Prompt: Stress Relief.
Summary: Wanda hears Pietro down the comms, flirting as they try to get people out of Novi Grad, and resolves to talk to him about it later. There is a time and a place for flirting, and she had not expected it from Pietro.
Notes: An Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies AU. This ficlet is mostly to explain the (semi-canon) deleted scenes of Pietro flirting with various women. Given we don't see it in the film itself it seems out of character given what we do see in the film, and thanks to a prompter I got given a start to write out my headcanon on this.
In honesty Pietro flirting as he does in the deleted scenes makes no sense to me, because after the film itself I read him as almost entirely asexual, uninterested in almost all people in all ways, with the singular exception of caring for his sister, and remembering their parents. Wanda leads them, Wanda decides what they do, for the most part, and he protects her before all else. He doesn't allow for space outside of that much, beyond poking fun at others. So when the flirting scenes turned up, my brain started trying to find reasons for them to exist, and with the aid of the prompt, eventually struck on this.
Warnings: Codependency.
i.
Pietro was lying in the medical bay on the Helicarrier when Wanda got to him. He'd heard her mind as soon as he'd been dragged back to life by the archer's CPR efforts and his own increased metabolism speeding his healing, and as soon as her feet touch the runway when the Vision sets her down her mind goes from desperately pushing warmth and love and comfort to him to I'm coming, I'm coming, I will be with you soon. She arrives scant minutes afterwards, the android trailing after her, and her scarlet darts between the surgeons trying to keep him anaesthetised while they try to work on his perforated body, and pulls out the bullets without any effort.
I'm here, her mind says, the warmth of her scarlet pressed against the blue of his mind. Rest. I will hide the pain from you. Then the scarlet sweeps through his mind, finds the stabbing shards of silver and white lightning, and hides them behind a curtain as dark as night.
Pietro sleeps.
ii.
When Pietro wakes he is not sure where he is. It is a different room, and the windows show a different view, but being on the Helicarrier before means this could be anything from a base to simply several thousand miles away from where Novi Grad was detonated.
"Pietro," breathes a voice beside him, and he meets Wanda's eyes.
They do not need to speak for her to see the I'm so sorry, in his eyes, for him to read the Oh, thank goodness you're alive in hers. Wanda's hand wraps around his, and brings his knuckles to her lips to kiss.
iii.
They are quiet awhile. They do not need to speak to enjoy one another's presence, they have had only each other and relied on only each other for so long silence is as much a comfort as sound. Wanda's hand stays wrapped around Pietro's and Pietro's fingers barely twitch in hers, only his thumb moving, stroking a steady soothing line over the back of her hand.
"Pietro," Wanda says eventually, and Pietro can just about see the swirling scarlet-and-gold of a question in her mind. "The comms," she says, "The earpieces. I heard you flirting."
There is a warning note to her tone and Pietro knows that anyone within hearing would hear the question in what his sister said - if they could understand Sokovian, that is - but does not think they would truly grasp the layers. Few people ever did. It was not Why would you flirt with them? It was not Why did you not tell me? It was not even Why did you waste time like that? It was, simply enough, Why?
He can see the possibilities in her mind down their bridge, wondering at it somewhat, that he had not told her, that she had not glimpsed even the possibility in his mind before. He squeezes her hand gently. "Stress relief," he says. "Protecting you is stressful. Sometimes too stressful. I do it to know people I can let off stress with, when I know you're safe."
Wanda's free hand twitches slightly, and Pietro can see in the scarlet of her mindYou do not need to protect me any more.
"Yes I do," he murmurs, keeping the Sokovian soft. "You're my sister. My little sister and my twin. What would I do if you were hurt?"
Wanda gives a wry smile. "The same thing I did when you were," she says, and Pietro cannot help but nod. Wanda's fingers play slightly over his knuckles. "I did not see any of it in your mind. No stress relief, nothing that is… nothing related to it. Other people when they think of it it is bold. It is bright and obvious. I never saw any of it in your mind."
Pietro's mouth twitches to a smile. "You wouldn't," he says. "There was none with HYDRA and after…." he catches strands of Wanda's hair and gently twists them between his fingers. "It's not desire. That is a distraction."
"You're always distracted," Wanda interjects. "Always teasing, always wanting to do something else."
"Around you," Pietro says. "It anchored you, after. And before it gave you a focus." He tugs her hair gently, as he had when he was little to get her attention before her magic had linked their minds. "What I mean is, it's a distraction from you. From protecting you."
"I don't need protecting, Pietro. Not any more."
Pietro's face turns almost sad, almost lost, and she squeezes his hand gently in comfort. "Wanda," he says, and his mouth wraps around her name in the same soft way it ever has, claiming her as his twin, his counterpart, just as her calling his name does the same for her. His eyes are solemn. "I flirt so if I am stressed I can stop being stressed. Stress is a distraction, more than they are." His thumb strokes over the back of her hand. "That is why it was never in my mind. They were not the distraction. The stress was."
Wanda's head tilts forward, and Pietro catches her against his still-healing chest. The pain of her head against his healing bullet wounds is not a distraction, though the noise of others outside the room risks being so, and Pietro keeps his eyes fixed on the door as Wanda's scarlet dances around them.
End Notes: Reviews are much appreciated!