All I Wanna Do Is Run
Gabby wasn't sure what to do.
She hadn't been doing anything wrong. Just wandering the boring hallways and riding the elevator all the way up and then back down without it stopping. Gabby had hacked into the system the day before so even if someone pressed the elevator button, it would still pass right by that level. It wasn't what you were supposed to do, but out of all her pranks, this was the most harmless one.
So, when Fury had called for her to meet him in his office, Gabby was worried. She had trudged to his office, replaying the last few days and couldn't find anything that majorly impacted S.H.I.E.L.D or any of the agents. Gabby knocked on the door and when no one answered, she opened the door. Fury sat in his chair, sipping a drink from his coffee mug, and was reading a file on the desk.
"Whatever's in that file, it's a lie." She pleaded, eyeing the file cautiously.
Fury rolled his eyes, "You're not in trouble, I just wanted to give you something. Take a seat, Agent 8."
The two chairs in the room were large and comfy and looked like they could swallow you whole. Gabby sat down in the left one, remembering something she told herself at the orphanage: left is lucky, right is wrong. She frowned, she couldn't understand why she said that. Hydra had messed her mind up pretty bad, she could recall most of the memories of her past but there were some Hydra had randomly taken from her by accident during one of their experiments.
There was something shiny on the desk in front of her, and when Gabby stared closer at it, she realised it was a disk. Fury must have noticed her looking at it because he moved it inside the folder with the file. She reddened at this and when she opened her mouth to explain she wasn't being nosy, that she just hadn't noticed what it was, Fury handed the folder to her.
Her mouth closed itself and Gabby took the folder from him and slowly opened the front cover. The disk was there in a plastic bag, nothing unusual on it. The file was behind it, tucked in a slot. It was only a few pages long as she flipped through it. Gabby glanced up at Fury for him to explain.
"This folder arrived in the lobby mysteriously and our cameras cannot pick up anyone that put it there. We haven't watched the CD, we don't know what would happen if we did but it appears to be a complication of multiple movies. The file goes into more detail but I'll give you a quick summary" Fury stops talking to make sure she is following. Gabby gestures for him to continue,
He takes in a deep breath and says, "Okay, so the movies are about the Avengers. There are single movies about each Avenger as an individual and there are movies about the Avengers main battles. The ones in the future. The person who gave us this, who we can call Samantha according to her, wants everyone to watch them because it is to make better relationships with each other before the battles happen. It is to make sure no mistakes happen this time."
Gabby gasps, all their lives on that disk? Right there in front of her? "Is my backstory in there too?"
Fury scratches the back of his neck, "There is a section in there for you, so yes. It isn't a movie actually, which was what Samatha wrote, but Samantha has these powers so she went into your head and literally just recorded your past."
She groans and rubs her temples. That means all the memories she can't remember are in there, her time with Hydra is there, her time at the orphanage and on the street, her parents dying too. She can't process all this information Fury just spat at her, so she just shoves it into the back of her head for later. Probably not her best idea but it would work for now.
Gabby closes the folder and nods, "May I be dismissed?"
"Hold on," Fury objected, "Samantha has written that she wants us to meet at the cinema in this room to watch it tomorrow at 11 am. She has said she can program the system to make her voice fills the room when she talks like an AI. I also want you to read that file tonight. Read it thoroughly. And don't tell Captain Rogers."
"Where's the cinema?"
Fury ponders that for a few seconds before replying, "It's on level 8, those two large wooden doors you've probably walked by and tried to get into," Gabby sheepishly grins, "Yeah, in there is the cinema."
Gabby assumes her cheeks are red from blushing but she just ignores that, "Thank you, sir.", giving a small salute, and stands up from the seat and is about to leave the room when a question fills her head
She spins around to face Fury again, who doesn't even seem surprised she has something to ask, "Sir, why did you ask me to do this?"
Fury sighs, "Agent 8, you, out of all my agents that I've assigned the task to, have somehow made a close bond with Captain Rogers. I don't know how, but if you can connect with Captain Rogers, you can connect with the rest as well. You have a proper personality where most of my other agents have been trained to show one plain emotion, you must have been sick that day."
She laughs and smiles, "Thank you, Director Fury."
Gabby opens and shuts the door behind her and peers down at the folder in her hand. What just happened? She was not expecting that at all. Her first thought was to go find Steve but then Fury's voice overflowed her head: 'And don't tell Captain Rogers.' Gabby sighs, this was going to be a long night and she was not looking forward to it.
It was past lunchtime now but she didn't feel hungry. She felt almost sick. Gabby trudged to her private quarters on level six in the east wing with Steve's room a few doors down. It would be so easy to knock on the door and spill everything she just learnt. But Gabby couldn't let down Fury, he already didn't trust her that much. But he thought she had character unlike everyone else so that was a good thing.
Scanning her finger onto the pad, her door slid to the side to let her enter. It was a basic room, a bed in one corner, storage cupboards, a nightstand with a lamp and a small bathroom. Luckily, on her first night here she had easily spotted all the bugs and detached them. They thought she was a baby but she had withstood eleven years at the orphanage, a year on the street and a year with Hydra. She knew how to kill and how to survive. It was one of the few things Hydra taught her that was useful.
Pictures hang on the wall, most of herself or of places she's never been too. There was one photograph of Australia, in Melbourne, that she took on a mission. Fury yelled at her afterwards for that but she got to keep it so it was a win in her book. She also had a small Polaroid photo of Steve when she was teaching him about them. It was cute and Steve wasn't prepared for it so it was funny. It sat on her nightstand and reminded her she had a friend.
The folder got heavy in her hands, the secrets consuming her. But, she laid it down on her bed and walked off to the bathroom for a refreshing shower. The door automatically shut behind her and she began to strip off her clothing. Once bare, Gabby hang a towel over the shower rack and turned the water on. She waited outside the shower until the water was warm. Gabby stepped carefully into it, trying to avoid the water in case it was too hot or too cold and attempting to not slip on the shower floor.
The lukewarm water hit her back and she let out a breath of relief. Her hair turned a shade of dark brown, a large difference to when her hair is dry, which is then light brown. Gabby squirted a few pumps of shampoo into her hand and kneaded it into her hair, making sure there were a lot of bubbles. Then, she grabbed the shower nozzle and took it off the hook and directed it right at her head, making sure all the shampoo was rinsed out.
Gabby squeezed a dab of conditioner into her head and massaged it into the bottom of her hair, which wasn't long, it ended at her armpits but it wasn't technically short. Then a song popped into her head, a song she hadn't thought of in a while. Gabby began to hum the melody and soon, the words leaked out of her mouth.
"I'm nearing the end of my fifth year. I feel like I've been lacking, crying too many tears," She didn't like to show her weaknesses to others but as Fury said, she had obviously missed the day you learnt how to control your emotions.
"Everyone seemed to say it was so great but did I miss out, was it a huge mistake?" Gabby was told it would be a great experience but so far, no one really respected her or treated her like their equal.
She places her hair on her shoulder and grabs the soap, rubbing it over her body, "I can't help the fact I like to be alone. It might sound kinda sad, but that's just what I seem to know," Gabby washes the soap foam off.
"I tend to handle things usually by myself and I can't ever seem to try and ask for help." Another flaw of herself.
"I'm sitting here, crying in my prom dress. I'd be the prom queen if crying was a contest. Makeup is running down, feelings are all around. How did I get here? I need to know." Water squirts in her eye and she grabs the face washer and rubs the water away.
She clutches her razor and shaves off the hair under her armpits, "I guess I maybe had a couple expectations. Thought I'd get to them, but no I didn't. I guess I thought that prom was gonna be fun but now I'm sitting on the floor and all I wanna do is run."
Gabby cleans the conditioner out of her hair and pins it up with a clip, "I keep collections of masks upon my wall to try and stop myself from revealing it all. Affecting others is the last thing I would do. I keep to myself though I want to breakthrough."
"I hold so many small regrets and what-ifs down inside my head," Gabby uses some special soap for oily skin and rubs it on her face.
"Some confidence it couldn't hurt me. My demeanour is often misread." She tries to make sure the soap doesn't get in her eyes or mouth, tilting her head up so it doesn't run down her face.
"I'm sitting here, crying in my prom dress. I'd be the prom queen if crying was a contest. Makeup is running down, feelings are all around. How did I get here? I need to know," She lets the cleanser on her face do its magic, singing softly to herself.
The water hits her back and slides down her spotless body, "I guess I maybe had a couple expectations. Thought I'd get to them, but no I didn't," She turns around carefully and dips her head into the water, the soap running off and into the drain,
"I guess I thought that prom was gonna be fun but now I'm sitting on the floor and all I wanna do is run. All i wanna do is run, all I wanna do is run. All i wanna do is run." Gabby stays like that, the water running down her back, her hair covering her face.
Next, she turns the tap off and stands there, shivering as water droplets fall to the floor. Gabby yanks her towel off the rack and wraps it around her waist. She unclips her hair and dries her hair with the towel. Gabby twists her hair up and clasps it back up. Gabby pushes the curtain to the side and brings one foot out of the shower and onto the matt so she won't fall. Gabby pulls the other leg out as well and wipes her feet on the mat and walks out of her bathroom, the door automatically opened for her and shut as well.
A dressing gown hangs on a hook next to her bed and she snatched it off, sticking her arms through the sleeves and tying the belt around her waist. She hung the towel up instead and flopped onto the bed. The mattress was hard beneath her but she didn't mind, she had spent two years sleeping on cold, stone floors so the bed wasn't a problem. Gabby clutched the folder in her hands and opened it, pulling out the file, leaving the disk inside. The letter had been handwritten, beautiful cursive filling the pages.
She read it out loud, so she could catch anything that sounded wrong,
"Dear Director Fury,
My name is Samantha and though you do not know who I am, I know you. Do not try and figure out who I actually am and where this came from for you will find nothing. I mean no harm to S.H.I.E.L.D, your agents, or the avengers. I am from a different timeline and I want the avengers and you to watch what is on the disk.
This letter is classified and if anyone I have not permitted to read this tries to read it, their hands will be burned. Those I have allowed to read this are: Agent Hill, Agent Coulson, Agent 8, Agent 11, Agent 3, Agent Blue, Agent Red, Agent 17, Agent 26, Agent 14, Agent 25, Agent 61, Agent 42, Agent 38, Agent 75, Agent 6, Agent 28, Agent 63, and Agent 19. I have specially picked these agents and have chosen Agent 8 has the most trustworthy of the group. Please notify her and give her this file to read."
Gabby raised an eyebrow at the last two sentences. Why did this person- Samantha, trust her? Gabby peered closely at all the agents chosen. They were all her friends, even her two brothers: Agent Blue and Agent 17. That was odd but Gabby kept reading.
"This project has been called Project OTP. The disk contains movies. There are movies about each individual avenger and movies about there battles as the Avengers. The movies are in order of your timeline. Please have all the Avengers and the agents above rounded up in the cinema. You will find two buttons on the walls, a red and blue one. The blue button, once pressed, will teleport all the other people we will need to the cinema. The red button, once pressed, makes a loud noise. The red one is a spolier button. It will sound when someone is about to spoil something. I will be the only one using it.
The reason for Project OTP is in my timeline, I am just a citizin but the Avengers have one more person: Agent 8. She has dramamtically changed the team and bonded them closer. The movies are of your timeline and will show what happens without Agent 8. Hopefully once you watch everything, you will change your timeline so no one dies."
She gasped. She was an avenger in Samantha's timeline? That would have been so cool. Gabby sighed, Fury would never let her become one. She was, though, curious as what does happen in the future and who dies. Gabby wished it wasn't her.
"I will be present in the cinema as hologram and if I am busy, just an AI, like Mr.Stark's 'Jarvis'. If you have any questions please head to the cinema and ask them and I will answer to my best ability. Thank you for your time, this will save many lives.
Sincerely,
Samantha."
She placed the file in the folder and closed it. Gabby put it in the top drawer of her nightstand, locking it with a key so no one could get it. She didn't want Steve to come in here and accidentally open the drawer and find it. That would be a problm with plenty of consequences but she didn't even want to think about it. Her brain felt like it was going to explode if she didn't spill all the information she just learnt to someone. But she couldn't.
Gabby rested her head in her hands and groaned loudly, though it was muffled. She didn't have to do anything else tonight, luckily, but tomorrow she would need to plan how to do this. She wasn't looking forward to that. What was she going to do? She needed to find the agents and bring them to the cinema. Find the avengers, lure them into the cinema without informing them why and then press the blue button and deal with the others. Gabby really needed someone who was good at convincing people and who could help her plan.
Then, a plan sparked in her head. Her friends were the agents assgined to Project OTP so surely she could notify them. She grinned. But who to choose? She couldn't say the project to all the agents, she'd have 16 agents following her around like lost puppies. No, but she could inform just a few. And, Agent 6, Agent 63 and Agent 28 were the perfect people to tell and they would deffinitly agree with her.
Time to find her sisters.
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