wanda and vision's mixtape

“Vision, look at me,” Tony said waving a hand in front of Vision’s eyes in an attempt to get his attention. “You can’t go. You understand that right?”

Vision dipped his chin in acknowledgement even as his brain ran furious probability equations through and through again. But they came back low again, and again, and again. There was only going to be one option.  

“Yeah, I don’t know about that,” Rhodey said from his seat before the flatscreen occupying half the wall of the strategy room they had gathered in. “Tony, this looks pretty bad.”

Vision turned his head and his gaze to the lights flashing across the screen, a live news report of everything that was going down in New York.

Tony swore at the sight before them, and Vision put a pause to his maths in shock. The camera was tracking a hooded redhead through a crowded street, suddenly zooming in on the individual’s face as she turned her head to look over her shoulder.

“Wanda Maximoff has been a fugitive since 2016 when she was decreed an international criminal by the United Nations,” the news reporter said over more footage of Wanda blending in as best she could with the crowds of the city. “While Maximoff has evaded capture for over a year, authorities now believe they are close to apprehending her.”

At this Vision had to quickly let go of the chair he was sitting in, lest he split the arm rests in two.

“We go live now to New York. Please be aware the next clip could be distressing to some viewers”

Tony scrambled to turn the news off even as Vision overrode his authority, ordering the compound AI to keep the report running.

The scene changed once more, and Vision watched as the crowd parted around Wanda as she engaged in a close combat fight with a man clad all in black. Her red magic had him restrained immediately as she spun around, a clear attempt to identify her best exit route. From that moment Vision knew her chances of getting out unharmed were dismal. In those precious seconds another agent was at her back, smartly keeping his distance and instead engaging her with his taser. Wanda’s head snapped up as her body jerked, but she somehow managed to twist around and send the man flying away. All around her agents emerged from the throngs of people trying to get off the main street. They began to close in like a pack of predators.

“Vision—” Tony said reaching out, but he was too late. Vision had risen without thinking when he saw the first taser, his legs moving of their own accord so that he had phased through the wall and was flying out away from the compound in moments. He’d never pushed himself to see how fast he could really travel and now he’d need every ounce of power to get to Wanda’s side in time.

The world was a blur, even to him. The only thing that kept his worries at bay was her in his head, the closer he got the louder her cries grew. He didn’t know how she was doing it; she’d always needed direct physical contact for her voice to be this loud in his head. He reached the streets of New York with her voice as his guiding light.  

‘I need you.’ She was weaker now. ‘Hurry.’

He was close now, all she had to do was keep talking.

‘I hear you, I’m coming for you,’Vision thought back, but he couldn’t say for certain if his voice reached her.

It didn’t matter though, he had arrived.

Vision managed to slow himself down enough to land, though his feet shredded the asphalt beneath him. Bullets flew his way immediately but he sidestepped easily and used the mind stone to blast two agent’s guns to pieces in their hands. The few bystanders left at the edge of the arena now before them, realised this was their indication to leave. They were quickly replaced by what must have been a hundred soldiers.  

Another agent took a run at Vision, electrified baton raised but all it took was a well-placed foot to send him to the ground. Vision continued walking forward, reading for the next onslaught even as Wanda’s voice echoed in his head again. ‘You shouldn’t have come’.

That made him angrier. He didn’t blink as he took out the next three agents before disarming two soldiers who’d mistakenly decided to try their luck against his inhuman body and the power inlaid in his forehead. They’d had enough difficulty restraining Wanda with carefully directed electrified pulses that had her incapacitated, on her knees in pain. They tried the same, turning the pulsing weapons his way but the energy passed harmlessly over him as he phased, carefully avoiding it. He was almost at her now, if he could just get to her side and get her out of the square, away, safe, alive. It was all he could think about.

Someone must have figured that out because next thing Vision knew, all weapons were trained on Wanda.

“Stay right where you are,” a voice crackled over a loudspeaker from a waiting cop car.

Vision didn’t stop until someone took a carefully aimed warning shot and he heard Wanda cry out in pain as she was hit by something. He didn’t know if it was just another pulse or if it was something more final.

The loudspeaker crackled again. “You take one more step and we won’t be taking her into custody, she’ll be going somewhere much more final.”

Vision had been learning a lot about feelings in the last year with Wanda. He’d experienced joy, love, lust, longing. He’d discovered these were warm emotions. Now he knew what rage tasted like.

Rage was cold, so cold. Rage made him irrational. And he was about to discover what happened when he turned that rage against others.

Wanda was on the ground again, clutching at her knee. So, it had been a bullet then. Vision’s shoulders trembled with unrestrained rage as she locked eyes with him, and a bloody, desperate hand reaching out.

And Vision exploded.

Eye-witness accounts would later say it was like the street had come to life. Others would say they thought a Chitarui ship had broken free from beneath the city, that the street had risen from the ground like a huge snake. Others still, would describe the red man, who had supposedly faced down two hundred members of the defence force, as impossibly fast, the yellow energy crackling around him like lighting. They’d say it felt dangerous, it was an ancient power that made the hairs at the back of your neck rise and your gut scream at you to run in the opposite direction. Those testimonies would never reach the news because no one could believe them.

Vision himself couldn’t be entirely sure what happened. He only recalled that he acted without thinking, his movements entirely guided by the immensity of rage crackling through his blood, calling to the stone at his forehead.

The stone, which so often sat dormant at his forehead, acted without his control. The power spread throughout his body and in his anger, he raised his hands, the golden light phasing and crackling about his arms, and thrust them towards the ground with a cry.

The soldiers didn’t have time to use Wanda as bargaining tool as he did this. As the power hit the tarmac the street shuddered and cracked. It didn’t reach the surrounding buildings, restrained only to the street and those who tried to weaponize Vision’s lover. She’d already been used that way once; he’d never let her be trapped again.

With the armed forces in varying levels of disarray, some injured while others just stunned at what they had seen, Vision darted towards Wanda.

The news would later say that an unidentified man and woman arrived on the scene some point into the chaos, but they would never be able to identify the individuals. Something about their cameras conveniently cutting out just in time.

Steve and Natasha raced for Wanda, lying prone and vulnerable in the middle of the street. They’d sent her out for the regular grocery run but hadn’t anticipated her getting caught. Afterall, they’d been in New York often in the last year and had never had problems like this. Vision was quicker and again it was as though the stone acted on his emotions. It took him a moment to recognise Nat and Steve past the caps pulled low over their heads and the masks taking up lower half of their faces, but by then the stone had already done what he must have deemed necessary, at least subconsciously.

As he reached Wanda’s side, throwing himself to his knees beside her and desperately surveying her body for injuries, a barrier appeared crackling in the air around them. Whatever irrational part of him that had seen his old teammates as a risk, wasn’t going to quieten down until he was sure Wanda was safe.

 Steve didn’t manage to stop in time and went flying off the barrier. Nat helped him to his feet even as they both hesitated behind the crackling ring of gold energy. Vision didn’t know how to lower the barrier, but at that moment it was the least of his concerns.

“Wanda,” he whispered lifting her carefully and drawing her into his lap. He supported her shoulders and laid a hand against her cheek even as her eyes cracked open. Her lip trembled even as she winced, trying to sit up.

“You weren’t supposed to come,” she said, coughing slightly. “I had it covered.”

“Evidently,” he murmured absentmindedly looking over her knee, glad it had only been grazed by the bullet. The rest of her was fairly scratched up from hitting the ground so many times, but she was remarkably okay. “You know I couldn’t stay away.”

“We promised,” she said, and Vision saw the tears welling in her eyes. “We promised we wouldn’t put each other at risk.”

Vision sighed, if she had the time to worry about him in her state then she really had to be okay. His relief was immeasurable as he dropped his shoulders and pressed his forehead to hers lightly, taking comfort in their shared breaths, evidence they were both still alive. He had thought the worst for a moment.

As he closed his eyes the barrier around them dropped and Steve and Nat were finally able to get to the pair.

“We need to leave, now,” Steve said with all the authority of the leader he had once been. “They’ve called for reinforcements and with the guns their bringing in, we won’t stand a chance like this.”

Vision helped Wanda stand but when she staggered on her injured knee, he immediately scooped her up.

“You understand the decision you’re making her, Vision,” Nat said as they started away from the scene they had caused. “There’s no going back now, are you staying or coming?”

“Staying is not an option anymore,” Vision said without hesitation. His decision had been made the moment he left the compound.

Wanda sighed sadly but rested her head against the crook of his neck in defeat. “You’ll lose everything.”

“As long as I never have to lose you.”