If I hear one more—

"But I want Burger King!"

"Look firecracker, obviously KFC is the way to go. Anyway, Burger King is like a wannabe McDonalds."

"Is not, you overgrown ferret."

"A ferret is not a wolverine."

"They're both stupid animals anyway."

"You're arguing like a kid."

"Am not!"

"Are too!"

I am surrounded by children. Two overgrown, not bad looking, hairy children.

"BOYS! If you do not stop arguing I will turn this car around!"

Silence.

"Yes ma'am."

Grinning at my obvious superiority in the car, I bob my head to the song on the radio, trying to ease my anger before I have the urge to throw one of them from the car into traffic.

When you see my face
Hope it gives you hell
Hope it gives you hell

When you walk my way
Hope it gives you hell
Hope it gives you hell

Now where's your picket fence love
And where's that shiny car
And did it ever get you far

You've never seem so tense love
I've never seen you fall so hard
Do you know where you are—

"He probably doesn't know where he is. He's that drunk," Johnny decides to speak up, and instantly, Logan and I know who he's talking about.

"He can't get drunk," I state as if it were the most obvious thing on the planet.

And truth be told I miss you—

"Oh she misses him," Johnny comments once more, an irritable smirk painted on his features.

And truth be told I'm lying—

"Oh," Match stick pouts, sheepishly placing a hand to the back of his neck and rubbing it in embarrassment.

"Yeah okay, lunch break. We've been driving for... six hours?" I announce, turning to Logan towards the end for an answer to my question. He shrugs, muttering something along the lines of "Feels like six weeks next to him."

Pulling the car up to McDonalds – my choice – you can imagine how cool I looked walking into the joint with Wolverine on my right side and the Human Torch on my left. Then, something occurred to me.

"Uh guys...."

"Yeah?" they reply in unison, the action surprisingly comical.

"People are taking our photo...."

"We're famous, it's a perk," Johnny smirks, seductively winking at one of the girls who are suggestively batting her eyelashes at him.

"No, not when you're a criminal fugitive wanted by every single government agency in America!" I hiss at him, to which his eyes glaze over as if the revelation just hit him.

"Oh sh—"

"Hi, can I take your order?"

The three of us shoot our gaze to the cashier, and almost immediately, her eyes widen to the size of bowling balls. "You-You're—"

"Human Torch, Wolverine and Nightingale. We know. Now I'll have a large Quarter pounder meal with a Pepsi, the ferret will have large Grand Angus meal with a Coco Cola annnddd Snowflake will have a large Big Mac meal with.... What drink do you want?"

Shooting Johnny an incredulous and practically fuming look, I manage to grit "Frozen. Fanta."

Johnny turns to wink at the cashier. "Frozen Fanta."

"Th-That'll be $17.50," the poor woman stutters, her eyes still resembling those of a Disney character and not veering from my apparently intimidating figure. She didn't even swoon when Johnny winked at her, which is presumably the reason behind his sudden mood drop.

"I'll pay," Logan gruffly chimes in, fishing out his wallet but I place my hand on his own softly to prevent him from doing so. Flashing him a warm and appreciative grin, I say "No it's fine. I worked how many missions and tasks that gave me enough money to last the rest of my life. Well, to last Ally and I the rest of our lives, so now I have more. Too much. I don't know how Stark deals with it. Here you go Miss," I turn to the still stunned McDonald's employee who looks at the money I hand out to her frightened, as if I will legitimately bite her hand off if she takes it.

"Just because I'm an assassin, doesn't mean I'll kill you," I try to assure, yet my attempts are to no avail, if anything, the reminder of me being an assassin seems to have petrified her more. Having been fed up with extending the money, I place it down on the counter and mutter "Keep the change," as I drag Johnny and Logan to a booth while we wait.

"Won't the—" Logan begins, only to be intervened by me.

"—the police be here soon? They will be here in approximately," I check my watch "twenty five minutes and thirty eight seconds. Traffic may stall them a little longer as well. This town is remote, and very low in criminal activity. The closest police station is half an hour to forty minutes away." I begin to drum my fingers on the desk, my eyes scanning the on looking civilians who quickly divert their gaze to their meals when I catch them observing. All but one female with what appears to be unruly curly shoulder length dyed black hair with white streaks running through, tattoos scattered along the majority of her skin and striking blue eyes.

I somewhat notice Logan and Johnny bickering in the booth facing me but I continue to have a stare off with the woman, who isn't staring me down in some judgmental or nasty way, but in a curious almost admirable way. Offering her an amicable smile, I stand up, ignoring the befuddled glances from the boys who almost immediately return to their quarrel once I've left, and take a seat in the comfy booth facing the mysterious woman.

"Hey," I start off, to which she grins affably.

"Hi. Lillian Nightshade right?"

My chuckle is of a weary one. "News reporters and paparazzi have no life outside of stalking the famous. That means assassins too."

Her lip twitches. "I've managed to avoid it somewhat well."

I quirk an eyebrow. "You....?"

"Name's Jade Leiton. My enemies know me as Viper. It's my assassin stage name or alias if you want. So, you're really Nightingale? I've heard all about you." As she eases back into the booth, her clearly professional gaze gives me a once over as she idly slurps on her drink in hand.

"All bad I presume," I lightly jeer, almost feeling as if I'm staring into a mirror. Professional assassin, I can gather that easy, but her eyes hold a broken soul. My guess, she went through an emotional trauma. Her eyes resemble my own in a way, so I presume a traumatizing childhood. Those are always fun.

A dry chuckle rolls off her tongue. "Some bad. Some good. Others don't understand us though... do they Lillian? They don't know why we do the things we do. After everything we've endured, we could have come out a lot worse. They should be happy we're not psychopaths."

I crack a knuckle distractedly. "More along the lines of high functioning sociopaths, wouldn't you agree?"

"Immensely. I don't know what you went through exactly, but by the look in your eyes, it was no walk in the park."

"Not many people can read eyes so well, especially when the owner of said eyes knows how to mask them. I've only run into another two people like you before, one only a day or two ago." My fingers begin to drum to a rhythmic beat on the greasy table again.

"I'm guessing the other is Natasha Romanoff?"

I nod. "We're closer than she knows. Her memory is just a bit jumbled. She doesn't remember much of when we actually first met."

Her eyebrow twitches up. "Oh? And when was that?"

I bite my lip cheekily. "Budapest."

Curiosity flashes in her eyes. "I've heard vaguely about that. She hasn't told me much, just that she never wants to talk about it again. Same as Big Bird."

I chuckle airily. "You mean Clint?"

"Yeah but Big Bird is better. Anyway, I couldn't help but notice your two amigos over there. Since when did Nightingale team up with Human Torch and Wolverine?"

I nonchalantly shrug. "This morning. I found Johnny hammered in a bar, participating a bar fight. One which Logan and I had to finish. I felt like breaking his nose again for getting into such a stupid quarrel."

"Again?" she chimes, amusement dancing in her eyes.

"First time I broke it was almost a year ago, when I first met him properly. The first time I did meet him I was in the character of a pizza woman,  one which he happened to hit on with cheesy pickup lines."

"Was that a pun?" She laughs, evidently talking about the 'pizza woman' and 'cheesy pickup lines'.

"Not an intentional one but yeah. Anyway, when I did break his nose, it was actually in a McDonald's in Seattle. I was trying to get around him in the booth but he pulled me down on top of him to the point where I was straddling him. So... I broke his nose." I laugh along with her as the two of us obtain a couple glances our way, purposely being oblivious to them.

"To be fair though, I also broke Steve's nose. Then later on he shot me with an arrow, so I pulled the trigger and shot him in the lower abdomen. Lucky us then became prisoners of HYDRA for a while, we got out though obviously." At the mention of HYDRA, her breath slightly hitches, and I have a strong feeling she's had a bad encounter with them in the past.

"Childhood HYDRA problems?" I attempt, to which she faintly nods and incoherently mumbles "Something like that."

"Well, HYDRA has been a royal pain in the ass. I worked for them for a while, but their goal is sooooo 1940. Not to mention their methods are unorthodox. They just bloody well kill anyone in their way of world domination. World domination though? Seriously? That's boring and mainstream." My light-hearted jest earns me an exhausted chuckle from Jade, her eyes flickering around the restaurant.

"Did you know the first time I heard about you was from a good friend of mine? You know her," Jade abruptly changes subject, her remarkably striking blue eyes surprising me as they fixate on my own amber brown ones.

"I don't have many friends. Most are either trying to hunt me down or are dead," I deadpan, stopping the drumming of my fingers on the table.

"She's a very old friend. You haven't seen her in a good while from the sounds of it. Rebecca Silver?"

"I believe it's Rebecca Banner now," I correct, becoming even more comfortable with the woman knowing that Becca trusts her enough to tell her about me. Becca... God I haven't seen her in a few years. Doesn't mean I don't check up on how she's doing from afar every once in a while, and by afar I mean on my laptop in bed at 2:00am in the morning after watching a Sherlock marathon and eating a few tubs of ice cream.

"Indeed it is. Alternate universes... funny things aren't they?" Jade muses, slurping down the last of her icy beverage and slamming it on the table.

"I assume you're from one?"

"Of course," she beams. You see, for those of you who don't know, there are many alternate universes out there, each one having the same people but with different names, different jobs, different everything really. Some are quite similar, some are not. Jade's is evidently a similar alternate universe, considering she knows Black Widow and Captain America, but who knows, in other alternate universe we may just be stories, comics, fanfiction, movies, maybe even actors for movies of our actual characters. Who knows?

"Becca's alternate universe is changing, so is she. That's for later though. You should probably head off; you have approximately," she checks her watch in an identical manner as I did beforehand "seven minutes and twelve seconds before police get here. Your friends have your food."

We rise from the booths at the same time, an almost telepathic and mutual understanding between one another; it truly does feel as if I'm staring into a mirror. "It was a pleasure meeting you Jade Leiton," I depart, extending a hand.

For a few brief moments, she stares down at it, then she accepts it happily. "The pleasure was mine Lillian Nightshade. I wish you the best of luck."

"Right back at you," I reply. I observe at her retreating figure, how she holds herself with such authority, superiority, elegance and grace. All that though covers a broken and shattered soul. I hope she's treated right now in her universe.

"We better blow this popsicle stand before another fat chick asks for a boob signing," Johnny pops up beside me, and I slap him directly in the arm which holds my food before snatching it from his grasp.

"Ow! What was that for?"

"Don't call people fat. Some are just larger than others. Nothing wrong with that," I scold, striding from the place as more photos are taken. Before I exit though, I hear Logan chuckling and saying "I would pay to see the look on your face just then all over again."

******

"Where the hell are we?" I inquire, pulling the car over to glance at Johnny who has been holding the dagger for the whole trip. He shrugs innocently, pointing to the dagger and admitting "I just told you the directions using this thing. Every time you took a right turn, it would glow a brighter blue."

Logan dramatically sighs, followed by unsatisfactory grunt "I know where we are."

"Where?" Johnny and I ask in unison.

He clicks his tongue. "Concord, California. And we are directly outside Concord's 2015 comic convention."

My eyebrows rise to my hairline in disbelief. "Comic convention? That's not Steve Rogers."

That's when an awkward cough comes from Johnny's position. Oh... oh no he didn't. "Flame brain...." I begin low, the tone of my voice practically saying you-know-something-about-why-we're-here-tell-me-now-match-stick.

"The dagger tells you where you want to go most right?" He begins vigilantly, his voice abnormally high. Catching on to what he inferring, I groan aggrevatedly. "And where you wanted to go most was the Concord comic convention?!?!"

He wags his finger. "To be precise, I just wanted to go to the next comic convention. Not necessarily Concord."

"I should be wearing a t-shirt that points to my right and says 'I'm with stupid'," Logan says, jabbing his finger to his right where Johnny is sitting beside him in the back of the car.

"And I should we wearing a t-shirt with scar from Lion king quoting 'I'm surrounded by idiots'," I mumble to myself as the two of them begin to bicker once more.

After a good the minutes of it, I exclaim "HEY!"

Silence.

"Let's just go to the damn comic convention so Johnny doesn't have the urge to do so again, and then we'll get back on with our search. Capiche?" I sternly order, feeling more like a mother than a 24 year old assassin.

Johnny fist pumps the air in excitement, his ecstatic figure hurdling itself out of the car and sprinting towards the building. "How will we even get entry?" Logan asks, to which I answer "You're Wolverine. He's the Human Torch. You two will be fine with getting in. I just got to squeeze in through the air vents or something."

Which I did. Which took a good fifteen minutes of my life which I shall never get back.

Once I got in though, I made a beeline for the comics, not bothering to find out where Johnny or Logan are. They're big boys, and Johnny's like a kid in candy land at the moment. A big boy... like a kid in candy land... well that didn't make sense.

Flicking through the comics, I stop in my tracks when I find something that sends a wave of shock through me. Snatching the comic book from the stand, I read 'Nightingale, edition #26'.

What. The. Fu—

Some moron shoves into my shoulder, inducing me to drop the mind blowing comic to the floor. "Hey! Watch where you're going you—"

I freeze. Again.

And here, my dear readers and friends, comes such a cliché moment that even I, Lillian Veronica Nightshade did not fathom such an absurdity to occur. In fact, I am literally fuming. Fire is licking up my arms and steam rising from my face.

"Steven Grant Rogers you are so dead."

Yeah yeah he's back, woopdidoo! Now are ya'll happy?

I just didn't want to go with the typical 'Steve?' at the end there so I had a more Lillian Nightshade approach.

Btw, I do not own the character Jade Leiton. She belongs to @purpleshadow14 in her book 'Viper: Enemy of Shield' which I personally love so if you haven't read it, I would make a beeline for the book right now.

Picture of Simon Zackery's new actor to the side. Very badly edited as well..... sorry 'bout that....

Thanks for reading and that's all for now, Bye! :) xxx