The Feeling's Mutual | Bucky x Reader

7 | Consequences

It wasn't unusual for you to be exhausted after shapeshifting; the bigger you were, the more energy it took. But nearly two days later you hadn't woken up. The others checked on you and Tony monitored you closely. According to him you'd be fine, you just needed time to recover. That didn't stop Bucky - despite the odd looks he received - from sitting beside you all night.

The next day the team had a meeting. Your 'incident' hadn't exactly put the Avengers in a good light. The public backlash was rising and bigger fish such as General Ross were questioning the publics' safety. There'd been eleven casualties total. Six were fatal; half of which were from the helicopters. The rest were civilians.

It wasn't a question who'd sent them. Drozdov had launched an attack on the Avenger's Tower - an act of war. To make matters worse, the pilot who'd ejected had gotten away and was probably reporting back to Drozdov (wherever that was). With no leads, the Avengers had no choice but to turn their attention to you.

"I went through Bruce's old files last night," Tony sighed, dumping a large box of folders onto the meeting table. "He knew more about her abilities than any of us."

Tony went on to explain what he'd found. In short, one of Bruce's earliest conclusions had been that your emotions triggered your shapeshifting - much like himself with the Hulk - but the difference was that the Hulk only had one variant. You, however, had hundreds. The stronger your emotion, the bigger your form. Over the years you'd learned to harness it, but without Bruce you'd regressed. This, however - this was different.

"Bruce had a theory that, if she were put under the right amount of stress, her powers could..." Tony gestured hesitantly. "Mutate."

"As in evolve? Like a Pokémon?" Clint asked. Steve frowned, failing to understand the reference.

Tony shrugged. "In a nutshell, yes. Now before anyone asks 'why here', 'why now', I don't know, alright? I don't know. This's all I got."

Bucky sat quietly in the corner as the others discussed their next move. He knew there was room at the table, but he preferred to sit on the outs and observe. When Steve had asked him about it, Bucky wrote it off as a comfort thing; surveying the room from a corner. While that was partly true, there was also an unspoken wall between himself and the rest of the Avengers. He'd been on more missions with them than you had, sure, but he hadn't quite found his place at the table.

Bucky thought about you. Your 'mutation' hadn't been random, it had been prompted. You were attacked and fought back, but it was more than that. You saved his life before going on the offensive. You were naturally protective, but over him? No. It couldn't have been just for him. Everyone was alive, thanks to you.

But the Avengers didn't sound so sure of that. They made it sound like you were as dangerous as the enemy. When Tony decided you had to be contained for everyone's safety, and no one objected, Bucky had enough.

"You can't be serious," he said. That made heads turn. "I mean, she saved us."

"She also got people killed, Barnes."

"And without her we could've all been killed, Stark." Bucky got up from his seat. "She wasn't just on a rampage, she had a target. That helicopter struck first. She defended us from it."

"That's not the point."

"Then what is?"

"She could do it again," Steve said quietly, unwillingly agreeing with Tony. For once, they were on the same page. It seemed your destruction was enough for even Steve to turn on you.

Tony gestured to the others as an example. "What if someone else pisses her off? What if her next target isn't an enemy?"

"She wouldn't hurt one of us," Bucky said.