hold on to your heart

“Violet.”

The sound of my name quickly pulls me back to reality. Something about the voice sounds wrong—it’s robotic and crackly. My eyes open, taking in nothing but darkness at first. I blink a few times, registering more light and colours. 

I’m still curled against the padded wall of my prison cell.

I can feel the places on my cheeks where furious tears dried. There’s a pounding in my head that I recognize as a result of lengthy sobbing. I roll over onto my back, releasing a slow breath that fails to erase the feelings of anger and fear that are still so fresh on my mind.

The room is darker than before. The fluorescent lights that brightened the space are turned off. Shadows of the wreckage I caused are tossed onto the walls by a flickering orange light. I gaze upon the overturned bed frame and the crumpled mattress with disdain. 

“Violet.”

That electronic voice comes again, fed through the ceiling from the hallway outside. Something about it eases me. It’s not Stark’s, so that brings me some comfort. I don’t want to see him right now. I’m not sure if I ever want to see him again.

I sit up slowly, stifling a groan as the pressure in my head doubles. Outside the glass, Natasha Romanoff presses the red button on the wall panel.

“How do you feel?” she asks, and I can tell hers is the voice that called me out of my sleep.

I look around at the damaged bed that’s in pieces around me, and shrug. There isn’t really any words for how I’m feeling. My whole life is collapsing around me. There wasn’t much life to start with, but even so, the revelations of the last days are enough to send me into a tailspin of baffling emotions. “I slept,” is all I say, because it does surprise me that I managed to sleep in the state I was in.

Natasha nods. “You needed the rest.” Her face is cast in shadows by that same fiery light. My eyes trail to the floor beside her, and learn that I’m only able to see anything thanks to the dim light of a lantern by her feet. She notices the direction of my gaze. “I didn’t want to wake you,” she explains. “But I wanted to make sure you were alright.”

“How did you know I was sleeping?” I ask, but as I’m saying the words, I figure the answer on my own. I look up to the cushiony ceiling. Somewhere up there is the speaker from which I can hear their voices. As I peer closer, I notice a small black mass fixed to the upper corner of the room. Its surface is reflective like glass, and a red light blinks on its side. “Camera,” I mutter, then turn my attention on her. “You’ve been watching me?”

“Yes,” she replies, and I oddly appreciate her honesty. She stands from her chair and reaches for something that I can’t see in the darkness. Her hands emerge from the shadows, clutching a plastic tray. On the tray is a plate of food, a tall glass of water, and a set of cutlery. I look closer, noticing a serving of mashed potatoes, a pile of green beans, and a slice of roast beef. The meal looks delicious, but even if there was a mound of moldy cheese on that plate, my mouth would still water. By my best guess, it’s been two days since I’ve eaten anything. “Hungry?” Natasha asks, her eyes twinkling with knowing.

She presses a yellow button on the wall panel, and to my dismay, a hole appears in the wall. To the right of the glass, part of the wall splits open, revealing an opening just big enough to slide the tray through.

I spring to my feet as the food comes through. The smell hits my nose immediately, and though I know I should be embarrassed about how quickly I pull the tray from her hands, I don’t have the energy.

I sit on the ground, immediately starting in on the mashed potatoes. They’re buttery and smooth, with little pieces of chives. The serving disappears in a few seconds. The green beans are next—perfectly salted and warm. When I get to the roast beef, I have to consciously contain my sigh of pleasure.

I can’t remember the last time I had a meal like this. The last piece of food that excited me was a can of alphabet soup I found in the garbage.

“My compliments to the chef,” I garble between mouthfuls of food. 

Natasha hums with amusement. “Thanks.”

“You made this?” I ask, pausing my inhalation of beef. 

Her eyes sparkle. “I’ve taken up cooking recently,” she says. “It keeps me busy.” The way her fingers fidget makes me wonder what kind of horrors she needs to be distracted from.

“It’s great,” I say.

She tilts her head, and the blonde end of her braid falls over her shoulder. “You mean it?”

“If you weren’t here, I’d be licking the plate,” I admit. 

When it’s done, I sit back, resting against the wall. I feel satiated and more stable, but the food didn’t replace that hollow feeling in my stomach. The feeling Stark dropped on me, and then left me alone to deal with. 

Despite the incredible relief of having a full belly, a wave of emotion begs to collapse me, and I have to push down a sob. I set my fork down on the plate, and wrap my arms tightly around my legs.

“I didn’t know.” My throat feels raw, my voice hoarse. I nearly cringe at the sound of it, but there’s more I have to say. Stark won’t listen to me, but maybe Natasha will. Maybe she’ll be able to understand that it wasn’t intentional. I don’t need to be kept in a cage. “I didn’t know what I could do.”

“How is that possible?” she asks softly. “You had to have acquired these powers at some point in your life. Is there anything you can think of that might have caused this?”

My eyes drop to the floor. “No.”

“Come on,” she coaxes. “Try and remember.”

“I can’t.”

She sits forward. “Think back to when you were young. Maybe there’s something—”

“I can’t.” The words are more firm this time, and they stop her in her tracks. Her expression wavers.

I lean my head back against the wall, letting my eyes fall closed. 

Stay hidden.

The memory of the taxi is nearly a decade old, and still, I can hear her words as if they’re being spoken to me now.

Don’t stay anywhere for too long. 

For nine years, I’ve been doing as I was told. Not because of loyalty or duty. Loyalty would require remembering who she was. Duty would require remembering who I was.

Don’t make friends.

I’ve stayed in isolation. I’ve never settled anywhere or had a place to call home. I’ve never felt safe. After I learned the ring’s origin, I thought it was the thing I spent my life protecting. I thought it was the reason I’ve never been anything more than a ghost.

And most importantly, don’t let anyone know who you really are.

But the ring isn’t the thing that ruined me. 

I am. 

There’ something inside of me that I can’t control. There’s a part of me that is powerful and dangerous, and it wants to be set free. This ring wasn’t the problem. It was the solution.

I’ve obeyed her commands because I didn’t have anything else. Her words and warnings were the only things I had to hold on to. That, and the ring on my finger.

But I was a child then. I didn’t know anything about the world. I didn’t have the capacity to chose. All I knew was the name she gave me.

I’ve grown up since then. I may not know how I came to be this way, but I do know how I can try to fix it.

Not by running from life and hiding behind a ring. I fell at the door of the most powerful people in the world, and I don’t think it was by accident. I’ve been given a choice, and this time, I want to choose differently.

I take a long sip of water. It cools my throat and soothes my stomach. But when I place the glass back on the ground, my hand still shakes. 

“The first memory I have…” I falter. Despite the drink, my mouth feels dry. “A woman put me in a taxi with a passport and a ring. I was ten years old. I don’t remember anything before that. I don’t remember my parents.” My voice breaks. “I don’t even remember my own name.”

Natasha sits forward, her face drawn. She doesn’t ask any questions. Instead, she waits in apprehension for me to tell my story.

“She gave me instructions,” I continue. “She told me to hide and stay on the move. I wasn’t supposed to let anyone get close to me. So I didn’t.” I clear my throat in hopes of removing the quiver from my voice. “I’ve been running for as long as I can remember. I couldn’t get a job, so I had to steal to survive. I didn’t like it, but I didn’t have a choice.” I look up at her. “That’s why I was running from the cops the night I came into the compound.”

Natasha’s eyes brighten with remembrance. “The jewelry store.”

I sit up straighter, feeling uncomfortable. “Yeah,” I mutter. It didn’t occur to me that she knew what store I had tried to rob. But then again, they’re the Avengers. They probably put the pieces together as soon as they found the gun in my bag. 

“Did she tell you anything else?” Natasha asks gently.

“I wasn’t supposed to take off the ring.” I study its purple stone, my eyes skimming over the scratches on its band. “I listened because it was all I had, but I didn’t understand.” An image of the explosion flashes through my mind. Purple tendrils of destruction that were born from my will. “Now I do.”

Natasha shakes her head slightly. There’s a shimmer to her eyes, and in this light, I almost think they’re tears. Her eyebrows are furrowed in a way that makes me wonder if I’ve struck a nerve. Like my story might be similar to her own. “That doesn’t make it right,” she says. “What she did wasn’t right.” There’s a ferocity in her tone, and I’m suddenly sure that my words have hit close to her heart. 

I run my hands up and down my shins methodically. “I’m dangerous,” I point out. “Maybe she was right to send me away. Maybe she was trying to protect herself from me.”

“You were ten,” Natasha says softly. “You were the one who needed protecting.”

I purse my lips. “She told me it was the only way to keep me safe.”

“That doesn’t make sense.” Natasha sits back in her chair. “If she knew what you were capable of, sending you into the world alone with no memories would’ve been putting you in the most danger possible.”

She’s right. I know she is. Sometimes it’s hard for me to feel sorry for myself after all of the awful things I’ve done. But at the end of the day, I was a scared little girl with dangerous powers, and I shouldn’t have been abandoned. 

I’ve played her words on repeat in my mind for years. I’ve been obsessing over that first memory for nearly half of my life. The auburn haired woman’s desertion of me has kept me up for more nights than I could ever count. And most of that restlessness came from not knowing why.

But even though I never understood her motives until I caused the explosion, she did give me one indication of why she left me.

“They’ll find you if you’re with me,” I mumble, almost to myself.

“What?” Natasha asks.

“They’ll find you if you’re with me,” I repeat, mimicking the green eyed woman’s words to me. “That’s what she told me.”

“Who will find you?” she asks.

I let my head lean back against the wall. “I wish I could remember.”

Natasha nods, slowly at first, and gradually more sure. “We’re going to figure this out,” she promises, unknowingly mirroring Stark’s earlier claims. “Violet, you’re going to know how this happened to you. You’re going to know who you were. I promise.” 

“You can’t promise that,” I object. “No one can.”

She stands, her shoulders rolled back with confidence. “I’m giving you my word. Do you trust me?”

I hesitate. There’s an authenticity to the Black Widow that I hadn't expected. Truthfully, I want to believe that she’s being sincere. But how can I trust her when she’s out there and I’m in here? 

“No,” I admit, hating the way it makes me upset to confess.

She studies me for a moment, her eyes flicking between mine. She steps over to the wall panel, and her palm presses against a green button.

My heart begins to race as the glass wall slides down into the floor, opening my path to the outside world.

“You can trust me,” Natasha affirms.

I stand slowly, unsure. I step forward carefully, my breath hitching as I step onto the concrete floor outside. The relief of freedom makes me want to cry.

I look up at her, the woman who freed me, the hero who promised to give me my life back. Her eyes are clear and genuine. 

I can trust her. I’m sure of it.

I nod. “Okay.”

Her face brightens with a hint of a warm smile. “Follow me.” She turns down the hallway, and I follow.

The floor feels steady beneath my feet. The space feels endless without walls on all sides.

She opens the door, and a blinding light floods into the hall.

***

The look on Stark’s face when he sees me in his workshop is actually priceless. Jaw clenched, eyes cold, shoulders tensed. He’s furious.

“Romanoff,” he clips. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Despite addressing her, his eyes are on me. I try to hide behind her with little success.

Natasha crosses her arms. “Tony,” she says, her tone firm. “Let’s talk about this.”

“There’s nothing to talk about,” he fires back. He stands, his chair rolling back behind him. I glance at the table where he sat. Various holographic screens hover in the air, filled with libraries of knowledge. On one of them, I recognize a blown up image of my ring, rendered in three dimensional glowing pixels. On another, security camera footage of an explosion plays, bordered with several analytical statistics. The heat waves, energy output, and decibel count of the blast are all being studied, as well as other charts and graphs that I can’t translate.

I look closer. It’s not just any explosion Stark has been watching. 

It’s mine.

The detonation I accidentally caused is playing on a loop for him to examine. I watch as the initial outburst throws violent bursts of lavender energy into the room. The surge knocks the Avengers off balance as walls cave in and furniture goes flying. Then Wanda is there, fighting my energy with her own. There’s no sound on the footage, but I know if there was, I would hear my own screams.

“You had no right,” Stark scolds Natasha.

She scoffs. “What about her rights? She didn’t know what she was capable of. The explosion was an accident. She doesn’t deserve to be locked in a cage.”

“I’m trying to keep her safe.” There’s a fierceness to his words. “One week. That’s all I asked for. I’m trying to figure this out before someone gets hurt.”

“Someone did get hurt,” she reminds him.

Their rapid-fire argument halts at her words. A painful pang of dread runs through me. Who did I hurt? Didn’t Stark tell me that everyone was fine?

And then I realize what she meant. Someone was injured in the explosion.

Me.

I wreaked havoc on the compound, and it almost killed me. I could feel it. I’m fairly certain that I’m only alive because of Wanda.

“You’re not going to figure this out without her, Tony,” Natasha says softly. “We need her help. She’s the only one who might know how this happened.”

There’s a pause. “Kid.” Stark sounds irritated, but also tired. He addresses me with an even mixture of exasperation and tenderness.

I swallow, stepping out from behind Natasha. “Oh, hey,” I say with a small wave, feigning surprise. 

Stark leans back against the table. “Did you eat?” he asks.

I immediately feel flustered. I guess some small part of me actually thought he was going to apologize for the way he left. I wrap my arms around my torso, feeling small. I try not to think about the last time we spoke, when he promised to come back. “You sure you care?” The words sting on the way out, and I can tell they burn him, too. I almost regret them. Then I think about how I begged and screamed, and after all of that, Natasha was the one who brought me food. Not him.

He sighs, running a hand over his face. “This may be hard for you to believe, but I’m not trying to ruin your life. I’m trying to save it.”

“You’ve got a funny way of going about that.”

“You were safe in there,” he justifies. “The cell was built with specialized refracting inhibitors designed to constrain quantum capabilities.”

“English, please,” I complain.

He rolls his eyes, searching for the words. “As long as you were in that cell, there wouldn’t be any more explosions.”

I hold up my hand, showcasing my ring. “I’m wearing this,” I remind him. “I couldn’t cause another explosion, even if I knew how.”

There’s a slight twitch in his right eyebrow, and his eyes drop briefly. Something turns over in my stomach. 

“Uh, I can’t cause another explosion if I’m wearing this, right?” I can’t fight the waver that creeps into my throat.

He scratches the back of his neck, averting my question.

“Tony?” Natasha asks.

He waits a moment more, then reaches over, tapping different areas on the surface of the table sequentially. A new screen flickers to life, and I immediately recognize Thor and Dr. Jane Foster. They appear to be walking across an intersection of a busy metropolitan street, weaving through crowds. The grainy quality of the video makes me think we’re watching footage from a stoplight camera.

As we watch, a tall man with red hair accidentally bumps into Jane’s shoulder amidst the bustling crowds. On contact, a scarlet eruption of light and energy breaks out between Jane and the man. The video momentarily cuts out, and I hold my breath.

When the camera comes back online, Thor can be seen carrying Jane in his arms, quickly leaving the scene. People run in all directions, screaming. Cars have crashed into streetlights or spun out in the intersection. The red haired man is unconscious in the street, alongside several others who were victims of the outburst.

The feed rewinds, controlled by Stark. “Look,” he instructs, zooming in on Jane moments before the collision. The resolution takes a few moments to improve, and once it does, we can see Jane’s left hand clearly. And on her middle finger is a ring.

Identical to mine, but with a red stone.

“She was wearing the ring when the explosion happened,” Stark says. 

I release a nervous breath. “I thought you said Thor gave her the ring to help her control it.”

“It did help,” he says. “It gave her more control. But it didn’t get rid of the power completely.”

“So…” I connect the dots, fear bubbling up inside of me. “You’re saying that even with the ring on, I could still hurt people?”

Genuine sympathy darkens his eyes. “It’s possible,” he laments. “Now that you know what you can do, you’re more likely to do it by accident. The ring was never meant to inhibit the power of an infinity stone. It was meant to control it.”

My mind latches on to something he’s said. An infinity stone.

“Wait.” The word bursts from my lips. “Infinity stone?”

Stark’s face weathers with the realization. “Violet, listen—”

“Don’t bullshit me,” I snap. “No more lies. If you know what’s happening, tell me.”

He stands from the table. “You’re a little emotional right now. It might be better if—”

“Tell me,” I seethe. An anger that I don’t recognize burns across my skin. The world tinges with purple as the words leave me. There’s an ache deep inside, and a burst of energy rushes out from my chest.

Not nearly as big as the explosion I caused before. Just enough force to rattle the surrounding tables and send a few tools toppling to the ground. The violet wave throws Stark off balance, and he stumbles to catch himself. Beside me, Natasha gasps as her footing is lost, too. 

The energy pulses outwards until it dissipates against the walls, dying out in the air.

My heart hammers at dangerous speeds. There’s a sinking feeling that threatens to pull me down to the floor and lower. 

Was that me? Did I do that?

Stark and Natasha regain their footing quickly, watching me as if they’re waiting for something. A charged silence hangs in the air.

All I can manage to do is raise my hand in front of me, looking for the ring on my finger.

I’m wearing the ring. And somehow, I still caused another explosion.

“I’m sorry,” I breathe, my chest tightening with regret. “I didn’t mean to. I swear.” I look up at Stark, all the outrage I had for him quickly replaced with guilt.

“It’s okay,” he reassures, but there’s a tangible uneasiness in the air, and it chokes me.

“No,” I rasp, fighting against the sob that wants to consume me. “None of this is okay.”

“We’ll figure this out,” he promises.

I shake my head, wanting to believe him, but unable to see a way out of this strange and horrifying new world. “How?”

He turns, swiping across the surface of the table and tapping different spots. That same three dimensional rendering of my ring flickers to life in the air above. He reaches for it, and somehow, the hologram simulates density as it bends to his will. He grabs the band and spins the image, revealing the Norse inscription. 

ᛈᛟᚹᛖᚱ 

Power

“That ring was made to control the power stone,” Stark explains. There’s a wariness to his features, but not in the way I would’ve expected. He doesn’t seem scared of me. He seems scared for me. “The power stone isn’t inside the ring. It’s inside you.”

It feels as though the room is tilting, the floor giving way beneath me. “What?” The word is constrained, and all too familiar to my tongue. It seems like all I’m doing is asking for clarification these days. 

“Well, metaphorically speaking.” Stark manipulates the table again, and a new image flashes in the air. A violet gem that seems to be made of pure light and potential hovers above the table. The power can’t quite be contained, and small wisps of energy curl away from the stone and lick at the surrounding air. Various charts and graphs appear beside its image, notating the characteristics of this strange item. 

Beside the stone, the footage of my explosion materializes, along with the analytical charts. Through the fog of despair that hangs over me, I try to study the statistics. It doesn’t take long for me to realize the similarities between the energy signatures of the stone and the explosion.

“They’re the same.” Natasha says the words as I come to the conclusion on my own.

“Exactly,” Stark confirms. “Violet, I think your powers came from the power stone itself.”

I shake my head, not wanting to believe what he’s saying. “That’s not possible.”

“Not only is it possible, it’s happened before.” he assures me. “Carol Danvers. Pietro and Wanda Maximoff. They all got their powers from encounters with an infinity stone.”

“But I’ve never…” I cut myself off, realizing what I mean to say. I’ve never encountered an infinity stone. It’s what I want to say, because nowhere in my memory have I ever come into contact with the power stone. But sometimes I forget that more than half of my life isn’t logged in my memory.

Could he be telling the truth? Could I have gotten supernatural powers from a brush with a cosmic entity? It seems too far out to be true. I want to believe it’s a lie, but I can’t. 

I’m not a scientist. I’m not familiar with the world of ancient forces and supernaturals. But Stark is, and he’s giving me an answer. It may not be one that I want to accept, but it’s one I can’t deny. 

Seeing my power and the stone side by side, it starts to make sense. The ring, that was meant to protect me. The green-eyed woman’s warnings, which were meant to keep me hidden.

“I know this is a lot to take in,” Stark sympathizes. “But knowing where your power came from gets us one step closer to finding out how it happened.”

“And finding out who you were,” Natasha finishes. She touches my shoulder gently, holding me in a sincere gaze. “I promised, remember?”