Work Text:
Lab equipment was really not meant to blend well within a lived-in home. And it didn't. The plush carpet on top of wooden floors giving way to the smooth lab flooring that squeaked under boots not appropriate for the setting created an odd contrast. Not that that was uncharacteristic for Miranda, any of her workspaces falling perfectly under the description of an organized mess, with particular emphasis on mess .
With Rose sleeping peacefully in the room generously, suspiciously so, provided by Miranda, Mia decided to stretch her legs by walking around the manor, the baby monitor connected to her phone. The building was relatively big, albeit quite old, tucked in the woods somewhere between the Beneviento house and the factory, with a tunnel conveniently connecting it to the labs running under the town. It had close to no spatial organization, bedrooms and labs and storage rooms alternating by patterns known only by the so-called goddess, or most likely not even by her.
Mia did not trust the woman. Not with the memories of the prison cell and the kidnapping of her daughter for experiments still fresh in her mind. But, the tiredness of motherhood and the odd loneliness that came with being the only two inhabitants of the house that were capable of coherent speech as of now, had her longing for some company.
It was an easy task finding Miranda, the soft cries of Eva guiding her down a short hallway to a lab door left ajar. Inside, the woman was sat at a desk, a laptop with half written reports and notes in front of her, pushed out of the grasp of the fussing infant in her arms. Miranda was far too busy trying to calm her daughter down enough to fall asleep to notice Mia leaning on the doorframe, curiously observing the scene. Oddly human, in her failing attempt to get her child to stop crying, when at any given time she could get anyone to kneel before her and bend over backwards to her every whim. Yet a small infant was giving her so much trouble.
"Need a hand?" Mia offered with a small chuckle. Should she even offer her help?
"I am fine thank you." But a slightly louder wail from Eva came with perfect timing to disprove her words.
Miranda's shoulders seemed to slump ever so slightly as her eyes closed slowly, the usual makeup replaced by dark circles, testimony to the long hours spent going through decades of research and reports while also caring for her newly reborn daughter. It was oddly bittersweet, to see a woman so dignified otherwise all but beg the small child to go to sleep so she could finish her work.
Work, Mia concluded, that was rather essential for the whole place, and also her home for now, to continue existing the way it was. With a sigh she walked up to the desk and gently stoked Eva's short brunette hair. "Here, let me hold her. At least until you finish typing whatever it is you're doing," she said waving a hand in the direction of the forgotten computer, who's screen had turned black by now.
There were a few long seconds of hesitation, but a weary glance at the mountain of files on the other side of the desk that she was yet to go through convinced Miranda to finally allow her daughter slip into Mia's arms. It took maybe five minutes of cooing and a one sided conversation made in silly voices to turn the cries into giggles, small hands trying to grasp at Mia's finger that was ticklishly caressing puffy cheeks. Exhausted from crying, Eva's eyes slowly fluttered shut and she was gingerly lowered into a crib set by the desk, one of the many scattered around the house.
Miranda watched the scene unfold with uncharacteristic softness slipping by the icy mask of her steely eyes. Even goddesses can be caught by surprise it seemed, and whether it was due to the apparent skills that Mia had with valmong Eva down or at how she was willing to help despite their precarious position was up to debate.
"Shouldn't you be better at this," Mia asked, pulling one of the chairs closer to sit in. "I know it's been, what, two or three centuries or something but haven't you done this before?"
Her question was obviously poking fun for the most part, but Miranda couldn't help the tired sigh that crawled its way from the depths of her now useless lungs.
"No, actually. I haven't," she responded curtly as she grabbed one of the files and opened it in order to transcribe its contents in a digital file. "At least not on my own," she added upon remembering the numerous subjects she helped raise during her time working with The Connections.
"Oh? Did you have a sweet loving husband once upon a time? Do tell me more," Mia said leaning her chin on her palms as if she were a teenager at a sleepover talking about crushes, although the memory of Ethan clawing its way to the forefront of her thoughts made her grimace slightly, until she pushed it back down in the depths of her mind.
It was foolish perhaps, acting like that around a woman that could, and would with the right motivation, kill her in the blink of an eye. Truth be told though, Mia was bored out of her mind, so what better way to pass the time than push Miranda's buttons, especially when she seemed too tired to retaliate.
The so-called goddess grimaced, at least ten different reasons to find the thought outrageous flashing through her mind and, settling on the most obvious one, looked at her, one eyebrow raised. "I was a nun."
Mia leaned back in her chair, looking at the black head covering hanging from a hook behind the door, together with black robes. She had to wonder if they were the same ancient ones or if she replaced them every once in a while.
"Yeah, I couldn't tell," she chuckled. "A nun turned goddess. How ironic don't you think."
"Worshipping was never quite up my alley. And neither were men," she replied flatly, turning the pages in front of her and typing the relevant information in the file she had open on the screen.
Mia's eyes widened slightly with an amused oh . "So was she raised by the convent then?"
Was this information really to be given out? Mirada did not like talking about her past, or personal information in general. Gods did not need backstories, they simply were.
She sighed. "No, no. Her parents died when she was four and with nobody else to look for her, she was brought to us." Miranda gave a small shrug, pausing to type up decades old results on lycans. "I was the newest there, so the nuns dumped her on me. I was so mad at first, but she's always been such a brilliant little girl, even back then. She would ask for a bedtime story and did not complain when I'd start reading from one of the medical books I stole from the merchant. There was just something about her that made her grow on me."
With the paragraph done, she pushed her chair back, quietly so as to not have its legs scratch against the linoleum floor, and walked to another, smaller desk pushed against a wall. From there, she walked back to the crib where the small infant was sleeping peacefully, a small doll in hand. Doll that Mia recognized immediately, as an identical one was by her own daughter's sleeping form, back in their room. It was a small replica of Angie, plush and soft to the touch, unlike its real life wooden counterpart, the white dress made of delicate silk. Both toys had been made by Donna herself as gifts.
"But as you can guess, she was well past a toddler when she was placed in my care," Miranda finished, leaving the doll just by her sleeping daughter's side.
"So you suck with babies," Mia concluded with a grin. She would have laughed, but had enough clarity of mind to be quiet.
Miranda simply gave her a tired glare before rolling her eyes. She went back to her desk and opened a new file to be transcribed, this one on the reservoir's structure.
"I can care for them," she started, an odd almost imperceptible strain in her voice. "It just gets trickier when it's my own daughter and not an act."
Mia nodded absent mindedly, eyes darting to Eva. To see a woman with such power and ruthlessness, who could level the whole town to the ground if she so pleased, show such raw genuine affection towards the child made some of the notions in her brain crumble to the ground. Miranda was still the same woman who, ironically enough, experimented on more children than she cared to count, but then again Mia was also a willing participant in said experiments so was she really that much better?
She definitely was, Mia concluded, choosing to ignore a small pang at her heart when she watched all the ice in those gray eyes melt into tenderness while looking at her daughter. Instead, she started toying with one of the many pens scattered on the desk.
"Since I'm staying here, I don't mind helping you out with her," Mia said quietly, keeping her eyes on the small giraffe doodle she was doing on a napkin.
It wasn't for Miranda's sake really. She simply wanted the best for Eva, the child completely innocent unlike the atrocities committed by her mother throughout the last few centuries. Besides, it would be nice for Rose to have a friend not unlike herself, given the yet to be understood power both girls possessed.
"There's no need-"
"Consider it a thank you for letting us stay here, without a sniper pointing at my daughter's head at all times," Mia finished, a slither of ire slipping into her tone on the last words, the memory of a rookie agent panicking and pointing his gun to Rose for the unforgivable crime of being a hungry crying child seared behind her eyelids.
Miranda sighed, an odd sense of relief washing over her. After centuries of trying to bring her back, you'd think the she would do anything to spend each and every second with Eva, not letting anyone else care for her in any capacity, but truth be told, the prospect of not facing motherhood completely alone, even if Mia was helping her solely out of some sense of obligation, did not sound half bad.
"As you wish," she finally said, going back to the half written paragraph her mind drifted away from minutes earlier.