"So how have you been settling in?" Asked Tony as the lift began to move up. "I know yesterday was a little bit of a... disruption."

"It's much better than HYDRA." I replied with the first thing I could think of. Tony nodded and Bruce gave me a small smile as he drank his coffee. The lift pinged and opened up to the next level, which was a completely different set out to the Tower. There was a forst glass wall a couple of steps in front of us with a door directly in the middle. Bruce opened up that door to reveal a whole level that was completely a hospital-like setting rather than being shared with a Lab. Tony and Bruce walked out past me and I slowly followed them, eyes darting all over the room.

"If you just want to sit down on one of the beds." Bruce said to me, nodding towards the row of white beds set up in a row along the back wall. I slowly walked over to one and hopped up onto it, my legs swinging over the side as I watched Bruce and Tony. Tony was opening up several cupboards and drawers, pulling out different little machines that I had never seen before, but most of them he ended up putting back until he had the little white disk that had checked my injuries last time.

"Bring up the projections JARV." Tony said, pressing the button in the middle of the white disc, throwing the thing up in the air and just as I panicked that it would fall to the ground and break, it hovered in midair, beeping softly. Several of projections appears in midair, the back of them blurry so I couldn't see what they were saying. I looked over at Bruce and saw him putting on blue surgical gloves that I was way too familiar with, causing me to clench my hands tightly. He turned to one of the cupboards and pulled out a small, shallow plastic container with a needle and several vials sitting in it. Immediately, I stiffened and clenched the edge of the bed, my nails digging into the soft mattress. My throat tightened as memories of needles at HYDRA flooded my mind and I tried to focus on my breathing techniques to calm down.

"I'm just going to put this small thing on your arm." Tony spoke up, causing me to drag my eyes away from where Bruce was preparing the needle. Tony was holding a small, black, oval-shaped disc in his hand and he moved over to me, instantly causing me to move back a little. The needle had unnerved me slightly, and now I could feel myself slowly spiralling down into a pit of anxiety. Tony paused for a moment, watching me cautiously before he began to move forward again.

"I'll need you to roll up your sleeve." He said softly and I immediately shook my head, clutching the hem of each sleeve. "Emily, it's a monitor, we just need to make sure all of your vitals stay as they should while we check everything." I shook my head again, looking down at my scarred hands, they were only just a glimpse of what was under my shirt, under there was much worse.

"Emily." Tony kneeled down in front of me. "I know you might be self-conscious of yourself, but we all saw what you looked like when Reindeer Games teleported you back to the Tower. We won't judge or whatever you are worried about." I looked back up at him briefly, biting my lip nervously before I took in a deep breath and slowly began to roll up my sleeve. Tony's didn't as much make a sound or even more away as I rolled up my sleeve until it was up at my shoulder. He gently placed the black disc on my forearm, just below where my sleeve was rolled up. I couldn't watch, I didn't want to see all of the scars, the signs of my weakness.

"Connected." Bruce called out just as the disk on my arm beeped, and another projection appears in the air. Tony stepped back and flicked through the projections as Bruce walked over with the needle. I stiffened again and clenched my hands tightly, Bruce giving me a small smile.

"This will only feel like a prick." He said comfortingly, softly taking my wrist and rubbing a cotton ball with something on it over the vein on my arm, leaving it slightly damp. "Try not to tense up too much." He gently ran his finger over the vein before setting the needle down on the bed, turning around and walking back over to the drawers.

"Everything seemed to be steady at the moment." Tony spoke up as Bruce went through the drawers. "Definitely an improvement from the first time we saw you. The scan will show up in more detail but ill wait until we get the blood sample." My eyes darted back to Bruce, who was now holding some sort of fabric that was in a loop that I was very familiar with from my time at HYDRA. It was one that you could easily tighten and loosen without having to retie it.

"This will just help your vein to become more visible." Bruce explained, noticing my worried expression. "I don't want to get it in the wrong spot." I swallowed nervously and nodded, trying to stay still as he slid the band onto my arm and tightened it up, not so tight that is hurt but it wasn't comfortable either. He picked up the needle again and I took in a deep breath, biting my lip so hard that I was surprised it didn't start bleeding.

"Try not to tense." He said softly again and I let out a heavy breath, trying to relax a little, my eyes staying on the needle the whole time. I felt a tiny prick as the needle pressed against my skin and I instinctively flinched, making to a move to get away from the needle, but Tony appeared next to me and gently but firmly held me in place. I continued to look away until I felt Bruce slowly take the needle out of my vein.

"See?" Tony squeezed my shoulders gently. "That wasn't that bad." I sighed heavily and took the cotton ball that Bruce was holding out to me, putting it over the small droplet of blood that was forming. Tony squeezed my shoulder gently before walking over to where Bruce was putting the vial into some machine that I couldn't see when he stood in front of it. Instead, I hooked down at my hand that I still had free, focusing on fisting it and then flexing it, calming down my breathing as I pushed all thoughts of HYDRA out of my head.

"When that stops bleeding," Tony said, nodding to where I was still holding the cotton ball to my vein. "You can just lay down and I run the scan thing over to you." I nodded and gently peeled away the cotton bud, a small little speck of blood in the middle. I swung my legs back up onto the bed, slowly laying down as Tony flicked the little white disk over to me. It hovered just above my head and beeped, the blue light starting to run down my face. I closed my eyes and only opened them again when I heard the beep again. As I sat up, more projections filled the already crowded room and I slowly sat up as Tony flicked through them all.

"How does it look?" I asked softly when he didn't say anything for a couple of moments.

"Definitely a lot better." He replied around the projections. "Things are still healing, but everything is returning back to normal. It should only take a couple more weeks, and until then, I'll have to tell Rogers to not train you too hard." I nodded and he gently took off the black monitor on my arm and I quickly pulled the sleeve back down my arm, hiding all of the scars on my arms.

"You're free to go now." Tony said, giving me a soft smile as he packed away the black disk and the white scanner. "Just take it easy." I nodded and shuffled off the bed, moving towards the door with my arms wrapped around my stomach.

"Thank you." I said softly, pausing just before the door.

"No problem kiddo." Tony grinned, Bruce smiled at me before the door slid open and I walked out.

"Is everything okay?" Asked a voice on the left side of the door and I jumped, my heart jolting as adrenaline pulsed through my body. I spun around in alarm and held my hands out in front of me, instinctively summoning up my fire though it was immediately blocked by the new bracelets.

"Sorry." Loki said softly, eyes darting down to my hands before he met my eyes. "I never seem to learn." He nodded back to the now-closed door behind me. "Did everything go okay in there?"

"Yes." I nodded, swallowing back my nerves as I let out a breath. "Tony said that everything was looking better than last time."

"So you can start training?" He asked and I nodded, fiddling with the bottom of my sleeve.

"Only light work though." I added and he nodded back, still smiling softly.

"That's good to hear." He said. "Come on, we should probably get you down to training before Rogers comes to hunt you down." I smiled softly and he raised an eyebrow, expression still light. "Trust me, he will do that. He's a stickler for training, he will hunt you down." I chuckled softly and we both walked into the lift, Loki pressing the button with a 1 on it.

A couple of seconds later, the lift pinged and the doors opened up to the kitchen and lounge room again. We stepped out Steve, who was sitting at the bench talking to Pepper, turned around to look at us over his shoulder.

"All good news?" He asked and when I nodded, be broke out into a grin. "Come on, its best to finish before lunch. I'll take you to the training rooms." I looked hesitantly over at Loki and he gave me an encouraging smile before I followed after Steve.