▷first chapter: christmas tragedies!◁

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BEATRIX CASTRO WATCHED HER MOTHER DIE ON CHRISTMAS EVE. As it happened, she'd thought to herself that it seemed like the type of cruel twist you'd find in a Disney movie. The night before Christmas, not a creature was stirring but Beth Castro, who ran blissfully ahead of her family as a Stark Cargo sped past a dark road that wasn't yet lit up by midnight's fireworks.

Beatrix screamed at the top of her lungs with her sister and her father standing by her as a truck with a drunk driver and STARK INDUSTRIES written in big bold letters at both of its sides, killed her mother. It swerved and crashed then rolled over and over, leaving Beth Castro bloody corpse surrounded by a myriad of Stark technology and weapons meant to hurt villains.

FUN FACT: It takes a million different actions and a million different reactions for a tragedy to happen.

The hit and run could be traced to the Helping Hand Initiative. It was a charity program started by Tony Stark to help recovering addicts find employment as they reintegrated into society. The driver had been one of the program's recipients. Her mother's death could be traced even further back than that though, to the Ultron attack in Sokovia. The attack, who many believed had been handled badly by the Avengers, triggered so many Stark Tower protests that Tony Stark was forced to move his infamous group of superhero buddies from the tower to the New Avengers Facility. That's where the driver had been headed. The Christmas tragedy could even be traced back to was Beatrix herself. She'd been the one who'd suggested they leave the Christmas party early. She said the lights were too bright, the place was too loud, and no one in her family even seemed to be enjoying it aside from her father. But if they hadn't left early, her mother wouldn't be dead.

Though Beatrix would probably spend the rest of forever wondering what actions and reactions ended her mother's life, that finished in a matter of two weeks for everyone else. In two weeks there'd been a funeral, hundreds of news segments, and a handwritten letter from Stark Industries signed with sincere regards and sincere condolences by Tony Stark, himself. Then it was all over. The majority of the world had practically forgotten.

But even with that hell having finished, the reactions to it were still at their peak. Every once in a while, the Castros still answered knocks at the door from neighbors they barely knew.

"We wanted to offer our sympathies."

Laurie Jones. That was the woman who stood at the Castro door holding a bereavement basket. It had the usual: chocolates, cookies, cocoa, and a whole lot of other pretty assortments to distract them from the fact that someone was dead.

"Oh," is what Beatrix said in response. It wasn't any specific type of oh. Not like the pleasantly surprised oh! or a low and disappointed oh...-just some plain, monotone oh. The type of thing people said when they didn't know what else to say, which she never did in these sorry-your-mom-was-hit-by-a-truck interactions.

She noticed two teenagers behind Laurie. They were familiar faces at lack-luster neighborhood parties and such. Beatrix had never spoken to them though. All she knew of them was the boy was named Oliver and the girl was named something that started with an M because she went by MJ.

For a mother and her kids, they didn't look anything alike, Beatrix also noticed. Oliver and MJ looked much more like their father; frizzy black hair, tall, soft features, and dark skin that derived from African or maybe Caribbean heritage. Laurie Jones, however, had long auburn locks and a pale Irish complexion that wouldn't tan even in the sunniest seasons of the year.

If it weren't for the bright, almond-shaped, brown eyes, Beatrix wouldn't be able to tell how Laurie's genetics resided in Oliver and MJ.

"Your mother was such a kind soul," Laurie was telling Beverly when Beatrix snapped out of her thoughts and back into the conversation. "With all the work she did for women in the science field-the charities, the awareness-raising, the donations-I'm sure Dr. Castro's legacy will live on."

Beverly nodded as Laurie spoke like it was the first time she'd heard this. In reality, she and Beatrix had heard 'her legacy will live on' about a billion times since their mother died.

Their mother's advocating for engaging young girls into STEM was a step in the right direction, they'd said it even at her funeral. Intelligent girls made intelligent women and that was something Beth Castro never failed to insist the world needed.

Beatrix doubted that would be her mother's legacy, though.

She doubted her legacy would be anything more than the fact that Tony Stark's truck killed her. That's all anyone was ranting on Twitter about now and there wasn't much sign of that changing in the future.

"We're sure everything she did will live on too, Miss Jones," Beverly said, even though she didn't believe it any more than Beatrix did. She was just a lot better at masking. "It's nice of you to come."

"Well, we wanted to come last Tuesday," Laurie stated. "But with all the news segments and Stark hate on social media your family's being pulled into-I figured your guys might need privacy for the first few weeks."

Beverly, the eldest of both twins by twenty-five minutes, had underlying annoyance strained in her expression as Laurie spoke. Mostly because she'd already heard all Laurie had to say from a dozen different people in only the past week, three of which were just journalists who wanted a comment on whether they resented Tony Stark. Nonetheless, Beverly forced a pained smile. Beatrix found it was weird to see Beverly being so polite. She never did that. Lack of regard for authority was basically her trademark.

Beverly could drop the rebel persona and become a well-mannered girl when it came to their mother's death, though-smiling at their visitors and saying, "That's very kind, Miss Jones."

She nudged at Beatrix making her add, "We appreciate it, Miss Jones."

"Please, girls, call me Laurie," the woman insisted. She handed Beverly the frilly basket that had been in her hands.

"Is your father here?" Laurie asked. "It must be particularly hard for him too-losing a spouse and all-I work in psychiatry, I know it can be tough."

Their father was definitely there. They knew it because Raymond hadn't left the place for anything more than a trip to the mailbox since their mother's funeral.

Yet, Beatrix and Beverly also knew he was in no position to be playing nice with well-meaning albeit slightly invasive neighbors. If anything, he was in his room with wine bottles scattered beside him where his wife should be while he watched reruns of the same soccer game on repeat, trying to sleep away whatever wave of sadness had mounted up inside him.

"No. He's out, I think," Beverly opted to say.

"Well, either way-" Laurie shook her head, dismissing her question. She gestured to the basket she'd given Beverly before saying, "We made you a casserole. It's in there, underneath all the flowers and snacks somewhere. I figured you guys might need a home-cooked meal, since, um..."

"Our mom died," Beatrix finished for her, itching to speed up the uncomfortable conversation. "Thank you for the casserole."

The heavy silence and uneasy looks that followed lead Beatrix to realize she'd done something wrong despite being disoriented on what it was. It took her a moment to relate the awkwardness to her comment but by the time she did, the conversation was already moving on.

"I forgot to put it in the basket," MJ said before Beatrix made complete sense of the situation.

"What?" Laurie turned away from Beatrix to her daughter, not quite having heard her.

"The casserole," MJ clarified to her. "It was still cooling off when me and Oli put things in the basket. I don't think I put it in there."

"Well, where'd you leave it?"

"Counter in the kitchen."

Miss Jones turned back to the twin sisters, brushing herself off. "Okay then, that's no problem. I'll just run next door and grab it."

Beverly extended her arm's length to try and stop her. "It's not that big of a deal Miss Jones. We appreciate the thought but we really wouldn't want to cause any inconvenience-"

"Yeah, mom, let's go." Oliver perked up for the first time in the entire conversation. "It's the last day of winter break. All my friends are shooting hoops together and I'm stuck giving out casseroles to people I don't even know."

"Oliver Jones," his mother hissed.

"Don't worry about it," Beatrix said. She didn't want to be any more than Oliver did and she felt like she'd made things even more awkward than they'd already been. "We've gotten more casseroles than we could ever need. You don't have to go get it."

"Don't be silly dear." Laurie chuckled even though nothing funny had been said. "I want to."

"I'll be right back, give me five minutes-MJ, keep these girls company while I'm gone, will you?" She looked to Oliver, her expression going stern. "And Oli, please, behave."

Oliver only groaned at his mother's orders. He didn't say anything but indicated an objection by crossing his arms.

For a solid minute, none of them spoke, this time not because of one of Beatrix's blunt comments. Then: Oliver looked up. "So do you guys like hate Iron Man now?"

MJ shot him a glance in second. "Mom said not to ask that."

He shrugged. "Mom's not here."

Rolling her eyes, MJ added, "Why do people even think that? It's not like Tony Stark was driving the truck."

"I mean, his program's the reason there was a drunk on the road. " Oliver shrugged again. "So do you guys hate him?"

"You don't have to answer him," MJ assured. "I ignore him most of the time"

Another beat of silence occurred, their conversation pausing itself for a couple more moments then: "Um..." Beverly put out her hand, trying to break the awkward quiet, with her best fake smile. "I'm Beverly, by the way, but most people call me Bev. That's Beatrix, with an x, some people call her Bea, written with an a, but pronounced Bee."

"I know." MJ shrugged before placing her hand to shake Beverly's. "We've lived on the same block since, like... I don't even know, forever."

"But we've never actually met before," Beverly said, still shaking MJ's hand. "And when you meet someone you tell them your name."

"Well then, I'm Michelle. I go by MJ," she told them. "And my brother's name is Oliver. He used to go by OJ but people were always weird about it."

"Because of the murder?" Beatrix asked, popping into conversation.

MJ nodded, concurring, "Because of the murder."

Oliver stuffed his hands his Midtown High varsity basketball team jacket pockets. "We've seen you guys at neighborhood stuff - you're like a genius or something, right?"

"Genius is pushing it." Beverly scoffed before Beatrix could answer for herself. "She's robotics prodigy which means she sucks at anything involve a computer."

"Says the one who sucks at anything that doesn't involve an electric guitar," Beatrix mumbled, only loud enough for Bev to hear it.

"Yeah, well, you freak the other kids in the neighborhood out. You're like a vampire or something, you never come out of this house." Oliver made a curious glance passed the door frame they were standing in front of, looking to the opening of their house. "The place is always so closed off."

Beatrix pursed her lips. It wasn't really that their penthouse was closed off. It was more that, most of the members of the Castro family were socially inept, (except for Beverly and Richard who were both social butterflies with bad social skills) so no one really ever came to their house except for a handful of Richard's friends and the occasional bandmate of Beverly's.

But still, Beatrix didn't want people to be 'freaked out' by her. She wanted to say something back to him. Something cool or funny. Something that told him to back off. Like, maybe I am a vampire, maybe I'll rip your head off like that one guy from twilight because you said that.

"What are those?" Oliver asked, noticing the array of machinery in their home's entrance.

The question was to be expected considering their house was scattered with different robots. Most of them being somewhat useless. Ranging from e.v.e, the bionic arm Beatrix created to pour milk and cereal into a bowl, to her mom's WALL-E, the flat, autonomous robotic vacuum cleaner that sat by the door frame.

"They're robots," Beatrix answered like it wasn't out of the ordinary-because it wasn't, not for her, anyway.

"You built all of them?" MJ asked.

"My mom made some, but, yeah," she told him, before mentioning her hand to individual robots. "That's WALL-E, Squiddy, e.v.e, Botzilla-"

"What type of motor did you use for the bionic arm?" MJ pointed to e.v.e, actually looking impressed as compared to her older brother who grew sufficiently bored after a grand total of two seconds being on the topic.

"Strepper motor," Beatrix answered. "I didn't personify it qt all so it's basically a glorified Uarm robot. I just programmed it to make my cereal."

"That's totally awesome." MJ smiled.

"Or signs of a totally miserable social life," Oliver commented. Beatrix made a subtle frown and he asked, "Don't you have friends?"

Not realizing it was a rhetorical question, she shrugged.

"Well, don't you have school?"

"Beverly does," Beatrix started to explain. "I do school online-or, I used to, I guess. I starting the whole normal education thing as soon as winter break's over."

"At Midtown?" Oliver asked, knowing Midtown was one of the only schools in their district with the type of curriculum to nurture a fifteen-year-old who built and programmed robots for fun.

"No, not Midtown." Beverly shook her head. "Upstate Preparatory."

Oliver wrinkled his nose. He obviously wasn't a fan of the school, since he found it hilarious to fake a couple gags and add some puking sound effects, just at the mention of it.

"Why are you doing that?" Beatrix asked, confused. She hadn't exactly been the biggest fan of the place when she'd gone to orientation but it wasn't that bad. "Upstate's closer. It's a good school, my mom went there."

Beverly, who went to Upstate Prepatory full time, pointed to his varsity jacket. "He's on a sports team at Midtown."

Still confused, Beatrix asked, "So?"

MJ explained further, "Midtown and Upstate have like this five-decade-long sports rivalry - it's dumb."

Oliver sneered. "Okay, first off: the rivalry is not dumb, it's a sacred semicentennial war, and even if it wasn't." He made a pause. "Upstate just majorly sucks in general. Bunch of pretentious rich assholes."

"Well, maybe you should enroll, then," Beatrix said to him. "You'd fit right in."

"That's a pretty unfriendly thing to say." Oliver made a pout, pretending to look hurt; his big, watery brown eyes really failing at the puppy dog thing he was going for.

Beatrix responded with a callous stare, "You've been saying unfriendly things since you got here."

"Yeah, and I guess I'm the bigger jerk here, then." Oliver made a smug cock of the head. "I don't have a dead mom to blame for my attitude."

That was when Beatrix pushed him.

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In Beatrix's defense: she did not, in any way, mean to break his nose. Yes, she did push him, and, fair enough, she did that with the intention of making him fall. But how could she have predicted that he'd end up falling forward and hitting the flat robotic vacuum by their house? She couldn't have.

Needless to say, the Castros never did get their casserole.

Oliver's nose began bleeding and Laurie Jones came back with the dish, only to see her son passionately explaining something about how he needed his sister to take off her jacket so he could hold up his bloody nose, he couldn't use his, it's his varsity jacket not some low-budget denim coat from Old Navy, MJ!

"No, no, thank you, Laurie. I'll definitely check that out, yeah. And again, I'm extremely sorry. It won't happen again." Raymond, their father, was saying a few hours later, as he hung up the phone with Miss Jones-whom he'd offer to pay medical bills for (given that his daughter caused them and everything).

"Okay-" He turned to his daughters who were both sitting on the counter stools a couple of feet away from him. "Good news: his nose isn't actually broken. Just badly bruised."

None of the girls were really paying attention to their father's words. Beverly was too focused on trying to beat Beatrix's ten-game streak on the Nintendo Switch in front of her. "Oh, good, he'll be able to start school tomorrow," she said distantly.

Raymond let out a small laugh, walking to the fridge. "Yeah, I think that's the one thing he's not happy about." He looked back over to his eldest daughter. "Can any of you actually tell me what happened?"

"What are you looking at me for?" Beverly peered her eyes away from the screen, offended. "For once, I'm innocent. I've been, like, hella polite the past two weeks, unlike others who will remain unnamed."

He looked to Beatrix.

"Nothing happened," Beatrix defended, more focused on the Nintendo Switch she was playing on than the conversation. "A dude was a douche. A dude got pushed. A dude now has a badly bruised nose. Equal reactions to each prior action. That's Newton's third law. Science."

"That's chaos, not science," Raymond said. He turned away from Beatrix and walked over to the steel refrigerator in the corner of the room, bending over to look through it. "His nose might not be broken but it's still spontaneously bleeding after like two hours."

"Reaction to action number two, dad."

"Aterrizaste a un hombre en el hospital, ¿cómo te sientes?" [You landed a man in the hospital, how do you feel?] Beverly asked in Spanish, their father's native tongue, turning to her sister with a click of the tongue and a smile.

"Badass," Beatrix answered, making Beverly let out a snort.

"You two are going to drive me insane... I know, the visitors can get annoying after a while but their heart's in the right place. You can't be angry at people for being kind," her father said, even though Oliver Jones had not been 'being kind' when she pushed him. Still rummaging through the fridge, Raymond added, "I'm in my room for, what, two hours? And suddenly it's a casserole and bloody nose fiasco."

"While we're on the casseroles topic..." Raymond lifted his eyes from the fridge he'd been so focused on. "I hope you guys are up for having it again for dinner 'cause we gotta get rid of all these."

"Can I wait for dinner in my room?" Beverly put down her controller, freezing the game once again. "I wanna call in and see if my friends are gonna take the subway back from school with me tomorrow. We were gonna do some street performing."

"We're in the middle of a level," Beatrix whined looking over to her sister and motioning to the Nintendo Switch. "I can't lead a robot army to end a dystopian government on my own."

"You've beat the game like a gagillion times without me," Beverly said. "You'll be fine, I barely even know how to play, I'm trash at it."

"But you're my emotional support trash," Beatrix argued.

Her twin sister just ignored her, turning back to her father. "Can I wait in my room?"

"Yeah, sure thing Bev," their father said. "I'll call you when it's ready."

Beverly walked out of the kitchen, leaving Beatrix alone with her father, her over-complicated video game, and her thoughts.

"So what'd you do today, anyway?" Raymond asked, looking over his shoulder. "You know aside from punching our neighbors?"

"I didn't punch him, I pushed him."

Raymond didn't bother to refrain from an eye roll. "Oh, that makes it totally acceptable then."

He put two servings of casserole in separate plates and poured out one bowl of soup, then the lot of them in a 3 in 1 microwave tray to heat them up. He turned back to his daughter. "You didn't answer my question, I feel like we haven't been talking lately, what'd you do today? "

"Nothing exciting," Beatrix answered despite the conversation being uneventful, "I played Minecraft for a while but then I got bored so I helped Bev dye her hair-"

"It's still blue?" Her father sent a confused look as he pushed away a strand of hair that was blocking her face.

"It's powder blue now, dad."

"Oh, okay." Raymond nodded, even though he didn't get it. "And why is powder blue different from blue blue?"

"I don't know Bev says it just is," Beatrix continued, "I remodeled e.v.e's arm today too. I thought her program was going out of bounds but really, the arm itself just had loose parts."

"Mh-hm," he droned on, nodding again. "Which one's e.v.e again?"

"She pours my cereal," Beatrix clarified. "It was a pretty standard day."

"Well, your day was more exciting than mine."

"What'd you do?"

"Slept, watched tv, slept some more, had someone pick up your school uniforms, watched a game of soccer, then dealt with the nose bleed incident. That's it." The microwave beeped and Raymond stood up straighter, heading over to it. "Tomorrow will probably be more lively, though-Miss Jones talked to me about this support group, single parents thing... I might go,"

"Miss Jones is a widow?"

Raymond shook his head. "Divorced." Taking the dishes out, he added, "-And, either way, you know, with school and work starting back up and all, we'll be busy."

Beatrix recoiled, curling her lip at the mention of school. She wasn't looking forward to it anymore-what Oliver Jones said took away any good feelings she might have had. Pretentious rich assholes didn't exactly seem like the welcoming type.

"Do I like have to go to school tomorrow?" Beatrix spoke up again, after a minute or so.

Raymond pressed both his eyebrows together, confused. "What?"

"I don't want to go."

"We talked about this, you were excited."

"Were," she accented on. "That's past tense."

"Beatri-"

"A bunch of kids do alternative learning," Beatrix attempted to debate before he could stop her. "And even they didn't, it's becomming more popular by the second."

Raymond just sighed at her unfought debate. He'd been relieved to see how smoothly the transition was going at the beginning. Beatrix barely even cared. She'd gone to orientation and to the Individual Education Plan meetings, with no tears, no meltdowns, and no debate on whether or not the education system was 'even a thing or just the government's way of assimilating the youth.'

By no means was she genuinely happy about the whole situation but at the very least she hadn't seemed to despise it. Now what Oliver Jones said was in her head. It was like they took one step forward only to take ten steps back.

"Why should I go to Upstate anyway?" Beatrix asked. "Virtual schooling is just as effective as any regular school-better, even, for some people."

"That's not the problem, Bea," he told her. "You're smart whether you learn at a regular school or behind a screen. Regular school just has things that you won't get if you only learn stuffed inside your house."

"Like what?"

"Like other people," her father told her.

"Empire State University has other people, so does Oscorp," Beatrix argued, naming her parents' workplaces. "And I go to those places all the time. I like the people there."

"Well, highschool has other teenagers and you're obviously not good with them." Raymond shrugged, placing her plate of soup in front of her. "You spend ten minutes with a teenager and you end up making his nose bleed."

"He was a douchebag," she said.

Raymond replied, "You can't push people just because they're douchebags."

"That's a sucky rule."

"But it's still a rule," Raymond stated. "Here's another one: School is a necessity. You can't change your mind about it right before the first day."

"That's a sucky rule too."

"You aren't a kid anymore, Beatrix, and you won't be an adult for a while," he said, waving his finger in the lecturing way her mother used to do. "It's important for you to hang out with people your own age."

"I hang out with Bev."

"Bev is your twin sister," Raymond said. "You didn't choose to hang out with her, you were assigned her by birth. She doesn't count."

"Well, there are people my age in video game servers."

"Video game friends don't count either."

Beatrix huffed, leaning against the backrest of the counter stool and un-pausing the Nintendo Switch in front of her.

"Listen, Bea, the second semester is only like five months and a few days." Despite her attention having gone to her video game, her father kept trying to get her to see this schooling thing as a good decision. "Do those five months and if you still don't like it, we can go back to online schooling or maybe tutoring. But you need to try the regular route before you do the weird route. You need to. Okay?"

"What's in it for me?"

"You don't get grounded for pushing Oliver Jones." He cocked his head. "Five months?"

"Fine.

▷ end of first chapter: christmas tragedies! ◁

━━━

JUNE'S CHAPTER NOTES:

The MCU didn't give any insight to MJ's family so I've taken the artistic liberty of giving her a brother, Oliver (who's kind of a dick at the moment), and a recently(?) single mother, Laurie. Both of whom will have very important roles in the fic..

I lowkey made the entire world blame tony for one of the greatest engineers of our time and feminist icon, Beth Castro's, death because it was a stark industries' truck, hIs prOgRAmS tHE rEasOn ThEre wAS a DruNK oN thE rOAd and everyone hates him already because of the lasting destruction and deaths in sokovia (since this is pre-civil war when everyone hated our son).

There was no Peter whatsoever in this chapter and it was kinda long, so sorry, (mainly because I felt the need to introduce Beatrix and her arc first) but I can guarantee he'll be in the next one.

so yeah... that's it if u read this whole thing i luv u. Until next time on dragon ball z! (i think im so funny).