Chapter 13
By the middle of the next week, Ashley was starting to go stir crazy. She had kept her promise to Matt and hadn’t gone out on patrol. She hadn’t so much as stretched her wings since Thursday night. As a result, her back felt as though it was starting to cramp every time she moved when she woke up on Wednesday morning. She had her first exam that morning – English. She was fairly confident for the actual exam itself, having shut herself inside the cramped library over the weekend to study once she had completed her assignment and helped Ned with his over email.
Not going out had been made a bit more bearable by the near constant chiming of her phone. Most of the notifications were Peter, sending her memes and YouTube videos, but Matt, Karen and Foggy usually checked in a couple of times a day along with some of the Avengers team. In fact, that morning she had received a flurry of good luck messages from Matt, Karen, Foggy, Pepper, Tony, Wanda, Bucky, Steve and Bruce.
The exam itself went by quite quickly. Somehow, Ashley had managed to relax at school, but that might have had something to do with the fact that she had spotted a familiar dark-haired woman outside, flask of whiskey in hand as she tried to blend in with the crowd of New Yorkers bustling about near the school. This must have been what Matt meant when he said he would call in some friends. The sight of Jessica so close by had actually reassured her and once she was out of the exam hall, she was sure to let Matt know that.
Ash: Thanks for posting Jessica outside. It kinda helped a bit. 11:49am
Matty: You’re welcome, although you weren’t really meant to know she was there. She’s going to be there all week. How did the exam go? 11:53am
Ash: It was easy peasy. 11:56am
Matty: Glad to hear it. Foggy and Karen both say well done on your exam. 11:59am
Ashley smiled as she pocketed her phone into her new coat, pulling it around her tightly. It was a thick, black parka with a fluffy hood, and was definitely a good investment. The chill of the winter air wasn’t quite hitting her bones now, which was good as the first snow of the season had hit on Tuesday, signalling that colder temperatures were ahead. She made her way to the library, where she intended to spend her lunch time studying for her next exam, which was statistics later that afternoon.
On her way there, she bumped into Peter in the corridor. He and Ned were discussing something in hushed whispers at Peter’s locker, but suddenly quietened as Ashley drew close. They both offered her guilty smiles as she came to a stop by her locker a couple down from them.
“How did the exam go?” Ned asked.
Ashley shrugged as she pulled her statistics textbook from her locker. “It went well, I think. I’m going to go cram a little bit before stats this afternoon, so I’ll see you later.”
Without waiting for a response, she had left the two teens and found a quiet corner to perch in the library for three quarters of an hour. She didn’t really need to revise any more for this exam, but it kept her mind occupied, instead of being left free to ponder on more unsavoury topics, such as how everyone she loved was in danger because of her.
The exam went by in a breeze and to top off the day, the school let them go home early at the end of the exam. The anxiety started to set in a little bit as she picked up her school bag and made her way out of the school entrance. As soon as she was outside, she did a quick scan of the area, eyes picking out Jessica in almost the exact same spot as she had been at eight o’clock that morning. After spotting her, she then clocked a familiar black Audi parked in the nearest spot directly in front of her. It seemed that Happy had gotten the memo that school was out early for them today. She clutched her bag tightly and started moving towards the car when the backseat window opened, revealing the face of a rather bored looking Tony Stark.
“Come on, kid. Let’s have some lab time to celebrate getting your first two exams done.”
Tony opened the car door for her, although he didn’t physically get out of the vehicle. She was vaguely aware that Peter was coming up behind her, but she turned one last time to look at Jessica. The dark-haired vigilante nodded towards her before turning the corner and walking away, clearly signalling her shift was over for the day. Ashley couldn’t help the guilty feeling that settled in her stomach as she watched Jessica walk away. Matt had involved more people, which meant there were more people for Ashley to worry about getting hurt.
Ashley was broken out of her thoughts when Peter had squished her into the middle seat between him and Mr Stark. He began babbling to their mentor about how easy he thought the exams were and how confident he was for the biochemistry exam they had the following day. Ashley stayed mostly silent, only giving one-word answers when Tony had prompted her for them. All she could think of though, was the list of names, which her subconscious had oh-so-helpfully tripled in size. Because now, Tony, Pepper, Happy and the Avengers were in danger, Peter, Ned and MJ were in danger and now Jessica Jones, Wade Wilson and whoever else Matt had dragged into this were exposed. And somehow, she was expected to just continue leading a normal life while all these people were potentially signing their own death warrants by agreeing to help her. They probably didn’t even know what they were getting into.
Tony tapped Ashley twice on the head as they arrived at the tower, lulling her from her thoughts. Peter and Happy had already left the car, having apparently received some kind of silent signal from Tony that he wanted to speak to her alone. “What’s going on in that head of yours, hmm?”
Ashley blushed in response, her gaze dropping down to her worn-out converse (that would be the next thing to buy once she got paid), as they had suddenly become very interesting. She chose not to answer, not entirely sure what she should say to Tony. The constant lying was becoming too much so she chose instead to stay silent.
Tony sighed when he realised he wasn’t going to get a response. At first, he thought of her as a female version of Peter and treated her as such. Pepper and the others had all remarked on how comfortable and happy Ashley had been with them Saturday morning, despite the night terrors the evening before, but now Tony felt like it was back to square one. The girl had withdrawn and looked down right scared since Tony and Happy had picked the kids up from school.
Of course Tony was pretty sure he had it all sussed out. Even with Matt Murdock doing his best to act ignorant and not give away her alter-ego. He supposed it was only natural that she would be scared but withdrawing from everyone was going to be a sure-fire way to end up in trouble. Tony was scared that she was a flight-risk, especially after the phone call with Murdock and the surprising tip-off Steve and Bucky had received on their Sunday morning run. Apparently Deadpool – and Tony loathed to even think the name – had come across some old friends of Hydra that were active in the area. Apparently, they were looking to create an army of super soldiers by splicing enhanced DNA into mutants.
Now, Tony wasn’t foolish. He knew this was all connected. He knew that Murdock had put together a plot to bring Tony and the Avengers on side. But honestly, Murdock need not have bothered getting Deadpool to deliver the message. It was clearly some kind of vain attempt to trick Tony into not only believing that the threat was Avengers-level series, but also that Deadpool and Daredevil were working independently of each other. For the most part, he didn’t care who the blind vigilante worked with, as long as Ashley had been nowhere near Deadpool. That man was a law unto himself and that made him dangerous.
“Ashley,” he started and waited for the girl to lift her head and meet his gaze. “If there’s something bugging you, I hope you feel that you can come to us – me, Pepper, Wanda, Bruce, everyone. You’re essentially a part of this big, dysfunctional family now and we will do anything to help each other out.”
The word ‘family’ rung out in Ashley’s head on repeat the rest of that afternoon. It had taken a lot of her willpower to not cave and blurt out the truth to Tony, but she couldn’t risk it. Not only would it put him and the others in more danger, but if she started talking, throwing out all her secrets, she doesn’t think she could keep a lid on everything that was piling up and she could find herself tossed in a foster home by the end of the day, and that was a place she very much did not want to be.
She followed Tony into the lab, where Peter was already pulling out his compressed web-fluid formula. Bruce was also already in the lab, copying out Peter’s formula onto a whiteboard so they could look over it together.
“Bruce is more into biochemistry than I am, so I thought we could take a look at the interface together.” Tony pulled up a chair and sat with Ashley at her desk and the pair worked together solidly for a couple of hours. Tony found the experience incredibly rewarding. He always enjoyed working with Peter – as the young vigilante was creative and diligent. Once Peter had latched onto an idea, he wouldn’t let it go until he succeeded, no matter how many failed attempts stood between him and success. Both Peter and Ashley were eager to listen to Tony and Bruce, sharing their own ideas and building on their mentors’.
It was close to five o’clock when Bruce and Peter both sighed loudly in frustration. The noise was simultaneous and had broken Ashley and Tony’s concentration on their coding. Whilst they had been working, Ashley had thrown out some of her ideas concerning building an AI to track symptoms of medical and psychological health issues in vulnerable people. Tony had of course loved the idea, adding that it could also be used to help track the health of the Avengers when they were in the field. But they were soon distracted from theorising it any further by the frustrated groans of the other two.
“Everything okay over there, Brucie-Bear?” Tony asked, quirking an eyebrow.
“I think we’ve hit a dead end… We’ve tried to condense the formula down further so Spider-Man can get the same amount of web fluid that is in the current canisters into the new disks, but we’ve hit a wall.”
Tony stood up and took a glance at the whiteboard Peter and Bruce had been working from. The math was complex and Tony wasn’t convinced he could solve it, but he didn’t have chance when Ashley got up and started making alterations on the whiteboard. She changed a couple of the ratios that they were working on before putting the pen back down with a mumbled apology. There was a brief pause for a moment while Bruce and Peter checked through the adjustments.
“It works...” Bruce said quietly, almost like he couldn’t believe it. “It works!” he repeated before letting out a delighted whoop. Peter grinned widely and rushed over to Ashley, sweeping her up in a tight hug. Tony couldn’t help the grin that broke out on his own face as he surveyed the workshop. It felt good for the space to be so busy and full of sounds of happiness.
The four of them continued working together, the air light between them with their success. Pepper had remarked to Tony over dinner that night about the change she had noticed in him that day. When she came to retrieve Tony for dinner and send Peter and Ashley downstairs to where Happy was waiting to take them home, the lab had been loud and the atmosphere had been ecstatic. Pepper hoped that between Peter and Ashley, they could bring the carefree engineer back out of his guilt-induced shell.
***
That Friday, Ashley did not join Peter at the end of the day to head to the tower for movie night. She had excused herself under the guise of studying and instead headed straight for the library after her History exam that afternoon. She had been feeling on edge all day when Jessica never turned up outside the school that morning. She had been there between the hours of eight and three for the past four days, but clearly something had changed. Tucked in a corner of the library, Ashley checked her phone for what felt like the hundredth time that day as she charged it. Matt still hadn’t texted her back, and that only added to her anxiety. She had messaged him early that morning to ask where the vigilante was.
She tried to focus on studying for her upcoming Geography test, but found herself distracted only a minute later when her phone vibrated. Her hopes were not raised for long when she realised it was just the group chat with Peter and the Avengers.
Lady Boss: If you change your mind tonight we can send Happy out to pick you up.
Legolas: Take a break kiddo. Me and Nat are picking up Macdonald’s! If you want some you’ll have to join us.
Birdbrain: that sounds creepy dude.
Ash: it's okay. Maybe next week guys. Have fun
After sending the message, Ashley muted the group chat notifications in a vain attempt to concentrate on her studying. It didn’t work and barely an hour later, she left the library and returned to her tent. It was still early evening and she was jittering away in her tent with nerves. She called Matt's number, but there was no answer. Where is he? Why isn’t he picking up? She needed to do something, so she broke the promise she had made and got changed.
Stretching her wings after a week was one of the best feelings she had ever felt. All of the bones clicked in protest as they unfolded, her feathers ruffling in the cold wind. As she leapt into the sky, she hoped the rhythmic flapping of her wings would be enough to warm her up, as the hoodie she was now wearing did nothing to shield her from the drop in temperature that the first snow of the season had brought. A shiver ran down her spine at the thought of the coat that was now sitting in her tent, folded away nicely.
Ashley flew as high as she could manage, trying to dart between the clouds for cover from anyone who might be watching. She didn’t go too far, finding a particularly high building to land on that was a good five stories above any of the other buildings around her. She perched on the roof ledge, legs swinging out underneath her. It was eerily familiar of her conversation on the roof with Matt the previous week. She breathed in deeply, the crisp air much more refreshing up here than it was at street level. As she exhaled, her shoulders finally relaxed from the tense position they had been in for so long and broken sobs startled the quiet. As soon as the first tears came, more followed. She drew her knees up to her chest and rocked herself lightly on the building ledge.
Her mind began to wander then. What if she just fell from the ledge, folded her wings away and let gravity do its thing? She could protect everyone that way – Matt, Karen, Foggy, MJ, Peter, Ned, Tony, Pepper, Jessica, Wade... the list went on and on. The tears abruptly stopped at the thought. No-one else needed to get involved if she disappeared. She stood up, toes hanging over the ledge. The ground below couldn’t be seen from up here, obscured by clouds, fog and snow.
The sound of her phone ringing pierced the air and caused Ashley to wobble where she was balanced. Once she had regained her composure, she pulled the phone out of her inside pocket and answered it, briefly looking at the ‘Matty calling’ that flashed on the screen.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Matt seethed down the phone.
“I'm sorry...” Ashley started but Matt soon cut her off.
“You're sorry? I told you to stay on the ground for a reason. I’m trying to keep you safe. We're all trying to keep you safe!”
Ashley sobbed. She had let down Matt and that hurt almost as much as it hurt putting him in danger. He, Karen and Foggy were the ones closest to knowing the real her and they were always there for her, but now she was throwing their kindness and love back in their faces by acting reckless.
“Ash... What's going on? You did so well this week. What's changed?” Matt softened his voice. It was clear to him that Ashley was upset.
“Where's Jess?” she whispered the question, almost afraid of what the answer would be.
Matt sighed on the other end. “She got into a spot of bother with one of her own cases. She got hurt but its not the same people...” Matt didn’t feel the need to specify the ‘same people who are after you.’
“But she got hurt...” A strangled noise left Ashley's throat. “I can't ask everyone to put themselves in danger for me. It would be better if I disappeared...”
“Ashley, no.” Matt's voice was harsh and commanding. “That wouldn’t be better for anyone. That would be like letting them win. We are not going to let them win.” There was a pause as Matt decided to change tactics. “If you… Who’s to say they won’t go after someone else? What’s to stop them going after Spider-Man and Wade and Jessica if you’re gone?”
There was a sniffle in reply as Ashley mulled over Matt’s words. Of course, he was right. Matt was always the voice of reason to Ashley. Ever since they had met six months ago, Matt had always talked her down from something dangerous, or stopped her from behaving recklessly while they were ‘in the field’. He was rational, whereas she was impulsive, and he kept her in check. And that was exactly what she needed at that moment. Someone to keep her in check – to give her an outsider’s view.
“You’re right, you’re right… Sorry, I just got kind of lost.”
“I’ve been there kid.” Matt states matter-of-factly. “It’s not over. This isn’t how we end it.” There was a long pause before he continued. “Where are you Ash? I’m not comfortable leaving you alone right now.”
“… I’m on a roof. Somewhere near the school.”
“What is it with you and rooftops?” There was a hint of a chuckle in Matt’s voice, but it was far overshadowed by the worry in his tone. “Why don’t I meet you outside the school? I can be there in ten minutes. Just stay up there, out of sight until I call you again.”
Ashley mumbled a quiet affirmative which was enough for Matt. He ended the phone call, leaving Ashley alone to the rooftop and her thoughts once more. Or at least, that’s what she thought. A strange twanging sound echoed around her, breaking her out of the spiral her mind seemed determined to lead her down that evening. Her guard came up automatically, shoulders hunching as her wings stretched – prepared to take flight at a moment’s notice. Her feet shuffled closer to the edge of the roof just as a blur of blue and red rushed by her. The figure landed rather gracefully on the roof, a few metres away from her.
“Sorry, I spotted you from a couple of rooftops away.” Spider-Man’s voice was calm. He was not the over-excited beagle he normally was. He was stood up straight, hands out in front of him, palms up and the thought crossed Ashley’s mind that he was treating her like a wild animal.
“I’m not going to jump, if that’s what you’re thinking.” She subconsciously tugged her scarf tighter around her face before jumping from the ledge to the concrete roof, closing the gap between them slightly. “Although, if you’d got here a few minutes earlier I would have still been considering it,” she scoffed dryly.
“Why?” Spider-Man asked. He walked over and sat on the roof ledge where she had previously been stood, keeping both feet firmly planted on the rooftop. Ashley decided to join him, despite the cold of the snow seeping through her jeans – not a pleasant feeling.
“A lot of people are in danger because of me – you included, actually.” The lenses on Spider-Man’s mask widened at that, and if the mood had been right, Ashley probably would have giggled. “Someone got hurt, it wasn’t because of this… thing that’s chasing me, but it could have been. I thought maybe…” she trailed off.
“Maybe if you weren’t around, those people wouldn’t get hurt?”
Ashley nodded in response. “Yeah, I thought maybe it would make things better. I could protect my friends and I could make the pain stop.”
“Would it protect them though?” Spider-Man asked. “Can you say for sure nobody else would get hurt?”
“No…” Her voice was a pained whisper as a set of fresh tears ran down her cheeks.
“Things might seem pretty bleak right now, but surely there must be something good to hold onto, like spending time with your friends?”
Ashley thought about his words. “I recently got an opportunity to work with a hero of mine. It’s like a dream come true.” She smiled softly behind her scarf as she thought about the time spent in the lab with Tony and Peter earlier that week. “But I don’t want to put them in danger. I’m supposed to be there now, but I can’t face it. Not while knowing they could be in danger for just knowing me.”
“I’m supposed to be having a night-off with some friends myself,” Spider-Man started. “But one of my friends didn’t show up. I’m checking the city just to see if she’s alright, but I can’t find her. I’m really worried about her. My other friends say I should tell her who I am, but I don’t want to risk putting her in danger too, especially when I don’t think she’s safe at home.” He sighed deeply; the sound almost despairing. “I guess what I’m trying to say is I know a little bit about how you’re feeling. I should work up the courage to tell her, because if I don’t and something happens, I’ll regret not being honest with her and not spending time with her as me – all of me.”
Before either of them could say any more, Ashley’s phone rang. She quickly answered it, stating ‘on my way’ to the caller on the other end. She stood on the ledge once more before turning back to Spider-Man. “I hope you find her. She’s lucky to have you as a friend.” Ashley stretched her wings wide and took off into the sky. “See ya around Spidey.” She mock-saluted him as she dived below, letting the wind do most of the work in carrying her back west to the school, where Matt was waiting for her.