Make You Feel My Love ~Book II~

Disclaimer: I do not own The Winter Soldier movie! All rights go to Marvel. All I own is my own characters and their stories.


~Chapter 28~
Epilogue

With her arms crossed and her foot tapping a rhythm on the shiny, marble floor, Maria waited outside of the lab of the new Avengers Tower. She had been picked up from the graveyard by a large man people seemed to call Happy. An hour later, she had arrived at the tower Stark had been working on the lately. It was beautiful inside and although it wasn't quite her style - the interior being far too modern - it was a current home she could live with. Already, Stark had given her a room and new clothing and although she was slightly surprised by the fact that Tony knew her size, she was grateful for the fact that she wouldn't have to get money and buy new things herself. Mostly because no one was going to give her a job now that her background was out there. If you couldn't find a job when you had been to prison, you definitely couldn't find a job when you had been a killer. But also because shopping wasn't her favorite thing to do.

Footsteps caused her to turn around and a soft smile appeared on her lips, happiness filling her from seeing her friends again. Bruce and Tony walked up to here, greeting her and opening the doors to the lab. Everything still looked new and the fact that Tony needed to open the door with a key-card told Maria that the tower wasn't quite ready yet.

"No Jarvis?" asked Maria, causing Tony to look back at her while he walked over to a specific machine, multiple screens attached to it.

"Not yet. Still have some minor details to fix," said Tony, waving his hands about as he spoke.

Bruce gestured for Maria to follow him as he walked over to Tony. "We have a key-card for you that you can use in the meanwhile. Later on, Jarvis is going to run the entire building."

"Cool," replied Maria simply, jumping up on the cot close to the machine, letting her legs dangle over the edge as she watched Bruce and Tony work, numbers and equations appearing on the screens which Maria didn't understand.

"Alright," started Tony, turning to Maria as a picture of what Maria thought looked like a DNA-string, appeared on the screen. However, it looked wrong and twisted in ways she knew DNA wasn't supposed to be twisted. "I suppose you know why you're here."

"Yeah, 'cause of my powers," replied Maria, nodding.

"We found something interesting," replied Bruce. "In your DNA."

"At first, we thought it was in your skin where we would find answer since it was what we had seen heal," said Tony. "However, it wasn't your skin. It was your DNA. This here is a picture of your DNA after we'd messed with it. This here, is a picture of that same DNA string a couple hours later."

Maria's gaze jumped over to the screen as another picture appeared on it. Again, it was a DNA-string as Tony said. Though this time, it looked as Maria knew DNA-strings were supposed to look. Curled in a spiral and whole.

"What does it mean?" asked Maria.

"That your powers come from your DNA. When you get hurt, your DNA makes sure that the cells reproduce, as they do on a normal person as well. However, your DNA makes sure that it is done ten times as fast as normal," explained Bruce. "Not only that… But we found something else in your blood."

"What?" asked Maria quietly.

Although she didn't feel all too surprised about the whereabouts of her power since it made sense that that was what was happening. The thing that was causing a slight tinge of worry to appear in the bottom of her stomach was the fact that her abilities had come out of the blue. She wasn't born with it. In fact, she still remembered when she had accidentally tripped and scraped her knee back when she still lived with her grandmother. It had taken her knee a month to heal. Not only that, but what did her abilities make her? A hero? Or something else?

"Mutant genes."

"That's not possible…" said Maria, shaking her head. "Why would-"

"Remember the file you gave us an hour ago… about the bullets," said Bruce; "and how they affected you?."

"Yeah?"

"The toxin reacts to mutant genes. To other people the bullets would be simple bullets. But since your mutant genes are what activates the speed of your DNA, they affect your healing abilities," said Bruce. "It proves it. You're a mutant, Maria."

"But I didn't have those until I met you guys," replied Maria, shaking her head. "How is that possible? I thought you're younger when you got your powers-"

"Did you go through something very traumatizing before you met us? Or did you, somehow, go through a lot of stress?" asked Tony. "Because that's a way to activate hidden mutant genes to create a mutation."

"No-" started Maria until she remembered that night. "Well… the last time I got hurt badly without healing was when I fell…"

"Fell?" asked Tony.

"I fell down a tall building in Hell's Kitchen – no, I was pushed… And I fell on a metal rod that pierced through my abdomen. I still have the scar," explained Maria.

"That could've caused enough stress for the mutation to start," said Bruce, nodding his head. "But you didn't heal fast then?"

"No," she replied. "I remember leaving the hospital early so that I could go and visit my granny. It was during the time that she was in the hospital and I needed to get money for her… medication."

"I suppose you were stressed about that?" asked Bruce. "A lot of pressure on you after such a traumatizing event. Finding a job with such an injury couldn't have been easy?"

"No… Wait, you think that is what started my mutation?" asked Maria.

"It's the only explanation," replied Tony as he walked over to her. "It's kind of cool though."

"Cooler than a metal suit that can make you fly?" asked Maria, a soft smile appearing on her lips. "Yeah, right."

Tony chuckled, looking back at Bruce who smiled too. "I'm glad you're taking it so lightly."

"Look, I've been dealing with these 'powers' for over a year. I was pretty sure I wasn't 'normal'," replied Maria, creating bunny ears with her fingers in order to empathize what she was saying. "Not to mention that I have pretty awesome friends who can help me get through this."

After saying that, she jokingly fist-bumped Tony in the chest, lightly and not in any way to cause pain. However, she was surprised when she didn't hit Tony's arc reactor which was supposed to be placed right where she hit him. Instead, she was met with the feeling of his chest underneath of his shirt.

"What?" asked Maria, placing a hand against his chest to which Tony started to chuckle.

"I got rid of it," he replied nonchalantly, shrugging. "Thought it was time."

"I feel like I've missed a lot," said Maria, earning a sudden sad look from Tony which confused her. Though he quickly turned over to his sarcastic self again, hitting Maria on the shoulder playfully.

"We'll tell you all about it during lunch," replied Tony, earning a sigh from Bruce.

"Why do I get the feeling you've heard it thrice already?" joked Maria as she jumped down from the cot, looking over at Bruce who chuckled.

"Thrice is an underdrift," replied Bruce.

"Typical Stark," scoffed Maria playfully.

"Standing right here," said Tony, waving his hands in front of Maria and Bruce's faces.

The three of them chuckled before leaving the lab and although the mood was light, Maria couldn't help but want to know more about these "powers" of her. Obviously, she knew she had them. But she wanted to know why and from where she'd gotten them. Of course she knew that mutant genes were something that usually just appeared and on some people, they were stronger than others. But with her, it felt different. They had appeared because she had gone through enough stress to activate her genes, not because they had matured as she heard happened to a lot of teenagers nowadays.

As the lights were turned out behind her, Bruce closing the door of the lab as she had exited, she knew that although their current mission was over – something she still needed to inform Tony and Bruce about – there were still things she needed to do in her future. Because she was an Avenger, she knew she had to deal with dangerous things. Though she didn't know what dangers were still waiting for her; both in the near future and the far-off future. Then again, who did know.


**PLEASE READ! IMPORTANT STUFF AT THE END***

Not my best chapter... probably the worst ever :P But, I couldn't write more without the story going on and on and on - and I feel like I need to have an opening on the next "book". So, next week, I'll probably have been able to rewatch AOU so that I can write down the important parts of the plot and twist it so that Maria fits in along with the ideas I have for this. I'll update this story so that there's a link to book three's first chapter :)

Okay, now you guys have a week to let me know what you want to see in the next story. Comment something you want like, Maria and Steve going to the park! or something like that. And I'll take it in consideration and add it in any way I can in the next book :) Not because I don't have an entire plot for the next book already planned (cause I have), but because I know I like it when the author gives the readers a way of making a difference and being heard. Don't have to, of course :)