In the End
Two Years and a Couple Months
"That Little Guy From Brooklyn Who Was Too Dumb To Run Away From A Fight, I'm Following Him." - Sgt. James Buchanan Barnes
Morgan sits at his desk flipping through the files he has left to complete. There are far too many for his taste. He enjoys having more responsibility, but right now he really misses the good old days without all the excess paperwork. A knock at the door startles him from his thoughts. He checks his watch then calls for the man to come in.
The man in question is a black man dressed in a slightly ill fitted suit. He smiles at Morgan, his teeth bright with a slight gap between the front two. He sticks out a calloused hand and they shake. Morgan gestures for the man to take a seat, while putting aside the file that he had previously been working on. Finally, Morgan leans back in his chair opening himself up to the other man.
“So tell me Mr. Wilson, what can an FBI agent do for an Avenger?” Morgan begins.
“Please call me Sam,” the other man laughs. “I’m working on a missing person’s case that I think you may have come across.”
Morgan raises a brow. They’ve had a lot of missing persons cases over the years; none came to mind that were immediately Avenger’s worthy to look into. Then it hits him and all the amusement is gone from the world. It isn’t about a missing person; it’s about the Winter Soldier.
“So you remember him.”
“He’s a hard guy to forget,” Morgan says almost in a spit. “He killed nine almost ten people in a span of five days.”
Sam nods solemnly, “I can’t speak for him, but I’m sorry that happened. It’s hard to lose people especially when you feel that they are under your care. And I’m sorry he shot you.”
Morgan looks down to notice his hand unconsciously clutching where he had been shot. The man’s perceptive. He’d make a good profiler if he wasn’t too busy being a superhero. Though Morgan is sharp to and he notices a pattern in the man’s word choice.
“You know who he is.”
“I do. There’s a lot more to this case than you can imagine, Agent Morgan.”
“I don’t suppose you’re gonna share with a brother, are you?”
Sam laughs, shaking his head. The tension that hangs in the room dissipates with each ring. Warm afternoon light shines in through the large window. Morgan feels a weight being lifted off his chest; it’s nice to hear the other man laugh. He finds his lips cracking a bit of a smile.
“Cap’s orders,” Sam finally says. “You didn’t happen to have a theory as to why he was in Nevada do you?”
“The town was home to three former S.H.I.E.L.D. scientists; one of them was a mole during the Vietnam War. Our more updated theory is that they were reporting to Hydra. The Winter Soldier was sent to kill them off and retrieve some German notebooks.”
“One of the scientist’s?”
“That’s what we originally thought, but our linguistic specialist disagreed.” Morgan pauses for a moment before asking, “You wouldn’t happen to know who the initials A.Z. belong to?”
Sam’s face darkens, “Arnim Zola. Hydra scientist who worked for Schmidt. He made the Winter Soldier.”
“Made? You mean he is enhanced?”
“Among other things. He had a metal arm, did you not notice?”
“I was distracted,” Morgan says, feeling slightly ashamed that he missed such a big detail.
“You wouldn’t happen to have notebooks in evidence or something?”
“Sorry. He took it when he attacked the car.”
“Don’t take it personally. He ripped the steering wheel out of my car and tore a guy through my window and ripped out one of my doors.”
Morgan releases a short huff of laughter. It didn’t feel real; the Winter Soldier didn’t feel real. An enhanced super soldier assassin seems like something out of a comic book not seriously being discussed in his FBI office. It’s absurd.
“You’re thinking about how crazy it is. I thought it was too at first when Steve told me everything. It’s understandable why he was a ghost for so long.”
“No one wants to believe that a man like him exists.”
“No, they really don’t.”
“I have to ask Agent Sitwell and Rumlow, were they…” Morgan trails off, not wanting to offend the other man if the case differs.
“Hydra? Yeah, they were. Rumlow was on S.T.R.I.K.E. with Steve; they were like an elite tactical team. He was in headquarters when one of the helicarriers hit it. Sitwell was the one to be pulled out the window and thrown into traffic.”
“The BAU wasn’t placed in any of the Ops, but we heard a lot of the chatter. It’s going to take a long time to root out all of the places Hydra got its tendrils into.”
“The Avengers are currently in the process of hunting down the rest of their bases.”
“Captain Rogers must be feeling a bit of deja vu,” Morgan says with a chuckle.
Morgan and Sam sit in the office and talk for what seems like a couple of minutes when in truth is closer to three hours. By the end of it, it feels as though Morgan got more answers than Sam, but at least he feels comfortable enough to close the Nevada case. The Winter Soldier killed those scientists for the notebooks. Sam may not be giving up the Soldier’s name, but Morgan isn’t sure it really matters if he can offer closer to the diner victim’s families.
As Sam is leaving the office, he turns around and says, “Agent Morgan, don’t feel like you lost to him. It’s not chess; there’s always more to it. And besides he shot Captain America like seven times, the fact that you are alive says much more than whether or not you caught him.”
Morgan thanks him, and Sam closes the door softly. He is grateful to be alive; he’s grateful to be able to age and grow. In facing death, he realizes how much he has left to live. His body may not be twenty-five anymore, but that doesn't mean there aren’t still things to look forward to. He leans back in his chair and sighs.