Behind the mask [Discontinued]

Chapter 6

Kahira wakes up to the pungent smell of hospital disinfectant burning the inside of her nostrils and throat. The room she glances around is silent apart from her heavy breathing and the beep-beep sound you often hear in hospitals that indicates you're actually alive. She slowly opens her eyes, squinting against the bright white lights in an attempt to sharpen the blurred images before her. She must have hit her head pretty hard. When she glances around, her still slightly blurred vision takes in the deserted, blue and white color schemed hospital bedroom. How long had she been here? Who had brought her here? The last thing she could remember was being in the lab talking to Bruce one minute and the next... Out of impulse, her hand travels to her face, pressing the throbbing area on her right temple where she had hit her head upon some surface. She flinches at the pain instantly. At least she didn't have another scar though. 

"Finally decided to leave your dreams did you?" 

A voice rings out in the once deserted room, Kahira using whatever strength she has from the meds running into her arm to turn her head towards the now open door. Two blurry figures stand within its frame, the blurry figures of Nat and Bruce. Nat has changed out of her usual black suit, a dark green hoodie hanging around her frame as she holds a coffee in her hand. Taking a sip of it, she makes her way into the room and towards the chair next to Kahira's bed with Bruce following closely behind. 

"Oh, now I want to go back." Kahira chuckles, instantly regretting it when a searing sensation washes over her head. No laughing. Absolutely no laughing at all. 

"Why?" Bruce asks her playfully as he lowers himself into another chair that sits on the far side of the room. A coffee mug is fixed in his hand, the text on the front reading 'The Science Bro's rock!'. Kahira had got him that mug for Christmas if she remembered correctly. Yeah, she'd got matching ones for her dad and Bruce. Their faces when they opened them were so perfect that Kahira wished she'd been filming them. "Are we not fun enough for you anymore?" Bruce raises his eyes and smiles jokingly at her. 

Kahira almost laughs, a large smile spreading across her face before she remembers the no laughing rule. She did not want to feel that pain again."On the contrary, you're both too much fun which is probably why I passed out."

"More like collapsed." corrects a voice from in the doorway, Kahira's heavy eyes turning back to the doorway where Clint Barton's figure stands. Clint wears a checked flannel shirt, blue jeans hanging loosely around his waist as he leans against the doorframe and watches Kahira with narrowed eyes. Clint and Kahira had been incredibly close for as long as she could remember. When she'd first come to the compound, nobody had really known what to do with her, never having been around kids before but Clint? He'd played with her, taught her to fight and shoot arrows. Taught her fun pranks to play and read bedtime stories to her. If there was anyone in the whole of the compound who was more like a father than Tony, it was Clint. 

"What?" Kahira asks him. "I didn't collapse."

Clint raises his eyebrows at her, uncrossing his arms as he makes his way into the room. She knew that look. She was in trouble. "If I hadn't walked in when I did you'd have fallen face first and broken your nose. And then you'd have just complained about your face being messed up for months."

"I absolutely would not have." Kahira snaps at him, pouting in true Kahira style. She knew he was right but she was not going to admit it. Instead, she was simply going to ignore him and his witty comments.

It's Nat who finally saves her from her humiliating defeated silence. "What happened back there, Kay?" She asks, her voice thick with concern for the girl. Kahira was like a daughter to Nat and she could not stand seeing her in a hospital bed. 

The memories of what had happened begin to flush into Kahira's mind in a wave all at once. She had collapsed, passed out if you would. And then all these millions of images had rushed into her mind, thousands of split-second events crossing her mind briefly before they were blocked out again. Not one of them was familiar to Kahira, each one a stranger passing by her as quickly as they'd come. "Your theory worked that's what." She didn't believe the words that left her mouth were actually existent.