My eyes opened and my head was in Natasha's lap.
I glanced around. I was in the backseat of the truck. "What happened?" I started to move but Nat held me down. "Don't move."
I noticed the pain in my leg. "My leg." I pointed my hand.
"Yeah you got a pretty bad wound there, don't worry it's not broken." Nat moved the hair out of my face.
My fingers were shaking. "Dad." I softly said. He was driving so he couldn't look back. "Hazel, you're okay." He assured me. "We're going to a safe place, for now stay still until we look at your wounds."
"Only my leg hurts." I was forced to look at the ceiling of the truck.
Nat was gently touching my head. Trying to keep me calm.
I feel protected and safe around Nat, I don't have many mother figures in my life. She's basically the only one.
After some silence I spoke up. "I don't like how that ended, let's pretend that never happened."
"Life doesn't work that way." Dad glanced back. "It does now." I shot back.
• • •
We pulled up to a small house. Natasha gently helped me out. Not letting my leg touch the ground.
Dad knocked on the door of the house. After a few seconds the door opened to reveal Sam Wilson. "Hey, man."
"I'm sorry about this. We need a place to lay low." He said quietly. We were covered in dirt. Looking like we worked in coal mines.
"Everyone we know is trying to kill us." Nat was holding me up. Sam paused a moment before replying. "Not everyone." He fully let us enter.
• • •
I sat on the counter, Sam offered to help with my leg because he knew medical stuff better or something, I don't know.
"Well it's not broken." He turned and pulled out some bandages that you would get from the store. "You definitely lost a good amount of blood. You should be fine because you know..Superness, whatever you call it."
"Super soldier serum." I corrected. "And thank you." He finished wrapping my leg and helped me down.
There's a dull pain in my leg but now that's it has been cleaned, medicated and wrapped it doesn't hurt as much. "Want to help me make breakfast?" Sam pulled out a pan.
"Sure, just warning you I barely cook." I picked up some bread to put in the toaster.
"In that case, let me go get some armor." He joked.
I rolled my eyes and pressed the button for the toast. "I should get this dirt off my face." I limped to where Nat and Dad were in a bedroom.
"Well, I guess I just like to know who I'm fighting." Dad was talking to nat.
Natasha stood up to tried and help me. "No, I can walk." I don't want to be babied. I walked into the bathroom and grabbed a wash cloth.
After my face was clean, my hair that is naturally blonde had so much dirt in it that I looked like I had brown hair.
I bent down and washed the nasty out of my hair and patted it to stop the dripping but I'll let it air dry.
I opened my backpack but on normal clothes but I couldn't get my shoes and bottoms off without hurting my leg.
I sighed and yelled. "Nat! Could you help me?" After a few seconds she opened the door and started helped me.
I hate asking for help. I looked at the dirt ripped pink skirt. "I hated that skirt anyway." I huffed. Natasha finished helping me and tied my shoes. "Hazel, it's okay to ask for help, you don't have to pretend to be alright all the time." She was still kneeled down. "Hazel. Something is wrong, you can tell me." She put her hand on my hand.
I sighed. "Back in when I went under....I didn't tell the whole story." I admitted.
She raised her eyebrow in a curious manner. "Peggy woke me up because she need to take care of business, at the old shield base...that blew up, anyway. We walked in, She she told me to wait for her but I didn't listen. I was a dumb 10 year old." I picked at my nails, a anxiety habit.
Natasha didn't say anything but listened. "Well I looked around and eventually left the building, I wandered for a bit then I stopped by a tree. Some hydra agents came to get me. I...I tried to fight back but...I was so weak."
"They kidnapped me, took me to Siberia, a hydra facility. That's where I found out that he was my father..." I continued.
"I don't know what they were going to do but, when they took me out of the cell I fought out but they caught me before I was able to leave. They took my blood for I don't know what." My voices cracked.
"Then I got away again. This time I made it almost away, but...a man shot my ankle." I slowly pointed to my ankle. The scar is still there.
"He was too strong...." tears fell down my cheeks. "He choked me and held me over the cliff, that's where the cold icey water was. He threw me over."
Natasha pulled out some tissues from the sink and handed me them. "Hazel, you cheated death, an assassination. You lived."
"I should have listened to Peggy." I felt ashamed. "I never disobeyed her and the one time I did, it cost years and years of my life." I sniffed.
"Hazel, you have to move on, you lost so much but you gained much too." She spoke in a motherly tone.
I smiled, Natasha stood up and helped me stand as well. I hugged her. "Thank you for listening." I muttered.
Natasha rubbed the back of my head. "Hurry up, we need to figure out this mess with hydra." She pulled away and walked out. She's right, I need to move on.
I looked at my face, it was still red from crying but I'll be okay. I looked at my outfit, way more comfortable then that skirt.
I walked out. Dad and Nat were talking but I don't think she told him. I only left one one part of that. That James threw me over. I don't have the heart to tell him.
Sam walked in. "I made breakfast. If you guys...eat that sort of thing."
• • •
We were all sat in Sam's kitchen. I was eating some eggs. Finally I can eat. "So, the question is: who in SHIELD could launch a domestic missile strike?" Nat questioned.
"Pierce." He replied. I met pierce once. He looks like that orange guy who owns the huge hotel towers or something. "Who happens to be sitting on top of the most secure building in the world." Nat walked from around the counter.
"But he's not working alone, Zola's algorithm was on the Lemurian Star." Dad talked about stuff that I didn't really understand but hey these eggs are heaven.
"So was Jasper Sitwell." Nat sat down. "But Why was Jasper on the ship?" I took another bite.
"Yeah, the real question is: how do the two most wanted people in Washington kidnap a SHIELD officer in broad daylight?" Dad literally said what I said but with bigger words.
"The answer is: you don't." Sam dropped a file in front of us. "What's this?" Dad reached for the file but Nat picked it up before him.
"Call it a resume." Natasha picked up a photo of Sam with his para-rescue team. "Is this Bakhmala? The Khalid Khandil mission, that was you." Nat turned to Dad "You didn't say he was a para-rescue." She looked at the photo of Sam with his colleague, I stood up and started washing my dish.
I'm learning new things about the people around me everyday. I thought Sam was a slow, weak, runner but he's practically a bird. And that's amazing.
I sat back down. "I can't ask you to do this, Sam. You got out for a good reason." Dad tried to turn down Sam's offer. "Dude, Captain America needs my help. There's no better reason to get back in." He assured us.
"Where can we get our hands on one of these things?" I picked up the file and looked at him in his mighty bird suit.
"The last one is at Fort Meade, behind three guarded gates and a twelve-inch steel wall." Sam spoke like it was a big deal. We looked at Natasha who shrugged her shoulders.
"That shouldn't be a problem." I shrugged. He took down a quinjet and has done many other things, this is nothing.
Whoop Whoop here a meme y'all