The next time anyone saw the enigmatic billionaire, was when Bucky was walking around aimlessly.
Unlike Steve, who tended to like hanging around the indoor gym just punching things all damned day. And the former assassins/spy's who were roaming around doing...former assassin/spy stuff.
He didn't know nor care to think too much on what Shield had taught them since he was pretty sure that he'd get nothing but a headache out of it.
Instead Bucky had decided to pretty much call it a day and had made good his escape while everyone's- cough- Steve's -cough- backs were turned.
Mainly because the stuff that had happened earlier that morning were sort of eating at his mind. Piquing his interest in ways that the others would find alarming if they ever managed to pick up on it. After all it was rare that the words 'enhanced, pregnancy and Hydra' were all used in the same sentence. So he was understandably curious.
And right now, his mind was totally focused on recon and nothing but recon. The prospect of learning something new was always distractingly nice to his tormented mind.
The prospect of being just one of the reasons why Hydra was screwed was also nice to him.
Revenge. Sad as it was he was a firm believer in an eye for an eye. So revenge was doubly nice. Especially since he owed Hydra pain the likes of which the organization couldn't possibly fathom.
Also- there was a woman in a delicate condition involved. And that was causing his long dormant protective instincts to kick up one hell of a fuss. Which was just one reason why he was walking around so aimlessly.
He was too damned restless to bother heading to his room and trying to crash for a bit. Between the recon, wanting to screw Hydra over, and check out the woman and make sure that she was okay and had what she needed or whatever her baby needed- he was pretty fucking high strung.
Maybe a bit more than normal if he were perfectly honest with himself.
Hearing voices up ahead of him, he moved quickly until he reached the end of the hallway and then pressed his back against the wall and simply listened. His mind already identifying the speakers as Stark and Banner.
"Okay so this morning was terrible." Tony said as he scrubbed his face with his hands. The man looked like he was dead on his feet practically ten times over.
"This morning made me cry," Banner said. "I lost samples! Blood that I was studying, tissues- the chemicals alone should have had us in lock down for weeks under a bio hazard threat!"
"Good thing that we have those annoying orange suits." Tony joked.
"This isn't a joke Tony, that can't happen again." Banner snapped.
"It won't Bruce," Tony assured the other man before then saying. "She's just...restless right now and dicking with us is her way of releasing some of her pent up energy."
Banner sighed heavily before saying, "Then you should allow her to leave every so often instead of trapping her here where she can cause chaos."
"But Bruce- she hasn't left since..."
"I know."
"And what if Hydra is watching?"
"I know that you have a point here but-"
"Plus she doesn't know anyone but us."
"Again I understand you're point but she needs to be able to go out and make new friends and maybe dick with them some."
"B-But what if new friends hurt her? What if one of them is some sort of creeper? We're all she and the baby has Brucie."
Banner made a groaning sound before then saying, "Then set her up on a date or something-"
"And let someone take her for a test drive without putting a ring on her finger first- absolutely not. Besides, after what Hydra did to her I'm fairly certain that she probably won't want any kind of sexual relationship for a long, long time."
Bruce sighed again and seemed to mull over what Tony had just said before agreeing, albeit somewhat reluctantly, that the man was probably right in that regard. Cassie probably wouldn't want any form of a sexual relationship with a man again for a very, very long time.
"Alright Tony, you win." He said tiredly as Tony made a small triumphant sound and muttered a weak sounding, 'yay me' as he and Bruce meandered off together.
Bucky was silent as he considered everything that he had just heard and slowly started to put the pieces of the puzzle in his head together as he stepped out of his hiding place- if one could really call it that- and started walking down a hallway that he'd not checked out before.
He walked for several minutes before taking notice of the somewhat subtle differences in this hallway as opposed to the others that he'd already seen. For example, this particular hallway looked more decorative. More lived in. Whereas the others that he'd seen so far didn't.
It had all kinds of paintings ranging from florals to landscapes in acrylics and watercolors. All were spectacularly pleasant to view. The colors were all vivid blues, purples, different shades of red, orange, pinks, and greens.
The furniture was different too.
The hallway tables were sturdier. Thicker looking. The build was oddly strong, the coloring a nice golden brown color as opposed to the dark oak ones that he'd noticed back the way that he'd come.
There were some chairs, all plushly cushioned, strategically placed here and there. For- For... It took his mind all of twenty minutes of walking down this hallway to figure out that he had literally just wandered into the female's living area.
The paintings, the tables, the chairs and other pieces of furniture were all something that she had used to decorate her personal space with. Which meant that he was getting close to finding her.
The thought of which made him feel ridiculously giddy as he tried to envision what she would be like and how their introduction would go. He would be polite of course. His mother had boxed his ears enough as a child to instill manners into him, thank god.
He'd make himself appear to be less threatening than he actually was- there was no need to frighten the poor woman after all. Fear would be bad for her health as well as the health of her baby. So if it looked like she was about to freak out on him he would leave her area immediately and contact Stark or something so that he could care for the female.
Cassie was sitting on the floor of her living room, watching a 'how to' video on YouTube on water painting. Her own art supplies were strewn out around her as she watched with avid interest how to prep the brushes needed for this particular project.
Pausing the video once she had the first bit down, she set about prepping her own brushes and then unpaused the video to watch the next part when a big dark shadow walked by her living room.
Figuring that it must be Thor or someone coming to check on her since her last fainting spell an hour ago- she called out to him without looking to see who it was and paused the video again and simply started to put her brush to the canvas when she realized that something was wrong.
Lifting her head to see who was standing in her doorway, filling the room with his nervous energy- she dropped her brush and accidentally kicked over her water dish in surprise upon seeing who was there.
Pale blue eyes met soft green for a moment before she managed to mutter, "Oh." in an awkward sounding tone. Causing the man's lips to quirk ever so slightly in an amused half smirk.
He watched her struggle to think of something more to say for all of a heartbeat before deciding to take pity on her and simply said, "Hello doll." Which seemed to do the trick at forcing her brain to restart, because the next thing he knew she was up and awkwardly fussing with her shirt hem- pulling it down as far as she could as if attempting to hide the small swell of her normally flat stomach.
To be honest he had almost missed her completely, which is unusual for him since he was usually more aware of his surroundings than he was now. He kind of had to be to stay alive this long.
And if not for her calling out to him-obviously thinking he was someone else- he would have totally missed her. But now that he had found her, he was pleasantly surprised by what he had found. He had expected a- damn near- total bitch in attitude if Tony, Bruce and Thor's actions this morning were any indication at all towards her personality.
However everyone's freak out this morning was obviously an exaggeration of her character.
She looked...for lack of a better word, absolutely lovely to him. Though it had taken him a minute of simply watching her from the doorway to realize that she was the pregnant woman that Stark and the others were freaking out so badly about.
Her top was slightly baggy on her, which partially hid her condition from unwanted, and prying eyes- a wise choice for someone that Hydra was after. She could manage to hide her condition in the early stages of her pregnancy, however later was a different matter altogether.
He was betting that Tony and the others were aware of this and that was why they were all sticking so damn close to her.
"Sergeant Barnes?" Her voice cut through his thoughts like a knife, cutting them off there where he could easily pick them up again and examine them later in the comfort of his own room. "Is everything alright? Do you- Are you having an episode? Should I call Steve here?" He noticed that she was standing up now, her expression was slightly alarmed and he could tell that she was fighting the urge to run for cover or something.
And that made him feel just a bit bad since it wasn't his intent to make her feel frightened of him. If anything, he wanted her to find his presence...comforting? Protective maybe?
"I'm fine. Just...thinking." He slowly said watching the way her body gradually relaxed and she looked less scared.
"I see," Was all that she said for a moment before then asking him, "Do you want to come in and have a seat? Maybe visit for a while?"
She was more astute than he had anticipated to invite him in for a spell. Nevertheless, this went along with his plans- so he merely smiled and nodded his head and let her walk over to him and gently take his metal hand in one of her own and lead him over to one of the chairs.