Monster

Chapter 6: Another Day, Another Mission

A month had gone by since the afternoon you'd brought Bucky to face the whole team. The outcome of the meeting had gone differently from what you'd expected—which was a full-on fight before the Q & A. Once the elevator doors had opened, you and Bucky made way towards the big living room where everyone—conveniently—had decided to chill and chat. Unsurprisingly, Steve was the first one to notice Bucky and you. The chatter that had been going on, stopped the minute Steve quieted down and just seemed to have frozen on the spot he had been sitting on. Of course, Nat had asked him if he was alright, Tony threw in a joke to see if it would snap the Captain out of his daze, but it only made Steve snap out of his shock long enough for him to slowly stand up. 

"Steve, what's wrong?" Nat sounded a bit worried now, so finally, she decided to look where he seemed to be staring at. Her eyes landed on you and then on the man next to you; she jolted from her spot and in less than a second her gun was out. 

"Nat, no!" Without a second thought, you stood in front of him, trying to cover him—which wasn't protecting the other foot of his height. Of course, Nat's panic made everyone in the room settle in a defensive stance at the sight of the man with the metal arm. Without moving from your spot, you looked up at Bucky and the poor man looked a tad worried. You thought it was because he hadn't had the warmest of welcomes, but he was more worried that he might have to hurt someone if they attacked. Nevertheless, you grabbed one of his hands and gave it a nice squeeze, hoping that it would let him know that you would protect him at all costs. He relaxed and had to fight off the bashful smile that wanted to come out.  

"Y/n, would you like to explain why the Manchurian Candidate is standing behind you?" said a dumbfounded Tony who was standing next to the still gaping Captain America.

"He's here because he kind of turned himself in," you said as you gave a bit of a shy smile. 

"He turned himself in?" the incredulous voice of Sam almost made you rolled your eyes. "Yes, we talked. He-" you stopped. What could you possibly say to calm them down? You knew that having one chat with a brainwashed ex-assassin wasn't going to cut it, but again, it had only taken you one chat to believe him wholeheartedly. 

"He what, Y/n? Don't tell me you honestly trust him?" Clint sounded a bit angry and that alone made you angry.

"I do, I trust him," you said angrily as he stared at the man behind you. "I know him, and he knows me." 

That made everyone in the room flinch. You hadn't addressed the elephant in the room since that eventful morning, everyone seemed to not care but their reaction was enough to project the obvious inability to forget the fact that, indeed, no one apart from Bucky, knew you. 

"Do you really believe that he's here for a good reason and not because he wants to kill us all?" said Bruce as he looked at you in the eyes. His voice always soft to the ears, it was enough to help you calm down from your initial anger. "Yes, Bruce. He's here because he wants me, us, to help him recover."

Silence filled the room for a couple of minutes before Steve took cautious steps towards where you and Bucky stood. One glance at you, and you knew what Steve wanted. So, with one last comforting squeeze to Bucky's hand, you stepped out of the way and allowed the blonde super soldier to embrace the man that had known him before the serum that now runs through his veins. Steve held onto Bucky, and almost hesitantly, the brunette hugged back before truly embracing his loyal best friend. 

From that moment on, life in the tower changed for the benefit of everyone. Having Bucky around helped everyone to be occupied with individual tasks to help with his treatment and training. It had been hard to tell Fury how things had gone down with Bucky and stuff; Fury had almost shot Bucky once he saw him approaching the headquarters. The story was that you had decided to look at the room he had stayed before you and Natasha had been ordered to bring him in, and that having nothing to lose, you decided to look around the other abandoned buildings. You found him when he had just come back from getting some food for himself. Fury didn't look convinced, but you had managed to get him in, so he took advantage of that. Time will reveal the truth, he'd thought. After all, it happened with you.