*ECHO'S POV*
"You see that Range Rover halfway up the block?" I hear Steve mutter through the comms.
"Yeah, the red one. It's cute." Wanda replies, sitting at a table just across from me and Mama.
"It's also bullet-proof." I interject, noticing the familiar look of the car's frame.
"She's right, which means more guns, which means more headaches for somebody, probably us." Mama spoke back into the open line, just as Steve focused us all back to the target.
From what everyone had told me on the way, Rumlow has been trading some sort of weapons, and this is the best lead the team have had on him in months.
"Hey Sam you see that garbage truck?"
"Uh-huh."
"Tag it."
"Cap this thing's loaded for max weight."
"It's a battering ram. Wanda go, now! Nat hold your position."
I noticed as Wanda shot up from her table spilling the cup of coffee she was just stirring before, heading towards Steve's signal.
"What are we supposed to do?" I asked turning to face Mama next to me.
"You heard Steve, we've gotta wait here."
"But I can help you know I can!"
"Echo I'm not going to tell you twice, just wait for the signal."
I turned back down to face the cup of coffee still steaming as I swirled the spoon around it, clinking the spoon against the edge of the cup before hesitantly taking a sip of it. I immediately spat it out in disgust wiping away at my tongue trying to get that taste out of my mouth. I could see Mama in the corner of my eye sniggering as she held her hand over her mouth trying to stop herself from laughing.
"What the hell is that?!"
"It's coffee, remind me to never give you that again." she continued laughing, just as the comms crackled in our ears.
"Rumlow's got a biological weapon."
"I'm on it." Mama says as she swung herself up onto a motorbike parked nearby.
"Что ты хочешь чтобы я сделал?"
("What do you want me to do?")
"оставайся здесь и не двигайся."
("Stay here and don't move.")
Before I could argue she was already speeding ahead to follow the signal. If anything I was glad she'd left when she did, because there's no way I was going to stay here so at least she wouldn't have seen me run towards her.
It didn't take me long to catch up to the bike she'd dumped in the middle of a clearing, with my super strength I could run five times faster than the average person. Surrounding the clearing on one side were several scattered buildings, managing to make my way to the fifth floor of one of them. From the end window I had a clear view of the market below where I could just see the scene unfolding. A van I hadn't noticed before had now crashed in the centre of the market, four men clambering out the back doors and splitting up each in a different direction. Sam followed two, Mama following the others. Distant screams alerted me to where Mama was standing with a gun in hand, closely hovering next to her were the two men she'd been chasing each holding a gun back to her. I couldn't see too close up but somehow she managed to knock them both down, gripping the biological weapon tightly in her grasp as she made her way back to the others.
Steve and Wanda weren't far from Sam, only just visible to me from my position. The people from the building I'd ran into had now begun to gather around the windows watching the scene unfold. Suddenly out of nowhere the man standing in front of them both pulled the pin out of what seemed to be some sort of grenade, but before he could realise Wanda sealed him into an almost protective circle as she lifted him up into the air. Straight towards my building.
"Вот дерьмо!" I shouted down the comms.
("Oh shit!")
"Echo, was that you? What's going on?"
"Erm, you see that building Wanda just set on fire."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah well I'm sort of in it."
"YOU'RE WHAT?"
"I'm sorry! I just wanted to help and I couldn't just stay sitting at that table the whole time what did you expect?!"
"Echo, ты придешь сюда прямо в эту секунду, или, клянусь богом, тебе не понравится конец этого предложения."
("Echo, you're coming here right this second, or I swear to God you're not going to like the end of this sentence.")
"Mama there's people up here injured I can't just leave them!"
"I'm not asking you Echo get down here now the others will sort this!"
Looking back at the scene behind me I could already see at least a dozen people scattered unconscious, I couldn't just leave them here to die even if the others were coming up to help, they might not make it in time. With the sound of Mama still screaming my name down the line I took the earpiece out of my ear and crunched it beneath my feet as I turned my attention towards the people behind me. Some of them had begun to wake up, stumbling around in the smoke looking for a way out.
"Hey! HEY! Everyone listen up I need you all to move away from the windows. NOW!"
I managed to drag a few people still unconscious away from the windows as I stood by them, trying my best to compose myself, grasping my hands into fists tightly by my side. I tried to think of what Wanda had told me the day before, about how all I had to do was use my mind. Control it. Focus it. I had to, or people could die. Good and innocent people. Slowly opening my eyes as I looked up towards the windows, I moved my left hand slightly in a twisted motion, the metal poles holding up the frames of the glass panes twisting with the movement. I stared in amazement as I continued to bend the metal until all the glass panes shattered, resting the longest metal pole so that it stretched from the open gap in the front of the building all the way to the ground.
"Okay everyone listen carefully. I need you all to take off your jackets and wrap them around your wrists. Then you've gotta hook them over the pole and slide down. I know it sounds crazy but there's no other way down!"
They all seemed to follow my orders, still in shock both from the blast and seeing me bend metal and shatter glass with a small flick of my wrist. One by one they slid down the pole as the team who had now gathered below were ready to catch them if they fell. As the last person slid down I peaked over the edge to see them all staring back up at me.
"ECHO COME DOWN NOW!" Mama shouted as I winced at her harsh and extremely cold tone.
"I need to check upstairs! There could be more people up there!"
"No Echo please! Just come down the emergency services are on their way! Please just come down!"
There was now no harshness to her tone just fear, I could almost hear the crack of her voice as she pleaded with me to leave the building.
"I'm sorry Mama." I whispered under my breath as I turned back towards the stairs to my left.
The trail of smoke was still climbing as I made my way up step by step, careful not to dislodge any debris still holding the building up. I could feel a gentle rumble beneath my feet as I moved trying to keep myself steady as possible. As I reached the top floor I began to shout out in hope of anyone still trapped hearing me. But as I made my way around it was clear there was no one up here. I managed to stumble over to the window and break the glass once again, leaning over finding myself now at least 20 stories high. I could barely see the others below but I could definitely hear them.
*NATASHA'S POV*
My heart now beating out of my chest, my stomach dropped at the sight of Echo standing on the edge of the top floor looking back down at us.
"What the hell is she doing so high up there?!" I tried to shout but my voice was barely above a whisper in such fear.
"Nat just stay calm she'll be ok."
"How can you say that Steve look where she is right now. I have to go and help her, standing here isn't helping anyone."
"Whoa whoa Nat, let me go. I think I have a higher chance of survival in this moment don't you?"
I didn't even have the energy to respond so I just nodded in Steve's direction as I slumped to the floor in exhaustion.
Just as I saw Echo turn to walk back away from the front of the building, the whole framework shifted, causing her to lose her balance and slip over the edge. I gasped out as I shot back to standing up, clasping my hand over my mouth in horror as she began falling, heading straight for the ground below her.
*ECHO'S POV*
Use your mind. It's all in the mind. That's all I could think of as I fell down. I tried my hardest to focus myself as I got into my mind what I truly wanted to achieve. Merely seconds from hitting the ground I felt the air whoosh violently beneath me as I outstretched my arms and legs into a starfish trying to steady my balance. And just like that I had it.
As I opened my eyes, I was only met with the ashy sky above me. Turning my head down to the ground I could now notice I was hovering a few feet off the ground, a thick cloud still whirling beneath me. I'd done it, focused it. I'd literally learnt how to fly.
In the moment I was so shocked at my achievement that as my feet touched the ground again I burst out laughing, but was soon interrupted as Mama shoved my shoulders pushing me to the ground.
"WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU?"
"What do you mean?! I saved all those people?"
"You almost died Echo! I am your mother when I tell you to do something you don't choose whether to listen or not! You could've died just then!"
"Excuse me? Look you don't get to pull that card after all these years."
"Pull that card?"
"The mother card. You can't abandon me for thirteen years and then expect me to just do everything you say?! That's not how this works."
"Echo that's enough." Steve remarked as I noticed tears begin to well in Mama's eyes.
I hadn't noticed yet but there were tears beginning to form in mine too.
"No you know what it's not! It never has been enough! If you really wanted to be my mother you would've never let him take me from you! You wouldn't have let him do what he did to me for all those years! Do you know how much shit he put me through, and all because of you?! I never asked for any of it! All I ever wanted more than anything was a mother who loved me and you never gave me that! I never asked to be your daughter, and you know what?! I WISH I WASN'T."