I mean Loki's reign in general seems to have been characterized by pure isolationism, and it doesn't seem to have worked out for him if we take Thor's assertion that "the nine realms are in chaos" in Ragnarok as fact, which it probably is.
Look What You Made Me Do (MCU)
- Thread starter mythSSK
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Chapter 26
Chapter 26
An hour later, I was showered and heading out. Before I left, I deadbolted the front door from the inside then spun a portal to just outside of it, heading down the stairs to street level. I walked out onto the sidewalk, a spring in my step as I made my way toward the café on the corner, Tony Stark's credit card burning a hole in my pocket. A few minutes later, I was sitting down at a small table outside with a breakfast bagel and a coffee—it had taken a moment of awkwardly explaining what a 'long black' was to the barista, but it turned out decent enough.
I people-watched for a bit as I ate, not really thinking about anything in particular other than the evening I'd spent with Natasha. Should I text her? No, no; way too soon. Play it cool. She was already going to text me about this afternoon, I had to wait for that.
I sighed softly. That wasn't going to be a fun conversation—I could have done it sooner, but ripping off the band-aid about Bucky and Tony's parents was never going to be fun and I'd been avoiding it. He needed to know what had happened and he needed to be in a situation where he wasn't going to have a complete and utter meltdown when he found out. What I'd done with Nat had worked out pretty well, so that seemed like a good model to stick with. Lay out the facts, provide some suggestions on approach, then let the Avengers decide how handle it.
My thoughts turned back to Natasha—her smile, her eyes, the way just being near her felt, the softness of her lips, the curves of her body… I realised I had a huge, stupid grin on my face and rubbed my cheeks, chuckling softly to myself. God, I really was pathetic. Utterly besotted.
The bagel was great and quickly disappeared, and I found myself greedily eyeing off a piece of orange cake sitting in the café's glass counter display. It wasn't like I was in a rush, right?
There was a prickling sensation at the base of my neck and I suddenly felt like I was being watched. A large black crow had just alighted on a tree just down the sidewalk. I stared at it for a moment and it let out a loud, clear caw. That… wasn't the same crow I saw the other day, was it? I knew that was a bit unlikely. There were heaps of birds in New York. It didn't look particularly distinctive, apart from being pretty damn big. Was it actually a crow, or a raven? I vaguely knew the difference, but it was difficult to pick out details at this distance. Could it be—
"Wanda."
I snapped out of my musings with a start. While I'd been spacing out, Jessica Jones had approached the table, her forehead already creased by a frown. "Oh, Jessica, Hi! Want to join me?" I asked, gesturing to the seat opposite me. "What are you up to this morning?"
She hesitated a moment before sitting, staring at me intently. The PI was dressed simply, blue jeans and a black leather jacket over a simple grey top. "I came to talk to you, actually."
"Huh. How did you find me?"
"It's literally my job." She shook her head. "Tell me what you know about IGH."
I held up a hand. "Hang on, walk me through this. You knew I'd be at this café somehow? Or did you follow me from Natasha's apartment?" She shot me an unimpressed look and I squinted at her, tilting my head curiously. "You remember I can make portals, right?"
"So?"
"What were you going to do if I'd just portalled out of the apartment and never came down?"
"…Are you going to tell me what you know, or not?"
"I thought you didn't want to know anything I had to say?" I asked mildly, taking a sip of my coffee and finding that I'd sadly reached the bottom of the cup.
A look of annoyance flashed across her face and she leant back in the chair, arms folded tightly across her chest. "Yeah, well…"
"Look, I'm sorry again for dumping all that on you at the party. It wasn't fair, but I didn't know how else to tell you. You're not exactly the most approachable person."
There was a pause. After a few moments, Jessica sighed and loosened her posture. "That's fair, I guess," she said, a little grudgingly.
"I'll make you a deal. You can pick my brain about whatever I remember about IGH and in return you come with me. There's someone I'd like you to meet."
"And who's that?" she asked, voice laced with suspicion.
"Matt Murdock—he's a lawyer. You two would end up working together eventually, anyway. I was going to go to see him and I figure I might as well introduce you two a little early."
There was another slight hesitation, then Jessica nodded. "Fine."
"Alright… I'm going to be honest, I don't remember a lot." It had been almost a full decade since I'd watched the Jessica Jones series, so the details mostly eluded me. "IGH did genetic editing for medical purposes, but ended up somehow making Enhanced. They're the ones that picked up your hospital bill after the accident and I guess they added a little extra spice to your treatment as an experiment. You should try to get a hold of the hospital's file on you. They also got into creating drugs that increase strength and reflexes—that's the stuff that Trish took, the combat enhancers. They have nasty mental side-effects, psychosis and stuff. There's a guy, a doctor. I can't remember his name. Gave Simpson the drugs."
"That's not helpful."
I snapped my fingers a couple of times as I thought back. "Trish should know his name, I think. Simpson told her. He's your best lead. I think he'd been killed by the time you tried to find him in my visions, but this is early so you should still be able to find and talk to him. He's an asshole. There's another doctor as well, a woman. She siphoned patients from the hospital you were treated at to IGH."
"Let me guess, you don't remember her name, either."
"Hey, how about you view the universe untethered by time and see how many details you forget."
"You said…" Jessica exhaled in a loud sigh. "You said that my mom was alive." There was a barely-concealed waver in her voice, hope warring with frustration and anxiety.
It was my turn to hesitate. "She's not well. She was experimented on as well, but she progressed to full-blown psychosis. I think it was too risky for them to release her, so they didn't. Well, except for when they wanted to use her as a weapon to murder someone. Simpson's doctor sent her after Trish for asking too many questions. Will send. Won't send now, I guess. Ugh, tenses are weird when I'm talking about this stuff."
"This guy has my mom?"
"I don't know if he has her," I hedged. There was another guy that ran IGH, the doctor that Jessica's mother ended up in a relationship with, but I really couldn't remember anything about him at all and I didn't think dropping that particular bomb on her without context was going to provide any benefit. "If he doesn't, he almost certainly knows where she is."
"Alright. Thanks."
"Hey!" I protested as she stood and turned to walk away. "Where do you think you're going?"
Jessica whipped her head back and shot me what might have actually been the most venomous look I'd ever seen. "What?"
I held up my hands nonthreateningly. "You said you'd come meet Murdock with me."
Tilting her head back, she closed her eyes for a moment and took a long breath. "Will this take long?"
"It shouldn't. We can just portal there. I already Street View'ed the address."
"Fine."
I stood up, glancing around at the few people that were nearby. "Maybe we should do this somewhere less public. Let's walk back to Natasha's building and we'll go from there." She acknowledged the suggestion with a shrug and we left the café. As we walked together, Jessica thrust her hands into her jacket pockets, glaring straight ahead. "You know, it wouldn't kill you to be a little nicer to me, considering," I said mildly.
She shot me a huge, exaggeratedly fake smile. "You know, when the Avengers first told me about you, I thought you were going to be a real pain in the ass to deal with. And when we first met, I really didn't like you."
I waited for a moment, then frowned when nothing else seemed to be forthcoming. "Is… is that the end of that sentence? There's no second part?"
"No. That's all I wanted to say."
"…Rude." Despite her words, I swore I saw the ghost of a smirk curve the corner of her mouth.
Once we arrived back at Natasha's building, we walked up to the front door and I spun a portal into existence almost flat against it. On the other side, we stepped through to a significantly less well-maintained street, gutters clogged with leaf litter and bags of trash piled on the sidewalk next to a graffitied fire hydrant.
On the other side of the street was a relatively nondescript building with a façade made of rough, irregularly-shaped bricks. Screwed to one of the dull, red-painted pillars that framed the entrance was a small plaque, black with raised bronze lettering in all capitals: NELSON AND MURDOCK, ATTORNEYS AT LAW. We crossed the street to the door, a wrought iron mesh affair covered in peeling beige paint. We let ourselves in and headed up a flight of stairs to the actual office. There were several other businesses operating out of the building, each with a business name stencilled on a frosted glass window set into the wood of their front door.
I opened the door to our destination and we walked in. The waiting room wasn't much to look at; they didn't even have a bench or proper matching seats, just a haphazard collection of folding chairs, with a flimsy card table tucked into a corner with some magazines and a lamp on it. Karen Page, their office manager, looked up from the newspaper she was reading as we entered—its pages deconstructed and spread chaotically across her desk—and shot us a brilliant smile. "Hi!" She stood up as she greeted us. "How can I help you?" God, she was pretty. Pale skin, with long, dead-straight blonde hair with strawberry highlights.
"Hi!" I said, matching her energy. Jessica folded her arms and fell back a bit, letting me take the lead. "We need to speak with Matt Murdock. Apologies for not making an appointment, but it's a bit urgent."
"Ah, sorry. He's not in right now. Is there something I can help you with?"
I tried not to pull too much of a face. Karen didn't know about Matt's vigilantism at this point, I was pretty sure. "Uh, what about Foggy?" I glanced to the side, looking through a glass window into his office. He was seated at his desk, and looked up at me at basically the same time. I shot him a hopeful smile and started toward his door.
"Sure, let me just check to see if he's available." Karen moved quickly, trying to intercept me before I just waltzed into Foggy's office. "Miss…?"
"Wanda. Wanda Maximoff. And that's Jessica Jones," I said as she stepped in front of me.
She was quick, but Foggy had already perked up and was moving toward the door as well. He opened it and she turned to shoot him a slightly annoyed look. "Uh, I have a Wanda Maximoff and Jessica Jones here to see you. They don't have an appointment, but they said it was urgent."
"Franklin Nelson," Foggy introduced himself with a smile, holding out a hand. "Uh, that's fine, Karen. How can I help you ladies?"
I shook his offered hand, grinning at him. "Hi, Foggy. Actually, we need to talk to Matt. Is he working today? Do you know where he is?"
He shook his head, his smile not quite reaching his eyes. "Sorry," he said apologetically. "Matt's unavailable at the moment. What—"
I interrupted him. "We really need to talk to him. It's about his… uh. Extracurricular activities." I waggled my eyebrows.
"I'm… not sure what you mean?" To his credit, Foggy had an excellent poker face—not even a slight widening of the eyes, and he actually sounded convincingly puzzled when he spoke.
I tilted my head toward Karen, flicking my eyes in her direction. "Sure, right. Can we, uh, talk privately for a second?"
He huffed a small sigh, then shook his head in a semi-defeated shrug. "…Okay. Follow me."
With one last glance at a concerned-looking Karen, Foggy led us through to his office. Closing the door firmly behind us, he stepped over toward his desk and hesitated. "Is Matt in trouble?" he asked quietly.
"He might be. I really need to reach him. It's about… well, you know. Hero stuff."
He paused, looking at me slightly uncertainly. "Matt hasn't mentioned you."
"He wouldn't have, we haven't met yet. It's hard to explain."
"Ah, I don't know. Okay. Let me… let me see if I can call him."
Foggy took out his smart phone, careful not to take his eyes off of us. It rang a few times before Matt answered. "Uh, hey. We've got a pretty intense woman who's come by the office looking for you. Said her name's Wanda Maximoff and that she has to talk to you urgently about your, uh, extracurricular activities." I could hear Matt responding on the other end, but not well enough to make out his words. "Yeah, pretty sure. Uh, no. Not at all."
"Tell him it's about Elektra," I said.
"Uh, she said it's about Elektra? …Sure. Okay. Got it." He hung up and looked at us. "Matt's on his way, he won't be long."
"Thanks, Foggy. I appreciate it. Sorry for dumping all this on you so suddenly."
He grinned and it only seemed very slightly forced. "That's okay. I think my most pressing question is why is literally everyone Matt knows involved in this stuff a beautiful woman?"
Jessica blinked, caught slightly off guard by the comment. I grinned. "Elektra's another, sorry to say. It's his curse to bear: to be forever surrounded by beautiful women without being able to fully understand just how hot we all are."
"Yeah, it's a curse all right," Foggy snorted.
"We'll let you get back to whatever you were doing. Thanks again." He gave me a worried look as Jess and I stepped back out into the waiting room. Karen didn't quite glare at me and I smiled at her apologetically. "Matt's on his way. We'll just wait quietly. Sorry to be a pain."
We settled into a pair of folding chairs to wait. Karen went back to what she was doing, glancing at us every so often when she thought we weren't looking.
"You really are just that clueless, aren't you?" Jessica asked me after a while.
"Huh?"
"These people have never met you before," she said, shaking her head. "You have no idea how off-balance you put people when you sweep in like this and bulldoze over them like you know everything, do you?"
I turned to look at her, shaking my head. "Believe me, I do know. I've tried other things… at least I know I can get some results this way. Even if it doesn't earn me any friends."
"How do you know that this guy will even listen to you?"
"You did, didn't you?" I grinned at her annoyed expression. "You wanted nothing to do with me, yet here you are. I'm growing on you, right? You're starting to like me. I can tell."
"Not even close."
"You can't lie to me, Jess. I've seen the future. We're going to be BFFs."
The corner of her mouth twitched as she tried not to react. I was definitely getting through to her a little bit.
Fifteen minutes later, Matt Murdock—Daredevil himself—stepped into the office, walking stick in hand, a set of dark red tinted sunglasses over his eyes. He ushered us into his office after a warm smile at Karen, and the door was closed behind us. Matt smiled warmly as he sat down, Jess and I settling into the chairs opposite him.
"I don't believe we've met, Ms Maximoff, and… I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name." His head was tilted slightly off to the side, as if he were looking past us instead of at us.
"Jessica. Jessica Jones."
"Ms Jones," he acknowledged her with a smile. "So, what brings you to see me?"
"Okay," I said, turning to Jessica. She raised an eyebrow. "How should I do this, then? You didn't like how I approached you, so here: Show me what I did wrong."
The PI set her jaw, shaking her head. "You—" After a moment, she let out an annoyed huff. "You weren't wrong. I guess. I probably wouldn't have listened if you'd been softer about things," she admitted grudgingly.
"Okay." I turned back to Matt. "Elektra is working for Stick." He was generally pretty good at hiding his reactions, but he visibly flinched when I said that. "She's a liar and she's trying to manipulate you. Don't follow her, don't help her. She's expecting you to do exactly that so she can manipulate you into position for Stick to use as a weapon again."
He paused as he processed that, jaw working for a moment before he spoke again, letting out an anxious little laugh as he did so. "Alright, Ms Maximoff…"
"Wanda, please."
"Wanda. How do you know any of that? How do you know about Elektra? About Stick?" He'd shifted his posture, sitting forward slightly to allow him to spring smoothly to his feet if the need arose, and his tone was slightly sharper.
"I have abilities, like you. Well, not exactly like you—kind of way cooler, if I'm being honest—but I just know things. Things I shouldn't be able to know. It's hard to explain. You know what that's like, right?"
His grip tightened on the handle of his walking stick as he flexed his knuckles. "Why are you here? If you're not working with Stick or the Yakuza…"
"I'm just here to help. The people you're involved with are more dangerous that you know."
Jess spoke up, her voice terse. "She's a pain in the ass, but she seems to know what she's talking about for the most part. You should listen to her."
"It all comes back to Midland Circle," I said. "Nobu wasn't just some guy that Fisk sent after you, he represented a very particular interest that wanted to acquire that specific block. They own it now. Everyone thinks they're Yakuza—they don't do much to disabuse people of that notion—but that's not what they are. Elektra is lying to you about that… or will lie to you about that, if she hasn't shown up yet."
Matt took a deep breath. "What do you mean, if she hasn't?"
"It's complicated, dude," Jess interjected again and I tried not to smile—she was on my side, here! "Just focus on the details for now."
"Okay… What are they, then? If they're not Yakuza?"
"The Hand. It's an ancient organisation. Basically evil ninjas, I guess. Your buddy, Stick, belongs to an opposing organisation called the Chaste."
"…Stick's War," he said quietly.
"Yeah. Madame Gao's actually one of them, too, a different faction of the same organisation," I snapped my fingers, suddenly remembering something. "Nobu isn't dead, by the way. I mean, he was, but he got better. He'll be coming soon."
Matt's head turned toward me, brow creased in confusion. "What do you mean he isn't dead? He—"
"Burned to death? You saw it? Yeah. Like I said, he got better. High ranking members of the Hand tend to do that, unfortunately. They can bring back the dead, if there's enough left of them to bring back."
Jess looked at me sharply. "They can bring back the dead?"
"I know it sounds like a lot, but yeah. I think there's a limited window of time they have to do it in. It can mess with the person's mind, though, and consumes a limited resource. They can't just bring everyone back."
"Fucking hell," she scoffed in disbelief, shaking her head. "Ninjas that bring back the dead. Why am I even here?"
"You and Matt worked together to bring these guys down, along with a couple of others. Or you will work together. Or maybe you won't have to—I'm thinking about trying to get the Avengers in on this. We have some time to decide how to handle it."
"The Avengers?" Matt asked, a note of surprise in his voice.
"I'm actually staying in Avengers Tower at the moment," I said, maybe a little bit smugly. "I've been helping them out with a few things."
"You said this all comes back to Midland Circle. Why?"
"They're excavating under it, looking for something buried underneath. An ancient treasure. It's going to take a while… I think a year, at least. Maybe." I shot a glance over at Jessica. "I'm not certain on timeframes."
Matt was silent for a few moments. "…Elektra showed up in my apartment last night," he admitted. His knuckles flexed again, walking stick creaking slightly under the pressure. "Let's just assume I believe you for the moment…"
--
Agatha stepped out into the small rooftop garden, trimmed hedges and miniature trees flanking a perfectly manicured lawn. She stepped carefully across the grass, toward where the garden's sole other occupant sat perched on a low stone bench, facing away from her. Beyond the bench was a square pool, a small stone fountain in the shape of a frog on the opposite side spitting a small stream of water into the air.
The elderly Chinese woman rose to her feet as the witch approached, leaning heavily on her wooden cane. Her hair was drawn back in a loose bun, and she wore small golden hoops through her ears. "Hěn gāoxìng jiàn dào nǐ, hēi pí shū de Agatha. Yǐjīng hěnjiǔle," she said, a small smile creasing her wrinkled features.
Agatha inclined her head slightly awkwardly in a small bow. "Thank you for taking the time to meet with me, Madame Gao. I'm afraid I've gotten a little rusty on my Mandarin over the last century."
"No need to thank me." She sat back down, a little shaky on her feet—an affectation, Agatha suspected—and gestured for the witch to do the same. "The Hand still honour the old agreements. What brings you to New York?"
Agatha sat as indicated, crossing her legs at the ankle. "I'm hunting."
She was not overly friendly with the Hand, but dealing with them in the past had been the cost of staying alive. They were both part of the same loose, informal network of organisations that had been adversaries of the Seven Capital Cities of Heaven and their Earthly allies over the centuries. An agreement had been reached, centuries ago, to avoid getting in each other's ways while fighting their ancient foes.
It was considered polite to offer a signal when moving into an unfamiliar territory for an extended period of time, to alert any of the current occupants that a new player had arrived and open a channel for negotiations. Though her prey seemed to have roosted in New York for a time, Agatha was unsure how long she would remain in the city. Accordingly, she thought it was safer to follow the custom out of courtesy, just in case she ended up having to cause a ruckus.
New York was such a significant location that she would have been shocked if she hadn't gotten any reply, but she'd been vaguely surprised to find that one of the Fingers of the Hand—their circle of leaders—had personally set up shop in the area. She'd met Madame Gao a couple of times before over the last three centuries and, immortal to immortal, the woman seemed to be the most stable of the Fingers.
"Ah. Your quarry must be quite interesting. I believe it has been near enough to a hundred years since you were last seen straying from your home," Gao note, an unspoken question in her statement. "Publicly, at least."
The witch grinned. "Yeah, well, I don't want to make a fuss. There's a woman, seems to be hanging around the Avengers lately. Wanda something." She held up a hand and a massive crow, black and sleek of feather, descended from the sky to alight on her wrist. Bringing the creature down into her lap, she muttered an incantation and the bird was replaced with a fuzzy, piebald rabbit in a flare of black-edged purple energy. "Señor Scratchy has been keeping an eye on her for me, haven't you? Haven't you?" she cooed over the demon.
The Scarlet Witch had been an absolute bitch and a half to keep track of—she seemed very happy to abuse the sorcerers' translocation spellwork and had been bouncing back and forth across the globe like a pinball. Agatha had her own methods of travel through the Ways but they were not nearly as convenient or quick, so she had decided to wait and observe until that behaviour changed. When her target had finally settled in New York and seemed content to stay put for a least a little while, Agatha had decided to move in and plan her approach.
"The Avengers?" Madame Gao's face twisted in distaste. "It would be best if you finished your business quickly, then. I have had my fill of so-called heroes of late."
"Already the plan. I'm not going to hang around for too long."
Gao sighed, a note of disappointment in her voice. "I had thought I might seek your assistance with something, but I have no desire to risk drawing the sort of attention you may draw in your hunt. Our business here is delicate and the remaining Chaste are already intent on interfering."
"Sure. Stay out of my way, I'll stay out of yours. Just like old times."
The elderly woman shrugged, both hands leaning on the curved head of her cane. "The wheel constantly turns. We must adapt to its position, or be crushed beneath it."
Agatha smiled and nodded. "…Uh, yeah. Sure. It's been just lovely to see you again, Madame Gao, but I really must be off. No rest for the wicked, after all."
She needed to observe Wanda for a little longer and get a better understanding of what she was facing before she'd feel comfortable closing in on her prey. The Scarlet Witch was a legendary figure, after all, and Agatha hadn't lived as long as she had by not being careful.
An hour later, I was showered and heading out. Before I left, I deadbolted the front door from the inside then spun a portal to just outside of it, heading down the stairs to street level. I walked out onto the sidewalk, a spring in my step as I made my way toward the café on the corner, Tony Stark's credit card burning a hole in my pocket. A few minutes later, I was sitting down at a small table outside with a breakfast bagel and a coffee—it had taken a moment of awkwardly explaining what a 'long black' was to the barista, but it turned out decent enough.
I people-watched for a bit as I ate, not really thinking about anything in particular other than the evening I'd spent with Natasha. Should I text her? No, no; way too soon. Play it cool. She was already going to text me about this afternoon, I had to wait for that.
I sighed softly. That wasn't going to be a fun conversation—I could have done it sooner, but ripping off the band-aid about Bucky and Tony's parents was never going to be fun and I'd been avoiding it. He needed to know what had happened and he needed to be in a situation where he wasn't going to have a complete and utter meltdown when he found out. What I'd done with Nat had worked out pretty well, so that seemed like a good model to stick with. Lay out the facts, provide some suggestions on approach, then let the Avengers decide how handle it.
My thoughts turned back to Natasha—her smile, her eyes, the way just being near her felt, the softness of her lips, the curves of her body… I realised I had a huge, stupid grin on my face and rubbed my cheeks, chuckling softly to myself. God, I really was pathetic. Utterly besotted.
The bagel was great and quickly disappeared, and I found myself greedily eyeing off a piece of orange cake sitting in the café's glass counter display. It wasn't like I was in a rush, right?
There was a prickling sensation at the base of my neck and I suddenly felt like I was being watched. A large black crow had just alighted on a tree just down the sidewalk. I stared at it for a moment and it let out a loud, clear caw. That… wasn't the same crow I saw the other day, was it? I knew that was a bit unlikely. There were heaps of birds in New York. It didn't look particularly distinctive, apart from being pretty damn big. Was it actually a crow, or a raven? I vaguely knew the difference, but it was difficult to pick out details at this distance. Could it be—
"Wanda."
I snapped out of my musings with a start. While I'd been spacing out, Jessica Jones had approached the table, her forehead already creased by a frown. "Oh, Jessica, Hi! Want to join me?" I asked, gesturing to the seat opposite me. "What are you up to this morning?"
She hesitated a moment before sitting, staring at me intently. The PI was dressed simply, blue jeans and a black leather jacket over a simple grey top. "I came to talk to you, actually."
"Huh. How did you find me?"
"It's literally my job." She shook her head. "Tell me what you know about IGH."
I held up a hand. "Hang on, walk me through this. You knew I'd be at this café somehow? Or did you follow me from Natasha's apartment?" She shot me an unimpressed look and I squinted at her, tilting my head curiously. "You remember I can make portals, right?"
"So?"
"What were you going to do if I'd just portalled out of the apartment and never came down?"
"…Are you going to tell me what you know, or not?"
"I thought you didn't want to know anything I had to say?" I asked mildly, taking a sip of my coffee and finding that I'd sadly reached the bottom of the cup.
A look of annoyance flashed across her face and she leant back in the chair, arms folded tightly across her chest. "Yeah, well…"
"Look, I'm sorry again for dumping all that on you at the party. It wasn't fair, but I didn't know how else to tell you. You're not exactly the most approachable person."
There was a pause. After a few moments, Jessica sighed and loosened her posture. "That's fair, I guess," she said, a little grudgingly.
"I'll make you a deal. You can pick my brain about whatever I remember about IGH and in return you come with me. There's someone I'd like you to meet."
"And who's that?" she asked, voice laced with suspicion.
"Matt Murdock—he's a lawyer. You two would end up working together eventually, anyway. I was going to go to see him and I figure I might as well introduce you two a little early."
There was another slight hesitation, then Jessica nodded. "Fine."
"Alright… I'm going to be honest, I don't remember a lot." It had been almost a full decade since I'd watched the Jessica Jones series, so the details mostly eluded me. "IGH did genetic editing for medical purposes, but ended up somehow making Enhanced. They're the ones that picked up your hospital bill after the accident and I guess they added a little extra spice to your treatment as an experiment. You should try to get a hold of the hospital's file on you. They also got into creating drugs that increase strength and reflexes—that's the stuff that Trish took, the combat enhancers. They have nasty mental side-effects, psychosis and stuff. There's a guy, a doctor. I can't remember his name. Gave Simpson the drugs."
"That's not helpful."
I snapped my fingers a couple of times as I thought back. "Trish should know his name, I think. Simpson told her. He's your best lead. I think he'd been killed by the time you tried to find him in my visions, but this is early so you should still be able to find and talk to him. He's an asshole. There's another doctor as well, a woman. She siphoned patients from the hospital you were treated at to IGH."
"Let me guess, you don't remember her name, either."
"Hey, how about you view the universe untethered by time and see how many details you forget."
"You said…" Jessica exhaled in a loud sigh. "You said that my mom was alive." There was a barely-concealed waver in her voice, hope warring with frustration and anxiety.
It was my turn to hesitate. "She's not well. She was experimented on as well, but she progressed to full-blown psychosis. I think it was too risky for them to release her, so they didn't. Well, except for when they wanted to use her as a weapon to murder someone. Simpson's doctor sent her after Trish for asking too many questions. Will send. Won't send now, I guess. Ugh, tenses are weird when I'm talking about this stuff."
"This guy has my mom?"
"I don't know if he has her," I hedged. There was another guy that ran IGH, the doctor that Jessica's mother ended up in a relationship with, but I really couldn't remember anything about him at all and I didn't think dropping that particular bomb on her without context was going to provide any benefit. "If he doesn't, he almost certainly knows where she is."
"Alright. Thanks."
"Hey!" I protested as she stood and turned to walk away. "Where do you think you're going?"
Jessica whipped her head back and shot me what might have actually been the most venomous look I'd ever seen. "What?"
I held up my hands nonthreateningly. "You said you'd come meet Murdock with me."
Tilting her head back, she closed her eyes for a moment and took a long breath. "Will this take long?"
"It shouldn't. We can just portal there. I already Street View'ed the address."
"Fine."
I stood up, glancing around at the few people that were nearby. "Maybe we should do this somewhere less public. Let's walk back to Natasha's building and we'll go from there." She acknowledged the suggestion with a shrug and we left the café. As we walked together, Jessica thrust her hands into her jacket pockets, glaring straight ahead. "You know, it wouldn't kill you to be a little nicer to me, considering," I said mildly.
She shot me a huge, exaggeratedly fake smile. "You know, when the Avengers first told me about you, I thought you were going to be a real pain in the ass to deal with. And when we first met, I really didn't like you."
I waited for a moment, then frowned when nothing else seemed to be forthcoming. "Is… is that the end of that sentence? There's no second part?"
"No. That's all I wanted to say."
"…Rude." Despite her words, I swore I saw the ghost of a smirk curve the corner of her mouth.
Once we arrived back at Natasha's building, we walked up to the front door and I spun a portal into existence almost flat against it. On the other side, we stepped through to a significantly less well-maintained street, gutters clogged with leaf litter and bags of trash piled on the sidewalk next to a graffitied fire hydrant.
On the other side of the street was a relatively nondescript building with a façade made of rough, irregularly-shaped bricks. Screwed to one of the dull, red-painted pillars that framed the entrance was a small plaque, black with raised bronze lettering in all capitals: NELSON AND MURDOCK, ATTORNEYS AT LAW. We crossed the street to the door, a wrought iron mesh affair covered in peeling beige paint. We let ourselves in and headed up a flight of stairs to the actual office. There were several other businesses operating out of the building, each with a business name stencilled on a frosted glass window set into the wood of their front door.
I opened the door to our destination and we walked in. The waiting room wasn't much to look at; they didn't even have a bench or proper matching seats, just a haphazard collection of folding chairs, with a flimsy card table tucked into a corner with some magazines and a lamp on it. Karen Page, their office manager, looked up from the newspaper she was reading as we entered—its pages deconstructed and spread chaotically across her desk—and shot us a brilliant smile. "Hi!" She stood up as she greeted us. "How can I help you?" God, she was pretty. Pale skin, with long, dead-straight blonde hair with strawberry highlights.
"Hi!" I said, matching her energy. Jessica folded her arms and fell back a bit, letting me take the lead. "We need to speak with Matt Murdock. Apologies for not making an appointment, but it's a bit urgent."
"Ah, sorry. He's not in right now. Is there something I can help you with?"
I tried not to pull too much of a face. Karen didn't know about Matt's vigilantism at this point, I was pretty sure. "Uh, what about Foggy?" I glanced to the side, looking through a glass window into his office. He was seated at his desk, and looked up at me at basically the same time. I shot him a hopeful smile and started toward his door.
"Sure, let me just check to see if he's available." Karen moved quickly, trying to intercept me before I just waltzed into Foggy's office. "Miss…?"
"Wanda. Wanda Maximoff. And that's Jessica Jones," I said as she stepped in front of me.
She was quick, but Foggy had already perked up and was moving toward the door as well. He opened it and she turned to shoot him a slightly annoyed look. "Uh, I have a Wanda Maximoff and Jessica Jones here to see you. They don't have an appointment, but they said it was urgent."
"Franklin Nelson," Foggy introduced himself with a smile, holding out a hand. "Uh, that's fine, Karen. How can I help you ladies?"
I shook his offered hand, grinning at him. "Hi, Foggy. Actually, we need to talk to Matt. Is he working today? Do you know where he is?"
He shook his head, his smile not quite reaching his eyes. "Sorry," he said apologetically. "Matt's unavailable at the moment. What—"
I interrupted him. "We really need to talk to him. It's about his… uh. Extracurricular activities." I waggled my eyebrows.
"I'm… not sure what you mean?" To his credit, Foggy had an excellent poker face—not even a slight widening of the eyes, and he actually sounded convincingly puzzled when he spoke.
I tilted my head toward Karen, flicking my eyes in her direction. "Sure, right. Can we, uh, talk privately for a second?"
He huffed a small sigh, then shook his head in a semi-defeated shrug. "…Okay. Follow me."
With one last glance at a concerned-looking Karen, Foggy led us through to his office. Closing the door firmly behind us, he stepped over toward his desk and hesitated. "Is Matt in trouble?" he asked quietly.
"He might be. I really need to reach him. It's about… well, you know. Hero stuff."
He paused, looking at me slightly uncertainly. "Matt hasn't mentioned you."
"He wouldn't have, we haven't met yet. It's hard to explain."
"Ah, I don't know. Okay. Let me… let me see if I can call him."
Foggy took out his smart phone, careful not to take his eyes off of us. It rang a few times before Matt answered. "Uh, hey. We've got a pretty intense woman who's come by the office looking for you. Said her name's Wanda Maximoff and that she has to talk to you urgently about your, uh, extracurricular activities." I could hear Matt responding on the other end, but not well enough to make out his words. "Yeah, pretty sure. Uh, no. Not at all."
"Tell him it's about Elektra," I said.
"Uh, she said it's about Elektra? …Sure. Okay. Got it." He hung up and looked at us. "Matt's on his way, he won't be long."
"Thanks, Foggy. I appreciate it. Sorry for dumping all this on you so suddenly."
He grinned and it only seemed very slightly forced. "That's okay. I think my most pressing question is why is literally everyone Matt knows involved in this stuff a beautiful woman?"
Jessica blinked, caught slightly off guard by the comment. I grinned. "Elektra's another, sorry to say. It's his curse to bear: to be forever surrounded by beautiful women without being able to fully understand just how hot we all are."
"Yeah, it's a curse all right," Foggy snorted.
"We'll let you get back to whatever you were doing. Thanks again." He gave me a worried look as Jess and I stepped back out into the waiting room. Karen didn't quite glare at me and I smiled at her apologetically. "Matt's on his way. We'll just wait quietly. Sorry to be a pain."
We settled into a pair of folding chairs to wait. Karen went back to what she was doing, glancing at us every so often when she thought we weren't looking.
"You really are just that clueless, aren't you?" Jessica asked me after a while.
"Huh?"
"These people have never met you before," she said, shaking her head. "You have no idea how off-balance you put people when you sweep in like this and bulldoze over them like you know everything, do you?"
I turned to look at her, shaking my head. "Believe me, I do know. I've tried other things… at least I know I can get some results this way. Even if it doesn't earn me any friends."
"How do you know that this guy will even listen to you?"
"You did, didn't you?" I grinned at her annoyed expression. "You wanted nothing to do with me, yet here you are. I'm growing on you, right? You're starting to like me. I can tell."
"Not even close."
"You can't lie to me, Jess. I've seen the future. We're going to be BFFs."
The corner of her mouth twitched as she tried not to react. I was definitely getting through to her a little bit.
Fifteen minutes later, Matt Murdock—Daredevil himself—stepped into the office, walking stick in hand, a set of dark red tinted sunglasses over his eyes. He ushered us into his office after a warm smile at Karen, and the door was closed behind us. Matt smiled warmly as he sat down, Jess and I settling into the chairs opposite him.
"I don't believe we've met, Ms Maximoff, and… I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name." His head was tilted slightly off to the side, as if he were looking past us instead of at us.
"Jessica. Jessica Jones."
"Ms Jones," he acknowledged her with a smile. "So, what brings you to see me?"
"Okay," I said, turning to Jessica. She raised an eyebrow. "How should I do this, then? You didn't like how I approached you, so here: Show me what I did wrong."
The PI set her jaw, shaking her head. "You—" After a moment, she let out an annoyed huff. "You weren't wrong. I guess. I probably wouldn't have listened if you'd been softer about things," she admitted grudgingly.
"Okay." I turned back to Matt. "Elektra is working for Stick." He was generally pretty good at hiding his reactions, but he visibly flinched when I said that. "She's a liar and she's trying to manipulate you. Don't follow her, don't help her. She's expecting you to do exactly that so she can manipulate you into position for Stick to use as a weapon again."
He paused as he processed that, jaw working for a moment before he spoke again, letting out an anxious little laugh as he did so. "Alright, Ms Maximoff…"
"Wanda, please."
"Wanda. How do you know any of that? How do you know about Elektra? About Stick?" He'd shifted his posture, sitting forward slightly to allow him to spring smoothly to his feet if the need arose, and his tone was slightly sharper.
"I have abilities, like you. Well, not exactly like you—kind of way cooler, if I'm being honest—but I just know things. Things I shouldn't be able to know. It's hard to explain. You know what that's like, right?"
His grip tightened on the handle of his walking stick as he flexed his knuckles. "Why are you here? If you're not working with Stick or the Yakuza…"
"I'm just here to help. The people you're involved with are more dangerous that you know."
Jess spoke up, her voice terse. "She's a pain in the ass, but she seems to know what she's talking about for the most part. You should listen to her."
"It all comes back to Midland Circle," I said. "Nobu wasn't just some guy that Fisk sent after you, he represented a very particular interest that wanted to acquire that specific block. They own it now. Everyone thinks they're Yakuza—they don't do much to disabuse people of that notion—but that's not what they are. Elektra is lying to you about that… or will lie to you about that, if she hasn't shown up yet."
Matt took a deep breath. "What do you mean, if she hasn't?"
"It's complicated, dude," Jess interjected again and I tried not to smile—she was on my side, here! "Just focus on the details for now."
"Okay… What are they, then? If they're not Yakuza?"
"The Hand. It's an ancient organisation. Basically evil ninjas, I guess. Your buddy, Stick, belongs to an opposing organisation called the Chaste."
"…Stick's War," he said quietly.
"Yeah. Madame Gao's actually one of them, too, a different faction of the same organisation," I snapped my fingers, suddenly remembering something. "Nobu isn't dead, by the way. I mean, he was, but he got better. He'll be coming soon."
Matt's head turned toward me, brow creased in confusion. "What do you mean he isn't dead? He—"
"Burned to death? You saw it? Yeah. Like I said, he got better. High ranking members of the Hand tend to do that, unfortunately. They can bring back the dead, if there's enough left of them to bring back."
Jess looked at me sharply. "They can bring back the dead?"
"I know it sounds like a lot, but yeah. I think there's a limited window of time they have to do it in. It can mess with the person's mind, though, and consumes a limited resource. They can't just bring everyone back."
"Fucking hell," she scoffed in disbelief, shaking her head. "Ninjas that bring back the dead. Why am I even here?"
"You and Matt worked together to bring these guys down, along with a couple of others. Or you will work together. Or maybe you won't have to—I'm thinking about trying to get the Avengers in on this. We have some time to decide how to handle it."
"The Avengers?" Matt asked, a note of surprise in his voice.
"I'm actually staying in Avengers Tower at the moment," I said, maybe a little bit smugly. "I've been helping them out with a few things."
"You said this all comes back to Midland Circle. Why?"
"They're excavating under it, looking for something buried underneath. An ancient treasure. It's going to take a while… I think a year, at least. Maybe." I shot a glance over at Jessica. "I'm not certain on timeframes."
Matt was silent for a few moments. "…Elektra showed up in my apartment last night," he admitted. His knuckles flexed again, walking stick creaking slightly under the pressure. "Let's just assume I believe you for the moment…"
--
Agatha stepped out into the small rooftop garden, trimmed hedges and miniature trees flanking a perfectly manicured lawn. She stepped carefully across the grass, toward where the garden's sole other occupant sat perched on a low stone bench, facing away from her. Beyond the bench was a square pool, a small stone fountain in the shape of a frog on the opposite side spitting a small stream of water into the air.
The elderly Chinese woman rose to her feet as the witch approached, leaning heavily on her wooden cane. Her hair was drawn back in a loose bun, and she wore small golden hoops through her ears. "Hěn gāoxìng jiàn dào nǐ, hēi pí shū de Agatha. Yǐjīng hěnjiǔle," she said, a small smile creasing her wrinkled features.
Agatha inclined her head slightly awkwardly in a small bow. "Thank you for taking the time to meet with me, Madame Gao. I'm afraid I've gotten a little rusty on my Mandarin over the last century."
"No need to thank me." She sat back down, a little shaky on her feet—an affectation, Agatha suspected—and gestured for the witch to do the same. "The Hand still honour the old agreements. What brings you to New York?"
Agatha sat as indicated, crossing her legs at the ankle. "I'm hunting."
She was not overly friendly with the Hand, but dealing with them in the past had been the cost of staying alive. They were both part of the same loose, informal network of organisations that had been adversaries of the Seven Capital Cities of Heaven and their Earthly allies over the centuries. An agreement had been reached, centuries ago, to avoid getting in each other's ways while fighting their ancient foes.
It was considered polite to offer a signal when moving into an unfamiliar territory for an extended period of time, to alert any of the current occupants that a new player had arrived and open a channel for negotiations. Though her prey seemed to have roosted in New York for a time, Agatha was unsure how long she would remain in the city. Accordingly, she thought it was safer to follow the custom out of courtesy, just in case she ended up having to cause a ruckus.
New York was such a significant location that she would have been shocked if she hadn't gotten any reply, but she'd been vaguely surprised to find that one of the Fingers of the Hand—their circle of leaders—had personally set up shop in the area. She'd met Madame Gao a couple of times before over the last three centuries and, immortal to immortal, the woman seemed to be the most stable of the Fingers.
"Ah. Your quarry must be quite interesting. I believe it has been near enough to a hundred years since you were last seen straying from your home," Gao note, an unspoken question in her statement. "Publicly, at least."
The witch grinned. "Yeah, well, I don't want to make a fuss. There's a woman, seems to be hanging around the Avengers lately. Wanda something." She held up a hand and a massive crow, black and sleek of feather, descended from the sky to alight on her wrist. Bringing the creature down into her lap, she muttered an incantation and the bird was replaced with a fuzzy, piebald rabbit in a flare of black-edged purple energy. "Señor Scratchy has been keeping an eye on her for me, haven't you? Haven't you?" she cooed over the demon.
The Scarlet Witch had been an absolute bitch and a half to keep track of—she seemed very happy to abuse the sorcerers' translocation spellwork and had been bouncing back and forth across the globe like a pinball. Agatha had her own methods of travel through the Ways but they were not nearly as convenient or quick, so she had decided to wait and observe until that behaviour changed. When her target had finally settled in New York and seemed content to stay put for a least a little while, Agatha had decided to move in and plan her approach.
"The Avengers?" Madame Gao's face twisted in distaste. "It would be best if you finished your business quickly, then. I have had my fill of so-called heroes of late."
"Already the plan. I'm not going to hang around for too long."
Gao sighed, a note of disappointment in her voice. "I had thought I might seek your assistance with something, but I have no desire to risk drawing the sort of attention you may draw in your hunt. Our business here is delicate and the remaining Chaste are already intent on interfering."
"Sure. Stay out of my way, I'll stay out of yours. Just like old times."
The elderly woman shrugged, both hands leaning on the curved head of her cane. "The wheel constantly turns. We must adapt to its position, or be crushed beneath it."
Agatha smiled and nodded. "…Uh, yeah. Sure. It's been just lovely to see you again, Madame Gao, but I really must be off. No rest for the wicked, after all."
She needed to observe Wanda for a little longer and get a better understanding of what she was facing before she'd feel comfortable closing in on her prey. The Scarlet Witch was a legendary figure, after all, and Agatha hadn't lived as long as she had by not being careful.
Last edited:
- Location
- Australia
Wanda: 'I'm here to give you some hints and a pat on the bum. If we have time (The avengers) will come and help."
Announcer: They have them on the ropes and- what's this!? Agatha with the steel chair!
Announcer: They have them on the ropes and- what's this!? Agatha with the steel chair!
Chapter 27
Chapter 27
Natasha sighed as they entered the elevator, letting her shoulders relax as she leant back and rested against the cool metal. She'd texted Wanda while they were on the way back to the Tower to let her know that the meeting she'd asked for was on for this evening. It had been a little tricky to organise without Tony catching on—she trusted Wanda that meeting behind his back was necessary for whatever it was she had to say, but Nat really didn't relish the idea of navigating the resulting conversation if he'd realised that that's what they were doing. Luckily, Pepper was arriving in New York this afternoon and some polite conversation had revealed that Tony had dinner plans with her, so he would be conveniently out of the Tower.
"Well, that was a shitshow and a half," Tony commented. "You'd think they might be a little more grateful, but I guess I should lower my expectations. It's not like they learned from the whole HYDRA debacle."
Nat shrugged, shooting him a wry smile. "It could have been worse. I think we handled ourselves pretty well in there."
"You've been awfully perky today," he noted, eyeing her.
"Had a good night."
"Slept well?"
The elevator doors opened and Nat stepped out past him, carefully turning around to walk backwards for a few paces as she shot him a lopsided grin. "Not at all. I'm exhausted."
She was actually tempted to have a bit of a snooze in her bunk in the Tower for a couple of hours, but was a little worried that if she lay down, she might not be able to get back up again. Though she was reasonably confident she'd been masking it well, her legs had been so weak and wobbly all day that she'd almost physically had trouble walking out of her apartment that morning. She'd been incredibly grateful that Wanda had been able to portal her to the Tower and that she'd been able to spend basically the entirely morning sitting down. Just the ten-minute walk from Avengers Tower to UN Headquarters had been a massive struggle.
Last night had been… energetic. Nat had previously had suspicions about Wanda being physically Enhanced and it had been gratifying to have Steve confirm the details of that with her earlier this morning. Ignoring for now the added difficulties with Wakanda, it very neatly explained Wanda's seemingly limitless stamina.
Without overstating anything, Natasha was extensively skilled in the bedroom. It had been a part of her training in the Red Room and she was confident she'd only gotten better as she'd gained experience. Wanda had been clearly less practiced, but she was extremely enthusiastic and just did not seem to get tired. Even after several actual, literal hours of various activities that had left Natasha a weak, sweat-drenched, quivering mess, Wanda had seemed basically fine. In the end Nat had to tap out, which was definitely a novel experience for her.
"Huh," Tony grunted noncommittally.
Natasha frowned slightly. Normally she'd have expected a crude joke in response. Out of anyone on the team, Tony was by far the least uptight about this sort of thing. Which meant it was the 'who' that he had a problem with. "What's up?"
"Can I borrow you for a sec?" Tony asked, tilting his head toward the briefing room.
"Sure."
He glanced around as they walked in, checking to see if anyone else was nearby through the glass walls, and Nat started to worry a little bit. Walking over to the far side of the room, he leant against the wall next to one of the screens, arms folded across his chest. "So, Wanda and her 'visions'. What do you think so far?"
Nat shrugged. "She was right. About all of it—the Red Room, Dreykov, Yelena. They'd managed to conceal themselves from SHIELD and HYDRA. If she didn't see it the way she says she did, I don't have a better explanation. I'm starting to believe her."
"Thought you might say that," he said with a sigh, shooting her a concerned look. "I don't trust her. She seems like a nice enough kid, means well and all, but she's still keeping stuff from us. You know that, right?"
"I mean, yeah, of course she is. What do you expect her to do, just… literally walk us through every little thing she saw? Decades' worth of experiences?"
"Yeah, well, it'd be better than getting drip-fed the cliff notes whenever she feels like it."
"I'm not sure it would be, to be honest. The whole Red Room thing…" She looked away from him and shook her head. "Honestly, it had the potential to be really messy. Dreykov being alive all this time, Antonia still being alive… I appreciated the way she chose to handle it. We just aren't operating from the same context as her."
"Isn't that why we need that context?"
"Tony… you're being a little unreasonable."
"Am I?" He retrieved his phone from his pocket and tapped at the screen a few times. With a flicking motion, he transferred data from the device to the display next to him. It lit up with what looked like a series of scanned pages from a notebook, fragmented, messy handwriting on cheap, lined paper. "Did you know she's still keeping a hotel room in Australia? I had some of the Iron Legion check it out. Little Miss Magic has been keeping notes. Thanks for keeping her busy all night, by the way."
"What the hell, Tony?" Nat said, narrowing her eyes.
"Don't worry, I was careful. She won't notice. Anyway, I use the term 'notes' loosely—it's a real mess. I figure she's been deliberately writing it in shorthand and stuff just in case someone found it, but I've got JARVIS running some algorithms over it, see if there's something we can maybe decipher, look up, cross-reference. Maybe we can catch some of the bigger picture she's been keeping from us." He paused, gauging Nat's expression, then rolled his eyes. "What? Black Widow is objecting to a little bit of simple spycraft now? Hope your judgement's not compromised, Romanov."
"You have your ways of getting information, I have mine," she said, a little defensively.
The reality was that she was feeling compromised. If this was an actual mission, she'd have asked her handler to pull her out by now. When she'd originally approached Wanda, Natasha just hadn't intended for things to go this far. The plan had been to flirt, lay down some implications, string her along until they were confident that they had her full cooperation going forward, then let her down gently. She still wasn't quite sure how it had happened but, somewhere along the way, she'd caught some genuine feelings. At first, she'd thought that maybe she was just going soft—it had been a long time since she'd honey trapped someone, after all, but at a certain point she had to admit to herself what she was feeling.
She'd enjoyed herself at the party. Wanda's earnestness was endearing. She was incorrigibly flirtatious and liked to push boundaries, but was so adorably helpless and easily flustered when someone pushed back. And, despite everything she seemed to know, everything she might have seen… she was still somehow utterly convinced that Natasha was a good person. That she wasn't a monster. Just talking to Wanda for a little while… her sincerity, the conviction with which she spoke… it was enough to make Natasha's opinion of herself waver, just a tiny bit. To see herself, even if for just a moment, the way that Wanda saw her.
Then there had been the Red Room. If it had been literally anyone else, she'd have been able to keep her defences up, but Wanda knew things. Not just about what had happened… she knew how Nat felt. At the time, it seemed like Wanda understood how she felt better that Natasha herself did.
It was an unfamiliar, almost scary, feeling, not being able to lie to someone. There was no pretending, no keeping herself closed off—she was completely defenceless and vulnerable, everything on the table. And Wanda was just so damn unrelentingly sincere and supportive the whole time. Utterly determined to be there and do whatever she could to support her, while still seemingly knowing exactly when to step back and let Nat take the lead or give her space and privacy to work through things with Yelena.
Afterwards, Natasha had wanted to thank her and, while the lewder implication had initially been intended as a flirty joke, their little date had turned out basically perfect. When it had come time for it to end, Nat had found that she just… didn't want it to. Sex wasn't normally a big deal for her. Her time at the Red Room had thoroughly disabused her of any of the normal emotional associations with it—it had been a tool to be used to her advantage like any other. When she'd invited Wanda upstairs, however, she'd had an unfamiliar knot of anxiety and excitement in her stomach.
"Uh huh," he nodded. "I'll bet you've been pumping her for information. Just really getting in there."
"Tony…" Nat said warningly.
"Look, I won't tell you to be careful. You're not an idiot; you know to be careful. I just don't think we can trust her. Not completely. Not yet." He dismissed the scanned imagines with a wave.
"I get where you're coming from, Tony, just…" she took a breath. "Talk to me, first, before you do something like this again, okay?"
He looked at her for a few moments, tapping his phone against his palm absently, then nodded. "Fine."
--
"Okay… so." I paused for a moment to gather my thoughts, looking around the assembled group. Natasha had pulled together the group of people I'd asked for—her, Steve, Bucky and Bruce—and we were currently all seated around the table in the Tower's briefing room.
"You said this was about Tony," she prompted me.
I nodded, then turned to Bucky and shot him an apologetic look. "I'm really, really sorry to put you on the spot like this, but the sooner we resolve this the better." He went still, a flicker of understanding in his eyes—he knew what was coming. I turned back to the others. "Tony's parents didn't die in a car accident. They were murdered. Assassinated, I guess, technically."
"…The Winter Soldier," Bruce murmured, glancing over at Bucky with an unreadable expression.
Steve and Nat exchanged a quick, guilty look—they hadn't specifically known it was Bucky, but they'd been aware for some time that HYDRA had something to do with the death of Tony's parents. They could have discovered it on their own, but I think that some part of Steve probably hadn't wanted to dig, hadn't wanted to find out the truth. He reached over and put his hand on Bucky's shoulder. "It wasn't you. You didn't do it."
"…it was me, Steve. It was my hands. I remember… I remember them." He took a deep breath and looked down at the table, avoiding everyone's gazes. "I remember all of them."
"I doubt you've looked into getting therapy yet, Buck, but trust me—you really do need it." I glanced over at Steve for a moment. "Make sure he does. Setting that aside for now, let's refocus on Tony. He's really not going to take the news well. Like… at the wrong time, it could be absolutely catastrophic."
"He's talked a little about his parents before," said Bruce quietly. "How much he regrets not having a chance to say goodbye. I think he's got a lot of mixed-up feelings about it and, I mean, you know Tony. It's not like he's gone to therapy."
"I don't want to intrude on this," I said. "It's obviously really personal and he's not going to appreciate me poking my nose into it. You need to decide the best way of doing this, but I think Pepper should definitely be there when you break the news. Maybe see if Rhodey can be available if you need him, too."
Steve nodded slowly, looking thoughtful. "Something happened in your visions. It was bad?"
I took a deep breath, weighing how much was worth getting into. "I can't really explain it properly. There are a lot of things that are different, so everything's a bit jumbled up—a lot of it just wouldn't make sense now. The team was already tense. There were some other things that had happened. A lot of friction. It sort of came out at the worst possible moment." I made a face, then glanced toward Bucky again. "Tony tried to kill you. He was angry, hurting. Pushed to his breaking point. You and Steve fought him. It… it was the end of the Avengers, basically. It broke the team apart." Bucky seemed to grow smaller with every word out of my mouth, still looking down at the table.
There was an awkward, drawn-out silence as everyone processed that. "We could show him what we have of the Winter Soldier program?" Steve suggested, his tone subdued. "Refresh his memory on what Bucky's been through, what HYDRA did to him…"
"That… it feels like it's just making excuses," Bucky said quietly.
"It's not making excuses, Buck. I know you feel guilty, but it literally wasn't your fault," I said, shaking my head. "That aside, I don't think an intellectual approach is going to work that well. Tony's going to be emotional, he's not going to rationally be thinking it through, he's going to be thinking 'he killed my mom'."
Everyone went internal again for a few minutes as they grappled with the issue. Eventually, Nat broke the silence. "Pepper and Tony are out tonight. I'll send her a text and ask to talk privately. We'll set something up for tomorrow and go from there."
There were nods and a general murmur of agreement. Steve, Bucky and Bruce stood and made to leave, but I held up a hand. "Buck, stick around for a little bit?" He looked at me like a deer caught in oncoming headlights, but nodded and lowered himself back into the chair.
Natasha took out her phone and looked over at me questioningly. "Do you need the room?"
"Yeah, just for a bit, if that's okay?"
"Sure thing."
"Um," I started as she stood up. "Did you want to hang out tonight? It's getting late, we could grab something to eat, or…?
Nat grinned, one eyebrow raised. "Sounds good. I'll warn you in advance, though, I am intending on actually getting a good night's sleep tonight."
"Understood."
Once everyone else had filtered out of the room, leaving Bucky and I alone, I shot him a sympathetic look. "How are you doing? Sorry again for putting you on the spot like that."
"I'm fine," he said, a bit too abruptly for it to be completely true.
"Don't lie to me. I've seen the future, remember? I know how much guilt you have over what the Winter Soldier did. I was serious when I said you needed to get therapy. If I don't hear that you're getting it yourself, I'll bundle you up and cart you there myself," I threatened, a few wisps of red energy playing across my fingers.
He snorted, a weak smile touching his face. "You're a real pain in the ass, you know that? Worse than Steve."
"I just want you to get well."
"Okay, I get it. Fine."
"Thank you." I held up my hand expectantly, waiting for his nod of acknowledgement before I reached forward and touched his forehead, small wisps of red power connecting us as I checked over the enchantment binding the Winter Soldier and recharged the magical battery attached to it. "Have you been having any problems?"
"Nothing. I mean…" he hesitated. "I'm still having nightmares. But that's it."
I 'hmm'ed quietly, withdrawing my hand once I was finished my work. "I've been thinking. You remember how I described your mental landscape?"
"The Facility, yeah."
"After what I saw in Yelena's mind, I'm starting to think that the environment itself might be the real issue—the Winter Soldier persona is a consequence of that, rather than the source of the problem," I said, a slight frown creasing my forehead. "Restraining the Winter Soldier persona was always just a band-aid fix. It's mitigating the symptoms but it's not actually solving the problem. I overcame the Red Room's control by guiding Yelena, helping her regain access to what had been blocked off. The Facility… it's a maze, but it can't be all there is to your mind, right? You're trapped in it. Maybe what I need to do is get you out. Have you literally or metaphorically move on."
"…Do you think you can?"
"I mean, there's only way to find out. It's not going to solve everything—you're still going to need that therapy—but maybe we can get you past HYDRA's programming properly, at least. A permanent solution, instead of a band-aid."
He nodded slowly. "Do it."
"You want me to try right now?"
"Yeah." He faltered a bit. "Uh, if that's okay. Do you need the Mind Stone?"
"I don't think so. I've mostly been using it as an amplifier—I don't think I actually need it for something like this."
"Okay. So you can try?"
"Did you want to go get Steve?"
Bucky shook his head. "I don't want to burden him any more than I already have. He's got enough on his plate with Tony right now. You should be able to restrain me safely on your own, right?"
"You know Steve would be happy to be here for you, right? You don't have to do this stuff alone."
He set his jaw stubbornly. "I know."
"Ugh, men. Fine. Do you just want to do it here or should we find somewhere more comfortable for me to pin you down and have my way with you?" I asked, grinning impishly. "Full disclosure, Nat and I are kind of dating now? Well, maybe not dating. We haven't put a label on it yet, but I'm hopeful. I don't think she'd mind, though."
"Can we please be serious?"
"Who's not being serious?" I said, which he responded to with a flatter, even more unimpressed look. Smiling innocently, I wondered if he was still traumatised from having been forced to explain to Steve what I'd meant at the party about 'visiting the Eiffel Tower'.
"Wanda…"
"Hold still," I instructed, tendrils of magic already wrapping around his body. I limited the power I was investing, strengthening the bonds by making them several overlapping layers rather than relying on single, powerful strands. Once I was satisfied, I tied off the power.
I was getting better at this. I'd been practicing when I'd had the chance to do so over the past week. All else being equal, these bonds would last for almost a whole hour without any refreshing. If I created a secondary linked battery enchantment, they could maybe last a couple of days. I still couldn't really think of any actual useful use-case for them outside of ad-hoc stuff like this, seeing as handcuffs were cheaper and didn't require ongoing maintenance, but still. The big problem was that I had no idea how to reinforce them against magical interference. Kaecilius had disrupted my first attempt with what amounted to a wave of his hand. I still didn't understand how 'dispelling' magical effects worked—not beyond brute-force tearing them apart, at least—so I had no insight into how to protect against it.
"Comfy?"
"Yeah… it's great."
"Cool."
I pressed my palm flat against his forehead, summoning my power and delving deeply into his mind. Once more, I found myself in the maze of corridors that we were calling the Facility, which seemed to be an amalgam of the memories of several different bases that the Winter Soldier had been kept in over the years he'd been in HYDRA's clutches.
Twenty minutes later, I pulled out. Bucky looked at me hopefully, but I just frowned and shook my head, dismissing the bindings. "I found your avatar, but no luck finding a way out of the Facility yet. I still think we're on the right track, but…"
"We're still missing something," he said quietly. "Thanks, anyway."
I nodded and grinned at him. "Hey, don't worry. We're trying to undo, like, decades of mental conditioning. I'd have been surprised if it was going to be easy. We'll get there, I promise."
--
"Okay, yeah, you were right. Colour me interested," Natasha said as the credits rolled on the first episode, Netflix's little alert that it would start the next episode soon popping up on screen.
"Right?" I nabbed the remote and hit 'back' to stop the autoplay.
We were curled up on her couch, a set of empty Chinese food takeaway containers on the coffee table in front of us. We had no idea where Yelena was—she hadn't been there when we'd arrived and she hadn't texted Nat or anything to let her know when she'd be back. Natasha wasn't worried; Yelena was an adult and could look after herself.
"So, all of the characters are, what, connected psychically or something?" she asked.
"I won't say much, don't want to spoil anything, but yeah."
"Do you have a favourite?"
"Jeez, that's a hard question. Overall, maybe Sun? I always liked Nomi a lot, as well, we—" I cut myself off, suddenly feeling very small and disconnected.
"Seeing as?" Nat prompted me gently.
"It doesn't matter," I said, sitting up. Absently, I wrapped my arms around myself, rubbing at my upper arms as if I'd suddenly felt a chill.
Natasha reached over and touched my shoulder, pushing at it gently so I'd turn and look at her. "You can talk to me, you know," she said softly. "This isn't just a one-way street."
"It's just… I don't really know who I am anymore. Things I used to feel a connection to—or thought I did… I don't know. It doesn't feel real anymore."
"This is about what the Ancient One said about you?" she guessed.
"Not just about that. I… okay, I know how this is going to sound, but I knew things that I shouldn't have been able to know."
Natasha grinned, sympathetic but obviously suppressing a chuckle. "Oh, wow, you knew something you shouldn't? That seems so unlike you."
I smiled back, then sighed. "It's just I have these memories. A whole life, growing up, everything. But it's distant. Disconnected. Almost… like it happened to someone else, I guess? When I woke up, after the Mind Stone unlocked my magic, everything about Wanda was gone. As far as I knew, I was just… someone else, trapped in a stranger's body. Only she wasn't a stranger, I knew her."
"From your visions."
My mouth opened and I barely managed to stop myself. I very, very nearly just went ahead and told her the absolute truth about my 'visions'. Instead, I swallowed the words, nodding and averting my eyes. "…Yeah. For more than a year, that's what I thought. I tried using my magic to look inside myself to see if she was in here, too, but I never felt her. Never found any trace. But my body doesn't feel like someone else's. It just feels like mine. I don't think of myself by any other name, just… I'm Wanda. The name feels right, you know? Then it turns out the world's foremost expert on magic is surprised that I don't think I'm Wanda because my soul—the most essential, inner part of me—is also just… Wanda."
Natasha's forehead creased, her expression sympathetic. "It sounds confusing," she said gently.
"After we left Kamar-taj, Pietro and I talked. He… he couldn't accept it. Wouldn't accept it. There was yelling. Crying." My face was growing hot again, the words both harder to say and somehow tumbling out faster than I could stop them. "And then something happened. I said something in Sokovian, remembered something about our parents. See? I just called them our parents without thinking, just then. But I remembered some stuff that I really shouldn't have because that's part of Wanda, not me. It's not stuff I saw in my visions, or if it is I don't remember it. And now… where does that leave me? Who am I?" I realised I was crying now, tears streaming down my face.
Natasha swept me into a hug, wrapping her arms around me and pulling me in close. I leaned into her gratefully, burying my face in her shoulder while I took a few moments to compose myself. After a little while, she took hold of my shoulders and pushed me back slightly, so she could look me in the eye. "Who do you feel like you are?"
"I told you, I don't… I just feel like me. Wanda."
"Then that's who you are," she said firmly. Her hands moved from my shoulders to my cheeks, cradling my face. "You're Wanda. I don't know what's true about your past. I don't know about these memories you have, or don't have. I didn't know pre-HYDRA Wanda, or whoever this other life was. The only Wanda I know is you—the one who's been doing her best this whole time, even when it was hard. That's who you are to me. That's my Wanda."
I opened my mouth again, but no words came out. God, I wanted to tell her that I loved her so badly. Which I knew was crazy—it was way, way too soon for that. We'd only just started seeing each other. We weren't even officially dating. We'd just spent one night together. I didn't want to scare her off, or push her away, or mess this up in any way. "Thank you," I eventually settled on. Natasha leaned in, kissing me gently, then pulled me into another hug.
Once I'd managed to pull myself together a bit, we stood and cleaned up the takeaway containers. While Natasha was taking care of a few things in the kitchen, I went ahead and brushed my teeth using a spare toothbrush she'd laid out for me, then headed to the bedroom.
It was a warm night, so I just stripped off everything except for my underwear bottoms and sat on the bed, looking at my phone while Natasha caught up. I hadn't seen Pietro all day—he hadn't called or texted, either. It felt a bit weird, not having him around for an entire day, like a piece of myself was missing. I hesitated, then typed him a short message: Hey, hope everything's okay. See you tomorrow?
I dropped the phone on top of the neat pile I'd made of my clothes and lay back with a sigh. Nat walked in, eyeing me with a slight smile as she closed the door behind her. She stripped out of her clothes, matching my partial nudity, then turned off the light and crawled into bed beside me. "Night," she said, quietly.
"Night," I replied, hesitating for a moment. "Nat?"
"Yeah?"
I rolled onto my side, facing away from her. "Cuddle me?"
She chuckled. "Sure."
We lay like that for a time, Natasha spooning me, snuggled close against me with one arm draped lightly across my waist, her hand resting gently on my stomach. I had just started to drift off to sleep when she flexed her fingers, slowly running them across my belly and up my side. I stirred, making a small contented noise in the back of my throat, and she shifted, lifting her head to bring her lips to the side of my neck.
I made another, even more indecent noise as she kissed my skin, grazing it gently with her teeth and tongue as her hand crept higher to cup the swell of my breast. Reaching up, I lightly traced the back of her hand with a finger, red wisps of energy slipping around her wrist before gently pulling her backwards off me. In the darkness, I could just make out Nat's look of surprise as I rolled over to face her. With a gesture, my power took firm hold of her other hand as well, drawing them both upwards until her wrists were bound over her head, telekinetically pinned to the headboard. "You," I said, a mild reproach in my voice, "told me you just wanted to get a good night's sleep tonight."
Natasha pouted playfully. "Well, yeah, but… we don't have anything on tomorrow until the afternoon. I wouldn't mind a nightcap."
With another gesture, wisps of red energy played across her bare skin, tracing her curves, and she inhaled sharply. "You know," I murmured huskily, "I've been thinking that I could potentially have a lot of fun with this. I've basically got access to unlimited ropes, handcuffs, straps, chains… whatever toys and tools I could ever need. What do you think? I've never really gotten into that sort of thing before, but I'm starting to feel a little… creative."
Nat's eyes had grown wider and rounder as I spoke, her breathing growing heavier. "Express yourself, then," she whispered.
Natasha sighed as they entered the elevator, letting her shoulders relax as she leant back and rested against the cool metal. She'd texted Wanda while they were on the way back to the Tower to let her know that the meeting she'd asked for was on for this evening. It had been a little tricky to organise without Tony catching on—she trusted Wanda that meeting behind his back was necessary for whatever it was she had to say, but Nat really didn't relish the idea of navigating the resulting conversation if he'd realised that that's what they were doing. Luckily, Pepper was arriving in New York this afternoon and some polite conversation had revealed that Tony had dinner plans with her, so he would be conveniently out of the Tower.
"Well, that was a shitshow and a half," Tony commented. "You'd think they might be a little more grateful, but I guess I should lower my expectations. It's not like they learned from the whole HYDRA debacle."
Nat shrugged, shooting him a wry smile. "It could have been worse. I think we handled ourselves pretty well in there."
"You've been awfully perky today," he noted, eyeing her.
"Had a good night."
"Slept well?"
The elevator doors opened and Nat stepped out past him, carefully turning around to walk backwards for a few paces as she shot him a lopsided grin. "Not at all. I'm exhausted."
She was actually tempted to have a bit of a snooze in her bunk in the Tower for a couple of hours, but was a little worried that if she lay down, she might not be able to get back up again. Though she was reasonably confident she'd been masking it well, her legs had been so weak and wobbly all day that she'd almost physically had trouble walking out of her apartment that morning. She'd been incredibly grateful that Wanda had been able to portal her to the Tower and that she'd been able to spend basically the entirely morning sitting down. Just the ten-minute walk from Avengers Tower to UN Headquarters had been a massive struggle.
Last night had been… energetic. Nat had previously had suspicions about Wanda being physically Enhanced and it had been gratifying to have Steve confirm the details of that with her earlier this morning. Ignoring for now the added difficulties with Wakanda, it very neatly explained Wanda's seemingly limitless stamina.
Without overstating anything, Natasha was extensively skilled in the bedroom. It had been a part of her training in the Red Room and she was confident she'd only gotten better as she'd gained experience. Wanda had been clearly less practiced, but she was extremely enthusiastic and just did not seem to get tired. Even after several actual, literal hours of various activities that had left Natasha a weak, sweat-drenched, quivering mess, Wanda had seemed basically fine. In the end Nat had to tap out, which was definitely a novel experience for her.
"Huh," Tony grunted noncommittally.
Natasha frowned slightly. Normally she'd have expected a crude joke in response. Out of anyone on the team, Tony was by far the least uptight about this sort of thing. Which meant it was the 'who' that he had a problem with. "What's up?"
"Can I borrow you for a sec?" Tony asked, tilting his head toward the briefing room.
"Sure."
He glanced around as they walked in, checking to see if anyone else was nearby through the glass walls, and Nat started to worry a little bit. Walking over to the far side of the room, he leant against the wall next to one of the screens, arms folded across his chest. "So, Wanda and her 'visions'. What do you think so far?"
Nat shrugged. "She was right. About all of it—the Red Room, Dreykov, Yelena. They'd managed to conceal themselves from SHIELD and HYDRA. If she didn't see it the way she says she did, I don't have a better explanation. I'm starting to believe her."
"Thought you might say that," he said with a sigh, shooting her a concerned look. "I don't trust her. She seems like a nice enough kid, means well and all, but she's still keeping stuff from us. You know that, right?"
"I mean, yeah, of course she is. What do you expect her to do, just… literally walk us through every little thing she saw? Decades' worth of experiences?"
"Yeah, well, it'd be better than getting drip-fed the cliff notes whenever she feels like it."
"I'm not sure it would be, to be honest. The whole Red Room thing…" She looked away from him and shook her head. "Honestly, it had the potential to be really messy. Dreykov being alive all this time, Antonia still being alive… I appreciated the way she chose to handle it. We just aren't operating from the same context as her."
"Isn't that why we need that context?"
"Tony… you're being a little unreasonable."
"Am I?" He retrieved his phone from his pocket and tapped at the screen a few times. With a flicking motion, he transferred data from the device to the display next to him. It lit up with what looked like a series of scanned pages from a notebook, fragmented, messy handwriting on cheap, lined paper. "Did you know she's still keeping a hotel room in Australia? I had some of the Iron Legion check it out. Little Miss Magic has been keeping notes. Thanks for keeping her busy all night, by the way."
"What the hell, Tony?" Nat said, narrowing her eyes.
"Don't worry, I was careful. She won't notice. Anyway, I use the term 'notes' loosely—it's a real mess. I figure she's been deliberately writing it in shorthand and stuff just in case someone found it, but I've got JARVIS running some algorithms over it, see if there's something we can maybe decipher, look up, cross-reference. Maybe we can catch some of the bigger picture she's been keeping from us." He paused, gauging Nat's expression, then rolled his eyes. "What? Black Widow is objecting to a little bit of simple spycraft now? Hope your judgement's not compromised, Romanov."
"You have your ways of getting information, I have mine," she said, a little defensively.
The reality was that she was feeling compromised. If this was an actual mission, she'd have asked her handler to pull her out by now. When she'd originally approached Wanda, Natasha just hadn't intended for things to go this far. The plan had been to flirt, lay down some implications, string her along until they were confident that they had her full cooperation going forward, then let her down gently. She still wasn't quite sure how it had happened but, somewhere along the way, she'd caught some genuine feelings. At first, she'd thought that maybe she was just going soft—it had been a long time since she'd honey trapped someone, after all, but at a certain point she had to admit to herself what she was feeling.
She'd enjoyed herself at the party. Wanda's earnestness was endearing. She was incorrigibly flirtatious and liked to push boundaries, but was so adorably helpless and easily flustered when someone pushed back. And, despite everything she seemed to know, everything she might have seen… she was still somehow utterly convinced that Natasha was a good person. That she wasn't a monster. Just talking to Wanda for a little while… her sincerity, the conviction with which she spoke… it was enough to make Natasha's opinion of herself waver, just a tiny bit. To see herself, even if for just a moment, the way that Wanda saw her.
Then there had been the Red Room. If it had been literally anyone else, she'd have been able to keep her defences up, but Wanda knew things. Not just about what had happened… she knew how Nat felt. At the time, it seemed like Wanda understood how she felt better that Natasha herself did.
It was an unfamiliar, almost scary, feeling, not being able to lie to someone. There was no pretending, no keeping herself closed off—she was completely defenceless and vulnerable, everything on the table. And Wanda was just so damn unrelentingly sincere and supportive the whole time. Utterly determined to be there and do whatever she could to support her, while still seemingly knowing exactly when to step back and let Nat take the lead or give her space and privacy to work through things with Yelena.
Afterwards, Natasha had wanted to thank her and, while the lewder implication had initially been intended as a flirty joke, their little date had turned out basically perfect. When it had come time for it to end, Nat had found that she just… didn't want it to. Sex wasn't normally a big deal for her. Her time at the Red Room had thoroughly disabused her of any of the normal emotional associations with it—it had been a tool to be used to her advantage like any other. When she'd invited Wanda upstairs, however, she'd had an unfamiliar knot of anxiety and excitement in her stomach.
"Uh huh," he nodded. "I'll bet you've been pumping her for information. Just really getting in there."
"Tony…" Nat said warningly.
"Look, I won't tell you to be careful. You're not an idiot; you know to be careful. I just don't think we can trust her. Not completely. Not yet." He dismissed the scanned imagines with a wave.
"I get where you're coming from, Tony, just…" she took a breath. "Talk to me, first, before you do something like this again, okay?"
He looked at her for a few moments, tapping his phone against his palm absently, then nodded. "Fine."
--
"Okay… so." I paused for a moment to gather my thoughts, looking around the assembled group. Natasha had pulled together the group of people I'd asked for—her, Steve, Bucky and Bruce—and we were currently all seated around the table in the Tower's briefing room.
"You said this was about Tony," she prompted me.
I nodded, then turned to Bucky and shot him an apologetic look. "I'm really, really sorry to put you on the spot like this, but the sooner we resolve this the better." He went still, a flicker of understanding in his eyes—he knew what was coming. I turned back to the others. "Tony's parents didn't die in a car accident. They were murdered. Assassinated, I guess, technically."
"…The Winter Soldier," Bruce murmured, glancing over at Bucky with an unreadable expression.
Steve and Nat exchanged a quick, guilty look—they hadn't specifically known it was Bucky, but they'd been aware for some time that HYDRA had something to do with the death of Tony's parents. They could have discovered it on their own, but I think that some part of Steve probably hadn't wanted to dig, hadn't wanted to find out the truth. He reached over and put his hand on Bucky's shoulder. "It wasn't you. You didn't do it."
"…it was me, Steve. It was my hands. I remember… I remember them." He took a deep breath and looked down at the table, avoiding everyone's gazes. "I remember all of them."
"I doubt you've looked into getting therapy yet, Buck, but trust me—you really do need it." I glanced over at Steve for a moment. "Make sure he does. Setting that aside for now, let's refocus on Tony. He's really not going to take the news well. Like… at the wrong time, it could be absolutely catastrophic."
"He's talked a little about his parents before," said Bruce quietly. "How much he regrets not having a chance to say goodbye. I think he's got a lot of mixed-up feelings about it and, I mean, you know Tony. It's not like he's gone to therapy."
"I don't want to intrude on this," I said. "It's obviously really personal and he's not going to appreciate me poking my nose into it. You need to decide the best way of doing this, but I think Pepper should definitely be there when you break the news. Maybe see if Rhodey can be available if you need him, too."
Steve nodded slowly, looking thoughtful. "Something happened in your visions. It was bad?"
I took a deep breath, weighing how much was worth getting into. "I can't really explain it properly. There are a lot of things that are different, so everything's a bit jumbled up—a lot of it just wouldn't make sense now. The team was already tense. There were some other things that had happened. A lot of friction. It sort of came out at the worst possible moment." I made a face, then glanced toward Bucky again. "Tony tried to kill you. He was angry, hurting. Pushed to his breaking point. You and Steve fought him. It… it was the end of the Avengers, basically. It broke the team apart." Bucky seemed to grow smaller with every word out of my mouth, still looking down at the table.
There was an awkward, drawn-out silence as everyone processed that. "We could show him what we have of the Winter Soldier program?" Steve suggested, his tone subdued. "Refresh his memory on what Bucky's been through, what HYDRA did to him…"
"That… it feels like it's just making excuses," Bucky said quietly.
"It's not making excuses, Buck. I know you feel guilty, but it literally wasn't your fault," I said, shaking my head. "That aside, I don't think an intellectual approach is going to work that well. Tony's going to be emotional, he's not going to rationally be thinking it through, he's going to be thinking 'he killed my mom'."
Everyone went internal again for a few minutes as they grappled with the issue. Eventually, Nat broke the silence. "Pepper and Tony are out tonight. I'll send her a text and ask to talk privately. We'll set something up for tomorrow and go from there."
There were nods and a general murmur of agreement. Steve, Bucky and Bruce stood and made to leave, but I held up a hand. "Buck, stick around for a little bit?" He looked at me like a deer caught in oncoming headlights, but nodded and lowered himself back into the chair.
Natasha took out her phone and looked over at me questioningly. "Do you need the room?"
"Yeah, just for a bit, if that's okay?"
"Sure thing."
"Um," I started as she stood up. "Did you want to hang out tonight? It's getting late, we could grab something to eat, or…?
Nat grinned, one eyebrow raised. "Sounds good. I'll warn you in advance, though, I am intending on actually getting a good night's sleep tonight."
"Understood."
Once everyone else had filtered out of the room, leaving Bucky and I alone, I shot him a sympathetic look. "How are you doing? Sorry again for putting you on the spot like that."
"I'm fine," he said, a bit too abruptly for it to be completely true.
"Don't lie to me. I've seen the future, remember? I know how much guilt you have over what the Winter Soldier did. I was serious when I said you needed to get therapy. If I don't hear that you're getting it yourself, I'll bundle you up and cart you there myself," I threatened, a few wisps of red energy playing across my fingers.
He snorted, a weak smile touching his face. "You're a real pain in the ass, you know that? Worse than Steve."
"I just want you to get well."
"Okay, I get it. Fine."
"Thank you." I held up my hand expectantly, waiting for his nod of acknowledgement before I reached forward and touched his forehead, small wisps of red power connecting us as I checked over the enchantment binding the Winter Soldier and recharged the magical battery attached to it. "Have you been having any problems?"
"Nothing. I mean…" he hesitated. "I'm still having nightmares. But that's it."
I 'hmm'ed quietly, withdrawing my hand once I was finished my work. "I've been thinking. You remember how I described your mental landscape?"
"The Facility, yeah."
"After what I saw in Yelena's mind, I'm starting to think that the environment itself might be the real issue—the Winter Soldier persona is a consequence of that, rather than the source of the problem," I said, a slight frown creasing my forehead. "Restraining the Winter Soldier persona was always just a band-aid fix. It's mitigating the symptoms but it's not actually solving the problem. I overcame the Red Room's control by guiding Yelena, helping her regain access to what had been blocked off. The Facility… it's a maze, but it can't be all there is to your mind, right? You're trapped in it. Maybe what I need to do is get you out. Have you literally or metaphorically move on."
"…Do you think you can?"
"I mean, there's only way to find out. It's not going to solve everything—you're still going to need that therapy—but maybe we can get you past HYDRA's programming properly, at least. A permanent solution, instead of a band-aid."
He nodded slowly. "Do it."
"You want me to try right now?"
"Yeah." He faltered a bit. "Uh, if that's okay. Do you need the Mind Stone?"
"I don't think so. I've mostly been using it as an amplifier—I don't think I actually need it for something like this."
"Okay. So you can try?"
"Did you want to go get Steve?"
Bucky shook his head. "I don't want to burden him any more than I already have. He's got enough on his plate with Tony right now. You should be able to restrain me safely on your own, right?"
"You know Steve would be happy to be here for you, right? You don't have to do this stuff alone."
He set his jaw stubbornly. "I know."
"Ugh, men. Fine. Do you just want to do it here or should we find somewhere more comfortable for me to pin you down and have my way with you?" I asked, grinning impishly. "Full disclosure, Nat and I are kind of dating now? Well, maybe not dating. We haven't put a label on it yet, but I'm hopeful. I don't think she'd mind, though."
"Can we please be serious?"
"Who's not being serious?" I said, which he responded to with a flatter, even more unimpressed look. Smiling innocently, I wondered if he was still traumatised from having been forced to explain to Steve what I'd meant at the party about 'visiting the Eiffel Tower'.
"Wanda…"
"Hold still," I instructed, tendrils of magic already wrapping around his body. I limited the power I was investing, strengthening the bonds by making them several overlapping layers rather than relying on single, powerful strands. Once I was satisfied, I tied off the power.
I was getting better at this. I'd been practicing when I'd had the chance to do so over the past week. All else being equal, these bonds would last for almost a whole hour without any refreshing. If I created a secondary linked battery enchantment, they could maybe last a couple of days. I still couldn't really think of any actual useful use-case for them outside of ad-hoc stuff like this, seeing as handcuffs were cheaper and didn't require ongoing maintenance, but still. The big problem was that I had no idea how to reinforce them against magical interference. Kaecilius had disrupted my first attempt with what amounted to a wave of his hand. I still didn't understand how 'dispelling' magical effects worked—not beyond brute-force tearing them apart, at least—so I had no insight into how to protect against it.
"Comfy?"
"Yeah… it's great."
"Cool."
I pressed my palm flat against his forehead, summoning my power and delving deeply into his mind. Once more, I found myself in the maze of corridors that we were calling the Facility, which seemed to be an amalgam of the memories of several different bases that the Winter Soldier had been kept in over the years he'd been in HYDRA's clutches.
Twenty minutes later, I pulled out. Bucky looked at me hopefully, but I just frowned and shook my head, dismissing the bindings. "I found your avatar, but no luck finding a way out of the Facility yet. I still think we're on the right track, but…"
"We're still missing something," he said quietly. "Thanks, anyway."
I nodded and grinned at him. "Hey, don't worry. We're trying to undo, like, decades of mental conditioning. I'd have been surprised if it was going to be easy. We'll get there, I promise."
--
"Okay, yeah, you were right. Colour me interested," Natasha said as the credits rolled on the first episode, Netflix's little alert that it would start the next episode soon popping up on screen.
"Right?" I nabbed the remote and hit 'back' to stop the autoplay.
We were curled up on her couch, a set of empty Chinese food takeaway containers on the coffee table in front of us. We had no idea where Yelena was—she hadn't been there when we'd arrived and she hadn't texted Nat or anything to let her know when she'd be back. Natasha wasn't worried; Yelena was an adult and could look after herself.
"So, all of the characters are, what, connected psychically or something?" she asked.
"I won't say much, don't want to spoil anything, but yeah."
"Do you have a favourite?"
"Jeez, that's a hard question. Overall, maybe Sun? I always liked Nomi a lot, as well, we—" I cut myself off, suddenly feeling very small and disconnected.
"Seeing as?" Nat prompted me gently.
"It doesn't matter," I said, sitting up. Absently, I wrapped my arms around myself, rubbing at my upper arms as if I'd suddenly felt a chill.
Natasha reached over and touched my shoulder, pushing at it gently so I'd turn and look at her. "You can talk to me, you know," she said softly. "This isn't just a one-way street."
"It's just… I don't really know who I am anymore. Things I used to feel a connection to—or thought I did… I don't know. It doesn't feel real anymore."
"This is about what the Ancient One said about you?" she guessed.
"Not just about that. I… okay, I know how this is going to sound, but I knew things that I shouldn't have been able to know."
Natasha grinned, sympathetic but obviously suppressing a chuckle. "Oh, wow, you knew something you shouldn't? That seems so unlike you."
I smiled back, then sighed. "It's just I have these memories. A whole life, growing up, everything. But it's distant. Disconnected. Almost… like it happened to someone else, I guess? When I woke up, after the Mind Stone unlocked my magic, everything about Wanda was gone. As far as I knew, I was just… someone else, trapped in a stranger's body. Only she wasn't a stranger, I knew her."
"From your visions."
My mouth opened and I barely managed to stop myself. I very, very nearly just went ahead and told her the absolute truth about my 'visions'. Instead, I swallowed the words, nodding and averting my eyes. "…Yeah. For more than a year, that's what I thought. I tried using my magic to look inside myself to see if she was in here, too, but I never felt her. Never found any trace. But my body doesn't feel like someone else's. It just feels like mine. I don't think of myself by any other name, just… I'm Wanda. The name feels right, you know? Then it turns out the world's foremost expert on magic is surprised that I don't think I'm Wanda because my soul—the most essential, inner part of me—is also just… Wanda."
Natasha's forehead creased, her expression sympathetic. "It sounds confusing," she said gently.
"After we left Kamar-taj, Pietro and I talked. He… he couldn't accept it. Wouldn't accept it. There was yelling. Crying." My face was growing hot again, the words both harder to say and somehow tumbling out faster than I could stop them. "And then something happened. I said something in Sokovian, remembered something about our parents. See? I just called them our parents without thinking, just then. But I remembered some stuff that I really shouldn't have because that's part of Wanda, not me. It's not stuff I saw in my visions, or if it is I don't remember it. And now… where does that leave me? Who am I?" I realised I was crying now, tears streaming down my face.
Natasha swept me into a hug, wrapping her arms around me and pulling me in close. I leaned into her gratefully, burying my face in her shoulder while I took a few moments to compose myself. After a little while, she took hold of my shoulders and pushed me back slightly, so she could look me in the eye. "Who do you feel like you are?"
"I told you, I don't… I just feel like me. Wanda."
"Then that's who you are," she said firmly. Her hands moved from my shoulders to my cheeks, cradling my face. "You're Wanda. I don't know what's true about your past. I don't know about these memories you have, or don't have. I didn't know pre-HYDRA Wanda, or whoever this other life was. The only Wanda I know is you—the one who's been doing her best this whole time, even when it was hard. That's who you are to me. That's my Wanda."
I opened my mouth again, but no words came out. God, I wanted to tell her that I loved her so badly. Which I knew was crazy—it was way, way too soon for that. We'd only just started seeing each other. We weren't even officially dating. We'd just spent one night together. I didn't want to scare her off, or push her away, or mess this up in any way. "Thank you," I eventually settled on. Natasha leaned in, kissing me gently, then pulled me into another hug.
Once I'd managed to pull myself together a bit, we stood and cleaned up the takeaway containers. While Natasha was taking care of a few things in the kitchen, I went ahead and brushed my teeth using a spare toothbrush she'd laid out for me, then headed to the bedroom.
It was a warm night, so I just stripped off everything except for my underwear bottoms and sat on the bed, looking at my phone while Natasha caught up. I hadn't seen Pietro all day—he hadn't called or texted, either. It felt a bit weird, not having him around for an entire day, like a piece of myself was missing. I hesitated, then typed him a short message: Hey, hope everything's okay. See you tomorrow?
I dropped the phone on top of the neat pile I'd made of my clothes and lay back with a sigh. Nat walked in, eyeing me with a slight smile as she closed the door behind her. She stripped out of her clothes, matching my partial nudity, then turned off the light and crawled into bed beside me. "Night," she said, quietly.
"Night," I replied, hesitating for a moment. "Nat?"
"Yeah?"
I rolled onto my side, facing away from her. "Cuddle me?"
She chuckled. "Sure."
We lay like that for a time, Natasha spooning me, snuggled close against me with one arm draped lightly across my waist, her hand resting gently on my stomach. I had just started to drift off to sleep when she flexed her fingers, slowly running them across my belly and up my side. I stirred, making a small contented noise in the back of my throat, and she shifted, lifting her head to bring her lips to the side of my neck.
I made another, even more indecent noise as she kissed my skin, grazing it gently with her teeth and tongue as her hand crept higher to cup the swell of my breast. Reaching up, I lightly traced the back of her hand with a finger, red wisps of energy slipping around her wrist before gently pulling her backwards off me. In the darkness, I could just make out Nat's look of surprise as I rolled over to face her. With a gesture, my power took firm hold of her other hand as well, drawing them both upwards until her wrists were bound over her head, telekinetically pinned to the headboard. "You," I said, a mild reproach in my voice, "told me you just wanted to get a good night's sleep tonight."
Natasha pouted playfully. "Well, yeah, but… we don't have anything on tomorrow until the afternoon. I wouldn't mind a nightcap."
With another gesture, wisps of red energy played across her bare skin, tracing her curves, and she inhaled sharply. "You know," I murmured huskily, "I've been thinking that I could potentially have a lot of fun with this. I've basically got access to unlimited ropes, handcuffs, straps, chains… whatever toys and tools I could ever need. What do you think? I've never really gotten into that sort of thing before, but I'm starting to feel a little… creative."
Nat's eyes had grown wider and rounder as I spoke, her breathing growing heavier. "Express yourself, then," she whispered.
- Location
- Australia
Given that the Mages of Kamar-taj can use magical energy to overcome their body not working, there totally is somewhere for physical exhaustion.
... I would be unsurprised if it turns out that there's a porn studio that's also a wizard 101 school. 'Last longer with one simple trick'.
As for Wanda's sense of self, I wouldn't be surprised if it was a combination of fake it till you make it and the mind merge resulting in psyedo body dismorphia. She knows she's not Wanda, but she's acted like it so long it feels real. I'm sure that can't become a exploitable mental stress or at all. No siree.
Thief of Words
Trans lesbian librarian
- Location
- Best book girl
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Cis woman copes with whiplash from reminder of memories of lifetime of transness.
- Location
- United Kingdom
Cool fic but the pairing seems quite forced
- Location
- Australia
I figure it's a case of opportunism and accidental manipulation.
Natasha looking for information flirted with Wanda.
Wanda expected it, but finds the Avengers to all be very attactive and flirted back. (Probably Bi)
Wanda then revealed and assisted with resolving the Red Room, in the process making Natasha emotionally vulnerable.
Because of the vulnerability, the flirting progressed beyond 'I'm pumping you for information', to 'for pleasure' to 'I might be catching feelings'.
It's a entirely plausible chain of events, Natasha even highlights it happening and that she would consider it a problem if she actively thought of Wanda as a potential enemy.
It's not a good basis for a long term relationship, but that's not guaranteed.
(Edit: In this case, Natasha Opportunistically looking from Wanda, with Wanda then accidentally making Natasha vulnerable enough for things to progress like this. However because it's not being done with those intentions, that's not a bad thing.)
Natasha looking for information flirted with Wanda.
Wanda expected it, but finds the Avengers to all be very attactive and flirted back. (Probably Bi)
Wanda then revealed and assisted with resolving the Red Room, in the process making Natasha emotionally vulnerable.
Because of the vulnerability, the flirting progressed beyond 'I'm pumping you for information', to 'for pleasure' to 'I might be catching feelings'.
It's a entirely plausible chain of events, Natasha even highlights it happening and that she would consider it a problem if she actively thought of Wanda as a potential enemy.
It's not a good basis for a long term relationship, but that's not guaranteed.
(Edit: In this case, Natasha Opportunistically looking from Wanda, with Wanda then accidentally making Natasha vulnerable enough for things to progress like this. However because it's not being done with those intentions, that's not a bad thing.)
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Obviously not everything is going to work for everyone, but if there's something in particular about the relationship that isn't working for you that makes it feel forced, would you mind elaborating on it?
I'd thought I'd done a reasonable job in showing the progression from Natasha managing Wanda as an asset (with Wanda's willing participation) through to the slightly messy situationship they're in right now.
For Wanda's side, she has a deeply parasocial relationship with Natasha that she developed through being a fan of Black Widow as depicted in the MCU movies. She's also been starved of physical/romantic affection for some time and so pretty easily latched onto it when Nat gave her positive attention and a human connection – it definitely didn't have to be Natasha, and Wanda probably would have just as easily latched onto Steve or Bucky if there'd been any reciprocation of her flirting/advances toward them. Wanda's also the sort of person to get infatuated with someone very easily.
For Natasha's side, she's an extremely closed-off person who doesn't form romantic attachments easily, partially because she was trained not to and partially because she views herself in a particularly monstrous light. When it comes down to it, Natasha doesn't believe that she's a good person or that she'll ever really make up for all the terrible things she did during her time with the Red Room, though she's trying—desperately—to prove herself wrong. She has trouble opening up to people and showing vulnerability, so she tends to discount other peoples' opinions about her because as far as she's concerned they don't really know her and if they did they'd think she's a monster, just like she does (per her conversations with Bruce in Avengers: Age of Ultron).
Wanda breaks through all her usual defences and hangups because, as far as Natasha can tell, she actually does have special insight into Nat's thoughts, feelings, and history that literally no one else does. So when Wanda validates her, tells her that she's a good person and seems to genuinely like her, Natasha's usual response/defence mechanism is completely short-circuited, and she doesn't really have any other way of dealing with the dissonance that causes. Wanda directly feeds into and validates Natasha's deepest wants (that is, her desire to redeem herself and be a good person) in a way that literally no other person can—it'd be difficult for anyone to not find that incredibly attractive.
It might not be the healthiest base for a long-term relationship, but, as Wanda points out to Bucky in this chapter – her and Nat haven't really had an actual conversation yet about their situation, so it's up in the air at this stage how things will progress. Wanda is significantly more invested in the relationship than Natasha is at this stage; if Wanda had slightly less self-control and actually blurted out an "I love you", then that definitely would have been a bit of an alarm/wakeup call for Natasha and she would probably have pumped the brakes a bit.
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Yea I think you made it work well enough, it's a pairing guaranteed to end in tears, but eh that's alot of relationships irl.
Nat has a history of catching feelings when honey potting avengers across continuities too.
Then again I think anyone who dates scarlet witch dies or watches her die ...
Nat has a history of catching feelings when honey potting avengers across continuities too.
Then again I think anyone who dates scarlet witch dies or watches her die ...
- Location
- United Kingdom
You have, but I think a lot of that is your view of it, and is not necessarily communicated through text as you've laid it out there. I read this all in a couple of days so my view of it will be different from yours but I say it seems forced because that's how I read it. You've justified it very well there, but it's more of a vibe that I'm talking about. It feels more like you're making excuses and using authorial fiat to achieve the result or pairing that you'd like. That's not inherently problematic, you're certainly allowed to use fiat to nudge certain events or dictate that things will happen according to the plot you want to write, but my issue is more that you've got the logic in your head but I'm not sure that's conveyed in the same way in chapters. You say it's messy for example but currently, it's not, there aren't substantive issues. If Nat was managing this as a asset type thing then fine, but I would encourage including more things like Tony looking at the journal. Make it messy, make it not work at first, make it really weird on Nat's part as she sees this odd young woman attached onto her. This should indeed be really weird for everyone, not just Nat/Wanda, I would encourage more of the oddness of the parasociality, more of the attatchment, but cut that off and have conflict.
It's fine, it's not a major issue for me in the story or anything. I do think it could be better elaborated though if that's the pairing you want to go for.
Chapter 28
Chapter 28
I picked up the last of the toasted triangles of my club sandwich and took a bite, savouring the flavours as I chewed. Placing the rest back down on my plate, I looked at it and nodded. "This is a really good sandwich," I announced, looking over at Pietro. "How's your food?"
"Eh, it's fine," he said, picking absently at what was on his plate.
Pietro's response to my text last night have been fairly noncommittal, so—once Natasha and I had managed to drag ourselves out of bed—I'd suggested we catch up for a late lunch and maybe do some sightseeing. He'd seemed unenthusiastic, but agreed anyway. We'd met up at a small café sandwiched between a CVS and a Hawaiian poke place, two streets away from Avengers' Tower.
"So, I've checked and there are Blue Man Group tickets still available for this evening's show," I said, looking at him seriously. "Can we go? I really, really think you'll like them."
Pietro grimaced. "The music guys with the blue paint on their faces? I dunno, it doesn't seem—"
"Please?" I wheedled, drawing the word out for almost two full seconds.
"You wouldn't prefer to go with someone else?" he said testily.
"Not at all. I want to go with you. Besides, Nat's probably already seen them before."
"…Fine, okay." He heaved a sigh. "I guess it might be fun."
I shot him a grateful smile. "Thanks."
"What did you get up to yesterday, anyway?" he asked with a bit of forced casualness, pushing the food around on his plate without much enthusiasm.
"Well, Jessica Jones came looking for me," I said, a little smugly. "Told you I hadn't scared her off completely. I just wish I could recall more about her situation… that part of things is all so fuzzy. I told her what I remembered, then we went for a walk and I introduced her to Matt Murdock."
"He's…" Pietro hesitated, thinking back to the conversation we'd had back in Kathmandu when I'd first started looking things up on the internet. Being on the run… it felt like it was almost a lifetime ago. "The blind guy. The Daredevil?"
"Yeah," I said, glancing around. No one was paying us any attention, but I still didn't feel super comfortable discussing people's secret identities in public. "No idea if they'll keep in contact, but they at least know each other now. I was actually planning on going and visiting Peter Parker tomorrow, if you wanted to come?"
It hadn't been very difficult to track Peter down. I knew he went to the Midtown School of Science and Technology and, from there, it had been a pretty simple matter of watching the school like a creep until I spotted him and Ned leaving so I could follow them back to Peter's place. He was young and only just starting out his career as a vigilante. I thought it'd be really good for his development if he got introduced to the Avengers right from the beginning, rather than leaving him to fend for himself.
I hadn't actually broached the subject with anyone yet, but I kind of wanted to pitch a 'Young Avengers' style thing to the rest of the group—a support program for youths with powers, to help lay the groundwork for future generations of heroes—and Peter would be the ideal first candidate.
"The spider boy? Eh… maybe."
My phone vibrated with a silent alert. As I pulled it out, Pietro sighed, his lips drawing together in a moue of annoyance. I ignored him—the message was from Natasha. You and Pietro around? Got something we need to talk about.
I glanced back up for a moment, considering the semi-eaten food in front of us, before tapping out a brief reply. We can be. Lounge in 15?
"That your girlfriend?" Pietro asked reproachfully.
"She's not…" I sighed. "Yes. Something's come up, looks like. She wants to see both of us." My phone vibrated again as Natasha responded with a thumbs-up.
"Both of us? What something?"
"I don't know." I shook my head, then gestured to our nearly-finished plates. "We'll finish this up, then go meet her at the Tower, if that's okay?"
"Sure, whatever." There was an exasperated edge to his tone. I took another bite of my food. "…You didn't stay in the Tower again last night," he said after a few moments.
I blinked. "Were you looking for me? You can just text me, you know."
"I wouldn't want to interrupt anything."
"You wouldn't have. We watched some Netflix. You could have joined us."
"Oh, yeah, sure," Pietro snorted derisively. "That would have been fun."
"Pietro…"
"Forget about it. Just eat. Don't want to keep your girlfriend waiting."
I sighed and we finished our lunch in tense silence. I really wasn't sure what to do about this. Pietro was obviously uncomfortable with my relationship with Natasha, but he refused to talk about it at all and it was mixed up with the whole problem he had with the Avengers in the first place, plus whatever was going on with me.
It was funny—the entire time we'd been together, despite each other being basically all we had, there'd always been a gulf between us. I'd never been able to talk openly with him before now, not completely… I'd been terrified that if he found out about my memories, he'd abandon me and I'd be alone. Now that the cat was out of the bag, he was still here, but somehow that distance between us seemed larger than ever and I just didn't know how to bridge it.
Once we were done, we left the café and stepped discreetly into an alley to spin up a portal. I wasn't too worried about creating portals in public spaces, but I really didn't like how much attention it drew from rubberneckers. Stepping through the gateway to the Tower, I made my way over to one of the couches and sat down, pulling out my phone to double-check I hadn't missed any further messages.
Pietro glanced around at the empty lounge as I dismissed the portal. "No one's here?"
"Shouldn't be long. I said fifteen minutes."
"Okay, well, I need to take a leak," he announced. "Back in a sec."
The moment he started to walk away, however, Natasha's head appeared as she ascended the steps from the Quinjet level below us. He faltered a little, then resumed his unrushed pace, acknowledging her briefly with a nod as he walked past her toward the restrooms.
Nat paused briefly, watching him leave, then walked over to me with a questioning look on her face. "He'll be back in a minute," I said, patting the couch cushion beside me.
There must have been something in my tone of voice that tipped her off. "Everything okay with you two?" she asked quietly, sitting down in the indicated spot and nudging me gently with her shoulder.
"I don't know," I said with a frustrated sigh. Leaning into her, I tilted my head to rest it on her shoulder. "Things are awkward. He's been avoiding me more and more. I don't really know what to do about it."
She nodded, putting her hand over mine comfortingly. "I could try talking to him?" she ventured. "It might be tricky, but he's feeling isolated. He doesn't have an external support network. There's not really anyone he can talk to about things except for you, which obviously isn't going to work. This sort of stuff is… well. It's difficult to work through on your own. I should know."
I snorted, lifting my head from her shoulder so I could look at her. "You are kind of one of the reasons he's annoyed with me at the moment. Do you really think he'd talk to you?"
"Hey, I'm pretty good at this stuff. Super spy, remember?" she said, a small smile lifting the corner of her mouth. "If not me, I think he might open up to Steve or Bucky. He seems to get along pretty well with them. Between the three of us, I'm sure we can sort something out."
I shrugged helplessly. "Sure, if you think it'll help. I honestly don't have any better ideas." I turned my hand over, threading our fingers together, then lifted her hand to my lips and kissed her knuckles lightly. "Thank you. I appreciate it."
We sat like that for a few minutes, quietly enjoying each other's company, before Pietro returned from the restroom. When he did, Natasha disentangled her hand from mine and stood up, turning to face the both of us. "I won't keep you too long, just wanted to talk this through in person," she said. "Two things, first: Wakanda."
"Ugh. I swear to God, Nat…"
Natasha held up her hands in a gesture of mock surrender. "Easy. We've reached out about your situation and Wakanda are… well. Let's just say they're not feeling particularly charitable."
Pietro snorted in amusement. "How unexpected."
"I was hoping maybe you had some extra information we might be able to use as a bargaining chip. You said you'd tried to warn them about a guy trying to take the throne?"
"Erik Stevens," I said, shaking my head. "I already told them everything I knew about him. They won't want the Avengers interfering in that, it's the royal family's personal business."
"There's nothing else?"
Slumping forward, I rested my elbows on my knees, massaging my temples with my fingers as I thought about it. I'd actually done a lot for Wakanda already, not that they would ever know or care, even beyond warning them of Killmonger. King T'Chaka wouldn't be killed in a bombing, thanks to me. Prince T'Challa wouldn't die of a degenerative disease, thanks to me. What else even was there? Wakanda Forever had them in conflict with Talokan and Namor, but that wasn't remotely relevant right now and might never be.
After a while, I looked back up at Natasha and shook my head again. "Sorry, I really can't think of anything."
She shot me a sympathetic look. "Fair enough. We'll think of something."
"What was the other thing?"
"We've had a request come through for a meeting with the Sokovian ambassador, for tomorrow. They've specifically asked for you two to attend."
I pulled a face. "Ugh, who organises these things for a Saturday?"
"Technically, you and Pietro are in the country illegally." Natasha shrugged, glancing between the two of us. "Homeland Security has been asking questions, but we've got a good working relationship with them so that shouldn't be an issue. On the other side of things, though, Sokovia could complicate things with the UN a little if they start making complaints, especially given that Wakanda is already determined to be a problem. It'd be a lot smoother if we just cooperate with the embassy and see what they want, head off any issues before they develop."
"Fine, fine," I sighed. "What time? I have things I wanted to do tomorrow."
"Three o'clock."
"That's… that should be fine. I can be back for that, easy." I glanced over at Pietro, my expression hopeful. "Did you want to come along?"
"You're just going to go talk to that kid, right?" he asked, brow creased slightly. I nodded and he responded with a half-hearted, noncommittal shrug.
Natasha perked up, as if she'd suddenly had an idea. "Actually, Pietro, if you're available tomorrow, how would you feel about joining a sparring session? Steve and Bucky have been slacking off lately and it might be fun to watch you knock them around for a bit," she shot him one of her infectious, mischievous grins.
He blinked, surprised by the request, a slight frown ghosting across his features. "I dunno."
I smiled encouragingly. "That sounds like it could be fun. You might have to slow yourself down and go easy on them, though—I mean, they're only super soldiers, after all." I wasn't great at the whole manipulation thing, but if there was one thing I knew Pietro liked to do, more than anything else, it was be a massive show off.
He snorted, considering it for a moment, then nodded. "Alright, fine. What time?"
"Let's say ten? That should give us enough time to work up a sweat, have lunch, and clean ourselves up for the meeting."
Pietro nodded. "Sure."
Nat shot me an encouraging look and I inclined my head in a brief nod. I had no idea if they would be able to get through to Pietro, but it had to be worth a shot.
--
I tapped the access panel for the laboratory door. There was a negative beep, the LED trim around the panel flashing red for a moment. Frowning, I tapped at it again, slightly more forcefully.
"I'm dreadfully sorry, Ms Maximoff, but you don't have authorisation to enter the lab unescorted." The smooth, artificial voice filtered down from somewhere above me, almost seeming to come from everywhere at once.
I looked up. There were panels of dark, smoked glass inset into the ceiling that I imagined hid whatever sensors JARVIS used to monitor the Tower, so I couldn't actually glare directly at whatever camera he was using to look at me. I addressed the empty air in front of me instead. "Are you serious? I'm not unescorted, JARVIS," I said, pointing through the door to where Bruce sat facing away from me, poring over the readouts on a monitor, utterly oblivious to my presence through the soundproof glass barrier. "Bruce is in there. He's literally right there."
"Very serious, Ms Maximoff," JARVIS said mildly. "Dr Banner is currently working. Would you like me to request authorisation for your entry from him?"
"Yes, please," I ground out.
A moment later, inside the lab I saw Bruce tear his eyes away from the screen, perking up as he listened to JARVIS, then glance my way. He gave me a lopsided grin and said something, and a moment later the door slid open.
"Thanks, JARVIS," Bruce said.
I heaved an annoyed sigh as I picked my way through the room toward him. The workbenches here were covered in computers and scientific instruments, with several seeming to be dedicated assembly areas for Tony to tinker with small electronic engineering projects. "Honestly," I said as I came up beside him. "I'm getting a little bit fed up with this 'mother may I' crap every time I try to move around here."
Bruce's expression turned awkward and he shrugged apologetically. "Sorry."
"Don't apologise—can't you do something about it?"
He made a face. "Ah, I don't… it's not my decision. You're still on probation." He waved his hand in a scrubbing motion. "Tony takes security pretty seriously."
"Yeah, but he knows I could just… right?" I mimed spinning up a portal and Bruce flinched, the expression on his face getting even more awkward. I paused. "Don't tell me…" Retrieving my sling ring from my jacket pocket, I quickly spun up a small portal connecting the inside of the lab to just outside the door.
Bruce slumped forward slightly in his chair as the lighting in the lab flicked over to a harsh red emergency glare and an alert started to beep. "Unauthorised portal detected," JARVIS's voice rang out above us. "Ms Maximoff, dismiss your portal immediately."
I stared at Bruce as I dismissed the portal, eyes wide in disbelief, before tucking the ring back into my pocket.
"Thank you for your cooperation, Ms Maximoff. Please do not attempt to create further portals in secured areas."
Bruce scratched at the back of his neck nervously as he scrunched up his face. "Yeah, Tony's got the whole Tower set up like that. I think just the lounge and your quarters are cleared for portals."
I took a deep breath. "Are you freaking kidding me? He should at least tell me if he's doing stuff like that."
"Like I said, he takes security seriously. Sorry."
"Stop saying sorry."
"Sor—" He paused when he saw my murderous expression, closing his mouth halfway through the word and just looking at me apologetically instead.
I pressed the heel of my hand to my temple, closing my eyes and taking another breath. It was fine. I'd talk to Natasha and Steve about it. The two of them together had to be enough to push past Tony's ego. "Okay," I said, opening my eyes again and glancing toward his readouts. "How goes your research? Any gamma-related insights?"
"You don't already know?" he asked wryly.
"Nope," I said, honestly.
I stepped over to the containment chamber that the Mind Stone was currently resting in—a tall vertical cylinder of reinforced glass, the bottom of which was magnetically locked to the workbench it rested on. The Stone was held in place on a thin robotic arm, with several other sensors and instruments on or around it, connecting to devices at the top and bottom of the tube. It glimmered slightly with golden energy and I placed my hand on the glass, tapping it with my fingernail.
"In the version of events I saw, you never really got a chance to examine one of the Infinity Stones properly, so I have no idea if you'll find anything," I said, looking at the Stone. "If I already knew, I'd have told you. Speaking of… there is something I did want to talk to you about."
He suddenly pushed away from me, rolling his chair backwards until it hit the desk. "Oh. Oh, no." I glanced over at him, puzzled, and he shook his head rapidly, looking alarmed. "Not me. I'm fine. No, thank you."
"…What?"
Bruce seemed to deflate, slumping forward in his chair slightly, his wrists resting on his knees as he restlessly flexed his fingers, his expression caught halfway between a grimace and an awkward smile. "We have a little bit of a betting pool going on about who you're going to emotionally traumatise next."
I shot him an annoyed look. "That's not fair."
"Nat won the last pool yesterday because of Tony. I put fifty dollars on Clint being next."
"You guys suck," I said, folding my arms and turning back to glare impotently at the Mind Stone.
"Are you, or are you not, planning on emotionally traumatising me?" he asked, eyeing me sceptically.
"…I'm not trying to traumatise anyone deliberately," I hedged.
Bruce pointed at me with a finger, looking triumphant. "Aha! See? I knew it. None of that for me, thanks," he waved his hand again to ward me off. "I have enough problems as it is, I don't need whatever it is you're going to dump on me."
"Bruce…"
"Ugh. What?"
"You're being incredibly dramatic," I said testily. "I only want to tell you because I think it'll help you."
"I know, I know," he said, heaving a heavy sigh. Reaching up, he covered his face with his hands for a moment, pressing the heels of his palms over his eyes. "Okay. I'm ready. Hit me."
"…Okay. So, I know you're not going to want to hear this, but—"
"Oh, God. That was not a good start." He winced. "I've changed my mind, I'm not ready."
"Are you seriously going to do this the entire time?"
"…No. Sorry, I just don't like being nervous."
I sighed. "Okay, so, the Hulk." I paused to glare at Bruce when he pulled another face, but he gestured silently for me to continue. "I don't know the specific details of how exactly it happened, but you eventually worked out how to handle it."
"…I got rid of him?"
"Not quite. The Hulk isn't some separate thing living inside you, Bruce. You've been treating the Hulk like he's some sort of disease, something to get rid of, but he's not. You're the same person, effectively, just split in two because of your trauma and anger issues."
Bruce shook his head slowly. "No… You don't know what you're talking about. I'm not him."
"You are, though. I've seen it. You successfully integrate the Hulk-Banner identities and are just… you. The whole split personality, dual identities thing isn't a 'Hulk' thing, it's a Banner thing."
"Nuh uh," he said, shaking his head more vehemently, a bit of anger leaking into his tone. "I was just Banner, perfectly fine, for years before I had that thing in me."
"You weren't fine, Bruce, and you know it. As for the Hulk… well, there's also your cousin, Jen."
"Jen?" he asked, his anger slightly derailed and replaced by confusion. "What about her?"
"At one point, you're in a car accident with her and she gets infected with your blood, including what should be a lethal dose of gamma radiation. Thankfully, she's got the same rare combination of genetic factors that you have, so she survives and becomes a Hulk, too."
"Jesus." Bruce slumped forward, cradling his head in his hands.
"But she never gets an alter ego. She never needs to take the long, painful road to integration that you did. Honestly, you're a bit miffed by the whole thing." I paused for a moment, then nudged his leg with my foot. "Actually, speaking of… would you, uh, mind introducing me to Jen? I mean, she's… and I mean…" Bruce lifted his head enough to glare up at me. "You're right, sorry, not appropriate right now. Sorry for asking."
"Apology not accepted."
I exhaled sharply in frustration. "Bruce, what I'm trying to say is I might be able to fix you."
"What, you want to go poking around in my head? Do you have any idea how dangerous that could be?"
"I do, but that doesn't mean—"
"No, I don't think you do," he said. "Bucky almost killed you—what do you think will happen if you cross the wrong neuron and suddenly there's a pissed-off Hulk in your face? Nuh uh. Nope. Too risky. Worst idea I've ever heard."
"But—"
"Just stop."
"…Okay, fine. Have it your way. All I wanted to do was let you know that you can get through this. There is a way to just be Banner, but you need to acknowledge that the Hulk is a part of you and do the work to accept him back into yourself."
"I don't… okay." He took a deep breath and let it out in a long, drawn-out sigh as he clenched his hands into fists and released them several times. "Fine. You've given me a lot to think about. Just… that's enough for now. Please."
"That's all I wanted to do," I said, trying to sound sympathetic. "See? That wasn't that traumatising, was it?"
Bruce glared at me again, jaw set, and pointed toward the door. "Out."
--
"You're going to wear a hole in the floor," Nat said mildly. She was sitting on one of the Lounge's couches, positioned in such a way to take advantage of the sightlines through the glass walls so that she had a bit of a view into the briefing room, where Pepper had just led Tony.
"I can't help it," Bruce said as he anxiously paced back and forth. "I hate this."
In the end, they'd decided to limit the number of people in the room. Pepper would be there as Tony's key support—Natasha had already had a difficult conversation with her where she'd laid everything out ahead of time. Steve would be the one to break the news and talk it through. Finally, after much debate, they'd all agreed that it would be better for Bucky to be there so that Tony wouldn't feel like they were hiding him. Nat and Bruce would stay nearby, just in case, but they didn't want to crowd Tony when he was going to be at his most vulnerable.
From where she was sitting, Nat could see that Tony was clearly on guard right from the start. They tried to get him to sit, but he refused. Pepper hovered at his left shoulder, not quite sure what to do with herself. Bucky was sitting at the far side of the table, looking small, while Steve walked over and spoke to Tony face-to-face, his expression gentle.
Tony's face fell and Pepper stepped closer, trying to put her arm around his shoulder, but he shrugged it off, staring at Steve and Bucky. His mouth moved, but it was too fast and too far away for Nat to lipread properly. He took an angry step forward and Steve reached out to place a hand on his shoulder. He yelled something, face red, and tried to push Steve away, but the super soldier held firm.
In the corner of her vision, she saw Bruce fidgeting, not sure what to do with his hands. "Should we go up?" he asked, his voice laden with anxiety.
Nat shook her head. "Not yet."
Tony was really shouting now, trying to get past Steve to Bucky, but he just wasn't able to shift the other man. Pepper was crying, grabbing at his shoulder in a weak attempt to stop him. Suddenly, Tony pulled back and tried to take an actual swing at Steve. Steve took the hit on the jaw—barely flinching back—then pulled the other man into a hug, wrapping both his arms around Tony, holding him still even he continued to shout and struggle. Pepper darted in to join them, her mouth moving as she tried to talk to Tony, her arms closing around him as well. Nat held her breath. It could go either way from here.
After several long seconds, Tony's body crumpled, slumping into Steve like a marionette with its strings cut. The super soldier shifted, bringing one arm up to hold the back of Tony's head while Pepper leant her forehead against his temple, her face red, tears streaming freely down her cheeks. Tony's shoulders heaved and shook as huge, wracking sobs tore through his body. Nat exhaled.
"Okay," she said softly, glancing at Bruce. "Now we go up."
I picked up the last of the toasted triangles of my club sandwich and took a bite, savouring the flavours as I chewed. Placing the rest back down on my plate, I looked at it and nodded. "This is a really good sandwich," I announced, looking over at Pietro. "How's your food?"
"Eh, it's fine," he said, picking absently at what was on his plate.
Pietro's response to my text last night have been fairly noncommittal, so—once Natasha and I had managed to drag ourselves out of bed—I'd suggested we catch up for a late lunch and maybe do some sightseeing. He'd seemed unenthusiastic, but agreed anyway. We'd met up at a small café sandwiched between a CVS and a Hawaiian poke place, two streets away from Avengers' Tower.
"So, I've checked and there are Blue Man Group tickets still available for this evening's show," I said, looking at him seriously. "Can we go? I really, really think you'll like them."
Pietro grimaced. "The music guys with the blue paint on their faces? I dunno, it doesn't seem—"
"Please?" I wheedled, drawing the word out for almost two full seconds.
"You wouldn't prefer to go with someone else?" he said testily.
"Not at all. I want to go with you. Besides, Nat's probably already seen them before."
"…Fine, okay." He heaved a sigh. "I guess it might be fun."
I shot him a grateful smile. "Thanks."
"What did you get up to yesterday, anyway?" he asked with a bit of forced casualness, pushing the food around on his plate without much enthusiasm.
"Well, Jessica Jones came looking for me," I said, a little smugly. "Told you I hadn't scared her off completely. I just wish I could recall more about her situation… that part of things is all so fuzzy. I told her what I remembered, then we went for a walk and I introduced her to Matt Murdock."
"He's…" Pietro hesitated, thinking back to the conversation we'd had back in Kathmandu when I'd first started looking things up on the internet. Being on the run… it felt like it was almost a lifetime ago. "The blind guy. The Daredevil?"
"Yeah," I said, glancing around. No one was paying us any attention, but I still didn't feel super comfortable discussing people's secret identities in public. "No idea if they'll keep in contact, but they at least know each other now. I was actually planning on going and visiting Peter Parker tomorrow, if you wanted to come?"
It hadn't been very difficult to track Peter down. I knew he went to the Midtown School of Science and Technology and, from there, it had been a pretty simple matter of watching the school like a creep until I spotted him and Ned leaving so I could follow them back to Peter's place. He was young and only just starting out his career as a vigilante. I thought it'd be really good for his development if he got introduced to the Avengers right from the beginning, rather than leaving him to fend for himself.
I hadn't actually broached the subject with anyone yet, but I kind of wanted to pitch a 'Young Avengers' style thing to the rest of the group—a support program for youths with powers, to help lay the groundwork for future generations of heroes—and Peter would be the ideal first candidate.
"The spider boy? Eh… maybe."
My phone vibrated with a silent alert. As I pulled it out, Pietro sighed, his lips drawing together in a moue of annoyance. I ignored him—the message was from Natasha. You and Pietro around? Got something we need to talk about.
I glanced back up for a moment, considering the semi-eaten food in front of us, before tapping out a brief reply. We can be. Lounge in 15?
"That your girlfriend?" Pietro asked reproachfully.
"She's not…" I sighed. "Yes. Something's come up, looks like. She wants to see both of us." My phone vibrated again as Natasha responded with a thumbs-up.
"Both of us? What something?"
"I don't know." I shook my head, then gestured to our nearly-finished plates. "We'll finish this up, then go meet her at the Tower, if that's okay?"
"Sure, whatever." There was an exasperated edge to his tone. I took another bite of my food. "…You didn't stay in the Tower again last night," he said after a few moments.
I blinked. "Were you looking for me? You can just text me, you know."
"I wouldn't want to interrupt anything."
"You wouldn't have. We watched some Netflix. You could have joined us."
"Oh, yeah, sure," Pietro snorted derisively. "That would have been fun."
"Pietro…"
"Forget about it. Just eat. Don't want to keep your girlfriend waiting."
I sighed and we finished our lunch in tense silence. I really wasn't sure what to do about this. Pietro was obviously uncomfortable with my relationship with Natasha, but he refused to talk about it at all and it was mixed up with the whole problem he had with the Avengers in the first place, plus whatever was going on with me.
It was funny—the entire time we'd been together, despite each other being basically all we had, there'd always been a gulf between us. I'd never been able to talk openly with him before now, not completely… I'd been terrified that if he found out about my memories, he'd abandon me and I'd be alone. Now that the cat was out of the bag, he was still here, but somehow that distance between us seemed larger than ever and I just didn't know how to bridge it.
Once we were done, we left the café and stepped discreetly into an alley to spin up a portal. I wasn't too worried about creating portals in public spaces, but I really didn't like how much attention it drew from rubberneckers. Stepping through the gateway to the Tower, I made my way over to one of the couches and sat down, pulling out my phone to double-check I hadn't missed any further messages.
Pietro glanced around at the empty lounge as I dismissed the portal. "No one's here?"
"Shouldn't be long. I said fifteen minutes."
"Okay, well, I need to take a leak," he announced. "Back in a sec."
The moment he started to walk away, however, Natasha's head appeared as she ascended the steps from the Quinjet level below us. He faltered a little, then resumed his unrushed pace, acknowledging her briefly with a nod as he walked past her toward the restrooms.
Nat paused briefly, watching him leave, then walked over to me with a questioning look on her face. "He'll be back in a minute," I said, patting the couch cushion beside me.
There must have been something in my tone of voice that tipped her off. "Everything okay with you two?" she asked quietly, sitting down in the indicated spot and nudging me gently with her shoulder.
"I don't know," I said with a frustrated sigh. Leaning into her, I tilted my head to rest it on her shoulder. "Things are awkward. He's been avoiding me more and more. I don't really know what to do about it."
She nodded, putting her hand over mine comfortingly. "I could try talking to him?" she ventured. "It might be tricky, but he's feeling isolated. He doesn't have an external support network. There's not really anyone he can talk to about things except for you, which obviously isn't going to work. This sort of stuff is… well. It's difficult to work through on your own. I should know."
I snorted, lifting my head from her shoulder so I could look at her. "You are kind of one of the reasons he's annoyed with me at the moment. Do you really think he'd talk to you?"
"Hey, I'm pretty good at this stuff. Super spy, remember?" she said, a small smile lifting the corner of her mouth. "If not me, I think he might open up to Steve or Bucky. He seems to get along pretty well with them. Between the three of us, I'm sure we can sort something out."
I shrugged helplessly. "Sure, if you think it'll help. I honestly don't have any better ideas." I turned my hand over, threading our fingers together, then lifted her hand to my lips and kissed her knuckles lightly. "Thank you. I appreciate it."
We sat like that for a few minutes, quietly enjoying each other's company, before Pietro returned from the restroom. When he did, Natasha disentangled her hand from mine and stood up, turning to face the both of us. "I won't keep you too long, just wanted to talk this through in person," she said. "Two things, first: Wakanda."
"Ugh. I swear to God, Nat…"
Natasha held up her hands in a gesture of mock surrender. "Easy. We've reached out about your situation and Wakanda are… well. Let's just say they're not feeling particularly charitable."
Pietro snorted in amusement. "How unexpected."
"I was hoping maybe you had some extra information we might be able to use as a bargaining chip. You said you'd tried to warn them about a guy trying to take the throne?"
"Erik Stevens," I said, shaking my head. "I already told them everything I knew about him. They won't want the Avengers interfering in that, it's the royal family's personal business."
"There's nothing else?"
Slumping forward, I rested my elbows on my knees, massaging my temples with my fingers as I thought about it. I'd actually done a lot for Wakanda already, not that they would ever know or care, even beyond warning them of Killmonger. King T'Chaka wouldn't be killed in a bombing, thanks to me. Prince T'Challa wouldn't die of a degenerative disease, thanks to me. What else even was there? Wakanda Forever had them in conflict with Talokan and Namor, but that wasn't remotely relevant right now and might never be.
After a while, I looked back up at Natasha and shook my head again. "Sorry, I really can't think of anything."
She shot me a sympathetic look. "Fair enough. We'll think of something."
"What was the other thing?"
"We've had a request come through for a meeting with the Sokovian ambassador, for tomorrow. They've specifically asked for you two to attend."
I pulled a face. "Ugh, who organises these things for a Saturday?"
"Technically, you and Pietro are in the country illegally." Natasha shrugged, glancing between the two of us. "Homeland Security has been asking questions, but we've got a good working relationship with them so that shouldn't be an issue. On the other side of things, though, Sokovia could complicate things with the UN a little if they start making complaints, especially given that Wakanda is already determined to be a problem. It'd be a lot smoother if we just cooperate with the embassy and see what they want, head off any issues before they develop."
"Fine, fine," I sighed. "What time? I have things I wanted to do tomorrow."
"Three o'clock."
"That's… that should be fine. I can be back for that, easy." I glanced over at Pietro, my expression hopeful. "Did you want to come along?"
"You're just going to go talk to that kid, right?" he asked, brow creased slightly. I nodded and he responded with a half-hearted, noncommittal shrug.
Natasha perked up, as if she'd suddenly had an idea. "Actually, Pietro, if you're available tomorrow, how would you feel about joining a sparring session? Steve and Bucky have been slacking off lately and it might be fun to watch you knock them around for a bit," she shot him one of her infectious, mischievous grins.
He blinked, surprised by the request, a slight frown ghosting across his features. "I dunno."
I smiled encouragingly. "That sounds like it could be fun. You might have to slow yourself down and go easy on them, though—I mean, they're only super soldiers, after all." I wasn't great at the whole manipulation thing, but if there was one thing I knew Pietro liked to do, more than anything else, it was be a massive show off.
He snorted, considering it for a moment, then nodded. "Alright, fine. What time?"
"Let's say ten? That should give us enough time to work up a sweat, have lunch, and clean ourselves up for the meeting."
Pietro nodded. "Sure."
Nat shot me an encouraging look and I inclined my head in a brief nod. I had no idea if they would be able to get through to Pietro, but it had to be worth a shot.
--
I tapped the access panel for the laboratory door. There was a negative beep, the LED trim around the panel flashing red for a moment. Frowning, I tapped at it again, slightly more forcefully.
"I'm dreadfully sorry, Ms Maximoff, but you don't have authorisation to enter the lab unescorted." The smooth, artificial voice filtered down from somewhere above me, almost seeming to come from everywhere at once.
I looked up. There were panels of dark, smoked glass inset into the ceiling that I imagined hid whatever sensors JARVIS used to monitor the Tower, so I couldn't actually glare directly at whatever camera he was using to look at me. I addressed the empty air in front of me instead. "Are you serious? I'm not unescorted, JARVIS," I said, pointing through the door to where Bruce sat facing away from me, poring over the readouts on a monitor, utterly oblivious to my presence through the soundproof glass barrier. "Bruce is in there. He's literally right there."
"Very serious, Ms Maximoff," JARVIS said mildly. "Dr Banner is currently working. Would you like me to request authorisation for your entry from him?"
"Yes, please," I ground out.
A moment later, inside the lab I saw Bruce tear his eyes away from the screen, perking up as he listened to JARVIS, then glance my way. He gave me a lopsided grin and said something, and a moment later the door slid open.
"Thanks, JARVIS," Bruce said.
I heaved an annoyed sigh as I picked my way through the room toward him. The workbenches here were covered in computers and scientific instruments, with several seeming to be dedicated assembly areas for Tony to tinker with small electronic engineering projects. "Honestly," I said as I came up beside him. "I'm getting a little bit fed up with this 'mother may I' crap every time I try to move around here."
Bruce's expression turned awkward and he shrugged apologetically. "Sorry."
"Don't apologise—can't you do something about it?"
He made a face. "Ah, I don't… it's not my decision. You're still on probation." He waved his hand in a scrubbing motion. "Tony takes security pretty seriously."
"Yeah, but he knows I could just… right?" I mimed spinning up a portal and Bruce flinched, the expression on his face getting even more awkward. I paused. "Don't tell me…" Retrieving my sling ring from my jacket pocket, I quickly spun up a small portal connecting the inside of the lab to just outside the door.
Bruce slumped forward slightly in his chair as the lighting in the lab flicked over to a harsh red emergency glare and an alert started to beep. "Unauthorised portal detected," JARVIS's voice rang out above us. "Ms Maximoff, dismiss your portal immediately."
I stared at Bruce as I dismissed the portal, eyes wide in disbelief, before tucking the ring back into my pocket.
"Thank you for your cooperation, Ms Maximoff. Please do not attempt to create further portals in secured areas."
Bruce scratched at the back of his neck nervously as he scrunched up his face. "Yeah, Tony's got the whole Tower set up like that. I think just the lounge and your quarters are cleared for portals."
I took a deep breath. "Are you freaking kidding me? He should at least tell me if he's doing stuff like that."
"Like I said, he takes security seriously. Sorry."
"Stop saying sorry."
"Sor—" He paused when he saw my murderous expression, closing his mouth halfway through the word and just looking at me apologetically instead.
I pressed the heel of my hand to my temple, closing my eyes and taking another breath. It was fine. I'd talk to Natasha and Steve about it. The two of them together had to be enough to push past Tony's ego. "Okay," I said, opening my eyes again and glancing toward his readouts. "How goes your research? Any gamma-related insights?"
"You don't already know?" he asked wryly.
"Nope," I said, honestly.
I stepped over to the containment chamber that the Mind Stone was currently resting in—a tall vertical cylinder of reinforced glass, the bottom of which was magnetically locked to the workbench it rested on. The Stone was held in place on a thin robotic arm, with several other sensors and instruments on or around it, connecting to devices at the top and bottom of the tube. It glimmered slightly with golden energy and I placed my hand on the glass, tapping it with my fingernail.
"In the version of events I saw, you never really got a chance to examine one of the Infinity Stones properly, so I have no idea if you'll find anything," I said, looking at the Stone. "If I already knew, I'd have told you. Speaking of… there is something I did want to talk to you about."
He suddenly pushed away from me, rolling his chair backwards until it hit the desk. "Oh. Oh, no." I glanced over at him, puzzled, and he shook his head rapidly, looking alarmed. "Not me. I'm fine. No, thank you."
"…What?"
Bruce seemed to deflate, slumping forward in his chair slightly, his wrists resting on his knees as he restlessly flexed his fingers, his expression caught halfway between a grimace and an awkward smile. "We have a little bit of a betting pool going on about who you're going to emotionally traumatise next."
I shot him an annoyed look. "That's not fair."
"Nat won the last pool yesterday because of Tony. I put fifty dollars on Clint being next."
"You guys suck," I said, folding my arms and turning back to glare impotently at the Mind Stone.
"Are you, or are you not, planning on emotionally traumatising me?" he asked, eyeing me sceptically.
"…I'm not trying to traumatise anyone deliberately," I hedged.
Bruce pointed at me with a finger, looking triumphant. "Aha! See? I knew it. None of that for me, thanks," he waved his hand again to ward me off. "I have enough problems as it is, I don't need whatever it is you're going to dump on me."
"Bruce…"
"Ugh. What?"
"You're being incredibly dramatic," I said testily. "I only want to tell you because I think it'll help you."
"I know, I know," he said, heaving a heavy sigh. Reaching up, he covered his face with his hands for a moment, pressing the heels of his palms over his eyes. "Okay. I'm ready. Hit me."
"…Okay. So, I know you're not going to want to hear this, but—"
"Oh, God. That was not a good start." He winced. "I've changed my mind, I'm not ready."
"Are you seriously going to do this the entire time?"
"…No. Sorry, I just don't like being nervous."
I sighed. "Okay, so, the Hulk." I paused to glare at Bruce when he pulled another face, but he gestured silently for me to continue. "I don't know the specific details of how exactly it happened, but you eventually worked out how to handle it."
"…I got rid of him?"
"Not quite. The Hulk isn't some separate thing living inside you, Bruce. You've been treating the Hulk like he's some sort of disease, something to get rid of, but he's not. You're the same person, effectively, just split in two because of your trauma and anger issues."
Bruce shook his head slowly. "No… You don't know what you're talking about. I'm not him."
"You are, though. I've seen it. You successfully integrate the Hulk-Banner identities and are just… you. The whole split personality, dual identities thing isn't a 'Hulk' thing, it's a Banner thing."
"Nuh uh," he said, shaking his head more vehemently, a bit of anger leaking into his tone. "I was just Banner, perfectly fine, for years before I had that thing in me."
"You weren't fine, Bruce, and you know it. As for the Hulk… well, there's also your cousin, Jen."
"Jen?" he asked, his anger slightly derailed and replaced by confusion. "What about her?"
"At one point, you're in a car accident with her and she gets infected with your blood, including what should be a lethal dose of gamma radiation. Thankfully, she's got the same rare combination of genetic factors that you have, so she survives and becomes a Hulk, too."
"Jesus." Bruce slumped forward, cradling his head in his hands.
"But she never gets an alter ego. She never needs to take the long, painful road to integration that you did. Honestly, you're a bit miffed by the whole thing." I paused for a moment, then nudged his leg with my foot. "Actually, speaking of… would you, uh, mind introducing me to Jen? I mean, she's… and I mean…" Bruce lifted his head enough to glare up at me. "You're right, sorry, not appropriate right now. Sorry for asking."
"Apology not accepted."
I exhaled sharply in frustration. "Bruce, what I'm trying to say is I might be able to fix you."
"What, you want to go poking around in my head? Do you have any idea how dangerous that could be?"
"I do, but that doesn't mean—"
"No, I don't think you do," he said. "Bucky almost killed you—what do you think will happen if you cross the wrong neuron and suddenly there's a pissed-off Hulk in your face? Nuh uh. Nope. Too risky. Worst idea I've ever heard."
"But—"
"Just stop."
"…Okay, fine. Have it your way. All I wanted to do was let you know that you can get through this. There is a way to just be Banner, but you need to acknowledge that the Hulk is a part of you and do the work to accept him back into yourself."
"I don't… okay." He took a deep breath and let it out in a long, drawn-out sigh as he clenched his hands into fists and released them several times. "Fine. You've given me a lot to think about. Just… that's enough for now. Please."
"That's all I wanted to do," I said, trying to sound sympathetic. "See? That wasn't that traumatising, was it?"
Bruce glared at me again, jaw set, and pointed toward the door. "Out."
--
"You're going to wear a hole in the floor," Nat said mildly. She was sitting on one of the Lounge's couches, positioned in such a way to take advantage of the sightlines through the glass walls so that she had a bit of a view into the briefing room, where Pepper had just led Tony.
"I can't help it," Bruce said as he anxiously paced back and forth. "I hate this."
In the end, they'd decided to limit the number of people in the room. Pepper would be there as Tony's key support—Natasha had already had a difficult conversation with her where she'd laid everything out ahead of time. Steve would be the one to break the news and talk it through. Finally, after much debate, they'd all agreed that it would be better for Bucky to be there so that Tony wouldn't feel like they were hiding him. Nat and Bruce would stay nearby, just in case, but they didn't want to crowd Tony when he was going to be at his most vulnerable.
From where she was sitting, Nat could see that Tony was clearly on guard right from the start. They tried to get him to sit, but he refused. Pepper hovered at his left shoulder, not quite sure what to do with herself. Bucky was sitting at the far side of the table, looking small, while Steve walked over and spoke to Tony face-to-face, his expression gentle.
Tony's face fell and Pepper stepped closer, trying to put her arm around his shoulder, but he shrugged it off, staring at Steve and Bucky. His mouth moved, but it was too fast and too far away for Nat to lipread properly. He took an angry step forward and Steve reached out to place a hand on his shoulder. He yelled something, face red, and tried to push Steve away, but the super soldier held firm.
In the corner of her vision, she saw Bruce fidgeting, not sure what to do with his hands. "Should we go up?" he asked, his voice laden with anxiety.
Nat shook her head. "Not yet."
Tony was really shouting now, trying to get past Steve to Bucky, but he just wasn't able to shift the other man. Pepper was crying, grabbing at his shoulder in a weak attempt to stop him. Suddenly, Tony pulled back and tried to take an actual swing at Steve. Steve took the hit on the jaw—barely flinching back—then pulled the other man into a hug, wrapping both his arms around Tony, holding him still even he continued to shout and struggle. Pepper darted in to join them, her mouth moving as she tried to talk to Tony, her arms closing around him as well. Nat held her breath. It could go either way from here.
After several long seconds, Tony's body crumpled, slumping into Steve like a marionette with its strings cut. The super soldier shifted, bringing one arm up to hold the back of Tony's head while Pepper leant her forehead against his temple, her face red, tears streaming freely down her cheeks. Tony's shoulders heaved and shook as huge, wracking sobs tore through his body. Nat exhaled.
"Okay," she said softly, glancing at Bruce. "Now we go up."
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Please no, I hated the MCU hulk stuff. Yeah they should get along but they shouldn't merge into one entity the way they neutered him in infinity war was garbage and disrespectful a Thor Ragnarok hulk that banner makes a deal with is what should happen. But at the end of the day it's your story and you can decide what to do with it.
- Location
- Toronto
Honestly I think that went about the same as canon, except Tony isn't in a suit this time, so Steve didn't feel he needed to fight back to keep Bucky safe. Tony 100% still went berserk there, if even Pepper couldn't talk him down.
Grey hulk is pretty deeply canonically a part of the hulk story across moat marvel continuities. Allegedly grey hulk was a jack Kirby invention.
Krazyfan1
Worrying for the future.
- Location
- Australia
i think Grey Hulk is a separate alter?
You know I just had a crazy random not very topical thought, but all of the fights Pietro has been in have gotten progressively less difficult right?
- Ancient One with sorcerer backup in the mirror dimension (Challenge difficulty)
- Avengers without Thor (Medium/easy difficulty)
- Wakandans (Easy difficulty)
- Red Room mooks with Avenger backup (Tutorial difficulty)
Pietro can fight Agatha. But just her crow minion.
"You want me to punch a bird?"
"It's an ancient familiar with an extensive history assisting it's master in her vile activities."
"It's a crow."
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Posting Schedule Announcement
As I've mentioned before, my original intent was to post the first four chapters of this fic, then just regularly post one chapter at a scheduled time each week.
That did not happen. Instead, I craved validation and chased Likes and comments, and due to my utter and complete lack of self-control I've been posting around three chapters every week (four, once!), for almost eight weeks. I knew that this was unsustainable in the long term. I've been spending almost all of my free time working on this fic just to keep up. But, earlier comments about self-control, etc, etc.
I've mostly been able to keep up with this. However, my backlog is starting to run a bit thinner, so I am going to cut back a little bit on posting. From now on, I'm going to try to make a commitment and restrict myself to posting only two chapters each week. Some weeks I might only post one, though I'll try to say so ahead of time if that's going to happen (and probably apologise profusely). So... in big bold letters to make it official:
So the next chapter will still drop in about 24 hours time, but after that I'm going to be slowing down, just a little bit.
Thanks for all your support with the story so far. I'm really glad people have (mostly) been enjoying it! I'm actually closing in on 2,000 followers/watchers in total across all the platforms I'm posting it on, so that's pretty awesome and exciting!
That did not happen. Instead, I craved validation and chased Likes and comments, and due to my utter and complete lack of self-control I've been posting around three chapters every week (four, once!), for almost eight weeks. I knew that this was unsustainable in the long term. I've been spending almost all of my free time working on this fic just to keep up. But, earlier comments about self-control, etc, etc.
I've mostly been able to keep up with this. However, my backlog is starting to run a bit thinner, so I am going to cut back a little bit on posting. From now on, I'm going to try to make a commitment and restrict myself to posting only two chapters each week. Some weeks I might only post one, though I'll try to say so ahead of time if that's going to happen (and probably apologise profusely). So... in big bold letters to make it official:
From now on, chapters will be posted around 7.00 PM-ish AEST (Australian Eastern Standard Time), Mondays and Fridays.
So the next chapter will still drop in about 24 hours time, but after that I'm going to be slowing down, just a little bit.
Thanks for all your support with the story so far. I'm really glad people have (mostly) been enjoying it! I'm actually closing in on 2,000 followers/watchers in total across all the platforms I'm posting it on, so that's pretty awesome and exciting!