The Unknown Emotion ~ A WandaVision Fanfic

Chapter 2

Pietro's clothing were not resistant to wear and tear, so I carefully laid them aside during our training sessions on the large green fields.

Every morning, Captain Rogers trains me in combat skills so that I may practise dematerialising instantly to avoid blows, and materialising to ten times my usual density to throw diamond-hard attacks. According to Steve, those rather hurt. I assured him that for training purposes, I'll attempt to control the strength of my density.

Occasionally, I'd see Natasha training Wanda in martial arts. She was a beginner, and an eager learner. In the past few weeks, she had already improved, and had begun to utilise her powers with her attacks. The strange red mist was powerful and quick, and swayed Natasha's deadly strokes and kicks away from her body.

The red mist had a physical property, able to handle solid, liquid and gas, but what Wanda truly needed was to practise her control on its psychological effects. Understandably, nobody volunteered to be her guinea pig. I was told that she had used her powers on the Avengers previously, resulting in recurring nightmares and horrific hallucinations over the next few days. A logical person would refuse to put themselves under her control after hearing these stories. But I am a naturally curious being, and suggested that she practise on me.

"Are you sure?" Steve asked, cocking an eyebrow. I nodded with certainty.

"I refuse." Wanda shook her head. "I don't know the extent of these powers, and I will not hurt friends."

I will not hurt friends, she had said. It was a fairly broad statement, one that I could imagine any of the others saying to each other. But she had said it of me, and I felt a warmth towards her that I couldn't understand the source to. These emotions were a tricky business.

"I insist, Wanda." I added. "The others had an overly negative reaction to your powers, because the nightmares stemmed from past traumatic incidences. I don't have many of those, as I am fairly newborn. Therefore, I predict I won't suffer as much"

She looked at Captain Rogers, who looked at me uncertainly, finally giving her a curt nod of confirmation.

"What you did before to us on the ship; that was fast, but not fast enough. Barton was able to attack you before you got to him. Focus on your speed, and suck out his will to fight." Steve instructed. Sam Wilson, who had been in the air practising aerobic manoeuvres, landed when he realised what was going on.

The Falcon, Black Widow, and Captain America watched us like a nervous tittering audience. We stood a generous distance away from each other, yet I felt a slight chill of fear seep into my bones. Her oak brown eyes glowed red as she twirled her fingers, and the mist formed, a slave to her will. My ice blue eyes watched her, betraying no emotion.

The attack was like the strike of a cobra. The pain I felt, it is... difficult to put in words. It was a searing, hot, radioactive pain that set my nerves, or rather their synthetic substitute, on fire. Though my body was suffering, it was a walk in the park compared to what was occurring in my head. Memories, that I had suppressed for so long that I hoped were forgotten, leapt into my head to torture me.

A child on the streets of Sokovia, crushed under rubble before I could reach him. Dark red oozed under the rocks, and I hadn't understood then that the substance was his life source. His mother wailed a mournful song, clawing at the mounds of rock until her fingers bled. A silvery-blue clad body that once belonged to Pietro with his proud, youthful arrogance, lay dead, sprayed with bullets until he resembled the cheese grate in the kitchen.

It was not a simple recollection of memory; I was reliving it.

Suddenly the memories morphed into events that never happened, but broke me all the same. I couldn't differentiate between what was real and what wasn't anymore. My only friends being slayed around me, their broken bodies lying in the dust. Wanda was the only one alive, her neck twisted into an unnatural angle. I took her hand in my mine, unable to mourn for my friends because the city was still falling and I had to save ... everyone...