Phoenix (Hawks x Reader)

𝙿𝚛𝚘𝚕𝚘𝚐𝚞𝚎

When I was thirteen heroes failed me.

When I was little, being a hero was my dream. I'd watch movies, read books, I watched the news when it was on. Of course, I never saw when my parents would switch the channels for major attacks, I was too young to notice.

My parents were two incredible people. My dad was a doctor, and my mom worked at a hero agency. I loved them both so much, and they always did their best to protect me and keep me safe. They supported my dream of being a hero and had every intention of sending me to a school with a great hero program. I had a good life.

And then one night changed all of that.

It was the night before my thirteenth birthday and I stayed up until midnight. I was just too excited to sleep, so I didn't. Then around 1am, I'd heard our door open. Both my parents were asleep in their room, and we didn't live with anyone else. I knew what robberies were, I'd seen them on the news and heard about them at school, but I had never imagined someone breaking into our house.

I had moved myself under my covers and acted like I was asleep, as I had been much too scared to go to my parents room. I remember this vividly, and it still haunts me even now. I remember them coming into my room, the creaking of my floor under their large feet. They were men, I knew that. They had stood over me and poked my cheek, with what I could only assume was a gun. They ended up leaving my room, doing what I could only assume was taking all the expensive things from our home. At first I had just hoped they'd take what they want and leave.

But that wasn't what happened.

I could hear my dad and mom in their room, which was next to mine. They were talking in hushed tones, but I couldn't make everything out. But I did know my dad let a pistol under his mattress, and my mom had a quirk that allowed her to create small balls of energy. At this point, I was beginning to worry about them trying to fight the men. I was worried, and my whole body was shaking.

I heard the door of my parents room creak, and I knew, they were going to fight. I heard yelling from the men in our house, and then I heard gunshots. I'd never heard them before, but they were loud and scary. I had a scream from my mom before another shot when off and everything went quiet again.

At this point I was frozen under my covers in a cold sweat. I just laid there for close to thirty minutes before I walked out again. The men had left, and the safe my parents had kept was opened, and emptied.

I had walked out to my living room, and realized the two men hadn't left without a parting gift. And that was the dead bodies of both my parents. Both had a single gunshot in their head.

At this point, my memory always fails. But there was always one piece that's clear. My moms phone in her hand, the caller ID?

911.

She'd been requesting for a hero to come and save us. And they hadn't. She'd trusted that help would come to save them. And it hadn't. My blood had run cold and in that one moment, my whole faith in heroes was shattered. I remembered a feeling of total dread and fear, and I remembered that everything I had known was lost. I had felt completely and utterly alone.

I was put into an orphanage after that. I don't like the memories from there. I was a teenager when I went in, so I wasn't at the top of people's wants for a child. I remember hating it, and hating how I wasn't treated the same as everyone else. I didn't make friends, I went through it alone. But there was only one consistent thought in my mind.

My hatred for heroes.