Vanished {Pietro Maximoff}

Chapter 11

"Hello Wanda."

"Hello, Alessandra. I've come to dress you."

"Lovely. Why you?"

"I volunteered."

"What's happening?"

"Ultron needs you."

"Why?"

"I don't know. He doesn't tell us everything."

"And yet you still say you're working together?"

"We have the same goals."

"To kill my family."

"Tony Stark— yes. The others are just a bonus." The dress Wanda held out was strapless, perhaps a peace offering or apology for the state of her hands from Ultron. Alex glared at it, then at Wanda, and then back at the dress,

"I'm not wearing that. Let him see me like this, I don't care."

"You need a change of clothes, you smell awful."

"Do you want an apology? In case you haven't noticed, I'm a little busy being used as blackmail to shower."

Wanda examined Alex, looking slightly amused, "I'll bring you some water and a cloth tonight."

"Wow, it's like you're reading my mind to know exactly what my mother used to do when she locked me in a room."

"Please, your mother didn't even wash you, just dumped water on you."

"It worked, I remained clean." Wanda's eyes were serious— more so than her brothers. Alex wondered if the girl had ever laughed or smiled, she just seemed incapable of doing so.

Wanda unzipped the back of the dress to put Alex in it. It was relatively painless and Alex felt lucky that they didn't need to undo the chains on her hands to get it on. Wanda nodded and tried to leave, but Alex quickly called out,

"I don't hate you, Wanda." She turned back to Alex, "I know I should, after all you've done but I was thinking and I can't feel anything but sorry for you."

"What do you mean by that?"

"You're so consumed by this righteous anger that you forgot healing only comes from within. Killing someone does not solve your emptiness, it only makes it more painful."

Now Wanda laughed, but it was more of a sigh, "What do you know about that? You don't remember half your life."

"I remember the loneliness. The waiting by the sea on the bench we used to eat lunch on, just incase she came for me. I remember the first alien I killed. I paused, thinking I couldn't do it. Hoping they would kill me first."

The way Wanda picked at the end of her sleeves, rubbing a hole into her clothes was something Alex used to do, and still did when she was scared, "You don't know what loneliness is."

"I know what love is, and what the absence of love feels like. But Wanda, you are loved, by Pietro. I can love you too, I can help you. It gets easier. You just have to make the first choice to let it."

Wanda was staring into Alex's eyes, her own being a deep maroon colour that matched the gloves she was wearing.

"We were similar ages when our lives fell apart. We were just kids and yet forced to grow up long before we should have. They always say that no child should experience that but then they do nothing to prevent it happening. But I want to stop it, I want to protect people like you and me. Trust in me."

"Why are you saying this? To me, as well. Why not Pietro?"

"Because I know, that you know that I'm telling the truth."