July 15, 2017. 8:00 PM.
"Hey, so this family reunion was awesome and all, but Nat and I have spaghetti on the stove that we need to go eat and we also have to clean the apartment tomorrow, right?" I ask.
"Yeah. We'd love to have you over for dinner and a movie sometime, just give us a heads up before you fly across the country for us." Nat smiles.
"Yeah. You two let us know when you're in the area." Tony smiles. "Hey, how're you two getting back to California? You need me to send some suits to fly you?"
"Crud! Yeah, that'd be best, thanks. I hope our apartment hasn't burned." I say.
"If it does, you can live with us in Dad's mansion!" Peter grins.
"Not compound?" I ask.
"Eh, needed to take a break from all the avenging stuff." Tony shrugs.
Then, two suits fly in.
"Well, we gotta go. Thanks for the ride." Nat smiles, getting into one suit.
I walk up to Stark and slap him across the face.
"That was for getting drunk." I say. "It won't happen again, right?"
"It won't, it won't. Besides, Peter here dumped everything."
"Stay safe!" I smile, walking into the suit left.
"Back at you!" Peter grins.
"Wow. That was different." I say, walking out of my suit.
"No kidding." Nat replies.
"You think Steve and the others are here yet?"
"No telling. What I do know is our food is probably cold."
"Ugh. Cold spaghetti." I frown.
"We have a microwave."
"Fair point."
We walk up the stairs to our apartment on the second floor and open our apartment door to find Steve, Bucky, and Sam on the couch watching tv.
"Sup, dudes." I say.
"Well, look who's finally home!" Sam smiles.
"Heh, we had an adventure." I say.
"Ooh! What kind?" Bucky asks.
"Well, let's reheat all the food and Lina can tell you all about it." Nat says, walking to the kitchen.
"Ok, spaghetti goes in the microwave." Nat directs.
"Bucky, can you use your metal arm to refract- crap, the sun's down. Never mind." I say.
"Spaghetti goes out of the microwave and in goes the sauce." Steve says, switching the two.
"I'll set the table." I say, walking to the cupboard where we keep our bowls.
Five bowls, five napkins, five forks, five drink glasses.
"Ok, what do you guys want to drink?" Bucky asks, opening the fridge.
"I'll have a lemon water. Bottom shelf in the door." I say.
"I'll have a Pepsi." Nat says.
"Water for me, Buck." Steve smiles.
"You guys have any orange juice?" Sam asks.
"Yes, they do!" Bucky smiles, pulling out the Pepsi, my water, and the orange juice.
"Yay!" Sam grins.
"Children." I roll my eyes jokingly.
"I'm an adult! Sam's the kid!" Bucky says.
"I am not!" Sam snaps.
"Am too!"
"Am not!"
"Am too!"
"Am not!"
"Hey! Break it up!" Steve says.
"Fine." Sam and Bucky say, them stick their tongues out at each other.
"So, all the food's warm, let's eat!" Nat smiles.
"Spaghetti!!" I grin.
"Hypocrite." Sam says and I roll my eyes.
"Hey, keep rolling your eyes and they'll be stuck in the back of your head." Steve says with his classic eyebrows of disappointment.
"Roger that, Rogers." I smile.
"Let's eat!" Bucky says.
"So, what happened on your adventure?" Steve asks.
"You want the long story or the short?" I ask.
"We've got all night." He smiles.
"Well, it all started at about five, just after you called me. Someone knocked on the door, I assumed it was you. It wasn't. So, you remember when I killed a guy on Christmas?" I ask.
"Yeah." Bucky says.
"Well, he showed up. He said he had to take me home. I thought he wanted to bring me back to the Red Room. Turns out, he's the one who kidnapped me and brought me there. We ended up going to the Empire State Building over in New York and surprise, the guy who kidnapped me is actually Poseidon, the Greek god of the sea.
"Turns out, he's also my birth father! I threatened to snap his neck more than once, that was fun. I got to see all the Greek gods and goddesses. Apparently I'm a 'demigod'. I made this whole speech and ranted in front of about fifteen gods and goddesses, I monologued, and acted like a child.
"So, long story short, I met my dad, I hate him, I met some gods and goddesses, don't like them, I told them to go visit Hades and to go crawl in a hole and die or don't, I'd love to add gods and goddesses to my list. And Tony's hungover, no idea how he managed to fly his way to the Empire State Building with a headache, but whatever, Peter's my brother now, Tony's like my dad, and I live here in California with my mom. So what's been going on with you guys, how's Wanda?" I ask.
"Wow." Sam drops his fork.
"What?"
"You are the daughter of a god. Jeez kid."
"Yeah, did you think I said something else?"
"It's just hard to wrap our heads around." Nat explains.
"Makes perfect sense to me. The Greek gods are not myth or fictional, they're real. Real buttheads." I joke.
"Language."
"Butthead isn't a swear, Icecube."
"Not an icecube."
"Huh. So, what's the difference between gods like Thor and Loki and your dad?" Bucky asks.
"Well, for one, he's not my dad. A dad wouldn't kidnap his eight year old and bring her to the Red Room. And two, the difference is the places that people worship them. Gods like Thor and Loki are worshipped in Norway and the Greek gods are worshipped in, you guessed it, Greece!"
"And I thought that there was only one God." Steve remarks. "Still just believe in the one."
"Makes sense. How's Wanda? How's she holding up?" I ask. Wanda and I grew closer in prison. Between talking about our nightmares and the whole powers thing. Turns out, we have more in common than anyone thought.
"She's doing pretty well, all things considered. She's currently in what's left of Sokovia helping rebuild the city. Undercover, of course." Steve says.
"How're you guys doing? Being undercover is hard for people who haven't been doing it all their lives." Nat says.
"Good for the most part. We've had a few close calls, but we're doing good."
I'm not.
Ok. First mission. Second kill. I'm doing good. Doing good. Doing good.
I rehearsed this. Assemble the gun. Aim at the target. Pull the trigger.
I can't do this. I can't do this. I can't do this! I can't kill anymore! I killed someone to get to here. I have to. 'Pride is everything.' That's what Madame C would say. Out of everyone, she was one of the meanest. She was the one that decided to use me as a human punching bag. She let Gina and the others get away with stabbing me. If I don't do this, I get retrained. I lose my pride.
"Hey! Lina! Wake up!" I hear as someone pats my face trying to wake me up.
"Shoot. I ruined dinner." I say.
"Heh. You didn't. What happened?" Bucky asks.
"Where's Mom?" I ask, panicking because I can't see her.
"Did she just...?" Sam trails off.
"She did. She said the 'M' word!" Steve grins.
"Where in the nine realms is my мама?!" I ask, making everyone focus on the fact that Nat has gone missing and I just had a flashback. (Russian for mom)
"NATASHA!!! GET IN HERE!! SHE'S AWAKE AND PANICKING!!" Bucky shouts because he's probably the only other one here who knows Russian.
"Hey. Please don't tell her what I said. In English and in Russian." I say, in tears.
"Got it." Bucky says, zipping his lips.
"Hey! I'm here. I'm here." Nat says, running into the room.
"Remember Code Blue?" Nat asks.
"Yeah." I choke out in between sobs.
"Ok, what do we do?"
"Um, we sit on my bed and cuddle and talk about whatever triggered it. And you sing something to calm me down," I list off the things we do when this happens. And believe me, it has.
"Ok. Steve, Sam, Bucky, this was fun, but Alina comes first. We'll see you guys later. If you could show yourselves out, I have a panicked daughter to care for, not that it's any problem." Nat adds.
"We'll see you two later! Thanks for having us!" Bucky smiles, shoves Steve and Sam out the door, and winks. He's probably going to tell everyone. Not sure how that'll go over with Nat. People care. People care now. I remember in the Red Room, I'd have a nightmare. I wouldn't cry. I'd get yelled at for showing emotion when not needed. I wouldn't cry. I'd just sit in my bed, overthinking things.
"Hey. Code Blue? You want to talk about it?" Nat asks.
"Yeah. That'd be best." I smile though the tears.
"Ok. Cuddle close." Nat says, grabbing a blanket and some pillows. "What happened, Little Shadow?"
"Um, Steve said something about doing good and it sent me back to my first mission. I didn't want to kill the person. I managed to get as far as aiming my gun before I... I froze. Not like Cap. I couldn't find it in me to pull the trigger. I thought about it for a bit and settled on one thought. I thought that if I didn't pull the trigger, I'd lose my pride. I'd get retrained. I'd have to go through all of that again. It hurt. That was only my second kill. I had my first kill at thirteen. My first mission a year later. It hurt, having to take someone's life." I explain.
"I get it. I went through the same thing. I get it. It's ok. You don't have to take anymore lives and you've more than redeemed yourself for the ones you've taken. You chose to let Fury live. You chose to become an Avenger, you chose to save people, you chose to sit in prison for fifteen days, surrounded by people with opinions and ideals different than yours, drastically. You're a good person. Thor had told me when you went to Asgard for a month that Loki's behavior changed when he met you. For the better, I mean. Stopped killing people. Stopped stabbing Thor. You saved him. You probably just saved Tony from a drinking problem and Peter from having a drunk playboy father. You've saved us all. One way or another."
"Really?"
"Really."
"I saved you?"
"Yeah. The Red Room took away my ability to have kids that were biologically related to me. I wanted a child. I just didn't know how. I wanted what Tony and Peter have. Then, I met you. I adopted you. Now, I don't want what they have." Nat says and I frown slightly.
"We have something better."
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Wahoo! More Romanoff family happiness! I love when I can dig into Alina's past a bit more, it's always fun. Anyways, what do you think's gonna happen next? This will be the last CA:CW chapter! I'm slightly scared (my brain just read 'scared' as 'scarred' and, tbh, that works too) for what I have planned. *evil laughs, then looks sad/guilty* 😅
May the Force be with you!
-nervous author