I'm sorry for the delay - I struggled with parts of this chapter.
Chapter 10 – Fears and Faults
They had been in Wakanda for five weeks. It had been calm and relaxing for all of them. Peter and Cooper had finished their tree house and now spent most of their days in it. Wanda had been through several shelves of T'Challa's library and had even begun to privately – and tentatively – practice her magic again.
Her disposition was a sunny one that morning. She walked down the main staircase, Cassie and Lila on either side, holding her hands and telling her all of the exciting things they had planned for their walk in the gardens. They were particularly excited about the new bugs they were discovering under T'Challa's stones and on his plants. Some of the gardeners had figured out their game and were saving the really interesting ones for them. They were passing the front corridor when she heard a voice that made her freeze. The little girls didn't notice and kept talking. Wanda motioned for them to wait in the hall and peeked into the main parlor. Natasha, Steve, and T'Challa were all standing in a loose formation around the room, staring at Tony Stark with stone expressions as he spoke in his traditional enthusiastic story-telling manner.
Wanda felt her heart sink. Every bit of progress she'd made since Pietro's death of not hating Tony Stark had been wiped out when he'd had her put in prison. In Australia, she'd still been too stunned to really consider his presence. Now, she was not so lucky. She quickly turned around and led the girls outside, ignoring Steve's voice as he called after her. The next few hours were spent following the two little girls around, watching them explore and listening to them tell stories about the things they found. They were enchanted by this new world; Wanda wished she could be too. She unfortunately couldn't stop thinking about the world outside. Tony infringing upon the peace they'd found could not be good – and was making her sick to her stomach.
Steve, Natasha, and Laura found them later in the afternoon – Laura was – probably at Natasha's request - looking for Lila and offered to take Cassie as well. Wanda waved as the girls did and watched them go. She began walking away from the palace toward the outer gardens. The other two followed. They eventually caught up with her and the three walked down the path together with Wanda in the center.
"We didn't know he was coming," Natasha told her. "We would have warned you."
"I know," Wanda answered evenly. "What does he want?"
Natasha shook her head. "Honestly, I think he's lonely. He claims he's here to talk to T'Challa about some new weapons system – but I don't really buy it."
"How long is he staying?"
"Wanda, you don't have to talk to Tony – " Steve started to say.
"Well, thank you for that permission," Wanda snapped. She was angrier than even she realized. She hugged her arms across her chest, her pace quickening. Not that she could outwalk – or outrun – Captain America or the Black Widow.
"I know it seems like the accords are Tony's fault," Natasha said calmly. "But Wanda, the government has been putting them together for years – even before you were discovered – it would have happened either way." She paused. "I signed too," she reminded her.
"You let Steve and Bucky go," Wanda reminded her. "Tony watched while they electrocuted me and then loaded us into vans like animals. That's hard to forget." They didn't try to argue with her. She was still in pain and – although Tony couldn't be blamed for the accords – Wanda's feelings also couldn't be discounted.
That night, Natasha ordered dinner to the suite for Wanda. She dangled black stones from her ears that matched her sweater and skirt. She dabbed on a bit of perfume and called to Steve – who was still in the bathroom shaving – that she'd meet him in the living room. Peter was dressed for dinner – wrinkling his previously-perfectly-pressed pants and button down while sprawling ungracefully across a sofa, a sheath of papers raised above his head while he read. It was a research paper on flexible electronics that Natasha had seen sitting on the coffee table earlier that afternoon.
"You sure you don't want me to stay?" She asked Wanda, who was curled into a chair by the fireplace. Steve had built and banked a large fire and Wanda was nestled into a blanket while she read a dystopian novel. She looked up at Natasha.
"I can eat by myself for one night without having a nervous breakdown," she said with a touch of snark.
"I never said you couldn't," Natasha answered with a forgiving smile. "I asked if you were sure."
"I'm fine," Wanda promised. "Go – be social. I have no intention of leaving the suite."
"Ok," Natasha said, her hand falling to Wanda's shoulder as Steve appeared, looking quite dapper in his shirt and tie. Although it felt weird to dress up for dinner, it was held in a royal dining room on the nights when T'Challa hosted them, so it was only polite. Peter begged to differ, but he was largely ignored. The dinner table was full, with all of the Bartons, Scott and Cassie, Sam, Sharon, Tony, and T'Challa himself.
Tony noticed Wanda's absence immediately. "No Wanda?" He asked. Natasha shook her head – but he couldn't let it go; he was Tony, after all. "She'd didn't want to say hello?"
"She's tired," Natasha said – which was entirely true – she hadn't been sleeping – but entirely not the reason. Tony smirked in a way that indicated how little he believed her.
Once dinner was over, T'challa invited everyone to join him in the library for dessert and games. Natasha played a game of chess with Cooper before excusing herself from the group to return to the suite.
Wanda had moved to the sofa and the fire was dying. Natasha went to her bedroom and changed into lounge pants and a soft sweater before returning to the living room and sitting on the other end of the sofa.
"You doing ok?"
"Fine," Wanda told her, looking up from her book. She looked at Natasha's expression and sighed. "I hate him," she said sadly. I know it's not rational," she added somberly.
"Emotions often aren't," Natasha said. "You don't have to like Tony – you don't have to talk to him. But hating him – or fearing him – that's only going to hurt you. Those kinds of feelings tear away at you, little by little. You deserve better than that."
"I don't know how to get past it. I'm angry when I even think about him."
Natasha shrugged. "Yeah, he used to piss me off a lot too," she agreed.
"What changed?"
"I've mellowed with age," Natasha mused.
"This is you mellow? That makes it frightening to imagine you before," Wanda informed her.
Natasha smiled. "You have no idea," she agreed. "But seriously, I think part of the reason I can handle Tony now – is that I know him better. He does stupid things – frequently – but his heart is always in the right place. His intentions are always good."
"What is it they say about the road to hell?" Wanda asked wryly.
Natasha smiled at her. "It's okay if it takes time – just do me a favor and don't spent too much energy on Tony." Wanda nodded, agreeing that she would try. Natasha stole half of Wanda's blanket to cover her feet, which she brought up to rest next to her. She grabbed the remote and turned on the television that hung on the wall in a gilded frame. Wanda set her book aside as the older woman searched for a movie. Peter and Steve returned and changed into lounge clothes in just enough time to join them for a Lord of the Rings marathon.
Tony attempted to speak with Wanda several times in the next few days, but no one would allow him in the suite – which was now kept locked – and she refused to come out. "I want to apologize." He said with a roll of his eyes as Natasha came out into the hall later that week, locking the door behind her.
"She's not ready for your apology," the redhead told him. "Give it time, Tony. Stalking her is not endearing you to her."
A few days later, Wanda was still keeping herself sequestered in the suite to avoid Tony. Steve walked into the living room to see her reading a book that he could have sworn she'd finished already. "Is that book really good, or are you avoiding the library?" Steve asked.
"Must it be one or the other?" Wanda asked.
"Wanda, you can't hide in here forever."
"I am not hiding," she informed him. "Everyone knows where I am."
Steve sighed. "Come on – let's go outside. The rain had finally let up – let's go for a walk. I haven't seen the eastern side of the gardens yet."
Wanda considered him. "Are you going to leave me alone if I say no?"
"No," he said, grinning. "Go – you need boots. It's muddy."
Wanda shook her head but set her book aside and went to her room to change into clothing she wasn't afraid of getting covered in mud. They walked through the gardens – and right to an entrance of the jungle. Wanda shook her head as she saw Steve considering it.
"No," she told him.
"Come on," he said. "You haven't been in there yet. It's kind of awesome."
"I'm fine with the gardens, thank you," Wanda assured him.
"Come on," Steve said. "I'll show you the treehouse Peter and Cooper are working on – it's pretty amazing." Wanda hesitated. The treehouse was far enough on the edge of the jungle that you could see it from the palace – she and Natasha had watched them working on it several times.
"Fine," she agreed. She followed him into the jungle. It was as amazing as he'd promised. The flowers were more plentiful and the colors richer than they were in the garden. They made it to the treehouse and Steve showed her everything they had been working on – there were several different types of entrances. They explored it and the jungle for the rest of the afternoon until Steve suggested that if they didn't head back – they would be late for dinner.
After more than a week of hiding from Tony, Wanda was tired of it. She didn't want to eat by herself in the suite again. She knew she could ask someone to stay back – and they would – but that felt childish. Instead, she dressed for dinner and walked down to the dining room with Natasha. The meal went fairly well – it gave her time to speak with Sam, who sat to her right and Laura, who was across from her. She was going to head back to the suite after the meal, but Lila and Cassie begged her to come to the library and play a game with them. She acquiesced, moving with everyone else to the library for dessert and games – which had become a new mini-tradition.
She was focused on playing with the girls, so she missed the beginning part of the conversation. But as voices raised, she turned her attention to Tony, who was on the other side of the room conversing with Sam and Steve.
"You guys have really lost your sense of humor," Tony said. "Did you leave it on the raft?" Sam and Steve were not amused – and their scowls showed it. A tremor ran through Wanda and her eyes momentarily lit red with anger.
"How dare you joke," Wanda said, her voice barely traveling across the room. It took Tony a moment to even realize she was speaking to him. Natasha ended her conversation with Sharon and T'Challa and crossed the carpet, standing next to Wanda, placing a hand on her shoulder in warning. The younger woman shrugged off the attempt to quiet her. "He thinks it is funny, what they did in that prison," she hissed angrily.
"Wandzia, this is not the time," Natasha told her in a calm, quiet tone. "Little ears," she reminded her in Russian, head gesturing with a nod to Cassie, Lila, and Cooper. Peter had been teaching Scott chess and was now watching the conversation, his eyes a bit wider than normal.
"Little witch, you better listen to your new mommy there and mind your own business. The grownups are talking." He raised his glass of bourbon, tipping it at her.
"Tony," Steve warned. "Don't start."
"No – seriously – she has been judging me all week for something that she did to herself. I didn't ask her to break the law – in fact – I tried to protect her. But now I'm the bad guy?" He scoffed.
"Stop, Tony," Steve said.
"Tony, that's enough," Natasha threw in.
"She's the one they're afraid of," he said, pointing to Wanda. "You think the Sokovia Accords were written for the rest of us? They didn't appear until after the powers of Scarlet Witch were revealed. Fastest legislation anyone's ever come up with in modern times," he scoffed. "Controlling or containing her," he said, his voice getting louder, "was the purpose. And they're not going to stop until they have her."
"It's time to call it a night," Clint said, loudly interrupting the argument. Laura and Clint gathered up the children and she led them out the door. Cooper looked angry – Lila was crying. Cassie glared at Tony as she walked by, her hand in Laura's. Once the children were gone, the atmosphere amped right back up.
"You can't blame Wanda for the accords" Natasha told him. "If I remember correctly, the unmasking of Ironman was the first time laws governing enhanced individuals were spoken about. There were hearings about your suits," she added with a look of incredulity. "This isn't Wanda's fault. It's something we've all helped create – it's been blown out of proportion – and we need to fix it."
"So what? So you can go back to your lives like before?" Tony asked. "You think that's possible? No one is going to allow us to be privatized again."
"We'll build new ones," Natasha said with a sad smile. "Most of us have done it before."
Tony rolled his eyes. "It doesn't bother you?" He asked snidely, "to build your life around a weapon of mass destruction?" He asked, motioning to Wanda.
Steve's expression was one of pure anger. "Tony, stop. You need to leave –"
Tony's temper flared, probably not helped in the least by his alcohol intake. "Bottom line - She's nuts! She has no emotional stability – it's like having a bomb with a pressure sensor under a teeter totter. Eventually it's going to go off."
"Do you really want to start on instability right now?" Natasha asked him quietly. "You don't have a lot of room to talk, Tony. None to judge."
"You can't blame Wanda for everything that's gone down with the accords," Steve said tightly. "I don't think we can blame anyone – but if you're insisting on it, then look in the mirror. You're the reason Ultron happened – "
Tony shook his head. "Ultron?" He laughed. "You know what? Everyone blames me for Ultron. But the witch? She saw it – she let it happen. Sokovia is as much her fault as Nigeria."
"I saw what you would do with the scepter," Wanda spat. "And I let you take it. That doesn't make it my fault – you have free will. You chose to create Ultron. And I lost everything – everything you hadn't already taken from me," she hissed.
"Oh, boo hoo, a bomb that my company sold – a company I did not start, mind you, killed your mommy and daddy? If it wasn't my bomb, it would have been someone else's. It's the price of living in a war-torn country. Not my fault, little witch. Grow up and move on." Steve was now holding Wanda, keeping her from removing her bracelets and creating havoc she would later regret. Through the chaos and her own stealth, no one noticed that Natasha had moved – until Tony landed on his ass, holding the left side of his jaw.
"You're finished," she informed him, standing over him. She turned back to face the rest of the room. She gestured toward the doorway to the hall. "I think it's time for everyone to go to their rooms."
Sam squinted at her as he walked past. He leaned close to Clint in the hall. "To clarify, was I just sent to my room by Black Widow?"
"You were, my friend. We all were."
"Go!" Natasha's voice boomed behind them, sending them a bit faster. Sharon took Wanda from Steve and led her to the stairs. Steve sent Peter along with them.
T'Challa and Steve watched the tableau of Ironman on his ass in front of Black Widow. They were both speechless.
"I can't believe you hit me," Tony said a few minutes later, his words a bit slurred due to the swelling in his jaw. He sat on a sofa, an icepack pressed to his face.
"I've been waiting a long time for a good enough reason to do that," Natasha informed him. "There didn't seem to be another way to shut you up."
Tony glared at her but then grimaced when the movement hurt his face.
"She's dangerous – you know it."
"She's still a kid," Natasha responded. "She need to learn to control her powers better. But she's not dangerous. You don't know her."
"Do you even understand what happened in that prison?" Steve asked.
"So what – they roughed her up? Nothing she hadn't experienced in a battle."
"Really?" Natasha asked, her anger peaking again. "I don't remember being gang raped in any battles. Or sodomized – or whipped. Peed on, electrocuted, injected with God knows what drugs." Tony's face whitened as she spoke. "Those are the types of things that happened to Wanda in that prison. Clint, Scott, and Sam heard most of it. She can't sleep – she's too afraid to use her magic. They really couldn't have found a better way to ruin a human being, Stark. And the saddest part?"
Tony looked up at her, listening and in utter shock. "She is still a child looking for somewhere to belong. No matter all the crap that she's been through – all of the torture – all of the people's she's lost – she's still willing to put herself out there because she wants a family, she wants to be loved, and she wants to have a place to call home."
Tony looked devastated. "Look, I'm – "
"Do not apologize," Natasha told him. "You pushed and pushed – you just couldn't leave her alone and let someone dislike you. Whatever fallout comes – it's on you." She stalked away, not sparing another glance for any of them.
Wanda was exhausted but wound up when Sharon led her into her bedroom. "Why must he be so arrogant?" She fumed. "I have done nothing for myself – ever. I do not enjoy using my powers. I don't get a thrill from using them against others. I am not a weapon."
"Of course you're not," Sharon said softly. "Tony has his own problems, Wanda. He needs someone to blame. It's not right, but it is what's happened." Wanda continued pacing the room in silence while Sharon watched. The older woman ordered herbal tea from the kitchen and checked on Peter before joining Wanda once again.
When Natasha and Steve arrived, Sharon wasn't sure how Wanda was still standing – she looked beyond tired. Sharon left as the two others entered. "Call me if you need me," she said, patting Steve on the shoulder as she passed him.
Wanda didn't stop pacing when they entered, but she altered her path to stay farther away from them. "Are you going to pace all night?" Natasha asked, her voice laced with what came off as curiosity instead of judgement.
"I might," Wanda answered firmly.
"Wanda," Steve said, leaning forward.
"I want to be alone."
"That's not going to happen," Natasha responded. She gently kicked off her heels and sat back on the bed, positioning herself to lean against the pillow-strewn headboard while she watched Wanda pace. Steve sat down in the desk chair and sighed, looking at the ground. Wanda continued to pace. They allowed her to continue until – along with the adrenaline rush from the argument and subsequent crash – she exhausted herself.
She sat next to Natasha on the wed, crossing her arms over her chest. "I'm tired of people being afraid of me. I don't know what else to do – to prove that I'm not trying to hurt anyone."
"You don't have to do anything," Natasha assured her. "It takes time. And Tony is stubborn – "
"It's not just Tony," she responded. "People are afraid of me. In this house – everywhere. They fear what I can do. They walk out of a room when I walk in." They spent the next hour speaking with Wanda, telling her time and again that she wasn't dangerous – that she didn't need to fear herself. They weren't sure how helpful it was – but she seemed calmer when Natasha left her alone with Steve so she could check on Peter.
She knocked on the door to his bedroom and waited until she heard Peter tell her she could enter. She did, closing the door behind her. "You okay?" She asked, sliding a chair over from the desk and perching on it.
Peter knocked over the structure he had been building from super polymer plastic pieces that one of the scientists had helped him 3D print. The pieces scattered off of the physics book base and landed in shimmery fragments across the bedspread. He shrugged his shoulders in answer to her question. "I don't know. Mr. Stark has always been good to me – and helped me. But what he said about Wanda – it's not true."
Natasha nodded. "I know that – you know that. We just need to make sure Wanda knows that."
"Why would he say those things?"
Natasha pursed her lips and shook her head. "I've known Tony for a long time – and I honestly can't tell you why he does half of what he does. As for what he says – he's not known for having a filter."
"Does he really think Wanda is dangerous?"
Natasha considered it. "I'm not sure what he really believes. I think he's afraid of things he can't control – and Wanda and her powers fall solidly under that umbrella."
Peter's voice lowered and he almost looked ashamed to ask the next question. "Do you think Wanda is dangerous?"
"Not anymore. Not to anyone beyond herself."
That night, after they were in their own room and lying together in the dark, Steve asked a question that had been bothering him since their conversation with Tony. "How do you know?" He asked, speaking softly into Natasha's ear. "What happened to Wanda on the raft?"
She sighed and rolled over, facing him in the dark room. "Maria found the security tapes. I was able to decode them."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"I shouldn't have even seen them," Natasha said. "It felt like a huge betrayal to Wanda – watching them at all. But once I realized what they were – I had to know. No one else can see them – unless she chooses to use them."
"Use them?"
"They prove that Ross not only knew what was going on, he encouraged it – and he participated. It's enough to put him in jail – but in order to be used…" She sighed. The videos would become evidence, leaving Wanda vulnerable in so many ways. "The things they did," she said sadly.
Steve's eyes were blazing but he was trying to hold back his anger. "Ross hurt her directly?"
Natasha nodded.
"I don't think I can handle this right now," he told her honestly. She nodded and squeezed his hand.
"It's a lot to take in."
"When are you going to tell Wanda that you have the video?"
Natasha shrugged. "I don't know. I broke the encryption the day before we had to leave. I thought it was too much to put on her shoulders when we were traveling – and then her nightmares picked back up during the first week here. She's been mostly happy here, other than the issues with Tony. I couldn't see risking her mental health on something that's only going to make her life more difficult – especially since I don't have details worked out on how we could use it."