entranceway | video; guess who's back, back again

[ The feed snaps on, and the frame is on the crowded side. In the foreground Steve and Wanda are seated, arranged on a couch in one of the mansion’s tea rooms, while Natasha stands behind them, leaning against the wall near the door. Steve has his phone tilted so that all of three them are visible, Wanda’s arm linked with his.

Steve’s in civilian wear, his expression composed and collected. He isn’t here to give out orders or make any speeches, though. ]

So it looks like Wonderland sent all three of us home at once. Sorry about that. [ As if they had any control over it. ] But we’re back now and more or less in one piece. [ Which isn’t the full story at all, but that isn’t something that needs to be shared with all of Wonderland.

Natasha pushes away from the wall at this and moves closer into the frame of the video, leaning on the back of the couch over Steve’s shoulder, expression mild. ] I don’t know if any others of us were sent home recently, but if so, letting us know would be greatly appreciated.

[ Her lips quirk briefly. ] Either way, I think some of us will need to be assembling for a SitRep soon regardless. But we wanted to let you know we were back to keep people from worrying.

[ Steve glances over his shoulder at Natasha, nods, and then returns to looking at his phone. ] Let us know if we’re needed anywhere.

[ With that, the feed cuts. ]

[ They’ve done their duty and reported their return, which means that it’s time for all three of them to go and lick their wounds. Steve returns to his room first and foremost, finding Bucky even sooner than he had expected when it turns out he’d camped in his room.

Once they’ve reunited, though, Steve laces up his shoes and goes for a run up and down the beach, needing some time to clear his head. Everything that happened back home has him on edge, searching for a way to take action, to do something, and yet none of it means a thing here in Wonderland. There are no Accords here, but a secret that had been revealed in the worst possible way back home remains a secret here, and it’s eating at him.

He also heads up to the roof, as if hoping that a bird’s eye view of everything will somehow cause it all to make more sense. Wonderland isn’t where he’s supposed to be, but at least some of his team is here. They maybe be prisoners, but they’re not caged and collared. It’s something. ]

[ Once Natasha parted ways with Wanda and Steve, having had a chance to - finally - compare information, she briefly stopped by her room upstairs, checking to make sure everything she'd accumulated here was as she'd left it. Then, after replying to a few text messages that had been waiting for her, she headed to the fifth floor. And the bar.

Because damn, did she ever need a drink. Or twenty. ]

[ For most of the day following their return to Wonderland, Wanda remains out of sight. There's no trace of her in either of her usual haunts, the training room or the magic study: she shuts herself away in her room for the better part of the afternoon, door locked tight, though she'll likely answer for those who seek her out. It's been months since she's been this withdrawn-- longer, considering how much time had passed during her trip home, but she finds herself feeling very much like the Wanda who had first come to Wonderland one year earlier, skittish and wary of human contact, unnerved by the idea of having to explain exactly what had changed to rob her of the confidence she had spent so many months building alongside her teammates and new friends alike.

Eventually, it's one of the most basic of human needs that forces her to emerge, hunger driving her to leave her room behind and make her way down to the communal kitchen. After spending time in government custody, the need for a real meal as opposed to whatever the closets might be able to supply is enough to make her brave the mansion beyond her room. She keeps her focus narrow at first, rummaging through the pantry to see what it might have to offer in the way of ingredients, occasionally turning her attention to the kitchen at large to see who else might have wandered in since her own arrival, an attempt to remain aware of her surroundings. House arrest followed by more severe isolation has done very little to put her at ease, and she finds herself unwilling to trust even the slightest creak of the floorboards, regardless of the fact that here, the word fugitive means very, very little. ]

[ OOC: One or all of them will respond to any network replies. If you reply to any of the action options, please specify who it’s for! ]

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She looks up from her reading at the knock, and even without asking, she knows who it is, feels his presence on the other side of the door. For as much as she feels the need to be alone, there are some people whose company she'll never turn away, and she gingerly pushes herself up from where she'd been seated at the end of her bed, pulling the door open just enough to spy him through the crack before stepping back to open it fully.

"I thought you might turn up sooner rather than later. Come in?"

He hesitates a moment before stepping forward and wrapping his arms around her in a hug. They weren't usually that affectionate but he missed her and he had been concerned. She looked withdrawn, like she had been when she first arrived her.

"Are you alright?"

She responds in kind, hugging him tightly-- it's new for them, but she had missed him, as well, or she would have if she had remembered. It wasn't until returning to Wonderland that she realized she'd been without him for an entire year, that something had been missing. She had come to depend on him, especially in Pietro's absence.

"I am--" She cuts herself off, reconsidering her words, and her mouth settles into a hard line as she pulls away from him. "I will be fine."

She might not be just yet, but she's sure that she will be. She can choose to be fine. She has to.

He squeezes her harder before she is pulling away. He knows that tone, he's had that tone. That no, nothing is alright at all tone.

He looks at her a moment, sees the steel resolve in her face and wishes he could be half as strong as she is. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"I'm not sure where to start."

Her face falls, slightly, but it's not a no. If she can talk to anyone about what happened, openly and honestly, it's Billy.

"Perhaps we should make ourselves more comfortable?" All things considered, they could be here awhile.

Billy reaches out and takes her hand, squeezing it reassuringly. "That sounds like a good idea. Couch?"

He asks the question even as he starts to lead her over to said couch. "Why don't you start at the beginning?"

She only nods in confirmation, and once they're seated, she reaches for a throwpillow, drawing her legs up to sit cross-legged on the sofa and hug the pillow to herself to keep from fidgeting, closing herself off as she so often did when stressed or deep in thought.

"We were in Laos," she says quietly, frowning. "Doing our jobs. Helping people."

She pauses, just for a beat.

"I made a mistake. I started all of this."

Billy makes himself comfortable, knowing she will talk once she is ready. And she does.

There are a few things he wants to ask about that, but most are meaningless details he can get later. Other things are more important.

"What did you do?" He asks it softly and not unkindly, his voice only holding support. He wasn't necessarily quick to jump and say it wasn't her fault, he knew their powers were hard to control sometimes and he knew the mistakes she had made in his world.

"I tried to save someone I care about."

Such a simple thing. Something that should never have to feel like a mistake, like she'd done something wrong, and she didn't regret that she had helped Steve in the least-- but what followed still hung over her, the memory of it still painfully vivid.

"Steve-- he is strong, but even he cannot survive an explosion at close range. I contained it, tried to direct it away from anyone it might hurt. I lost control." Another pause, and she frowns, her brows knitting together. "People died. Countless people."

Billy frowns, he knows that weight, trying to help and having it backfire, doing everything right only to fail.

"I'm sorry. I know you'd never do something intentional, but that doesn't change what happened, I know." He reaches out and puts his hand on hers, giving it a gentle squeeze.

"Did they come after you?"

She nods stiffly, letting his hand close over hers, although she hadn't been pursued right away-- not until what happened at the airport. What came before that, however, had hurt more. Cut deeper.

"I was put under house arrest first," she says darkly, remembering how her stomach had clenched when she'd first realized that Vision was actively trying to keep her from leaving. "Stark said it was for the safety of others."

Billy nodded. "I- I was held under house arrest by the Avengers once. They were also scared of my powers." He gives her a bit of a sardonic smile. "It was for the safety of others. That was the first time I really realized Captain America wasn't always right."

"You, too?"

Perhaps she shouldn't be surprised that this is one more thing they have in common, unfortunate as it may be. She smiles faintly, a ghost of an expression in response to the show of solidarity he's offered.

"No one is right all the time. But it felt-- extreme. He could not tell me to my face that I was to be kept there, as though I wouldn't notice when I wasn't allowed to leave."

"And it always seems to be for our safety, right? When really they are just afraid of what we can do." He sighed. "The sad part is they really think its keeping us safe. Not just proving they think we are dangerous."

video; guess who's back, back again

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