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Ava wakes up to the familiar feeling of her cells ripping apart from one another, lost without the energy that keeps them in line. Her sheets are warm and damp underneath her—like her tangibility, her temperature is unpredictable as well. During the worst of her condition, she’ll cycle rapidly between hot flashes and chills alongside the pain the moment she’s whole enough to experience sensations again.
Panting, she uncurls herself from her bed limb by limb. It’s a miracle she hasn’t fallen through her mattress and straight down into the glass-and-concrete depths of their tower already, lost forever. It used to be one of her nightmares when she was young, falling through the earth for eternity with no one to catch her. Then, for a while, she had Bill.
It was the first year, after the Blip, that he got sick. Terminal colon cancer. Funny, how their periods of dying were so close that they almost overlapped. It was strange to go from the one being cared for to the one providing care. IV pumps and oxygen tanks that used to belong to her now went to him. It was all so expensive, too. She was drowning in it, and then, like the savior she had always hoped for as a child, until Bill, Valentina appeared—and a desperately needed paycheck had accompanied her.
Being a caretaker hadn’t come natural to her, not at all. She loved Bill, undoubtedly; he was her friend, her mentor. Like an uncle, because no one could ever replace her father, although he never tried. But she could never quite shake the stiffness and reticence that accompanied her every time she administered his medication, or helped him to the bathroom. In his final days, their apartment was so drenched in the smell of suffering and sickness that she couldn’t stand it. Bill, delirious from pain, had called for her, weak and moaning, over and over again. She hid in their tiny bathroom, hands pressed over her ears with tears streaming down her face.
It was her deepest shame, failing to comfort him right there at the end.
Her feet nearly crumple the moment they hit the floor. The pain makes her gasp. Her form flickers, then fades, sending her crashing onto the soft rug she had placed around her bed for this very purpose.
Every six months, she needs an infusion of quantum energy. Janet, Hank, and Bill had been able to synthesize an injection instead of energy rays, and the Pyms had, thankfully, supplied her with many years worth just before they were lost to the Blip. Now, that supply is running out.
Janet is a kind woman, who speaks gently and smells of lavender. The first thing she did upon seeing Ava again after the Blip was give her a hug. Then, Ava had told her about Bill—and the work she had done to pay for his care. The work she was still doing. Janet had taken a step back, disappointment and disapproval written all over her face. They had a fight. Ava had turned to storm out, and at the last moment, Janet had grabbed her hand and placed a case of her quantum injections into it.
Ava, she had said. I know you’ll make the right choice.
She hadn’t. At least, not until she met the others. Her friends. And now, even still, she’s too proud to contact Janet again. Too afraid. And here she is, suffering because of it.
She stumbles to her feet, taking her plush, light purple robe off the hook by her closet and wrapping it around herself. It comforts her mind more than her body. Purple, she’s found, is her favorite color. She’s spent so much of her life surrounded by grey: grey walls, grey machines, grey suits. It’s nice to have something different.
She takes slow, measured breaths as she navigates through the hallways of their penthouse at a glacial pace. Breathing always helps, at least a little. She’s careful to stay close to the walls, trying to avoid a stray, glitching limb from colliding with a side table or a piece of hideous, Val-approved wall art.
All she wants is a glass of water, is what she tells herself. Water, and then she’ll steel herself to go crawling to Janet in agony, all the way in San Francisco.
To her surprise, the common room connected to the kitchen isn’t dark, or empty. Bob is curled up on the couch, the tall lamp besides the sofa illuminating the paperback in his hands with warm, diffused light.
Her first thought is that she’s glad it’s not Walker. She isn’t ready for him to see her this way. She wants him to think of her as witty and confident instead of pathetic and sick. Not yet. She isn’t ready to ask herself what that might mean.
But with Bob it’s different. It always has been. From the beginning, she shared neither Walker’s animosity towards him nor Yelena’s softness. But his sacrifice had spoken to her. It reminded her, just a little bit, of her father’s. Of her own. And back in that O.X.E. truck, she couldn’t let it go to waste.
It’s not that she doesn’t care what he thinks. It’s just that she’s already seen him as vulnerable as a person could be, in every way. She’s seen him at his worst, so it’s only fair that she returns the favor.
She clears her throat; they all know Bob doesn’t like being sneaked up on. It was a hard habit for her to break. “Hi,” She raises a hand swallowed by the thick sleeve of her robe in greeting.
Bob looks up. “Hey,” He says softly, looking unsure as he often does. Sometimes, she thinks that her powers would be better suited for him. He’s always trying to make himself smaller, invisible. She understands. She was a shy girl, who grew into a shy young woman, until years of pain had slowly twisted her into something insane and monstrous.
“Where’s your other half?” She says lightly, looking around for a flash of platinum hair and doing her best to keep her voice normal, free of all traces of pain. She even tries for a smile that she hopes doesn’t look like a grimace.
A small smile spreads across his face as he looks down bashfully. “She’s sleeping. I wanted to read but I didn’t want to wake her up. What’s up?”
She opens her mouth to respond, but the pain flares so badly that she chokes, folding in on herself. Bob is there in an instant, dropping his book on the couch and rushing to her in one smooth motion. His arms wrap around her, and she tenses, flinching instinctively. He notices, because of course he does, and hurt flashes across his face for a brief moment.
As much as she wishes she didn’t, she remembers the feeling of his hand around her throat. A rare comfort that her condition granted her was the ability to escape—and he had taken that away. She isn’t angry at him for it, but she would be lying if she said it doesn’t scare her, another person having complete control over her molecules like that—
Wait.
“Bob,” She gasps out desperately. “When you fought us up here, all those months ago, you did something—”
“Oh, no.” He’s already shaking his head, expression pained and wracked with guilt. His eyes are avoidant, fixed on the floor.
“No, no, it wasn’t bad,” She tries to assure him. “It was…well, it kind of was.”
His face blanches like a kid in trouble.
“Nevermind all that!” She huffs, frustrated. “The point,” Another wave of pain strikes her. “The point is that I was phasing, and you stopped me. I need you to do that now. Please.”
He still looks conflicted, but he meets her gaze this time.
Taking advantage of his powers for your own benefit, a thought hisses. Isn’t that familiar? You’re just as bad as S.H.I.E.L.D.
She shoves it down.
“Look, Bob, just—just grab me by the shoulders, alright?” Still using him as support, she guides his hands in place. “And just—try.” Try to hold me together.
For a moment, nothing happens. It’s silent, aside from her panting and whimpering. She sags underneath Bob’s hold.
Then, his eyes start to glow. The air fills with a faint hum. And slowly, slowly, she feels her molecules coming back together, stabilizing. Warmth rushes through her body, a supernatural kind she’s never felt before, filling her with so much elation that she laughs. “You’re doing it!”
Bob—the grown ass man that he is—giggles back. “I am!” He says grin wide and toothy.
Before she can stop herself, she’s tackling him around the midsection in a hug, renewed energy coursing through her veins. He freezes. “Thank you,” she says. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
Gently, he brings his arms down to return the hug. “Anytime,” he says quietly. He brings his head down to whisper it. “No more bad days.”