The White Wolf: Of all things above {2}

Nightmares and mother figures

"ℕ𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕣 𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕣 𝕞𝕚𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕜𝕖 𝕙𝕖𝕣 𝕤𝕚𝕝𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕗𝕠𝕣 𝕨𝕖𝕒𝕜𝕟𝕖𝕤𝕤. ℝ𝕖𝕞𝕖𝕞𝕓𝕖𝕣 𝕥𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕤𝕠𝕞𝕖𝕥𝕚𝕞𝕖𝕤 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕒𝕚𝕣 𝕤𝕥𝕚𝕝𝕝𝕤, 𝕓𝕖𝕗𝕠𝕣𝕖 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕠𝕟𝕤𝕖𝕥 𝕠𝕗 𝕒 𝕙𝕦𝕣𝕣𝕚𝕔𝕒𝕟𝕖..."

The next morning I wake in a cold sweat, when it's still dark out. I get up, throwing the covers out of my way and walk to the bathroom. Splashing cold water on my face, I look at myself in the mirror. My hair is a mess, and dark circles still dawn the undersides of my eyes. Sighing, I unravel the bandage from around my waist. The cut is a bright pink around the stitches, and hurts to touch. I turn the handle to the shower letting the cold water run over my back and arms, searing the small cuts on my legs and arms. Why aren't they healing?

Walking out I head to the living room, as I expected I'm the only one up, so I decide to make breakfast. After about forty minutes of finding everything I need, I start. I make pancakes, waffles, eggs, bacon, and sausage. By now the sun is up, and Steve walks out into the living room as I'm setting a table for all of us. 

"I was just about to ask if the JARVIS would wake you, glad you're up." I tell him with a small smile. 

"I couldn't help getting out of bed, the food smells great!" He says smiling and taking a seat, soon Bucky, Thor, Natasha, and Sam walk into the room.

"Where's Tony?" I ask 

"He's probably still in the lab from last night." Bruce says walking into the room and taking his seat. I put the plates of steaming hot food on the table, with orange juice, water, milk and coffee. 

"I'll go get him." I say shaking my head and walking toward the elevator.

When I get to the lab I see Tony talking, presumidly to JARVIS, and testing out repulsors. 

"Tony, have you been down here all night?" I ask, my hands on my hips.

He stops what he's doing and looks at me surprised.  "How the hell did you get in here?" He asks 

"Tony, I was literally made to be smarter than you.  I think guessing your password would count as being intuitive." 

He rolls his eyes going back to what he's doing. "I made breakfast, everyone's already there. Come up right now." He raises his eyebrows and mocks me like a child. 

"Fine then." I growl taking his repulsors out of his hands. Grabbing the back of his shirt I pull him out of the lab and into the elevator. When we step out I drag him along the floor from the back of his shirt. When I put him down next to his chair his arms are crossed in a mock pout. "Oh my goodness Tony, you've been with your toys all night, it's time to eat food like a normal human being." I say grabbing my own plate and sitting between Thor and Steve, digging in. Suddenly alarms begin to blare, making me jump. My fork clattering to my plate. 

"Uhh kid?" 

I look up-wait..up? I look down and realise that I transformed into my wolf form. I shake my head turning back into my human form, rolling my eyes. 

"What the hell is that?" I ask as Tony hits a button shutting the sirens off. 

"It means that someone unauthorized has entered the tower." Steve says, Tony giving him a weird look. "What I read the handbook?" He says shrugging.

The elevator dings and a man with dark, short hair walks out followed by a woman with strawberry blonde hair. 

"SECURITY BREACH!!" Tony shouts pointing at the man "This one's on you!" He tells the woman he's pointing at. She rolls her eyes in response, I immediately like her.  

The man tries to hand Tony something "Uh I don't like when people hand me things" He says the woman walking up next to him. 

"That's okay because I love being handed things, lets trade." She says taking the binder from the man's hands and in return hands him a glass of freshly poured orange juice (I know it was alcohol but I'm adapting okay hehehehe), she shoves the binder at Tony taking the glass of orange juice out of his hands. 

"That has everything on the tesseract." The man says 

"Wait, the tesseract?" I ask suddenly feeling sick, the Avengers falling silent from their original bantar. 

"yes." The man says looking at me curiously

"Uhh Tony, you haven't introduced us to her." the woman reminds Tony, he just keeps reading so I step forward, slightly awkward. 

"My names Adriana, I uh- I helped out the Avengers a while back." I say shaking the woman's hand, then shaking the mans. "I'm Pepper Potts." She says with a smile "The group has told me a lot about you." I blush suddenly feeling out of place "I'm Phil Coulson." He says politely. That's when Tony turns around looking confused "Phil?" "His first name is Agent." Tony says pointing to the Phil now across the room. 

"Well, it looks like you all have some homework to do so I'm going to go." Pepper says when Tony brings up some holograms of what Agent Coulson gave him. 

"Wait no, you can go tomorrow morning. You don't have to fly out tonight." He says I'm guessing that they had a conversation earlier about her flying somewhere, because I have no idea what they're talking about. 

"You have a lot of homework to do." She says 

"No, well, what if I didn't?" He asks

"Like if you finished it?" She asks and he nods

"Then-" He voice quiets down as she whispers something into his ear and his face goes slack. I turn away feeling slightly awkward and embarrassed.

"Deal." He says "Have a nice flight" She laughs coming over to me "It was really nice to meet you Adriana." 

"It was nice to meet you as well Miss Potts." I say with the first real smile in days, well months

"Please, just call me Pepper." 

I chuckle "yes ma'am." 

"Nope, just Pepper, I'm not old enough to be ma'am." 

We laugh and she heads out the door "Bye Pepper!" I yell as the doors to the elevator close. I go back over to my seat and finish my breakfast, when I'm finished I join Tony and Steve over by the holograms. 

"Adriana, we didn't want to make you do this until you're ready, but you need to tell us what happened." Steve says  "We need to know." 

"Steve I-I please, don't ask me to relive this." I say as I feel a hand on my shoulder, when I turn I see that it's Bucky.

"Hey, I know where you're coming from. Your whole world is crashing down, and nothing is normal for you anymore. You did everything you could, and it wasn't your fault."

"That's where you're wrong Bucky." Everyone looks confused "I was the one that got my pack killed."