Victoria

3rd of July, 2011.
S.H.I.E.L.D. Headquarters, Triskelion.
Washington, D.C.

  I poured myself some coffee from a pot that's on a coffee station to the left side of the room before I sat back down on my desk. I sighed as my left hand found the area where one of the bullets hit me in Budapest on my abdomen.

  That's why I'm here, listening to foreign conversations of civilians through intervened devices worldwide —which is a fancy way to say you're spying on people— that might find themselves near a zone of interest, from a comfortable chair at headquarters and should be ready to answer if any operative that's been dispatched on a mission calls. It's hell being chained to a desk when you're used to be on the field, veins full of adrenaline, but orders are orders. Unfortunately.

  After taking a sip of my disgustingly bitter black coffee and leaving a red lipstick stain on the mug, I placed the diadem that's connected to the phone over my head as I reclined on the back of the chair to fix the blue blazer of the suit I'm wearing. It was odd to wear these elegant pant suits instead of a tactical suit.

"Hey." Said Sharon's familiar voice. We didn't grow up together, but I ended up moving in with her five years ago until I moved out to my own apartment a couple months back.

"You're late." I said to her as I took a sip of my coffee again, almost spitting it back into the mug.

"Yeah, well, I was busy attending a meeting." I nodded, knowing her schedule because it's stuck to the cork that's on the wall of her station, to which I had a direct view of to my right.

"Ugh, that's fucking disgusting." I said under my breath as I placed the mug on my desk and Sharon chuckled.

"That's a childish mug." She said narrowing her eyes at the white mug with a small blue and orange dinosaur that said 'fuck'.

"You gifted it to me." I said as I scoffed and she chuckled.

"Yeah, as a secret Santa joke."

"Well, it's my favourite mug, alongside the 'my house, my rules, my coffee' mug." I shrugged as I took another mouthful of coffee that I gulped with difficulty.

"Stop drinking it if it's so disgusting."

"Oddly enough, I can't. My need for caffeine is stronger than the urge to stop drinking the coffee Jefferson made for this shift." I sighed. "I've been struggling not to fall asleep for the past hour and a half, so..."

"You shouldn't have coffee with your medication." I waved her off as I took a sip again, Sharon rolled her eyes. "Anyways, how have things been over here?" She asked as she took off her blazer and placed it over the back of the chair.

"Quiet, which is surprising because tomorrow's 4th of July." She sighed as she sat down on the desk beside me and I took off the diadem. "How'd the meeting go?" I asked as I saw Fury arrive with Coulson and Hill to his office through the wall of windows of the room itself.

  He looked my way as he stepped near the window and I placed my mug up to cheers at him, saying hi. He nodded his head, tapped the glass twice and it became opaque, granting him the privacy he needed for his meeting with Phill and Maria.

"Good, turns out my undercover mission was a success."

"Oh, that's great." She nodded.

"Yeah, I'm staying here until further notice."

"Why?"

"Fury's heading to New York's H.Q and he's taking Coulson and Hill with him, so he's asked me to stay here and cover for them."

"Good for you, agent Carter." She smiled at me as I put on the diadem again when the phone's button turned green.

"Thank you, agent Carter." We chuckled at that ridiculous joke. Sharing last name was a fuss but we decided to take it with humour. Only that, when we've been on missions together, she's the one to use 'Carter' while I use my father's last name, or we stick to the agent codes we have. I answered the phone. "You know what? We should-" I complained at the sudden sound of static that hurt my ear. "What?"

"Nothing, random interference." I fixed that up by amplifying the signal with a few clicks of the computer's mouse. I changed channel as the information that was coming through the previous one was irrelevant and the voices started to speak Russian. I frowned and started typing the keyboard the coordinates of the source, quickly finding them in the Arctic region where a high importance operation is taking place since last year.

"Everything alright?" The Russian men spoke about a job that just got complicated because of something they could read on their radar, then, I heard commotion. Someone complaining about almost crashing onto it.

"I'm figuring that out. Uh, do you have the file of Op. Valkyrie nearby?" Sharon typed on her computer quickly and opened the file.

"What do you need?"

"The agent that's leading it on location."

"Agent 5-12." I sent a message to the agent asking him to make contact, in a minute, the phone rang and he answered the phone.

"T.H.Q, Agent 14, SSN code D-742-6193 speaking." I spoke.

"Agent 5-12, SSN code 789-430-54." Said a male voice and I typed the numbers in the keyboard of my computer, the screen quickly showing the location of the agent through our satellite, he was at the Arctic Region, as well as his picture and file. "What's the matter H.Q?"

"Agent 5-12, I'm intercepting a communication channel of Russian civilians near your area, they claim to be an oil team. Do you have a visual?"

"Hold there, Agent 14." A moment of silence. "They are an oil team, indeed. I have a visual on the cars. I-" Silence.

"Agent 5-12? Everything alright?"

"H.Q...inform Director Fury and agent Coulson that we might have found something." I gulped.

"Repeat, 5-12?" Sharon moved closer to me watching the screen of my computer and trying to catch a glimpse of the conversation.

"Inform Director Fury we may have found the wreckage." I covered my mouth as I grabbed one of the post-it's I have on my desk and wrote down the coordinates I had of the Russian transports.

"Get to the civilians, ask them to leave the area under our orders, secure a perimeter, and I'll inform the Director."

"Will do, 14. We'll be waiting for your arrival. 5-12 over and out." I took off the diadem and stood up quickly.

"What's going on?" Asked Sharon, I just looked at her and smiled, and she understood. "Holy shit." I basically ran across the room and up the stairs until I was standing before Fury's door. I knocked on it twice.

"Come in." Said the Director, annoyed. I opened the door just to find three of the most distinguished operatives of the company staring at me. "What?" I walked in, closing the door behind me and handed over the post-it. Nick stared at it, then back at me.

"Those are the coordinates of a Russian oil team in the Arctic, just a few degrees and minutes away from our operatives of Op. Valkyrie." I informed.

"And?"

"I intercepted and listened to their conversation, they said they had seen on their radars something big on the road, they almost crashed their vehicles against it, and described it as a metallic thing that resembled a part of an aircraft that came out the ice." Coulson sat up straight and Hill unfolded her arms, her eyes meeting Fury's. "I've sent our operatives to the area for them to safely remove the civilians and secure the perimeter. Agent 5-12 should be waiting for us there." Fury looked at Coulson.

"Go." Phil stood up and walked towards the door.

"I'm taking her with me." Fury arched his eyebrow. "She intercepted the call, it's only fair Carter comes along." Fury doubted for a moment and nodded.

"Are you discharging me from the desk?" I asked, smiling.

"You're still grounded." I rolled my eyes, the smile fading and being replaced by an annoyed frown.

"You know I'm not a kid, right?"

"Kid or not, if you fuck up on a mission, you get grounded. Simple as that. But I am discharging you from the desk. For now. Get out of here before I change my mind and send someone else with Coulson." I smiled at him.

"Thank you, sir." I rushed out of the office and met up with Phil. "I could kiss you right now." He chuckled.

"I thought it was about time you'd get off that chair." I laughed. "Get your stuff, meet me in the hangar."

"Yes, sir." I walked up to my station and started logging out of everything, shutting down the computer I had used.

"You're going aren't you?" I chuckled at Sharon's question. "You lucky bitch." I laughed.

"That's definitely an angry compliment, but I'm taking it because I'm cool and great at my job." I said as I grabbed my bag and threw it over my shoulder.

"I hope you catch a cold."

"Hey, keep your jealousy to yourself." She smiled at me. "See you around."

"Good luck out there, don't do anything stupid and look after yourself." I nodded and walked away with quick steps towards the dressing rooms. I got rid of the elegant navy blue suit and put on a tactical and thermal suit. I clipped my belt around my hips and rushed to get to the hangar, where I found Coulson boarding a Quinjet. I boarded with him and we undertook an eighteen hour trip from D.C to the Arctic region.

  It was a long trip. We arrived at the early hours of the 4th of July. It took an extra of four hours to get to the site from the area the jet had dropped us off.

No cold weather compares to the cold that I experienced the second I opened the door of the truck. Even with the thermal suit, the scarves, gloves and jackets, it felt as if I'd freeze to death here. We got off the car and immediately felt how strong the wind is and the way it moved in all directions. It was scary to think we were stepping on ice covered by piles of snow, but it's a good thing it's solid and it won't break. I think. However, I knew that would complicate our mission.

"I'm Agent 5-12. You're the guys from Washington?" Asked the man that had come to receive us over the wind.

"I'm Agent 14," I said shaking his hand. "This is agent Coulson. We spoke on the phone." He nodded and let go of my hand to greet Phil.

"Glad you got here fast." He started guiding us through the thick wind that carried snow and made it a little hard to see.

"How long have you been on site?" Asked Coulson.

"The eighteen hours it took you to get here." I scoffed.

"How come nobody spotted it before?"

"It's really not that surprising. This landscape's changing all the time. That's why it was so hard for us to pinpoint the location of the plane."

"You can confirm it is the Valkyrie?"

"We read the number on the wing. The serial number is the one we've been searching for." I looked at Coulson, he had a smile on his face. "The only problem is that we don't have the equipment for a job like this."

"How long before we can start craning it out?" I asked.

"I don't think you quite understand." I frowned. "You guys are gonna need one hell of a crane." We stopped walking and my eyes went from the man beside me to the metallic part of a plane that got out of the ice. It was huge, in all my years in the field I had never seen the wreckage of an aircraft. It was shocking to look at it. I walked around to see it properly and realised the perimeter that had been secured covered miles of ice.

"Holy shit." I said under my breath.

  Coulson called the team from the jet and we waited for them to show in order to get to work and get the ship out of the ice. Coulson and I supervised the operation, helping when we could.

After running some scans, we realised we were standing on top of the ceiling of the ship, which meant we could cut through it and get into the aircraft to have a look with our own eyes. I was standing next to a laser machine that was cutting through the ice and the metal of the ship as I got a harness on to get into the ship.

  After thirty minutes, the hole was cut and the metal fell, clattering against the ground. I breathed in and out as I placed a protective helmet over my head and sat on the edge of the hole, getting ready to go inside, adjusting the protective suit. We didn't know what we might find, specially if there could be anything sort of radioactive, but it was better to be secured from anything. I nodded at the team and slid inside, being taken down by them carefully. Behind me, entered Phil, wearing a suit like mine.

"Base, we're in." I informed.

  It was dark and cold. I turned on my flashlight and looked around realising everything was covered by layers and layers of ice. Each step we took had to be taken carefully, for the floor was very slippery. It looked like a tomb. It felt like a tomb. A lot had happened in this place, you could sense it.

We approached the opposite side, near the cockpit, little by little; one of the steps I took almost took me to the ground because I had missed a step that was covered by ice and snow.

"Careful." Phil said to me and I nodded as I breathed in. I moved the flashlight to see what was in front of me, a colourful shimmer calling my attention. I approached the spot carefully and knelt before it. I removed the snow and frost from it with my hand, revealing something everyone thought was lost long ago.

"Coulson!" I called and he approached me with quick steps. I looked over my shoulder to find the same shock I believe it's in my eyes in his the second they landed on what was captured in thick ice. "Is it...?"

"My God." He whispered and I stood up, I began to approach the seat by the console of the ship. When I looked at the pilot's chair, I yelped, frightened and surprised. "What?" Asked Coulson as he rushed to where I was standing, almost sliding on the ground due to the slippery ice. My eyes were glued to the face of a man, his eyes closed, the years hadn't gone through him. He looked like the old pictures in history books I read growing up. When Phil's eyes landed on the person I kept staring at, he dropped his flashlight to the ground. "Base, give me line to Director Fury."

"It's three in the morning back in Washington, sir." Said the operator through our earpiece.

"I don't care what time it is. This one's waited long enough."

  An extraction team came into the ship and started working on freeing the shield from the ice, as they did, they discovered there were a bunch of artefacts, as well as weaponry from the 40's that used to belong to HYDRA, the original enemy of S.H.I.E.L.D. when our name used to be the SSR.
Carefully, they removed Captain America himself from the ice extremely slowly to make sure no harm came to the corpse. We had been pulled out through the hole in the roof before they brought a block of ice with the super soldier inside.

"And here I was thinking we'd only find the debris of an aircraft, nothing else." I said to Coulson as they loaded Captain America on the back of the truck we had driven on to here. His shield accompanying him and us.

"That's what keeps it fun." I chuckled as we got into the truck and Phil drove us back to the Quinjet, when we had gotten there, we boarded the transport and began the journey back home after we had informed Fury of the kind of equipment that was needed at the Arctic to extract the Valkyrie from the ice.

  The back of our transport was adapted to melt the thick ice cocoon that was around Captain Rogers. It caused the jet to feel extremely hot, but it was necessary. Slowly, it began to melt and the med team could analyse the body. Half of the ice was gone, his face and chest free of it. "He went down into the ice in late 1943. He was twenty five." Said Coulson all of the sudden as we stood beside the table where Rogers was laying down, our protective and thermal suits gone and replaced by tactical gear.

"You're kidding." Coulson shook his head as I crossed my arms over my chest looking at Captain America's face. "That's how old I am today. He doesn't look one day older than that." Phil shrugged.

"The ice preserved him." He sighed. "Today he would've turned twenty six." He added as he looked at the date on his watch and shook his head as he sighed, returning his gaze to the frozen Captain. "I'll get some rest, you should do the same, kid." I nodded as Phil turned around and started to walk away. That's when I noticed a slight movement in Rogers' hand, the twitch of a finger.

"Wait." I called, softly, making Coulson turn around. "What was that?" I asked the Doctor that was on board.

"What thing?" He asked as I pointed at Rogers' hand and we all waited until it happened again.

"Did you see that?"

"It's certainly a reflex."

"A reflex? From a guy that's been frozen for the past sixty eight years? Nah." I shook my head. "He should be dead, with no muscular or brain activity. How can that be a reflex?" Coulson approached me and looked closely. I put on a pair of gloves and gently placed two fingers of my right hand on Steve Rogers' neck while my left hand held his. His skin was, obviously, extremely cold. The exact way a corpse should be, but I could feel a faint thudding. Then, I watched his chest inflate as his hand squeezed mine very faintly. "He's alive." I said to myself.

"What did you say?" Asked Phil.

"Connect him to the monitors, please." The Doctor's team did as I asked and connected Rogers to the monitors searching for brain and cardiac activity. At first, there was nothing. However, after a hot minute went by, a faint heartbeat was picked on by the monitor, as well as brain activity. "My God." I said as I looked at Steve, his hand squeezing mine again.

"This man is alive." The Doctor said aloud. "We must get him warm, free him from the ice and make sure he doesn't suffer from any reprisals of the accident." He turned to us. "Please, let us work. We'll keep you informed." He forced us to step away as they began to work on him, bringing more heaters and stuff to unfreeze him.

"What the hell?" Coulson asked to himself.

"Happy 26th birthday, Captain. I guess." I said. "How is that possible? How could he have survived that?"

"I don't know." Phil ran a hand through his face and sighed as he checked his watch again. "There are still ten hours to go." I remained standing there for a few minutes after Coulson had left to sit near the cockpit and away from the heat, wondering how the hell did America's golden boy from the 40's survived this long frozen in the Arctic, until I went to sleep for the rest of the trip.