Hey guys! Let me preface this with a huge sorry for ghosting you for literal months on this story, but these last two chapters finish it all up. I wanted to start out by saying thank you so much for being on this long, multi-year journey with me to finish up this longgg book because at the end of the day, your support has encouraged me in countless many ways.
This chapter pretty much serves as character bonding for Sienna and Zerina in a really odd way. The next chapter is the final scenes from Winter Soldier, which will be posted in a few days. Then I can say with relief, this part of Sienna's story comes to a close. Thank you all for staying with me this long <3
~~~~~~~
Undisclosed Stark mansion, eleven miles outside of Washington DC
What about 'Ghost' files?
The screen lit up on the blanket beside and is quick to catch my attention. My fingers are fast to begin typing back to Layla on the FarHorse commissioned cell phone she'd developed, What are the keywords?
I set the device back down on a folded blanket and picked up the squeezable stress ball I'd found on the table. I gripped that while directing my focus back to the laptop sitting in the crook of my crossed legs. A painfully slow loading bar stayed glued on the monitor, only inching forward every few seconds at a low speed. Forty-three percent of the decryption completed with over half-way to go. I used the back of my only available hand to wipe the tiredness from my eyes as I waited for several incoming messages to pass the time it took to properly access the leaked HYDRA files.
The US government had been fast to wipe as many as possible from the Internet before more intelligence secrets were disclosed to the public. All that entailed was hacking into the correct wings of American intelligence organizations, which always tended to be a tedious process despite Stark's streamlined wi-fi.
Layla was recovering any printed documents Homeland Security had under the guise of operating with Stark. She was happy to apprehend any files that could possibly link to me. I wasn't particularly worried about mission reports I'd done over the years. My interest was in Operation Phantom and any other event directly related to the anomaly.
Renning's reply arrived quickly, STARR, Quantum physics, experiment, quantum phasing. Level 9. No mention of anomaly.
I didn't want to take any chances of passing off on vital information. I put down the stress ball to text back, Bring it anyway and come on back.
The TV screen mounted on the decorative brick wall directly in front of me beeped. That monitor enlarged live security footage of the front gate a quarter-mile away. One of Stark's various AIs sounded throughout the room to alert me, "There's a woman at the gate. Identification profiles her as your half-sister Zerina Sprouse and resident chauffeur Hamen Westfield."
I stood up from my sunken spot on the couch, momentarily wincing as I stretched up with one arm, "Let her in."
"Yes, Ms. Firman."
I haven't been this sore in a long, long time. After a small groan, I meandered towards the kitchen area. The black duffel bag Natasha had given me days ago when this whole ordeal started laid atop a granite countertop. Hill had dropped it off by the hospital shortly before Steve and Sam managed to convince me not to sleep overnight in a mildly uncomfortable chair. Maria added a few extra things I'd asked for into the bag but left right after handing it to me. I hadn't expected an apology from the deputy director for maintaining the coverup of Operation Phantom, but somehow ended up still feeling disappointed by her abruptness.
The flash drive was easy to find amongst the inlined pockets. I slid it into the pocket of my leggings and leaned back against the edge of the counter. For a moment, I let my eyelids shut, anticipating the coming conversation. I hope I won't regret this.
It was another few minutes of stillness that left me in contemplation before the AI spoke again, "Ms. Sprouse is at the door."
I shifted up, walking out of the kitchen back into the large living space, "Might as well open it."
One of the mammoth double wood doors parted from the other at the end of the house, letting the brisk air of night escape into the room. The sight behind it was my older sister, not nearly as mobile as usual courtesy of the two crutches she rested her weight on. Her regular scowl of indifference stayed despite the injury, yet even that expression was momentarily deterred by a wonder at the large mansion's interior. Her eyes stayed glued to the new area as she hobbled in.
"Welcome, Ms. Sprouse." The disembodied voice greeted her, which only added to Zerina's sense of awe.
The chauffeur was quick to funnel in from behind, holding a few bags that he took to a guest bedroom without suggestion. That allowed me to keep full watch on her when she finally looked to me, "You've got some strings to pull, even when all hell breaks loose."
"One of Stark's properties." A basic assessment led me to believe she only had one weapon on her. I sat back down, the laptop already shut on the couch.
She nodded, still scanning the entire room, "Figured. Just guessing here, but this is probably the best civilian security set-up you can have besides your own private army. Smart move for the night."
"He was generous." Though Tony was giving in most aspects, he was very grateful once he learned we'd saved his life and a few million others from a sprawling massacre. He offered me an estate to stay in before I even reached out to him. The spare mansion and it's gratuitous safety precautions was probably one of the only places near DC that I wouldn't be completely paranoid sleeping in considering the events of the last week.
My own well-being aside, I was still overly apprehensive of my friends not having the same extreme protection. Leaving Steve at the hospital with Wilson didn't sit too well with me despite the armed guards. I knew Natasha and other SHIELD-or former SHIELD members would retreat to their own versions of safe houses scattered around the area, though the question was if they were truly secure. With the entirety of the agency's database spilled onto the Internet and lingering HYDRA agents still at large, 'undisclosed' SHIELD sites weren't the best choice to seek refuge in.
That's where inviting Zerina to Stark's came in. I regretted the idea the moment I agreed with Layla on it. Still, some small part of my better nature knew my injured half-sister would have no better place to go. The other, much larger piece of my common sense was assured that this entire situation wouldn't reconcile anything. Still, I couldn't say no to Renning when she was still doing so much for me.
"Seems like that." Zerina pressed her lips together, shifting her weight forward onto her crutches. Awkward silence ensued when I couldn't find anything more to comment on.
Just don't think about how every time you see her she accuses you of murder or treason, I thought to try and think of polite small talk, She's not even acting hostile yet.
I sat back down, vaguely gesturing her to do the same before instantly regretting the vain attempt at conversation, "What'd the doctor say about it?"
Sprouse's gaze narrowed at me with apprehension before glancing down to the wrapping around her gunshot wound, "That I should've been in the hospital longer, but they're about a hundred other worse cases. I have an appointment in a place down south tomorrow with more vacancy."
She stopped to swallow and I would've thought she would have elaborated more if her eyes didn't find mine again. That was the most amicable we'd talked to each other in months. It didn't surprise me when Zerina's usual vexation flooded into her voice when she questioned me, "What about you? How fast does a superhuman recover from everything?"
I resisted the urge to set my jaw, expecting the bitterness but my skin still crawled at her low tone. Superhuman. I despised the way she said it in reference to me, to what I had found out myself to be, "I don't know. Meredith is gonna take another tissue sample before the hearing in the morning."
Another uncomfortable beat left between responses. Her demeanor hadn't changed,
"That's progress." My half-sister's hazel eyes still burned with the same emotion highlighting her words. Everything pointed to the precursor of another argument that I didn't have the energy for.
Silence persisted. The chauffeur entered back into the room despite the uneasy tension. He only briefly glanced at the both of us before crossing to the door and dismissing himself outside. Not a sentence was exchanged in those moments and it became painstakingly obvious the two of us had abandoned the previous conversation.
I turned away from Sprouse, still keeping her in the edge of my vision, "I'm going to turn in now. Layla should be back in a half-hour-"
"This was her idea, wasn't it?" Zerina interjected quickly, "Inviting me here for some bullshit reason?"
"Out of concern for your safety?" My own sharpness matched hers easily with the accusation, not wishing for this to escalate further, "Yeah, she did. You're lucky she's as considerate as she is."
Her mouth pinched together, "Then why'd you agree?"
"Doesn't matter." I clipped, pointing back towards the hall, "Your room's to the left-"
"Same reason why you jumped in front of Bradley's gun?"
The mention of Colton's name ignites the pinpricks of energy at my fingertips in an instant. The wound in my shoulder still aches from the deep needle puncture. I bite down when I look back at her face, knowing this is what she wanted to ask all along.
"Zerina, this can be saved for another time-"
"I just need to answer one question-"
"Fine."
There's still palpable static swimming under my skin. Not here, not right now. I need to respond then diffuse the conversation quickly.
I expect to find smoldering hatred at the forefront of her direct glare, but something else strikes my attention. All that burns in her is a determination for something and I have no doubt it's the raw, stripped truth. It's all my sister has ever looked for, but never fully accepted, "Did you know what was going to happen before you put yourself in front of me? Did you know that-that thing would happen and stop the bullet?"
I can feel electric tension pressing underneath the creases of my palm. It's a sensation not foreign to me in the last few months, but it was dramatically amplified by the final component in a DNA cocktail. I knew something was there. I just didn't know what.
"No. I didn't know what was going to happen."
Sprouse swallows and bites down, but the action only halts her stammering for a moment, "So you were just going to take a bullet for me?"
The statement is spit out the same way she spoke when she told me that I had killed Nya; it's an accusation. A troubled vein in her neck throbs in anticipation of the answer. Zerina eyes never leave me and allow me to observe the conflict of emotions gripping within her. She has no idea which way she wants me to answer. She has no idea how to react to it.
I don't know what I'm going to admit or what I even want to say. This is a messy attempt at manipulation. I was fully aware I was walking into a set-up for emotional compromise and I arrived at the ultimatum. Why did I try to take a bullet for my half-sister who had loathed me in every aspect of the word?
"You want me to be honest?" The lines come naturally off the tongue even in my weary state. I don't know if they're trustworthy or simply an aversion from a confession, "Yes. That's my job. I try to minimize casualties on my side of the line. That's what I do."
I'm immediately sick to my stomach before I even finish the last comment. My stoic demeanor doesn't change with the turning of the tide in my thoughts. All I can hear pounding at the front of my skull is Bradley's promise to kill my last living relative and how it would be my fault.
Sprouse is clearly unsatisfied with my response. She curls her lips together and begins to formulate another barrage of ceaseless remarks. Most obviously, she's disappointed.
There's another stab of pain in my chest. I adjust the strap of my sling with my free hand again, fighting urges to speak again before she says another bitter assertion. I can't just let her die. That moment of realization was the only thing that led me to stagger to my feet. It was the only thought that kept me standing.
"And if you died, that's on me." The vulnerability of the statement makes me want to swallow it right back down into my stomach, "Because like it or not, we're each other's last living blood. I regret all of my family's death. I wasn't going to let you be another."
My pulse kicks it's pace up to match the speed at which rampant shame drowns me. I remember to keep my breath steady, repeating one phrase over and over again in my head. I wasn't going to let you be another. It should sound grudging selfish. Part of me meant it to be because it would quantify my familial attachment to her as only potentially detrimental to myself. That's all our relationship has ever been to each other.
Yet it doesn't end there and we now both fully understand that. I stepped in front of the barrel because I spent my entire life hoping to amend the disconnection I felt from the word 'family' that my parents' deaths had created. Zerina was that last living chance.
In some convoluted way, I care for her. I know there's nonsensical, desperate reasoning behind that concern. Maybe it was based purely on DNA alone. It still was something I deemed was worth dying for in that split second.
That concept is frightening.
My sister's strained muscles go slack immediately at my admittance. Her eyes still bore into my own, but the stare moves to my temple once she loses her nerve. Her standoffish persona melts away with the dramatic change in her entire presentation. The anger had diffused to leave the bare, anguished woman underneath.
I still don't expect Sprouse's next announcement, "You're making it really hard to hate you."
It keeps the brashness of her tone but lacks the resentment she always carries. I find it best not to interject as she twists her lips, "I've spent every moment since seeing that video hating you and all you've been doing since we've met has been saving my life. From Cybertek with Coulson, the building before it blew, HYDRA......I'm beginning to lose count of how many times you just decide to save me. And you keep doing it."
Zerina brushes back an escaped strand of hair while focusing her attention directly on the ground. I don't miss how her voice waivers, "I spent seven months hating you because you murdered my mom and you lied about it. I thought you killed Nya and I thought you were a traitor because how else could....could this Avenger be the same person who killed my family unless they were hiding something."
"I spent my whole life looking for two things." She pauses, weighing the next statements before letting them fall off her tongue despite consequence, "My mom's killer and my baby sister. Then I end up with you."
"I'm sorry." The apology leaves my lips before I can process its meaning.
My sister still can't properly face me and continues to talk at the floor panels, "While you were MIA, Fury offered me that Avenger spot. The deal was I take it if he let me see the report filed for Mom's death."
I watch her mouth quirk to the left as all her efforts go into assuring her voice doesn't crack, "She hurt you."
I'm aware of my own emotional state and I'm aware of what the mention of my mother and her lack of care for me does. Now, with the revelation of the anomaly and a concrete reason for Isabelle's abuse, it sends me reeling to hang onto what little information Fury told me.
Zerina finds enough courage to directly look at me as an obvious question hangs in the air, "I'm guessing there's a reason for that."
Why? Presumably the alcoholism because of my father's death, who may have been killed protecting me and the Tesseract energy. The fact she saw me as an unnatural freak. Those were just the first two in a myriad of options that could explain her hatred of me, yet it still begs why? Why would this woman hate me, even if I was an anomaly? Why would this mother love Zerina and Nya, but not me?
It makes me burn. That fact makes me burn with anger or sadness or heartache or whatever feeling erupts from my core. Isabelle loved them. Yes, she had been distant in their lives, but she loved them.
"Isabelle probably had a mountain of them to justify it all, or at least try to." I shrug my good shoulder while deciding whether or not to hand over the flash drive stowed in my pocket. Maybe I owe that to her, "I have an idea for some of them."
"Doesn't make it right."
The sentence is a catharsis and a fact, yet somehow I struggle to grapple with it all these years later. I inhale slightly, not wanting to jump headfirst back into my repressed memories of the basement when so many other traumatic recollections take precedent. My mind instead rested on the drive I'd asked for, "What files did Nick give you? Just the one from 1999?"
Zerina's gaze hadn't broken yet and became even more quizzical from my diversion in the conversation, "I think so; standard procedure mission report from when they found you."
My own apprehension already tries to persuade me against the action I'm about to take. I'm already rethinking the move of reaching for the drive, but my fingers had already grasped it. Heat rushed through the lines of my palm with pinpricks dancing across the places where my skin met the metal. I don't swallow down the lump that's formed in my throat before extending my hand to show her the USB, "Here's everything else."
Sprouse is hesitant to reach for the gift, not quite understanding what I'm offering. I elaborate, "I had a friend grab this. It's all the files SHIELD had on my family. I have a few older ones stored, but that was before I found you and Nya."
"Everything? Like the truth version of everything?" Her question is plagued by an uncertain hope dangling in front of her. Her tone finds it's edge again, "Because you've played that card before."
It won't include everything about the anomaly or Dr. Swell's experiments, but it doesn't omit much else, "No, this is it. I'm sure there are gaps that won't match up with the info, but..."
Zerina's already eagerly procured it, turning the drive over in her own grasp. I find it futile to ramble more as her attention is entirely on the small piece of tech. Her fixed features betray the fact that I just handed her, truly, everything she was ever looking for. The moment that revolutionized my life so many years ago when I fired that gun was the same moment that changed her's. Even still, she doesn't take it at complete face value, "I don't...I get that you're trying to mend things after a huge trauma and I kind of deserve this, but why? After we've been huge assholes to each other?"
I have to bite my tongue not to correct her and guilt helps weigh down challenging words. You did try to frame me as a double agent, so it's kinda your fault......I swallow them down because so much of the blame rests on me, "I have an idea what it's like to have the biggest bombshell of your life dropped right on you and not having anything answered. And you're not a HYDRA double agent, so it's okay to pass on the info."
"Yeah, I can see a change of heart there." Zerina almost appears amused by the comment, but holds her tongue for a moment more. The pause is brief, but in it she finds soft gratitude I've never before seen her exude, "So thank you. And I guess this is the part where I admit I don't hate you."
The left corner of my lip twitches up, "I don't hate you either."
Another awkward moment passes whilst I realized we've reached a cordial agreement of indifference. Sprouse purses her lips but doesn't retreat to looking at the floorboards. Instead, she reverts to small talk, "So Layla gets back soon?"
"She's on her way, so any minute now." I finally feel comfortable enough to glance back at the monitors by taking my eyes off of my sister, "The whole place will go on a complete lockdown after that."
"What's she doing out so late?"
"Picking up a few things for me."
She bobs her head slightly as if she expected the answer, "Not a surprise. How's she holding up?
"Better than expected. She's just been focusing on damage control and reviewing all the job offers from private tech companies until she gets overwhelmed. Then she retells the story of you two sneaking inside the Tri using a tractor, which I still don't entirely understand, but it takes her mind off everything." I reach out to grab the stress ball, giving it a small squeeze to unload some of the pressure the conversation dealt me.
"Yeah...that's kind of a long story." Zerina shifts again on her crutches, "but I'm surprised the military hasn't drawn her up a contract yet."
I slightly shrug with the only available shoulder I have, "Give it a day or two and they'll be offering her starting bonus Stark might bat an eye at."
My sister's eyebrows crinkle at that comment and then observed the vast room again, perhaps wondering how much money would entice even a billionaire. She contemplates for a moment longer until stating, "I can't see her with the government though. Not after this mess."
Another weight on my chest comes when I sigh, "I don't see any of us even thinking of going back on a federal payroll for a while."
The mindless conversation loses it's traction when I see Sprouse's eyes dart towards the hallway to the guest bedroom. Both of us are thankful to wrap whatever the last fifteen minutes have been up, "Room's down there, right?"
"To the left." I jut my chin in the appropriate direction, "You have a ride to your appointment? If not, Hamen can-"
"Sharon's giving me a lift."
"Carter?"
"Yep." The clarification is quick before Zerina turns back to me, the drive held secure in her hand and a little bit of edge to her words, "Then I don't think I wanna be in a 50-mile radius of DC ever again. So unless I see you in the morning, good luck with the hearing. And the rest of your life."
My fingers tighten around the rubber ball without thought. If she has her way, we'll never see each other again. My voice is steady, "Good luck with the rest of yours."
Too much time passes but she doesn't hobble away yet. Too much sincerity bleeds into both the look she gives me and the subdued tone, "Take care of Layla, please. And kill whoever sent Bradley."
"I will." Suddenly there's such a finality attached to everything I utter. I couldn't have imagined all those months ago, when I freed her and Coulson from a Cybertek holding cell, that so much would have happened, "I'm sorry it ended up like this."
"Me too."
And I watch my sister angle her crutches towards the door and limp out of my life.
~~~~~~
The next eight minutes were spent on the couch staring at the brick wall, trying to calm the slight burning sensation gnawing at the palms of my hands and trying not to think about the last half hour. Or even the general state of my life.
I looked to my left at the laptop screen with bright white letters stating 92% of decryption completed.
A huff of impatience left my mouth as I threw the rubber ball down to the floor, which bounced onto the wall before ricocheting back to me. I caught it easily, turning it over through my fingers before throwing it back. It was a distraction from the ceaseless static.
93% of decryption complete
The AI's disembodied voice seemed to come from every corner of the room when it made it's announcement, "Ms. Renning is at the front."
The ball bounced back as my neck swiveled towards the double doors eagerly, "Let her in."
I could hear Layla's tired chattering before the doors had fully parted. She squeezed through the space that had opened between them and made a beeline to the plush couch I resided on, "I just wanna talk about the absolute mess they call a filing system at the prestigious Homeland Security HQ. It was a madhouse."
"They are dealing with an international emergency and just got millions of intelligence info-dumped in their lap." The toy came hurtling back to my hand as the exasperated blonde scoffed at my comment. She let go of the large messenger bag filled with mission reports and let it drop onto the middle of the living room floor while simultaneously trying to slip out of her sneakers at the same time. The result was her tripping into the cushion to the right of me.
"So they haven't had time to organize; Let me complain about it." Layla readjusted herself to sit up normally and brushed her tangled hair out of her face. When she leaned closer to me to get a peek at what was on my laptop, I instantly smelled a pungent whiff of alcohol on her breath. The next observation was the swollen bags under her red-rimmed eyes.
Renning squinted her eyes at the bright screen, "Why didn't you wait for me to start the decryption? I could've cut the wait time in half."
"You were busy and I was bored." My eyebrow went up in surprise, "Where did you find a bottle of red wine in the middle of recovering top secret mission files?"
"To be specific, it was a merlot," My friend was quick to defend herself, fighting off a yawn and bringing up her index finger to hold my attention, "and I found it in a hospital and for the record, Mere is a lot more wasted then I am right now. Did Zerina get here?"
I didn't hide my obvious eye roll at her deflection and tossed the ball back at the floor, "About twenty minutes ago. She's in the first guest room."
"Good, I'll say hi to her in the morning."
"So you and Meredith passed around a bottle of wine in a hospital," I set the computer aside for a moment to cock my head in her direction, trying to get a better gage on her emotional state, "before you went to collect high-risk government secrets?"
Renning wasn't good at hiding things from me and that became painfully obvious when she resisted looking me directly in the eyes in favor of being very invested in watching her fidgeting fingers, "She got done with a crazy long shift and then we had a sisterly bonding moment that was really just us drinking in a supply closet while having a meltdown. I was responsible and only had a half a glass there before I left and the drive to the facility meant the alcohol was already processed through my liver by the time I got there."
The scent of liquor that was now very hard to ignore was too recent to be from half a drink hours ago. It was easy to deduce the rest of the story, "But you took the bottle with you and finished it on the drive back."
"I finished it." Layla still didn't look at anything but her hands, but her tone had begun to ease to match a more earnest story, "I cried the whole way here until I saw the Stark logo on the gate."
An instant, empathetic pain blossomed in my chest and every regret I had about bringing her in on the mission came to the forefront of my conscious. I took a moment to prepare sympathies as best I could, "That's a normal reaction to everything that's happened-"
"Colton's dead."
That silenced me immediately. Dead air surrounded us as she tipped her head back to focus on the ceiling with a pained grimace and it was easy to tell she was trying not to let tears spill. A knot coiled in my throat as I relived the moment in which I sent Bradley sprawling into the wall. The sickening crack of his spine breaking upon impact resounded clearly in my ears.
"They pulled his body from the wreck four hours ago." Her words were tight to try to keep her composure.
The muscles of my back tensed in their usual, uncomfortable way while heat built in my palms. I had to keep my own nervous tics from manifesting while energy expectantly rushed towards my fingertips. I tried not to dwell on it as I threw the stress ball back at the floor.
"I know." I admitted, a stab of misplaced guilt in my gut, "I saw the building fall on him."
She didn't say anything more nor seemed to be too surprised by this. My friend worked her jaw while I spoke again, "I didn't tell you earlier because of everything that's happened since-"
"No, no you were kind of busy throwing up. I get that." She took in several shallow breaths to keep her own anxiety at bay before turning to me. When she finally did meet my gaze, I expected to find some betrayed expression. Instead, I found a conflicted one. Layla swallowed back whatever else she had to say on the subject and mustered an odd grin, "Good riddance, I guess. I'm totally gonna start sobbing about this in another twenty minutes, but until then I'm not going to talk about it because both of us need a break."
Somewhere inside of me there was selfish relief that we wouldn't discuss the subject. The less ego-centric part of me knew that Renning needed to get some rest before plunging herself into more emotional turmoil. I nodded in agreement as the ball hurtled back to me, "Sounds like a plan. Try to get to bed in the next half-hour, okay?"
Layla pushed herself off the couch and meandered towards the kitchen, pulling her hair back with a scrunchie from around her wrist, "Already working on it. I'm going to take a shot of NyQuil and hope I don't start hallucinating. You should try it."
"I think I'll pass." The premise of guzzling down cough medicine and then puking it right back up wasn't a welcome one. I was already uncomfortable again; my nerves were still humming from talking with Zerina and the mention of Bradley.
I needed a distraction. Another glance at the computer screen told me ninety-eight percent of the decryption was complete. With that still loading, I turned my attention to the discarded messenger bag in the middle of the floor. With a long groan, I grabbed at the strap and pulled it towards me.
Renning had already flung open enough cabinets to find the NyQuil and was currently pouring herself some, "Okay, but you need to get some sleep before the hearing. I'm totally for you hunting down all of HYDRA single-handedly, but you really need to put the files away. Even if you just pass out on the couch, I'll join you. It'll be a post-trauma sleepover."
She gulped down the medicine and headed back to the couch while I flipped the flap of the case open. Where I expected to see dozens of folders, a folded leather jacket was stuffed down over the papers. My eyebrows scrunched in surprise as I pulled the clothing out.
"Oh, Hill sent someone to leave that for you. 'Must've forgotten it when she picked up the duffle bag." My friend thought nothing of it and was quickly confused by my reaction, "It's got your knives and everything-"
"Maria couldn't have left this." My regular knives were in their custom pockets that had been specially fitted for me. The leather of the left shoulder was torn from where a bullet had clipped my collarbone. This was the same jacket that had been forcibly ripped off me when HYDRA recaptured me for a total of twenty minutes before an unlikely ally helped free me, "I left this in a truck somewhere near Trolley Road."
I dug into all of the inner pockets looking for anything else that proved this was my lost jacket. My fingers brushed against a scrap of paper. I hastily pulled it and unfolded a short note scribbled in poor handwriting. Shock tore through me when I read it.
Glad you made it out - JC
Layla bewilderedly adjusted her glasses, "I'm not tracking anything...but is Jesus Christ giving you back your knives...I mean, I know you're Catholic but I didn't know you were this right with God."
The static under my skin expanded tenfold as I forced myself to re-read the message over again, "Her name's Julianne Caris and I didn't know if she was still alive."
Why was this girl still in DC? I turned over the note to find more written in bold letters on the opposite side; METIS. Was that a name? An acronym for something?
"Who's Julianne Caris?" Renning loomed over my shoulder to spy what had been written. She moved out of my way once I grabbed the laptop again. The decryption had finished, leaving thousands of mission reports filed by SHIELD/HYDRA over the years successfully downloaded to my flash drive.
"She's the woman who sent me to the Lemurian Star."
I rubbed my thumb against my ring finger as I stood up, stopping only when I realized the friction increased the heat gathering at the edges of my hand. I picked up the stress ball instead and called out to the household AI, "Show me the files on the main screen."
"No problem Ms. Firman."
In a split-second, my laptop screen was imposed and enlarged on the massive TV hung on the brick wall. My pulse skipped a few beats and I ignored the sensation by giving another order, "Search all personnel records. Keyword 'Julianne Caris'. Include potential pseudonyms."
Less than a moment later, I was staring at the profile photo of a redhead somewhere in her late-twenties. She appeared much more well-rested compared to the woman I'd met days ago, but it was the same person. The latest update had put her last known location as the Triskelion.
I threw the ball back at the wall and finally elaborated more on Layla's question, "She gave me a few answers about my time with HYDRA, but I don't think she told me everything."
Renning's has was slightly ajar while she rapidly read the screen, only closing her mouth to express some more confusion, "Uh-huh. When did you have time to meet her?"
"Very long story," The unwanted static had returned to simmer in me and I did my best to keep my heartbeat steady. More pressure was applied to the ball in my palm and I sent it flying back towards the brick.
"But she was a part of HYDRA and she was stationed somewhere on the German border-"
CRACCKK!!
A bolt of electricity might as well have shocked me to life at the loud sound. Instinct immediately made me try to reach for the knife at my side, but a quick observation of the scene made it clear there was no apparent threat. The clamor wasn't from an impending attack, but rather from only a few feet away.
"Oh...oh my God." Layla's attention had rapidly shifted from gazing at the picture of the mysterious woman on the TV screen to the lovely interior decorating that had just been ruined, "There's a hole in the wall."
One look and I knew Stark would have something to say about this. Or more likely Pepper would kill me, "You've got to be kidding me."
The rubber stress ball hadn't just dented the wall in impact, but was firmly lodged several inches deep into the slab. Fine, crushed pieces created by the fissures spindling out from the crack in the bricks fell onto the hardwood floor and had begun to make a pile of dust beneath the mess. I had just thrown the ball into the wall and now it was crumbling.
The pin pricks of energy dancing across my hands lessened once I realized what I had just done. I spun around to look back at Layla, who simply repeated herself amidst her own surprise, "You just put a hole in the wall with a rubber ball. And unless the NyQuil just kicked in, your irises are kinda glowing."
Not right now, do not want this right now
"And your hands." She gestured towards my one useable arm, "Your hands are glowing. But it's dimming."
"For crying out loud...." I muttered when I glanced down. The same thin, silver strands of light that I had witnessed on the bank of the Potomac River now followed the path of the veins that ran down to my wrist. In a blink, the illuminance disappeared back into my bloodstream and I was left with the ruined wall and a very startled friend.
Layla and I shared a look as I stood unmoving in the middle of the living room, only glancing back to the ball when I had digested the fact I had managed to throw something that small so hard that it broke brick. It was another moment before she spoke again, "Did you know you could do that?"
"I don't think so."
hello all it's been a minute ( seven months...whoops) and here's me offering you a tad more on what sienna's extent of her powers will be. so far, we have the fact she can conjure up an energy shield, has an advanced rate of healing, and mayyy be a little stronger than before.
one more chapter to go folks and then that will be up by the end of this week!! it's like half way written and i'm putting a lot of work into because it has a few moments pay off so much build up ive done over this lonnggg book!
but it's been awhile since i updated (absolutely my fault) and since then both endgame and captain marvel came out and may i just say...... *chef's kiss* thank you carol danvers for my life
and alsoooooooo;
no one:
not a soul:
me: okay tho zerina is probably one of the more complex characters i've accidentally conceptualized and she's grown a lot and let's just appreciate that even if she can be a bitch at least she's a justified bitch
it's late where i am at and this author's got work in the morning so enjoy these three girls and hopefully this chapter doesn't suck