Asʜᴇ Pʀɪɴᴄᴇ

📹 for me to use a line from my favorite movie as a starter

@lxthologica

              “More than you’d think,” Ashe says. “And yes, Fury is very good at half-truths but that is his job. Do you know some of the other parts of his job? Keeping his people safe. Keeping his promises. Trying to keep the world from falling apart.” Ashe doesn’t like liars - hates how emotions vs. expression confuse her senses, how she can sense someone isn’t being entirely honest but not know what the truth is - but at the least: Fury will keep them safe. Fury will keep his promises. Fury won’t let the world fall to chaos or the tight control of HYDRA.

                 Ashe shrugs. “You have a point. SHIELD and HYDRA are, in a way, twins. Both have their politics. But here is the counter: everything is flawed, everything is fallible. All we can ever do is make the best decision we can under the circumstances. I chose SHIELD so I could help people with the powers I was given. I left after the leak because I refuse to have anything to do with HYDRA. I came back because I trust Fury’s promise that he won’t let HYDRA in again. You and your sister chose to sign up to HYDRA because you wanted to make yourselves heard, then left HYDRA to fight the Avengers, then left Ultron because you would not see him destroy the world, yes?”

              Ashe taps her fingers on her leg. “We all have our own agendas. We may not even mean to make them into agendas, but they become other aims and goals - I do not doubt that you would leave the team for your sister without much hesitation. Not an agenda, necessarily, but something that comes before the Avengers. We all have them and yes, as you say, they make everything more complicated. The world is complicated. Do you think it can be made otherwise?”

      “The world would not fall apart without SHIELD. Not to the extent it has. Evil grows to meet good. One doesn’t exist without the other, and they fight until they are even. One will never beat the other, not permanently. They will only grow larger and larger until the world is destroyed. Is the only way they will be satisfied.’ Pietro was growing tired of hearing about good and evil. He’d been on the side of both, and he knew they weren’t as different as they wanted to believe. Pietro would be on whichever side was best for Wanda and the people of Sokovia. “Shows they are not all that different, yes?’

                      Ashe taps her nails over the screen of the tablet, considers the emotions of the man before her, before she switches it on again, tapping open internal communications, creating a draft addressed to Fury and passing the tablet over. “All right then.” It’s important - essential, sometimes - Ashe knows, to ensure that patients know they are being heard. She can sense their emotions, hear their words and that’s the very reason SHIELD employs her. So if her patient wants to be heard she’ll do what she can to help (especially when she considers how little the twins were heard - how little Sokovia as a whole country was heard - before these recent days). “Type out an email, or if you want to actually talk, hit the phone button - it’s internal communications, there’s a shortcut from email to video calling. Fury’s busy, he may not reply, but you can leave a message.” She knows, with certainty, that either Fury will hear it or Hill will - this isn’t the vast hive SHIELD once was, they can’t afford to ignore her missives or any other’s.

                         Ashe nods slowly at Pietro’s words. “There are always catastrophes. Big or small, personal or national or both… there are always catastrophes. And everyone responds differently - some of us try to help and heal. Others try to gain control. We’re at seven billion now, is it so surprising there are so many views? We all respond to catastrophes and trauma differently, all react in different ways. I don’t think we would be human if we didn’t.” She taps her fingers on her thigh now, half-wishing she could reach back to her desk, take another worrystone without it seeming awkward to reach back again so soon. 

                        “That is one of the risks of HYDRA, I think. For all of the horror they cause and commit… some things they say can be accurate in one way or another. But that doesn’t make anything let alone everything they do right.” Ashe shrugs. “It is human nature and free will that causes the differences. But it is free will that SHIELD will at least try to respect - though I think they may have erred in your case - while HYDRA will gladly stomp on it with hobnailed boots because they believe they know better.” Will gladly stomp on the not-yet-made choices of a child unborn to try to have enhanced humans. Will gladly stomp on the choices of the people of Sokovia to get the test subjects they so wanted. Ashe knows SHIELD does questionable things but that at least… they have not done that so absolutely as HYDRA did, though in bringing Pietro back… they have toed the line. Ashe half-wonders if she is allowed to treat him so she is made to feel they are being honest.

       “What good will it do?” he asks as the tablet is passed to him. “What good will it do to talk to Fury? It won’t change anything. Fury is as bad as the rest of them. He speaks of good, but he has as many secrets as the others. There will be lies and half-truths, but never the truth, not from a man like Fury.” He doesn’t know what to do. He can’t talk to the people in charge, but he can’t stay silent. But either way he’s ignored, so what’s the point of either? 

       “You speak of these differences, but they are only surface details. I was led to believe SHIELD was a saint, and while they did save my people, and I do thank them for that, I have learned more about this organization. In their hearts, SHIELD and HYDRA, they are twins. Two sides of the same coin, as you say. Did not SHIELD take a man and experiment on him to save his country, the way HYDRA has? Did not HYDRA take a man left for dead and return him to  life, just as SHIELD has? No, the difference is only politics, and politics cause war. Politics kill people and destroy homes. I will not be a soldier if i cannot trust those I am fighting for.

                 Ashe shrugs. “You have a point. SHIELD and HYDRA are, in a way, twins. Both have their politics. But here is the counter: everything is flawed, everything is fallible. All we can ever do is make the best decision we can under the circumstances. I chose SHIELD so I could help people with the powers I was given. I left after the leak because I refuse to have anything to do with HYDRA. I came back because I trust Fury’s promise that he won’t let HYDRA in again. You and your sister chose to sign up to HYDRA because you wanted to make yourselves heard, then left HYDRA to fight the Avengers, then left Ultron because you would not see him destroy the world, yes?”

📹 for me to use a line from my favorite movie as a starter

@lxthologica

                     Ashe shakes her head, reaches back to her desk for the tablet there. “You aren’t their property. No more than you are the property of anyone else who might seek to track you.” She can feel his near-fear of - well she assumes its of being tracked - as she swipes the tablet into wakefulness, taps a few buttons, types something out. It’s much the same as that of a few other List candidates she’s talked to over the years and well… she was right with them, so she hopes she’s right here. 

                    “And that is now in your notes. They may not heed it, but I’ve recommended they not track you.” She glances up, takes care to meet Pietro’s eyes. “They should listen to my notes, they usually do.“ They have learned my understanding of my patient’s emotions is reliable enough to know when space really is required. “And…” she draws the word out. “If it comes to it, simply run. SHIELD is quick when it comes to scrambling agents, but not as quick as you, not nearly. If you need to get out you should be able to.” That is going to get Comments from Fury or at least Hill, but, well, she’s a therapist, he duty is to her patients as much as it is to SHIELD. If they don’t want her advising her patients to leg it, then they will heed her notes.

                       Ashe’s fingers tap on the now-dark screen of the tablet. “I remember the Project. I - and a number of others - advised against it. It was too…. too HYDRA an idea, even in it’s infancy. Those of us with experience with what that means who were - are - still loyal to SHIELD advised against it.” She remembers more than just the Project, though - she remembers the Aftermath. For her, for the other therapists, that is what there reliably is. Always the aftermath. Always those recovering. Always those who need help. “Someone will rise to the challenge, maybe - but will they be HYDRA or SHIELD in nature? The oppressor or the protector? And if the former, who will stop them? Who will protest, who will fight?” (The answer is of course, simple, really. The Avengers.)

     For some reason, it doesn’t strike him well to hear something’s been added to his file. They say he’s not an experiment, yet they write down every note, every word spoken, as though looking for something, waiting for something. “I do not want it to be read in a note, I want it to be listened to from me.” So often he felt like nothing more than a gear in the machine, but he wanted to be listened to. Wasn’t that his problem so long ago in Sokovia? But he hadn’t expected a change, really. There was never a change. He’s tired of trying. 

                         Ashe nods slowly at Pietro’s words. “There are always catastrophes. Big or small, personal or national or both... there are always catastrophes. And everyone responds differently - some of us try to help and heal. Others try to gain control. We’re at seven billion now, is it so surprising there are so many views? We all respond to catastrophes and trauma differently, all react in different ways. I don’t think we would be human if we didn’t.” She taps her fingers on her thigh now, half-wishing she could reach back to her desk, take another worrystone without it seeming awkward to reach back again so soon. 

               Ashe can feel the anger in Pietro, whacking into her mind like a hammer. It softens very slightly as he takes the stone, begins to roll it between his fingers but it’s still there, still present. She’s relatively certain it will remain regardless of what is said or done - Pietro so far seems very much like his powers, immediate and reactive. Ashe doesn’t think he’s going to forget what happened any time soon - quite possibly even never.

                “Yes.” The answer is simple, has always been simple, will always be simple unless S.H.I.E.L.D. turns into HYDRA. “They won’t try to keep you here; if you want to go home that’s your right. They might track you - I know they do the Avengers, for obvious reasons, and I know they do me, but that’s as much because I work for them as because of my ability and my family history. But they won’t interfere. They never do with List candidates, it’s not allowed. If you accept employment you accept employment and if you don’t they’ll keep an eye on you in case HYDRA or something similar tries to pick you up.”

                   He’s still worrying though, and with good reason: it’s not as though the Avengers or S.H.I.E.L.D. are particularly in his good books with all that’s happened. Dragging his corpse back to base and then resurrecting him. That’s a tough pill to swallow. Ashe shrugs at what he says. “We can try though. Yoda is wrong in that regard - do or do not do there is no try… All you can ever do is try. And if we don’t, who will?”

     “I do not want them to track me. I do not belong to them.” He doesn’t want to be SHIELD’s property. If they can track him, they can find him, and they can take him back. He is grateful, of course, that he and Wanda have been given shelter, and he doesn’t want to decline that, but he feels trapped, sometimes. Like everyone’s watching him. Like he’s constantly under observation of the scientists. Maybe it’s worse that it’s not just paranoia. He can’t imagine he’s not being watched. That’s why he needs to get out. He needs to leave. 

                    “And that is now in your notes. They may not heed it, but I’ve recommended they not track you.” She glances up, takes care to meet Pietro’s eyes. “They should listen to my notes, they usually do." They have learned my understanding of my patient’s emotions is reliable enough to know when space really is required. “And...” she draws the word out. “If it comes to it, simply run. SHIELD is quick when it comes to scrambling agents, but not as quick as you, not nearly. If you need to get out you should be able to.” That is going to get Comments from Fury or at least Hill, but, well, she’s a therapist, he duty is to her patients as much as it is to SHIELD. If they don’t want her advising her patients to leg it, then they will heed her notes.

ITS PRIDE DAY AND IM PUMPED LETS PLAY

password is bettertwin // like this post if you join!

📹 for me to use a line from my favorite movie as a starter

@lxthologica

                It’s all true, what he says, Ashe can feel the honesty of his every word, clear and crisp as frosted grass, distinct and clear in her mind, the truth behind each word echoing. This is what Pietro believes to be true. And whether he is right or wrong, Ashe thinks, It is his right. With gentle fingers she picks up the haematite and offers it to the man opposite her. 

                “The world was broken by Ultron’s attempt to remake it, yes, but it can be healed. Not to how it was, no. That is quite impossible as you know all too well. But help can be offered. If you wish to return to your home that no longer is why not do so? Go back to Sokovia, to the hole where half of Novi Grad once stood and try to help? With your speed I am sure you could help set up shelters in moments, help people in milliseconds. You could do for them as people did not do for you, prevent others going down the path you chose.”

                  Ashe holds out the haematite still, even as she feels Pietro’s tiredness wash over her, running into her mind with more speed and force than she is used to. Almost as though his emotions carry his speed too, she thinks. “We are not a monolith,” she says. “There are always cracks in the stone, always those who think otherwise. We are not uniform and we value that - if we are different and yet can work together for humankind, rather than uniform and working against it, maybe we can keep HYDRA from ever staying here.” There is the slightest touch of venom in her tone as she says “It should never have managed to stay in the first place.”

     His eyes drop to the stone, resting on it for a moment before he takes it. It can’t make anything worse, he figure, as he moves it between his fingers. If anything, maybe it can keep him grounded…keep him from losing his temper. Things were already tense as they were, and he didn’t want to yell. He can feel it building up inside of him, though. The screaming, the yelling, for him, for his family, for his home, for all the friends he had that are dead, now. They’re all dead, or they’re suffering, struggling to find a home, and he got out. Somehow, through everything, he and Wanda got out. They’re living in luxury, now, and he can’t even say if anyone from Sokovia even has a bed to sleep on.

     “Sokovia…” he mutters. Sokovia doesn’t exist anymore. Sokovia is a gaping crater. He opens his mouth, but before he has a chance to disagree, she continues. He could go back. He…he could. He could go back, and he could help them. She was right. With his speed…his stamina…he could help. He could help in a thousand ways in a day. But… “Would SHIELD allow it? Would they let their, ah…project go so far away? Can they let me so far away for so long? Where they cannot…control me?”

                “Yes.” The answer is simple, has always been simple, will always be simple unless S.H.I.E.L.D. turns into HYDRA. “They won’t try to keep you here; if you want to go home that’s your right. They might track you - I know they do the Avengers, for obvious reasons, and I know they do me, but that’s as much because I work for them as because of my ability and my family history. But they won’t interfere. They never do with List candidates, it’s not allowed. If you accept employment you accept employment and if you don’t they’ll keep an eye on you in case HYDRA or something similar tries to pick you up.”

     “    I  can  do  this……    I  can  start  over.    I  can   save  my  own  life,   and   I’m  never  going   to  be  alone  as  long  as  I  have   stars  to  wish  on  and   people  to  still   love.   ”

📹 for me to use a line from my favorite movie as a starter

@lxthologica

“Yes! Exactly!” Well, maybe not exactly but definitely close enough. It’s something Alex can work from, and seeing how Ashe had been the one to bring it up he’s pretty confident that he can use it to explain in a way that Ashe can actually understand. “They’re all arguing and you’re trying to make your point made but sometimes their voices completely drown yours out and you’re listening to so many of them at once and sure, they sort of blur together but you still end up at that point sometime where you’re like ‘wait, fuck, how did I actually want to cook the chicken? Was it like this?’ And then you realise that no, that might have been someone else’s idea in your head.”

▼ kissing them

♢ stabbing them

♞ shooting them

✖ punching them

➶ slapping them

☠ poisoning them

☎ hugging them

☂ picking them up

✗ bringing them alcohol

✣ bringing them food

☯ coming home late

Pietro almost blamed himself for pushing someone so understanding to say such a thing to him. But  he  wasn’t the one who chose to say those three words. Words powerful enough to leave a sting if said by a certain person.

Pietro hated therapy, but he did  not  hate his therapist. As much as Ashe pushed him to answer, to speak about things he didn’t dare mention to anyone else &&  to accept what had happened   —   she was not a bad person. She was a good person who said a harsh thing.

Things said in arguments were almost always out of anger  —  or the bottled-up truth.

It has been years since she has done this, let emotions bouncing off her skull drive her to frustration and to near-anger and to spilling out words she should not ever say. Hate is for HYDRA she thinks. For those who took my life from me before it was even mine. “ I should have thought, ” she agrees. “ It is hard to do that when I’ve had other’s emotions bouncing off my skull all day, but that is not an excuse, not when I’ve had a lifetime of it to get used to it. I should not have said that. ”