Control | S. Rogers [2]

FOURTY FOUR

CHAPTER FOURTY FOUR

BUCHAREST

LAUREL WALKED THROUGH THE STREETS of Bucharest with her phone in hand and ignoring the nervous and fearful looks passers gave her. She had an idea on where he was but refused to tell Sam, Sharon or even Steve. So, instead, she made them drop her off significantly further from where the bombing happen. It took a lot of convincing but eventually, she succeeded and was on her own, surprised that Steve allowed her to be. However, all the Avengers had learned not to answer Laurel back when she was angry, that was an unspoken rule they had.

She had swapped from a laptop to phone a while ago, it made no difference except for a phone being easier for her to carry. It vibrated quite a lot, notifications popping up at the top of her screen, but she ignored them. Most of them were from Melissa and Natasha, asking where she was or pleading for her not to do anything stupid. But, in her eyes, finding Bucky before anyone else was the right thing to do.

Looking back down at her phone, she declined another attempted call from Natasha before realising she was close because the camera she had hacked into showed her. She had seen a man that resembled the Winter Soldier too much to not be him through this camera, and a few seconds after, her prayers were answered.

Standing in front of a fruit stand, was a man wearing very long clothing with greasy hair slicked back under his hat. Laurel felt like her whole world stopped as she paused at the side of the footpath, looking at him like it was the first time she ever did.

Laurel couldn't believe her tactics worked, she found Bucky Barnes before anyone else.

Shoving her phone back in her jacket pocket, Laurel swiftly made her way through the crowd, approaching him as he went to step away from the stand, shoving a bag of plums in his pocket. When he was out of the way of other shoppers, he finally looked up and seemingly hollow blue eyes met soft doe like ones.

Laurel's smile spreaded from ear to ear as she stepped towards him. "Hi," she greeted awkwardly but was slightly shocked when Bucky pulled her close.

He hugged her tightly, inhaling her scent that seemed to have a calming effect. He feared that if he let go again, she'd disappear, they'd be seperated and Laurel's presence was one of the only things Bucky had missed since 2014.

"I missed you too," Laurel whispered, standing on her toes to give her a little bit more height considering how tall he was. It was a similar situation whenever she would hug Steve. "But we gotta move."

Bucky stayed silent as they seperated, hands lingering on Laurel's arms but he dropped them a few seconds after. Simply by looking at Laurel's expression, he could tell something had happened but he wasn't overly sure.

"Si-Laurel-Laurel what happened?" He purposely corrected himself, vividly remembering her telling him about the name years ago. It felt like a lifetime for him because the woman standing in front of him was most certainly not the same one he worked beside many years before.