“Home safe, Kate Bishop.”
So back in Chapter 3 of @the0fi’s lovely Kate Bishop/Yelena Belova fic Red Post-Its (which I read because 1) they’re a fantastic writer and 2) they said you could see a bit of Hosie in there, and, yeah, as promised 👍) there’s a scene involving Kate, Kamala, and Yelena, where Kate hopes certain events don’t end up in one of Kamala’s fanfics. And, well, we never got to see if they did (which I suppose means they didn’t), but my mind wouldn’t let go (never mind I’ve only seen one of these characters!). So a few days ago it gave birth to a tiny little fanfic for another fanfic involving writing fanfic! Fics all the way down! Ficception!
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“Home safe, Kate Bishop.”
“Home safe, Kate Bishop.”
“Home safe, Kate Bishop.”
“Home safe, Kate Bishop.”
Kamala Khan played those words over and over on her own journey home. She and Kate had planted a trap for a bunch of thugs in a warehouse, and things didn’t go quite according to plan. Nothing they couldn’t handle, really, but a Mysterious Stranger suddenly appeared and provided an unexpected assist…beat the crap out of all of the thugs near Kate. (Well, all but one, who’d managed to knock Kate to the ground.) And then the stranger helped Kate up and uttered those four words before disappearing into the night. “Home safe, Kate Bishop.”
The voice was steady, belying any emotion, but there was something about it…the tone? the cadence?…that made Kamala sure there was more to it. It was accented, Slavic…probably Russian, maybe from Brighton Beach? And definitely female.
Kate had never mentioned a partner. Or a trained friend, for that matter…besides Clint. And this Mysterious Stranger…Mysterious Friend…was definitely too professional to be one of the LARPers. Was she a spy? The newest Marvel’s mind continued to spin, considering the possibilities…this was even better than her fanfiction!
There was definitely an undercurrent of not just concern, but tenderness, in the woman’s voice, Kamala was sure of it. Maybe it was a gut feeling? But she knew she wasn’t imagining it, playing those sounds over in her head again.
When she’d asked Kate, “Who was that?!” the CEO-by-day, Hawkeye-by-night had answered “A friend,” but the smile that took over her face told a different story.
Was Mysterious Friend Kate’s…girlfriend?
Kate’s girlfriend, an international agent, a foreign spy?
That would be one reason for Kate never to mention the woman to Kamala. Not that she thought Kate was doing anything wrong; she was sure the new Hawkeye had thoroughly vetted Mysterious Friend. And not that Kate was in any way obligated to reveal her private personal life, either; they were teammates, not sisters.
The Pakistani-American teen’s imagination began to run wild. Maybe the two met when Mysterious Friend dropped in to help Kate in a fight in a warehouse, not unlike tonight. Ever since then, they’d been passing each other in the city in the way that only spies do. Secret rendezvous in coffee shops, where they stole longing glances at each other across the room, leaving love letters taped to the undersides of their respective tables. Passing each other on the subway, pressed against the windows, cars going in opposite directions. Perhaps one time they both found themselves in a crowded elevator, slowly moving towards each other as the occupants got in and out on various floors; eventually, they were pushed together, shoulder-to-shoulder, in the back, the tips of their fingers touching. And watching over Kate, silently, in the shadows, as she patrolled, perhaps taking out unseen threats to her girlfriend with a thrown knife, never making her presence known. Except Kate would know. She would feel Mysterious Friend’s love radiating through the city, helping to keep her safe.
When she arrived home, Kamala rushed to her room and opened her laptop, starting a new fic. This was too good not to write. She began to type.
“Home safe, Kate Bishop.” Hawkeye had just taken out a nest of petty crooks when a knife-throwing mysterious stranger had emerged from the darkness. The only prior indication of the stranger’s presence had come moments before, when the glint of steel in the moonlight caught a knife in mid-air, a knife that had then embedded itself in the right gastrocnemius of one final crook. He was either trying to escape or to get the jump on the dark-haired heroine, whose back was to the man. Whichever was the case, it didn’t matter to the stranger. Kate Bishop whirled around upon hearing the crook scream in agony and then crumple to the ground. She had an arrow nocked, drawn, and aimed in the direction from which the knife had come, even though she had neither seen nor heard it. When Hawkeye caught sight of the stealth suit emerging from the darkness, she lowered her weapon—and an enormous smile spread across her face. “Thanks,” she greeted the mystery figure softly, the smile being joined by a blush spreading across her cheeks. If the Mysterious Stranger had acknowledged the gratitude, it was imperceptible. The figure then spoke a single line of heavily-accented English, “Home safe, Kate Bishop.” She—for there was no doubt the voice was feminine—then melted back into the shadows whence she had come, leaving Kate Bishop alone with the neutralized crooks. Kate Bishop whose face was hot, red, and giddy. Kate Bishop whose heart was beating rapidly, but not from adrenaline nor from danger. Kate Bishop, whose fingers traced her lips as she remembered the feeling of another set of lips pressed against them. Kate Bishop who, in that moment, was no longer a deadly archer, but instead a besotted schoolgirl. “Home safe, Kate Bishop.” The words echoed in her head as she restrained the incapacitated crooks for the authorities. “Home safe, Kate Bishop.” They followed along with her as she moved through the city. “Home safe, Kate Bishop.” They were not a request nor an order. “Home safe, Kate Bishop.” They were a promise. “Home safe, Kate Bishop.”
FIN
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No idea what Kamala’s fics might be like, or what her internal monologue might sound like, or, well, anything 😳 But this idea was too good not to write, and that line, those four words, wouldn’t leave my head, so here we are. Enjoy, I hope?
(Now also on AO3.)