Letting Go | Bucky Barnes

10 | Friday, June 11th

I couldn't help but feel satisfaction when we found out those officials had their bank accounts drained yesterday. The feeling didn't last long when I remembered what that money would be used for.

Experimentation.

Imprisonment.

Torture.

A shiver runs down my back and I focus back on the ongoing meeting.

"I compared this theft to the one on the first, and I'm pretty sure they were done by the same entity," Tony explains, pacing from one side of the screen to the other. "Both took money from multiple accounts simultaneously, in one go, and without a trace. This time, however, they increased security. When I tried to trace the money, there was some type of virus that was safeguarding the transfers. F.R.I.D.A.Y. caught it in time and had to create a counter-program to stop it from wiping everything, but I haven't been able to get past it. It fights everything I do."

"How much money did they take?" Rhodey asks.

"Just over two point four million dollars," Fury answers gravely.

Damn.

"How does that much money just disappear?" Steve asks. "Money, regardless of whether it's tangible or intangible, has to take up space. If they moved it, it has to go somewhere."

"Thanks, Captain Obvious," Tony smiles.

"Well, there has to be a way to find it," Steve bites back.

"Did you not hear a thing I just said? They're guarding the transfers with a virus. It matches anything I do."

"Steve's right though," I intervene. "It does take up space. Can't it be backtracked or something?"

"It's like talking to walls..." Tony mumbles, throwing his arms up in annoyance.

"I'm serious. You're going at it directly from the transfers. How about looking for money being deposited into accounts."

"There are billions of people on this earth getting money deposited into accounts," Tony counters.

"Yah, but if the money is being deposited the same way as it was being taken, it will be at an exact time, into multiple accounts. You know how much total was taken and you know when, so search for money being deposited when the money was transferred. You said two point four million—in USD? Was the money from American bank accounts? Or did you just convert it yourself?"

Tony purses his lips and raises his eyebrows, waiting for a response.

"It was taken from different countries' currency, but it would have been converted automatically to whichever countries currency the bank belonged to," Fury says. "But we don't know which country that is."

"Are you able to convert the dollar amount into different currencies, then do some math or whatever you do to make a program that would search for deposits?"

"It's not math," Tony grumbles. "But F.R.I.D.A.Y., could you get on that? Freeze the virus for now and look for money transfers within ninety seconds of those accounts being hacked. Run the twenty-five most common currencies to start with, and if there aren't any matches, increase to fifty. We're going to have a lot of background noise, so compile a list of all transfers meeting those criteria and we'll analyze each one independently to see if we get a hit."

"On it, boss. Good work, Y/N."

"Thank you, F.R.I.D.A.Y.," I say smugly.

"You never compliment me," Tony says accusatorily.