Emily (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
iluvroadrunner6) wrote2025-03-08 09:42 am
iluvroadrunner6) wrote2025-03-08 09:42 amget your words out { 2025 } yahtzee tracking
Fill Form
Fill Form
Fill Form
Fill Form
iluvroadrunner6) wrote2025-03-08 09:42 am
SET #6: PICTURES (FULL HOUSE) (cosmic mcu)
seems they've dried up all my tears | marvel cinematic universe | 897
Wanda thinks he knows what to expect when Carol tells her they’re going to space. Wells and wells of inky blackness sprinkled with the sparkles of stars. Occasionally, a planet or two. But as they get into Carol’s ship and take off into space, she’s surprised at how much color it has.
Swirling seas of dust and all kinds of transcendent colors stretch out ahead of them. It’s so much more alive than Wanda ever thought it would be, and she feels like after everything she’s done, she’s somehow cheated to see something so beautiful.
“Wow.”
“Right?” Carol smiles, glancing back at her. “I knew from the first time I flew up here that there was nowhere else I wanted to be.”
“How did you get to space, anyway?” Wanda turns, asking her curiously. “All I really heard was that you were up there until Fury called you.”
“That is a long, complicated story. But the short version is I was working for a member of the Kree who was trying to stop a war, and then I absorbed the energy of an Infinity Stone, and the other members of the Kree decided I was much more useful to them with amnesia and under their command than I was wandering around on Earth.”
“That sounds awful.”
“Yeah, but I got them back for it, so I consider it a score settled.” Carol glances over at Wanda again, before turning her eyes back to the stars beyond. “We can talk about the long version over drinks. And if you want to share some of yours? I know a place where no one will care.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be taking me to Thor?” Wanda isn’t sure if that’s an earnest question or just a dodge. It might be good to talk to someone who wouldn’t judge her, and Carol seems pretty nonjudgemental. But she isn’t sure she’s ready to go there yet.
“Thor is off with the Guardians, so we may not get an answer right away.”
Wanda nods slowly, keeping her eyes on the swirl ahead of her. “I could use a drink.” She can’t promise she’ll talk, but she can at least settle in for a drink.
Carol grins before nodding as she calls up the gate system. “I know just the place.”
Knowhere, where Carol takes her, sports the chaos that Thor would enjoy. The two of them curl up in a booth towards the back and begin trading drinks. Carol tells her stories about the Kree, the Skrulls, some from her time in the Air Force. She says she’s still fighting to get some of them back, and part of Wanda is tempted to just reach out and touch, see if she can find them.
But she waits. There’ll be time for that later.
Eventually, Wanda is drunk enough that: “Everyone came back from the Snap but him.”
“Vision?” Wanda must have flashed her a look because Carol holds up her hands. “No judgement. Love takes all kinds of shapes in space.”
That makes Wanda smile slightly, before nodding. “I didn’t have time to really think about it at first. There was the enormous battle and then the funerals, but slowly … slowly people disappeared. Vision was already gone. Natasha died getting us back. Then Steve left, and Sam had to do damage control, and Thor was gone and Bruce was gone and—”
“Soon you had no one.” Carol nods. “I would have lost my mind a little too.”
Is that what New Jersey was? A psychotic break? A delayed wall of grief that Agatha manipulated to her advantage? Or was it Wanda’s intention all along to take back what she had lost? No one can stop her, after all.
“Doesn’t make it less wrong.” Wanda sighs. “Doesn’t make what I did after less terrible, either.”
Carol watches her. “Personally, I’ve never been a big fan of bad things, being the end of the road for anyone. Maybe it’s because I’m usually the most powerful, unkillable thing in the room. I don’t enjoy taking people out just because they’re causing problems. I don’t—” She makes a face. “—The Kree call me the Annihilator. Because I didn’t think things through and did a lot of damage. I don’t want to be that anymore. If my stubborn head can change, so can you.”
Wanda nods. “I think the problem is, I’m not even sure if it’s worth trying. Who is left for me to prove myself to?”
“Who gives a shit about anyone else?” Carol points out. “Do it for yourself.”
Wanda thinks that’s easier said than done, but she does set aside that question for later, trying to see if there’s something there worth exploring. Carol lets the silence sit for a moment, before tipping her head to the side.
“You like sitcoms. Do you like musicals?”
Wanda raises an eyebrow. “The happy ones, yes. Why?”
Carol grins. “I know where we’re going next.”
But before she can elaborate, another ship lands nearby and a loud booming voice rings through the air as a familiar tall blond steps into the parking lot below them.
“Wanda!” Thor’s voice roars through the air. “Welcome to Knowhere! Come, meet the Guardians.”
Wanda smiles in return, and for the first time in what feels like forever, it doesn’t feel so forced.
truth be told, my problem's old | marvel cinematic universe | 1,045
The neon lights of the bar fall over Wanda’s face as they sit on the balcony of the bar, watching as Carol chats with the other members of the Guardians. Thor can see the weight of loss weighing on her, something he’s been all too familiar with in his time. He takes another sip of his ale, quietly contemplating, before drawing her attention back to him.
“How are you enjoying your first time in space?”
Wanda blinks, coming back into the focus of the moment, and nods. “It’s … different. But also, in some ways, the same?” The wry smile crosses her face and she shakes her head. “That must sound stupid. People are always people—why wouldn’t some things be the same?”
Thor smiles before shrugging. “I found things quite strange on Earth the first time I came. New foods, new technology. It takes time to adjust, regardless.”
“That’s true. All change takes time.”
“How long do you think you’ll stay?”
She turns back to look at him, and he can see from her expression that there’s something she isn’t telling him. Something haunts the edges of her expression, but he doesn’t push and waits for her to decide what she wants to say.
“No one is really waiting for me back home,” is what she finally settles on before taking another long sip of her drink. “I haven’t fully decided yet, but I can’t help but feel like this is going to be a one-way trip.”
His face softens, studying her expression to find what he’s missing. “Not even Clint?”
“Clint hasn’t exactly been the most available,” she says dryly. “He holed up in his house with his family and aside from some mentions of him in New York, he hasn’t exactly reached out.”
Thor’s fingers grip tighter on the tankard, trying to compress his annoyance. He would think, being as Clint was a man who once lost everything, he might have been more understanding of someone who has lost everything.
“I’m sorry that I have been neglectful in my duties as a friend as well. I thought that those on Earth would have been more attentive.”
“It’s not all their fault.” Wanda pauses as she glances back at him, when he finally reads her expression for what it is: shame. “I’ve done some terrible things.”
He reaches gently across the table for her hand. “We all do terrible things when we’re grieving.”
“I held an entire town hostage, and then killed … so many people throughout the multiverse.”
He can’t say it doesn’t catch him by surprise, and his eyes narrow. “For what injury?”
“The town, nothing. I … I wasn’t fully in control of that. But the people in the multiverse … simply standing in my way.”
Thor nods slowly. “And you think because of these acts, you should be denied companionship and compassion?”
Wanda glances up at him uncertainly before shrugging. “You know that most of our friends back home are very black and white in their lines of thought.”
“Most of our friends are dead or gone,” Thor points out, and her eyes drop to her glass in agreement.
“Well, I … most of the world thinks I’m dead. So it’s probably for the best it stays that way.” She swallows before looking up at him again. “I’m grateful to Carol for giving me the out. If she hadn’t, the Sorcerer Supreme would have tracked me down eventually.”
“Strange? Eh, he’s not as scary as he looks. Loki and I met him once when we returned to Earth for my father’s death.” Those words don’t feel as heavy as they used to, weighed both with the grief from his father’s death and his brother’s.
“I know he’s not. But he takes his vocation seriously.” Wanda shakes her head. “I don’t want to put him in that position.” Then she narrows her eyes. “Are you sure you want to spend your time with me?”
“You’ve met my brother, haven’t you?” Thor points out with a small smile. “If I can forgive Loki for his much more personal transgressions, when he has done harm on a much grander scale than you, why would I take any issue with your company?” He squeezes her hand as he leans in close. “You are a brave compatriot and a worthwhile companion, Wanda Maximoff. Whatever penance or exploration you intend to do, I would be happy to do it by your side.”
Her eyes glisten, almost as though there are tears beginning to form, but before she can say anything, Carol appears at the head of the table, bringing her hands down.
“So. Are you sticking with the Guardians, or are you coming with us?”
“Where are you going?”
“Aladna.”
His eyes light up with interest – it has been a long time since he’s beheld the waters and singing of the Aladnean people. But he doesn’t want to crowd Wanda on her adventures. He glances over at her, waiting for an answer to his offer, and she offers a small smile before nodding. He smiles widely in return.
“Wonderful. When do we leave?”
“As soon as you’re ready. It’s a pretty long trip from here, so we should probably do the gate hopping while we sleep it off.”
“Let me gather my things from the ship and I will meet you at yours.”
Carol nods before heading off to pay her and Wanda’s tab, and Wanda catches Thor’s hand before he can get up from the table. “Thank you,” she whispers, and he smiles.
“Of course.”
Less than an hour later, the three of them are climbing onto Carol’s ship, and Thor makes his way to a comfortable chair while Wanda and Carol sit up front. An orange cat hops off the table and into his lap and sniffing at his hand. He stares at it closely before glancing over to Carol.
“Is this a Flerken?”
“Yep,” Carol smirks. “That’s Goose. She won’t eat you if you don’t make her mad.”
“Wonderful to make your acquaintance, Lady Goose. I should hope we will be good friends.”
Wanda glances back over to the cat, almost as though it’s the first time she’s seen it. “What’s a Flerken?”
Carol laughs. “Give it time and you’ll find out.”