5. A Ghost Story

Jessie and Steve made their way to the hospital. They were going to get the flash drive they left, but noticed it was gone, along with all of the gum. Natasha walked up behind them, blowing a bubble, letting it pop. Steve turned around, and after a doctor walked by, pushed Natasha into a room. Jessie followed.

“Where is it?” Steve 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, Rogers.”

“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.”

“I know who killed Fury.” Jessie looked to Natasha.

“Who?” she asked.

“Most of the intelligence committee 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,” Steve said.

“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 Jessie who took it.

“Well let’s find out what the ghost wants,” she said.

The three headed to the mall. They went to the Apple store where they knew no one would find them. They were wearing disguises. Steve wore jeans, a grey sports t-shirt, and a green sweatshirt with black hightop Nikes, a black baseball cap, and black glasses. Natasha was wearing a striped hoodie, green light jacket, black skinny jeans, and purple hightop Nikes. Jessie wore something similar to Natasha, but her hoodie was purple and her jeans were denim. She also sported fake black rimmed glasses and a snap back hat which she wore backwards. They walked into the Apple store and over to a Macbook Air.

“The drive has a level 6 hunting program,” Natasha said. “So as soon as we boot up, S.H.I.E.L.D. will know exactly where we are.”

“How long to we have?” Jessie 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 malwares. 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. Jessie and Steve looked at him. Jessie turned to Natasha.

“Distract him,” she whispered. Jessie turned and put her arms around Steve.

“Oh, no,” she spoke up. “My fiancé and sister 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.

“Right,” Steve said realizing what Jessie 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.

“Huh… I have the exact same glasses.”

“Wow, you two are practically twins,” Natasha said.

“Ha, I wish. Specimen. If you guys need anything, I’ve been Aaron.”

“Thank you,” Jessie said with a smile. Ben began to walk away. Steve turned to Jessie.

“Really? Fiancé?” he asked.

“What? She told me to lie, I had no other thing to say. What else was I supposed to say?”

“Ugh, it’s fine.”

“You know you liked the lie,” Natasha said. Jessie chuckled. She looked at her watch.

“You said nine minutes, come on,” Jessie 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 Jessie. “Standard tech team. 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 Jessie then Steve.

“What?” Steve asked.

“Just do it,” Jessie said. Steve put his arm around Jessie. 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. Jessie saw Rumlow and turned to Steve.

“Kiss me,” she said.

“What?”

“Public displays of affection make people very uncomfortable.”

“Yes, they do.” Jessie pulled Steve down and kissed him. They stayed like that until Natasha told them that Rumlow was gone. When they pulled apart, Jessie turned around and began to walk down the stairs. “You still uncomfortable?”

“That’s not really the word I would use.” Steve and Natasha followed Jessie. 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 Jessie in the backseat. Natasha had her feet up on the dashboard. 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. Jessie 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. You know this is the most I’ve heard you talk, even more than at home.”

“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. But I know it was for you.”

“Nobody special though?” Natasha asked. Steve scoffed.

“Believe it or not it’s kind of hard to find someone with shared life experience, besides Jess.”

“Well, that’s alright. You just make something up.”

“What like you?” Jessie asked.

“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, Evans.”