A/N: A lot of updates lately, since I've had some time off I've written a load, but will have a lot of work next week so probably only one update if we are lucky! Thanks to all who've loved this story so far! All I seem to write is fluff where a mama Nat is concerned, so if that's your thing you'll love this next chapter!
The next few days at the Compound found a steady routine with their newest houseguest. Anya would wake and have breakfast with Steve and Wanda. Tony stopped making an appearance that early in the morning (he was finding it hard to get coffee stains out of his shirts) but Vision would join them, despite his incapability to consume food or drink. Anya found that fascinating and followed the being around quite regularly, asking him questions.
"So you weren't born?"
"No, I wasn't." Vision asked. He didn't find the questions probing or intrusive. He was happy to sate the curious mind of the child.
"Neither was I," Anya said as she followed the being around. Vision found the child strange, but enjoyed her company.
The daily routine, post breakfast, consisted of Anya exploring the compound. She must have explored almost every corner, but she still found new places or new things. Once she'd explored a little, she would look for Steve and find him in the gym. She enjoyed climbing over the equipment, and ignoring Steve when he told her it wasn't safe. When she started climbing into the rafters, he would suggest they go running, and she'd immediately climb down. She liked running. Steve would do three laps of the compound, which must have been fifteen miles by the end. Anya would collapse onto the grass half way through the second lap and lie and wait for Steve, staring at the sky. She liked to look at the clouds, and imagine what it would feel like to fly among them. Sometimes she'd see Tony testing a new feature on his suit, and he would fly up into the air, and she could sit and watch for hours.
They would both come indoors, and Anya would find a glass of orange juice and a peanut butter sandwich waiting for her. She knew Nat made it for her; she would sit at the kitchen table and see the redhaired Avenger conveniently come to the kitchen to refill her water bottle at the time she sat down every day, and she'd sit at the table with her as she ate. Anya would eat half her sandwich, and Nat would eat the other half. It was a silent affair, but it had become routine. Nat wouldn't change it for the world. She had promised Anya time and space to let her warm up to her; she took the shared peanut butter sandwich as a step in the right direction.
After that, Anya would be forced to sit at the conference table with one of the Avengers, who had started to take turns in teaching her things. She'd had lessons in the lab – she could read, write, do basic maths and understood simple science. History was sparse. All she'd learnt about was wars and their tactics. She'd sit at the table for three hours, bored and tempted to fall asleep into whatever book was in front of her.
Afterwards, she and Wanda would watch TV together. The older girl enjoyed her TV shows and sitcoms, and was happy to find Anya was enthralled by them. They'd sit in the main communal space and have the holographic screen play, or sit in Wanda's room under a blanket. They would watch movies, and Wanda introduced her to her favourites, of all genres and holidays, regardless of the season.
At the end of Anya's first week, she had decided she would never leave this place. She loved to spend time with Wanda, Steve, and all the others.
She wouldn't admit it out loud just yet, but she enjoyed spending time with Nat too. She liked sitting at the woman's feet as she did paperwork. Just being around her wasn't as bad as she thought. She'd caught Nat smiling down at her a couple times.
She enjoyed running with Steve, who would tell her stories about his time before the ice.
Rhodey didn't spend a lot of time on base, running down to DC a lot. But when he came back three days later, he brought her a candy bar which she had happily taken with wide eyes.
Sam hung around a lot. He spent most his time either in the gym often with Steve, or repairing Redwing. Anya would stand next to him and watch as he played with wires and the tech. It was a silent affair, but Sam always made sure there was some snacks around.
Tony wasn't too keen on the kid watching him work on his suits, but he soon found the girl looking at the stack of music he had in his lab. Each day, a new album he introduced her to. He just hoped it didn't expand her vocabulary too much otherwise Natasha would be after him.
Clint had taken her out onto the grounds one afternoon at the end of her first week and taught her the basics in archery.
"Hold it steady," Clint said as the bow was steady. "And release." The arrow shot from the bow and hit the large round target. It was a far distance from the centre, but earlier that day all her arrows hit the ground around the target.
"Hey you're getting there kid," Clint clapped her shoulder and sent her after the arrows. But instead of retrieving them on foot, the arrows were surrounded by a blue light and shot back towards them both.
"Whoa!" Clint said as the arrows landed at their feet. "Careful, kid!" Clint picked the arrows up and returned them to his quiver. "You did good today kid. Why don't you go find Vision? He's meant to be giving you your lesson today." The girl nodded and ran across the grounds back towards the base, Clint following soon after. He stored his equipment in his locker, before heading to the communal area, where he found Natasha bent over a large pile of books, the assassin sitting at a strange angle as she usual did when in concentration.
"Please don't tell me you're reading parenting books, Nat." Clint smirked as he sipped his water. Nat sent him a dark glare. "You know they're a load of crap, right?"
"Really? Cause when I phoned Laura this morning," Clint's eyes shifted down. "She said these were the ones you read when Cooper was born."
"Ok ok, but that's how I know they're a load of crap." The archer sat down on the couch next to his friend, who closed her book. "Honestly, all they did was tell me that biting was kind of normal."
"Is it?"
"Well, for toddlers. If she does it at her age, I don't know." Clint tried to get Nat to smile, but he knew she struggled somewhat. "Listen, the kid is warming up. Slowly, I'll admit. But she's getting there, Nat." He placed a hand on her shoulder. "Hell, she didn't like me at first, now she keeps asking if we can shoot, and she calls me Legolas, thanks to Tony. I swear I could kill him," That got a small smirk from Nat and he felt a slight win.
"I know it takes time. That's why I'm reading these. She needs a more stable life that what she had before, and I'm worried how she's going to act out."
"Kid is gonna act out at some point. Just don't worry about it till it happens."
Clint would eat his words, he would later think.
As much as Anya liked Vision, his lessons were her least favourite. He would get very philosophical (she wasn't even sure how to pronounce that word, but she'd heard Wanda describe him that way) and she couldn't keep her focus. Instead of the conference room, she decided to go to the kitchen, where Tony was sat with his cell phone and a cup of coffee.
"Hey kid," Tony said, clutching his cup a little tighter. "What you doing?"
She just shrugged, and opened one of the fridge doors. Tony knew he shouldn't have to hide his cereals from a nine year old, but a bowl of Lucky Charms at 1am was his secret pleasure. Well, one of them. He let out a silent sigh of relief when he saw the kid was simply collecting a sandwich and glass of juice already made for her. She sat opposite him at the kitchen counter and tucked into her sandwich.
"That's gotta be better than eating my cereals, right kid?." Tony said jokingly, watching as Anya slowly chewed her food. She ate half her sandwich, before heavily slurping her juice. She wiped her mouth with the back of her jumper sleeve, and pushed her plate away, half a sandwich still there. Tony stared at the half eaten sandwich and shrugged, reaching over to grasp the small snack. He didn't see the girl's eyes go wide, or her hand quickly delve into a draw next to her, until the girl brought up a small dinner knife and stabbed it into counter, right between Tony's fingers. The man's eyes went wide, and he instinctively tried to wrestle the knife from the small girl's hands, but she was stronger than she looked, shouting at him in Russian.
"Tony!" The man let go of the knife, Anya still clutching it, and saw Nat staring wide eyed.
"Don't look at me like that, Romanoff, your kid just tried to cut my hand off over half a damn sandwich!" Nat stared at Anya before marching over. She too was stronger than she looked and managed to pry the weapon from the girls hand.
"No." She said in a low, dangerous voice. "You do not attack anyone, do you understand me? And not over a damn sandwich." Anya glared at her darkly. Whatever silent progress had been made that week was unravelling before her eyes.
"Pridurok!" Shithead! Anya cursed at the woman, and Nat found herself grabbing the girls shoulders, doing her best not to shake her. If the child knew what phrases like this meant, she'd be surprised; she'd heard the soldiers call her names like this in security tapes when she misbehaved. She would merely repeating words that had been thrown at her before.
"No. Do you hear me? No. You're not in that place anymore, and no one will treat you like that, so you don't treat anyone else that way!" She was nearly shouting, and hadn't noticed Clint run in. Nat wasn't sure what she should do next as she looked in her daughters eyes. She was full of fire, but she could see it was a wall. She remembered how aggressive she first was with Clint, when she defected. She was hostile and on edge. She supposed the quiet routine wouldn't last.
"Go to your room," Nat finally said, letting go of the tight grip on the girls shoulders.
"Suka!" Bitch! The girl bellowed before running from the kitchen. She slammed the door without touching it, and it nearly came off its hinges.
"Think biting would have been easier to handle," Clint frowned as he stared at the mess. Nat sighed into her hands before cleaning up the mess.
"Remind me to make my own sandwich next time," Tony said with wide eyes. The girl had issues, that would be a no-brainer given the situation she'd grown up in. He just hoped he wouldn't wake up dead if he took away her candy bars.
Anya stormed into her room and slammed the door, yelling in a mixture of Russian, Serbian, and Ukrainian. She didn't understand what the words actually meant, or notice that they were in fact different languages. She learnt her words from phrases shouted at her, and right now she just wanted words to yell. She kicked the wall, before folding herself away in the furthest corner of the room, hugging her knees. She tugged the jumper round her tighter, until she remembered it was Natasha's. She unzipped the striped hoodie and threw it across the room in a ball. She didn't like not wearing long sleeves; she hated seeing the little marks and bruises still on her upper arms, which were visible when she wore just a t-shirt. But right now, she didn't care as she buried her face in the knees of her grey sweatpants
She'd done it now. She'd wanted to stay. They wouldn't let her now. She dug her nails into her palms as she thought about going back. They'd all promised she'd never go back. But now it was just a waiting game.
Natasha was conflicted on when she should go up and check on the girl – she knew if she was still in fits of anger, then the door would be slammed in her face. Tony continued to mutter about how important a sandwich could be.
"Seriously, does the kid need a therapist or something." Nat shot him a look of thunder, but deep down, she was asking the same question.
"if I may, I feel it's more a matter of patience and understanding." Said Vision, who had eventually come looking for his missing student.
"My understanding is that the kid doesn't like to share a great deal," Tony quipped.
"Tony, stop it." Clint sighed.
"No he's right," Said Vision, confusing them all. "From what I've observed, and I must confess to reading one too many books on human psychology, is that historically, Anya has had nothing to call her own. She has never had property or possessions or anything that she cares about. However, over the last week, that sandwich has come to represent something else," The sythenzoid looked over at Natasha. "She shares that sandwich with you every day. That's not her property, but yours, and she felt threatened so she defended it."
"She couldn't use her words, she had to use a knife?" Tony said, rubbing his fingers, even though the knife hadn't actually made contact with him.
"It's more instinct. We don't know fully how she was trained to respond to incidents. I would have expected her to use her powers before a weapon."
Natasha hung her head as she cleaned the countertop of crumbs, and hid her face as she turned to put the dirty dishes in the sink. She'd defended a sandwich for her. It was a small thing, but huge to her. Natasha bit her lip, before deciding to risk going upstairs to check on the girl.
She lightly knocked on the door, but got no response. She knocked again, before slowly pushing it open. "Anya," she called into the room. Her eyes scanned over and found the small hunched form in the corner, head bowed. "Oh Anya." Nat walked over slowly and kneeled down in front of the girl, but she didn't look up. Nat looked hesitantly at the marks atop the girls arms, before she placed a hand, her thumb stroking her slowly. "Anya?" The girl's head came up, but she didn't look at Nat, she just stared at the wall to her side.
"I understand, baby. I'm sorry for shouting, but you could have hurt Tony." She tried, but no response. The little steps they'd taken this week had been undone. Nat looked at her hands, until she heard the small sniffles. "Hey, it's ok." She shifted round to sit next to her, and tried to coax the girl to lean against her. Eventually she let up, and Nat kept an arm round the girl's shoulders as she leaned into the older woman. Nat closed her eyes and began stroking Anya's hair.
"You'll get better at this, Anya. The world's a scary place if you don't understand it." Nat's words nearly caught in her throat when she felt the girls arms move around her body to hug her back. The Avenger slowly lowered her face and buried her nose in Anya's hair, pressing a kiss to the top of her head.
Nat could have stayed there for hours, letting the girl cuddle into her. It just felt right and didn't want to let go, or have her girl let go of her. But she slowly stopped stroking her hair and tilted the small chin to look up at her.
"Do you want to go say you're sorry to Tony?"
The girl frowned. "Sorry?" She hadn't heard that word before.
Nat smiled and stroked her cheek. "It means, you know you did wrong and you want to make things better. Ok, so I'm sorry for shouting at you?"
Anya sat up properly and looked at Nat. "Sorry." Nat nodded and stood up, holding out her hand. Anya clasped it and stood up, shivering now she was away from Nat's warmth. The redhead found the jumper on the ground and passed it to the girl, who happily tugged it back on, breathing in the comforting smell.
"Come on. Normally I wouldn't encourage apologising to Tony but I think this time we can,"
To say that was the only incident would be a lie. Over the coming days and weeks, Anya would take one step forward, then two back. Windows shattered, things flew, and people were pushed away. There was no pattern – she could be scared, angry, or even overly tired. Tony had nicknamed them her Temper Tantrums, which Nat did not find amusing. The girl could not seem to make her mind up with Nat – one moment not wanting to be anywhere near her, next minute clinging to her like she would disappear. On the most recent occasion, she was seriously considering Tony's idea of a child psychologist.
Her powers were another issue. The temper tantrums would be one thing without them, but with the ability to move things without touching and to cause blasts of energy was concerning. Anything pertaining to her powers origins were removed from the encrypted file. Only thing they could use was her bloodwork. More samples were taken (which in turn, caused another tantrum – Steve managed to calm her down somehow, he seemed to be gifted where the girl was concerned). Times like this, they needed Bruce and his more biological focused science. There was something in her blood; evidence from a long list of unknown drugs and exposure to something. Whatever it was, it had left its mark.
Another pattern that came along with the temper tantrums, was nightmares. A good day, and the girl would have to be woken up by someone. But a bad day, when her powers had become a little too unstable, she wouldn't dare close her eyes, because when she did, she didn't like what she saw. After the knife incident, Anya had a mixture of good and bad days.
The next bad day, the girl moped around until bedtime, and she disappeared. Full of tense energy, Nat stayed awake for a late night training session. This time of night, Steve often hogged the gym, but he and Sam were away, chasing leads that might lead them to the ghost that was James Barnes.
By the time she'd done the last round of her intensity training, the large clock in the gym was reading 2:30am. She decided to call it quits for the evening. She travelled through the quiet hallways, and could tell her mind wasn't going to let her sleep at all tonight. She decided she'd sit at her work computer after her shower until she atleast felt tired. Once in her room, she chucked her gym bag down and went to turn the shower on to warm up. As she walked back into her room to collect some clothes, she noticed a light flicker under her door as the automatic lights came back on. She stood perfectly still and suddenly heard small footsteps run down the corridor as fast as they could. Peering out, Natasha saw the briefest flash as her daughter ran round the corner. It didn't take her too long to find her; huddled in the kitchen beneath the breakfast bar, small feet poking out from underneath. She heard the raspy breaths and looked under to finding Anya red faced and struggling to breath.
"Hey, what happened?" She got down to her knees and tried to shuffle under the table. The girl was tucked away in a corner, and couldn't seem to breath properly, coming out in short rasps. Knowing she wouldn't get under, Nat grabbed the girl by her legs and dragged her out.
"No!" She yelled between her struggling breaths, but couldn't have the strength to fight. Nat pulled the girl onto her lap in the middle of the kitchen.
"Try and copy my breathing, dorogoy," Sweetheart. She hushed the girl and cradled her close, keeping the girls head to her chest so she could hear her heartbeat. This must have been a bad nightmare; she would normally scream out, but settle herself down (after Nat burst in the room looking for an attacker). But now she was still struggling. Nat rubbed her back and kept her own breathing steady. Eventually it worked, and the rasps came out in even breaths and the girl no longer shook in Natasha's arms. "There we go, shh." She hushed, feeling small fingers cling to her clothes. So much for getting her paperwork done tonight, she though as she buried her face in Anya's hair. There were some small sobs still coming from the girl. "You want to tell me about your dream, baby?" She felt the girl shake her head into her chest, and Nat hummed in response. The girl's grip did not seem to want to let up, and Nat was beginning to become uncomfortable on the hard kitchen floor. "Come on, dorogoy." She felt the girl cling hard when she moved, so she manoeuvred one hand under her legs and stood up, still cradling the girl.
Nat walked slowly back up the stairs, and made the decision not to take Anya back to her own room. They both entered Nat's room, the shower still running in the bathroom. Fighting to free one of her hands, Nat pulled back the blankets on her bed and placed the girl gently down, who looked up at her with wide green eyes.
"Shh, it's ok now. You can stay in here with me if you like.' The girl nodded, but said nothing. Nat stroked her face before pulling away from the bed. She needed to shower. She quickly tucked the girl in and promised she'd be just a moment. She had the fastest shower possible, and came out shortly after, dressed in a vest and shorts, and rubbing her red hair with a towel. She smiled when she saw Anya had turned over to watch the bathroom door, waiting for her return. She placed the towel in the hamper and straight away climbed into the bed next to the girl, who shifted immediately to let her in. Nat tucked an arm around the girl and tried to bring her close. Her heart soared when her girl immediately snuggled into her side, head resting on her chest. Nat continued her habit of stroking the girl's hair, and watched her small chest and rise and fall with much steadier breaths.
"It's ok now, it was just a nightmare." She whispered, the two shifting slightly to get comfier. Anya buried her nose in Nat's vest and slowly closed her eyes. She whispered something into the clothing, and Nat wasn't sure if she was meant to hear it, but she was grateful she did.
"Spasibo mamochka," Thank you, mommy. Nat would stay in that bed for all eternity if the universe would let her