Prompt: The Way of the Sith.
Summary: When they train it is together. That was the agreement they had made, when the Jedi had taken them in. Master Yoda had counselled against it, counselled that their closeness could send them to the Dark Side if they were trained, but Windu had decided that so long as they had each other when training and after training neither would fall so far.
They train together, Wanda's skill with the Force and Pietro's speed with his lightsabre, and get better and better together.
Notes: Star Wars AU, obviously. Most of the Star Wars stuff is accurate, down to the Hydra system, though the Force Amplifier is made up (but given the amount of crap in Star Wars there's probably something alike to it somewhere in that universe). Planet Strucker is a blatant MCU reference, as are Novi Grad and Sokovi (not rendered Sokovia here for obviousness reasons). Barton is obviously Clint, Grievous is Star Wars canon, Crimson Witch is a reference to a Wolverine and the X-Men episode in which she is misnamed. List and Cho are from MCU canon, Jocasta and Alkhema are both feminine robots created by Ultron in various comic continuities. Togruta and Bothan are both Star Wars, Rainer is from Guardians of the Galaxy and thus MCU. Mon Cala is an oceanic planet from Star Wars.
Warnings: Codependency.
i.
When they train it is together. That was the agreement they had made, when the Jedi had taken them in. Master Yoda had counselled against it, counselled that their closeness could send them to the Dark Side if they were trained, but Windu had decided that so long as they had each other when training and after training neither would fall so far.
They train together, Wanda's skill with the Force and Pietro's speed with his lightsabre, and get better and better together.
(They do not tell the Jedi of their nightmares, crushed beneath rubble and vehicles as red lights from guns and lightsabres play outside their sight)
ii.
Wanda learns how to influence people first, Pietro is the first to learn how to jump so high with the Force to help. Pietro never quite grasps the fluid way Wanda influences others, makes them believe or do things, and she is never quite as fast as he when it comes to running the courses.
iii.
They go through the trials together - those that they can - and Pietro protects his sister where he is able. They have been criticised for that before, advised that Wanda must protect herself, and that Pietro must learn to be away from her side, but here they must be themselves and still be worthy and so he stays. Wanda is incredible to Pietro, darting through, letting the Force slip and slide around her to make the way as smooth as they need it. People influenced, objects moved, and Pietro guarding all the way through.
When they are alone for the Trial of Isolation Wanda tells him she will remember their childhood and he promises to do the same.
iv.
When Wanda is refused a pass it is all Pietro can do to hold in his emotions and not lash out with the Force around them. Wanda, they say, relies too much on misdirection and influence, and that is too much like lies and trickery and that, Master Yoda says, is the path to the Dark Side of the Force.
Wanda squeezes her brother's hand then lets go and lifts her chin. "Well," she says. "It's a good thing I made my sabre red, then, isn't it?"
Then perception warps and Wanda is gone.
v.
Pietro has nightmares for weeks, and Master Windu wonders sometimes if he shouldn't remain with the students, if he cannot manage his thoughts so well. Pietro quietly, softly, reminds the Council that he cannot remember a time he was apart from his sister barring the isolation trial, and the times they had almost died.
"It is not, honoured Masters, as though I have many good memories associated with my sister's departures."
vi.
Eventually, oh eventually, the nightmares begin to ease. Pietro knows, somewhere deep down, that this means Wanda's are easing too, that she has found something to give her peace and help her, and he hopes she will visit when well enough, or at least tell him where she is. He hopes, even more than that, that this means Wanda isn't dead, that she lives still and that the peace of his dreams are not born from her resting in it.
Sometimes he wishes he was one of those species with telepathy, those able to, with or without Force training, reach out through the stars to find others, to know if they were well, let alone alive.
Alas, the mind was ever Wanda's realm, just as the physical was his.
vii.
The Council of Reassignment eventually sends him to Strucker, a small planet in the Hydra system, where Sith activity has been playing up. He is, they point out, one of their best fighters, and more than able to face down the largely fledgling Sith on the planet.
Pietro sighs and packs his things. At least, he thinks, travelling he will not have to think on his sister, with so many new things to see.
viii.
The plant is a rocky mess of rubble, and Pietro has to blink back memories of home when they set down. He is met by an older Jedi who says to call him Barton and they settle at the quarters the Jedi Council arranged ahead of time.
After sparring Barton offers him some tea and they talk.
"Most of the Sith won't be much trouble," he says. "Most of them are apprentices - poor apprentices - besides. If you see one of metal, that's Darth Ultron, get out of his way. No idea what he used to be, but he's more droid than Grievous, and harder to kill besides."
Pietro drinks his tea. "Any others to keep a watch for?"
Barton shrugs. "Droids in black are Ultron's, he keeps them in a hive. Nasty weapons, but easy enough to dispatch of. No idea where he keeps getting more from, though. Of his apprentices - he has about twelve, no idea why he's breaking pattern - keep an eye for the Crimson Witch. You'll know who she is. Dressed all in red and fast as a demon. She'll give even you a run for your money."
ix.
Pietro has nightmares that night, but not of childhood. Much worse than childhood.
He dreamed of fighting his sister, and of killing her.
x.
His first days are relatively peaceful. He only comes across a few droids, and they are, as Barton says, easy enough to dispatch of. The fifteenth day pits him against a bearded human apprentice, quick but not as quick as he. They die after a quick fight, and Pietro brings them back to town to be logged in the morgue. Barton pulls the collar of the apprentice's robes down to reveal a brand and nods.
"Klaue," he says. "Well done."
Pietro nods. "Do the others have names too? I'd like to put a name to a face if I'm going to be killing more of them, even if its for the Jedi Council and to rid the world of the Sith."
Barton shrugs, and points him out the door. The walk home is usually quiet, but Barton is oddly talkative in his way. "There's List," he says. "Used to be a doctor half the planet over, low level Force sensitive with a knack for patching things up that might not want to be patched up. Not sure why Ultron went for him but he did. Cho, another doctor. She was one of ours until Ultron, no idea what he did to bring her over. Stark, back on the Reassignment Council, wants to try to save her still, thinks she doesn't want to be here. Crimson Witch, I've told you about. No idea where she's from. Other than that… Jocasta and Alkhema. Sisters and mostly droid at this point. What isn't droid has been cybernetically enhanced. And then the six or seven others, yet to be identified firmly enough."
Pietro's mind is reeling with too much information and he blinks. "So," he says. "List: Doctor. Cho: Doctor. Crimson Witch: Unknown. Jocasta and Alkhema: mostly droid. Then, assorted others?"
Barton nods. "Pretty much."
xi.
He spots Darth Ultron one day, and sees why Barton said to get away. The Sith Lord is huge, seven, maybe eight feet tall, and strides towards the town in an easy lope, metal glittering in the sun. Pietro calls Barton on the comlink and is ordered back immediately.
"Don't go against him," Barton says, and pulls a face at Pietro's quizzical expression. "Orders from the Council. We've lost too many to him so far, we're waiting until we have a better idea of what he's up to and what it would take to kill him."
Pietro nods. "Training until he's gone then? Or are you too tired old man?"
Barton laughs, and pulls down something strange from the wall. "Let me teach you archery," he says. "See how good you are with that."
xii.
Archery is something new, utterly new, to Pietro, but he cannot help but think how Wanda would have loved it. The peaceful nature of it, the elegance, the calm but instinctive way one had to hold it and focus and ah there shoot the arrow to its target.
"Where did you learn this?" he asks and Barton shrugs.
"The ones who raised me," he says. "I was late to the Jedi, they found me after following my troupe around for months. Said they could feel me tugging on the Force for some of my shots, but not enough to focus in on."
Pietro nods, recalling similar stories. He and Wanda had been lucky, he thought, to have been found for calling the Force to them after one try and not many.
xiii.
When Pietro first sees her he is sure he is dreaming. Dressed all in red, climbing down from a flier, but…
"Wanda?" he asks, because the way she moved, her height, her hair he cannot see her face but-
A mask faces him, as red as blood. "I am the Crimson Witch. Leave me be, Jedi."
The voice is… could it be Wanda? Would she really have…?
He remembers what she had said that day, the day the Council had denied her and she had left. It's a good thing I made my sabre red, then, isn't it?
But Wanda… she wouldn't, would she? She who had always tried to make him help the other Padawans, the younger ones, who'd encouraged kindness, she wouldn't…. She couldn't…
He is grateful for his training in speed fighting when the Crimson Witch's lightsabre swings in front of his face.
"Leave me be means stop staring, Jedi." Her voice is a snarl, and Pietro cannot help but think of when Wanda was angry, when she was furious, when something had been so wrong she had made things around her shake. He pulls his own lightsabre free, and parries.
He almost smirks when she seems startled. "Bet you didn't see that coming."
She makes a noise almost like a growl and leaps, lightsabre flashing, and Pietro parries again, quickly, before darting in to strike. She parries. It has been so long since he fought someone this fast, someone almost as fast as he, and even if this is not Wanda, even if this is just some other Sith with all his sister's speed he almost cannot dislike them for this. It feels like sparring with his sister and he has missed this so.
Pietro is startled to find he is almost laughing as he leaps to a rooftop to follow her fighting, and they duel across the town's rooftiles. Speed is everything in this, he knows, when they seem already so close in skill. Speed is everything and if this is his sister he knows he is faster.
Two fingers fly by in his vision, "Stop this," is said as firm as an order and he pushes through the wave of compulsion.
He laughs again, he cannot help it. "You have to try harder than that, Sith lady. My sister was better at that than you and she was trained as Jedi."
Is that a flinch? He almost pauses too long to wonder, when her lightsabre flashes towards him again. Pietro reminds himself focus, and responds in kind.
xiv.
Pietro is not sure how long he has been fighting when a strike with the butt of his sabre knocks her mask briefly loose. He catches a glimpse of skin, fair like his own, of dark brows and dark eyes and, "Wanda?" he asks again. He cannot help it.
A swipe of her fingers pushes the mask back into place. They seem to have paused, for a moment at least, atop the repair shop. "I am," she says, "The Crimson Witch. Leave me, Jedi, to go about my business."
Pietro remembers what the Council had said about misdirection and tries again. "Crimson Witch isn't a name. What's your name?"
The woman barks a laugh. "Magda."
Mother's name, Pietro remembers. Wanda's middle name.
Pietro tries again. "Your first name, your personal name." He pauses, considers, and turns off his sabre. "Or are you too scared to take off your mask?"
He knows, if this is indeed Wanda, she is rolling her eyes in the pause it takes her to turn off her sabre and raise her hands to her mask. "If I do this," she says, "Will you stop chasing me, stop fighting me?"
Pietro pauses and her hands begin to dip. If this is Wanda he cannot leave her to the Dark Side, he cannot, she is his twin- there is the buzz of her lightsabre switching on and Pietro steps back.
"I will." This time.
The mask comes off and Pietro almost sighs in sadness. It is not Wanda. The face is almost their mother's, but it is not his sister. He would know her even after months apart, even years, and while this woman may move like her it is not her.
Then he catches a glimpse of a waver at the edge of her face, and the way her fingers twist inside her robes. He finds the Force about them and pushes.
The illusion falls.
xv.
"Wanda," he says, and does not need to say more. Wanda, it's you.
She can hear him, he knows she can, they had always heard each other if they thought loud enough and she has retained her skill with tricks of the mind. She must be able to hear him, his mind singing out Wandawandawandawanda in glad, adoring tones, and you're alive oh thank the Force.
Wanda flinches. "You thought I'd died?"
Pietro swallows past a lump. "The nightmares eased. I thought you'd come back when that happened, that you'd come to terms with what they said and contact me but…"
Her eyes drop to the floor. "But I didn't."
Pietro wants to rush forward, wants to take her hands, cradle her face, hug her, hold her to him and never let her go, but she is still holding onto her lightsabre so tightly her knuckles are as pale as snow.
"Oh, Stars, Wanda, why didn't you tell me you were alive?"
One scarlet shoulder shrugs. "I am Sith now. You are Jedi."
Pietro almost sobs but: "You're my sister. I would never betray you, could never betray you, you know that." He is blinking away tears as he repeats himself, a gentle whisper. "You know that."
"Betrayal is-" she already sounds like she is reciting something and Pietro remembers after a moment more.
"Betrayal is the way of the Sith."
Her voice is gentle, almost an apology in tone alone, and she takes his hand. "I am Sith now," she says, and lets his hand slip free. "You should go. You should letme go. We aren't of the same anymore."
"Please," Pietro says, and he does not care if it sounds like begging. He lets out all the emotions he, as a Jedi, is supposed to keep careful hold of, all the sorrow, all the loss, all the burning grief, and feels tears trickling down his face. "Please, Wanda."
She sighs. "I will come by," she says, and he knows that in this tone her words are a promise. "This evening. Make sure your house-mate doesn't notice."
xvi.
Pietro claims an early night, that his fight with the Crimson Witch had tired him and Barton waves him off to bed with a laughing, "Who's the old man now?"
Pietro settles in his room. Opens the window with a waved hand, locks the door behind him and sits, elbows on knees, hands clasped, chin on knuckles, at the edge of his bed. He hears Barton eventually rise from his seat, switch of screens and lock the door. There are the fainter noises of a shower and curtains pulled shut, and Pietro untenses.
He will wait all night if needs must, if only to see his sister.
xvii.
It is late, so late it is almost morning, when Wanda floats her way over the garden wall and through his window. She settles, silently, just before him, and Pietro looks up to her unmasked face and relaxes utterly with her presence.
"Pietro," she murmurs, and Pietro cannot stop the quiet noise of relief he makes at her voice wrapping around his name. "Oh, Pietro," she says, and she is kneeling, kneeling before him, her elbows on his knees, her face close to his, hands wrapped around his. His head tilts forward, their brows touch, and Pietro is almost undone.
Tears roll freely, and Wanda shushes softly, smooths them away with her thumbs, pulls him close and rests her head on his shoulder. He is crying, and he knows she is crying, can feel the sobbing shift of her shoulders, and pulls her closer even as she holds him tighter. "Oh, Stars, Wanda, why didn't you tell me you were alive?" is croaked out, and she just shakes her head and presses her face closer into his neck.
"I'm sorry," she whispers. "I'm so sorry." Pietro's hand runs over her hair, still the same dark and soft brown it ever has been. Her hands are in his hair, shot through with grey after all the grief though they are not yet twenty-two. "I should have," she murmurs, damply. "I wanted to. But they would have killed you, Ultron would have had you killed, if they knew my loyalty split like this."
Pietro holds her closer. "That's not your fault," he murmurs, and, "Stay with me, oh Stars, Wanda, stay with me, please."
Her head is shaking again, and Pietro tries, with gentle hands, to still it. "I can't," she murmurs. "I can't leave Ultron now, he goes mad without us all there."
"Stay," he asks again. "Just for tonight. Please, Wanda, it has been so long."
Wanda nods, and gently, oh so gently, pulls free of his embrace. The mask, he notices, is attached to her belt beside her lightsabre. She slips off her robe, sets it down over the chair and stretches down one side of Pietro's bed. Pietro half-smiles. "You can have the covers," he says and she shakes her head.
"Your bed," she says. "Besides I'll have to leave early."
Pietro sighs and slips beneath two covers, and pushes the third over Wanda. He can hear her huffed laugh, even as she switches off the lights and hides their faces in darkness. Pietro relaxes, and feels Wanda do the same, burrowing into his shoulder.
He sleeps, and it is the deepest sleep he has had in a long time.
xviii.
He wakes and Wanda is gone. There is a small note on the chair she'd hung her robe over (I will return), but nothing else. Pietro still feels better than he has since before the Trials, and rises, stretches, smiles, and goes through to the main room to start making breakfast.
Barton is blinking and bleary when he comes through and sees Pietro so cheerful. "Sleep well then?" he asks and Pietro grins.
"Who's the old man now?"
Barton sits and digs in when Pietro sets a plate in front of him. "Me, it would seem." He wolfs down most of the plate before: "Any reason for the cheer?"
Pietro pauses and shrugs. "Fighting the Crimson Witch," he says, for it is not exactly a lie. "It was a challenge. I haven't had a challenge like her since before the Trials."
Barton sets down cutlery on his empty plate with a clink. "Since your sister," he says, and Pietro turns. Barton nods. "I've read the file they sent of you. Look, whoever she is, even if she is your sister- she's Sith now. And she chose it. Don't get caught up in the joy of a good practice enough to let your guard down. Don't think you can turn her from the Dark. The Crimson Witch is not your friend."
Pietro's good mood fails. Barton does not know, Barton does not understand, and he cannot say but she is my sister. "I know," he says instead. "I saw her face under her mask, if that helps? Human, about my age. Dark hair, dark eyes."
His housemate looks slightly surprised and Pietro grins again. "You do washing up," he says. "I'll go into town."
xix.
He does not see Wanda that day, but he does that evening.
"Ultron," she explains. "He is building something, wanted my help."
"Do you know what it is?" he asks, but does not expect her to answer.
She shakes her head, dark hair still soft and long as it ever has been. "He keeps all of his plans close to his chest, and I'm not good enough with computers to break his code."
"Would you?" Pietro asks without thinking. "Would you, if you thought he might hurt us?"
Wanda's hand finds his an squeezes gently. "Yes. Without question. I am Sith now. Betrayal-"
"Is the way of the Sith." Pietro almost wants to be sad at how easily she says it, but cannot be. She would still put them first. She could still come back to him. She could still be Jedi. He presses a kiss to her hair where she is curled against him and sighs softly. It is easy to slip into sleep with his sister beside him.
xx.
They do this most nights. Not all. Sometimes Pietro is passed a message when in town, by a Togruta or a Bothan or a Rainer, saying "I cannot. I am needed." But she is always there the next day, or the day after. Pietro knows her, knows her like he does his bones and skin and self, for she is still his sister. Still as close to half of him as two separate people can be.
One night they are woken by Barton stumbling through the main room and Pietro hisses to Wanda "Hide" just before Barton comes in. Barton sees her there and calls his bow to him. Pietro pushes his sister behind him.
"Pietro, move. She's Sith."
Pietro shakes his head. "She is my sister," he says. Then, "She's my twin."
Barton sighs and lowers his bow. Scrubs his hand over his face. "It's too late for this," he mumbles, and waves them through to the next room. Pietro is careful to grab his sabre as they go, and notes that Wanda does the same.
"Technically," Wanda says as they go through, "It's too early. It's only three hours until dawn."
Barton flaps a hand at her, "Hush up, blabbermouth. Sith or not. Too late, too early. Need caffeine." He bustles about, making tea, and puts out a mug for Pietro when he nods. Wanda shakes her head when offered, mouth thinned into a fine line.
"Why…," Pietro paused. "Barton why did you come through?"
Barton shrugs. "Had a dream I was a sandwich, wanted to ask if there were loaves of bread that big." Pietro almost glares. "Woke up and saw your window was open," Barton says. "One of the guys in town said they'd seen the Witch about, wanted to make sure you were ok."
Pietro gestures to himself, "As you can see, I am."
Barton points vehemently at him with a teaspoon, "You were in bed with a Sith."
"With my sister," Pietro says and then, "… That sounds just as bad, doesn't it."
Barton almost smiles and pushes the second mug towards Pietro. "It does. Explain yourself. Both of you explain yourselves."
It is simple enough for Pietro to start, cradling his warm mug in his hands. "I thought she was dead," he says.
Barton puts the kettle back on.
xxi.
By the time they are done Wanda has her own mug (well, Pietro's mug, and Pietro has a new one), and Barton seems almost comfortable with Pietro's Sith sister sat beside them on the sofas.
"Let me get this straight," Barton says. "Your sister was failed on the Trials, and left to become a Sith. You both have horrible nightmares, until she gets here and actually has a place of her own. Almost a year later you are sent here, and discover your sister is the Crimson Witch. You somehow don't duel to the death and instead agree to meet again, and have been sleeping together - but only sleeping - pretty much every night since. Did I miss anything?"
"Only one thing," Wanda says, "But it's easy enough to do. I've learned that Ultron plans to destroy the planet."
xxii.
Pietro is certain that Barton is as stunned as he is when Wanda says that. "Wanda," he breathes, "When did you learn that?"
"Today," Wanda says, and her eyes meet his and Pietro can see honesty honesty honesty truth all the way down their depths. "I was going to tell you in the morning, so you could tell him," she nods to Barton, "and call in whoever could stop it. Ultron's mad, Pietro, and not powermad like most Sith. He's almost omnicidal."
Barton finally gets his brain back online and sets his mug down without shaking. "How?" he asks. "How is he going to do it?"
Wanda pauses, glances to Pietro. Pietro looks at his sister and silently begs her to speak. You could come back with me if you do this, come home, come home, be safe with me. Pietro knows Wanda can hear the song of his mind and takes his hand.
"Novi Grad," she says. "The moon colony. He's going to rip it from it's orbit when Sokovi comes close by in three weeks and crash it into Strucker. He's been building a Force Maximiser that allows him to channel it through all his apprentices as well as himself, and he'll have one of us on the moon to act as a conduit." Her hand clenches around Pietro's. "He was furious when Ulysses - Ulysses Klaue - was killed. He was going to use him as the conduit. Now," she swallowed. "Now he wants to use me."
xxiii.
Pietro's hand is so tight around his sister's that he fears he would break her bones were she not holding his hand just as tightly. Barton looks stunned, and pulls a tablet towards himself, starts tapping out equations.
"Doing that…," he says, muttering half to himself. "To do that… The conduit would be killed, if not by the process then by the impact. And crashing NG into Strucker… he'll kill everyone. On both of them, Mother of Moons, he's insane."
Pietro tugs Wanda's chin up, gently gently, from where she is looking at the tiles of the floor. "You were going to go back to him?" he asks, and he knows that what Wanda is seeing in his eyes is betrayal betrayal betrayal, how could you, how could you?
Her thumb strokes over his hand. "I am Sith now," she says. "Betrayal-"
"Betrayal is the way of the Sith," Pietro says, and bows his brow to hers. "Come back to me," he whispers. "Please. I could not live without you again."
Wanda shifts her head, rubs her cheek against his. "Betrayal is the way of the Sith," she says. "I was going to betray him."
xxiv.
Pietro feels joy as intense as the shining sun, a sun about to go nova and illuminate everything in its range, and he knows Wanda can feel it emanating from his mind in wave after silver-gold wave of joy. Behind it, as deep and blue as the oceans of Mon Cala, is mine, my sister, my wonderful sister, Wanda is safe and home and good again, she is herself she is right and Pietro hears her chuckle when she receives that.
"We need a way to stop him," Wanda says. "To destroy the Maximiser, kill him, kill his apprentices or get the ones like Cho who don't want to be here away. I don't know how we can but we have to, or-"
"Or everyone here dies," Barton says. "Crimso- Wanda. You should head back. Tell us how the Maximiser works, if there's any weaknesses in Ultron's defence, if there's a way we can counter the pull on NG to keep it in place and prevent this that way. Can you do that?"
There is something intense in Barton's gaze, something only there when he was teaching Pietro to shoot, and when he held them both at arrowpoint. Wanda nods. "Pietro and I will start working on viruses for the Maximiser, and get the Council in on this," Barton continues. "They need to know." Wanda nods again and squeezes Pietro's hand.
"I should go now," she says. "The more ready I am at Ultron's side the more he will believe me." Pietro nods as she rises, and lets her hand slip from his. There is silence in the main room as she takes her outer robe from the chair, and the soft noise of wind as she floats out the window and over the wall.
"Pietro," Barton says, and his eyes still have the strange intensity. "You know she may not-"
"She will come back," Pietro says. "Even now she will not lie to me. She will come back."
"Betraya-"
"I know the saying," Pietro says, and stands. "But she won't betray me."
xxv.
The day finally comes and Wanda leaves in the morning with the virus they have designed. She has managed to convince Ultron, at the last moment, to send Jocasta and her sister instead of herself, convinced him that two on Novi Grad will increase the strength of the Force by a significant enough amount to ensure the wipe-out he seeks. Now Wanda's only job is preventing the Maximiser getting online.
Pietro and Barton follow as close to the base as they dare, pausing when Wanda's slight movement indicates they are as close as is safe. They watch her enter, and Pietro settles by a rock and listens with his mind for hers. She has just slipped the chip with the virus on it into the Maximiser when the odd voice of Ultron asks, "Wanda?" and almost makes him jump out of his skin. He had not known the Sith knew his sisters name, and he feels his joy curdle into worry worry worry gnawing its way out of the edges of his mind.
"Sir!" she says, brightly, and Pietro hopes hopes hopes- "Last minute checks. You wanted the third fuse down checked again; I just replaced it."
The strange metal face almost… smiles? And Pietro can feel his sister's pulse slowing from its startled response. "Good," he says. "That's good. The others are already in harness, but we just caught trespassers at the boundary. Will you come and help me deal with them?" There is something almost cheerful in Ultron's tone and-
The image shatters as Barton pokes him in the ribs. "Pietro," he says. "We've been caught."
Over them stand two droids, weapons out, and Pietro knows that even with his speed, going for his sabre is suicide.
xxvi.
They are lead in, hands cuffed together, and Wanda is standing, mask on, beside Ultron. Pietro can feel her mind racing, racing faster, as fast as he fights and then… it withdraws. Pietro watches her inscrutable mask, and barely pays attention to Ultron until, "Should we kill them, do you think, or wait for them to die with the rest?"
He is looking to Wanda, with an odd kind of attentiveness, like a parent to a child. Our parents are dead Pietro thinks, as loudly as he can, trying to get through to Wanda. They were killed by Sith. He feels the least flutter from Wanda's mind, and one hand slips beneath her robe, toward her sabre.
"My Lord," Wanda says, smoothly, and Pietro's head bows. He looks to the floor. Do not betray me, please, sister, do not betray me, please, Wanda, please please please. "As you say, Death is a gift to those unable to advance beyond its bounds, for they would be lesser than those who would yet survive."
There is the screech of metal and the buzz of a lightsabre.
"But I will never let you hurt my brother."
Pietro opens his eyes, sees Wanda stood, her lightsabre thrust through Ultron's chest, one hand holding… something, her thumb pressing a button, as droids in the room fall down and Ultron…
"Wanda," the droid-Sith says. "Wanda…?"
Wanda twists the lightsabre, pulls it up, pulls it to one side, and pulls it straight through Ultron. Sai tok, Pietro remembers. The Sith Strike.
Ultron falls in two, upper and lower, and Wanda does not let go of the button in her hand until his eyes have faded.
"Wanda," Pietro breathes, and her hand rises to rip off her mask.
"Pietro," she says, and flies down the stairs, wraps him in her arms. It is with a flick of her fingers she undoes their cuffs and Pietro hugs her back, mind singing Wandawandawandawandawanda, brave sister, beautiful sister, wonderful sister, in the same silver-gold joy it had when she said she would betray Ultron. His mind is shining like a supernova, and all he cares for is his sister in his arms.
xxvii.
As Barton says later, it's a good thing that other apprentices - barring Jocasta and Alkhema - are trapped in harnesses. They offer them all a chance to turn back or face imprisonment and possible execution, and the apprentices are stuck tied up. Cho - Helen, Pietro learns her name is - wants nothing more than to go home and forget she can access the power of the Force. List has war crimes listed against him from another planet, it turns out, and the others variously chose death and imprisonment. Jedi called by Barton wait on the edge of the system and catch the fleeing Jocasta and Alkhema, and Wanda stays with Pietro and Barton.
Pietro is surprised when Windu and Yoda visit, weeks after the event. Wanda has been staying with them, helping to guard the town, helping the people, living her life, and still with her bright red lightsabre at her side, and when the Jedi Masters come Pietro stays by her and refuses to move.
"We're not here to punish her," Windu says, but Pietro only stands closer. "Yoda," Windu tilts a bald head to the diminutive Jedi, "Wanted to assess how far to the Dark Side your sister had gone. After Barton's report we've decided she can't be as Dark as we'd feared. Misdirection and influence may be her forte, but betraying you and the Council? Much less so."
Pietro's grip on his sister's hand is fierce. "I could have told you that. Years ago, before you failed her Trials." Wanda's hand is soothing on his, thumb running over his skin.
"Shh," she murmurs. "They know now, at least."
"Patience you have," Yoda says, looking at Wanda. "And anger too."
"But not enough," Windu says, "For the Dark Side."
Yoda nods. "A Jedi she can be," he says, and Pietro looks to his sister. She seems almost drifting and he tugs on her hand.
"Wanda?" he says.
"Y-you… You'll pass me on the Trials?" she asks, and Yoda smiles.
"By the Force you were passed," Yoda says, "And this your Trials were."
Wanda's laugh is joyful, and Pietro feels her mind shine like a supernova.
End Notes: Reviews are much appreciated!