Sub Rosa
David McDonald
CONTENTS
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Copyright
About the Publisher
Dedication
To my Muse. You know who you are.
To Joe Simon and Jack Kirby—thank you for creating
a timeless hero who will never go out of fashion,
and whose virtues will never be obsolete.
Chapter 1
Bolívar, Colombia: 1500 hours
Steve Rogers dove behind a fallen tree as bullets, humming past his ears like angry wasps, sliced leaves off the branches around him. Even in the middle of the evasive maneuver, his mind identified the distinctive sound of AK-47s set to full automatic fire. It was no wonder his subconscious was familiar with it; he had come across the ubiquitous weapons—or their counterfeits—on a hundred battlefields since he had woken up in this brave new world. Familiarity hadn’t bred contempt, though, and he had a soldier’s healthy respect for the weapon’s utility, especially in capable hands. And the men shooting at him were far too capable for his taste.
Rogers took a deep breath, then launched himself from behind the log. His muscles flexed beneath his tricolored uniform, working in perfect harmony as he sprinted across the clearing in a blur of red, white, and blue. With a single fluid motion, he reached over his shoulder for the shield strapped to his back and sent it spinning through the air. The concentric red circles on white, inset with a white star on a blue field, echoed the patriotic shades of his uniform, but were now merely blurs as the shield whistled through the air. A series of wooden thumps sounded as the shield ricocheted from trunk to trunk, followed by meatier sounds as it struck flesh and bone. Rogers stretched out a hand just in time to catch the shield; it thrummed slightly in his grip.
Steve had counted the sounds of bodies hitting the ground, and, knowing that one man was still standing, brought the shield up in front of his face just in time to block a hail of bullets from the gun fired by the last of his assailants. The shooter squeezed the trigger in panic rather than letting off short, controlled bursts, and the gun pulled up, giving Rogers the opportunity he had been waiting for. Before the other man could react, Steve crossed the space between them, diving under the arc of fire. His shoulder hit the other man’s midriff in the sort of tackle Rogers had dreamed about laying on someone back when he had watched the jocks playing football—from the sidelines, of course.
Rogers was almost a hundred pounds heavier than he’d been then, and it was all muscle—the other man didn’t stand a chance and his breath left his body with an anguished grunt as he was driven to the ground. Rogers knelt over him and delivered a precise blow to his temple that rendered him unconscious.
Steve glanced around to be sure that was the last of his assailants, and then sprinted into the trees, heading in the direction of the site he had been shown on the map back at HQ. He was moving on instinct now, veering seemingly at random around anything that appeared out of place. It might have been nothing, but his finely honed combat skills told him that a slight difference in color or texture might hide a land mine or a trip wire.
Rogers froze, then darted behind a tree just before three more men came running along the faint outline of a path. They could have been stamped from the same mold—short and stocky with hard, cold eyes and AK-47s held across their chests. As they passed his hiding place, Steve stepped out behind them. One was down before he knew anyone was there, knocked out with a blow from Rogers’ shield. Steve’s fist crunched into the chin of the second man as he turned around, sending him sprawling. Steve ducked a razor-sharp machete that cut though the air where his head had been; rigid fingers stabbed into its wielder’s solar plexus, followed by a knee coming up to meet the man’s descending face.
The whole fight lasted only a matter of seconds, and Rogers wasn’t even breathing quickly. He resumed his run through the woods, keeping parallel to the trail and using the natural cover to mask his approach. He was almost on top of his objective now, and stopped to assess his options. From the edge of the trees, he could see that the site was nothing fancy—a large canvas tent with no walls, its floor space taken up by long tables. A number of women and young men in surgical masks were lined up along the sides of the tables, some weighing out piles of white powder, others bundling it into compact bricks. A number of guards strode back and forth, occasionally stopping to examine the work going on under their watchful gaze.
Steve, concealed behind the branches with sunlight shining through leaves and dappling his face with tiger stripes of shadow, watched for almost half an hour. Slowly, a subtle pattern emerged in the guards’ movements, one that they might have been unaware of, but that was evident to Steve’s trained eye. As soon as the moment presented itself, Steve was up and running, his shield flying through the air and taking out the first of the guards. Before the others could bring their weapons to bear, Steve was on them. Realizing quarters were too close for guns, the guards drew other weapons.
Five of the six men were armed with machetes; the sixth man held a gleaming straight razor. His grin was almost as dangerous looking as the razor was—right up until Steve’s boot landed squarely in the middle of his face. As the first guard went flying, the man nearest to Steve slashed out with his machete, but Rogers grabbed his assailant’s wrist, holding it in an iron grip while his other fist crashed into the attacker next to his foe. The man went down and Steve pivoted, throwing his captive over his shoulder and into the man coming up behind them. Neither guard got up, leaving Steve free to deal with the rest. They were good, but Steve was better. In a matter of seconds, he was the only man left standing.
Rogers turned and looked at the stunned workers, who were frozen with fear. Some were on their knees, hands clasped in prayerlike gestures, while a number were huddled together, sobbing. Steve felt a flash of guilt—he knew that the workers were little more than slaves, pawns in a game they could not understand.
“You’re free,” he said gently. “You can go.”
The only response was uncomprehending stares, and he realized that the people couldn’t understand him. He tried the few words of Spanish he’d picked up over the years, but there was not even the slightest hint he was getting through to the workers. He sighed, reached down to free the strap of an AK-47 from around the back of an unconscious guard, and pointed the gun into the air. He pulled the trigger, letting off a short burst of gunfire and stitching a line of holes in the canvas of the tent’s roof. Some of the workers screamed at the sound, while others were beyond even that, such was the extremity of their fear.
“Please, get out of here,” Steve yelled. “I’m not going to hurt you, but you need to go. Now.”
The workers might not have understood Steve’s words, but the gunshots spoke a universal language. Without a backward glance they rushed into the jungle, leaving Steve alone among the tables. He ran a finger along one, his lip curling in disgust at the film of white powder on his gauntlet. He pulled the utility belt
from around his waist and took out a number of small, oblong objects. Systematically, he placed the devices around the tent. After they were all positioned, Rogers dragged the unconscious guards one by one into the jungle, tying them to trees no closer than thirty yards away from the tent. As Rogers grabbed the last guard, he hesitated for a moment, then seized a couple of the white bricks and stuffed them into the man’s shirt.
Steve checked the knots on the ropes, making sure that they were firm enough to hold the men even if they woke, and then pulled out a small sphere with a flashing blue light that he placed on the ground between one of the men’s boots. A team made up of a mix of agents from the local government and the CIA would come to arrest and question the men, and the beacon would guide the authorities straight to the prisoners. Technically, his role in this joint exercise was now finished and it was time to leave, but Steve had one more thing to take care of. He’d left enough of the drugs to make the charges stick, and for a team of chemists to analyze the narcotics and provide the data required to track the spread of this particular cartel’s influence, but Rogers—like his superiors at S.H.I.E.L.D.—was enough of realist to know that if there was too much temptation, some of the drugs would conveniently disappear. As he turned back to the jungle, Steve pulled a black, rectangular box the size of a small book from his pocket. Extending an antenna, he raised a hinged flap on the front of the box, revealing a red button. Without hesitation, he pressed down on it, hard.
The jungle air was split by a cascading series of explosions, and smoke and flames billowed high into the sky. Rogers didn’t flinch, even when a smoking fragment of table crashed a few feet to his left. Behind him, what was left of the site burned briskly, thousands of dollars a second going up in smoke. Steve reached up to the side of his head and touched the transceiver that nestled snugly in his ear.
“It’s done,” he said softly.
“Roger that, Captain America.” Steve winced at the loud crackle in his ear. “Proceed to the rendezvous point and prepare for extraction.”
“Roger.” Steve grinned. “Get to da choppa.”
“Ah, we have some interference; please repeat.”
“Never mind,” Rogers said. He didn’t want to explain that his catch-up movie and TV viewing since his return had only made it to the mid-1980s. “On schedule to meet the chopper.”
“GPS tracking has you at four miles out. You’re going to have to hustle—we can wait fifteen minutes at most.”
“That won’t be a problem. Rogers out.”
He was running before the last word had left his mouth, sprinting through the trees and leaping over logs without breaking stride. Faster and faster he moved, wanting to leave the stink of burning narcotics and the even greater stench of corruption behind him. He tried not to think about the look of hopeless resignation in the eyes of the workers, or wonder how long it would be before they were back sorting and packaging illicit drugs. The workers probably didn’t even spare a thought for the morality of what they were doing, and were just happy to be able to feed their families. The real villains—some of them a thousand miles away—were the ones making billions from the drug trade, and the politicians and law enforcement personnel pocketing bribes to look the other way. Steve’s stride faltered for a moment.
So much corruption in this new world. Are we achieving anything with these little victories, or are they just pinpricks? What I wouldn’t give for another war where I knew who the enemy was and what victory meant.
Steve couldn’t help himself; he started laughing. He really was starting to sound like an old man yearning for the good old days. There’d been plenty of corruption back in his day—plenty of men living outside the law and exploiting the helpless. Today’s enemy might not be as easily identified by their uniforms, but the fight remained the same. He could only hope that he had set the Ortega cartel back with this latest raid, and that with enough punishment, it would be forced to give up on its smuggling operation.
Steve burst into the clearing just as the Black Hawk helicopter came into view above the treetops. Branches whipped in the downdraft from the rotating blades as the chopper slowly descended. It was still twenty feet above the ground when Steve leaped, grabbing the undercarriage with the poise of a circus acrobat before flexing his arms and flipping himself in through the open door, landing next to a startled Marine.
“Just thought I’d save you some time,” Steve said.
The Marine nodded, his standard issue gyrene expression of unflappability already back in place.
“Yes, sir,” he said, saluting.
Steve returned the salute.
“I’m Master Gunnery Sergeant Fischer, sir,” he said, handing Steve an unmarked, white envelope. “I have a message for you.”
Steve made no move to open it. “Who is it from?”
Fischer hesitated. “I can’t tell you that, sir.”
Rogers raised an eyebrow.
“You don’t know?”
“I do know, sir.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“I was asked to not to tell you, sir,” the Marine said. “I owed the person a favor and they asked me to give this to you. My instructions were clear—straight into your hands only, no intermediaries, and no witnesses . . . and before we got back to base.”
Steve stared at him.
“Marine, this is definitely not SOP,” he said. “I don’t like it one little bit.”
“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.”
“What if I ordered you to tell me, Gunny?”
“I gave my word, sir,” Fischer said stiffly.
“Well, I know better than to try and make a Marine break his word,” Steve said. “And I wouldn’t want to do something like that, even if I could.”
“Thank you, sir,” Fischer said. “I knew that of all people, you’d understand.”
Steve tore the envelope open and scanned the single sheet of paper inside, trying to puzzle out the strange characters.
“You know, I’m sure I’ve seen this before. Not for a long time, back before the war.”
“You’re talking about the big one, right, sir? W-W-two?”
Steve suddenly felt very old. The man sitting across from him was a veteran, with grey temples and a grizzled face. But to him, Steve’s yesterday was ancient history.
“That’s right. Well, I can tell you right now that I’ll need to get home before I can translate this.”
“Well, sir, it’s always nice to get home.” Fischer’s eyes took on a faraway look, as if he were suddenly in another place. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been home.”
“Me too, Marine. Me too.”
S.H.I.E.L.D. had given Steve a nice place of his own. The lounge alone was as big as the apartment his whole family had shared when he was growing up, and sometimes he felt like a pea rattling around in a pod, barely making use of what, to him, seemed like luxury. But, he had made one room his own—the den. Its walls were covered in Second World War posters, and a cabinet that took up almost a whole wall held a huge transistor radio set that had been retrofitted with the latest in audio technology by a helpful technician back at the S.H.I.E.L.D. lab.
The entire room had an old-fashioned feel, and a man from the ’30s would not have felt out of place sitting in there, which was the point. When Steve needed to think, this was where he came. Sitting in the comfortable leather chair at the desk, with a baseball game playing softly in the background, Steve found he could relax and consider his problems.
Lying on the desk in front of him, the white paper a stark contrast against the mellow oak, was the mysterious message. Steve had been staring at it for what seemed liked hours, trying to puzzle out where he had seen it before. The memory floated just on the edges of recollection, teasing him. He turned to the shelf of books and magazines at the side of the desk. Why did the message seem linked in his mind to those magazines? He r
ummaged through them—it was a collection that would make any comic-book geek drool with envy. Weird Tales. Amazing Stories. Astounding. There! He pulled out a battered copy of Galaxy, then flipped through it, searching among the advertisements for X-ray glasses and sea monkeys for a half-forgotten memory. For a moment, he thought he’d picked up the wrong magazine, but there it was, in glorious color on the back.
STAR DECODER RING. Trade secret messages with your friends. Learn the amazing art of . . .
STELLAR CRYPTOGRAPHY.
Steve reached into his desk drawer and pulled out the ring. It was only cheap plastic, but as an eleven-year-old, it had been his treasured possession. The ring worked on a simple substitution cipher, the circular face inscribed with a series of symbols that corresponded to a letter of the alphabet. The first word of the message would tell him which symbol equaled “a,” and then solving the cipher would be merely a case of substituting the appropriate letter. The code was far from unbreakable, but its obscurity was such that anyone trying to break it would spend days trying to work out its origin, not believing that any code could be so simple. More importantly, Steve now knew with absolute certainty who the message was from, because no one else would have thought to use the ring.
Steve had been at one of the innumerable parties Tony Stark held at his luxurious Manhattan penthouse. He never really enjoyed Tony’s get-togethers—they were completely alien to a young man who had grown up on the Lower East Side. He got on well enough with Tony, and the billionaire playboy had never made Steve feel like he thought less of Steve because of his humble background, but Rogers was very aware of their differences. He never knew what to talk about, or what one was meant to do at those kinds of events.
That night, he had been standing in the corner, awkwardly nursing a ginger ale and wondering when he could leave without being impolite, when Maria Hill had wandered over and started chatting with him. He wasn’t sure, but he had gotten the feeling that she was as bored as he was. They didn’t normally mingle much outside of what their jobs required—to say that they had a checkered history would be an understatement. But it was not in Steve’s nature to be rude, and he was glad he’d given her a chance. They’d both been delighted to find that they shared a common interest in science fiction, especially of the pulp variety, and that this interest hadn’t been ruined by their encounters with the real thing. They’d chatted about bug-eyed monsters for a good chunk of the night, and he had learned that one of the reasons Maria had ended up working for S.H.I.E.L.D. was because of a story she had read as child.
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