A/N: I am double posting againnnn. That wasn't originally the plan and I hope this won't continue. Normally, or at least before, I tried to post every Wednesday on the other fanfic, but it's been very on and off and it might not continue like that, but that is my goal at least. On this one, I feel like I can post more or less every other day without problem because I have so much. Like I'm currently over 25k words into this fanfic, and I think I'm going to hit 50k already next week which is insane.
I don't remember what is happening in this chapter, but I know that at this time I was like, man we need to move the plot this is ridiculous. So that's probably what's going to happen. Time jumps will happen if we are ever going to finish this fic ever.
(And for everyone that keeps questioning why they are annoyed with Nat for not telling them and stuff. It's just because they have been like dealing with a lot of mistrust, and Natasha keeps hiding things from them which just makes it hard to trust)
Red
"Clint?" Laura was just about to miss Clint before he went for his normal morning workout but hurried down after him to catch up.
"Thought I had been good and not waking you as I left." Clint said turning around to kiss her softly when he noticed her running after him.
"You were, but Lila woke me up so." eLaura said with a laugh, still leaning close to him in his arms. She had to move her head back to look at him, but she didn't mind having to reach for his lips. Not when he was wearing that smirk at least.
"What are you thinking about?" Clint said kissing the top of her head. Of course, he already knew she was going to ask him about something or propose an idea.
"I wanted to get an opinion on when we should move." She said softly, leaning on his chest with a sigh.
"Any new updates?" Clint replied, holding around her. They were standing in the middle of the hallway blocking the entire thing, but none of them gave any signs of wanting to move.
"Yeah, they have finished the walls and roofs. In theory, we could go back whenever we want." Laura hummed back as Clint continued to hug her.
"Already? I thought they weren't due to finish in at least a few weeks?" Clint said back, and Laura could hear the frown in his voice, even if her head was mainly in his shirt.
"Think Pepper asked them to finish earlier, I think the news somewhat strained their relationship." Laura mumbled back to him with a tired voice.
After the news about Natasha's small house stunt started to float Laura had noticed a change in both Pepper and Natasha's behaviour. She couldn't blame any of them, but it was painful to watch them drift apart after everything they had gone through. Mistrust had been a variable the entire time period, and Laura had to admit, it hadn't been easy for her to come to terms with Natasha yet again messing around with them, even if it hadn't made any direct harm.
"Well, an empty house without much furniture might not be the best place to live with three kids." Clint started slowly.
"Yeah, I know, but I thought maybe we could, I don't know, camp with Annie, Kent, and the kids or something. We can spend a few hours a day each maybe, go and buy some furniture or move a few things while they were out playing. It doesn't have to be camping either. It's just… it's just that I don't know how long we should stay here." Laura pulled back and looked at Clint with a small smile.
As much as she had loved living with the Avengers, and not to mention how grateful she was for everything, she felt that their time was starting to run out. She knew that the team was still working hard, and they should be allowed some time just to be with themselves now that their new house was at least livable. She didn't want to take any more advantage of their hospitality.
"Yeah, that could be an idea, I'm sure the kids would love that. I can talk to Steve. I know he wants me to train some more with Wanda, but I can talk to him and Maria, maybe next week?" Clint said, looking down at her with two kind eyes. She nodded back with a small smile before letting go of him.
"Okay. Thank you. Now go kick some ass."
Laura was looking forward to the change now. Like planned, they were going to fly back to their new home in four days. They had however landed on a somewhat new plan than what Laura had originally planned in her head. Instead of just the five of them flying back, Steve, Maria, Wanda, Pepper and Natasha were all going to join them flying over the next Wednesday.
Pepper and Natasha alone would have made sense. Natasha could fly and was part of their family no matter what had happened in the past. Pepper was like a bonus member now, as if she was married into the family, even though Natasha and Pepper weren't even close to getting married and neither Clint nor Laura were related to Natasha by blood. But that was how it felt, and how it was natural to explain Pepper to outsiders to connect her to their family. Not to mention Pepper had bought them the house too, to gift them.
The rest however Laura was more unsure about. Or not unsure. She liked all of them, of course, she did. And all of them had played a really big part in their life the last half-year. But knowing they were joining for safety purposes was kinda scaring her.
Maria and Steve, with an open dialogue with Clint and Natasha, had decided to hook the house and property up with some new fancy tech to help to keep them safe. With the Stark tech, they could be on their network and be able to contact them within minutes if needed.
Even if the admission of Natasha's old house had hurt some minds, it had also resulted in some good things. Clint, who had been somewhat sceptical even to move at all, had admitted that after knowing Natasha had used the house for years without any problems, he was feeling better about it.
Still, they had decided to install some more safety measures, just in case. That included cameras across a lot of the property and alarm systems for when they were gone for a longer period of time. For Laura, it was alarming to even have to do this, but she had understood after the last year that these was things that needed to be done. And at least she had the Avengers only a few buttons presses away if something did happen.
Steve and Maria were both going to help with installing all of this, while Wanda was more doing it out of pleasure rather than business, which Laura did not mind at all.
"Mommy, is the house nice?" Cooper asked the night before they were going to move. Laura was tucking the two oldest to bed while Clint was packing the last few things from the compound.
"I think you are going to love it." Laura said with a small smile, kissing Cooper on his head.
"Is it BIG?" Lila asked from the other bed, looking at her excited. Laura knew Lila was more excited than her brother who was a lot more reserved for new things. She had always known Lila would be more open to change, and she was excited to see Lila in their house. She had a feeling her daughter was the first one who would fall in love with the place out of all of them.
"Very big." Laura said with a small laugh, knowing very well she was never going to get Lila to bed now.
"Can we get a horse then?" Lila looked at her with big eyes, and Laura couldn't do anything other than laugh again. Lila had asked for a horse for years now and was it one thing Laura did not want was it a horse, even if she was somewhat weak to the animal herself.
"I don't think so." She shook her head at Lila before looking down at her son with a small grin who was rolling his eyes at her.
"Why nottttt" Lila continued, practically jumping in her bed now.
"Because a horse is a very big responsibility," Laura said, trying to talk as calmly as possible to calm the girl even if it was absolutely not going to work.
"What about a dog or a cat then?" Cooper asked carefully. Laura looked down at the boy with a small smile.
"Maybe." She just answered back before standing up, looking between them. "But bed now. Come on." Laura said as she walked over to the door, turning off the light.
"I'm serious Lil, sleep." She watched as Lila laid down again before closing the door, knowing very well both of them were going to talk for hours about the potential pet now.
She was not wrong. Both kids were so tired the next morning, and Laura was not planning on giving them much sympathy. She had more than enough with Nathaniel and the one hundred bags they were bringing with them to care really care about how tired her kids were. They could sleep on the plane if they needed to, but she couldn't really let them take her attention just to do that. Not when she had one hundred other things to do.
They had brought a single bag with them when they drove over here months ago, so how they now had all of this she had no idea. Natasha and Pepper had decided to drive the car over instead of flying with them last night. Laura was very aware they could have flown the entire car in a plane or quinjet of some sort, but she was guessing that maybe this was Natasha's idea to get some time with Pepper alone, which was a fair play.
Pepper and Natasha had left last afternoon and would probably already be there by the time the rest of them got there. But it was hard to organize three kids, a million things, and five adults.
"Everyone got everything?" Clint asked for the fifth time, walking around in the quinjet while trying to get the kids to sit down. It would only be two hours flying time, but the kids were all over and they hadn't even started.
"Hey, listen to your father please and sit down." Laura said between her teeth, looking strictly at Cooper who was on his knees in his seat.
"You are really starting to give me a very unwanted headache," Laura said, looking at them with a stern look.
Laura could see Wanda humming in the corner of her eye. On her lap, she was bouncing Nathaniel who was reaching after the younger woman with a smile. At least Laura had one child under control, even if she had literally handed him to Wanda half a minute ago.
Steve was in the pilot seat with Maria beside him, both looking back at them with an amused smile on their lips which Laura didn't like.
"Okay, are we ready to go?" Maria said with a way to chipper voice looking at the kids. "Every hawk and eyas seated?" Maria looked at the kids again before they both sank down in their seats making Laura let out a heavy sigh before falling down on a seat close to the agent.
"Eyas? Really?" Laura said looking at her with a defeated soft laugh.
"I thought it was creative." Maria said with a shrug before they took off softly.
Thankfully the kids calmed down during the flight giving Laura some time to catch up some rest. They were due to land just after 11am and she knew they would probably have a long day in front of them and she was going to take all the sleep she could get.
The flight was pretty painless, and the kids were pretty good until they touched down, then it went somewhat crazy again. Both Cooper and Lila were out of the jet in a matter of seconds. That left Nathaniel in Clint's arms screaming when he couldn't go after. Of course, that mean Clint followed, leaving Laura alone with the rest of the crew and five trillion things all over the jets floor.
"Right… Lovely." Laura mumbled, picking up a bag from the floor looking at Maria with an annoyed look.
"Don't worry," Wanda said with a small smile before placing a hand on her shoulder. Laura looked at the younger woman, but when she offered her hand, Laura slowly handed her the bag. For a second Wanda only stood there before some red light filled the jet and the bags lifted themselves from the floor.
Right… Wanda had inhuman powers…
Laura followed Wanda slowly out of the jet, looking at the bags following her carefully. They had been careful not to display Wanda's powers around the kids before, and Wanda was quick to put them down on the ground in front of the jet when they had exited before the kids noticed.
Like what they had done at the old house they had landed the quinjet away from the house. Since it didn't have the same forest just by the house like the old house, they had simply just landed on one of the orchards. Apparently, the quinjet could do something called "cloaking" which could hide the aircraft. Laura chose not to question it, knowing she wouldn't understand the explanation even if she tried.
The kids were only a few feet's away from the house with Clint close behind when they got out of the plane. Pepper was walking towards them, while Natasha wasn't anywhere to be seen.
Laura looked at the rest of them with a questioning look.
"Come on, let's go. Bags can stay, we can get them later." Maria said nodding at the house. Laura nodded shortly before nodding at Steve who was smiling at her, before slowly making their way over the field.
Laura could hear Pepper say something to Clint, before she watched the kids sprint into the house hearing Lila scream "auntie Nat," assuming Natasha was in the house then.
The second the kids slipped into the house Laura felt a gush of win behind her and watched as the bags flew towards the house at full speed before coming to an abrupt halt right in front of the door, Wanda winking at her quickly.
"Laura, welcome, how was the flight?" Pepper said, hugging Laura softly when she caught up to them.
"When did you two arrive?" Maria asked with a smile, hugging Pepper next.
"I think just before 9. We stopped and picked up a few things that were ordered for the house." Pepper said with a smile guiding them towards the house.
Pepper, Clint and Laura had decided to pre-order a few things so they wouldn't arrive to a completely unfurnished house. They did want to pick up a few things in person, but since Pepper had already designed every single bedroom in the compound, they trusted her judgment and contacts and ended up ordering all the beds, mattress and some bedding for the arrival.
"What is Natasha doing?" Laura asked as they stepped into the house's living room.
"Well, she was sleeping, she drove the whole way, refused to switch with me." Pepper said, stepping around one got the many boxes she and Laura had left untouched after their last visit.
"Sleeping on what exactly." Maria said, looking around in the cardboard box-filled room.
"Good question, not that I have an answer for you." Pepper said with a small headshake. "We left everything in the trailer, not sure where you wanted everything. Trailer needs to be returned in three days, but I already told Clint." Pepper continued with a smile.
"Thank you." Laura said with a small smile.
"Okay calm down." They turned around when they heard Natasha's voice behind them. Lila was dragging the other woman after her with Cooper jogging beside them.
Natasha did really look tired, and Laura saw she wasn't the only one noticing this detail. Both Pepper and Maria immediately tilted their heads looking at Natasha with a frown as she made her way over the floor.
"Guess what auntie Nat just told us!" Lila said letting go of Natasha's shirt and running over to them. "She said that it's an ice-cream bar with unicorn poop flavour, CAN WE GO PLEASE!" Laura turned her head to Natasha with a concerned look, having a feeling it had to be something more behind those words.
"Why don't you go outside, and I will be there in a few minutes so I can talk to your mom, and then we'll go," Natasha said with a small smile, waving them towards the door.
"Do I want to know what that was about, or should I just go with it?" Laura said looking at the other woman in front of her. Natasha let out a small sigh.
"Well, it is true, there is an ice-cream bar that does have that flavour, and you know Lil, ice cream is her weakness. Thought it would give you some time to move a few things without the kids running around. I can bring Wanda with me, and you can move the few big things, and Steve and Maria can walk up the property without the kids trailing. It is big, and some of the parts the kids don't need to see yet." Natasha said with a half-smile.
"What do you mean with doesn't need to see yet?" Laura said with a small frown.
"You know that little bit of forest on the other side of that big orchard that is technically part of the property even though it's literally on the other side of a field?" Natasha said looking at her with a smirk.
"Yes?" Laura answered slowly, not entirely sure if she wanted to know anymore.
"Yeah, it's a shooting range." Natasha said with a small shrug before passing her walking past her and out the door, leaving Laura to look after her shocked.