The Brooklyn safehouse was quiet. Too quiet, Steve thought, for a place that was supposed to belong to him. The walls were bare, the furniture functional, and everything smelled faintly of dust and fresh paint—as if SHIELD had tried to build a home out of a catalog.
Steve sat at the small kitchen table, sketchbook open in front of him. His pencil traced lines out of habit more than inspiration. Not soldiers. Not planes. Not even the war. Tonight, his hand had drawn Camelot—stone towers, banners waving in the wind.
He stopped, staring down at the page, the pencil tip pressed against paper until it nearly tore through.
The knock at the door was steady, deliberate. Steve didn't look up. "You don't usually knock," he said.
The door opened anyway. Nick Fury stepped inside, his coat still scorched from Montana's fires, his one good eye sharp as ever. He set a thin folder on the table without asking permission.
"Rogers."
Steve finally looked up. "Director."
Fury stayed standing, like a man too restless to sit. "You've seen the news. That wasn't a mining accident in Montana. Wasn't an earthquake either."
"I figured," Steve said, voice quiet. "Doesn't take a genius to know when something's wrong."
"Then you know why I'm here." Fury's gaze flicked to the sketchbook—long enough to register the castle towers on the page—then back to Steve. "You're still trying to decide where you belong. Camelot, SHIELD, America. Hell, maybe nowhere."
Steve's jaw tightened, but he didn't deny it. "Arthuria… she makes people believe. She gives them real hope… I don't know if she is right, but I think I want to believe. And then I come back here and see politicians clawing at each other while the world falls apart." He shook his head. "It's hard not to compare."
Fury leaned on the back of a chair, his voice dropping low. "I won't sell you on politicians. Most of them aren't worth your breath. But this isn't about them. It's about people. Regular people, the ones who don't get to stand behind a sword or a suit of armor or a goddamn castle. The ones who burn when the sky falls. They don't need a king, Rogers. They need someone who remembers why we fight at all."
Steve looked at him, eyes steady. "And you think that's me."
"I know it's you," Fury said. "Arthuria's got Albion covered. But the rest of the world? It doesn't have a symbol it trusts. Not anymore. Not until you pick up that shield and remind them what it means."
For a long moment, Steve said nothing. His gaze dropped to the folder Fury had left on the table. With a sigh, he finally opened it, and the first picture made him pause.
The Tesseract.
It brought back memories, and not good ones. It had been Hydra's secret weapon, the key to their plans, and the key to the many lives they had taken. Without that, many more would have survived, the war might have ended sooner than it did.
He had seen what it did to Red Skull, whatever fate he got, he no doubt deserved, but clearly, that thing, it wasn't something that could be controlled.
Only hours ago… that massive explosion, the earthquake… the Tesseract.
Steve pointed at the photo, jaw tight. "This. Where did you get this?"
Fury met his stare evenly. "SHIELD's had it since the end of the war. Howard Stark recovered it from the ocean after you went under. It's been in our custody ever since… until now."
Steve's brow furrowed. The memories came unbidden—Hydra weapons glowing with alien fire, soldiers torn apart by blasts of impossible energy, Red Skull raving about destiny with the Cube burning in his hand.
"I know what it does," Steve said grimly. "Hydra built their entire war machine on it. Thousands died because of that thing. And now you're telling me it's loose again?"
Fury nodded once. "Not just loose. Stolen. And worse—someone's already figured out how to use it."
Steve's fist clenched against the table. "Then you never should have touched it. You had no right. After what it did in the war, after what Hydra turned it into—you still thought you could play with it? Like it was just another gadget to put in a vault?"
Fury didn't flinch. He let the anger burn out between them, let Steve's words hang heavy in the room. "Maybe we should've buried it deeper," he admitted. "Maybe we should've left it where Stark found it. But we didn't. We studied it, and now it's gone. The should-haves don't matter anymore, Rogers. What matters is stopping what comes next."
Steve's eyes narrowed, his jaw working as though grinding against every reason to say no. "You don't control it, Fury. I saw what happened when Red Skull tried to control it. There was nothing left, not even ash!"
Fury leaned forward, both palms pressing on the back of the chair. "Trust me, I have seen what it can do. I almost got blown up by it, but the important truth is that right now, it's in the hands of someone who can and will use it against us, so we can discuss what to do with it later. For now, we need it back."
Steve's nostrils flared. He wanted to argue, to drag Fury across the table and make him admit SHIELD had no right to play god. But deep down, he knew Fury was right about one thing: the Cube wasn't sitting in a vault anymore. It was already out there, and every second wasted was another second it could be turned against innocent people.
His hand drifted across the photo again, tracing the edge of the Cube with a finger that trembled despite himself. "This thing doesn't belong in human hands. Not in Hydra's, not in SHIELD's. Maybe not even in mine. But if it's loose again…" He shut the folder with a sharp snap. "Then I can't just sit here."
Fury straightened, his single eye glinting with something that was not quite satisfaction. "Good. I don't need you to like it, Rogers. I just need you ready."
Steve's voice was low but steady. "I'll fight. But don't mistake that for trust. You tell me this is about protecting people, then you'd better mean it. Because if SHIELD starts thinking like Hydra, I'll put it down myself."
Fury didn't argue, didn't smirk, didn't posture. He only gave a single, solemn nod. "That's why you're Captain America."
He tapped the folder with one finger. "Read it. Details are inside—names, intel, what we're up against. Someone will come for you soon. Suit up when they do."
With that, Fury turned and left, the door closing with a muted thud that left Steve alone in the silence.
The sketchbook lay open beside the folder, Camelot's towers sketched in soft lines that looked almost fragile under the hard photographs of Hydra weapons and Tesseract energy. Steve stared at both for a long while, torn between two symbols—one of myth, one of memory—and the decision he already knew he'd made.
At last, he closed the sketchbook, slid the folder on top of it, and whispered to the empty room, "Guess I'm not done after all."
The shield waited, and the war was beginning again.
-----
Tony Stark and Steve Rogers weren't the only ones who were informed about the situation.
This was far too serious for Fury to keep things hidden; he needed all the help and support he could get, which meant he not only had to inform his own superiors and get the full support of the UN, but also be able to draw upon the full strength of SHIELD.
All time off was suspended, and every pair of hands was made to be on standby.
The secure conference chamber was dim, its walls paneled with screens that flickered to life one by one. Four faces appeared in ghostly light—members of the World Security Council, voices that could order armies to move with a word.
Fury stood in the center of the room, hands behind his back, his coat still marked by smoke and ash. He didn't bother smoothing it.
The first councilor wasted no time. "Director Fury, do you have any idea of the scale of the disaster you've just handed us? The destruction in Montana, the footage of the crater—it's already gone global. And now you're telling us the Cube, SHIELD's most classified asset, is in enemy hands?"
Another voice cut in, sharper, almost gleeful in its condemnation. "You've failed, Director. Billions in research, lost. Agents compromised. Barton, Grimm, Richards—assets we cannot afford to lose. And for what? You said SHIELD could contain the Tesseract. You said it was under control!"
Fury's eye narrowed. "Control was never a guarantee. Containment was the goal. And now containment's been broken—by forces beyond anything this Council has ever faced."
A third face leaned forward. "Excuses. What we see is negligence. Your entire operation has collapsed. And in the process, you may have just provoked an alien war."
Fury stepped closer to the projection, his voice low but cutting. "No. That alien war was already coming. Phase two was already about being ready for it. You don't want to hear it, but this wasn't a failure of SHIELD—it was a reminder that Earth isn't alone anymore. And if we keep fighting like we're the only players on the board, we won't last long enough to argue about who's to blame."
For a moment, silence pressed down. Then another face leaned into the light—Alexander Pierce. Calm, silver-haired, his tone more measured.
"Enough," Pierce said. His voice carried the weight of command without the need to raise it. "We can't waste time fighting among ourselves. What happened in Montana is a tragedy, yes, but Fury is right—this is bigger than containment, bigger than politics. If we keep him tied up in these chambers, we'll have nothing left to argue over when the next strike comes."
The sharp-voiced councilor snapped back, "You're siding with him? After this catastrophe?"
Pierce's expression didn't shift. "I'm siding with survival. If Fury says this threat is beyond our current capacity, then the only logical course is to give him the tools he needs. Otherwise, we're gambling with the entire planet."
The room fell into an uneasy quiet. Finally, the first councilor muttered, "Very well. Director Fury, you will have the resources you're asking for. But understand this—failure will not be tolerated again."
Fury inclined his head, though his tone was still steel. "I don't plan on failing again."
The screens winked out one by one until only Pierce remained. For a moment, his eyes met Fury's through the projection, unreadable.
"Don't waste the chance I just bought you," Pierce said quietly. Then his screen, too, went dark.
Fury stood alone in the silence, the hum of the secure chamber surrounding him. He exhaled once, slow and controlled, before pulling his coat tighter around his shoulders.
The Council might not understand yet. But they would. When the storm came, they'd see why he'd set the Avengers in motion.
(End of chapter)
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