Bleh, I am sick so author's note will be very short. Feeling very miserable but excited to give ya'll another chapter. I'm so glad you enjoyed the last one!

Melinda May could count the number of times in her life that she had honestly had no idea what she was doing on one hand. She always had a plan, she always knew what was going on around her, and she always knew what she was doing. But right now, staring at the two little girls who were curled around each other in the bright, sterile, hospital bed, Melinda May felt lost.

She had no idea what she was doing and it scared the hell out of her.

Skye had fallen back asleep ages ago but Phil was just now letting go of her tiny hand and coming to sit down next to her. He didn't say anything, just held her hand, but that was what she needed right now.

They both studied Skye and Natasha.

Both of them were knocked out, the stress of the last few days and the pain relievers that the doctors had given them were allowing them to sleep peacefully, and it was one of the few times that Natasha actually looked her age. The redhead's face was relaxed and without the perpetual frown or glare that was always present. She was lying with one arm thrown around Skye, who was tucked impossibly close to her sister's side. They had a whole bed to share but the two of them were only using one tiny section of it, practically lying on top of each other.

Melinda watched as Skye shifted a little and adjusted her head so that it rested more comfortably on Natasha's shoulder before moving her good hand up so that she could stick her thumb into her mouth.

They were both so small and fragile-looking and… hers.

Now those two little girls were hers and Phil's and she had no idea what she was doing.

Phil squeezed her hand, "It'll be alright."

She didn't bother looking over at him, "We don't know what we're doing Phil, we have no plan or anything."

Her husband let out a long breath and from that sound alone she could tell how exhausted he was, "We'll wing it."

"Skye and Natasha deserve something better than, 'we'll wing it'."

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him turn to her, "Skye and Natasha deserve happiness and safety and love and everything positive in the world."

Melinda nodded. That was her point here.

"Don't you want to be the one to give that to them?" He asked.

It was silent and Melinda kept her eyes trained on the two sleeping girls in front of her.

Phil rubbed his eyes, "I want to give that to them. I know you do too."

She finally turned to him, "What if we can't?"

He raised a hand and cupped her cheek, "We can, I know we can. We'll just have to take it slow and learn as we go, but we can make them happy and we can give them love and I know we can keep them safe."

Somehow, her husband always knew what to say.

She let Phil pull her into his side and they leaned against each other. She stared at Skye and Natasha for a few more moments, pushed her doubts aside, and straightened up a little, "Okay."

Melinda May may not know what she was doing, and yeah, the thought of taking care of two girl's scared her more than anything else in her life, but she wasn't going to let that stop her.

"I'm sorry Mrs. May, but we need to take their statements."

Natasha looked up from the book she was reading to Skye in the hospital bed, pausing at the sound of the strange voice at the door. The doctors said they could go soon, and Mr. Coulson said they were just working on some paperwork and then they could leave.

"Can't you at least give them a little more time to recover from what happened?" Mrs. May's voice was hushed but Natasha could hear the dangerous edge in her voice.

"It'd be best to interview them as soon as possible, it's protocol."

A moment later the door opened and a few police officers strode into the room. Natasha had to stop herself from panicking at the sight of their blue uniforms. For a moment, all she had seen was John.

Skye had the same reaction, shrinking back against Natasha, her good hand searching for a grip on her shirt.

"Hello girls, I'm so sorry about what happened..."

If you were sorry, you would have stopped John, Natasha thought bitterly, putting an arm protectively around Skye.

"We just need to ask you two a few questions..."

Natasha instantly tensed.

"Where's Mr. Coulson and Mrs. May?" Skye asked nervously, scanning the room for their teachers.

"They're just staying right outside while we talk to you." The older police officer said, sitting down on a chair. "Now we need to talk to you one at a time, so Natasha, if you could leave…"

Natasha's heart thudded in her chest and she grabbed onto Skye.

She didn't like this one bit.

"Come on, it's okay. We just need to ask you each a couple questions..."

The police officer reached a hand out towards Skye.

Skye screamed at the top of her lungs, grabbing onto Natasha even more tightly.

Natasha's ribs hurt like crazy at Skye's embrace but she couldn't care less as she pulled Skye closer and got ready to put herself between the police officer and Skye.

"What is going on?!"

Mrs. May was suddenly between them and the police officer.

Natasha had never seen her teacher so mad. The woman radiated anger and the police officers seemed to shrink back in spite of themselves. But when she glanced back at them, her face softened.

"Are you girls okay?"

"Ma'am, we just had a misunderstanding. We're going to have to ask you to leave the room... We need to talk to the girls alone and one at a time."

Mrs. May didn't move, "You think they're going to want to talk to you? When you're wearing the same uniform that the person who hurt them, who was supposed to protect them, wears? You're scaring them."

"We didn't mean to scare them."

Mrs. May put a hand on her hip and stared the officers down. Natasha would not have wanted to be on the receiving end of that look.

The officers relented, "How would you have us handle this situation then?"

"For starters, they're children, let them stay together. And call in Officer Triplett, they've met him before and trust him."

Natasha wouldn't say that she trusted Officer Triplett, she barely even knew him, but Skye seemed to like him and she knew that Officer Triplett was friends with Mrs. May and Mr. Coulson. And if Officer Triplett would let she and Skye stay together, she would much rather he be here than these people.

The officers considered Mrs. May before the older one nodded slightly, "Alright, we'll call him in." He looked over to her and Skye, "Sorry if we scared you girls."

Skye was still clutching at her shirt but as the officers started to leave the room, her grip loosened a little. Nat made sure that all of the policemen left before she took her eyes off of them and comforted her sister, "It's okay, they're gone now."

Skye didn't say anything, just let go of her shirt long enough to throw her arms around Nat's waist in a tight hug. The pressure on her ribs was too much and Natasha cried out in pain and Skye immediately let go. It took her a moment to catch her breath and for the screaming pain in her ribs to ease up but when it did, she was horrified to see that Skye was crying.

At first, Nat thought that she had accidently hurt Skye's arm or had brushed up against one of the many bruises or scrapes that decorated her little sister's skin, but then she realized that Skye was staring at her chest.

She reached for Skye but her little sister didn't move towards her like she usually did, she stayed where she was. Natasha frowned and moved closer so that she could carefully pull Skye close, so that she knew that she could be close without accidentally hurting her, "It's not your fault Skye, my ribs are just sorer than usual."

Skye whimpered, grabbed onto her hand, and started crying harder. She tried to comfort her, she did all the things she usually did to help calm her sister down, but nothing was working. She kept pressing kisses to Skye's forehead and continued to murmur soothing words until Mrs. May stepped into view and quietly said, "I think everything might be catching up to her."

It made sense but Natasha didn't tell Mrs. May that, she just rocked her sister back and forth until her cries turned into soft whimpers and Nat could hear the sounds Skye made when she was sucking her thumb.

Natasha wasn't really sure what to say and sometimes it was better to not say anything at all, so she held Skye close until the door opened up again and Officer Triplett poked his head into the room and gave them a friendly smile.

He walked past Mrs. May, rested a hand on her shoulder for a moment, and mumbled something too quietly for Nat to pick up on. Mrs. May looked back to them and Nat wondered what she saw. They probably looked pretty pitiful, sitting there with all their bumps and bruises, clinging tightly to each other.

"Mr. Coulson and I will be right outside if you need us, okay?"

Natasha nodded and Mrs. May gave her one last look before disappearing out the door.

"I'm so sorry you got scared earlier," Officer Tripp slowly eased into a chair. He wasn't wearing his uniform, instead he just wore jeans and hoodie like a regular person. "Is it okay if I really quickly talk to you about what we're going to be talking about and how it's going to go?"

Skye didn't let go of Natasha's shirt but she relaxed slightly. She nodded slowly and she could feel Natasha hesitantly doing the same.

"First off, I don't know if you remember me, but I'm Tripp."

Skye wanted him to know she remembered him. He had been the only nice person on that horrible night that Nat had called 911 and they were friends.

"I remember you Officer Tripp," she spoke up, taking her thumb out of her mouth momentarily.

"Awesome," Officer Tripp's face spread into a huge friendly smile and Skye felt pleased. "And you can just call me Tripp. Just you two though."

That made Skye feel kinda special. She glanced up at Natasha but her sister did not look impressed. That was okay though. Skye knew Nattie didn't like Tripp like she did.

"Alright, so I'm going to ask you two some questions about what happened in your home with the Garretts. This is so that we can know what happened and put Mr. Garrett into jail for a long time. I'm going to have this little thing going and it'll record what you say." Tripp showed them a small silver box. "We need to have it recorded so that we don't have to ask you again and so that we can have other people hear what you said without making you go to court. Finally, I want you to know that you can say the truth here without being afraid of someone getting you in trouble. You are never going back to that home and Mr. Garrett cannot hurt you. Does that sound okay? How are you feeling?"

Skye felt a little confused about all the stuff Tripp had said, but overall she thought it sounded okay. She did want John to go to jail. And she liked that if they recorded it then they wouldn't have to talk about it again.

"Let's get this over with," Natasha spoke up. She didn't sound happy, but she also didn't sound really angry.

"Alright. You okay with that, Skye?" Tripp looked at her and Skye nodded shyly. "Okay. I'm turning this on." Tripp fiddled with the silver box then set it on the bedside table. "This is Antoine Triplett, talking with Natasha Romanoff and Mary Sue Poots, who goes by the name Skye, about what took place in their home with John and Rebecca Garrett. The date is..."

As Tripp talked, Skye looked up at her older sister. Natasha caught her gaze and kissed her on the top of her head.

They could do this. Natasha was with her and everything was going to be okay.

"Nattie."

Natasha stirred, blinking slowly to find Skye's face up close to her own.

"Nattie, we're here."

She must have fallen asleep at some point in the car on the way to Mr. Coulson and Mrs. May's house. The hospital had kept them all the way into the afternoon but finally they had decided they could leave. Natasha was glad. She did not like the hospital at all. After they had talked to Tripp, she had felt all drained out on the inside and she must have fallen asleep pretty quickly.

"Don't you want to see?" Skye whispered. "Mr. Coulson said that we have our own room we get to share and that the walls are blue."

Natasha didn't want to get out of the car and she didn't want to see the house. She didn't want to be hurt again. Natasha was tired of being on guard and being disappointed and being scared.

It wasn't that she explicitly didn't trust Mrs. May and Mr. Coulson; it was just that she didn't trust anybody.

That was a lesson she had learned the hard way.

"Hey, it's gonna be okay," Skye grabbed her hand.

Natasha smiled slightly, recognizing the words Skye was telling her as words she often told Skye. Her smile faded as her gaze rested on Skye's broken arm and the bruises that littered her sister's tiny body.

"Girls," Mrs. May called.

Natasha pushed her hesitation away and carefully got out of the car, being careful not to jostle her ribs, before helping Skye out.

Natasha grabbed her battered suitcase as well as Skye's backpack. She had seen the large dark bruises on her sister's back. There was no way she was going to let Skye carry it.

"Want me to help?" Mr. Coulson offered but Natasha shook her head firmly. She carried their stuff. Nobody else.

Mrs. May opened the door for them. Natasha hesitated slightly, Skye nervously grabbing her free hand.

Taking a deep breath, Natasha followed her teacher into the house, holding Skye's hand tightly.

The house was… nice. Actually, it was really nice.

All of the furniture was clean but obviously well-loved. There were pictures hanging up on the walls and placed around the living room, some of them were pictures of Mrs. May and Mr. Coulson and some of them were pictures of people that Natasha didn't know. She spotted a picture of Officer Triplett that was sitting proudly on the side table next to the couch in the living room. There was a closed laptop and papers cluttered along the coffee table. From what Nat could see so far, Mr. Coulson and Mrs. May's house was clean, loved, and felt cozy.

Her teacher motioned for her to drop her bags, which Nat did after considering it for a moment.

Mr. Coulson had a nervous smile on his face when he said, "This is the living room and over here's the kitchen."

Skye's grip on her hand was loosening the further they got into the house and once they made it into the kitchen, her little sister gasped, let go of her hand completely, and pointed to the fridge, "Look Nattie! They hung up my picture!"

Sitting in the middle of the refrigerator, hanging by an old, scratched up Captain America magnet, was a messily colored in picture of Supergirl with Skye's name written haphazardly along the bottom in green crayon.

Mr. Coulson smiled, "I said I would, didn't I?"

Skye looked up at her and then towards him, "Yeah but no one actually hangs up the pictures."

Mr. Coulson's smile slowly faded away.

While the grown-ups were occupied, Natasha left Skye's side and wandered into the kitchen. She tugged on one of the cabinets and stumbled back a little when it opened easily. For some reason, she hadn't been expecting that.

When she turned back around, everyone was staring at her. She pointed to the partially opened cabinet and gave Skye a tiny grin because these cabinets weren't locked. Her sister smiled back at her. Mrs. May and Mr. Coulson just gave each other confused looks but didn't say anything about it.

Mr. Coulson pointed to the next room over, "Our dining room is in there."

Skye grabbed onto her hand again and they both followed their teachers into the dining room. The hardwood table was big enough to fit six people and Natasha could see that it had little scratches all over it. She kind of liked that it had marks that showed that it was used often and loved by their teachers.

Skye pointed to the table, "Where are we going to sit?"

Mrs. May shrugged, "You can sit wherever you want."

Her little sister gave her a confused look and then asked, "Where do you guys usually sit?"

"We sit wherever we feel like, there's no assigned seating in this house. We just always make sure there's enough room for Tripp because he likes to come into our house and steal our food." Mr. Coulson's grin was now back in place.

Skye crossed her arms, which looked difficult with her new blue cast getting in the way, and looked at the ground, "Stealing is bad."

Mr. Coulson laughed, "Well, I guess stealing was the wrong word to use. We like Tripp a lot so we don't mind that we feed him almost every night."

Skye looked at her again but she just shrugged so Skye dropped the subject. They looked around the house and Natasha was surprised by how comforting it was to be in here.

She felt a tug on her hand and carefully leaned down so Skye could whisper in her ear, "It's not so bad here."

Nat wanted to agree but couldn't just yet. Everything always started out as being nice, usually you had to wait a little while before things started going bad.

Mrs. May cleared her throat, "There's a bathroom over there and another one upstairs. Do you want to go see your room?"

Skye nodded and then looked back to her to see if that was okay. Natasha shrugged so Skye turned back to Mrs. May and gave her a small smile, "I wanna see."

Mrs. May and Mr. Coulson led them upstairs, pointing out the bathroom and their bedroom along the way. Natasha tried to look at the pictures hanging on the wall but apparently Skye was very excited to see their new room because her little sister wasn't letting her lag behind. Natasha let Skye pull her along and everyone stopped outside a door.

Mrs. May and Mr. Coulson both looked a little nervous but Mr. Coulson pushed the door open anyways.

For all of her excitement, Skye was hesitant to walk into the room. She watched as the little girl peered through the doorway and she sighed a little before stepping into the room and tugging Skye behind her.

The walls of their room were blue and there was nothing decorating them. There were two big windows along the wall and a window seat with flower-print cushions. Nat spotted a closet but the doors were closed so she couldn't see how big it was. All of the furniture was white, the two dressers, the two bedside tables, and the medium-sized antique-looking desk that sat in the corner of the room next to a bookshelf stuffed with books. The two beds, decorated with plain blue sheets, were placed on opposite sides of the room. Natasha wondered if she was strong enough to push them closer together.

She and Skye silently studied the room. It was bare but it was pretty. Her little sister smiled up at her and she gave her a tiny grin back, not wanting to dim her enthusiasm.

From behind them, Mr. Coulson nervously said, "We didn't have much time to get everything together so maybe once you're all healed up, we can go to the store and you two can pick out whatever you want to decorate."

Skye looked up at him, "We can decorate it?"

"Yeah, it's your guys' room. It should look how you want it to look."

Slowly, Skye moved further into the room and Natasha followed after her. They circled the room, Skye especially liked the fully-stocked bookshelf, and both carefully sat down on one of the beds.

Mrs. May and Mr. Coulson studied them for a moment before Mrs. May murmured something to Mr. Coulson and called to them, "Girls? We can move the beds closer together, if you want."

She and Skye looked at each other before both turning to their teachers and nodding. Natasha didn't want to be so far away from Skye, even if they were in the same room.

Their teachers stayed over by the doorway and let them get used to their surroundings. Natasha glanced out the window and saw that they were facing a pretty backyard.

She felt a tug on her shirt and looked down at Skye, "I like it here."

Nat pulled Skye in for a hug, pressed a kiss to the top of her head, and quietly said, "Don't get too comfy, okay?"

She felt Skye reluctantly nod against her.

Reviews might cure my cold.

Until next week!

~silverlining