writing this story is being such a good help for myself. i'm loving to write it out.
i'm sorry this took a bit longer to get out! i have started college which unfortunately will mean that my updates will be very scarce between each other, but i will continue and finish this story! i promise!
It turns out that Wanda and Pietro aren't just siblings. They're twins. And I'm not sure if that makes my whole situation better or much, much worse.
Because I don't know much about twins, but in anything I read and saw before, there was always this closeness between pairs of twin siblings, that doesn't exist in pairs of non-twinsiblings.
And in this particular situation, I'm in the body of a twin, an advanced individual twin, sister to another advanced individual, who spent his entire life with the girl that I'm inhabiting and he knows he better than anyone else most likely and I know nothing about both of them, except the fact that they were willing to be here for God knows what reason and that he dies at some time in the future.
The fact that he didn't suspect anything at first eye contact is already much more that I could've asked for.
Oh yeah, and apparently they're not English either.
The moment we stepped apart from the hug, Pietro began asking all kinds of questions, if I was okay or if anyone did anything they shouldn't and I would've had joked and probably replied about the situation that were both in if I hadn't been so caught off guard over the fact that every word he had said hadn't been in English and I still managed to understand every word.
So I can safely say that I know how to speak Sokovian. Whatever language that is. Probably fictional in the fictional universe I'm currently in. No, stop. You're over this.
And the doctors in this facility also weren't speaking English but I understood it as well and God, I'm just gonna accept whatever comes because my mind can't take much anymore.
What is even my life at this point?
Crazy, that's what it is. Batshit crazy.
"Sister," Wanda's brother says and I jolt back into the conversation, focusing on him. His eyebrows are furrowed in concern, "Are you okay?"
"Fine," comes out in Sokovian because he's also talking in that language, before I catch my tongue and continue in English, because they both speak it and it'll be easier for me, "Just . . . my head hurts."
And it wasn't a total lie. A headache has been developing since I first woke up today and dragged back to more exams and needles. But it's nothing I can't handle. I'd rather the pain than thinking of something to talk with this boy that I'm connected and family to that I don't know at all.
And I can't start the conversation with hi so i know that you die and i wanna leave but i don't want to leave you here so will you please help me escape? can I?
Fuck. I need to know why exactly they're in this place, before anything.
"Did they. . . hurt you?" he asks, his face changing towards anger, perhaps pure fury. I don't have a doubt that he'd possibly go after all the doctors that have been doing their experiments on me.
"No, it's just . . ." I trail off, unsure of what to do next. How do I even do this? "They like to . . . stuck me with needles, to check up on any changes, I think. And there's also some experiments they make me do, to check on these . . . these abilities."
At that one word, Pietro's eyes seem to widen in wonder and get this glint that I normally would only see in children. "Would you . . ." he hesitates, as though he isn't sure if he should ask, "Show them to me?"
The smile comes forward easily with that. He's just a curious boy, isn't he? When he's like this, it isn't hard to forget that these two are just kids. They're young, maybe barely into their early 20's. And already in the middle of something with awful people.
And without really replying, I focus on the energy that is constantly alive beneath my skin, one call away from coming forward and appearing forward it does. The red tendrils, the energy, is somewhat comforting at this point. I've seen it come alive so many times now and I know exactly what I can do with this. It's power, it's the mind control that I can bestow on people. It's easy to just drown in it.
And now, it's the thing that is making Wanda's brother smile, the red reflecting on his light eyes. It makes me enjoy it even more.
"I can . . ." With a twirl of my fingers, scarlet spawns below the table that the people here think it's bed worthy and it rises slowly in the air. The familiar twinge of pain in my temple resurfaces, but it's not as harsh as in the beginning, "Levitate, well, control things. Change their shapes, too and even just . . ." The table goes back to the floor and I focus instead on spawning the energy on both my hands, expanding it a bit. It seems to sing and want to be used against something, "Use it as a weapon."
"That is amazing," he says, the last word coming in Sokovian and just as in awe as I was was when I first saw it as well.
"And there's also something else," I add quietly, not sure how he's gonna handle that part of these powers. But Wanda's brother just looks at me with these expectant wide eyes and I find myself continuing, "I can . . . I can go inside people's minds and, uh, sort of manipulate them."
"Inside people's minds?" Pietro repeats as if to make sure he heard correctly possibly. I nod once. And he takes my hands, "Show me."
At that, I pause for a second. He's welcoming me into his mind? He's not even put off by any of this (then again, he does have a enhanced ability as well), just looking intrigued and wanting to know more about it and god there's the ache in my chest again because my brother was exactly the same-
Okay, let's not go there. Not now. Perhaps never.
"You're letting me . . . go inside your mind?"
He gives me this look like I'm the idiot one for asking that, "Wanda, you're my sister. Anything you see, you already know of."
Oh. Oh.
Right. I'm such a dumbass. The way I completely forgot who I am right now.
Clearing my throat and trying to make the awkwardness that my question brought into the room, I meet his eyes, "Alright. Think of a memory."
He closes his eyes immediately, breathing softly. I let a couple of seconds pass, until he tells me, "Got it."
Okay, here goes.
After breathing in and out once, I raise my hand towards his temple, focusing once again. The energy comes out as easily as a few minutes ago and is more than ready to be used. And that's when I hesitate, because this is the first time of me doing this to someone I somewhat care for and I really don't want to fuck up his mind.
Fucking hell, I hope I don't screw up his mind. That would be a big no no.
"This may feel . . . weird," I begin explaining gently, fighting off a tremble in my hand, "And should it hurt you in any way, do your best to push me away. Alright? You got me? If it hurts or if you feel like something is wrong, you fight me out. You hear me?"
Light orbs open to meet mine and he gives me a nod, along with a smile, "I got it. I trust you, sister."
My heart squeezes painfully. This . . . He shouldn't . . . He shouldn't trust me at all. I'm not his sister. I basically killed his sister so I could live again and only felt glee at doing it. Because it meant I could go on, even if it meant taking someone else's body. And here is her brother, telling me that he trusts me.
God fucking hell.
Just breathe. Calm the fuck down.
"Let's do this," leaves my lips in sort of a sigh and that's when I let the energy to reach him.
And everything just vanishes.
The thing about using my mind invading powers is that I don't exactly experience what the person is remembering or whatever I want them to see as them.
It's more like . . . I'm watching them go through it from the sidelines. There's a red hue everywhere I look as the memory slowly forms into place, an obvious children's room. The walls are a dirty yellow, some pieces of it flaking off. There's just a bunk bed and a small wardrobe in it, as well as some toys scattered across the floor. But my attention is on the two small children sitting in the bottom bed.
They're obvious twins, sharing some facial features and the dark hair, looking about six or maybe seven years old. Unable to stop myself, I get close to them, observing their smiles and child glee as they cuddle together, reading the big book in their hold together.
I don't even get to hear anything, when the scene changes.
And suddenly I'm still in the same room, but this time the two kids are beneath the same covers in the same bed, still the bottom one. But this time, a man and woman come into the picture.
Ah, their parents most likely.
The mother is sitting right beside the twins, one arm across their shoulders and the father sitting at the edge of the bed, the kids' little hands in his bigger ones. They seem to be talking and laughing, but I can't hear a thing. Their mother reaches out and presses a kiss on each their foreheads, making the children smile and their dad does the same right after.
My heart squeezes painfully. God, I can't- Of all the things he could've thought of . . .
I wonder what Mom and Dad . . .
No. Don't think about that! You need to focus!
The father is the first one to leave the room. The mother stays with her arm around her children and the twins curl up onto each other, their eyes closing. And their mom starts humming and then singing a song in Sokovian, her voice gentle and beautiful.
And the scene changes and I'm in a small living room, connected to a kitchen and the whole family is together. The parents are curled up in the only couch and the twins are grinning, sitting at their feet and their eyes locked on the television.
I notice that the program is in black and white and it's also very familiar and the audience in it laughs, which then makes the two kids laugh and I can feel the love - so much lovelovelove that it overwhelms me - in this memory but there's also this never ending ache and pain why is there pain I don't understand why-
And that's when the whole room explodes.
As soon as my fingers leave his temple, the room slowly fades in and I take a step back on shaky legs.
Pietro's form is blurring. Everything is blurring. The tears just spring forward, salty and heavy on my eyes. And I let them fall, because I can't focus on them right now while I can't breathe. My lungs are hurting, like there's a vice around them and my breath is coming way too quickly and I've had enough of these before to know that I am hyperventilating.
God, I miss them.
I miss Mom's hugs and laugh, Dad's tries at being stern and his jokes, my brother's joy and happiness whenever I could spend time with him. Their faces are slowly fading from memory, but I can still remember them. I hold to them fiercely, the pain and ache and longing that comes with it hurts so much.
Because I'll never see them again.
Arms curl around my shoulders and I'm brought into warmth. I return it, a noise resembling a mix of a hiccup and a sob leaving my throat. "I miss them too," he says, voice trembling.
I don't say anything. I just curl myself around him as well and try not to think about what I just saw.
And definitely not thinking about how we're both missing completely different people.
They bring me back to my cell (because it's just a prison cell, I refuse to call it my room) not long after my breakdown and I try to fall asleep.
No sure how long I stay asleep, but it's probably the middle of the night when I wake up on the floor, my breathing inconsistent and tears in my eyes. The table that was my bed was completely wrecked, along with the TV and camera and scarlet tendrils danced all around my hands and forearms.
Someone comes in and touches my shoulder, but I flinch away and panic rises in my chest and the person is thrown away from with a explosion of red.
I try to breathe and bring the magic inside me again, but all I can see is the nightmare happening over and over. The explosion, but instead of the twins' parents, it's my parents smiling and laughing on the couch and my brother between them and all of them coming apart like humans shouldn't and i can't deal with this someone make it stop-
There's a sting in the side of my neck and suddenly I was no more.
They keep me in a new cell, with only a camera and nothing else.
They try once to bring in one of their doctored to take my blood for new exams. She gets close to where I'm curled up in one of the corners and I can feel the energy bubbling underneath my skin, begging to be let out and me trying my hardest to not let it because I need control, dammit. I can't do anything, escape, if I'm like this.
She tries to smooth me with kind, somewhat actually being genuine, words, but the moment the needle pokes my skin, the energy screams itself out and warps around the woman and she's thrown out through the wall.
I just curl into myself more, waiting for them knock me out again and move me to yet another cell.
They don't let anyone alone into my cell again.
They also don't let me see Pietro for a long time.
Days pass. The only stuff I see when I'm awake is being strapped down on a table and the doctors as they get ready to get more exams done and I'm out before they even start.
Let me out, the energy seems to sing in my ears, every day when I'm awake. Bubbling right underneath my skin. It seems to whisper more now than before. Let's destroy them all and escape.
No, I think in response every time it does. Because throughout all the time I've been in this body, it didn't show any signs of being uncontrollable. It had seemed way too easy to manage it, actually but, I had thought once that it was just because Wanda herself had been a natural with it and since I'm in her body, it responded to it. I need to be in control when I plan our escape and I need to grab the damn stone, because I'm not leaving it with these people so stop being fucking difficult and let me get in control again please.
I'm starting to figure out that it wasn't like that at all. It always seemed like it wanted out, wanted to cause chaos, to wreck everything when I was first learning how to use it. And the way it got suddenly out of control like this, right after that day in Pietro's cell, it's linked to my emotions. That's gotta be it.
I was unstable and it became unstable with me, because we are one. It belongs to me, I belong to it. We are one and the same.
So I know exactly what I have to do.
I try to control my own emotions. Anger, fear, panic, everything. When I have a nightmare, I do my best to keep the emotions from coming out, like there's a wall in front of them. Panic and fear don't resurface as much when I start doing it.
After we do manage our escape, I will let you out to wreck all of them.
It seems to sing more gently, as if it's pleased. And the control I once had is slowly coming back to me.
And after these people, I think with a grin, it'll be the purple fucker.
Days after that, they seem me in control enough so I'm finally able to see Pietro again and I tell him my plan.
Telepathically. As in, I sent everything I wanted to say to him mentally and he responded in the same way.
Yes, that is another aspect of this magic I have.
It just seems to grow and grow, like there's no end to the abilities it gives me. I'm starting to not be surprised by them anymore with how many there are already. It's somewhat terrifying, but exhilarating.
Anyways, moving on. It takes a bit of convincing and lying but not really lying from my part. I just tell him about this vision I had when I first interacted with the staff, about this dude that wants to use these six rocks that are the embodiment of six parts that makes the universe to destroy half of said universe, which normally would make someone think I'm insane, but Wanda's brother is luckily no one of them.
He did look skeptical when I was done, but he either must've seen I was really serious or he trusts me unconditionally because he agreed to the plan. It probably the latter, considering I am, to him, his twin sister that he has lived with for two decades.
Well, and I also show him the purple dude in his mind from the scenes that I still remember from the movie, which most likely helped. For some reason, he laughed at the dude.
"His chin looks like saggy nuts," he tells me.
Huh, never thought of it like that. Now that's never leaving my mind, so thanks a lot.
When I tell him that, he just laughs even harder.
Plan Get the Stone and Escape was officially a Go.
The plan was simple.
Pietro would scout and find where they're hiding the staff, because neither of us have seen it since the experimentations and once he knows where it is, I'll invade and scramble all the people's minds as needed so we can get to it, take the Stone and we wreck chaos and destroy everything and everyone, before escaping.
It's a pretty simple plan. These people have no way to stop us, not really. And we'd catch them of guard, because from what I have observed these last weeks in this place is that they think we're on their side. Which makes things easier for us.
Nothing could go wrong. Everything will go according to the plan.
Those are always the famous last words.
Because of course something just had to happen.
The day we decide to put it to action, I make every lab coat and superior think that we're still in our cells.
Thankfully there's not as many people as I feared. But it still takes a lot of magic (and it was more than gleefully willing to comply to my wishes. It just spread out of my hands, red tendrils expanding and expanding all over this place) and I feel dizzy and fucking exhausted and an awful headache explodes in my head, but I do my best to focus on our objective. Pietro does find the staff; behind this secret door, with all these mechanics creatures and stuff that is both scientifically amazing looking and horrifying.
I can't help but just stare at it all. The . . . creature hanging and linked to all sorts of suspenders was huge. It seemed metallic, but that seems to be just the armor around its body. It's clearly dead and I realize with an horrifying jolt that these people were probably thinking of creating more of these, probably as an army. Or maybe use their bodies to develop something?
I really don't want to know what they're planning. And as soon as we take the staff, it'll be over.
"'Changing the world'," Wanda's brother snorts, looking up to the thing, "More like destroying the world."
"Let's just get the Stone," I say tiredly. The headache is growing and the exhaustion is driving my body to a limit, so I quickly move towards the staff.
The glow of the blue gem is familiar and it seems to increase as we make our way to it. The magic seems to react to it, pleasantly bubbling to the surface but remaining inside, as if it's drawn by it. I take the staff in my hands.
Pietro leans closer, the blue reflecting on his clear eyes, "So that's the Stone?"
"No," I grab the gem with scarlet coils (the headache spikes and I wince) because I don't want to risk touching it, pull it out and let the staff clatter to the ground. And then, twisting my fingers, I crush the blue, freeing the yellow, "This is the Stone."
The Mind Stone hovers above my mind, wrapped around red. It's beautiful and bright and I can feel the immense power emitting from it, so so familiar to the power residing inside of me and yes, it's very clear to me that this is the source of my magic. It's because of this Stone that I - Wanda, really - got her powers.
I let the red fade, because I just can't keep it out while I still have mental control on all the people, although it's starting to slip. I can feel them trying to see past my illusion and we need to hurry before they do.
The Stone gently falls on my palm and there's nothing, unlike what I expected. It doesn't react badly to the human touch. It just stays there, shining abnormally and seemingly trusting me to have it.
"Let's go."
And then, all hell breaks loose.
There's an explosion at some part of the facility. The shocks of it knocks us both to the ground and that's when my last mental grasp slips and the hold on the people is released all at once, making me see white with pain.
Everything hurts. My head, my body, everything. I can feel Pietro trying to keep me upright but I just can't feel my body anymore. I feel something warm above my lip and I'm pretty sure that it's blood. I lean on him because I just feel so tired.
What's happening? I try to ask, but the words won't come.
There's yelling and gunshots all around us. Hurried footsteps. I wonder if someone found their way in here and is wrecking this place up.
Huh, I wanted to do that, but I won't complain.
"Come on," Wanda's brother says quietly and he takes me in his arms.
I lean my head on his shoulder, curl my hand around the Stone and shut my eyes, feeling the rush of his speed. He stops and I immediately know that we're not outside. We're still inside, hidden somewhere I can't focus enough to recognize or not and I go to ask why, but the yelling is deafening and making my headache even worse god please stop shouting fucking jesus
"The twins!" One of the doctors outside of our hissing place shouts, "Where are they? We'll use them to-"
"Are you out of your mind?" Another one shouts back and I just wish they knew how to speak quieter. There's more gunshots and Pietro moves quietly even more into our hiding place, curls himself around me. "They still don't have any good control-"
"They'll have a better chance than us!"
"Not against the-"
"Where's Strucker? We need the words-"
I'm slipping. I can feel it. My arms and legs are losing strength. My head is clouding and my vision blurring.
"Wanda, sister, stay awake."
"'m 'wake," I slur, the control over my voice officially dead.
There's more shouting and screaming and there's Russian yelling and more gunshots and sounds that I wish I didn't know what they sound like. Sounds of bodies hitting the ground. And then . . . silence. There's nothing. Just absolute silent bliss. Thank god.
"Can I 'leep now?" is the only thing out of my lips and I just get a hand covering it in response. Okay then.
Fuck's sake. I just wanna sleep.
I nearly do manage to fall asleep, when Pietro gets to his feet and jolts me out of whatever I was along getting to. When he gets us out of our hiding place, we're met with bodies scattered around the floor. Just bodies everywhere. And if I wasn't so tired, I'd probably feel more horrified.
What the hell just happened?
Who the fuck got in here and managed to do this?
My only answer is the glint of metal.
Well shit.
[doctor strange's voice] oh we're going straight and heavy into the Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence tag. oh wait, this isn't ao3. oh well lmao.
and also throwing basically the plot of age of ultron out the window lmao, except for the part where wanda could mentally manipulate an entire city to make them think they had to leave. that was the inspiration for the scene of controlling every person in the hydra facility. but obviously here she's not as strong mentally to be completely fine after using it once.
also: the saggy nuts joke. i've been watching waaay too many marvel cast funny moments videos. please feel free to ignore it.