A Reckless Soul | Captain America ✓

FLIES DROPPING

VAULT D
July 15th, 2012

THE English assassin's eyes skimmed the page of her book: Wuthering Heights. She devoured the pages like a dog to its bone. Hardly anything fazed her from reading, even when Zachary walked down the hallway munching on a crispy green apple. The delicious crunch from the fruit would have tingled anyone's taste buds, and arouse a desire for the food, except her of course, who had been too indulged in her book.

"My power is awesomer," Zachary said with much confidence, his voice booming off the walls as his approaching footsteps neared his little sister's cell.

"You can shape-shift into a lion, I hardly see how that's 'awesomer.'" Audrey put in quotation marks with the use of her free hand, not at all bothering to glance up. She forever had a knack for multitasking. A skill Audrey knew Zachary had the pleasure of acquainting, and that such a topic he couldn't argue nor disagree about.

"Actually," he began, a contagiously sly smirk formed his mouth. "I've been able to shape-shift into an eagle, a bear, a wolf, and a horse. I'm still trying to work on shape-shifting into a water snake." He easily avoided mentioning that he could shape-shift into any human form, merely so he wouldn't have to open another door of discussion that he didn't want to reveal in at the moment.

And the incredibly disappointing fact, that shape-shifting into any human form drained him far quicker than animal forms.

"Ew," Audrey said in responds to his fascination to transform into a slithery water snake. His comment had her full attention as she looked up from her book in disgust. "Why on earth would you want to shape-shift into those vile creatures?"

"Because they can hold their breath up to 90 minutes." He shrugged. "And mainly because you're afraid of snakes."

"You're cruel."

"And you never called, emailed, texted, or sent a letter for the past 8 years," Zachary bluntly stated with a pinch of venom attached to his words. He took a big bite out of his granny apple, observing her the entire time as he crunched on the juicy fruit.

She rolled her eyes and huffed, retreating back into the comfort folds of her book's pages. "I'm not going there."

"Fine," he said in between chewing. "You'll just have to hear me talk, and talk, and talk, and—"

"Alright!" she yelled, slamming her book shut. "What," she began through gritted teeth, "do you want to talk about?"

He swallowed the remaining fruit in his mouth, at this point it had been forgotten, hidden behind his crossed arms. "Why didn't you ever reach out to me?"

"I'm sorry I was busy all those years." A hint of irony pricked her words and bled into them.

"Busy making a reputation?"

"You could say that—"

"Audrey I'm serious!"

"Then don't ask questions I can easily make fun of."

Zachary grumbled something incoherent, fixed his angry glare to the ground, and leaned on the wall opposite her cell. She chuckled, revealing a tiny smirk. "You know," she started, growing serious, "we used to have fun adventures as kids, you and I, brother." The word brother came out softer than she intended. Her eyes held an honest sadness, one that wouldn't be so easily shown to the others. Her heart ached for those uncomplicated and blissful days.

"We were naive children back then, sister. And besides." He paused. "We're all grown up now. We don't do adventures anymore."

"Well you don't, but I do."