Tony woke up with an aching head. He lifted a hand to his forehead and found bandages. He groaned, leaning forward and applying intense pressure to the pain in a halfhearted attempt to stop the throbbing of his head.
"If you move that around much more, you're going to tear your stitches," A voice said, bringing fear out of Tony. Where was he?
It was Steve, sitting in the corner and sorting through medicines and antibiotics. He had a pile of what Tony believed to be insulin on his left and the other medicines being sorted on the right.
"Didn't know you cared." Tony retorted, lying back and groaning at how stiff his limbs were.
"Some people are just nice to others." Steve huffed, rolling his eyes. "Maybe you should try it."
"Maybe you should grow a brain, and some manners while you're at it."
"If you guys kill each other, I'm not cleaning it up," Bucky shouted from through the door. It sounded like he was eating something.
Steve rolled his eyes again. "Look, I'm sorry about earlier. From what Sam said, you'll be here for a few days at least, so we may as well have a temporary truce."
Tony looked at Steve's extended hand uncertainly for a while, before taking and shaking it.
"Alright," Tony sighed, giving up. Shame, really. He had thought up some great lines and he wouldn't get to use them now.
"I'm going to go get food, you want some? It's not like you can walk around to get some." Tony knew a peace offering when he saw one.
"Yeah, sure. I'll take over sorting the meds." Tony slowly came to his feet - his spine ached unbelievably, sending shooting pains all through his body. He staggered and fell for a bit, before Steve grabbed his shoulder.
"Yeah, I wouldn't try walking for a while." Steve muttered, awkwardly removing his hand. Tony flicked an eyebrow up.
"I'd figured that much," He replied as Steve walked out. Tony sat, legs crossed in an awkward, stiff position, and began to sort through the medicine. Insulin over here, penicillin over there, paracetamol over there...
Once he had finished sorting through the medicine, Tony took in the room he'd been left in. There were two twin beds, one of which he had woken up in. He assumed the other was Steve's, as it had been made military-style.
There was a knock at the door. It swung open and revealed Bucky.
"You ok?" The boy asked, handing Tony a paper plate with scrambled egg on it. "Everyone's eating in here, if you wanna come through."
Tony thought for a moment and nodded. If he was going to be in this house for a while, he needed to befriend the inhabitants. He already had Bucky on his side, he hoped, and Steve might not take long.
He just hoped everyone was holding up okay at the school. Contrary to popular belief, he did care - and he was worried about those kids.
"Yeah, I'll be right through," Tony took a moment to straighten out his hair, run a hand over his face and smoothen down his clothes. He didn't have to look like a slob.
He found his phone in his pocket and checked the time and date.
10:33, Wednesday.
He'd been gone for nearly a whole day! If he didn't get the insulin back by Friday, there would be problems at school. Besides, he wanted to make sure everything was still in order.
"Hey, everyone, come sit down," Natasha called, placing plates of microwaved perishables on the main table. There had only been three chairs in the beginning but Clint and Sam had gone out and cut large sections of logs and hollowed the underneath to make them lighter, as to avoid going through the floor into the basement. It had taken them nearly three days, but the group now had each gotten a chair - even if they weren't all the same size and some rocked because of impurities in the wood. Steve brought his plate over, impressed with the work that Sam and Clint had done.
"I'm gonna start a fire, it's cold as hell in here," Bucky piped up, hopping out of the front door and coming back waving two pieces of roughly chopped lumber. Before disappearing into the woods, Pietro had brought an old, somewhat rusty axe up from the basement.
"He ate all that already?" Clint asked through a mouthful of macgyver-style pancake.
Bucky nodded, grinning maniacally. Tony decided he liked Bucky; the guy seemed to be on his wavelength. Meanwhile, Tony turned his attention to wolfing down the slightly dry pancakes and eggs as a topping. As the eggs would expire first yet were disgusting when eaten alone for three meals a day, each of the house had taken a turn preparing them a different way each meal. For today's breakfast slash lunch, the "crew", as Bucky had affectionately nicknamed them, were eating fried eggs (again) with some slightly overcooked basic pancakes.
Inside, Wanda noted, the house was becoming warm and vibrant again. She had holiday memories from here, times spent with her father, Pietro and two others - Charles and Raven, their father called them - during the christmases, watching snow fall onto the distant Xavier mansion. With the fire roaring and happy speech filling the room, it almost felt like home again.
But there was something wrong. There was a hole in the space, a silence in the noise. Wanda felt it next to her, following her around in the place of the person who had once occupied it. It was her brother; he hadn't returned since running off, that horrible day when they had been in pain together.
Wanda sat and chewed thoughtfully, setting herself a goal. Tomorrow, she would bring her brother home.
A niggling, irritating voice disagreed. The voice told her things she didn't want to hear.
He's dead, Wanda.