Chapter 9
You didn’t want to stay here. You didn’t want to stay in this room where anyone could come in at any time and see the emotional mess that you were. You headed to your room, your safe space. Safe-ish, at least. In reality, you wanted to leave the tower completely, to just run and leave your problems behind, disappear like you knew you could. But- you couldn’t. Sure, you could get stronger suppressants that would help you deal with the soulmate shit, but you wouldn’t just be running away from negative things, like you had when leaving the Red Room. No, this time you’d have to leave behind anything you’d come to love. Bullet, Nightshade, the strays, Wanda… Natasha. You were upset with her, sure, and she was upset with you, of course, but that didn’t mean that you didn’t care for her. If you didn’t care for her, then that damned heavy feeling in your chest would just go away. You didn’t want to care about her, you didn’t want to care about Wanda, but… okay, maybe that part’s a lie. To not care for them means you would’ve had to have never met them and that – that’s not what you wanted.
You paced in your room like a caged animal, thoughts swirling in your head as your anxiety grew. You were startled by a knock on the door and spun around to see Wanda poking her head in somewhat tentatively.
“Are you alright, Y/N?”
“Fine. Why?” You asked stiffly, eyes narrowing. Wanda stepped into the room hesitantly, shutting the door behind you.
“Because I could feel your anxiety from the kitchen.” She tilted her head at you, waiting patiently for a response that she wasn’t fully sure was going to come.
“Nat hasn’t told you, has she?” you asked carefully.
“Told me what?” Confusion lit up in her green eyes, and your tense shoulders lowered ever so slightly. She wasn’t here to scold you, or to defend Natasha. She’d been genuinely concerned about you.
“I suppose it’s best you hear it from me,” you sighed. “I’m from the Red Room, and Natasha figured it out last night when I dropped and called her Natalia.” You were expecting Wanda to take a step back, glare at you, at the very least stiffen, but she only nodded sympathetically. “What?”
The witch chuckled. “Y/N, you do know that I’m a telepath, right?”
“You read my thoughts?” you snapped, feeling somewhat violated.
Wanda chuckled a little. “No, no, that’s- I don’t go out looking for your thoughts. I’d never do that without consent, and I figured it would take time to get to that point with you, so I haven’t even bothered asking. But when thoughts are loud, sometimes I have no choice but to listen. Kind of if you’re in a conversation and someone nearby is yelling. You’re going to hear them, right?”
You relaxed a little at this. “So what did you know, exactly?”
“Not much,” Wanda admitted, shaking her head, “Just that you thought of Bucky as Yakov when you panicked upon first seeing him. That’s how Nat knew him in the Red Room, but I didn’t want to make assumptions since Yakov is James, Bucky’s first name, in Russian. It could’ve just been a coincidence, which is one of the reasons I didn’t say anything.”
“One of the reasons? What was the other?”
Wanda shrugged, “It was your business. Me telling Nat would’ve upset her and you, and if I wasn’t 100% sure without further invading your privacy, I figured I could just wait for you to tell us on your own terms.”
“But it wasn’t on my own terms,” you muttered.
Wanda smiled sadly, “I suppose not, but Nat will come around. I think she’s more angry at herself than at you.”
“Why’s that?” You moved over to the bed, bringing your knees to your chest and resting your chin on them. Wanda sat beside you, close enough that you could initiate contact if you wanted to, but not so close that you felt crowded.
“She wants to help you, to make you feel more comfortable, and she’s been trying so hard to do just that. She’s just about bitten Steve’s head off a couple times,” Wanda chuckled, “I think that she’s just upset that she didn’t see it sooner. She wants to think that she knows you, and then she’s hit with something like that and… well.” She paused for a moment before continuing. “Just, remember that it’s hard for her to talk about too. She was there just as you were, so this is going to bring up some… difficult memories for her as well.”
You leant your head against her shoulder. “I know. I just… I just need some space from- from all this.” You sat up again and gestured around you.
“You want to go to the warehouse?” Wanda guessed.
“Not that I’m allowed to go anyway,” you replied dully.
“I can come with you and wait outside if you want,” Wanda offered softly.
You turned your head to look at her. You could see that she was expecting you to say no, and for a second you thought you were going to, but she’d been so kind and patient with you. She was supporting you now too, despite knowing that Nat was upset with you. Maybe it was about time that you trusted her a little.
You threaded your fingers through hers and tugged her to her feet with a simple “okay”. The shock on the witch’s face was only evident for a moment before she hid it. You moved over to the window, opening it. You stepped onto the windowsill, but Wanda’s hand on your wrist stopped you before you could lean out of the window.
“Are you sure we can’t just take the elevator down to the ground floor?”
“It’s quicker this way. Why? Not afraid of heights, are you?”
“No,” the witch replied indignantly, stepping up beside you.
You chuckled, “So competitive,” before springing away from the building and hurtling towards the ground.
The air wrapped around you as you controlled it, lifting you up to lie on your back as you looked up at Wanda, whose feet were still glued to the windowsill. Upon seeing you smirking up at her though, she found a new determination, and stepped out, quickly catching herself with her magic before even having fallen a few feet. You rolled your eyes, somehow unsurprised by her tentativeness.
The pair of you landed outside the warehouse, and you looked back to survey Wanda’s expression. You had to admit, you were somewhat nervous about what her opinion of the place would be. You supposed that you were more worried about whether it would change her opinion of you.
She looked around the place curiously before her gaze met yours. “Do you want me to stay out here?”
You shook your head. “You’re here already. You might as well come in.”
You stepped up beside her, threading your fingers through hers and tugging her inside. She didn’t seem as shocked as you’d expected, and your mind went back to when she’d told you about how she and her brother had lived on the streets for a while. You supposed she’d been expecting something like this, but as you slipped through the narrow entrance into the dark space, sending a ball of flame at the empty firepit, you still felt the need to say, “It’s not much, but it’s home. Was. It was home.”
You moved away from her side, stepping towards the back of the room and egging the strays out to say hi. You put names to faces as they stepped into the light. Oscar was still going strong, thank God. He’d been the only one you’d been really concerned about. A few of them stilled as they spotted Wanda, a few even going as far to growl at her, but Oscar toddled forwards trustingly, sniffing Wanda curiously.
Wanda smiled softly, kneeling down to say hi to the friendly, elderly dog. She was gentle, you noted, in a way that – before meeting her – you hadn’t known alphas could be. You knew that there was a chance the strays that growled or froze had been victimised like alphas, much like you had, and that it would take time for Wanda to gain their trust, but you had a feeling that she’d win them over.
“That’s Oscar,” you introduced. “I’ve known him for years. Since he was just a puppy. His tail’s crooked because it was broken when he was little. That’s how I found him. Under a park bench, whining in the rain. I did what I could to help him with what I had, and then I found this place. We’ve been here ever since. That would’ve been… eight years ago? It’s a miracle really. Usually the strays that come through here stay maybe one, two years at most before disappearing. I like to think they found somewhere nicer, warmer, a home maybe, but really I know that they didn’t make it.” You sighed, turning away from the alpha, chuckling humourlessly. “Not Oscar though. He’s a stubborn one.”
“You identify with them,” Wanda said. She wasn’t asking. She knew that you did.
You shrugged, though you kept your back to her as knelt down to look over the dogs and occasional cat one by one, checking for injuries. Other than bumps and bruises, none of them seemed too worse for wear. “What? Displaced, abused, subject to the horrors of humanity?” you shook your head, standing. “I’ve never met an omega who hasn’t gone through the same shit I have. Maybe the Red Room was an exception, but it could have been worse.”
Wanda seemed to sense that she was stepping into sensitive territory, so she shifted the topic a little, something you found yourself hugely grateful for. “It’s not too dissimilar to a place Pietro and I found whilst we were on the streets in Sokovia. We were only there for a couple moths though before Strucker picked us up and introduced us to Hydra.”
“What was he like?” you asked, “Pietro?”
Wanda smiled sadly. “You remembered.” Of course. “He was… a trickster. Mischievous. Always knew how to make me smile. He was… protective, and fast. Very fast. I got the mind tricks; he got the speed. Strucker rarely referred to us as individuals. It was always ‘the twins’ or ‘the Maximoffs’. It was difficult losing him.” It may have been the dim lighting playing tricks on you, but you could’ve sworn the witch was tearing up.
* “I guess that’s one thing I didn’t have to worry about in the Red Room,” you sighed. “Getting attached, I mean. They gave us rabbits once, when we were little. Six or seven, I think. They said ‘look after the rabbit. Feed it, groom it, water it. Maybe train it to do something fun.’ We did. We looked after them all day, and all night. They were our only sources of comfort. Looking back, having an omega bearing probably made it even harder for me when one day, they gave the order for us to kill them.” You heard Wanda’s sharp intake of breath, but continued. It felt good to get this off your chest – this story you hadn’t yet had the guts to share with Bullet or Nightshade.
“What did you do?”
“Some kids just… wrapped their hands around their bunny’s neck and twisted- killing it quickly and more-or-less painfully. One kid got a shovel and just-“ you squeezed your eyes tightly shut at the memory, opening them when you felt Wanda’s warm hands slip into your cool ones and grip them reassuringly. “I couldn’t.” You swallowed. “I couldn’t kill it.” Your voice broke. “So they grabbed it from me and slit it’s belly, throwing it and me into this dark six-by-six foot room. I listened to it scream for half the night as it slowly bled out. The next day, when they took me out, they brought me to another class, the grade below us. They’d had their rabbits for just under a fortnight. They made me grab one girl’s bunny and kill it as she begged me not to.”
Tears spilled down your cheeks, and Wanda wrapped her arms around you, hugging you tightly. *
“They trained us to be monsters,” you whispered. Wanda hushed you.
“You are anything but a monster, Y/N. If you were a monster, you wouldn’t be here helping these strays, you wouldn’t be as kind and compassionate as you are.”
You breathed in a deep, shuddering breath, trying to focus on her warm scent. She held you in silence, letting you sort yourself out, but not leaving you like you were so used to people doing when you got emotional.
“I kept my Red Room history from Natasha,” you said after a while.
Wanda placed her chin on your head with a soft sigh. “Yeah, you did.”
“You think that was wrong?”
“I… I don’t think I’m in much of a position to say,” she replied honestly. “But what I do think is that we all kept secrets from the pack at some point in time, and Nat knows that, and I think she’s more forgiving about that than you’d expect. She just needs time.”
“And what if she hates me?”
Wanda pulled back suddenly, and you almost flinched. “No, Y/N,” she said quickly. “Don’t say that. Natasha would never hate you. Look, she may be irritated, angry, annoyed, but she cares about you, we all do. You’re one of us now, and that won’t change – not unless you want it to.”
“I don’t,” you admitted, surprising even yourself with the honesty of the statement. “For the first time in my life, I have a place to call home.” And yeah, you thought, there are issues, but none that won’t smooth out with time and communication.
“Good. Now, how about you introduce me to the rest of these cute fellas?”
You and Wanda returned to the tower about half an hour later, flying into your room alone, seeing as Wanda had opted to go straight back to her own room. Only a couple of minutes had passed when J.A.R.V.I.S informed you that there was a pack meeting in the living room. You’d never wanted to run away from something so much in your life. For a moment you’d been frozen with indecision – run or stay. You’d chosen the latter. You couldn’t avoid this conversation forever, as much as you hated that.
Dread filled every inch of you as you entered the living room. The others were already there, and you sunk down onto a chair quietly, fiddling with your sleeves and refusing to meet anyone’s eyes. You felt Natasha’s gaze on you, but this only made you duck your head to avoid it.
“Where’s Bruce?” Steve asked Tony.
“Supervising an experiment. We can’t really leave it without risking turning this place into an impressive bonfire.”
“That’s fine. We can catch him up later,” Steve replied, standing up the front. “Let’s make a start. First off-.”
“Steve, hold on,” Natalia – Natasha – interrupted. “I think Y/N wants to tell us something.” You clenched your jaw, turning your face away from the pack in an attempt to shield your unshed tears. It was one thing for Natalia to tell the pack your origin, but it was a whole other can of worms for her to trip you into telling them. “No? Okay, I’ll tell them then. Y/N was so secretive about where she’s from because she’s from the Red Room.”
Dead. Silence.
You clenched your hands, digging your nails into your palms and making them seep blood through half-crescent marks.
You startled when you felt a hand settle just above your knee, and your head snapped around to see Wanda kneeling on the floor in what the alpha had desperately hoped was a non-threatening position. You let her reach out to your hands and uncurl your fingers gently. She wasn’t angry, you had to remind yourself. You knew that. You’d lied to her, concealed things from her… but she wasn’t angry. Slowly, ever so slowly, she moved up to sit on the chair beside you. You shifted so there was enough room for both of you and somehow ended up in her lap. You didn’t mind. She was warm and her scent calming, so you rested your head on her shoulder. She wrapped her arms around you comfortingly, and you allowed your focus to drift back to the pack. You had something – someone – to ground yourself with now. It was okay.
“So,” Steve started slowly, “You grew up where Natasha did.”
You nodded. The cat was out of the bag, you might as well send the kittens on their way too. “I was a few grades below hers, which is probably why she didn’t remember me. The separate grades had very little contact with each other, except for the older girls occasionally teaching the younger classes.”
“And you didn’t think to tell us before this?” Steve’s tone wasn’t as angry as you’d expected it to be. It was more… disappointed, which was somehow worse. You looked away. “We run on trust here, Y/N. Trust is what keeps us together. What else are you hiding from us?”
You wouldn’t have noticed it had you not been so close, but Wanda’s scent shifted, almost imperceptibly. It shifted to something like… guilt? You looked at the alpha, meeting her gaze, and she gave you a pleading look. She wanted you to tell them you were on suppressants. Speaking of, you hadn’t taken your dose yet today. You supposed you hadn’t thought of it because you’d felt good this morning, thanks to your drop. You hissed out a breath through your teeth, leaning your forehead down to meet Wanda’s shoulder. You needed to think.
“I-,” you forced yourself to take a deep breath. “I’m on suppressants.”
“You’re what?” Steve asked, a growl entering his tone.
A small whine slipped past your lips before you had the chance to cut it off, and Wanda reflexively reached a hand up to stroke your hair. You leant into the contact, hiding your face in the crook of her neck.
“Breathe,” she whispered to you, “You’re doing so well. Thank you for telling the truth.”
You melted at her praise, your body relaxing into her hold. She was on your side. She would protect you.
But you shouldn’t need protection from your own pack member, a small part of you thought. Maybe that small part was right too.
Bucky stood abruptly, a stormy expression on his face. “Where are they?”
You wanted to lie, but your mouth wouldn’t listen to you. You swallowed nervously. Lying would only get you into more trouble. “Under the sink in my bathroom.”
Bucky left the room, only to return moments later with the bottle in hand and fury in his eyes. You shrunk back into Wanda a little. Bucky looked at you for a moment before throwing the bottle at you with a tad more force than what was necessary. You flinched, bringing your hands up to shield your face, but it was unnecessary since Wanda used her powers to catch the bottle in mid-air and set it down on the coffee table gently before resuming running her fingers through your hair.
“Don’t throw things, Bucky,” she scolded gently, wrapping her free arm around you.
“Why the hell are you on suppressants?” Bucky demanded, taking a step forward. You startled at his tone, and your body tensed up automatically. You’d had little interaction with him before, so this irritation was rather startling. How was this any of his business? You haven’t accepted a position in the pack yet, despite the others acting like you had. Still, with his anger – an alpha’s anger – you couldn’t help your whine, and you hid your face in the crook of Wanda’s neck again. “Y/N, answer me,” Bucky ordered. “Why are you on suppressants?”
“Bucky, stop. You’re scaring her,” Nat intervened, placing herself between you and the alpha.
“How are you not upset about this? She’s using suppressants, Natasha! They’ll kill her. Have you seen all the horror stories about them? Come on, you’ve got to be upset about this too. She lied to us by not mentioning the suppressants, despite them having been proven to harm omegas. Why are you defending her?”
“Because they gave them to the omegas in the Red Room, okay? You’ve been on them since you presented, right Y/N?” You nodded nervously. “Right. Y/N was raised as a Widow. To do that, she needed to be able to do things like stave off drops, and ignore alpha commands. To do that, she needed to be on suppressants.”“But you’re not a Widow anymore,” Bucky said to you. “Why do you still use them?”
“You don’t get it,” you whispered.
“Then fucking explain it to us!” he yelled. You flinched away violently, your body curling in on itself in an attempt to escape his wrath. Tears escaped your eyes. You hated alphas yelling at you.
“Bucky, stop yelling,” Tony spoke up from the couch. “Y/N’s right. You’re an alpha. You don’t get it.”
“Get what?” he was irritated, definitely, but at least he wasn’t yelling anymore.
Tony glanced at you, and you nodded a little, urging him to answer. “It’s… dangerous out there for omegas-“
“We know that,” Bucky snapped, “That’s why we have rules to protect you.”
“Well I wasn’t always a part of your pack!” you cut in, voice pinched with nerves. “And I’m still not, in case you’ve all forgotten. I’ve followed your rules more as a courtesy than anything else. Natalia and Wanda are my alphas. You and Steve on the other hand, never were, so stop acting like it.”
There was tense silence for a moment before Steve spoke up. “You’re right. You are. She is.” Bucky twisted his head to glare at the other alpha, but Steve met his eyes steadily. “Look, we’ve heard the stories, watched the news. We know the sort of stuff that happens to omegas in the streets and I’m sorry that bad things have happened to you, and I’m sorry that you feel like suppressants are the only way to feel safe. And as much as I’d like to wash them down the drain, that’s not my decision to make. Nat?”
You met Natasha’s gaze to find it filled with disappointment. She may have supported you against Bucky, but that didn’t mean she agreed with your point. You turned away, curling into Wanda. You couldn’t do this. You couldn’t. Not when the memories of the alphas at the Red Room being angry at you were so close to the surface. You knew that they were angry, and maybe they deserved to be, but it scared you. And you hated things that scared you because fear isn’t an emotion that you can control. You can suppress it, sure, but never control it. And that lack of control terrified you.
You knew you weren’t at the Red Room… logically. But you could still feel the phantom pain of the alphas grabbing you, pulling you this way and pushing you that, hitting you, beating you until you were black and blue. You could still imagine the scent of their irritation with you as you struggled to respond to the flurry of sentences that they’d spat at you. You could still hear them yelling at you, all of them simultaneously trying to force you to do different things.
“Hey,” Steve said sternly, grabbing your arm in an attempt to get you to look at him. He was sick of you hiding from him. He wanted to talk to you, not your back.
The moment his hand closed around your arm, you let out a loud keen. The sound shocked even you. Keening was… well it just wasn’t something you’d done in a very long time. The sound had been all but beaten out of you in the Red Room. Keening had never gotten you anything besides a beating there, so it was lost on you as to why your body had decided to betray you by forcing that sound past your lips. It was an involuntary sound, only ever made by omegas in distress. It was like a distress whine but more urgent, you supposed. The sound was designed to grab alphas’ attention, and of course any attention-grabbing behaviours had been destroyed in the Red Room. Apparently, not destroyed enough in this case.
The moment Steve heard you keen, he let go of your arm, hurriedly stepping back. The sound grated on his heart. Wanda, respectively, tightened her hold around you, hushing you as she rocked you back and forth, crooning softly in an attempt to calm you. Your fear-scent was permeating the air around you, and the smell put Wanda off. She hated it when you were upset.
“Hey, Y/N,” Steve said softly, kneeling down beside you as he tried to be as nonthreatening as possible. Nat had quickly come to his side, closely followed by Bucky, all three of them having been disconcerted by your keen.
They were trying to help, you knew, but it was too much. Too many alphas. Too many overwhelming scents making you want to drop. And you couldn’t. You just couldn’t. You whined softly.
“Hey Y/N, what do you need? We need you to tell us,” Natasha placed a gentle hand on your back but you flinched away.
“Guys back off,” Tony said. “Give her some space. You all need to go take a breather- not you, Wanda,” he added quickly when the alpha shifted underneath you. She stilled again, but the others left, ushered out by Tony. You’d never been so grateful for the omega’s presence. “Are you alright Y/N?”
“I- yeah. Thanks.”
“Hm. You know, I can’t blame you for using suppressants. I’ve had moments when I wish I could use them. And the others… well, the others are alphas and as much as they can try, we can’t expect them to really understand how hard it is, let alone if you’ve lived in the streets and the Red Room and such- no offense, Wanda.”
“None taken.”
“Careful Stark,” you muttered, “You’re losing your egotism.”
Tony chuckled, “I’ll leave you two to it.”
The omega left the room, and you heard Wanda huff out a breath. “That… actually went better than expected.”
You twisted to look up at her. “Oh yeah? How did you expect it to go?”
She shrugged, “I’m not sure. Maybe someone storming out, more throwing things, maybe setting something on fire.”
You laughed. “No, seriously.”
Wanda shrugged again. “In all honesty I didn’t know how they’d react.”
“It seems I just can’t stay in their good books,” you sighed.
“Cut yourself some slack. You’ve only been here for a week. It’s going to take time to settle in.”
“I just can’t do anything right. The warehouse, my friends, suppressants, the Red Room. Things just keep getting added to the list.”
“Because we’re all still learning each other, Y/N. You need to be a little patient. It’s a process. Just because we’re soulmates doesn’t mean things happen instantly. We all have quirks that we’ve needed to learn about each other over time.”
“What I need is space, Wanda.” The words came out harsher than expected. “Sorry, that was mean. I just meant that being around this many alphas is… it’s a lot.”
“It’s okay. Do you want me to leave?”
“No, no. You’re okay. I’m actually starting to like you,” you smirked at her.
Wanda rolled her eyes and poked you playfully in the side, “Thanks, I think.”
The two of you sat in comfortable silence for a short while, Wanda playing with your hair comfortingly. It could have been minutes or hours later when the Natasha re-entered the room, albeit hesitantly. You looked over to her, your now-stiff posture alerting Wanda to open her eyes from where she’d been dozing. She ran her hand up and down your spine, encouraging you to relax.
“We need to talk,” the redhead sighed, taking a seat on the coffee table. “About a lot.”
“Yeah, we do,” you replied tensely.
“I think we just- we’ve all been behaving like kids and I think it’s about time that we have a real, adult conversation about our limits when it comes to… whatever this is.”
You nodded in agreement, and felt Wanda shift under you so she could sit up straighter.
Natasha pulled out a piece of paper. A list? Really? “So first off, I take it that you don’t want to be a part of the joint pack situation?”
“No, I don’t,” you agreed. “This may sound mean, but I don’t want Steve or Bucky as my alphas. It’s just…”
“You don’t have to have a reason,” Wanda spoke up from behind you. Natasha ticked off a box on the list.
“I think we need to figure out what we need to tell each other, versus what’s bad to keep from others,” you said slowly. “I can’t promise to tell you guys about my past,” you shook your head, “not yet.”
“Okay,” Nat agreed slowly, “So we don’t have to share our pasts unless, it either puts one of us in danger or involves someone here.” You nodded that was fair. She ticked off another box. “Punishments. Okay, because you’re not comfortable with spanking and I’m never going to use a belt on you again, how about we just rule out corporal punishments all together?”
You nodded. That works. “So it’ll be like, writing lines, physical exertion and stuff?”
Natasha nodded, “Nothing that they had in the Red Room, if that’s what you’re asking.”
You let out a breath. She seemed to be taking the whole Red Room thing well now that she’d had a breather. Wanda was right. Maybe this conversation was helping too – making her feel in control again.
The three of you spoke for a while, covering a new set of rules that outlined just about anything you could think of. The rules were fairer than the ones Steve had set – you could go out on your own so long as someone knew where you were and when you’d be back, and stuff like that.
The tension had long-since dissipated by the time the conversation was coming to a close. You looked up as Steve entered and said, “Hey if you guys are done, I wanted to see if everyone was up for a picnic this afternoon. I feel as though we hadn’t had one in ages. The rest of us think it’s a good idea, so you three can stay here or come with us.”
“I’ll come,” Wanda said, glancing at you and Natasha questioningly. Both of you nodded after a moment of thought. “Great! We’re in.”
“Okay then. We’ll leave in fifteen if that works.”
Sure enough, when you re-entered the room a quarter of an hour later, everyone was ready and waiting. Tony and Wanda bore picnic baskets whilst Steve carried a collection of blankets with the help of Bucky.
“Right, let’s head off.”
The pack exited the compound, Natalia, Buck and Steve laughing and talking up front, and Bruce, Tony and Wanda talking just ahead of you. You lurked at the back of the group, dawdling along and occasionally tuning in or out of conversation.
The group eventually reached the same park that you and Steve had run through just the other day. You followed them over to a patch of shade. Tony laid just out of the shade’s reach, settling down to sunbathe whilst stretching not unlike a cat. Steve shook his head with a small smile.
You also settled in the sun, enjoying the warm rays as they hit your skin. You’d been sitting for not even a moment before Natalia let out a sharp noise, as if correcting a puppy or small child.
“Ah! Sunscreen, Y/N. You too, Tony,” she scolded. You gave her a sheepish smile, shrugging a little. She threw you the bottle and you caught it, applying the sunscreen.
When the sun safety that Natalia obviously cared deeply for had been taken care of – even if she had to tackle Tony to the ground to put sunscreen on him – you copied Tony’s prior movements and laid back on the soft grass, stretching languidly. You watched him out of the corner of your eye. Maybe he’d be a good indicator of how to act. You did a doubletake at the sight of his collar. Collar?
Bruce must’ve noticed you staring because he said, “I can get you one if you want, I just figured it wasn’t your cup of tea.”
You nodded, forcing your gaze away, “Yeah, I…” you chuckled wryly, “I’ve had more than enough bad experiences in which I’ve been choked out because an angry alpha met a sturdy collar around my neck.” Bruce bristled. “Sorry,” you quickly apologised.
“No, it’s not you. Just let me know if you’re ever interested in a collar. If you want, I can get one with a safety breakaway like Tony’s or whatever else you’d like. But we’d never force you to wear one if you didn’t want to, okay?”
You smiled, nodding, before going back to observing Tony. The omega was laying on his back purring in the sun. You could do that. Maybe not the purring bit – not in public and not with all the pack present. It just felt like too intimate of a thing to do, even after a week of knowing your soulmates. Doing it unconsciously in a room with one alpha was one thing, but doing it consciously in public with four alphas present? No, that was a step too far.
You were resting there for a while before the picnic baskets opened and the pack started eating their way through sandwiches and snacks that Bruce and Tony had prepared.
“Y/N, wanna play frisbee with us?” Bucky asked, getting up and brushing his hands off on his pants. His metal arm glinted in the sun. It was a different colour to what it used to be back in the Red Room, you realised now.
You tilted your head. “What’s that?”
“Come on, we’ll teach you,” Wanda said with a grin. She grabbed your wrists and all but dragged you to your feet.
She led you away from the group, accompanied by Wanda, Natalia and Bucky. Wanda stopped and stepped behind you. You moved to turn, but her hands on your shoulders stopped you. She wrapped her arms around you, placing the frisbee in your hands. She guided you through the movement of how to throw it before stepping back. You immediately missed the warmth and sturdiness that her body had provided.
“Have a go.”
You threw the frisbee and the disc flew, albeit not anywhere near to where Bucky or Natalia were, but still. You grinned proudly, darting off to go retrieve the object and leaving Wanda in your dust. This time when you threw it, Natalia caught it – granted, it was after an impressive show of reflexes. You concealed a squeal of proud excitement at your success, but not a moment later you felt arms wrap around you and lift you into the air, spinning you. A squeak of shock escaped you, and you clutched Wanda’s shoulders tightly, laughing.
Wanda placed you down, “That was so good, Y/N!”
Your cheeks warmed at the praise, and you turned back to catch the frisbee as Natalia threw it back to you. The four of you continued playing, and you steadily got better. Though, you supposed you weren’t surprised when Bucky used just a little too much power in his throw and the frisbee flew over your head. You jogged in the general direction you’d seen it fly in. You looked around, confused to see that it had seemingly disappeared.
“You looking for this?”
You turned towards the source of the voice. A blonde alpha stood holding the red disc, her head slightly tilted to the side and a smug grin on her face. You took a step towards her, only for your steps to falter when her alpha scent hit your nose. You stopped dead in your tracks, eyeing her warily. Her scent was strange… almost muted. Kind of like if an omega was on suppressants, but she was an alpha, so that didn’t make sense. You pushed the thought away.
She huffed, “I don’t bite.” She threw the frisbee at you and you caught it, backing away. The blonde’s smirk faltered, but it returned a moment later when her gaze fixed on someone over your shoulder.
“Carol, hey!” Wanda rushed past you to embrace the blonde alpha. You jumped a little as Nat’s arm circled around your waist, but you soon settled into her touch.
“Hey Wanda, Nat, Bucky. Who’s this?”
“I’m Y/N,” you answered coldly, though the question hadn’t quite been aimed at you, “And I can speak for myself.”
The woman smirked again. The expression seemed to be a favourite of hers, “I like you.”
“Relax,” Natalia muttered in your ear. “She’s a friend.” It was only then that you realised quite how stiff you’d been. She ran a hand up and down your side gently, and you forced your muscles to relax. You shifted you weight uncomfortably. You didn’t dislike the woman, she just carried this sort of self-confidence – cockiness, almost – that you’d learnt to avoid in alphas.
You felt the woman’s calculating gaze on you, and you somehow knew she was summing you up. Your spine stiffened unconsciously, and your gaze fixed with hers. It was a bold move on your part; you couldn’t count the number of times that alphas had struck you for such an action. But for some reason you didn’t think this one would. She was cocky, yes, and very prideful, you felt. But there was something almost gentle about the way she carried herself – as if she was aware of whatever power it was that she held, or thought she held – and was constantly trying to ensure she didn’t harm anyone.
“Carol Danvers,” she introduced, holding a hand out. You eyed it suspiciously. You’d always been taught that a handshake was a show of respect – equality. But alphas didn’t respect omegas, much less ones they didn’t know. And equality, you scoffed mentally. There was no such thing as equality in this world. Regardless, after a moment’s hesitation and a gentle nudge in the ribs from Natalia.
“Carol stays at the tower when she’s not off-world,” Natalia explained.
You tilted your head slightly, nodding a little. If Natalia trusted her – knowing her being generally sceptical of people – surely you could trust her too.
“Want to play with us?” Wanda offered.
The blonde’s gaze met yours, as if… as if she was asking your permission. You slightly taken aback by the movement. No alpha you’d met had ever searched for your permission. You nodded a little, simultaneously confused and endeared by the silent question.
Carol smiled, and the group spread out and began throwing the frisbee. Maybe it was a lack of your ability to catch, but yet again, the frisbee flew over your head. You huffed.
“I’ll get it,” you called.
The frisbee had landed on a paved path, and you picked it up. You spun around to head back, but instead almost ran into a solid body. The stench of unbathed alpha hit your nose, and you took a hurried step back.
“Sorry,” you muttered, moving to step around the alpha.
“You’re a pretty little thing,” he said, voice low and gruff. He gripped your upper arm in a vice-like hold, and you winced at the pain. “You ran into me, and I reckon you should apologise to an alpha properly, or did your parents not teach you manners?” He shifted his hand to grab the back of your neck, scruffing you. Your body went limp automatically, and fear turned your blood to ice.
“Oi! Get your hands off her,” you scented Natalia and relief flooded through you. For once, you were glad to know of the overprotective redheaded alpha’s nature.
“Come now, sweetheart. I’ve got money. Care to share your pretty little omega here?” You felt sick to your stomach at the idea of your new pack leasing you out to alphas. It wasn’t uncommon – quite the opposite in fact – and for just a moment, you had a flash of doubt as to whether they’d sell you out or not.
The shortest pause felt like a lifetime, and then Natalia growled, “I said, get your hands off our omega.” Our omega?
When the alpha didn’t immediately let go, tendrils of red wrapped around him and yanked him back, unceremoniously tipping him into the dirt. You immediately hurried to Natalia’s side, and the alpha wrapped a protective arm around your shoulders. Wanda’s magic lifted the alpha back into the air before slamming him down again. The alpha coughed and spluttered, but Wanda continued the motion. Carol moved over to her side.
“Wanda, enough. He’s learnt his lesson,” she said gently, “We’re attracting too much attention.”
Scowling, but knowing Carol was right, Wanda dropped the man to the ground for a final time.
“That’s not how omegas should act,” the alpha on the floor spat at you. You shrunk away from him, pressing into Natasha’s side. “She should be kneeling, and in a collar. They aren’t our equals.”
Carol strode up to the alpha and kicked him solidly, evidently done with his bullshit. He grunted in pain, curling in on himself. Natalia guided you away, and though your legs moved with her, you remained staring at the alpha on the ground, even when you’d reached the tree the others were sat at. Carol hung back a little, though you didn’t miss her concerned expression as she purposefully kept you in her line of sight.
“Hey Y/N, you alright?” Wanda asked, coming up to walk beside you, her hand finding yours and squeezing tightly.
“I- yeah. Yeah. He uh… he wanted to- to lease me. Would you- I mean, you wouldn’t have let him, right?”
“No!” Wanda exclaimed, grasping your hands and egging you to look at her. She lifted a hand to your face, brushing the pad of her thumb across your cheekbone. “Y/N, we’ll never ever do that. Never. You’re not an object to be traded and sold.”
You looked down, blinking rapidly to avoid letting your tears fall. You didn’t quite know why you were crying. You supposed it was just relief. You still didn’t know what to expect from them, and there had been a small part of you that had expected them to begin debating prices.
“Y/N,” Steve started, a concerned expression on his features. “You didn’t… you didn’t actually think anyone here would even consider that did you?”
You looked away, regretting having said anything. You felt a soft hand settle under your chin, gently nudging your face up. You complied, putty in Natalia’s hands.
“Never, Y/N. Never.”
You looked between the members of the pack, and all of them stood surrounding you with a soft protectiveness of sorts. It warmed you, really. You’d never really… well you’d never really had people who’d put their lives on the line for you, but in this moment, you’d bet everything you had on the fact that your new pack would sacrifice for you. It was an intense emotion, one that scared you a little, even. But Natalia was right. You couldn’t always run from your problems. Maybe it would be worth it to try and wait this one out. See where it takes you.
You were in your room alone later that day. The pack had gotten back a couple hours ago, after the sky had begun to darken. Steve had wanted everyone back before dark, and the others had agreed. Were you an outsider, you would’ve had no clue that Carol wasn’t one of the soulmates. The pack treated her as one of your own – not too dissimilar to how Bullet’s pack treated you. She fitted right in, bickering with Steve, trading funny mishaps from training with Natasha, explaining how different parts of her spaceship worked to Bruce and Tony… she was a part of their family.
You were starting to like her. She was a lot more of a teddy bear than she gave off. She was the sort of person who you could trust to keep your secrets, and you had to say, you’d like to find an ally in her. You could tell things to the pack, of course, you were gaining a preliminary level of trust with them, but… you didn’t know. It was kind of like they cared too much. They’d react emotionally if you told them something important because they cared. And that was great… until it just didn’t work. It was fine until whatever problem you had couldn’t be solved by a view that was skewed because of them caring about you. Maybe Carol could be that objective observer. Maybe you were getting ahead of yourself, but it would be nice to have a friend outside of your and Bullet’s respective packs.
A knock sounded on your door and you leapt to your feet lightly, placing your book down on the bed gently. You opened the door, brows furrowing and head tilting as you saw Carol in the doorway.
“Oh… uh, hi. What’s up?”
Carol didn’t seem put off by your awkward greeting, and she leant against the doorframe casually, her arms crossed. “I was coming to make sure you were okay,” she said, her eyes searching your face for any micro expressions you may accidentally let slip. “That guy in the park was… out of line.”
“Oh, yeah. I’m fine,” you shrugged, feigning nonchalance. “It happens a lot,” you add honestly.
She tilted her head thoughtfully, nodding once. “Alright then. Let me know if you want to talk though.” She turned to walk away, but just before you closed the door, she turned back. “Oh, and Y/N?” You tilt your head. “The Avengers may be some of the most overbearing people I know, but they’re also the most loyal people I know. And from what I can tell, they’re absolutely smitten with you.”
Your cheeks warmed a little, “Thanks,” you muttered. “I’ll see you later.”