22Faith and Mistakes
Are we too far apart?
Two worlds among the stars?
You're gonna take a piece of my heart
If you leave...
Pietro walked to the window and pushed back the too-small white curtains. It was dark in this little motel room, the only light coming from the grey daylight outside, and he seemed to be keeping watch on the street while Wanda rested.
They'd narrowly escaped. The others had been captured, escorted away from the airport in heavy restraints. But the moment they saw the Quinjet in the sky—and the moment Rhodes went down—Pietro sped up to Wanda's side, picked her up despite her injuries, and whispered that they had to run.
So now they were here, in the first motel they could find that would accept cash euros with no questions, and Pietro stared out the window with a sour look on his face.
"Remind you of anything?"
Wanda knew what he meant. He was referring to their life in the orphanage, clawing for scraps on the street. He felt they were alone again, like the Avengers had all abandoned them.
She was quiet. "They'll come around."
"Yeah? And how long will it take?" He turned, flaming angry, but she knew the anger wasn't directed at her. "You saw how they fought."
"I don't know." She sunk into the thin sheets on her shoulders. "But people fight, and people change. We must have faith."
Pietro crossed his arms and pressed his lips together in a hard line, and that said volumes more than his usual mile-a-minute words.
Wanda sat up. The wounds in her torso still ached, so she pushed herself up slowly, and sat propped against the headboard. "You're angry at them, brat?" she whispered.
Pietro laughed with no humor. "At Vision."
"Why?"
He shrugged, as if it was obvious. "He detained you."
"He detained you too." She was starting to smile in spite of herself.
He snorted and began to strut to her bedside. "I could have left if I wanted."
"Pietro."
"You're not angry at him?"
She shook her head. No, she wasn't, and he wasn't the only one either. "I'm not angry at Stark. Nor Natalia, or Rhodes."
Pietro was quiet again. What a remarkable occurrence.
Wanda, too, couldn't bring herself to speak loudly. "They're all doing what they think is right."
"Then how are there sides?" he demanded, and turned back to the window. "There's only one right. There can't be two sides."
She sighed. "Some things are not so simple."
"Áno." He leaned on a corner wall and fell silent.
It wasn't an easy thing for her to say, but she had to bring it up somehow. "Did we believe we did what was right to join Strucker?"
Pietro whirled around. Guilt and anger, rage and regret all flashed across his face too quickly to hide, and then he looked askance. "Doesn't excuse it."
"Excuse it, no. Forgive it, yes."
He fixed her with a piercing look.
"And more, we came around."
Pietro was quiet. "You forgive them, then?"
"Yes."
"Don't deserve it."
"That's the whole point."
He sat on the bed, put his nose in his hands, and stared out over his fingertips to think about this.
Wanda took one of his hands in both of hers. "We promised." A long, long time ago. We promised to forgive Stark…
Pietro snorted. "Áno, we did." He squeezed her hand, but didn't meet her eye. "Not easy."
"No, it isn't."
"He keeps making it hard."
"Brat."
Pietro flopped onto his back and spread his arms out as far as he could on the little twin bed. "Whatever anyone says, you're not dangerous," he said lightly. "Me, I'm dangerous. You stop me."
"Pietro…" She had to press down a smile.
"True, yes?"
She gave a tiny laugh. "It is true." Quieter, and picking at a loose thread in the sheets, she added, "Vizh said a similar thing. That I'm not dangerous."
Pietro lifted his head and gave her a long, disbelieving stare.
Wanda's smile felt tight. "I said it's not so simple."
"You did." Pietro let his head drop back onto the mattress and sighed. "Never should have come up with the Accords."
"It would be good to have some leadership…"
"But not from people who don't understand."
She smiled. "True."
"So we wait for them to come around."
"And they will." As long as they followed what was right, at some point, they'd come around. She knew it, because she'd done it herself.
Pietro was quiet, his eyebrows furrowed in his forehead. "What happened to Kubko?"
Suddenly, it all flooded back to Wanda, and it made her bite her lip. They'd all been jet-lagged and tired when they met up in the airport car-park, but even then, she could feel Bucky's mind in distress, and see the haunted look in his eye.
"He didn't seem well," Pietro went on, oblivious to her thoughts.
"He was guilty and sad." She pulled her knees up to her chin, curling into a ball. "I think they hurt him again."
Pietro sat up, his eyes wide with fury. "How?" he demanded.
"I don't know," she answered dismally.
For a moment, Pietro looked like he'd enjoy nothing better than smashing a few heads in at hyper-speed, but then he simply deflated, his shoulders dropping. "So that's why Štefan took him."
"Yes." She'd caught the radio tower and ensured it herself.
Pietro fell back onto the bed. "Better take care of him."
"I hope so."
That Quinjet was in the air somewhere, far out of her reach, and they were stuck here on the ground in Germany. At this point, hope was all they really had.
A/N: As always, I use Google Translate's dubious Slovak for Sokovian. Brat means brother, áno means yes, and Kubko and Štefan are respectively the Slovak versions of the names James (diminutive) and Steven. For some reason, I can just see Pietro nicknaming everybody with their actual names in Sokovian.
It is completely up to your own interpretation whether Wanda and Pietro got caught and stuck in the Raft right after this, or just went straitjacket- and shockcollar-free in this timeline.
Reviews are motel window-curtains.
