As Darkness Falls Upon Us // MCU

overexposure

"It wouldn't be long before she started talking about teamwork."

♦️

Maize woke up when her alarm rang on a bright Thursday morning, because the last thing she wanted to do was keep Steve Rogers waiting. She realized she was thinking like Meaghan, but she didn't care. She had a training session, and Maize knew that Captain America was not the type of guy who liked lateness. Still tired, she rolled out of bed and put her hair in a high ponytail before pulling her training clothes on and brushing her teeth before she gathered her things and headed out the door. Steve was certainly old-fashioned and meticulous about his ritual, and that was mostly exemplified by his early-morning training sessions. He woke up at the crack of dawn to start his day, and he did more in his first few hours of his day than any normal person would ever hope to achieve in that same time frame. Maize was one of those people.

She sauntered into the elevator and found the button for her floor after some haphazard searching. As the elevator doors closed she rested her head on the wall of the elevator and let her eyes close as she searched for another moment of precious sleep. Every day it felt like she was becoming more and more like an Avenger, but it seemed to be taking a lot out of her. 

The elevator came to a stop and dinged at her floor, opening up the doors to reveal the gym on the top floor of the building. She stepped off the elevator and scanned the room to find Angelina and Talia already in the gym, doing their own training routine. She looked across the gym to see if Steve was already there, waiting for her. He was, but Talia was standing in between her and Steve. She thought that if she didn't engage Talia then things would be fine, but she still had her hesitations. She didn't have such a heavy gut feeling that something bad was going to happen, and the lack of a spontaneous nosebleed backed her up, but she was still a little weary. 

As she walked forward confidently with her chin up, trying to send the vibe that Talia wasn't getting to her today, she was stopped by the one and only. Maize learned that it didn't matter if she did or didn't engage Talia, she was going to find something to pick on her about. Maize decided that whatever she said, she wouldn't let it get to her like some of the other things did. Talia spoke, stopping her workout to hold up Maize. 

"Who are you- Kim Possible?!" Talia asked, eyeing up her outfit and looking at her judgmentally. 

Maize looked down at her black sports bra and skinny army green cargo leggings, her UFC-style fighting gloves to top it off. She did look like the red-headed cartoon character, Talia was right about that. 

"Well, that's funny." Maize said in response, seeing the comparison. "I just have a hand-to-hand combat session with Cap."

"Whatever, I didn't ask." Talia said, going back to her workout. Maize was glad their interaction was brief and minimally hurtful. Maize continued her journey over to the mats where Cap was waiting for her.

"Good morning, Maize! Are you ready?" He asked brightly.

"Cap, I'm not even awake yet. I'd like to say I'm ready, but honestly, I'm not."

"Well, let's get your blood flowing and let's wake you up. That's an easy fix. 100 jumping jacks!"

"What, really?!" She asked.

"Maize, this is the warmup!" He said, leading off the exercises and doing them with her. After they had finished a series of cardio exercises, he continued to warm her up with some stretches since he had already gotten her heart rate up. They then headed over to the side where he set up the music for the main part of their workout- on a record player.