Author's Note: Hey guys! So, this is my first shot at a Doctor Strange story and the first thing I've published in years. I'm probably a bit rusty, so please bear with any grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. Also, this story is completely prewritten, so I'll be uploading without fail every Wednesday and Sunday!

Enjoy!

-Mundie

Stephen remembers the first time he saw Hayden with crystalline clarity, despite the months that have already passed. As he lays in his bed in his small room at Kamar Taj after a long day of study and practice, he closes his eyes and allows the memory to wash over him.

Stephen glances left and right at his fellow pupils, the sling ring cold and uncooperative on his tremulous and equally uncooperative fingers. He copies Mordo's instructions to perfection, brings up an image of the operating room at his previous place of employment in his mind's eye, yet, despite making the exact circular motion with his right hand like everyone else, he's getting nothing more than some pathetic sparks. Strange heaves a quiet sigh and lets his useless hands drop to his sides as Mordo calls the lesson to an end. Everyone present for the lesson begins to disperse and that's when Stephen sees her walking toward him.

She has the most vibrant red hair he has ever seen. There's so many subtle shades and nuances to it, he can't decide exactly what kind of red it is and the light catches it in such a way it is almost blinding to look at. Stephen would liken it to the radiance of the sun. Strange stands frozen to the spot as she gets closer. When she passes him, their gazes meet for the briefest of moments. Her eyes are a beautiful and bright green, shot through with gold around the pupils. She almost immediately breaks the eye contact and lowers her freckled face, shoulders hunching, in embarrassment or discomfort, Stephen doesn't know.

He turns a little to watch her go, a voice in the back of his head telling him to stop staring creepily at her, but the sight of a pair of bright red wings folded tightly against her back drives the thought away. The sun catches the feathers and, with the combination of her movement, turns them to shimmering and dancing fire. Stephen has never seen anyone like her before in his life.

"It's rude to stare, Strange."

Stephen jumps at Mordo's sudden appearance by his side, too caught up in that unusual and extraordinary woman to notice his approach. "Who is she?"

Mordo claps his shoulder with an amused smirk. "Her name is Hayden Jones and she arrived here two months ago. If you want to know more, talk to her instead of staring at her with your mouth hanging open."

With one last hardy clap, Mordo turns and walks away.

"My mouth was not hanging open," Stephen calls after Mordo's retreating back.

Stephen smiles to himself as he settles fully into bed, allowing the tension from the day to ease from his body. He never would have admitted it, but Strange could have caught flies had Mordo not said anything to him.

Hayden steps out into Kamar Taj's central courtyard, letting the early morning sunlight wash over her. She stretches her arms above her head and raises up on her tiptoes, her back giving a few satisfying pops. She lets out a long sigh as she next unfolds her wings and opens them to their fullest.

"Enjoying showing off?"

Hayden turns around and refolds her wings, reminding herself she doesn't need to squeeze them against her back anymore.

She smiles sweetly at Stephen, who stands behind her with his arms folded loosely and a confident smirk on his face. "I'm sorry, me, showing off? That's hilarious coming from you, Strange." She takes a couple steps back, returning his smirk. "Now, if you'll excuse me, it's time for my morning exercise."

Without waiting for a response, Hayden reopens her wings and takes off, intentionally angling them in such a way that Strange gets several facefulls of gusty wind. She hopes it messes up his ridiculously perfect hair. She gains a fair bit of altitude before leveling out and doing slow, wheeling turns in the air, the wind rushing through her feathers and against her face a welcome sensation. Thanks to Kamar-Taj's magical warding, no one outside it can see its true inhabitants or anything that happens there. In other words, Hayden can fly as high or as low as she wants without having to worry about being seen and drawing unwanted attention.

Hayden looks down at the courtyard below and notices Stephen is still standing where she left him, looking up at her with a hand shielding his eyes from the sun. She's too high to see his expression, but she can feel his gaze on her like warm fingers, sending a small shiver down her spine. She hastily looks away from him, even though there's no possible way he could know she was looking at him. A familiar feeling, a feeling she's come to associate with Stephen, twists in her stomach and she wonders when these feelings she gets around Strange started.

Definitely not when she first saw him or when they first met months ago. Her first impression of Stephen Strange was that he was a rather self absorbed and fat headed former surgeon, desperate to fix his irreparable hands. She'd heard of him before on the news and various talk shows and what she thought of him when she saw him on tv didn't change when she met him at Kamar-Taj after a sling ring lesson.

It was the day after Hayden noticed him for the first time. She was just been passing through the courtyard on her way to the library when a sling ring doorway suddenly opened up and Stephen came spilling through, ice in his facial hair and shivering, at Mordo's and the Ancient One's feet. Hayden stopped, recognizing the signs of one of the Sorcerer Supreme's methods of motivation. She'd done the same thing to Hayden after her first week of struggling with the sling ring, except she'd dumped Hayden on a small island in the middle of the ocean.

Hayden walked over to the three of them and stopped next to the Ancient One. "Did you really leave him on Mount Everest? Now that's borderline cruel."

The corner of the Sorcerer Supreme's mouth quirked up. "Are you questioning my teaching methods, Hayden?"

"W-wait," Strange said through chattering teeth as he picked himself up from the ground. "Does she really d-do that to e-everyone?"

"Only to those like Hayden and yourself who are too stubborn to really listen to our teachings, " Mordo said as he looks between the two of them.

Hayden smothered the urge to bristle at Mordo's words. He didn't have a clue as to why Hayden struggled with the Mystic Arts when she first arrived at Kamar-Taj. She still hadn't completely grown accustomed to it. That old fear of hers loved to rear its ugly head.

Strange shot Mordo a dirty look as he wrapped his arms around himself. "I did listen and I did e-everything exactly as you said. I-it's not my fault you didn't t-teach well enough. "

Hayden's eye brows shot up at his spiteful words, her own irritation at Mordo forgotten, and she opened her mouth to say something in Mordo's defense, but the Ancient One began to chuckle, effectively silencing Hayden.

"And yet, when your life depends on it, you manage to open up a doorway back to Kamar-Taj." She gestured at Strange with her closed fan. "You must learn to let go, Stephen. That is the only way you will succeed here."

And with that, she turned and swept away, Mordo hot on her heels, leaving Hayden and Strange standing awkwardly behind. They stared at each other for several moments. Hayden forced herself not to tighten her wings against her back or to shrink under his gaze. She didn't need to hide anymore.

Hayden broke the awkward eye contact and began to step around the shivering man. "If I were you, I'd go change and wrap up in bed. Wouldn't want to cause temperature shock." She stopped a little ways away from him and looked over her shoulder at him. "But, I forget, the great Doctor Stephen Strange knows everything, right?"

With that, she turned and walked away.

After that, Hayden remembers noticing Strange's sorcery improving dramatically over the next few days. Because of this, Hayden had decided to confront him and ask him what he was doing to improve so quickly. She remembers the smirk he gave her as he offered to be her study and practice partner. She suspects the only reason he had offered at first was to make himself feel smarter than her and stroke his own ego. But, she agreed nonetheless and, from there, an unlikely friendship was formed. Sure, he was fat headed sometimes and, during particularly difficult practice sessions, he'd get angry and rant and rave about his useless hands. Hayden let him vent and didn't take any angry thing he said to her to heart. She understands very well what anger does to people, more than Stephen could ever possibly understand. Luckily for him, sharp words do less damage than fire.

On the good days, Stephen's dry humor and sarcasm bounces off of Hayden's playful teasing and banter well.

And over the months of sessions they spent together, the more infrequent those angry outbursts became until they stopped entirely to be replaced with the occasional "Yet my hands still shake." The duo even began sharing meals outside in Hayden's favorite haunt, under a shaded oak tree tucked away in one of Kamar-Taj's gardens. They became more than practice partners, they became friends and virtually inseparable.

That's around the time Hayden noticed the small, kind things Stephen would do for her. She'd mention she planned on going to the library to get a certain book from Wong at the end of the day, but Stephen would already be waiting for her in the courtyard with the book in hand. He started always having some sort of snack tucked away in his robes for Hayden, knowing she's constantly hungry. When she falls asleep doing late research in the library, she began to wake up under a blanket that smells like Stephen's after shave and a scent that is unique to him alone. Sometimes there was even an apple waiting beside her on the table top too.

Mordo seems to have noticed Hayden and Stephen's closeness and teases her relentless about it. "Should we be expecting a happy announcement soon?"

At first, she'd just roll her eyes at him and continue about her business, but as time went on and Mordo's antics continued, she'd find herself embarrassed after one of his light jabs, especially if Stephen was with her.

Now, she can barely look at her best friend without noticing the unusual blue green color of his eyes or the way they crinkle at the corners when he smiles or laughs. She's constantly distracted by the most tiny things about him when they're practicing, like the way it makes her feel when he touches her, even in the most platonic of ways.

Then there are the times when Stephen brushes the back of his hand against hers if they're standing next to each other or when they make eye contact and their gazes linger for slightly longer than normal. It drives her absolutely bonkers because she's not sure if it's her imagination or if she's reading too deeply into it.

Hayden is fairly certain she's falling for Stephen, hard. There's no other explanation for how he makes her feel and, if she's being completely honest with herself, that scares her. In all the time she's known him, she's told him almost nothing of her past. What if when he finds out what she did, why she doesn't use her fire-

She cuts that thought off and the memories that come with it and decides it's time land.

She looks down as she begins her descent, noticing Stephen is no longer standing in the courtyard below. She feels a small pang in her stomach and her face drops a little as her feet touch down on solid ground and her wings refold. She makes her way into the library and raises a hand at Wong in greeting and he acknowledges her wave with a nod from behind his desk as she passes.

Hayden moves further into the sizeable library, running her fingers over the spines of the shelved books as she passes them. There's something comforting about libraries to her. Maybe because they are so calm and quiet, a balm to the frequent turmoil of her soul. They make her feel at ease.

Hayden halts in her tracks, spotting a familiar blue grey tunic and dark hair a little ways down from her. She feels the now familiar jolt in her chest at the sight of Stephen as she pauses just a little longer to admire him. Stephen looks up from the book in his hands and turns his head to look at Hayden. Fighting off the urge to blush, Hayden gives him a painfully awkward wave as she approaches him.

"Admiring the view?" Stephen quirks an eyebrow at her as she stops at his side.

"Pssh, in your dreams, Doctor Ego." She bats him lightly with a carefully outstretched wing. "I didn't expect to find anyone so far into the library. What are you even doing here?"

Stephen closes the book he was looking at and reshelves it, avoiding looking at her. His sudden change in mood makes Hayden fidget for a moment, then take a small step closer to him as she lays a hand on his upper arm. "Stephen, is everything okay?"

He finally looks back to her, having come to a decision. "You know why I came to Kamar-Taj?" Hayden nods as he motions vaguely with his hands. "And we've known each other for a while and it occurred to me I don't know much about you at all or why you're even here."

Silence falls between the two of them as Hayden lets her hand drop from his arm and breaks eye contact.

"Can I see your hand?" She glances up at him briefly. Stephen's eyebrows furrow, but, after a brief moment of hesitation, he offers her one of his hands, palm up, regardless. Hayden takes it in both of hers, feeling it shake against her fingers. "You came here to fix your hands, but I think it's become more than that for you." She runs a thumb over the palm of his hand, hoping the shiver she thought she felt from him wasn't her imagination.

"When you've been hiding as long as I have, it's habit to keep that wall up." She takes a breath as she gently turns his hand over. "I'm sure you've figured out by now I'm a mutant. "

Stephen chuckles softly and the sound gives Hayden the courage to look up at him. "That's about all I've figured out from you. You're a real mystery, Hayden Jones."

She smiles briefly at him before her gaze drops back down to the warm, tremulous hand in hers. "I'm sure you also know how a lot of people think of mutants. So, I hid who I was, got used to holding my wings so tightly against my back they were always hurting." She traces the raised scars along the backs of Stephen's long fingers. Finally, she looks back up at him, his eyes soft as he meets her gaze. "I came to Kamar- Taj because I was tired of hiding who I was and I wanted to not-." Her voice cracks and her shoulders droop a little as the memories of that terrible, fiery, night rise up in her mind. She takes a deep breath and blinks rapidly for a moment. "- to not be afraid of myself anymore."

Stephen carefully draws her into a warm embrace and rubs soothingly between her wings. Hayden winds her arms around him and relaxes against his chest, eyes squeezed shut, letting him comfort her. They stay like that for several long moments as Hayden's emotions go from boiling to back to normal. She lets out a long exhale as the tension leaves her body, along with the urge to cry.

"I know you want to learn more about me, Stephen," she says without pulling away from him. "My past is not a happy one, but, I swear when I'm ready, I will tell you everything. "

Everything.

What a terrifying thing to promise, something she's never promised anyone before in her entire life.

Stephen's grip on Hayden tightens and she feels him gently lean his head atop hers. "...Okay, Hayden."

"Thank you."

Thank you for having patience with me, though you have it with nearly nothing else. Thank you for trusting me to keep my promise. Thank you for not pushing me to talk about something so painful. Thank you-

Thank you for actually caring about me.

Hayden gives Stephen one last squeeze before slowly letting him go and stepping away from him, one arm crossed over her body, the other hand tucked awkwardly in a pocket. They look at one another for a moment before Stephen breaks the tension, a tension Hayden isn't familiar with, between them by turning to look at the bookshelf and saying something about fetching a book for Wong. She pats Stephen's shoulder as she moves past him, taking the hint that he wants to be alone.

She forces down the small pang of disappointment she feels as she finds her way out of the bookshelves and into the main sitting area. Stephen is more than allowed to have his space. God knows he's more than willing to give Hayden hers. She approaches a shelf and unlatches a couple books at random, hoping some reading will help her get Stephen off her mind for a bit. Hayden settles down at a table and, resting her elbow on the tabletop and cradling the side of her face in her hand, flips open one of the books she picked.

She reads for an indeterminate amount of time before she feels drowsiness settle over her. She didn't sleep all that well the night before, kept awake by a combination of Stephen hovering in the back of her mind and old recurring nightmares. Deciding a little nap couldn't hurt, Hayden nudges the book aside and folds her arms on the desk before settling down, using her arms as a makeshift pillow. She lets sleepiness over take her, grateful for the chance to get a little rest.