The first time that Steve caught a glimpse of you, it was just an ordinary night. He was out late, after the rest of the team had turned in to sleep, leaving the tower dark behind him as he casually strolled away from it and onto the sidewalks that weren't so busy as to crowd him, but just sparse enough to feel a little lonely. He hated nights like this when he couldn't sleep, but when the gym didn't give him the outlet that he needed to clear his mind of the nightmares that he knew would plague him if he slept. There were nights when he wouldn't look up from watching his feet land on the asphalt, one in front of the other, until he would find himself in Brooklyn, as if his body knew where he needed to be. Other nights he found himself making pointless circles around the city until the hint of sunlight on the horizon told him to stop. When he left the tower on this night, however, he couldn't have anticipated that his routine walk would end only a mere two blocks from where it had started.

He tried to hurry and bring his phone up to catch a picture of your face before you could notice, fumbling with the device nervously within his thick fingers with a grumble of frustration. Positioning himself just around the corner of a building at the end of the alleyway where he saw you, he held his breath silently and watched as you made short work of a small group of men that you had intercepted mid-robbery. Steve thought about jumping in to help, but he quickly decided that he wasn't needed and would rather watch as you more than held your own, but when you were finished and turned towards him, it was all he could do to hide himself and not drop his phone on the ground when his hands failed him again.

"Rogers," you called out, "that wasn't sneaky at all. You know that I'm gonna need that phone."

"I...I don't know what you're talking about," he answered anxiously, peeking around the corner to see you approaching. "I didn't get any of it."

"I thought Captain America didn't lie."

"I...usually don't."

"Hand it over."

"It's Avengers property. I can't."

You took the last steps towards him, and he didn't balk at your proximity; he clearly wasn't afraid of you, and didn't seem to know any better than to not take you seriously. You centered your energy and directed your strength into your hand, clamping it down over the phone with a force that he couldn't fight. He tried to hold onto it as you pulled it from his grip, but you were far stronger than he was, and far more determined.

"Thanks," you smiled, crushing the device in your hand and dropping its remnants to the ground. "I'm sure that Stark can make you a new one."

"Who are you?" he asked in a quiet gasp, eyes wide in shock and a little bit of admiration. "What are you?"

"No one that you need to worry that pretty little head about, Cap," you smiled, stepping back and away. "Enjoy your walk."

When you faded away from his sight and seemingly into thin air, he was stunned into immobile silence, staring at where you had been standing only seconds before. He had never seen you before, but you clearly knew who he was, and knew about the team; he broke through his shock and turned back to the tower, promising himself that before this night was over, he would know exactly who you were.

~~~

"What's Chi Manipulation?" Steve asked of Natasha, squinting at the screen of his computer as he read the limited information that he could find on you. There wasn't much out there to be known, as you had been pretty successful in keeping a low profile for a very long time. Even with their virtually unlimited access to private data, Steve was struggling to piece it all together. "Is that how she disappeared?"

"She probably didn't actually disappear. More like she manipulated her aura to make herself invisible," Nat explained, reading along over his shoulder with a long yawn. "You didn't do anything embarrassing after she blanked out did you? Pick your nose? Scratch anything private?"

"I hope not," he mumbled, barely focusing on what she was saying. "Okay, it says here that she can augment her own abilities, such as physical strengths, agility, speed, and durability when necessary like in combat situations. She can channel the strength from her opponents to increase her own skills as she weakens theirs."

"That's bad ass."

"That's dangerous."

"For who?"

"Us, if she's on the wrong side," Steve sighed. He pushed back in his chair, reaching out to darken his computer screen so that he could focus on what his next step was going to be. "It doesn't seem like she is though, right? She took down a group of robbers, and didn't try to engage me when she saw me there watching her."

"Doesn't sound like it, no. You want to bring her in?"

"Yeah," he nodded with a heavy exhalation, pushing himself up. "But I'll do it on my own. I wouldn't want to scare her off, and she's already seen Peeping Steve."

Natasha grimaced, crinkling her nose as she watched him walk to the door of his office in silence until he turned around, sensing that she was staring. "Peeping Steve?" she asked cautiously. "That's what you're going with? I think that might scare her off more than anything. It sure as hell is creeping me out."

"Captain Creeper, then?"

"Points for alliteration," she shrugged, bringing her hand to her chin in thought, "but how about just don't get caught this time and we can skip the nicknames that make this bordering on illegal."

~~~

The next night he took the same route on his walk, only this time, Steve's eyes were trained on every corner and dark alley in the hopes of spotting you again. Block after block had been traversed several times over until he began to lose hope. It wasn't like him to give up, and he wasn't about to now, but the idea that he might be on a fruitless search didn't sit well with him and he began to question his motives. He wanted to bring you in to talk to you and to know more about your abilities and how you were using them, or if you were using them for someone, but he also couldn't argue that he was fighting his own curiosities as well.

"I am Captain Creeper," he muttered under his breath, stopping with a press of his hands on his hips, "this is ridiculous. What am I doing?"

"I assume you've been trying to find me," you offered coyly from a perch just above him. "I've been following you all night, Cap, and I have to say, you're kind of turning out to be a bit of a disappointment."

Steve hadn't looked up at you yet, because he was staring at his feet, trying and failing to wipe the wide grin off of his face at the sound of your voice and the realization that he had been bested at his own game. "Maybe your standards are set too high?"

"Hey, you're the one carrying the persona around. It's not my fault if it's too heavy for you." You jumped down from the three-story building that you had stopped on, landing solidly on your feet at his side without so much as a wobble. "Wanna fight?"

"I'm sorry?" he gasped, the smile now completely gone and replaced with a mouth open in confusion.

"That was three syllables, Cap. Which one tripped you up?"

"All of them, I guess?"

"Come on," you smiled, taking his arm, "let me show you something. It might be the outlet for that pent up energy that you've been looking for."

"I...I don't know what you mean," he argued, "I don't have any-"

"Please, stop lying, seriously. You can't pull it off. I see you walking almost every night, looking like you just want a good old-fashioned fight. A no rules, back-alleyway beat down like the good old days, am I right? Isn't that why you keep stumbling into Brooklyn?"

Steve stopped in his tracks, leaving you no other choice but to stop with him when his hand grabbed yours from the hold it had on his arm; he spun you around to face him, his eyes looking at you with the yearning to know more about who you were, and to know how you knew that about him. "Yes. That's exactly what I want."

"Then that's what you'll get. Come on, I know just the place," you began to lead him away again, "it's a little group of friends who aren't so unlike you. We all need to let out our aggression now and again."

"You mean like...a fight club?"

"I mean exactly like a fight club, but with just one rule."

"You don't talk about fight club?" he snickered, quickly faltering into a nervous cough when you didn't join in.

"No, smartass. It's don't kill anyone."

"Oh...oh! Yeah, that's a good one." He silenced and returned to following you, his mind running back to why he was trying to find you in the first place. It was a happy accident that you were so willing to allow him to tag along, but he still had his own mission to fulfill. "Can I fight you?"

"That was the plan. You want with or without powers?"

"Um...with?"

"Okay, but let's make one thing perfectly clear, Rogers," you shot back, throwing a harsh glance over your shoulder to him, "this isn't an audition. I'm not the superhero type."

"Wanna wager on that?"

"Such as?"

"If I win, you consider it," he tried, hoping that you would bite at the offer.

"And if I win?"

"I buy dinner."

"Pfft, you are so conceited, you know that? Did you even stop to consider that I might not be interested? You superhero types are so full of yourselves."

"Hey," he huffed, "rude!"

"Besides, I'm totally gonna kick your ass, Captain Creeper. I've gotta keep guys like you off the streets while you all get your beauty sleep up in that big ugly tower back there."

"Yeah," Steve scoffed, hanging his head in shame as he followed, "that's not going away any time soon."