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With an almost wary air about him, he parked the car, after shuffling it to the side of the empty road. He would not stop scanning our surroundings, probably waiting for one of Eve's Puppets to pop up from thin air.

"...Are you sure Hydra hasn't infiltrated your corporation?" he asked.

My shoulder's shrugged. "I might have been able to answer that eight years ago, but I know very little now.... Eve will know best. Shall I bring her back?"

He nodded, and I sent her a quick text.

Ears.

"Hey Eve? Are you sure Hydra doesn't have people in Ayers Corp or found a way in?" I asked.

"How many times do you have to ask that?" She did not sound happy over the speakers of the car. Not one bit. "Of course they aren't! Are you seriously doubting my ability to do my actual job? After all these years?"

"They got pretty close with Cybertek. How did we almost let that slip through?"

"...I don't know how I want to respond to that."

"The fuck is that supposed to mean?!"

"I... don't want to get into this...."

"Oh, we are fucking getting into this! The hell was going on with Cybertek!?!"

"...I'll confirm that Hydra has not infiltrated us. The only way they could is by a sleeper agent who's never come in contact with anyone I so much as suspect of being slightly affiliated with anyone who came in contact with anybody that I have an inkling might have anything to do with those bastards. Unless everything happens in some underground technology-less shithole.... If anyone who works for us up and goes missing for even a short amount of time, I'd know and look into it. You know how long corporate espionage idiots last with us, Val."

"...We keep them blind and feed them info for shits and giggles. But can you call Hydra corporate spies?"

"Either way, I sure hope I know what I'm doing after forty years."

'Please don't pick up on it. Please don't pick up on it.'

"F-forty years...?" Bucky repeated quietly while I wanted nothing more than to bash my head in with anything. "Did you know they were around for forty years?"

"Short answer, yes. Long answer, I can't confirm shit until they've been brought into Ayers Corp. They have come to us for me to do anything about them... due to my... let's call them chains...."

I wanted to stop this. Stop his questions. He was going to end up with answers he might never want to hear. But that wasn't my choice. It's his.

"Did you know of... me?" His voice so small and broken.

"I came across chatter of the Winter Soldier a few of times, if that's what you mean. I couldn't confirm that the Winter Soldier was an actual person and not some team or some old man pissing contest until Fury's attempted assassination. You've been pretty good at keeping out of my eyes before that. You might be a few unconfirmed blurs on video.... Nothing was confirmed until this April."

'She's talking in circles.... The hell is she hiding?'

I dared a glance towards Bucky and was torn between a bunch of different things. Pull him into a hug. Wrap him up in blankets. Send him off to Gramps far from me. Send him off to recover as far away as possible from my fucked up family.

My hand reached up on its own, my fingers finding their way through that soft hair of his. He jumped at the touch, blue eyes staring at me with far too many words and emotions to begin to sift through. When he didn't slap my arm away, I gently dug my fingertips against his scalp.

As his eyes fell shut, a tuneless hum escaped from me. Almost like what someone had done for me some years ago, though he wasn't anywhere near as tone deaf. My fingers ended up drifting to the soft skin on his face, but the beginnings of stubble marred it. Not enough to see, but each bump scratched at my fingertips.

"I'm so sorry, Bucky... for everything.... Are you... are you sure you don't want to go with Sparks? I can still call her back. Have the best people work on whatever was done to your mind. Be done with us faster."

At this very moment, I'd feel like a better human being kicking a puppy than having him stay on this stupid road trip with me.

He merely leaned into my hand, just the slightest of pressure. Unless I was imagining it. The air around him didn't come off as angry. More of a defeated sadness about him.

Minutes passed by with no response. The silence filled by tuneless humming.

As his eyes finally opened, Bucky leaned away with a soft sigh. "After what you told me... no."

As a smile found itself on my lips, my hand dropped back onto my lap. "And I'm the one with the ridiculous forgiving tendencies? We all left you with... with Hydra.... All of us. We could have at least started something. Eight years could have made some difference. If I dug a little further or went to Auntie Peggy. Maybe... may –"

"No. There was nothing you could have done.... You wouldn't have lived if you tried."

An icy shiver raced down my spine. The edge in his voice made it clear just what he was talking about.

"With who you are and what you know, Valeriy.... What you can do... they... they wouldn't let you go. Wouldn't kill you either."

Oh, how I knew that was true. Didn't matter how dumb I played.

The cat always escaped the bag.

This wasn't something I wanted to think about. I could feel the panic starting to set in like collapsing walls. "Do you want to get some fresh air?"

Bucky gave a tiny little nod. "I'll move the luggage."

"I can do that. There's not much. Besides, I have a few things to do in town before settling in? I'll be fine on my own."

The doubt in which he stared at me with those beautiful blue eyes, I swear he expected me to do the first dumb thing that crossed my mind the moment he turned away.

"Whatever the plan is, Bucky, if anything happens, Eve will get us back together. Somehow... if you want.... You should probably arm up some, but mostly you keep hidden, 'kay?"

I searched the car for something I could wear that wasn't that bright peach dress. Something that was recognizable. My search had led me to fold down the back seat and root through the trunk. Passed him a bag of Puppet approved weaponry while I was there. Would give him some non-lethal options to his set of rather deadly reflexes. That he could probably turn into lethal options....

With a grin, I plucked his cap out of his bag and slipped it on my head. "This is an order, so listen carefully."

Bucky's spine straightened up and he turned to face me, pausing his movements in hiding weapons like a good chunk my high school friends did with cheat sheets. Some stuffed up their sleeves, tucked into socks, stuck to the underside of their skirt and wherever else that had room.

"At least once within an hour of each other until you decide you've had enough fresh air and join me again, you must lay eyes on this hat with my hair. I don't care if it's a reflection or through a window or you're up a tree and looking through binoculars or whatever as long as you see your hat at the same time as my hair. Pictures do not count. I suggest asking Eve to help locate me if you don't see me. I'll probably be moving around a bit in the area and can easily drive to somewhere more convenient. Got it?"

Bucky gave a stiff nod.

In hindsight of ordering him, I don't believe he'd be doing whatever he needed but rather going through the motions of whatever I ordered. But this was my attempt at stopping him from running back to Hydra, and I had no idea if the orders would stick if I....

I reached out anyways, wrapping my unhurt hand behind his neck and massaging out some knots in his neck might help rid that blank look in his eyes. Just in case, I passed him an earbud.

"Eve will keep you safe, and if you wander too far, she'll connect us. I'll be using the octopus skin mask thing to deal with my face. You should take one too. Here."

He slipped the earbud into his ear canal and pocketed the white sheet. "Contact me if you suspect anything."

"You too. Take as long as you want."

With a nod, Bucky left the car and disappeared from sight in seconds.

A shaky breath managed to fill my lungs while I tried to fight back the tears.

"What was that about?"

"You kind of sort of told him that maybe he could have gotten away from Hydra about forty years ago? Or at least sooner than a few months ago."

"...Would have helped if I had an idea what the two of you were talking about."

"Also found out that you switched Hydra's symbol from an octopus to a multi-headed dragon on me."

"Father... he figured he couldn't stop any curiosities into the matter and risk provoking them, so we changed some facts. A symbol, for example."

"And yet you invite them to our house," I stated, waiting for her to deny it.

"...I never meant for you to get hurt.... You were never meant to come across them. You suck at forensic accounting. You shouldn't have found anything fishy. But Mochi... she's better with that than I estimated. Then the two of you happened upon Garett meeting with a Hydra head. The only reason he was even wearing that damn pin. You were never supposed to find out any of that.... I've stopped going out of my way to lure them in since."

"Oh, cut the shit, Eve! You brought them to the D.C. house. I terrified that kid into never speaking of Bucky. He wasn't the leak."

More than likely, she had another kid pretend to be the one I scared.

"Jekyll flooded D.C. with men. They were closing in."

"Not worth returning Bucky to the hell everyone left him to for seventy fucking years."

"With Hydra, I can at least do something."

A sigh escaped me.

She's in a dangerous mindset. Too confident. Too desperate. Too blinded by some personal vendetta she seemed to have.

"I didn't kill the ones from the other night, if it eases anything. But I'm not letting them go either. Consider them dead to the rest of the world."

'Not going to stop poking at them, huh...? Fine then.'

"Get the info out of them and get me any info you have on Hydra –"

"No."

"Out of all the times to use me, you say no? I don't have your limitations, Eve. On this, my hands aren't tied."

"Father wants you as far away from them as possible, and I don't want to remotely risk their ideas polluting you. Ideas spread far faster than any epidemic can and far harder to eliminate."

"I'd at least like to know the people I'd come in conflict with. Info's kind of super useful."

"...Let me think about it.... For now, you have a decision to make. I could at least predict that the two of you might be utter idiots and prepare for it. I don't need the two of you to go do stupid things on your own...."

"Wow, such faith," I droned out sarcastically, while I climbed into the driver seat and fiddled with the settings again. For one, scooting the seat forward until my feet could touch the pedals. That would help with the whole driving bit.

"You can cross the country in two fashions. Dumpy for your safety or fancy for Cinnamon Buns'."

"Hmmm.... You managed more than I thought."

"I wouldn't waste my minutes of freedom so frivolously."

"Gramps... he... did he build you with revenge in mind?"

"No.... I'm a lot of things he never meant for me to be.... Most definitely not some brainless twit of a V.I. to be ordered around by your father."

With a sigh, I put the car into drive. "...Just a heads up, the steering wheel's kind of...."

"...It's broken, isn't it?! Val! Ishould have shipped the pair of you in a steel crate!"

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Author's Note:

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