Chapter Six: The Escape

Once off the island and bridge it was easier for Peggy to keep her head down or stick to alleyways to lessen people seeing her. It was still not even ten hundred hours so the streets and sidewalks weren't too crowded yet, but that would likely change very soon as all the tourist would very soon be out and about to go to museums or go look at the Capitol Building. Lots of museums might be a good thing though, as she needed somewhere with a gift shop and a bathroom from which to change in as the civilian clothes she arrived at the Triskelion in were still in a locker there.

Ironically the closest museum was The International Spy Museum, which wasn't properly open yet, but since she didn't need to see the exhibits themselves all that mattered was that the front doors were open. Inside there were a decent amount of people in the lobby lined up either buying tickets or waiting for staff members to open the doors to the museum proper. Being as quick as she could Peggy, hoping not to be seen, made her way over to the doors that were labeled "Gift Shop". The doors were locked, but she just used her advanced strength to pry the doors just enough apart that the lock broke and she was able to enter and close the doors behind her. Peggy had gotten lucky, this museum had a very wide selection of merchandise, including lots of clothes. Quickly she grabbed a large women's lilac hoodie that read 'Beautiful But Deadly' with flowers on it, as well as a black large women's tee-shirt that read 'Leave No Evidence' and had a red lipstick print on it. Next she snatched a black baseball cap that along with the image of a gun had the numbers '007' on it for some reason, Peggy also took the only somewhat real glasses she could find that were styled like those of an aviator, and while most of the spy stuff here was just fake plastic toys there was a real multitool that had six functioning appendages which she took that too, finally a navy blue backpack that could hold the multitool and her combat uniform.

Immediately she put the hat and glasses on and then started making her way to the door, she didn't keep much money in her uniform, but she pulled out every penny she had and left it on the counter. It wasn't enough, especially considering the museum was going to have to pay for a new doors, but it would do for now and hopefully she'd be able to come back later to properly pay for everything. Quietly Peggy snuck out and made to the lady's washroom where she got into a stall and locked it behind her. She changed into the shirt and hoodie, and stuffed the top half of her uniform into the bag along with most of the contents of her trouser pockets. Peggy unfortunately was unable in the gift shop to find any trousers or shoes, so those of her combat uniform were going to have to do. Carefully she stepped onto the toilet and lifted up one of the large rectangular ceiling tiles where she proceeded to stash the shield her old friend Howard Stark had gifted her, as she would be giving away her disguise walking around with it any longer.

Now looking somewhat like a normal person and not an Avenger, Peggy pulled her hood up and began to make her way towards the hospital where Fury died. Washington DC is only 176 kilometres squared, but to avoid the surveillance of S.H.I.E.L.D. Peggy could not use the subway or bus routes, nor even really the sidewalk much, so she had to stick to alleyways for most of the journey. Even with the delay it was only just past noon when Peggy managed to sneak back into the hospital. She once again was grateful for her espionage training as it meant she was able to walk in a way that was both forgettable and portrayed herself as though she was supposed to be in this staff only hospital wing. Casually she walked up to the vending machine where she left the USB stick behind the bubble gum and...it wasn't there.

All the bubblegum and the USB stick were gone. Looking into her own reflection in the vending machine glass, Peggy began to panic a little internally. Did someone from the STRIKE team notice her hiding the stick? Or possibly worse, does some random person who was in the hospital have it and she'll never be able to find it? Or what if...

But that was when another reflection joined her own in the vending machine. Natasha, in civilian clothes, just came into view and was sarcastically blowing a bubble from the missing bubble gum. For just a brief second from her mistrust of Natasha and all that had happened in the last few hours Peggy was worried Natasha was about to turn her in, but despite being angry at her Peggy did know her better than that. If Natasha intended to bring Peggy into S.H.I.E.L.D. custody, she would have sneak attacked her, not announce her presence so annoyingly.

Peggy rolled her eyes then turned around, grabbed Natasha by the scruff of the front of her shirt and dragged her quickly and forcibly into the now empty surgery observation room. With the door closed behind her, Peggy wanted to get down to business, and maybe Natasha did too, but she just was always such a bag of sass.

"Wow Carter, if you wanted me all to yourself you should have said something," she said with a smirk, but Peggy's glare turned it into a frown very quickly.

"Where is it, Romanoff?!" Peggy growled.

"Safe," Natasha responded simply, her eyes were darting all over Peggy's face.

"That's not good enough of an answer!"

"Where did you get it?" Natasha asked, and that was when Peggy clued in that this was a double sided interrogation. Natasha may not be planning on taking Peggy in right now, but she could still be gathering information to give back to S.H.I.E.L.D later.

"I'm asking the questions here, Romanoff."

But Natasha was expert at reading people and putting pieces of a puzzle together.

"Fury gave it to you. Why?"

This was beginning to get extremely frustrating. Peggy just wanted answers to all the chaos that had been occurring over the last couple days, but it was beginning to feel as though the whole world was against her.

"What information is on that little hard drive?"

"I don't know," said Natasha, her greenish-grey eyes still darting all around Peggy's face and rest of her body.

"Will you ever stop lying!" demanded Peggy, finally letting go of Natasha's clothes neck collar in absolute frustration.

"I really don't know, I only act like I know everything, Carter."

"But you know more about what has been going on these last few days than I do, for example you likely knew Fury was the one who hired Batroc and his crew, didn't you?"

"If you're asking if Fury told me that, then no, I just figured it out for myself. It just made sense. The ship was dirty, Fury needed a way in, happy?"

"Not yet. Natasha, please," said Peggy, a little softer this time, "tell me what I want to know."

Something in Natasha's gaze relaxed. She then took a deep breath.

"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 two dozen assassinations in the last fifty years."

"That shouldn't be possible, while he was disguised, the assassin I encountered looked at the absolute oldest forty, not seventy or more."

"I can't answer that mystery, but I know he's real. 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 fatally shot him straight through me," to Peggy's surprise, Natasha proceeded to pull up her shirt, which revealed a nasty looking scar on her abdomen. Something she couldn't quite explain caused Peggy to zone out for a second, maybe the trust Natasha was giving to Peggy by showing her this.

"Nat…I'm so sorry…"

Perhaps to protect her own emotions in relation to this trauma, Natasha didn't seem to acknowledge this comment, pulled back down her shirt, and continued her own line of thought.

"Soviet slug, no rifling, just like Fury. Bye-bye bikinis."

"Right," said Peggy while rolling her eyes sarcastically with a smile, "because you would look utterly horrible in one, instead of, you know, the prettiest woman on the beach."

For a brief moment Natasha smiled, almost bashfully, before going serious again.

"We can't track the Winter Soldier directly, it's a dead end. I know, I've tried," said Natasha, before revealing she was holding the USB stick. "It's like he's a phantom."

Peggy's first instinct was to snatch it right out of Natasha's grip, but she had just shown Peggy great trust, so instead she put her open hand out and Natasha placed it in Peggy's hand.

"Well, let us hope this stick has more information on this phantom, and whoever it was who specifically hired him."

"Alright, but not with you dressed like that," said Natasha, she looked hesitant. "I really admire how confident you are in how you look…I am obviously not as confident," she said while gesturing toward the side with the scar, "but most women aren't six foot and muscular, so it might be best if we get you some guy clothes while we're in public so you draw less possibly dangerous attention.

Peggy didn't like it, but she knew Natasha was probably right. The closest place with what they needed was a nearby University campus store. At the moment not really having another choice, they were forced to illegally borrow the items they required. Peggy got a cheap more normal looking pair of sunglasses, a navy blue pair of silky synthetic fabric men's pants that said "Georgetown" on left leg which she used to better cover her combat boots, and she replaced her sweater with a men's hooded navy blue rainjacket with a big G on the right side. She tucked her auburn-brown hair into her black "007" baseball cap and on the inside of her jacket.

More thoroughly disguised, Natasha started guiding the both of them to the best place she could think of to access the files of the USB stick, the DC USA mall which thankfully wasn't to far away.

On the way however, a question that had been burning inside of Peggy slipped out.

"Why are you helping me, instead of turning me in like I'm sure every S.H.I.E.L.D. employee has been ordered to do at this point?"

"Because the orders coming from up top don't smell quite right, because this'll involve me hopefully getting double revenge on the Winter Soldier, because Fury entrusted this mission to you and your going to need backup. Isn't that what comrades in arms are for?"

Peggy snorted, slightly annoyed, "Comrades…"

"Fine, what would you call us?"

"I don't know, but before all that has happened I thought we were at least friends."

This might have been to harsh, as Natasha looked slightly hurt, she even opened her mouth to say something, but then seemingly changed her mind.

"We have to keep moving," said Natasha, and they travelled the rest of the way to the mall in silence.

As they entered the main part of the mall, Natasha let out a sigh of relief.

"I'm at least glad I'm here with you, and not say Banner, you actually know the first rule of going on the run is to walk, not run."

"Don't worry, if I ran right now I'd draw way too much attention."

Natasha had thankfully known what she was talking about, no one seemed to be paying attention to her while dressed more masculinely, and likely only someone being very close up to Peggy would be able to tell she actually was a woman. Peggy hardly remembered a single moment since becoming a super soldier where people weren't constantly staring at her.

Natasha guided them to a tech store with a symbol of an apple. Peggy had seen this sybol on the back of a lot of cell phones, computers, and tablets since arriving in the future, so this was likely a very popular brand. They came to rows of tables full of laptop computers, and Natasha strategically picked one closer to the back of the outlet to hopefully keep more eyes off them. She picked a computer called a MacBook Pro that was already turned on and connected to the internet and she held out her hand, to which Peggy to out the USB stick and gave it to Natasha.

"I noticed at the Lemurian Star that 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.

"How long will we have?" asked Peggy.

"Uh...about nine minutes from..." Natasha popped the flash drive into the laptop, "now."

Natasha began typing and clicking on the keypad at an incredible speed, and what appeared on the screen kept rapidly changing, but always their appeared to be at least a long box filed with what Peggy believed to be computer code. Peggy took off her sunglasses to see the dark screen better. For the first couple minutes Natasha just seemed focused and determined, but quickly her expression changed to frustration.

"What's wrong?"

"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."

"Do you thick you can get past it?"

"The person who developed this is slightly smarter than me," Natasha looked up at Peggy for a moment and saw the apprehension her last statement caused her, and added, "Slightly."

Another minute passes by and it was becoming clear that Natasha wasn't making any progress, but thankfully she realized that as well and changed strategies.

"I'm gonna try running a tracer," she said as she began typing new lines of code. "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."

Before they could do anything else, a store employee with a name tag around his neck that read "Aaron" came up to them.

"Can I help you guys with anything?" he asked.

Natasha put on her innocent smile and put her arm around Peggy, "Oh, no. My fiancée was just helping me with some honeymoon destinations."

Of any story Natasha was about to say, Peggy was not expecting that. Her cheeks turned red for a second.

"Er, yes, we're getting married," Peggy realised to late that it was a mistake to speak as it partially gave away the disguise. Aaron's eyes narrowed for a second before smiling widely.

"Hey, good for you two, my uncles in New Mexico are finally tying the knot in a couple months after over a decade of being together. Where do you guys thinking about going?" asked Aaron as looked at their laptop, Natasha was thankfully covering the USB stick, but if he looked for to long at their screen he'd probably realize they weren't exactly searching for Honeymoon destinations. Peggy looked at the screen as well and thankfully a believable answer popped right up.

"New Jersey."

"Oh. Yeah, better there than Texas," said Aaron with a sigh. He then stopped and began staring at Peggy's face for a moment. "Do I know you from somewhere."

"She does some stunt double work for films," said Natasha quickly, trying to get this guy to leave.

"Cool, well...if you guys need anything, I've been Aaron," and with that he finally left, and Natasha snapped back to her work.

"Thank you," Peggy called out to the employee before also turning her attention to the screen.

Peggy's fairly accurate internal clock was beginning to raise her heart rate. Either it had already been a full nine minutes, or it was very close to being so.

"Nat, we can't stay here any longer."

"Shh, relax," stated Nat, before a small smile crossed her face. "Got it."

The location on the screen zoomed in from just New Jersey, to the location of Camp Lehigh. Peggy's eyes widened.

"You know it?" asked a surprised Natasha.

"I was supervisor of the Project Rebirth candidates there. This can't be a coincidence, how is this possible?"

"We'll find out, now let's move," said Natasha in an urgent tone. Peggy nodded and unplugged the USB stick and put it in her pocket.

Quickly but casually the two Avengers walked out of the store. Their goal was to get to the top of the escalator as it had the closest exit to the street, but right away Peggy noticed six pissed off obstacles that were going to make Natasha and Peggy's escape more difficult.

"The tac-team is here performing a standard sweep. Two behind, two across, two coming straight at us. If we're spotted I'll draw their attention and I want you to sprint for the descending escalator for the tube. I'll find you when they're all-"

"Shut up and put your arm around me, laugh at something I said."

"Excuse-?"

"Do it!" she hissed, and Peggy did what she said. She didn't have the greatest laugh, but it seemed to do the trick as the two Avengers walked straight by the first two agents without them looking at them at all.

They made it not only to the escalator, but to its top. However they made it no more than a couple meters before they both stopped.

"I don't think they've seen us, but they're all converging on this point," said Peggy, looking around she was about to spot Rumlow at the base of the escalator they just ascended. "They're all going to make their way down to him, going this way is no longer any good, but if we can get past him there are likely no agents behind him and we can head for a different exit.

"Back down we go," whispered Natasha.

So they got on the descending escalator as Rumlow got on the ascending parallel one. Peggy thought they would be safe, but they both noticed that Romulo appeared to observing every person who passes him on the escalator. They were stuck between to many civilians, and while Peggy knew she could jump off this elevator at this height and make a run for it unharmed, she wasn't sure if Natasha could. The only option Peggy could see was wait until Rumlow was directly next to them, try and knock him out in one hit, ad then painfully wait until they were low enough to jump off and-"

"Kiss me," said Natasha suddenly, Peggy was almost certain she must have heard that incorrectly.

"Pardon?" said Peggy, unable to think of any other words to say.

"Public displays of affection make people very uncomfortable."

"But we can't, we-" before she could protest any further, Natasha pulled Peggy's head down and kissed her. A mere second earlier Peggy had thought the idea of her kissing another woman was simply ridiculous, but now...now it was like electricity was running through her whole body, and not the painful kind she had experienced that morning. It was pleasant, and exhilarating, Peggy leaned in and wanted it to never end. The kiss felt like it both lasted forever and it ended almost instantly, Natasha pulled away and turned her back to Rumlow who had passed them without seeing them.

"That bad?" Natasha whispered as the got off the escalator.

"Er...Not the words I would use," said Peggy as they escaped the mall.