"Luna!" Peter spluttered out in surprise, head snapping in her direction as she walked out from the elevator, "Hi!"
"Hi Peter," she laughed out back to him, as she made her way over to the kitchen island that the cute boy with brown hair was currently sat at, pouring over a pile of books as he ate his breakfast. She tentatively pulled out the stool next to him and looked at him questioningly, checking she was goos to take the seat next to him while Tony sat on the other side. "Oh !" Said Peter after a minute or so of Luna waiting to be told she was good to take the seat "sorry, sit down please aha, sorry my heads all over the place- I've got this French test this week and Mr Stark was trying to help me all night long, but it turns out French isn't that much like Italian, so he wasn't too much help and now he's majorly sleep deprived and I'm super stressed out." With a big breath in, Peter eventually ended the rambling, something which Luna found warmed her heart a little and for some unknown reason to her. Shaking it off she looked at the books in front of her, asking, "voulez-vous de l'aide?" She honest to god laughed out loud at the reactions around the room at her words. Tony's head slammed onto the counter in front of him as he mumbled something about why did he not know this sooner, whilst Wanda turned to look at her with a surprised smile. Sam, who was stood at the stove cooking something as per turned to look at her too, as he exclaimed , "French! Of course she speaks French! Is there anything you cant do kid?". Luna shrugged sheepishly, before saying with a little giggle "Art… I absolutely suck at art." Sam looked at her with a disbelieving smirk but evidently decided to drop the matter, saying something under his breath about believing it when he sees it. Nat however, simply turned to Luna, exclaiming, "tu parles français ? Ce sera sympa d'avoir quelqu'un d'autre avec qui parler, pour une raison quelconque, Clint ne l'a jamais compris." Luna smiled back, also pleased at the concept of being able to speak the language more, and also for the fact that if just she and Natasha spoke the language, it meant if they ever needed to they could communicate privately. "Bucky est le même! toute mission en France que nous avions, je devais toujours parler!" Natasha let out a laugh at this, whilst Tony sprang up, saying "No no no, no more making jokes in languages we cant all understand!"
"Sorry Tony. No promises!" Said Natasha as she sauntered over to the other side of the lounge towards where Wanda had sat down on a sofa with a coffee. Luna turned her attention back to the boy sat next to her, asking, "So, what do you need help with?" And laughed out loud when Peter gestured to the pile of work in front of him as he miserably exclaimed "Everything!"
"I'm gonna need a little more help than that. You eat and then we head down to the lab to work together ?" Suggested Luna, knowing well enough that his super metabolism would surely have him hungry by now. Peter nodded at Luna, as he started eating again. In between shovels of cereal Peter turned to her and asked her, "So, where did you learn French?"
"I don't know I guess," replied Luna, obviously thinking back, "It was one of the first languages I learnt. Hydra had me learning so many languages from such a young age I don't even know what I learnt first anymore." At Luna's words the conversation had the potential to spiral downwards into a heap of sadness, but instead Peter looked at her with shinning eyes, exclaiming "That's so cool ! You must be like multi-lingual with how many languages you can speak!" Luna smiled suddenly at Peter's ability to spin anything dark into something positive. From all of what she said, he could've picked out any number of horrific things to focus on. But instead he smiled and focused on the positive. It made Luna's heart sing to have someone so positive around her. "This is for you kid," said Sam as he unceremoniously placed a pile of pancakes in front of her, ignoring the stunned expression on Luna's face, "Bruce said your metabolism is even higher than Steve and Buck's, so make sure you eat up, and I don't wanna hear any complaints!" And with that Luna simply dug into the pile of food in front of her, knowing it was unlikely she would finish it all, but equally knowing she had only really eaten snacks last night, so she probably needed to eat a lot.
"Speaking of, where is metal arm and Capsicle?" Asked Tony, who seemed to have recovered from his bout of despair from earlier and was now tapping on a stark pad he was holding in his hand.
"Buck said they picked up on a lead some point yesterday and were gonna track it down this morning." Said Sam, shrugging his shoulders. It made Luna feel uneasy knowing Bucky was out on the streets looking for Hydra on purpose, but she reminded herself how capable Bucky was, and the fact that he was with Steve meant it was super unlikely either of them would really get hurt. Plus, if anything went south while they were out, Luna knew Mr responsible, Captain Steve Rogers would call in the rest of the team in, and god knows no one was going to stop Luna joining them.
"Im sure he's fine," whispered Peter to Luna as he sensed her unease. Luna smiled warmly back at him, before she carried on tackling the mountain of food in front of her. Around her, Luna hears everyone drop into their own conversations, Wanda and Nat talking in hushed voices about what had transpired this morning, She knew logically it was just because they were concerned about her. They cared enough to be concerned about her. With the remembrance of what had transpired this morning Luna realised it was time to talk to Sam. Not just with assurance that she would talk to him. No, Luna realised she needed to book a slot with him, needed to start talking through some of her trauma so she could start getting better. He'd told her that he'd taken on the role of therapist for each of the avengers, and that he was happy to talk to her too. She didn't wanted to be haunted by her past any more. Didn't want anymore sleepless nights. Wanted to be as innocent as the guy sat next to her who always saw the good in any situation.
"Sam," she called quietly, immediately grabbing the attention of the man in front of her. He turned around casually, leaving the pan on the hob and the spatula on the kitchen counter next to it. "Sup kid?" He asked, with a gentle smile. Luna had a sneaking suspicion he knew what she was about to ask. When she had walked through the doors of the lift the atmosphere of the room had shifted. She knew her eyes are likely still bloodshot. It was just a fact. F.R.I.D.A.Y probably had some programming for a resident having a nightmare, incase someone like Wanda accidentally brought the building down. It wouldn't surprise Luna to learn that programming was now extended to cover her too. But she didn't want to be a problem. And she wanted to get better, not for Wanda or Nat or Peter or Tony, not even for Bucky. For herself.
"You know what we were talking about the other day?" Asked Luna, not really wanting to have to spell it out for him in front of everyone.
"Sure I do kid, you ready to talk?" Replied Sam in a quiet yet evidently proud voice.
"Yeh, I think I am." answered Luna.
"Great, I've got a slot free tomorrow at 11 if you're free?" He said, and Luna appreciated the tentative time frame, Sam was letting her decide when she was going to talk. He was giving her control over the situation.
"Sounds good," she responded with a shaky smile. She was nervous, naturally. But it felt good to have something planned. And Bucky would be proud of her. She knew that much. Sam nodded warmly at her and turned back to the food he was cooking himself. As Luna went to take the final bits of her food she felt Peter's hand on her knee, before he leaned in speaking in a low voice as to not be overheard, saying, "I'm really proud of you Luna." Sparks shot around in her chest at Peter's words. She was proud of herself. She really was. She was refusing to be Hydra's monster.
"Pete, are you sure you have to work on your French? I could really use your help on the new schematics for this stark phone," said Mr Stark, looking at Peter with what could only be described as puppy dog eyes. Peters head banged forward onto the table as he let out a groan, turning to Tony and saying, "Don't tempt me Mr Stark. If I don't pass this French test I'm pretty sure Aunt May will kick me out. Come on Luna, let's head down to the lab before Mr Stark tries to bribe me!" He said, picking up his text books, moving to place his and Luna's dishes in the sink and making a beeline for the lift and grabbing Luna's hand dragging her along in the process. "Mr Stark!" Luna called as the lift doors opened, "I can help Peter then come and help if you want?" She asked, seeing this as the perfect opportunity to get into the lab with Tony. At this, Tony shot into an upright position, eyes brightened with rejuvenated life, as if he hadn't just been moping around the minute before, "Kid," he started, "That would be brilliant!" Luna sent him a brightened smile back just as the lift doors closed in front of them. Suddenly Luna worried, what if the next few hours were unbearably awkward? She really wanted to get on with Peter, like really did. He was cute, and dorky and had no reason to be as nice to her as he was. She wanted them to be friends. Plus all the avengers seemed to adore him, and she was slowly seeing why. Before Luna even had the chance to think of what to talk about Peter turned to her.
"So, I was kind of wondering," he started, looking adorably nervous, "me and two of my friends are planning on catching this film together on Friday, they're re-running the empire strikes back, one of the star wars films, I figured you don't really know many people our age around here and it might be nice for you to come out with us, and Ned and MJ are like super cool, don't feel like you have to say yes thought I-"
"Peter," interrupted Luna, whose heart felt about ready to burst at Peter's inclusion of her. Recognising him going off on one of his rambling tangents, she continued, "I'd absolutely love to come!" She said, an involuntary smile spreading across her face, lighting up her eyes with joy. "One thing thought," she said, heart fluttering at the sudden look of disappointment on Peter's features at the idea of there being a potential problem in his plan, "I've never seen the first star wars film." Just as quickly as the boys expression had dropped it lit up again, in an almost cartoon-esque manner as he practically yelled, "Thats not a problem at all ! We can watch it tonight!" He sped out, before backtracking massively as his cheeks reddened and he added on the end, "if you're not busy that is." Luna simply grinned in response, saying, "Im not busy at all - that sounds perfect!" Just as the words left her mouth the lift's doors opened and Luna stepped into Peter's lab for the first time. Naturally, everything looked super high tech. One of the lab benches seemed to be reserved specifically for him to make his web-fluid, as it was currently engulfed with a sticky white substance. On another bench he had a bunch of robotics stuff strewn across the area, and on a third he had a few beakers of colourless chemicals, which he quickly moved back to the storage cupboard once he had put his French books down. What Luna loved most about his lab thought, was that it was clearly Peter's. On the walls hung classic movie posters, like the old ones you used to get outside cinemas. A whole section of his lab was just a worn down sofa that looked stupidly comfy. He had a fridge by it, which Luna could only assume Tony kept fully stocked and a cupboard which Luna too, assumed was fully stocked with snacks. "I don't really spend too much time down here," started Peter, while Luna continued to look around the room in amazement, "I told Mr Stark I didn't need my own lab, but he insisted. I only really use it now when I need to get away from everyone else to do stuff like homework. That or make new web fluid." he said, gesturing to the currently entirely absorbed white bench.
"You make it yourself?" Asked Luna in surprise.
"Yeh, I started making it in my science lab sessions in school, but that didn't really work out too well. This one time I nearly blew the whole place up. I didn't thank god. But after that I realised I needed to start making it in here." Luna smiled up to him, saying enthusiastically, "You'll have to show me the formula for it sometime!" Peter spluttered, evidently surprised Luna was interested in it, before smiling back to her, saying, "Yeh, defiantly." Luna crossed the room to where Peter sat, pulling up a lab stool next to him and cracking open his French book, staring with, "Alors, quelle est le problem ?" But Peter just stared back at her blankly, then to his book, and back to Luna again. She let out a small laugh, before looking at the page in Peter's textbook. "Okay, past tenses we can do. What do you need to be able to do?"
"I gotta be able to tell the difference between perfect, imperfect and pluplural, and conjugate verbs in each." Said Peter, sounding woefully defeated already.
"Okay dude, you're gonna be just fine," said Luna, sounding much more optimistic as she reached across Peter and pulled over one of his notebooks as the two 17 year olds settled down for the next 2 hours, focusing on French, and both trying to hide their blushes when an arm or a leg brushed up against the other person.
Two hours later Luna felt a minor headache coming on from her time spent teaching Peter. Peter however, could now tell the difference between all three tenses, knew when to use each, could conjugate verbs in each, and even had a few example sentences stored in his mind for future reference. Sure, he'd have to use the flashcard he and Luna had made (and subsequently drew silly little doodles on) to make sure he didn't forget anything before his test, but he felt confident he could do it now at least. "You," he said confidently, "are a much better teacher than Mr Stark." Luna let out another laugh at this, before joking, "Don't let F.R.I.D.A.Y hear you saying that, she's probs got some programming telling her to tell Mr Stark if anyone trash talks him."
"I can assure you, miss Luna, that I don't," came the Irish voice, "however," she carried on, "Mr Stark would like to know if you're done tutoring Peter. He claims he's so bored he's dying and wants you to come spend some time with him now." Luna shook her head, looking over to Peter, who too was laughing at the older mam's toddler like demands. Nonetheless he stood up with Luna, gathering his stuff in his arms and the two of them headed to the lift together.
"You fancy coming to help me control Tony?" Asked Luna, secretly hoping the answer would be a yes.
"I would, but now I've got my French done ive got a date in the gym with Natasha. I think she's gonna try and beat her record for how many times she can throw m to the ground today - cant wait!" He joked sarcastically. Luna felt a little disappointed he wouldn't be joining her, but turned her mindset back to positive as she asked "promise to come find me later so we can watch that film?" as the lift's doors opened onto Peter's floor.
"Promise," he said smiling at her as he stepped out, "thanks again for your help with the French !"
"Anytime!" Luna responded, smiling back at him. As he left and the doors shut Luna suddenly realised just how happy she'd been over the last couple of hours. Granted, the start to her day had been a rough one, and the memory of feeling like she was reliving the worst moments of her life all at once had left her feeling utterly sick to her stomach. But in her time with Peter she had managed to push the thought to the back of her mind. Now however, it was making its reappearance with a vengeance and Luna barely noticed herself reach Tony's lab as her breathing began to quicken and her mind retreated into the horrific memory. It was only feeling Tony's warm, calloused hand on her back guiding her over to a sofa that kept her partially grounded in reality. She tried to slow down her breathing, she really did, but her breaths were coming in short snaps, waves of anxiety were rolling into her and all she could see in her minds eye was her handler hurting her again. Her body was taking in too much oxygen. Her eyes were starting to cloud and her head was spinning.
But suddenly she saw a figure crouched in front of her. She felt a hand gently take one of her own and place it on a chest, which was currently showing over exaggerated breaths for her to copy. Luna, even in her hazed state knew the drill well enough, and she tried to focus her mind in on the rise and fall of the chest in front of her. Matching her own breathing to it was a struggle, and more than once she found herself speeding back up again, but soft words would come from in front of her, asking her to just breathe.
Eventually Luna came back to the world in front of her, and her eyes focused in on the figure on Tony Stark, crouched down in front of her, looking up to her with a worried expression painted on his face.
"Fuck." Luna breathed out weakly, letting out a pathetic excuse for a laugh as she spoke. "I'm sorry Tony, that wasn't a great start."
"No need to apologise kid," he said with a genuine smile and look of understanding on his face for Luna's situation, "Everyone here struggles with this stuff. Me included. When I first came back from Afghanistan I was a mess for months on end. It's not my place to tell you bout the rest of us, but trust me kid. Everyone here gets it, and no one judges you for it." Luna felt some kind of reassurance from Tony's words, and whilst she wasn't 100 percent sure what he said was true, it helped that he tried to make what she was going through a little less isolating. They stayed where they are for a few moments more, before eventually Luna drew herself upwards so she was standing and Tony followed suit. Luna looked to him with a small but genuine smile as she said a simple "thank you," before carrying on, saying "so what was it you needed looking at?" Tony seemed to pick up on the vibe that Luna just wanted to move on, and so following suit, he stalked over towards one of the slightly less cluttered work benches and pulled up the holo-schematics for the new Stark Phone he was working on. "Essentially, we want to give the phone a 72 hour battery life with cell service available literally anywhere. But by installing the signal booster here and the extra battery here we cant have the phone running for more than 18 hours before it over-heats and shuts down. R&D have been on this for a few…" Tony continued talking on, but Luna essentially zoned out to him as she took in the problem. She pulled up another set of the holo-schematics and pulled it outwards more, before picking up a pen from the desk and altering the designs slightly, not noticing the blatant look of shock on Tony's face at seeing Luna so effortlessly navigate using the holo network in front of her and the ease at which she started editing designs. He was content to simple let her work, and within 15 minutes or so Luna had completely re-worked the inner design of the phone, maintaining the long battery life and service receptors, whilst designing an entirely new, more compact, viable cooling system to ensure the phones wouldn't over-heat.
"You're a genius," Tony stated simply, once Luna had finished explain her re-designs. She blushed furiously under the praise, but Tony carried on, saying, "No, I mean it kid. Ive been stuck on this for days and suddenly you just come in and fix the whole damn thing in 15 minutes. I should hire you. In fact - can I hire you?"
Luna spluttered in response, utterly unused to the amount of praise she was receiving off of the man in front of her. "I'm sure you would've got there Tony, it was probably just a fresh pair of eyes."
"Sure kid, if you say so." He said, pulling her into a brief side hug, before moving closer to inspect her designs. Typically however, just as Luna and Tony were finding a moment to bond a red light starts flashing above the lab as F.R.I.D.A.Y announced loudly and clearly a Code Black. Luna looked worriedly to Tony, muscles tensed and ready to spring into action if they were under attack. "Whats a code black." She asked the man in front of her sharply, switching into a soldiers mindset. Tony had a suit forming around him, nano-tech sprawling out from its housing unit in his chest.
"A code black …means Hydra."
-AN-
hi all, sorry ive had to re-upload this chapter, had some formatting issues- massive thank you to MozzyDog for letting me know !
hope you're all well
ERS x
