Maria walked through the tents of their temporary, hidden camp which was set up a few kilometres outside of de Ruyter's Boer National Union's current rendezvous, its location – the South African province of Western Cape.
She approached a white man who was dressed in jeans and a t-shirt that read 'B.N.U.' across it. "Agent Kruger," Maria addressed him. "According to your file, you speak fluent Afrikaans."
"Yes, Ma'am. I was born in Johannesburg, raised in Albany. I didn't learn English until kindergarten."
"You don't have much time logged in the field."
"Ah, yeah, that's true." He nodded. "I mostly just do data analysis." Maria looked at him with skepticism. "But I assure you," his eyes widened as he started to sell himself, "I'm up for a challenge and looking forward to this opportunity to build on my practical skills."
His words angered her as she curtly said, "You think you're instilling faith in me by calling a reconnaissance mission, with millions of potential lives on the line, a challenging opportunity for your own personal growth?" She raised her brow.
"N— no, ma'am," he stuttered out in fear. "I didn't— I mean. You can count on me to do the job." He tried his best to assure her that he could handle being undercover and gain entrance into the white supremacists' organisation.
She glared him down, watching him shaking in his boots before she spun around, facing the tactical unit leader. "Agent Myer."
"Ma'am?"
"Get your team ready," she ordered him. "We leave in twenty."
"Yes, ma'am." He nodded before Maria turned to walk away from her men.
Almost immediately, Steve fell in line beside her. "Scaring the newbies don't usually help their performances," he casually said to her.
"I wasn't scaring anybody, I was simply focusing the desk jockey," she said plainly with a locked jaw.
"Pretty sure I saw tears in his eyes."
"And that's why I think he'll choke out there. He's too soft."
"He'll be just fine. Nat'll be right next to him the entire time." Maria huffed, knowing that Natasha being fluent in Dutch didn't mean that she could monitor the young agent as well as she could if she'd known the African derivative of the language too. And there was also the added fear that Natasha's ballcap wouldn't do a sufficient job in concealing her race, and that her presence would shift from being helpful to being a hindrance. They were banking on the assumption that the group was too anti-black focused to care much about an Asian showing up in their ranks. "Everything's gonna be fine. It always is when you're involved," Steve said encouragingly.
"Shouldn't you be getting ready right now?" Maria snapped at him, hating that he was both lying to her and coddling her. Things were not better with her involvement and he needed to acknowledge that and stop handling her with kid gloves.
"Yeah, I'm going," he said professionally, yet she could still hear optimism in his voice.
Steve was trying so hard with her, wanting her to open up – or at the very least – relax a bit. But she wasn't giving him the results that he was looking for. She was stressed more than ever.
Just as Maria passed by the back of the weapons tent, where her men were starting to gear up inside of, her phone vibrated in her pocket. Stopping, she pulled it out to see that Hope had texted her.
The message read:
Hey, it's me again. I'm assuming you're really busy right now but I wanted to say thanks for sending my request along. I just got a call from recruitment. They're sending me to Pennsylvania in a few days.
Anyway, I hope you're doing alright over there. You're in my thoughts always.
She felt such guilt. This was Hope's third text to her and Maria had yet to respond to the two prior. Maria had managed to tell Fury and Steve that Hope wanted to become permanent. She did it on her way over to Africa. But as soon as she landed, she had completely lost herself in her work. Nothing else existed but her mission. She felt that she had to prove herself to be both worthy and safe, not only for S.H.I.E.L.D., but for Hope too. She saw herself as an overall risk to everyone.
After reading her last message, Maria knew that she really had to respond. This was a huge deal. Hope was stepping into a new phase in her life. But yet, she couldn't bring herself to type anything out. She didn't want to open up a dialogue because it would lead to her having to talk about herself, and she wasn't ready for that. Instead she stared at her phone screen, cursing at herself to move her thumb across her keypad and type something out. To acknowledge Hope. To not be a complete dick towards her.
"You think the scuttlebutt's true about her?" Maria heard one of her agents say from the other side of the tent wall which she was standing right next to as her focus was pulled away from her phone.
"That the attacks were because of her?" Maria's head jerked up to look at the canvas wall, recognising Myer's voice, her attention now totally shifted away from her conundrum with Hope to the conversation in progress.
"Yeah," came the same voice who Maria now recognised to be Myer's second in command, Peter Kelly.
"I don't know. Commander's definitely a hard-ass who scares me more than Fury ever could."
"Fury?" Kelly interjected. "More like God himself on judgment day,"
"True. But I have a hard time believing she's a genuine monster who'd kill her own."
"We all heard Romanoff mentioning her breaking parole when we were breaching Reneen. Why would she say that if she wasn't involved in something sketchy?"
"It could've just been an inside joke knowing those two," Myer's suggested a possible explanation.
"So you think she's innocent?"
"Honestly, I dunno." He paused for a moment before sighing. "Maybe I could see it. I mean, we're all still just pawns on her chessboard after all. I don't even think she fully sees us as people."
'Did she see them as people?'Maria wondered to herself. She did view everything as numbers while strategically planning. Whether it be strength, location, time, or weapons – like she was solving a mathematical equation. Faces fell away when she was commanding. 'God,' she thought to herself, 'she really was a monster.'
"Quit your lollygagging and gear up," Steve's voice harshly cut through their conversation.
"Yes, Captain," Myer's voice jumped, answering in fear.
"Sorry, Captain," Kelly blurted after.
The fresh message that she was a monster, translated in her mind to specifically mean that she would bring more harm to all her pawns, which now included Hope, just like she'd done before.
With irrational anxiety, Maria shoved her phone back inside her pocket as her heart began racing. Her breathing too started to fall short while her palms became clammy. She closed her eyes and tried to take a few calming breaths, not able to deal with Hope. Not just her text message, but with her all together. It's not that she didn't care about her, on the contrary, she cared so, so much. It was just that it was all too much. Everything was too much.
Hope fired her weapon at a man who dropped to the ground just as her and her two teammates ran past him and into a large shed.
The three of them did a quick sweep of the place before they gathered together, discovering that they were alone, save for all the tools and old military Jeeps that were stripped down to their parts inside of the sizable enclosure.
"Any thoughts?" a young, short, latine woman in her early twenties, with brown, wavy, shoulder length hair, asked.
Hope scanned the space, an idea emerging as her gaze caught on a longboard that was leaning up against a tool cabinet. "What were the rules exactly when we get shot?"
"We have to hit the ground and stay put," the woman said.
"And what if we're not on the ground when we get hit?"
Her other partner, a tall, handsome, First Nation's man who was around Hope's age, shrugged. "I suppose we simply go limp wherever we are."
Hope nodded, assuming that same thing. She then asked him, "We've all seen how quickly you move. How fast can you sprint?"
"Thirty-five miles per hour." Both women gawked at his answer.
"Alright then," Hope smiled, admittedly impressed by him. "How're your climbing skills?"
"Excellent," he said, which did not surprise her in the least. He was like a Navajo version of Captain America, which arguably made him an even more qualified Captain America than Steve was.
"Kay." Hope nodded. "I think I've got an idea."
Their objective was capture the flag. It was their team of three against twenty S.H.I.E.L.D. operatives. There was only one flag in their opponent's possession that they had to reach without getting shot.
Shortly after Maria had left for Africa, Hope was sent off toThe Farm, which was part of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s training program (which was just outside of Pittsburgh.) She'd been there for nearly three weeks now with Sharon Carter running her class. There were only three of them, herself, Rosalinda (Roz) Solomón – a recent S.H.I.E.L.D. academy graduate who'd requested to be there, wanting to gain as much experience as possible (clearly an overachiever), and Jason Strongbow – who was coming out of the Navajo Nation Division of Public Safety. The man had a lot of experience under his belt and had special abilities akin to Steve's but unlike the captain's supersoldier serum, Jason went through a radiation induced mutation caused by a sonic blast inside of a uranium mine.
Hope grabbed the longboard and spun its wheels to make sure that it was in working order. She was then quick to grab a can of WD40 from off of a nearby messy countertop, not pleased with the rotation. She sprayed the bearings to make for a smoother ride.
"Okay." Hope moved to the other door – opposite the one they had entered from – poking her head through it. She studied the hardtop that ran all the way from their location to the tower that held the flag which was hanging from the top of it. The building was about 150 metres away from them, so it was going to be a long ride with – by the math – at most, ten men between them from it. Hope brought her head back into the building before she told her plan to Strongbow and Solomón.
A short while later, Hope and Solomón had exited the shed. The small woman was quick to piggyback onto Hope's shoulders right before Hope took off on the longboard towards their target.
Hope was never big into skateboarding but a bunch of her friends had them growing up, so she'd hopped on their boards at times to cruise down the boardwalk at the beach. It really wasn't that much different than a surfboard when it came to balancing and steering. Though, with Solomón on her back, it took a little bit for Hope to adjust her movements to compensate for her, almost losing balance right out of the gate.
Once she found her stride and they made ground, it didn't take long until they were under fire. The bean bag bullets soared towards them from behind various crates (that were set up on the tarmac) as they passed by. Solomón was quick to return fire on them. The woman had both her gun and Hope's as she took out three hostiles with them. Hope had to admit, the girl had great aim.
Hope pushed them along, nearing the building as the bullets multiplied with every metre they gained. Projectiles soon rained down on them from above as shots were now coming from the tower.
"Ah!" Solomón cried out. "I'm shot!" Her words made Hope buckle down and push harder as the woman tactfully slumped over Hope's shoulder, resting her head on top of hers while doing her best to shield Hope.
"We're almost there," Hope grunted as she quickly swerved the board to avoid a bean bag bullet that would have surely tripped them.
"Gah!" The girl yelled out again. "These things hurt," she said, clearly now getting shot repeatedly.
"Shit," Hope growled as a man stepped through the tower door as they were speeding right towards it. "Roz, I'm gunna toss you!"
"Do what ya gotta do!"
Just as the man raised his weapon on them, Hope skidded the board to the side, letting go of Solomón as she bodily crashed into him. The action sent the longboard flying off and Hope crashing to the ground.
Hope hissed before she speedily scrambled to her feet. She was out of range from the shots above, since they were now under an overhang. She turned to the man, who was luckily struggling to get up with Solomón sprawled out over him – playing dead. Hope speedily grabbed Solomón's upper body, taking a hold of her gun that was tied to the girl's wrist and shot the man in the chest.
"Roz, you good?" she asked while nicely setting her down before she grabbed the knife out of her pocket, cutting the strings that fastened the weapons to Solomón's wrists. They'd afixed the guns to her so when she was shot, she could drop them without losing them in transit. They didn't want to be accused of cheating if she'd held onto them while she was "dead".
"Yeah, I'm good." Roz gave a thumbs up from her death position while she was sprawled out on her back. Hope nodded, glad to hear that she didn't injure her partner as she holstered the one gun while bringing the other one up in front of her. "Go get 'em, Waspie," Roz called out to her just as Hope opened the door to breach the building.
The tower had a metal grated staircase that spiraled up the sides of the building, reaching to the top which made it able to see two hostiles about two storeys up. She assumed that they were the ones who'd been firing on them from above when she was outside.
Hope bolted up the stairs as they quickly noticed her and tried to shoot her, but they didn't have a clear line of fire due to the stairs and their landings that were in the way. The two started making their way down to meet her, probably not wanting to waste their ammunition. As soon as they were about to round the corner to her, Hope shoved her gun inside her pants, and hopped up onto the railing, only to quickly climb to the next storey, bypassing them.
She'd only just pulled her body over the railing above them when she heard gunfire and felt her own weapon slip out of her pants. They'd just missed her as they shot from below while her gun went tumbling down the tower to hit the ground floor. "Shit," she muttered in reaction, now only having one gun with little ammunition left. Pushing on, knowing that she'd only saved herself a few seconds with her shortcut, she quickly barreled up the stairs. She only had to travel a few more storeys before she reached the top.
At the final level she drew her holstered weapon before entering onto the roof. She then speedily burst through the door with the other two men not far behind her.
The top of the building was open with just a canopy roof sheltering it. But that was all she could note of her surroundings, for that as soon as she entered the space, she was shot repeatedly by Sharon Carter herself. The agent was clearly waiting for her and Hope was in too much of a rush to enter the floor in a more tactful way.
"Barreling head first into a heavily armed tower by yourself?" Sharon placed her hand on her hip as she raised her gun to rest it by her shoulder. "Not too brilliant, Van Dyne. But I guess I shouldn't fault you. I'm sure they didn't teach you how to infiltrate a building in finishing school."
Hope rolled her eyes, getting really tired of Sharon's constant jabs at her – jabs that only she had received out of the three of them. They were usually about how Hope was spoiled and had no appreciation for anything that didn't fit into her charmed lifestyle, or they were about Hope not having what it takes to become an agent. This time, however, she managed to nail both topics in one insult.
The door shut behind her, though Hope could still hear the two men approaching through the barrier. But before they reached the closed threshold, Hope dropped to her butt, pushing her body against the door and flopped over.
"What are you…?" Sharon's question tapered off as the guys started pushing at the door. Hope winced in pain as they very forcefully knocked it into her side, yet she tried her best to not allow them to roll her away. "Hold steady!" Sharon yelled at the two, clearly not pleased with the way they were whacking the door into Hope's body. Sharon may have not been her biggest fan, but she clearly didn't want one of her trainees to end up with broken ribs either. As soon as she gave her orders, they stopped trying to beat down the door.
Then, like it had clicked in Sharon's head, she whipped her body around only to find Jason, who had scaled the side of the building and was now perched on top of the railing, gun pointing directly at her. Before their instructor had time to react, Jason shot Sharon directly in the chest.
The man then hopped down and casually grabbed hold of the flag, giving Hope a smirk with a nod.
Hope slowly sat upright and rose to her feet as she watched Sharon very calmly pick up her walkie-talkie and speak into it, "Game's over. Flag has been captured."
Hope really couldn't tell if she was impressed by them or annoyed. Agent Carter was such an anomaly who ran from hot to cold with no inbetween. Hope couldn't quite put her finger on her.
Sharon looked back and forth between her two students as she said, "We'll break for lunch and reconvene in the gym at thirteen hundred." And with that she left, entering the building.
Hope walked up to Jason, smiling as he offered the flag to her. "Did you have any trouble getting here?" She accepted the object from him.
"Not much. You and Roz kept them well distracted. I only had to take out one other guy."
Hope nodded. "And how was the climb?"
"A little more challenging than scaling a cliff, but still not that challenging."
Hope smiled. "Show off."
"Me?" He walked to the door, opening it for her to pass through. "I thought that skate was much more impressive than my climb."
She chuckled as she felt her cheeks growing warm, finding the man extremely charming. "Come on, let's go scrape Roz off the pavement and get some food."
"Sounds good to me, boss." He winked.
Hope grinned at his words, enjoying the flirtatious attention that he'd often given her as she led the way down the tower.
On their lunch break, Hope had taken out her phone to see if Maria had called or texted her. During their time apart, Hope had tried calling once, and sent four separate texts to her with zero replies from her. Hope was sure that being back in the field was playing some kind of toll on her, but she was expecting Maria to let her know what was going on with her. But instead she was completely unresponsive.
Hope sighed, seeing only a message from Scott, who was checking in on her, with – again – nothing from Maria. She placed her phone face down on the table next to her food before dropping her chin into her hand.
"What is it, Waspy?" Roz asked her from across the table, right before the young woman shoved a large club sandwich into her mouth.
"Nothing." Hope shook her head, reaching for the pepper shaker that was in front of Jason's plate, who was seated next to Roz. "Just haven't heard from my girlfriend in awhile."
"How long is awhile?" she mumbled through her mouth full of food.
"It's been a few weeks now." She sighed.
Roz swallowed her bite before gawking, "A few weeks?"
Jason shook his head as the two gave her disapproving looks.
"She has a crazy busy workload so she doesn't always have a chance to contact me," Hope defended Maria.
"Dude," Roz said unapologetically, "unless she's an astronaut currently on mission to outer space, I'm sure she can find the time to send a – what? – ten second text." Hope shrugged, not really sure about the woman's rationale in this particular case. "Wait." Roz picked up on her apprehension, misreading it. "Is she an astronaut? You've told us next to nothing about her."
"No, she's not an astronaut." Hope rolled her eyes at her while still feeling unsure on how much information she should disclose about who she was dating. She was already acutely aware that people probably suspected nepotism for her being both there, at the farm, and in the Avengers, from her parents' connection with S.H.I.E.L.D. The last thing she wanted was to add that she was also the deputy director's girlfriend onto her list. She needed to prove herself worthy of her position, even if she fully understood the privilege that she was born into that gave her these opportunities in the first place.
"Well there you go." Roz opened her arms out, palms up in a told-you-so gesture. "No excuse. Not an astronaut."
"She might have an excuse."
"Really?" She cocked her head, obviously not buying it.
She sighed. "Maybe." Wanting so badly for there to be a legitimate reason but not knowing what it could be.
"You don't deserve to be treated like this."
"I agree with Roz on this one," Jason added to her statement.
"Things aren't that simple." Hope thought back to when Maria went undercover and couldn't contact her. But then again, Hope knew that Maria was currently on a mission under Fury along with a number of other agents, including Steve and Natasha. So the chances of her suddenly going covert while both leading personnel and acting as a backup S.H.I.E.L.D. database was very slim. Even when she asked her mother about her, who was still a consultant on the mission, she told her that the last she heard, Maria was on the ground hunting down intel and from what she could gather, was in contact with headquarters.
Roz looked at her, cocking her head to the side as she asked in all earnest, "If your roles were reversed, would you ignore her like this?"
Hope thought on how her own go-to defence mechanisms was ironically to isolate herself just like this, she'd literally done that exact same thing to Scott that past month. And yet, she couldn't imagine cutting Maria out like that. Maria was different. She was her confidant. Her person no matter what. She would text Maria in the middle of a sub-saharan African snake pit if she had to.
"No," she said with a heavy heart. "No, I wouldn't,"
"Just for the record," Jason spoke up with honesty in his voice, "if our roles were reversed, and I was your boyfriend, I would never ignore you like she is."
He caught her gaze, holding it for a moment before Roz nudged his arm with a smile. "Did you just finally shoot your shot there, Strongbow?"
"I am not shooting anything, I'm just trying to be sincere," he calmly explained to the young woman.
"Anyway." Roz ripped her gaze off of the man before looking back at Hope. "Are you now ready to admit that we have a point?"
"Yeah," Hope grumbled. "You guys may have a point." She hated to say it, but she was having a hard time with Maria's radio silence. It was one thing for her to be busy and out of reach, but for her to ignore her was a whole other kettle of fish.
"Good news." Roz's eyes lit up. "If you guys crash and burn, you got handsome Strongbow here who seems very eager to step in," she said, clearly trying to get a rise out of the man.
"You sure have a way of exaggerating situations." He eyed her, though he always seemed to find her shit-disturbing ways to be enduring enough to let slide, this one included.
"Do I though?" She tipped her head to the side, biting down on a grin as she wagged her eyebrows up and down.
From behind her Hope heard a huff followed by heavy footsteps, realising that Sharon had gotten up from her seat, two tables over from them, and was noisily passing by. Hope just caught sight of her, for a second, as she fell into her view while exiting the room while aggressively pushing through the doors to leave.
"Okay" – Roz lowered her tone as she leaned closer into Hope – "Carter totally death glared the back of your head just then," she said as if she didn't want any of the other personnel in the cafeteria to hear her.
"Mine?" Hope asked.
"Yes." Jason nodded. "I don't think she liked the way you bested her this morning."
"She shotme."
"Yeah," he explained, "and I believe you made her feel foolish for it since you were the decoy that she fell for." He then started to speculate out loud, "I also feel as if she doesn't enjoy being here. Like, she was ordered to take this assignment against her will."
Roz took a sip of her water before saying, "I mean, she is a security level seven agent. Seems a little excessive for her to be here." She paused for a moment before contemplating out loud, "It almost makes me wonder if she's filling in the position. Like maybe something happened to the regular guy." Hope instantly thought on the possibility that they could have been lost or injured during the A.I.M. attacks.
"What do you mean by 'she's a security level seven agent'?" Jason asked.
"Oh, ah." Roz straightened up in her seat before explaining, "So, all agents go through promotions. The higher the level, the more information you get to know, which means, the more classified missions you get to be part of. You get it. Now – for instance – I graduated from the academy at level two, but most graduate at level one."
"Yiiyah." Jason smirked at her.
"What does that mean?" Roz asked.
"It's kind of like a nerd or a try-hard."
"A brilliant overachiever?" she pressed like she wanted to hear that exact wording as a possible translation.
"Sure." He shrugged.
Her face split into a grin. "That's true, I am all of these things," she said proudly. "Anyway," she fell back into her explanation, "after farm training, you guys should be level twos as well. All combat field agents are a two, minimum." She then studied them both like she were in deep contemplation. "But, then again" – she pointed to Jason – "you're transferring from another agency" – she then pointed to Hope – "and you're an Average which makes me wonder if you'll both be higher than the average field agent. Maybe like a four," she theorised, but Hope suspected that she might have even been beyond that already since she'd been permitted to attend Maria's trial.
"So seven must be high then," Jason deducted before biting down on an apple.
"Very. Pretty much all the top agents are sevens." She began listing off a few examples, "Carter, Romanoff, May, Morse."
"What about Coulson?" Jason interjected after swallowing his bite. "He's the agent I've worked with in the past when we've done joint agency projects."
"He's an eight. He's the only one." Roz briefly looked over to Hope like she was making sure that she was following the conversation too, which she was. "See, there's only one person for level eight, nine, and ten."
"I'm assuming Director Fury would be ten," Jason assumed.
"Yup, and Commander Hill is nine." Roz's mention of Maria made Hope take in a sharp inhale. She'd just gotten her mind, and ironically, the conversation off of the woman only for her to be mentioned again. But this time, by name.
Jason scrunched his face as he said, "I don't know him."
"Her." Roz corrected him before letting her head fall back as she sighed. "Oh god, Hill is like my idol." She then looked back to him as she continued, "I've never met her, but I did a paper on her S.H.I.E.L.D. career at the academy." Now Hope's interest was truly piqued as she listened intently. "She was recruited straight out of the Marines, did a compressed three month training program where she got a perfect score on her tactical exam which has only ever been done twice in S.H.I.E.L.D. history. She still holds the marksmanship record under three categories at the academy's shooting range, to this day." Now Hope couldn't help but bite down a smile. "She proved herself so capable that within six years, she climbed the ranks and was promoted to Deputy Director. Oh!" – Roz bounced excitedly in her seat – "and the title 'commander' was created specifically for her. When the helicarriers became a fleet they needed her to take charge of it, so she was just dubbed with a completely new title for the position."
"Wow, she does sound impressive." Jason nodded in awe as Hope was filled to the brim with pride for having such an accomplished woman as her girlfriend.
"Yeah." Roz nodded. "And this is just the stuff that isn't classified." She looked over to Hope as the realisation dawned on her. "Wait. You've been hanging out with the Avengers for a little while now." She casually pointed at her. "Have you met Commander Hill?"
"Ah," Hope, now suddenly feeling very awkward, said, "yeah." She tried to come off as nonchalantly as possible.
"Really?" Her eyes lit up. "What's she like? I've heard she's super stoic and a major hard ass."
"She is those things, yes," Hope said stiffly, not wanting to continue on with Roz's line of questioning. "You know what?" Hope quickly followed up with, "I'm gonna head over to the gym early." She stood up abruptly, grabbing her phone and tray. "I'll see you guys in a bit."
"Okay." Roz gave her an odd look. "I mean, I thought I was the yiiyah, but you're even worse. Can't even take a full lunch break."
"Guilty." She forced a smile before heading out.
Shortly, when Hope arrived at the gym, she found Sharon punching away at the heavy bag – the activity that she wanted to do.
Sharon looked over to her, giving her a once over. "Spar with me," she said more like an order than a request, eyeing her like she was prey while she aggressively tore her gloves' velcro fasteners loose with her teeth. She then pulled them off before tossing them to the ground.
Hope nodded, ready to finally punch the woman who had kept giving her grief. She threw her gym bag and water bottle to the side and walked onto the mat, right up to her.
Hope wasted no time as she threw a punch right at her face, Sharon was quick and dodge it.
"You know" – Sharon stepped back – "sacrificing your team, including yourself, in order to have a successful mission" – she started circling Hope – "isn't actually an achievement." Hope countered her movements, never exposing her back to the other woman. "Are you planning on doing that with the Avengers too? Should I start saying my goodbye to them now?"
Hope huffed, really on the edge at this point with her attitude. "What is your problem with me?" she finally snapped.
Sharon stopped in her tracks, cocking her head as she studied her like she was not expecting her to so bluntly ask her that. "I don't trust you," Sharon griped right before she jumped her with an explosive left jab. Hope moved to block her but didn't expect the kick that followed it, failing to stop it as Sharon's knee came in to impact her ribs. The woman was admittedly very fast. Faster than Hope.
"Ah." She scrunched her body into herself as Sharon backed off. Hope then looked up to her, straightening out her body as she repeated her words, but in a question, "You don't trust me?" Not understanding where this was coming from.
"Yeah, I don't trust you. I don't think you're truly committed." She moved towards Hope, circling her once again, ready to pounce.
"I think it's fair to say I've shown that I am." Sharon went for a right hook just as Hope stepped past her moving body, getting low, to deliver a punch to her kidneys from behind. In hignsight, it was a stupid move because Sharon quickly pivoted and slid her arm under Hope and over her chest, grabbing a hold of her only to knee her in the back as she fell to the mat.
"You've shown initiative, I'll give you that." Sharon backed away from her again as Hope dragged herself up, anger and frustration rising along with her. "You throw yourself fully into the moment, jumping in with both feet. But what about tomorrow?" They started circling each other again as Hope rolled her shoulders back, trying to realign her body. "What happens when things get tough? You gonna run away like you did before?" Hope suddenly realised what she was talking about. Sharon nodded at her. "Yeah, I read your file. You quit the Avengers Project after your first mission. Things got a little complicated and your instinct was to bolt." Sharon moved in for another attack while she grunted, "There's no loyalty in that."
"I came back!" Hope defended herself both physically and conversationally.
"This time. But what if you change your mind again?" Another punch came as Hope blocked it with her firsts up in front of her face.
"I'm not gonna!" Sharon made contact with her, kicking her in the side. "Ah!" Hope yelled, getting really tired of being the other woman's punching bag. She hated how much better of a fighter she was than her.
"I know you believe that." Sharon stepped back, nodding as her words seemed genuine. "I do. You think just because it's new and exciting now, you'll stick around forever."
"I will stick around. I am committed," Hope pressed again.
"They all say that in the beginning until they realise it's more than they bargained for. The lonely nights. The missed birthdays. Spending Christmases alone." Sharon started moving in again as they repeated their circling dance. "The overall stress of having duty come between you two. Not just your duty, though, but her's too. It's mostly hers, actually." Hope took in a short breath, realising that Sharon wasn't talking about S.H.I.E.L.D. at all, but about Maria. "They all tell her they can handle it but they never can. They always leave her in the end." Sharon locked eyes with her. "And I think you're gonna leave her too."
"No!" Hope swung a few times at her in frustration as she was easily blocked.
"You're gonna get tired of waiting around for her and run to the next available guy, per your usual," Sharon grunted as she pushed Hope away.
"Per my what?" Hope asked in angered confusion.
"Johnathan McDougall. You shared a condo with him for a year while you were both undergrads." Sharon brought up her first serious relationship, one that started shortly after her two month secretive fling with her professor. "Collin Stanley, Pym Tech engineer. You guys lasted just shy of four years." She mentioned her late-baby's father. "Michael Dubois. He was your on-again-off-again boyfriend from France. Well, according to the tabloids, that is." Sharon moved to Hope, delivering another punch kick combination, landing a strike at Hope's hip while making her stumble. "Oh, and let's not forget about Lang."
"What's your point, other than proving your background checks are extremely invasive?" Hope huffed while she stepped back, grinding her teeth in resentment.
"You clearly have a preference and I think once you've had your fun, you're gonna leave her for a man. Specifically, one who's readily available." She said in a disingenuous tone, "Maybe even Strongbow. You two seem to be hitting it off so well already."
"No!" She lunged at her in fury, despising all of her accusations. She might have been frustrated with Maria's radio silence, but what Sharon was saying was so extreme. And also, none of her goddamned business.
Hope's anger got the best of her as she created an opening for Sharon in her haste. The agent got low and kicked Hope's legs out from underneath her, sending her flying onto the mat. She landed hard onto her back. The wind was knocked out of her as she took in a struggled gasp of air with a short coughing fit to follow.
Just as Hope regained control of herself, along with her breath, she rolled over to catch sight of one of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s personnel entering the gym. "Ma'am," he addressed Sharon from the doorway.
Without a word, Sharon walked over to him, not even looking at Hope as she slowly picked herself up off the floor. The man muttered something rather briefly to Sharon before leaving.
Sharon sighed in annoyance before saying, "Pack your bags. You're to go to Wakanda and report in with Fury for a mission." She shook her head. "Guess they think Avengers can take gap days in the middle of their training." Hope didn't know how to respond, there was so much tension between them in that moment. "Well you better get your ass moving. Your transport is already waiting in front of the lodging house."
Hope, under any other circumstance, would have been beaming with excitement, but Sharon had put her into such a distressing headspace. So Hope awkwardly bent down to grab her stuff before moving to leave the gym.
Just as she walked past the other woman, Sharon spoke up rather boldly, "You break her heart, I break your bones."
Hope stopped right as she was about to push open the door, and turned to face her. She glared her down as she said through a locked jaw, "You don't know me." She hated how someone could think so low of her while assuming that she needed to be threatened in order for her to treat Maria right. With that, Hope aggressively shoved the doors open, exiting the gym.
She then hurriedly made her way back down to the cafeteria to say a quick goodbye to her new friends before going to her room to pack her bags and leave.
By the time she loaded into the truck (which was her shuttle to the airfield) she had cooled down from her encounter with Sharon. Now she could finally get properly excited for her mission. Though, she admittedly was also nervous that she would probably be seeing Maria there too. She was anxious to learn what state she'd find her in, hoping that she was alright and had a legitimate reason as to why Hope hadn't heard from her. She really didn't know how she'd feel if she were to learn that Maria had been purposely ignoring her this whole time. So she prayed that that wasn't the case, as she allowed her transport to take her to her mission, and likely, to some answers too.
Maria crawled into her bunk on the Wakanda airship that she was a current passenger of. She was flying to Birnin Zana along with T'Challa, Okoye, and Nakia (who she'd been working alongside with) monitoring the movements of the B.N.U. as they gathered to infiltrate Wakanda's borders.
de Ruyter, now confirmed by Maria's team to have both possession and control of the impundulu, had been designated as an FPCON level threat. Together, S.H.I.E.L.D. and Wakanda – along with the support of the Pan-African Alliance – made the decision to allow the B.N.U. to advance on Wakanda because their fractions have been so spread out over the continent that this way they could hit the organisation all at once, on the soil of a country that was ready for it.
The sleeping quarters were tight on the aircraft with bunks two high, tucked in up against the back bulkhead. Maria had just enough space to sit up without bashing her head on the bed above her. She drew the bunk curtains closed, giving herself privacy before she took out her phone.
She brought up Hope's old messages, for probably the fortieth time during the past three weeks. It'd now been four messages in total, the last one was from a week ago, simply reading:
I don't know if you're getting these messages or not, but if you are, just remember that I love you.
She took a deep breath, staring at it while finding the message equally comforting as it was nerve racking. She was terrified that she was messing it all up. She felt so inept in every way and it wasn't just a sense of unworthiness, it was that she also felt that she was constantly causing harm to those around her too. She was the incompetent girlfriend who dropped the ball, like she was doing now. She pushed her partners away, sacrificing her relationships with them for her job. A job where she was now sacrificing her own agents, and it was all because of her ineptitude. Everything was a mess. She – specifically – was a mess. Hope was going to break up with her, and rightfully so. Maria couldn't so much as type the words, "I love you too," back to her. She finally found the love of her life and she was sabotaging it all in a missguided desire to protect Hope from her.
Maria threw her mobile down on the mattress before digging out her tablet from her backpack which was next to her on her bed. As she grabbed it, her little sugar pumpkin rolled out along with it. She stared at it for a moment before she decided to put it into her lap, still finding comfort in it even in her dissociative state. As the device was booting up, she reached behind her, grabbing her blue tuque from underneath her pillow and pulling it onto her head. She'd done that often. Whenever she had some privacy she would put it on. She rested her hand on her head, moving her fingers over the textured ridges of the garment, always feeling closer to Hope in the action.
Maria then opened up Sharon's latest report, ready to check in on how her agents-in-training were doing. As much as Maria was having a hard time herself, she was so proud to be constantly reading about how well Hope was doing in Philadelphia. The knowledge that she was thriving was the only source of light she had those past days. If Maria was crashing and burning, Hope was at least reaching new highs and that was the only thing that truly mattered in the end. That Hope was happy, safe, and flourishing.