Chapter 9!

More of a filler chapter than anything else, but it belongs there.

Fluffy warm chapter, with a little bit of angst and some grumpying on Alexanne's part.

Hope you'll like it!

Chapter 9: Friends

Bored, I trailed my fingers over the laptop's keyboard. I was in one of those moods that could only be described as… well, brooding. And brooding meant that leaving me alone was the best thing that someone could do.

Two more weeks had gone by, so fast yet so slow. Things had somewhat settled down and if Fury's short – and not very detailed – message was anything to go by, Ness and I weren't going home anytime soon.

Giving up the idea of trying to write something, I reached out for my coffee cup and took a cautious sip. It was barely warm anymore and I putted it down with a sigh, feeling far too lazy to get up from the couch and reheat it in the microwave.

Instead, I putted the laptop on the coffee table, closed my eyes and basked in the silence, emptying my mind slowly. For the first time in a long time – Weeks? Days? I wasn't sure – I was completely and utterly alone. And only the barely-there buzz of Tony's costly appliances was disturbing my practically silent environment.

Talking about Tony… I probably wouldn't see him for a while since he was in his workshop, as usual.

Bruce was in his lab, working on God knows what kind of chemistry mix. As long as there wasn't an explosion, I guess everything would be alright.

Clint and Natasha were in the gym, comparing their strengths and abilities and, unsurprisingly, sparring. They might come up before lunch but I doubted it.

Thor had gone back to Asgard for something that had to do with Loki. We wouldn't see him for a while.

As for Vanessa, she was locked in her bedroom, brooding about things I could only guess about since she didn't want to tell me what was on her mind. I didn't push, just accepted the facts as they were. She would avoid me anyway.

And Steve…

I opened my eyes and let out a deep weary sigh.

Now, I'd be lying to myself if I didn't admit that I was dealing with a lot of feelings when it came to Steve Rogers. And I'm not talking about Captain America, the USA's perfect golden boy, the superhero a lot of girls secretly pictured as their charming prince. I'm talking about the man under the suit, the man with the forces and weaknesses, the man who – though physically enhanced by a super serum – was still human. For that man I felt such turmoil. And I held to that distinction fiercely, if only to prove myself that I wasn't having a fan girl's crush over the guy I dreamed about some nights.

And yet, I was slowly sinking in such dreams. More than once I had caught myself starring at muscled arms, plump pink lips or silky-looking golden hair. More than once I had to remind myself to focus on what Steve was saying instead of letting myself get lost in the blue depths of his bright eyes. The only thing missing was swooning.

"And here I am, poetically thinking like a fucking Disney princess!" I snapped aloud, disgusted with myself.

"A Disney princess?"

I let out a shriek and jumped on my feet, arms crossed protectively in front of my face. I didn't even relax when I recognised what I had thought previously as a threat.

"Anthony Stark, goddamn, don't sneak up on me! Jesus…" I growled, venomously muttering various curses under my breath until my heartbeat began to slow down. "What are you doing upstairs? It's not even lunchtime!" Inwardly, I cursed him to hell and back for disturbing my peace.

He raised his hands. "Hey, it's my Tower! I can be wherever I want whenever I want!" Tony protested.

My shoulders slumped and I let my arms fall by my sides limply. "True." I admitted, a bit of shame washing over me. "Doesn't explain what brought you out of your workshop at…" I glanced at my watch. "Eleven seventeen in the morning."

The man shrugged. "I've finished what I was doing. And I've missed breakfast."

I rolled my eyes and dropped on the couch, scooting to the left when Tony sat down beside me. I glanced suspiciously at him from under my eyelashes. What did he want from me?

"A Disney princess?"

I groaned and brought my knees up to hide my face. "Drop it. Forget I ever said that aloud, okay?"

Stark, damn him, smirked deviously. "Why should I when I have fun picturing you in Snow White's dress?"

Of all things! "Wipe that picture from your mind!" I snapped. "It's won't ever, ever, ever happen, understood? Not even at Halloween." I added sourly.

Once again, Tony raised his hands in a peaceful gesture. "Whoa, calm down here, Tiger. It was a joke!"

For once, thankfully, I didn't flinch at the nickname. Maybe it came with the fact that Clint kept using it each time he deemed it appropriate for the situation… Which happened incredibly often.

Still, grumpily, I snorted. "A good joke is one that everybody thinks it funny." I muttered.

Tony gave me a mock pout. "Aw, come on Alexanne! You can't say it isn't at least a little funny?"

I grimaced. A dress in only the primary colors and a little bow in the hair had never seemed like a pretty thing to wear to me. "Not for me, thanks." I finally answered, scowling when Tony accentuated his pout, transforming it into a kicked puppy look. I was about to snap at him again, but a picture suddenly went through my mind and my face split in a wide grin instead. "Now… If you were the one wearing the dress…"

He actually thought about it before shaking his head. "Nope. Not my colors."

I allowed myself to laugh a little, to which Tony smiled. "Ha! Gotcha!" he exclaimed, giving me a smug look when I raised an inquisitive eyebrow.

"Gotcha?" I repeated.

"I got you to wipe that grumpy look from your face, didn't I?"

I tried to fight down a smile, tried to keep a neutral expression. I failed miserably when, still looking awfully too smug for my liking, Tony mused aloud: "Now, I wonder how Clint would look in Cinderella's dress…"

I huffed, then giggled. "Awful."

Believe it or not, we actually wondered about all of us in disguised as various princesses until lunchtime.

*o*O*o*O*o*

In a total opposition to my mood this morning, I was now positively giddy, high on happiness and feeling so warm inside that the cool breeze was a welcomed caress on my flushed cheeks.

Clint smiled brightly and caught me before I lost feet, dizzy from vertigo, pure relief and utter happiness. I might have cared about how I looked with my pale face and my goofy smile if I hadn't been feeling so great.

"Whoa there, Tiger! Had I known that telling you that you were a friend would make you react like this, I would have waited until we were back inside the Tower!" Clint said, his strong hands on my shoulders steering me away from the building's edge.

The reminder of the danger sobered me up quickly and I was shaken by a slight shiver.

Clint had brought me up as an answer to my teasing about making nests on top of city buildings. But once at the top of the Tower, I had suffered a bout of vertigo that had driven all teasing thoughts from my mind. Clint, bless him, hadn't made fun of my sudden weakness, instead remarking aloud how tiny the people looked from so high.

Curiosity had gotten the better of me and I had cautiously approached the edge of the roof to peer down, grasping at Clint's arm none too gently when the world blurred at the edges of my vision.

Then, for a short moment, vertigo had left me as I had contemplated how small we, humans, were. How easily we could die for various reasons, by our own hand or as a result of something we could not control. How short our lives were when you thought of the immensity of the universe. I could understand a little bit why Gods would look down at us and consider us weak.

We weren't weak but how fragile we were!

"Hey, are you okay Alexanne?" Clint had asked, breaking through my brooding thoughts.

I had blinked. So many people, minding their own business, living their own lives. Each day, most of them went to work or to school. At the end of each day, they went home or hoped that they could.

Home…

"Lex?"

"I just… suddenly feel so far from home." I had gestured the people down in the street. "They go home each day. And we… we might never go home. We're strangers here, you know?" I explained softly.

Clint had frowned. "We?"

I had allowed myself to give him a disbelieving look and had gently pointed out: "Yeah, we; Vanessa and I."

He had offered me a small sheepish smile… before his expression had morphed back into a frown. "Strangers? You feel like strangers?" At my shrug, Clint had grabbed my arm and squeezed. "Alexanne! You and Vanessa might not be part of the team", and ouch, that had stung more than I wanted to admit, "but you're our friends! Not strangers!"

I had felt a little flower of warmth bloom in my chest at the word "friends". Had I heard him right?

My dumbfounded silence had displeased him. "You know that you're welcomed here right?"

I had bitten my lip. "Fury has made us feel as if we are… well, burdens."

Clint had shaken his head. "Fury is Fury. Acts like a real bastard sometimes. Inexplicable events make him sweat. And the guy has such a temper!" He had shivered mockingly before squeezing my arm again. "You and Vanessa are our friends, Lex. And if Tony hasn't kicked you out yet, it's either because you're useful or because you're both welcomed here."

Relief and happiness had washed over me, so strongly that I had swayed under the onslaught. Which had caused vertigo to slam back into me, resulting in Clint's quick decision to steer me away from the edge of the Tower's roof.

Putting pressure on my shoulders, the archer forced me to sit down. He then crouched before me and ordered softly:

"Deep breaths."

I noticed my violent shivers, due to both vertigo and the cold seeping through my clothes. I took a couple of deep breaths in an attempt to get over the dizziness of heights, shaking my head, frustrated, when my teeth began to chatter together instead.

Clint pulled me up and removed the leather jacket he was wearing to drop it on my shoulders. I was about to open my mouth to protest – I was wearing a vest too! He didn't need to catch a cold for me, thank you! – but was cut shot by the clearly audible chatter of my teeth, which was becoming quite annoying.

"Let's go back inside." Clint proposed, having apparently forgotten – or acting as if he had – the reason why we had come up here in the first place.

"S-s-sure!" I managed to say, clenching my ghost-white hands in the hems of the leather jacket and trying to wrap myself as tight as possible in it. But the residual warmth was not enough to stop my cold shivers.

In fact, my teeth were still chattering together when we entered the common room. I stood awkwardly beside the elevator for a while, not sure about what to do. Clint had quickly disappeared with a muttered "Coming back", forgetting his jacket which I still held to tightly. I finally decided to at least clear the elevator, kicking off my shoes – I would pick them up later – and curling on myself into the cushions of the couch.

It took a while for my shivers to subside. But once they did, I was sufficiently comfortable and relaxed to nod off.

*o*O*o*O*o*

Warm… Comfort… Comfy cozy cloud… Hmm… A little hungry though. Bah, later. Not important for now… Nose in cloth… Hmm… Thought the couch was made of leather… Pillow? No, smells weird… Like electricity and heavy summer days, right before a storm… Wait, what? We're not even in April yet!

I sat up quickly, staring in utter incomprehension at the red cloth covering me. What…

Someone laughed and my head shot up. Vanessa gave me a teasing smile.

"Slept well?" she asked, leaning back in the armchair she was occupying.

"How long did I sleep?" I asked instead of answering. I grabbed the red cloth, understanding that it was, in fact, a cloak. And I only knew one Avenger who had such a cloak.

"Thor is here?"

Nessa nodded, staring at the Asgardian piece of clothing. "Yes, he is. Loki apparently managed to escape." I cocked my head as I listened absently to what she was saying. Something sounded… off, in my friend's voice. She was keeping her emotions bottled up and keeping her whole attitude and posture neutral.

I then understood what she had said.

"Loki escaped?" I repeated. Vanessa nodded again and, wow, I had to give the God of Mischief some credit.

"Does Thor know where he's hiding?"

My best friend shook her head, hesitated. "He's on Earth but where is the question." Then, apparently thinking that the subject was closed, Ness analysed me slowly. "You have a new jacket?"

I looked down. I still had Clint's jacket. Thank God, I had never seen rumpled leather. To my friend's question, I shook my head. "I wish." I loved leather but, hey, it did cost some money. "But this is Clint's."

"Clint's." Vanessa repeated and I felt a spark of annoyance, which I quickly swallowed down. "Why do you have Clint's leather jacket?"

I sighed. "Jeez, Nessie, why don't you just ask him?"

"I'm asking you."

I muttered a curse, then summarized what had happened after lunch, after she had gone back to her room to doodle. I omitted the brooding and the vertigo parts. But I told Vanessa what Clint had said about us being friends, about us being welcomed here.

Vanessa didn't say anything but I think that the way he posture relaxed slightly meant that she was as relieved as I was. I hadn't been the only one stressing over the fact that we would have to settle down. I hadn't been the only one seriously doubting that SHIELD could force the Teleportation Device to obey their will. And I hadn't been the only one feeling as if we were burdens for the Avengers.

I broke the silence that had settled between us. "Why do I have Thor's cloak?"

"You were shivering in your sleep. When Thor came in, he noticed it. He touched your hand and declared that you were freezing and that you were probably sick. He decided to let you borrow his cloak to keep you warm since, in his opinion, you were "shaking like a little leaf caught in a strong wind"."

Sick!? I had bad blood flow in my hands and feet – thus making them uncomfortably cold more often than not – but I wasn't sick! "I suffer the curse of cold hands and cold feet but I'm not sick." I said. As if to deny my claim, my nose began to itch and I sneezed once, twice, then a third time.

I scowled at Vanessa's snort. "You might have caught a cold."

"I might have not." I shot back.

"Am I interrupting something?" And wow, Clint had such timing!

"Nothing." Vanessa and I answered at the same time, exchanging a challenging look.

Clint looked at both of us. "You're sure you aren't sisters?"

Ness shook her head and I said: "Nope. We don't have the same parents." And I had to swallow down a lump at the thought of my family. Quickly, I pushed the thought away and qualified it as taboo thinking. It would only make me miserable and I couldn't – wouldn't – let such thoughts poison my life. It wasn't as if we were going home anytime soon, now were we?

Clint didn't notice my brief emotional struggle, instead shrugging. "Well, you sure act as if you were." Then, looking at me, he cocked his head. "Is that Thor's cloak?" the archer asked and my eyes fell on the piece of clothing I still held.

"Uh… yeah." I stood and let it pool on the couch before shrugging off the leather jacket and handing it to its owner. "And I believe that's yours. Thanks for sharing."

Clint shrugged. "No prob."

A booming voice took me by surprise. "Ah, Alexanne! I see that you are awake!"

I had to find a warning system to put on the guy before he traumatized someone.

"Hey Thor!" I answered with a smile, picking up the cloak and handing it to him. "Thank you for the blanket."

But instead of taking it back, Thor gently grasped my small hands in his huge ones. He frowned. "You still are very cold."

I opened my mouth to explain about bad blood flow and the fact that it was normal when Thor picked his cloak and draped it over my shoulders.

It was huge! I felt as if I was drowning in heavy red fabric. And I was small enough that the hem was dragging on the floor. Vanessa began to giggle and I shot her a small glare. I probably looked ridiculous.

"Uh… Thor? It's a bit too big for me…"

The God smiled brightly. "It is true that you are short, my friend. But this will keep you warm and I do not need it at the present moment."

"But…"

I could not find any argument to convince him otherwise and I shut my mouth.

Clint patted my shoulder. "You're cute, Lexy! You look like a little girl trying on Daddy's coat."

I spluttered in indignation. "First, I'm not a little girl! Second, don't call me Lexy!"

A flash.

Tony – popping in from God knows where – was holding a camera and snickering. "You're trying to find a costume, Lex? Didn't know that Thunderess was your kind of disguise."

Vanessa's giggles became deep-throated laughter.

I groaned, pressing my face in my hands.

"Do not worry, Little Leaf. Though it is too big for you, my cloak suits you rather well." Thor tried to comfort me, before letting out a chuckle when I gave him my best kicked puppy look.

I couldn't hold back a small laugh either.

They're here to make you go crazy and make fun of you but give you help and comfort you in the difficult moments. That's what friends are for.

And heck, they could laugh if they wanted. It felt good to be surrounded by friends.

Nice, eh?

Some fluff is always welcomed.

And so are your comments! (I really love those.) ;)