AN: Hello! Sorry this chapter took longer than the others, school and sickness and stress was getting to me, along with writers block. Anyway, I quickly wanted to say that not all things in this story are accurate to the MCU (obviously), I know that Loki is supposed to be pretending to be Odin on Asgard but for plot I've put him on Earth, Peter isn't with the Avengers yet, Peter isn't fifteen yet, Bruce is supposed to be on another planet with the Grand Master, and I know that Peter and Shuri and Clint don't live in the tower but just so that they can be more involved in the story I've put them in. Everything that I've changed, I've changed for a reason, not because I don't know the timeline (I do thank you very much). Also, this is my first ever Avengers fanfiction so I'm not used to writing these characters, so if a character isn't acting or talking like they should be then please feel free to give me some tips or suggestions, I'm very new to this Avengers fanfiction. Right, that was a long AN but I had a lot to say, so let's get on with the story!

TW: Swearing, mentions of scars, blood, self harm, mentions of electrocution and mild forms of torture, mentions of overdosing, painkillers and anaesthetics

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Marvel or it's characters, I do not own the settings or names. They are owned by Marvel, not me.

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Out Of The Woods

Chapter 4

Running her fingers through her long hair, Melinda let out a sigh. She didn't know how long she'd been awake for, but the tiredness was eating at her like a lion eats it's prey. She could practically feel the bags under her eyes.

Three short taps at her door made the girl look up as it slid open. Shuri smiled at Melinda and walked over, carrying a small bundle in her arms.

"Good, you're already awake. I've brought you some clothes, Peter did leave you out some pyjamas but you didn't wear them. I can't blame you, the Spider has an odd choice in fabrics, and they aren't always very comfortable."

Shuri lay the clothes on the bed and Melinda gave a small smile. The Wakandan girl always seemed so cheerful.

"Thank you Shuri," she said, taking the clothes from Shuri and standing up. When she did, a sharp pain flooded into her ribs and she grunted, her free hand flying to where the pain was.

Shuri stared at her, concern spreading across her face. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, that guy umm Captain America? He threw his shield at me to get me off Bucky and it's left a mark, my healing factor should deal with it in about an hour."

"Steve hit you with a vibranium shield and neither of you thought to mention it?"

Melinda nodded, the pain ebbing away now that she wasn't moving.

Shuri looked worried now and stood up. "Is it broken?"

"Yeah, I've felt broken ribs before. It's only a small one though, nothing too bad," the girl said, giving a smile as if nothing was wrong.

Shuri went to lift up Melinda's top half of her HYDRA suit when the girl took a huge step back, looking almost scared.

"No. Please," Melinda said, dipping her head.

Melinda's head filled with the possibilities of different reactions people would have if they knew what she was hiding under her clothes. Concern, anger, fear? She wasn't ready to show them yet. She wasn't ready to show the scars that lined her body, twisting and weaving over her skin like a tree.

"Okay. Well, we should probably give you an X-Ray but your healing factor will deal with it, as you said. If it starts hurting more or gets too painful then get Peter to send you to me," Shuri told her, still looking concerned.

"Peter? Oh Spider boy, I'll ask him if we can walk slower or something. I'll be fine."

Shuri nodded and went to walk out of the room when Melinda put a hand on her shoulder. Shuri was quite a bit shorter than Melinda and Shuri turned, looking up at the girl.

"Can I have a bandage? To support my ribs until they heal?"

Melinda's face suddenly fell, a thought rushing through her like electricity. The tracker. Shit shit shit! HYDRA had put a tracker into her arm for if she ever went rogue and remembered something. It electrocuted her when HYDRA pressed something. So why hadn't they activated it yet?

"Sure, I can get you a bandage. Would you like painkillers too?"

"Can you make that two bandages? And some scissors please? Oh and painkillers don't work on me, fast metabolism burns through it too fast for it to have any affect."

"Sure, why do you need scissors and a second bandage though?"

"Scissors for cutting my hair, a second bandage for extra support," she lied.

"Okay, get dressed and I'll be back in a few minutes."

The girl left and Melinda paced around the room, moving slowly as not to move her ribs too much. This could go so wrong in so many different ways, HYDRA could be on there way right now, they could press the electrocution button any second, all the Avengers could be in danger and it would be her fault for forgetting about the tracker. She had to cut it out by herself, she couldn't let down the other Avengers by telling them she has forgotten about something that could lead to dire consequences.

Melinda was so lost in thought that she didn't hear Shuri come back in.

"Here's some scissors and your bandages. Would you like anything else while I'm at it?"

"Oh no I'm fine, thank you," she replied, trying to sound as okay as possible.

"Alright, Peter should be up soon to come and get you for your tour. Enjoy, everyone loves you already. Be careful with your ribs, and your scissors. And get dressed before Peter comes, I don't think either of you want to have him walk in on you changing."

Shuri turned and left again, sliding the door closed behind her and leaving Melinda alone.

Instantly, the girl made her way into the bathroom and closed the door, hoping it would muffle any sounds of her cutting out the tracker. She looked into the mirror, her face had paled significantly, and she wasn't surprised.

Heaving a shaky sigh, she rolled up the sleeve of her left arm and lay it on the counter next to the sink. Grabbing a towel and shoving it into her mouth, she grabbed the scissors with her dominant hand and held it above her arm where she knew the tracker was. She'd seen it light up the last time she was electrocuted.

A muffled cry escaped her mouth as she dug the scissors into the space just below her wrist and moved it around, creating a slash that started pouring red liquid over her arm and onto the counter.

Blood started to drip off the side of the counter, making a dipping noise as the white floor started to turn red. Her head was spinning and the pain in her arm was almost overwhelming.

She swallowed hard and pushed the scissors back into the cut, whimpering though the towel. Melinda opened the scissors and closed around something hard. The tracker.

Her hands shook uncontrollably and she lost the grip on the tracker, the scissors clattered onto the counter and Melinda let out a pitiful cry. She took the towel out of her mouth, staining it with the blood on her hand.

Ready to give up, she started to cry silently, when a voice sounded from outside the bathroom following three small taps.

"Melinda? Are you in there?"

Peter. Shit, this was the worst time for him to be here. Or was it?

"Y-Yeah. Can I ask you something?" she called, trying to stop her voice from wavering but failing.

"Sure? Are you okay?"

"I need your help with something. Don't come in yet though. Do you have steady hands?"

"I guess so, why? You still haven't answered my question though. Are you okay?"

She ignored him, trying to find what to say next.

"Are you okay with blood?" She glanced at the blood pooling around her arm and on the floor. "Lots of it?"

"Depends on the kind of blood- wait are you injured?!"

She was started to lose patience, she needed this tracker out before it was too late, and the pain was started to make her head buzz.

"Are you okay with blood? Yes or no?!"

"Y-Yes I'm okay with blood."

Melinda could have cried she was so relieved, then she realised she was already crying.

"Come in, and please don't freak out before I explain."

The door slid open to reveal Peter wearing a nerdy t-shirt and looking freaked out. The second he saw the blood he covered him mouth and ran forwards, holding out his hands as if he was trying to think of what to do.

"What's going on? God that's a lot of blood! Did you do that to yourself? Oh my gosh I'll get Tony-"

"No! Just please help," she whimpered pathetically, the pain making her defences drop instantly.

Peter looked terrified but nodded. "What happened? What do you want me to do?"

Melinda was panting now, she thought she had a higher tolerance for pain seeing as she'd had a lot of injuries in the past, but it was clear to her now that it was just the mind control making her so resistant to it.

"There's a tracker in my arm, I forgot about it with everything going on yesterday. It can also electrocute me, it's happened a few times before when I started to remember and stop fighting for HYDRA. I'm scared that they're tracking my location right now. You could all be in danger. I tried to cut it out but my hands are shaking too much, I can't get a good enough grip on it. I-I need you to use the scissors and get the tracker out of my arm. Can you do that for me?"

"Umm yeah s-sure I can do that, I don't want to hurt you though," he said.

"Look, it's going to hurt me a lot more if you don't get it out. And please, I don't want to put you all in any more danger."

Peter nodded shakily. He picked up the scissors and held them above the cut on her arm.

"Right, this is going to hurt me a lot but whatever you do, don't stop until that tracker is out."

She shoved the towel back into her mouth and squeezed her hand into a fist, her jaws clamping down on the towel in the hope that it would relieve some of the pain.

Peter stuck the scissors straight into her arm and Melinda's muffled yell sounded, making Peter flinch. "Sorry, I'm sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry," he repeated over and over again.

He opened the scissors, trying to ignore the yells and whimpers from the girl next to him. He felt the tracker and clamped the metal around it, pulling it out slowly. Melinda's yell turned into a scream of pain and Peter felt so close to crying that he almost dropped the tracker. After a few more seconds, he dropped the tracker onto the floor and the scissors clattered into the bright red sink.

Melinda's legs buckled and she landed on the floor with a heavy thump, quickly dragging herself up and leaning against the cupboards under the sink.

Peter knelt down next to her and started wrapping the bandage around her arm without saying anything. He was almost as pale as she was now.

"Sorry. I know that's not what you expected to do first thing this morning. Thank you though," she said weakly, panting and wiping sweat from her forehead.

"It's fine. Anything to help. Right, is that tight enough?"

Melinda nodded and slammed her foot down onto the blood covered tracker, sending small pieces of metal and plastic flying across the floor, and struggling to her feet.

"We should clean this up, wouldn't want Mr Stark or someone walking in here and seeing this," Peter suggested, gesturing to the blood covering everything.

"Right, yeah. I'm going to throw this towel away though, I don't think there's any saving it," she said, holding up the once-white towel that was now red.

"O-Okay."

"Peter? I really am sorry that you had to do that. I don't . . . I don't like relying on other people, and I don't trust very easily. Hell, I haven't trusted anyone for seven years, not even myself," she whimpered. "You're a good person, and I just needed to get the tracker out and I couldn't do it by myself. I'm so sorry."

"You don't have to apologise, I understand. You didn't want to put us in any more danger, and you could have gotten even more badly hurt or been mind controlled again if you hadn't taken it out. I've seen a lot of stuff, Melinda, I don't think this will scar me any more than anything else that's happened in my life."

"But, I need to ask one more thing," Peter added. "Why didn't you tell someone? Mr Stark or Dr Banner or Shuri, they could have given you painkillers or anaesthetics and gotten it out in a much safer way than this."

"Painkillers and anaesthetics don't work on me, my metabolism burns them too fast. Either I don't have enough or I overdose, I had to learn that the hard way. And I didn't want to be a burden, I guess. You're already all in danger because of me being here, I just didn't want to disappoint anyone or get people to hate me more. I'm already a killer, I don't want to be responsible for your deaths too."

Peter looked at her, his huge brown eyes full of sympathy. The way that Melinda was staring down at the blood, her blood, on the counter, her eyes full of tears, made his heart ache. Everything she'd said, he just wanted to help her and save her. She was his age, no one that young should've had to go though that. He had only known her for less than a day, but he was ready to protect her at all costs.

"Thank you, Peter. Look, I've never been one for socialising or friendship or trust, but I guess I have to trust you after this so-"

"You don't have to trust me," Peter interrupted. "You shouldn't force yourself to trust me, but I think this deserves friendship, don't you?"

A small smile spread across Melinda's face. "Yeah. I'd love to have you as my friend."

"We should probably clean up now though, I'm surprised FRIDAY hasn't said anything about this yet."

The two of them grabbed some tissues and cloths and started cleaning the blood off the bathroom floor and counter.

"What's FRIDAY?"

Peter realised with a jolt that she didn't know anything about the Compound and most likely didn't know much about the history of the Avengers too.

"FRIDAY is an AI that Mr Stark created after his last AI, JARVIS, was killed by another AI called Ultron who ended up taking over and starting a robot invasion that lead to a city called Sokovia flying into the air and killing a bunch of people. Then Ultron tried to create a synthetic human with his consciousness but the Avengers stopped him and in the process ended up putting JARVIS into the robot thingy and that created Vision, the floating red guy that you met yesterday. Then he made FRIDAY and she's really cool but she's a huge tattletale like Karen."

Melinda looked at him as if he had just said the most outrageous thing ever, and to be honest, in her head, he had.

"That was a bad explanation," Peter chuckled, throwing a blood-covered tissue into the bin. "Mr Stark is an amazing scientist and inventor, he thought that he should have an AI, like Siri or Alexa but way more advanced, that could help with everything. Mr Stark made JARVIS, and put him into his Iron-Man suit first, before eventually putting him in his lab. JARVIS could do everything, he could access files, show directions, say the most sarcastic things, control his suits, and more. Then the Avengers found a new way of creating an AI, through something called the Mind Stone, embedded in Loki's sceptre. Mr Stark and Dr Banner ended up trying to create a new artificial intelligence with it without telling the others, and it didn't end well. They created Ultron, it tried to destroy JARVIS but he managed to escape. Ultron then took over all of Mr Stark's Iron-Legion robots, who were supposed to get civilians to safety during battles, and turned them into his own slaves. Then there was a huge battle and Sokovia got lifted into the sky and JARVIS was saved and turned into Vision, and then Ultron was killed but Miss Wanda's brother died along with a bunch of other people. It was really sad. I wasn't there for that though. Then Mr Stark made FRIDAY, who is now in the entire building and is capable of loads more than JARVIS. She can even scan us and tell if we're injured or in distress. And then I have Karen in my suit, but she's a real tattletale so I don't trust her that much, because there was this one time where I was slightly injured and she contacting Mr Stark because it was her protocol and Mr Stark made me promise to never get hurt again but I was only lightly stabbed, it wasn't that bad. Anyway, FRIDAY is basically just some really smart AI system."

There was a silence between the two and Melinda stared at Peter, disbelief and shock etched into her face.

"You talk a lot," she said simply.

"Yeah I've been told that a lot."

"Also, what are Siri and Alexa?"

Peter frowned. "That's what you ask about that story? Not anything about the robot invasion or Wanda or me getting stabbed or anything else?"

"Yep. I have no idea was Siri and Alexa are so I thought I'd ask about that," she giggled.

The two of them laughed and got back to work cleaning, an oddly joyful feeling filled the room despite them cleaning up blood after the horrific event.

. . .

. . .

Eventually they finished and Peter stood at the door. "So, I'll go down to the kitchen, once you're dressed then come down. It's just down the hallway and you need to take a left and then it should be at the end of that hallway."

"Thank you Spider boy, I'll be there in a minute."

Peter left and closed the door behind him, leaving Melinda alone again. She started to get changed, focusing on that instead of having all her thoughts running through her head. They ran too fast sometimes, or too wildly, it hurt and she didn't know how to stop it.

Eventually she finished changing and looked at herself in the mirror propped up against the wall next to her desk. She'd been given a nerdy t-shirt that was about a size too big for her, most likely one of Peter's, a tartan button up shirt that she'd left undone, the sleeves long enough to cover the bandage on her arm, and some jeans that fit her almost perfectly. It suited her though, and she liked the outfit. But there was one thing that she didn't like. Her hair.

Melinda never thought her hair would make her want to cry, it was a strange feeling. Her hair reached down to her waist, it was bouncy and wavy too and classically pretty. But there was more to it than that.

HYDRA had never allowed her to cut her hair, just like Bucky with his long hair. Pure hatred burned in her head and she grabbed the scissors that Peter and her had cleaned up, and held it to the hair around her shoulders.

Snip, snip, snip, snip.

After a few minutes, her hair was shoulder length, and a smile crept across her face. She looked good, felt good, she felt like herself, her real self.

'Time to go and meet the Avengers again, I wonder if they'll trust me soon', she thought to herself as she gave her newly short hair a brush, making it go fluffy and more wavy than before. Then she left the room and started down the hallway.

. . .

. . .

The smell of pancakes filled her senses even before she reached the kitchen. There was the sound of talking and Melinda closed her eyes, trying to increase her hearing.

"She'll be through in a minute Mr Rogers, she's just taking a minute to her changed, must be hard with the wings and all that."

"If she doesn't walk through that door in the next minute then you're going to get her."

A giggle escaped her mouth as she walked into the kitchen and looked around. It was big, like really big, with countertops and two people in it.

"Hey, you're here, I was just talking about you," Spider-boy said, turning from his spinning seat to look at her.

"Yeah, I heard, super hearing and all. I could smell pancakes from a mile away," she said, surprised by how comfortable she already was around Peter.

"Oh you changed your hair, it looks really nice on you, it's a lot fluffier than I thought it was," the spider complimented.

"Thank you."

The second person turned around, Steve. He was holding a pan and spatula, a strong smell of pancakes coming from him.

"I was just making some pancakes. Would you like blueberry, chocolate or normal?"

Melinda froze. "O-Oh I can make myself some breakfast, I don't want to trouble anyone."

"Nonsense kiddo, I'm already making them. Besides, you're one of us now, even if some people around here aren't fully . . . into that idea. And around these parts, we look after each other. Now, blueberry, normal, or chocolate?"

"Whatever's easiest," she said, sitting down next to Peter and fiddling with her sleeve.

"Alright, me and Peter are having blueberry so you can have that if you'd like," Steve said, turning back around and flipping the pancake, catching it with ease.

"Thank you."

There was silence between them all for a few seconds, making an awkward atmosphere turn even worse.

"How are your ribs?" Steve asked her. He put the pancakes onto the plates and set them in front of the two teenagers.

"Better, they don't hurt as much now. My healing should take care of them in about an hour, as long as it doesn't get distracted by anything else," she replied, putting her hand over where her arm was still bleeding under the bandage.

Peter cast her a worried glance but stayed silent. They finished their pancakes and Steve placed the plates in the sink, turning on the tap and starting to wash up. They had been delicious, her first pancakes in over seven years, made by Captain America himself, and they were the best things she'd ever tasted.

"Right, we should start the tour before anyone interrupts us. Thanks Mr Steve, those were really nice," Peter said.

"Yeah, thank you Mr Steve," Melinda chimed.

"Ah, no, I'm already trying to convince two of you kids not to call me that, I'm not managing a third. You can call me Steve, or Cap, whichever suits you best, but no more Mr Steves or Mr Rogers from you, kiddo," the super soldier said in a joking but harsh voice.

"Okay, Cap. See you around," she called as she left with Peter.

As they walked down a corridor, Melinda started thinking, how could she feel so comfortable around these people already? She'd been with them for less than twenty four hours but already she felt so . . . at peace with them around. Weird.

"So Steve seems to be quite accepting of me, that's good I guess," she said, breaking the silence.

"Yeah, he's definitely the mum friend, he's always making breakfast for us or doing the cleaning and washing up, and it's impossible to be sad in the tower, because next thing you know, BOOM, Steve swoops in to cheer you up," Peter said, making an explosion gesture when he said 'boom'.

The two teens giggled and carried on with the tour, Peter explaining the way around with ease, showing her the best hiding places as well as showing her where not to go. This was going to be fun, Melinda felt safe here, protected and welcome. Most of all, she felt like she had found a home.