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With the wide range of dysfunctional miscommunication styles amongst the new inhabitants of the Watchtower, being on either side of an easily avoided misunderstanding was a rampant occasion that Ava does her best to stay several steps ahead of. Mostly because the entire process of deescalation and the humiliation ritual of apologizing is exhausting enough when she's already struggling to adapt to the shared living arrangement. Because the alternative is cutting and running, and for whatever unfathomable reason she's far too attached to these misfits to give in to old habits.
It helps that she considers herself rather perceptive, able to pick up on the little details that, sure, the others have been trained to be observant of too. They've all worked within different corners of the same field for most of their lives, which makes slipping up even more of an embarrassment. And the thing Ava hates more than conflict itself was being caught off guard with information she should've known. Ava doesn't like being wrong.
So when she arrives at the meeting spot downstairs to face her teammates in the form of a dashing vampire, a rugged cowboy, an unraveling mummy… and something else she can't quite identify but assumes is Bob by the way he awkwardly shuffles in anticipation of the oncoming collision, both her boots and her brain screech to a sudden halt.
But it was already too late.
"Where's your costume?" Yelena speaks the question first while the others echo agreement, and it's hard to tell what her expression or tone are meant to convey with her mouth full of fake pointy teeth and equally fake blood dripping down her chin.
"This… is my costume," Ava weakly defends. And up until a second ago that had been her understanding of Mel's instructions to arrive 'in costume.' She simply assumed that meant their New Avengers uniforms, for whatever photo ops with the sad orphans they were supposed to be entertaining for the Halloween event tonight. Masquerading as spooky scary skeletons never crossed her mind.
"Oh, I get it," Bob muffles from behind the scarred up rubbery mask, confirming her suspicions of his identity… though still not what he was meant to be. Which means Bucky was still missing, or found some excuse not to come.
Everyone turns a confused yet expectant glance Bob's way, which Ava is thankful to have the focus off her for the moment. A haphazardly bandage-wrapped Alexei gestures impatiently for him to actually voice the conclusion he's come to. "She's a ghost," and points at her with… are those knives on his hands?
John groans, shaking his head. "You can't just turn up to a Halloween party as yourself, not when the rest of us had to dress up." And yet he looks perfectly comfortable in his cowboy hat and matching chaps, thumbs tucked into his belt like he always does. Had to, indeed. Like he hadn't been waiting for the opportunity to whip out that belt buckle and sheriff badge.
Ava crosses her arms, defensive and self-conscious that she messed something so obviously simple up. "I thought dressing up was for the kids," she sighs out, at a loss for how to quickly fix this situation.
"Halloween is for everyone," Bob sounds like he's already had this conversation with the others, convincing them to participate, and Yelena nods along with a suppressed excitement.
"Out of everyone, I thought you'd be the most into this holiday," John comments unhelpfully.
Ava narrows her eyes, can already guess the reasoning. "Because she's a ghost," Alexei whispers, nodding knowingly to Bob.
Right. "Fine, I can go toss a sheet over my head so we can get going," Ava turns, already glitching out of focus with intention to leave.
"No, no, you have time for a better costume," Yelena interjects before she can quite disappear. "We're still waiting on Bucky. Mel said she's helping with his prosthetics." Yelena holds up her phone, probably in indication that she's been texting the assistant but all Ava can see is the display screen of her guinea pig, Cucumber, staring back with his beady little eyes and munching on some lettuce.
"I don't have a better costume on standby," Ava responds with more irritation at herself than anything, "I barely have any clothes outside of this suit, if you haven't forgotten-"
"I have something," John interrupts. "Well, a few options. We can be quick, if you don't drag your feet about it."
"I don't drag my feet," Ava mutters with a scuff of her heel against the floor, and okay metaphorically perhaps she's delaying accepting the offer because she's still getting used to this allowing of somebody to help her thing. John raises a brow, Ava tosses her hands in defeat because she's out of options. "Fine, but if you're preparing to dress me up as your horse I'm going to kick in your teeth."
"Whoa, whoa," John holds his own hands up, and it's hard to tell from the shadow of the wide brim his hat casts over his face, but Ava thinks she catches the hint of a blush.
He turns, man on a mission, and she follows.
She pretends she doesn't hear when Alexei observes: "Always at each other's heels."
She's seen inside John's room before, lurked in his doorway while telling him to hurry up or checking in after a fight or asking to borrow a clean towel, but never stepped inside. Mostly because she's never wanted to create any delusions of familiarity that anyone would be welcome inside her room.
He seems to be slowly settling in, like her. A few more personal belongings that indicate a hope that this is more than just a temporary arrangement, more than just a joke at their expense that's about to be pulled out from under them. But an actual home. Even if his pictures display the family he's lost, rather than the one he has now.
A framed Lemar smiles back at her, oblivious of his tragic fate, as John unceremoniously presents a storage bin full of what appears to be various holiday clutter in the middle of his otherwise clean floor space. And as Ava circles to the other side, it is indeed labeled 'HOLIDAY' in faded sharpie. There's a dusty looking wreath tucked in there, a string of lights… but on top mostly seems to be costume pieces he's already rummaged through.
More than she expected, honestly. But then again, he did lead the most normal American life of any of them. Up until he didn't.
"Quite the collection, huh?" Ava comments absently, kneeling down to start investigating the selection.
"It's older stuff, that we had in a storage unit. Had to uh, clear it out after the divorce was finalized," John clears his throat a bit uncomfortably, watching her pull out a pair of cat ears.
She slips on the headband. "Why a storage unit? Had too much junk?" She finds the tail next, dangling it from her fingertips with a mixture of disbelief and amusement that anyone would wear this.
"No, because we were moving around a lot early in my career, and when you're young and living paycheck to paycheck it feels irresponsible throwing anything out. Yet we never did use any of this stuff again," he shrugs. And she gets that, in a weird way. When she went back to her parents' abandoned Californian home, it was full of their old belongings that weren't actually of any use to her, but far too sentimental to let go of. "I was going to drop it off at the donation bin, but then we got the assignment."
"Assignment," Ava mocks, reaching back to clip the tail to the back of her belt. "It's just a kid's party."
"Well, back in my day children actually went door to door to trick-or-treat, none of this…"
"We're in a city, John. Not your crusty little picket fence suburb. You want the children out there knocking at gutters and asking the sewer rats for candy?"
"There's apartment buildings!"
Ava slips her hands into oversized stuffed cat paws, and though he can't see it, John absolutely knows which finger she's holding up at him.
"Very cute," he grumbles.
"Meow," she purrs out, smirking at just how pink his face has gotten. He's always been so easy to rile up. "Is there any more to this costume, or is it just this?"
John doesn't answer, doesn't seem to know how to answer. Ava wrinkles her nose at him, and digs around in the tub some more, until she finds a faux fur-lined black corset top with a jingly little bell on a bow right at the neck.
"Oh." She blinks. "So I guess everything I learned about Halloween from Mean Girls is true."
"Probably wouldn't be appropriate for you to wear that to a kid's party," he manages to get out, as if the occasion itself were the only thing making it a bad idea.
"I don't want to wear your wife's-"
"Ex," he corrects hastily.
"Old lingerie." Though she's still holding it up to herself, trying to imagine how it fits. Because she's never worn any lingerie at all, how frivolous that would be. Which doesn't seem to help John's strained expression. "Sure she doesn't want all this back?" Maybe she's found a new partner that might be appreciative, though she doesn't outright suggest it, not knowing how sensitive John was on the topic now that he's finally removed the wedding ring. Ava can only hope, both on Olivia's behalf because raising a child alone must be exhausting, but also for her own selfish reasons. Perhaps.
"She was more concerned with getting the house and all the furnishings. And custody. Wouldn't fit her anymore, anyway."
"Wooow," Ava raises her brows at John, in disbelief. "Calling your wife-"
"EX," he corrects more firmly. Maybe he has given up on the intention of trying to reconcile after all.
"Fat?"
"What! No, no. Jesus, Ava. She's not twenty anymore and she's given birth, that changes a woman's body. Stop making things weird, or I'll toss the sheet over your head myself and not bother to cut out the eye holes."
Ava huffs, but seems satisfied by his answer, slipping the ears back off.
"Decided against being a cat?"
"Seems a little low effort, doesn't it?" Everyone else was wearing full costumes, after all. She doesn't want to stand out as the jackass that couldn't be bothered about orphans.
"Problem that would have been averted if you didn't wait until last minute to get one together. Besides, I thought black cat was fitting. You have that... energy."
"Like a stray in a back alley garbage bin," Ava agrees absently. Pulling out a fringed Pocahontas dress from the pile, she looks between it and John's cowboy costume with open judgment. "Haven't you already been cancelled enough?"
"It was a different time," John shrugs, no real effort in trying to defend. "Don't blame me for that one, Olivia picked it out."
Ava tosses it aside, not willing to take part in such tasteless appropriation. "I don't know how any of this is meant to work, it's my first Halloween." And though she wasn't alone in having a rather deprived childhood, Yelena at least got to fake it for awhile in Ohio with her dad. In a lot of otherwise unfortunate ways, Yelena's training gave her a lot more advantages in knowing how to fake fitting in and being normal than Ava's.
Yelena had once called her the child assassin equivalent of homeschooled. Ava expressed at least she didn't have to kill her classmates.
"Wait, really?"
"No, the SHIELD scientists weren't parading me about the streets for candy. Like I said, this was my only costume." Well, the rather outdated version before that she heavily modified into the current. But she wasn't feeling too technical. She finds another skimpy little corset, this one red with spiky wings attached.
"But what about when you were a kid, before all that? Didn't they have Halloween back in England?"
Ava rolls her eyes. "Argentina."
"What? You're Brit-"
"I was raised in Argentina. Didn't you read my file?" The one that informed him she was on the run from 15 nations, the one that she fears daily getting leaked to the press.
"I tend to skip the childhood section. Really puts a damper on things when you're sent to kill someone."
"You were sent to eliminate Yelena," Ava reminds him. "And thank god for that." John stares incredulously at such a statement. Ava clarifies, "Could you imagine the disaster it would've been if we were assigned targets in any other configuration?"
John's quiet, as the implication catches up. Ava was the only one that completed her mission, eliminating Taskmaster… and in the process, inadvertently saving John's back from being skewered by her blade. While there's a lot that will never be known, what would have happened if Bob's timing would have been different and Ava hadn't pulled that trigger, there really wasn't much room for debate about what would've happened if the Infamous Ghost had been assigned John or Yelena instead. John tugs uncomfortably at the bandana around his neck. "Don't want to imagine it, no. Uh. That one is a devil costume. Just the matching headband and tail again." Not mentioning the corset he's certainly not imagining her in.
And a pointy plastic pitchfork that Ava pokes him in the shin with, as if trying to chase those inappropriate thoughts away. "Ow," he responds, deadpan.
"I'm sure Olivia was perfectly lovely and respectable," Ava begins, "But are there any costumes in here that aren't so scandalous?" She plucks out an eyepatch and her first thought is Nick Fury. Wondering what he thought of them all now, using the name of the team he originally assembled. There's a small stir of bitterness.
"Pirate," he informs her with an edge of amusement as she squints one eye closed.
"Ah, I can work with that," Ava decides, slipping it on and adjusting the patch over the eye.
"No, that's one of my costumes. There's an angel gown or a clown suit…"
"Yours? You're dressed as a cowboy," Ava remarks, fishing around for the flouncy white blouse. "No way in hell I'm going as a clown." Plus she's fairly certain kids hate those, and she's already bad enough with kids. Or so she assumes. Other than threatening to kidnap Cassie, she really has no experience.
"I mean it's a men's size, it'll be too big for you." He tries holding up the little tinsel halo, which has gone crooked from being smashed in storage.
"You're not that much bigger than me," Ava insists dismissively, despite the reality that he's got at least half a foot and roughly 70 pounds on her. "Other than your ego, of course. And your overcompensating firearm. And-" she tugs the frilly blouse on over her head, over her suit. The collar droops down one of her shoulders as she pulls her hair out from under it, and it's practically a dress with how large it is. "Got a stain right here…"
Ava looks over to John, to see if he's going to make any funny remarks for her to fake offense to. But her claim seems to have shut him up for a bit with whatever sizing-her-up calculations he's running against his own measurements, so she leaves him to fiddling with the crooked halo wire while continuing her search. There's a vest and a striped sash, which she wraps around her midsection to help obscure her own bulkier belt under the loose fabric. Orphans or not, she's not going to remove her regulators just to pass as a more convincing scallywag.
Likewise she passes on the pants, but tugs the boot covers after figuring out what they were, securing the elastic straps beneath her heel with a snap and a giggle. And at least that helps tie things together into a more comprehensive and convincing costume, even with her skirts poking out beneath it all.
"You look… ridiculous," John claims, though the way he watches her through the golden tinsel ring says otherwise. He's somehow bent it up more than managed to straighten it out. Tossing it aside and pulling the tricorne hat out from under the hideous clown wig, John dusts it off before plopping it unceremoniously upon Ava's head. Little beads jangle near her ear, and she bats at it.
"Any hook hands?"
"Now don't you think that would be culturally insensitive to Bucky?" John smirks.
Whatever remark she's about to make is interrupted by a hesitant rapping at the doorframe. It's Bob, in his ugly striped sweater and instead she blurts out, "What even are you?" at the same moment he asks "You two ready yet?"
"Freddy Krueger."
"I don't even know what that means," Ava adjusts the fabric of the ruffly pirate blouse in the mirror. Sure, she's ready enough.
"Nightmare on Elm Street. Classic horror film. Really, I thought you'd be more into this stuff," Bob pulls up at the edge of his mask to peer out at her.
"No, never really got into any holidays," she shrugs. She's more of a Nightmare Before Christmas girl, though she's not willing to give that away. "I didn't even know what day of the week it was most of the time, all the seasons felt the same in the lab. Though Bill liked Chri-" when it was just the two of them. Ava's throat closes up at the mention of the man, and she pointedly ignores the way her teammates exchange confused glances as she storms out of the room before anyone asks her to finish the abandoned sentence.
Back downstairs, she's greeted by the sight of what apparently had taken Bucky and Mel so long to prepare. He's a werewolf, complete with a snarly looking dog muzzle and an impressive amount of fake fur glued to his face and poking out of his claw-torn shirt. It'd look silly, if Mel hadn't done such a great job with the detailing. She stands next to him, on her tablet, wearing a cute red riding hood outfit that makes Ava ponder if it's meant to be a thing or if they're just… matching for fun? Ava tries not to get too much into the business of her teammates, so they won't get into hers either.
Maybe she's just looking for hints that she's not the only one with some unprofessional crush.
"Alright, we're all here," Mel looks up, looks Ava up and down, scrutinizing. And then gives a reluctant nod of approval that makes Ava guess it's not really up to par with what she was expecting, but good enough not to delay them any further. She breathes out with relief.
"Valentina has the car waiting out front-" Alexei holds up a finger, but doesn't manage to get a word out before he's cut off. "No, you're not driving. Statistically Halloween is the most dangerous night on the roads for children, with fatalities more than doubling than average. It'd be irresponsible of me to allow you behind the wheel."
"I am great driver! Many licenses," Alexei protests as Bucky reminds that fake ones don't count. Yelena points out the clear driving hazard of the bandages drooping over his eyes, and luckily Alexei doesn't make any more arguments after that, and they arrive at the venue safely. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
The Met is only familiar to Ava in the context of the fancy gala that celebrities show up to flaunt ridiculously themed costumes every year, but Valentina seems to have had some sway in booking it for her Halloween party that Ava is certain didn't come cheap. Or more likely involved blackmail. It's meant to be high profile, and there's photographers snapping every angle of their arrival and far too close to her face, and none of it at all seems to match what Ava thought Halloween was supposed to be about. Outside the spooky decorations.
She likes those, especially when John walks straight into a fake spiderweb. She doesn't even bother to hide her laugh as he bats himself free and sends the styrofoam spider flying into Yelena.
Once they're inside though, Ava's overwhelmed by the amount of tiny demons and dinosaurs and fairy princesses there are running about. Yelena however is rather pleased, fake spider still tucked under her arm. "I insisted that it's a party for local orphans," she tells Ava, fellow orphan who never got to experience anything quite like this. "And not just some photo op for her wealthy donors."
Which seems fair, because she knows how much Yelena is trying to make something good out of this farce they've been trapped in. And makes it a lot easier for Ava to lighten up about the entire ordeal.
John seems pained with reminder, watching the kids that aren't his own play, until a group of them drag him off.
"You've never been around kids before, have you?" Bucky asks, after she spends five minutes that feel like five hours with one attached to her leg crying about losing a game of pin the skull on the skeleton, awkwardly patting the sniffling Dracula on the head until she was rescued by a pigtailed ninja with caramel apples. Funny how a little sugar could stop the hysterics.
"No," she agrees while adjusting her hat, beads jangling right at the corner of her sight again. "I was an only child."
"I was the oldest of four," he reminisces with that all too familiar ache of a life gone too soon. She wonders if he ever sought them out, if they had survived his time in Hydra's captivity into old age, but doesn't ask. Because it'd be hypocritical, wouldn't it.
"Really? I guess you do have that big brother vibe," she smiles lightly, that after all the shared loss between them at least they had each other now. Even if maybe they were poor substitutes for the family they all actually wanted. She's painfully aware she'll never be Natasha for Yelena to look up to, even as they whisper each other their secrets. Or Olivia and Lemar that have been inseparable from John since school despite how hard she tries to support him through their absence. She'll certainly never be comparable to the morally upright Steve Rogers that had fought for Bucky across an entire century only to disappear back into it. She expects him to finally abandon them too, one day, once he patches things up with Sam Wilson and the remaining real Avengers. Sometimes she feels… just there, by association. Because none of them were cruel enough to toss her out to the curb.
Maybe she's just never learned how to quite fit in.
"Never saw anyone my own age again, once I got locked away in the labs. Not that I had any luck with the kids at the orphanage, either. I thought… well, kids are cruel, aren't they? But mostly I think they were just scared."
"Of the phasing?" Bucky observes, scratching at a patch of facial fur with fake claws. It's almost difficult to take the conversation seriously, with his snarly snout.
"Mm, the nuns whispered about how I was cursed." SHIELD had hardly been the first ones to label her a ghost, though 'fantasma' at least had more of a ring to it.
She watches John pick up a small girl dressed as Iron Man, and 'fly' her around in his arms while she emulates laser blasts, both laughing. Maybe he wouldn't have been such an awful father, if it weren't for everything else in his life falling apart. Maybe sometimes you learn the important lessons after it's already too late.
"Not these ones, though. Guess it's a different world they grew up in, aliens and killer robots on tv. Ghost girls really aren't that impressive anymore."
"I think you are," Bucky offers, though he's also looking off into the crowd, in another direction.
"Guess that's an improvement over pathetic, isn't it."
He excuses himself hastily, to go off in the direction he's been intently staring, as if he'd seen someone. Ava wonders briefly if it was Mel, but no, there she is helping Yelena and a small group of children with carving a giant pumpkin. Or at least supervising. She seems far more concerned about the implementation of sharp knives that Yelena pulls out, while the kids clap excitedly.
"Really makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside," Valentina comments drolly, right from behind her shoulder. Ava tenses, feels her fingers curl into tight fists, the side of her mouth into a snarl that she barely manages to relax before halfway turning. Apparently it was too much to hope she could avoid the woman for the night. Valentina rarely cared about Ava enough to singularly seek her out unless she had something particular to dig at her with.
Ava is hardly fooled by that strained, lipsticked smile she's greeted with, and doesn't bother to try faking one in return.
As benevolent Valentina was trying to appear with putting on this whole public outreach affair, her true nature really is on display with the wicked witch costume she's donning. It looks pieced together from her personally tailored wardrobe than anything off the rack, with a sleek velvet dress and glossy buckled boots. Even the signature pointy hat looks far more expensive than something meant to only be worn once a year. But that's Valentina, isn't it. Always for show. The whole outfit probably worth more than what she bothered donating.
"Looking for Hansel and Gretel to push into the oven?" Ava remarks, arms crossed. "Or is that an honor you only reserve for-"
"En garde!"
Ava's indeed caught off guard, glancing down at the plastic sword inexpertly thrust her way. But instead of the small child dressed as a skeleton holding it, she sees somebody else entirely behind that skull mask. Sees a bullet hole that isn't there, blood dripping down in finality, lights flashing red in warning.
Her throat tightens at what can't be reversed.
"Seize him!" A musketeer chases after the skeleton, and they both run off waving their play swords at each other.
"Almost makes you want to adopt, doesn't it?" Valentina continues, lacking any sincerity. As far as Ava knows, the woman is completely childless herself. But maybe she has some hypothetical estranged offspring that hates her, and who would blame them.
Ava hides a shudder behind a scoff, but is more thankful for her boss's presence to direct her irritation at than she wants to admit. "Absolutely not, no child deserves to put up with any of this." But truthfully, really, Ava has no interest in taking in an orphan, only to inevitably leave them an orphan again. She never estimates her lifespan beyond the next year or two, not with her condition. Not with the nature of the work she does. Not with the boss she has.
"We all have to make due with what we're given, so few children get to pick the circumstances of their upbringing." And while Ava's not all that interested in the details of her tragic backstory, she can only guess it was plenty messed up to result in somebody quite so corrupt and callous. "A shame you eliminated Taskmanager-"
"Taskmaster," Ava weakly corrects, the name tasting like ash.
"Right, that one."
"You ordered it."
"And you always were my most efficient little operative. But her father was a rather nasty sort, though sometimes I get why he kept his agents brainwashed for all the troubles you cause me. You two would be able to share sob stories about how unfair-"
"Do you have a point, Val?" Ava snaps, hating how the weakness lingers in her tone.
"Oh, just that you need to work on being a bit more grateful for the opportunity you've been presented," Val swirls her cocktail, ever so casually, but her gaze is sharp. Accusing.
"Me? You're the one that's lucky to not be rotting behind bars."
"Bold words from the woman who only isn't because I offered protections in exchange for compliance, if you hadn't forgotten. But then I find out you've been meddling in the security systems…"
Whatever Ava was expecting, it wasn't that. Sure, she's disabled a few of the cameras in the Watchtower that had felt more invasive in placement. "I haven't done anything of the sort." But that means somebody has, and that feels more alarming than defending against the accusation itself.
Their tiff seems to have caught John's attention, already halfway over to intervene when the lights suddenly cut out.
There's silence, and then frightened screams of children followed by the shouting of adults.
"Everyone calm down!" "It's just a blown fuse, no need to-" Shattering glass. "AH!"
"Who would attack a place full of children?" she hears Bob nearby, and god there's about to be a lot more to worry about if this blackout somehow triggers him into his own. Deep breaths. She feels somebody's hand on hers, and she nearly yanks it away. But it's John, isn't it. She squeezes back.
"Somebody that wants to make sure we're more focused on protecting the kids than what they're trying to steal," speculates Yelena. "Hush, hush. Nobody's going to hurt you." Sniffles and whimpers.
The speaker system screeches and crackles with static. "Somebody that wants to expose you all as the frauds you are," a distorted voice echoes through the room.
"Get the children out of here," Bucky orders, silhouetted in the flung open doorway. More glass shatters.
In the ensuing chaos, the New Avengers help evacuate. Mel's outside with her tablet, counting off the children by name to make sure they're all accounted for. Alexei's doing his best to keep them corralled and entertained as the sirens blare closer. Bob's checking for injuries, and Valentina's on the phone yelling orders and demanding explanations.
Ava's running back inside, after the attacker. Her boots crunch across shards of glass.
"Of everyone trying to stop me, didn't expect you, little Ghost." She spins around, sees a flicker of movement from behind a display case full of fancy pottery. Her blood runs cold.
"I don't care about whatever you're trying to steal," Ava tosses off the pirate hat, and presses the button at her collar to activate her mask. Seeing in the dark is suddenly much easier, but finding the thief isn't. She never expected to be on this side of the game of hide and seek.
"That'd make both of us, but a job is a job. And this one isn't about the money."
She tenses, spins around again on her heel in time to see a man in all white gear walk right through a statue. Well, fuck.
"What do you want? Who sent you?"
"You know I'm not going to tell," the distorted voice mocks, from behind a mask so similar to her own that it must have been ripped off from early prototypes. Glowing red eyes stare back at her. They both tilt their heads.
She charges forward, but it's like grasping at air. Her molecules shift, and she reaches through the layers of flickering reality. Snatching at the neck of the invisible man, she jerks him right back into tangibility.
He laughs as their facemasks collide, and slaps a small circular device right beneath the loose collar of her pirate shirt, against her chestplate. It beeps, beeps, then flashes. She doesn't have time to demand what it is before it's activated, and her molecules are scrambling. It's some sort of disruptor, but the knowledge does her no good now. Her nerves are fraying, and she tries to hold on tighter to her strange doppelganger. Not to prevent him from getting away anymore, no, but to have something to hold onto as her grip on reality rapidly dissolves.
There's a high pitched ringing in her ears that distantly she recognizes as her own screams that drown out everything else.
She hits the floor, hard. And then it's over, after what could have been seconds or minutes. She feels numb, confused. Too exhausted to get up, but her palm scrapes against the floor beneath her in futile attempt to anyway. There's strong hands around her, lifting her limp body, muffled words she can't make out as her ears continue to ring. If somebody's asking her a question, all she can manage in response is a small groan.
Vaguely she recognizes through the disorientation the solid presence and rumbling baritone as John, too weak to deny herself the comfort he offers as she clings back with whatever strength she still has left. Too weak to tell him off for his hand on her ass while he carries her off, too weak to ask where they're going. To safety, she trusts blindly. She focuses instead on breathing.
When she comes to again, no idea how much later, she's in a bed that's too comfortable to be her own. Her eyes warily open and immediately scrunch back closed from the blaring lights overhead. There's beeping of machines, monitoring something. Probably her. Soft arguing, out in the hallway. Probably about her. Her fingers twitch, and glitch, and something cold is pressed into her hand.
"Don't spill it."
A small paper cup of water, she determines. Which… yes, is exactly what she wants right now. She tips her head up, and takes a small sip that rinses the crackling dryness out of her throat.
Finally reopening her eyes, just a squint, she takes in her surroundings the best she can from her prone angle. John's sitting in an armchair, still in his cowboy costume, sans hat, so at least she knows she hasn't been out for a week or whatever. He looks tired, strained with worry. There's scrapes on his face and knuckles that hadn't been there before.
"Did everyone-"
"Everyone made it out fine, yes. All the kids are back safe where they belong."
Ava closes her eyes again, relief making it easier to relax despite the discomfort of the situation. "And that villain?"
"Got away." They both sigh in unison, knowing that means they'll likely have to deal with him again. "Did you know him, Ava? His tech looked-"
"Similar to my own, I know. I don't… No, I have no idea. How he got my powers. All the studies at," she pauses, downs more water. "All the experiments, trying to replicate my abilities, transfer them to other organisms. All of them failed. There shouldn't be anyone else."
"But there is."
She goes to rub at her hairline, but John's already there with a damp towel, smoothing her stray curls out of her face so tenderly that she almost can't stand it. She bats lightly at his hand, but ends up holding onto it instead. Somebody's removed her gloves, and skin on skin contact tingles so unfamiliarly beneath the pads of her fingers.
"Luckily he's not as good a fighter as you are, got a few blows in before chasing him off. But he did get away with a few random artifacts. Mel's trying to analyze them against various databases and historical records, look for a pattern or anything significant about them to figure out what our knockoff Ghost guy is up to. Because they weren't the most valuable pieces he even took." Even through his report, getting her up to speed, all she can read from his tone is How are you? How are you? How are you?
She slowly shakes her head, knowing monetary value wasn't the point as she recalls pieces of the exchange before it all went sideways, but her mind is too cloudy to offer anything helpful. "Can we not talk about this right now?" Her body fades in and out with each breath, and she's not sure she's ever seen John look quite so scared as his hand grips at her thigh, trying to hold onto her very existence.
"I'm fine," she whispers, and the tinge of pain betrays her tone. "Really, it's been much worse than this."
And that apparently isn't as comforting as she intended, the way he winces.
"We have somebody coming to check in on you tomorrow," John informs her, softly. "So you should rest up. I'll let the others know you're awake."
Somebody. There's only a handful of somebodies in the world that even understand what's wrong with her, even less with the ability to do anything useful about it. She bites at the inside of her cheek. "If it's Dr. Pym…"
"It's not."
Which narrows it down considerably, but Ava's too afraid to ask for confirmation of the man she both hopes and dreads that it is. Whatever high dose of painkillers they've given her make it so she doesn't have to dwell long. She's out again before John even leaves the room.