Archive of Our Own ^beta

Nobody knows what Dimitri can do.  Only Nick Fury knows where Dimitri is really from – the true Nick Fury, not this shapeshifter who keeps giving the game away in the little details.  “Don’t invoke her name,” really!  Dimitri is amazed the kid didn’t pick up on that.  But while the kid seems ... well-intentioned, he’s not exactly clued in to everything around him, though that’s supposedly one of his big deals.  He only catches the tall girl staring at him one time out of twenty, although to be fair she’s what passes for less obvious among these loud American teenagers.

Perhaps the kid is actually playing some deep and subtle game, masking far greater competence. Was he trying to be seen saving them all from the drone attack, while hiding that the drone flew on his orders?  Targeting someone else entirely, using Brad as a distraction?  But who — oh.  Flash.  Obviously.  Huh.  Kid should’ve asked, Dimitri would’ve helped with that one.  The few minutes Flash was knocked out were Dimitri’s only interlude of peace on that whole drive, even if some of it was spent madly careening around on the road avoiding the killer drone and the drop-off while everybody else screamed.  Maybe he should take the kid aside and show him how “grabbing someone’s glasses” should really be done for maximum effect.

No.  No, the kid is merely a typical adolescent of his kind – powerful, but with appallingly rudimentary skill at dissembling and misdirection.  (“Look at the baby mountain goats”?  Really?  Give him credit for knowing his audience, at least.  Only the tall girl had kept her attention on him.)  He needs guidance.  Perhaps they could reach a profitable understanding.  The kid couldn’t lurk, loom or intimidate if his life depended on it, and Dimitri is willing to bet these are only the most obvious of the skills he has and the kid does not.

Enough!  Classify the kid as “provisionally harmless except accidentally, bears watching” and move on to the main problem: when will he next speak, and what will he say?

Nobody knows what Dimitri can do.  Not even Nick Fury.  Fury thinks he does, of course; Fury always thinks he knows.  But all he’s seen is what happened the last time Dimitri spoke too much.  He’s never understood that speaking too little is equally dire.  This suits Dimitri fine; a reputation for silence makes it easier all around.  He can choose his times, speak to an empty room if that’s better when the moment comes, not have to explain himself.  (It would be difficult to explain why “Petrol and toilets, ten minutes!” – not one syllable more nor less, not one moment earlier nor later – had been so necessary.  That one had, frankly, been a masterpiece: plausible in context, even relevant and useful to his current charges, and therefore unremarked and unquestioned by any of them.  Even the kid.  Super-awareness, ha!  Dimitri had touched him and he hadn’t noticed anything amiss.  Dimitri would have smiled darkly at that, if he’d been inclined to allow any expression to cross his face.)

(Another time it had been “Oh, speak again, bright angel!” to an extremely nonplussed convenience store clerk at 2:31 a.m. in Snowflake, Arizona.  Who hadn’t said anything to him in the first place.  That one had been more awkward.  Dimitri had glared, handed over exact change, grabbed his ridiculously oversized plastic soda cup and stalked out.)

Dimitri will never explain this to anyone else, but he’s unsure to what extent he chooses the words and their time and to what extent they choose him.  He has to be ready, but the years of preparation are behind him.  He is ready, always.  The words are there.  He just has to be there, too, exactly when and where they need him to be.

He waits, slightly wistful.  “Oh, speak again, bright angel!” has had its moment and will never return.