Changes | Marvel

FORTY. Lies & Tales

This was familiar.

The constant beeping in my ear, the drowsiness, the feeling of a tube shoved into my arm. Why was it always me waking up in a hospital room from being knocked out? Was I knocked out? Honestly, I didn't really remember anything that happened. Breathing in deeply, I open my eyes, seeing that I was inside of the Quinjet's interrogation room.

"What the-" I sit up quickly, looking around. Why was I in here? What did I do? I swear, I'm not Hydra. I rub my eyes and let my legs fall off the side of the bed, feeling the soft power-proof material underneath my bare feet. The door is unlocked, and I look up to see Lincoln coming in, nervously glancing at me.

"Hey..." He greeted awkwardly, making me scrunch up my face in confusion.

"Hi?" I answer back. "Why am I in here?" I ask, running my hand through my now shoulder length hair.

"You don't remember?" He asked, which confused me even more.

"What? Remember what?" He bites his lip, sighing. He sits at the table in the middle of the room and turns the chair, so he was sitting backwards on it.

"You've been unconscious for a couple of days, Ave." He said quietly. "On the ship, one of the Inhumans dropped a crystal when you were in the room with him."

"But." I look down at my body, not seeing any limbs missing. "Wait... what?" I look up at him, my eyes widening in realization. "I'm-" I trail off.

"You're an Inhuman." He confirms. "None of us knew, but we ran some blood tests and we figured out that the man was telling the truth."

"The truth?" I ask again, leaning back against the wall.

"Tony Stark is your half-brother. Maria Stark isn't your birth mother, an Inhuman was." He said again. I look at the floor, letting my eyes begin to water up. "I'm sorry." He tells me, but I shake my head, sniffing.

"Can you- Leave?" I tell him quietly, my voice cracking. He winced, but wordlessly got up and walked out, locking the door behind him. I get off the bed, and begin to pace the room, sobs escaping my mouth every now and then. After a while, my vision was getting blurry and I was freaking out too much, so I leaned against the wall. Slowly, I let my body slide down to the floor, collapsing in a heap and bursting out into tears.

My life has been a lie, literally. My dad cheated on my mum? My mum had the heart to take me in? Tony wasn't my brother? The door opens again, but this time it was Daisy and the look on her face made me want to start crying all over again. She fell to her knees and wrapped her arms around me, hugging me tightly.

The pain in my chest was getting intense, it was hurting. My head was throbbing, my hands shaking, and my mouth was dry. Was I having a panic attack? I was crying so much that it was becoming hard to breathe, I was beginning to hyperventilate.

"Ava? Calm down." Skye tried to calm me, but I was already sucked too far in.

"Tony?" My younger self asked, walking down the stair to the lab. It was just after we found out that our Arc reactors were poisoning us, we were dying. Of course, I thought that we could just make something to fix it, I didn't realise that Tony thought that this was the end. I walk in to see him on the floor, rocking with an intense look of shock and anger on his face. "Tony!" I run over to him, trying to get him to respond. "Calm down!"

"Ava?" He whispered, clenching his hands on mine and closing his eyes tight.

"I'm sorry." She whispered in my ear. "I'm so sorry, Ava."

"I wanna go home." I cry. "I wanna go home, I don't want this anymore."

"You can't." She whispers. "Not now, But I promise you." She pulled away from me, looking straight into my eyes. "I will get you back home." I nod, beginning to sob again and all Skye does is wrap me up in her arms. A tingling feeling emerges in my torso and I gasp, feeling myself grow dizzy as the minutes passed.

"Ave..." Skye trailed off. Where she was holding me, was now empty. I was across the room from her and she looked at me, wide eyed. I look at her, horrified. My powers, my powers were coming into show. "Wow." She slowly said, coming over to the other side of the room and pressing her hands on my shoulders. "Calm down, Ave, the more you stress the more out of control you'll become." She soothes me. I rest my head on my knees, slowly breathing in and out. Skye sighs, before getting up and leaving the room.

"I'll come back, but I need you to stay calm, alright?" She asked. I nodded, not looking up and focused on stopping the tears and gulping down the sobs that were stuck in the back of my throat. I keep my head down as the door opens, but the familiar woman's voice sends me into a wild frenzy of sadness and excitement. Her brown hair still pulled up in the usual bun, standing tall and formal and soft eyes that were usually being rolled from my brother's antics.

"Maria?" I get up and bound to her, hugging her tightly.

"Hey, kid. Look at you." She smiled.

"What are you doing here?" I ask her, pulling away.

"They called me. I had to bring a blood sample from Tony" She said, wiping my cheeks from any tears. I sniffle again, looking down at the floor. "Hey," She said sternly. "Just because this happened, doesn't mean that he isn't your brother. You grew up as his sister, and you will stay his sister." I nod again, wiping my clothes so I looks a little more presentable.

"Where is everyone else? How's Phil?" I instantly ask, remembering his hand getting cut off.

"He's fine. SHIELD has more than enough tech and engineers to make Phil a new hand. He seems fine with it actually." She mentions, making me snort.

"Yeah. Fitz will fix him up something, I can help but I guess I'm going to be stuck in here for another couple of days. Until they find another solution?" I guess, making Maria nod.

"I'm sorry." She tells me again.

"It's okay, I guess. I'm just a little surprised... and freaked out." I sigh, sitting back onto the small bed connected to the wall.

"I'll be outside. I'll keep an eye on you so just holler if you need anything." She tells me, smiling before walking out of the room. The new feeling in my body made me feel weird, like I was the most powerful I've ever been in my whole life.