verb.
To come or go back to a place or person.
noun.
The firing of a weapon to counter a shooter's shot.
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They recoiled from their pasts, and in doing so found each other.
But the universe isn't kind enough to let a moment of peace last.
It took se...
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A shaking breath passed Kat's healing split lip as she pressed her palm to the cool, smooth surface of the glass.
Part of her had expected it to be freezing, like the chambers back in Siberia, but it was merely a few degrees below the temperature of the air-conditioned lab. The glass wasn't frosted with crystals of ice, there was no clouding, nothing to obscure her view of him. The first glimpse of his face that she had been granted in a year.
Though she had known nothing about him would visibly change, she was still taken aback by it. He was still the same, perfect image she had left over a year ago. Still faintly baring the healing wounds sustained during that awful day in Siberia. Wounds that had long since shifted to fading scars on Kat's body were merely days old for him.
And despite the fact she had known, despite the fact she had prepared herself, the sight of what was left of his arm was jarring. She couldn't help that she still saw it in her mind's eye. Every memory she held dear with him featured that left arm in some way. When she imagined his arms wrapped around her, she imagined just that. Both arms, the cool contrast of metal and the heat of his skin.
Still, after so long, after so much waiting, she was here. He was here. Bucky. Her Bucky.
"How was your flight?"
Turning from where she had been silently tracing the lines of his face with her eyes, Kat's own face flushed with the realisation that she had probably been standing there for far too long. Swiping the back of her hand over the traitorous moisture dampening her cheeks, she mustered a smile at the form of the young princess striding towards her.
"Not fast enough." She breathed out an unsteady laugh as she reached to clasp Shuri's hands in her own, feeling the tight squeeze of her fingers being returned comfortingly.
"You know I'd have sent a jet if you'd asked."
"Steve didn't mind." Kat promised, "He'd have stayed, he wanted to- but they picked up on this job and..." She shrugged and bit her lip, her stomach tightening at the memory of parting with her team mere hours ago, on the gangway of the jet. Of Steve's crushing hug and the way Sam had clapped her back so hard it had driven the air from her lungs. Of the way Natasha had lingered, uselessly trying to fix a few strands of Kat's hair after the boys had mussed it, before relenting to a long, tight embrace of her own. She hadn't wanted to say goodbye, but Steve had promised they'd come when they could.
"Well, you're here now, and I'm glad you are." Shuri smiled softly, releasing Kat's hands to swiftly pace to a screen across the lab from Bucky's chamber. "Would you like me to run you through what we've been doing over the last year?"
"I'm not sure I'd keep up with it all." Kat confessed sheepishly as she followed, casting a small glance at Bucky's peaceful expression as she passed him, her heart clenching at the thought of seeing those eyes open soon. At the thought of seeing those perfect, steely blue eyes once again. "My area of expertise is more... Mechanics, rather than neuroscience."
