I seem to be what I'm not, you see. I'm wearing my heart like a crown.

[usavatar]

[The lab at the NTS gives Steve the crawls, no matter how many times he ends up there. Maybe it's the wasteland backing the place, the radiation warning signs or the huge pits where gamma-based explosive have ripped chunks out of the earth. Maybe it's the way the self-contained facility circulates purified air until the entire place tastes stale. Regardless, when Howard says there's 'something interesting' there and that General Phillips has requested Captain America's presence at the base ASAP, Steve doesn't exactly have a choice but to go.

The surroundings are still unsettling. The air still tastes stale. But there's a wildness to the place that Steve's never seen before. Scientists rushing back and forth, holding conversations that are at once hushed and excited. He almost has to pry one away from her clipboard in order to find out where Phillips and Stark are waiting. "Requested SSR personnel are supposed to go to observation room three," she says, and by the time he manages to get directions there he's already looking forward to stepping back out into the Nevada heat.

What he doesn't expect when he gets to Observation Room Three is to see Peggy and a half-dozen higher ups whose names and faces he knows but whom he's never personally met. What he doesn't expect is to see a man restrained in the otherwise empty cleanroom on the other side of the glass. Steve's escort stays on the other side of the door when it gets shut. He drifts to Peggy's side, saluting the Phillips at the same time.]

General. Is... What is this?

[Phillips raises his eyebrows at Steve in a look the Captain knows too well by now.]

Funny.[Phillips gestures at the glass.]I was hoping you could tell me. Stark got Skull's toy box open - ripped a nice shiny hole in the wall of his lab and spiked radiation levels in the entire facility. And also gave us him.

[Steve moves to the glass, resisting the urge to press a hand against it and peer closer, like the prisoner is a new exhibit at the zoo.] I'm not sure I follow, sir.

Came through the hole, took out two scientists and five guards - and then things got interesting.

[Steve frowns, still watching the prisoner.] ...Sir?

He took one look at the uniforms and started demanding to see you.

Comments

[shootingshields]

[Peggy takes a step closer to the glass herself, narrows her eyes at the man in observation.]

He won't say much of anything else otherwise. I think he's rather used to the set up. There's a level of familiarity and understanding in how he's demanding, prior experience with government agencies perhaps, despite all abrasiveness.

We'd like to send you in, though not alone, of course. [ie: Peggy is going, along with one or two other agents. But Steve is stronger than most, and perhaps his presence will lead to some sort of answer]