❛ Do I not look happy? ❜

After a restless sleep and the knowledge that school and decathlon practices started back up again the next day, Andy had trudged downstairs with a frown on her face. It had been about three days since Thanksgiving and the thoughts that disrupted her mind then were still floating around in her head. But she was also thinking of her shift at Delmar's the other day and how she met Peter's aunt for the first time and how okay she seemed even with Ben's passing not long ago. Andy certainly wished she could feel okay for even a day, and she had years to deal with her parent's "deaths."

But she had to remain focused and put her complete concentration on the mission before her. And that mission was taking up time she needed to effectively look into her parent's deaths. So, with the energy to get going on her daily algorithm progress, Melisande found herself slugging into the kitchen to greet her former teammates 'happily.'

"Oh, look, it's the monster that normally stays hidden under the bed," Sam grinned, looking at the girl who didn't bother to brush her hair before rolling downstairs. The girl parted her mouth and narrowed her eyes, "Haha, oh, you're so very funny," she sarcastically remarked before walking behind Rhodes to grab a coffee mug. "He prides himself on that," Wanda smirked, glancing over at the teenage girl as she filled the cup to the near brim with black coffee. 

"Black? You take your coffee black?" Rhodes wondered, staring over at the liquid in surprise and yet, at the same time, astonishment. Andy shrugged and took a sip, "It's like me, plain, simple, dark-souled, doesn't like things added to it," she listed off, still gulping down the liquid as Vision entered into a conversation with Wanda. 

Ruffling her hair, Steve leaned on the counter next to Andy and smiled, "Nat and I are spending the day out in the city to get information on your parents," he informed her, "We're going to get there."

"Yeah," Nat jumped in, "We won't stop harassing SHIELD agents until we get some answers," she grinned. 

"That's what I like to hear," Andy nodded.

After a long moment of silence, Nat cleared her throat and dragged Andy's computer from across the counter to where she was sitting and opened it up to reveal a military-grade security lock. Pointing at it, Nat pursed her lips, "Some odd noise sounded from your laptop last night. At first, I thought it was Sam, but he makes long machine-gun noises," she chuckled, looking at Sam who's cheeks burned a bright red. Everyone in the kitchen began to snicker and laugh while Sam tried to defend himself, "I don't fart," he snapped, "I enunciate with smell."

Cracking a smile, Andy shook her head, "Yeah, you enunciate a bit too much," she added before wandering over to her computer that Nat had pushed toward her. After typing at least two dozen keys of numbers, letters, and symbols, the computer opened and Andy instantly saw a notification for her algorithm. With curiosity, she opened up the program and was bombarded with names organized by alphabet and probability of them being 'Thunderbird.'

Being annoyed with the silence, Steve walked behind Melisande and peered over her shoulder to see her scrolling down the screen to observe the seven dozen names. She was shocked to see the name Liz Toomes and Maya Clemmons appear but after remembering that the algorithm was specifically designed to hand pick which female students had home's that generated an income that didn't match the parent's professions, she figured the girls had extreme trust funds. Of course, Andy didn't trust anyone, certainly not girls she had just met months ago, but Liz Toomes couldn't injure a fly without hosting a funeral for the creature. 

"Please,  by all means, stand there in wonder and don't tell us why," Nat groaned, seeing the girl so invested in her work that she forgot to tell the others what happened. Andy stuck her tongue out at the assassin before licking her dry lips once, "My algorithm finally worked and I guess I'm just surprised to see who's on it," she replied.

"You mean equation," Sam winked, causing Andy to grab the nearest spoon on the counter and chuck it as hard as she possibly could at the man. With her previous training, the spoon hit him square in the forehead and he yelped, his hand reaching up to rub the red blotch forming. While glaring at her, Sam picked up the spoon from the floor and tossed it into the sink, his eyes burning circles into Andy's. "Aren't you happy that your work has paid off?" Vision wondered from the sitting area where he was flipping through a newspaper from the coffee table. "Do I not look happy?" she remarked, a frown evident on her face and her eyebrows scrunched together as she looked at the android. "No, you do not," he responded.

"Well, sure, I am. But the work isn't over yet, now I have to look through two dozen names and try to figure out who Thunderbird is."

Natasha dryly laughed from the seat next to Andy and let out a long sigh, "Yeah, I remember having a list of two dozen people to kill. Only took me two nights," she said as if the statement was nonchalant.

"I don't think we have the same problem," Andy blinked, staring at the woman with a blank look. Natasha shrugged and picked up her muffin that was sitting atop her napkin and picked it apart while Andy moved her finger on the keypad so that her cursor was hovering over Liz Toomes' name. With a second of hesitation, she clicked on the profile and looked over the information, seeing that her two parents generated a heavy income but normal enough that Andy knew the girl was not part of a secret weapons deal.

So reluctantly, she deleted Liz's profile from her computer and slammed the screen shut, not wanting to look over anyone for any more time then she needed to.

Melisande was tired of looking through names, she wanted action. And she wanted progress.

•••

After spending half of Sunday with Wanda and Sam, Andy was more than ready to plop onto the couch and look through the two dozen profiles sitting on her computer. And making her even more anxious, she had texted Maya - as she was on the list and Andy needed to get her own answers - and asked her if she had wanted to study for a minor decathlon competition on Tuesday afternoon - not that Andy had any intention on actually meeting with the girl - but when Maya replied saying she had her hands tied working with her dad every day after school, Andy got curious.

So instead of going in alphabetical order and looking through every profile in order, Andy skipped past the two A's and one B and went right to C; Clemmons.

She double clicked on the girl's name and found herself looking at basic information: sixteen-years-old, sophomore, decathlon and culinary clubs, and not much more. But Andy skipped the small stuff and went down to family history. Maya's home generated an income equal to that of Liz's. But Liz had two parents, when Andy checked Maya's home life, she saw that she had only her father. Her father worked at a power plant and her mother died during a lightning storm six years earlier.

Andy didn't care for Maya's excuse of helping her father and not being able to meet up, but teenagers don't do father-daughter workday at a power plant. They were dangerous, and seeing as her mother died in a lightning storm, Andy wasn't falling for these coincidences and excuses. Evidence or not, she planned on following this girl around town, and she believed she found her girl.

this is really short, i know. it's a slow chapter, and yes, no peter. we will be seeing him next chapter, this is background information on why maya is a subject of interest and it's not a filler. i don't write those, all my chapters progress the story line.

anyways, no one reads this story, so i'll end the note here.