A Rush Of Blue
Wanda goes down hard and Pietro can feel it in his every molecule.
He can hear Cap screaming at him to hold the line; Clint yelling at him, begging him to stay back, but it's a background noise. Everything feels like it's fading into the ether in the midst of the complete absence of Wanda he can feel within his bones.
The blink of time it takes to reach her feels like an eternity, every inch of him desperate to reach her, and the sight of her broken body in front of him brings him to his knees.
Too late.
Not good enough.
Too slow.
What the hell good was this power of his when it couldn't even let him protect his sister? All the pain they'd endured, the weeks of torture disguised as experiments, and where did it get them? Pietro can feel Wanda's blood soaking into the fabric of his trousers and it's too much.
He snaps.
His world explodes in an icy burst of blue power. The pain that rips through his mind and body is nothing compared to the aching emptiness in his heart. Wanda's voice calling his name is the last thing he hears before the blackness overtakes him. He falls into nothingness with a smile on his face.
He awakens in stages. He can feel a large, calloused hand squeezing his own. Clint, his mind supplies - even in death he'd know the feel of those hands against his skin. Except he can't be dead if Clint's here, can he? Or is this what heaven feels like? There's another hand, smaller, softer, just as familiar stroking through his hair and his heart leaps, causing a shrill beeping noise to force its way into his consciousness.
Wanda.
Gasping, Pietro bolts upright, eyes wide and panicked as he takes in the familiar sight of the infirmary, the even more familiar sight of a concerned Clint and Wanda at his bedside.
"You - you - were...you d- -", Pietro chokes on his words, as much from the inability to vocalise the cold, hard thought that Wanda had been dead than from any lingering hurt.
"Easy, kid."
Pietro bats Clint's hands away, glaring. Easy? The old man wants him to be easy when all he can remember is Wanda's unseeing eyes staring up at him, her broken body on the ground. Nothing about that was easy. He scrambles madly, reaching for Wanda, seeking her touch, needing to feel her skin against his, needing to hear the rush of blood and oxygen that would prove beyond a doubt that she was really here.
"You brought me back," she whispers against his neck, her breath sending a ghost of shivers down his spine. "You brought me back. I'm OK. I'm here."
Pietro's chest expands, a deep breath, inhaling the sweet, floral scent that is Wanda into his lungs and he relaxes.
This is real.
She's here.
Clint's here.
He's here.
With Wanda pressed against him and Clint's warm, steadying hand on his shoulder, Pietro laughs.
"Does this mean that you can run fast, too?"
Wanda pulls back just far enough to meet his eyes, smiling widely. "You want to race and find out?"
Clint doesn't let them race right then, pushing Pietro back against his pillows and growling at him to at least wait until he's discharged from medical.
Pietro indulges him just this once, lets him fuss with the blankets and grumble over what's taking Dr Cho so long.
He has his sister and Clint.
For the first time in a long time he isn't in a hurry to go anywhere.