VITALITY ↝ B. BARNES [1]

[3]

"So..." Sam mused the next morning at breakfast, eyeing the girl sitting across the table from him over his cup of coffee. "Voltage, was it?"

Elysia halted, the forkful of pancakes not quite reaching her mouth before she set it back down on the plate with a slight clanging sound, nodding slowly. "That would be me." she confirmed with a small awkward smile, the room falling silent around them.

"So why is it we've never heard of you?" he asked suspiciously. "The way Tony and Rhodey make it sound, you must be quite the character."

She shook her head quickly, shrugging off his words. "I helped with a couple missions a few years ago in exchange for Tony taking me in." she explained, trying her best to sound nonchalant and steady the shake she could hear at the edge of her voice. "I had an... incident with my foster family when I was eighteen and I ran away, which is when they found me. But I don't do that anymore. Tony kept me on his reserve in case he ever needed me, but I haven't used my... abilities, in years."

Her curse, was more like it.

"Well, as soon as you're finished, go suit up and we'll get you down to the training center to see what you can really do." Steve said, taking his empty plate back into the kitchen.

"No problem," Elysia murmured, her appetite having long vanished as she followed suit, disposing of the leftover pancakes and dishware before disappearing back up the stairs towards the living quarters.

As soon as she entered her apartment, she slid the sliding lock into place behind her, moving quickly to the closet in her room and pulling it open to reveal a line of plain black suits hanging up. Pulling one of the bodysuits off the hanger, she laid it on the bed, changing out of her normal clothes and pulling it on, noticing the way the material seemed to cling to her body yet still allowed for a full range of motion.

"Well, at least there's no stars and stripes," she mused, catching a glimpse of her reflection in the mirror, already looking more and more like the frightened twenty-one year old who'd fled New York without a second thought rather than the grad student who wouldn't willingly admit she'd been raised anywhere other than Arizona.

Pulling her hair into a ponytail, Elysia left the room, spying an illuminated path on the floor before her left by F.R.I.D.A.Y. to lead her down to the training center. As she followed the arrows to an elevator, it opened before her, a button already illuminated and ready to take her downstairs to the training floor.

"Good morning, Miss Sparks." the metallic voice of F.R.I.D.A.Y. spoke through the elevator's speakers.

"Good morning, F.R.I.D.A.Y." Elysia said, her eyes staring straight ahead through the clear doors of the elevator, watching as it passed down floor after floor before finally coming to a stop in the second basement, the doors sliding open in front of her.

The space before her was open, with a singular wall made entirely of bulletproof glass protecting any onlookers from those inside the training center. Dummies and traps covered several stations in the room, displaying several training scenarios for the Avengers to practice, though the wide space in the middle was empty, several circles on the floor mats spacing out areas for hand-to-hand combat. Already, Steve and Natasha were warming up as the rest of the group watched from the sidelines, each of them rooting for their favorite contender.

"Glad you could join us, Sparky." Tony said, announcing her presence as he stood up from his chair, walking over to meet her at the beginning of the mats, and Natasha and Steve broke away from their sparring, rejoining the others.

"Just remember, Tony, I'm only here for-" she began, but was cut off as he continued speaking.

"Alright, everyone, grab a sparring partner." Tony announced. "Sparky, you're with Falcon."