Between Time- MCU

The sky is streaked with orange and gray as the sun sinks between the high-rises. Wind kicks up trash in the alley behind the diner.

Alex stands alone, just around the corner from where she left Clint finishing his sandwich.

The comm still sits in her pocket. She hasn't thrown it out. That should mean something. But she doesn't know what yet.

She breathes in deep, the sharp bite of cold air grounding her. Then she turns her hood up, slings her bag over her shoulder, and walks.

No destination.

No map.

Just motion.

That's always been her constant, keep moving. If you stop, you get noticed. If you get noticed, you get hurt. Or worse, you start to hope.

She weaves through the crowd, her shoulders hunched, every step echoing with Clint's words.

"You don't have to stay. But running from everyone who gives a damn about you? That gets old fast."

She hates how much it sticks with her.

She finds an abandoned subway entrance, one of the sealed-off ones people forgot existed. She pries open the rusted gate with effort, slipping into the darkness like it's an old habit. The stale air, the creaking echoes, it all feels weirdly comforting.

She settles down in a corner behind a broken vending machine, her bag acting as a pillow.

She finally pulls the comm out of her pocket. Her thumb brushes the surface. The little blinking light still pulses, waiting.

"I'm not ready," she whispers to it. "Not yet."

She tucks it away again.

And then she does something she hasn't done in months, maybe longer.

She closes her eyes and lets herself remember.

Her parents' laughter. Her mother's humming in the kitchen. Her dad's old radio playing Fleetwood Mac. Her father's arms lifting her off the ground when she got scared. The warmth of their old apartment, messy, loud, full of love.

Then the gun. The screaming. The smell of burning metal. The moment time stopped for the first time and she didn't know how she'd done it, only that it wasn't enough.

A tear slips down her cheek.

She doesn't wipe it away.

Because tonight, for the first time, she isn't running from something.

She's running toward something she doesn't understand yet.

And maybe... just maybe... she'll figure out what that is.