It was a few days before Christmas and Skye was outside with Morgan, Nate, and Lila. They were all sledding. At one point Morgan ran inside for a fewminutes before coming back out with something she really had no business playing with.
"Morgan, what are you doing with that?" Skye asked with a raised eyebrow
"It's the perfect sled!" the little girl said.
"My dad's shield is not a sled, or safe to be used as one," Skye said trying not to laugh. The idea sounded hilarious, but she knew that would not end well. For Morgan or herself if she let her.
"Your dad said I could use it," Morgan said.
"Really?" Skye asked, "So if I ask him he will tell me he said that?"
"Yup," Morgan said. "Go ask him."
Skye took out her phone, she was not letting the girl or shield out of her view, soshe called her dad.
"Hey Peanut," Steve said.
"Are you at home right now?" Skye asked.
"I'm not," Steve said.
"So you did not give Morgan permission to borrow your shield to use as a sled then," Skye said fixing the girl with an unimpressed look.
"I most certainly did not, has she?" Steve asked
"I stopped her, she has not," Skye said. "She is claiming you said she could."
"So no. Do not let her, she will end up seriously hurt if she even attempts that," Steve said
"I know," Skye said.
"Good. Thank you for being responsible," Steve said
"Of course," she said before they hung up.
"Hand it over," Skye said.
"No," Morgan said as she took off running with it.
"Morgan don't you dare," Skye said running after her.
Morgan jumped on the shield and went to slide down. Skye had to jump off the ground and slide to grab the shield as it started to slide down the mountain yelping as she felt something in her shoulder yank.
Morgan went flying a little and Lila saw what was happening and came over to help half catching Morgan as they both fell over.
Skye sat up slowly and looked over at Lila and Morgan, "are you two okay?"
"I'm fine," Lila said.
"NOT FAIR," Morgan screamed getting up and trying to grab the shield.
"Absolutely not Morgan Stark," they heard Bruce's loud voiceas he came over.
Morgan froze
"I tried to stop her, butshe wasn't listening," Skye said kind of panicked.
"I know. Your dad called me to help, knowing I was here," Bruce said, taking the shield before the younger girl could get it. "Is anyone hurt?"
"I'm fine," Skye said as she stood up.
"I'm okay. But Skye it did seem like you were hurt," Lila said.
"Just hurt my hand a little grabbing the shield in movement but I'm fine," Skye said taking the glove off her hand to show it was just slightly red.
"Okay, well you keep an eye on it and if it hurts more you let me know," Bruce said.
"Nate, let's go inside it's getting pretty cold," Lila said taking her little brother and going inside.
"I can take the shield back to where it's supposed to be if you want to handle her because she doesn't listen to me," Skye said frustratedly.
"Okay, right back to where it goes," Bruce said.
"Of course," Skye said taking it before she went inside.
Morgan was just sobbing at this point because she didn't get her way.
Bruce picked her up and brought her inside to her room, "I need you to tell me if you are hurt," he said sternly to the girl.
"No," she said between sobs.
Bruce helped her get her snow gear off as she calmed down. Once she was calm he spoke again "I suggest you stay put until your parents get home." Tony and Pepper had gone to an appointment with the baby.
"Nooooo! Don't tell them," Morgan cried.
"If Skye does not, I will be telling them exactly what happened," Bruce said.
Morgan huffed and stomped her foot.
Bruce left her to her sulking and went out to find Skye coming out of her parent's bedroom rubbing her shoulder.
"You're sure you're not hurt?" Bruce asked.
"Yeah, just pulled a muscle or something," Skye said.
"You're sure? I can take a look if you need me to," Dr. Banner said.
"No. I'm sure it's just a pulled muscle," Skye said.
"Okay," Dr. Banner said.
Skye went and flopped on the couch where Laura was with Nat and Lila had made her way there too.
"Heard you had a little troublemaker out there," Nat said.
Skye sighed, "She no longer listens to me."
"This isn't a first-time thing?" Laura said.
"No," Skye said sadly.
"Hey, don't take it personally Skye," Nat said softly. "It's just her being a kid."
"She listens to everyone else," Skye said.
"I know it seems like that," Nat said.
"Has she given you a hard time?" Skye asked.
"Well no," Nat said.
"The second Bruce came out and raised his voice she froze," Skye said.
"That's because Bruce doesn't ever raise his voice," Nat said with a chuckle.
"I know," Skye said with a sigh.
"She is just having a hard time with not being the youngest anymore," Larua said. "She will get over it in time."
"So I have to deal with her not listening to me til then, that's not fair," Skye said.
"I'm sure Tony and Pepper will deal with it when they get home. They will make sure she does," Nat said.
"Really because you don't think they tried that the last two times?" Skye asked a little attitude slipping,
"Okay. I know you're upset. And you are allowed to be. But don't take it out on me," Nat said softly.
Skye let out a breath as her eyes filled with tears, "sorry."
Nat wrapped an arm around the girl.
"She could have been seriously hurt, and she did not listen," Skye said leaning her head on Nat's shoulder.
"Oh, I see why you are so upset. She scared you," Nat said.
Skye nodded a little.
"But you stopped her before she could get hurt," Lila said
"Yeah, but what if I can't next time," Skye said. "That is if there is ever a next time."
"Oh?" Laura asked.
"Last time she did get hurt, this time she almost got hurt, I can't watch her if she doesn't listen and can get hurt," Skye said.
"Last time she got hurt because she was doing something behind your back that she knew she wasn't allowed to do. If you had been in the room you would have stopped it but you were handling the other kid," Nat said. "This time you were there and no one ended up hurt right?"
"Right," Skye said.
"So don't let it get to you," Nat said softly.
Skye nodded a little.
Tony and Pepper came into the living room with the baby.
Pepper saw Skye looking upset. "What happened?"
Skye took a breath to keep herself from crying, "Morgan gave me a hard time."
Tony took a breath as he set the car seat holding his son down. He was annoyed. His daughter was really pushing her limits lately. "What happened?"
"I'm sorry," Skye said softly.
"Why do I feel like it wasn't actually your fault?" Pepper asked.
"Cause it wasn't," Lila said
Pepper looked at Lila.
"I saw the whole thing happen," Lila said.
"Skye, neither of us are upset with you. Just tell us what happened," Tony said.
"We were outside sledding and she went inside for a couple of minutes she said to grab something. She came back out with the shield. Intending to use it as a sled," Skye said.
Tony covered his mouth to hide the smirk. It was not funny. His daughter could have been seriously hurt but when he was a kid he would have done the same thing.
"You didn't let her I'm assuming," Pepper said as she carefully took James out of the car seat.
"No, I tried to explain to her it was dangerous and not a toy. She tried to tell me my dad said she could use it. I knew he's not even here. I called him and he verified he wasn't here and certainly didn't say she could and that she could not," Skye said. "And then she grabbed it and ran and jumped on it. I had to basically fly myself to grab it before she slid down the hill. She flew off a little but Lila saw what was happening and jumped in to catch her so she was not hurt. She threw a fit and tried to grab it from me and that was when Bruce came out, my dad had called him knowing he was here to come help and he got her to stop."
"He raised his voice," Nat said.
"He did," Lila said.
Pepper nodded. She knew for him to have raised his voice the situation was bad.
Tony had composed himself at that point, "Did you get hurt?" he asked Skye. "Or you?" he asked Lila.
"Just my hand where the shield hit is a little sore, and my shoulder. Must have pulled a muscle or something," Skye said.
"No, I'm not hurt at all," Lila said.
"Bruce check out your hand and shoulder?" Tony asked.
"He took a look at my hand, it will bruise I'm sure but he didn't say much about it, my shoulder is just a pulled muscle," Skye said.
"Okay," Tony said.
"You handled it perfectly Skye," Pepper said.
"If you say so," Skye said softly.
"We do," Tony said. "You blaming yourself?"
"Trying not to," Skye said.
"The situation scared her, with the possibility that Morgan could have been seriously hurt," Nat said.
"But she wasn't. Because you handled it," Pepper said.
"She wasn't hurt because Lila jumped in and caught her," Skye said.
"Sounds more like you two worked together. You stopped her from flying down the hill on something that could have hurt her a lot more than the slight hurt that could have happened if Lila hadn't caught her," Pepper said.
Skye nodded a little.
"I know this seems like a repetition at this point. But we will deal with this. She will not give you a hard time again," Tony said.
Skye nodded a little not saying what she was thinking which was that it hadn't worked the last two times she didn't see it working this time either.
Tony looked at Pepper, "You want to talk to her this time, or do you want me to?"
"Maybe we talk to her together," Pepper said.
"That works," Tony said.
"I can take the baby," Laura offered.
Pepper smiled and handed James to her.
"Getting baby fever?" Nat asked Laura with a smirk.
Laura chuckled, "No. I'm very much happy to be done having babies. But I'll get the baby snuggles when I can."
Tony and Pepper went towards Morgan's room running to Bruce on the way.
"Skye tell you what happened?" Bruce asked
"She did," Tony said. "Thank you for the help you provided."
"Of course," Bruce said. "She is in her room."
Pepper and Tony both nodded before they went and went into her room after knocking.
Morgan was sitting on her bed her arms crossed sulking.
"Morgan Stark," Tony said arms crossed.
Morgan huffed.
"No none of that sulking," Pepper said. "Dad and I are very disappointed in you."
"It's not fair!" Morgan said. "I just wanted to play with it. I wasn't going to break it!"
"That does not matter young lady. It is not yours. And not a toy. It is a very important piece of equipment that you could have gotten very hurt using," Pepper said.
Morgan huffed.
"Drop the attitude, Morgan," Tony said sternly.
Morgan didn't say anything.
"And on top of that you went against what Skye told you when she was responsible for you," Pepper said.
Morgan again didn't say anything.
"Morgan, this is the third time you have chosen to ignore, disobey, or do something you were not allowed to do with Skye," Tony said.
Morgan curled away from them.
"Hey. We are talking to you, you will look at us," Tony said sternly.
"No!" Morgan screamed.
Tony pulled her over his lap and landed two hard smacks to her butt.
"Daddy noooo!" Morgan cried out.
He sat her up in his lap "Are you going to cooperate and listen and talk to us?"
"Yes Daddy," she said sadly.
"Okay. So why don't you listen to Skye?" Tony asked.
"I dunno," Morgan said.
"I think you do," Pepper said.
"I wanted to play with it," Morgan said.
"Okay, we know that. But she told you no and you didn't listen. But when Uncle Bruce told you no you stopped. Why the difference?" Tony asked.
Morgan shrugged.
"is it maybe because you think you can get away with more with Skye?" Pepper asked
Morgan nodded a little.
"But you still get in trouble when she tells us don't you?" Pepper asked.
"I'm sorry. I'll listen next time," Morgan said.
"I really hope so, but you know you are still in trouble," Tony said.
"Nooo! I will say I'm sorry to Skye, please I don't want to be in trouble," Morgan said with tears in her eyes.
"You will be saying you are sorry yes, but you made a choice not to listen and there are consequences for the choices we make," Pepper said.
"Because of your choices, Skye hurt her hand and her shoulder, and Skye is very upset because she doesn't understand why you don't listen to her when you do everyone else," Tony said.
Morgan started to cry and buried her face in her Dad. She didn't mean to upset Skye or for her to get hurt.
Tony hugged her rubbing her back to calm her down. He hated how upset his little girl was but he knew this conversation needed to happen. They left her with Skye often enough that they needed to make sure she listened to her.
Eventually, the little girl did calm down and looked up at her daddy.
Tony looked down at the sad, tear-stained face and sighed.
"Morgan, do you understand why you need a consequence?" Pepper asked, she could see her husband was caving to his little girl.
Morgan nodded sadly.
Pepper looked at Tony, "I'll take care of it."
Tony silently thanked his wife and handed the girl over to her before he left the room.
Pepper took the girl over her lap and pushed down her pants and underwear. "When we leave you with someone else. You listen to them. It does not matter who it is. If you don't this will keep happening. And next time it will be with my hairbrush," she said before she started to spank her.
Morgan started crying right away.
Pepper gave her two dozen swats before she fixed her clothes, sat her up, hugged her, and let the girl cry herself to sleep. Pepper tucked her into her bed before she left the room.
The next day Skye woke up and the pain in her shoulder was worse. She had known she had hurt it more than she was claiming but she figured that like everything else it would heal itself. But now it was hurting her more and she could barely move the shoulder. She looked over and saw that Lila was already awake and had left the room. She
She got up carefully and went into the kitchen. She grabbed an ice pack from the freezer and went back to her room. She did not want to have to explain why she needed it. She had lied and she knew it would not be taken well. So she thought maybe if she iced it and rested it that it would heal.
About an hour later there was a knock on her bedroom door.
She shoved the ice pack under her pillow "Yeah?"
Peter went in. "Morning. Do you want to train together today?"
"Um. I'd love to but I have a lot of schoolwork to do," Skye said "Tomorrow?"
"We can do that," Peter said. "How do you have school work on what should be the Christmas break?"
"Cause I'm a slacker," Skye said with a smirk.
Peter chuckled.
"I have a hard time focusing for long periods so I don't get as much done in a day as I did when I was in an actual classroom so I tend to fall behind of what should be where I am," Skye said.
"Can I help at all?" Peter asked
"No, I'm okay. I'm going to get to it in just a few minutes," Skye said.
"Okay," Peter said before he left her room.
Skye did get up and went to her desk, she did have some schoolwork she could do. But she wasn't as behind as she made it seem. She just knew she couldn't train today. And she was hoping she was healed enough to do so tomorrow.
By dinner time her shoulder was hurting even more. She knew she was so screwed. That she needed to have Dr. Banner take a look at it. But she didn't want to be caught in a lie. She went out when she was called for dinner and sat at the table just poking at her food. She was in too much pain to be all that hungry.
"You okay Skye?" Bucky asked when he noticed.
"Yeah, just not all that hungry," Skye said.
"You feeling okay? Not getting sick?" Steve asked.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Just not hungry," Skye said.
After dinner, Skye went back to her room and found some painkillers in her bathroom, and took a couple of them before lying down.
An hour later there was a knock on her bedroom door.
"Yeah?" Skye said.
Steve went in. "You're sure you are feeling okay? Have you eaten anything today?"
"Not much," she asked. "But yeah I'm just not hungry."
Steve went over and felt her forehead. She didn't have a fever. "Well, you're not warm."
"I said I'm not sick," she said.
"Okay," Steve said. "And you're sure nothing else is wrong?"
"Yeah, just tired," Skye said.
"Okay," Steve said kissing her head before leaving her room.
The next morning when Lila got up she noticed an icepack on the floor next to Skye's bed. She sighed. She knew Skye had been more hurt than she was letting on but chose to believe she was fine. She picked up the icepack and went into the kitchen where she found Steve and Dr. Banner.
"What's with the ice pack?" Dr. Banner asked.
"Um. Well. I found it on the floor next to Skye's bed," Lila said putting it back in the freezer.
"Did you now?" Steve said with a raised eyebrow.
"Yeah. I didn't see her using it but I do think she got more hurt the other day when she stopped Morgan," Lila said.
"Okay, thank you for telling me," Steve said shaking his head. "So she lied to me."
"Lied to me too, more than once," Dr. Banner said clear annoyance on his face.
Skye came into the kitchen, "morning."
She had three sets of eyes on her and she instantly felt the tension in the room.
"What?" Skye asked.
"Why did Lila find an icepack on the floor next to your bed?" Steve asked
Skye looked at Lila quickly.
"Sorry, I'm not getting myself in trouble covering for you again when you should have just told them the truth," she said before she left the room.
Skye sighed and refused to look at either her dad or Bruce
"Scale of one to ten. How bad is the pain?" Dr. Banner asked. "And don't you dare lie to me again."
"Seven," she mumbled
"Can you move it?" he asked.
She forced herself to look up at him as she shook her head. It was clear to her that he was pissed at her.
"I want you down in my lab, now," he said. He was not happy with the teenager and it showed on his face.
Skye nodded and went that way.
"Steve you are welcome to join us," Bruce said before he followed the girl.
"Oh I will," Steve said following as well
When they got there Skye got up on the table without being told.
He turned on the X-ray machine before he took a look at the swelling shoulder and shook his head.
Steve leaned against a wall his arms crossed.
"I'm sorry," she said to her dad.
"I'm sure you are. Sorry, you got caught," Steve said.
"I'm sorry I lied to you too," she said.
Dr Banner took an x-ray of her shoulder and found it was dislocated.
"Did you know it was more than pulling a muscle when you told me that?" Dr. Banner asked
"Yes," she said softly.
"It's dislocated, sit up," he said.
Skye did so.
Dr. Banner took hold of her arm and looked at her. "Take a breath and relax as best you can."
Skye did so and as she was letting out the breath he popped her shoulder back into place. She whimpered.
"Lay back down," he said.
Skye did so and he took another x-ray to make sure he popped it back properly.
"How does it feel?" Dr. Banner asked.
"Sore, but better," she admitted.
"Good, now sit back up and let me tape it up," he said.
Skye did so.
"Why did you lie to me?" Dr. Banner asked.
"I – I don't know. I just didn't want to make a big deal out of it. I thought it would heal on its own. So I lied," Skye said.
"It hurt you all day yesterday didn't it?" Dr. Banner asked.
"Yes," she admitted.
"Why didn't you come to me then?" Dr. Banner asked
"I had already lied. I knew you would be upset, I iced it and hoped it would get better by today," she said.
"I'm angry with you Skyler, yes because you lied. But I'm more disappointed because you didn't do the right thing and tell me the truth on your own. Lila had to tell me," Dr. Banner said.
Skye nodded a little. "I'm sorry."
He finished taping up her shoulder before moving around the table so they were face to face.
"You are not to train until I give you the all-clear. Got it?" he asked.
"Understood," Skye said,
"You lie to me again about an injury there will be more than a conversation between you and me," Dr. Banner said.
Skye took a breath "Understood."
"Go, ice it. Let me know if it starts to hurt more," Dr. Banner said,
Skye got up and went upstairs.
Steve thanked Bruce before he followed his daughter up to her room.
Steve went in. "I know you know that I'm pretty lenient in you doing what you want. I have allowed you to date even though originally I wanted you to wait until you are sixteen. I let you wear what you want for the most part. I'm even loosening up on the swearing. The top two things I ask of you. Are to not lie and to make sure you are taking care of yourself. Both of those expectations you have ignored."
"Yes Sir, I'm sorry," Skye said
"Why Skye?" Steve asked sitting on her bed.
"I didn't want to make a big deal out of it. And then I had lied so I stuck with the lie," Skye said.
"You know better than to lie to me," Steve said.
"Yes Sir," Skye said.
"Get up," Steve said.
Skye groaned but did so.
Steve carefully helped her over his lap pushed her pants down, and started to spank her.
Skye started sobbing pretty much right away from the guilt she felt.
Steve didn't spank her for long knowing that the lesson had already been learned and that it was just about making the lesson stick. When he was done he sat her up and held her in his arms as she sobbed herself to sleep.
