Chapter 14

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It took Lainey around two weeks to warm back up to the Avengers. Before it took her all of three days, but now. Most of them assumed it was because of the secrets revealed to her and the trust she lost in them. They weren't wrong. Lainey lost a lot of trust and part of herself, especially after the visit with her dad, or just plan old father.
By the time she was feeling open with them all, her wrist was nearly healed completely. She started talking with them a lot more, and laughing. It was no longer awkward because they all began to feel like family. Especially considering they were all willing to help her out of the darkness.
      The one darkness that never left her was the nightmares. They plagued her every night. Tonight was one of those nights.
Like always it was her killing innocent lives, but this time the victim wasn't so innocent. She'd almost died from him. Almost. In the end she gutted the mans body, literally gutted him.
Lainey woke up with bile in her throat from the remembrance of that night vividly in her dreams. Not able to contain the bile she hurled herself over the bed when it let loose. It wasn't chunky, but straight up smooth. Pretty much water with little bits of her supper, yet it still made her disgusted.
Not wanting to smell the bile, Lainey left the room and wandered into the elevator. Lainey knew where she was heading. She was going to the training room.
That night she nearly died and if she came into contact with that sort of danger again, Lainey wouldn't be able to take it. She knew that much.
When the doors opened she found herself staring at a large room filled with different sections for each of the members skill. In the middle was a huge ring probably meant for sparring.
What caught her attention was the far wall. A grand portion of it was covered with knives. Some long, some short, and some jagged. Mostly all different for different purposes. Lainey didn't think to long for what the jagged purposes was.
There was a dainty, but powerful blade propped on the wall. The grip was styled with small Star like details. And the blade. The blade was curved precisely until the end, where a sharp, sharp point would be waiting to puncture someone's flesh.
Lainey let our a small yelp as a knife plunged straight into the wall inches from her head. "Why are you up, specifically here?" Nat pushed staring at the girl.
"I woke up and couldn't go back to sleep. Why'd you throw a knife at me?" Lainey questioned her voice still laced with fear.
"To get your attention and to see if you'd try to defend your self at the threat." Nat said cooly walking towards her.
"Oh." Was all Lainey could say.
"Why are you in here?"
"I woke up and wandered in here." Lainey replied smoothly.
"Judging by the way you were admiring those knives I'm going to say this was no accident." Nat grinned almost proud that the girl loved the knives as much as she does. "You smell gross."
"Oh. Sorry about that." Lainey replied blushing ferociously. She completely forgot that she threw up and never washed up.
"Why do you smell?"
"I threw up."
"Why?" Nat said inspecting the girl.
"I had a nightmare of myself gutting a man." Lainey replies softly.
"Oh." It was now Nat's turn to be awestruck. Nat has gutted people in her past. But to have Lainey remember doing it. She had a right to feel sick. "Sorry." Nat hugged the girl trying her best to comfort her.
They just stood there in each other's arms before Lainey spoke up, barely a whisper, but it still sliced through the silence.
"Will you train me."
Nat was slightly taken aback at the girl but would either way be pleased to train her. "I'd love to. But why now?"
"Well, I'm going to need to defend myself. On top of that I'm obviously not going to have a normal life any time soon. And if I'm as good as you guys claimed I am then I can help. I guess that's why." Lainey said shyly.
"We can start with knife throwing." Nat stated walking towards the dummies meant for this specific profession. Lainey followed her and glanced at the bin full of knives with a smile.
They trained with knives for about an hour. Constantly Nat had to correct Lainey to slacken her wrist, and it took forever till she got the right technique. Usually it'd take people days to master that skill, but all Lainey needed was a trigger to her muscle memory. Nat was thankful for that much.
After mastering knives they began hand to hand combat. Nat went over the basics while Lainey watched and listened intently. Taking in as much as she could with her sharp eyes. This was the easiest for her to pick up on. Only about 30 minutes of practicing and she was just about at Nat's level. Lainey was annoyed it wasn't right then, but Nat assured her she'd be as good as her soon.
Three hours had passed of full blown training. Never once did they use guns. Nat decided it'd be best to wait a while before making Lainey pull a trigger again. The first time she ever shot a gun, or remembered, was when she killed her mom. And Nat didn't want to put Lainey through that. At least not her, maybe she'd force Bucky to do it.
"Thanks a lot. You have no idea how much I appreciate it." Lainey told Nat with real gratitude.
"Of course. Now go shower, you smell like shit." Nat ordered, lovingly.
"I don't think Steve would be pleased by your language." Lainey laughed and Nat smiled at her. "Again tomorrow?"
"Yes, but not so early." Nat replied before walking off.
Lainey followed her out the door and sauntered towards her room. She was so close to the freedom of her own shower until Bucky showed up right at her door.
"Where were you? I thought you ran off again." Bucky's eyes softened as he saw that Lainey was okay.
"I didn't, I was in the training room." Lainey answered calmly.
"In the training room? Doing what?"
"Wandering." Lainey replied quickly. For some reason she didn't want to tell people that Nat was training her. No one would take it well. But luckily Bucky took the bait.
"Are you sick? You smell like bile." Bucky questioned worriedly.
"I'm fine. Earlier this morning I threw up, but I'm fine. That's the reason I'm off to my shower. So can you please let me go so I don't burden your nose." Lainey said jokingly even though she wasn't trying to be funny. She just wanted an easy way out of this conversation.
"Okay." Bucky walked off without another word. Lainey was grateful for that much. Bucky grew so attached to the girl, before he could even realize it. He was over protective of her, and couldn't come of lovingly, which sucked. Especially considering it made Lainey annoyed with him. Yes, she trusted him more than the others for reasons of her own, but he got on her nerves. Bucky would always look out for her and it made her feel useless. It was even harder for her because this is the first time someone would look out for her. Recently she'd just follow guidelines and make sure she didn't die.
All worries washed away in the shower along with the reeking smell. She cleans herself up and went straight to the kitchen.
Breakfast was already made, or at least sitting out. Mostly everyone was in the general vicinity. Quiet conversations were happening throughout the room, but when Nat started one with Lainey everyone listened.
"Did you like training this morning Lainey?" Nat asked. Before Lainey could mutter or even think of an answer the whole room yelled in unison,
"You TRAINED LAINEY!"
"It was Nat's fault, I asked her to train me." Lainey defended Nat straight away, but the avengers didn't care what she had to say and yelled at Nat once more,
"You trained LAINEY!"

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Hey guys! Sorry this is way shorter than usual. Also, I'm going to start writing in past tense and just in third Person. I naturally do that already and I'm too lazy to try otherwise. It would make my writing more consistent and better, hopefully. 😂 Also, I'm too lazy to change my past chapters so I'd by chance it's updated that's why, even though I highly doubt it.
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On a different matter... I SAW ENDGAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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