A/N: Fam, I am literally so unspeakably sorry. I know, it's been two years, but on the upside I have ACTUALLY FIGURED OUT HOW TO REWRITE MY SHITTY 2012 WRITING. I underwent my HSC which was really very time-consuming, but now I've got all the time in the world as i've ACTUALLY GRADUATED WTF?

I just decided it would be easier to delete the earlier chapters, re-do the entry and then release my favourite parts as one-shots or shorter fics. I've already replaced the first chapter, and I may add another to smooth it out early next week which will just explain how Emma got there etc in a more condensed manner. It would have stopped the clogging up of this fic like a millennia ago. Anyway, the two side-fics are still canon in terms of this and as per usual, it's an MCU multiverse where both X-men and Avengers and now, Daredevil and co. exist in the same universe.

I wrote this fanfiction four years ago, and as a lot of the more recent reviews have pointed out, I was quite frankly shit, rip me. But I've gotten older and had more practise and learned. So I will be steadily editing what I've deleted from (chapters 35 on) and bleeding in details into this most recent ret-con. Thank you all so much for your support and kindness, I've received everything from hysterical messages from emotional overhaul to one person even cosplaying Emma Holmes at a con last year. I sobbed for a solid hour and it's really made all of this worthwhile. So thank you all, and I hope you enjoy a much more improved IWFCSPA.

If you would all like to follow me on Tumblr my main blog is mischief-and-maryment, and my fanfic sideblog is if-weshadows-haveoffended.

During the hiatus I also completed the side-fic to this (which you will need when I upload the next chronological chapter as I do refer to it quite a lot): An Agent and An Assassin. It's a delight, so please check that out :)

Now, for something I haven't written in a while:

Disclaimer: I own absolutely nothing, but BOSTES doesn't own me anymore either.

In Which Fury Chooses Stark's PA's Chapter 1- Rewrite

Emma Sherlock Holmes, born July 7th 1983 at St Mary's hospital, graduate of Cambridge in 2005; was incredibly aware of what her file entailed. Or at least she had believed. Sitting here now, in what remained of SHIELD, commanding Tactical… no, this was not what she had anticipated, she had trusted Fury much more than this. Or at least she thought she had. Fury would have had to be naïve to think any agent would do exactly as they were told, the best manipulated their instructions to suit their benefits. Agents of SHIELD, of MI9 (as they were known in the Second World War, now STRIKE) and of other nations knew that it was those who were slaughtered on their first battle, that had followed instructions to the letter, saluting as they went along.

She had uncharacteristically slid to the floor as if she were a teenager having a fit once again in the gaudily-decorated bedrooms in Kensington. Privileged little shit she had been, feasting on her comics and her books and her movies and her TV shows as if it were the only thing keeping her alive. She'd forgotten about those passions in her SHIELD uniform. But this, no, it was wholly different and the numbness had now spread to her entire body.

There it lay, her life; in four neatly-typed pages of government-issue paper, blue-green eyes scanning a condensed summary of day-to-day activities and school grades and photographs in agonisingly neat paragraphs. Of her juvenile hi-jinks with the Avengers, of her mediocre job as PA.

And that final sentence that sent her into this spiral in the first place:

If necessary, do not hesitate to eliminate.

Personal Assistant to Tony Stark. She'd held that title with some pride and cynicism, knowing above all else it had been and always would be below her pay-grade. Yet, as she raked taloned fingers through the now messy up-do of unruly curls, she discovered with pang that she was once again yet another pawn. It kept her safe, yes, it prevented SHIELD from paying total recompense for what she had done and how she had bargained, but Emma Holmes knew well it came at a cost. How could she not? Not with her previous illustrious career interacting with whistle-blowers and the like.

She should never have believed she was any more special than the other agents she had worked with, trusted before eventually betraying. Fuller, Shiro, Agostino… names that thanks to her orchestrations, held no more consequence to the world of espionage. It was for the best after all. Or at least she attempted to convince herself.

Perhaps she should have taken that chance, to have left the torturous nightmares the sounds of a beloved cousin as she related a final detail to a small child, and of a small body still in the pyjamas his mother ironed an infuriatingly perfect circle between eyes that would never open again. If she convinced herself as she convinced others of her lies, that his small chest was still moving, that he would play; as she had observed over the last year undercover, with his Lego set and his cars.

It wasn't particularly successful.

But her sense of vengeance had to succeed, didn't it? She simply had to avenge her cousin, find delight in the thrill of espionage and lies.

Lies, perhaps she was well-suited to her husband after all?

No, she loved him. She was in love, madly, completely in love with Loki Laufeyson. That was a certainty. She had known since that foolhardy mission, she had denied it for too long, dancing around pristine lab-benches as he would visit, enquiring as to developments, ensuring that his neutrality was especially partial to the Avengers cause. It was brief and passionate and marriage followed soon after. How could it not? Happiness for once had come to dictate her life and she revelled in every second, never mind the well-needed warnings of her elder brother and the teasing of the younger twins.

"I'm overqualified. Far too overqualified. BA in Political Science, not some secretary."

That had been her first protest.

"Yes, but Agent Holmes, take into consideration your less-than-stellar track record. Yes, Case 5654 B was a success. But you haven't forgotten about Assange have you? What about London? That was just a strike of luck. Don't forget it was only your brother that had bailed you out." Coulson listed her successes and faults without even the slightest hesitation. Fury barely bothered to look up from his station.

"I was young," She'd been an angry university student. "I didn't know any better."

"You were a privileged little shit with mommy's money, ready to bribe to get revenge. Sure, you were clever, but don't forget you're not the greatest." Coulson reminded. "Your ignorant student self very much fucked up years of work, and now it's coming back to bite you in your former-model ass. STRIKE made you disposable, and we very nearly did if it weren't for a couple of the miracles you pulled."

"Fact remains, Holmes," Fury interjected calmly, "You're a wanted agent for everything you've done. This is the nicest we can do for you. Or would you rather a SHIELD desk job like our old friend Melinda May?"

Things proceeded quickly from that. She was bundled off into an office to speak to Stark, then moving into an apartment within the Tower.

Loki still hadn't recognised her, and Emma wasn't sure whether or not it excited or terrified her. She knew what she did and she refused to regret an instance of it.

And things slowly snowballed, the Avengers grew both in members and in family. Stark and Potts as well as Barton and Romanoff produced progeny. And so did she, surprisingly. Understanding and forgiveness had taken form in her shape-shifting husband, inconstant in all but affection. They all remained as sane as they could, working and amusing themselves. She was given the most delightful charge and she could not possibly fail the young woman, not when she had so much to live for.

But the five-foot-eleven (and a half) woman brushed her well-tailored suit off and re-pinned her hair. She had once been told by a well-meaning aunt that she would grow to be serene-looking. If anything, all Emma saw was a severity that not even a genuine smile could completely warm. A nose that seemed far too sharp, eyes in such a cold, unforgiving blue and pale skin that only served to contrast to the deep brown curls or to turn violently scarlet in the presence of sunlight. She lost that innocence long ago, that elegance was just a façade, savagery and deceit masking as quipping beauty. So she reduced herself to the clever enigma in a designer suit, re-kindling a love for the escapism of her pop-culture and the ridiculousness denied in her youth. They didn't care, they enjoyed it, her atrocious behaviour.

And she supposed it helped, they forgot her cruelty in the field and that was essential, they simply had to trust her.

So Emma walked in newly-broken in Louboutin heels to the glass doors waiting at the end of the corridor, heels echoing threateningly in crisp, sharp falls against a grey monolith-slab floor, mottled with crystals.

With a quick breath, she opened the door and the small-trademark half-smile that was now associated with the Head of Tactical graced her aging face and she addressed her regular crowd.