It was Thursday. In four days, Valen would have her first day in court. Last night, she had another nightmare and ended up freezing almost her entire room. Nat referred it to an icebox when she went to go check on Valen. She feared if she couldn't get it under control, the court would use it against her calling her unstable.
To keep her mind off it, she kept thinking about tomorrow. Her and Tony still had dinner plans with his lady friend Pepper. Valen already picked out a nice outfit to wear, but Wanda came in and made her choose a dress. She wanted to dress nice even though Stark told her he didn't care if she wore sweats.
Besides dreading the arrival of Monday, there was only one other thing bugging Valen. Ever since Loki and Thor arrived, they have been acting very suspicious. Everyone was quiet and seemed so serious. She felt like there was a secret that they all were keeping from her.
"You good?" Bucky waved a hand in front of Valen's face.
"What is everyone hiding?" Valen quit biting her fingernails.
"I don't know what you're talking about." Bucky sat beside her and put an arm behind her against the back of the couch.
"Thor said there was business to be discussed and now everyone is acting strange."
"I have no clue."
Valen punched him on the arm, completely forgetting that the side she was on would be beside his metal arm. She winced and shook her hand. "Liar."
Bucky chuckled watching Valen hold her hand. "You don't need to worry about it. You have other problems like having to act and look like a girl for dinner tomorrow."
"I act and look like a girl."
Bucky scuffed. "The only girl thing about you is that you're dramatic."
"So not true. I have the anatomy."
Bucky put a hand over Valen's mouth. He scrunched his face at her words. "Stop."
"It's got to count for something."
Thor walked past the two no longer showing a hint of his friendly side. He looked like he was ready to go to war. Loki followed behind but faltered for a split second when he looked at Valen. Something like pain hit him in his eyes, forcing him to look away and follow Thor.
Bucky patted Valen's head before getting up to join them. Valen walked to the window to watch the entire team get in the Quinjet and leave her behind.
"Friday, where are they going?" She called watching the Quinjet disappear in the clouds.
"Information classified."
Valen looked around like that was the stupidest thing she's ever heard. "Friday, I'm a Stark now so tell me the information."
"Information classified for Baby Stark."
Valen grabbed a phone and called Nat. She impatiently tapped her foot until Nat answered. "Where did you go?"
"V, we'll be back soon. Stay home. Peter will be there soon."
"Peter?" She sounded almost insulted. "Why are you purposely trying to distract me? What's going on?"
"We will be back tonight. Everything is okay."
"Everything is okay yet the whole team is gone."
"V."
"Nat."
Nat sighed. "We're just making sure nothing is happening. It's a quick look to make sure everything is okay, then we'll be back."
"How long is this 'quick look'? A week? A month? I'm going to be all alone Monday."
"Believe me. All of us will be there for you Monday."
"Promise?"
"Promise. Now I have to go." Nat hung up the phone.
Valen turned away from the window. She shuffled her feet to the couch and slumped down onto it. Half her face was smushed against the couch as she looked at the television.
-
"Valen is going to find out about this sooner or later." Sam stated.
"Not today she isn't. We all agreed it's in her best interest if she doesn't know. At least for now it is." Nat was checking to make sure none of her gear was left behind.
"If she notices I'm gone, then she knows it's not a ... what did you call it? Oh, a quick look at something." Bruce was bouncing his leg, feeling nervous.
"Peter will be there. He'll distract her to not notice." Wanda chimed in.
Loki sat the furthest away from everyone. His arms were crossed and he looked at his feet nervously. Thor was worried for his brother because he has never been this way for as long as he could remember.
"It's better this way. We're protecting her." Thor sat down beside Loki.
Loki didn't say anything. He just looked at Thor before going back to his feet.
"When did you suspect they'll be here again, Thor?" Wanda asked.
"Heimdall said he saw them gearing up for battle when Loki and I left Asgard. From there it would only be a matter of days before they decided to invade. I would say that day would be today."
"A whole army just for a girl?" Steve raised an eyebrow, questioning if this was real.
"When she became an Avenger and people started realizing what she could do, it was obvious who she was. She's not just some girl to them. They'll do anything to take her back. So yes there is a whole army coming down here to take Valen because they know we would all protect her if they did." Loki let out a breath of air after his little rant.
Clint was screwing on his arrowheads. "Who doesn't love an army of ice giants coming to Earth to declare war for an eighteen year old girl?"
"She's going to kill us." Bucky leaned back in his seat already picturing Valen's reaction to all of this.
"Or just Steve." Sam whispered.
Wanda looked at the ground and smirked as she overheard Sam's whisper.
-
Peter walked around trying to find Valen. She wasn't in her room, the kitchen, the gym, or the living room. Finally, he found her on the rooftop looking up at the sky.
"Usually star gazing is at night when you can actually see the stars." Peter looked up at the sunny sky.
"I'm cloud gazing. See that one up there?" Valen pointed to a cloud in the sky. "Looks like a bunny."
Peter looked up but there were too many clouds to see which one she was pointing at. He laid down beside on. "That one looks like a cloud."
Valen backhanded him on the chest. "Shut up. How was school?"
"Good. We don't normally do anything on the last couple of days."
"Are you excited that you're done with high school?"
"Part of me is. Part of me isn't."
"Next step is college." Valen almost whispered as she started to play with her hands.
Peter admired Valen as she watched the sky. She looked beautiful and peaceful. "I have a question."
Valen smiled as she turned to her side and looked at him. "I have an answer."
"Move in with me when I go to college."
"What?" Valen chuckled not thinking she heard him correctly.
"When I go to college, me, Ned, and MJ are all getting a place together. You should come to."
Valen shook her head. "What would I do there? You guys would be going to school. I would what? Stay home and wait for you all?"
"You could get a job."
Valen rolled over onto her back. "Pete, I don't know. I belong here with Wanda and Nat and Tony. I already have a job or hopefully will have it again as an Avenger."
"Not everyone lives here full time. Wanda and Vision are thinking about getting their own place. I don't know about Natasha but if she and Steve become more serious they might move. Tony has multiple houses and stays with Pepper a lot. Clint is barely here unless he has to be. You can still be an Avenger and move with me. I will be."
Valen bit the inside of her cheek. "What if the trial doesn't go good? What if I end up in jail?"
Peter grabbed Valen's hand and ran his thumb up and down. "The trail will go good. You will not be put in jail. For the moving part, you don't have to make your decision today. It's May, we move in August. It's up to you. Either way, I love you."
Valen glanced at him before turning over to kiss him. "What if I don't make up my mind by then?"
"If you're still here when I'm gone, we can take turns visiting each other. I'll be here on all my breaks. You can come stay for a week or weekend whenever you want."
Valen smiled knowing her relationship with Peter wasn't ending over this. She needed him in her life. She didn't know what she would do without him.
Peter's phone started buzzing in his back pocket. He pulled it out to see Ned was trying to FaceTime him.
"Hello?"
"Yo! Did you see the news?" Ned's eyes were wide as he looked half terrified half amazed.
Peter turned a sickly white. No, he hadn't seen the news, but he had a million dollar bet on what it was. "I'll check it later, Ned. I have to go."
Peter was about to hang up when Valen grabbed the phone. "Hey, Ned!"
"Hey, Val. I'm still waiting for my invite."
"How about next week? Bring MJ with you."
"I will, but you should really check the news. Some people from outer space just-"
Peter grabbed the phone and hung up on him. Valen suspiciously gazed at Peter wondering what in the world was that.
"We should go inside. We can watch a movie, spar, play some games. If you're hungry we can cook something."
"What are you hiding?"
"Hiding? I'm not hiding anything." Peter's voice raised an octave.
Valen got up and started running towards the nearest computer or tv she could find. She knew Peter was hiding something and he wouldn't give her back his phone.
Peter chased after her. He knew it was the frost giants coming down and that the Avengers would be there to fight them. If Valen saw, he knew she would freak out.
Valen grabbed the remote and turned on the tv. She changed it over to the news to see a live video of someone recording massive ships coming out of the sky. She could hear a man's voice in the video describing what was going on and that the Avengers were all there. His video started glitching and went blank before the news anchors took back the screen to discuss the emergent news.
"Who is that?" Valen was staring at the screen, still pointing the remote at it.
"I don't know."
"Peter, who is that?"
"I really don't know. Thor just said it was some people coming down here to wage war."
"Wage war for what?"
"I don't know."
Valen frustratingly slammed the remote on the coffee table. "I need more information than 'I don't know'."
"You weren't supposed to know. The team can handle it."
"Why wouldn't they just tell me? I'm going to go ask Bruce." Valen started making her way to the elevator when Peter grabbed her arm.
"He isn't here."
"Bruce went with them? This is serious then! He doesn't go on any mission unless he absolutely has to. I have to go. I have to help." Valen shrugged off his hand and started pacing around the living room.
"Valen, you can't. They're hours away and you're on house arrest. You'll be in even more trouble if you leave."
"I can't just let them go to war with some aliens. What if they get hurt?"
"They have more help than they did when they fought the Chitauri. They're more than capable of taking care of these people."
Peter took one step closer to Valen. He didn't want her to go. He didn't know fully what was going on, but he knew he didn't want anything to happen to Valen. He lost her once and he wasn't willing to do it again.
Valen raised her hands. They started to glow blue as she stared him dead in the eye. "Don't try to stop me, Peter. I'm going."
"There's no way I can convince you to stay?"
"No. I know I'm only one extra person to help them, but I have to. I care about them. I'll blame myself if anything happens to any of them. I need to be there. They're my family."
"Then I'm going with you."
"Really?" Valen put down her hands.
"I'm not going to let you go alone. Now they have two extra people to help."
"Great now let's get this off." Valen raised her foot showing her ankle monitor.