End of Hydra in US

------Phil Pov-----

Howard woke up and all of us went to meet him. He opened his eyes and looked at us. Steve & Bucky were standing close to him. When he looked at them, he was beyond surprised.

"Steve, Bucky how.....kan....it...kud..ben...you? Wat....krnng...wid...may?" (Steve, how can it would be you? Wait, what's wrong with me? /Howard's speech ability is affected/)

"Easy, Howard. Your brain took a hit during the car crash. Frontal lobe. Damaged but with time it can get better." Hank Pym tried to comfort him. Whatever the animosity was between these two, it seems Hank decided to move on from it for now.

Howard without even thinking actioned like he was writing something. Obviously, he was asking for a pen.

I found a marker and some sheets in the operations room and brought them to him. He simply wrote on the paper. His handwriting was also too rough but clear enough to understand.

"Frontal lobe?"

Hank nodded.

Howard looked at him for a few minutes. Then he looked at the crowd. He understood something. He put down the paper. Steve felt the emotions Howard was going through and hugged him tightly.

"C'mon you are a genius, Howard. The first and the best I ever knew. You have a son now as old as Phil and you had a great life. You are still alive man. I know this kind of thing might break others, but it can't break you." Steve gave an impressive talk to Howard.

This guy might have the ability to give confidence booster injections to everyone around him. Howard obviously upset but his fists were clenched tightly.

Finally, he picked the marker and wrote a clear word "Enemy?"

"Dead. Head cut off." I interjected.

Howard looked at me and started laughing wildly. He coughed in between and then wrote again, "Mark knows you saved me?"

Okay, this guy definitely had a poisonous tongue. I started laughing but shook my head. This time he looked seriously at us and wrote another thing.

"Who is the mole?"

Steve spoke "Hydra. The paper clip project bought Hydra into Shield and they have since infested it completely. They had captured Bucky here and turned him into a killing machine. They managed to kill a lot of our brothers from Howling Commandoes and obviously you were on the list now."

"Tony and MAARIAA?" Howard suddenly asked listening to the explanation. He can hardly remain calm after listening to the word "HYDRA". He knows he was one of those people who started the Paper clip project and supported it. After all, scientists working with HYDRA were mostly forced. How could he know there were such loyal leaches hidden in it?

"They are safe. And you should relax Howard. Hydra has been in the shadows for too long but now we are going after them. We have a plan. They won't even see us coming after them." I said and Howard looked at me deeply. Then he nodded and picked his marker.

"I need a laptop. Also, bring Maria here." these were his final words before handing us the paper and going back to sleep.

"Fury it's up to you. I will leave you with this." I said handing this thing to Fury. Hope tried to speak but Steve said "You need to spend time with Hank. He looks fine and everything but you came this close to losing him. It will be better for Fury to do this work while you can get more free time to spend with Hank. Trust me, time is not something you can get back once lost."

Okay. So, this Rogers played an emotional daddy card on the vulnerable Hope and somehow got Hope to give up her Operations head position with just a few words. I take whatever good I said about this guy. He is really powerful in speech and sinister at heart.

Hope just heard him, shed some tears and hugged her father. They were now having father-daughter time while I was thinking is this Steve's other power? Persuasive Speaking?

"Martha, please record whatever advice Steve gives me in future and analyze it properly. In case I am making an irrational choice based on his advice, notify immediately." I gave a command to Martha looking at this scene fearfully.

Now, Fury was going in the operations room like a boss.

Bucky and I walked out of the base and moved towards area knight training areas. I saw Bradley here laughing and talking to other knights and they were sharing stories. This guy, in this life, finally found some inner peace before it was too late.

"Bucky, I think everyone is moving on with their lives. Are you going to change yourself and move on too?" I just asked a random question that came into my head to Bucky. I mean it's been months since he rescued him. But he still looks more like a Winter soldier than Bucky Barnes.

"There are things here that they left," Bucky said pointing towards his head. "Martha told me I need some time and medication before I am completely free. Once I am, I will think about it."

"We need to have another team meeting and set the targets. I will hand over the HYDRA agents list to Fury and he will assign the missions. We will take out the top leaders first before moving down to foot soldiers.

We also need a prison and some holding cells and somehow a new base. This place is not big enough for everyone. We can keep one team here but we have to move the rest to another base." I told him about the future ideas I was having.

"Where?" Bucky asked curiously.

"Antarctica, I found a small jungle there. Hidden from the entire world and filled with things that go beyond any imaginations we have. Recently, I had asked Martha to search for metal from which Howard made Roger's shield and we got a hit there. I sent a few recon falcon teams there and got some amazing results." I told him the news I was trying to keep a secret.

It's true. This place in comics would be known as Savage Land. Thankfully, in MCU things are still reasonable. Its structure and the overall survey reveal a huge crater formed above the vibranium base. Somehow, Vibranium helped and protected nature in the most pristine form for 1000 years there. Dinosaurs and other extinct species live in this habitat and no human has ever touched this place.

This place is a perfect heaven for his base and the families of all members of his team. Away from regularly bombed or attacked US / New York and far from any political conflict.

"Dinosaurs? in Antarctica and in a jungle? Are you sure not kidding Phil?" Bucky asked surprisingly.

"Well, you will be in the first team going there. We will target HYDRA in multiple teams at the same time here in the US but after that, I think these snakes will hide deep and we will need time and patience to take them out. During that time, we can shift to our new base."

After Howard was properly relaxed and his condition improved, we shifted him into a private hospital in New York where Fury arranged for Maria to meet him. Later that night, media all over the US got the news that Howard Stark was involved in a horrific car crash but survived. He has handed his entire company and most of his wealth to his son Tony Stark.

In reality, after handing out his will and power of attorney to his lawyers, Howard met Tony briefly. Gave him some papers and then he took his wife away for a 'world trip'.

After Howard shifted to an overseas SHIELD safe house which Fury had privately kept hidden, our team attacked Hydra.

Fury officially 'died' in a bizarre car crash and then he took over the operations here. He coordinated with only Director Keller of SHIELD who is surprisingly a hidden character in MCU.

This guy was the boss of Nick Fury and if Fury was the king of the spies then this guy was easily the emperor. He had tens of small and large hidden private bases and kept a lot of weapons, getaway cars to trucks and he never used any computer. This guy wrote all these files by hand, kept them in his safe and any paper trail about him or his secrets never entered into the SHIELD database.

I had Martha search for his history and we found no problem or any dirt on him. I don't know why Fury took over him suddenly in MCU but in this life, with this guy help, we were going to make SHIELD snake free.

In mid-January, Commander Rogers along with Fury in a private mission personally captured Alexander Pierce and a senator from Pennsylvania, Stern. These two were top leaders and political powers for Hydra.

After the head was cut off, it was time for small snakes. There were more than 20 teams of agents moving from SHIELD to a secret Arctic base where a possible sighting of Captain America was discovered. All 20 teams were full of HYDRA agents and their team landed near this possible location. However, instead of meeting Captain America in ice, a huge explosion happened underneath their feet and all agents were buried in the ice river forever.

Me and Bucky came later with the knights and captured all the quinjets and their drivers along with whoever survived. This was a huge mission and the safest one against Hydra. After this, there were many spies that were either captured from their homes or from some other locations silently. In these missions, we didn't lose a single man. If anyone ever questioned Fury and his tactics, no one said anything now.

All this was happening in the shadows and the official reply from Shield Director for missing agents was "Budget Cuts for Shield and Secret Spy war with Soviets (Project S.S.S)".

Oh yeah! You see Shield had a lot of budget issues as they were always in conflict with the Military and other agencies. So, Director Keller used this nonsense excuse and surprisingly everyone cheered for him.

FBI and CIA also worked with Keller in grabbing multiple hidden Soviet agents in the US. This info came from a Soviet database cross-referenced with our female captive Melina Vostokoff. She was ready to do anything as long as we keep her and the girls safe. Still living with her kids on the base and now, taking orders from Fury after some deal.

Keller became a hero in both politicians and the public eyes. I supported him with Phillip's corporation resources and a lot of media made noise for him. Currently, he is nominated for Noble Peace Prize. Amazing.

Sadly, the original noble peace prize winner 'Alexander Pierce' and 'Senator Stern' were taken hostage by the Soviets and possibly killed. Americans mourned for them. It was truly a sad day and Jan 28 1992, became "the last day of war".

All in all, January was going to end and with it, Hydra in the US. I was feeling relaxed and was preparing to lead a team with Bucky to Savage Land when suddenly Martha gave a notification "Sir, the invisible jet hidden at Long Island, has started to move and it is moving towards Oakland, California."

Well, fuck! Now what!!