Work Text:
Ava’s been spiraling out for the last two weeks. Slowly but surely, she finds herself running out of steam, snapping at something he’s said unpredictably, almost always shocked at the words protecting out of her mouth, but she can’t stop them.
Ava’s mind won’t quit, it’s starting a revolution against her, reminding her over and over again that she’s the one who caused all this harm and just because she wants to fix it, doesn’t mean she can.
She tosses and turns all night, fighting with herself as she gasps for air mere seconds after her eyes closed. She clenches her fists as she grabs the pillow beside her, screaming as Bill stirs down the hall.
He’s always been a light sleeper, but ever since Janet’s homecoming, he hasn’t gotten his full eight hours. Ava hasn’t been able to escape the night terrors for the past week.
It’s like a switch in her brain turned on. Something’s different, he doesn’t know why or how, but it is, and he’d do anything to go back to what they had before.
“Ava?” Bill reaches for the lamp, muttering under his breath as he looked for his glasses. He stands, but immediately is met by the ground beneath him as his knees buckled.
Bill inhales. Listens to Ava’s gut-wrenching shout one more time as he pulls the glasses atop the bridge of his nose, shouting as he rounded the corner, pushing through her bedroom door as she rocked back and forth. “Ava?”
She doesn’t budge.
Bill moves to her left side, resting a gentle hand on her back as she wept. “Sweetheart, you’re okay.” Bill reassured. “It was just a dream. It’s me, It’s Bill, Ava. You’re okay. Just try and breathe, okay? I’ve got you… I’m not going anywhere.”
Ava froze the second his hand touched her skin, jerking her shoulders to the left as Bill wobbled, ultimately keeping his balance as he sucked in a breath, keeping his mouth shut as he watched her.
“You’re okay.” Bill repeated himself, as if that made any difference. That time, Ava started to believe him as her lungs constricted. She was frozen with fear, rocking back and forth as she panted. "It's okay." Bill leaned in to hug her. Ava resisted him at first, fists formed in her hands as she cried. Bill didn't give up, he held her close as he scooted onto the bed. "It's me." Bill said, moving a piece of hair behind her ear as he took a look at her face, puffy and red from all the tears. He wasn't sure how long she had been crying before he found her. He thinks back to when he first met her, this scared little girl, exactly the same nearly twenty-five years later.
"What happened?" Bill whispered as Ava's head hid in his chest. A real hug from her, something he wished he could have experienced for the first time under better circumstances. He tries to hug her every night around the midnight hour when her thoughts becoming overpowering and there's suddenly someone at the door or in the corner of her room, or worse, in her closet or under the bed: waiting for her, wanting Ava to pay for the harm she's caused.
She killed her parents after all.
A child killer.
Ava thinks back to last week, when she sat awkwardly in Janet Van Dyne's kitchen, trying hard not to laugh when they referred to Hope as a child prodigy. Ava has a hard time believing Hope was good at anything. They know how they'd talk about her, that little girl at the orphanage that killed her parents.
How does Bill tell people about her?
Here's my daughter , Ava. She's hurt people from a young age, we're still working through that. Yes, she's mine. Ava laughs at that, even internally. Of course she isn't.
Ava shook her head. He already knew. Of course Bill knew. He still loved her somehow. Ava, the girl that's caused most of the harm in the world.
Bill doesn't force it out of her. He stays there until she's fallen back asleep.
Not even twenty minutes after he made it back in his bed, it's happening again, worse this time. A scream so blood-curdling Bill's afraid someone else might hear it, and he lives in the middle of nowhere. For her sake.
"Why do you still love me?"
It comes out of nowhere to Bill. He's pouring himself a cup of coffee as Ava sits at his kitchen table. She hasn't touched the breakfast he made her.
"What?" Bill turned, almost regretting it when he saw the sadness dancing across her lips.
Ava hates repeating herself, but for Bill she'd do just about anything. "I asked why you still loved me. I killed my parents Bill. That must have been in my file when you adopted me."
Bill didn't falter, he didn't stop even though it felt like his lungs were pooling with water. He aired on the side of caution, standing in front of her as he took a sip of his coffee. "Ava. You didn't kill your parents. I have no clue why you think that."
She doesn't listen to him. Ava considered that for a while now, that they've been lying to her, but who could do such a thing? She seethes with anger as she breaks, tears running down her cheeks as she struggled to breathe, shouting, "Bill. Do you think I'm a bad person?"
Foster paled, and before he could stop Ava, Starr says, “I — I killed my Mom and Dad, Bill. They’re dead because of me. I’m the one who caused the explosion." She doesn't even stop in inhale. Bill knows she struggling to get the words out in such a succession, "Why on earth did you save me? I deserved to die, Bill." She throws a fork across the kitchen, "Why didn't you let me die!"
Bill froze, all the color drained from his face as she folded her hands against her face, head down as her knees came up towards her chest. “It’s my fault.” Ava continued. She refuses to listen to his lies. Bill painstakingly recounts the worst day of her life to her, the real version of it, not the one S.H.E.I.L.D. bolted in her brain. Bill wants to know where they got their venom from, and why they had to choose his daughter to prey on and not someone else.
Ava couldn't save anyone — especially not herself, or her parents. She was a kid when she killed them. No older than eight.
She’s hurt people, continues to hurt Bill as she picks a fight over dinner, bringing up Janet just to tear her down or comment on how miserable her daughter is.
Bill almost misses that. The tranquility of Ava's misplaced anger over dinner, small things he could re-route. Hope's not a bad person. Janet's obviously different and then a long pause when Hank's brought up, because even now Bill hasn't changed his stance. He'd take that over this missed placed guilt and spitfire. Bill can't keep seeing her like this, distraught seconds after waking up, only getting a few hours of sleep.
"Ava." Bill exhaled. "Sweetheart. What are you talking about? The explosion is what killed your parents. Not anything you did. You tried to save them."
"But they said..." Ava whined. "They told me that I killed them. They showed me videos, Bill. I — I watched them die, over and over again until it was engraved in my brain. I can describe it to you." Ava moved off the chair, almost like she wanted to go grab a whiteboard and draw it out for him. Bill shook his head, trying to get her to sit back down as she walked around his kitchen in circles. "I'm the one who started up the tunnel and then my dad intervened to stop it..."
Bill disagreed. "Ava, that's not what occurred. Elihas started the tunnel. You left your mother's embrace in an attempt to save him." One that hadn't worked. "You never hurt anyone."
She just watched her parents die in front of her.
Ava wept as she tensely ran a hand through her hair, all but ripping the bottom strands out. "No... that's not what happened at all." Ava says, "Its my fault, Bill. They're dead because of me."
Bill bridged the gap between them, hugging her tight as she cried into his shoulder. "Ava, you didn't hurt anyone."
"I've hurt everyone, Bill." Her snot sank against his woven jacket. Bill didn't mind at all. He just needed Ava to be okay and to listen to him.
"Not me."
Ava almost smiled. Bill fully did. "Not me, Ava. You still have me."
She didn't move an inch. Ava quietly asked, "Even though I've killed my parents?"
Bill let that lie sink as he kissed her hair. "Ava, that's not what happened."
That time, there wasn't a scream. She didn't have any reason to fight him on it anymore. "They strapped me to a chair, Bill. They placed the tape over and over until I believed them."
Bill swallowed. They took everything from her. "But that's not what happened." He admitted. "They're just lying to you, Ava. Would I ever lie to you?"
She takes too long to think about it, shrugging as Bill cradled her. "Of course I wouldn't."
"You promise?" Ava whispered. Scared his words will come back to bite her.
Bill smiled wide, silently extending his pinky out towards her. Ava looked down and laughed, intertwining the two as her shrieks slowed down.