The closest thing to a daughter

Season 2 Episode 1

Ten forty-five. Fifteen minutes before closing time, only Abigail was still in the store. At least that was what she thought. But suddenly a person dressed in black, armed with a gun, darted through the door and ran toward Abigail and the cash register. "Open the register! This is a robbery," yelled the man, who had to be over twenty-five for sure. By surprise, she didn't really have a chance so she did as instructed and with shaky fingers, began to open the register. At least that's what the robber in front of her thought, but in reality she typed in a code to alert the police. This feature had been put in place at the time because of her robbery and now she was more than happy about it.

At the same time, Natasha Romanoff received the emergency call at Stark Tower. When her eyes fell on the address, she nearly choked on an Oreo. This store was all too familiar to her. Actually, normal robberies were the police's business, but she had such a strange feeling about it. So she stopped the transmission of the call for help and made her way independently to the store where she had first met Abigail three years ago. However, when she arrived in front of the store, there was not much left of it. The entire store was on fire and smoke was already rising seven feet above the ground. Holding her breath and with one hand in front of her mouth, she ran into the store to check for casualties. The robber had fled immediately when the flames arose, but Abigail lay injured and unconscious in the midst of the fire. Anyone else would have been burned to death by now, but the flames seemed to spare her, forming a protective circle around her. This made Natasha assume that she must have been struggling against the robber and seemed to have had no control over her powers. Carefully she lifted Abigail up and brought her back to Stark Tower, which was recently called Avengers Tower. She was already awaited by Steve and Tony, who had noticed the sudden disappearance of the spy. Looking at the unconscious Abigail in her arms, the two men did not know how to react. However, the joy was quickly replaced by concern and before any explanation, Abigail was brought to Bruce in the lab.

When Abigail woke up the next morning, she did not know where she was. Everything had changed a lot since her first visit, but there was one thing she would always recognize. The face and the red, now shorter hair of Natasha Romanoff. "Nat?" she breathed weakly and tried to sit up. "Hey kid," she smiled and helped her sit down. "What am I doing here?" she asked, confused, glancing around the room again. Nat sighed audibly before she began to tell how she had found her in the fire. Abigail was so shocked and shaken by the extent of her powers that she had completely forgotten that she really didn't want anything more to do with Natasha or any Avenger for that matter. As tears welled up in her eyes, Nat wiped them away and ran her fingers through her still now longer red curls. "I missed you little one," she whispered and Abigail looked at her in surprise.

She should and wanted to be mad at Natasha that she, just let her go. She wanted to hate her and banish her from her life forever. But that part was her head and just not her heart. Her heart, on the other hand, was crying out for a never-ending embrace from Natasha, the person who was everything to her. An ally, an acquaintance, a friend, a sister, ... a mother "I love you too," she replied, before she could decide for one of the two feelings. With much effort, she pushed herself to the edge of the bed and fell into Natasha's arms.