Chapter Text
The Watchtower’s lights went kaput, a sad little pop like a deflating balloon animal.
For a moment, no one moved.
They stood there in the dark —Alexei mid-gesture, John mid-snark, Yelena mid-swing of her legs—frozen like those little plastic army men you’d find at the bottom of cereal boxes.
And then the smell hit.
Not just burnt wires — though there was plenty of that too — but the sharp, sour tang of borscht. Not normal borscht, mind you. This was Alexei’s borscht, cooking in the kind of contraption only he could imagine. A self-stirring, turbo-heating, multi-purpose borscht pot.
A pot that, unfortunately, had also doubled as the final straw for the building’s fuse box.
The sour-metallic fog stubbornly in the air, clinging like an old argument you couldn’t quite let go of. Somewhere in the dark, someone coughed.
Bob pressed himself against the far wall, trying his best to blend into the shadows. He tugged his robe tighter around him — a soft, slightly threadbare thing in a faded blue that always felt like wearing a hug on bad days. His hands found the loose threads in the pockets, as they always did, and worried at it, pulling and twisting as if it might unravel more than just fabric.
The dim glow of the emergency lights danced across the floor, weak and wavering, like fireflies trapped in a jar at summer’s end. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to illuminate the chaos:
The table piled high with mismatched chairs, empty takeout containers, and Alexei’s infamous invention.
“This,” Alexei boomed, his voice echoing dramatically in the dim room, “is SABOTAGE!”
Bob winced at the sheer volume of it, his shoulders pulling inward, instinctively trying to make himself smaller.
Alexei stood the end of the table, arms stretched wide, his shadow exaggerated in the dim light. He looked like a man who fully believed he was the protagonist of his own action movie.
“This is TREACHERY! A plot against us!”
Bob’s gaze flicked to Yelena. She was perched on the edge of the table, legs swinging back and forth, back and forth, this little metronome of I-am-so-over-this. The faint light caught her hair, giving it a soft, golden shimmer—not quite a halo, but close enough to make Bob look away too quickly.
She was everything Bob wasn’t.
Bold.
Unapologetic.
A sharp spark that lit up dark corners.
And him? Well, he was the dark corner.
“It’s not sabotage,” she said, rolling her eyes, her heavy Russian accent turning each word into a sharp jab. “It’s your stupid borscht pot. Again, Dad.”
Bob’s lips twitched, not in a smile, but in that small, involuntary way they did when something threw him off balance. A faint warmth stirred in his chest — uninvited, unfamiliar, unsettling.
Yelena. Always her.
The one who never hesitated to say the unsayable, to poke the bear when doing so was inadvisable (and, let’s face it, she was technically a bear cub herself). Alexie’s daughter, through and through.
Their friendship wasn’t “matching friendship bracelets and singing campfire songs” sort of deal. It was messier, more complicated than that — scraped together out of shared scars and a mutual understanding of what it was to lose yourself.
Trust like that didn’t come easy. Not for him. Not with his past.
And yet, here they were. Somehow, against all odds, it happened. Fierce and unyielding, like it had been decided without his input.
It’s all started after the incident. The Void. The day the darkness in him swelled and nearly swallowed Manhattan whole. He could still feel it sometimes — how close he’d come to losing himself completely. But then there was Yelena.
Yelena, who had gone in after him. Into that. Into the kind of black hole people with any sense would run from.
To pull him back. Who does that?
“We’ll stick together from now on,” she’d said when he woke up.
No big speech. No swelling music. Just blunt, straightforward Yelena, stating like it was a universal truth. Like the sky is blue, gravity exists, and she wasn’t going anywhere.
It floored him. It still did. That moment had become his anchor, the thing that steadied him when everything else started to slip.
And yet, he didn’t dare poke at it. Didn’t dare ask what exactly they were to each other. Because if he did—well, knowing his luck, he’d probably ruin it. And then where would he be?
So, no. He didn’t name it, didn’t examine it too closely. Whatever it was, it worked. He just had to not mess it up.
Alexei gasped, clutching his chest like she’d accused him of war crimes. “It is NOT a borscht pot! It is a culinary revolutionary! A masterpiece of modern engineering!”
Unshakeable conviction of a man who believed, with every fibre of his being, that he was right. Even when hilariously, demonstrably wrong.
“Revolutionary?” Yelena shot him a look, one eyebrow arching as her lips twitched with the ghost of a smile. “Dad, last time you tried to be ‘revolutionary,’ we ended up with smoke alarms, the fire department, and—what was it again?” She paused, just enough to let the memory sink in. “Oh, right. ‘Russian Guy Fieri.’”
John sat up straighter in his chair, his grin spreading like wildfire. “Wait, wait. Russian Guy Fieri? I am here for this.”
“FAKE NEWS!” Alexei bellowed, banging a fist on the table, though his eyes twinkled with mischief. His outrage was always half-play, a little too exaggerated to be entirely genuine.
“You’re deflecting,” Yelena said, leaning back slightly, her voice smooth and dry. “Like you always do when someone brings up the samovar incident.”
Bob let their voices wash over him, his fingers still tugging at the thread in his pocket. Normally, this kind of chaos felt like home—messy and loud and strangely comforting, like a patchwork quilt of personalities stitched together with arguments and laughter. But tonight, it felt distant.
The photo flickered in his mind like a faulty lightbulb.
It had been weeks ago, but it still lingered: Yelena and Kate Bishop, caught in a blurry snapshot that had made its rounds online. The image had been simple enough—just the two of them hugging each other, their faces close, their expressions soft.
Hugging. No, not so much hugging.
It's leaning.
It wasn’t the photo itself that had stuck with him, though. It was how it had made him feel—a sudden, sharp twist in his chest that he couldn’t quite explain.
A faint tug pulled at the corner of Bob's mouth. He couldn’t help it—it was always like this with them. Alexei’s booming declarations, Yelena’s sharp-edged wit, John’s relentless teasing, Bucky's quiet steadiness, and Ava's razor-sharp remarks. It was chaos, yes, but there was something else there, too. Something warm.
He glanced at Yelena again, just for a moment. Her expression had softened slightly as she watched her father—exasperated, yes, but also fond. She cared, even when she was pretending not to.
Bob swallowed hard, his chest tightening. He needed air.
His gaze drifted to the table, to the crumbs scattered across its surface and the faint smudge of gravy someone had left behind. The emergency lights cast a faint, uneven glow over the mess, making everything look sharper, harsher. His fingers twitched, curling into fists inside his pockets.
“I’ll… uh…” He cleared his throat, forcing the words out. “I’ll check the utility panel.”
The silence that followed was almost comical.
John froze mid-bite, his sandwich hanging awkwardly inches from his mouth. Alexei’s hand stopped mid-gesture; his face caught in a moment of exaggerated shock. Even Ava stopped tearing at her bread, her fingers stilling as she turned her head toward him.
“You’ll go?” Bucky finally asked, breaking the stillness.
He straightened up from where he’d been leaning against the fridge, his expression unreadable but tinged with mild surprise — as if he hadn’t expected Bob to say anything at all, let alone volunteer.
Bob nodded stiffly. “Yeah. Just…probably a tripped breaker. I…I can handle it.”
There was a pause. Then Bucky nodded in his quiet approval that felt like a lifeline. “Alright. Good man.”
“See?” Alexei said, slamming the table with enough force to make Bob jump. ” This is why I like Bob! He is dependable. Not like the rest of your ingrates!”
He shot a pointed look at John, who rolled his eyes in exaggerated annoyance.
“Yeah, yeah.” John muttered, leaning back in his chair. “We get it. Bob’s great. Can we move on?”
Bob’s cheeks burned. He ducked his head, letting his hair fall forward, and scratched at the frayed edge of his robe pocket. The rough texture snagged against his fingertips, grounding him just enough to keep from bolting.
“I’ll come with you,” Yelena said.
Her voice was soft, casual, but it cut through the noise like a spark. Bob froze, his hands stilling in his lap. He didn’t look at her.
“No,” he said quickly, too quickly. The word came out sharp, like it had been forced through his teeth. He winced, then cleared his throat, forcing his voice to steady.
“I mean… I’ve got it.”
The silence that followed was heavier than before. Bob could feel the weight of Yelena’s gaze on him, pressing into him like she was trying to read something he didn’t want her to see.
“What?” she said, her voice quieter now. There was no teasing this time, just confusion. “Why not?”
Bob’s throat tightened. He stared at the table, at the crumbs, at the faint smudge of gravy someone had left behind. “It’s fine,” he said finally, his voice barely above a whisper. “I’ll… just go.”
Yelena didn’t move. She stayed where she was, her elbows resting lightly against it, her body angled forward like a cat poised to pounce—or retreat. One hand still held the torn bread, her fingers curling around it absently, but her expression had shifted. She wasn’t just looking at him now; she was studying him, her head tilting slightly, brows knitting together in something that wasn’t quite anger but carried the weight of hurt and confusion.
“You know,” she said softly, her voice barely above a whisper, threading the words carefully, like she was trying not to let too much show.
“To …make sure he doesn’t blow everyone up. Or something.”
She forced a faint smirk, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes.
“NO.”
He snapped, cutting her off. The words came out louder than he meant, sharp enough to make John stop mid-chew and Alexei freeze with his mouth open.
The silence that followed was immediate, absolute.
Yelena flinched—just barely—but enough that Bob felt it like a punch to the gut. Her confusion deepened, her mouth opening slightly before she closed it again.
The room seemed to exhale all at once, the quiet snapping back into the background hum of conversation. But the energy had shifted, like someone had knocked a picture frame askew and no one dared fix it.
Bob turned sharply, his feet moving before he could think, and strode into the hallway.
Behind him, the room was still.
Yelena stayed where she was, her arms crossed loosely, but her eyes remained fixed on the empty doorway Bob had disappeared through. Whatever she’d been about to say, she swallowed it down, her jaw tightening just slightly.
“What was that about, huh?” John finally asked, his voice breaking the silence.
Yelena didn’t answer. Not right way. Her eyes remained fixed on the empty doorway; her expression unreadable. ” Nothing.”
John raised an eyebrow, exchanging a glance with Ava and Bucky, who stood nearby, arms folded and expression unreadable.
“Didn’t sound like nothing,” he muttered.
Alexei, bless his heart, was on another planet entirely.
"Bobs got this", he said, his voice booming with the kind of confidence only Alexei could muster. "He always does. The boy can fix anything. Remember that time with the toaster? Genius work."
He gestured vaguely toward the wall, his expression brightening as if the solution was already a foregone conclusion. "Probably just… tightened a wire, maybe flicked a switch. Bob has a magic touch with these things. Knows how to talk to them, make them work."
“He mimed a small adjustment, like he thought fixing a fuse box was as simple as turning a knob. Bet it’s already fixed by now.”
He grinned, utterly oblivious to the tension rippling through the room, or the fact that Bob usually fixed things with a screwdriver, a lot of patience, and absolutely no magic touch.
He just sometimes whistled a jaunty tune while doing it.