By the time Natasha and Eleanor had walked back into the room that everyone else was in, they had all seated themselves around a table on the other side of the room, sitting awkwardly whilst they were clearly waiting for the two women. Maria was seated to Fury's left, with Steve standing at the other end of the table with Sam.

Natasha placed herself down opposite Maria and gestured for Eleanor to sit in the chair next to her, the one next to Fury. Eleanor simply nodded as the Director gazed at her.

As soon as she sat the Doctor practically ran to her as he crouched in between Fury and Eleanor. He started by wiping the excess blood away from her face, and then cleaning the wound with alcohol, causing her to let out a harsh wince before hardening her expression as the cleaning proceeded. Natasha sent her a sympathetic smile before turning her attention back to Fury as he began moving slightly.

He picked up a photo with the hand that wasn't in a sling and stared at it before sighing, "This man declined the Nobel Peace Prize. He said peace wasn't an achievement, it was a responsibility". He then threw it down in frustration, and Eleanor spotted the clear face of a younger Alexander Pierce. "See, it's stuff like this that gives me trust issues". Eleanor wanted to reply that him faking his death is contributing to her trust issues but she bit her tongue.

Sam moved around the table behind Natasha to get a look at the photo. "We have to stop the launch", Natasha spoke after leaning back in her seat slightly.

"I don't think the Council's accepting my calls anymore", Fury opened up a case that contained three chips, their use Eleanor was unsure of.

"What's that?", Sam looked on edge again at the lack of certainty surrounding this situation.

On the less deep part of Eleanor's large gash, the Doctor started placing butterfly stitches, it was hard for her to focus on what was being said with the Doctor's face being directly in front of hers but she managed to refocus when Maria began talking.

"Once the helicarriers reach three thousand feet", she then flipped her laptop around showing the helicarriers and satellites on the east side of the U.S., Eleanor just about saw this as she moved her head slightly, "They'll triangulate with Insight satellites, becoming fully weaponised".

Fury looked as though he was about to speak, but as the Doctor started stitching up the deeper parts of the cut, he absentmindedly said, "This is incredible how narrowly it avoided both eyes, you were close to being blinded".

This caused Eleanor to widen her eyes in horror, whilst everyone else looked at him as though he was crazy. Looking around he saw everyone looking, so he sheepishly bowed his head before carrying on with the stitches, "Sorry, continue".

"Anyway...", Fury began, "We need to breach those carriers and replace their targeting blades with our own". The screen showed the inside of the hellicarriers, and how the targeting blades were located in the middle, inside what looked like a capsule. That's what the chips were.

"One or two won't cut it. We need to link all three carriers for this to work because if even one of those ships remains operational, a whole lot of people are gonna die", Maria looked incredibly anxious about the situation, which was not surprising, this was a lot of pressure on the small gang of national outcasts.

"We have to assume everyone aboard those carriers is HYDRA. We have to get past them, insert these server blades, and maybe just maybe, we can salvage what's left...".

"We're not salvaging anything!", Steve half-shouted as he interrupted the Director, and Eleanor agreed with him. This was years and years of HYDRA infiltrating SHIELD, this goes too deep for them to be able to try and scrape actual parts of SHIELD out, the whole thing just needs to be shut down. Even though that was painful to think about.

"We're not just taking down the carriers, Nick. We're taking down SHIELD".

"SHIELD had nothing to do with this", Fury was standing his ground. At this point, the Doctor had finished and so patted Eleanor on the shoulder before walking off. She was glad that he had finished as it was getting harder to concentrate with him in her face, and it was now a very important one.

"You gave me this mission. This is how it ends. SHIELD's been compromised, you said so yourself. HYDRA grew right under your nose and nobody noticed".

Eleanor turned to Natasha who was looking ahead with a relatively blank expression, this would be incredibly hard on her too.

"Why do you think we're meeting in this cave? I noticed". A lot too late, they were all in this mess because no one noticed until they were literally all on the brink of being shot down by helicarriers.

"How many paid the price before you did?". Fury looked around and down at the table with slight guilt showing on his face.

"Look, I didn't know about Barnes".

"Even if you had, would you have told me? Or would you have compartmentalised that too?". Steve had a point, apparently, Nicholas Fury had an insatiable habit of keeping secrets. From everyone. "SHIELD, HYDRA, it all goes".

"He's right", Maria whispered to Fury. She looked distraught, SHIELD was her home too, it was where her family was.

He then looked to Natasha for backup, who just leaned back into her chair again as her answer, looking majorly pissed off. His next effort was Eleanor, she didn't want to say it, she didn't want this to be the end of SHIELD, of that part of hers and Natasha's life, but the cost of trying to salvage it was too high.

She shook her head and gave a sad half-hearted shrug, "It needs to go", she muttered delicately.

He even then turned to Sam as a last-ditch attempt at keeping his organisation. "Don't look at me, I do what he does, just slower".

"Well...", Fury leaned back in his chair in defeat and sighed, "It looks like you're giving the orders now Captain". Steve looked forward in a stoic manner, this was a big responsibility, millions of lives now rested on his shoulder, literally. Eleanor just hoped that he could rise to the challenge.

---

The plan that Steve had made was going to be difficult, but they didn't have any other choice.

Eleanor, Maria, Fury, and Natasha had a few minutes alone together in which they tried to clear the air before embarking on their quest. If it went wrong then there would be no time for apologies, because they would all be dead.

Maria and Fury apologised, they explained that they were desperate for this to go right, and so needed to keep the circle incredibly small, and that it wasn't personal. If the two women hadn't ended up on the run with Steve then they would have told them sooner.

After a few seconds of mulling it over, and a silent conversation between Natasha and Eleanor with just eye contact, they nodded and accepted the apology. There were bigger things to be worried about, and Eleanor didn't want to be angry at them any longer. She wanted to go into the current mission with a clear slate with them. Maria looked relieved and gave Eleanor the tightest hug that she had ever given the woman. Eleanor lived with the lack of oxygen for a few seconds knowing that Maria needed this.

She had been worried that she wouldn't have been forgiven, which would have devastated her. As she clung to the younger woman she looked up and met Natasha's gaze, and the two gave each other a smile.

As soon as they let go, the beginning of the plan commenced. With Maria being prepared, she had managed to get lots of equipment in. Natasha was going to pose as Counsellor Hawley, and Eleanor wasn't happy about her going into a main role in the mission with a fresh gunshot wound, but this role required someone to wear a mask that made you look identical to the person it was programmed to look like. Handy technology that once again she didn't understand the inner workings of.

With the way that this mask clings to the person's face, it would have disrupted Eleanor's stitches, and been very painful. So, they spent the next minute programming it to look like Counsellor Hawley for Natasha to wear.

Sam's wings were likely being held in the Triskelion as they were taken from him during their arrest, so Maria, Sam, and Steve would get his wings, along with trying to get the Captain a suit, before moving to the control room so that Maria could be in control of the helicarriers, ready to get them to shut down at the correct moment. Steve and Sam's job was to replace the targeting blades with the ones in Fury's case.

This left Eleanor with Fury.

Her job would be to act as Fury's bodyguard when they arrived at the Triskelion. If their assumptions were right and the place was crawling with HYDRA, then he would be a big target. Fury had used one of his contacts to get a helicopter to land nearby that they would sit in until Natasha had secured Pierce's office. After that, the helicopter would take them right to that room in the Triskelion as there was a helipad next to it. Meaning that Fury would be able to use his high access for the task to be complete.

Natasha was going to release all of SHIELD's files to the public. And therefore all of HYDRA's files. It was a risk because all of their information would go to the public as well, but they couldn't have HYDRA secrets still staying hidden, they needed it all out.

The group got their communications systems set up, and Natasha got into a navy skirt and matching blazer ready to pose as Hawley. She would go to the airport and demobilise the real Hawley, and hide her in the bathroom, not the most modest thing but Nat needed to be quick in order to catch Hawley's ride to the Triskelion.

Maria was going to be on comms with everyone, but Eleanor was only going to be connected to Natasha and occasionally Maria if she tuned in to their channel when speaking. It would mean that there was less confusion with everyone trying to complete their tasks.

Sam, Maria, and Steve bid their farewells and left, needing to be fast in retrieving Sam's wings and a suit for Steve and making their way to the control room.

Natasha was due to leave shortly after, and Eleanor was extremely nervous. But Nat reassured her that she would be okay, that the painkillers the Doctor had given her meant that she could barely feel her injury. Still, Eleanor couldn't help but feel guilty, if she hadn't received her own injury then she would be fit enough to do that role herself. Instead, Natasha was having to do it hours after being shot.

Nat could sense the exact train of thought going through Eleanor's mind as she searched her eyes, "We'll both be okay", she smiled and pressed their foreheads together before mumbling, "Just focus on being the hottest bodyguard in the world, okay?".

Eleanor scoffed playfully and pushed her away lightly, "You ruined the moment, Romanoff".

"Oh really? I thought I made it better", she teased before giving Eleanor a kiss goodbye, and hopping into one of the cars placed in storage.

Eleanor then made her way over to Fury after longingly watching Natasha leave, he hadn't wanted to be there for their soppy goodbye, so opted to stay seated at the main table as they did so.

"Hughes", he nodded but with a kind glint in his eye, "You ready to move?".

"As I'll ever be", she breathed out whilst gathering her weapons and placing them in the holsters that she had previously attached to her jeans.

The two began to slowly make their way outside to the helicopter, Fury was still struggling to walk, so it was a very slow journey. But Eleanor didn't mind, they weren't in any particular rush at this stage in the game, they had to wait for Natasha's signal, but that would take a while to come through yet. She had to wait for Hawley's flight to come in, demobilise her, make the journey to the Triskelion, deal with whatever drawl Pierce would be coming out with, demobilise even more people, and then signal them if they weren't already on their way.

So... they had time.

"Oh, we don't have a pilot, so that's your second job, I only have one arm", Fury turned to Eleanor as they approached the black helicopter.

She nodded and slowly pursed her lips, she had flown jets plenty of times, but it had been a while since she had been in control of a helicopter. She just hoped that she didn't send them crashing into the Triskelion instead of gracefully landing on the helipad. "Not a problem", she lied, but her tone of voice came off as nonchalant.

Eleanor made herself comfortable in the pilot's seat and tried to familiarise herself with the controls whilst Fury sat leisurely in the seat next to her, waiting to hear from Maria or Natasha.

As she looked at all of the controls she was sure that she was going to send her and Fury into early graves, she was very out of practice.