END-GAME

Pietro had never before seen her like that – given that this time he was even more astonished by not only her reaction but also her entire body language, than when she had seen her after Steve left.

So, he had to admit; Pietro was feeling a little afraid over what he had seen happening, given that he still had pondering questions that none of them was willing to answer clearly.

Himself, Peter and the rest of the marines – except for Perez,still in his appointed apartment – had only managed to rush upstairs seconds after Emma and her team vanished.

They all looked around confused, baffled by the absence of the people their team had supposedly already captured, as said by Tony's sent message mere minutes ago.

Pietro had had enough time to only watch his sister trying to force Theo to breath properly.

Peter was the only one who rushed to their side, asked Wanda politely to take a few steps over,and helped Theo. He said something along the lines of “being a teenager and having panic attacks is like ketchup and fries man. You hate them, and yet they're always together”.

But Pietro himself was merely starring at them. Starring at Theo slowly and gradually standing up, her eyes widened more than he himself had ever seen them, her lips parted.

Marcus himself was sharing a mutual shock, though he mostly looked astonished; he wouldn't dare and go anywhere close to Theo. He was the one to put an arm in front of Naveen's chest when he tried to walk there, and shared a look with Natasha, as if to tell her to stay put as well.

To Pietro, it seemed as if Marcus had helped them both dodge a bullet. For as soon as she was standing, Theo's fist got entirely covered by that dark purple matter as she turned her body around completely to punch the wall.

Her impetus alone was extremely fierce, and given that she had just used her power,it was no surprise that the entire wall cracked to debris, down to dust. Thankfully for the rest, Wanda was quick to act and her powers held the ceiling in place, just enough for it to not fall on top of their heads and bury them down.

“Theo!”,she shouted at her, “You're gonna kill us-”

But Wanda's eye fell on Tony, faintly shaking his head at her. His facial features all stiffened, a few lines embracing both his eyes. As much as he hated to admit on that, things had come to the worst possible outcome, for everyone on this team.

“Let her have it”,he whispered weakly.

Wanda's lips parted,and for a second she wasn't sure she had heard correctly, but seeing how Theo moved up to the next wall and did the exact same thing, with Tony still looking at her- Wanda figured that there was a reason for him to be asking that.

And so, Wanda kept on forming her red masses, doing her absolute best to not disturb Theo and still keep a roof over their head, keeping them alive.

By the time Theo reached the third and final wall of the apartment, the only remnant one, she stopped for a few seconds. She took a few deep,deep breaths.

A few stinging tears managed to escape the nooks of her eyes, and if she were to grunt her teeth any more she'd probably break them. Theo punched the last wall with all her might,and had Wanda not made sure to keep everything in place, the debris would have damaged every other building to be in line next to the one they were in.

Nobody dared to speak to Theo for as long as it took Wanda to fix the place back. She was standing right in front of the wall she had just broken to pieces, and as the purple matter slowly vanished, quite the few drops of blood started pouring down her knuckles.

As Pietro noticed, lowering his glance with a mouth mostly opened, there was no flesh to be found or seen on her hands. Covered in blood that had no time to dry, and yet the surface had only began turning her otherwise sickeningly blanched skin into masses of yellow and faintly purple bruises.

When she turned around,no one dared to do so much as breath. But Theo walked,her back straightened as always. She didn't lose composure, nor did she feel the need to hit any more bricks. She reached the end of the floor, one step away from the wall that had been broken first – and not by her.

Natasha took a few steps, worried and as to make sure Theo wouldn't do anything crazy while standing on the edge like that, given that they were standing on the twentieth floor.

“I want to meet with Johnson”,she stated almost softly, in contrast to her previous outbreak, as she turned around to face them.

“Daisy is in Belgrade The-”

“Then that's where we're going”.

Natasha didn't have anything to say back to her,nor could she think of anything to fill that heavy silence with. Tony took a rather deep breath, trying to muster up the guts to speak.

“Daisy won't help you go behind Fury”.

“I'm not asking you”.

Natasha moved her lips nervously, as she momentarily brushed the tip of her nose. Then,she crossed her arms against her chest,trying her best to somehow contribute on this one.

“Theo,we still have a mission, and so does Daisy- this.. this is..”

“Selfish?”,Theo let out an ironic yet short smile. “How many times have I acted selflessly on either of your parts? Of anyone's being here, and not, in this room?”,she demanded an answer,her voice low and harsh.

“I was gonna say foolish”,she noted,now a tad more austere than before. “You're gonna compromise three highly classified missions and risk your career on this damned agency,solely based on something Emma Frost, the enemy, told you just so she could get enough time to get away”.

Natasha and Theo were both starring each other down. But Theo wasn't having it. This wasn't anything like all those other cases in which Natasha would raise her voice and sound just a little harsh, and Theo would comply and laugh it off.

No, this was beyond anything Natasha knew of her. It was not debatable, and Theo would certainly not ask twice. If she had to, she'd leave the team. She'd leave Natasha behind, she'd fight her,if this only meant finding out the truth. Because, if there was just one chance- just one in a trillion, that Emma was saying the truth...

“I don't care”,Theo whispered bitterly.

“You can't be s'riously thinkin' Ian's dead,Rosie..”

Theo's expression softened a little, only in a way that made her look much more helpless.

She clenched her jaw, as if to save face. She could barely bear and think, as she feared she might actually lose her mind if she did so. There was only so many things one's heart, even someone's as Theo's, could manage and handle. And hers couldn't take any more hits.

She couldn't force herself to speak anymore, although Marcus got the message clearly. No words she,or anyone in there, knew were enough to describe not only how she felt, but also how she looked.

Pietro unconsciously remembered an old widow back home, from when he was still a child. They had attended her husband's funeral, and although he wasn't old enough to remember everything that had happened on that day, there was thing he couldn't erase from his mind:

Her face; the hollow,dark eyes,dry of tears. The popped veins around her irises, the coldness of her skin. She looked more like a corpse someone had mistaken out of the morgue, than a living woman.

They say the eyes are the mirror to one's soul, but that woman's eyes looked ripped; torn apart, broken down to tiny little pieces that she lacked the courage to pick back up. Just like Theo's eyes.

Both her irises seemed to have an invisible veil covering them, as if she couldn't see anything in front of her. Theo had never before felt like that; she had never even dared to think that there was a feeling to be felt like this.

In the span of two months Theo had lost two lives she never had the time to live. No one should ever feel this empty and hollow, she kept thinking to herself. No one should ever hold this much fear and loathing over their lives; for,Theo felt as if she was actually cursed at this point.

No more tears to cry, and yet she could sense the seaway raging inside her chest, flooding her lungs, suffocating her. A turmoil vibrating through her every vain, polluting her own blood.

Even when they boarded the jet, packing everything inside and making sure there was no thing left behind, Theo didn't utter a single word. Natasha had managed to get a location way back from Bucky,and although she knew that he would be disappointed at her, at how she used something he had said in confidence to bring everyone there- Natasha couldn't bring herself to do nothing.

Theo was sitting on an isolated part of the jet, consciously choosing to be left alone. Tony and Marcus figured she desperately needed such an isolation, if only for a few hours, and so they made sure no one was to disturb her.

Peter,however, didn't exactly comply. He didn't know anything more than Pietro,or Wanda and Natasha did – and perhaps he had understood even less, but he didn't have the heart to leave her alone. He walked in, as cautiously and silent as he could.

Theo didn't even notice him at first, her glance hollow as she stared at the wall across her, her back uncharacteristically crouched, her arms hanging from her thighs. He sat next to her,a little shyly.

For the first time in his entire life- Peter Parker didn't speak a single word. Not a sound escaped from his lips. It wasn't nervousness, nor did it make him feel awkward. It was respectful, and to Theo, it was what she needed.

At some point she turned her head towards him,all so slightly. Peter let out a soft,faint smile.

“I got you”,he whispered,poking her shoulder with his own.

If asked, she wouldn't know what to say. Perhaps it was this childlike innocence, always mirrored in his eyes. That he somehow poked her softer side, the one still to this day desperately desiring to be a mother. Her boundless need to feel some warmth from someone as purely good as Peter.

Theo started breathing hard, her eyes slowly filling themselves with tears. Before Peter could even think about responding to what he saw- Theo began bawling.

She was breathing unevenly, her chest coming up and down much faster than her lungs could catch up.

She wailed, the sounds coming out her mouth making next to zero sense to him,or her. Her heart was pricked, and once started Theo had no control over it. She had no strength to stop.

Peter let out a soft huff of air, and slowly -if not hesitantly, tried to put his arms around her. Surprisingly enough – as he though, Theo allowed herself to be hugged, to be held.

“I got you”,he whispered again to her, gently brushing her hair as she hid her face inside his neck.