Time Converges

Of all the many things that changed in the world that Peggy knew - and that was a great many things - there were a few things that remained the same. Unfortunately, one of those things happened to be the average US Senator. Then, as now, Peggy found them rather annoying, loud, and bombastic, particularly the Honorable Randall Peters of Kentucky, who was currently grilling her in front of the entire subcommittee on the nature of Thor Odinsson.

“So you just...what...let this so-called ‘god of thunder’ go with a powerful artifact that had been in SHIELD’s lockers for seventy years?”

Peggy ignored the twinge of a throb behind her left eye and the deep desire she had to punch the sneering disbelief off his face. She chose to answer simply. “Yes.”

“An alien being from off this world who you knew for only a few hours, who was the adopted brother of the man leading the attack against us, and you just gave him an item that can…” He paused, looking through his glasses to a sheaf of papers on his desk. Peggy suspected they were there mostly for show. “Open portals between two different areas in space?”

“I presume you did read the entire report on Thor Odinsson, correct?”

The senator frowned, lifting a shoulder diffidently. “I did.”

Peggy only barely managed not to roll her eyes. “Then you know that Mr. Odinsson can wield lightning right out of a clear blue sky. He nearly destroyed huge swaths of the Black Forest when confronted by Tony Stark in his Iron Man suit. His ancestors were considered gods by many in Northern Europe and for good reason, and his adopted brother nearly succeeded in conquering the Earth, and you think I was going to argue with a man whose father could call up an army to follow up on the job if I didn’t give them back their magic space box?”

There were titters of laughter from the other collected senators and few other attendees in the gallery. After all, when put that way, it did sound rather ridiculous, but Senator Peters was not precisely one who seemed to ever mind sounding like an idiot, something Peggy supposed the find people of Kentucky must like, seeing as they were the ones who sent him there. His mild irritation was quickly covered by a condescending chuckle as he pulled off his glasses, using them to wave lazily at Peggy behind her microphone.

“I like you, Director Carter, you’re funny.” He chuffed a brief laugh, gamely going with the laughter at his expense, choosing his next words. “But I would like to point out that that space box, as you call it, cost a lot of lives once. That space box was found and utilized by one of the more evil organizations this world has ever seen, people who followed a madman who gave a lot of credence to those gods on Asgard and felt that made them a superior race because of it. A lot of good men died trying to get that box away from the Nazis, Hitler and HYDRA, and now you’ve given it all back to the very gods they thought made them better than everyone else.’

Uncomfortable silence fell across the committee changers. Several of Senator Peters senatorial counterparts suddenly became rather uncomfortable, one or two staring at him rather askance. One of his compatriots from Iowa leaned in, but he waved him off, his beady eyes meeting Peggy’s in challenge. It didn’t take her long to realize that this was, as it always was with men like Randall Peters, a show of power and dominance, a means to show his party colleagues and the voters back home how he was tough on issues such as national security. How better to show off than to back the Director of the Avengers under SHIELD into a corner, to paint her as being incompetent and unable to protect global interests, let alone national ones. All the better that she was a woman and British by birth, all to underscore both her incapability in the job and her own foreignness, both in terms of geography and time.

“I am well aware of what the Tesseract cost, Mr. Senator,” she replied, evenly and coolly, despite the aching anger that swelled at the very memory. “Better than you, I suspect. I remember the men who died, blasted into nothingness by the very weapons that Johann Schmidt created with the Tesseract. While I can’t say I am an expert on Asgardian history, I can at least say that of what little I know of them, they at least never used the Tesseract to create weapons of mass destruction. I can’t say the same for Earth.”

“You mean SHIELD,” he qualified, trying once more to gain the upper hand.

“SHIELD, the SSR, the US Army.” She eyed several other senators who started at that. “You all are smart men and women, you know what was done in the past. If the Tesseract had stayed here, how long would it have taken for one of the many powers to try and come for it, to make weapons of their own? My guess, not long at all, a year, maybe. A weapon like that needed to be somewhere out of our hands, out of temptation. And while I’m sure that you, Senator Peters, would have the moral fortitude not to try and use it in harmful ways, can you say the same about everyone you know in the halls of power? How about just on this subcommittee?”

Her comments hit home. A few more senators squirmed, uncomfortably, at the allegations Peggy laid down. Some were incensed, some were more honest about it, frowning speculatively. Only Peters seemed amused, leaning forward to his thin microphone.

“So you say, Director, but I’m curious to hear what someone like Steve Rogers would have to say about it. After all, he sacrificed everything in order to keep that cube out of the hands of HYDRA. Don’t you think Captain America should get a say?”

Peggy resisted the temptation to roll her eyes at this utter childishness. “I don’t know, Senator, but I could ask him when I go home after this. I am sure he’s riveted to the proceedings of this sub-committee hearing.” Peggy just did manage not to smile, cheekily, at the senator as another low rumble of chuckles sounded again. “Though, I think he was spending the afternoon alphabetizing his book collection…”

A gavel sounded, the chairwoman of the committee, a senator from Colorado named Sullivan, snapped the meeting to order. “The committee would like to thank Director Carter for coming in, once again, to meet with us, and we recognize that you have taken time out of your schedule to see us. We will adjourn for the day.”

With another crack the meeting dispersed as Peggy gathered things and ignored the pointed glare from Senator Peters, who hulked in his seat like a vulture, clearly trying to make her feel ill at ease. He was by far not the first man to do so and would likely not be the last, and she took rare pleasure treating it with the sort of indifference it deserved, knowing it would only irk him more. Instead, she shot brief smiles to the various staffers and others who helped man the chamber, thanking her for coming in, as she made her way to the lobby beyond. She hadn’t planned on being up on the Hill that day, instead hoping to spend it with Steve, organizing and unpacking, to make what would otherwise be a spartan space more...well, them, she supposed. It would be their second home, outside of her apartment in New York, which was sleek and modern and reflected more the sentiments of the designer who had decorated it than Peggy’s own. In truth, she wasn’t sure she even had an aesthetic, seeing as she had had no permanent home of her own since she left to join the SOE...since the day she thought that Michael died and her world changed forever. Now, however…well, Peggy wouldn’t call it a home, not yet at least, but it was a start.

The thrill of building anything of the sort with Steve Rogers, after all these years, after losing him for so long, still made her giddy despite herself. Certainly, the circumstances were far different than either of them had expected. Poor Steve had not known what to make of it all when Peggy told him, rather emphatically, that in this modern age men and women lived together for quite some time without being married, and she didn’t see why they should rush it just yet, not while things were as mad as they were in the immediate weeks after New York. It had been the opening gambit of what would prove to be an awkward, but centering conversation on the state of things with them. They were both so bad about simply stating what they wanted, dancing around the topic in fear of upsetting the other, that it had been a good place to start, to lay their feelings and hopes on the table between each other.

For Steve’s part, he had been honest with her about his trepidations about this modern world and the place he had in it. If he were to take back up the shield, he needed to understand it far more than he did. That would mean, most likely, taking a formal position with SHIELD, in taking all the same steps Peggy had when she arrived in the future. That would necessitate the move to Washington DC to be closer to the main SHIELD headquarters and to the training facilities nearby. It would be the first time in his life, outside of his time in the active military, that he would have ever lived in a place outside of New York City. It was a huge step and terrified him all the more because Peggy’s own focus, the Avengers, were for now based out of New York. He had just gotten the girl of his dreams, finally, and he was somewhat loath to let that go.

For Peggy her feelings had not been dissimilar. For so long she had missed him, had fought so hard to find him, and the idea of him moving away so soon after getting him back seemed unfair. And yet, this was 2012, not 1942. They had the luxury of all manner of travel to go between New York and Washington at any time they wished. Communications were so advanced that she could literally see his face with the telephone she carried in her purse. Distance was not as far as it once had been so long ago. After all, this would only be temporary, allowing Steve to find his place in this new world, at least till Barton came back from this sabbatical. They could use this time to reconnect as Steve and Peggy, to figure out who they were as people now, and what they wanted out of a future together. They could learn how to live with one another; Steve with his habitual neatness born out of a nurse for a mother and years of the army, Peggy with her particularity about where things did and did not go. Most of all, they could learn how to be together, bickering and laughing, busy and lazy, learning how they drove each other crazy and how they made each other be better people. And once Barton was back and the Avengers were more fully off the ground as an entity...then they could see what steps they would take next. Until that day…

“Did you hear about the latest attack?” Someone over her shoulder, a woman, was not being precisely quiet. In the marble halls of the United States Capitol building, voices could carry, and this one was just enough that it started Peggy out of her daydream.

“I got the notice while I was in the subcommittee hearing with Carter.” A man, the voice of the director of the National Security Agency, Peggy realized. His name was Jake Nance, a man she’d gotten to know over the weeks and months since New York, tall and gangly, whose thin frame reminded her of Steve before the serum. Well into his forties, he had a deep, dolorous sort of tone that she could pick out of a crowd.

The woman remained a mystery, however, somewhere behind Peggy, likely trailing five to ten steps behind her and completely oblivious to Peggy in front of them. “I found out when we got out. They are saying it is another explosion, like the others. They are fairly certain it is the Mandarin.”

That caught Peggy’s attention. The case Sharon had been working on. Curious, she pulled out her phone, scrolling through various messages, including one from Steve asking what she would like for dinner, pretending to be preoccupied as she carefully measured her steps to stay just in front of the pair behind her, while carefully maneuvering around senate pages and office staff making their way down the hallway.

“Has he claimed it as one of his,” Nance asked, quietly curious.

“Not yet, but the hallmarks seem to be the same.” The woman sounded slightly exasperated. “This is the tenth one now, and we aren’t going to be able to contain it for much longer.”

Tenth? Peggy frowned, pretending to be fascinated with an email Cassandra had sent her on some minor request from Stark. When Sharon had gone over the particulars of the Mandarin case the other day, she had mentioned only three attacks. Did she know about the others? Why hadn’t that particularity been shared with SHIELD?

“I don’t think you should have been containing it in the first place,” Nance replied, dryly, to the woman. “The fact is that we’ve been telling you all for years that this isn’t your garden-variety fundamentalist militant hanging out in a cave in Afghanistan. You all have been treating him like that and now he’s upping the ante on everyone.”

“Well, now he really has,” the woman muttered. “This one was outside of London, near a distribution center for MST Pharmaceuticals. They are contracted with the UN and a variety of charities, providing vaccines and other medications for distribution in various economically challenged areas, including Central Asia.”

“Were they the target?”

“Scotland Yard and the Home Office over there are still investigating, so no word to us, yet. Not sure if they will reach out to us at all. I got word that the whole thing has been booted over to SHIELD over our heads.”

Well, that at least answered the question of who the woman was affiliated with. The CIA had been the ones with the case before it was passed to Sharon, or so she was told.

“On whose orders,” Nance snapped, hotly.

“Not mine. I was going to ask you the same thing.”

“Not mine, either.”

Peggy could almost feel them both glaring at the back of her head. She prayed she looked as oblivious as she was trying to be, tapping away on the glass of her phone.

“Whatever the case, London is probably going to want SHIELD in it anyway. We’ve not been on good terms with them for a while. This way they can claim they got a neutral party involved.”

There was a sigh from Nance. Good, bad, or otherwise, Peggy couldn’t tell. She had a feeling she was going to be sucked into this discussion in the next minute, whether she liked it or not.

“Let me talk to her,” Nance said, softly. Peggy could surmise who the ‘her’ was, her fingers tightening on her phone. “Perhaps, emphasize shared interest…”

The woman responded, a lot less softly than Nance did. “I have people pissed on my end. We had dibs on him after his other attacks. The fact they are getting involved…”

“I know, just...let me see what she says.”

“All right! Let me know.”

Footsteps, the clunking sound of chunky women’s heels, veered off down a hallway as Peggy cut her eyes to see a woman, short and somewhat thicker with middle-age, her hair a dyed blonde, marching away from where she was making a point to stop and delete items off her list of things Steve still needed in his apartment and looking rather intensely focused while doing it. She only paused to look up when Nance was standing several feet in front of her.

“You don’t have to pretend you didn’t hear us behind you.” His smirk on his thin face was knowing. “Linda has a voice that carries a bit much for a woman who works in the CIA.”

“I’m surprised that the Director of the NSA would be so blatant about it.” Peggy made a show of closing out of her list, as if she were sending an email, then slid her phone into her purse. “Either you didn’t think it was important enough to have a private conversation or you wanted me to hear it.”

He didn’t look interested in confirming either, simply shrugging, holding on to the strap of his briefcase over his shoulder. “Let me walk you out.”

Peggy agreed. “We are doing one of those political ‘walk and talks’ I see on the television shows?”

“I wish my job was nearly that glamorous.”

“You and me both.” She fell into step beside him as they made their way through the building towards the exit Peggy had entered in at.

“Sorry that Peters was being such a hard ass in there,” he said, companionably. “He’s an idiot, but he’s an idiot with clout and he keeps using it to make life difficult.”

Peggy only shrugged, now long used to the vagaries of the American political system and the various senators and members of congress using their positions to pick petty arguments in order to please constituents. “I suppose trying to explain away an alien god to the good people of Kentucky is a bit challenging.”

“No offense, but explaining away Thor to anyone on Earth is a bit challenging.” Nance chuckled, briefly, the sort you had when you wanted to shift the conversation to something less friendly. “The truth is Thor isn’t the reason people are worried over here. Your Avengers are formidable, not going to lie, and there are more than a few people worried about them, but there are just as many, more even, that would say they are necessary to have for the threats out there. That’s not what has got people worried.”

It didn’t take Peggy longer than a second to get at what Nance was pointing to. “I understand that there are many upset with SHIELD right now. I’ve already addressed it to the World Security Council and Secretary Pierce…”

“Who is going to do what? Go chat with President Ellis? Make some phone calls and smooth it all over?”

Peggy paused, schooling her features against Nance’s astute observations. “Director Nance, I can assure you that the World Security Council takes this seriously.”

“I’m sure they do, which is why they are sending Pierce in. He’s the big guns, the man with a megawatt smile and a resume a mile long. People respect him around here.”

“Is there a reason why they shouldn’t,” Peggy asked, bluntly, curious as to where the NSA Director was going with all of this.

The man shrugged broad, thin shoulders briefly, making her think very much of Steve before he took the serum. “I am only saying that Senator Peters isn’t the only one nervous.”

She stared up at him for long moments, mulling over what he said and what he wasn’t saying. “Are they nervous about the way the World Security Council handled the situation in New York, the fact that SHIELD is the one in control of the Avengers, or that the Mandarin case is now being investigated by them as well?”

“Yes,” he replied, seemingly to all of it. “It’s no secret that the intelligence agencies have all long had beef with one another. Everyone gets upset the minute they feel jurisdictions have been crossed and people have stepped into sacred territory. SHIELD has been the biggest bully on the block for a while now and people don’t like it.”

“I think that was the idea, Mr. Nance. SHIELD was always supposed to be outside of the pettiness of a single nation’s goals or directives.”

“Which was perhaps great at the close of World War II, but we are now sixty-five years on and things change. SHIELD is fairly powerful now and carries a big stick and feel they can lord it over everyone else no matter who they are or their own interests. They are already the biggest intelligence agency. They have their own tactical military units, a whole army of their own that they deploy, and helicarriers they can send anywhere in the world by air or by sea. That alone makes them a military force more formidable than any one country. Now they have their own personal team of superheroes as well, ones who just managed to stave off an alien invasion from another planet. If that isn’t terrifying, I don’t know what is. Thaddeus Ross is screaming to anyone who will listen that SHIELD has too much firepower and can’t be trusted.”

Peggy only just did manage not to openly roll her eyes. “Thaddeus Ross is also likely jealous he doesn’t have the toys himself. He has made no secret in how badly he wants them and is mad he can’t have them.

“It’s not just him, there are a lot of people who are scared of SHIELD right now, feel they are overreaching their hand and involving themselves where they are not wanted.”

“Like this Mandarin case?”

Nance simply smiled. They had made it outside to the crisp autumn afternoon. The trees that lined the way towards the National Mall were a riot of colors, reds, oranges, and golds, fire against a deep blue sky. She would much rather be enjoying that sight than having this conversation.

“If the Mandarin attacked on British soil, the Prime Minister is well within his rights to call SHIELD directly to investigate the case,” she offered, knowing he was well aware of that.

“Yes, but it crosses into US interests. I’m assuming you’ve heard something of the case?”

“I happen to know the person assigned to it, yes. I know that his previous targets have been American interests.”

“And now he’s branching out. The fear is that he’s escalating because he’s not been getting the attention he wants. We kept the others quiet. They were all smaller situations, relatively easy to contain, none on US soil. The latest one is clearly less so. The worry is that this is only going to get bigger and worse, for all of us.”

“So what do you want, Director Nance?” She might as well cut to the chase.

“For you to get SHIELD to work with our teams, to keep us in the loop.”

Peggy could only chuckle, mildly. “Once upon a time, my name could have been linked to the title of ‘Director of SHIELD’, but now I am focused on the Avengers. I’m not involved in field operations.”

“But you do have Fury’s ear, don’t you?” Nance wasn’t an idiot. One didn’t get in his position if they were. “I get it, SHIELD is trying to keep the peace, but this is personal for the US. If we don’t get him contained, people’s lives are at stake.”

“And you don’t think SHIELD is capable of keeping Americans alive?”

Nance’s paused, his expression carefully neutral, though a whole play of things was evident if you looked at the subtle way his mouth tightened, the way his eyes flickered from the steps they stood on to the shine of the crowds of tourists and workers. He clearly didn’t trust a lot of aspects of SHIELD, and yet, he was talking to her. He trusted Peggy at least.

“Let’s just say that SHIELD has done a lot of dirty things over the past few decades, a lot of things that were questionable and they called it peacekeeping.”

Peggy couldn’t help the flare of defense for the organization she founded. “And the US intelligence agencies have not?”

“They have. You can’t be in this business and not be dirty in some way. But you know, I hear things. Other people do too. And when you hear those things and then know that SHIELD can call upon Tony Stark and his suit, or some alien God of Thunder, or a raging monster who can destroy things, people get worried. SHIELD was founded with good intentions, but that was decades ago. Now, they aren’t that different from the rest of us.”

His words hit Peggy harder than she had expected, leaving her mute in the face of his matter-of-fact cynicism. There had always been interagency rivalry, of course, even during the war the SSR and SOE had feuded, and afterwards the SSR had been forced to fight with the FBI till it was subsumed into SHIELD. That sort of jurisdictional nitpicking had long been a part of the game. But the idea that now the agency she, Howard, and Phillips had worked so hard to put together would be outright attacked in the halls of government, all for having bigger toys than the US military intelligence personnel, left her angered and mildly disillusioned.

“I came to you in good faith, Carter,” Nance continued, voice quiet in the bustle around them. “As a friend, really.”

Peggy knew that wasn’t totally true. “It’s not because I was conveniently standing ten feet ahead of you in the hallway?”

If he was embarrassed for being caught out, he didn’t show it. “Convenience doesn’t take away from my intentions. People respect you, a lot of people as a matter of fact.”

That earned an honest snort out of her. “Mmm, I can tell by Senator Peter’s glaring at me like some sort of gargoyle all through that hearing.”

Nance rolled his eyes. “Peters is a pandering idiot who represents a base that is still stuck in the back hills of Appalachia and doesn’t realize how crazy the world has become. The rest of us know, and we also know you and what you sacrificed to be here. Your name has respect attached to it. And there is more than a few of people who feel you could be the breath of fresh air that SHIELD needs, the one who could maybe remind them of their roots.”

Peggy could only blink long moments at him, processing what he was saying. “I believe you overestimate the role I play in SHIELD now. I am just in charge of the Avengers, nothing else.”

“That doesn’t mean that your word as a founder doesn’t carry weight there. Just...think about it.”

With that, Nance gave her a short nod of farewell before turning to lope down the steps, hands shoved into the pockets of his trench coat. She watched him go, unsettled by the conversation itself, considering what he was suggesting and the greater issue at hand. That the US intelligence community was upset with SHIELD at the moment went without saying. That they feared the agency was a bit surprising to her. And she found it interesting that of all the things they could be caught up on at the moment, the Mandarin case would be the one they would be approaching her about jurisdictional lines.

“Ten instances...not three,” she murmured to herself, moving down the steps once again. Interesting that there were more cases than even Sharon knew about. With determined steps she headed down to the bottom, already planning to call a cab and make her way to the Triskelion for a chat.