Where your loyalties lie (Two New Bartons book 2) (completed)

A mission gone wrong - Wanda

When I see Cap talking to Rumlow, I'm relieved. The mission is over. We can go home.

Cap's been chasing this guy for two years, since before I joined the team. I'd even go so far as to say he was obsessed with catching him, to the point where it's unhealthy. Nat and I have been getting worried about him. 

Now, he can stop, slow down, take a breath.

And then I feel Rumlow's emotions. Excitement. Fear. Anger. At first, I'm confused about why. Then he reaches down and I realise.

He's turned himself into a bomb.

I react without thinking. As the bomb goes off, I point my hands at him, surrounding him in a red glow. I lift him into the air, the bomb still going off inside the glow. Rumlow is screaming.

Cap's face registers the shock I feel from him.

And then I can't hold it anymore and the bomb blows up - right next to a building. There's screaming and fire, but I can't hear it.

I fall to my knees, my hand over my mouth, horrified at what I just did. 

I'm hit by an onslaught of emotions, some mine, some not. Terror, shock, horror, pain, grief, anger, hate. I don't know what's from me, what's from the crowd and what's from both.

The attack blinds me, and I know I have to stop it. I close my mind to everything: emotion, thought, reason. I'm a blank slate, and empty void. I prefer it to the broken thing so many negative thoughts feelings make me.

I feel hands on my arms, pulling me to my feet, leading me away. I don't resist.

*~*

One month later, we're back at the facility. I'm sitting on my bed, legs curled up to my chest, watching the news.

It's still playing the footage from Lagos, even after a month, showing people being brought out of the damaged building on stretchers. Every word they say about me, every time they replay the explosion, feels like a dagger in my gut. 

Eleven dead. Innocents. Wakandans trying to make the word a better place. People with families. Children, parents, siblings. A little girl, no older than twelve. Dead. Because of me.

"What legal authority does an enhanced individual like Wanda Maximoff have to operate in Nigeria?" asks the reporter. 

What authority indeed? I think. 

The TV turns off, and I look up. Cap is standing by the door, looking concerned. I remember that, not too long ago, Nat and I looked at him like that.

"It's my fault," I say.

"That's not true," he tells me.

"Turn the TV back on. They're being very specific."

Cap sighs and comes over to sit down next to me. His guilt rolls into me, mingling with my own.

"I should have clocked that bomb vest long before you had to deal with it. Rumlow said, 'Bucky', and all of a sudden, I was a 16-year-old kid again, in Brooklyn. And people died. It's on me."

I can't let him bear the weight of my actions, but I also can't deny the ring of truth in his word.

"It's on both of us," I concede.

"This job," he sighs, "We try to save as many people as we can. Sometimes, that doesn't mean everybody."

But maybe it should, is what I'm thinking. Maybe we should be able to save everybody.

"But if we can't find a way to live with that," Cap goes on, "then next time, maybe nobody gets saved."

That makes sense. If we don't go on mission where we can't save everybody, or don't make the hard call where some people die but more stay alive, then everyone dies. But what if there's another option? What if there was a way where I could have saved everybody? What if more than the minimum amount possible died?

Before I have time to dwell on it any longer, or reply to Cap, Vis steps through the wall, making the both of us jump.

"Vis!" I scold, "We talked about this!"

My relationship with Vision has grown, developed into something... else. Something stronger. He visits my room often, sometimes through the wall. I've told him it's terrifying when he does it, that it creeps people out, but he doesn't seem to grasp the fact.

He indicates the door, "Yes, but the door was open, so I assumed that..." he trails off when he spots my incredulous expression. Then he sighs and says, "Captain Rogers wished to know when Mr. Stark was arriving."

Cap nods. "Thank you. We'll be right down."

"I'll... use the door," Vis says, then heads out. Before he leaves though, he adds, "Oh, and apparently, he's brought a guest."

Cap frowns, "Do we know who it is?"

"The Secretary of State."

I take a deep breath as Cap turns to me. I don't doubt that the Secretary is here for me. Great.