New chapter! I'll give you guys a hint, there was a promise that Clint had Kate make to him before she started school. It's gonna be an important piece coming up with who the mystery caller is.
As always, please review :)
Kate hit the punching bag in the gym. She had been trying to work out all her frustration for the last hour and she still didn't feel any better. With a well-placed roundhouse, she sent the bag swinging and stepped back, breathing hard. She caught the bag after a second and gave a half-hearted punch, feeling tired.
"You need to turn your fist more." She jumped hearing Bucky's voice and turned to see him walking forward out of the shadows. "If you under-rotate, you're gonna hurt yourself."
She looked back at the bag and mimed how she had been hitting and realized she hadn't been rotating enough so she corrected it. "Thanks." She said turning back to him.
Taking in the tired look to the Winter Soldier she didn't have to guess why he was up so late.
"Wanna talk about it?" She asked.
Bucky shook his head. "Why are you up?" He asked instead.
Kate shrugged. "Haven't been down here in a while." She said. "I need the practice. Gotta stay sharp."
"You've had a busy two weeks with starting school." He said looking at the still gently swaying punching bag.
"Yeah…" She said quietly.
"Also, with your late-night searches since you came back from the movies last Friday."
Kate froze and turned to look at Bucky who was watching her carefully. Clint had been gone since Sunday and so had Natasha, she thought she had been careful enough to avoid the others when staying up late.
"Wanna talk about it?" Bucky asked parroting her question back at her.
Kate pressed her lips into a thin line. "There's nothing. I've just been looking for H.Y.D.R.A. cells." She said. It was a half truth, she did it as a side bar.
Bucky seemed unimpressed. "Please, I had sisters." He said blandly, showing he recognized the lie. He looked at her seriously. "You don't have to tell me; just know we all have your back okay. Whatever you need."
Kate nodded quietly.
Bucky smiled faintly after a second. "Come on, I know where Sam put the last of the cheesecake that he was hiding from everyone." He said.
Kate smiled brightly and followed him to the elevator.
…
A month came and went without incident. The Avengers cleaned up H.Y.D.R.A. as they found them, and things seemed to settle down. Kate was beginning to think that the phone call was just gonna become a distant memory as she had found nothing and heard nothing for weeks. She had even agreed to join the decathlon team on a temporary basis, they were going to be heading to Washington DC at the end of the week for a competition.
Kate was rushing around main living area gathering a few wayward books that she had left up here while waiting for her bagel to pop in the toaster. It was just another school day, but she had woken up late after Clint, Tony, Wanda, Thor, and Loki had arrived back at the Tower late last night.
It was a new adjustment with Loki starting to help out on missions. Other than Thor and Bruce, no one really trusted him still, but it was getting better. The Trickster God had actually saved a few of them in some pretty close calls.
"Kate, c'mon you'll be late!" Natasha called by the elevator.
"I can't find my chem book!" Kate called back looking around in panic.
Sam and Steve were at the dinning table drinking coffee and watching the chaos go down.
"It's under the coffee table." Steve called out helpfully.
Kate gave him a grateful look as she dove to the ground and grabbed the book. She was tired, normally she would have spotted something that easy. She ran back to the kitchen, shoved the last book into her backpack as Natasha handed her the popped bagel with cream cheese already on it.
"See you later!" Kate called the two soldiers at the table to which they raised their coffee cups in farewell.
On the way out, Clint exited the elevator. Kate gave him a hug and he and Natasha shared a kiss before the two women left the building.
Thanks to Natasha's faster than legal but skillful driving, Kate was on time. With a goodbye, Kate got out and Natasha drove off, a few kids staring after the shiny new corvette.
She saw Peter walking across the parking lot, so she waited for him. He looked up and she smiled at him, but it quickly faded as Flash tried to hit Peter with his car…again. Quickly scooping up a small stone, she chucked it with pinpoint accuracy, hitting Flash in the side of the neck making him swerve in surprise. Kate was already turning back to Peter, who was laughing having seen the whole thing.
They chatted about the upcoming chemistry test as they walked up the stairs to the school. This had become habit for them to stop at her locker and then proceed to his where they would wait for Ned.
Leaning against the lockers, Kate allowed herself to space out for a moment, trusting that Peter would react if there was any danger. This last month or so had been hell, but she was starting to believe that she was actually in the clear.
Maybe they don't want to face the Avengers.She thought idly.
She came back in to focus as she saw Ned walking up. Peter hadn't noticed him yet and was still rummaging around in his locker. Ned smiled at Kate, she noticed he was holding a small LEGO figurine in his hand.
"Come with me." Ned said putting the figurine on Peter's shoulder. "And together we will build my new LEGO Death Star."
Kate laughed as Peter whipped around with wide eyes. "What?" He said.
A couple cheerleaders nearby scoffed at them and walked away. Kate rolled her eyes at them and focused with a smile back on her two best friends.
"That's awesome." Peter said smiling as he shut his locker and they all began to walk down the hall. "How many pieces?"
"Three thousand eight hundred and three." Ned replied.
"That's insane." Kate said shaking her head.
Ned smiled. "I know. You guys want to build it tonight?" He asked hopefully.
"No, I can't tonight." Peter said. "I've got the Stark—"
"Stark internship." Ned said with disappointment.
Peter nodded. "Yeah, exactly." He said.
Kate frowned but didn't say anything. The 'Internship' was a way for him to do his Spider-Man patrols without anyone asking about where he spent his time. He had been diving in to it more and more lately and he wasn't leaving a lot of time to be a kid.
"Always got that internship." Ned commented as they walked.
"Yeah, well, hopefully, soon it'll lead to a real job with them." Peter replied.
He meant a job with the Avengers.
"That would be so sweet." Ned said.
"Right?" Peter smiled.
Ned grinned. "He'd be all, 'Good job on those spreadsheets, Peter. Here's a gold coin'." Kate and Peter raised their eyebrows at him, and he shrugged. "I don't know how jobs work."
"That's exactly how they work." Peter joked back with him.
"I'll knock out the bones of the Death Star." Ned said as they got closer to their classrooms. "I'll come by afterwards. For the most part, the difficult thing is the base of it. The top half we can knock out in two hours, tops."
"That'd be great." Peter said.
Kate looked up at the distracted tone in his voice and saw him looking down the hall. Following his gaze, she saw Liz walking by at the end of the hall talking with one of her friends. Sighing, Kate turned her focus back to Ned as they made plans to meet at Peter's apartment tonight.
…
"Okay, so how do we calculate linear acceleration..." Ms. Warren said. "...between points A and B?" Flash, who was sitting in front of Peter and Kate raised his hand. "Flash."
"It's the product of sine of the angle and gravity divided by mass." Flashed replied, which Kate rolled her eyes.
"Nope." Ms. Warren said simply. She looked at Peter who was watching a video of YouTube that someone had caught of him stopping a car from hitting a bus. "Peter." The kid's head shot up quickly. "You still with us?"
"Yeah, yeah." Peter said quickly closing his laptop. He looked at the board. "Mass cancels out, so it's just gravity times sine."
"Right." Ms. Warren said. She looked at the bully in front of them. "See, Flash, being the fastest isn't always the best if you are wrong."
Flash turned around and mouthed. "You're dead."
Kate glared at him until the kid turned back around.