The Viper

Chapter 11

Present Day

"Slow down, first rule of being on the run, do not run, walk." Serena explained as she and Steve walked through Pentagon City Mall.

"If I walk any faster, these shoes will fall off." Steve murmured.

Serena adjusted her black Nike baseball cap. "Calm down, it's going to be fine. Nat, do you see anything?"

"No, you're both clear." Natasha replied over the coms from her position on the third level.

"Copy." Serena explained.

The reason why the three of them were in the mall was so that they could access the hard drive, and the only way to do that in the most inconspicuous way possible, would be to access it on a computer that wasn't theirs. In other words, they needed a computer from the Apple Store. As she and Steve walked in, she carefully surveyed the room, making note of anyone suspicious...but thankfully there was none. Once they were at a computer, Serena began to access the drive.

"The drive has a Level 6 Homing Program, so as soon as we boot up SHIELD will know where we are." Serena explained.

"How much time do we have?" Steve asked looking around.

"Uh...9 minutes." She explained before plugging the drive in. "Starting now."

"I'll keep watch, I'll let you know if I see anyone." Natasha explained over the coms.

As the drives began to be accessed, Serena sighed.

"Fury was right about that ship...someone's trying to hide something." She murmured. "This drive is protected by some sort of AI. It keeps re-writing itself to counter my commands."

"Can you override it?" He asked, still looking around to see if they were followed.

Serena sighed and tilted her head slightly. "Well, the person who developed this, is slightly smarter than me...slightly."

Steve continued looking at the doorway, as Serena continued to type.

"I'm going to try running a Tracer. This is a program that SHIELD developed to track hostile malware, so if we can't read the file, maybe we can find out where it came from." She explained as a map appeared on the screen beginning to pinpoint the location of origin.

"Do you guys need anything?" One of the Apple workers asked.

Serena flashed her billion-dollar smile, that she used when she was charming politicians and dignitaries...her fake smile.

"On no.' She explained warmly wrapping an arm around Steve. "My fiancé was just helping me figure out our potential honeymoon destination."

"Right." Steve said with an awkward smile and nod. "We're getting married."

'He's horrible at this.' Serena said to herself before turning back to the computer.

"Congratulations." The worker said with a warm smile. "Where're you guys thinking about going."

Just as the worker said so, Serena had a soft smirk on the screen as the location of the algorithm's origin popped up. Steve glanced at the screen.

"New Jersey." He explained making Serena mentally facepalm her head.

The worker nodded, before staring very closely at Steve, making Steve start to mentally freak out.

"I have those exact same glasses." The worker explained making Steve nod and sigh in relief.

"Wow, you guys are practically twins." Serena said with the smallest amount of sarcasm.

"I wish." The worker said before gesturing to Steve. "Specimen. If you guy's need anything, I'm Aaron."