∆ {5⁶} {STARS} ∆
IT WAS NATASHA, in the end, who broke the deathly silence of the Quinjet, and Roxi's head snapped up at the sound, a soft, small smile gracing her lips as she processed her words.
"I thought we had a deal; stay close, check in, don't take any chances." Although Natasha's words were stern and disapproving, they came from a place that she rarely allowed a thought to escape from, let alone be voiced. It meant that Natasha had at least partly given up on her grudge against Wanda for what had happened at the salvage yard three years ago, if only for Roxi's sake.
It was an odd feeling that accompanied her smile, Roxi realised, as if this pocket of time in-between would be the last true time she would be able to savour anything for a long time. As if the moment that the Quinjet touched the ground again, the weight of the world would fall onto their shoulders again. That itself was a horrible sensation, one of impending, inescapable doom that weighed on the back of Roxi's mind like a cool patch of shade that only covered the smallest part of her, and yet seemed to seep into her very veins. So she attempted to focus on something else, about how Natasha extending the circle of people she would show emotion around would be good for her, about how Natasha seemed to look good with any hairstyle she wanted to, or perhaps the way that she could see the stars through the thin veil of clouds that was draped across the sky around them, that they waded through with such a practised ease that it was able to settle at least one part of Roxi's mind that seemed to be constantly thinking, churning, making things as bad as they possibly could be.
"I'm sorry. We just wanted time." Wanda's tone was slightly dejected, and Roxi found her smile slipping from her lips and her attention brought back to the interior of the jet and those within it. Time was what they all wanted, it was what everyone wanted, at least in some form. But time was as fluid as the emotions that still thrashed against Roxi's skull like a stormy ocean, albeit less violently than they had used to, and it would slip through a person's fingers before they even had the chance to register that it had been there to begin with. Time wasn't fixed, nor was it temperamental; it was simply something that people had made themselves aware of because they had become so obsessed with their fears of death that they needed a way to ease their panic, and had needed some sort of barrier between themself and the inevitable. Sometimes she wondered if time was really a thing at all, or if it was just a concept invented by somebody who had nothing better to do than anxiously await the end.
But equally, hadn't her hiding her first name from as many people as she could for so long been her own barrier between herself and what was, in truth, inevitable? Surely, it had to be, and the idea of it sent a jolt of realisation through her body that made her want to twist her features in a way that demonstrated her lack of fondness for it. If there was one thing that Roxi admitted wasn't her best quality, it would be that to be unintentionally hypocritical, though there were many times she didn't realise she'd been doing it, and had only figured it out later on, as with this issue, and had begun to dislike a small part of herself because of it.
"Where to, Cap?" Sam's words provided Roxi little distraction from the catacombs of her own mind, but Steve's reply did jolt her slightly, if only because the word was a concept that she hadn't spared much of a thought in years.
"Home." At that moment, it seemed like such an old-fashioned notion. The idea of a place where you were safe, happy, calm. A space where a person could do anything without judgement, and if they were lucky, with another person. A little place in the wild world that was simply yours, where time was ignored in favour of comfort and barely existed to anyone lucky enough to be able to experience such a thing.
Roxi had had a home. She knew that, even if it had only been for a short while, and she knew exactly where and when it had been. That year after Sokovia, though it may not have seemed the best at the time, when she looked back on it, it seemed like one of the brightest times in her life. She and Natasha had been together, surrounded by people who had somehow become her family, and Wanda and Tony had grown from meaning so little to so much, to the point where they had become two of three people who were quite so important to her. Of course, she cared for all of them, even if she refused to display it, but Wanda, Tony, Natasha, they were different. They each were something she'd never had in her life; a sister, a best friend, someone who she had managed to find solace in, who she loved. They would've been novel concepts had she not spent quite so much time over the past few months considering the matter of where she would've been without Natasha's call at the beginning of it all.
Though the compound had become a familiar place to her in the year she had spent there, it was the three people that she treasured the most who she truly found her home in. And now, one of them she'd barely been able to talk to for two years, another had been such minimal and fleeting contact that sometimes she wondered if she'd imagined them, and for the last; she'd let their relationship deteriorate too much, she knew that, and that she would have to fix it in some way, even if it wasn't clear how, and was evidently not going to be quite the same as it was once.
In her thoughts, Roxi had been boredly gazing at the floor of the Quinjet, not really registering anything in her vision, but with her final thought, she found her eyes flitting firstly from Natasha, who stood only a little way away with her arms crossed and brow scrunched slightly in concentration and contemplation, to Wanda, whose state inspired more worry in Roxi. The Sokovian was also staring at the metal floor, though with a dangerous amount of pain and conviction and guilt that Roxi didn't have to be able to see her face to be able to pick up on. She'd picked up at least one or two things about body language with her time in SHIELD and working side by side with Natasha Romanoff for so long.
It was only after another glance in Natasha's direction to ensure that the spy would be okay on her own, at least for a short while, that Roxi dared to move over to Wanda. She didn't look up immediately, even as Roxi sat on the seat next to where Wanda was kneeling on the floor, sitting back on her heels, and probably uncaring of the ache it would cause her in favour of what had just happened. Roxi could understand it. She'd been in the same position once upon a time, after all, in 2012, the first time aliens had attacked their planet, and these had been worse. Smarter, faster, stronger, and with their own motivation to fight. It was Wanda's first time encountering them, and that wasn't aided by the fact that she had simply been trying to relish in what little time she could snatch up with Vision, in a world that now had begun to loathe them for the way that they protected it.
Roxi had sat down, fully expecting to have stayed in silence for at least a few moments, trying to figure out what to say, but when she fished around in her head, she found that it was already there. That was unusual in itself, and it seemed to take her mouth a few moments to put together what her head had and string it into a sentence.
"None of us can blame you for wanting peace. It's what we all want; we just go about finding it in different ways. For me and you, it's the people that finally made a difference to our lives, the ones that we would do anything for. Sometimes it can be harder. I don't think Steve will ever feel truly at peace unless he's done what he could ever do to make the world a safer place. Natasha's still trying to make up for things in her past, Sam's still trying to be of service. It's different for each of us, but we get it. It's just worry that gets in the way of that." She didn't dare to speak louder than a simple whisper, knowing that Wanda would be able to hear her perfectly, and the others in the jet either wouldn't care or would be too respectful to listen in.
Wanda showed no sign of listening other than tilting her head ever so slightly while Roxi talked, and seemed to contemplate her words for a moment before shifting so that her back and head now rested against Roxi's legs. It surprised Roxi slightly, and she felt her eyes widening and her body instinctively stiffening, though she relaxed only moments later and attempted to adjust her position to make it more comfortable for Wanda, who still had yet to say anything in response. They sat like that for a while, in a comfortable almost-silence, the thrum of the Quinjet engine running through the pair of bodies and providing white-noise to drown out the sound of the rushing tide of emotions and thoughts that coursed through Roxi's mind. It was Wanda who spoke next, in an exhausted tone which allowed her accent to seep thickly into her words, and allowed Roxi to see quite how drained the Sokovian was.
"Roxi.. do you think we could just sit for a bit and watch the stars? Like we did on the way back from Lagos? It really helped me then and I just-." Wanda's words forced a sad smile onto Roxi's face, though she found herself replying before Wanda had even finished her sentence. She wouldn't make the mistake of not being there for those who needed her; not again.
"Of course." Roxi allowed her voice to stay as soft as it had before, and after a little manoeuvring, sat down on the floor next to Wanda, and feeling the Sokovian's head fall immediately onto her shoulder, she gently laced their hands together and used her others to trace the constellations they could see through the window and tell Wanda everything that she knew about them, from fact to folklore. Roxi had found herself intrigued with the topic since it had become a sort of tradition between the pair, and had spent many hours over the past few years doing research, if only to feel some sort of link to Wanda, who was most often thousands of miles away.
She didn't notice Natasha watching them with an endearing, fond smile, one that showed how much the woman truly did care, though if she had, she would've sent the now-blonde a smile of her own, one tha promised that they would have their own moments like this, where the rest of the world didn't seem to matter because they were thousands of feet above it, soaring through a field of grey-whites and darkening umbers that enhanced the bright glow of the stars even further.
For a moment, there was peace. Roxi would realise that at some point afterwards, once the Quinjet had touched the ground, that that moment would become invaluable to her, if simply because of the comfort the thought of it would bring her, because she was exactly where she needed to be. There was only one thing missing; Tony.
{~}
THE THING THAT welcomed Roxi back to the compound that had been the closest thing to something that she would ever call a home, was the voice of a man who seemed to be determined to get her under his thumb, if only because of his fear of her power.
"I remember your signature on those papers, Colonel." Secretary Ross. The man who had torn the only family she'd ever had to pieces because he wanted to know how it would feel to experience holding power over 'Earth's Mightiest Heroes', or half of them, at least. If landing and forcing herself to accept that the idea of time she had wouldn't stop for her had worsened her mood, this certainly took it to a new level. In fact, she didn't bother to stop her lips from curling into a slight scowl at the sound of the man's voice.
"That's right. And I'm pretty sure I've paid for that." Rhodes' voice was somehow maintaining a steady tone as he talked to the politician, but the mention of his injury in such a calm, cold, context forced Roxi's mind to spiral more than it would've if he were simply mentioned in passing. Even after all this time, after all those apologies, there were still shreds of nasty guilt that lingered throughout her body, ones that Rhodey had given up on trying to get her to ignore, and that Natasha hadn't been in the right state of mind to alleviate. She didn't mind. In fact, over the past two years, she'd finally been able to make up for some of what Natasha had done for her, to help get rid of the nightmares, and sit with the redhead through some of her worst moments just as Natasha had done for her. While she'd rather be able to take all of Natasha's pain away from her, she wasn't quite able to do that, so what she managed to do so far was enough for her to feel as though she was doing a satisfactory job.
"You have second thoughts?" Ross' voice grew clearer as they rounded a corner lined with glass walls that hadn't changed much since she'd last been there. A little dirtier, a little more scratched; there really wasn't that much difference.
"Not anymore." As they rounded the final corner and caught sight of Rhodey and the projection of Ross, Roxi forced her features into a calm mask, something that had become more difficult for her recently, though she wasn't certain that it didn't have something to do with the politician standing in the room in front of her. Roxi wasn't normally one to hold grudges, but something inside her pushed her to it this time. Perhaps because it had been her family that he'd ruined because he'd wanted notability and power. The situation was a little different to normal, she reasoned.
"Mr. Secretary," Steve noted, as polite as ever, though Roxi refused to acknowledge him and sent a small nod to Rhodey who smiled gently at her in return. Roxi had found herself at the back, her hand still loosely linked with Wanda's, while Sam supported Vision and Steve and Natasha presented the idea of a united front. Roxi was sure that Ross had noticed her though, because he scanned over the six of them as if looking for one thing specifically, and his gaze had paused on her long enough to register her dangerous glare before he had promptly moved on.
"You've got nerve, I'll give you that." Playing at holding power to make himself feel more secure; a thing that people in a position of importance who were about to be in trouble often did to try and fool whoever they were going to be in trouble with, as Natasha had muttered to her to expect at some point or other.
"You could use some of that right now." Natasha herself was quick in her response, not daring to let Ross see just how uncertain about this situation that they truly were. Thinking fast to protect whoever she could, and then acting on it; it was a core part of Natasha that Roxi loved as much as any of the woman's bad parts, though she seemed to have very little of those.
"The world's on fire and you think all is forgiven?" The world always seemed to be on fire, lost in chaos that they did their best to clean up, but it was impossible to catch the glowing embers that drifted to the rug while containing the larger, more deadly flame to a decent standard. It was the same issue as it had been two years ago, just phrased and framed slightly differently.
"I'm not looking for forgiveness, and I'm way past asking permission. Earth just lost her best defender, so we're here to fight. And if you wanna stand in our way, we'll fight you to." Steve spoke with a tone of authority that sounded as though he had truly earned it, and compared to it, Ross' next words sounded flimsy and desperate for an ounce of the control he was under the illusion of having.
"Arrest them."
"All over it," Rhodey replied, finally allowing an ounce of irritation to slip into his carefully calculated tone as he swiped away the hologram, facing them with a grave expression, "That's a court-martial. Great to see you, Cap." Only then did he allow his façade to break, and when it fell, so did Roxi's scowl, and the tone of the room lightened as considerably as it could while still taking the matter at hand seriously. When Steve and Rhodey's hands met in a firm shake, Roxi allowed a part of herself to relax, because they were back in the place where she had found her home, and with someone that had helped make it.
"You too, Rhodey." After a glance at Wanda and a reassuring look, she slipped her fingers away from the Maximoff's, moving towards Rhodey to greet him the same way that Steve had. Natasha hugged him in greeting, something that Roxi took note of so that she would be able to mention it at a later point. When Rhodey's hand met her's, she gave him a smile of appreciation. Despite never having met him until Tony's party that had been when the whole Ultron fiasco had kicked off, Tony himself had trusted Rhodey and known him for most of his life, and that had helped her trust him immensely. His sense of humour happened to be somewhat similar to hers too, however minimal it was.
"Well, you guys really look like crap. Must've been a rough couple of years," Rhodey diverted the attention to the entire group, and allowed humour to seep into his mannerisms, possibly trying to lighten the room as much as he could before he gave them the brief of what was coming.
"Yeah, well, the hotels weren't exactly five-star," Sam replied, though while an element of light-heartedness laced his words, his face remained serious. It seemed that everyone in the room understood the weight of the situation that they were in, even if the majority of them knew only just enough to know that this would be the hardest fight of their lives.
"Uh, I think you guys look great. Yeah, I'm back." Despite the familiarity of the new voice that rang out through the room, Roxi found herself immediately tensing and wiping her face of emotion. It had been three years since she'd last seen Bruce, and they hadn't been particularly close before that. Nor had he been there for the year that Roxi truly allowed herself to become at home. In this situation, he felt like nothing more than an acquaintance to her, and she knew that her upbringing and SHIELD training were at least partially to blame.
Though, that was another thing that had recently begun to worry her. Her slipping control over the mask she'd previously been able to flick over her face with ease, even not noticing Bruce's presence in this room; the instincts left from the 12 years that she'd devoted to SHIELD were beginning to fade, she was sure of that, and the way it felt was almost uncomfortable. Like a rug becoming crumbled beneath her with nothing more than time and slight movement. It was disorienting, and from the glance Natasha had shot her upon feeling her tense, she knew that the now-blonde had caught the flash of panic and discomfort as it had flitted across her face.
"Hi, Bruce," Natasha greeted, and though the woman was far more practised at hiding her emotions, Roxi could recognise all the little signs that she needed to. The shift of weight, the way that Natasha's head was tilted, the way her hands were half-curled; she was unsure what to do in this situation, because it was unexpected, and when Natasha felt unsure she felt vulnerable, and vulnerable was something that she'd barely been allowed the chance to feel. There was another moment of silence where Roxi could've sworn she could hear the LEDs above their heads buzz.
"Well, Roxi and I are gonna go change our clothes, we'll meet you down the hall in a bit." Natasha's words were a request, a plea for some alone time with Roxi so that she could attempt to catch herself up to speed on the situation, as well as satisfy the need to talk some things through.
"Roxi? What-wait, wait, Roxi?" Bruce's confused voice rang out through the room, but Roxi had already followed Natasha's lead and begun to walk out, the beginnings of one of her awful headaches beginning to scrape against her skull.
{~}
NEITHER OF THEM had actually needed to change their clothes, because the pair of them had got ready while Roxi was still coping with the knowledge of what was to come in the flat they'd stayed in in Venezuela. And yet, no-one in the room had commented on their abrupt departure, and Roxi hadn't found it in herself to question Natasha about it, because she needed some private time as much as Natasha seemed to. No matter what did happen after, in that awful silence that always followed, Roxi knew that she would need a moment to look back on in hopes to anchor herself.
Before, she might've been regarded as relatively stable, but she had simply become awfully accustomed to shoving it all down to the point that it had formed the ocean of emotions that resided within her currently. Since after Washington DC, however, she'd found that that ocean had begun to drain, ever so slightly, and that she was more prone to emotional outbursts, which when accompanied by her power, could be unnervingly dangerous. All that she could hope was that this, this small, perfect moment in time would be enough to lower those moments down to a simmer, and that she wouldn't burn anyone in the process.
And this moment did seem to be perfect, at least in Roxi's eyes. It was almost silent, the idea rendered hopeless by the soft whoosh of the air conditioning and the gentle song that Natasha hummed next to her, one that Roxi faintly recognised as American Pie. It was slightly chilly, but the afternoon sunlight seeped into the room, and it was enough to warm up one side of her. She and Natasha lay side by side on the bed in her old room, their hands laced together between them, and Roxi finally allowed her muscles to relax, her eyes closing as she tapped a finger against the side of Natasha's hand, matching the beat of the music as well as she could while she allowed her mind to wander, attempting to memorise every tiny detail about that moment, the way that there was an uncomfortable crease in the bedsheet below her. Even her headache had faded, to the point where she could comfortably ignore it.
But this was Roxi's mind, and if left alone, it would never take her to a good place; she'd spent far too long being paranoid about things that would never happen to forget all of that, even over the four years since SHIELD had fallen. Some habits, the ones she sometimes wished she still had, had faded to just a thought instead of an instinct, but the bad ones, the ones that had ultimately helped herself survive, but had also cost her her peace of mind.
So where did her mind drift, but back; to when things seemed better but were ultimately about to go wrong. There had been another moment like this, where things had seemed almost unconditionally perfect, but that had been the morning two years ago, that Ross had come to the Compound with Tony because of the Lagos incident, and had first told them about the Sokovia Accords. There had been a moment similar to this before Ultron, where they'd had a quiet piece of time to let themselves adjust in, but that too had been quickly followed by something bad.
And so the moment, at least in one part of Roxi's head, tarnished with dread, and a twisted tide of nostalgia coursed through her, strong enough that it made her stomach drop so violently that it twisted her mind into panic too. And it happened to be a panic so awful that it disrupted the oceans that had lain dormant in her mind for so little time that the wave of emotion felt suffocating, as if she was drowning in the emotion that she couldn't begin to comprehend. It was then that the waves began to stir and to thrash, and then the dark ocean crackled with lightning and roared with a thunder that seemed to be the voice of all of her fears.
So Roxi found herself sitting up abruptly, her body tensing and eyes snapping open all in the space of half a second. The headache came back, and suddenly the noise of the air conditioning was annoying her, and couldn't they draw the curtains? The one thing that she wouldn't have minded continuing had stopped though, because Natasha had stopped humming and had somehow tightened her grip on Roxi's hand as she sat up.
Roxi brought up her other hand and ran it down her face, her breaths coming out short and sharp. It took her a few minutes to calm down, feeling her heartbeat calm to its normal pace and her breathing to return to its pattern. It was only then that she realised why Natasha had had quite such a firm grip on her hand, because when she looked up to check on her, she found Natasha staring, wide-eyed at the ceiling. Roxi didn't dare to say a thing, afraid she might startle Natasha if she did. Instead, she slowly, gently, adjusted her position and pulled Natasha up into her body, in a way that mimicked their embrace only hours earlier, and hugged her. She whispered some of the few words of Russian that she knew in Natasha's ear - ones of comfort that she'd learned specifically for this purpose, and simply held the woman she loved and waited for her to recover from whatever it was exactly that was happening inside her head.
It took a while - ten minutes maybe - for Roxi's soft coaxing to bring Natasha back into reality, and when she finally did seem to be able to crawl out of the darkness of her own mind, she shifted slightly, and muttered a quiet reply that Roxi could only just make out, and wrapped her arms around Roxi's shoulders, still seeming disorientated.
"Thank you," were the next words that Natasha murmured in Roxi's ear, and Roxi didn't dare to pull back from the hug until Natasha felt safe to do so. When they did finally part, they didn't move far enough that the heat between them would disperse, and instead sat on the edge of the bed, their shoulders touching and hands linked together once again - though this time it was far tighter, because with women were holding onto each other with an urgency that they needed to stop themselves from spiralling any further downwards.
"Something feels off." Roxi finally dared to murmur, her voice tremoring, and met Natasha's green eyes when she looked to Roxi, and the expression on her face meant that she agreed; something - neither were sure what - would go wrong.
"Like whatever I- we do," she corrected herself quickly upon seeing the way that Natasha's expression became more stern with the idea of Roxi blaming herself, "won't be enough. But it has to be, Nat, because this is gonna be the biggest fight of our lives, and not being or doing enough is not gonna cut it." Natasha observed her in silence, deciding it was better to let Roxi get it off herself, but something in her only realised quite how strongly Roxi felt about it - and how she should - with her next words.
"We're about to go to war. Against this titan that we know nothing about, who has an army that we know nothing about, and it's not gonna be enough."
"It is- We're gonna be enough, Roxi, because you're right, we have to be enough, so we will." And so the two of them sat there, languishing in their time, wishing that this moment could carry on forever, where they weren't quite caught up to speed on the entire truth of the situation, where maybe they would still know little enough to turn a blind eye.
But as much as they wanted to, they couldn't, because that wasn't the way the world that they'd been alienated from for two years worked, at least not anymore. Because they had to be enough, to do enough, but there was only a chance that it would, and that was what bothered the two women; the not-knowing.
The uncertainty was what neither of them were quite used to, and likely never would be. The two women were anything but normal, and yet their greatest fears were the most common; that of the unknown.
AUTHOR'S NOTE
Take. (Again).
JABBERJAY_011
WRITTEN [10.10.2021]
WORDS [5025]
PUBLISHED [12.10.2021]