Venus | James B. Barnes✔️

xxvii. 𝚗𝚎𝚠 𝚓𝚎𝚛𝚜𝚎𝚢

"I KNEW Pierce was a piece of shit," Evelyn snarled quietly as they walked through the mall. Steve had just disclosed that Pierce believed that he had a hand in Fury's death, and now, Steve was an enemy of the state due to everyone looking for him. With Natasha and Evelyn disappearing, they were considered so as well due to their noticeable involvement. Evelyn fixed her new jacket, hating that it was tighter than the large ones she wore that were for Bucky. "At least I got rid of the heels."

Natasha sniggered. "We'll have a rematch after all of this if it'll make you feel better."

"Rematch?" Steve asked as he quickened his pace, hating to be around this many people.

Natasha grabbed his arm with a scowl. "Yes, a rematch. A fight. Jesus, Rogers. And anyway, first rule of going on the run is, don't run, walk."

Steve looked down at his shoes. "If I run in these shoes, they're gonna fall off."

Evelyn walked into the computer store first, looking around to make sure they were safe. As she walked up to a computer, Natasha immediately grabbed the flash drive from Steve as Steve stayed on watch, his faux glasses making him look only slightly different. Evelyn grinned, wiggling his glasses with her hand. He swatted her hands away with a mock-glare.

"The drive has a Level Six homing program, so as soon as we boot up S.H.I.E.L.D. will know exactly where we are," Natasha revealed.

Evelyn figured as much. "How much time do we have?"

Natasha typed a few keys. "Uh...about nine minutes from... Now," she said as she stuck the flash drive into the computer." Typing a few more things, she hummed softly. "Fury was right about that ship, somebody's trying to hide something. This drive is protected by some sort of AI, it keeps rewriting itself to counter my commands."

"Can you override it?" Steve asked worriedly.

Natasha smirked. "The person who developed this is slightly smarter than me. Slightly. I'm gonna try running a tracer. This is a program that 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."

A man walked up to Steve and Evelyn, both supersoldiers hiding Natasha's work on the computer. He smiled politely at them. "Can I help you guys with anything?"

Natasha laughed from behind them. "Oh, no. I was just helping my friends here with some honeymoon destinations."

Steve, with poor acting and a reluctant arm over Evelyn's shoulder, exclaimed, "Right! We're getting married."

The employee grinned. "Congratulations. Where do you guys thinking about going?"

Evelyn glanced over, looking over her sunglasses as she saw the computer tracing somewhere in New Jersey. "Uh... New Jersey."

"Oh," he said before he glanced at Steve and Evelyn as if he recognized them. After a moment, he snapped his finger. "I have the exact same glasses!"

Natasha chuckled mockingly. "Wow, you two are practically twins."

"Yeah, I wish," he said as he waved his hand over Steve. "Specimen. Uh... if you guys need anything, I've been Aaron."

"Thank you," Steve said as he glanced over at Natasha. Once the man was out of sight, he said, "You said nine minutes, come on."

"Shh, relax. Got it," Natasha said as she pointed to the computer. Evelyn's eyes widened at the location. Obviously, Steve made the same face. Natasha looked at the pair. "You know it?"

"Used to," Evelyn whispered.

Steve pulled the flash drive out of the computer. "Let's go." The trio ran from the room, walking too close and too suspiciously. "Standard tac-team. Two behind, to across, two coming straight at us. If they make us, I'll engage, you hit the south escalator to the metro."