Hacky Sack ~ An Avengers Story

Two - Answers

To save you the long and overly drawn out explanation provided by Tony seeing he remembered every detail, I'll tell you what I found in my file.

From birth up until around the age of seven, I was experimented on and tested by my own birth-father in our home's basement. He was a mad scientist to say the least. After the cops busted him due to the complaint of neighbors hearing the constant screams of a child, they handed me over to SHIELD. They didn't know what to do with a seven-year-old girl with powers.

During my short stay at SHIELD, Tony apparently looked after me. He didn't adopt me, but was willing to take care of me until someone did. He wasn't fit to be a permanent father, but wanted to experience it.

Eventually a regular man (or so I was told he was) named Johnathan Evans adopted me into his home and raised me as his own, much protested by his wife. To try to give me a chance at a normal life, SHIELD figured out how to erase my memory, and replace it with memories that the average child would have. They thought that they reverted by biological father's work on me, eliminating my powers but oh were they wrong.

"And now here you are. My little weirdo." Tony ruffled my hair.

"Oh hush it I'm an adult." I crossed my arms and pouted, "And I expect you to treat me as one of your peers."

"A peer that broke into my database."

"But aren't you glad that I did?"

"Yeah, yeah." He punched my arm lightly, "Come on, we have some things to discuss."

"What do you mean?" I asked, hopping off the counter. Tony walked to my front door, the Avengers and I on his tail.

"Well obviously we didn't do something right in taking away your powers. We need to do some testing to see what's going on with you." He explained, grabbing his keys.

"Do I haaaave to?" I leaned against the threshold as they stood waiting for me in the hallway of my apartment complex.

"Yes, now get your ass out here."

/*/*/*/

As we walked into the large building, I stared in wonder. This place was so much larger than I had expected. So this is the inside of the Avengers tower...

"Do you like it? Of course you do, you're practically a Stark." Tony bumped his shoulder into mine. I chuckled while nodding my head.

"Quite impressive Tony." I approved. The whole walk to wherever we were going, I could feel Steve's eyes on me. Tasha had peaced out and went to her room saying "I've had my fair share of confusion for the day" as she did so.

"I have a question." Steve spoke up, joining my side, "Why couldn't we find any old records of you? Obviously there are none for your first eight or nine years, but why were there none from then till a few years ago?"

"That's a story for another time." I replied ominously. There are aspects of my life that I'm not ready to share yet. Parts that don't need to see the sunlight, so they'll stay tucked away for now.

Tony took me on a quick tour of the place before taking me into the room where I assumed my so called "testing" would take place. As we entered, I was greeted with a curly haired man.

"Tony, whose this?" The man asked, walking away from his computer to greet us. Tony proudly wrapped an arm around my shoulder and pulled me close.

"Banner, meet Cedar-my beloved daughter."

'Banner's' eyes went wide at the statement so I cleared it up. "Technically I'm not his daughter. He took care of me when I was young."

"Don't sound so disappointed." Tony seemed ever-so-slightly hurt at the detachment from his name.

"It's confusing enough as it is. And I thought there was a file on me? Shouldn't people know of me?" I questioned, turning to look directly at Tony.

"Only I have it. You did find it in my database, remember?" He cocked an eyebrow.

Banner waved his hands, "Okay, so let me get this straight. So your so called 'daughter' is the one who hacked into your base?"

"Oh wait, there's more." Tony chuckled, "Cedar here has got some powers up her sleeve."

I could feel eyes on my six, but didn't want to make it obvious that I was aware of their presence. I wouldn't consider it a power, but my sixth sense it pretty keen. It comes in handy, especially seeing how paranoid I am. What? Of course I'm going to be paranoid, I have f u c k i n g p o w e r s.

"Powers?" Bruce questioned. It took me a moment to put together the pieces and realize that this was Bruce Banner A.K.A The Incredible Hulk. Something in me makes me believe that him and I are going to become fast friends. He's obviously incredibly intelligent *pun intended* which will be nice to be able to talk to someone with a similar IQ as moi. Obviously my knowledge isn't anywhere in the range of comparison with the genius when it comes to sciences and mathematics, but I am quite filled to the brim with knowledge of computers and other fields that are involved in my hacking. Not to mention that he seems to be a total sweetheart, that is when he isn't a raging green... hulk.

Instead of letting Stark inaccurately describe them himself as he did back at my apartment, I sat down in front of Bruce's desktop and after a few minutes of searching - it being obviously easier to access them with the clearance he has that I don't - I pulled up my file in Stark's database.

"I'm still not okay with the fact that you know how to do that." My sort-of-father grumbled. I rolled my eyes and pushed against the desk to make the swivel chair that I occupied roll away so Banner could read my file.

"You don't have to be Tin Can." I shot finger guns at him. He non-verbally responded by grabbing the back of my chair and pushing me further away with all his human might. It was then I remembered that it wasn't just us three-genius-musketeers in the lab. My chair spun out of control and flew straight to the vintage American Flag himself. If he hadn't been the one alerting my sixth sense, he wouldn't have been able to act quick enough to stop me from ramming into him or the wall he was leaned up against.

The sudden halt of my chair cause me to fall forward due to the remaining momentum my body had. The vintage American Flag luckily shot out his arm in time to at least stop my head from colliding with the white wall in front of me. As for the rest of my body, it's forward flight cause the chair to glide in the opposite direction allowing me to ungracefully fall to the ground. Hey, at least I don't have a concussion courtesy of America's Golden Boy.

"You okay?" He asked, cocking an eyebrow. His hand that wasn't occupied with my head reached out to assist me in standing. I dismissed it,

"Yeah, but I think I'm gonna chill on the ground a bit. Make Tony feel bad." I whispered the last part so the Rock n' Roll Dad™ wouldn't hear. His already raised eyebrow lifted to his hairline, confused by my request but obliging anyways.

"Capsicle, what're you and my kind-of-but-I-claim-her-to-be-anyways-daughter doing over there?" Stark asked, protectiveness lacing his words as he stared down the super solider. I sent Rogers a wink signifying him to go along with it. He acknowledged my request with a curt nod.

"I think she hit her head." Cap replied with, concern under his words. I propped myself against the way, making it seem like such a chore. Tony's face dropped as he rushed over to my side, kneeling beside me.

"Are you okay? I swear I didn't mean to let you get hurt." He placed a gentle hand on the side of my head. It's times like these that I thank my high school drama teacher for being such a damn good teacher - shout out to you Mrs. Green, what a legend. It was a struggle keeping my smirk under control.

"I-I think.... I think I see the light." I made my voice horse. A part of Tony realized that I was fucking with him, but he still didn't want to be too sure. I gasped, "T-There it is." I reached my hand towards the light bulb directly above us to extract it's energy and aim it at Stark. As the light reached his eyes, he cowered away and instinctively brought a hand to shied himself.

"I should have seen that one coming." He shook his head, rubbing the dark dots out of his vision. I chuckled softly to myself and allowed Steve this time to help me get up. Dusting off my denim clad thighs, I shot the recovering Tony Stark an innocent smile as he stood.

"Well that answers my mental question of a demonstration."