The little Stark

opening up the past

Steve allows her to walk into the room first "after you". He sticks out his arm gesturing to the meeting room.

Stas walks in and mimicked him with a higher pitch in her voice "AfTeR yOu."

They both go into the meeting room rolling their eyes at one another, already annoyed.

"Hey you happy campers" says Tony jokingly. "Hi Tony" Stas says before rolling her tongue in her mouth against her bottom lip.

"Hey" replied Steve with his eyebrows raised quickly.

He remained across the table from her and sat himself down.

Stas had sat as well. Tony stayed standing up ready to read mission details. He cleared his throat and proceeded to speak.

"So" He flipped the screen on the tablet he was using onto the main big screen in the meeting room.

"Martin Boskow.. he used to work with Dreykov when he was still alive with Red Room jobs." The name Dreykov made shivers go down her spine.

Steve looked over at Stas who seems nervous and reluctant to do anything that involved the name "Dreykov".

He looked at her and furrowed his eyebrows but she hasn't noticed.

She was looking down fidgeting with her fingers after having heard the name. Tony continued on with the details.

"Boskow has been taken from the prison facility he was being held in in Omsk, Russia. I'm going to show you a security tape of his escape." Tony showed a group of what seemed to be Russian assailants helping Boskow escape his cell.

The alarm had gone off within the facility but the group had already left.

"We have leads on the two main men who helped Boskow escape. Sergei and Lubov Monova."

"So our objective is.. capture all three and put them back into the facility?"

"That's right, if you are to complete this mission before the two week deadline, knowing you two I'm sure you'll want to come back here to the tower, you are free to do so."

"Well. I'll be down in the training room trying to prepare myself for this exciting adventure" She says as she puts her hand on the cold glass meeting table.

Stas uses her hands to push her rolly chair out from under the table so she can get up.

Tony and Steve detected the sarcasm in her voice when she said "exciting adventure".

What about the name Dreykov and Boskow ticked off Anastasia? Thought Steve.

Stas walks out of the room back into the grand living room where some people are, looking down fidgeting with her fingers.

As she is walking she bumps into Bruce. Bruce has been just about the only father figure in her life. Ever.

Ever since she was a child, she hated her biological father, Howard. However, Tony never quite understood why.

Stas, never wanted to tell Tony that Howard was the one who would send her off to those mini "vacations". What Tony never knew and still doesn't know is that those "vacations" were trips to the Red Room.

The only person who knows that is Bruce and Nat. That is in fact how she met Nat. In the Red Room.

"Hey, are you okay?" Says Bruce moving his head to the right and down towards her face so he could get a better look at her.

She doesn't even hear him. She's too lost in her thoughts, still looking down and fidgeting.

Bruce places his hand gently  onto the side of her face and says "Stas?"

"Ye- Yes sorry oh my gosh I really didn't mean to bump into you, I should've been looking up as I was walking I- I'm sorry" She spoke fast. A little too fast for Bruce's liking.

"What's going on? You can talk to me, you're worrying me a bit." "I uh uh" She looks around and catches a concerned gaze with Natasha.

"Come with me" Stas drags a startled Bruce by the hand and motions Nat to follow them.

She takes him down the stairs and down the hall way with Nat jogging closely behind them.

She enters her light grey walled bedroom with Bruce and Nat and shuts the door.

"Are you ok? Stas you look like you're about to cry"

"What? No, I never cry, especially in front of people. C'mon you know me better than that, Nat" "Stas please just tell us what's going on!" exclaimed Bruce.

"My mission.. it involved Dreykov's right hand man. Boskow. And maybe some other people who worked within the Red Room."

Nat's face dropped and Bruce closed his eyes painfully after hearing the mission details. Stas continued to explain the rest of the mission and what had to be done.

"How- how am I supposed to do this? Aren't I just a little too close to this? I know me, I'm gonna make this personal and I'm gonna fuck this whole mission up. I know I am."

Nat grabs her hand reassuringly as they sit onto her bed.

"No. No you're not. You got this. You're Anastasia Stark. How could you possibly mess anything up? You're a lot smarter, stronger and better than you know. I promise you that."

She looks up at Nat and Bruce who are smiling at her but she could see the pain and sacredness in their eyes.

How could they possibly want her to open up her past. The past that ruined her, mentally.

They want her safe and to not go anywhere near this mission but they know, she has to.

A knock on the door disrupts any thoughts the three of them had spiraling in their heads. Two knocks on top and one in the middle. Anastasia turns her head.

"Come in spider boy!" "Hi! I heard you were gonna go train downstairs, do you mind if I join?"

Stas stands up leading Bruce and Nat out her room. "Nope spider boy! Not one bit! Just give me.. ten minutes? I'll meet you down there."

"Alright"

Peter leaves. Bruce and Nat stood in the hallway waiting for Peter to go.

"You know, if you need anything before you leave for this mission, I- we got you okay?"

A smiling Stas hugs the two taller people in front of her. She hated being 5 foot 5 but oh well! "I love you two so much". They pull apart from the hug leaving Stas to get changed so she could train.

She opens up her closet and retrieves black lulu workout leggings and a black  sports bra and a pair of black nike sneakers.

She runs down the three flights of stairs to get to the floor where the training room is.

Before heading down the hall to the room she sits beside Loki on a sofa in a mini living room where he was watching a special on Alligators.

Looking up at the screen on the wall and back down at him she says "I see the resemblance you know" She says bending down to retie her shoe laces.

  "Ha ha darling very clever" She looks back down giggling with a smug facial expression.

Loki was the one person she was always oddly close too but never spoke often. There was always excessive jokingly flirting between the two.

However they both knew there was never anything real between them and they were perfectly okay with that. She gets back up ready to walk away and pets his head "see you later alligator".

He laughs and looks down at her physique in her leggings. He whistles and praises her. She laughs it off chuckling ready to go into the training room.

What she didn't see was Steve standing in the hallway ready to enter the training room as well, uncomfortable and bothered with the situation that just occurred between her and Loki.

She entered the room scanning around for Peter.

"Hey Peter!"