Working with the Avengers was never without risk, and you knew that from your very first day there when Clint came home from a mission with a knife stuck into his foot; even so, it didn't make you doubt joining them at all. You had been working with the team under Nick Fury's direction and supervision, having been a medic with SHIELD before it fell, using your powers to heal as a quick method of climbing the ranks to lead the department. When SHIELD was no longer, it made perfect sense to move into working with the group of people most likely in the world to need medical attention at any given moment.

It also made perfect sense to their enemies that you would be a wonderful target. You carried information that any adversary would want, and your powers would be of high value to anyone who could control it to keep their ranks at peak physical function. A few attempts had been made to get to you during missions that brought the team deep into Hydra territory, but they hadn't been successful in taking you yet; the team was fiercely protective of you and made sure that you had cover beyond the training that they had provided to you when you joined. The use of your powers on your new friends brought you close to each Avenger, and soon, you were just as much a part of their family as anyone. So when the attempt to take you finally found success, it created a panic within the team that reached Nick, who took the lead to find you without a second thought.

"How long has she been gone?" Fury asked in a near-panic, rushing to catch up to Maria as she made her way through the Avengers compound to reach Tony. "Any trace on where they took her?"

"She's been gone since this morning. No trace yet, but Tony's setting up a tracking algorithm from where she was last seen and any known Hydra activity in the area. He should have it up and running within the next thirty minutes."

Nick nodded along as she spoke as if he were barely listening to her, frantically typing on his phone as he kept pace at her side. "That's great, but I've got my own team on it too. I want to find her first, Hill. Make sure that happens."

"Yes, sir."

~~~

Three weeks after you had been taken, there was no sign of a rescue attempt from your team; you weren't about to give up hope, however, knowing in your heart that your friends wouldn't give up either. The Hydra goons who had been working on breaking you day after day were reaching their limits with you and growing increasingly impatient as their methods failed, and you worried now that if your Avengers didn't appear soon, your time would be short for this world. No matter what they did to you, and no matter what threats to your life they could conjure up to try to scare you, you would never give them what they wanted, even if that meant that it would be the end of your days once and for all.

The only time that you felt any chance at finding a little peace was at night, after they had confined you to your tiny cell of a room, it's walls grey and bare, their cold bricks leaving the cramped area freezing and without more than a sheet over your paper-thin mattress. You could ignore the chill away, soothing the constant shake and numbness in your muscles, but what you concentrated on instead left you more despondent with each day. You missed Nat and her taunting you into a spar that felt like a real life-or-death fight. You longed for a smartass comment from Tony, or Sam's whining for you to fix even the smallest scrape just to have a few minutes of fun away from work. Clint had promised to teach you archery, but this put a halt to that, and the meditation sessions with Bruce might not ever happen now. The more you thought about what you were missing, the deeper the pain in your chest felt and robbed you of the air around you.

"(Y/N)?" came a soft whisper from the doorway, convincing you immediately that you had finally reached the point of hallucinations. It was a voice that couldn't happen, not anymore, and you tried desperately to block it from your mind to hold on to yourself. You curled up and stayed facing away, terrified that if you looked towards what you thought you heard, it would only prove your insanity. "(Y/N), I'm here."

"Phil?" you gasped, not caring about your own mind anymore and needing to see. "Oh my god, I really have lost it." You turned to face him, but your mistake in moving too quickly caused a stab of pain that attacked your ribs and forced in a harsh sucking breath before you soon couldn't take another; the slightest movement with even the shallowest of breaths felt as if it were cutting your chest wall open with a dull knife. When you stopped moving so suddenly, all of the color draining from your face in the pain, Phil was forced into quick action.

"Okay, (Y/N), I've got you," he soothed gently, his hands sliding beneath you to lift you to him, "we're getting you out of here, I promise."

"You're...dead..." you panted through shallow breaths.

"Yeah, that's a really long story that I'm going to leave to Fury. Or at least until you're able to drink over it." Phil pushed up to stand straighter, but a yelp of pain left him stopped dead in his tracks with no urge to move any further. "I've got her," he called out to someone in his comm, "but I need help with the extraction, she's injured."

"Two minutes, Coulson," came the reply that you could just barely hear even through his ear piece. You rested your head against your friend's shoulder not only to seek the comfort that you had been missing for weeks, but also so that you could hear who he was talking to. "One more skull to bust..."

"Is that Nick?"

"What, am I not good enough to rescue you?" he snickered, though his expression held his concern as he watched the door with one hand hovering over his holstered weapon. "I'll have you know that I've saved his rear end more than once."

"I'm sure you have."

"Try to sound more convincing, could you?"

The two of you waited in silence after that, both watching the door while the sounds of a violent fight grew louder and louder on its other side. A few sharp bangs against the barrier that made it shake left you jumping in Phil's arms, but he held you tight, ready to either face the threat head-on or to turn and fight his way out of the one tiny window that you were given, whichever option would keep you safe. Ever since your first day with SHIELD, it was a feeling that Phil had felt towards you, and you were thankful now more than ever that his determination had never wavered. His grip only tightened when the loudest hits slammed against the door until it finally gave way and fell, but his sense of danger dropped quickly at the sight of Nick standing ready to take you when the dust settled around him.

"Give her to me," he commanded urgently, his arms extended to accept you.

"I'll keep her," Phil retorted, standing to pass by, "she's injured and too much movement is painful."

"I can hold her more steadily."

"I've been okay so far."

"Coulson that's an order-"

"Okay, that's enough," you finally broke in with a wince of pain in your voice, "I'm fine where I am, Nick. Just get us out of here in one piece, alright? I don't want to go back to the team in a body bag." Nick and Phil exchanged heavy glances with each other as they made their way with you towards their escape, but even as subtle as they tried to be, it didn't miss your attention at all. "What? Tell me."

"You're not going back to the team, (Y/N)," Nick answered, though his tone carried a heavy regret that you had never heard from him before. "It's not safe for you there anymore. This has happened too many times, and you're too much of a target to think that it won't happen again. I'm pulling you from the assignment."

"How is taking me off the team going to make me any safer?" you argued vehemently. The pain that increased with each hurried breath didn't seem to slow you at all now, given the emotional announcement that he had just thrown your way. Nick was tearing you away from your family, and he wasn't giving you any room to argue.

"Because we're putting you into identity protection," he answered quietly, looking down with a quick glance to his phone. "Maria just told the Avengers that you were found dead, and we've got your new persona established and ready for you to take over. We're giving you a new life, (Y/N). Hydra will never find you again so long as I have anything to say about it."

~~~

"Coulson, you're kidding me, right?"

"What? I thought we did pretty well with your relocation."

"Well, you guys have one thing right," you sighed, looking up at the hospital building before you, wiping away flakes of heavy snow as it fell onto your face, "they'll never look for me here. No one in their right mind would live here voluntarily. Between the cold that's making my hands numb and the snow in my boots that's drenching my socks, I'm pretty sure that this is what kills me. I'd almost rather let Hydra find me."

There was a long silence on the other end of the phone line, and you could practically hear Phil's mind racing to control his initial reaction to spew angry sarcasm your way; he knew that this was a traumatic thing for you, to be ripped away from your home, and he was trying his best to be empathetic. "(Y/N), I've been through this too. You'll be okay. Besides, it's Minnesota, not Siberia. It'll be spring before you know it."

"Yeah, I can't wait to wear sandals after my toes fall off," you groaned, pulling your pack over your shoulder with as much conviction as you could muster. "Alright, wish me luck, Coulson. I'm going in."

"You don't need luck, (Y/N), you've got more skills than half of the staff in there. Just don't be too good at it and give yourself away. Oh, and no powers."

"Are you serious?"

"(Y/N), you're not an Avenger anymore, and you're not really you. The only way that this is going to work is if you become the person we've created for you."

"Then maybe it isn't going to work," you argued back, trudging through the snow and shuddering at each wave of cold that chilled you to your core. "Maybe I would've been okay taking my chances, but neither of you asked, did you?"

"They would have agreed."

Dammit, you knew that he was right; you knew that Steve would have insisted on this if he had been a part of the decision, and that Natasha would have driven you here herself if it meant keeping you safe. You could only imagine what Tony was feeling right now, knowing that he was likely punishing himself in terrible ways and blaming himself for your loss; you wanted nothing more than to see him and tell him that you were okay, just to save him from himself if nothing else. You wanted to see him so badly that your mind seemed to be playing tricks on you, and you thought for sure that you saw his car turning the corner behind the building.

"Phil, you're sure that they have no way to know where I am, right?"

"Why?" he asked, his tone immediately changing to one of worry. "Talk to me."

"Maybe this cold is screwing with my brain, but I swear that I just saw Tony's car."