The Sound of Silence

Chapter 17

The mission went exactly as planned...for once or so you'd been told. A clone of Loki stayed behind to keep you company. That's what he said anyway. You were pretty sure he was guarding you instead, but you didn't mind the company.

"Siren, you're up!" Cap called over the comm device in your ear. You got up from your seat on the jet and made your way to where the battle had been with Loki's clone at your side. He was definitely guarding now, especially as you looked like a civilian.

The Hulk was looking desperately for something else to smash now that the bad guys had been defeated. Loki's clone vanished when you were close enough. The Hulk hated Loki. Hulk's attention caught on you and he relaxed some; he liked you. You were pretty sure you were his favorite person. You smiled at him and began to sing. His attention focused entirely on you and he sat down to listen to your song. A minute later the Hulk was gone and a dazed Bruce was in his place. You rushed forward with the robe in your arms to wrap around him. His pants had survived the experience, but Bruce was shy and appreciated the gesture.

"Thanks, Y/N. Are you ok?" he asked as you steadied him with an arm around his waist. You nodded and walked with him back to the jet. Neither of you were needed here anymore.

"Great job today, Y/N," Cap said after everyone was back on the jet. You nodded in reply. Everything had gone according to plan today, until Jarvis made an announcement.

"Sir, someone took a video of Siren singing and posted it online," Jarvis told Tony. He always addressed Tony first unless someone spoke to him directly.

"Shit, can you pull it?" Tony demanded.

"I'm sorry, sir. All of the news outlets have already received the video and they are airing it," Jarvis replied. You blanched. That should not have been posted. Tony and Cap started planning out damage control, though in reality it wasn't so bad. The world had to know about your powers if you were to continue living with the Avengers anyway. The ability to calm the Hulk was the most palatable of your powers.

The video remained popular for weeks. Even a recording of your voice kept a very small piece of your power. You heard that a lot of parents had started using the video to get their kids to sleep.

*

School got better after the first day. People began to respect your silence, though it took a few weeks before they'd stop asking you to sing. Your grades were good and you earned the respect of your teachers with your work and attitude.

*

You went on more missions with the team over the next few months, mostly keeping back and soothing Hulk at the end of the battle. Once you used your singing for crowd control; the crowd was helpless against the siren's song holding them in place. Once you used your newly found power of persuasion to get all of the bystanders to go home. Once you'd had to knock out the entire battle, the rioting was too bad for the team to do anything and singing wasn't working.

*

Your 18th birthday came with a huge party thrown by Tony. The party room of the tower was filled with your friends and family, laughter, and fun. Plus way, way too much food and way too many presents.

*

You took Loki to the homecoming dance a couple weeks after your birthday. It was so much fun to dress up with him. Your dress was gorgeous and his suit was perfectly tailored. You danced with him all evening, and traded teaching him the electric slide for him teaching you to waltz. The DJ looked perplexed as to why a waltz was playing, but the kids were giddy and thought it was a silly bit of fun as they tried to do the dance.

*

It was all going so well until a mission where you were fighting enhanced. Hulk looked excited to see you at the end of the battle and sat down patiently waiting for your song. You smiled at him and began to sing. No one else was paying much attention. The enhanced were all contained, the battle over, and the white noise from Jarvis over the comms kept them from being affected by your song.

None of you saw one of the enhanced fight through the haze of your song. They were all too slow when he grabbed one of the SHIELD agent's guns and fired off a single shot. You shrieked in pain as the bullet went through your side. The wound was just a graze, but even a graze was a lot of pain, and bleeding. The entire team whirled at the sound of your shriek. The Hulk roared in rage, lunging for the enhanced who had hurt his favorite person, but even he was too late. Loki caught you before you hit the ground, cradling you to him while he threw daggers at the enhanced, killing him instantly for daring to injure you.

Loki lowered you gently to the ground and lifted your shirt enough to see the wound. "It's just a graze," he said, relieved as he placed a bandage against your side. The rest of the team had run over to help. You touched Loki's arm, your teeth clenched as you fought against the haze in your mind. He saw the glazed look in your eyes and the blood on his hands and he understood. "Fight it, darling, not here, not now, there are too many eyes," he bid you softly, urgently.

"Fight what?" Cap demanded, slower on the uptake of what your bleeding meant.

"Get her to the jet. Now! We can patch that wound up there," Nat snapped the order, understanding what Loki had and what Cap had not.

It was too late, though. You couldn't fight it, couldn't fight the haze of visions, couldn't fight the pain demanding you speak. You tried. You really tried, but the visions overtook you and you had to speak what you saw.

You were laying on a bed in one of the medical rooms of the tower when you became aware of your surroundings again. Your mind was so hazy and fuzzy and it took a lot of blinking and way too much focus to finally realize where you were. "Easy, darling," Loki's voice came from beside your bed as you struggled to sit up. He rushed over to help you as you bit back a curse at the pain in your side.

[What-?] you started, not remembering much of what happened after you'd been shot.

"You've been trapped in visions all night, love. Lady Natasha had to stitch that wound closed," Loki told you softly. That explained why your brain was so fuzzy and why you woke up so exhausted. Every puncture of the needle would have driven you to more visions.

[How bad is it?]

"The wound will heal in a couple weeks. The media..." he trailed off and you blanched. This was exactly what they wanted to make sure didn't happen.

[How bad?] you demanded.

He offered you a hand in reply. "Let's go to the living room and you can watch the footage for yourself." You looked around the room concerned about leaving before someone told you that you could. "They said you could leave as soon as you woke," Loki explained when he caught your expression. You nodded and with his help slowly got to your feet. He bit back an offer to carry you when he saw your determined expression. You weren't weak just because you'd been shot. Hell, Clint got shot nearly every mission and he didn't just lie in bed afterwards.

It was a slow walk to the living room, but it was worth it to see the relief on everyone's faces that you were up and moving. You tried to reassure them that you were ok.

You curled up on the couch between Loki and Thor to watch the footage.

It was as bad as you were expecting. The news had shown up to film the Avengers as usual. The public ate up anything involving the Avengers, so the news showed up to any battle involving the team as fast as possible. They had gotten a close up on you when you appeared in the battle and made your way to the Hulk. They'd wanted to catch your song. Instead they had closeup footage of you getting shot, Hulk's rage, Loki's rage and obvious love and concern, the team running toward you, Cap's and Nat's orders.

There was even more close-up footage of you speaking prophecies and visions of the future. Your words were clear, the meanings behind them not always clear, but your attention kept shifting during the clip, to various teammates, so you figured your words were for them. It wouldn't have been even that obvious, until you looked directly in the camera and clearly announced the Powerball numbers.

You were so doomed.