"Where were we? Right. My origin story. The one the TVA files don't have."

  I leaned against the counter, looking directly at the space above the toaster.

  "I wasn't born on Earth-199999. I was born on Earth-199998. A variant timeline."

  I closed my eyes for a second, letting the smell of the cooking eggs ground me, though it paled in comparison to the paprika of my dream.

  "When I transmigrated, I was just a squalling infant. My adult mind... it would have fried a baby’s brain. So, my subconscious did something smart. It sealed away the memories of my past life. I grew up thinking I was just Aryan Spencer, born to a wealthy Sokovian family."

  I plated the eggs and carried them to the small dining table. I sat down, gesturing to the empty chair opposite me. "Pull up a seat. Don't worry, I didn't poison it."

  I took a bite. It needed salt. It always needed salt.

  "My parents in this life... they were good people. My father was in arms manufacturing… not the Tony Stark kind, more the 'small arms for local defense' kind. But Sokovia... Sokovia was a place that chewed people up."

  I chewed slowly, the taste of the eggs barely registering as the memories of my second childhood washed over me.

  "They died when I was ten. Collateral damage in a conflict that didn't even make the history books. I inherited the money, the big house on the hill and a crushing sense of silence."

  I put the fork down.

  "That silence lasted until I was sixteen. That’s when I met them."

  [Flashback]

  Sokovia, Earth 199998, 2010

  The rain in Sokovia was different from the rain in New Jersey. It felt like the sky was trying to wash the gray off the buildings and failing.

  I was walking home from the private school I attended. I had a driver… but I hated the isolation of the tinted windows. I preferred the open air. It made me feel alive.

  I turned the corner onto a street that had seen better days. Bomb craters from the '90s had been filled in with gravel, but the scars remained on the buildings. That’s when I saw them.

  They were huddled under the awning of a bakery that had been closed for months. Two of them.

  I stopped. My heart did an acrobatic flip in my chest. Even with my memories sealed, even without knowing their names or their destiny, my soul recognized them. It was a gravitational pull.

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  The silver-haired boy with a sharp jaw stepped in front of the girl immediately. His eyes darted around like a trapped animal. He was wearing a track suit that had seen too many washes, shivering but trying to look tough.

  "What do you want?" he snapped. His voice hovered between adolescence and manhood.

  And behind him... her.

  Wanda Maximoff.

  She looked up. Her eyes were rimmed with red. She looked like she was waiting for the world to kick her again. She was clutching a worn out scarf, her knuckles white.

  I stood there, a sixteen year old boy in a tailored school uniform, holding an umbrella that cost more than their clothes combined. I should have walked away. That’s what people in my social circle did. We didn't look at the 'street rats.'

  "You're cold," I said. It was a stupid thing to say. Of course they were cold.

  "Go away, rich boy," the boy spat, though his teeth chattered, ruining the effect.

  "I have a house," I said, the words tumbling out before I could filter them. "It's big. Too big. And it has heat. And food."

  The boy narrowed his eyes. "We don't need your charity."

  "Pietro," the girl whispered.

  It was the first time I heard her voice. She stepped out from behind him. She looked at me, really looked at me and I felt exposed. Like she could see the loneliness I carried around like a heavy backpack.

  "Why?" she asked. Just one word.

  I didn't know why. I didn't know that in another life, I had idolized her. I didn't know she was a nexus being. I just knew that leaving her in the rain felt like a crime against nature.

  "Because," I said, stepping forward and holding out the umbrella so it covered them, leaving me exposed to the downpour. The icy water soaked my blazer instantly, but I didn't care. "Because nobody should be cold."

  Pietro looked at the umbrella, then at me, then at his sister. His bravado crumbled into exhaustion.

  That night, they came home with me.

  [Back to reality]

  "Pietro was a pain in the ass," I said, chuckling softly as I picked up a piece of bacon. "Always eating my food. He ate like a metabolism on overdrive even before the experiments… well, in that universe, there were no experiments. But he ate like there was no tomorrow."

  I pointed the fork at the audience.

  "That’s the key difference, you see. In Earth 199998, Hydra never got them. The bombings happened, their parents died, but they slipped through the cracks. They never went to Strucker. They never got the Mind Stone. They were just... normal humans."

  I smiled, a warm expression that felt foreign on my face these days.

  "And they were my family."

  I took a sip of orange juice.

  "Living with them was... chaotic. Pietro was the protective brother who didn't trust me for six months. He thought I was grooming them or something. I had to sleep with my door locked because I was pretty sure he’d try to smother me with a pillow if I looked at Wanda the wrong way."

  "But Wanda..." My voice softened.

  "She was quiet at first. She had nightmares. Screaming nightmares. The kind that wakes up the whole house."

  [Flashback]

  The Spencer Estate, Sokovia, 2012

  It was 3:00 AM. The scream tore through the hallway, echoing off the high ceilings.

  I was out of bed before I was fully awake. I ran down the hall, skidding on the polished floor in my socks. Pietro was already there, banging on her door, but it was locked.

  "Wanda! Wanda, open up!" he was shouting, panic making his voice shrill.

  "Move," I said, pushing him aside. I jammed the master key into the lock and twisted.

  The door swung open.

  She was thrashing on the bed, tangled in the sheets. "No! No, the shell! Wait! Momma!"

  She was sobbing in her sleep, tears streaming down her face.

  Pietro rushed to her side, shaking her shoulders. "Wanda! Wake up! It’s a dream!"

  But she wasn't waking up. She was trapped in it.

  I approached the bed slowly. My heart was breaking. I sat on the edge of the mattress.

  "Wanda," I said. I used the voice I’d used when I found a wounded bird in the garden once. "Wanda, listen to my voice. You're safe. You are in the Spencer house. There are no bombs here."

  Pietro looked at me, surprised by the tone.