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[ Eleven kicks her legs a little, contemplating Natasha's words. Decides maybe she will ask Bucky too. Find a way to cheer him up. ]

I don't understand why everyone was angry.

[ Politics escape her. Her world narrows down to 'the bad guys are dead or in prison, and we fixed everything'. Monsters are uncomplicated in her world, after all - at least from where she's standing. ]

Are you sad?

Nah. Mostly just tired.

[Which might be adult code for depressed, but ultimately Natasha does just feel tired.

She's been doing what she does for most of her life, and the last mission was in most ways not all that different.

Right down the the arguments.]

Who was angry? Someone here, or the Fables?

[ What even is mental health awareness in the 80s. ]

The people hated us. Mouthbreathers.

[ Eleven is well used to being perceived as a monster. Sometimes she perceives herself that way. But it's different when you help people and they do that. It feels worse, somehow. Bullies are easier than this. ]

Some of them do. And some of them are afraid of us. For some, we're probably a convenient target, and others... we meddled and overstayed our welcome.

[Natasha shrugs slowly. It's complicated. While she respects Eleven's intelligence, she's not entirely sure she's entirely ready to take the full weight of things.

But she also doesn't want to dumb it down.]

Who taught you that word?

[There is a part of her that wants to laugh at the mouthbreathers thing.]

[ It's a good approach. Eleven has a tendency to check out and drop a topic when she can't follow along anymore, but at the same time she's always glad to be given a chance to understand at least. She knows all about overstaying welcomes, too. Hopper didn't like Mike staying late, after all.

She misses them both. ]

Mike. He gets bullied. I wish I could go to school, too. I could defend him.

[ A deep sigh. World weary as only a teenager can be. ]

I made a mouthbreather pee his pants, once. That was good.

[Natasha smiles very slightly at that. She doesn't have a hard time seeing why that would be satisfying, and while the exact morality of retaliation and escalation might be a conversation for another day, she has no interest in making Eleven question past choices.

A bully pissing his pants seems very small stakes compared to what she is very sure Eleven is capable of doing.]

That sounds very satisfying.

[That doesn't means she can't try to help Eleven understand this situation. Maybe. It's definitely complicated.]

I'm not sure the people in this situation are bullies through. Some of them might still be mouthbreathers.

[A little humor on that last part.]

You said before you didn't understand why everyone was angry. Do you have any guesses? If you were one of them, would you be angry?

[ To her credit, Eleven thinks about that for a moment before answering. Squinting up at the ceiling in deep consideration. ]

I don't think so. We saved people. Made a lake. Helped the good guys.

[ What's not to like. ]

Should we have killed more bad guys?

[She's trying, and that's the important part, especially when there's a lot of catching up for Eleven to do.

Natasha isn't horrified, or even particularly surprised, by the answer and she keeps any disappointment off her face.

Any shortcomings on this front aren't any fault of El's.]

Have you ever had someone try to help you, but you didn't like how they did it? Maybe they tried making choices for you, even though you could make them yourself?

[Honestly, the morality of the killing can wait for later. Natasha isn't going to lose sleep over the deaths of some gulag guards.

But she does add:]

Maybe your dad, or your boyfriend.

[Someone who, presumably, Eleven would understood had her best interests at heart even if they made mistakes.]

[ silence for a while. Then, very softly and quietly. ]

Yes.

[ And she thinks, still, then offers: ]

They were scared. Not of me. For me. Wanted to keep me safe. Didn't trust me to stay safe.

[ And then it clicks, a little bit. ]

Didn't listen to me. Just decided. That made me angry.

I think that's how the people we left behind felt. They didn't ask for us to help, not the way we did.

[That doesn't mean that they shouldn't have helped, but Natasha shrugs past that.]

And they didn't know us well enough to know that we had their best interests at heart.

[ That feels difficult to her, but makes sense. When Hopper decided, he wanted to protect Eleven, but to her it felt no different from Papa deciding to keep her locked up, too. She understands it now, and they revised the rules together. To keep Eleven safe but give her room to grow, too. ]

Do you think they would have understood. If we had explained better?

[ Eleven isn't convinced of that - after all, she remembers that she didn't listen to Hopper until they were both hurting. ]

I think there were a lot of people. Some of them probably wouldn't have understood no matter what we said, especially not after the fact.

[Natasha shrugs, accepting that. There's no changing it now.]

Maybe if they'd known us better before, it would be different, but it's done. And we're out of their hair.

[Eleven seems to understand, though. It's a good start.]

I think some of them would understand if they had more information.

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