She blinked blearily as everything started to come into focus. Where in the world was she? A minute ago, she had been on the train and there had been the boy…..Drew. Oh. Oh. Bree scowled before wincing at the headache currently pounding into her skull. She inhaled sharply before heaving herself into a sitting position. Her hands were tied above her head with metal chains and some intricate looking lock. Across from her sat Pepper, eyes closed but still breathing. Regardless of their situation, Bree felt herself sigh in relief. She had found Pepper.

"Welcome back to the land of the living," said a familiar voice and she twisted to look at who had come in. Two people, both men. One….one was the boy. Drew. He had betrayed her. The other….Bree inhaled a sharp gasp when she saw his face.

"Long time, no see, Bree," Matt said. His voice brought back memories she had long stopped thinking about from ZoneTech and she stared at him. He was even wearing a lab coat as he had used to. "You look like a deer in the headlights. Relax, we're just going to talk for now." He pulled up a chair and sat back on it, looking younger than he probably was. "We've been working on this for a long time now. You even helped us work on it, though you had no clue what you were doing."

The confusion must have been written on her face because he smiled warmly and went on to explain. "Remember all those tests you ran on the human mind? Those were not just regular tests, I'm sure you know. We've been looking for people with something a little extra. For some reason, there are certain people in this world with a small section of their brain working that most people don't have. That's what you were testing for."

Bree swallowed hard- her voice felt dried up and must have sounded as scared as she felt. "Why are you telling me all this?" she asked, blinking hard. There was something off here. Something in the way Drew was looking at her.

"Well, those experiments were done sometimes had negative effects. That one patient, Marisol Cento? You met her after you, ah, 'escaped' from here," Matt said, making air quotes. "Once they exited the labs, like yours, we gave them a shot of a certain vaccine we've been working on. It rearranges their cells and...well, I won't bore you. But it starts with brain fog, balance issues, nausea before the worse symptoms hit. Some don't survive. I believe Marisol lasted for about a year before she succumbed to the illness."

"What?" Bree couldn't help the roughness in her voice. It felt like it had been ages since she had any water.

"You didn't hear? She passed away, unfortunately. Lasted the longest of all of them. But you...we didn't get the chance to inject you with it while you were at ZoneTech. It wasn't ready yet. But once it was, well, we sent it Drew here to administer it at the party." The pieces were starting to fall together in a horrifying, terrible way.

"The warehouse," Bree breathed and Matt nodded along.

"Yep. But through all of this, ZoneTech also had an agreement with another...company, per se. They wanted the Avengers broken. So both companies thought- why not kill two birds with one stone? They provide the resources, we provide the manpower. And that's what we did. Breaking the Avengers apart has been needed to crack them. When you end up here, it will consume them. They'll become so consumed on finding you that we'll get to make our move."

Bree's breath started to hitch. "Matt," Drew warned, shuffling the weight on his feet. Bree stared at him- she had to be missing something. Everything in her told her she was missing some important fact. Matt glanced back at him and nodded, some unspoken conversation occurring.

"You're wrong," she sputters out, words flying out her mouth before she can stop them. Just to show that she can still fight. "I don't mean that much to any of them. I'm just a teenage girl they happened to find on a mission, and no one knew what to do with me. Your plan will fail."

Matt shrugs. "I guess we'll find out soon enough. Well, I think that's enough of an information dump for now. After all, you'll be here for a while." With a wink, he slipped back through the door and Drew trudged closely behind. Bree waited for her heart to stop beating a mile a minute before whispering,

"Pepper?" Her companion's eyes flew open and gave her a feeble smile. Bree had thought she had been pretending.

"It'll be okay, Bree. The others will be here soon and get us out." Bree shook her head- well, the best she could with her arms tied above her head.

"We can't count on that. We don't know what could be happening or if they even know where we are. We've gotta make a plan." Bree didn't know what on earth it could be, but they couldn't stay here.

"You're right," the woman sighed. Pepper shook her head. "I just don't know-" The door slipped open and Drew entered with a finger to his lips.

"Don't be too loud. The security cameras can't pick up whispers." Bree's eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Was he trying to help them?

"What are you doing?" Bree asked softly and he shook his head.

"Just let me talk. We're going to be moving you guys tomorrow. You'll each be receiving some tests. There are two exits out of this place. 6th floor, door eight. You only have one chance." He opened the door back up before adding loudly, "And no mischief!" Bree was completely lost, but she had to trust him. They had no other choice.

"Alright," she whispered. "Let's plan an escape."


The plan seemed simple, but easier said than done, Bree thought as the security guard prodded them forwards. Bree and Pepper had each planned to meet up at wherever the sixth floor was and get out. The only problem was getting away. Pepper had enough self-defense but not enough to take on armed guards. Bree didn't know whether she herself could, but would rather not find out. Instead, Drew was coordinating with them. He had materialized later in the day and offered to cause a distraction to let them slip out.

"Why are you helping us?" Bree had asked before he had left that time. He just smiled and winked, leaving with more questions than answers. He had been so cruel on the train. Now, however, Bree was more uncertain as the guards led Pepper in a completely different direction. What if this didn't work? Squaring her shoulders as she stepped into the new room, Bree blinked against the white light and an unsettling sense of deja vu washed over her.

"Welcome back, Bree," said a deep voice that sent shudders through her body. She hadn't heard that voice in a long time. Standing before her, Justin Walters, leader of ZoneTech, in the flesh. He wore an uncanny smile and held out his hands in greeting. Matt stood a few paces behind him on the right and Drew on his left.

"You," she said feebly, uncertain how to react. Drew wasn't looking at her, but instead had a hard look in his eyes and was staring straight ahead.

"Yep, me. Do you know what we're going to do here?" he asked pleasantly like they were old friends. She hesitantly shook her head, remembering how often a wrong answer led to punishment. This was a nightmare. Bree just wanted to be back at the Tower with her teammates, eating pizza and watching some idiotic movie that Tony had picked out. He crossed to the side of the room and she realized why everything seemed so familiar. This was an exact replica of the room she had once worked in. But instead of a table in the middle, there was…

"Recognize it? It's the memory retrieving device you were working on before you, ah, left. You made some pretty good progress here. We finished the job and reconfigured it to retrieve all memories, not just lost ones." Bree looked helplessly to Drew. He had to do something. She had an inkling of what was coming next. He finally looked at her and shrugged casually.

"Thinking Drew here is going to help you?" Bree felt her veins turn to ice as panic started to grow. He knew. Something was up. She was still missing something. "I'm surprised you haven't figured it out. How do you think he got the invite to your Iron Man's party? How he just happened to somehow know your name? It wasn't an accident he was at the Chinese food restaurant." Matt and Drew walked over and some unspoken signal and grabbed each of her wrists, forcing her over into the chair she had spent many nights working on from months ago. They were going to watch her memories- or worse, take them. As they pushed her down into it and tightened the straps, she bit her lip, her breath coming dry again. She hadn't had water in over eight hours.

"Sorry, Bree," was all Drew said before standing back with a smile. She watched in horror and started to pull what looked like glowing blue saran wrap off his face. She squeezed her eyes shut. There was no way Colin Richards could be standing in front of her. His hair was dyed a different color, but without the face mask, there was no mistaking him. Betrayal burned in her stomach and made her taste acid. This couldn't be happening. She screamed in betrayal, panic and nerves seeping in and didn't stop. This couldn't be happening. Her lips were cracked and dry and she struggled to gasp in another breath. So much work, so much effort and time had been put into this plan. Pepper and herself hadn't slept in over 24 hours preparing. Justin Walters looked at her with a cold smile, not reaching his eyes. The white lab coat Matt was wearing blended in with the sterile light bathing the room.

"Let's begin, shall we?" Justin asked in his velvet voice. Bree glared at him, refusing to offer anything. SHe wouldn't give her memories up. He just grinned, though. "What a feisty little one you've become. Being with that band of misfits gave you some backbone, I'll give you that. Now, this won't hurt a bit, but since you designed it I'm sure you knew that. It'll take a few minutes to kick in." She bit her lip, determined not to show the fear gathering in the pit of her stomach. She remembered making the machine, alright. It would mentally relive her memories. It would be like living them all over again, every long, painful, exhilarating, and happy moment. All his memories would be his. She assumed they would start on the day the whole ordeal began. Her mind became fuzzy around the edges. She gripped the edge of my table or whatever they had her strapped to. No. She would be stronger than this…this drug, this machine. She glanced around helplessly. Where were the others? Had they figured out what was going on? Please don't come for me, she mentally begged. It would be safer. Her vision fizzed out and came back in. "Brielle. Fighting it will just prolong the inevitable." A tingling feeling shot up her spine as she closed her eyes.


(A/N: ...okay. I know it's literally been over a year since I updated this last. I created this story FOUR YEARS AGO and never finished it. With Avengers: Endgame coming up, I just can't let it go unfinished, okay? Even though my old writing makes me want to throw up a little bit XD I mean, I started this when I was a young wannabe writer teen and now weirdly enough I'm an adult. I have nearly the whole story written from last year and just never updated the story (TRUST me, I'm struggling to post this chapter without trying to scratch the whole thing and redo it). But I keep getting reviews and asks to finish out the story, so here y'all go. It's all for you.)