For @littlestartopaz : Steve
catches Wanda sulking and invites her to Disney Night with Nat and Clint. Wanda teases him, and Vision ends up there
too. Better yet, not MCU so we can also
have her brother. Or just ignore that
part of the MCU.
GOOD. Also, Quicksilver is alive and healthy after a while in a healing coma, as speedsters do. I read a wild AU once where he was shot and died, and the comments were full of complaints about how it didn’t make sense. I am RIGHT THIS MOMENT deciding that this fic and this and this and possibly some others with small tweaks exist in the same universe as this one (I do not have a timeline to speak of) and also I’m disregarding that same wild AU’s belief that Clint lives? On a farm? Rather than a shitty apartment building in NYC and the Tower/Mansion? And that Nat and Clint are not soulmates on a level that makes romance look downright petty, kay-thanks-bye. AND also I’m so glad we all remember how Wanda and Pietro were kids who were pressganged and conned into service of HYDRA rather than being voluntary recruits.
It wasn’t like Wanda had expected her relationship with Pietro to be all roses after he came out of his coma, but her worry had also done a spectacular job of blurring out some of his less desirable qualities as a brother. Like, just for example, his overwhelming, pointless, overprotective bullshit. She muttered a bitter Sokovian curse under her breath and stripped off her jacket, dropping it on the bed without a care for the soot that would certainly stain her sheets. The rest of her uniform was given the same careless treatment, abandoned on the floor as she yanked on a pair of leggings and a soft shirt two sizes too big.
She wasn’t even sure who she was more frustrated with—Pietro, for yanking her out of the way of a spider ‘bot that she could have taken care of, or herself, for losing focus for long enough to let him take the hit for her. Someday, he was going to suddenly realize that his fragile twin sister had gone and turned into an adult while he was busy fending off the world. She hoped it was sooner rather than later, or she might have to beat it into him. Assuming he even lived that long, which was beginning to look increasingly unlikely.
“Stupid nervous bastard,” she muttered in English, and flopped down on her bed, flat on her back with her fingers laced over her face. “Martyr.”
“Hazard of the profession,” Steve’s voice said, amused. Wanda turned her head, untangling her fingers to look toward the door, where Steve was leaning against her doorjamb. He was dressed in sweats and a t-shirt, standard fare for any of them after showering upon returning from a mission. His hair was a rumpled mess and he had a nasty purple and blue bruise marbling over one cheek, where Bruce had diagnosed a cracked zygomatic. In combination with the blood that had been leaking from a split in his lip, Natasha had cheerfully commented that he was looking very patriotic indeed.
“Put ice on your face,” she said, frowning at him across the landscape of her comforter. Steve grinned at her, and winced, raising the cold pack in his hand back to his cheek.
“Like I said,” Steve said. His voice was muffled, but his eyes were bright and wild with adrenaline, like blue fire. “We’re all fucking martyrs, or so I’m told. Your brother just wants to keep you safe.”
“Well, I just spent months at his bedside because he took eight bullets to the chest and severed his spine,” Wanda said, sitting up sharply. “So he can get over it.”
“Easy,” Steve said, holding out his free hand in a gesture of peace. “I’m not saying whether he’s right or wrong, just that he’s got his reasons. You’re a grown dame, if you want him to cut it out you can tell him.”
Wanda pressed her lips together and looked down at her hands, rubbing at a spot of grease she’d picked up while she was blowing up a ‘bot. It just seemed to get more deeply ingrained into her skin. “I just. He’s protected me our whole lives. I want to be able to protect him sometimes.” She glanced up, and Steve was nodding, ambling over to move her jacket out of the way and sit down beside her. Some of the anger was beginning to burn itself out, but the feeling of failure it left in its wake was worse—much worse. “I should be able to protect him,” she almost snarled, slamming an open palm down onto the bed, and Steve gave her a half-smile, rueful.
“Yeah, that doesn’t go away,” Steve said, all dry, dark humor, and Wanda hummed agreement, then sighed, leaning into his shoulder. There was a moment where the only sound was the quiet crackle of the cold pack as Steve adjusted it against his cheek. “Hey, Wanda,” Steve said at last, “you wanna watch a Disney movie? Take your mind off things?”
Wanda laughed a little at that, startled. “The Captain himself watches children’s movies after missions? What would the world think if they knew?”
“It was Nat and Clint who started it, actually,” Steve said, standing, and offered her his hand. Wanda didn’t move, blinking up at him in shock. “Don’t believe me?” he asked, clearly entertained by whatever her face was doing.
“I believe Clint—Natasha?”
“Yeah, she thinks kids’ movies are good for the soul. Something about Clint watching a lot of them while the two of them were waiting for her to get over the Red Room’s influence. Are you coming or not?”
“All right,” Wanda said, bemused, and took the offered hand, letting Steve haul her bodily to her feet. “Is anyone else coming?”
Steve grinned with the half of his mouth that he could move freely and dropped her a wink. “Our secret. Well,” he revised, “Vision probably knows. He’s got the databanks from the Tower’s theater room.” He smirked as he gestured her out the door. “If you wanted to invite him–”
Wanda made a strangled noise and hit Steve with the back of her hand. “Steven!”
“What?” he asked, all innocent blue eyes, and she scowled at him. Whoever had suggested that Captain America was a pure and naïve soul, entirely unaware of the concept of mockery, had obviously never met the man. Natasha had once confided to Wanda that Steve had convinced them all he was scandalized by the mere thought of a woman swearing, and had fleeced almost a hundred dollars off Tony by way of a Swear Jar before the man figured out he was being conned.
It was all very funny until Steve was needling her.
“Leave Vision alone,” Wanda huffed, lost for a better response.
“I haven’t done anything to him.”
“He is still figuring things out.”
“Aren’t we all,” Steve said, perfectly neutral.
“He does not think of me like that. I don’t know if he even can.”
“Sounds like someone should ask him.”
This time the sound that choked on Wanda’s tongue sounded almost like an angry cat, and she smacked Steve again, harder. “Shh!” she half-hissed. “Don’t you dare!”
Steve was laughing when he raised his free hand in surrender. “I won’t,” he said, sincere. “But really, if you wanted to invite him, I’m sure Nat and Clint wouldn’t mind. They put up with my commentary the whole time already.”
“Maybe another time,” Wanda said, walking quickly to keep pace with Steve as he took a flight of stairs at his usual quick pace. “What are we watching?”
“I think the plan was Atlantis, but if you have a favorite we could watch that instead.”
Wanda shrugged, pushing through the door at the top of the stairs to Natasha and Clint’s floor. “I have never seen one.”
She didn’t notice Steve had stopped until his hand closed on the back of her shirt and brought her up to an abrupt halt. He’d removed the ice from his cheek, as if he was too distracted to hold it in place. “Seriously?”
“Our mother showed us Snow White once?” she said, looking up at him. She didn’t often feel particularly short—five foot six put her at a perfectly respectable height, and a full inch taller than Natasha—but Steve was an even six, and built like a fridge. She would have dared anyone not to feel small standing beside him in their bare feet and most casual clothing. “But that was years ago. We got…busy.”
“Wanda,” Steve said solemnly, dropping her shirt and resting his hand on her shoulder. “We’re going to watch Bambi.”
“That is…specific.”
Steve took a deep breath, and said, in a tone approaching religious fervor, “Tyrus Wong was the finest animator of his time, and the art he assembled for Bambi is beyond unique and–”
“—represents a level of expression all animation should aspire to,” Natasha chorused, appearing in the hallway as she toweled her hair off, red curls sticking damply to her skin. “Hi, Wanda. Are we watching Bambi?”
“I have never seen it,” Wanda said.
“Steve has some thoughts on it.”
“We should all hope to be half as skilled,” Steve said, entirely unashamed. “The fact that Wong wasn’t appreciated as a genius at the time was–”
“Reprehensible and an indicator of systemic intolerance. Come on,” Natasha told Wanda. “We can get set up. He’ll go on as long as you keep making affirmative noises whenever he pauses to take a breath.”
“Are we showing Wanda Disney? Tasha, you should dance the Firebird for her,” Clint said, balancing two monstrous bowls of popcorn on one arm as he pulled the door to the small kitchen closed behind him. Natasha shot him an exasperated look that he ignored blithely. “Wanda, make sure you ask Tasha to dance the Firebird when we watch Fantasia next.”
“Okay?” Wanda asked, bemused.
“Stop harassing her,” Natasha said, catching Wanda by the elbow with one calloused hand and tugging her down the hall. “Steve, put that ice back on your face. What do you have to say about the animals in Bambi?”
“It was actually the first time anyone put real work into making them move like real animals,” Steve said, almost bouncing down the hall after them. “It was absolutely fantastic.”
Wanda laughed, feeling better than she had since they had departed for their mission. Natasha smiled at her, the small, quick, toothy thing that the spy offered as genuine happiness, rather than the practiced one she flashed cameras and marks.
“Your brother will sort his shit out,” Natasha said quietly, under the steady rhythm of Steve’s voice. “Clint had a protective moron phase after the first time I had to run missions without him, too. He got over it. You’ll have the same problem, whenever you get taken out of commission and have to watch Pietro go get into trouble without you.”
“Thank you,” Wanda whispered. “Wait,” she asked, looking back at Steve, “did they really keep a private zoo?”
***
The movie, to Wanda’s surprise, was exactly what she hadn’t known she needed—it gave her a chance to come down as gently as possible from the adrenaline rush of the mission, and having other people around was steadying in a way she hadn’t been prepared for. Clint sat on the floor, the ankle he’d sprained stretched out in front of him as he leaned his head against Natasha’s thigh and she played with his hair. Steve sat between Natasha and Wanda on the couch, offering informative commentary on the art and the occasional comment about what the movie had been like the first time he saw it, in 1942. As Wanda felt the electric energy of the fight fade from her muscles, she let her head drop wearily to Steve’s shoulder. Steve was, she thought, very much like a really big dog, affectionate and protective and tactile—she hid her face in his shirt when Bambi’s mother was shot, and when she looked up again even Natasha’s eyes looked a bit shiny, and Steve’s lashes were damp.
The door opened as Bambi took his father’s place as Prince of the Forest, and two figures stood there. Wanda didn’t look over, still watching the screen as the music swelled.
“Close the door, Vision,” Natasha ordered. “What do you need?”
“I have been speaking with Pietro and thought you would not mind if I brought him here,” Vision said, doing as he was told and closing the door behind them.
“Brat,” Wanda said, sitting up in surprise.
Her brother smiled at her, a little sheepishly, and blurred across the room to stand beside the couch. Pietro lowered himself to sit on the floor and looked up at her, chewing on his lip. “Sestra,” he said, “I—I am sorry. I should have let you take care of yourself. You are not a child anymore.”
“Neither are you,” she said, and reached out tentatively toward him. Pietro tangled their fingers together, like they had when they were small, and she looked at where their hands linked. “I know you want to protect me. I want to protect you, too.”
“I should have trusted you more,” Pietro admitted quietly. The words clicked into place like the last piece of a circuit, and Wanda blinked.
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, you should. You are always in a hurry to protect me from the whole world. Do you not trust me to protect myself?”
“I do!” Pietro rushed to reassure her. “I do. I just.” He sighed, visibly casting about for the words he was struggling to articulate, and made a motion, as if tearing his heart out of his chest with one clawed hand. “You are my sister,” he said helplessly.
Wanda took a deep breath and felt the last of the hard knot in her chest unravel, the words he couldn’t find settling into place in her mind as surely as if he had written them a foot high on the wall. “I know,” she whispered. She clutched his hand tighter. “You are my brother. Let me take care of you, too. That is all I ask.”
“Da, Wanda,” Pietro murmured. “I will.”
There was a beat of respectful silence before Natasha announced, “I think this calls for another movie.”
“Can Vis stay?” Wanda asked, looking up from her brother.
“Sure,” Clint said. “Pull up a bit of floor, Bot Boy. All right, kiddies, raise your hand if you’ve seen Lilo and Stitch.”
