Everything was going fine until we stopped to drop everyone else back off at the S.H.I.E.L.D. apartment building. Steve opened up the doors of the van to ask if everything was alright and as soon as he put one foot on the metal floor to climb in Bucky was up out of his seat and had snapped the handcuffs in half giving him total freedom.
"Steve move!" Natasha yelled, sprinting to stand between the Captain and our raging captive. As soon as she got there the Soldier froze, lowering the arm he had raised into a fist. I just about managed to stop myself from gawping at the scene in front of me to get up and pull Bucky back into his seat. So it wasn't just me that had the power to halt him.
"Laura, maybe it's best if you sit by him for the rest of the journey; I will to, it will give us more of a reign on him." Nat said
"Yeah, ok. We're cool here Steve." I said, turning to the super soldier
"You sure?" he replied
"Yeah. Just let me and Nat handle the situation, we'll be fine."
"Ok." he said before turning to go back to the front seat. Before the metal doors slammed shut once more I could have sworn I heard him mutter something along the lines of 'it worked' but I decided to ask him about it later.
After about 3 hours of sitting and staring at the black metal of the van wall my eyes started to droop but I tried as hard as I could to keep myself awake so that I wouldn't be caught off guard if Bucky were to start acting up.
"Hey," Natasha whispered from the other side of the Winter Soldier. I looked to my left to see her leaning forwards so she could see around his muscular torso, "You can go to sleep if you want. I can handle it."
"You sure? I just don't want to leave you alone if he starts getting angry."
"I'm not gonna get angry," a deep, rough voice cut in and I looked up in shock to see Bucky looking at me, "Just go to sleep."
"O- ok." I stuttered before leaning back in my chair and turning my head so that I was looking away from my companions and resting it on the seatbelt. What completely baffled me was that he was so nice about telling me to sleep. I wouldn't have expected him to be that calm but then again he might have been trying to pull something and get me off guard so that he could make a break for it so just to be sure that I was ready if it did happen, I placed one hand around the gun that I still had latched on to my left thigh and slowly drifted off to sleep.
I had no clue what time it was or exactly how long we had been driving when I felt a gentle yet firm hand on my shoulder shaking me to consciousness
"Laura, c'mon, wake up. We're here." I opened my eyes to see a fuzzy image of Natasha hovering above me with the Winter Soldier in tow. Remembering what was happening, I got to my feet and stood by Bucky's side as we all got out of the back of the van. The brightness of the world outside that cavern of metal was blinding and I had to squint for a few seconds while I waited for my eyes to adjust. We had just arrived at one of the scarcely remaining high security facilities that S.H.I.E.L.D. owned ,which wasn't infested with Hydra agents and hadn't been taken down by the new secretary of defence, just outside of New York city. Steve spoke to me over my ear piece giving me instructions that I was to relay to Natasha.
"Hey, Nat!" I called to the assassin who was approaching the door of the building with our prisoner in tow. I hated calling Bucky a prisoner because it made him sound like a criminal and he really wasn't, it was the people controlling him who were the criminals. Natasha turned around at the sound of my voice "Cap wants us to take him straight to a cell."
"Don't we usually assess the people we take in first?" she replied
"Yeah, but he thinks that that's too dangerous, all things considered."
"Ok, I'll take him straight down." with a slight nod from both of us, Natasha disappeared to take Bucky to a cell but I decided to wait behind for Steve.
"Is your old age catching up on you Steve?" I laughed as Captain America casually wandered towards me
"Very funny Jones." he smirked, standing next to me as we walked into the concrete, one-storied building. All was quiet and I took a moment to glance sideways at Steve's expression. His eyebrows were creased together and he looked genuinely worried. Probably because we just captured his formerly-dead best friend for killing thousands of people and the last time he saw him Bucky didn't even remember who Steve was. I thought I'd better say something to ease his worry.
"You know he spoke to me earlier." I broke the lingering silence
"What?"
"Yeah, he told me to sleep." I said looking towards Steve's now-hopeful face
"Really? Why?" he said, confused
"Well I was pretty much asleep anyway and Nat told me to get some shut eye and said she'd watch Bucky and wake me up if there was any trouble; long story short he approved of the idea." I explained
"Wow..." Steve was stunned by the notion that Bucky had regained some of his humanity "That's amazing."
"I know, it means that Hydra are slowly losing their grip on him. It's fantastic." I said, "By the way, what did you mean by 'it worked'?"
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Taming The Ghost
FanfictionLaura Jones has had a rough life. Criminal, murderer, and now hero, she has a lot of secrets that she keeps very close to her. When she is recruited by Captain America to aid in the man hunt for his old friend turned assassin Bucky Barnes she is com...
