CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO:
NOT STRONG ENOUGH

"WHAT HAPPENED?" A GROAN FELL from her lips, a pain was shooting through her abdomen as if she had just been shot, which she had, but only in the dream. Wanda was sitting there, worriedly waiting for the woman to wake up, and when the two words fell from Beth's mouth Wanda immediately let out a breath of relief.

"We don't know." Wanda started, standing up and carefully making her way to stand beside of the bed. "Well, we didn't. Until Avery showed up and said you were in her dream last night, and that you got shot. Which is why you started bleeding out and we had to put you into surgery before you died."

"No, that shouldn't be right." Beth denied, shaking her head. "My powers, they stopped working when I was with HYDRA. I stopped having dreams, I couldn't do anything, that's why I haven't been able to contact you because my powers were gone."

"Well, they're clearly not." Wanda sighed, sitting down on the edge of the bed. Beth looked at her with a confused frown, reaching out and grabbing her hand. Wanda glanced up towards her with a ghost of a smile before that fell.

"If I had known they would come back. . ." Beth started, but Wanda shook her head.

"It's not your fault."

"I should've made you put a dreamcatcher up anyways." Beth denied. "I mean, they don't help as much as they did when I was a kid, but sometimes they divert me from the bad dreams to the good dreams."

"Dreamcatcher." Wanda mumbled, furrowing her eyebrows before standing up. "I'll be right back." Beth watched as Wanda left the room only to come back a minute later with something in her hands. She sat back down on the bed, and that's when Beth realized what she was holding.

"Is that-" She swallowed, carefully sitting up as tears sprang to her eyes. "Is that my dreamcatcher?"

Wanda nodded before handing it over to the girl. Beth carefully took it in her hands, looking down at the object as a tear slipped from her eye, rolling down her cheek. "We found it in that motel room you stayed at before. . . well, you know. I saw it hanging on the wall, and it didn't seem like something a motel would usually have, so I assumed that it was yours. It was how we managed to find you."

Beth smiled a teary smile as she looked up at Wanda. "Thank you for keeping it safe." Wanda nodded, watching as Beth looked back down at the object with both pain and love in her eyes, it confused her. She opened her mouth to say something, but Beth beat her to it. "This is the last thing I have left of my mother before she was taken when I was kid. I've had it ever since. . . and it's helped me a lot. I may not have any pictures of her, but I have the memories, all of them locked inside of this thing that's only supposed to capture dreams. It's stored my memories too. It's the most important thing in my life."

"I'm glad that I was able to give it back to you." Wanda answered with a small smile.

"Hey, Wanda?" Beth asked. Wanda looked at her as a response. "Is there any way you can get me out of this room, even if it is for only thirty minutes?"

Wanda pursed her lips for a moment, looking around before nodding her head. "Yeah, I think so." She stood up and walked out of the room once again before coming back in with a wheel chair. Beth looked at the transportation and almost rolled her eyes. "I know, it's not the best form of transportation. But, you can't be walking around especially since you got out of surgery barely twenty-four hours ago."

"And I'm not strong enough yet." Beth nodded her head at the words that Wanda had avoided trying to say. She knew that Wanda was worried about her. And she knew Wanda was trying to keep the topic of conversation away from HYDRA. But it was bound to eventually come up. It always did, and it always would. HYDRA was a part of her. They were the people that had traumatized her by taking her mother from her. They were the people that chased after her since she was thirteen years old.

However, there was one thing that she didn't get from those monsters. And that was her powers. The powers that she was born with. The powers that were more harm to her than anyone else. That's why she had always seen it as a curse. Because it did nothing but harm her. But as she sat there, looking at Wanda―︎ the woman who had chaos magic in her body because of HYDRA―︎she couldn't help but realize that it was a blessing, because there was no possible way that she could harm someone with her own powers when they were all simply in her head.

Beth sighed before nodding her head. "Wheelchair it is."

Wanda chuckled softly at this before carefully helping Beth from the bed and into the wheelchair. "You'll be healthier soon, Beth. You just have to give yourself time to build your strength up. You know what might help?"

"What's that?" Beth hummed, looking up at Wanda with a raised eyebrow.

Wanda looked down at her with a joking yet serious smile and answered with, "Not getting shot in your dream again."

Beth let out a chuckle. "Hey! I cannot control what I do and don't dream about."

"I thought that was your whole thing."

"Well, yeah, it is." Beth shrugged. "I just haven't quite gotten the deciding whose dream I want to go to under control yet. I'm getting there. But, it takes a lot of energy and process. And most of the time I like the dreams I manage to land in." She made herself comfortable before looking back up at Wanda and smiling. "Where to first, madam?"