$ Chapter 535 Shall We Play a Game?

"This should be the place where it was established..."

The two people's voices echoed in the empty hall, and the dust on the ground and the table showed that no one had been here for a long time.

But strangely, the power facilities here were still operational, so that Steve could clearly hear the whirring sound of the ventilation system above his head.

"Strange, why do I always feel like I have seen this scene somewhere before."

Natasha reached out and brushed the dust on the table beside her. Judging from the degree of accumulation, this place has been abandoned for at least ten years.

She was sure that she had never been here, but why did she still feel inexplicably familiar?

However, Steve on the side had the same feeling. Since the two of them entered this bunker, he felt that the furnishings here were more and more familiar, especially the yellowed wall in the distance and the SHIELD logo on it...

Suddenly, Steve's mind flashed, and he couldn't help but recall the first time he woke up from a coma.

"Welcome to the 21st century, Mr. Rogers..."

"...After the victory of the war, the Strategic Science Corps you know announced a reorganization, led by your friends Mr. Howard Stark and Ms. Peggy Carter, and General Chester Phillips to establish the Strategic Homeland Defense Attack and Logistics Support Agency."

"Abbreviated to SHIELD!"

Steve clearly remembered that when he woke up from his coma, Lainie beside him had handed him a document.

In that document, a photo of the old version of the logo determined when SHIELD was first established was shown.

However, thinking back at this moment, Steve suddenly realized that the logo on the photo at that time seemed to be the one he saw at this moment.

"In 1945, after the end of World War II, SHIELD announced its establishment, and this is where they were first established..."

Pushing open the door of the office compartment with a click, the two walked into an area that looked like a data room, surrounded by bookshelves, but they were also covered with dust.

"That is..."

Suddenly, three photos hanging on the wall not far away attracted Natasha's attention.

"Howard Stark, Tony's father..."

The photo in the center is the most eye-catching and the easiest to identify.

When he was young, Howard had almost the same temperament as Tony now, equally unruly and talented.

Then, Natasha turned her eyes to another photo on the side.

The woman in the photo was very young and beautiful, very elegant, and looked quite heroic.

Natasha recognized the identity of the woman in the photo. Obviously, her identity should be Peggy Carter, who had just passed away not long ago.

That is, the first love of Steve Rogers who was next to her at the moment.

"Agent Carter, she was really beautiful when she was young."

Natasha turned her head and glanced at Steve, and then found that he was staring at the photo in a daze.

Steve's mind seemed to be immersed in memories at the moment. Natasha looked at him with interest for a long time, and the latter came back to his senses belatedly.

"Hmm? What did you just say?"

Natasha couldn't help but smile when she saw this.

"Nothing, I just want to say that Agent Carter was really extraordinary when he was young."

After that, Natasha walked to a large bookcase with a faint sound of wind without waiting for Steve to react, and touched the thick solid wood partition of the bookcase with interest.

Noticing Natasha's action, Steve immediately gathered his mind, walked to Natasha with a solemn face, and also carefully observed the large bookcase in front of him.

Then the two looked at each other, Natasha immediately gave up her position, and Steve stepped forward and moved the bookcase away.

Then, what greeted the two was an old elevator with a sense of age!

"Since this is already a secret office, why hide the elevator?"

"Who knows, SHIELD likes to be mysterious for a long time."

Natasha complained quite skillfully, and then took out her high-tech tactical terminal and scanned it in front of the elevator controller.

A group of fingerprints that were frequently pressed appeared on the terminal screen, and then after a series of analysis and calculations by the terminal system, a password result was finally obtained - 8539.

"So easy."

According to the displayed result, the green light came on with a beep, and then the elevator door opened with a ding.

This elevator, which seemed to have been out of service for some time, unexpectedly but naturally resumed operation.

"Gentlemen first?"

Natasha looked at Steve beside her with a little bit of mischief, and the latter smiled helplessly and walked into the elevator first.

...

"At this time, Steve and the other two should have found Dr. Zora, right?"

Lying on the bed in the lounge where she had not lived for a long time, Lainie closed her eyes and slowly sank her consciousness into her mind.

"If it develops according to the original timeline, the time is indeed almost right."

Ryan's voice came.

"I just don't know if anything unexpected will happen."

"It shouldn't happen. I've already told Sitwell that he will notify me as soon as there is any news."

Laini spent the whole day at SHIELD today, and also acted all day.

It is said that the heart of playing tactics is dirty. Lainie tried hard to pretend for a whole day, but she could not do it perfectly.

Those people who are as meticulous as the second sister who carry out disguises to the extreme, how meticulous must they be?

"Director Geng, you should have seen something, right?"

Thinking back to the conversation with the Chinese director in the afternoon, Lainie couldn't help but feel worried.

Her plan was not very thorough. The old man could guess it, so it was unreasonable that Director Geng, who was also an outsider, could not guess it.

"It's possible, otherwise he wouldn't ask that, but he probably didn't expect that this matter would be related to Hydra. After all, in that era..."

Lian had doubts in his heart, but he didn't think that Director Geng could be so imaginative as to associate it with Hydra.

It is estimated that at most he would think that Pierce and Lainie were taking the opportunity to make trouble and trying to seize the power of SHIELD.

"I hope so. If it's not necessary, we'd better avoid offending them."

"Yeah, I think so too."

The sea of ​​consciousness fell silent for a moment.

"By the way, how is the little girl's training going?"

As if she suddenly remembered something, Lainie turned the topic to little Lainie, whom she hadn't seen for a long time.

Since the second sister left them the gift of the female mechanical inheritance a few months ago, little Lainie has been soaking in the training dojo almost 24 hours a day.

So much so that Ryan had to temporarily stop his training plan and stay in the sea of ​​consciousness every day to discuss with Lainie what to do next.

"I don't know. I remember that when she came out last time, she had already caught up with our current level, but the professional skills that can be unlocked seem to still be a small part of the G system."

"Does it need to trigger a side quest to unlock it?"

"I don't know. According to Michael, she is different from us and it doesn't seem to be that troublesome."

Ryan is not sure about this. After all, little Lainie's profession is a mechanic of the intelligence system, which is completely different from the two people's gunners of the strength system.

In addition, the system did not provide any further branch unlocking tasks, which resulted in the two of them being unable to help at all even if they wanted to.

"Forget it, it's a blessing, not a curse, and it's a curse that can't be avoided. Whether it's good or bad, this is the opportunity for that little girl, and everything depends on her."

Shaking her head and throwing away the thoughts in her mind, Lainie returned her consciousness to reality and reached out to pick up the phone that had just received a message from the pillow beside her.

Not surprisingly, a message just sent by Sitwell was displayed on the phone screen.

[We found Rogers and the others, and they are currently in New Jersey. Mr. Pierce ordered a direct destructive strike! ]

Laini sighed lightly when she saw this, and after a moment of silence, she edited a string of text to reply.

[Do as he said, I want to see the person alive or the body dead. ]

...

Ding!

The crisp elevator reminder sounded, and the elevator door in front of Steve and the others opened again, revealing the quiet and dark environment outside.

The whirring sound of the wind was heard constantly, especially in the dead silence around, which seemed even more strange at this moment.

Steve pricked up his ears and listened for a while, and then he found that there seemed to be some sound of electronic equipment running mixed in with the sound of the wind.

Carefully holding the shield in his hand, Steve motioned Natasha to follow him, and then walked out of the elevator first.

After their eyes adapted to the dim environment around them, the two of them found that there seemed to be many relatively old computer equipment stored here.

Ding!

Suddenly, the sensor equipment in the room seemed to sense someone entering, and the chandeliers above their heads lit up again at this moment.

The soft light sprinkled inside the room, and the two of them were able to really see everything displayed around them.

"Here... are all antiques?"

Natasha looked at the furnishings around her in a daze, but the old equipment around her that looked more than a generation older than herself did not look like the data source they were looking for on this trip.

The whole room was filled with various storage devices that were twice as large as the bedside tables. Even the main control computer displayed in the center was a super-large model that Natasha had only seen in popular science books.

"This doesn't look like the place we are looking for..."

Natasha was about to say this, but her eyes fell on a data expansion port that was completely out of tune with the furnishings here.

It was a USB docking station.

Why would a modern technology product that was only born in the 1990s be connected to this set of antiques that were more than ten or twenty years older than it?

There was obviously only one answer, that is, someone wanted to use this USB docking station to copy some data stored in this set of antique computers.

"Someone was here before us."

Steve noticed the traces of someone using the docking station everywhere.

"Hmm, and he also took something away from these antiques."

Natasha stared at the docking station with deep eyes for a while, then took out the USB flash drive that hid some important secrets from her pocket and inserted it into the docking station.

Buzz!

At this moment, it seemed that some special program hidden in the USB flash drive was triggered, and the antiques around the two of them resumed operation at the same time.

【INITIATE SYSTEM? 】

The old CRT monitor displays a line of prompt text "Do you want to start the system?"

Upon seeing this, Natasha couldn't help but recall the plot she had seen in a certain movie, and then walked forward and typed the "YES" command on the keyboard with interest.

"Shall we play a game?"

Natasha pulled off a movie gag that meant, "Are we going to play a game?"

But she didn't expect that Steve had already watched the movie released in 1983 and knew this movie plot.

Before Natasha could explain, the latter had already said the name of the movie - "War Games".

Natasha couldn't help but look at Steve with admiration. Unexpectedly, only 2 years had passed, and the latter had completely evolved from an "old antique" who couldn't understand the prank habits of young people to a modern person from head to toe. people.

But just when Natasha wanted to tease Steve, the CRT monitor in front of them suddenly flashed a series of strange green data symbols, and finally formed a very strange and terrifying skull pattern. .

"What the hell is this?"

Natasha couldn't help but frown.

She hadn't paid much attention when this bunch of antique computers were started just now, but at this moment, she suddenly realized that the old camera on the top of this set of antique computers seemed to be moving the lens following her movements!

Unconsciously, Natasha felt some shivers down her spine, as if the skeleton on the screen was watching them through the camera.

"Steve Rogers, born in 1918. Natasha Elianovna Romanov, born in 1984."

A sharp and harsh mechanical sound suddenly sounded from the antique player, making Natasha shudder.

"This shouldn't be a video, right?"

Natasha frowned. It was not that she had never seen similar artificial intelligence. After all, there were two similar beings in the Avengers Building.

But this was the first time Natasha had seen this guy in front of her being so weird.

Moreover, can this kind of antique computer, which is so old that it can be put into a museum at any time, also contain artificial intelligence?

"I am not a video, Miss Natasha."

The Green Skull continued to say in that heart-wrenching voice:

"I may not be the same person who was arrested and sent to prison by Captain Rogers in 1945, but I'm still me!"

Something very horrifying happened. The talking skeleton in front of him showed a picture to the two people in front of him. It was actually used by Hydra, and was eventually caught by Steve and imprisoned. Scientist—Dr. Zola!

"Arnim Zola, how is this possible?"

Natasha was a little unbelievable. She didn't fully understand SHIELD's information. After all, she only had level 7 authority so far, which was even one level lower than Leni.

But thanks to the latter, Natasha had had the opportunity to learn some information about SHIELD's past before, and she also knew a little bit about the person in front of her.

"Aren't you already dead a long time ago?"

"Strictly speaking, my body is indeed dead, but my consciousness and my mind have been successfully preserved..."