Teach Me How to Read These Broken Lines

"HYDRA?!" Steve nearly shot out of his chair at Nick's words.

When the director merely nodded his head, Charlie spoke. "I thought Gramps, my gram and Howard Stark took them down?"

"That was the belief." Fury nodded slowly. "But apparently we were wrong, HYDRA went into hiding until now. Their leader is a man they call the Grim Reaper."

Though Tony was about to comment on the name, Johnny cut him off. "And you think he's too big for your Avengers to handle? That's why you called us in?"

"Yeah, why the hell did you call them?" Charlie couldn't help but shoot Johnny a dirty look.

"Rogers, that's enough. Put your personal bullshit aside and act like an adult! You can continue your childish antics after this has all been taken care of." Fury chose to ignore the mumbles that came out of her mouth. "We brought you in because a Victor Von Doom has been assisting HYDRA, you know of him, correct?"

"Victor?" Sue blinked slowly, taking the information in. They hadn't ran into Doom in a few years and she was starting to hope that he had dropped the whole 'villian' bit and moved on with his life. "You're sure?"

"Positive." Agent Hill, Fury's right hand, answered for him as she began to pass out folders to each person in the room.

"It seems as though they are trying to recreat the super soilder serum."

"Again?" Steve piped up, examing the information in front of him.

Bruce shook his head in disapproval, his voice was quiet as he was trying his hardest to try not let the anger get to him, "Don't they know the dangers? The risk? The monster that was created last time." He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed.

"Dr. Banner, why don't we step out for a minute?" Natasha offered. When the doctor nodded, she took his arm and gently lead him out of the room.

"Now it's time you learn why you're here," Fury's gaze shifted from the entire group to focusing on the Captain's granddaughter.

"For the family reunion, right?" When Charlie's sarcasm seeemed to go unappreciated, she gave up. "I'm just here as an extra hand to take down HYDRA." She shrugged her shoulders as though the task at hand was no big deal.

"Not quite. HYDRA has been doing their research and we have reason to believe you might be a target for them."

As Charlie tried to process this information, all eyes in the room shifted to her. "What do they want with her?" Steve's voice broke her from her thoughts. He seemed suddenly on edge. He might have only just met Charlie, but she was the only thing he had right now. He was damn sure he wasn't going to let anything happen to her.

"Seeing as she was born with the serum rather than it being injected, they may believe she holds the key to recreating the serum."

"....and do I?"

"That, I'm not sure. You'll be helping Dr. Banner with his research on the serum.

"So..I get to be a lab rat? Swell.."

~~~~

After wandering around Avengers Tower for quite some time, Charlie stumbled upon the training room. There were various stations and her eyes lit up when saw the punching bag. She couldn't think of a better way to release her stress.

"Now..is there a spot to plug in my ipod..?" She pondered aloud.

"In the far corner of the room, Ms. Rogers."

She jumped slightly but quickly headed to the far corner. "You scared the crap out of me, JARVIS. Again."

As she plugged her ipod in, JARVIS spoke again, "I suppose you would like to listen to the 'workout' playlist, Miss?"

"That'd be correct. And please, drop the Miss. Charlie's fine."

The sounds of Papa Roach filled the room and once she had her things set, started letting rip on the bag. With each hit, she could feel the tension slowly fade away. She didn't know how long she was there when Tony came into the room, though based on the amount of sweat that built up on her forehead, she had to guess it had been a while.

"Mute." In an instant, the music was shut off and Charlie whipped around to see who/what had made it stop. "Little Spangles, you are one hard person to find."

"Little Spangles?" She shook her head, not wanting to question the nickname further. "I'm not that hard to find, you just don't me." She striped off the gloves she had on, taking a seat on the bench to rest.

"Gramps is looking for you."

"Yeah?"

Noting her bored tone, he made his way across the room and took a seat beside her. "Yeah." He nodded. "Look, this isn't easy on him. He thought he lost everyone. Play nice, okay?"

Raising an eyebrow, she glanced over at Tony. "Since when did you have a heart?"

"Who said I had one?" Tony shrugged and she laughed, causing him to chuckle a bit as well. When the laughter died down, he got up and stopped at the door, glancing over his shoulder at her. "Anyway, just think about it kid. He's up in the living room."