you saw things that shook your core things you've never seen before could've walked away instead now you got no one you can trust thinking you sold your soul unjust point your finger and deny
unstable was the first word that nick miller ever learned. well, actually that was a lie - surely it was rat bastard. his mom called his dad that enough times that it was seared into his brain. but he would never say that he had a bad childhood, it was just different to say the least. survival of the fittest, if the competition was to see who could just make it to college. spoiler alert, nick won that battle!
it was hard to leave chicago, to leave his family. but a larger part of him was excited to start his life, to be independent from his family. to not have them rely on him. believe it or not, nick was the reliable one of his family. maybe that was why he let himself go a bit once he’s away from chicago. it was comforting.
he went to college to become a lawyer, which, yawn, now that he thinks about it. but growing up, that’s all he wanted to do. and nick knew he could do it but the real question was - did he want to do it? and that answer was no, as it would turn out. he found a passion instead in bartending. sure, he took the bar exam and aced it. but he didn’t want to be a lawyer, he wanted to be a bartender genuinely. it was comforting for him in a way, it felt like home to him. it gave him the freedom to pursue other dreams.
those dreams? well, it would turn into a career in storytelling. young adult books at that! but it got him to new york, a place so much different than chicago or even la! but the change was nice, he was doing something. sure, the books weren’t taking off quite as much as they would’ve liked but that’s where the bartending skills come in pretty handy. plus, he just really loved to do it.
most kids will think they got stuck with shitty parents, and most would probably be right. but in rachel’s opinion, she definitely got one of the worst picks out there. born out of a forced marriage between her mother and her demonic father (no, literal demon !) rachel life was played out before her. death and destruction seemed to be the only two feasible options. her father split, like any demonic father would do! and she was taken in by the temple azarath. while her presence initially brought upon panic that they set to undo, it turned out that they wouldn’t be so lucky to complete it. they wanted to send her into limbo, some days she wished they would have been successful.
unable to cast her aside, they instead taught her how to maintain her powers. pretty wicked, right? her powers were pretty cool, until she had the dreaded ‘meet the father’ thing happen. a conversation in which he informed her he was going to convince her to be his ally. when she became an adult, when she was at her most powerful. she tried not to think too much about that, because there was no way that could actually happen right?
thats what she thought, but around her 16/17th birthday, she started to hear her father’s voice in her head. beckoning for her to join him in his twisted plans. she did the only thing she could think to do, she ran to earth. that turned out to be the best thing she could have done for herself. it was there that she met the other people she would consider to be her family. even if she would never actually admit that upfront. still, they did more for her than her family ever could.
it was great! they called themselves the teen titans, pretty cool name right? they seemed to think so. but as she grew older, her father’s voice came back. and it wasn’t as quiet as it was last time. it was taunting her, waiting for her to break down and join him. and she didn’t want to do that, she wouldn’t do that. she had friends, a family, she couldn’t do that to them. she didn’t want to leave them either. but as he got more persistent, the more rachel shut down. much to the confusion of her teammates.
it wasn’t long before he got to her, not directly, but he found a way. on a mission, right around the time of her birthday, he got her back to where her destiny was to be fulfilled. and she couldn’t escape it, but to prevent the inevitable from getting to them. letting the apocalypse caused by her father, and even her, from hurting them.
that was the last thing she remembered about jump city, even if all of those memories were now hazy to begin with. the apocalypse never happened and she was there, with a new crowd of super heroes to save the day. at least she won, right? her time was now spent working on her powers at the strange institute and continuing to use them for good or at least attempt to do so.
from a young age, natasha’s potential was seen before she even learned how to walk. unfortunately, it was the wrong type of people who saw her potential and took her from her mother’s arms prematurely. she was always under the impression that her mother had abandoned her, that she was garbage tossed to the side. but she would later learn that she was instead taken from her home, against her mother’s protests. and her mother had been killed to it.
as an infant, natasha was raised in the red room, a place where killers and spies are made. it was the only life that she ever knew, it was what she grew up. she didn’t know anything else, so she was forced to live this life. she was put through intense conditioning and training both mentally and physically. sometimes when she closes her eyes, the red room is the only thing that she sees. those images don’t leave one’s mind so easily.
but then she was sent on an undercover mission with another widw and two older agents, one former widow and the red guardian. of course, she didn’t know that at the time. she just knew them as mom and dad and her younger sister. although she knew it was fake, natasha wanted to cling onto that life for as long as she could. they finally got to live normally, to be with other people and she could finally be a kid for once.
however, as two years passed by, the mission was complete and the two were sent back to the red room. natasha didn’t want to go back, she wanted to protect her younger sister from going there too. but it was clear there was no way out.
many years after that, it was time for her last step to becoming a widow. official and on the field and natasha passed with flying colors, even if she did try to make herself seem not worthy of the title. like she couldn’t do it. but the others say right through her and forced to overcome it and show her true potential. she hoped that they would’ve gotten rid of her for trying to do that, but they never did. she was far too valuable for that.
she had been working with the widows for a. few years when an opportunity arose. there was a way out and natasha could see a light at the end of the tunnel. she was given a chance to join shield, to be something more than the trained assasin they made her out to be. but there was a catch, she had to take down the red room once and for all.
she did that, but it wasn’t without any emotional distress. she got dreykov and the rest was history right? she was finally free, the red room was gone. at least that’s what she had thought.
she spent the next few years polishing her appearance and identity. she put the red room behind her and became a new person entirely. she could actually make a change now, she could do something good! and natasha did just that, becoming an avenger and saving the world more than once. she was a hero, right?
until she wasn’t. she had been on the run after the accords, betraying part of her family in favor of the other side and becoming a fugitive. who would’ve guessed that? and then she ran into a blast from her past, her younger sister. still having been put through the red room, because it was never shut down. it was still active and it was her job to shut it back down. with the help of her family, which she never reallly had given herself a chance to call them such. they weren’t just the mission anymore, they were real. they were the most real family that she had other than the avengers. not bad for a trained assassin right ?
but that success and good news didn’t last her long, as she had to face yet another threat to the earth. only this time, they didn’t win. they lost, big time. half of the universe was snapped away and natasha couldn’t save them this time.
the final five years passed and there was a solution to undo the snap. they had to recollect the infinity stones, but there was one final obstacle they had to face. vormir, to get the soul stone. natasha sacrificed herself, it was the least that she could do. this was her final chance to make up for everything she did in her life, to save the world. and even though she never got to see how the snap turned out, she really hoped that they won.
now, natasha is back in new york like none of that ever happened! it all felt like the worst nightmare, one that she kept returning to. but if all was normal again, who was she to think twice about it? even if there was a voice in the back of her head telling her that something wasn’t right.
may grew up wanting to see the world and help it all in the same lifetime. that seemed like a simple enough task right? her desires to travel mostly stemmed for her questionable life growing up, but you live and learn right? as soon as may graduated high school, she was out of the door and onto college.
she studied a lot of things, jumping from major to major. people called her indecisive, but she would call it wanting to get the best bang for her buck. the idea of majors were a bit pointless to her, why should someone put themselves in a box like that? it was that time that she met ben parker, the man who was going to change everything for her in more ways than one.
it was love at first sight, the two were seemingly meant to be together. they had the same passions, the same mentality and they were nowhere near settling down. they were in the prime of their lives, as they would always tell themselves. and all of that was great, until they received a phone call that was going to change their lives forever.
ben’s brother and sister in law had passed away, leaving behind their nephew peter. confused, lonely among many things she could only guess. sure, it wasn’t apart of her plan but she was willing to adjust. she didn’t know the first thing about being a parent, especially to a child whose parents both just passed! it was daunting, but she had ben to help them through it. he was her rock, she knew that they couldn’t have made it through that time without him there.
things went great after that, the three of them becoming a family. to the point where may would even consider peter to be her own son rather than her nephew. it also helped that he was a pretty amazing kid to boot. but soon, their fairytale ending was coming to a drastic halt, as they received news that would shake things up forever.
ben had passed, it took her a few times to hear it to actually process that he was gone. she felt like a part of her had been taken away, and she didn’t know how to go on without him. but then she looked at peter, peter who only had may now. and she knew that she had to be there for him, she had to step it up. she was going to be the best damn aunt that anyone has ever seen. for ben but most importantly - for peter.
born to a picture perfect family, kate had never known how cruel the world could be. even when her father had passed away, he had been replaced with an even better father in kate’s opinion. of course, it also helped that she was fairly young when she lost her biological father. then, her father rod came into the picture, and he was the best thing that ever happened to their family.
the wallis family was the talk of the town, they were the picture perfect family with a daughter that everyone wanted their own children to be like. she was the blueprint of the skylin hierarchy without ever really realizing it. she had the perfect parents who were madly in love, a group of friends who adored her and a boyfriend who adored her even more than that somehow. and she was fine to live her life like that, until the summer of 1993 when everything changed.
at the center of this story was a scandal of infidelity that could not only ruin her family’s reputation but her family as she once knew it to be. of course, even after she had tried to confront those issues, her mother quickly shot them down. this led to their first fight of many that summer, some of which would have lasting impact on the wallis family. she was finally starting to see the world for what it was and it looked a lot more bleak than she even realized it could be.
the light at the end of the tunnel for her was martin harris, a newcomer to the town. at least, that’s what she thought it was at the time. he was the assistant principal who started up a friendship with kate, earned her trust when she was at her most vulnerable moments. he encouraged her to confront her family about the glaring issue of infidelity and that one night was more damning than anyone could ever imagine.
it ended with her mother, in a rage, slapping her daughter across the face and kate, in turn, running away from home. with nowhere else to turn to, after having seen the world for what it truly was, she turned to the only person she felt she could trust. martin harris. what sparked from that night was a relationship that should have never happened and turned into something far more sinister.
she fell for the man and he in turn fell for her but there was a glaring issue - the very obvious power dynamic and the subtle hints of grooming that had been sprinkled in over the course of that summer. now, he was the only one she trusted and he had used that to his advantage. since the moment she walked into that door, this started a relationship for a few months. she was never allowed to leave the house and at a certain point, she realized that she had to choose martin or the real world. she chose martin but as the days went by, she started to regret that very decision.
it didn’t dawn upon her the desperation she had to speak with another person until christmas time. she felt so lonely and she missed her family and friends dearly so she left one night to see them. she never stepped foot into the house and no one had spotted her. but martin did and he confronted her about it the next day.
what came next was a fight and kate admitting she wanted to leave martin’s house and go home, to her old home. he agreed and told her where she could find her suitcase. little to kate known though, martin wasn’t going to let her leave the house and locked her in the basement. he had too much at stake to let her leave his house. it was in this moment that it was clear this wasn’t love but it was something so much more sickening.
she was kept in that basement until the beginning of summer in ‘94. her freedom didn’t come until the police had started to catch onto what was happening and martin came downstairs to take care of everything once and for all. he had pulled out a gun, intent to use it on himself after declaring his love for kate one last time. however, he couldn’t go through with it and dropped the gun right in front of kate. desperate with no glimpse of hope or a light at the end of the tunnel, she shot martin. but she couldn’t find it in herself to leave him like that all alone so she sat with him, watching him bleed out.
within the next day, kate was found and the story that she portrayed had been fixed. some of that was to save face but most of it was the trauma that she endured while she had been locked away. this whole moment left her realizing that this world is cruel and brutal, in a way that her parents had refused to acknowledge until it was too late. this led to a total change in her demeanor. she switched out her flowery and light wardrobe for flannels and fishnets. this was her real world now, even now that she’s a few years removed from skylin. nothing has ever been the same for kate and what’s been broken cannot be fixed again.
this in turn has left her a bit more standoffish, hesitant to make connections. she can’t quite put her finger on it, since skylin is just a haze to her the more time she spends in new york. but there’s a sick feeling she gets in her stomach at the mention, shemaybe it’s for the best that it was left in the past.
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