Marvel's Captain America: Sub Rosa Read online

  “I don’t know whether I can trust you.” Katherine stared at him defiantly. “Until I do—if I ever do—I won’t be telling you anything.”

  “Hang on a minute!” Steve said angrily. “Why don’t you trust me? Are you implying I’m part of this . . . conspiracy against you, or whatever it is? If so, I resent that.”

  “No, I guess I can trust Maria’s judgment on that. Plus, I don’t think you’re capable of helping have someone knocked off.”

  “Then what is it?”

  She gave him a considering look, as if trying to decide whether to elaborate.

  “It’s obvious we have very different opinions about the wisdom of our government. I have to be honest, I’m bit worried that if I do tell you, you’ll feel duty bound to confiscate my research, or try and shut it down for the good of the nation, or some sort of rubbish like that.”

  Steve was more than angry now.

  “The good of the nation isn’t rubbish. But I gave Maria my word I would keep you alive, and the only way I’ll break that promise is if someone kills me first.”

  “Keep me alive. Not keep me free, right?” Katherine said. “It’s what you might do for my own good that worries me.”

  “I think you’re being a bit harsh given that you barely know me,” Steve said. He took a deep breath and tried to remember how young she was, and that she was likely scared to death and trying to hide it. “I don’t know what I can say to put you at ease.”

  “Neither do I,” she replied. “So that puts us in an awkward position, doesn’t it?”

  Steve nodded. “It does. How about this? I won’t insist on learning your secret if you come with me. Now.”

  She started to protest, but he cut her off.

  “I’m not saying you need my protection. But it will make me feel much better, and let me keep my promise to Maria. If you don’t need me, then that’s fine, but at least I get to feel useful. Sound fair?”

  “I guess so.”

  Although she had said it grudgingly, Steve could see the relief on her face. It had been pride stopping her from accepting his help, and he’d given her a way to back down while still saving face.

  “So, can I ask one more favor?” he asked.

  “Depends what it is.”

  “I’ve been doing this for a while, so if we do happen to come under attack or anything like that, will you follow my lead?”

  “I’m not stupid. I’m a genius when it comes to computers, but I know my limitations. If it’s a situation that you’re better at dealing with, I’ll listen.”

  “That’s very reasonable of you,” Steve said. “I appreciate it.”

  “Look, I don’t . . .”

  Whatever she was about to say was cut off by the sound of smashing glass coming from all parts of the house. This was followed by splintering wood and the sound of booted feet on the floors.

  Chapter 4

  Alexandria, Virginia: 2200 hours

  Steve was up and moving when the kitchen door slammed open. A small ovoid object came sailing through the door, but his hand was already on the handle of the pot sitting on the stove. With a backhand motion, he swatted the object, sending it flying back the way it had come.

  “Cover your ears and close your eyes!”

  A shout of alarm came from outside, followed by a jarring noise and a bright flash.

  “Flash grenade,” Steve said to Katherine. “Head down to the basement and don’t come up, no matter what. If I’m not there in five minutes, make a run for it. Not a minute more, or less. Got it?”

  “But what about you?” Katherine asked. “I can help.”

  “I’ll be fine, but I can’t watch out for myself and for you at the same time. Now, GO!”

  As Katherine headed toward the basement stairs, Steve sprinted out the kitchen door, running low and fast. Three men were scattered in the hallway, two lying prone. The other had pulled himself to his knees, but was busy vomiting, the flash grenade having done its work all too well. He barely reacted before Steve was on him, a knee to his head sending him to join his companions on the ground.

  Steve followed the sound of footsteps on the other side of the wall, and then turned, driving his shoulder into the drywall, hard. He crashed through into the living room, sending another pair of intruders flying. Two punches and they were out. The third man was short, giving up almost a foot to Steve, but broad across the shoulders, with the appearance of an ambulatory fire hydrant. Like the rest of the intruders, he wore a black uniform bare of any insignia or identifying marks, but he carried two short staves strapped to his back, each about three feet long. At the sight of Steve, he pulled them from their sheaths with an ease that spoke of long practice. He walked slowly toward Steve, staves spinning in long, looping patterns.

  “I’ve always wanted to see how good you were,” the man said softly. “I’d love to be the man who took Captain America down, even if I’m the only one who knows about it.” There was something familiar about the voice, but Steve couldn’t quite place it. Then the man attacked, and, fighting for his life, Steve didn’t have any more time for thinking.

  For all his squat stature, the man was fast. Before Steve could pull his shield from his back, one of the staves was arcing toward his head. Rogers caught it on his forearm and, despite the padding built in to his sleeve, felt the shock of the blow all the way to the bone. Whatever wood the weapons were made of, it was strong; the force of that blow should have snapped the stave clean in half.

  All this went through Steve’s mind in a heartbeat. By the time the second stave was whistling toward his ribs, his shield was in its path. The other man cursed as he lost his balance, the momentum of the stave so completely absorbed by the shield’s Vibranium that it fell from his grasp. The stave skittered across the floor, coming to a rest against the wall.

  Steve’s attacker didn’t let the loss of one of his weapons distract him; the other was already swinging toward Steve’s head. This time Rogers caught it, the wood landing in his palm with a meaty smack. With a hard yank, he pulled the other man toward him, rapping his opponent across the bridge of the nose with his shield. Steve’s assailant staggered back, blood pouring from his face, and Rogers followed with a roundhouse kick to the man’s temple. His eyes rolled up into the back of his head and he collapsed in a boneless heap.

  Even before the man had hit the floor, Steve was spinning to face the other entrance to the room. He brought his shield up just in time block the volley of bean bag rounds fired from the shotguns the pair of intruders charging toward him were holding. Steve continued his momentum, the rim of his shield catching one man under the ribs, then cracking into the temple of the other. Steve made a mental note that whoever these men were, they were here to capture Katherine, not kill her. He hadn’t seen a single lethal weapon yet, but he knew that even bean bag rounds and truncheons could kill if luck ran against you. And even when people had been ordered to take someone alive, accidents sometimes happened in the heat of battle.

  He did another sweep of the house. All of the intruders were unconscious or incapacitated, but he knew that more would be coming. And now that they knew there was more than one person in the house, the gloves might come off. He ran down into the basement, ducking under the flowerpot that Katherine hurled at his head the moment he came into her eye line.

  “Sorry, I thought—”

  “It’s okay. You’ve got a pretty good arm, by the way.”

  He ran over to her, then looked out the basement windows and up into the yard.

  “We have to get out of here. We don’t have much time.”

  “Where are we going?” Katherine asked.

  “Never mind that now,” Steve said, trying not to snap at her. She was putting on a brave face, but he knew that she had to be scared. “We need to get past the perimeter before we do anything else.”

  Katherine didn’t look
happy about it, but she followed him out the basement door. They snuck through the ­shadows, no longer worrying about trip wires or alarms, and darted through the space between the houses. The observer that Steve had dealt with earlier was gone; he guessed that that was what had triggered the raid. He kept his eyes out for more attackers, but, for now at least, the coast was clear. In fact, the streets were eerily deserted; there was no foot traffic at all, and no sounds came from the houses around them. Windows were shuttered and blinds were closed, and no lights burned through the cracks. Steve led Katherine to where he had hidden his motorcycle, and dragged it out onto the footpath. Jumping on, he beckoned her to join him. She hesitated for a moment, then swung her leg over the pillion and took her place behind him. He kicked the machine to life, and they took off with a squeal of burning rubber.

  Three blocks later, just as he was starting to think they might have made it past the perimeter unnoticed, he realized they were being followed. As the pair of headlights behind them was joined by another, Steve swung onto a path between two houses where a car couldn’t follow. Their pursuers were a step ahead, though; he could hear the sound of motorcycles behind him, and then the drumming beat of helicopter blades above. He pulled through a yard and back out onto the road, and was immediately flanked by two motorcycles, the riders clad in black and their helmets giving the impression of monstrous insects. One of the riders pulled a long-barreled revolver from his jacket and pointed it at Steve. Before Rogers could react, Katherine kicked out and connected with the side of the other motorcycle. The rider dropped the gun to wrestle with the handlebars, trying to keep his balance. But the wobble proved too much, and he careened off the road into the bushes. The second motorcyclist swerved closer, trying to grab at Katherine. Steve didn’t know what the man was thinking—maybe he had lost his head in the excitement of the chase—but there was no way that anyone could transfer a struggling hostage to the back of a moving motorcycle.

  Katherine rendered the chain of thought moot, grabbing Steve’s shield and neatly clotheslining the other rider. The shield connected with the rider’s helmet with a nasty thunk, and he went flying backward, tumbling end over end before coming to rest in a heap in the middle of the road. The man’s motorcycle kept going for a few hundred feet before teetering over and smashing into the curb with a very satisfying crunch of glass and metal.

  “Very nice,” Steve yelled.

  “Thanks!”

  The road had opened up now, with fewer houses to either side. Two cars were coming up behind them, fast, and Steve blinked against the glare of the bright spotlight lancing through the sky from the chopper above them.

  “Hang on, this could get interesting,” he yelled to Katherine. “Let’s see if we can shake them off.”

  “Shake them off? How?”

  As they came around a curve, a beautiful vista opened before them. They were on the side of a hill, and below them the city was laid out like a child’s railway set. The hill was terraced, each level covered with houses and, to their left, the roadside dropped off, revealing rooftops just below. Rogers made a quick mental calculation of the distance and the weight of the motorcycle with the two riders. He didn’t like the way the numbers came up, but he was running out of options.

  “Hold on tight!” Steve yelled.

  He revved the engine as hard as he dared, building up speed before he swerved, launching the bike out over the drop. Katherine’s arm tightened convulsively around his waist as they plummeted toward the rooftops, wheels spinning as they searched for traction in thin air. Steve lifted the front wheel as the rear came down with a thump on the peak of a roof, then eased the front wheel back down. The bike shuddered, and for a moment Steve thought they were going to tip over, but he somehow held the bike steady as they raced along the rooftop. The houses were built close together and, after the insane leap to the first rooftop, merely keeping the bike going from house to house seemed easy. Katherine was screaming something in his ear, but it was lost in the roar of the wind in his ears.

  “I can’t hear you!”

  “I said, ‘are you crazy?’!” she screamed.

  “Nope, I just enjoy a bit of a nighttime ride. Hold on.”

  Up ahead, there was a garden shed with a roof that sloped down almost to the ground, and Steve revved the engine as he jumped the bike off of the roof and rode down the side of the makeshift ramp before pulling back onto the road. They’d lost the cars in the plunge off the hill, but still had the helicopter to worry about. There were no trees to speak of, but ahead a string of power lines crossed the road and continued into a flat, grassy field. Steve drove beneath the lines and then turned off the road once more, following the line of wires while swerving around the poles, weaving in and out. The helicopter followed, staying well above the lines, the light cutting through the night to follow their passage. The power lines cast strange, skeletal shadows across the field, adding to the unreality of the situation and making it hard for Steve to find clear ground.

  Up ahead, Steve could see a fence that marked where the field met the woods. He knew if he could make it under the cover of the trees he could lose the chopper, but it was clear that his pursuers were thinking the same thing. As Steve and Katherine drew closer to the fence and its fragile promise of safety, the whine of the helicopter’s blades changed pitch. The chopper came in as close to the wires as the pilot dared, and there was a sound like a giant swatch of fabric being torn in two. As heavy machine-gun rounds hit the ground, a line of dirt fountained up alongside the motorcycle, first on one side, then on the other. Steve ignored it as best he could, continuing toward the fence line, but the next eruption of dirt was right in front of them. He swerved hard to the right, then back to the left, cutting a zigzag pattern across the field. Each time he tried to get closer to the woods, the fearful noise of the twin-mounted Gatling-type miniguns filled the night air, and another wall of dirt was thrown up into the air. Finally, fed up with the pursuit, Steve yanked the bike around hard, the wheels skidding before he regained control and sent them hurtling back toward the helicopter.

  “Reach around and take the handlebars,” he shouted to Katherine.

  “What? No!” she screamed back. “What are you going to do?”

  “Just do it!”

  Ignoring her protests, Steve grabbed her hands and placed them on the handlebars, pressing down until he felt her grip them. Without another word, he scrambled to his feet, balancing precariously on the pillion. As they passed under the chopper, he leaped straight up, grabbing the landing gear. He swung back and forth a few times, then used his momentum to flip up through the open door. This time, instead of a startled Marine, there were two black-clad men and a gunner staring at him with dumbfounded expressions. The frozen tableau held for a moment, then shattered as the nearest man launched himself from his seat, a wicked foot-long knife appearing in his hand as if by magic. Rogers grabbed his attacker’s wrist and turned slightly, using the man’s momentum to help him on his way straight through the open door and to the ground below. The helicopter had come in low enough that Steve could see him struggling to sit up.

  The second man was either more experienced or less rash. Instead of risking getting within reach of Rogers, the assailant went for the gun holstered at his side. He was very fast, but Rogers brought up his shield in time to block the two shots the man got off—and this time they weren’t bean bag rounds. Steve didn’t give the man a chance to fire again; the rim of the shield caught him under the chin and left him slumped in his harness. The gunner was scrabbling at his own harness, trying to free himself. By the time he managed to unclasp the buckle at his waist, Steve had his arm cocked and was ready to hurl his shield. The gunner looked at Steve, and then at the open door. Steve winked and nodded toward the opening. The gunner sighed, then threw himself into the air.

  Steve made his way to the front of the helicopter. Leaning over the front seats, he rapped his fist against the
side of the pilot’s helmet, getting his attention.

  “Land it. Now.”

  The pilot froze, then shrugged. “Whatever you say, boss. They don’t pay me enough to argue with you.”

  He pushed the joystick forward and brought the helicopter down gently next to the two fallen men. At a nod from Steve, he flicked the switches that shut down the machine. After the noise of the chopper, the sudden silence was strange in Steve’s ears. The quiet was broken by the sound of a motorcycle, but he relaxed when he recognized the familiar notes of an engine he had stripped down, bored out, and built back up a hundred times. He turned back to the pilot and spread his hands apologetically.

  “You’ve been so obliging, and I hate to do this to you, but . . .”

  Quickly, but gently, he tied the pilot to his chair, pulling his arms back behind the seat and securing them with the man’s own belt. A few minutes later, he was dragging the other men back into the chopper. They’d come prepared, and their belts had a number of restraints to choose from, from standard police-issue handcuffs to nylon zip ties. Steve took a perverse pleasure in using their own tools against them. All three men—including the knife man, who was still out cold—were too stunned from the drop to put up any resistance.

  Job finished, Steve jumped out of the chopper and trotted over to where Katherine had pulled up on the bike.

  “Well, that was a bit dramatic, wasn’t it?” she said.

  “Maybe, but effective enough. Let’s get out of here.”

  “What are you waiting for?”

  Steve coughed. “Are you going to let me back on?”

  “Sure, but why do you get to drive? Is it because you’re the man? That’s not a very good attitude.”

  “Ah, no—it’s because I know where we’re going, and you don’t.”

  She deflated slightly.

  “You make a good point.” She shifted back on the seat, making room for him. “Hop on. But, can you do me a favor?”