Good Morning, Sunshine

Feeling too guilty to take a break

~
Get up early to admire sunrises and stay up late to take in sunsets.
~
Two weeks later

I stood in the kitchen in the Avengers tower, making another load of cake I had loved back in my world just to give me a feeling of home and comfort. And to eat none-industrial or take-out food. Because that was what the Avengers lived off of.

Jaromir was sitting next to me, looking at me work and trying to appear innocent which was futile because we shared thoughts and I knew that he was hoping for me to drop some food by accident.

I had done that quite a lot the last two weeks. Baked and cooked and overall used the kitchen, I mean. Normally Steve would sit at the table and watch me but he wasn't today. Just like the other Avengers he was out on a minor mission I wasn't allowed to be part of. I wasn't allowed to leave the tower at all.

I had good news too though. Things had gone uphill despite my suspicions and fears. For one thing, Stark hadn't killed me on sight but just stayed out of mine all the time. I swear, I haven't once seen him ever since setting foot in the tower. Which he owns.

I had, on the other hand, met the other Avengers, spent most of my time with Steve because he wanted to know about Bucky and desperately tried to form a plan for freeing him. His efforts had been fruitless but we had gotten closer and he was the guy who's company I enjoyed most. I still had to spend time with other people too.

For example with Banner who was quite sweet, always kind and calm on the outside. I could feel his nervousity boiling underneath the surface though. To be honest, I could relate.

I had shown Jaromir what Banner could turn into and he'd had some memories of the hulk himself so we both moved on tiptoes around Bruce as to prevent the other guy from showing up. Which was quite hard at times for that guy did a lot of research on my tiger friend and me. Blood tests, MRI, CT, all the things and more. By now he must have know more about me than even I did. He was also responsible for removing our old trackers. And putting in our new ones. Since he kept constantly apologising for doing so, I couldn't be mad at him. Jaromir hated the Hulk though.

It appeared that J, my body and the other guy had previously met in the battle I hadn't actually been part of. And it hadn't been for a nice cup of tea.

When I wasn't chatting with Cap or being tortured for biological information by Bruce I was either strolling around in the tower or training with Natasha. Jaromir adored her like crazy. He always praised her smooth movements, the control she had over her body and how quick her movements were. He was also a friend of her cobstant vigilance (I tried to tell him that that might be a sign of sufferinv early on in her life but he didn't want to hear that). I wouldn't normally have disliked Nat. She was friendly enough, treated me with some respect and was hard on me during training, which helped me overcome my lazyness. But Jaromir had taken to sitting right next to her whenever he could, letting her pet him. That led to his thoughts dissolving into blissful emptyness and made it very hard for me to concentrate. And I was jealous of Nat, no need to deny that.

Thor I hadn't met yet since he was off in Asgard, doing whatever.

Clint kept a healthy distance between him and I. He was known for making a bunch of unapropriate jokes in the wrong situations which he had tried on me too. That had resulted in Jaromir nearly ripping Barton's throat open because he'd been angry that day anyway since Nat had gone on a mission. Since then Hawkeye had not made a joke about me or my tiger friend ever again. At least not while we were around to hear it.