Christmas in July

Metamorphosis: Two

Kate sat, alone, outside the war room. She was exhausted. Exhausted from crying, exhausted from broken, un-restful sleep, exhausted from re-living the last twelve hours in her head over and over. The pursuit, the alarms, the panic, the adrenaline and the tailspin. The bitter cold, the gunshots and the blood against Siberian snow. She was exhausted from the guilt, so exhausted she was worried that no amount of sleep would ever be able to extract every single drop of it. Kate pinched her nose as tears threatened to fill her eyes once more. She just wanted them to stop shouting at each other, she just wanted everything to stop.

"You're not telling me that you didn't know about this!?" Yelena was angry. Yelena was so angry.

"I knew as much as you did," came Carol's curt response.

"Bullshit! You think I'm going to believe that the almighty S.H.I.E.L.D made an oversight this fucking big. You knew what you were getting us into, you knew this was Government."

Yelena had been calm on the flight home, so calm. Only two things had mattered; Kate and getting Kate home safely. She'd held Kate when she'd needed it, she'd given her space when she'd needed it, she'd listened when she'd needed it. She'd been perfect, but as soon as they'd touched down, as soon as Carol had shown her face, she'd broken. Whatever she'd been holding in, whatever she had been holding back to protect Kate, all of that had begun to spill over, and of course, Carol was having none of it.

"It doesn't matter who it was, that asset needed securing."

"At whose expense, huh? It was supposed to be simple. Safe. This was her first job." It certainly had been. And for the most part, it had been wonderful, it had been everything she'd hoped it would be, especially with Yelena. Before they'd met, oh man, had Kate wanted to be an Avenger. She'd wanted it more than anything. But after meeting Yelena, after learning from Yelena, after falling for Yelena, all she wanted to do was go where she went, fight who she fought and make her smile whilst doing it. In reality, it was never going to be as idyllic as that, and maybe all of this was her fault, because maybe, she should never have let herself think like that in the first place.

"And it sounds like she aced it, maybe you should have more confidence in her."

"That is not what this is about and you know it."

There was a pause, a heavy pause, and Kate hoped upon hope that the two had stopped fighting. She'd had enough conflict for one day, and even if Carol had admitted to knowing more than she'd let on, something Kate knew she would never do, it could never change what had happened in the previous twenty-four hours. It was done.

"Yelena, I'm sorry that things went south and we can offer Kate whatever support she needs going forward." Carol's voice was quieter this time, more sympathetic, and Kate could hear Yelena audibly sigh. She sounded pained, she sounded tired, and above all, she sounded sad.

"She's a kid, Carol." Yelena said, softly, and Kate's heart broke all over again. Of course. Of course, that's what Yelena thought of her. She wasn't mature enough to choose between their life and his death, she wasn't experienced enough to know the risks of ejecting during a firefight, she wasn't hardened enough to fire two nine millimetres into a dying man's head. She wasn't any of those things. She was a kid. A kid that needed sheltering and protecting. A kid that she was happy to go home and play house with though, a kid that would hold her and kiss her and comfort her when she awoke from one of her more horrifying nightmares, a kid that was teaching her how to be a real adult.

"No, she isn't. She's an Avenger. She needs to learn that people will die and that our actions have consequences. Some people will suffer so that an overwhelming number may live. That's the burden of being an Avenger. Your sister understood that and Kate will too, just give her time". It was unkind of Carol to speak about Natasha, but she knew what she was doing. Any suggestion by Yelena that the opposite was true would be to diminish her sister's memory, so Yelena fell silent. Kate could feel the tension, the unease and general disrespect the two held for each other. Carol didn't like Yelena's way of doing things, she didn't like her general disregard for authority, showing no understanding of Yelena's years of subjugation. And Yelena didn't like Carol's way of doing things. She didn't like her overwhelming power, she didn't like the autonomy that was granted her, she didn't like that she would come and go as she pleased, and she hated that it was her sister who had to save the world, when Carol wouldn't.