fire (loki's daughter)

t h i r t e e n

chapter thirteen: eavesdropping
song: anarchist — yungblud

"I know who killed her and why," Maryanne said in a low voice.
   
Somehow Cameron had ended up back in the hospital room after the whole ordeal. She was tired, really tired. In the past twelve hours, she'd passed out, found her foster mother dead, been questioned at the police station, and saved by Tony Stark. All she really wanted to do was sleep but the images of Rachel flooded her mind every time her eyes closed. So instead, she was visiting Maryanne. It seemed like a good way to think about something else. As it turns out, Cameron was wrong.

"Who?" Cameron asked.
"You remember the place that you saved me from?"
"I couldn't possibly forget."
"The man in charge of that who organization ordered her dead."
"And how do you know this?" Cameron was still skeptical of Maryanne.
"Because I was inside of his organization for years, I know what his plans are, and he's pulling the same thing he has before."
"What 'same thing' as before?"
"In the years since the fire that the woman you claim to be your mother died in, you've been in three foster homes, counting the one that you're in currently, correct?"
"Yes."
"And what has happened to all of those families, including your mother?"
"Horrible things." Cameron shuddered, remembering them.
"Exactly, Michael Andrews over-dosed just after you become somewhat friends and the family couldn't deal with you after their son died, Ava Perez was hunted down and inevitably murdered, and now Rachel Taylor is dead. Even Mary Granger died."
"That last one was my fault."
"No, it wasn't."
"Yes, it was."
"If she hadn't died in that fire, she would've died soon after anyway."
"I still let her die."
"It doesn't matter, the point is, important family figures have a way of dying around you. And it's because he wants to set you off."
"What?"
"Jaxon Wilson. He wants to set you off."
"I don't understand." Cameron still had more questions than answers.
"He knows the extent of your powers and he wants to use you to create destruction."
"I still don't understand."

"When you first started showing signs of powers," Maryanne started, but her tone was different, calmer. "I was nervous. I knew that you'd inherit powers from your father, but I didn't know what kind or how powerful you would be. It didn't take long for me to realize that you were strong, extremely strong and that your emotions could easily force you to lose control of your powers. That was when I decided to homeschool you. That, and it was easier considering we were practically on the run." She paused, looking out the window. "I remember this one time when you were five, we didn't have any more milk and you got angry. You lost control and I was so afraid that you were going to burn the house down. You managed to burn the couch to ash before I got you to calm down. Waltz music. It always calmed you down, I don't know why."

"It's the steady beat, the sets of three." Cameron interrupted.
"What?"
"Waltz music, it's the steady 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3. An odd number of beats in a measure, the steady back-and-forth you feel. It just makes everything seem so light and easy."
Maryanne was smiling now. She was so happy to learn something about her daughter.
"That's why you liked it?"
"Yeah. I still do."
"I'm glad that some things haven't changed."
"Anyway..." Cameron tried to push her back on the subject.

"Oh, yes. The point is that your powers are unstable and Jaxon Wilson wants to use that to cause destruction. He thought that by removing someone you care about from the equation, he could set you off. Clearly, it hasn't worked."
Cameron was quiet for a minute.
"It almost did." She said.
"What? When?"

"I left the first foster home when I was twelve and I moved in with Ava Perez. She was single with no kids, so it was just me and her. She and I became really close over the two years I lived with her. She was more of a mother to me than my own mother, sorry, Mary Granger." Cameron corrected herself. She still had no actual proof that this woman was her mother but deep down, Cameron was beginning to hope that she was. "She was so kind. And then there was the first attempt on her life. It wasn't successful, obviously, but I told her she should run, and she did. Two weeks later, she was dead. And I lost control. Clearly not as bad as this guy, Jaxon Wilson, hoped, but it was bad. I may have burned down a few houses. Before I could continue, one of the neighbors was able to get through to me and I got back in control."
"Wow. This Ava must have meant a lot to you."
"She did." Cameron looked down.
   
There was a knock on the door, interrupting the silence that had settled over the room. Cameron got up and went over to the door, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye. The doorknob was cold and pulling on it revealed a dark-haired man. Loki.