haven’t you heard what becomes of curious minds?
“Знао си љта же се десити пре него љто се то десило. (You knew what was going to happen before it happened.)” Pietro says to her, in Sokovian, once they’re out and roaming. A poor attempt at hiding, because they don’t even really know who they’re hiding from, where he is, what he knows, all they know is any robot around is bad news for them. Stark or Ultron, either way, it spells danger for them.
She would have loved it if she time travelled a bit earlier, so she never joined Ultron, or later, just enough time to save Pietro, and not have to deal with everything before.
She turns towards Pietro and raises her eyebrow. Replies in Sokovian, “ Да, јесам. Нежу те лагати. (Yes, I did. I will not lie to you.)”
Pietro hummed, and picked up a wrapped potato bread, two, one publicly with his right hand, showing everyone who cared to look that he was checking it out, while his left hand, covered by his lean body moved in super speed, leaving a barely noticeable blue blur as he took Borodinsky bread for himself to eat, never mind that this was the sixth stall he had stolen from. Before, the sight used to stir up some have-to-be-ignored resentment at the back of her mind, at the sight of so much food, that she just knew she would have to decline no matter how much her stomach ached for it, and it would all have to be for him— especially now that he was the fast one, and burned through his food with a speed that even her faster-than-most metabolism could never hope to keep up with.
Now, it just filled her with a sort of pain, to remember the way they used to have to live. The way they had to steal, just to keep Pietro fed, and the resentment that either couldn’t fight back when one had to get more than the other constantly. She placed a hand on his arm and shook her head, and he put both bread back down.
“But I’m hungry.” He tells her, leaning down to whisper.
“I know, Piet, but… but just trust me, okay? I’ll keep you fed. No more stealing.”
Pietro looked at her with suspicious eyes, but nodded his agreement, though he kept the bread that he had already stolen and started to eat as they walked. It wouldn’t be enough for him, but that was alright— what were reality manipulating twin sisters for, after all?
“Па (So),” Pietro says, as he gulps down his bread, because Mama taught them manners, and Papa… told them to do whatever Mama told them to do. “како си знао за све љто би се десило? Иак и др. Ћена, видела сам да си је љтитио са. Нисам ни знао да то моћељ. (How’d you know about everything that would happen? Even the Dr. woman, I saw that you protected her with like– like, a thrown shield? I didn’t even know you could do that.)” He said, speaking much faster and more comfortably in Sokovian, than he did in his accented English.
She wonders what will sound more ridiculous. The truth, or lies?
“It’s part of my powers.” she says, because did she not just say a few moments ago that she wouldn’t lie to him? “It didn’t start until recently, I didn’t even know I could do it, but—it happened, and now I— well, now I know my future.”
Pietro oohs in interest, and fishes out his second bread, as he asks his second question. “What other new abilities do you have?”
She smiles, “That’s for me to know, Piet, and you to find out.”
Pietro rolls his eyes, and she bites back another laugh at how much attitude he fits into an eye roll, and decides that their eye rolls are absolutely a family trait. Even the Fake, Agatha-made WandaVision Pietro had the eye-roll down.
“Don’t worry,” she starts. “If we survive this, then I’ll tell you everything.”
Pietro nods, and tries to act happy with that, but she can see the way his eyes darken in worry, as he chews on his third bread, as he thinks over what she could have meant by ‘if’’ they survived. She could see his mind, rather than hear, working away to think about the fact that if she knew her future, and yet she wasn’t sure if they would survive– what would that mean for them? She could see him mull over the idea of just running away. Then that furrow on his brow disappeared as he realized he was out of food.
Reaching into her leather jacket, faint scarlet mist surrounding her hand, not enough to light even the little dark space between herself and her leather jacket, but enough for it to work to create a chocolate croissant out of nowhere, a big one, because her brother couldn’t keep lasting off of small pastries. She handed it to him, and he smiled like he used to when they got to open birthday gifts. It brought a smile to her face, too.
“Any time you’re hungry—and I mean anytime —you come to me, okay, Piet? I’ll always have food for you. We won’t ever have to steal again. Ever. You got me?”
Pietro nods his head, then after a few bites, he asks; “Did you steal this?”
She just said that they wouldn’t have to steal anymore, but alright, Piet. Whatever works for your mind. With an eye roll, she shook her head.
“Then how’d you get it?”
“Me to know, you to find out.” She repeats. His eyes widen when he figures it out.
“Have I ever told you how much I love your powers?” Pietro says, excitedly.
“A few times.” She replies with a smile.
At least someone does. She likes her powers, they have a symbiotic, give-take, help each other, love/hate relationship, but for all the power it gives her, it’s also never really enough to help her keep the people she loves, and tends to always hurt innocent people. But at least Pietro didn’t see it as something dangerous or horrible, and she missed that. She lost that the moment Pietro died, because Von Strucker and his guards were as terrified as they were amazed of her, and the Avengers were too wary and cautious to really accept her powers like that, and everyone else after didn’t see her powers as something beautiful. Not like Pietro used to, and still did now. Vision had similar opinions, but it wasn’t the same.
“I love your powers.” He repeats anyway. “Do you have another…?” And Wanda feels a slight phantom hunger still there.
Wanda nods, and hands him another chocolate-filled croissant. “If you don’t want croissants or bread, I can give you whatever food you want.”
Pietro nods, again, his eyes shining. He’s happy, not just because of the food, but because her new powers means he doesn’t have to steal and eat so much in front of his undoubtedly starving sister over and over again, only to have it never actually be enough, and he would still be a little bit hungry, because she would never really be full ever again like he was when his parents were alive, and when Von Strucker realized how much he needed to eat.
She’s happy too. Stealing is a good skill, but it hurts to see when it’s done out of necessity by someone you care about, instead of for fun, or a mission.
“Thank you.” Pietro smiles at her.
“Anytime.”
Then they walk past the news, and Wanda knew this was coming soon, but her heart still gets stuck in her throat at the fear she feels at the possibility that she might not be able to protect Pietro again. And she barely survived losing him once, twice would be far past what she can handle, no matter how many times Fate wants to test her limits.
Pietro gives her a look. He knows they need to join the fight, and she knows they have no other choice now, because he can’t stop her. If she decides not to come, then she will just leave Pietro unprotected, and just as it was before when he was picking fights with playground bullies, leaving him alone fighting by himself wasn’t an option because if she didn’t have his back, then who would?
She nods back.
She sighs in her head, fucking Avengers.
⊱⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⊰
Pietro runs right into him, pushing him off of Steve, and she bends the bars to keep him where he is, protect everyone else. He turns, to face her, as Pietro stands on the other side. The urge to just finish him off by herself is oh, so strong, but she holds on, because she can’t willy-nilly change the future, and risk ruining her own. She doesn’t care if that’s selfish, she’s done being selfless, that just leads to loss.
“Please,” Ultron says “don’t do this.”
“What choice do we have?” She spits back.
Ultron gears up to fire at the railing she moved, and Pietro moves out of the way, the railings go out, through the window, and he escapes, the vehicle goes a little bit faster and Wanda’s sent back a bit, but she keeps upright, Chaos Magic and the grace that comes with being the Scarlet Witch keeping her steady on her feet.
She looks up at the sky, and wonders again, why the future is so fickle that she couldn’t just take care of this.
‘Hold on until Vision is alive’ , she thinks, ‘ Just be patient. ’
Wanda watches him escape, and tears her eyes away with a sort of boredom, she blinks her eyes slowly, and tries not to question every choice she’s ever made in her life, because she knows she’ll be thinking back on some pretty stupid decisions that will give her a migraine–not that the migraine will stay long, but still–and she’s got better (debatable) things to focus on right now.
She catches Pietro staring back at her, his head tilted in question, and his eyes narrowed in suspicion. Wanda keeps her eyes away from his on purpose, she doesn’t need him knowing he could have taken the big bad villain on her own but just didn’t because he’s the reason her future boyfriend–and then fiance–comes to life.
Focus.
“Civilians in our path.” says Steve, pointing, and Pietro rushes to take care of that certain problem, thank god. “Can you stop this thing?” He asks her.
She smiles then, no, smirks, much like her brother. Now, that, she can do without changing the future. No holding back. She takes an extended blink, and then gestures to the ground, Chaos Magic following with her gesture, and far stronger, far faster than she did before, the train begins to skid to a halt. Back then, it had been hard for her, so heavy, so strong, so resistant to what she was trying to do. Now, it was barely anything compared to what she had to do just to destroy the Darkhold.
Steve looks on at her, impressed. She resists the urge to flick her hair, because she is not that type of person. She looks away, trying not to smile at the ridiculous urge, she has to scrunch her nose to stop her lips from quirking upwards. Pietro comes into the train, and pulls her in for a hug, clapping her back.
“That’s my sister!” He boasts.
Wanda smiles fondly at him. People start to clamour out, and he walks out, panting slightly, and takes a seat closest—they stopped much sooner, she notices, based on where they’re stopped—and she rushes to his side like she did back then.
“I’m fine,” he reassures her. “I just need a minute.”
“I’m very tempted not to give you one.” Steve says, as he approaches them.
Mornings of pancakes and breakfast, and team bonding sessions, and inside jokes flash through her mind but they mean nothing to her, as she steps up in his space, eyes glowing Scarlet red, not the weak red it used to glow in her original Ultron age time.
“Try him– try me…” Her voice comes out as a growl. She’s long grown comfortable with being very irritated with people that get in her way or threaten people she care about, and Steve, as nice as he is, does not get to go away unchallenged after saying something like that to Pietro.
Her hand covers with Chaos Magic, and she is ready to take him out, fuck future consequences, she can handle whatever his role is and do whatever he needs to do to keep the future going, and he doesn’t really need to exi–
Pietro jumps to his feet and places a hand on her shoulder, as if sensing her thoughts. “Down, sister.” He tells her. “It is okay.”
She stares at Steve, with visible disdain, from his suit, looks him up and down and nearly sneers. But she follows through with his brother’s words and lets go of her hold on her Chaos Magic, eyes lightening. She clicks her tongue, and tries to remember her lines. Ah, yes– “The Cradle… did you get it?”
“Stark will take care of it.”
Ah yes, Steve the idiot.
Pietro nudges her foot with his.
Who here is the mind reader again????
She rolls her eyes, and keeps on, to warn Steve about Tony and not call him stupid (do not call him stupid do not call him stupid do not call Captain America stupid do not–)
She shakes her head, a slightly horrified look on her face, Pietro looks at them both. “No, he won’t.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Steve replies after a bit of silence. “Stark’s not crazy.”
Doesn’t know what she’s talking about–
(do not call him stupid do not call him stupid do not call Captain America stupid do not–)
“He will do anything to make things right,” she tells him.
“Stark, come in.”
How was she, at 24, smarter than him, at 70? Wasn’t age supposed to make the person wiser?
“Anyone on comms.” How did she know his own teammate better than he did after what, maybe not even 10 full collective minutes in a room with him?
‘Do not call him stupid, Wanda.’ , she reminds herself.
“Ultron can’t tell the difference between saving the world and destroying it.” She pauses. “Where do you think he gets that?”
She pats herself on the back for not calling him stupid even once.
When Steve turns around, Pietro is behind her, and he whispers– “That was really hard for you not to call him stupid, huh?”
Who, she repeats, is the mind reader here???
“How’d you know?”
“I was feeling it, suddenly really wanted to call him stupid, and you’ve rolled your eyes like twice as soon as he turned around.”
Wanda shushes him, but doesn’t deny anything because no one, not even herself, would believe anything she could say to try to deny such an obvious truth. Pietro shakes with contained laughter behind her.
⊱⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⊰
Steve takes a step forward, Pietro and her behind him.
“I’m gonna say this once.”
“How about none-ce?”
That wasn’t even good, but alright.
She knows she and Pietro think the same thing based on their similar reactions, split second nose scrunches, and downturned lips.
“Shut it down!”
“Nope. Not gonna happen.”
She knows that she’s supposed to internally take Stark’s side on this and all, because Steve is opting to shut down Vision, the man she has let all of this happen for, and Stark is opting to instead let Vision go online, but she really just– it is physically impossible for her to want to agree with Stark.
“You don’t know what you’re doing.”
“And you do? She’s not in your head?”
“I know you’re angry.” She says.
“Oh, we’re way past that.” he says, calmly. “I could choke the life out of you and not change a shade.”
Okay, one, dramatic.
Two, get in fucking line.
Three, anger issues + green ogre, chill, she’s as mad as that at herself too on a daily basis, he’s not special just because he’s ‘so mad he wants to kill her’.
Four, as if he could kill her.
She clenches her jaw for appearance sakes.
So with a lot of her lines over, she tunes them out, until it’s her time to say her lines, and turns instead to Pietro, opening their mental link, as she sees him react in a similar way to how she did in her mind, with his iconic ‘what the fuck’ look.
Right, Pietro? So dramatic.
‘None-ce? Really?’ she thinks, starting the telepathic conversation by roasting Stark. A great way to start a Maximoff conversation. ‘And Banner is so dramatic. A drama king.’
‘I know right.’ Pietro thinks back, and nods to her comment about Banner. ‘For such a self-proclaimed sarcastic billionaire, his sarcasm is not that good.’
‘Even Ultron would have said something better, wouldn’t he?’
“Oh definitely, you heard his omelette joke, yes? He is funnier than Stark.’ Pietro glances towards them, ‘Why did you want to call Captain America stupid so badly?’
‘This. How do I know Stark better than him when we haven’t spent even an hour in his presence?’ Wanda tells him. ‘He’s a grandpa, and I’m 24. How did I know more? He is–was–very dumb. Handsome, and nice, but dumb.’
Pietro squares his shoulder, ‘Handsome? Do you have a crush on him, Wanda? You could do better– as you said, he’s very dumb. You shouldn’t– you should, you know, find a different crush. He also kinda seems like really righteous and annoying and—’
Wanda holds in her laughter, again. Pietro was so much funnier than she remembered, and after almost a whole lifetime or two of not being given many reasons to laugh, he is paradise incarnate, reward for sticking it out this long.
‘As… funny that is to hear, especially since I thought he was your favourite Avenger. He is not my Avengers crush.’
Pietro nods beside her, then realizes what she just said and– ‘Wanda?! Wanda? What do you mean he’s not– who is? Wanda? Who do you like if not Steve? Steve is the best Avenger, who do you like if not him? Do you like Bruce?!’
Wanda watches the Avengers argue stupidly, and stomps on Pietro’s foot, lightly, because he still needs to run and be a little shit later. But enough to show him exactly what she thinks of her crushing on Bruce Banner.
He is nice, but he is… nowhere near her type.
‘Ow! Okay, so not Bruce. Not Bruce. Oh god, do you like the arche-’
Wanda steps a little harder this time.
‘OW! Okay! Not Clint!! Not Clint! Not Clint, and not Bruce, and definitely not Tony–’ he moves his foot away before she can step on it, this time. ‘And Not Steve… Thor? No, you never go for the obvious ones… Oh!! You like Natasha!?’
Wanda doesn’t react. It’s enough for him to take it as a yes.
“You don’t know what’s in there!” She exclaims, because yes, she and Pietro are fast thinkers and manage to hold a whole conversation in the time it took them to say their small lines. Really, it wasn’t even that long of a line, they speak so slow.
‘Pietro,’ she thinks, ‘do what you want to do.’
“This isn’t a game.”
Pietro takes that as permission, and runs, unconnecting a bunch of wires.
“No, no. Go on. You were saying?”
God, she adores her brother.
Why couldn’t she have lines like that? Instead, what she gets to do is sit here, and lecture the men who always think they know better than her—Strange included, because even if he did know what he was doing, protecting America, she still stands by her words on him being a hypocrite for dreamwalking—and join in on the very idiotic arguments.
Oh, why, oh why did she have to time travel so early?
Her mind snaps back into focus as soon as she remembers what happens next, and her hands move as fast as she can, to bring up Chaos Magic, flicking it as soon as she can, to protect Pietro as he falls down, because she was too late, in her thoughts to remember sooner that someone fucking shoots the floor from under him .
“Pietro!”
Clint places his foot on Pietro’s leg, “What?” he says, stealing her brother’s line. “You didn’t see that coming?” She can’t really even see it, but she can feel it, senses that that’s what’s happening.
Wanda’s blood grows hot with anger, and she feels her Chaos Magic respond in like, and she knows Thor is coming, and Vision will be alive soon, but still, she takes the time to flick Chaos Magic at Clint blindly, trusting her instincts, and start a small fire on his clothes, but his clothes are a lot more resistant than she thought, and instead, what she achieves is burning his back a little, enough to make him wince and take his foot off her brother.
Good enough. For now.
When they’re part of the Avengers, she’s going to–
‘Wanda, no.’ Pietro thinks up at her. ‘I’m fine. You look like you’re about to murder him.’
She bites back the retort that ‘I was.’ , but her face speaks for her. They both know she doesn’t mean it (maybe), but the urge was still there, and Pietro purses his lips to stop himself from laughing. He was the overprotective twin brother, yes, but that didn’t mean Wanda didn’t have her own very protective streak.
This was the woman that used her powers for offence, on purpose, for the first time the moment she heard them insult Pietro, and took down at least three guards, then another two, kicking and screaming, because she did not go down without a fight, or not start fights when it came to her brother’s honour.
They were both very protective of each other, and also petty, so that was a fun combination for others to deal with.
As soon as Tony fires his hand thruster, Wanda knows what will happen next and summons her Chaos Magic, and then gets ready to have Bruce grab her from behind, and threaten her.
SO dramatic .
She sends Chaos Magic through herself to get him off of her, like she did in the past and the mental image of slapping him pops into her mind, but she ignores it. Then Thor comes right in, literally sliding to the door and jumping right on top of the Cradle, and oh my god, she thought Bruce was dramatic.
Is everyone here dramatic?
She doesn’t stop him, and waits in anticipation for Vision to come to life. She doesn’t remember what Bruce does next but if he pisses her off again soon, she’ll say fuck it to the future, and lash out in real.
“Wait!” Bruce yells.
Wanda is aware she doesn’t look surprised or like she’s watching in wonder and confusion of what’s to happen like she did in the past, like she should be right now, no, she knows instead that she has a wide grin on her face, like when she watched Tony take the sceptre. She doesn’t care. Vision is about to live, again (again).
He sits up in a (dramatic) crouch—except he gets a pass, because he just woke up—and Wanda stares at him in amazement, and uncontained glee, and happiness, and tears fill her eyes, because he’s back. He’s not her Vision, but he’s not White Vision either, and… oh, just the sight of him brings her comfort.
She missed him. His wiseness, and safety. The way he never judged her, always there, like a support pillar.
Then Thor sends him flying as soon as Vision flies straight at him.
Wanda opens up another mental link with Pietro, this was easy to watch in silence and wonder back then, because it’d all been so new and confusing to her, but now she knows just what is about to happen, it has lost its novelty very easily, very quickly, and if she does end up being taken away from this very real time travel episode of hers, she will spend as much time as she can talking with Pietro.
‘Is he naked?’ She hears Pietro think. ‘Where is his…?’
‘Why, pray tell, is that where your mind goes to first?’
‘Yes, but Wanda– look at him! He’s– he’s red all over and he doesn’t have a dong’
‘A dong? Mature. And he’s a robot, why does he even need a…’
‘At least I can say it. You’re so embarrassed by the word.’ Pietro sneers. ‘And I know he’s a bot but still— he’s supposed to be a man, is he not? He– it just doesn’t look right!’
‘Just think of his redness like clothes… and that’s why he doesn’t have…’
‘--A dong?’ Pietro supplied.
‘...sure, yeah.’
Pietro laughed quietly from his side of the room. Clint rose a brow from where he stood, and Wanda noticed, but didn’t pay any more attention to him.
‘Did you hear Bruce the entire time? He really laid it so thick on the drama. I mean, I pretty much did worse for Natasha and she wouldn’t be that–’
‘I know right!’ Pietro agreed. ‘I mean, the way he grabbed you too, it’s like he was just waiting for the chance. Desperate, much.’
Wanda nodded, ‘And it’s not like I even did a lot. Who just comes into a mission like that, looks out, and doesn’t even try to protect himself? It wouldn’t have helped, but still, he’s the one that made it so easy!’
‘Right, right!’ Pietro agrees, as always, her first hypeman before anyone else. Then he’s running to her side as Vision returns from his session of staring-out-the-window.
“I am sorry. That was… odd.” Vision turns to Thor, “Thank you.”
Then he grows his own cape, after Thor’s.
Adorable , Wanda thinks.
Please don’t let her mental link with Pietro be open.
‘Too late, sister.’ Pietro’s voice echoes in her mind. ‘You think he’s adorable??? He’s a— well, I don’t even know what he is, but he’s not even a man!’
Wanda closes their mental link.
“You helped create this?”
“I’ve had a vision. A whirlpool that sucks in all hope of life. And at its centre is that–” he points at the Mind Stone.
“What, the Gem?”
“It’s the Mind Stone. One of the Six Infinity Stones.” Thor says. “The greatest power in the universe, unparalleled in the destructive capabilities.”
Like her, she thinks wryly. Except no one gets to use her to wipe away half or more of a population like Thanos used the stones.
Somewhere in her mind, she thinks she just jinxed it, and now somewhere out in the universe, a version of her is being used to wipe away a percentage of a population, much like the infinity stones.
Yeah, she knows she just jinxed it.
“Then why would you bring–”
“Because Stark is right.” Thor interrupts.
Wanda knows this, but hearing the words still make her cringe.
“Ohhh, it’s definitely the end times.” says Bruce.
If only he knew.
“The Avengers cannot defeat Ultron.” Thor says.
“Not alone.” adds Vision.
With Wanda here, she wants to show them that they’re wrong. If anything, in a room with her and ten dozen armies of Ultron, she would still be the biggest threat in the room.
With power comes safety. In being a danger, comes security.
“Why does your Vision sound like Jarvis?”
“We reconfigured Jarvis’ matrix to create something new.”
Wanda’s getting bored, but she refuses to reopen hers and Pietro’s mental link and be interrogated on what she thinks of Vision. She feels hungry, but like a phantom hungry. It’s not her. She glances at Pietro, and turns to the side, summoning another croissant, and handing it to Pietro, who smiles and nods at her in gratefulness.
(She wants popcorn now, but that would be far more easily noticed than bread).
“I think I’ve had my fill of new.” Steve comments.
“You think I’m a child of Ultron.” states Vision.
“You’re not?” Steve asks.
“I’m not Ultron. I am not Jarvis. I am…” Vision trails off. “I am.” He stops there.
Wanda thinks back on the original events, and remembers that, aside from Pietro not having a croissant in his hands, and soon, not in his hands, instead in his stomach, she was the one who breaks the silence.
Right. Yes. Speak.
“I looked in your head and saw annihilation.”
“Look again.”
“Her seal of approval means jack to me.” comments Clint.
“Yeah, same.”
Shit. Did she say that out loud?
Scarlet wisps surround her hand, the others go right on guard, but she doesn’t attack, simply turns back time a minute before she slipped up, and watches Clint walk towards them again.
“Her seal of approval means jack to me.” he repeats.
“Their powers, the horrors in our head, Ultron himself— they all came from the Mind Stone.” Thor butts in again. “And they’re nothing compared to what it can unleash. But with it on our side…”
Once again, quite like her.
“Is it?” asks Steve. He turns his head towards Vision. “Are you? On our side?”
Wanda wants popcorn. Or something to drink. Or to take a seat. Or for them to start talking faster…
Doesn’t she have time powers?
She brings up her hand, encased in Chaos Magic again, and fast forwards time.
She needs to start remembering the things she can do, far more frequently.
…
“But we need to go.” says Vision, handing Thor his hammer.
Vision casts a glance at her, as if he’s noticed what she’s done to time. Maybe he has, but she has a feeling he won’t mention it.
She is right, once again, as he walks past them all without a word of her time changes.
There’s a sort of stunned silence that waves over the Avengers in the room. Wanda doesn’t get it, but maybe it’s just an Avengers thing.
“Right.” Thor says, and walks past Tony, patting his shoulder. “Well done.”
“Three minutes.” Announces Steve. “Get what you need.”
He says as if they have anything to get in this dumb tower.
Oh wait.
They do.
Natasha’s jacket.
The one she loves, even in her old lifetime, and the same jacket that Pietro will be throwing at her while she’s staring at Vision. Rudely. Like a man that was taught no manners.
⊱⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⊰
She feels uncomfortingly reminiscent of WandaVision, and WestView as she takes up a wide (far wider than she did in her original timeline) radius of minds that she lets her Chaos Magic keep in contact with, telling them to take whatever’s most important to them if they have it, and get the hell out of there, making sure that for the kids, she lets them get the time to get their stuffies, coats, or whatever they want that they have the time to get.
The people walk out in real orderly lines, marching out of the city, out of danger and into safety. She makes sure to get those that live on the streets too, because she knows some of them, and they are decent, and do not deserve to die either, just because they are homeless (like she and Pietro are).
And she searches for Zrinka, and her little brother, Costel, because if there is no little kid to protect, then there is no reason for Clint to stop, and therefore, no reason for Pietro to sacrifice himself.
The people she leads are panicked, since she has stopped reaching into their minds–it’s too uncomfortable for her–and they panic, scream, as they stand in a crowd, as one of Ultron’s minions fire at them, but Wanda keeps her guard up.
She has fought against a far better and stronger versions of Ultron, on Earth 838. Her shield refuses to falter against weaker strikes, and she keeps a vigilant eye for other Ultrons, because it is barely even a strain for her to keep this shield up. Then she remembers Clint, and bends her knees a little, and changes her stance to at least look like she’s struggling a bit in keeping this up.
This would be much easier if all Avengers and Civilians left, and she could just fight alone.
Then the inevitable shifting of the ground, as Ultron starts to lift Sokovia up. She doesn’t feel any more ready to let their home country be destroyed again. A country they volunteered for experiments for. But she knows she has to, so she sucks it up and focuses on destroying Ultrons past her shield, and her other hand on discreetly controlling other people’s minds to start walking out again, and following to the edge, so she can fly them past the gap.
She remembers, when this first happened, she had been by Clint’s side, terrified, holding on to a car to stay standing, and just out of her mind with fear, with so many emotions–second trauma time–that she could barely think, much less fight, while Ultron made his monologue.
Now, she stands tall, beside Clint, destroying Ultrons with flicks of her wrist, rather than letting Clint waste his arrows, even if that’s what they’re for.
They make it to the core, because Ultron is targeting the core. Pietro rushes up to her, hand outstretched to make sure she’s fine, “You good?” he asks.
“Yeah,” she replies, stretching her hand out too, and feeling his stomach for any sort of wounds or tears. The last time she remembers placing her hand on his, in the original timeline, she had felt real bullet wounds for the first time, unfortunately on her brother’s body instead of anyone else’s, and it was a horrifying sensation.
She comforted herself with the fact that his abdomen was absolutely intact.
“Stay alive for me, Piet. Please.”
“I- uh, yeah. Of course.” Pietro replies.
As they’re fighting, Natasha arrives, and she falters– just a little bit. Memories pop into her mind.
Black latex.
“Is that my jacket?” “she’s with us” “still doesn’t explain the jacket.”
The scent of vanilla, cinnamon and something earthy and distinctly Natasha.
She clears her throat and looks to the side, and Pietro notices, his eyes narrow. She can feel his suspicion leaking off of him in waves as he stares at her and Natasha. She wishes he would stop, because Natasha is close to taking notice of both her reaction and Pietro’s reaction to her reaction.
She remembers struggling in this battle, but now it feels like child’s play to her. She looks to Pietro, and decides not to take a chance, and opens a mental link with him. Visuals and all, because she doesn’t need to focus that much, and would rather know where he is if she needed to.
‘Did you and Natasha do something?’ Pietro asks her.
Wanda tries to see through Pietro’s eyes. ‘2’o clock.’
Pietro takes out another Ultron. ‘Thanks.’ And he goes right back to the question, ‘So, did you?’
‘No.’ , Wanda answers. ‘She has eyes for the green Drama King. I’m not even on her radar of people to do anything with.’ If she sounds a little bitter and sour, no she doesn’t, and Pietro doesn’t mention it thankfully.
‘But you would like to be?’
‘I’m not going to deny or agree with tha– 5 o’clock. Pay attention, please.’
‘I am!! I was going to get to him, you worry too much!’
Phantom bullets tear at her skin, like an itch. She knows it hasn’t happened yet, but they’re so close that she feels like it might, no matter the precautions she takes.
Thor provokes Ultron. Ultron summons his army—weak, by the way—and Steve makes a sarcastic comment. Pietro stares in amusement and horror. Wanda is, once again, a little bit bored. She can’t bring herself to skip time forward this time, though. She needs to stay, and make sure she knows what’s happening at all times, for Pietro’s sake.
Is it annoying to have to restrict her own power back to balls of energy instead of utilising her full Chaos Magic potential? Yes.
Would Ultron look more like a clown, after all of his bragging, and bravado and “how can you possibly hope to stop me” speeches if she could fight him all by her lonesome and not have to worry about anyone’s questions? Also yes.
Will she get to? Fuck no.
Wanda takes a deep breath, as she fights, and her hands move in an upward motion. If everyone could please just get out, she has a twin brother to save and they’re all stalling this process. She just– she imagines herself in the bed she owned back in the Avengers HQ, her second new room, after Ultron’s age, and imagines sleeping in the fluffy mattress. Thinks of the candles she lit up there, to make her room smell like her own personal heaven.
If anyone happens to notice the similarities between Natasha and Pietro’s scents in the candles she lit, no, no they didn’t. It’s not her fault Vision doesn’t really have a smell per se, or at least not one that comes in a candle.
They start to discuss plans, she realizes, when she zones back in, after getting herself out of the mental image of her future/past room in Avengers HQ. She’s gotten too used to going on autopilot, she doesn’t even remember what’s happening. Then the core is mentioned.
She doesn’t really want the responsibility— she already has a life to think about to protect, but then she thinks of their skill-sets, and sighs inwardly (she will deny it to any possible mind reader, but yes, she pouted inside her head), as she recited her lines.
“I’ll protect it.” She said, going back into autopilot, mimicking her past memories to create a similar present to the one in her memories, “It’s my job.”
Now she needs to think of a way to keep the core protected when she goes to Pietro’s side.
Should she just ask him to stay with her at the core? That seems like the best plan, but also this is her brother, and it wouldn’t be that easy.
Maybe she could wrap it in Chaos Magic, sustain it while she checks on her brother? No. Maybe if she wrapped her brother around in Chaos Magic? If it’s fluid enough, it should last, even as he runs, shouldn’t it? No, that’s not… the best plan. Oh, you know what? The simpler the better.
She’ll make a bulletproof vest, and all will be fine. She’s already watching things happen through his eyes somewhat anyway, when she focuses on their mental link, she can see where he is and what he’s doing. The bulletproof vest would just be another precaution. She could even probably increase his speed through the mental link, thought that would undoubtedly be tricky, but also worth it, and help him catch the bullets?
Pietro arrives just as the others leave.
“Get the people on the boats.” She tells him.
“I’m not going to leave you here.” He answers back.
She taps her head. “You won’t be leaving me, because I’m not leaving you either.” She strikes down a fast-running Ultron. “I can handle this.”
Pietro acquiesces with a nod.
“Come back for me when everyone else is off. Not before. Do you understand?”
“Wanda, the air–”
“New abilities.” She reminds him. “Me to know, you to find out.”
Pietro scoffs, but he’s giving in, he walks to where he stood before, and he says “You know, I’m 12 minutes older than you.”
Her heart sinks at those words, because those were his last words (oh god oh god oh god oh god) and no he’s not, he’s not older than her anymore, never again, because he died, and she kept living, and it wasn’t fair or right and she should have been the one that died early, and he should have stayed older than her and–-
“Go.” The word slips out of her, but not with a chuckle like last time. No, her voice cracks this time. “But Pietro, please, can you do something for me?”
“Of course, what?” Pietro asks.
She turns, creates the bulletproof vest, makes it as light as she can, and tosses it over to Pietro, when she turns back, also taking down another Ultron with a quick jerk of her hand. “Wear that for me. Please.”
Pietro sees something in her eyes, and thinks better than to argue. He slips it on, and goes on. “Keep our mental link open!” He yells.
“Nothing could make me close it.” She whispers back, but to herself, because she knows he can hear her through the mental link too. It’s even better than any sort of comms.
She prays to god it’ll be enough. All these precautions she takes. Her sanity quite literally depends on this plan.
⊱⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⊰
It’s a few minutes after when she starts to hear it, she hears it through Clint, because she’s kept all her mental walls down since she knows she can’t afford to miss a thing. First she hears just a little bit of Zrinka’s distress, then she hears Clint’s resigned sigh, and her heart speeds up, and she’s almost distracted. She prepared for this. She can do this. She will keep Pietro alive, and not at the cost of sacrificing Clint and Costel. Then the bullets start raining down, and Clint is determined, and Pietro is approaching and this is not what she remembers happening . It was supposed to be Ultrons running at them, not something from up the air shooting at them.
She panics, because this could go wrong even more now that the angle was different, what would a bulletproof vest do against bullets that didn’t even hit it? Oh god, her hand trembled, shaking in nervousness and stress and she felt the urge to use her old habits, the thumb-biting as she thought and tried to keep calm and keep her storm of a mind at least somewhat composed, but she didn’t have the time. She didn’t have the time, and she needed to focus, and that meant keeping her hands free for movement to keep channelling her Chaos Magic as best she could.
She focuses on hers and Pietro’s mental link, and in a promise-breaking move, where she practices a new power/skill in the heat of the moment again, instead of taking the time to practice it in safety and peace, she sends out a shield through the mental link. She has never done this before, and it’s so much like when she turned invisible just a few hours ago, just a day ago, really–though that feels like an eternity away–but this time, there’s no embarrassing moment where she’s facing someone’s crotch.
After, if she manages this, then she’ll really make sure that she stops practicing new abilities in high-stress situations. She means it this time.
She doesn’t even know if she could really send her magic through someone else through a mental link, and Pietro’s body might not even be suited or capable of channelling Chaos Magic through his body and she might end up killing him instead of the bullets, or maybe because it’s a mental link, she’ll only be able to put out a mental shield, and nothing physical will protect his body. She doesn’t know. There are many ways for this to go wrong, and she curses herself for letting him go, and leave her at the core, despite the fact that she knew what would happen to him.
She sends out a crimson blast around her again, like she did that last time when she felt Pietro’s death, just to make sure no Ultrons would be around so she could focus without interruption, and then she shifts all her mental presence into Pietro and hers’ links, and in sending a shield for Pietro. When the dust goes away, and the bullets pass them by, Pietro is still standing
She cries with relief, because it worked , her absolutely spur-of-the-moment, panicked plan worked, and she didn’t have to feel Pietro’s death this time, didn’t have to live on without her brother this time. She will never again practice new abilities in the moment that she needs them, she did mean that, but she is so glad she did this time.
She is far gladder that it worked, and nothing went wrong.
She feels so relieved she doesn’t notice an Ultron survived, who had waited just half a second for her crimson blast to stop as she focused on protecting her brother, and he shoots, and it rips through Wanda, and she looks down at her clothing, blood. She can feel Pietro’s concern, worried that he died, because he felt those phantom bullets in the same way that she did. She closes their mental link, despite her whispered promise.
Maybe she had celebrated ‘nothing going wrong’ too soon.
She presses her hands to her stomach, her wounds already closing at a fast pace, though not enough for blood to not end up on her hands. She changes into her Scarlet Witch outfit, the Darkhold corrupted one. She twists around and glares at the Ultron with glowing red eyes, he didn’t go easy on the bullets, and she can feel the many bullet holes in her body closing. She celebrates the small victories, which is the fact that the bullets ripped through her body, instead of staying inside her and so her body can heal well enough. She can feel Ultron start to ask-–
“What are y-”
But she rips it in half before it can finish, and sweeps away those that try to enter, with a wide hand gesture. The use of Chaos Magic to kill them slows down her healing. She hopes that Pietro doesn’t question the feeling of bullets ripping through him, because she wouldn’t know how to tell him. Her healing is slower, not slow enough that her bullets will kill her, but slow enough that it will get her caught, because she knows her brother, and no matter how much she wishes otherwise, he will come, because he knows what that phantom pain of bullets means, just like she did back then, and he will come either in concern or curiosity and if her healing doesn’t heal any faster, she will be caught and she will have to face more questions than they have time for right now.
Just her luck that her healing works best with magically induced wounds or wounds acquired through any sort of magically related means, but also thank god for healing ‘spells’ on herself (did she get it from Agatha, when she visited the dark Sorceress one time? Yes, and she’s very grateful she did, or else she would be walking around with bullet wounds for a few minutes, and more people than Pietro and Ultron’s other selves).
With one hand, she keeps the shields up around her and kills approaching Ultrons, as the other hand starts to patch herself up faster than her healing because Pietro will be here in a few seconds, maybe even faster if he’s running to her out of concern, and her wounds aren’t disappearing fast enough and the wounds finally close, and she switches out of her Scarlet Witch clothing into her dress and leather jacket, but when she turns around, she feels a familiar presence. Someone who saw it all. Even the way she closed her gunshot wounds, he must have seen it from behind, the way that her Scarlet Witch clothing healed and stitched up along with the wounds..
“Wanda, what the fuck?!” Pietro asks.
She feels glad, though. At least he’s alive to ask that question.
She kept him alive.