Chapter 7 Time Away

The next day, I decided to lay low in my dorm, not wanting to draw attention to myself.

Natasha went to breakfast, telling Vision and Clint what my plan was.

Like I knew what would happen, Vision decided to come join me, not wanting me to be totally alone for the day.

Monday morning, I went through my classes, but had to go to Women's Studies due to a test. To bring less attention to myself and hopefully not get Magicseer's attention, I sat in the back corner, as far away from my usual seat as possible, giving the excuse when asked by the teacher when she came to me that I wasn't feeling too well and that I just wanted to get the test over with.

I did my test quickly but accurately, turning it in and then quickly going back to my dorm, usually waiting for Natasha and Wanda to finish, but this time just wanting to get out of there.

As I walked, I felt like someone was watching me. I glanced around every so often, trying to shake off the feeling.

Suddenly an arrow landed by my foot, exploding and sending me flying into a tree.

I groaned as I got to my feet slowly, looking up and seeing Bullseye on top of Young Hall.

"You tricked us," Bullseye said as he jumped down, the building being five stories tall yet him not getting hurt from the fall. "You aren't dead, and your 'heart' is giving my sister more problems than before."

I took a step back, knowing that I had to get out of here as quickly as possible. "I-I don't know what you're talking about, or who you think I am," I began innocently, pretending to be someone else, stepping away from him. "I'm sorry for your sister, but I can't do anything to help you." I began to walk away, planning on hanging out outside Vision's class until it finished in about twenty minutes, but Bullseye grabbed my wrist tightly, digging his nails into the skin enough to draw blood.

"Quit faking, Rosalina," Bullseye growled, tightening his grip slightly, causing me to wince. "I know you set up that trap. I tried to tell the others, but they didn't listen. I'll use you to show them that I'm not lying."

I looked down, knowing that the odds of me getting help right now was slim unless Natasha and Wanda finished their test quickly. "You're going to have a difficult time, then," I said softly.

"Oh, and why's that?" Bullseye asked in a daring voice.

I didn't reply, only turn to him and cast a stunning spell at him. As soon as he released my wrist, I took off running, not wanting a fight to happen.

"I've gotta get into Young. By the time I get there, his class should be getting out."

I ducked as an arrow flew by my head, casting a spell to protect me as it exploded.

"You won't get away that easily!" Bullseye called. "We'll find you again! Just wait!"

His words only made me run faster, darting into Young but not slowing down as I climbed up the steep stairs to the third floor. A couple times, I tripped, but I kept going, determined to not stop.

I reached the right floor, going to the bench and sitting down, waiting. I looked at my watch, seeing I still had five minutes.

I took a deep breath, trying to steady my rapid pulse. I looked at my wrist where Bullseye had grabbed it, seeing that it was red and still had blood running down it. Gingerly, I covered the cuts with my hand, but I winced as I realized how tender the skin was.

"What the heck was on Bullseye's fingernails when he grabbed me? Normally cuts don't feel this way. And I'm starting to not feel too well."

I closed my eyes, taking a few slow breaths to calm myself down.

"You're overreacting, Rosalina. You're high on adrenaline and you know that enhances your senses, especially now."

I felt a hand being placed on my shoulder and jumped, opening my eyes and seeing that it was Vision. "Vision, you scared me," I said.

"Sorry," Vision said. "Are you alright? Your wrist is bleeding." He set his bag on the ground and sat down next to me, looking at my wrist.

"I'll tell you in the dorm," I said.

Vision nodded, getting to his feet and grabbing not only his bag, but my bag as well before I could get it, putting them both on.

"Vision, you don't have to do that," I sighed as I also go up.

"I know," Vision replied. "But I want to."

I smiled as we held hands, going down the stairs once everything cleared up and walking to Lois, though I was constantly aware of my surroundings as I walked by where Bullseye had ambushed me.

When we reached my dorm room, Vision set my bag on my bed and turned to me.

"Bullseye knows that it was a fake," I said. "That we set them up and this is only making his sister worst. He ambushed me after my test. I tried to play it off that I didn't know who he was or what he meant, but before I could leave, he had grabbed my wrist, dug his nails into me." I looked at my wrist now, grabbing a paper towel and wetting it with the water from my water bottle before cleaning off the now-dried blood, the skin no longer tender and me no longer feeling sick. "He said he'll tell the others, and if he has my blood on his nails, then he can do a DNA analysis to prove that he did have an encounter with me. Which is only going to make it worst for our situation."

"How did he find out?" Vision said, confused.

I shook my head. "No idea," I replied. "All I know is that he knew it was fake. And now he's furious with us, mostly me. When it comes to the care of his sister, he's exactly like Clint. And that makes it all the worst for us." I started to grab a pair of gloves to put over the cuts but Vision walked to me and gently took the gloves from me.

"If you cover your hands, people would take notice," he said when I looked up at him. "And it could be the Dark Avengers taking notice as well. Besides, they're hardly noticeable. There's no need to have theses." He put them where I had gotten them from.

I looked at the cuts, see that they were, indeed, small, and nodded in agreement. "Alright," I said. "I'll keep them off."

"Good," Vision said, taking one of my hands. He kissed the back of it. "What should we do while the others are at dinner?"

"I was thinking about going into Lake Forest and walking around, seeing what there is," I said. "We haven't done that much."

"Then let's do that," Vision said. "Just the two of us. Away from the school for a couple hours."

For that night, it was quiet and peaceful, though I was constantly watching our backs since I didn't trust Bullseye to leave us alone.

Afterwards, Vision walked me up the steps to Lois. "You have homework to get done," he said. "Do it. I'll see you in the morning."

"I will," I promised. "Night Vision. I love you."

"Love you, too, Rose," Vision replied. He waited until I was inside before walking back to Blackstone.

I went to the stairwell to go up the stairs but paused as I saw a few people in the lounge, talking. I felt a chill come over me as I noticed two of them: Magicseer and Bullseye.

I hurried up the stairs, hoping they didn't notice me, and went into my room, where Natasha was working on an essay.

"Welcome back, Kid," she said without looking back. "How was your time out with Vision?"

"Fine, fine," I said, going to my bag and getting out a textbook to read, trying to take my mind off of seeing the brother-sister duo in the lounge and hoping that they didn't see me or actually live here, that a friend was having them over.

"You're rushed in talking," Natasha observed, turning to look at me. She immediately saw the red on my wrist and got to her feet, walking next to me and leaning on my bed slightly. "What happened? Those marks better not be from Vision."

"No, they're not," I said honestly. "He'd never do that to me."

"Then who do I have to beat up?" Natasha asked.

I smirked internally, glad that she always had my back. "Bullseye," I said.

"What?" Natasha said, confused.

As I opened my textbook to the right page, I told Natasha what had happened after I got out of the test.

"You should've waited in the lobby for me or Wanda," Natasha said.

"I know that now, but I didn't want to risk Magicseer seeing me, since I'm supposed to be dead," I said. "But now I'm really dead, because the game is up." I saw how badly my hands were shaking, placing them flat on the desk.

"Rosalina," Natasha said sternly. "You're not going to die. They're not going to get a hold of you. Trust me."

I nodded slowly, taking some deep breaths to stop my shaking, but to no avail.

"Don't think too much about it, Kid," Natasha said. "Just make sure that you aren't alone, like what you have been doing. Today, it was just a wrong place, wrong time situation. That's it. It won't happen again."

"I'll try not to worry," I said as I sat down in my chair.

Natasha patted my back and then continued her homework, occasionally glancing at me, worried.

XXX

The entire week saw me constantly dodging all interactions with anyone but the Avengers, them being the only ones I knew I could entirely trust.

I knew I was paranoid: everywhere I looked, I thought I saw Bullseye, watching me intently, but the others said that either no one was there or it wasn't him, a different student that looked nothing like him.

I was definitely glad that I shared all my classes with at least one person, or else I thought I would go insane, not that I was doing a good job at that, already.

It got to the point that Clint and Vision both suggested I take some time off of school, to head to the Avengers base nearby for a few days in order to settle myself down.

At first, I wasn't going to agree, thinking about how far behind I'd get in my classes and how stressed I would become, but when they said that they would make sure I got the notes needed for my classes and send any work my way, I decided to do so.

The only thing was that I would have to walk to the train station, a fifteen minute walk, and ride the train north to the right stop, a thirty minute ride, alone, and they worried that I might be followed and ambushed before I reached the station where an agent would meet me. And no one could go with me because they had to cover for me to say why I was gone, to make sure that no one got suspicious.

Natasha watched me as I packed for the few days I would be gone. "By the time you're back, everything will have settled down," she said.

"I hope," I replied, zipping my bag closed.

"And if you need help, contact us," Natasha added. "One of us, most likely Vision or Clint, will meet you when you come back."

I nodded, shouldering my bag. "I'm heading down," I said. "Tell me when it's all clear."

"Will do," Natasha said. She gave me a quick hug before I walked down the stairs and to the lobby where Clint and Vision were waiting.

"Be careful, alright?" Clint said as he came to me, hugging me. "I have only one sister, and I don't want to lose her.

"I'll be careful," I promised as I returned the hug before turning to Vision, who also hugged me.

"We'll make sure you don't fall behind," Vision said. "And we'll take off as much suspicion around you as possible."

"Thanks Vision," I said, pulling away after a moment. "I'll contact you when I'm at the station, and again once I'm at the other one."

"Good," the two said at the same time, as if they were twins.

I chuckled and waited for Natasha's signal before I went outside and started walking without looking back.

Once I was away from the school, I became more alert of my surroundings, glancing around me every so often.

I saw the park I needed to walk through to get to the train station and took a deep breath: there was houses all over the place. I'd be safe there.

Before I crossed the street to get there, however, someone suddenly grabbed me from behind, covering my mouth so that I couldn't scream.

A knife was pressed against my neck and a familiar voice growled in my ear, "Move and I'll make sure you suffer before we kill you."

I felt a chill pass over me as I forced myself to ease up, discretely pressing a button on my watch that I had upgraded to double as a communicator.

"You thought you could win," Magicseer hissed as she walked in front of me, giving me a dark look. "Thought your little 'trick' would work. I will admit, you had me fooled, but once I had woken up after they put 'your' heart in me, I knew right away that it wasn't the real you. Now, you'll pay. Brother, let's go. We have what we need."

"Stop!" a voice called and Magicseer was struck by a beam.

I elbowed Bullseye and pulled away from him before he could use the knife on him, stepping back as Vision came next to me.

"Run," Vision said. "I can hold them off until the others get here. Miss your train, we'll lose our chance."

I nodded and started running to the train station, ducking to avoid an arrow from Bullseye.

Glancing over my shoulder, I saw that Magicseer was down for the count after receiving that hit.

Looking forward, I saw the train station, forcing myself to slow down and look calm.

I turned back to see if I could see the fight, but I couldn't, so I just hoped that Vision was alright.

Hearing a train horn, I saw my train coming into the station and rushed to board it, getting my ticket stamped and taking a seat the farthest away from everything as possible.

Once the train started moving, I took another deep breath, willing my pulse to go down and return to normal.

The walk was done, but the train ride would be the hardest part of the trip.

I listened to music during the ride, constantly watching the people walking down the aisle as I read a book, pretending to be engrossed in it.

When I got to the right station, I got off and looked around for the agent.

"Rosalina Barton," a familiar voice said behind me.

I gasped and spun around. "T'Challa!" I exclaimed softly, keeping my voice low to not draw attention. "I wasn't told I would be meeting you!"

"Indeed," T'Challa replied as we walked away from the station. "They didn't tell you who because if for some reason I couldn't be here, you wouldn't get suspicious. We have not talked since the incident between Tony and Steve, since the party was cut short."

I nodded. "Yea, it has been awhile," I agreed. "And a lot has happened since then."

"Indeed," T'Challa said.

"So who else is at this base?" I asked.

"Just agents, trainees," T'Challa said. "I oversee this one, make sure nothing goes wrong, and if we are expecting company, I go get them if possible. When you had came before, I was out on mission, so unfortunately, I wasn't able to meet you."

"Understandable," I said.

We continued to talk until we reached the base, going inside.

T'Challa showed me where I would stay and I contacted Vision to see how he was doing, since I assumed the fight would be over by now.

I was relieved when he answered, saying that he was fine.

Bullseye had gotten Magicseer and ran off as soon as Clint has arrived as backup, and since then, they haven't heard of them around campus.

"I don't know whether to be relieved or worried," I said.

"You don't worry about it," Vision said. "You left for a reason: to settle down and allow the stress to leave you. Worrying isn't going to do anything here."

"Alright, alright," I said. "I'll try not to worry about it."

"Good," Vision said. "You need a break. Put your feet up or something."

"I think I'm just going to train," I said. "That always helps me calm down, and at the school, we don't really have much of an opportunity to do so."

"That's true," Vision said. "Don't overexert yourself."

"I won't," I promise. I looked at the time. "You have class in ten minutes on south. If you're still on north, you better start heading over."

"I'm going now," Vision said. "I'll talk to you later."

"Alright," I said. "Love you."

"Love you, too," Vision said.

We cut connection and I got my fan from my bag, knowing that I still needed time to specialize on it.

I slid it into my belt and walked out, trying to find the training room.