Put to rest what you thought of me
While I clean this slate
With the hands of uncertainty
So let mercy come and wash away
What I've done

-What I've Done by Linkin Park

"So I've sent out the invitations, I just need to confirm with the caterer," Pepper announced as she entered the main room, where everyone else was. She set her purse on the coffee table and put her hands on her hips, cocking them to the side. "Tony," she said, frowning at him, "did you hear me?"

Tony sighed and sat up straight. "Yes ma'am. I'll confirm later," he huffed and put his feet up on the table. Pepper shoved them off and sat down next to him.

"Invitations for what?" Ellie asked, turning the TV's volume down. Everybody else gathered around to hear too.

Pepper smiled. "Your 'welcome party', of course," she said as if Ellie was supposed to already know. Ellie narrowed her eyes confusedly and that's when Pepper came to a realization. "Oh my God," she slurred to herself. Her smile faded as she looked at Tony. "You didn't tell her?" she asked with her teeth clenched.

"It may have slipped my mind," Stark admitted slowly, biting his lip guiltily. "I was going to, but something extremely important came up, so I couldn't…"

"Anthony Stark!" Pepper gasped, standing up swiftly, "I asked you to do one thing!" she reprimanded him, pacing the floor. "I have to organize the food and entertainment and I have to constantly watch you like a hawk!" she started panicking, "now I have to organize Ellie's dress and hair and make-up and –"

"Dress?" Ellie snorted, slightly amused, "I really don't have to wear a dress and since when do I have a 'welcome party'?"

"You have a 'welcome party'. We all just kind of decided. It's tonight," Tony nonchalantly mentioned to her.

Natasha stood up, too and grabbed Ellie's arm. "We have to sort this out. Pepper's right, we have to get you a dress."

From the corner, Clint suddenly burst out laughing as if he had just heard the funniest joke ever. "Ellie in a dress?" he gasped in-between fits of heavy laughter. "Oh that's gold, Nat, no offence El."

Ellie shook her head. "There's nothing wrong with wearing a dress. You should try it sometime."

"This is bad. This is really bad. We have to improvise and go shopping like right now."

Natasha nodded her head. "Agreed. We have to do something about this mess."

"Sweet," Ellie smirked, enthusiastically punching air with her fist, "shopping. I'll just grab the stash of money I don't have and we'll go right down to the that Kardashian shop thing."

At that point, all of the guys were silent. They just watched as the three women sorted their issue out. Pepper bit her lip and thought for a moment, ignoring Ellie's protest. "Where do we begin?" she asked herself, staring into the distance. "Where do you shop?" she asked Ellie.

"I don't know… anywhere's fine."

"Okay. Lovely," Nat sarcastically said, combing a hand through her hair.

"Yeah," Pepper huffed and grabbed her purse. "I'll just grab Tony's card." Tony didn't even protest. He just shrugged and handed it to her willingly, just to get her off his back. She grabbed it and held on to it tightly. "Alright," she hummed and turned to Bruce and Steve, "you two need to do something productive and just double check with that and just make sure we have good enough music."

They didn't argue or confirm. At that point, nobody wanted to rub Pepper the wrong way. She was a woman on a mission and they just hoped that she wouldn't get angry at them like she did with Tony.

"Ellie, go get dressed," she commanded, not seeing that she was already dressed in light blue, ripped skinny jeans, a white t-shirt and black Doc Martens. Her black hair was down, flowing just past her shoulders. She turned to Natasha and cocked her head toward the elevator. "Let's get a move on; we don't have time to waste."

Within a couple of seconds, all three women had left the building.

…

At about 6.30pm, the first couple of guests arrived. Maria Hill, Nick Fury, Sharon Carter and Phil Colson arrived together, with a bunch of other S.H.I.E.L.D agents following. Since the party was a semi-formal occasion, they were smartly dressed in jeans and shirts and for the women; dresses and skirts. There was music playing all around the open living room and speakers played music outside on the balcony too.

There were about four food bars all around the venue, as well as one main bar. Tony even hired a bartender for the night.

Tony and Pepper were greeting the guests as they entered, while Thor took on the food bar. Bruce was long-lost in a small debate with a few of the S.H.I.E.L.D scientists and Natasha and Steve were positioned in a corner, arguing about Sharon Carter.

"I thought I told you to call her," she said, taking a sip of her drink.

Steve sighed. "It's not going to work out. She lost my trust. I only said yes to you to get you off my back."

"Well you failed miserably at that, then, because now I'm more determined to find you a date."

Steve shook his head and blocked her out. He wasn't interested in finding a girlfriend or a life-long partner at that moment. If a suitable woman suddenly entered his life, sure –he's play along. But he didn't want to go out of his way to find one.

"Where's Ellie?" He finally asked Natasha, who shrugged.

"Somewhere around here. Why?"

Steve scratched the back of his head and sighed. "What do you mean why? I thought it was her party."

Natasha laughed and shook her head. "Relax, fossil," she teased, "she's mingling."

"Mingling?" he asked, with an arched eyebrow.

"You know, talking, getting to know people, saying no to dates, etcetera. God, Steve, you need to go out more," she sighed, looking around at the guests and straightening her dark blue dress.

Steve scrunched up his face. "Dates? What do you mean dates?"

Natasha rolled her eyes and gave him an obvious look. "What the hell do you think I mean? Besides, I was kidding," she said, laughing. Her laugh came to an instant halt when she spotted Clint walking towards them. Her happy facial expression turned into a glare of irritation.

"Hey guys," Clint grinned, holding up his drink. "Nice party, eh?"

Steve nodded in agreement.

Natasha rolled her tongue to the inside of her cheek. "Excuse me. I have other people to talk to," she mumbled and disappeared.

Clint frowned. "Who put a stick up her ass?" he asked Steve, who just shrugged and took another sip of his drink. Just then, Thor came pushing through the crowd of people. Clint and Steve exchanged looks of concern when they saw that Thor's hand was full of chocolate.

"Greetings, allies!" he roared, smiling excitedly.

"What's with the chocolate?" Clint asked him, raising an eyebrow.

Thor's smile widened. "I stumbled across the cascade of chocolate and just could not defy my urge," he explained, licking his fingers. "What strange technologies your world possesses."

"You just had to use your hand? You couldn't use the strawberries like a normal person?" Clint retorted, watching him lick his fingers in disgust. "That's gross."

Steve chuckled. "Let him have his fun, Barton. It is a party after all."

Clint sighed and looked away from Thor, who was content with his sticky snack. Suddenly, his face dropped. "No way," he gasped, looking past Steve's head at something in the distance. Both Thor and Steve looked back to see what all the fuss was about. It took a second for the crowd to disperse, exposing Ellie. She hardly even looked like Ellie anymore. Her black hair was in messy bun with chunks of hair sticking out. She wore a black mini dress with lace sleeves that ended at her elbows. Around her neck was her signature choker ribbon. She paired her dress with a pair of plain navy-blue platform pumps.

Thor, Clint and Steve all watched her. Although she looked different, she still remained faithful to her style. It was definitely an 'Ellie' look. It seemed as though she was by herself as she aimlessly wondered through the heaps of guests. Every now and then somebody would complement her or congratulate her on making the Avengers.

Finally, she spotted the three of them and fought her way through the crowd to get to them. She had been looking for a familiar face.

"Excuse me, ma'am, have you seen our teammate, Ellie?" Clint jokingly asked her, "She looks a little like you."

Ellie rolled her eyes. "Always the clown, huh, archer?" she smiled.

"But seriously," Clint snorted, "who are you, beautiful, can I have your number?."

Her pale cheeks went a light pink. She had never been called beautiful in her life. Clint always teased her about stupid things, but he always managed to make her smile, even for a moment. She secretly adored the brother-sister relationship they shared. It was nice to be able to feel like she had an actual family member in the world.

"Lady Elizabeth, you look rather ravishing," Thor bowed, smiling.

She bit her lip, not sure what to say. She had never been in a situation like that. All of a sudden, her face lit up. "Hey, Jane's here. She's looking for you," she informed him. Without hesitation, he took off to find his brunette Midgardian, leaving Steve and Clint with a very awkward three stood in silence for a few seconds. Steve opened his mouth to say something at one point, but then backed out.

Clint finally let out a loud, obnoxious sigh. "Well, not that this isn't interesting," he slurred, "but I'm gonna go find Nat. She seems a little troubled." And with, that Clint ventured off into the crowd, leaving Ellie and Steve.

"Why are you not dancing like everybody else? Even Pepper's out there," she went on, putting her hands on her waist. "Can you even dance, Captain?"

Steve looked up at the ceiling and smiled guiltily, trying to avoid the question. He didn't know how to dance. Peggy was supposed to teach him, but obviously that wasn't going to happen anymore. Ellie gasped.

"You don't know how to dance?!" she gushed with a shock look on her face. "I don't know how to dance either! We should just stick together and not dance together then, you know?"

He chuckled and put his hand his pocket. "Yeah. We should. That's a good plan. And if they ask, we can just say that we're talking."

"Yeah!" she agreed, giggling. "Talking about how we can't dance."

Both of them laughed. It had been a while since either of them had something to laugh about. People gave them strange looks, but they didn't care.

"Honestly, I thought –" Steve voice stopped as a loud BANG filled the room. The music stopped and the entire room went silent for a couple of minutes, before people broke out into gasps and in some cases; screams. Instinctively, Steve and Ellie both rushed forward to see what was going on. The rest of the Avengers had made their way to the scene, too.

There was glass all over the floor, as something, or someone had completely smashed the entire window, which was basically the entire wall. As the smoke cleared, the Avengers were able to see what was going one more clearly; it was Doctor Doom.

"I don't remember him being on the guest list," Hawkeye said, not taking his eyes off of the masked villain.

Natasha narrowed her eyes at Doom. "Me either. Looks like we have a party crasher."

"Don't flatter yourselves, Avengers," Doom growled and stepped forward. As he did so, the entire crow of people moved further back. "I come with a mere warning."

Steve stepped in front of Ellie as Doom stepped towards her. "You're not welcome here, Doom" he snapped, "Get out."

"Give it a rest, soldier. I'm here for the new Avenger," his voice growled. He lifted a metal finger and pointed it at Ellie. "Enjoy your time as an Avenger while you still can. I shall not hesitate to put you down, should you ever attempt to stand in my way. It will be easy."

Ellie's face coiled into a glare. She stepped out of Steve's protective cover. "I appreciate the welcome, metal man, and the same goes to you," she retorted, puckering her eyebrow slightly.

Doom let out a cold cackle. "Already so eager, are we? We shall just have to see then," he said, then raised his hand in the air. Ellie watched in dismay as Doom's hand sucked up the entire room's electricity, before pointing at her again. In a split second, a ray of electricity darted right at her, but she disappeared into thin air, before reappearing a few feet away.

For a moment, Doom looked around the room for her before locating her. Meanwhile, the building lit up again. He let out another laugh.

"Impressive, I must admit. Luckily for you, I didn't come here to destroy you. I came to deliver a message. My work here is done. Goodluck."

And with that, he took off, leaving the Avengers to deal with the mess he had left behind.

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Ellie's dress: .

Ellie's hair: .

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