Austria

"What do you plan to do? Walk to Austria?"

- Peggy Carter to Steve Rogers

Austria, officially the Republic of Austria, is a federal republic in Central Europe.

Hard Labor
Colonel Lohmer, officer in charge of one of the HYDRA Weapons Facilities built in Austria after its invasion by German forces, devised a strategy to reduce the potential number of mutinies among the prisoners of war captured and enslaved inside the factory, based on his beliefs that the Third Reich would win World War II because its members were unified, while the enemies of the Reich were of different nationalities and ethnicities, and that would cause conflict among them.

As such, Lohmer splitted the prisoners by nationality, locking up members of different factions and brigades within the Allied Forces, hoping that they would be too busy fighting each other to try to fight their jailors. For example, he put in the same cell a British member of the, James Montgomery Falsworth, a member of the , Jacques Dernier, a member of the , Gabe Jones, a member of the, Dum Dum Dugan, and a member of the , Bucky Barnes, many of them captured during a battle at Azzano. A joke made by Dugan while introducing themselves raised tension between the cellmates, and a brawl started, proving Lohmer's point.

Bucky Barnes, having contracted pneumonia on the battlefield, received a brutal beating for being unable to satisfy the quotes of production, letting munitions fall for while moving a cart. Jones tended Barnes while they returned to the cell, assuring that, given his sickness, contusions and broken ribs, if Lohmer made him work the following day, Barnes wouldn't survive. His cellmates, knowing that Liutenant Kleiber was a reasonable man, tried to think a way to avoid Lohmer forced Barnes into hard labor. Falsworth, being a strategy expert, devised a plan to get rid of Lohmer, that required Dugan, Jones and Dernier to work as a team using their respective expertises.

The following day, Falsworth's plan was carried out, with Dugan, Jones and Falsworth smuggling components for Dernier so he could make a substance to melt the chain of a crane carrying scrap. Lohmer appeared, demanding to incorporate Barnes into labor, even although Kleiber considered he was very sick. Just when Lohmer was shouting how Barnes would die working if he had to, Kleiber ordered the crane to be activated, what made the melted chain break, and the junk falling over Lohmer as he passed, crushing him.

The soldiers made every prisoner return to their cell, and Dugan informed Barnes that Lohmer wouldn't cause any harm again, while their role in his death couldn't be proved and the punishment would just be reducing their food rations for a week. Barnes only response was, however, to ask Dugan stop calling him "Jimmy", as his bull name was James Buchanan Barnes and he preferred being called Bucky.

Liberation of Allied Prisoners of War
Steve Rogers, hearing about the events in Azzano and the imprisonment of the soldiers that battled HYDRA, decided to rescue the prisoners alone. Agent Peggy Carter of the Strategic Scientific Reserve supported his decision and offered to fly him from Italy to Austria in a plane piloted by Howard Stark.

Discussing the details of Rogers' extraction, the plane went under attack, so Rogers decided to jump off the plane, ordering them to abando enemy airspace, as now he was a captain, and therefore able to give orders.

Arnim Zola was transferred from HYDRA Headquarters and put in charge of the weapons facility, with the Tesseract contained inside thr factory to harness its energy to fuel production and power the weapons. Zola took Johann Schmidt on a tour of the production floor, with Zola being very pleased that they where ahead of schedule considering the large size of many of the parts. Schmidt was not all that impressed and order Zola to increase the output in this and the rest of facilities. When Zola informed him that the request was not possible given the condition of the prisoners, Schmidt casually replied for Zola to use what remaining strength they had left and that there were always new workers were easy to come by.

Rogers successfully infiltrated the facility boarding a truck, and made his way through the production floors to the prison, acquiring a Tesseract fuel cell along the way. Rogers freed the prisoners, asking for the whereabouts of his friend, sergeant James "Bucky" Barnes, and told them to exit the facility heading to a nearby forest, while battling HYDRA soldiers along the way, while Rogers went to look for Barnes.

The freed prisoners battled HYDRA forces, seizing many weapons and vehicles to clear their way out. Schmidt observed the ensuing chaos on the security monitors and activated an alarm signal in the whole facility, before realizing that Captain America also infiltrated the base.

In order to avoid the facility being captured, Schmidt activate the self-destruct sequence to the shock of Arnim Zola, who rushed to his office, in order to save important documents, coming across Rogers but fleeing before being reached.

Rogers eventually found Barnes in a laboratory, where a map showing other HYDRA facilities was displayed. Rogers memorized the map and began searching an exit with Barnes just before the self-destruct mechanisms started to explode. As the two tried to find a way out, they came across Schmidt and Zola, where Schmidt taunted Rogers about their no longer human nature after being subjected to Abraham Erskine's Super Soldier Serum.

Rogers and Schmidt two exchanged blows, but Zola pulled a nearby leaver causing the walkway the two were standing on to separate. Before making their getaway, Schmidt revealed his true face to Rogers, the result of have the Erskine's imperfect serum, being that the reason of his nickname, the Red Skull.

Schmidt boarded a single manned aircraft to escape the facility, while giving Zola the keys of his personal car to escape.

As the explosions continued, Rogers and Barnes made their way up the factory to a beam they needed to cross to get to safety. Barnes managed to get across before the beam broke. Without the beam, Rogers was left with no other option then to jump across in order to make it to safety. Despite the danger, Rogers successfully made the jump across the void through the erupting flames.

Rogers and Barnes succesfully escaped the factory, and met up with the rest of the freed prisoners to make their way back to base camp in Italy.