Stay the night

"I shouldn't have brought her there, she already had a panic attack when we were in the forest so I should have known that it wasn't a good idea." My eyes are closed and I can feel myself lying on a comfortable mattress. It's Wanda's voice I hear. "That's nonsense Maximoff and you know it. You wanted to introduce her to the group and that's important if she is going to stay with us. It's these moron's fault. They never think before they act, everyone with ears on their head could have heard you guys entering the room." It's Natasha's voice and she sounds annoyed. "It's always the same, give them some alcohol and they forget everything. They become a bunch of losers." Silence. "I worry about her Nat." "I know Wanda, so do I. There is this enormous amount of power inside of her, and I don't mean her firepower." "You know about that?" Wanda sounds surprised. "Of course, I talked to Shuri." "So Shuri is just going to tell everyone about Lidiya?" "Of course not, but you know that when I ask something I always get what I want." I can hear a smile in her voice. After a couple of seconds Wanda continues the conversation. "If you don't mean her firepower, than what do you mean?" "Just her inner power, I understand why Hydra had so much trouble breaking her." "They didn't break her, she just let herself disappear. She never did what they wanted of her and her body had to suffer the consequences." "You put that nicely Maximoff. She has a lot of power but it's buried deep inside of her, I don't know if she'll make it." "She has to!" Wanda her voice rose with these words. "Easy there. Why do you care so much about her Wanda?" "What do you mean Nat?" "What I said. You haven't left her side since she got here two weeks ago." "So? You were also there for me when I arrived." "Yes, but I didn't spent every minute with you. I do feel for her, our past kind of overlaps and I really like her. I can see us getting good friends in the future. But it's not that way with you. What's going on?" It's quiet for a couple of minutes before Wanda starts to talk. "Honestly, I don't know. There is just something about her, I want to move the world to make her happy. If someone would harm her, I swear that I'll tear their limbs of. I haven't felt this whole since I lost Pietro Nat." I hear Natasha take a deep breath. "You got it for her." "Maybe I do, even when she was lying in that hospital bed with all these wounds and her hair so dirty, there was just a beauty underneath it all. Her eyes have the color of the sea, her hair that of chestnuts. She is so small and fragile and I just want to hold her close to me. It hurts my heart to see her in so much pain, to see her flinch every time someone laughs. To be able to count her ribs." "Why don't you talk to her about it? It looks as if she cares a lot about you, you're the person she reaches out to." "I know, but how can I talk to her about love when all she has been through is pain? Besides, we don't even know how old she is." I can hear Natasha sit down on something. "Than just show her your love. Show her how much you care about her. Love is more than kissing and fucking each other. Even though that last part is all I'm looking for." She snickers. "Be there for her, and see if you can figure out her last name. That way we might be able to find out more about her." Slowly I open my eyes and cough, getting their attention. "It's Ivanov." I whisper. Instantly Wanda is standing next to me, looking into my eyes. "Your name is Lidiya Ivanov?" I nod and move over to the other side of the bed, so she can sit next to me. "Why didn't you tell us sooner?" Natasha asks. I can see that she is sitting on a grey couch, and slowly I start to take in my surroundings. It's a big room with white walls and a big TV screen opposite to the bed. There is the said couch and a bookcase that is completely filled. The right side of the room, which is opposite to the door in which you enter, is entirely made out of glass. It gives me a view of the compound but since it's getting dark there is not much to see. There is a big wardrobe and I wonder how I can ever have enough clothes to fit that. "Lidiya?" Wanda asks and my attention goes back to the question that Natasha has asked. "You didn't ask." I say. For a minute both of them just stare at me, until suddenly the small redhead starts laughing. "Ha, right you are. And never give information they don't ask for, right?" I nod, and after a couple of seconds I join Natasha in her laughter, with Wanda joining in as well. I hiccup and tears stream over my face, I don't remember when the last time is that I had so much fun. After a couple of minutes all three of us start to calm down, and I wipe away the tears. "This is the most fun I have had in years Natasha, thank you." Natasha winks at me and says: "You are very welcome, and call me Nat. All of my friends do that." She gets up and walks towards the door. "Is it okay if I look you up?" After thinking for a moment I nod my head. "Yes please, I want to know who I am."

Natasha leaves the room and I am left alone with Wanda. I smile at her and she gives me a heartwarming smile back. "I'm scared." I whisper and she moves closer to me. Both of us are lying on our sides, looking at each other. "Why milyy?" I take a shaky breath. "About what Natasha will find out about me. How can I not know how old I am. What if I'm way younger than you, and…" and you won't want me. That's what I think, but I can't say it. "and you will think of me as an annoying toddler." Wanda her warm laugh fills the room. "We might not know your age yet malysh, but I'm pretty sure that you're not a toddler anymore. You look a bit too old for that." I laugh along with her but tears take over. "I remember my mother and my dad, I remember their warm smiles and how it felt when my mum held me. But I don't remember their names, how can I not remember their names Wanda." My voice sounds desperate and she takes me in her arms, my head resting against her chest and our feet are tangled. "Ssshhhhttt Lidiya, I know how you feel. But even if you don't remember their names right now, it doesn't change the fact that you never stopped loving them." I sniffle. "Nobody remembers them." I mumble against her breasts. She pulls back a little bit so she can look me in my eyes. "What did you say?" "Nobody remembers them." I whisper. "Why not?" I just look into her eyes for a moment, I trust her but I have never talked about this. And that's what I tell her. "I have never talked to anyone about this. After it happened Strucker locked me up, and then you guys found me…" She combs through my hear, something that relaxes me. "You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to Lidiya. But if you do want to, know that I'm here for you." The fact that she doesn't push me into telling her about my past is the exact thing that makes me open up. I turn around so I lay on my back with my head on her lap. "It was my birthday." I start, my body in the present but my eyes in the past. "I just turned nine that day. My parents didn't have a lot of money so we tried to get by as good as possible. I shared a bedroom with them and they both worked a lot. My mother wanted to take an extra job to get a bit more money but my dad didn't want to leave me alone. My mother made pancakes for breakfast, it's my favorite. They even bought a candle even though it must have been expensive as hell. We are sitting at the table and I'm getting ready to blow out the candle, and then…" I shudder and take a deep breath. Wanda gives me a kiss on my forehead. "I'm here with you." "There was this explosion, it was a bomb attack. The entire building collapsed and I was unconscious. When I got by there was fire everywhere. I couldn't get away because there was this heavy wardrobe trapping my leg. That's when I saw her…" My voice is only a whisper at this point, silent tears start to stream down my cheeks. Wanda lets me cry, she knows that I need this, all she needs to do is be here for me. "What did you see malysh?" I start shaking and the crying gets worse. "My mother!" I cry out. "Her lifeless body was lying right in front of me. And that's when I noticed that there were dead bodies everywhere." Wanda holds me tight, letting me sink into her presence. "I wanted to get out of there but I couldn't get away. When the fire reached me I expected to die, but I didn't. Why didn't I die Wanda?!" I shout into the room, letting go of the emotions that I have been holding in for years. "I wanted to be dead like my parents were, I wanted it so badly. But instead the fire burned me alive, it entered me and consumed me from the inside. It melted my bones and rebuild them. It hurt so much." I shudder when I think back to the tremendous amount of pain I remember being in. "Shhhtt you're safe." I turn to my side, pressing my face against her belly. She rocks me back and forth. "And then while I was lying in the rumbles of what once was my home, there he was. Someone told him about a girl surviving the bomb attack so he came to get me." I don't need to tell her that I am talking about Strucker, she knows. "I've been locked up ever since." We spend minutes in silence, me just getting comforted by her presence and Wanda clearly lost in her own thoughts.

"You know malysh, I also lost both of my parents in a bomb attack." I raise my head and look into her eyes. "You did?" She nods. "It took me years to finally make peace with it but I still miss them. I don't think that I will ever stop missing them. Often I wonder if they would be proud of who I am today. I made a lot of mistakes but I try to make up for them now by being part of the Avengers. The mistakes were made because of the grief I was in. I didn't think anymore, I just let my emotions get the best of me. I was lucky enough to have my brother by my side…" She falls silent, lost in thoughts. "You have a brother?" She looks down on me with sad eyes. "I had. His name was Pietro." "What happened to him?" I whisper. A sad smile crosses her face. "He died a hero. All of us were on a mission to save the earth and he took a bullet to safe Clint. At first I blamed the archer, I thought he should have been the one to die. But in time I learned that it's not his fault, he didn't ask to be saved. It was my brother his own stupid idea. That's why every day I try to do better, to make him proud of me up there." She kisses the necklace she was wearing. "I'm sorry Wanda, I didn't know. I'm sure that he is very proud of you, how couldn't he be." She smiles and we hold each other, finding comfort in the other one's presence. "You know what always makes me feel better?" I look up at her and frown. "No?" "Hot coco, did you ever get to try it?" I shake my head. "My parents couldn't afford it." She understands, I know she does. "Then today will be your first time and it would be an honor to give it to you." I blush when I realize that her words can be interpreted a lot less innocent. "Let's go." She softly pushes my head of her lap and gets out of the bed. I look at her, she is wearing a loose t-shirt and a grey jogging. She probably changed clothes when I was sleeping. "See something you like?" she asks teasingly and I swallow. "Uhm no, I mean yes, I mean let's go." I jump out of the bed and walk through the door, determined to get away from this situation that makes my heart go up. That's when I realize that I have no clue where I am. I'm standing in a long hallway with multiple doors, leaving a lot of place between each one. Wanda joins me and gives me a big grin. "Were are you going milyy?" Unsure I look from the left to the right. "Uhm left… I think." She laughs. "Follow me. This is one of the corridors with the personal rooms of the team. You have this room." She points towards the door that I have just run out of. I can see my name on a card. "The door straight ahead of you is my room, I demanded you to be situated close to me." With Wanda spending all of her time by my side for the past two weeks I completely forgot to realize that she must have had a room of her own all this time. Will this mean that I have to spend my nights alone again? I try not to think about it, I don't want to keep her away from her own place. Wanda turns to the left after walking a few – a lot- of meters she points towards another door. "That's Nat's room, and opposite to her is Carol's." Before she can show me more of the bedrooms we arrive at an elevator and she presses the button. "This will get us to the kitchen." She smiles. I can hear a 'ping' sound and the doors open. I look inside and doubtfully enter the elevator, I have never been in one before. "Hello miss Maximoff, Lidiya, where do you want to go?" A robotic voice startles me and Wanda grabs my hand, giving it a soft squeeze. "Don't worry Lidiya, this is JARVIS. It's an IA that Tony has created years ago. I want to go to the ground floor please." "Of course." The doors close and I can feel the elevator descending. When the doors open again we leave the metal danger cage and I follow Wanda to the kitchen. On our way we pass through the living area and it turns out that I didn't get the chance to see how big it was the last time I was here. It consist out of several small rooms but there are no doors. When we pass a big TV screen I can see Bruce, Gamora and Daisy watching something which I assume is a horror movie. In the next room I can see two people having a civilized conversation about a book that is lying on a table. One of them is a robot I assume and the other one is hovering a couple of cm over the floor, wearing a pretty red cape and a special necklace. They don't seem to notice that we have entered the room so Wanda coughs to get their attention. "Who is – ah Wanda, it's you. How nice to see you again." The robot is talking towards Wanda with a dreamy smile and I can't help but feel jealous. I press myself against Wanda her side and I can hear her chuckle. "Hi Vision, this is Lidiya. We are on our way to the kitchen for some hot coco." Vision turns his head towards me and gives me a polite nod. "Nice to meet you miss. Wanda was really worried about your physical situation but I'm glad that has approved." The other man his feet touch the ground and he takes a step towards me. "Very nice to meet you, I hope you find yourself comfortable?" I nod at the man and can't help but scream a little when the cape he is wearing leaves his shoulders and flies towards me. The cape kind of boops my nose and then flies around me, making me chuckle once I recover from the shock. "Ah, it turns out that the Cloak of Levitation likes you." The man says and the cloak waves at me. "Cloakie!" I say with a big grin and it flies around my head, messing up my hair. "That's a special magical artifact who has chosen me and you call it…" "Cloakie!" I finish his sentence while laughing with the cloak. "I should have known that nobody here has any respect for the arts." He mumbles while straitening his clothes. "I am doctor Steven Strange by the way." He says while shaking my hand. "Doctor Strange." Wanda says with a smile. "Yes you can call me that but please don't call me a wizard, that's not what I am." I smile at him and make a mental note of this. "We have to get going, otherwise I will never get that chocolate Wanda promised me." I explain while removing Cloakie from my head. The cape flies back to Strange and takes place on his shoulders, and with a final goodbye we move on to the next room. I see Scott and his daughter playing a game of chess, while Hope is sitting on the sofa reading a book. We wave and they wave back. In the next room Rocket, Thor, Nebula and Groot are still playing the Cards against Humanity game, but this time their volume is a lot lower. And last but not least Peter (Parker) and Carol are playing some kind of video game, and hearing Peter's reaction it appears that Carol is on a winning streak. "No fair! Ned told me that this move would definitely work!" "Looks like your little friend was wrong Spidey!" She laughs at his sad face.

Finally we make it to the kitchen where Valkyrie is drinking some water. She raises her glass towards us and leaves the room, giving us the entire kitchen to ourselves. "Sit." Wanda says, pointing towards one of the high chairs against the bar. I do as she says and sit down, curious about what she will do. "I'm going to make us hot coco just like I promised." She replies to my thoughts. She takes a cooking pot out of the cupboard along with some chocolate bars and a box of milk. She pours some of the milk in the pot and puts the stove on, waiting for it to warm up. "So what do you think of the team so far? Besides that fact that they can be obnoxiously loud." I'm quiet for a minute, thinking of all the people I have met today. "They are interesting." Are the words I decide to go with. Wanda laughs while she is stirring the milk. "You can say that, yes. I promise you all of them are very kind though, they all want you to feel comfortable here." I smile at her words and I see Wanda break pieces of the chocolate bars, adding them to the milk. "I just get a weird feeling from that Peter guy." She tilts her head to the side, looking at me. "Peter Parker or Peter Quill?" "The latter." Wanda is thinking about her words while she stirs the chocolate and the milk into one brew. "He is… Pretty old school." She says. "What do you mean?" "He doesn't like it when two people of the same sex have a relationship together, and he always acts like he is a big macho." I get a little bit somber at her words. At home we never talked about sexual preferences because I was still too young for that, but there is no doubt in my mind that they would have accepted whoever I chose to be with. "Who do you like?" I ask her. A flush flashes across her cheeks and she stumbles over her words. "W-what do you mean?" "Do you like men or women?" She visually relaxes after I clarify the question. "Oh. I'm into girls, men just don't do it for me." I laugh at her words. "What about you?" "I don't know, when I was nine I wasn't really into romance and after that I didn't get a lot of chances to try things out. But I think I tend to lean to girls, I mean they are just so much prettier than boys are. And dicks… are the grossest thing ever and I don't feel like seeing one again anytime soon." I can see the questions in Wanda her eyes, like how I know about dicks, but she senses that it's not the time to ask them. "Right you are. Hands can do the same, and even more." She moves her fingers and immediately I get this tingling feeling in my stomach. My cheeks turn red and the only thing I manage to say is "uh". Wanda laughs and sends me a wink, after which she goes and grabs two cups together with a bottle of whipped cream. She pours the hot coco into the cups and adds some of the whipped cream on top of it. When she is finished she walks over to me and places the cup on the bar, sitting down on the other chair. "Be careful, it's hot." She says and I just grin at her, taking the cup with both of my hands. The heat feels amazing, it warms me up completely and gives me the energy I didn't know I was missing. "Right, fire starter." She laughs and picks up her own cup, being more careful than I was. "To first experiences." She says and we clink our cups together. I take a long sip, the taste of the hot coco on my mouth together with the cream is absolutely heavenly. I smack my lips, trying to catch as much of the whipped cream as possible. Wanda laughs when she sees the joy in my eyes. "You like it?" I nod my head and take another sip. Wanda looks at my lips and bursts out in laughter. I look at her, confused. What did I do wrong? "There is whipped cream on your lips." She laughs and I can't help but feel embarrassed. "No need for that darling, I'll help you with it!" She clearly hears my thoughts and moves closer to me. With her index finger she wipes the cream of my lips, bringing it to her mouth and licking her finger clean. My mouth falls open and she brings the finger back to me, closing my mouth with it. Her mouth goes to my ear and she whispers "I like the way your lips taste". I feel like falling off the chair and it's like my heartbeat is going hundred miles per hour. I turn my face away from her, trying to regain my composure.

When we have finished all of the hot coco we clean up the mess we made. "I think it's time to get to bed, what do you think?" I nod my head but can't help the empty feeling that is settling in my stomach. My breathing is getting quicker and sweat appears on my forehead. "Hey, hey, milyy, what's wrong?" Wanda takes my hands into hers and looks into my eyes. I feel so stupid for saying this. "Can… can you please stay with me? N-now that I have m-my room you will probably want to sleep in your own bed again and I-I can't be alone, I need you Wanda, I…" She pulls me in a hug. "Shhtt Lidiya, I will stay with you as long as you want me."