Once everyone had left the room the Duo moved from the kitchenette and onto the small sofa that Wanda, Pietro and Vision had taken residency on during the debate about the Accords. After Steve had made his hasty leave the whole atmosphere seemed to shift, urging more people to leave quickly before being dragged back into the conversation without the Captain to back them up. Tony, Rhodey and Vision had all signed their names before leaving, along with Natasha who held onto the Accords for the meeting in the next few days. The twins and Sam had dipped before they could be questioned on it and everyone seemed to know to leave the Duo for a while to talk it out.

Crystal turned her head, looking towards her best friend who was staring off into space. "What do we do Ruby?" The blue eyed female tilted her head slightly, watching as the sixteen year old spoke softly. "If we don't sign this we either retire or are seen as villains again. Retiring, at sixteen and seventeen? How would that work? We don't have a standard education, and that won't matter anyway really because we'll always have someone watching over us to make sure we don't defect." She paused, letting out a sigh.

"And if we sign it we're giving away our freedom again to a group of people who could make us do anything, who are most likely scared of us so will isolate us. We've just got our freedom from Strucker and HYDRA." Ruby completed as the Duo locked eyes. "No matter what we pick, we have people hovering over us and mostly likely have orders to take us out if we make one wrong move." They fell silent for a few moments until the door opened once more. Tony stood tall in the doorway, his hands tucked into the pockets of his suit trousers. He kept his head high until he came to sit in front of the teenagers, leaning forward until his forearms were resting on his knees.

"Girls-"

"Tony, we understand that you've made your decision. Now we have to make ours alone." Miss Jackson seemed to almost sing, leaning back on her hand and throwing her head back to avoid looking at the billionaire who huffed.

"Just hear me out." Miss Evans gave a short nod in Mr Stark's direction, signally they were both listening. "I know this is going to be hard for you, I know everything that has happened has been hard for you as you haven't been brought up the way most people have. But trust me when I say, signing this will be the best option you both have. This will protect you."

"Protect us?" Ruby hissed, leaning forward once more until there was inches between herself and Tony. The male sat still, knowing that if he moved he'd give her the satisfaction of intimidating him. It was something everyone learnt about Ruby pretty early on in training, although she was no longer 'evil', the ways in which she did certain things resembled everything HYDRA was known for. So the team had to learn not to let her get to them even if she doesn't mean it. It was hard but most caught on quickly.

"Protect us?" She repeated bitterly. "It'll give the United Nations every chance to use us just like Strucker did, just like Ultron did. And then when they have no use for us they'll lock us up, scared of what we can do. We get that on one hand it'll stop the public being scared of us and give us a better image but we have to think about our welfare as well. I'm not letting Crystal get locked up again when a 'higher power' doesn't need us anymore."

"Tony please just let us decide what's best for us." He turned his head to Crystal. Another thing everyone learnt quickly was that Crystal was a lot more innocent that her best friend. She would take everything into account first before arguing her point, which while good caused hesitation. This was often when Ruby would step in and protect her no matter what. HYDRA's training also still resided in the green eyed girls mind yet it was dimmed, almost as if she hadn't experienced it as much as her blue eyed companion.

"Alright." Tony finally gave in, standing up and walking back towards the door. "Just keep in mind that if you don't sign, things could get bad, I don't want you both to get hurt. Believe it or not I do care for you, as well as the twins. You're all still children who shouldn't have been dragged into this world of heroes and villains. Please look after yourselves and your futures." With that the brunette left the room, leaving the Duo alone once more.

"I'm going to train, I need to burn off some steam." Miss Jackson finally spoke, standing and walking towards the door. "You coming?"

"I don't know."

"Either come with me or go and find the twins, please. I don't want Stark to catch you and bully you into signing that thing."

"Ruby-"

"Please Crystal."

"You're putting me before yourself."

"I've always done that."

"I know, but don't you think I'm old enough to take care of myself?"

"I never said that, but although we now work with him I don't fully trust Stark, or anyone other than you and the Twins. Now with these accords and the United Nations on our tails, things are going to change again. You aren't getting hurt, and neither are the twins." Crystal stood and wrapped her arms around her friend tightly. "Are you coming?"

"Yeah, let's go and train."

*******
A/N:
Another chapter down! This one is kind of a filler but at the same time an opportunity to show you where the girls stand at this moment in time.

Thank you for reading and I hope you're enjoying the next instalment of the Duos story.

Unfortunately college will be starting up again soon so updates will become more spaced out again but I will try my hardest to get them to you.

secretandlies