Steve didn't speak to me about the incident for the rest of the day, but every time I looked over at him, he was already looking at me, his face full of concern and worry, but as soon as he saw me looking at him, he gave me a comforting smile.

Despite the happy mood among the rest of the Avengers for the rest of the night, the panic attack alone was enough to resurface the nightmares when I crawled into bed.

I was standing in the crowded lounge room in the compound, people everywhere. I was standing next to Nat, who was chatting away to someone with a big smile on her face. A waiter passed by us and I reached out to grab a glass of something, drowning it in one gulp. Christmas music was blaring through the sound system, pounding in my ears drums.

"I'm just going to go to the toilet." I yelled at Nat over the music.

I walked into the bathroom and suddenly, someone grabbed me, shoving me against the sink so hard that my spine bent around it, pain flaring through my whole body. I opened my mouth to scream in the hope that someone would hear me, but the man slammed his hand onto my mouth, pressing down hard enough that I couldn't even move to bite his hand. He slammed my head back into the glass mirror of the bathroom and I heard it shatter as I was temporarily disorientated.

His hands fumbled with the zip at the back of my dress and through the stars flickering across my vision, I managed to raise a knee and kick out at him, aiming to hit his stomach and knock the breath out of him. However, my foot just went straight through his body, like he was a ghost or something.

"Nice try, pretty thing." He smirked, his voice grating at my eardrums. "Do you really think you are stronger than me?"

He abandoned the zipper and instead ripped the dress straight off my body, causing a horrible loud sound to fill the air. I flinched away, or at least tried to, but he kept one hand firmly tangled in my hair to keep me pinned against the wall, while the other one began to run down my waist.

Nausea rose inside me and I tried again desperately to kick out at him, but it went straight through again. However, as I tried once more to kick him, he grabbed my leg with ease, pulling himself closer to me. His breath brushed at my neck and this time, I screamed.

"Emily!" A voice yelled back as I kicked and thrashed around. "Jesus. Emily, stay still please!"

I could feel hands grabbing me all over and I quickly opened my eyes, knowing that it would be more dangerous for me to close them. However, as the tears finally escaped from my eyes, I made out the blurry figure of Tony standing next to my bed, Pepper hovering nervously in the doorway. Tony reached out with his hand, probably to brush the damp hair out of my face, but I instinctively flinched away from him.

"It's okay." Tony soothed, pulling his arm back for a moment before reaching forward again and tucking the strand of hair behind my ear. "JARVIS is getting Loki, he'll be here in a moment."

"Do you want a glass of water?" Pepper spoke up from the doorway, biting her bottom lip nervously.

Not trusting my voice not to wobble, I nodded, twisting my sweaty palms nervously as I looked down, almost trying to hide from the sympathy in Tony's eyes. There was a gentle knock on the door a couple of seconds after Pepper had left and I immediately looked up, but relaxed a couple of seconds later when I saw Loki walking in, his eyes immediately landing on my face.

"Hey." I croaked weakly, wincing at the sound of my voice.

"How are you feeling?" He asked, kneeling on the opposite side of my bed to Tony.

"Still a little shaky." I held my hands out to show them still faintly trembling in the dark.

"Do you mind if I calm you down a little?" He held up one of his hands that was already full of his green-twisting magic.

I nodded, weakly smiling, grateful that he had asked. His lips twitched back faintly, but I knew that he wouldn't properly smile, not with Tony so close by. Loki gently leaned forward and pressed his cool fingertips to the side of my forehead. A gentle chill went down my spine and I felt the soothing wave of carm wash through my body, slowly untensing my shoulders and easing the trembling in my hands.

"Thank you." I spoke a little easier now that my throat didn't feel like it was being squeezed tightly, smiling weakly at Loki, whose lips twitched in reply again.

"It's two o'clock in the morning." Tony spoke up and I looked over at him, completely forgetting that he was there for a moment. "Do you think you can go back to sleep?"

"I don't know." I admitted softly, taking the glass of water that Pepper brought back in and sipping from it slowly. "I...I don't want to fall back into another nightmare."

"I can give you some sleeping medicine if you want." Tony offered. "Bruce has already made up some especially for you."

"I don't want to be drugged." I shook my head, my hands tightening around the glass.

"It will help you have a dreamless sleep." Tony sighed, looking at me sympathetically. "They're not harmful, I promise."

"I can stay up with you if you like." Loki suddenly offered and we all looked at him. "That way you don't have to go back to sleep."

"I don't think that's a good idea Reindeer Games." Tony began. "She needs her sleep-".

"If you wouldn't mind." I interrupted Tony, looking over at Loki, knowing that despite Tony wanting the best for me, staying awake so I didn't fall victim to the nightmares again was probably the best option.

"Of course not." Loki shook his head, and Tony sighed heavily, but I knew that he wasn't actually annoyed with me, despite how it sounded.

"Just take it easily Emily." Tony looked at me as I handed him the now-empty glass back. "Get JARVIS to grab me if you need anything, okay?"

I nodded softly and gave him a small smile as he stood up from where he had been kneeling next to my bed. His eyes darted over to Loki, giving him a stern look, before he gently guided Pepper out of the room, who gave me a soft smile. I watched them leave and shut the door behind them before I looked over at Loki.

"You really don't have to stay up." I tried to tell him.

"I'm not letting you stay awake on your own." Loki interrupted almost immediately. "You would be bored, and you'd probably just fall asleep straight away again, I can see how exhausted you are. I know you don't want to risk having nightmares again, but Stark is right, you need to get some decent sleep at some point."

"I have actually been sleeping better lately." I sighed. "But something happened at training and... it kind of triggered them all again."

"What happened?" His eyes were sharp in the dark room, his posture straightening a little in concern.

"It's nothing." I shook my head, instinctively wrapping my arms around myself. "I don't really want to talk about it."

Loki was silent for a couple of moments, like he was debating whether to push it or not, but he eventually looked away from me and I relaxed a little, glad that he had dropped it.

"I know you said you didn't want the pills Stark was offering." Loki began and this time it was my turn to cut him off.

"I'm not taking them." I gave him a firm look, which probably looked pretty weak considering how I was feeling.

"I wasn't suggesting that." His lips twitched in the ghost of a smile again. "I was going to offer to help ease you into sleep with my magic. I would make it so that you couldn't have any dreams either."

"That's basically the same thing as drugging me." I shook my head. "Really, I'm fine to stay awake."

Loki fell silent for a moment, looking down in thought before he looked up at me again, a smile playing on his lips.

"I have another idea." He said, holding out his hand that became wreathed in his green power. "I want to take you somewhere. Do you trust me?"

"Of course." I nodded, reaching out with a sweaty hand and gently placing it in his bigger one before seconds later, the floor disappeared under me and my vision suddenly became black, but I didn't panic.

"Open your eyes." Loki's voice was near my right ear and I slowly opened my eyes, feeling a cold breeze tickling my face, immediately chilling any exposed skin.

I obeyed his words and slowly opened my eyes, which as usual I didn't remember closing. I blinked a couple of times and then realised that I was seeing the tops of the pine trees surrounding the Avenger's compound, illuminated faintly by a slither of a moon hiding behind the clouds.

"Are we on the roof?" My voice was quieter than I was expecting, slowly recognising the sight of the sprawling fields.

"I've got you, don't worry." He chuckled softly and I slowly became aware of one of his hands holding me around my waist, causing me to stiffen instinctively. "Hey relax, I'm not going to let you fall."

I smiled weakly, even though that wasn't the reason that I was so tense against his body. I became aware of my legs dangling over the edge of the roof and my mood immediately soured even more as I remembered the last time I had been sitting on this roof, my legs dangling over the side.

"Look, I know that last time you were up here, things weren't the best." Loki began, immediately noticing my dampened expression. "So, I wanted to bring you up here on a better note."

"Thank you." I murmured softly, feeling the guilt beginning to rise in my stomach. "Look, about all of that..."

"I don't want to hear it." He shook his head, cutting off my words. "We're not going to think about that, okay?"

"Okay." I murmured, trying my best not to dwell on the thoughts too much.

"Here, you're shivering." I didn't even realise it until he pointed it out, my body shaking slightly as we sat in the cold air.

There was a flash of green and I realised Loki had conjured a blanket over me, covering me with a warmth that I knew wasn't just from the blanket. I looked up at him with a faint smile and he brushed a strand of hair out of my face.

"I can see you're exhausted." He smiled softly as I tightened the blanket around me. "Just try and sleep."

He patted his shoulder and I hesitated for a moment before slowly leaning towards him and resting my head on his shoulder, not even fully comprehending what I was doing. Something about him was drawing me close and before I knew it, my eyes were fluttering shut before I could even question if he was using his magic. 

AN: 

I don't know if this chapter feels a little rushed or not, or if it feels a little too sudden... Please, let me know what y'all think!