Lost Soldiers (Avengers Fan Fiction #3)

Chapter 14

AN: Dedicated to @mercyjason, who has been a wonderful reader and voted a ton! Thank you :D

I let Steve have his space the next day and just sat in Kitty Pryde's room. Hanging out with her had been long overdue, so I waited patiently for her to get back from teaching her class. The walls of her room were a deep purple that swirled into darker colors the closer it got to the ceiling. The ceiling was decorated with glow in the dark stars to recreate a galaxy. Kit always loved the idea of going to space. As children, we thought we would go together. Be the first women mutants to go to space...I couldn't tell if we were naïve or just had high hopes. I glanced around the room and saw papers scattered across the desk. Polaroid pictures of Kit and Bobby, Storm, Colossus, Rogue, Wolverine, and more were thumb tacked to the wall.

I sat on her bed and logged onto a guest profile on her laptop. Kitty wouldn't mind, or at least I hoped she wouldn't. I started a Skype call with Natasha, but my mind wandered off as she went into some story about Tony. Just the way Peter acted yesterday really got to me. He wouldn't open up to me, his beloved cousin, but he opened up to Wade? You've got to be freaking kidding me. Then poor Logan saw his dead pregnant wife. I'd have to ask Steve later about the Winter Soldier to see if he knew anything. He was his best friend once upon a time. Then Steve...poor, poor Steve. I don't know how long it would take to get over something like what they went through.

"Hey, Lilly. You okay?"

I snapped back to reality and smiled softly. "What? Yeah, of course." I didn't want to put my troubles on Natasha. She had her own to deal with.

"You sure?" Natasha watched me carefully with her emerald shaded eyes and I nodded. She pursed her lips when she figured that I wanted to avoid that topic. She brushed her hand through her blonde hair; I noticed some of the red was coming back through her roots. She continued on with what she was talking about earlier, "The boys are driving me insane."

Being stuck in a building with Tony and Clint must've been tiring, but it couldn't be that bad. Could it? Unless Tony was fixing his suit and messing with new improvements that could explode... My face soured. "I'm sorry."

Clint perched behind Natasha in the background and told me things in sign language. He made a few funny faces before talking about his day with Nat. He went on about being able to scrounge up something for breakfast in bed and show her that within the dark times, there are some blessings of light times worth remembering. It warmed my heart to know that Clint would do something like that for her.

Natasha must not have had the small window open to see herself. She raised an eyebrow and smiled slily, "I can feel Clint doing something weird."

I laughed a bit. I mean...she wasn't wrong. I adjusted the laptop on my lap and responded, "Yeah, he's telling me some stories."

She acknowledged my answer and moved on. She could always ask him later what he told me. There was only a limited time we could talk, so might as well save every second of it. "How's everything over there?"

I sighed heavily. Do I tell her everything? Does she already know? I wasn't sure if any of the others had communication with the rest of the group, but with all of the phones lying around, I'm sure they did. "As good as it's gonna get. We're a little on edge."

"That's understandable. With the situation at hand, it's hard not to be," she answered quietly. Natasha looked down at the desk she was sitting at and trailed off for a moment, lost in her own thoughts. She must've been going through a ton of stress and sleepless nights. "How's Peter?"

"He still hasn't talked to me. I tried to give him some food yesterday, but he wouldn't come out," I declared as my tone fell deeper. I wanted to be close to my cousin...not distant and pushed away. What he had gone through was traumatic. He needed someone to talk to. He needed a shoulder to cry on. He needed support.