Wilder: An Altered Civil War

Chapter 2- The Engineer

About an hour later, I arrived at the new Avengers Compound.

Goodness, was it giant.

I pulled into the parking garage, locked my car, and headed up to the main floor, feeling jittery on the inside.

"Ava?"

I turned at the sound of my dad's voice.

"My dad" as in the guy who adopted me a year ago.

As in Steve Rogers.

"Hello, Dad," I said airily. "Any chance you know what mission we're going on?"

"We just got done with one," he said a bit roughly. "I thought you were on your vacation to see your boyfriend?"

"I was until Tony called me in," I said gruffly.

"Why did he call you in?" Steve asked.

"I don't know, he just told me to get to the compound ASAP," I replied shrugging.

Steve sighed. "Well, I guess we can wait until he gets back, then,"

"Wait, he isn't already here?" I questioned, now irritated as Steve began to walk away.

"No, he's at his Stark Foundation project that ended a few hours ago. He should be back soon. Until then, you should probably stretch out from being in a car for so long," Steve advised. "Did you do your training exercises for today?"

I grinned. I never had a true dad or mom, so Steve was the best parent I'd had in a long time. Sure, I had an adopted brother who took care of me after my first mother died, but he treated me as... well... a brother would. Naturally, because of that, I honestly didn't mind getting pushed around a little bit.

"Yes, I did them the second I woke up," I answered.

"Which was?"

"...3 AM,"

Steve spun around to face me. "How late did you fall asleep last night?!"

I shrugged. "Probably around 11,"

Steve gave me the ultimate "eyebrows-raised-head-tilted-at-an-angle-with-a-finger-pointed-at-you" dad face as he protested, "You can't be going to sleep at 11 and waking up at 3. That's only 4 hours of sleep-"

"I know, I know! Look, I had to take melatonin gummies last night because I couldn't sleep. I tend to get really emotional at night," I confessed.

"Why?" Steve took a few more steps toward me, his expression softening.

I usually told Steve everything, but there were a few things that I just couldn't. Like how I still cried over my dead ex or found myself in nightmares about how I assume he died.

Normally, I'd be able to tell him about this stuff, but now when my ex threw him about 4 feet.

In case it was unclear, that ex is Loki Laufeyson, the guy who tried to take over Earth. He died back in 2013, according to Thor, less than a year after his going back to the Asgardian dungeons. 

We'd taken him into Avengers Tower, see, because Thor thought that he could make a change. When we(Loki and I) actually started to get on good terms, the team thought he was using me and send him back.

So yeah. Because I can talk to Steve about him and not get a biased reaction.

"It's... my mom," I said quietly. I hated lying to Steve, but at this point, it was only necessary.

"I know how it feels to lose people you love," Steve replied softly, placing a hand on my shoulder. "Trust me, I've done it a lot. So if you ever need someone to talk to, I'll listen,"