PURE AND TAINTED ( wanda maximoff )

twelve → i need to let you go

PURE AND TAINTED
CHAPTER TWELVE
( i need to let you go )

WITH LOKI MUZZLED AND HANDCUFFED, Aline had happily flipped him off several times before Thor had gone back to Asgard with him. She stood off to the side, arms crossed over her chest with a smug grin dancing on her lips. It pleased her to see Loki like this, and she was very tempted to go up and punch him hard across the face (shortly before handing him over to the proper authorities, Aline had actually punched him in the gut). The brunette looked over, seeing Thor move on from hugging Selvig towards her.

Aline gave him an awkward smile then finger-guns. "So this is goodbye then?" she asked, shifting from foot to foot. It still slightly unnerved her that Thor, the Thor of her childhood, was here and actually real. God, her parents and brothers must be rolling in their graves knowing that she was talking to him.

"We shall meet again, Lady Aline," Thor said, nodding his head at her. "I hope to fight alongside you or your kind once more."

Her eyes nearly bugged out of her skull. "Wait, you know what I 一"

Thor's hearty laugh stopped her. "You are not the first of your kind that I have met," he said.

"Well, that's... reassuring, I guess." Aline lightly shrugged, dropping her arms to her sides. "So you also know that I totally prayed to you?"

"Wait, what 一"

Her cheeks suddenly burned a bright red and Aline physically froze. Her mouth, however, worked quickly and shouted, "Okay, see you later! Gotta go!" Before the Asgardian could say anything, she turned on her heel and headed straight towards the first person she saw, who just happened to be Natasha. She walked straight towards her, lifting her hand to shield her blushing face. "I'm a total embarrassment, aren't I?"

"What'd you do?" Clint asked, approaching the two women.

She bowed her head. "Don't ask." She then watched as Tony opened the Tesseract's case and Bruce took it out and handed it to Thor. The blond god gripped it and handed the other end to Loki, who reluctantly took it. Thor nodded once more to the others and twisted the case's top, and the two Asgardians disappeared in a rainbow beam of light.

"So now that this whole thing is over," Natasha started, "you finally gonna tell us what you are? Or do we still need to level up?" There was a hint of playfulness in her voice.

Aline chuckled and shook her head. She supposed that now, after everything they've gone through, they deserved some answers. They fought side-by-side, risking their lives to help one another and protect civilians; the least she could do was tell them what she was. "I think you've leveled up to know a little about my tragic backstory," she said, "but before I do, there's something I need to do first."

___

Holding the bouquet of lilies in her left hand, Aline slowly made her way through the cemetery. This wasn't the first time she had visited this place, but she supposed this might be the last. Despite the amount of graves in this place, she couldn't get lost as she headed straight towards a specific one. Once she finally reached it, she grinned weakly and sat down in front of it, placing the bouquet down. "Hey there, beautiful," she said, reaching out and tracing her fingers along the edge of the grave. It read:

MADELAINE LEANNE YORKE
JULY 23, 1939 一 AUGUST 18, 1963
BELOVED FRIEND AND DAUGHTER

"Sorry I haven't visited in a while. I've been... busy." Aline ran a hand through her dark hair, pushing it behind her shoulders. "I kinda had this whole ordeal that involved aliens and gods and invading New York. Yeah, I know, confusing but whatever." She sighed again and picked at some grass. "But if it makes you feel any better, I met these... these pretty cool people and they helped me. When I had broken down and lost control, one of them took care of me. It was nice... I'd forgotten what it was like to feel something like that. To know what it's like to have someone comfort me and stuff...