wanted it for their ends. Did you intend to die, to keep the child from their hands?”
“Yes, yes, yes,” she snarls.
Doctor Faustus places an oddly cool hand on her forehead. Her anger and pain subsides, replaced by an artificial calm.
“That’s better. Did you know that even the worst monsters may harbor the delusion of caring and may develop a real affection that overrides certain, shall we say, fixations?”
A horror is growing in the back of Sharon’s brain, but something is telling her not to care about it.
“You are an amazing specimen, Agent 13. I sincerely hope you make it through the coming days. Do not be afraid of retribution from the Red Skull. He and Zola still need you. You are the constant, after all.”
None of what Faustus is saying makes any sense to Sharon.
“I am absenting myself from the finale of this drama, but I am leaving you with two gifts.”
He places a small blinking device in Sharon’s hand. She knows what it is. It’s her own S.H.I.E.L.D. GPS locater, and it’s been switched back on.
“And this is my most valuable gift, my dear: I don’t believe we’re done with you yet, Agent 13.” Her eyes go blank, and he continues, “Forget your grief. You were never really pregnant. It was all a bad dream. When I am gone, you will have complete control of your own mind again. Be strong, Sharon—and good-bye.”
PART FIVE
UNRAVEL
AND
RE-KNIT
FORTY-ONE
BUCKY has been heading east toward Albany on I-90 for eight bug-eating hours. Above, Falcon rides the air currents, keeping track of the incoming intel from Redwing and other birds.
Redwing’s endurance is limited by his need to kill and eat, so other birds along the route have been recruited to maintain a leapfrog relay of avian surveillance on the A.I.M. van transporting William Burnside. Eagles, barn owls, crows, sparrows, robins, finches, and yellow-bellied sapsuckers all have done their turns.
It was Redwing, taking over from a yellow warbler, that spotted the van descending a camouflaged ramp in a densely wooded area due east of Albany.
The two heroes stop to consult on the east side of the Hudson River, where I-90 turns south.
“The birds spotted air and heat vents sticking out of the ground around that ramp covering an area bigger than two football fields. Disguising them as trees might fool a hiker, but birds sure know the difference. I’d say there’s a sizeable underground A.I.M. base in the woods there.”
“More than the two of us can handle?”
“Does that matter?”
“Not if Sharon is in there.”
As Bucky climbs back on his bike and Falcon spreads his wings, a small armada of S.H.I.E.L.D. flying cars, light transports, and heavy troop carriers descends and settles around them. Black Widow hops out of the lead car. Sam is ticked off.
“Damn, Natasha. Did you put a trace on me when you called while we were staking out the diner in Toledo?”
“Actually, we were tipped off by a disgruntled former associate of the Red Skull, who also informed us that you two might be on your way.”
“And just who might this ‘disgruntled former associate’ be?” Bucky asks.
“Doctor Faustus decided to terminate his partnership with Red Skull and has neglected to inform him of the fact. As a gesture of good faith, Faustus turned on Sharon Carter’s GPS transmitter last night. She’s in—”
“An underground A.I.M. facility east of here?”
“We confirmed that. And it’s not a trap. We’ve cased the place all day and tapped into their internal communications. We’ve compromised their radar, infrared detectors, and alarm systems. A bunker-buster strike will blast open entrances and escape tunnels in about two hours.”
“Sounds like S.H.I.E.L.D. has this all covered, Natasha. Are we being uninvited to the party?”
“Nyet, Zeemneey Soldat. Faustus also told us that another part of Red Skull’s plan is going into effect in Albany at the presidential debate. Captain America needs to be there to stop it.”
“Captain America will be there,” Bucky says. “What time?”
Black Widow hands him an earpiece.
“You have less than ninety minutes. Stark will monitor and update you as you go. Better move.”
INTERLUDE #21
SENATOR Wright is perturbed. Doctor Faustus is in the bathroom of the Senator’s suite in the best hotel in Albany, shaving off his voluminous beard.
“You can’t leave me on my own at this stage, Doctor. Without your advice, and without your help rewriting my speeches, I don’t believe I could have come this far.”
Faustus pats his smooth cheeks dry and helps himself to a brisk splash of Wright’s expensive aftershave.
“You need to relax, Senator. Everything will work out fine. I have to be elsewhere, but I will see you again someday. You can be sure of that.”
Donning a suit jacket of much more modern cut than he usually wears, Doctor Faustus goes to the door with Wright at his heels. The Senator is fighting back a rising panic.
“But what about the debate? It starts in less than half an hour. I was supposed to be a hero.”
Faustus’ fingertips feel extremely reassuring on the Senator’s forehead. The anxiety seems to melt away. Can there be anything more soothing than the voice of Faustus?
“And a hero you will be. Simply remember: When you hear the first shot, the man on your left will fall, and then you will dive to save the manon your right.”
FORTY-TWO
FIFTY different views of the University Auditorium in Albany are showing on the monitor screens in the S.H.I.E.L.D. operations center within the Helicarrier. A capacity crowd has packed the venue for the presidential debate, and the attendees are anxious to hear the latest word from candidate Gordon Wright.
Smaller screens show every corridor within the building, and all the walkways and approaches, as well as every neighboring rooftop. An extra shift of S.H.I.E.L.D. operatives is on duty, assisting with monitoring and assessments.
A number of newscasters are blathering endlessly about the Senator’s rapid rise in the polls and the popularity of his positions and stances.
Director Stark stands on the catwalk overlooking the monitors, and watches the sea of faces filing into the auditorium and taking their seats. In a different political climate, he would have been on the scene himself supervising the operation as Iron Man. But after the divisive agonies of the Civil War and recent public-relations disasters stemming from the riots, Stark knows it is best to keep a low profile. He
reflects that transparency might be good for democracy in the long run, but that it certainly plays hell with the short game. Stark sees that same concern on all the familiar faces of his operations staff whenever they turn from their tasks to look at him. All this would be a lot simpler if Iron Man were on the job—
Familiar faces.
He makes a sudden decision.
“Run a facial-identification scan on everybody in the auditorium and within a two-block radius.”
The operations staff is stunned, and one of the analysts objects: “Sir, that will hog all our computer resources, and the deep study we’re running on Agent 13’s pistol and the bullets that killed Steve Rogers hasn’t finished. There are anomalies about the bullets that—”
“Just do it.”
INTERLUDE #22
IN the underground A.I.M. facility east of Albany, the Red Skull stops by the Immersion Room to check on the disposition of his substitute Captain America, William Burnside. The same kind of containment equipment that had secured the Winter Soldier is being used to immobilize the recaptured doppelganger, and his brain has been plugged into the devices that will ensure his future cooperation. Red Skull wonders why Doctor Faustus isn’t personally supervising this part of the operation. He orders the A.I.M. techs to find Faustus.
Farther down the hall, in Arnim Zola’s lab, Red Skull is gratified to see the pulsing blue glow that marks the powering-up of Doctor Doom’s device. He fights back the vertigo he feels as he enters the lab. When the machine is turned on, the floor seems to be constantly tipping.
“Is it ready, Zola?”
“I believe so. Of course, there is no way to tell if it works. It will either implant your essence in the new body, or it won’t.”
“And the other device? The one that separates me from Lukin?”
“That one I have more confidence in, since I designed it myself.”
The Death Of Captain America Page 20
