"Being a fangirl is the best thing that's ever happened to me. ...We know what we're into, we love hard, and we're okay with it."

― Sam Maggs

" . . . ate . . . . Miss . . . Kate . . . Miss Kate!"

I snapped out of my daydream to look directly into my biology teacher's angry old face.

"Uh, yes Mr Jay?" I sputtered. I felt a deep blush of embarrassment creep up my neck and onto my cheeks when every student in my class turned their eyes towards me. Students who felt sorry for me sucked in nervous breaths through their teeth, while others looked away.

"I asked you what type of relationship this is?" Mr Jay pointed to the whiteboard where he had drawn up examples of relationships found in nature.

Content review! That's what we were doing, going through what we've been studying for the last couple of months. Mr Jay was pointing to a drawing of a tapeworm and a human. I cleared my throat. "That is a, uh, parasitic relationship. A relationship between two organisms where one benefits and the other is harmed."

"Very good." Mr Jay praised me, albeit being a little annoyed. "But next time I suggest keeping the board in focus, that way you don't look like you're about to fall asleep." I nodded furiously and before he could say anything else, the bell rung for lunch.

Thank God, the bell was my superhero for the day. I began to put away my stuff when I surprised myself. Across my notebook was a pen sketch of Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen as Pietro and Wanda Maximoff from Avengers: Age of Ultron. I almost laughed, that was so me. I'd lose myself in a daydream, and a doodle turns into a detailed sketch. Especially if it had anything to do with Marvel.

I had been a fangirl for as long as I could remember. Marvel and DC specifically were two of my top favourite fandoms. Though I was born in 1998 and the original comics had skipped me, cartoons became my original source material. Fantastic Four, X-men TAS and Evolution, Justice League and the Teen Titans were my childhood. I loved the superhero genre and I just couldn't get enough of the superpowers and tragic backstories.

"Well, that explains a lot." I heard a voice say from next to me. I turned to see Lana So, a tiny Korean girl with her hair dyed a deep red and my best friend, with her bag slung over a single shoulder and smirk on her face. She pointed at my drawing. "This is what I call a parasitic relationship."

"I know right? Marvel just sucks the life out of you." I joked and ripped the page from my book and handed it to her. "But we wouldn't have it any other way."

"Aw thanks, Mella." Lana gushed at the sketch as I packed up the rest of my things.

I was always alone in my interests, about Marvel I mean. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to stereotype other girls but the ones I had been friends with all preferred shows and books like Twilight and Pretty Little Liars and Criminal Minds. Not that there was anything wrong with that, I liked those things too, and some were fans of the Marvel and DC cinematic universes, but they never knew enough about the comics or past shows and movies to have in-depth conversations with.

It wasn't until I the seventh grade I finally found someone who understood. Lana was a spritely girl who had the exact same range of interests as me, and she was always bursting with opinions, theories and headcanons. We became best friends almost instantly. The two of us also being only children, I'd come to love her like a sister.

I slung my bag over my shoulder as we left the lab and joined the sea of maroon uniforms in the corridors that were all headed to their usual spots for lunch.

I was in year eleven and attended St. Mary's Catholic School in Perth, the capital city of Western Australia. I lived there with my father, who was an experimental physicist that worked at the Western Australian Institute for Experimental Sciences. He was actually working on creating the world's first teleportation pad, and not to brag but his work actually had merit, which kind of made him famous in the science community on an international level. Plus, teleportation! It sounded like something straight out of a comic book.

Despite the name, St. Mary's Catholic School was a co-ed school. The campus I attended also only catered to the year eleven and twelve students. The other grades of St. Mary's had a campus down the street and around the corner. There were still a lot of students, but only having two grades on one campus made our school community more intimate. Everyone knew everyone, and so news of my slip up in class didn't take long to spread around the school. Probably because nothing else newsworthy happened that day, unfortunately for me.

"Heard Mr. Jay caught you daydreaming." Jack teased as he and our other friend Kay sat with us at our lunch spot; under the shade of a large tree off to the side of the large patch of grass out the back of the school.

Jack Abbatelli was a short and extremely rotund boy, with light skin, dark brown hair and blue eyes. I remember that I met him in the eighth grade when Lana and he had gotten into a fight. I don't really remember what it was about, but all was forgiven after that, and then we found out Jack was a huge Harry Potter fan and a gamer, so the fact that we all became friends wasn't a big surprise.

We met Kay Palmer through Jack as he was his best friend. We had no idea how they were friends as Kay was Jack's complete opposite. Kay was lanky and was one of tallest boys in our grade, with olive skin and bleached blonde hair done up in a victory roll on the front right side of his head, which was his usual style. Kay was gay and wasn't afraid to show it, nor did he care that he was open about his sexuality and acted on it in a Catholic school which "tolerated" homosexuality. He was also a complete makeup junkie, he even did mine for our year ten formal. He was also a complete DC nerd, but he was a big fan of Captain America, mainly because he had a huge celebrity crush on Chris Evans.

I groaned at Jack's comment and laid back on the grass. "I dozed off for a minute, so what?"

"We don't give a shit that you daydream, I just wish you would stop doing it in his class. You get into so much trouble! I think he hates you." Kay replied and bit into an apple, which he had stolen of Lana.

Lana agreed and snatched her apple back. "Yeah, you remember what happened last time."

"What happened last time?" I turned my head to the side to see the last three members of our group arrive and sit down. The girl who had spoken was Giovanna Gonzales or "Geo" as everyone called her. Her parents were Mexican and she was a good friend of Kay's, she was also hands down the prettiest girl in the grade; at least Lana and I thought so. Caramel skin, dark hair and eyes, big lips, curves in all the right places, and she was notoriously known to go through boyfriends quicker than I could go through pages in a sketchbook, and that's saying something. She was so popular it was hard to believe she hung out with us.

I couldn't help but feel a little washed out next to her, though. I know what you're thinking, no I'm not insecure about my looks, I think I'm decent looking. I'm not too pale, but not really tan either, even though I live close to a beach. All I had to show to prove that I'd actually been out in the sun were the few freckles I had under my eyes and on my nose. My eyes were brown and super round, like a doll's. Lana always goaded me into dressing up in dolly and Lolita fashion, just so she could stick giant multi-coloured contacts in my eyes. I didn't actually mind dressing up. When you're a fangirl, the desire to cosplay becomes engrained into you.

My hair was long and this dark brown colour that looked black at times. I liked that it had a slight wave that turned into very loose curls at the end, it gave my everyday ponytail a little something extra. I had my father and his curly hair to thank for that. I was, at least, five foot 4, and I my chest was pretty big but my hips were huge, apparently, I had my mother to thank for those. Now mix that all together and what do you get? Me! And I think I look absolutely A-Okay. Though Lana thinks I'm self-deprecating, and would always say-"You're like a teenage Hayley Atwell with those hips!" I nearly spit out my drink due to laughter the first time I heard that one.

I guess what I'm trying to say is I'm fine with the way I look, but Geo was much more beautiful. Plus she was so worldly since her family travelled a lot, and she gave great advice, especially when it came to dating. Me? I've never even kissed a boy let alone ever gone out with one. Geo kept trying to set me up but I'm so awkward around any boy I wasn't familiar with, and I never really got out much, so with that, I thought I'd save myself the trouble. Not only was I a fangirl, I was an introverted fangirl.

"I think they're talking about Mella falling asleep in Mr Jay's class. That was a big mistake." Aadesh said before he plopped his head in Liz's lap.

Liz had been watching her boyfriend's lips very carefully and I managed to sit up before she raised her hands up and moved them around in fluid and thought out motion. Using sign language I could see she said-"You mean the time she fell asleep in class and Sir woke her up by slamming a textbook on her desk?"

I frowned at her and raised my own hands to sign as I spoke. "I only fell asleep because I was working late on a painting the night before."

Everyone in the group hollered in understanding of course, and Liz smirked and signed again-"I'm not surprised."

Aadesh and Liz were the cutest couple ever, talk about a real life OTP, and the hopeless romantic in me hoped they'd stayed together after high school. Addesh Doshi was an Indian boy with an extremely pronounced jawline that was hard not to stare at because it was so perfect. He had only moved to Australia with his family from India in the ninth grade and became friends with Jack, which was how he met the rest of us. He loved Batman and Minecraft so we got on great. He also developed the biggest crush on Liz.

Elizabeth 'Liz' Williams was a mousy blonde girl and had really come out of her shell since becoming friends with us. Whenever we had her over we would bake mountains of cookies and cupcakes before she'd smash us all at Monopoly. I've known her since year six and she was a good friend, but we didn't really hang out until she became best friends with Aadesh.

She was hard of hearing; partially deaf. She could hear sounds that were really loud and some speech if she was close enough to the person speaking. A few of our teachers in my primary school knew sign language and helped myself and many other's in my grade set out to learn sign language to better communicate with her, and I'm one of the few who became fluent.

Aadesh, having had such a huge crush on her, set out to learn sign language himself. Even though Liz could still hear some things and read lips fairly well, he wanted to be able to communicate with her fully. It was so sweet of him, and Liz thought so too. They got together the night of our year ten formal, Aadesh asked her to dance, and the next thing anyone knew they were kissing. They've been together ever since. Oops, I have to be careful telling that story, I always feel like I'm about to swoon after.

"Okay, I take the blame for that one." Lana raised her hands up in surrender. "She stayed up late because she was painting me this awesome portrait of Tony Stark."

"That painting is awesome." Jack agreed. "But not as good the Optimus Prime painting she gave me for my birthday."

Lana scoffed and chucked her half eaten apple at him. "Yeah right!"

"Now now guys, back to the subject at hand?" Geo redirected with a flip of her hair. "Mells, you've got to stop daydreaming in Mr Jay's class, or that shit's going to show up in the comments on your report."

"Really? She should be worried about that?" Lana spoke at Geo in disbelief. "All Mella ever gets are A's and B's, and everyone knows no parent reads the teacher's comments unless their kid gets D's and under."

"Not true." Aadesh disagreed while signing for Liz. "My parents always read my comments."

"See? Your logic is flawed. 'Desh is a straight A student." Geo argued. "Teachers have nothing bad to say, that's why parents would read the comments. "

Lana however, wasn't going to let this go. I knew she wasn't, not until she proved she was right. Jack knew it too, and he sent me a knowing look that almost made me laugh. Lana raised a brow at Aadesh. "Really? Aadesh, do your parents read or skim? Like, do they actually spend more than five minutes with the report in their hands?"

The Indian teen paused for a moment before he thoughtfully replied. "No."

"Ha! Point proven." Lana grinned and it was Geo's turn to throw some food. Unfortunately, what she threw was a tiny packet of Doritos chips, which Lana gladly caught and began to dig into.

One point for Lana. Geo: zero.

Kay scoffed and turned to me. "What were you daydreaming about anyway?"

"I don't really remember," I answered honestly though I knew it had something to do with Marvel.

"But your hands do." Lana smiled slyly and pulled out the page I had sketched all over in class.

"Damn." Geo gasped and grabbed the page. "I wish I could draw like this."

"Everyone wishes they could draw like Mella." Jack corrected and I shoved him in the shoulder, another blush on my face, but everyone else agreed. I didn't want to brag but I do think I have some pretty great art skills. I was a very visual type of person from a very young age, something else I got from my mother that I was incredibly thankful for. I loved to draw, and with the help of books and youtube tutorials, I became quite good at it.

My love for drawing soon led to painting and photography, then to design, textiles and filmmaking. It was just something I loved to do and people liked it. I'd always hoped that one day I could study to better my skills and become an animator, I would have loved to work for Disney or Dreamworks one day.

Geo handed the sheet back over to Lana. "Can I have my own copy? Pietro Maximoff is fine."

"Mm-hmm." Kay hummed appreciatively.

"Of course," I said, requests weren't unusual, but I smirked at Kay. "But he's not as fine as Steve Rogers?"

"Hell no. No one's finer than Cap. End of story."

"I beg to differ." Lana scoffed. "Thor is on a whole different level compared to Cap."

"Oh, here we go." Aadesh sighed and Liz let out what we considered being a giggle while she ran her fingers through her boyfriend's hair.

"Speaking of Marvel," Jack said while Lana and Kay were bickering away, something about Chris Evans' shoulders and pecs vs. Chris Hemsworth's biceps. "I heard you say you're headed to Big W after school to pick up the new Age of Ultron DVD."

"Oh my God are you still on that movie? It's been months!" Geo complained.

"Yes, I'm still 'on it'. I just have to have it, there's forty-five minutes worth of behind the scenes footage and interviews!" I explained irritated. "You saw it too, I thought you liked it."

"I only watched it for Pietro Maximoff." Geo huffed with her arms crossed. "And he died."

Lana let out a whimper and I put a hand on my chest, clenching the white material of my school blouse dramatically. "Don't even mention it, the wounds haven't healed yet."

It had been a few months since Avengers: Age of Ultron had been released, and what a glorious movie it was. I had heard others talk about how there was too much action but I thought it had a good balance, and who didn't love the action? But that was my view on the film and don't get me started on all the Brutasha-too many feels

"Yeah yeah." She waved us off and Lana stuck her tongue out at her.

Lana grinned after and pointed at me. "Tell me when you get it yeah? I want to make sure so I can come over tomorrow and check it out for myself."

"You're coming over anyway, even if I didn't have it, right?"

"Oh yeah, definitely." I knew it.

"Oh yeah, it's Friday." Aadesh gasped excitedly. "I completely forgot."

"Of course, you did." Kay chastised, it was universally known that despite his smarts he was more forgetful than I was. Kay checked his phone and groaned. "Oh man, I have to work this afternoon, until closing, and again tomorrow."

"Sucks to be you, Addesh and I have the entire weekend to ourselves." Liz signed. So that's what 'Desh was excited about. I'm pretty sure Kay didn't get everything that Liz had said, but Lana told him and Kay made some off-hand comment about what Liz and Aadesh did in their alone time, which caused everyone to laugh.

A warm, content feeling washed over me as I laughed along with my friends. I had such great friends, I was getting the new Avengers DVD, and all my worries just melted away. That moment was perfect, maybe the rest of my day might've been perfect too.

Of course, I spoke too bloody soon.

"Lana! I got it! I got it!" I squealed over the phone and held my DVD in hand. I must have looked crazy because I was currently on a bus headed back from my local shopping centre.

"Oh my God, we have to watch it, I'm coming over tomorrow!" Lana wheezed over the phone and I could hear her yell to her mother. "Ma! I'm headed over to Mella's tomorrow!"

"Yeah, it'll be fun. We'll have an Avengers marathon!" I told her and another idea popped into my mind. "We should make those Avengers themed cupcakes again!"

"We should! I'm still getting so many notes on Tumblr for the picture we took of them." Lana giggled over the line. "Well, before your dad ate most of them."

"Yeah . . ." My mood dropped instantly at the mention of my father, and Lana sensed it through the phone.

"Oh no. Is your Dad still acting weird?" My silence was her answer. "You really need to talk to him, Mella."

"I know, but the more I try, the more he shuts me out." I explained and I could hear Lana hum in understanding over the line. For the last few weeks, my Dad had been acting weird. He started to spend more time away from home and when he was home, he locked himself away in the basement that doubled as his study and workshop.

My father was a brilliant man. He was always kind and was always spitting those cheesy 'dad-jokes' that were so lame you had to laugh. He was intelligent and hardworking, but a dreamer at heart. But he had become withdrawn and I had no idea what to do. It was hard to sleep at night sometimes because there was so much noise coming from down there in his workshop, like machinery, and it was even worse because he had forbidden me from going into the basement. He had always allowed me into the basement, what was he doing down there that was so important (or dangerous) that he had to forbid me from entering?

Lana joked once that maybe he was performing some illegal experiment, and I got emotional because all my doubts were pointed in that direction.

"Mella I don't have to come over, maybe you need time to sort stuff out with your Dad." Lana suggested but I immediately refused.

"No no, don't worry about it." I brushed off. "Come over, my father will probably be down in his workshop anyway, he probably won't even come out tonight, but I'll try . . . I'll try to talk to him."

"Ok, if you say so."

"Yeah," Looked out the window as the bus took a turn. My stop was close. "Hey, I'll talk to you later yeah? My stop's coming up."

"See you tomorrow then, love ya."

"Love ya." And Lana was off the line.

I shoved my phone in my bag, got off the bus and headed down to my house. It was a simple two-story building that was painted a soft cream colour. I walked up the cobblestone path up to a wooden deck to the door. I entered the house and called out. "Dad?" No response, no surprises there.

I looked down the hall where there was a door that led down to the basement. The lights were on, I could see it leak through the space between the door and the floor. I said I would try and talk to him . . .

With a newfound determination I dumped my bag on the stairs off to the side, the DVD still in my hand. I don't know why I kept it on me, but I did. I went up to the door and didn't bother to knock, and reached my hand towards the doorknob, but stopped.

I found myself in this position often, frozen outside the basement door, hand hovering above the doorknob, but my hand would never touch it. It sounded just like a superhero backstory. Hero's parent was some mad scientist who withdrew themselves away from their kid to work an illegal project, and that always ended with parent scientist causing an accident that would either get them killed, give their kid (future hero) superpowers, or both.

But this wasn't some mad scientist; this was my father! Kind, warm and caring all wrapped in cheesy dad jokes and a good work ethic. I was about to give up when there was a sudden bang that came from inside the basement strong enough to shake the door. When smoke started to seep through the bottom of the door was when my hand touched the doorknob.

"DAD!" I yelled and flung the door open. I was met with a gust of grey smoke, which was sucked into my mouth. I coughed and covered my mouth and nose with my free hand before I made my way down the stairs, hoping I wouldn't trip and fall down the steps. The DVD proved useful as it helped fan way the smoke that clouded the basement. I called again. "Dad!?"

"Mella!?" Dad called back over the beeping of the smoke alarm. He shut off the smoke alarm with a broom and came over to me. He was in old sweatpants and a dirty grey polo, his dark hair was messed up and his face and hands covered in grease. "I told you not to come down here, sweetheart!"

I did a double take; was he serious? "I heard a bang and there was smoke! I thought you might've been hurt."

"I'm fine sweetie-"

I interrupted him. "What is all this?" I looked all around and the basement was filled with equipment that had never been in the basement before."

Dad tried to get away from the topic. "It's just something I'm working on-"

"But you've been down here for almost three weeks!" I reasoned, this was the last straw. "What's so important that you can't just finish it at the lab?"

I could my father was getting frustrated. "Honey-"

"No Dad! What aren't telling me?" I accused, all the anger and confusion finally pushing its way to the surface. I hated this, I knew my father was hiding something from me, and I was tired of not getting any answers.

Dad said nothing but instead held out his hand. After a second, I took it. I let him lead me over to the spot where the smoke had come from, and I recognised the object before me from the plans my Dad had shown me months before.

On the metal table was a circular disk a little more than half a meter in diameter, with two large ray gun looking devices, pointed at the disk on either side of it. It was made from metal and looked as if it had been bashed around a few times with smoke pouring from visible tears in the metal. It was hooked up to a whole array of computers and generators that were beeping and blinking. I also noticed the scorch marks in the centre of the disk.

"Is this the prototype teleportation pad? What happened to it?" I spoke worriedly, inspecting the damage.

"Something wonderful." Dad grinned at me, and I turned around and held in a gasp. On the other side of the basement on the ground was a replica of the last disk. It sparked but didn't look as overly damaged as the first one, and in the middle of it sat a teddy bear, a horribly burnt teddy bear, but it was in one piece.

"H-how?" I choked out. "I thought you were still working on how to break down objects for teleportation! Not actual teleportation!"

From what I could understand, the teleportation method my father had been developing was similar to the Zeta tubes the Justice League and Young Justice used in the DC Universe. It was similar in terms that there had to be machinery at the home location and the destination and it involved the breaking down of the person and reforming of those particles at the destination of choice. It was also similar in terms that weather conditions would affect the method quite significantly-storms might possibly create bad connections for teleportation, and that could potentially be dangerous to the person teleporting.

However, how the particles got from one place to the other was a whole other story that I would never understand.

"I know!" Dad spoke giddily. "But it actually worked sweetie! I just need to work on the speed and the actual reformation of particles and in a year or two's times we'll have teleportation pads everywhere!"

"Dad that's great!" I laughed and threw my arms around him, hugging him tight. "Mom would be so proud of you, Dad."

I could feel my father squeeze me tighter. Mum died when I was four, but from I could remember she was a bright Filipino woman; loud and brash with a laugh like no other. My mother (much like me) preferred the arts to science but always supported my Dad in his ventures.

When I was younger, my father was having a hard time trying to find someone to fund his work, to give his work on teleportation a chance. He used to be partnered with all these other researchers on several projects but he wanted to peruse his own work. He was using all his personal funds at first but he knew that wouldn't last, that was why he needed funding. During this period in his life, he had been pen pals with my mother for a few years, and he decided to take a break and go to Marikina City in the Philippines to meet her. One thing led to another and my mother moved to Australia with my Dad, they were married and shortly after I was born. Yep, I wasn't planned, but I knew my parents loved me regardless. However, with my father's money slowly dwindling and with my mother only working a simple office job, we weren't doing well.

We had lived in a shabby little studio apartment in the city, and it wasn't until after my mother died in a car accident when my father's work was finally acknowledged. But all through the hardships, Mum never stopped believing in my father's work.

I was happy, but of course not all my questions were answered. "But, Dad?"

"What is it, honey?"

"What was the rush?"

"What?" Dad spoke in confusion and looked right at me.

I watched his expression skeptically. "You've been rushing about for weeks and you've been so stressed out, why did you need to make so much progress for? Not that that's a bad thing! But why now?"

Dad's expression hardened, which, in all honesty, frightened me greatly. He turned away from me and went back to the metal table and tinkered with the teleportation pad.

"Dad?"

"The institute cut my funding, and they kicked me out."

I didn't understand. "What?"

"The institute cut my funding, I haven't been at the lab for the last two weeks," Dad spoke quietly. "I've been here."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. "But why? You were doing such good work!"

"Yes, but I wasn't doing it fast enough," He replied, still not turning to face me.

"Not fast enough?" I repeated, but something in the room caught her eye.

On the wall above the first teleportation pad were posters, pamphlets and letters from what looked to be the military. Not just Australia military, but American, Japanese, and Russian military. The sight of them caused an uneasy feeling to settle in my stomach.

I swallowed hard, Lana's joke about my father echoing in the back of my mind. "Wait. Dad, if they cut your funding, isn't experimenting like this then . . . illegal?"

"Mella-"

"And where did you get all this equipment, if they cut your funding?" I pushed, and another thought came to me. "Dad, please don't tell me you stole it."

There was no response.

" . . . Dad?"

"I didn't steal it, I just borrowed it."

My jaw hit the floor. "Dad!"

"Listen, honey, I have my own connections, and I needed to get my work done." Dad turned around and placed his hands on her shoulders. "I'm so close! Don't you see? Once the board sees how much work I've done they'll give my funding back, they'll want me back-"

"Or have you arrested!" I yelled and backed away from him. This was crazy. "And what do you mean you weren't working fast enough? I didn't realise your work had a deadline."

"There wasn't until they gave me one." Her father explained. "Some people looked into my work and needed it done, but my work wasn't moving fast enough so they cut my funding and gave my research to a team they had put together to see if they could make more progress."

In my mind, I connected the dots, though I hoped I wasn't right. "Some people? You don't mean the military, do you?"

"Yes, unfortunately." He sighed with a worn out look on his face.

I did my best to calm myself to calm down, which didn't last long. "Ok, so the institute cut your funding, but you think by showing them your own progress you'll get it back. So what-" I started before I stormed over to the wall and ripped off a military poster with her free hand. "Are these?"

"They're just. . . backup plans."

"Backup plans?"

"Others had heard of my work, so if I couldn't get my funding back-"

"You'd sell your work to foreign military!?" I nearly screamed. What in the history of fuck was my Dad thinking!?

"Mella Serenity Kate! Don't you dare use that tone with me!" My father rose. "You don't understand."

"Of course, I don't understand!" I responded. "I know how important your work is to you, but why would ever go this far?"

"It's not that simple, honey," Dad explained, massaging his neck. "This isn't just about getting my work out there, this is about supporting ourselves! Without the funding I get, without my employment at the institute, I have no other income. My savings won't last forever, and I don't ever want you to be in a situation where money is going to be a problem. Not again."

I sighed. Of course he was thinking about me, that was the kind of person he was. He always put me first, and I loved him for that, but he lied to me, hid things from me. The person in front of me didn't seem like my father at all. I opened my mouth and told him what I thought. "But this isn't about me, Dad. What's happened to you? Do you remember what you told me when I was old enough to understand what you were doing? You told me you wanted to use the pads to help people, whether it was to get a man to work on time or to get children out of a disaster zone, you wanted your work to help."

"it will, honey, you know it will."

"In know, Dad," I said, in hopes to comfort him a little. "But not like this. Don't try and convince me that you're doing the wrong things for the right reasons. What if the board doesn't accept your work and gets you arrested? Or if they don't, will you really sell your work to another country? Who could potentially turn it into a weapon!?"

That brought my father to his breaking point, and our screaming match started. We threw around the same arguments, trying to prove the other wrong. We were so immersed in our fight that we didn't even notice the strange happenings at the other teleportation pad.

I tried again. "But Dad, please reconsider-"

"Honey." Dad spoke, his voice nervous and some of the colour had drained from his face. "Come here."

"Why?" There was a sudden cracking noise, and I whipped around to see something that definitely looked like it came right out of a comic book.

The pad that the singed teddy bear sat on was cracking, and blue light poured out from the cracks. As it broke the metal fell into the disk, as if there was a force sucking the shards into the pad. And the cracks were getting bigger and bigger.

A sense of panic shot through me like lightning. "Dad! What's happening?"

"I don't know," He admitted, his voice filled with dread. He rushed back to his computers that were blinking and screeching as if they were in pain.

"What's it doing?" I asked as the pad continued to break down and suck itself in.

"The pad, i-it's creating its own teleportation channel!" Dad yelled. He then grabbed me and pushed me to the farthest part of the basement before he returned to his monitors.

"How is that possible?" I said, my voice filled with fear as the pad broke completely and got sucked into a glowing portal on the floor that grew and took more of the floor with it. "Where's it teleporting the debris to?"

"I don't know!" Dad repeated and his form shook with confusion and stress.

Suddenly, the glowing portal in the floor grew at a faster pace, and the floor split. The forming crack was headed for my father.

"DAD!" I screamed in warning and raced over to Dad to shove him out of the way, but it was too late to save myself. The rumbling of the floor threw me off balance, and the next thing the I knew was that I was falling backwards.

And the portal sucked me in.

"MELLA!" I heard Dad scream before I had lost all sight of the basement and saw nothing but light. I felt as if I was falling faster and faster, and I clung onto the only that had remained with me.

The Avengers: Age of Ultron DVD.

That last thing I could remember were my fingers clutching the plastic of the DVD case, and the feeling of hitting a hard surface before I lost all consciousness.

AN: So there's the first rewritten chapter! I know there's going to be some people who are going to be so annoyed by this, but I'm trying. What did you think? I tried to make Mella's regular life a lot more fleshed out compared to the first fic, so there's more detail about her friends and what she's like (a complete and utter daydreamer). There will be more chapters up soon so please don't run away just yet.

The fic is finished in my head and I know what's going to happen, so while I'm rewriting as I said in my author's note at the end of my last fic the sequel is in the process so as soon as this is done expect the sequel soon as well, so stay tuned! Thank you everything guys!