emmylou | natasha romanoff

forty-eight.

2018
Manhattan, New York

Kennedy crosses her arms over her chest as she looks at the small boy resting peacefully on her bed. TJ had no idea what was going on, that his parents were gone. He had no idea that half the universe had been wiped out and that the world had been sent into a spiral of chaos. He didn't know anything as he lay there, sound asleep.

"Kennedy?"

She looked up to see Anya standing there, "Hm?"

"I can't sleep," Anya tells her.

Kennedy pats the spot on the bed beside her and Anya enters the room, laying down on the bed. It was insane to think that only a couple of days ago they had all been in this bed, celebrating Kennedy's pregnancy, and now, now it was only three of them.

"Nightmares?" Kennedy asks softly.

"Yeah," Anya answers.

"Me too."

"I didn't think there was anything worse than death, but this? I think this is worse than dying," Anya tells her.

"It is," Kennedy answers, "This is so much worse than dying."

"They can't find him," Anya says, "I don't think they will."

"They'll find him," Kennedy mutters as she glances over at TJ. Anya notices and looks over at him.

"What are you going to do?" Anya asks softly.

"Look after him until we can get his parents back," Kennedy responds.

"And if you can't?" Anya asks, "If we can't get them back-"

"We're going to get them back," Kennedy states, "We are going to get them all back."

Anya nods her head, "Yeah. Yeah, okay."

Kennedy looks over at Anya, "Have you talked to Kate?"

"Yeah," Anya says, "She's okay. Her mom is too."

"That's good," Kennedy says softly. She thought of her own conversation with her mother, hearing as she sobbed when she told her that she'd lost Reagan. It was quite possibly the worst phone call of her life.

"Is the baby okay?" Anya asks softly.

"Babies," Kennedy tells her with a small smile, "Triplets."

"Triplets?" Anya asks, "Are you – are you prepared for that?"

"I was," Kennedy answers before quickly correcting herself, "I will be."

Her phone buzzes on the nightstand and she carefully reaches over TJ as she answers it, "Hello?"

"Hey," Natasha says, "How are you?"

"I'm doing okay," she says as she rubs TJ's back.

"How's TJ?"

"He's sleeping," Kennedy says, "Any updates?"

"Fury's gone," Natasha tells her, "So we've lost both Hill and Fury. Sharon and Alex have no idea what the symbol is on the pager, so we don't know who he was calling. We've also had a new visitor."

"Who?"

"Her name is Nebula," Natasha says, "Gamora's sister."

"She knows anything? Where Thanos might have gone?"

"She said Thanos had a retirement plan, but she doesn't know where he went," Natasha informs her.

"Okay," Kennedy says softly.