You sat on the floor of your bedroom with your knees pulled into your chest. Your head rested on your knees as the tears fell from your eyes. The team had just returned from a mission gone wrong. Horribly wrong. While Steve, Natasha and Clint were charged with dispatching HYDRA agents, your job was to free the people that HYDRA had kidnapped for experiments. The Maximoff twins were there to help you. Everything had gone well until you opened the last cell in the base. The small child had looked at you, eyes wide with fear.

It took you nearly five minutes to get the kid out of the cell. As you were running through the base with the child in your arms, you suddenly felt something burning you. You looked down and saw that the child had set himself aflame. In your state of shock, you accidently dropped the boy and used your powers of transportation. You found yourself on the jet just as the HYDRA base exploded. As you watched the base go up in flames, you felt numb. You sank to your knees and struggled to catch your breath. All you could see were the eyes of that poor boy as he looked at you from the floor of the cell.

You had been silent the whole way back to the tower. Your two best friends, Steve and Pietro, tried to talk to you but you just stared blankly at them. As soon as you all returned to the tower, you bolted for your bedroom, leading to the position you now found yourself. You were berating yourself. "I could have saved him," you said out loud to the empty room. You threw your head back to hit the bed and then again. Again. Again. The tears kept coming the entire time. You kept repeating that you could have saved the boy until there was a knock at the door.

Without waiting for a reply, Pietro opened the door and was next to you in a second. "Y/N, what is the matter?" You looked into his brilliant blue eyes and swallowed the lump in your throat. "Why, Piet? Why do we continue to try?" you whispered. He quirked an eyebrow in confusion. "why? It is our job, no?" You jumped up. "WHY?! Please explain to me, Pietro! Explain to me how what we do is good when people-when children die in the process! We are fighting a losing battle! It doesn't matter how many we save or how many HYDRA bases we take down because nothing and I mean NOTHING can ever bring that child back!" Tears were rolling down Pietro's face now as you continued, " He was in my arms, Piet. I held him close to me and in a moment of panic I...I left him there! I left him in that building to die! How could I do that? How can I call myself an Avenger?"

You could no longer speak as you broke down again, falling into Pietro's open arms. He murmured in Sokovian in an effort to comfort you until you stopped crying. You sobbed for what felt like hours and by the time you finished, you'd made a decision. You wiped the tears from your face and crawled out of Pietro's arms. "I'm leaving, Piet. I can't do this anymore." The look of content on his face quickly changed to a mixture of anger and misery. He jumped up and looked down at you. "Y/N, wait. Think about this, please."

You shook your head. "I can't. I won't let my mistakes cost anymore lives. Besides, the team will function fine without me." You got up and moved to pack your suitcase. "That's not true! We need you! I need you," Pietro begged, his eyes shining with tears yet again. "I'm sorry. I just can't stay. I can't fight this fight anymore. There's no point to it." You leaned up on tip toe and kissed Pietro's cheek. "Good bye Pietro. I'll miss you. Tell Steve I said good bye." You transported yourself out of the tower. As soon as you left, Pietro looked around the empty room and whispered, "But I need you. I love you." He sank back down to the floor and sobbed.