Do I Really Need This?
A knock at my door brings me from a nostalgic dream. My mother, father, and I were at the table for my fifth birthday, a few kids gathered around to watch me blow out the candles. With one wish, and a rather stupid one at that, I blow out all five. What did I wish for? That I could be special. Although my parents told me I was so often, I just didn't feel like it; I suppose not being special would have been a good thing.
According to the video in Tony's archives, it's my own fault my parents are gone; my own fault that my high school graduation, which had been publicly announced as a terrorist attack, was completely ruined. Every little thing I saw on that screen out there is my own fault.
"Lyra?"
"What, Bruce?"
"Is it alright if I come in?"
A smirk plays across my lips. "It's not like I'm naked, so I'm sure you're fine."
I could feel the amusement as the door opens to let in the good doctor. "I'm sure I am, too, but just in case…"
A sad smile graces my lips as Bruce walks up to the side of my bed where I lay and sits on it. He fiddles with his own hands, no doubt trying to find a place to start. I've got millions, so I could give him a hand, but I'm honestly just too lazy to do so right now. If anything, my guilt just means I need to be left alone right now; looks like I failed to drown it in alcohol last night.
"Listen, Lyra, alright?"
My head turns to Bruce as he smiles softly at me. "Alright," I mutter, somewhat like a child.
"There's nothing wrong with you. And you aren't a horrible person."
"Neither are you," I retort.
He flinches and a sadness crosses his face. "Yeah, well, I've been aware of my problem from the start, so my situation is a little different from yours right now."
"No it's not." He glances at me skeptically before returning to his hands. "You're human, just like me. You're not a monster that hides under the bed or in a closet. There aren't fangs anywhere on you. No claws take your nails' places. Every aspect of you is human; you just happen to be harder to kill than most."
His soft laugh makes me smile. "Yeah… Well you literally took my little pep talk for you and threw it right back in my face," he laughs while shaking his head. He then eyes me critically. "How did you do it?"
"Do what?" I ask with a soft smile.
"How did you manage to hide from SHIELD so well? According to Tony, most of the reports and information stored in the SHIELD network on you has only recently been collected, just after your graduation."
My face falls at the mention of my parents' death date. Bruce sees this and mutters an apology.
"My parents used to tell me that I was special, y'know?"
Bruce looks at me with understanding in his eyes. "Most parents do tell their kids that."
"They do… And they should. Each child is as special as the next, if not more. But I never really noticed the sadness and pain in their eyes when they said it. At least, not until I woke up in a hospital bed with my uncle hovering over me. That was a week after their deaths, and the entire time my head replayed every moment where they told me just how special I was."
"Your uncle?"
I nod and move past it. "The first time I visited their graves, I noticed the SHIELD motif on my father's grave. It makes sense, really. He and my uncle both worked for SHIELD. Uncle still does."
"Really? Which agent? I don't think I've met a Terry yet."
I shake my head with a laugh. "I changed my name when I lost my parents. My adoptive parents' names are Terry. Uncle thought it a better idea."
"Why did you need adoptive parents? You had graduated high school already."
"My adoptive father is my godfather. The adoptive mother, or bitch troll, as I like to call her," I mumble with a smirk, "married him a year after my godfather formally adopted me."
"Huh… And your uncle?"
"What about him?"
"Who is he? I think I'd have remembered meeting someone with your kind of eyes."
A smirk grows on my face and I laugh. "Sorry, jolly green. Not telling."
Bruce rolls his eyes, smiling softly. "No more Tony time for you."
"Hey! I heard that!"
The both of us burst into laughter as Tony's voice breaks over the intercom. While Bruce falls over onto the floor, I curl up into a ball on my bed.
"Ha ha, you two. Now both of you get out here! Fury's on conference call with us and it's time for a meeting!"
Uncle's face is on the flat screen… and damn does he look intimidating with that glare and scowl. As I enter the room, I see it only for a moment, until his eyes move to me and he sighs, his face finally easing up.
"Good of you two to finally join us."
"Sorry, U- Director." Tony looks at me with a smirk, and I glare back. "Shut it, Tin Man."
"I didn't say anything."
"You were thinking it!"
"Enough, you two."
I cross my arms and turn my head in a huff, somewhat like a child, but minus the puffed cheeks and pouting lip.
"Now, then. Thor has informed Dr. Selvig that he will be returning soon, and that Loki's punishment has been changed from what it had been."
Everyone perks up at this, y'know, minus me. I'm lost.
"What happened?" Clint asks, a dangerous glint in his eyes.
"Well," Uncle says, rubbing his temple. "I guess he saved them a great deal of trouble or something. My bet is he's trying to regain enough trust so he can get here and deal some damage. Unfortunately, according to Selvig's warning, the fools on Asgard have fallen for it. He's on his way to Earth."
The entire room bursts into shouts and yells about stupidity, ridiculousness, and Tony's many insulting compliments towards Asgardians. For some reason, Bruce seems to actually be more along the lines of thinking than anything, as he's only listening to the noise instead of making any.
"Quiet!" Uncle's loud voice demands through the speakers, shutting everyone up. "Thor is bringing his brother with him from Asgard. The punishment was not cancelled, merely amended. Lyra."
I look at my uncle, waiting for him to continue. "Be wary of this guy. You haven't seen the havoc he can wreck."
My head bobs with finality. Uncle never steers me towards a bad choice; not if he can help it. If he thinks this guy needs to be avoided, then avoided he'll be. The others stare at me for a moment, and I look back, flashing a bright smile.
"The rest of you!" Their eyes turn back to the screen. "Keep an eye out. Thor should be arriving sometime today, and I'd rather still have out newest recruit around tomorrow morning."
With that subtle order of 'protect her or else,' my uncle's video feed closes from the screen to show a list of files under my name. I stare at the one labeled 'HS Graduation Incident' for a few seconds before addressing Jarvis.
"Yes, ma'am?"
"Play 'HS Graduation Incident.'"
Everyone's breath hitches as the video plays once more, showing me exactly what I can do. It also gives me the last motivation I need.
"Bruce?" I whisper quietly.
He looks at me in worry. "Yeah?"
"How do I control it?"
His eyes divert from me, staring at the ground, and he can't seem to bring himself to answer me. It's rather unnerving, when the one person who can fit in your shoes can't give you an answer that they themselves should have, and need.
I'm on the roof of Stark Tower, laying back and watching the clouds pass by. My jumpsuit is rather tight, but Natasha insisted that I wear it all day, to get used to the feel of it. The necklace my uncle had given me yesterday is between my thumb and forefinger as I rub the smooth surface of the pendant. In the shape of a sparrow, I feel like it belongs there.
For some reason, my eyes squint at the clouds, recognizing the color shifting, before finally lightning strikes. And I could've sworn it was going to hit me! Thankfully, it strikes a few feet away, only making me squeal and jump up to my feet, tossing myself behind a vent in the ceiling. Looking up over the metal, I see two people, both wearing an identifying piece of clothing Tony had referred to as 'their mother's drapes and curtains.'
Slapping my hand over my face, I drop back behind the large vent hood before they see me. Trying to hold back my laugh, I just can't stop myself from falling over from my hiding spot in hysterical laughter. The memory is just too much. Tony, in a way of demonstration, had taken a set of curtains from a window and thrown them around his shoulders, strutting around the tower for a good half hour. As I curled up in a ball, holding my cramping stomach, Thor stares at me in bewilderment.
"Lady Lyra? What are you doing on the roof of the Tower of Stark?"
I just laugh harder, wheezing as I try to catch my breath. A chuckle reaches my ear, and I can tell someone find my current predicament rather amusing.
"Lady Lyra?"
Thor has crouched beside me as I suck in air, trying to restore the missing oxygen in my lungs. "Yes?"
"What's the matter?"
"Mother's, heh, drapes."
And I go back into laughter rolling back and forth at the memory once more.
"Well, so much for keeping her away from Loki," Clint mutters.
"Got to admit, she's got some really bad luck."
Since Thor and Loki had landed on the ceiling, Loki had found the newest SHIELD agent rather interesting. As a result, he's been asking her a great deal of questions about herself. This had led to numerous rescues by Steve and Bruce, who have officially become her escorts around the entirety of the towers. So far, it's only been two days with the demi-god present.
When the Asgardians first arrived, Tony had attempted to contact Fury so Loki would be placed in a cell much like the one that currently sits on the helicarrier in case Bruce… you know. But Thor had convinced Tony to merely set up a space separate from everyone on another floor, which also happened to be Thor's floor.
"And is there a reason you always wear that thing?"
Lyra walks into the room, Loki right behind her with Steve following with a frown on his face.
"It's her uniform!" the super soldier answers before dragging the girl away from a smirking demi-god.
Alright, maybe he only finds her interesting just so he can play with the Avengers' heads.
"Brother!" comes Thor's rather enormous voice. "Try this!" he says cheerily, shoving a green plastic bottle into the man's hands.
"What is it?" he asks with his eyes trained on Thor.
The blonde demi-god grins brightly. "A new Midgardian drink that Lady Lyra let me taste. It's delicious! Try it!"
"It's not new, Thor," she said from the couch, a tablet in her hands with a racing game turned on. "It's just Mountain Dew."
"She's right, Mr. Lightning," Tony smirks from a chair, a similar tablet in his hands, but with blueprints covering the screen. "That stuff's been around a while."
Thor frowns. "But it is not in Asgard, yes?"
Lyra smiles and rolls her eyes. "Yes, Thor. No one in Asgard has ever made it. Not unless they felt like breaking copyright laws."
Tony, with his drink held to his own mouth, chokes in laughter. "Too... good!"
With a victorious grin on her face, Lyra crashes into a fellow racer on the video game track, sending them out of bounds and out of the race. "I know."
Turns out, even demi-gods can get hyped up on sugar and caffeine. After the first bottle had disappeared into Loki's stomach, the brothers had begun a drinking contest with it. Which we all know is a very bad thing… a very bad thing.
Loki is currently hiding somewhere, setting up prank after prank, while his brother is practicing with his hammer, swinging left and right. Quite frankly, it's a little annoying to everyone else. I, on the other hand, just duck under the swing and keep walking. It amazes everyone how I manage it.
"Lyra! If you're so good at dodging, keep him from breaking my stuff!"
With a sigh, I place my tablet in the corner of the room to keep it safe, then turn to Thor. Taking a deep breath, I imagine my uncle's stern look and duplicate it. The result seems to terrify those hiding in the kitchen, meaning Tony, Bruce, and Steve. Next is my uncle's tone of voice, which I perfected when I got my first puppy.
"THOR!"
The demi-god flinches, stopping mid-swing and turning to me slowly, wide-eyed. When he sees my face, he leans back away from me. I snap my fingers and point down.
"Hammer," I say slowly. "Drop… Now."
And the hammer is dropped. My expression softens and I smile sweetly, whereas he swallows hard.
"Good! Now then, Tony?"
The man with the glowing chest looks at me in fear. "Yeah?" he replies quietly.
"Find a nice open space where our wonderful puppy can play with his toy, please."
And he disappears past the Asgardian, who's still leaning away from me, and down into his workshop, no doubt trying to find a space in the tower where a demi-god would do the least damage. I pinch the bridge of my nose and walk over to the hammer. Crouching down, I poke it, annoyed.
"Thor?"
"Yes, Lady Lyra?" I can see him squirming in my peripheral vision; he's still got a lot of energy to burn. "When Gryffindor finds you a space, try not to break too much, alright?" The demi-god nods to me. "And you can pick your hammer back up. But no swinging!"
He does as he's told, taking his hammer back into his grasp and holding it close. "Yes, ma'am."
"Now then," I mutter to myself as I stand once more. "Where'd your 'fun' brother go?"
Thor thinks for a moment, trying to recall where his brother went, before staring at me blankly, a little fear in his eyes. Heh… My mom was right; women do run the world. This guy is supposed to be damn near immortal and here I am scaring the daylights out of him. He should have a few more gray hairs by the end of the day.
"I, uh… am not sure, Lady Lyra."
With a sigh, I try to think about pranks and jokes. Where would a god of pranks and lies go? Frankly, there are just to many places in the tower… then I have a 'duh!' moment.
"Jarvis!"
"Yes, Miss Lyra?"
"Find Loki!"
"He's on the roof, Miss Lyra. Shall I inform him that you wish to speak with him?"
I roll my eyes. "Sure."
And it takes only a few moments for the man clad in a green t-shirt and black pants to appear in the room, another bottle of Mountain Dew in hand and a smirk on his face.
"You don't seem nearly as hyped up as your brother," I remark as I glare at him.
"Or course not!" he scoffs. "I know how to use energy effectively."
I roll my eyes and mutter under my breath, "Fucking sorcery."
Loki glares at me. "I heard that."
My tongue makes an appearance as I glare at him, then snatch the soda from his hands and walk towards the kitchen. "Stop drinking my soda! I need this stuff to stay awake!"
And with a toss into the fridge, I feel better knowing that Tony would restock tomorrow morning.
"La la, la la la la~."
Her voice carries through the halls and rooms of stark towers.
"La la, la la la la~."
And it attracts a number of people.
"I like your smile. I like you vibe. I like you sty-ile. But that's no why I love you!"
As soft footsteps enter the room, a few faces peer from behind corners of walls, watching feet as the bounce over the back of the couch.
"And I, I like the way you're such a stah-ar. But that's not why I love you.
"Hey! Do you feel~? Do you feel me~? Do you feel what I feel, too?
"Do you need… do you need me? Do you need me-eh-eh?"
Keeping an eye out on the balcony, Clint looks at an open window further along the building, hearing a girl's voice. Closing his eyes, he listens intently, memorizing the sound. On the roof, Loki, with a spellbook opened to a manipulation spell and a bird in front of him, loses his focus and his spell breaks. The bird he'd been controlling flies off as the sound reaches his ears as well.
"Yoouu're sooo beauuutiiifuull! But that's not why I love you!
"III'm not suuure yooou knooow that the reason I looove you is yooou
"Being yooou! Just yooou! Yeah the reason I looove you
"Is allll thaaat weee've been through!
"And that's why I looove yooou!
"La la, la la la la~.
"La la, la la la la~.
As her voice continues to fill the upper levels of Stark Tower, the unconscious Lyra, whos singing is by no means her own, sleeps peacefully as her voice carries. Unaware of this, the others listen in enthusiastically, waiting for her to finish before commenting.
Natasha leans against the wall of the hallway, swishing her finger back and forth to the song. Behind her, Tony and Bruce are listening with calm smiles, which is quite rare for the playboy. With his hands behind his head, Tony's ears pick up a joyful melody that reminds him of his girlfriend in Washington D.C. Bruce, with his hands stuffed in his pockets and his eyes closed as he listens, hears a more melancholy song, picking up the hidden meaning behind the upbeat notes; heartbreak and grief.
Thor, the only person who had been in the kitchen at the time, is listening intently, enjoying the sound as it brings back memories of people he loved and lost, along with thoughts of his home. For some reason, though, he feels more of a chill as he continues to listen, as if something is off.
"Shut her up!" Loki shouts, halting the girl's voice mid-chorus.
"Yo! Reindeer! What the hell!?" Tony yells. "She was just getting to the good part!"
"And sucking you all dry!"
Thor walks in, rubbing his temple. "He is right, Anthony."
Tony looks at Thor skeptically. "Oh, please! What could a little music do? If anything, it had been brightening my day!"
"Guys?" Natasha says at them, staring over the couch.
"You're a fool if you think that sound is harmless!" Loki shouts back.
"Guys."
"It is harmless," Bruce says evenly, trying to hold in his temper. "There's plenty of songs out there that have been proven to harm people. And that's because they have subliminal messaging! That was nothing but a simple love song!"
"Guys!"
"Bruce," Thor begins, still rubbing an aching head. "That song was not simple. Anything but simple! If Loki hadn't stopped her from continuing, we would all be on the floor unconscious by the end of it.
"Hello! Guys!"
"I highly doubt that," Clint says walking in. "And anyway, I think Natasha has been trying to get some attention!"
His glare and nod of his head turned everyone to the red headed assassin as she looks over the back of the couch.
"She's fast asleep!"
Loki glares at her. "Not possible! If she had been asleep, she wouldn't have been able to sing! Let alone use whatever sorcery-"
"Then see for yourself!" she counters, stepping away from the couch.
All the boys step up and look at Lyra as she snores peacefully, her headphones plugged into her ipod and sitting in her ears. The song playing ends and switches to the next one as the screen's icon for the album changes.
"She's asleep?" Tony whispers.
Loki looks bewildered. "That's not possible. No one should be able to sing like that when asleep. Talking is possible, but singing?"
Bruce looks at the girl carefully then looks up to a camera. He taps Tony on the shoulder and points to it, sending a clear message.
"Everyone! To the lab!"
And with that, the scientists turn away and rush down the staircase on the other side of the room. Once they disappear beneath the floor, the others follow them. Loki is the last to reach the steps, stopping to glare at the feet hanging over the back of the couch.
"Not possible."
"You're telling me that Agent Lyra sang in her sleep?"
Director Nick Fury is at his captains post on the helicarrier watching a screen with all the Avengers team plus one dark haired demi-god. Stark nods definitively.
"That's right, eyepatch. Sang in her sleep. Reindeer seems to think she was trying to kill us."
Nick Fury's eye twitches at the mention of killing. His niece has done that before, although he knows for a fact that she didn't actually do it. The girl had been diagnosed by a SHIELD doctor for multiple personality disorder. And the girl had been given medication to handle it as well. That other half of his niece shouldn't be a problem.
"Alright… Did anyone happen to look to see if she took medication?"
Everyone tensed and they looked from one another, until finally Banner stepped forward.
"She does, sir. But I'm pretty sure she's out. The last time I saw the pill case, she only had one day's worth left."
Nick Fury sighs deeply. "Then get it refilled."
"Yo, eyepatch!"
The director stared at Stark for a moment, before finally giving in, pinching the bridge of his nose. "What, Stark?"
"How 'bout you let us in on princess's little secret. Why on earth would she need medication?"
"Bruce and Lyra can answer that for you. Now I've got-"
"Not so fast!" Stark interrupts. "What about her family?"
Nick Fury begins to twitch. The subject of family is not a good one to any person with surname of Fury. There's always been a lot of pain involved with it. That's why he had his niece change her official surname, even though she still goes by the original one.
"What about them?" he says slowly.
"She said her uncle works for shield, but not under the name Terry," Bruce informs him. "We figured we should let the man know that his niece is having some… issues."
"I'll be sure to let him know."
"Who is he, Fury?" Stark says with a smirk. "Which particular agent is it?"
"Drop it, Stark!" Nick Fury snaps.
Everyone on the other side of the live feed stares incredulously. Snapping from the director of SHIELD is normal, but not that kind of a snap. Usually it takes a lot more prodding from Stark to get to the breaking point, but this time only took a few, and measly, pokes.
Stark puts his hands up in surrender, then asks one more question. "What's so important about her, Fury? Why protect her like you are?"
Everyone on the other side of the feed stares from Tony Stark to Nick Fury, back and forth with their eyes. Glaring at the scientist, Nick Fury closes the feed and curses under his breath. He'd given a fair bit away; his niece's safety and health is starting to wear his mask thin. He'd do anything to protect what little family he has left, and considering that happens to be a girl with personality issues and a rather raging power, more desperate measure were going to have to be taken.
"You shouldn't have done that, Tony," Bruce mutters.
"Done what?" he asks innocently.
"Pushed him," Natasha says blandly.
"Fury is protecting her for a reason, we get that," Bruce continues. "But whatever that reason is, it's obviously personal. Ah!" He holds up his hand when Tony opens his own mouth to speak. "I get it! You want to know just what Fury's up to! After the whole tesseract nonsense, I can see that with ease. Believe me.
"But you didn't see her when she talked about her own family. It's almost as if she has none left. The look on her face seemed as if she had given up on having one. If her uncle is all that's left, and neither of them are going to tell, then it's probably best to drop it."
"But that's just the thing!" Tony shouts, throwing his hands into the air. "We can't just drop it! According to Rudolph and Bolt, that girl could've killed us by singing! I want to know why!"
Natasha sighs and rubs her temple. Clint taps her on the shoulder and nods to the screen behind Tony.
"Are you sure?" she asks, eyeing him carefully.
From his perch on the lab table he can see the screen's camera watching the girl in the living room sleep. Taking another second to think, he nods to his partner.
"Better now than when she's caused damage."
Tony stares at the two SHIELD agents, curious. "Whatcha two talking about?"
Natasha moves forward and pushes Tony out of the way, opening up a system on the computer and logging onto the SHIELD network. There, she opens up a personal folder labeled 'Hazard Information,' continuing into it and opening numerous other folders. Finally she reaches a particular one labeled 'Lyra Terry.'
"She's got a lot of folders," Bruce comments.
Natasha shrugs it off. "She's got quite the interesting background."
And she clicks the file to pull up a window with multiple document, records, and personal information. She clicks on a particular file, a word processing document labeled 'Hazardous Situations,' and flings the mouse towards the holographic projector. There, the computer processes the document's words and context to create simulations.
"First off, she's not telekinetic," Natasha starts. "Whatever it is that she does is with her mind, but not so much with the objects themselves."
She flicks a small figure in the hologram, the entire simulation starting. One person stands on a 360 degree stage, surrounded by other figures. With a raised hands, the figures around the stage start to drop and snap into unrecognizable forms.
"Whenever her power activates, it takes hold of something that present in everything that exists and bends it to her will. She can collect it to herself, causing that glow I'm sure we all noticed in that graduation video, or scatter it everywhere, causing the explosion that stopped the camera recording."
Tony Stark watched as small dots gathered around the figure, the spread out like an explosion, sending the disfigured forms of other holographic people flying. "So she's pretty much a human bomb?"
"As far as we can tell," Natasha says with a sigh and a shrug.
"Director Fury doesn't believe that's all, though," Clint says, still on the lab table. "He thinks there's something else to her ability, something that was missed during a physical examination a week after her graduation."
"Clint, you know most of the other agents, right?" Bruce asks.
The archer nods. "I know almost all of them, memorized nearly every name and face. It's the new ones I don't have."
"Can you remember anyone with her kind of eyes? Any agent that resembles her in the slightest."
Clint closes his eyes and thinks before they snap open. "Only one."
"And that person would be…?" Tony pushed, trying his best to hide the smirk. He already knows.
"Nathaniel Fury."
Natasha rubs her forehead. So much for that secret.
"Who's Nathaniel Fury?" Bruce asks.
Clint seems to shake, as if haunted by something. "An amazing agent. He was supposed to be promoted to director, but he died a few weeks before that could happen. Our current director needed a body double to help with the work load. That's why his brother was going to be co-director with him."
"His brother?" Thor finally speaks up. "I understand that names can be similar here on Midgard, but surely you do not mean the brother of Nick Fury?"
Clint place his hands on the back of his neck, pulling at a particular spot as if trying to stretch it. "That's right. The director we all know and love."
Tony snickers. "Our dear director has a niece. And she upstairs on the couch."
Natasha glares at him. "Way to go, Stark! Are you happy now?"
"You knew?" Bruce asks, a small amount of shock present.
"Yeah," she says, rubbing her eyes. "I went and packed her bags for her. I'm the only other girl that would be a constant for her, so I was told before I even met her who she was. I was also told that Tony knew, and was the main reason she's now forced to be a part of SHIELD."
Tony holds his hands up. "Me? What'd I do?"
"You broke into the director's personal files! He kept every record of her locked away in there, until you dragged it all out and onto your own mainframe! And you left the door into his personal files wide open! The board got into it, found the files, and ordered her confined until further notice."
Tony backs up a bit. "Hey! She's not forced to be here! She can leave whenever she wants."
"No, she can't, Tony," Bruce sighs. "You've seen the videos. They're going to treat her like they treat me. If she tries to leave the organization now, she'll be hunted down, locked up and treated like a lab rat for the rest of her life. I doubt even her uncle could protect her from that."
Loki smiles a little. "I wonder if you fools have noticed…" Everyone looks up at him. "I wonder if you've noticed that you're little pet has disappeared from her seat on the couch."
He points towards the door, where a girl with bright orange hair, shining green eyes, and wearing a black jumpsuit is paled to almost ghostly white. Natasha doesn't waste a moment, dragging Clint with her. At the door, she turns the girl around and the two of them lead her upstairs.
"Well done," Loki smirks. "Now you've gone and terrified her."
My body won't stop shaking as the thought of needles and machines and chemicals plague my mind. Natasha just left to get me some sleep aids, leaving me a Clint alone. He looks haunted, as if he did something terrible and could never ask forgiveness. Me? I'm barely staying together myself. The thought of being a lab rat isn't a good one.
Sitting on the edge of my bed, I stare at my hands as they quiver on my legs. My breathing is shaky, and I'm sure I'll be oxygen deprived if I don't get it under control. The entirety of my body feels cold, as if the blood in my veins had stopped pumping through my limbs. It's enough pain that I can't control whatever's inside me; enough pain that it killed my parents. Now I have to deal with the pain that I'm no longer free to pursue whatever I wish.
Steve walks into my room, a face I haven't seen all day. His suit is on and his shield on his arm, so I'm assuming Fury had him go on some mission. As I look up at him, I can feel myself about to cry. When the man of America looks at Clint, he frowns deeply.
"I get that I missed something, but now it seems a bit important," he mutters, looking back to me. "What wrong?" he asks, moving over and sitting on my bed.
"She heard us while we were in the lab talking."
I lean against Steve, trying to gain some form of warmth. My tears won't come out, even though I'm trying to will them out as they build in my eyes.
"What exactly was so stressful about talking?" Steve's frown deepens.
"She's like Banner, Steve," is all Clint can say before dropping his head in his hands and silencing himself.
"Lyra?" Steve asks me.
"Yeah?" I ask, my voice breaking.
"What did they say?"
"I'm a trapped rat," I sob. "I'm no longer free to do what I wish with my life. And to top it off, I'm a human bomb just waiting to go off."
When she finally falls asleep, after taking a few sleeping pills from a bottle Natasha brought in, the three people left in the room talk quietly.
"So, she can never leave SHIELD?"
They both nod solemnly. "She's just like Banner in that aspect," Clint mutters. "If either of them tried to leave SHIELD, one way or another, they'd be captured and tested on, although I'm sure they'd be a little more liberal with her. There isn't anywhere near as much information on her as there is on Banner."
"We can't leave her alone. Not in this state," Natasha whisper sadly, moving some hair from the girl's face. "She looks like a little kid like this."
"Motherly instinct, huh?" Steve mutters in admiration. "I guess we'll have to be her new family, then."
"I'll stick with her for now," Clint mumbles, leaning back against the wall.
"Are you sure, Clint?" Natasha asks, worry etched into her face. "I know how much it hurt when Nathan died."
"It's fine Nat," he assures her. "It's the least I could do for the man. I don't know why Fury didn't just tell us, though. He should've known we all would've gone into protective mode."
Steve laughs softly. "Really? I wonder about us sometimes. We can be rather cruel to one another."
Natasha smiles softly. "Maybe, but we always bounce back from it, don't we?"
"Just like a real family," Clint points out. "She'll fit in with us just fine."
With those words ringing in the silence, Natasha and Steve nod and leave the room. Clint looks at the girl lying on the bed, thinking about his regrets towards the dead. A memory of a dear friend and mentor fills his head.
"It's not just your fault, kid. There are plenty you don't know about your parents before the ceremony started… Gotta say, though. Now that I think about it," he murmurs as he slides down wall to sit on the floor, "You looked pretty damn good in that dress, didn't you?"
Watching her sleeping form, he lets himself drift off to his own sleep.
I remember getting up and doing something. But I don't remember what. There was this sensation of lifting something heavy, then something else light. Then moving to a new place and falling over, just to back to sleep. And what's truly astonishing is that I actually don't really care that I'm never able to leave SHIELD now that I'm a part of it. Even if they want to test on me, I won't stop them. If it helps my uncle, the only family I have left, I'll do anything
Slowly, I force my tired eyes open to see a familiar face next to me. Curled up under the blankets of my bed, I tiredly watch Clint as he snores softly, his head lolled towards me. He seems rather content right now, so I'm not going to worry about the screaming in my head that wants me to cry like a little girl. He's an adult, I'm an adult. We're responsible.
