A/N: My second attempt at writing Ava's story. I'm planning for this to be a long fic. So thank you for taking interest in and reading my first chapter! Hope you enjoy it!

-Chapter 1-

"Snakes don't eat chocolate cake, dummy," I said. The leather seat of the car was soft and worn. Achingly familiar, for reasons I couldn't identify.

"Yeah, they do. Joey likes chocolate cake," Andy bounced up and down in his child safety seat to my right, and held out a green stuffed snake with a very un-snake-like grin on its face. "And I'm not the dummy, you're the dummy."

"No, you're—"

"Nobody is the dummy," Mom interjected. "Be nice to each other."

Andy stuck out his tongue at me. Our appearances were polar opposites. Where my hair was black, his was a light feathery brown. My eyes were dark, and he had eyes clear and blue as the sea. Even with how different we looked, though, I knew his face almost as well as I knew my own. Again, there was that pang in my chest at the sight. But instead of investigating the feeling, I frowned at his blatant show of disrespect and pointedly turned my head away. "Are we there yet?"

"Not yet," Mom said, infinitely patient.

"This is taking forever," Andy complained. "We're never getting to the zoo."

"Not forever," my dad said. "Just in about twenty minutes."

An uneasy feeling came over me suddenly. There was something in the back of my mind, teasing me like an elusive dream. But when I tried to hold on to it, it dissipated like mist.

"Mom? Dad?" I said. "Maybe we shouldn't go."

"What?" Andy turned to face me with a scandalized look. "Are you kidding me?"

"Why not?" Mom said. "I thought you were excited. Are you feeling okay, Ava?"

"I …" The nervousness grew stronger. Something was wrong. Something important, something I know I know. "We have to turn around."

Mom and dad shared a worried look.

"I know this sounds crazy." I tried to calm myself but failed. "But just turn around, okay? Something bad is going to happen."

"Ava—"

It was too late.

I knew it a second before I saw the truck coming toward us at a breakneck speed from the corner of my eye. Our car swerved violently to the left, and the seat belt dug painfully into my chest. My head snapped forward with the momentum. I closed my eyes, unwilling to see what was going to happen. Mom and Andy shrieked, and distantly I knew I was screaming with them. Nauseating shock vibrated through my bones when the truck collided, the sound of metal meeting metal grating against my ears, and I felt the world spin away as our car was overturned. A white-hot slash burned across my face—

I sat up in the bed, my hand flying to the uneven scar on the side of my face.

Not in the car. I was not in the car. I lowered my shaking hand, and grabbed a fistful of the bed sheet just to assure myself of that fact. This was June in 2014. I was in bed, in my current foster parents' house. Nick and Julia. Their names were Nick and Julia. There was no car, no driving, no truck. Just darkness, other than the dim sliver of light that escaped into my room between the curtains. Nick's snores came faintly from the next room.

Guilt roiled inside me, bitter and scathing. I could've—should've—remembered sooner what was wrong, insisted more forcefully that we turned around. Then maybe the truck would not have hit us.

But it was only a dream.

A glance at the glowing screen of the electronic clock beside my bed told me it was the ungodly hour of two in the morning. My head throbbed dully with exhaustion. If I didn't go back to sleep right now, I would feel like crap in the morning. But I did not want to go back to sleep.

I swung my legs off the bed and made my way to the closet, pulling out a plain set of t-shirt and old jeans, as well as a spare pair of ugly sneakers. After changing into these, I reached back and rummaged through the clothing until my hand touched what I was looking for—a small, blue drawstring nylon bag, stashed in the corner.

Taking it out and drawing it open, I looked inside and cataloged the familiar objects. My parents' dented wedding rings, a thick stack of photos bound by a rubber band, a stuffed IKEA dog … and a pack of cigarettes and a lighter.

The last two items were stuffed into the pocket of my jeans. I closed the bag and put it back into its place in the closet carefully.

Of course Nick and Julia didn't allow smoking. Actually, they were pretty horrified when they found out the thirteen-year-old who was coming to live with them smoked, and tried to break me out of the habit by confiscating all my cigarettes. But I know that one place they would never even try to search was that bag. Hence why I hid the cigarettes in there.

I climbed onto the writing table and crouched down, pulling the window on top of it open with excruciating slowness as to avoid making too much noise—only to yank it aside with too much force when I lost my balance and nearly fell off. There was a low screech, and I stilled.

The house was silent. Nothing to signal that Nick was about to get out of his bed, storm down the hallway, and hurl the door open to ask me what in the world I thought I was doing.

With a last glance around the room to make sure everything's okay, I jumped out.

The window was only a foot or so off the ground, so I landed without problem. Dusting myself off, I stood up and headed off.

New York was quiet at night. At least, that was the case in this neighborhood, at the edge of the city no one bothers. The soles of my sneakers slapped against the pavement, an empty sound echoed by the surrounding buildings. There was no one else but me. It felt as if I was the only person still alive in the world.

When I reached the next block, a place filled with old buildings and abandoned construction projects, I paused and lit a cigarette, having to try several times to ignite the nearly-empty lighter. The smoke burned my mouth and lungs, but the calming buzz that came more than made up for it. I sighed, the tension in my mind from the dream draining away with the smoke like water.

I put out the cigarette after I finished it and tossed it into a nearby trash can. My fingers twitched to the pack of cigarettes in my pocket. Even though I told myself that I wouldn't smoke anymore, before I knew it I had another cigarette in my mouth. I was so focused on trying to get the deficient lighter to ignite that when a small bang came from the alleyway to my right, I started in surprise. I dropped the lighter, and in my effort to catch it, the cigarette fell from my mouth.

"Oh hell," I muttered, and glared at where the cigarette and the lighter laid on the ground. That was one good cigarette wasted. Who knew when I could get more?

Sighing, I picked up the lighter and threw the cigarette away, deciding to go home. Before I could walk away, though, something caught my eye. A weak light at the end of the deep alleyway, occasionally blocked by wavering shadows.

Despite common sense telling me to leave it and go, I stepped into the mouth of the alley and leaned forward, both curious and slightly afraid. Nobody lived in the run-down buildings around that alley, which barely held themselves together. There was nothing in it, not even a trash can or the broken bottle glass and empty beer cans one can usually find in a place like that. I knew because there was once or twice I'd ducked into that alleyway to smoke after school, and there wasn't anybody in there to bother me.

I frowned and turned to go home. Who cared about the random person inside the alley, anyway? It was probably just some drunk or druggie or whatever that I shouldn't get involved with. Although, I might have to be more careful if I ever go in there again—

Something grabbed onto the back of my shirt and yanked, and I stumbled back into something solid. A small shriek tore out of my throat, only to be chocked off when an arm wrapped itself around my neck, tighter than a vise. I struggled, kicking back and clawing at the arm, trying to loosen it so I could breathe. But I might as well have been trying to wrestle a brick wall. Through the blank roaring in my ears, I heard a soft click and felt the cold bite of metal against my temple.

A gun.

"Stop moving." The voice was rough and unyielding. "Or I'll shoot."

I stopped. The person's arm loosened slightly, not enough for me to escape, but enough for me draw in air. Deep inside, I wanted to shove his arms back, kick him away, and run and never look back again. But my mind was hazy with terror, my body frozen, and it was all I could do to not break down in tears.

He took a few steps back, leading us deeper into the shadows of the alley. "Who are you? Why are you here?"

"I—I don't—" I swallowed, trying to form coherent words. "I didn't know there was anybody in there, it's always empty! I wasn't doing anything!"

"Wasn't doing anything," he repeated, his voice heavy with suspicion. "What's a kid doing outside in the city in the middle of the night?"

"Smoking. I sneaked outside because Nick and—I mean, my parents, don't allow it. I can prove it. I still have the cigarettes on me, and the lighter—"

"Don't care," he snapped, and I shut up. "How do you know the layout of the alley? How did you know what was inside it?"

"Inside it?"

"You said you knew the alley was empty. Have you been in there before?"

I cursed myself. "Well, I just thought it was empty. Alleys usually are."

He crushed the gun barrel harder into my head. I flinched. "Don't lie. When have you been in there? How many times?"

"Just once or twice. Some time ago, maybe a month or two." Tears were beginning to burn my eyes, welling up and threatening to spill over. I tried to blink it away. "Look, I don't know anything. I never saw anything interesting in that alley and I could barely remember what it looks like. I don't have anything valuable on me. I don't know what's going on! Please, just let me go! I won't tell on the police or anyone on you, I'll never go in there again in my life—"

"Shut up," the person said, harsh. "Listen. You're going to come with me. You will be compliant, and you will not make any noises or struggle. You will not talk unless addressed to first. Otherwise, I will shoot. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

The person turned us around so we were facing the inside of the alley. "Move." He walked me toward the light source.

Shit, shit, shit. All I wanted was a cigarette, and now I'm going to be murdered in the back of an alley by a psychopath for intruding on his self-proclaimed territory. When were the police going to find me? Tomorrow? A week later? Probably never. Maybe he was going to steal a car, drive us to away from the neighborhood, and dump my corpse into the Hudson river. Fear was everywhere, heavy as lead in my veins, a metallic taste in the back of my tongue. I needed to find a way out of this, but I couldn't think of a solution.

"Stop," the person said when we reached the end of the alley. A small light bulb I don't remember being there before flickered, attached to the wall beside a door.

Instead of hitting me or hurting me, the person only muttered something under his breath, too low for me to hear. He paused, after a moment, and I heard the words "yes, sir."

He was talking to someone, I realized, bewildered. He probably had a microphone or some sort of communication device attached. There was more of them like him, whoever he was. Maybe he was in a gang. But that didn't make sense. In the six months I spent in this neighborhood, I'd never seen or notice any suspicious activity. Then again, as this night has shown, I don't know anything.

The person moved toward the door, jamming a set of keys he'd took from his pocket into the doorknob and pushing it open. With the gun still trained on me, he jerked his head toward the inside of the building.

"No." I was shaking so badly I could barely keep myself upright. "I can't. Please."

"I'm going to give you five seconds," he said, calm and technical, and nodded at the gun in his hand. "Five. Four. Three—"

I walked into the building, the person following behind me. Inside, there were only a few other light bulbs that cast a weak circle of light around them. I could see shadows of other people moving. The air was stale and musky, filled with dust.

We reached a staircase, and the person prompted me to go down. We descended for what seemed like an eternity, before we reached a door, which the person opened.

The sudden contrast of the bright light forced me to squint. The basement was gigantic. The first thing I noticed was the weird machine-like object beside the wall. It was the size of a small table, and partially covered in a dirty blue tarp. I soon forgot about it, though, when I saw the man standing in the middle of the basement. He wore a dark suit, with eyes like coal set into a thin, sharp face.

I was pushed in front of him and forced down onto my knees.

"Who are you?" he glared at me. "What were you doing in the alley?"

The genuinely furious look in his eyes paralyzed me. "I…"

The man sighed. "Alright. Let's try this another way. What's your name?"

"E-Emilia Baker," I said.

His gaze became more cutting. "You are a terrible liar."

A shove from behind sent me onto the floor.

"What. Is. Your. Name?" He leaned down, propping his hands on his knees, eyes locked on my face.

"Ava Ashford." The concrete floor pressed against my bare arms was cold and grimy. I wanted to get up, but I didn't dare move.

"And you were doing … what, exactly, around the alley?"

"Smoking," I repeated what I said to the person who had caught me and brought me here. "I'm not allowed to do that at home." Home. Nick and Julia's house, where it was safe. It felt a million miles away. I needed to get back. My thoughts were murky and incoherent, and I couldn't seem to focus enough to think logically.

The man stared at me for a few more seconds, before straightening himself and sighing again. "My God, Moores. Why the hell did you bring her in here?"

"You said to capture and report whatever suspicious personnel found around the area, sir," the person behind me said.

The man cussed. "I meant spies, Moores! Shield members! Not random teenagers looking for a place to smoke pot. Jesus Christ, I can't believe—This is already going wrong—" He swore again, colorfully. "I'll have to clean this up."

He reached into his jacket and took out a gun, leveling it at me. A small gasp escaped my mouth, which had dropped open slightly. I was sure I'd gone slightly cross-eyed staring at the gun pointed at my forehead.

"I don't really believe you have anything to do with this. You were probably just at the wrong place at the wrong time," he said, "However, now that you've seen me, I'll have to end you. It'll be quick, I promise."

"No—no—" I sat back up, leaning my head back to look at him. "Please—I won't tell anyone—"

He shook his head.

"I have family, they're waiting for me, you can't do this—My parents—!"

"I'm sorry."

I shut my eyes and tensed, flinching back from him and curling in around myself. There was no need to feel guilty about surviving the car crash without my mom, my dad, or Andy after all, in the very end. I was going to join them soon.

The shot never came.

Instead, I heard the man muttering, quietly and angrily. When this went on for another few moments, I dared to open my eyes slightly. His head was turned to his collar, and he was saying something rapidly. Beads of sweat were gathering on his forehead, and his eyebrows were drawn together.

"Change of plans." He lowered the gun and stepped toward me. I shrunk back, but his fist closed on the front of my shirt. He hauled me up to my feet, pulling me to him and spinning me around so he was holding me in a lock throat position.

"Moores, stand ready." The man pointed his gun to the side of my head again, the way Moores did in the alley. The gun wasn't held steady, and it shook against my head slightly.

The basement door swung open.

"Don't try anything. I currently have a child at gunpoint, and I won't hesitate to shoot." the man said, " I want you to come in and, in my view, drop whatever weapon you possess."

The woman who emerged was beautiful, her red hair falling in thick waves to her chin. She had her hands—one of which held a pistol—raised in front of her, but the way she moved suggested no helplessness at all. Her features were also familiar, but I didn't care. Hope flared back inside of me. The men who were going to kill me were afraid of her.

Her eyes flickered over the room, her expression cool. For a moment, her gaze landed on my own. Then it moved up to my captive's, and her face hardened.

"Who are you?" she said, her voice low, "What's Hydra doing in this part of the city?"

"You're not in a position to ask questions," the man said, "I know you couldn't allow an underage civilian to become injured—That's not how you operate anymore. Drop your weapon and kick it away, slowly."

She stooped down and let the gun in her hand to fall to the floor, before standing up and nudging it away with her foot. My previous relief was overshadowed by my disappointment at how easily she conceded. Too easily.

"Now turn around, with your hands in the air," the man said, "Step away from the entrance of the room."

The woman complied.

After a few moments of tense silence, the man said, "Moores, go bind her."

Moore stepped toward her, and the man begin moving toward the door, facing the woman and holding me in front of him the entire time. I watched the woman, waiting almost desperately for her to do something. But she was motionless, hands still raised in the air.

We were there when Moores finally reached out for her. His hands nearly brushed against hers when she whipped around and caught him in the face with her left elbow with a sickening crack. There was a yell and a spray of blood. In the same motion, too fast for my eyes to follow, she turned to me and drew her right arm down sharply, throwing. The object flashed in the light as it hurtled toward me. I screamed and jerked back against the man hiding behind me.

At the same moment, that man cried out in pain. He stumbled backwards and lost his balance, bringing me down with him. The arm around my neck loosened, and I instinctively pushed the man away from me, scrambling backwards.

The man himself sat up, cradling an arm against his chest. A knife stuck out of the hand that was just holding a gun to my head. He braced his uninjured hand against the wall, and with a heave, forced himself back up. Fumbling in his jacket, he drew out a second gun. I grimaced at the sight, but the man seemed to have forgotten all about me.

"Find cover!" The words cut through my dazedness. I looked up. It was the woman.

I tried to follow the order. My eyes landed on the weird, misshapen object covered in tarp.

I pushed myself up and, bending over to make myself smaller, sprinted to the object. It wasn't very far away, and I hid myself behind it.

"It's over." The woman stood a few feet away from the man. "All your subordinates are incapacitated, and I have others surrounding the area. Drop your gun."

The man shook his head. "No … Hail Hydra."

He veered the gun in my direction and fired.I ducked back behind the object. The bullet hit it with a small, metallic bang. Relief flooded through me. It was over, like the woman said—

The object exploded.

I was flung into the air. A wave of pure heat washed over me, scorching every inch of my skin. It was everywhere, ripping down my throat, tearing through my body. I was burning from the inside out. Colors exploded in front of my eyes, brighter than any fireworks. Instead of being beautiful, they were terrifying. They blazed, searing into my retinas, each fighting to drown the others. I opened my mouth and screamed, but I could barely hear my own voice through the agony.

Then, just as suddenly, everything went dark.