"Morning," said Eva, measuring every world, "what can I do for you today?"
"Espresso, please," said Agent Romanoff, then looked to Hill. "What d'you-"
"Same for me."
"On it. You staying in or taking out?"
"Taking out." Romanoff turned to Hill. "Well? Was it him?"
"We don't know, Nat. He's good at going underground."
"We had tabs on him last time, didn't we?"
"That was when we still had the whole of SHIELD on our side. Now even with Stark, we haven't got the manpower. We're supers now, not spies, we can't afford to track anyone when there's bigger threats."
"But he's not just anyone, Maria," said Romanoff agitatedly, "he's one of us."
Eva frowned as she made the drinks. It sounded like one of the Avengers were missing, but that wasn't what bugged her- it was Black Widow, who seemed genuinely distressed, and it wasn't like the woman to show emotion normally.
"Is everything okay?" she asked, handing over the drinks.
"It's fine," said Romanoff shortly. "Put these on Stark's tab."
"Sure." She chewed her lip, and the two agents' conversation bugged her for the rest of the day, through her classes and up until she met Vision in Central Park that evening.
"Bruce Banner's gone missing," she said, pulling clumps of grass up with her fingers, "hasn't he?"
"I couldn't say," he replied. "But if he hasn't been publicly seen since Sokovia… I'll leave you to make your own conclusion."
"I heard Romanoff and Hill talking about someone going missing," she said, "and he's the only one of you lot who hasn't turned up in the last month. I'd ask what happened if I expected you to answer."
"He's alive," Vision assured her, "we would know if he isn't. I'm sure Mr Banner can look after himself."
Eva's lip twitched. "You talk like a butler," she told him.
"Would you like me to stop?"
She shook her head. "Never stop being you, V, you bring rare joy to my life." He laughed. "It was weird though, seeing Romanoff be human. She's terrifying normally."
"Really?"
"Yeah. Which is weird, considering Barton is about as intimidating as a sparrow."
Vision shrugged one shoulder, the same way she always did. "I'm sure there are many people who would disagree."
"No doubt," she said, and yawned. "My final paper's due in next Tuesday."
"Good luck," he said, "although I'm sure you don't need it."
"I'll take what I can get. If you don't see me on Wednesday, it's because my professor's murdered me for it being so bad."
"If he does then he will have me to deal with," said Vision.
"What about you? How's your first month of life been?"
"It's been a little odd. People are much more vivid in the flesh than when you're just an AI," he told her.
"You're blending in wonderfully," she told him, "apart from the whole appearance thing, plus that you're much nicer than the average human."
"Thank you."
"You're welcome."
"You are okay though, right?" she asked, a little anxiously. "Settling in? Not becoming disenfranchised with humanity as a whole and developing a desire to blow everything up? Nobody picking on you?"
He tilted his head to one side. "Are you worried about me?"
"No! Maybe. A little bit. Just… I don't like the way people act around you, especially in the shop- as if you're not a person, because you are. Okay?"
"Okay," said Vision.
"Promise?"
"I promise to remember that I'm a person."
"Good." She relaxed. "Okay, I'm done fussing over you now. Normal conversation can be resumed."
"When you pass-"
"If I pass," she corrected him.
"When you pass, what are you going to do after graduation?" Vision asked. "Move back to Austin?"
"Oh, no. That place is too weird even for me, and I'm the Avengers' coffee girl. Besides, my friends have all moved on and my parents made clear they don't want me, so I'll stick around here."
"Good," said Vision, "I would miss you otherwise."
"Really?" she asked disbelievingly, and he nodded. "Aw. Anyway, who else is brave enough to serve the Mighty Thor when he's in town?"
A/N long A/N, with good news and bad news.
Good first: in celebration of this getting 100 favs & (nearly) 200 follows, to flesh out the world a bit I have made Eva a fully in-character tumblr. Want to ask her a question about anything; her favourite tree, how she got Rachel Carson, weird trivia about the Avengers? Well, now you can! Her username is arbxrea, so if you don't have a tumblr just type in arbxrea dot tumblr dot com, and click on "ask". If you do have a tumblr, if you scroll through her blog you'll see she leaves little messages in the tags, often for Vision. It also has lots of pictures of plants.
Bad news: due to the amount of time between now and Civil War, updates are going to become a lot less regular- probably once every week for a bit, then I'll space them out to fortnightly since I want to avoid a long hiatus between films. More bad news: sorry reviewer, but (spoilers) Pietro is still dead in this fic. That doesn't mean he won't have his own chapter though... ;)
Anyway: as always, thank you all so much for the staggeringly large amount of support this has, I love you all. And apologies for the shameless self promotion last chapter. And the absurdly long A/N. I'll shut up now.