EVERMORE ─ marvel

IV. Jotunheim

Chapter Four
Alex

When the Institute for the Enhanced & Gifted started up, only a handful of students were enrolled. In the last eighteen months, more enhanced humans, some Skrulls, and a few citizens from the Nova Empire decided to go through the institute and become Avengers. Twenty students of the forty five enrolled have been sent into space for their final trial. Most of them are on Vanaheim right now, while a handful were picked to come to Jotunheim to assist and protect Naomi as she negotiates peace with their leader. Bucky and I are here to oversee the student's progress and make sure they don't get themselves killed.

Stevie and Lee are two of these students. They're on the other side of the ship right now, talking quietly with each other. Stevie looks pretty excited about this mission, Lee doesn't, he just looks nervous. I'm sure he'll be fine, they both will. My nephews are resilient and strong as hell, they can handle whatever the Nine Realms has to throw their way. They'll both graduate and then we'll go on more missions together, but then I won't have to be a chaperone, which is a plus in my book. Bucky doesn't seem bothered by our duty on this mission, he just looks happy and proud of his sons. He's over by them, watching them talk with a large smile on his face.

"Alex, may I sit with you for a moment?" Kieran asks me politely.

She approached me from the left so I feel a little startled. My vibranium eye and hearing aid work fine, but even after eighteen months, they don't even come close to the enhanced hearing and vision I have in my right eye and ear. All the input I get from the vibranium replacements just feels wrong, artificial, kind of two dimensional. It's like I'm watching and listening to a movie that I didn't know was 3-D. It's annoying as hell.

I nod to her. "Sure."

Kieran sits down and folds her hands in her lap, looking a little uncomfortable. "I was hoping I could ask you something."

This feels weird. It's not like we haven't talked before, we have, but this feels different. Every time we've talked it's been pretty surface level, unless we're talking about mission stuff. It's clear that whatever she wants to talk to me about is personal, and I wait with baited breath to hear what exactly she has to ask me.

"You have a longer life span than an average human, yes? Because of your powers?"

Huh. Not what I was expecting her to ask. I honestly don't know what I was expecting her to ask. "Uh, yeah. Shuri thinks I'll live to be about one hundred and eighty."

"But Lord Khari will not."

"No. No he won't." I say, blocking out any thought that accompanies that fact.

"Did you find this out before you got together?"

"Just before he and I got engaged. Why?"

Kieran pauses for a long second, contemplating her words before finally asking her question. "How did you come to terms with it? With loving someone that you knew you would lose one day?"

I'm kinda stunned by the question, and still a little confused why she's asking it, but I answer anyways, knowing the answer without needing much thought. Lord knows I've thought of this a lot. "I came to terms with it because I had no other choice. It is what it is. I can't change the situation. I won't get rid of my powers and he doesn't want any, so we just accepted what would happen one day."