The next day, Comrade Pierce, former Director of S.H.I.E.L.D., received a grand funeral. The man had somehow become yet another beneficiary of Daisy's reforms. His remains were accorded the honors of a lieutenant general, and the Department of Defense even sent a deputy secretary to preside over the ceremony.
Only heaven knew what Barack Obama and the Pentagon were thinking. They deliberately blurred the time of Pierce's death and treated him as the highest-ranking officer killed in the Battle of New York. After a frantic day of preparation, they actually managed to arrange something close to a state funeral.
The public viewing was held at the Capitol.
The funeral itself took place at Washington National Cathedral. Many senior agents attended. Even Phil Coulson, who had been busy rebuilding schools every day, as well as the semi-retired Hawkeye and Black Widow, came to see the former Director off.
In a solemn, resonant voice, the priest recounted Pierce's life and, on God's behalf, assured everyone that the man was doing very well in heaven. Then he invited someone to come forward and say a few words.
Nick Fury gently shook his head. He was eloquent enough, but he rarely gave long public speeches and almost never attended funerals. This occasion was already an exception. He nudged Daisy with his elbow, clearly telling her to go.
Daisy could only walk to the front and complete the ceremony.
She first swept her gaze across the gathering. There were agents, members of Congress, generals from the Department of Defense, and several of Pierce's relatives. Their relationships with him had been distant. If they had not heard there would be a substantial death benefit, some of them might not have bothered to come.
"Director Alexander Pierce was our elder. He was a kind elder and a wise guide."
"Through despicable means, our enemies bewitched his mind, and we were forced to part from this stern mentor in grief. This is not Director Pierce's shame. It is ours! The enemy trampled on our dignity!" Daisy raised a fist to demonstrate her anger.
At that moment, the White Queen's voice sounded in her mind. "You're killing me. Are you sure the man you're talking about is Pierce? Hahaha..."
As a special consultant to S.H.I.E.L.D., the White Queen had also come today, unusually dressed entirely in black.
"...Shut up!" Daisy snapped at the White Queen mentally. Outwardly, she pretended to cough, as though overcome with emotion. In truth, she was reorganizing her speech.
"Those who came before us always leave something behind for us to learn from. What did Director Pierce teach us? Progress. The drive to keep moving forward. Learning. The perseverance of a sixty-year-old man who still taught himself how to use computers and studied algorithms."
"S.H.I.E.L.D. endured World War II, endured the Cold War, and survived to the present day. Director Pierce deserves great credit for that. He helped maintain world peace. Now that heavy responsibility falls to us."
Did sending the Winter Soldier to assassinate Kennedy count as maintaining world peace? Daisy was not entirely sure...
"I can see uncertainty in your eyes. You don't know whether what you're doing now still matters. When that green-skinned monster outside beats enemies around like sandbags, and when a big man in a red cape flies over New York carrying a silver hammer, I ask myself the same question: does what S.H.I.E.L.D. does still matter?"
The agents below were all highly trained. They were not ordinary civilians who would start applauding wildly after hearing a few inspirational lines, and Daisy was not especially gifted at stirring up a crowd. Still, many of them looked interested. They wanted to hear her answer.
"I think it matters. People need to see a group like us. They need to see ordinary people just like them fighting on the front line, to see someone working and trying to make the world better. I am friends with many superheroes, and we respect one another, but I still have to say this: S.H.I.E.L.D. is indispensable. It is the link between superheroes and humanity."
"Ordinary people are not a burden. They are the source of the strength with which we protect the world."
The funeral soon ended. Daisy kept watching Pierce's coffin until it was lowered into the ground, and his frequency never changed. She left shortly afterward. There was still a prisoner to deal with, along with the aftermath of Pierce's death.
"What do you think? Was our decision really right?" Hawkeye and Black Widow had become outsiders within S.H.I.E.L.D. Many agents now merely nodded when they saw them, without the old warmth. Hawkeye wanted his partner's opinion.
Black Widow did not answer. She hurriedly said they would talk later, then plunged into the crowd.
For one instant just now, among the people outside the cathedral, she had seen a familiar figure. That was the real reason she had abandoned Hawkeye.
An acquaintance—an extremely familiar person. Someone who should have been dead for many years had reappeared. Her guard went up, and her curiosity was immediately piqued. She had no attention to spare for Hawkeye's questions.
Weaving through the crowd and around the buildings, Black Widow noticed that the suspicious figure's footwork, concealment methods, and countersurveillance techniques were exactly like her own. That confirmed the person's identity.
He was the instructor who had trained Black Widow in the Soviet Red Room, perhaps the only man she had ever loved. They had never known each other's names. They had known only the two numbers assigned to them in the Red Room.
Instructor 01 and Trainee 1445.
Black Widow had not performed well during training. Aside from her looks, she had possessed no strengths to speak of. Bearing the prestigious Romanoff surname only exposed her to even more unfair treatment.
Combat, infiltration, killing, poisoning—she had been worse than the others at all of it. Back then, she had been a kind and compassionate girl. Unfortunately, everything changed.
Now she was the strongest spy in the world. No one could shake her once she was on their trail, not even her former instructor.
As she rounded a street corner, alarm bells rang in her mind.
Her expression did not change, as though she had expected this all along. The sequence seemed to have been rehearsed countless times. She ducked low, drew her pistol, and lunged diagonally forward, completing several movements in one seamless flow.
With a boom, a silver mechanical arm smashed into the corner where she would have appeared. Seeing the strike miss, the Winter Soldier did not hesitate. He rolled sideways and evaded Black Widow's shot.
The Winter Soldier threw a dagger, knocking the pistol from Black Widow's hand, then immediately pressed the attack again.
Recognizing him did nothing to make Black Widow hold back. She sprang into the air, wrapped both legs around the Winter Soldier's neck with a jujutsu hold, then twisted hard through her waist and hips, trying to throw him to the ground.
She exerted force twice in succession, but the Winter Soldier's feet seemed rooted to the pavement and he refused to fall. She knew she was in trouble. A technique that had always worked had been neutralized by his immense core and back strength. Black Widow's position was now extremely dangerous. She could only clench both fists and hammer at his head, trying to knock him unconscious.
Once. Twice. On the third strike, the Winter Soldier regained his balance. He simply let Black Widow hang from his body and charged into the wall in front of him like an enraged bear. The instant Black Widow took a breath, his mechanical hand clamped around her throat.
"You can at least recognize me, can't you?" Black Widow spoke quickly before he could tighten his grip.
The Winter Soldier stared at Black Widow's face, both familiar and unfamiliar. His thoughts froze for a moment. His fingers loosened without him realizing it, and he took two steps backward.