Chapter Text
ONE
Leather boots stomped across the frozen earth, snow crunching underneath their feet as four figures crept through the woods. The air was frigid- the kind of air that freezes the inside of your nose and causes your breath to catch. Natasha cursed as she caught a glimpse of the setting sun in between the bare trees, knowing the temperatures would soon drop even lower. Turning around to glance at Clint, she noticed he was shivering as he walked behind her.
"Hope you're wearing your long johns", Nat teased.
He looked up with a scowl. Not watching the ground, Clint tripped into a snowbank, catching his foot in a semi-frozen stream. With a yelp, he fell into the snow. Stifling a giggle, Nat called out to the two supersoldiers who paced 20 feet ahead.
"Man down!".
Steve and Bucky turned with concerned expressions only to find Clint struggling to pull his foot from the ice. The two supersoldiers jogged back and Steve shook his head, fighting to keep himself from smiling. Bucky had no such reservations. Smirking, he held out his metal arm to pull Clint out of the snow.
"C'mon Barton, now's not the time for making snow angels."
Clint slapped his hand away, huffing as he stood up to brush the snow from his thick snow pants and shake the icy slush off his boot. He reached down and picked up the arrows off the ground from where they had spilled from his quiver.
"Whatever, man".
He glanced at the others. Despite wearing the same thick black coat, wool cap, insulated snow pants, and waterproof boots, he seemed to be the only team member shivering.
Frowning, Clint said, "You've got to be kidding me. Are you three even cold?"
"The serum helps Bucky and I regulate our body temperatures better than regular humans", Steve explained. "I don't know about Nat though".
They turned towards her, and she shrugged.
"I was trained in Russia- I've faced worse than this".
Nat checked her watch and frowned. She knew it wouldn't matter how special they were- the team would be at risk for frostbite if they didn't find the vibranium soon.
She turned to Bucky as they continued to press forward.
"You catch anything on the scanner yet? Bruce said we'd know where the vibranium was once we came in a half-mile radius of it".
Bucky appeared frustrated as he not-so-gently shook the compact device in his hand.
"I thought we'd find it by now. The scanner is definitely picking up vibranium in this forest, but it can't seem to pinpoint the exact location".
Steve stopped to adjust his boots, lacing them up tighter as the sun descended below the horizon. It already felt colder. As he spoke, the air steamed around him.
"If we don't find it in the next thirty minutes, we're heading back to the Quinjet. We'll wait out the worst of the night and keep searching in the morning."
"Roger that, Cap", said Clint glumly. "We've been out here for three hours in the freezing cold with nothing to show for it. Great".
Natasha grit her teeth to keep them from chattering. She and the other three men had been sent to Maine in the middle of November to scope out a forest near Fort Kent. Abandoned in the 70s due to extreme weather, no one had given it much thought until Fury discovered it had been turned into an undercover HYDRA base. He lead a raid and arrested over 30 men, leaving the fort empty and nearly blown to pieces. The raid had been six years ago.
Fort Kent had been forgotten until Princess Shuri of Wakanda picked up a reading of vibranium near the fort on a scanner. Determined to not let it get into the wrong hands, the team set out Captain America, Hawkeye, the White Wolf, and Black Widow to find and secure any vibranium. They assumed it was left over from HYDRA's glory days- before Fort Kent had been blown to pieces.
The four heroes trudged on through the snow and ice. Normally Natasha would love to be out in the snow- it reminded her of her childhood in Ohio and building snowmen with her little sister. Now, however, she was starting to lose feeling in her fingers and nose. The harsh wind whipped through the trees and straight into her bones. She couldn't wait to return to the warmth of the QuinJet.
Steve turned around to face Nat and Clint, probably to announce that they were turning back. Instead, he was cut off by a shout from Bucky, who stood at the top of a small hill ahead of them shining a flashlight at the ground.
"I think I found a bunker!"
"Finally", Clint grunted as he, Nat, and Steve bundled up the hill.
They found themselves staring at a squat concrete structure half-buried in the snow. It was weathered with age- the corners worn down and cracked. Roots from a nearby tree had pushed their way through the right side of the concrete, making it slant slightly to the left.
"You think the vibranium is in there?", Natasha asked skeptically.
Steve glanced down at the scanner in Bucky's hand. "It has to be. The scanner is going nuts."
"Why would it be out here though, so far away from the fort?", Clint wondered aloud, his eyes narrowing.
Bucky stomped through the snow and shone his flashlight at the bunker. A short doorway appeared as the rest of the team gathered closer and pushed aside the snow.
"Let's find out," Bucky said with a small grin. Natasha noticed that his lips were chapped and his nose was red as he pulled his scarf down below his chin. "The vibranium has to be down there. At least we could get out of the cold for a bit".
The team looked to Cap for direction. He tersely nodded. "Alright. This is an in-and-out mission. We get the vibranium, hustle back to the QuinJet, and take it straight to the Avengers Tower. Anything goes wrong for any reason and you can't make it back to the jet, we'll meet at Fort Kent". He looked around at each of team members. "Got it?".
They each nodded quickly, eager to get inside the bunker. Steve stepped forward and looked around for some kind of handle or button to open the door. Instead, he found a frozen-over keypad with a cracked screen.
"Great", Clint groaned. "Nat, tell Laura and the kids I love them. It has to be a closed casket funeral. Don't let them see my frozen ass with all the black and blue appendages".
Nat's eyes lit up. "That means I get to marry Laura, right?".
"Don't even th-"
"Clint!", Steve exclaimed. "No one is dying. We just need to get this door open and we'll be fine". He pounded on the concrete door and tried to slide it. The door didn't budge.
"Will you do us the honor, Buck?". Steve gestured to the door and Bucky frowned.
"You want me to punch my way through solid concrete?".
"Yep".
Steve, Nat, and Clint stepped back as Bucky set to work. Clenching his vibranium fist, he began to punch the door as hard as he could, focusing his assault along the thin cracks that already lined the edges. Steve pulled his shield from his back and started to chip away at the holes Bucky created.
Natasha rummaged around her pack that sat around her hip.
"I've got a grenade if that helps". She pulled out a green canister and held it gingerly in the palm of her hand.
Bucky and Steve looked at each other, and with a shrug, took the grenade from Natasha's hand and wedged it between one of the door's larger cracks.
The team got behind a nearby boulder, and Steve gently pulled a string that was attached to the pin of the grenade.
"Cover your ears", Natasha warned.
With a huge BOOM and a crash of light, the door exploded, sending chunks of concrete into the snow. Quickly glancing at the three men to make sure they were uninjured, Nat stood from the frozen ground to inspect the bunker.
The grenade had blown a large hole in the door- large enough for each of them to push their way through once they took their backpacks off. Steve got caught though and had to wiggle his broad shoulders to get into the bunker.
"Get a little stuck there?", Bucky questioned with a cheeky grin.
Steve good-naturedly shoved his friend and pulled out his flashlight. Nat and Clint had already pulled out theirs, and together they pointed them into the depths of the bunker to reveal a worn down metal staircase that descended into a long hallway.
Clint shuddered and muttered under his breath. "Creepy".
"At least it's warm and out of the wind," Nat offered. She frowned.
Too warm, she thought to herself.
She pushed past Bucky and Steve, who was still looking down the rickety stairs. As she descended on to the first step, a loud hum suddenly came from the ceiling.
"Nat-", Steve warned, reaching out his hand to stop her.
Nat stopped to stare at the ceiling, trying to determine where the humming was coming from. Bright LED lights clicked on from overhead, and she winced, averting her eyes.
"Damnit", she heard Clint whisper from the top of the stairs. "This bunker ain't abandoned, boys".
*****
AH! I hope yall enjoyed the first chapter! This is the first story I have ever written, so please don't hesitate to leave any comments correcting my grammar or word choice. I know this first part was a little slow, but don't worry, it's about to pick up :)
Have a safe and lovely day ❤