The room is poorly lit, both to our advantage (as we were unlikely to be seen), and our disadvantage (as there wasn't much we could see.) I whip out my phone and record the scene playing out before us.

Lara steps in front of a window, her silhouette contrasting the soft grays from the rain. She waves something flat in the air, and another figure (cloaked, like the other Chitauri) reaches to take it. He opens it like a book and flips through the sheets of paper.

"You'll find full security detail inside," Lara says, swinging her hair over her shoulder, along with a calendar of when my father will be visiting, Thor's schedule, and any other visitors. We'll be housing such figures as the head of the C. I. A., S.H.E.I.L.D, and even the Red Room organization, from all the way across the planet,"

The cloaked figure mumbles incoherently, and I edge closer.

Lara laughs. "Yes, an actual school. You know how Thor can be, with her little obsession, and who was Odin to keep her dreams away from her? All in all," she purrs, snatching what is now visible as a folder away from her companion, "We find ourselves with a wonderful opportunity, wouldn't you say?"

I slide against a wall until I'm incredibly close behind the two of them. A guard stands on either side of the head Chitauri.

"But what of the Tesseract?" the leader groans.

"Why, it can be provided to you without any problem—if my conditions are met," I'm close enough to see the mischievous grin spread over Lara's face, and also close enough to hear Tara's gargantuan roar as she leaps at her sister with her hammer high above her head. Lara manages to roll to the side before the impact but not without dropping the folder, which is quickly scooped up by her comrade. With a flash of blue light and a spin, the Chitauri are gone. Gone, along with the information that I had so desperately been needing.

Tara sits on top of her sister, pinning her to the ground as she cries softly over her. Lara is shocked and upset and she stares up at her sister with her dark hair pooled around her.

"I made sure they wouldn't hurt you," she whispers, but Tara doesn't move or speak.

I stop the recording, and slip away into the shadows.

I wander around for a while. When Heidi asks me what happened I shake her off. I pass people on the street, watching them. I take in a sea of umbrellas on shopping streets. I stop into a coffee shop, trying to take comfort in the warm beverage, but all it is is bitter. I keep wandering until I'm back at the gates of Attilan, and I make my way up its grand marble steps. I try to avoid the office, as Tara and I didn't sign out in our rush and panic. All that energy to save her-a girl who didn't need to be saved. Several kids mingle around the commons room, each in groups, all talking and laughing, everyone enjoying their Saturday. But how many of them are aliens? How many of them fight other-worldly battles? How many are spies? How many of them are traitors?

At the moment it feels like there's just one traitor in the building, and it feels like it's me.

I knock softly, as she might not be home. She opens the door with a smile and I'm relieved, to an extent. Her smile fades and her brow furrows. She pushes the door open and lets me in. I sit down on her couch, but I don't relax.

"You look like you saw a ghost,"

I look up at her and her soft, concerned features. I turn away.

"Aliens actually. And devastating familial betrayal,"

She laughs, "That would seem to describe it," She joins me on the couch.

I stare at her some more. I saw her earlier, but she still manages to look fresh and interesting, in her purple hoodie with a cross-hairs spread across the middle. Cross-hairs are something I'm all too familiar with, and it makes me flinch.

"So," she takes a piece of my hair in between her fingertips and squeezes the water out. "I was thinking earlier, 'what a beautiful day for a walk,' and it seems like we were on the same page,"

I just keep staring at her.

"Do you have tea?" Perhaps it will leave a better taste i my mouth than the coffee.

She cocks her head to the side and stares at me with deep, inquisitive eyes.

I watch her as she stands to make it, and I watch her as she sticks two cups in her small microwave, an older model, with red vinyl coating that has worn away in several places. I glance around the rest of her nest, and I find similar items. Not all vintage, but most of them are worn down. And this really is her nest. This room has her all over it, each them complimenting her and adding to her charismatic personality.

Everything except me.

I stand up without thinking, as if I'm about to leave.

She turns to me, her soft skin furrowing across her brow. "Oh, no you don't. You don't wander in here like a lost puppy and then bolt once I'm nice and concerned about you, asshat." She shoves the steeping tea into my hand, sloshing the hot liquid onto my skin. It burns, but I don't bother to wash it off.

I sit down, and stare at the floor, and, rather than parking into the chair across from me, she's right by my side. I glance up at her, into those soft grey eyes, and they tell me that she's there. And more than warm, beverages, that's what I need. I need someone who is there for me. For me and everything I have done, every mistake I've made, and every order I have blindly followed.

"You know," I whisper, "You could say you're my first friend,"

She chuckles softly. "I'd believe it,"

I smile back at her, shifting slightly closer so our legs are pressed against each other. I take her hand in mine and she blushes slightly but i don't let it deter me. "I've seen things," I whisper, barely audible, but she leans in, listening intently. "Not just seen, I've done. I've done terrible things." My emotions which were once so neatly tucked away find their way into my tear ducts, bury themselves in my throat making it hard to swallow. They push against my chest, making it ache for the faces of the people I have undone in order to be here.

Claire pushes my hair from my face. "Is it for your job?" She asks. I haven't mentioned my line of work, but she knows.

"Everything is for my job," I sigh, and I look at her, gesturing around me as tears finally tip over my eyelids and make rivers down my face. "This is for my job," I croak, gesturing around us. "I know I haven't been here for long, but," My voice breaks and I don't know how to say it. I don't know how to say what my every bone is telling me.

Claire finishes it for me. "But you feel like you can do something," she says, smiling at me, trying to make me not cry.

"Something good," I nod. "But I'm not doing something good." That file. I watched a family be torn apart and all I could think of was that file.

And that's what really gets me. Family is all I have ever wanted but in the face of preserving it my mind only cares about my mission-no matter how unholy that mission is.

And that's when I break. I begin to cry, but harder now. Now my shoulders shake and my every muscle tenses.

But she's there, just like I wanted her to be. She slides her arms around me and holds me in a tight embrace.

"Then, do something good," she whispers, and I wish it were so simple.