Lucy and Steve went to the hospital after the event and watched as the doctors tried to save Nick. Natasha walked in almost running to the window watching in horror.
"Is he going to be okay?" she asked.
"I don't know," Lucy replied.
"Tell me about the shooter."
"He's fast. He's strong. Had a metal arm." Maria Hill walked in and stood on the other side of Natasha.
"Ballistics."
"Three slugs," the Agent said. "No Rifle, and completely untraceable."
"Soviet made."
"Yeah." The heart monitor began to go off. The doctors tried to revive Nick, but failed. Lucy covered her mouth as she walked out of the room, Steve following her to comfort her. Maria followed them about 5 seconds later leaving Natasha with Rumlow and Jasper Sitwell as they walked in. Later, they were all in another room as Natasha was there to see Nick one last time. She walked out, Lucy following her.
"Natasha," Steve said, trying to get her attention. She turned around.
"Why was Fury in your apartment?" she asked. Steve walked over to the two.
"We don't know." Agent Rumlow walked up.
"Agent," he said. Lucy turned around. "They want you back at S.H.I.E.L.D." She nodded.
"Yeah, give me a second."
"They want you now."
"Okay." Rumlow walked away. Lucy turned back around to Natasha.
"You're a terrible liar." She walked away. Steve looked to Lucy before looking to the vending machine next to them deciding to leave the flash drive in it. Steve and Lucy had changed into their uniforms which had been modified again, both being the same style just a different fit for the two soldiers. Alexander Pierce spoke with Lucy about what had happened. Before the Agent left, the last thing she heard him say was, "Someone killed my friend and I'm going to find out why. If someone will interpose in my way, they'll regret it. Anyone." Lucy walked out of the office, Steve waiting outside for her. They made their way to the elevator.
"Operations control," Steve spoke to the AI waiting for a command.
"Confirmed," it said. The doors began to close until Rumlow and two other Agents walked in.
"Forensics," he said.
"Confirmed."
"Cap. Agent." Steve turned around and Lucy looked at the Agent.
"Rumlow," Steve greeted. The elevator began to descend to the lower floors.
"Evidence reports said they have some fibers from the roof they want us to see. You want me to get the Tack Team ready?"
"No, let's wait and see what it is first."
"Right." The elevator stopped and the doors opened. A group of business Agents walked in.
"Administrations level," a man said.
"Confirmed." Steve noticed that one of the men with Rumlow kept his hand on a taser. The business men moved to the back corner of the elevator. Lucy and Steve stepped forward, giving the men room.
"Sorry about what happened with Fury," Rumlow said. "Messed up what happened to him."
"Thank you," Steve replied. He and Lucy began to have suspicions of the men in the elevator. It stopped again and the doors opened revealing three more Agents, Agent Jack Rollins being one of them. They walked in.
"Records," Agent Rollins said.
"Confirmed." The doors closed. After a minute, Lucy decided to speak up.
"Before we get started," she said breaking the silence. "Does anyone, want to get out?" After she said that, all the men began to attack her and Steve. The business men took the handles off their briefcases and used them as a sort of magnet. One of them put a handle around Lucy's wrist causing her to drop her shield as they tried to magnetize her hand to the metal wall of the elevator. She began fighting the other men. Steve fought the men who had stayed to the side. Rumlow kicked Lucy's hand and magnetized it to the wall of the elevator. It was just now him against Lucy and Steve. The Agent got her arm loose from the wall.
"Whoa, kiddo," Rumlow said. "Just so you know, Serge, this isn't personal!" He began to attack her, tasing her a few times before she kicked him. Steve fought him until Rumlow was finally knocked out.
"It kinda feel's personal." Lucy kicked her shield up and cut the magnet off. Steve pressed the emergency stop button and the doors opened. A swat team ran up pointing their guns to Lucy and Steve. Steve used the shield and cut the cable to the elevator, making it begin to fall. When it stopped, he opened another door, only to see another swat team there causing him to quickly close the door. Lucy looked out the window of the elevator and did the only option they had left and jumped through the side of the elevator, landing in the lobby of the building on his shield. Steve followed, both using their shields to protect them from the ground but were pained from the land. They ran stumbling to the garage getting on Steve's motorcycle. Luckily, they made it out as the doors were closing. A Quinjet flew in front of the car and began to shoot at it. Steve threw his shield at the turbine of the jet. It began spinning out of control but soon gained control again. He stopped the motorcycle, both him and Lucy jumping off it. Lucy jumped onto the jet breaking the turbines before both she and Steve jumped off the jet, landing on the ground as it spun out of control. They ran to their apartment, changing, then getting into Lucy's car and driving to the hospital. They were going to get the flash drive which Steve had left, but noticed it was gone, along with all of the gum. Natasha walked up behind them, blowing a bubble, letting it pop. Lucy turned around, and after a doctor walked by, pushed Natasha into a room.
"Where is it?" she asked.
"Safe," Natasha replied.
"Do better."
"Where did you get it?"
"Why would I tell you?"
"Fury gave it to you. Why?"
"What's on it?"
"I don't know."
"Stop lying."
"I only act like I know everything, Stark."
"But you knew Fury hired the pirates, didn't you?"
"Well it makes sense. The ship was dirty, Fury needed a way in, so do you."
"I'm not going to ask you again." Steve put his hand on Lucy's shoulder trying to pry her away from the red head assassin.
"I know who killed Fury."
"Most of the intelligence community doesn't believe he exists, the ones who do call him the Winter Soldier. He's credited with over 2 dozen assassinations in the last 50 years."
"So he's a ghost story."
"Five years ago I was escorting a nuclear engineer out of Iran. Somebody shot out my tires near Odessa. We lost control, went straight over a cliff, I pulled us out. But the Winter Soldier was there. I was covering my engineer so he shot him, straight through me." She pulled up her shirt revealing a scar on her stomach. "Soviet slug. No Rifling. Bye-bye bikinis."
"Yeah, I bet you look terrible in them now."
"Going after him is a dead end. I know, I've tried. Like you said, he's a ghost story." She held the flash drive to Lucy who took it.
"Well let's find out what the ghost wants."
The three headed to the mall. Steve and Lucy wore disguises. Steve wore jeans, a grey sports t-shirt, and a blue sweatshirt with a green jacket over it, black hightop Nikes as shoes, a black baseball cap, and fake black glasses. Lucy wore the clothes she had gone to the hospital in but got fake glasses to wear with the outfit.
"First rule about going on the run is don't run, walk," Natasha said as they walked.
"If I run in these shoes, they're going to fall off," Steve said. The three walked into the Apple store.
"The drive has a level 6 homing program," Natasha said. "So as soon as we boot up, S.H.I.E.L.D. will know exactly where we are."
"How much time do we have?" Lucy asked.
"9 minutes, starting from-" Natasha put the drive in the USB port of the laptop, "-now... Fury was right about that ship. Someone was trying to hide something." The files on the drive opened up and began loading. "This drive has some sort of AI, it keeps re-writing itself to override commands."
"Can you override it?"
"The person who designed this is slightly smarter than me. Slightly... I'm going to try running a tracer. This is a program the S.H.I.E.L.D. developed to track hostile malware. So, if we can't read the file, maybe we can find out where it came from." An employee walked over.
"Can I help you guys with anything?" he asked.
"Distract him," Natasha whispered. Lucy turned and put her arms around Steve.
"Oh, no," she spoke up. "My fiancé and friend were just helping with some honeymoon destinations." She gave the man a smile. Steve looked at her like she was crazy and she looked at him, raising her eyebrows slightly.
"Right," Steve said realizing what Lucy was doing. "We're getting married."
"Congratulations," the employee said. "Where you guys thinking of going?" Steve looked at the computer.
"Uh, New Jersey." The employee stopped for a minute.
"Oh... I have the exact same glasses."
"Wow, you two are practically twins," Natasha said not looking up from the computer.
"Ha, I wish. Specimen. If you guys need anything, I've been Aaron."
"Thank you," Lucy said with a smile as he began to walk away. Steve turned to Lucy.
"Really? Fiancé?" he asked.
"What? She told me to lie, I had no other thing to say. It's not like we have any little kids with us so I can't say we were looking for a vacation spot."
"Ugh, it's fine."
"You know you liked it," Natasha said. Lucy stifled a laugh as she looked at Steve who blushed slightly. She looked at her watch.
"You said nine minutes, come on," Lucy said, impatient.
"Just relax... Got it." The computer showed a location in New Jersey. Wheaton. "You know it?"
"We used to." They took the drive and left the store. Walking out, they found S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents walking around looking for Steve and Lucy.
"Standard tech team," Steve began noting out loud. "Two behind, two across. And two coming straight at us. They spot us, we'll engage and make an escape on the escalator."
"Shut up and put your arm around her and laugh at something I said," Natasha said to Steve as two Agents walked in their direction.
"What?" Steve asked.
"Just do it." Steve put his arm around Lucy's shoulders. The two put their heads down to hide their faces, and laughed until the Agents walked by. Steve looked back. The three got to the escalator. Lucy saw Rumlow and quickly turned to Steve.
"Kiss me," she said.
"What?"
"Public displays of affection make people very uncomfortable."
"Yes, they do." Lucy pulled Steve down by the collar of his shirt and kissed him. Steve put his hand on her cheek, deepening the kiss slightly. Natasha faced the opposite direction of Rumlow who had looked away from the PDA going on. Lucy and Steve stayed like that until Natasha told them that Rumlow was gone. When they pulled apart, Lucy began to walk down the escalator.
"You still uncomfortable?"
"That's not really the word I would use." Steve and Natasha followed Lucy. They got into the parking lot and found a blue Chevy Silverado. Steve got in the driver's seat as Natasha got in the passenger's seat and Lucy in the backseat with the shields. While driving, Natasha put her feet up on the dashboard and Lucy was laying in the back seat. They drove past a sign that said:
Welcome to New Jersey. The Garden State.
"Where did Captain America learn how to steal a car?" Natasha asked.
"Nazi Germany," Steve replied. "And we're borrowing. Take your feet off the dash." She took her feet down. Lucy moved to the middle between the two front seats.
"Alright, I have a question for you," she began to say, "of which you don't have to answer. I feel like if you don't answer it we'll never know-"
"What?"
"Was that your first kiss since 1945?"
"That bad huh?"
"That's not what I meant."
"Well it kind of sounds like that's what you're saying."
"No, it didn't. I just wondered how much practice you had-"
"I- You don't need practice."
"Everybody needs practice."
"It was not my first kiss since 1945. We're 95. We're not dead. It was for you, though."
"True, true."
"Nobody special though?" Natasha asked. Steve scoffed.
"Believe it or not it's kind of hard to find someone with shared life experience besides Lucy."
"Well, that's alright. You just make something up."
"What like you?"
"I don't know, the truth is a matter of circumstance it's not all things to all people. All the time. Neither am I."
"A tough way to live."
"It's a good way not to die though."
"You know it's kind of hard to trust someone when you don't know who that someone really is."
"Yeah... Who do you want me to be?"
"How 'bout a friend?"
"Well there's a chance you might be in the wrong business, Rogers." Steve continued driving till they reached their destination. They walked up to the gate, Steve and Lucy carrying their shields.
"This is it?" Steve asked.
"The file came from these coordinates," Natasha replied. Lucy read the sign. Camp Lehigh.
"So did we."