Chapter 26

I couldn't look at her in the eye.

My entire body screams at me to do something but what could I do?

I couldn't do anything to let her know it was going to be okay. I couldn't reach out to her and tell her it'll be alright because the truth was nothing is okay.

Nothing will be alright.

Her brother was dead.

And her pain is all I felt.

"W-Wanda..." It's the first time I spoke her name.

The first time I acknowledged her as a person I trusted instead of Scarlet.

She doesn't reply. Instead, she leaves the core, steps slow and subtle, heading nowhere but outside.

I watch her go, tears springing in my eyes as she disappears from view.

There was nothing else to be done.

I felt like a failure.

I was supposed to be the one to protect them, to save them from themselves. Everything fell down to me.

Maybe if I hadn't escaped that Helicarrier, Tony wouldn't be forced to build Ultron.

A rippling feeling began to crawl up my arms and I pulled my sleeve, watching the disgusting veins grow higher.

They burned with several layers of pain and instead of giving me the power I so desperately wanted. I felt them take it away. I felt them strip and pull at my skin.

Like my body was unable to absorb the power it gave me.

"Riley! Where are you?" Steve was calling for me through the ear comm.

I couldn't leave.

Not yet. Not now.

Not until every last one of them was dead.

My brown eyes turned luminous blue searched the surroundings for a familiar energy wave.

"Wanda!" Shouting, I run out of the church to find her.

Her energy tells me she was in a bus somewhere with... Ultron?

I ran up ahead and entered the enclosed space. The bus had been overturned and inside, there she was, her hair flowing against her back, knees on the floor in front of a dismantled Ultron.

"Do you know how it felt?" Her fingers glowed red, sparkling brightly.

Ultron grunted as Wanda ripped out his metal heart.

His glowing hollow red eyes dimmed, turning into nothing but darkness.

Wanda smiled bitterly. "It felt like that."

She was a girl who's lost everything and everyone and my heart ached even more.

Reaching out for her shoulder--

I felt it before it happened.

The ground plummet downwards, gravity taking hold.

The City was going.

My eardrums began to pop and crackle. Shooting up an energy field, I surround it around Wanda, as the two of us were beginning to float.

I struggled to maintain my own force field and hers as it got increasingly harder to maintain it.

Something yellow flash across my vision.

Odd ball.

He peers into the bus and both of us, odd eyes glowing.

"Get her out!" I command him, gesturing to her wildly.

He hesitated but obeyed, swooping in to cradle her to his chest.

The two of them shot up out of there and I forced my feet to remain planted on the ground, allowing the lights to swirl around my boots.

I ran out of the bus and headed back to the church.

The god of thunder was there. He was struggling to hold on, hands on the crater.

"Thor!" I bracketed the ground around us, giving the two of us more stability to stand. His eyes go wide upon seeing me.

"You should not be here!" He shout, his voice lost against the roaring wind.

"I'm not leaving until this rock blows!"

"Blues, what in gods name!?" Tony sounded beyond pissed but it was the least of my worries.

"You and I both know, I can handle my own!"

The ground cracked beneath us and I could feel the air getting heavier and heavier. We will meet the ground soon, whether we like it or not.

"Thor on my mark!"

The core began to vibrate with power, the machinery whirring out of control. The sequence was already launching.

"Blues, penetrate the heart of the crater, make sure nothing gets out!"

Nodding even though he couldn't see me, I let my abilities cover the core, projecting the beams farther and farther out the rock beneath us.

"Now!"

The god of thunder, struck lighting against the core and the effect was immediate.

The ground crumbled, the very foundation shattering among itself.

I felt the floor give way, the structures fall, the City evaporate, before everything projected to nothing but fire and heat.

The City exploded and I was thrown backwards, free-falling towards the air beneath me.

My abilities did their job in lashing out across the falling debris, melting them turn to nothing as blue and green formulated a light so bright I have to squint.

Pain and numbness shadowed over my being whole.

I shut my eyes, allowed myself to be swept away against the currents of gravity.

I didn't see how the lights navigate themselves around me.

I didn't see how, in my last moments of falling, the desperation in my emotions gave way to my abilities that I wanted to live.

That I wanted to continue breathing.

I never realized it until now.

But maybe I did.

Maybe I just didn't want to accept them for who they are.

How many times have they saved me?

How many times have they allowed me to remember?

How many times have they transported me elsewhere and out of the enemy fire?

They were never my enemy.

They were never a threat.

All they wanted was for me to accept them.

To embrace them.

I had been too afraid to do so.

Always thinking the dark energy would eventually tear me apart.

But now I see, it has always been myself, creating that darkness.

It has never been about my abilities.

It was about me.

All those visions. All those dreams.

They always ended with my abilities pulling me out before they finished.

They were helping me. But somewhere in those lines.

They knew I was human. And no human should ever have to control these abilities.

It almost felt like they were sorry for me. Sorry for what I had to go through.

Sorry for what was coming next.

Glittering lights flooded my vision and I allowed them to take me away, my body following the cool currents of the bluish green and gold as I felt something pull me backwards.

The next time I reopened my eyes, blistering cold and humid ground greeted me.

I was laying on wet snow and falling debris was raining everywhere on the ocean in front of me.

I watch it happen, letting my body sink into the ground and my entire stance relax.

We won.

But at what cost?

Everything.

~~@ @ @~~

A/N

Next chapter's the last chapter for Book 2: Part 1.

I hope this chapter clears a few things out the way about her mysterious powers. I haven't actually dealt deeper into it because I wanted you guys to be shock at the end.

(I still haven't revealed everything yet)

I'm reallyyyy dreading Civil War though.

I love the movie and everything else but it was so damn sad.

And its going to be even sadder in my book.

Hang on to your butts, Sir and Madam. 

You're about to cry me a river.

VOTE AND COMMENT.