Salt for Salt
Now don't you try and move me; you're just gonna lose
There's a crash on the levee and, mama, you've been refused
Well it's sugar for sugar, and it's salt for salt
If you go down in the flood it's gonna be your fault
But, oh mama, ain't you gonna miss your best friend now
You're gonna have to find yourself another best friend, somehow
--"Down in the Flood", Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs
When Pierce calls her on her SHIELD phone, rather than paging her, Peggy figures something’s up.
“Report to my office, Agent. There’s a situation we need to discuss.”
Well, that doesn’t sound ominous.
“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” she promises, and hangs up. She thinks for a moment, biting her lip, then makes a decision.
She pulls a derringer from her desk drawer and conceals it in her waistband, then tucks a couple of Widow’s Bites into the cuffs of her sleeves. She’s already got a knife in her boot and another strapped to her waist; she pulls a couple of the stiletto chopsticks Nat got her for her birthday and winds them into her hair. They’re made of ceramic, as are the knives; they won’t show up on a metal detector if she’s required to pass through one. Finally, she takes a button-sized mic and hides it under her collar, then sets it up to record to her laptop and phone.
Thus armed, she heads down the hall, stopping at Sharon’s cubicle.
“Hey, Sharon.”
“Hi, Peggy!” Sharon smiles at her warmly, but there’s a tinge of strain to her features, and a tension to her shoulders that’s not normally there. “What’s up?”
“I was thinking of going to get a coffee,” says Peggy, grabbing a pad of paper and a pen from Sharon’s desk. “Want to come?”
“Oh, sure! Just let me—”
“If you’ve got something you need to finish, I can meet you there,” she continues, and shows Sharon the message she just wrote: Pierce is involved with Fury’s death. He’s just sent for me.
Sharon grabs the pen. “Well, I was kind of in the middle of something.” You need backup?
“Well, shall we meet in, say, half an hour? I have a couple things I should finish up, anyway.” If I don’t meet you in 30 minutes, come looking
Sharon nods, casually crumpling the top several pages of the pad in her fist. “Sounds good. Foyer?”
“East entrance. It’s closest to the café.”
It’s not, in fact, close to much of anything, but Sharon merely nods again, her forehead wrinkled with concern. “See you then.”
Peggy waves a hand and continues down the hall, taking the elevator up to Pierce’s floor. No one gets in, and when she exits the elevator, the hallway is deserted. Static prickles up her spine. Something is very, very off. She just hopes she can handle it.
She takes a moment to compose herself (and turn on the recording device on her jacket), and knocks on Pierce’s door.
“Come in.”
She does, closing the door carefully behind her, and tries not to feel like she’s trapping herself as she does so.
Pierce isn’t alone; two guys from Strike Team Two are lurking near the door—Geoffries and Lawton, she thinks. She’s seen them both in action, even gave her approval on Lawton’s assessment. They wouldn’t know that, though. Peggy’s role in decision-making at SHIELD is something that Nick and Maria have been careful to conceal from as many people as possible. These two guys aren’t stupid, but they’re not great tacticians, either—the kinds of jobs they’re usually assigned to require brawn over brains. If it comes to a fight, she can probably take them.
She doesn’t let any of what she’s thinking show on her face, just nods at them and crosses the room to Pierce’s desk. The guy has a huge office; Peggy and Nat have jokingly wondered whether he’s compensating for something. Maybe this is where he holds his secret HYDRA jamborees.
“You wanted to see me, Secretary Pierce?”
Pierce smiles at her, charming in a gosh-a-hyuck manner borrowed straight from Ronald Reagan. In retrospect, Peggy feels she ought to have known he was evil long before this.
“Thanks for coming, Miss Carter.”
Miss. Not Agent. Peggy would be seething, if the fact that he’s already patronizing her didn’t exponentially increase her odds of surviving this encounter. Alright, maybe she’s still seething a little. She keeps her smile polite and bland, waiting for whatever comes next.
“After the tragic events of yesterday, I’m personally interviewing everyone who was close to Nick Fury,” he says. “He was my friend, and I am determined to find out why and how he was murdered.”
Like you didn’t order the hit, Peggy thinks caustically. “I understand, sir,” she says, letting the smile drop into a more serious expression. “We’re all reeling.”
“I understand you sat in on many of Nick’s assessments for new hires.”
More like argued with Nick until we were both blue in the face over new hires. “That’s right,” she says aloud.
He gives her a searching look. “I have to say, that seems like an… odd… decision, considering that most of your work seems to be in data analysis.”
He doesn’t know. Thank God for Nick’s paranoia. “It was an odd decision,” she says, smiling a little. “Director Fury seemed to think I had a good instinct for spotting talent. I was grateful enough to get a break from number-crunching.”
Pierce flips through a file in front of him. He’s not reading it, she knows—he’s trying to psych her out, make her nervous. Well, he’s going to have to work a hell of a lot harder for that. “You were present for Natasha Romanov’s intake interview?”
She nods. “That’s correct, sir.”
“May I ask why? That interview was highly classified.”
“Actually, that was mostly a coincidence, sir.” Her mouth quirks into a self-deprecating smile. “Deputy Director Hill was in the hospital, and they wanted another woman on the interview team. I happened to be one of the few people available who had any familiarity with the situation.”
“And why was that?”
She allows herself to look surprised, as though she’d assumed Pierce would already know. “I was the one who analyzed her hit pattern and predicted her target. The idea was to set a trap so Barton could neutralize her, but…” She lifts one shoulder in a lopsided shrug. “He brought her in instead.”
“And your relationship with Romanov now?”
“We’re friends. Good friends.”
“Not lovers?”
Shit. Peggy’s been pretty careful, but she should have known that kidnapping incident would come back to haunt her.
“Not—as such,” she says carefully. Pierce raises his eyebrows, and she lets out an exasperated huff. “We—we had a thing, but it… didn’t work out. We’re—her job, it’s just too… we decided we’d be… better off… as friends.”
“You seem less than happy with that situation.” Pierce is doing the whole concerned-uncle bit, and Peggy is finding it hard to resist punching him in that smug face. She’s no amateur, though, and so she takes his bait easily, acting as though she has no idea he’s leading her on.
“It’s not the first time someone’s chosen their job over me,” she says ruefully. “I’m… resigned to it, I suppose, but it still hurts.”
“And now she’s on the run. With Steve Rogers.”
“Yes, I—I thought she was more sensible than that, honestly.”
He leans back in his chair, regarding her closely. He still hasn’t invited her to sit down. Wanker. “Tell me about Steve Rogers.”
There’s no point in pretending she and Steve aren’t close; it’s well-known that she’s pretty much his best friend, outside of the Avengers. (She is his best friend, Avengers or no. She’s quite proud of that fact.) Instead, she acts the put-upon, sensible woman who thinks her friend has gone off the deep end.
“Steve is… impulsive,” she says. “Director Fury’s death hit him hard, and I expect he just… snapped.” She meets his eyes. “I tried to call him—I thought maybe I could talk some sense into him—but it didn’t go through.”
Pierce leans forward again, steepling his hands together. “Miss Carter, your closeness with Rogers and Romanov is well-known. There are some who would question your loyalty to SHIELD in the face of their defection.”
Peggy bites her lip. “Sir, I—I don’t pretend to understand precisely why Steve and Natasha have—defected—but I promise you, my first loyalty is to SHIELD. I’ll admit I’m hoping this is all a misunderstanding, and that once they’re back in SHIELD custody they’ll cooperate.”
There’s a long moment of silence, and then Pierce laughs. “Well, Miss Carter, for what it’s worth, I believe you. Unfortunately, we have come to a point where loyalty to SHIELD is no longer enough.”
She feels her pulse quicken, and wills herself to stillness. No sudden moves. She is suddenly hyper-aware of the pistol resting on her hip, and of the two men at her back.
“Sir?”
“I’m about to make you an offer, Miss Carter. An offer you can’t refuse.” He smiles, like it’s a joke, and walks around the desk. Peggy steps away from him, trying to make it look like she’s just giving him room. The two goons move closer.
“You see, SHIELD has become outdated. Ineffective. Inefficient.” Pierce waves a hand at the wall, and a projection splashes across it: the familiar tentacled symbol of HYDRA.
Peggy has to swallow a wave of nausea at the sight. It’s one thing to know that HYDRA has concealed itself right in the core of SHIELD; it’s another to actually see it.
“We’re building a new future here, Margaret,” he says, horrifyingly chummy. “Order from chaos. Peace from war. And you can be a part of it.”
“I’ve been fighting HYDRA for the past fifteen years,” she reminds him dryly. “What makes you think I’m going to convert now?”
“Because it’s the right thing to do,” says Pierce, apparently sincerely. “Aren’t you tired of fighting? Things could be so much better. Look at the world, Margaret. It’s a shambles. But with HYDRA, we can have order. We can have peace. We’re almost ready. We just need one final push.”
“And how are you going to achieve that?”
Pierce smiles at her, and she thinks of a lizard, waiting to catch some hapless insect with its long tongue. It’s hard not to let her disgust show.
“We have an algorithm,” he says. “With Project Insight, we can kill anyone who threatens the world order. We can stop the bad guys before they even do anything.”
The projection on the wall changes to a schematic, a run-down of Insight’s capabilities. Peggy’s been arguing with Nick about this stupid project for months, but she’d never realized the extent of it. Something else he forgot to mention, she thinks. Nick and his secrets. If he was alive I’d wring his neck.
“Seven million people?” she says aloud. “Don’t you think that’s overkill?”
Pierce raises his hands in a “what can you do” sort of gesture. “Security comes with a price. Sometimes, we have to make tough choices. Really, is this any different from Nagasaki and Hiroshima? Peace requires sacrifices. Safety requires sacrifices.”
Hiroshima and Nagasaki were atrocities, she thinks. And I notice you aren’t the one making the sacrifice.
“Okay,” she says aloud. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe we do need order. I certainly wouldn’t say no to a little peace.”
Pierce blinks at her in surprise, momentarily lost for words.
“I’ll join,” she says decisively.
There’s another, longer pause, and then Pierce laughs. “Very good, Miss Carter. But it’s not quite as easy as that. We can use someone of your skills, but not until after Insight launches. In the meantime, you will stay in one of our containment facilities.” He nods at the guards, who are now holding onto her elbows. “Cuff her.”
And normally, she would go along with it. She would let them cuff her, let them lead her away, and once they were a couple floors down, she would take out the guards and escape. But they don’t have time, and Steve and Nat are depending on her being their insider here, and the only way she’s going to be able to do that is if there are no witnesses to this little encounter.
Fuck.
“You know what?” she says out loud. “Fuck this. Fuck you, and fuck HYDRA. You can all bloody fuck yourselves, because I’m not going over.”
Pierce shakes his head. “Well, I can’t say I’m surprised, but I am sorry.” He heaves a theatrical sigh, and gestures toward the window. “Oh, well. Plan B it is.”
Peggy follows his gesture, and frowns. “You’re going to throw me out the window?” she asks in disbelief.
“Well,” says Pierce, “I’d just have you shot, but it’s a tad obvious.”
“And having me thrown out the window of your office isn’t?” she demands. “You think nobody’s going to notice that I went up to your office and never came down?”
He nods, baring his teeth in what he probably thinks of as an intimidating grin. Peggy has been sleeping with Natasha for over a year, now; she knows what real intimidation looks like, and this isn’t it. This man needs to step up his game.
“That’s exactly what I think, Miss Carter. No one saw you come up. The security feed in this part of the building has been on loop for the past twenty minutes. Anyone reviewing the footage will see you entering the 42nd floor, find the open window in storage room 426A, and assume you committed suicide.”
“And why would I do that?”
The goons prod her toward the window, and Peggy goes easily, waiting for the right moment. Very few people at SHIELD have seen her fight all-out. As far as anyone here knows, she meets the minimum requirements for a non-field agent, and that’s it. Neither Pierce nor the Strike Team is aware that she spends a great deal of her free time sparring with the Avengers.
Three-to-one odds with her hands unbound isn’t anywhere close to the biggest challenge she’s faced. She’s only mildly worried.
“Because, Miss Carter, you have just found out that your best friend and your lover—yes, we know about that—are dead.”
His words are like a punch to the gut, like a knife carving straight into her lungs and twisting. For a second, all she can do is stare at him, all her breath gone.
“No,” she says.
“Yes.” Pierce waves a hand, and another scene is projected on the wall—Steve, Natasha, and another man, whom she assumes is Sam Wilson, kneeling in the street, surrounded by SHIELD SUVs. As she watches, a man in a tac vest puts his gun to Steve’s head.
“Rogers and his allies were apprehended just thirty minutes ago,” say Pierce, and there’s a sick sort of satisfaction in his voice. “They have since been disposed of.”
“No,” she whispers, and lets herself slump, lets her heartbreak show on her face. There are tears in her eyes, and she doesn’t bother to hide them.
Pierce opens the window, and cold air whistles through. Peggy moves toward it of her own accord, the goons falling a step behind her. In the window’s reflection, she can see that only one of them has his gun trained on her.
“Really, Miss Carter?” Pierce goads. “Broken so easily? I would have thought you were made of sterner stuff.”
She stops, mere inches from the edge, and looks at him. “We lost,” she says, and smiles a little. “Nick’s gone, Steve and Nat are gone… what do I have left, really?” She looks down at the ground, far, far below. “Might as well make a decent exit.”
She doesn’t move though, standing with her hands on either side of the window.
“Geoffries,” says Pierce. “I believe Miss Carter might need a push.”
Geoffries obeys, and the second he touches her, she drops, elbowing him hard in the stomach on the way down. Before he can react, she grabs his arm and flips him over her hip, straight through the open window.
Lawton shoots, and she dives sideways, toward Pierce—Lawton can’t shoot without risking hitting his boss, and she uses his moment of indecision to draw her derringer, flicking off the safety and firing as she rolls behind the desk.
The first shot misses, and so does the second. Peggy pops up from behind the desk and shoots Lawton a third time, this time hitting him right in the head. He goes down in a spray of blood, but Peggy can’t concentrate on that, because Pierce has gotten behind her, and has one arm around her neck and a gun to her head.
“Drop the gun,” he says. “Or I’ll shoot you.”
You’re going to shoot me anyway, she thinks, but drops the gun. She’s got her face turned into the crook of his elbow, so the pressure he’s putting on her neck doesn’t actually cut off her airway. She pretends, though, thrashing and making choking noises, one arm grasping at his arm like she’s trying to break his hold. His arm tightens, and her struggles get weaker and weaker, until she goes limp.
The second he moves his gun hand, she grabs his wrist, forcing the gun away from her, and stabs him in the stomach with her free hand. Pierce grunts in pain. Peggy twists around, still keeping his gun away from her, and drives one of her chopsticks into his throat.
He makes an awful gurgling noise and falls backwards, blood bubbling from his mouth and neck and spreading in a dark wave across his torso. Peggy grimaces. She hates killing people, but in this case, she can’t feel much remorse.
She gets his laptop, using his thumbprint to unlock it, and attaches one of Stark’s devices—which he calls Advanced Data Collection Drives, but which Nat, Peggy, and Steve call Barnacles, much to Stark’s chagrin—to the underside of the computer. It only takes the Barnacle a second to connect with the hard drive, and Peggy sets it to download everything on the laptop.
It takes six minutes and thirty-four seconds for the Barnacle to download the contents of Pierce’s computer, during which time Peggy drags Pierce and Lawton’s bodies to the window and throws them out, then uses paper towels from Pierce’s bathroom to clean the blood from the hardwood floor and her clothing. By the time it’s finished downloading, she looks at least somewhat presentable, and the office doesn’t look like a murderous brawl took place there.
It still doesn’t look great, but there’s no evidence of her presence here. Pierce himself made sure of that.
She collects the Barnacle, closes the laptop, and lets herself out of the office. The floor is deserted, and so is the elevator. Peggy gets out at a random floor, taking a different elevator, and then a staircase, to get to the east exit. She’s trembling a little, and she’s finding it harder and harder to breathe evenly.
Nat and Steve are alright. They have to be. Pierce didn’t actually show footage of them being killed. That has to mean something, right? He has to have been bluffing. They’re alright. They’ll be fine. Maria’s on the Strike Team, she’ll… do something. She won’t let them die.
“Peggy?” Sharon’s hovering near the entrance, looking concerned. There’s no one around, and no cameras close enough to pick up her voice when she leans in close. “You okay?”
“Not here,” Peggy whispers, and straightens, determinedly cheerful. “Come on, darling. I’m dying for a cuppa.”
They’ve been driving for about half an hour when Natasha’s phone rings. Immediately, everyone goes tense.
Natasha’s face is perfectly blank as she accepts the call, putting it on speaker. Steve, knowing what that look means on Nat, feels his stomach clench. Whatever this is, it isn’t good.
“Hello?”
“Natasha!” says Peggy’s voice. She’s breathing hard, her voice higher than normal. “Thank God. Are you—are you okay?”
“Yeah, fine,” says Natasha. Sam raises his eyebrows, looking pointedly at her shoulder, and she gives him the finger. “What about you?”
“And Steve? Steve is okay?”
“We’re all fine,” Natasha reassures her. “Are you?”
“I’m—fine,” she says, in a way that sounds like she really isn’t. “But… I think I’ve—I might have made a bollocks of this. I don’t know.”
“Made a… what? What happened?”
Peggy blows out a breath, making a rush of static over the speaker. “I killed Pierce.”
“WHAT??!”
“I killed Pierce,” she repeats, sounding mulish now. “He didn’t give me much choice.”
“But—you were going to stay undercover—where are you, what—”
“I’m still at SHIELD,” she says. “Well, I’m pretending to be on a Starbucks run with Sharon, but I’m going back in a minute. I don’t think they know it was me.”
“Peggy…”
Hill cuts in. “Agent Carter, I thought we agreed we needed Pierce alive.”
“He had a gun to my head, it wasn’t like I had a lot of choice!” Peggy snaps. There’s a pause, and then she adds, in a quieter tone, “He called me into his office on a pretense, and tried to kill me. It was—the situation got out of control, I didn’t… Anyway. He’s dead, and Sitwell’s dead, so apparently now Rumlow’s in charge. Which is good for us, because he’s a complete idiot. But Pierce was going to set my death up as an accident, so… I was able to use that. No one knows I was in there, not even Rumlow. So it ought to be alright, as far as it goes.”
Natasha’s face is still terribly blank, her fingers white-knuckled on the phone. Steve puts a hand on her good shoulder, and she leans back into his touch, just the tiniest bit.
“You’re alright, though,” she says. “You’re not hurt.”
“I’m not hurt,” says Peggy reassuringly. “Just a bit shaken. It was closer than I’d have liked.”
“Yes, well. It’s closer than I’d like, either.”
“I’d better go,” she says, after another pause. “I’ll call you tonight, alright? Let me know what’s happening.”
“Okay. Peggy?”
“Yes?”
Natasha clearly struggles with herself for a moment before saying softly, “I love you.”
“I love you too, darling. Come back to me in one piece, okay?”
“I will.”
“Bye, then.”
“Bye.”
She hangs up, and stares blankly into space for a moment, before rubbing her face and sighing. “Well. Shit.”