The closest thing to a daughter

Season 1 Episode 4

"I told you you should have run away," Tony said with a laugh as Abigail struggled to crawl to the sofa without showing any pain, a gaping hole in the wall now looming over her.

"Very funny," she commented to Stark through clenched teeth. "Sorry about the wall," she added meekly. After all, Tony hadn't been too bad to her all things considered and it had been a long time since she'd been in an apartment. And she had never been in such a modern, let alone expensive, apartment before. He just asked too many questions and had her kidnapped in the first place. Although it had to be said that there were definitely worse places to be abducted to.

"Don't worry about it. The show was well worth it, after all, I still had a score to settle with our Black Widow and I'll just get someone to come and fix it tomorrow. To be honest, I've never liked the wall color, they can change it right after," Tony replied casually and waved off with his hand. Abigail would have liked to have had as much money and as few problems as he did to have someone come and not only repair the wall, but also have it completely repainted just because she didn't like the color.

Some time passed before Tony was called in by J.A.R.V.I.S. and disappeared for a short time. Abigail was left alone with Steve and Bruce in the living room and an uncomfortable silence spread. What was she supposed to ask them? However, she was relieved of this thought because the doctor spoke up again.

"Why did your parents sell you?" Abigail winced slightly. She didn't like talking about it and would prefer to forget her entire past.

"They needed money for their addiction. Alcohol, drugs and cigarettes. That was always more important to them than their own daughter," she admitted and fixed her gaze on her right hand, from which small flames rose and let her play with them.

There was another uncomfortable silence. Neither man knew what to say, so they preferred to say nothing at all. But Abigail's thoughts were in chaos. Before her eyes, she saw her parents arguing and shouting at each other. First at each other and then at little Abigail. Blows followed and the image blurred in front of her. The current Abigail quickly blinked away tears and cleared her throat inconspicuously.

Steve looked at her, but said nothing, which was for the best, because only seconds later a new image emerged. An old fat man slipping money to the Nolans. Too little, considering that they had just sold a child. Their own child. The man took her by the hand and promised her a new sheltered home, but Abigail quickly realized that this would not be the case.

Fortunately, Tony stormed back into the living room a little later with a serious face and followed by Natasha Romanoff, snapping the girl out of her dark memories.

"We have an emergency alert. Loki is in Stuttgart, whatever he's up to, we have to stop him. Romanoff, you stay here and keep an eye on Miss Rebellious," he immediately ordered in a tone that brooked no argument.

But Natasha wouldn't be Natasha if she didn't have something to say: "I'm busy, Tony. I'm not looking after her." She didn't like the situation at all.

"Then take her with you," he simply suggested and disappeared with Steve and Bruce. Romanoff rolled her eyes. She was the longtime S.H.I.E.L.D. agent here, not this multimillionaire with a cool gadget, yet now she had to stay behind to baby-sit. Yet it was he who had wanted the child so badly.

"Little lady, I'm busy. Leave me alone and I won't bother you.... easy!" she ordered her, annoyed, and disappeared from the room again.

"All right, all right," Abigail replied angrily, rolling her eyes. After all, she couldn't help Stark's decision and she was just as unhappy about it as the Russian. Natasha left the room, leaving Abigail alone in the living room. It didn't take long for her to get bored, though, so she decided to take a closer look around Stark Tower. She stumbled into Tony's lab by chance and curiously explored all of his equipment. In addition to cars, motorcycles and countless other vehicles, she also found prototypes of the Iron Man suit.

First she sat down on one of the many motorcycles, but it was far too big for her and her feet just dangled in the air. Tony was a lot taller than she was. She loved riding motorcycles, but it wasn't particularly easy with her size. She then turned her attention to the Iron Man accessories.

A little too aggressively, the seventeen-year-old grabbed a glove, which immediately hurled her against the nearest wall. She hadn't expected that to happen. A scream had escaped her out of shock and only seconds later Nat came rushing into the lab, startled by the noise and sounds, to find Abigail once again lying on the floor.

"What the hell are you doing?" Natasha exclaimed sourly, but there was also a hint of renewed concern in her voice. Even though the new arrival had been nothing but a burden to her so far, Natasha was anything but heartless.

"I'm fine, thank you for asking," Abigail moaned, rolling back and forth on the floor to counteract the pain in her ribs.

"Yeah, I really don't care," Nat assured her, though her eyes spoke a different language. She did care. But Abigail didn't see her eyes and believed her words.

"Since you can't be trusted alone, you can go sit in the office," Natasha ordered her and they both set off, leaving behind a half-destroyed lab. Tony wasn't going to be happy about this - there was going to be a lot of trouble.