About the Iphone
There was so much to do, and yet so little.
Relief efforts were made. Steve crawled back out of his retirement quickly enough, causing an entirely new media shitstorm. For this, Bucky felt grateful; so much had changed without his knowledge, without his consent, and no longer having Steve by his side at the time was a blow bigger than any of them. When Steve first began poking his head in on meetings again, interjecting here and there, Bucky had been almost annoyed. If he was going to have to adjust to an Avengers without Steve, he would have rather ripped the bandaid clean off. But his annoyance faded to relief when Steve began tagging along to relief efforts, helping to organize missions, and eventually, returning to training with the rest of them.
It almost felt normal, then. The random side characters from space went back to space, and with them went Thor, who seemed the most changed out of any of the Avengers who had been left behind. Well, and there was Bruce. He was still Bruce, just… green. Still just the same, otherwise. Maybe a bit more confident- and if Bucky was being honest, he didn’t like it. It was jarring, to hear Bruce say things he never would have said right to his face. To see him training alongside Steve and Natasha, lifting the one-ton weights and throwing punches as himself and not the Hulk.
Well. The world wasn’t going to rewind itself just for him. And he wasn’t the only person going through it- he knew that, he did. But it felt unfair, that he should have to do it twice. Hadn’t he already readjusted to a world that was irrevocably changed? Hadn’t he been de-programmed and socialized once already? He had killed and maimed and blackmailed, and remembered it. He had frozen and unfrozen and hurled up the nothing he was allowed to eat under Hydra while defrosting. He had learned to use an iphone, read the books, catch up on movies. Everything.
And there was Carrie. At least she wasn’t training, Bucky thought. She was recovering, still weak from her close brush with death. And her hands were still fucked, anyway. He didn’t know when she might return to team operations, and most of him hoped it was never- though he wasn’t so stupid as to believe that might be a real possibility.
He hated her, he decided. She wasn’t like the rest of them; poisoned or beaten or chained. She certainly wasn’t hardened by the storm of her upbringing. She was normal . She put romcoms on the TV and tried out recipes from tiktok- always with one of her three little lackeys in tow. It became a normality for Bucky to catch Bruce stumbling after her or even to see Will, a complete outsider, trolling around the tower at her heels. Peter hung around her often, too, although this bothered Bucky the least out of the three of them. Bucky hadn’t asked specifically what had happened with the kid, but for some reason, he had moved in following the battle and never left. Bucky wasn’t sure what the onus was on child super-soldiers if they were willing, but he wouldn’t exactly call himself a fan of the idea. He never bothered to confront Tony about it, though; frankly, he was tired of shouldering the team’s affairs on top of his own. He wished, (although it wasn’t an entirely conscious wish), that everything would just slow down.
“ Peter?”
Carrie was fussing around in the kitchen earlier than usual, Bucky noted with annoyance. Since when did her routine cut into his? He had been blessed, so far, that his pre-existing routine existed mostly in a realm which didn’t seem to collide with the one she had formed during his absence. She woke up much later than Bucky on weekdays, (since he rose in the early hours of the morning to go running with Steve), and much sooner than he did on the weekends. There was almost never a time when they were in the kitchen at the same time for breakfast or even for coffee. For whatever reason, though, she had decided to change things up. It was barely seven AM, and here she was cooking breakfast, a half-finished mug of coffee on the counter next to her as she worked. Bucky sidled up to the machine to pour his own mug, side-eyeing her. She smiled briefly at him, but let it drop a moment later when he didn’t return it.
“ I know! ” Peter’s voice rang out from down the hall, and Carrie paused to glance back in the direction of his room before she sighed to herself, turning back to the pan and tipping the fried egg that had been cooking in it out and onto a piece of buttered toast. A moment later, Peter tumbled down the hallway, tugging self consciously at the flannel layered over his t-shirt and messing with his hair. Bucky noted with interest the backpack slung over his shoulder, which he deposited at the base of the kitchen island before pushing himself up onto one of the stools.
“You really didn’t- you didn’t have to make breakfast,” Peter said feebly, his eyes flickering over the kitchen utensils that had obviously been used and Carrie’s back as she moved about, continuing to use them. She shook her head, and from the corner of his eye, Bucky could see a small smile on her face. She bit it back.
“What, now you’re afraid to abuse my hospitality?” she quipped lightly. She reached into the spice rack, pulling out salt, pepper, and… a few other things, before she began seasoning the egg. “You used to swing by Antonio’s every other day begging me for a free slice.”
“I never begged, ” Peter huffed. He flushed slightly, glancing at Bucky to see if he was listening. Bucky focused his own attention intently on his coffee, pretending not to.
“Uh-huh.” Carrie finished up whatever blend of seasonings she had chosen, and then scraped the spatula back into the pan, fishing out two thick tomato slices which had been softening over the oil next to the eggs. She set them over top of the egg, and then turned around. Sliding the plate over the counter to Peter before flitting back around to turn off the burner. “I’ve still got it, see?”
Peter grinned as he took the plate, mumbling out a quick thank you before he began to shovel down his breakfast. Typical teenager, Bucky thought. Carrie seemed to think so too, and she stifled a short laugh as she began to clean up from cooking.
“You’re not eating?” Bucky asked, not thinking before he opened his mouth. Carrie paused, turning to him. She hadn’t expected him to speak to her- honestly, when he had come in, she had felt a little anxious to have intruded on what she thought of as ‘his time’ to use the kitchen. It wasn’t like they talked very much at all, but Carrie knew he didn’t like her and they had come to some silent agreement to avoid each other as much as possible.
“I can’t eat this early. Makes me sick. Even in school, I couldn’t do it. But,” she paused, leaning over the kitchen island to ruffle Peter’s hair. He let out a noise of protest around a mouthful of food, but she just snickered at him. “Kid’s gotta go back to class today. Can’t let him go hungry, can I?”
Peter choked back his bite. “You can, actually. You don’t need to get up early just because I have to, I can-”
“Stop arguing with me,” she cut him off, crossing her arms. “I want to do it. I’m not letting you do everything by yourself, you’re just a kid. Relax a little.”
Bucky surveyed the interaction with slight interest. He hadn’t really thought about Peter having to go back to school, and the whole thing felt oddly domestic. Peter seemed anxious- whether it was because he was nervous about school, or because he was uncomfortable letting someone else try to take care of him, Bucky didn’t know. He guessed it was probably a mix of both. It wasn’t like Carrie was a kid- she was thirty, only a couple of years younger than he was, but she would’ve only been twenty-five before the snap, when Peter knew her, and the kid was just sixteen. She certainly wasn’t a matronly age. From what Bucky could gather, she had always looked out for him, but it was more in the way that someone who ran on the same streets would look after their younger neighbors. Peter was a vigilante, and their network ran deep in New York. Had Carrie been a part of it? That didn’t sound quite right. He was sure he would have remembered if one of the New York vigilantes had a cloning power- he would have recognized it, when she’d shown up for the battle.
“I didn’t know we were throwing a party.”
Tony shuffled into the kitchen, Morgan in tow. Seeing him with his daughter still gave Bucky whiplash, even after a few months- yet another thing he had yet to get used to.
“You’re behind, Stark,” Carrie teased. She batted his hand away as he began reaching for the pan to make Morgan her own breakfast, and then reached up to the microwave, pulling out a covered plate similar to Peter’s. She pulled the tomatoes off of the egg and cut it in half, putting one part of it on a small plate and handing it off to him. Tony grunted an acknowledgement, clasping his hand over her shoulder for a moment in a show of gratitude before he set the plate at the stool next to Peter’s, hauling Morgan up to sit next to him. She giggled, kicking her feet, and Peter grinned at her, raising a hand for a fist bump. He had met her only recently, like Bucky, but he seemed to be the type to be fond of kids, and he had spent a lot of time babysitting her in the past month while Tony was busy trying to sort out Avenger’s business with everyone else.
“You’re my favorite Avenger,” Tony grumbled quietly to Carrie, cutting between her and Bucky to reach for the coffee machine. Morgan, left to her own devices, began eating and babbling away at Peter, who responded with an equal enthusiasm. “I’m so bad with the alarms. Usually Pepper does breakfast.”
“To be fair, I didn’t actually make it for her,” Carrie hummed, grinning as she watched Tony try to blink away his exhaustion. “I just wasn’t going to eat it until later.”
“Right. Thank you,” he sighed, slumping back against the counter and taking a deep sip of his coffee. If it burned him, he didn’t so much as wince.
“Long night, Stark?” Bucky asked. Tony smiled, tight-lipped.
“Yes, yes. We have a lot to take care of, Barnes. Some of us have organizational roles on this team, on top of training.”
“Oh, leave him be,” Carrie rolled her eyes. Bucky’s gaze darted to her, a bit surprised that she would defend him. “He has a very full schedule. Sulking from seven to nine, training for an hour, and then brooding until dinner.”
Well, that made a lot more sense. Bucky glared at her, and she flashed him her teeth.
“Right. And what do you do all day?” he snarled back. She raised an eyebrow.
“Work,” she stated plainly.
“I haven’t seen you at training,” he prodded. Immediately, Tony’s lips quirked slightly downward. Since she had come back to the tower, he and Carrie had quickly grown closer. Even if they hadn’t hated each other, they had been coworkers at best. Now, though, Carrie was beginning to consider Tony as a friend- maybe even a close one. It wasn’t as if Bucky had seen them before, but their friendship was new to him all the same- and it irked him. Why should this woman, who was all but a stranger to him, be so close with anyone on the team? Whether the bonds were newly formed, or if they had been developing over the five-year gap in Bucky’s timeline didn’t matter. It still irked him either way.
“Low blow,” Carrie replied, although she didn’t sound truly hurt. “What am I supposed to do, huh? I can’t pull a trigger anymore. I can grab stuff, but it’s not exactly graceful.”
“Practice makes perfect,” Bucky replied, his voice dry. Carrie snorted, her eyebrow shooting up to her hairline.
“Very nice,” she huffed, and promptly pushed off the counter, moving instead to lean over the kitchen island and join in on Morgan and Peter’s conversation. As she approached, Peter shot her a worried glance- he had obviously been keeping an ear on the adult conversation, even as he entertained Morgan. “Are you guys almost done? Happy will be here in a minute, and…”
The kids were ushered out a few minutes later. Carrie excused herself from the room a moment later, heading back toward her own room to get ready for the day. When she was gone, Tony turned to Bucky, his coffee already drained even while Bucky had over half of his left. He set the mug down with a definitive thunk, frowning.
“That was nasty,” he told Bucky plainly. He didn’t wait for a response before he was dragging himself back out of the room in a practiced beeline for the lab.
Bucky stood there for a while longer. He finished his coffee, staring blankly at the shiny metal of the fridge door as he did. Then, he pushed himself off and scooped up the forgotten plates from Morgan and Peter, taking them and the three empty mugs to the sink. He washed them mechanically, barely paying attention as he lost himself in the kind of thought that was more like non-thought, or like being on autopilot. Since when was Stark so defensive? Since when did he care about the blows someone else was taking? He never would have stepped in if Bucky had said something nasty in the past- whether it had been to Natasha, to Steve, to Bruce- hell, even to himself? Stark was a guy who ignored your anger, not a guy who corrected it… or, was he? He must have changed, in five years. Anyone would.
Bucky flexed the fingers on his metal arm. What did that feel like? Not like the fingers on his real arm, though it could be felt. It was a simulated feeling- an imitation of synapses firing. He ran the fingertips over the plate he was scraping, and then under the hot water. From that, he felt nothing.
Did Carrie still have feeling in her fingers? He pushed the thought away as soon as it had come. He didn’t care. He didn’t care- why should he? Bucky didn’t believe in all that nonsense, empathy and sympathy. He believed that your suffering was your own. He didn’t believe in talking it out, despite the efforts of his court-mandated therapist. He didn’t feel bad for Carrie. He didn’t wonder why she did things or how she felt about them. It was what she didn’t do that infuriated him, how she let herself be trapped here without fighting it.
What kind of person gave up their freedom so willingly? It was disgusting to him. It wasn’t like she was in handcuffs, it wasn’t even like she had a set of explicit rules to follow. And yet, she never tried to leave undiscerned. Bucky had seen it- had been standing next to Natasha when her phone had gone off. “Just central park.” “Just down for coffee.” As if she was expecting to be hauled back, the moment she tried to go rogue. It wasn’t even like she was a high-grade criminal. Hell, Loki would probably have greater jurisdiction on Earth, and he had tried to take it over once. Carrie’s crimes were, to Bucky’s knowledge, an entirely civilian matter. And she had settled for, what? Visitation rights to her cell, even after giving up an arm?
He put the dishes on the rack. He could’ve just stuck them in the dishwasher, but he never used it. Sometimes people really couldn’t change, even if it was twenty-twenty-whatever now and the dishwasher had been in circulation for over fifty years. There were some additional fixtures one just never grew to appreciate, he supposed.
When he returned to his room, he could see her moving around, her door cracked open. She had changed into an actual outfit, instead of the pajama pants and volleyball shirt she had been dressed in before, and was carefully combing out her hair. The brush caught a tangle, and a couple of her fingers slipped away from it before she caught herself, hissing with annoyance. She tried again, only for her grip to fall slack again.
“Uhg!” the brush clattered to the floor, and she let her hand fall to her side. She ducked her head slightly, and in the mirror’s face, Bucky caught a glimpse of her expression, twisted with frustration. Quickly, he pushed into his own room, shutting the door behind him.
***
“Hey, Peter- I forgot to ask you if you were gonna buy lunch, but, I’m not too busy, if you need me to, I’ll bring you something.”
Carrie had her phone wedged between her shoulder and her head, which was tilted awkwardly to hold it there. She was getting better with her grip, but the phone was an awkward size for her to hold, since it required her to curl just the tips of her fingers around one side.
“Oh- uhm, I’ll just- I’ll just buy lunch,” Peter replied. His voice was quiet, somewhat shaky. Immediately, Carrie’s brow furrowed.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, concerned. “Why are you upset? Are you in class?”
“I’m not- no, I’m in between classes,” he answered feebly. “I’m fine.”
“Peter,” she sighed, a frown tugging at her face. She knew things were rough for Peter right now, but getting him to admit as much or to rely on her support was still an uphill battle. She didn’t blame him; it had only been a couple of months since she had snapped. Peter was grieving, and adjusting to the shifts in the world. It was certainly a big adjustment, even without having to move and live with an entirely new set of people. The Avengers and Stark Tower were a far cry from an aunt and an apartment, after all. She was sure it was awkward for him, trying to get used to a new set of caretakers. It still felt surreal to think that she was his legal guardian. She was sure however long it was taking it to sink in for her, it would take him even longer.
“No, I’m really fine,” he insisted. To his credit, his voice did sound slightly more sure upon the second insistence. “It’s just… different. I’m okay.”
“Do you have classes with Ned?” Carrie pressed, chewing on her lip slightly.
“Yeah, most of them,” Peter confirmed. There was a slight, appreciative warmth in his voice. “He and MJ both got snapped, too.”
Carrie relaxed slightly, relieved to hear it. “Alright, webs. Just focus on what you need to focus on. If you’re not feeling right, rely on your friends a little more. It’s good you guys got to stick together.”
The phone line was quiet for a moment. Carrie’s working hand fidgeted with the half of her egg sandwich she hadn’t given to Morgan, picking at the edges of the crust where it sat on the counter in front of her. Through the receiver, she could hear Peter take a deep breath.
“I will,” He said, when he had released the air again. “Thank you, Carrie.”
“Don’t ever thank me,” she told him. She relaxed fully, glad to hear him sounding a bit more grounded. “I’m always gonna be watching your six, kid.”
“I get it,” he huffed, the smile audible in his voice. Distantly, Carrie could hear his school-bell ring.
“Get to class,” she dismissed, her own smile just as detectable. “And have fun.”
“I’ll see you later,” Peter promised. He disconnected the call.
The maneuver that was required for Carrie to re-pocket her phone was annoying, but she had mostly mastered it. She shifted it carefully until one end was sticking out over the front of her collar, and flattened her palm below it so that it would rest there once she lifted her head. Then, she pressed it flat against her back so that she could slide it into her back pocket without needing to pinch it or hold it by the sides.
“You might as well use FRIDAY,” Bruce hummed, leaning against the doorway. Carrie glanced up, surprised, and smiled sheepishly.
“I’m too old-fashioned,” she laughed. Bruce pushed into the kitchen, passing by her with a hand on the small of her back to pull open the fridge and search for some kind of breakfast. Carrie picked up her own meal, popping it into the microwave to be reheated. “I like my phone.”
“I still can’t believe you wouldn’t let Tony get you a new one,” Bruce said. Tony had complained many times over the past five years about how attached Carrie was to her old iphone, when clearly the Stark phone was much better. She had never given in, though. She insisted she liked the interface better, or that it was a pain to move her photos over, even when Stark insisted that the AI would take care of it for her.
“Yeah, well, I like my phone,” she told him. It wasn’t anything he hadn’t heard before, but there was something Bruce enjoyed about having the same boring old conversations with Carrie. In some ways, being around her felt different than being around any of the others. Even though her integration to the team had been reluctant and drawn out, she had never been nasty toward him- except, he supposed, during that first day when he had been forced to try and interrogate her. But, of course, he didn’t think that wasn’t her fault; she was under duress. And although she could be just as dry and sarcastic as the others on the team tended to be, Carrie somehow seemed to enjoy herself more, even when she was confined to just the tower. She had hobbies and occupied herself well- and when she didn’t, she seemed just as content to sit and talk aimlessly as she would have been to read, or draw, or do much of anything else. She was easy to talk to- at least, Bruce thought so. She seemed less overly-serious, in some ways.
“Yeah, right. That thing is ancient,” he shot back. “How is the battery even still working?”
“Not well,” she grinned. She pulled herself up to sit on the edge of the counter, twisting around a moment later when the microwave beeped and settling her plate over her legs. She picked up her toast and egg from a somewhat awkward angle, though it was clear that there was a certain precision to her adjusted grasp that had become well-practiced over the past month.
“Peter’s at school?” he asked, pulling out the eggs to make himself a similar breakfast.
“Eavesdrop much?” she teased, shoving a bite past her lips and swallowing. “But yes, he is. Crazy, making them go back so soon.”
“Better they not miss much of the year,” he shrugged.
“Yeah, but Peter says they’re basically repeating a year anyway. They were close to the end of it when they were dusted, so it’s all review.”
“Damn. I guess it will give some of them a chance to do better?”
“He already aced it,” Carrie smiled, obviously proud. “I guess maybe he can bump some ninety-nines up to hundreds.”
They kept chatting for a while. Bruce let himself relax into the familiarity- just him and Carrie, messing around in the kitchen. One of them cooking, both of them eating. Her, propped up on the counter with her feet kicking absently against the cabinets beneath. And him leaning next to her. Talking. Laughing.
Of course, there had never really been a time with no Avengers. But during the snap, it had been much more calm. With the return of the missing half of the population had come an increase in crime, an abundance of refugees. There were political battles and people to help. While charity and relief efforts had become less crucial in the past two years, they were now even more necessary than they had been when Carrie had first been taken in. Not only that, but the return of their missing teammates had caused a shift back to ‘old times-’ people who had moved away and moved on had returned. Steve, Sam, Clint, and Bucky had returned to the tower. Natasha and Tony, who had been there some of the time but hadn’t truly been living within the tower, were far more present. There was a bustle, an abundance of new energy. For the most part, it was a good thing. But him and Carrie- on their own- that had become much more rare, and he had missed it. Between the newfound business of being an Avenger- both for him, who was training more and taking on more missions- and for Carrie, who was shouldering most of the relief and charity organization with Pepper- and the time that she was now dedicating to Peter, (and to Will, a new fixture of the tower), it happened sparingly. When, finally, he had to leave for training, he found he regretted it.
“Recess is over, kids!” Clint crowed, pushing up on his tip-toes just so he could throw an elbow around Bruce’s shoulder, tugging him to a hunched posture as he did. He grinned at Carrie, who he had been very friendly to since his return to the team. “Training in five.”
“Alright,” Bruce huffed, shoving him off. Carrie smiled. “You wanna come watch?”
“Nah, I’ve got work to do,” she told him, sliding off the counter and brushing crumbs from her jeans as Sam and Steve followed in from the direction of their rooms, joining Clint where he was standing next to Bruce. “Have fun, boys.”
She walked off the way that they had come, waving at them as Sam wished her good morning.
“Keep your head up, big guy,” Clint laughed as they moved on, all filing into the elevator together. “You’ll see her later.” Bruce just glanced at him, unimpressed by his teasing.
***
“I thought the sorcerer guy was going to fix her hands.”
Natasha quizzically quirked her brow. She threw up a leg, blocking Bucky’s right hook, and used the leverage to tug his torso downward. He rolled between her legs, attempting to tug one ankle out with his metal arm, but she leapt away a second before he could catch it.
“He tried,” she answered, as she tucked herself back to a defensive position and whirled to face him again. “Didn’t work.”
Bucky’s brow furrowed. He lunged outward again, but Natasha was gone before he could even reach her- like dust in the wind, as usual.
“Why are you asking?” she pressed, when he didn’t continue on. She leapt from nowhere, curling herself around his back, and used her weight to turn him over himself, slamming him down on the mat. He rolled to the side just before the heel of her shoe could connect with his cheek.
“I’m not asking,” he grumbled. She caught him with a roundhouse kick, and he huffed out with the impact. “I mean, I was just wondering. She should be back to training.”
“You say that like you want her here,” Natasha snickered. She clipped his cheek, but only barely. He caught her arm in its retreat, tugging her forward into a grapple and taking them both to the ground.
“I don’t care if she’s here,” he insisted.
Natasha insisted back. “You’re asking.”
Bucky grunted. He twisted one leg around the both of hers, pulling it back so she was forced to bend her knees and sit up on her shins. He pressed her shoulders to the ground, folding her, and she grumbled in annoyance as her cheek flattened to the mat.
“Why are you feeling guilty all of a sudden? Because of what you said?” she asked. Always in need of the upper hand, somehow. She couldn’t ever lose with grace.
“Who told you?” Bucky snapped. He pressed her down with slightly more force, and she smiled.
“No-one. So, what’d you say?”
Bucky let her go. They separated, and he sat back, his arms slung loosely around his knees. They caught their breath, Natasha curling up like a cat, or a French woman, her legs draping carefully to one side.
“You’re a pain,” he mumbled, but he told her. She whistled slowly once he had recalled the exchange from earlier in the morning.
“You’re a real piece of work,” she remarked. He glared at her. “Well, I still don’t see why you feel bad. You don’t like her,” she pointed out.
“Neither do you,” Bucky shrugged. Natasha let out a non-committal hum.
“I’ve grown indifferent,” she admitted. She had missed this, when Bucky had been gone. They had an odd sort of friendship that was built on the practice of blunt, overly-objective discussions. Natasha was too nosy to leave The Winter Soldier alone, and Bucky was too reactive not to indulge her. Oftentimes, it had led them down roads like this one; ruminations on themselves or the people around them. Frankly, he found her to be much more helpful than his therapist, who was overly-focused on ‘feelings’ and ‘getting in touch with them.’
“There are things about her I find to be… off-putting,” Natasha continued. “But she’s not so bad.”
Bucky looked at her suspiciously.
“Something happened,” he said immediately. “Something you didn’t tell anybody.”
“Sure. You’re right.” she admitted. Her lips tightened imperceptibly. The casual tone of her voice was just a bit too forced. Then- “I didn’t agree with her philosophy, but you could say she proved me wrong.”
For a moment, Bucky felt his confusion deepen. Her philosophy? Bucky was well aware of what had caused Natasha to dislike Carrie, initially. Steve had told him, when he’d been catching Bucky up to speed back in Wakanda. Of course, Steve hadn’t witnessed it happen, but he’d heard about…
“The gun?” Bucky questioned, his head tilting slightly. “That philosophy?”
Natasha’s lip tightened a little more perceptibly. A single crease appeared between her brows.
“Sure,” she said again.
“What could have possibly proved you wrong about that?”
Natasha’s hand tightened where it had been resting over the back of her knee.
“Vormir.”
Bucky wracked his brain for a moment. When he seemed to hit on the right piece of information, his eyes widened slightly. Now that he was thinking about it, the information Steve had given him really hadn’t lined up with what he knew to be true- which was that Natasha and Clint were both alive. One of them should have been… well, sacrificed. That, Steve had told him, was how one of the stones had to be retrieved.
“But neither of you loved Carrie,” he protested, still slightly confused. “How did that work?”
Natasha looked far away, for a moment. Her fingers unclenched, and she blinked slightly more slowly than was normal, maybe to calm her thoughts.
“Well, neither of us did it. It was her.”
“Damn,” Bucky blinked. “She split?”
Natasha nodded, confirming his theory.
“I guess you can’t say that my initial opinion on her doing… that kind of thing… was really swayed,” she sighed. “But I have to admit that in some cases, it’s a valuable talent. And at least she’s not… indifferent, you know? It still counted as- as the sacrifice.”
“Killing yourself isn’t a valuable talent,” Bucky countered, his tone slightly pinched. “It’s sick. I still don’t understand how any of you allowed her to do that.”
“Would you rather I pushed Clint?” she asked, her tone defensive. That wasn’t normal- well, neither was Bucky disagreeing with her so wholeheartedly. “Or jumped?”
“I’m not telling you to trade one suicide for another,” he seethed, immediately defensive in kind. As always, reactive.
“Alright, and what? You’d rather we not find the stones? That she not snap? You’d rather trade your life?”
Bucky’s mouth, already parted to cut her off, clamped shut.
“I never asked her to save me,” he spat venomously. “So don’t guilt trip me.”
Natasha stared at him, her expression caught between anger, confusion, and intrigue. He pulled himself off the floor, shucking off the weighted vest he had been wearing to even out the odds and leaving it on the mat as he went toward the door. They had been early to training, and sparring for fun. As he pushed through the entrance, the others were just arriving on the other side, about to join them. He ignored the inquisitions from Steve and Sam. He knocked into Bruce with his shoulder as he passed him, heading straight for the hall.
“What’s his issue?” Clint asked Natasha, his voice audible through the still-open door as he did.
“He’s being a dick.” The door clicked shut behind him.
***
It always felt good, getting to sponsor charity events. Carrie got to be helpful, and any event associated with the Avengers was bound to receive more donations than it would have on its own. Especially since they had defeated Thanos- if donating an old blanket or a box full of canned foods would mean someone might get to meet The Denominator- the hero and saviour- well, who would bat an eye at stuff like that? Carrie didn’t feel especially important or heroic, but at least some good would come from it. And it was nice, really nice, to get out of the tower.
“Miss Greenwall? Do you think we could- oh, sorry-” the event coordinator ducked around some members of the crowd, fighting through the line to get to Carrie. “We didn’t expect so many people, uhm- we’re a little under-staffed, if…”
Carrie looked up. She smiled.
“Happy to fill out the ranks,” she assured him. The crowd, of course, was even more excitable at the opportunity to watch the cloning happen live. Nobody was too aggressive, today, at least. That didn’t mean it wasn’t a slight struggle to keep her smile in place as she was suddenly bombarded with excited cheering and babble.
She split once, the copy on the left stepping forward and following the director away to wherever more people might be needed. Better to do most of the divisions on the site than try to fight through the crowd multiple times. The remaining copy looked on until they disappeared, then turned back to the crowd. Smiling again.
“That’s so cool,” one of the girls in front of her breathed, awed. “I’m jealous.”
Carrie took the picture gently from her hand, since she seemed a bit distracted. It wasn’t anything special- just a print-out of a picture taken years ago, when Carrie had been introduced to the world by press conference. It was the only time Carrie had ever been photographed in her official ‘suit-’ her costume, more like. Her curly black hair had been left to fall around her shoulders, slightly obscuring the dark orange detailing that ran in a line over her collarbone. For the most part, the suit was simple- black, very lightly armored, like an agent’s would be. The only stylization came from the subtle lines of orange that poked out at the joints, and the small insignia on her shoulder- a simple icon of a hand with two crossed fingers. It was a nice touch, from Stark.
Carrie signed it. She still felt weird signing stuff, but it would have been weirder for her to refuse doing it, so she powered through. She handed it back to the girl, who squealed excitedly.
“It’s not all it’s cracked up to be,” Carrie sighed, a hint of exhaustion creeping behind her smile. “If I want to be more efficient, I still have to double the work.”
The girl’s eyes gleamed. “Still,” she protested. “It’s like, the coolest power.”
Carrie laughed it off. She bade the girl goodbye, politely urging her off so the next person could step forward. She was about to extend her hand for the next boy to shake, when she froze. Her smile disappeared, and her head whipped to the side. Long, dark, curly hair. Longer than hers, to the waist. Blue-gray eyes, the same shade as her own. And…
The woman smiled. The rugged scar on her face, which ran from the bottom of her chin and up over her top lip, stretched as if to exaggerate itself. She lifted a hand, blunt nails painted a deep red, and wiggled her fingers in a playful wave.
The boy in front of her had reached forward to grab her hand, shaking it between both of his. He was rambling nervously, staring at his feet rather than meeting her eyes. Well, Carrie wouldn’t have been looking at him anyway. Instead, her shell-shocked gaze was superglued on the other end of the crowd, where the woman was mouthing to her familiar, inaudible words.
Missed me, Cassie?
“Miss- Oh, I’m sorry dear- Miss Greenwall?”
Carrie blinked. She glanced to her left, where the event coordinator had re-appeared, one of his hands braced on the boy’s shoulder as he separated him from where he had still been clinging to Carrie’s hand.
“Oh- yes?” she replied. Her eyes flickered back across the crowd, but the woman was gone.
“Sorry, I just want to update you on the schedule- we’re going to give you some more time out here before we start wrapping up, if you’re alright with staying on. We just have a lot of people waiting still, and…”
Carrie nodded. She was barely listening.
“Yes, that sounds fine,” she breathed, when the coordinator was done. He grinned, clapped her on the back, and left again.
She greeted the boy, who’d been waiting. She kept on smiling. It no longer took her much effort; she felt too far away from herself for her facial expression to have any impact on her mood. She supposed, in that strange way, there could be a silver lining in anything. Even to seeing a ghost.
She signed whatever it was he had brought, and the next girl stepped forward. She held up a hand, apologizing politely, and dug her hand into her pocket, sliding her phone up to her back and then tilting it over onto her palm in the reverse action she had used earlier, to put it away. The people standing closest to her peered curiously at the action as she took it, balanced it in the crook of her left elbow, (her bad hand hanging limply in front of her as she lifted the arm), and began tapping at it with the side of her right thumb.
The application she opened had been used rather sparingly, in recent times. The oldest messages were still easily accessible, if she were to only open one of the old forums within it, but she didn’t. Instead, she opened the top forum- entitled ‘UPDATES-’ which was the only one with messages more recent than five years old.
MEMBER: Can someone break away?
There were responses. She explained the situation as quickly and cryptically as possible, closed her phone, and began the process of slipping it back to her pocket. She smiled at the girl who’d come to the front of the line.
From the back of the event- where extra hands had been needed to sort through donated items and begin packing them away- another copy ducked behind a corner, splitting once more. The copy on the left went into the building where everything was being packed, up the stairs, and to a window.
MEMBER: Spotted on the East, she’s leaving now.
On the East side of the event area, where extra hands had been needed to inventory items and exchange them for meet and greet tickets, one of the copies checked her phone. She cloned herself again, the clone on the left excusing herself as she pretended to take a call- and headed in the direction of the entrance. Her eyes swept carefully back and forth through the crowd there, and she pushed further out, phone balanced on her palm near her ear so that she could look around better. She got all the way outside of the event’s barriers, all the way out into the surrounding park lawn, before she was tugged harshly through the bushes lining the path. She hissed in surprise, her phone clattering to the earth beneath the shrubbery as she came out on the other side.
“You did miss me,” the woman teased, her hand enclosed around Carrie’s good wrist with an iron grip. Carrie glared up at her, eyes steely. “How are you, Cassie?”
“Carrie,” she corrected, planting her feet firmly on the ground. “How are you here? You shouldn’t be here.”
“Did you think I was dead?” the woman crooned, leering down over her. With her free hand, she fiddled with a lock of Carrie’s hair, twisting it around a finger. “You should know it’d take more than some glass.”
Carrie glanced down at that hand, her lips twitching downward. She ignored the question.
“I still can’t believe you changed your name like that,” the woman continued, not seeming to care whether Carrie actually responded or not.
“You changed yours, too,” Carrie managed to mumble. The woman raised an eyebrow.
“Yes, I did. But a full change isn’t quite the same as changing two letters. You might as well have kept it as it was,” she complained. She tugged gently on the lock of hair she was fiddling with, then let it drop.
“What do you want, Elijah?” Carrie asked, her voice soft with fear. She glared up through her lashes. Elijah sighed, reaching manicured nails out toward her face. She pressed the pad of her thumb to the skin above Carrie’s lip, dragging it gently down until it fell away from her chin. It was the same traced line of the scar on Elijah’s own face- the only feature which distinguished it from Carrie’s.
“You’re having too much fun without me,” Elijah frowned. She inspected her nails, as if touching Carrie’s face, however briefly, may have dirtied them. “You’re famous. That’s not fair.”
“You’re insane,” Carrie protested. Then- “Just kill me already. That’s what you’re here for, right?”
“No. I need your phone,” Elijah pouted. She tugged on Carrie’s wrist, dragging her a step closer.
“I dropped it there,” Carrie inclined her head to the shrub, her entire body seizing at the loss of distance between them. “But- but Stark will track it. And Director Fury.”
Elijah raised an eyebrow. For the first time, the languid, unserious quality seemed to drop from her expression, replaced by genuine confusion. “You’re being protected? From me?”
“I’m not- I- No,” Carrie denied, tugging away from Elijah, who only tightened her grip in response. “I haven’t told anyone about- I thought you were dead! I just… I’m an Avenger!”
Elijah laughed, a surprised smile spreading over her cheeks at Carrie’s desperation. Her scar stretched with it, the rough tissue straining slightly against the tension. “You’re an Avenger,” she snickered. “What a joke! You’re far too soft.”
She dropped Carrie’s wrist, and stepped away toward the hedge. She ducked down, fished out the dropped phone, and slipped it into her pocket. Carrie watched her, her whole body taught like a compacted spring.
“I’ll have someone take care of the tracker,” Elijah hummed, smiling politely. She reached forward again, brushing the hair from Carrie’s face. “Will they be suspicious if I contact you?”
Carrie sighed, glaring up at the sky for a moment. “Why can’t you just leave me alone?”
Elijah grinned. She leaned forward, a wicked glint in her eye, and nipped quickly at the shell of Carrie’s ear. Carrie let out an affronted sound, stepping back. Elijah watched her, amused, her hands folded behind her back. She leaned forward, hinging at the hip, to peer closely into Carrie’s eyes.
Carrie’s good hand twitched. Elijah had let her wrist go, and she raised it toward Elijah, reaching for her face. At the last second, Elijah caught it again, halting its momentum with Carrie’s index finger barely an inch from her forehead. She grinned wickedly.
“See you later, sister.”
Elijah’s opposite hand rose, a mirror of Carrie’s. She pressed her finger to the center of Carrie’s forehead, and the wrist that she had been holding disappeared from her grasp. She groaned, then, hunching over herself in pain for a moment and collapsing to the earth a moment later. Her fingers scrabbled at her temples, struggling for some position which would alleviate the pounding in her head.
“Fuck,” she hissed. “Twelve years. That’s way too long.”