This was a mess. The whole situation was a mess and everyone in the small room down in the Compound lounge knew it.
The team was scattered about in the small room. Steve was seated at the end of the little area with the large packet otherwise known as the Sokovia Accords in his hands as he skimmed through. Beside him to his right, lying on the little couch with his hand pressed over his face, was Tony, who looked completely exhausted – whether it was over the situation or Sam and Rhodey's nonstop arguing going on behind him, Danielle couldn't really tell. Next to Tony was Natasha, who had the most neutral expression as always.
Across from them was Vision and Wanda, seated on the couch while Vision played with a small piece from the chessboard on the coffee table in front of them. And that was where Danielle and Jack were seated, on opposite sides of the coffee table, staring blankly at the chess pieces on the board, silent like the rest of the team – save for the two arguing team members.
Danielle wasn't sure what she was supposed to say after that... problematic conference. She wasn't sure how to talk to Jack about the whole thing either, seeing as he looked just about as lost as she did.
And Sam and Rhodey going back and forth a few feet away wasn't exactly helping anyone. "Secretary Ross has a Congressional Medal of Honor, which is one more than you have," Rhodey exclaimed, jabbing a fingerin Sam's direction. Danielle chuckled to herself, so that was the Secretary's name. She remembered hearing something on the radio about how he had been appointed Secretary of State by President Ellis a few months after the Battle of Sokovia due to his 'experience' in the department of 'enhanced individuals'. She remembered Sharon scoffing and stating the only reason they considered it experience was because he tried to kill the Hulk and grew hell-bent on stopping anyone like him... Which wasn't very comforting, now that Danielle thought about it.
"So, let's say we agree to this thing," Sam continued on with his argument. "How long is it gonna be before they low-jack us like a bunch of common criminals?" Danielle shifted slightly from where she sat. He had a point. Danielle had already been wondering the same thing during the conference with the Secretary, and knowing other people saw it as a possible problem made her wonder if it was actually a possibility and she wasn't just being dramatic or overly paranoid.
"A hundred and seventeen countries wanna sign this," Rhodey stated. "A hundred and seventeen, Sam, and you're just like, 'nah, it's cool, we got it'-"
"How long are you gonna play both sides?" Sam cut him off and Danielle was suddenly wishing she were anywhere but in this room right now.
"I have an equation," a new voice chimed into the conversation. Danielle peeked over her shoulder from where she sat and found it was Vision who had spoken.
"Oh," Sam sighed as all attention turned to the Android. "Now this'll clear it up," he added a little sarcastically.
Danielle paid no mind to Sam's comment as her full attention was turned to Vision. In the few months she had gotten to know him, she knew him as someone very wise and smart. A little... lost when it came to actual human experiences and contact, but smart philosophically speaking. He was, Afteralll, worthy enough to carry Thor's hammer – whatever that meant (everytime she tried bringing it up Steve would end up groaning while Natasha usually laughed in the background).
"In the eight years since Mr. Stark announced himself as Iron Man, the number of known enhanced persons has grown exponentially," Vision explained. "And during the same period, the number of potentially world-ending events has risen at a commensurate rate."
Danielle tilted her head in confusion, and as if he were reading her mind, Steve asked, "Are you saying it's our fault?"
"I'm saying there may be a causality," Vision corrected. "Our very strength invites challenge, challenge incites conflict, and conflict... breeds catastrophe." Danielle shuddered at his words, but paid enough attention to allow him to continue. "Oversight... Oversight is not an idea that can be dismissed out of hand."
"So..." Jack slowly drawer out his words with an uneasy look on his face. "You're saying we need these Accords because of who we are and what we can do?" Vision nodded and from behind him Danielle could hear Rhodey say, 'boom', as if he'd won the entire argument he had been having with Sam.
Had he? Was Vision right? Danielle still didn't fully understand what was all in those documents in Steve's hand, but she knew she didn't like the way Jack had worded it: 'because of who we are and what we can do'. It wasn't like it was her choice to be kidnapped by a group of Neo-Nazis and tortured and experimented on with some magic stone from outer space until she was given these out of whack powers-
Danielle's mind-rant was cut short when she felt a soothing sensation flowing through her body. When she looked up to see where I was coming from, she found Wanda's hand brushing through her hair gently, a small light of scarlet coming from the palm of her hand. Danielle smiled and Wanda returned it before they went back to the conversation at hand.
"Tony," Natasha spoke up for the first time, directed to the man lying beside her on the couch who removed his hand from over his face to look at her. "You're being uncharachteristally non hyper-verbal." Danielle chuckled but she knew it was true. Tony hadn't said much since his arrival at the Compound, and remembering her few interactions she had with the eccentric billionaire, she knew he really liked to talk.
"It's cuz he's already made up his mind," Steve explained before Tony could answer for himself.
"Boy, you know me so well," Tony replied as he began to slowly pull himself off the couch. "Actually, I'm nursing an electromagnetic headache," he clarified as he began to walk towards the kitchen area nearby. "That's what's going on, Cap, it's just pain... it's discomfort– who's putting coffee grounds in the disposal?" The billionaire abruptly asked as he dug through the sink.
Across from Danielle, Jack grimaced.
"Am I running a bed-and-breakfast for a biker gang?" He asked as he made his way back to the front of the island kitchen. Just then, he silently set down one of his holographic devices and activated it. A picture of an unfamiliar young man appeared on screen to everyone's confusion. Why was Tony showing them this? "Oh, that's Charles Spencer, by the way. He's a great kid," Tony explained, gesturing to the photo of the man. "Computer engineering degree, 3.6 GPA, had a floor-level gig and Intel plan for the Fall. But first, he wanted to put a few miles on his soul before he parked it behind a desk, see the world, maybe be of service.
"Charlie didn't want to go to Vegas or Fort Lauderdale – which is what I would do," Tong continued his speech. "He didn't go to Paris or Amsterdam – sounds fun. He decidedto spend his summer building sustainable housing for the poor – guess where – Sokovia!" The genius finally snapped while opening a bottle of what looked like pills.
Everyone in the room fell silent. Tony didn't need to finish his story about Charles Spencer's life, or how it ended in this case, everyone already knew what had happened to him. And Danielle didn't need to be partially psychic to understand that everyone in the room felt guilt falling over them like a thick blanket, she felt it too.
"He wanted to make a difference, I suppose –I mean, we won't know because we dropped a building on him while we were kicking ass," Tony finished his story anyway, prompting Danielle to bow her head reflecting on the poor young man's successful life and it's tragic end. She had no idea who Charles Spencer was until only a few moments ago, yet the guilt eating away at her chest made it seem like she'd known him for years. Like he was her oldest friend and she somehow let him die that day in Sokovia...
After Tony downed his pills with a quick swig of his coffee he had made in a mug, he set the cup down and walked around the island to face the team as he continued his speech. "There's no decision-making process here. We need to be put in check. And whatever form that takes, I'm game. If we can't accept limitations, we're boundaryless, we're no better than the bad guys."
"Tony," Steve was the first to speak up after the heart-wrenching story. "If someone dies on your watch, you don't give up."
"Who said we're giving up?" Tony retorted.
"We are for not taking responsibility for our actions," Steve replied. "This document just shifts the blame." Onto them, Danielle added mentally.
"I'm sorry, Steve, that-" Rhodey chimed in, cutting himself off as he searched for the words to continue he statement. "That is dangerously arrogant. This is the United Nations we're talking about. It's not the World Security Council, it's not SHIELD, it's not HYDRA-"
"No, but it's run by people with agendas, and agendas change," Steve countered. Danielle thought on about this statement. What if the people they would be... basically signing their wills to, had a different agenda? An agenda run by HYDRA? Would she become just another one of their 'Assets'? Would they force her out into the open or drag her down into another lab to become yet another experiment?
Flashes of light and bits of memory came back to Danielle. The shiny point of a needle, the light reflecting off of a scalpel, the cries that bubbled from her chest, the screams that erupted from her mouth.
She shuddered and gripped the carpet beneath her to refrain from her mind going any further than it already had.
She was safe, she reminded herself. She was safe...
"That's good. That's why I'm here," Tony's voice bright Danielle back to the present and the conversation still going on. "When I realized what my weapons were capable of in the wrong hands, I shut it down, stop manufacturing." Danielle cringed yet again at his wording. Comparing them to weapons now? God, why didn't she just ask to be excused from this entire conversation?
"Tony, you chose to do that. If we sign this, we surrender our right to choose," Steve exclaimed. "What if this Panel sends us somewhere we don't think we should go? What if there's somewhere we need to go, and they don't let us?" Danielle sat back silently and listened. This was a mess. Chaos, just as Vision had stated.
The teenage girl glanced up at the board f chess pieces in front of her and sighed as she picked up a pawn from off the board and fiddled with it in her palm. Like a pawn in a bad game of chess where no one wins...
"We may not be perfect," the Captain continued. "But the safest hands are still our own."
"If we don't do this now, it's gonna be done to us later," Tony exclaimed. "That's the fact. That won't be pretty."
Danielle glanced up at the billionaire at the same time Wanda spoke up, "You're saying they'll come for us."
The telepath set a hand on her younger sister's shoulder in a protective manner as Vision replied, "We would protect you."
Jack gently nudged Danielle's foot with his own underneath the coffee table. "No one would hurt you," he reassured her. Danielle wasn't sure whether to feel comforted or terrified at the fact that her brother was actually considering this.
"Maybe Tony's right," Natasha chimed in unexpectedly. Danielle even had to do a double take after replaying what the redhead just said. "If we have one hand on the wheel, we can still steer. If we take it off-"
She was suddenly cut off by Sam. "Aren't you the same woman who told the government to kiss her ass a few years ago?"
Jack and Danielle both exchanged confused looks at the statement. Jack turning his head up at the ex-assassin sitting on the couch just above him. "Wait, what?"
Natasha paid no mind to either young men as she turned back to Steve. "I'm just... I'm reading the terrain. We've made some very public mistakes. We need to win their trust back." But at what cost? Danielle had to think, was Natasha even taking into consideration the needs of everyone in the team? Sure, Nat had made mistakes, Danielle had too, but was she going to sign away her powers, and Eris altogether really, just because some of the public eye found her untrustworthy? Was this a matter of international security or a publicity stunt?
"Focus up," Tony interjected. "I'm sorry did I just... mishear you or did you agree with me?"
Natasha gave him a pointed look as she shook her head. "Oh, I want to take it back now-"
"No, no, no– you can't retract it," Tony exclaimed with a triumphant smile on his face.
Jack chuckled from where he sat as he turned to face Natasha. "He's never gonna let this moment go," he told her. "You should've thought before you spoke because now we're all gonna hear about it for years to come." Natasha let out a heavy sigh in agreement.
"Thank you," Tony told the both of them. "Unpresidented. Okay. Case closed – I win," he stated. Danielle remained quiet, staring down at the pawn piece still in her hand. Did Tony win? Even if he did, she wouldn't. And that was if she agreed to this. If she didn't, and Jack did, more consequences would be paid. Was she ready for that?
"I have to go," Steve abruptly said, standing up from where he sat a few feet from where Danielle was on the floor, dropping the Accords onto the table beside the chessboard before quickly exiting the room. Danielle, along with the rest of the team, watched in confusion and worry. She wished she could've known what was going on inside his head, but it looked like that was a one time thing only.
"So," Jack was the first to speak after the Captain's abrupt departure. "The meeting for this... thing-" he gestured to the thick stack of papers on the table. "-is in Vienna? A few days from now?"
"Yeah," Tony answered. "You on board with it?"
Jack hesitated before answering, slowly looking back to his sister who's eyes remained peeled on the door Steve had left out of before ducking down to her lap where the pawn was still lying in her palm. "Dan?" She lifted her head to look at him, taking in the rest of the watchful eyes on her now. "You know, if I sign, you do too, right?"
Danielle pursed her lips and nodded, ducking her head back down onto her lap.
"What's wrong?" Jack asked.
She was silent at first before she finally spoke. "I... I don't think it's... something that I would... want to do..."
Jack sighed heavily. "Alright," he began. "I'll give you some time, a few days to think it over-"
"No," she abruptly said. "I... I don't need a few days to think, I don't want to sign."
The room fell silent. Jack stared at her, dumbfounded. "Danielle," he started, and the brunette already knew this wasn't going to be good. "You don't know what you're talking about-"
"Why?" She cut him off once again. "B-Because I'm just a kid? Because I haven't been on the team long enough? Because I'm out of control?" She asked, her voice growing louder than before. "I may not understand all of the politics, yes, but I understand what's a bad idea for me, and for my family. And this-" she gestured to the Accords. "-Is a bad idea." She took a pause before looking her brother straight in the eye and repeating her initial statement. "I don't want to sign."
Suddenly, Jack's expression grew into that of anger. His eye twitched slightly as his shocked slack-jaw turned into a frown. His eyebrows furrowed and she could see his jaw clench. "Well, you don't get to decide what it is you want anymore. I'm your legal guardian meaning I know what's best, not you. I wouldn't trust your better judgement either way."
"Jack!" Wanda protested with a gasp.
Danielle blinked in surprise. Not at his blunt statement, but the last part of it. Ignoring Wanda completely, Danielle tilted her head slightly as she asked, "What's that supposed to mean?"
Jack scoffed. "As if you don't know. These past few months, all you've been doing is making bad decisions. Sneaking out of the Compound, following us to Lagos, trying to take on Rumlow. And before that? Don't even get me started on your brilliant decision to go stay with Mom-"
Danielle flinched and Wanda stood to her feet behind her. "Jack, that's enough!"
Danielle was having none of it, however, as she jumped to her feet as well. "No! You don't get to say that to me. You trusted her just as much as I did, you let me go with her. This wasn't my fault-"
"It was!" Jack snapped, jumping to his feet. Danielle fell silent and her brother continued. "Who did she tuck in at night? Who did she sing to? Who spent hours with her playing little pieces on the piano?" Danielle shut her eyes and shook her head rapidly, flashes and visions of her old life with her mother and family before getting kidnapped flashed before her eyes. Images of sunny afternoons sipping on iced lemonade on the back porch in her Mom's arms. Sounds of sweet hymns her Mom would sing to her before bedtime. "Who did she take care of the most?! Who did she trust more?! Who did she take with her to live a perfectly normal life in Rhode Island?!"
"No," Danielle bit out, her voice cracking as she felt hysteria building up in her chest. Small images in her head of her mom and her spending time at the old house in Rhode Island. The last time she was there with the USB she had found that her mother had left for her. "Stop it."
"Jack!" Wanda continued to protest in the background.
But he kept going. Anger and rage and pain fueling his words as he delivered the final punch – "Who did she love more?!"
Danielle was in tears, a sobbing mess standing in the middle of the room as the rest of the team watched in horrified silence. It was at that moment Jack realized, watching how heart broken and how much hurt he had brought to the little sister he had always sworn to protect, that he had made an enormous mistake.
"I..." he trailed off. "Dani, I-"
A choked sob shook Danielle's body, cutting him off before she abruptly ran out of the room, accidentally pushing past Tony to get to the glass door nearby.
Everyone was frozen. Jack watched in silent horror, wondering to himself what he had just done...
"Low blow, Harper," Sam muttered from beside Tony, crossing his arms and giving the enhanced young man a disapproving stare.
Wanda looked after Danielle, a pained expression on her face before she took a step towards the door. "I should go check on her-"
Vision abruptly grabbed Wanda's hand to keep her in place. She looked down at him questioningly. "Perhaps, it is best she be left alone," the Android suggested.
Wanda, though silently disagreeing, sat back down beside Vision with her head in her hands. How much more of a mess could she have caused in Lagos, she thought to herself.
—
It was cold and rainy back in Queens.
Danielle, sat on the cold hard-wood floor in the living room of her and Sharon's apartment, listened to the rain as it hit the back patio's sliding glass doors.
It hadn't been long after her argument with Jack that she had packed her remaining things from her room (sneaking into his to steal back her phone) and teleported here where Sharon was waiting.
"Two mugs of steaming hot coco coming right up," Sharon announced as the blonde CIA agent made her way into the living room, setting down two mugs with whip cream mountains on top in front of Danielle on the coffee table. Once she handed them out, she took a seat on the couch beside the teenage girl.
Danielle had already told Sharon all about what had happened, from Lagos to the incident with her brother (leaving out the part about the USB from when she abruptly left the apartment that day and hadn't been heard from in days).
Sharon frowned at how unenthusiastic the brunette took the mug of hot coco in her hands and stared ominously at the whip cream on top. She sighed before setting down her own mug and shifted her position to be able to run her hand through a piece of Danielle's hair. "None of it was your fault, Danielle," she assured her.
The teenage girl shook her head, unsure if she was talking about the Lagos incident, the Accords, her augment with Jack, or just everything in general. It all hurt just the same. She laid her head back onto the edge of the couch and closed her eyes, taking a dee breath and letting it out again. "I... I wish it would all just stop. Or, not stop, but startover." Danielle ducked her head down to look at the pawn from the chessboard she still had in her hand from the Compound. "A clean slate."
"A clean slate won't take the pain away, trust me," Sharon told her truthfully. When Danielle looked up at her questioningly, she sighed before starting her story. "Back when I first joined SHIELD, I thought I was helping make the world a better place. I remember going on my first mission. I was so excited, the Agent running the mission nearly tased me just to get me to stop smiling so much," She chuckled as she recounted the memory. But the smile on her face slowly faded into that of a glazed-over stare. "By the end of the mission, we had lost four new recruits... and I had my first kill.
"Taking a human life... You see it on TV and in movies, you hear soldiers talking about the adrenaline and the rush... But in reality, it feels just brutal. You just took a human life, you did. You pulled the trigger, and ended someone's life..." Sharon frowned and Danielle instinctively reached out to hold Sharon's hand that rested on her shoulder. Sharon smiled at her before continuing her story. "I went home after that mission and cried for two days straight. Then, on my next mission, I knew from then on not to take my life for granted, or anyone else's for that matter."
Sharon shifted in her seat and let go of Danielle's hand as she ran a hand through her hair. "Then, HYDRA happened." Danielle frowned at the mention of the organization and Sharon nodded in understanding. "They told us that they had been within SHIELD since the beginning, and I couldn't help but wonder... All those kills, all those people I had taken out, all the blood on my hands... Had it all been for the greater good of the world, or the greater good of the people I had vowed to protect the world from?
"I left SHIELD and joined the CIA not longer after what happened in D.C. I hoped that maybe knowing who was working for this time might help me with the trust issues or my guilt, but in truth, it never goes away," the blonde explained to the little girl by her side. "So, you can wish that all the bad things in your life never happened... or you can lift your chin and try to make up for the mistakes you've made in your past. It all depends on you." Sharon concluded by smiling softly at Danielle and poking her nose lightly at the end.
Danielle chuckled slightly at the gesture before Sharon added on a lighter note, "Now drink your coco. It took me lots of frustration and focus trying not to burn the milk and I won't have it going to waste."
Danielle laughed at that one and took her own mug in her hands. "Yes, ma'am," she replied in a whisper before taking a sip. When she retracted her mouth, there was a whip cream mustache lining her upper lip and when she looked up at Sharon, the blonde agent laughed out loud.
The pair were content to laugh and ignore the sad, cold, and rainy world outside the apartment walls when it all abruptly came to a halt when the landline phone started t ring from the kitchen.
Danielle looked past Sharon's shoulder to glance in that general direction curiously. She hadn't known that phone to ever really ring.
Sharon quickly downed the rest of her hot coco, placing the empty mug on the coffee table, before pulling herself off the couch. "I've got it," she called over her shoulder as she walked to the kitchen.
Danielle smiled after her caretaker with a loving smile. Sharon was great. Someone who could always bring a smile to her face, give her a warm shoulder to lean on, and just be an overall caring person Danielle could always count on. She couldn't have asked for anyone better to stay with while attending school.
After a few minutes passed as Danielle remained seated in the living room alone, she began to realize it was a bit too quiet in the kitchen where Sharon was. "Sharon?" She called out. No response. A mildly concerned Danielle then pulled herself up off the ground and made her way towards the kitchen with caution, not sure what to expect when she got there. But as she turned the corner past the counter, she found the blonde agent hunched over the kitchen sink, her hair falling over her face as her shoulders shuddered as if... she were crying.
Sure enough, the sounds of muffled sniffles began to come out from under Sharon's hair. "Sharon?" Danielle asked as she slowly walked towards her.
The blonde abruptly looked up, revealing the tears falling down her face. She quickly wiped them away with the sleeve of her sweater she wore. "Sorry," she apologized through the sniffles. "I'm fine. I'm... It's alright. I just-"
"What happened?" Danielle asked.
Sharon paused, staring at the teenage girl as if she had been the first to ever ask that question to her. "I... My..." she stammered before taking a deep breath and finally managing a coherent sentence. "My parents just called... My Great Aunt just passes away this morning." Fresh tears started falling down Sharon's face again, but she managed to refrain from turning into a sobbing mess as she continued. "Um, the funeral is in a few days in London..."
"You want me to go with you?" Danielle asked her.
Sharon quickly shook her head. "No, no. It's your last week of school, I wouldn't want you to miss it-"
"It's fine," Danielle assured her. "I just... I don't want you to be alone." Danielle hesitated for a moment before launching herself into the blonde's middle, wrapping her arms around her and squeezing tight. It didn't take long before Sharon hugged back, equally as tight, burying her face on the top of Danielle's head, crying and sobbing.
Danielle wasn't sure how much Sharon's Great Aunt meant to her, but she knew how much Sharon meant to her, and she wasn't going to let her caretaker and guardian go through this loss alone. Not after all Sharon had been through with her. Going back to school and normalcy after nearly four years, high school troubles, her mother's abrupt return from the dead, her mother's death, Rumlow's death, Lagos, the Accords, trouble with her brother.
She just didn't want her to be alone...
—
A/N: CELEBRATORY EARLY CHAPTER! Why? BECAUSE WE HIT 200 FOLLOWERS! Geez, I don't know how much I can thank you guys enough for supporting this story and me and everything. You all mean the world to me because writing this story is like one of my favorite things to do. You're all absolutely amazing, and I love you all. Thanks.
Sharon Carter deserves better as an overall character in the MCU in my opinion. I loved her in the comics and really liked her portrayal in the movies. My only problem was her and Cap's build up the Big Kiss in Civil War. There was a deleted scene where they flirt and talk more at a bar rather than just walk straight to the hotel and if they had left that,it would've been a bit better build up. But, then again, I still have a problem at how they had them reconnect at Peggy's Funeral. A bit tacky if you ask me. Kind of like wearing a dead girl's scrunchy (Heathers reference).
Anyway, summarizing this chapter? Accords drama. Danielle likes chess. Jack is being a prick. Wanda and Vision are my OTP. Sharon is amazing and deserves better. Peggy Carter (the woman I would die for) has now passed. And Danielle is going in a nice family trip to London. What could possibly go wrong?
There has been a major lack of Peter these last few chapters, but lucky for you, there will be a lot of fucking Peter coming up real soon. Just hang in there my readers.
Chapter Songs is up next because I don't feel like any real questions need to be answered here unless you really want to, but anyway: when the party's over by Billie Eilish and lovely by Billie Eilish ft. Khalid. (You can see my slight obsession peaking out, can't you?)
Incorrect Quote of the Chapter:
Steve: *just sitting at his desk, minding his own business*
Bucky: *walks in* Sorry I was late. I was... doing things.
Sam: *bursts in, out of breath* He pushed me down the fucking stairs!
Steve: ...
Bucky: 'Push' is such a strong word. I prefer to call it 'giving you a little nudge'.
Sam: Oh, I'll give you a little nudge when I shove my foot up your ass!
Bucky: Hey!
Bucky: Watch your fucking language in front of Captain America.
Steve: *facepalm*
