The Archangel (Avengers Fanfic)

Chapter Thirty Two

Bucky escorted me down to Shuri's lab, he seemed on edge, but I knew he just wasn't used to seeing me weak or injured. I wasn't either. Not being able to properly move my wings really hurt my pride. Finally arriving at her lab, Shuri directed me to sit at her worktable as she prepared whatever she needed to. Bucky stood vigilantly by my side the entire time, one hand clasped in mine though he was more standing guard over me. Thoughtful as ever, it was the little things like this that made me fall in love with him.

Love, what a foreign concept. Back when I had just gotten free of Hydra, I'd had no notion of the emotion, I hadn't known who I was, didn't have any connections to any living being. Bucky had been my first, though it hadn't started off on friendly terms, he had been my first connection. Sure, there was Steve and Tony and Sam and the others, but they all came after. Bucky had been the first, he would always be the first—and best—connection I had ever made. I didn't need to know who I was to know that.

I glanced up as Shuri came back holding a pair of tweezers. "Relax, I'm just going to remove the bullets to see what they are made from." She had a metal tray with her, and with every bullet she removed that had been lodged in my wings, a small ping sounded. I couldn't do anything but sit there, so I started counting every little ping I heard. When she finally finished, my count was at seventeen, not bad for automatic gunfire. Shuri announced moments later, "these bullets are made from vibranium. I have no idea how they could have gotten their hands on these."

"We'll let T'Challa figure that one out, just focus on fixing Angel," Bucky seemed to be growing increasingly more on edge and it was starting to show. Shuri set to work on examining every indentation, scratch, or puncture that the bullets had caused very thoroughly before turning away. "So, what's the verdict, kid?"

Shuri hesitated before saying, "I can fix the skeletal structure of your wings but I'm afraid without knowing the molecular composition, the feathers are simply too thin for me to return them to their previous state."

"Don't worry about it, Shuri, they'll just grow back in a few days anyway."

Shuri turned to address Bucky directly, "I've never tried this process on anything . . . sentient before. It may be painful, I don't want to suggest you leave, Sergeant Barnes, but if you can't handle it . . ."

Bucky put up a hand, stopping her there, "say no more, kid," he caught my gaze, silently asking if I wanted him to stay, but as much as I'd like him to, I wouldn't ask him to subject himself to that—I hated seeing him in pain and I can't imagine it would be much different for him either, "alright, Angel, I'll wait outside." Bucky gave my hand a squeeze and kissed my undented cheek before going back the way we came. A moment later, I heard a door slide closed and he was gone.

I muttered, "this should be interesting." Despite me being metal, I could still feel pain though it wasn't the same as when I was normal. Glancing over, Shuri looked . . . dare I say, nervous? "You'll be fine, Shuri."

She gave me a brief look of thanks and moved around the table to my back. "I should be telling you that. I can knock you out if you'd like?" She offered.

I knew the offer came from a place of kindness, but that didn't stop the flashbacks from Hydra rearing their heads. The weakness, the forced obedience, the paralysis of long weeks and months in my hibernation state. "No, I'm good, I'll try not to move for you." Key word was try. I knew that my wings could be dangerous, as sharp as they were and I didn't want Shuri to get hurt because of an instinctive reaction. "When you're done, just tell me to wake up."

Before she could ask any questions, I shut down, retreating deep into my subconscious to prevent myself from reacting. That didn't mean, however, that I wouldn't feel the pain, I just wouldn't be able to respond to it.

I guess I was expecting Shuri to start right away, and when she didn't, well, I forgot to expect it. So when the pain did come, I was woefully unprepared. Whatever machine she was using wasn't gentle, the pain was akin to someone twisting their spine in a complete three sixty it hurt so bad. I trusted that she knew what she was doing, but most of all, I trusted Shuri as a person. As my skeletal structure moved back into place, the pain began to ease more and more.

When she was finished with my wings, she moved to my cheek. For a while, nothing happened, as if she were considering what to do, but then I felt something on my face. There was a brief flash of pain and a popping sound before she moved away. She found all the other dents that blasted weapon had made and fixed them in the same way.

I waited for another long minute, actually, I wasn't sure how long this pause was, but it was longer than the others. Finally, Shuri spoke the words that would wake me and I opened my eyes to her smiling face. "See? Good as new."

I opened and closed my wings experimentally and found that she was right, aside from some really beat up feathers, you'd never know just how bad the damage had been. "Thanks Shuri."

"What is it your American advertisement's say? But wait! There's more!" I rolled my eyes at her, that was so dramatic, sometimes I forgot she was a teenager. "I found something that I think you should know." She moved over to her worktable and pulled up a hologram of a molecule of some sort. "Your molecular composition."

"Go on." I urged.

"It's incredibly similar to raw vibranium, that's what made it so easy for me to work with, but there are distinct differences, part because you're organic."

"And the other part?"

"Titanium. It seems that the combination of the two metals makes you slightly stronger than vibranium. That makes vibranium one of the only two metals on the planet that could harm you, both incredible difficult to acquire, the second more so, and we never would have known without this weapon," She gestured over to the weapon I had taken off the hostile, "it's one of my designs."

My eyes narrowed in confusion, "how did they get their hands on it?"

"I don't know, my lab is secure and no one has broken in. I have software searching for that answer and T'Challa has promised that he will find the culprit."

I glanced at my renewed wings, looked up into her eyes and said, "good." We may have been successful in rescuing the hostages, but the fact that they had weapons that were from Wakanda, made from vibranium, and could damage my nearly invulnerable skin was a cause to be concerned about.

Shuri drew my attention once more. "I tried pulling out your damaged feathers but it wouldn't work."

"Yeah, it's a neural thing, as far as I can tell, defense mechanism of some sort." I explained as I went through my feathers and pulled out the damaged ones, one at a time. They clinked together with the sound of bells as they piled up beside me. Apparently I had many more damaged feathers than I thought, that's what I get for going up against a machine gun apparently.

"What do you do with them?" Shuri asked, curiously.

I glanced at my growing pile of feathers, "nothing usually, but Tony seemed to think he could do something with it."

"Most definitely, would you mind if I . . . ?" She left the question open ended, but I knew what she meant. She wanted the feathers, probably for some experiment she had in mind, but there weren't many of them in the pile, relatively speaking.

"Sure, but I have a request first . . ." I let the statement trail off. I wasn't certain if this would be crossing a line in Bucky and my's relationship. It was impossible to tell. Would it be too presumptuous of me? What if he thought I was trying to change him? I would never do that and I hoped he knew that about me. Deciding, I restarted in a more roundabout way, trying to explain myself, "when I look at my hands, I can still see the blood on them from before. Bucky never had any choice in the matter, far less control too. He looks at his arm and sees the Winter Soldier. I want to give him a clean slate. I want to give him the choice that he never had, to decide what he wants to do with it."

Shuri thought for a moment, but then nodded, "I can do that, but there won't be enough here for all of it."

I breathed in a deep breath and let my eyes wander, finding it nearly light outside the window. Apparently, it had taken quite some time for Shuri to do as she intended. "Use what you can, it's flexible so maybe you can use it for the joints or something. He'll have paced a rut in the floor by now, I should let him know I'm alright."

"Go, I will see that it is done."