To have Archie agree was pretty much a piece of cake and took almost no effort coming from me. Once Wanda convinced me to let them help I ate while she kept me company and talked a little bit more so that I could see that she wasn't there to hurt me. I didn't know what to make of her but if I wanted answers I had to play along and show that I trusted her enough to be around me despite what had been happening. After this is when she brought me into his room so we could all have a talk. When I first walked in he was pretty heated of course from seeing his best friend with cuts and bruises. It's only natural to feel this way because my blood was boiled as well when I saw his condition of being physically hurt on his face with some sore ribs. As soon as I assured him I was okay and relaxed him I told him to keep an open mind and listen. That's when she told him what she explained to me and with my help he eventually accepted the offer. If it wasn't for me being convinced of what she was saying then he would have probably told her to go screw herself. Which in all honesty would have been my answer too if I hadn't been so scared in the first place. But what other options did we have?

Once a few days of rest and getting our strength back from the soldiers torture passed we were ready to start out training. The more we trained the closer we got to Wanda and Pietro Maximoff, who are both 17 and turned out to be twins. Knowing this much was a good start and the more we built our friendship with them the more information we got from each other's past. This started with finding out that they grew up here in Sokovia and are familiar with having soldiers around without even batting an eye. When they were 10 they had a war in their country and until this day the soldiers never really left. It's as if they stalk around the country on their guard waiting for something else to happen. In all honesty I can't blame them now that I understand the fear from the attack on New York.

To top all that off this war has had them a little lost on how to fit in because their parents died during it and they became orphans. A missile ended up in their house with no warning and killed them on the spot just as another came in not too long after, which almost killed the twins too. To make things worse we found out that the missiles happened to be made by Stark Industries, Tony Stark's own company. It wouldn't have mattered if I told them that when this happened Tony wasn't fully in charge of things by then, because something like that will always haunt you. They were only kids and seeing their parents die like that causes a lot of trauma, anger, hate and a need for some type of justice. I can't blame them and I would be lying if I said I wouldn't be the same way if it happened to me.

Now what surprises me when they told us this story is how they are actually okay with being around us. I say this because when they became orphans they didn't just have that hate for Tony, they had it against American's too. They'd been at protests and rallies that were Anti-American since around 15 or 16 because of that war. Getting their powers was even to help their country from another attack. Luckily though in the time we've been here we've all adapted to each other and are now pretty good friends.

...

It's been a hell of a ride learning our powers. By letting them help us they managed to in fact get us to figure out how to control our magic more than when we were growing up. Almost 20 years of having these abilities and the most we'd do at home is have our noses in the books and barely ever got to use our powers unless it was during our lessons. But here we can use them pretty freely and they've shown us how to relax, how to let it swarm us enough to have bits and pieces of that magic out without overdoing it. The way the energy of my powers makes a tingling sensation rather than chaotically running through my body from being overwhelmed before shooting out fire is amazing. Even controlling my telepathic powers is freeing as I'm able to shift between people's minds a lot more easily. The next step is working on focusing myself enough to block people out and keep someone from reading my thoughts.

Now despite the fact that we are no longer being locked in our rooms and aren't being watched as if we have something to hide we're still not allowed to go out. We have been warned not to leave the Sokovian army compound that is located in the mountains. It's a beautiful place and being able to go onto the balconies or stare out the windows to see it is amazing, but I definitely miss being out in the world. This has made it more clear on why the twins ran away the day we saw them in the city.

With that in mind we haven't been able to go home from all the training so the best we've got is calling and video chatting with our families. When we were let out of our rooms we called our parents immediately and for obvious reasons we left out the being kidnapped and tortured part before apologizing about not reaching out to them. Then we explained that we found new friends that have magic too and how they are helping us adapt to it more, adding that we also fell in love with the city and plan to extend our stay in Sokovia. We figured this would be the best way to keep them from being too concerned about us. We could tell that they were happy but we also knew they were upset about not coming home any time so. But despite that they seemed to understand that we want to expand on our magic and they also respect that we are old enough to make our own choices.

"I'm homesick, Arch." I tell him while watching TV in Archie's room a month later, leaning up against him on the bed.

He half smiles and looks at me, "I know me too. We're making a lot of progress here though."

I press my lips together because I'm still concerned about why we aren't allowed to leave. I have this feeling like there must be more to it but I know that asking won't give us answers. "I'm grateful for the twins and Strucker for helping us get our powers under control but this isn't our life or home."

He rubs my arm gently as he tries to comfort me, "One day at a time. Stay focused and we'll get through it."

I smile, leaning into his touch a bit. "I would have been lost if you weren't here."

He shifts himself a bit so he's able to look at me better, his eyes worried because he knows that if something ever happened to him I wouldn't be the same. "Well I'm right here. I go you, Mads."

I half smile at him, hugging him. His hugs are always the best and reminds me of home. He's the only familiar thing I can grasp onto now. His brown eyes still make me feel safe and calms me down when I look at them because not much about him has changed other than the subtle differences like his hair being a little longer so he has to side part it instead of being a bit messy and spiked up while still rockin that scruff on his face. He seems to like it so he's been shaving and letting it grow on and off. But the sad part is that I can tell his scent is almost gone, being here for over a month is dissolving his normal smell. We have all of our things from when they went to the motel and packed it all up so no one noticed we disappeared. But the soap and travel shampoos/conditioners we had with us is gone. The only thing left is his cologne and once that finishes everything about home will be a memory.

I feel him rub my back as I hug him, both of us taking a breath. Then I sense someone coming as a wind of thoughts follow and I smile to myself when I hear who it is.

"You guys are adorable."

"Don't get any ideas, Wanda." I think as I laugh in my head.

"Oh the idea is there. Stop making it obvious." She laughs back before I hear her footsteps.

I pull away from Archie when she walks in and I turn to her, giving a sly look. "He's my best friend. Never gonna happen."

She slightly smirks at me, but then notices Archie staring so she doesn't continue. He can always tell when we are telepathically talking to each other. "Strucker wants us in the training room in 10 minutes."

Archie rolls his eyes, sitting back against his wall. "We literally had 2 hours of training this morning. Doesn't he give it a rest?"

"Not until you are able to freeze time for longer than 10 seconds and stop Pietro."

When it comes to his powers he's gotten better with his telekinesis, but his freezing still needs work. As for his premonitions there's really no way to practice that as far as we all know. He just gets winds if random flashes when he least expects it. Sometimes it's from touching things with his hands and other times it just pops into his head. This power is just as tricky as my telepathy since it takes more mental strength to figure them out.

"I've never been able to freeze for longer than that. It drains me out too quickly. Plus your brother is too fast."

"Which is why he wants you training more. He knows you can do it."

"I think I'll lose my mind before then." He says this sarcastically but I know he's serious. He's getting fed up.

"Come on, Arch. You have to admit that this is a lot more fun than having our noses in books all day. We barely got to use our powers at home." As much as I hate that we aren't able to leave we do have more freedom with our powers.

"Ughhh." He groans playfully before pushing me over gently and smiles, "Fine."

I smile back and laugh, pushing him back. "Jerk."

"Oh you know you love me." He hits my chin with his knuckles slightly.

I roll my eyes but smile, "Always will."

So we both get to our feet and my eyes land on Wanda. I see that she still has a soft smirk on her face, "What did I say?" I think to her as I walk behind Archie and beside her.

"He's your best friend." She thinks back to me in a sarcastic voice.

"Always has been and always will be." I smile at her as I try to hide my laugh from her sarcasm so the soldiers don't notice that we are secretly talking to each other as they pass. Most of the soldiers here are paranoid when we do that, thinking we're trying to find ways to get outside. They've learned their lessons from the twins.

Once we get to the training room Pietro is already here lifting some weights. There's sweat all over his face and it makes his silver skater-hair stick to his forehead. Majority of the time he's in his tracksuit, so you don't even notice that he has muscles unless he takes off the jacket or is training. His usual training outfit is a gray tank top, black basketball shorts and gray running sneakers. Wanda is in black leggings, a black t-shirt with her red hair in a high ponytail and red converse. Archie is wearing a green long-sleeve workout shirt and black workout pants with black high tops, and I'm in blue knee length basketball shorts with a simple blue and white tie dye t-shirt with the New York Yankees symbol on it and white Nikes, my hair is in a side ponytail as I sweep my side bangs behind my right ear.

"Ah, there you are." The accent of everyone's boss Baron Von Strucker comes from the upstairs area as he looks down at all four of us, "Archie my boy, we are close to getting you to the capacity it takes to stop time in longer aspects."

I look up at the light-skinned man in an all black Sokovian uniform, buzzcut and his monocle glasses. Despite how scary he seems to look he treats us like equals, even like we are his own kids. "Low energy for us?" Whenever we train we are usually using our powers against each other with low range magic so no one gets hurt. But every once in a while he'll have us raise it up by a few notches to give a challenge.

"We'll start at 10% power." He tells us.

We all nod and go to our spots on the open area of the training room surrounding Archie. I smirk at him as he looks at me with a smile on his face, "Don't hold back." He thinks to me and I can't help but laugh because he knows I would never.

"On my mark." Strucker says in his booming commander like voice and we all get ourselves ready.

My hands turn blue and flames seep out, Wanda's palms swarm in her red orbs, and Pietro gets himself in a running position. He's so fast that freezing him in his spot isn't easy at all. Archie hasn't been able to do it yet because he has to concentrate all of his energy to will himself to freeze the object he wants and the only time we ever see Pietro is when he decides to stop. All we normally see is a silver streak in bits and pieces when he runs so we're not even sure if it's possible to freeze him.

"Now, Wanda!" Strucker yells to her and she doesn't hesitate to throw balls of red at my best friend.

With no effort Archie is able to freeze each one as they stop in mid-air each time and then swats them aside with his telekinesis. I can't help but smile at my best friend as he does this, seeing how much he's grown with his powers. Then I smirk when Strucker calls my name, my hands pointing downward to the floor. I see him stare at me and he smirks back just as I shoot out blue lines of fire that go right towards him. This is going to be fun.

If you're enjoying the story so far let me know in the comments what you think! Feedback is much appreciated so that I can keep posting and understanding everyone's mindset on how I'm doing.