Synopsis / Summary / Plot
July 4, 2001: Captain America is in Philadelphia battling an armored terrorist of the Millennium Dawn, when he would rather be on a picnic with Connie. As the villain aims his laser razor at Cap, he is gunned down by Sharon Carter. As she and Cap beam up to the SHIELD orbital platform, Cap thinks about their on/off romance and recalls an earlier day when they were only co-workers….
It was also a July 4, again in Philadelphia: Captain America and Agent 13 (he did not yet know her real name) are on their way to board the SHIELD Helicarrier which has been hijacked by the rogue Agent Nine. 13 tells Cap how Nine had been disappointed with his role in the security organization and was subverted by a mysterious employer to become an inside man for a villainous scheme. Nine captured the Helicarrier with the aid of some henchmen and is now carrying a dossier with the real names of all agents, security codes and other secret info, which he also carries in his photographic memory. En route to the Carrier, 13 opens the envelope containing Cap’s orders from the President himself and learns that he is to assassinate Agent Nine; she does not tell him this. They land atop the Helicarrier and overcome the guards, with Cap saving one from falling over the side ("No one dies on my watch" he says, giving 13 pause). On the bridge of the craft, Agent Nine contacts his employer to report that soon he will teleport him and his army aboard. Inside the craft, Cap and 13 find SHIELD agents dead, slain by the Red Skull’s nerve toxin, revealing who Nine is working for. They spy Nine and Cap hurls his shield, causing the villain to drop the dossier; as Agent Nine fires back he calls 13 by her real name—Sharon Carter—and threatens her parents. As he escapes further into the ship, Sharon recovers the doissier and accidentally learns that Cap’s real name is Steve Rogers ("Funny, I had you pegged as a Jim.") Cap however has found his orders and asks why she didn’t tell him it was a termination order. She just hurries them on toward the teleport room. On the way they are intercepted by Nine’s henchmen and Cap saves Sharon from certain death. She explains that Cap is a soldier but no assassin and she wanted to spare him the burden of his conscience—and that she is afraid it might change how Steve feels about her. They realize that the Helicarrier is now in place for an attack on Washington. Elsewhere the rogue Agent Nine is teleporting the Red Skull and his minions aboard but Cap arrives and hurls his shield, damaging the controls and preventing the Skull from materializing. Nine leaps into the teleport beam and turns to mock Captain America, threatening a war with the stolen secrets in his head, and the only way Cap can stop him is to kill him. As Cap hesitates, Sharon appears and fires her gun causing Nine’s atoms to be scattered into the ether. As the two tired heroes gaze at one another they move together for a kiss….
2001: Aboard the orbital platform, Cap enters Sharon’s office—where she is now the head of SHIELD; her personal mission: to clean up the dirty ops. Cap thanks her and leaves.