Sir Nicholas Fury

The target is a caravan of people who have been picked up by the President's squads to be tested and cleaned. The world isn't kind to those who have been picked up, even if they are found clean.

The path has been charted out, the number of people (thirteen) has been confirmed, and so have the number of guards. The point of extraction is between two abandoned warehouses.

The building is the same as it was the day before. Few obvious people, few obvious cameras. Plenty of open space, and a couple of men across the street getting themselves ready for a snatch-and-grab...while prepared for it to go very, very wrong.

"They needed me, Fury!" Rojhaz is enraged, has been since the second the girl stepped through the door, "You bastard, you made me leave them!" Sir Nicholas looks on impassively as the tall 'American' storms around, "Who is going to protect them? Teach them? Who is going to show them how to avoid the mistakes we made?"

"Someone else." Sir Nicholas finally says, "Someone who will not tear the world apart merely by existing in it. That is what you were doing. And so now, instead of the end of my world, my people, and my home there are two men against a world." His lips curve, but it isn't a nice smile, "Look on the bright side. Once again you are not alone."

"Tear the world apart? What do you mean?" Sir Nicholas rubs his temples at that, privately wondering just how badly the future man was damaged in his trips through time...and if he, himself, is destined to be the same.

"I mean that you were too early. The storms, the quakes, those were all your fault. Doctor Strange, God rest his soul, found that if you had not been sent back we would all have perished. There would be no America, for there would be no Earth."

Rojhaz is quiet the rest of that day.

The next day is slow, and quiet.

"Why are you going to help me?" the American asks in the early morning. Sir Nicholas looks up from where he was polishing a knife in a meditative state and says simply, "It is what I do." before going back to what he was doing. Rojhaz...Rogers. Steve Rogers. Such a strange name, the more because it is almost normal. Regardless, Rogers contacts a man, who contacts another, and by noon there is a tentative knock on the door. It is Rogers who opens the door, collects the box, and shows the young man in.

He's weedy, with dusky skin and dirty hair, and he looks at Sir Nicholas like a man from 1602 might look at God. "He looks almost exactly like the old pictures of Nick Fury." he informs Rogers, while Sir Nicholas sits straight-backed reading history books. He pretends that he can't hear the conversation behind him, but Rogers' comment is clear, "He is Fury." as is the kid's sharp intake of breath and quick retreat.

"Let me bandage you up better." Rogers says when they're alone again, "I've got a first aid kit here that will help keep it from getting infected." Much of what he says is meaningless to Sir Nicholas, infected being amongst those words, so the other man says, "A physic to keep you healthy."

"Very well." Sir Nicholas says, removing the over-large shirt and allowing Rogers to remove the purple bandaging. His mind is racing with the facts he's found out already, and he knows that he's barely scratched the surface. There is no way that he could walk out in public, even if his face was not apparently widely known even to this day.

He's got a tally running through his mind, a tally of things to learn. Money. Maps. Politics, although that is dreadfully obvious. Speech patterns. The technology, enough to get around if not become a master. How to drive, how to use the little telephone, how to survive in this world.