Cornelia Street - Avengers

Welcome Home

"Hell was the journey but it brought me heaven."

New York, One Year Later

(invisible string, Taylor Swift)

...

During her near year of freedom, Lucia Stark had had to redefine every term and everything in which she had been taught since birth. Redefine family, and what a home and a place of safety meant. 

Lucia's choice to become a part of SHIELD's strike team was among the easiest of her life, and truly the most rewarding. She wanted to give her skills a better purpose and learn how to use them as a form of protection, rather than as a weapon for both others and herself to fear.

It had taken her a month or so to catch up to everybody's training, but nonetheless, she had graduated at the top of the ranks, where she had then moved on to partner alongside both Agent Coulson and Maria Hill. In turn, this granted her the removal of her tracking device and the allowance for her and Natasha to share an apartment to assist in her memory retrieval and psychological conditioning therapy.

She hated it at first, but it had been good for her, speaking aloud with a SHIELD moderator she supposed. Although she hadn't had a single night without a nightmare, waking up covered in sweat and screaming into the void, was her own personal alarm clock. 

Leaving the past behind her was impossible, but she knew she needed time, it would do her good but damn was it hard. The second she would feel free enough to be happy, a memory would appear. Ripping her from slumber and gripping her body so tightly she would wake up halfway across the room.

The memories of him proved the worst, and they were the hardest to wake up from. But even if the nightmares hurt her, they were the only place where she would find him. She would remember his hands, soft and gentle. 

One cold, one warm, hands cradling her like they had nights and nights long ago. Like she was the most holy thing on this earth.

She remembered how he would refuse to touch her for months, refused to be near her unless he truly had to be. He helped her more than she could imagine, and now when he needed her, she was here. Locked up in her world, not even looking for him. She would imagine his voice before she slept, a soft whisper a caress out in the open air. It would touch her exposed ear, and her hairline, and trail down her jaw. Her skin would light up at the memory, brimming to life before fading.

"You're okay. Remember to breathe. I'm right here," James told her, calming her fears with merely several words.

But he wasn't. He wasn't here.

Within 6 months she was practically at Natasha and Phil's level within SHIELD, under medium precautions of course, and she was told that in that time she had learnt what had taken most SHIELD agents over a decade to complete. It had felt like a lifetime since she had stepped onto that familiar Siberian base, the place that she had known as her only home for the entirety of her life.

"Jesus!" Natasha yelled as Lucia threw her down onto the practice mat, for seemingly the thousandth time that day. Nat rolled over, with a groan and a grimace.

She was gentler with her sister in the beginning, but by now they both fought each other with as much ferocity and intent as anyone else. Just like sisters would. Natasha swung up her legs, attempting to wrap them around her younger sister to pull her down to the floor.

But Lucia had anticipated the move, swinging out of the way, knees landing on her sister's arms instead to keep her pinned to the floor. Natasha let out a groan of frustration, but the younger girl couldn't miss the flicker of pride in her eyes.