Temper in Red *Editing*

Chapter Three

Chapter Three

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"He's really alive?" Leo asked me for what seemed like the hundredth time as I sat in one of the chairs, trying to read since I had nothing else to do.

"Yes Leo, he's very much alive." I sighed, turning the page in the book I'd borrowed from Jemma. "Still getting into people's lives in ways he shouldn't."

"How long have you known him?" He almost seemed fascinated with the fact that I knew Fury and had spoken with him. I was almost afraid to find out how he'd react if he ever found out about the fights Fury and I have had. Maybe he'd start a fan club for me or something?

"About two and a half years." I sighed, closing the book. There was really no point in trying to read it, not with Leo here asking me question after question. "Though I wish it were none."

"Why do you say that?" He frowned.

"Because, all SHIELD seems to do is take someone whose life is already fucked up and just fuck it up that much more." I was honest with him. "I mean, before I was dragged into the Avengers business and all of that I wasn't the best role model or anything. I'd committed a few crimes here and there, changing my name whenever things got to complicated. I hadn't had a real home in a long time."

"How long?" Skye's voice caused me to look up and I saw her watching Leo and I with no smile on her face. Instead she had her arms crossed over her chest, looking more vulnerable than she had since I'd met her, even if it was just a few hours ago.

"Last time I had a home was when I was eight years old, back in nineteen seventy-three." At my words both of their eyes seemed to widen slightly.

"How-" Leo cut himself off for a moment before continuing. "You look like you're our age, possibly younger."

"That would be work of the x gene floating around inside of me." I shrugged. "Up until two years ago I never aged past the appearance of twenty-three. Apparently being stabbed by an alien changes that so I started aging again. I'm going to hate the day my hair goes gray."

"What happened, to make you lose your home?" Skye asked me.

"I gained my abilities." With the blink of an eye a small ball of fire was dancing across the palm of my hand for them to see. "When my parents found out they weren't too thrilled. My dad ran out on us and my mom blamed my for it, I still blame myself for it. That night my mom lost it and grabbed a gun from the living room and shot me in the head before killing herself. I woke up awhile later and ran, never looked back."

"She tried to kill you? Your own mother?" Leo said in a state of disbelief.

"I'm used to not trusting people, it technically got me killed." As I said this I couldn't help but picture Scott's face, along with the others back at the school. I hated to admit it to myself, but I did trust them. I cared about all of them when everything in my body told me not to, to try and forget them entirely. I couldn't though, it just wasn't that easy.

"Where have you been the past two years? With everyone thinking you're dead?"Leo tried to change the subject. His words were instantly followed by my phone vibrating. I pulled it out of my pocket, recognizing the number that the Professor had used to call me earlier. I pressed the decline button before stuffing it back into my pocket, looking up to see both Skye and Leo watching me closely now.

"Who was that?" Skye asked.

"One of my contacts." I tried to brush it off. "So, where did Jemma and Antoine run off to?"