"I was broken from a young age
Taking my sulking to the masses
Write down my poems for the few
That looked at me, took to me, shook to me, feeling me
Singing from heartache from the pain"
- Imagine Dragons
Danny didn't remember how she made it to the emergency entrance to the hospital. There were people everywhere, doctors and nurses and patients alike. Bodies were occupying beds, some worse off than others.
Her limbs were heavy, and her head was spinning, and the blood felt dry and crusty on her skin. She was drained of all her energy. You wouldn't believe she ran miles to the city without breaking a sweat if you saw her now. Danny kept herself balanced against the door and walls, almost running on auto-pilot. One foot in front of the other. God, did her head hurt.
"Ma'am?" One of the ER nurses slowly approached her, concern etched into her features. Her brown hair was tied up in a messy bun, and her brown eyes searched Danny's hazel-grey ones urgently. "Ma'am, are you okay? Are you hurt?"
Danny met the nurse's gaze blankly. She wasn't hurting, not anymore, but she probably looked like fucking hell. Her body was healing ever so slowly. She was fine. But her mind was splitting, and her knees buckled from under her somehow, and the next thing she knew the nurse was catching her before she could hit the ground.
The nurse slowly eased Danny to the floor. "Heather, get a bed ready!" she called out to a co-worker. Even in her dazed state, Danny's eyes caught on the nurse's ID clipped onto her scrubs: Claire Temple. Metro-General.
Danny didn't realize she was being asked questions until she heard a soft, "Is there anyone I can call?"
"Stark –" Danny croaked. She swallowed, feeling the dryness of her throat for the first time. Wincing, Danny groaned as a sharp pain began stabbing at the back of her head and the backs of her hands where the metal claws had come out started to itch. "Uh, Stark Industries. Virginia Potts, she's… my…"
A wave of vertigo washed over her, and Danny felt like she could throw up again. Except that she hadn't eaten much since yesterday because of Reddik's dumb fucking fasting requirements, and she had retched anything she had in her back in the alley.
"Ma'am, what's your name? Do you know where you are?"
The world continued spinning and Danny welcomed the darkness like an old friend.
Pepper Potts's life had been in absolute chaos ever since Tony Stark was taken two months ago. The thing was, she had trusted the military with him. It was Afghanistan during a true civil unrest. She had trusted James Rhodes to bring Tony back, but everything had gone to shit.
She told herself that she didn't blame them. Not entirely – it was just easier to point fingers at someone, and it just so happened to be the U.S. Air Force. Rhodey said they lost some guys, and Tony was missing in action, and they had been searching for so long.
Was she even still employed? She's supposed to be Tony's personal assistant, but there was no Tony to personally assist. Obadiah Stane had been maneuvering the company since February now. (Word has it that he's been maneuvering the company since before the untimely deaths of both Howard and Maria Stark, but that wasn't of concern to Pepper much.)
Her phone had stopped ringing every five minutes about a month after Tony's kidnapping. It was a news cycle turnover, and there was no new update to be given. He was still missing, and the world just kept turning. She was slightly relieved of the fact, despite the lingering worry.
Which was why Pepper had jumped at her phone when it rang at an ungodly hour, because who would call at one in the morning unless it was an emergency? Her mind vaguely registered the New York area code before picking up because it has to be about Tony, they've found him, dead or alive, but preferably alive –
"Pepper Potts speaking."
The call wasn't about Tony. The call was about a teenage girl walking into a hospital in the middle of the night looking like Death had come for her. No name, no identification, nothing except for Stark Industries. Virginia Potts. She had almost hung up until she remembered the little girl that she'd fostered years ago; the one who loved calling her "Gigi" and loved Rocky Road ice cream; the one that trouble always seemed to follow.
Pepper requested for wheels up first thing in the morning.
"How is she doing?"
"Frankly, we don't…" A heavy pause was all Danny could hear. "We're all shocked, really. She's in perfect condition this morning. It's like nothing was wrong."
"What – what do you mean?" That voice… That voice was so familiar. "Wasn't she just admitted last night? Your nurse made her condition sound serious –"
Danny couldn't quite remember everything that happened to her. She recalled escaping the lab, the dead bodies she left behind. She recalled the innocent life she had taken away, in the alley. There were parts of the night that were a blur, mostly the instances when… something else had taken the reins.
At the hospital, she had accidentally injured one of the nurses. Being so disoriented and scared, Danny's first instincts were to defend herself when she woke up in a strange place, with smells and sounds that made her think that she was back in that godforsaken facility. The nurse, Claire, had thrown back the curtains and startled her, and that resulted in some screaming after Danny's sharp claws had cut up her forearms.
(They thought Danny had brandished a knife or managed to nick a scalpel, but confusion was all they discovered when they searched her. They had tried sedating her afterwards because sure, definitely, why not. Much good that did, anyway.)
Her doctor was dumbfounded when she received a follow-up in the late morning. All injuries Danny had sustained were healed as if overnight, and whatever they found was science fiction to them. Of course, Danny did have an idea of what they saw. She only hoped that they wouldn't subject her to more unnecessary tests and more doctors with agendas. Danny was finished with being a lab rat.
She had seen the vials and the stacks of files in Reddik's office; she had lived through the hell that he had put her through. Danny sussed out pretty early in her treatments that some of the files may have been stolen. Not one folder had the same label. From what little she could remember, they ran from S.H.I.E.L.D., S.S.R., C.I.A., F.B.I., Cybertek. She'd never even heard of half of them.
Something fairly secretive was going on, even at the hospital. While the doctor assumed she was asleep, Danny listened in on a phone conversation he had with a "Director" about wanting to keep an eye on her and also bury all the tests they had administered. She felt like kicking herself now. She was so stupid—
"Is she awake?"
Danny sat up in bed, eyes landing on the two human-shaped shadows dancing on the curtain that separated her from the rest of the world. Blood started pumping faster through her veins, and Danny tried to calm her nerves before something bad happened.
Her doctor said in a quiet voice, "She was responsive when we checked on her this morning. I'm not sure if…"
The curtains were pulled back, revealing the form of Pepper Potts. The same one that Danny hadn't talked to since before her cancer diagnosis but was still there despite the radio silence. She was dressed clean in a skirt and blazer, red hair tied back in a neat ponytail. There were dark bags under her reddened eyes that were hastily covered up with concealer, and Danny briefly wondered why she'd been crying.
Pepper's expression immediately switched from worry to relief. Danny found herself pulled into a tight hug, and for the first time in a long time, she let herself break down and be vulnerable. She wrapped her arms around her old foster mom and began sobbing.
"Honey, were you hurt? What happened?" Pepper began wiping away the tears that kept staining Danny's cheeks. The girl tried getting out words, but they were unintelligible over her heavy sobs. Pepper merely engulfed her in another hug, brushing back her light brown hair.
The doctor cleared his throat, starting, "We haven't been able to get anything from her –"
"Leave us. Please," Pepper said firmly, more than likely giving an apologetic look.
After managing to work through the wracking sobs, Danny let the walls fall. With words flowing like a broken dam that had just burst, she told Pepper everything. From never staying in one place for more than a few months. To the struggle of cancer and chemotherapy. Then being approached by some agent to join this organization for a supposed cure that just turned out to be more lies.
For almost three years, she was stuck in that facility in the outskirts of New York and isolated from the outside world. Danny spared Pepper the details about the monstrous treatments, the numerous near-death experiments, and the pile of bodies she left behind. She wanted to tell her everything, so badly, but the second voice in her head convinced her that it wouldn't be wise.
But it wasn't until then that Danny realized Pepper had problems of her own. Things were a shit show at Stark Industries. Their CEO had been kidnapped after a weapons demonstration was ambushed, and he was probably being held captive by some terrorist organization. His business partner, someone by the name of Stane or other, was keeping the company afloat in his absence. However, Danny could tell that Pepper was worried out of her mind.
Danny sniffed, wiping her eyes and looking at Pepper. In attempt to make light of things, she asked in jest, "It's been so long since we saw each other. Why the hell did you fly across the country for me? I probably would've been fine. I've been fine, for a while."
Lies, but Pepper knew that all too well.
Pepper exhaled a laugh, trying to cover the tears that were brimming at her eyes. "Danny, you're a nineteen-year-old that has been to Hell and back. And, to be honest, I needed this as much as you do."
Danny's warm hands covered Pepper's cold ones, and the former managed a small smile. "Thank you, Gigi. For everything."
She closed her eyes as Pepper leaned forward to place a kiss to her forehead, momentarily feeling a sense of peace that she hadn't been witness to in a long time.
Nicolas J. Fury never believed in coincidences. In his line of work, that sort of thing didn't even exist. When Alexander Pierce had appointed him as Director many years ago, best believe the man had seen some shit as a senior agent: Intergalactic warfare that involved superhuman beings and alien races from other galaxies. A blue cube that was lost after World War II which was then stored relatively safe inside an alien that looked like a motherfucking cat.
(Not coincidentally, that was the last time Fury had ever trusted any kind of animal.)
SHIELD had been getting involved in a lot of things over the last few years. A notable scientist working with the U.S. government's Bio-Tech Enhancement Project miraculously survived radiation poisoning and now turned into some big, green monster. One of SHIELD's master assassins was injured trying to escort a nuclear scientist out of Iran. A young covert agent had phased in and out of reality because of some quantum anomaly, because that's such a normal thing going on around the agency.
There was no time for unknown electronic surges coming from facilities outside of New York, or miniature blips in the airspace in Afghanistan; that was what his agents were getting paid for. Let's just say that Fury had his hands full with paperwork and covert operations across the board.
Agent Sitwell notified him when a signal appeared in the general vicinity that Tony Stark was last seen abroad. "It's too small to be a one-man craft," he had said, staring confused at the radar. "And it's got an energy signature like I've never seen before." Whatever it may have been was the first and only lead they had on finding the genius billionaire, so they reached out to the U.S. Department of Defense. Last he heard, Stark was rescued by the Armed Forces and was on his way to a CIA location in Germany for debrief.
Fury never believed in coincidences. Not when his old Cold War missions all started with the letter "B." Not when he met Carol Danvers and somehow got the Tesseract back for the agency. Not even in the last weeks, when a hospital liaison had informed him about a girl who seemed to have super-healing powers and claws in her goddamn arms. Claws. Almost nothing surprised him anymore.
Almost.
"You sent for me, sir?" Clint Barton's head popped into the office. He was dressed in his usual uniform: cargo pants, vest, and jacket. Must have been ready to go on an ops run.
The Director motioned him in, starting with, "Take a seat, Agent Barton." When Barton sat in the chair opposite him, Fury nonchalantly reached for a folder on his desk. "I'm giving you a new assignment," he stated firmly. "We need someone evaluated, and I couldn't think of anyone better to be the case agent."
The man's brow furrowed slightly. Already he seemed wary of the situation. "Right, of course. 'Cause the last time I was sent to assess someone, it ended so well for us."
Budapest was still fresh in their minds despite the time that had passed, but if it wasn't for Barton, they wouldn't have Natasha Romanoff on their side. Fury huffed, forgoing a snide comment to Barton's own, sliding the dossier across the desk.
"I think you'll find this one to be of interest," was all the Director said, eyes trained on the master archer to gauge his reaction. Barton's facial expression immediately turned stone cold when his eyes landed on the profile. Fury watched as he blinked ever so slowly.
"This is a joke, right?" Barton all but spat, frowning. His grip was so tight on the folder that his knuckles began to turn white. "If this is some sort of test, it's sick even for –"
"Keep reading."
Fury wasn't expecting anger to be the first emotion from Barton. Confusion, maybe. Disbelief, absolutely. But anger seemed such a foreign concept to be emanating from him. Barton shook his head slightly, sighing in defeat. His eyes flew back and forth across the dossier pages, his brows pushing together the more he read.
In the folder were curated SHIELD files on the girl from the hospital; she was nineteen, orphaned, with a long list of foster homes and stellar academics and a longer list of medical summaries. Her photograph was an old high school ID from nearly three years ago: blonde waves, bright smile. There was a note in her family history section about blood-type anomalies, but the pressing matter involved the x-ray of what lay hidden in her forearms and the string of bodies found in her wake.
Barton stuttered out, "This can't – no – there's no way –" He threw the dossier onto the Director's desk.
"How are you so sure? You haven't seen her in over a decade."
"Respectfully, sir, you're shitting me, right? That is not – that cannot be my sister."
"Do you believe in coincidences, Barton?" Fury inquired to steer the conversation, narrowing his visible eye. "Because I don't. So, explain to me how the sister that you lost just so happens to turn up with powers and a connection to Tony Stark, two weeks before he's found?"
"I can't –"
"Precisely." Fury leaned forward, linking his fingers together. "Which is why you're going to investigate."
The muscles at his jaw visibly tightened as the light-brown haired man clenched his teeth together. "Isn't Coulson running point on the Stark case?"
"He is," Fury responded. "You're going to be running point on this one."
"There's got to be some kind of conflict of interest with –"
"Barton."
"Where am I even supposed to find her?" Barton questioned. "Said she got discharged from the hospital –"
"– under the care of Virginia Potts. Lucky for us, the Starks are local."