Steve laid wide awake in bed, just as he did most nights. He glanced at the clock -- 3:15 AM. He could always count on one hand the amount of hours of sleep he received each night. This particular night he didn't even need to count as he had yet to fall asleep.

He was tired. Not only tired from lack of sleep, but he was tired of the nightmares, the memories, and haunting images that plagued him night after night. Some of them were real, others were figments of his imagination created by his brain to torture him.

Steve knew if he tried he could probably fall asleep, but a part of him didn't want to. Because the previous night was the first time his nightmares had ever included Evelyn. And the image was so terrifying for him that he never wished to close his eyes and ever see it again. It was always rough to see images of Bucky falling from the train, or see his fellow Howling Commandos get taken out by the enemy. But something about seeing Evelyn's body crushed and bloodied had left a chill inside of him that he wasn't sure he would ever shake.

Evelyn was special to him, that was obvious to anyone that knew him. Her friendship was the one thing in his life he cherished above everything else. She was calm and attentive and playful when he needed it, and she did it all while suffering from trauma of her own. She was his rock, and he would do everything in his power to make sure she never endured the pain she knew ever again.

Typically after a nightmare he would call Evelyn, and she would rush over and calm him down. But he had done it so much lately he didn't want to burden her that night. So he decided to deal with it in other ways -- by running around Central Park until the sun came up.

~

That same afternoon Steve hadn't pushed his body quite enough, and the images from his nightmare kept popping into his mind without his control. So he took to releasing his frustration at the boxing gym.

With every punch, his anger at his own inability to control his thoughts shined through. They got harder, angrier, more chaotic, until the punching bag was left lying across the room. He breathed heavily yet he hadn't had enough. He hung up another bag before continuing on with his attack.

"Rough night?" he heard, he glanced over to see Director Fury standing across the room. In his aggression he hadn't heard him enter the gym.

"What are you doing here?" asked Steve between punches. He could sense Fury wanted him to stop his attack on the bags full of sand before continuing on, but Steve kept on punching anyway.

"We need to have a little chat," Fury told him.

After knocking the second punching bag across the room, Steve walked over to his gym bag to remove the white tape that protected his knuckles from the rough leather. He tossed the tape in his bag before giving Fury his full attention.

"Are you here with a mission?" asked Steve.

"I am." Fury began, "Two, actually."

Fury handed Steve the file that contained confidential information on the tesseract. He knew all about it, both from his own interactions and from of course Evelyn. Last he knew, S.H.I.E.L.D had possession of it and it was safely in New Mexico.

"I'm confused." Steve said, shutting the file and handing it back to Fury.

"It's been taken, by a man named Loki. He's not from around here. If you're in, we'll debrief you on more later. We could really use you on this one, Cap."

"And the second?" Steve asked.

Fury sighed before pulling out a second folder. Steve could sense a change in the air as Fury handed him the second file. And when he opened the file to see Evelyn's face staring back at him, he felt like his heart stopped.

"Eva's been compromised." Director Fury's normal tough vibrato had an obvious distress to it.

Steve felt a rush of emotions racing through him all at once, so many he had to sit down on the bench before he felt he would topple over.

"What happened?" Steve asked, his eyes rushing over the paperwork in front of him. Most of it was her general info, some about her schooling and awards she had won, but when he got to the bottom of the last page he grew even more concerned.

'Status: Enhanced individual. Highly lethal.'

Across her information was a red stamp that said 'Compromised'

Nobody knew about Evelyn's abilities outside of himself and her family, so what happened in the twenty-four hours they hadn't seen each other?

"Eva tried to fight off Loki when he came to take the tesseract. He grew very interested in a human who could do what she can. He took her along with Barton and a physicist who was working on the project."

Steve's eyes kept glazing over the word 'lethal' in her file. Evelyn was the most compassionate and thoughtful person he knew, there was no way she should be considered lethal even with the inhuman things she could now do. And she would be heartbroken to know that people saw her that way. He didn't know the full extent of the things that happened to her, he never pushed her to talk about them. But certain things she said gave him the notion that she had to do something against her will that caused harm to other people.

"Why was she there?" Steve growled, standing up and throwing the file back at Fury.

"I have no idea. One second I'm supervising my team, the next Eva is standing beside me. By the end of the night the S.H.I.E.L.D base was in ruin and Eva was taking them somewhere in a portal. I've seen what she can do Rogers, it's imperative we get her back on our side and get rid of the control Loki has over her."

Steve's mind was racing quicker than he could process all the information thrown at him. He was undoubtedly overwhelmed with the situation presented before him, but one thing was certain; he would do whatever it took to save Evelyn.

"When do we start?" he asked.

~

Tony was livid. He was absolutely livid at his sister, so terrifyingly angry he was practically trembling. He warned her time and time again to stay away from the tesseract, and it was all for not, as she was now in the clutches of the enemy once again. Why couldn't his sister just listen to him? Why couldn't she do what she was told? The questions rolled over and over in his overactive mind until he was driving himself sick. He knew the answer, as she was obviously just as much a Stark as he was. But that didn't mean it didn't drive him crazy.

S.H.I.E.L.D's helicarrier was where he landed, he was quick in exiting his Iron Man suit which flew off at his command on it's own. He needed to get to work, too much time had already passed. He needed to get to Evelyn before Loki made her do something that would no doubt break her when his control over her wore off. She already had to deal with the ramifications of being captured by the same people that took him, so many bodies had fell in the wake of the capture of both Stark siblings.

"Mr.Stark, welcome." Tony looked to see Phil Coulson welcoming him at a doorway that led inside. Every time he had come in contact with Phil he had a gentle smile on his face, but not today. He knew Evelyn's capture had effected more people than just himself, but he was too focused on finding her to care.

"Where do you want me?" Tony asked.

"Right in here, the others are already inside." Phil told him, motioning to the open door behind him.

Tony followed him down long corridors full of agents bustling about before they entered the Hub of the carrier, which housed Director Fury who was already yelling orders at the agents around him. Natasha Romanoff stood beside him, her arms crossed against her chest, and not to his surprise was Steve Rogers pacing already in his Captain America uniform.

'Waiting for orders, like a good little soldier,' Tony thought. Tony wasn't sure what bugged him about the Captain so much. It could stem from his father constantly raving about the man, bordering on incessant. It could come from his convenient friendship with his little sister, one that he never saw coming. He knew Steve wasn't a bad man, he knew the Captain was the hero everyone made him out to be. And even though something annoyed Tony about him, he couldn't argue the fact that he made Evelyn happy, and that was the most important part.

"Spangles," Tony mumbled, walking past the soldier.

"Stark." Steve responded.

"Any progress on finding either of them?" Tony asked, walking to stand beside Fury. Fury looked down and shook his head.

"We're running facial recognition now. We should have a hit soon." Fury told him.

"Where's Banner?" Tony asked, looking around for the Doctor who was nowhere in sight.

"He's in the lab searching for gamma rays. Between the tesseract and Eva, they should give off a good signature to find." answered Fury.

Tony wanted to desperately ask Fury if he had coerced her into seeing the tesseract again, he needed some answers to the long list of questions he had. He wanted to ask Phil if maybe he had used his gentle fatherly tone with her to do the same. But he knew then wasn't the time for questions, finding Evelyn was so much more important than his anger.

"We've got a hit!" Agent Jasper Sitwell called out across the room, he was seated behind a computer that was showing a 100% match on Evelyn Stark's face.

Tony and Steve were quick in rushing over to get a glimpse at the monitor, both of them became instantly distressed at what they saw.

Evelyn was in Stuggart Germany, she was fighting a police force all on her own. She was using her portals to catch the officers rushing at her, having them exit above her before falling to their death. The men behind her she easily took out with energy blasts. Her now signature blue color was doing the very thing she had been trying to avoid.

"God dammit!" Tony growled, slamming a hand down on the counter in front of him. The room around him was quiet before another agent called out that they had another match for Loki.

"He's about thirty miles away from Eva's location. We need to get them at the same time, under Loki's control she most likely will only use her portals to go back to his location. We get one, we get the other." Natasha explained, her training instantly kicking in to get started with her next mission.

"Rogers and Agent Romanoff, you two will be getting to Eva --"

"I'm going after her." Tony cut him off instantly. He wasn't going to trust anyone with the mission of getting Evelyn back. Not even the great Captain America or the Russian assassin. 

Fury looked at him and sighed. Tony was already hitting buttons on his wrist to call his suit back to him. 

"Alright then." Fury responded upon seeing the determination behind Tony's chocolate colored eyes. "Captain and Romanoff, you'll be heading to Loki's location. He isn't exactly hiding. Tony, I'm leaving Eva up to you."

Several hours later, Tony along with Steve, Natasha, and several S.H.I.E.L.D agents were waiting in the back of a Quinjet to descend into Germany. None of them had much to say on the flight over, it wasn't until Tony was about to fly out of the open jet that Steve placed a hand on his metal covered shoulder. 

"Bring her home, Tony." Steve told him. "Please." 

Tony could see the Captains vulnerability, it was clear in his ocean blue eyes. His voice trembled, as did the hand that rested on Tony's shoulder. He didn't realize how much Evelyn meant to Steve until that very second. Tony wasn't good at making promises, he was even worse at keeping them. So he gave Steve a single nod before pulling his helmet down and flying out of the back of the jet.