TW: Child neglect, child abuse, canon-typical violence, needles, cursing

The Girl was tired. Very tired. Her eyes drooped as she sat on her blanket and leaned her head against a cool part of her wall. Her stomach grumbled once, twice, then three times. The Girl hoped that the Men In Black would come by with something to eat soon. The Girl was unsure when she had last eaten.

She pulled her legs to her chest and ignored the pain it caused, only giving a slight hiss under her breath. The Girl knew They were watching. They were always watching, and They did not like it when she showed pain. They said she had to build up 'tolerance', but she didn't know what that word meant, only that it meant she could not cry when she was hurting.

The Girl pulled her white nightgown over her knees. For once, her nightgown was clean, only a few brown spots from when the Red Stuff came out. The Nice Doctor had given it to her. She had said it was her birthday and that now The Girl was Three.

The Girl had not known what she meant, but she liked having a clean nightgown all the same.

Her Room was cold, but it was always cold. She was not allowed shoes, and her socks had ripped to shreds back when she was Two. Her feet were always freezing, and she shivered, thin white hairs sticking up on her arms and legs.

The door opened, and there stood the Nice Doctor. The Nice Doctor smiled at The Girl. Nice Doctor was the only one to smile at her.

The Girl did not move or respond. She was too tired and hungry to. Nice Doctor walked over to her and knelt in front of her. Something was wrong. Nice Doctor was alone. Normally Nice Doctor came with Men in Black and Men with Guns.

"Hi," Nice Doctor said. Nice Doctor pulled something out of her pocket and held it out to The Girl. The Girl took it quickly. It was Bread. Bread was her favorite. She ate it hungrily and she expected Nice Doctor to instruct her to come with her to Room with Needles. But she didn't. Nice Doctor just kept kneeling in front of her.

"Listen child," the Nice Doctor whispered. "Soon, things will change. Some people are coming to visit us. They're going to come take you somewhere. Do not fight them." The Girl nodded and reached for Nice Doctor's hand.

"We go?" The Girl asked. Nice Doctor shook her head and caressed The Girl's cheek.

"No, you leave," Nice Doctor said. "I…can not come with you. But do not worry. I will be okay."

Nice Doctor sounded sad, and The Girl wanted to ask why she must go alone, but then there was an alarm and the Nice Doctor let go of her hand and left and then the door was shut.

The Girl sat in the cold again, but now her stomach only grumbled twice. The Girl stared at the door. Who was coming? Were they like Nice Doctor? Or were they like Mean Doctor? Did they know Nice Doctor? Were they her friends? The Girl had never had friends before. Maybe if they were Nice Doctor's friends, they could be The Girl's friends to.

Outside Her Room, The Girl could hear loud yelling. There were the sounds the gun the Men with Guns used. There were thuds and grunts, and then the lights went out in Her Room. The Girl whimpered, and she covered her mouth, trying not to be heard.

If They heard, it would be bad. But would Nice Doctor's friends forget her if she didn't make noise? The Girl shook her head. It was better not to be heard. She would not get hurt by Them if she did not make noise.

She shut her eyes, deciding she should sleep. Her eyes were stinging with sleepiness, and she leaned back onto the ground, turning onto her side and hugging her knees. She used to not be able to hug her legs. This was back when she had Chain, but when she turned Three, they took it away.

The Girl liked being Three. She had a new dress and no chain. It was much better than being Two.

The Girl dozed in out of sleep for a while, and the sounds outside kept going for what felt like forever. She hoped it would end soon. All this noise was probably scaring off Nice Doctor's friends.

And then there was the loudest noise. Her door kicked open into Her Room and she sat up, frowning. Through the darkness, she could not see who was there, so she did not speak. They did not like her to speak.

"Hi," the figure said, and as the figure came closer, The Girl realized this was a person she had never seen before. In the dim light of the hallway, she could see trimmed blond hair and a blue outfit, and a circle painted blue and red on his arm.

The figure kneeled in front of her, and The Girl shrunk back. Was this Nice Doctor's friend? Or was this a new kind of Men in Black – a Man in Blue? Yes, he was Man in Blue.

"Hey, I'm not going to hurt you," the Man in Blue said gently. The Girl did not move away but she did not lean closer. There was kindness in his eyes. The kind of kindness in Nice Doctor's eyes.

Man in Blue sighed once.

"I promise I'm not going to hurt you sweetie," the Man in Blue said. "It's going to be okay; I won't do anything to hurt you." Man in Blue smiled and The Girl decided she liked his smile. She leaned forward towards him and she finally took the hand outstretched to her.

"Can you tell me your name sweetheart?" Man in Blue asked and The Girl tilted her head curiously, her eyes heavy and she blinked tiredly.

"Name?" she asked. What was a name? "What name?"

Man in Blue frowned and squeezed her hand, and The Girl found it was not a hard squeeze. Not one meant to hurt her, like the others who grab her hand do.

"What do they call you?" Man in Blue said. The Girl frowned.

"The Girl," The Girl said. The Girl closed her eyes. "Tired."

"You're tired?" Man in Blue said. The Girl nodded. Man in Blue turned around, peering out into the hallway were there were muffled sounds coming.

"I'm going to pick you up, okay?" the Man in Blue said. The Girl retracted her hand and frowned.

"No," the Girl said. "Nice Doctor fr'nd."

Man in Blue titled his head. "Nice doctor's friend? You're waiting for the nice doctor's friend?"

The Girl nodded. "Wait."

The Man in Blue seemed to contemplate for a long moment, and his lips twitched, like he wanted to say something. Finally, he sighed and reached for her hand again.

"If you come with me, we can go find their friends," the Man in Blue explained. The Girl widened her eyes. Leave? She was going to leave. Leave to find Nice Doctor's friend?

The Girl hesitated. What if Man in Blue took her away and she never met the Nice Doctor's friend? They said they were going to go with Nice Doctor friend. Not Man in Blue. The Girl stared at the Man in Blue, unsure, before she nodded nimbly.

"Go," she said. She rose to stand, unhooking her arm from around her knees, pulling down her white gown so it went over her knees. The Man in Blue's eyes widened, and she realized they were blue too. The Man in Blue opened his mouth to say something, and then he shook his head and shut his mouth. But still, he looked like at her sadly, like the way Nice Doctor sometimes looked at her when they left the Room With the Needles.

The Girl went to take one step forward, but the Man in Blue reached down and picked her up. He slung her over his shoulder, and on instinct she wrapped her legs around his back and arms around his neck.

"I'm sorry, sweetie, but it'll be easier if I carry you," the Man in Blue said to her. He was quiet for a long moment. "Close your eyes for me, okay?"

The Girl blinked. "Close eyes?"

"Yes," the Man in Blue responded. "Can you do that for me? Just for a few minutes."

The Girl frowned but did as she was told. She knew better than to not do what she's told. Then the Men in Black got really angry. The Man in Blue might do the same thing.

They started to move, and The Girl was dimly aware that they left Her Room. She felt a pit of fear grow in her stomach. When she left Her Room it was never good. It meant it was time for the Room With the Needles or it was time to get punished. She didn't like it when she left the Room.

She heard the sound of yelling and screaming, metal hitting metal, and the loud pop the Men with Guns made with their big, black guns. She let out a shrill sound of fear, not quite a yell, and buried her head in the Man in Blue's neck to make the sounds go away. It was loud, too loud.

"Romanoff!" the Man in Blue said. "I've got one hostage. Taking her back to the Quinjet."

"Fr'nd," she murmured. Was the Nice Doctor's friend at this Quinjet?

"Yes, taking you to their friends," the Man in Blue said. The Girl's fear did not dissipate, and she frowned into the Man in Blue's neck, trying to make the sounds go away.

They didn't, not for a long while.

They made it to the Quinjet, the cold wind of the Northern Canadian area causing goosebumps to rise on the back of Steve's neck. He walked up the ramp of the Quinjet, but did not shut it to keep out the wintery draft. In case of retreat, the others needed to get in quickly. Small flakes of snow flew in from the outside, mixing with the tips of Steve's blond hair.

Steve walked deeper inside the jet and moved to a line of seats on the far wall. He reached to set down the young girl on his back, and the pressure was relieved as the young girl was transferred from his back to the black metal seat. The girl sat primly in the chair, back straight and her eyes still shut tight.

"You can open your eyes now," Steve told her. The girl blinked her eyes twice and then opened them, and she looked around the Quinjet. Fear covered her features and she shrinked back into herself. She hugged her knees to her chest, pulling her messy white hospital gown over her legs. She gritted her teeth and her pupils dilated, so much that so that he could barely see the blue of her iris.

"Hey, hey," Steve said, reaching out to her. She leaned even further away from him and Steve stopped, knowing getting closer would only make it worse. "I'm not going to hurt you, I promise."

"Nice doctor fr'nd?" The little girl mumbled, voice tight and scared. "Where?"

Steve did not know who this so-called nice doctor was or who their friend was, but the little girl was insistent that they meet this person. Steve hadn't wanted to lie to the little girl about knowing this person or going to meet them, but he had desperately wanted to get that little girl out of the Hydra facility. The last place she needed to be was in the warzone that the Avengers had descended upon it, looking for Loki's Scepter. But there was also the begged question: what was the girl doing there in the first place? She didn't seem to be their willingly, and she couldn't be older than four. Maybe three.

Why was she here? Who was she?

"They'll be here soon," Steve fibbed. Steve would have to find this nice doctor or this friend eventually, but for now, his main priority was to keep her here. He was confident that the others could handle the base on their own, especially since it appeared that Loki's Scepter was not on sight. He had to make sure that she didn't run off, not before they figured out who she was and got her out of here.

The girl still looked frightened, and Steve finally got a good look at her. She had long blonde hair, dirty and matted from what appeared like a lack of brushing and washing. Her dress was dotted with brown spots, some spots larger than others, and there was a metallic scent about her that alerted to Steve was that was most likely blood. She had bruises running up her arms and legs, and most likely more hidden under her messy hospital dress. She had no shoes, and the tups of her toes were colored with dirt. She was thin, far too thin for a little girl with a gaunt face and eyes that almost bulged out of her skull.

Pity and sympathy rose in Steve, as he realized this little girl was most likely a prisoner of some kind. What could a little girl have done that made Hydra want to keep her prisoner? Especially one so young?

The little girl seemed to have no concept of what a name was, and she seemed to be simply called 'girl' if her answer to his earlier question was anything to go by. Either Hydra had stripped her of her own name, or she had never had one to begin with. Steve made it his mission to find it. Everyone deserved the dignity of a name.

Steve lowered himself down so that he was at her eyelevel, and her gaze turned to directly to him. He felt a familiarity in those eyes, and he couldn't quite place where he had seen them before.

"Listen, I'm not going to hurt you, I promise," Steve pledged to her. "I know this is all new, and very frightening, but you're safe now, okay?"

"Man in blue keep me safe?" the girl asked. Man in blue? That must have been the name she gave him.

"My name is Steve," Steve introduced. He put down the shield from his arm, setting it down with a gentle clink. He raised both his hands to show that he had no means or intentions of hurting her. "I'm a friend, I promise. I mean you no harm."

"Rogers!" Stark barked into the comn. "Where are you?! We could really use you out here!"

Steve sighed and raised a hand to his ear, pressing the comn link.

"On the Quinjet," Steve answered softly. "I have…a situation. I'll explain later." He paused for a moment. "When you come on board…..be quiet. We have a guest, and she's a little skittish."

"Guest?" Clint asked.

"She?!" Stark exclaimed. Steve shut his eyes. If only Bruce was here. Bruce had been called away for some kind of convention in North Carolina, where he was to be a keynote speaker. Once they got the lead on where a base was, they didn't have time to wait on the off chance it was a mobile base. That meant Bruce was out of commission for this mission. For as skittish as Bruce was about hurting others, he was actually really, really good with kids. He would be able to soothe the girl while Steve helped the others, and that would have kept questions at bay for a short while at least.

"Yes, she. Just….be not you, okay, Stark?"

With that, he dropped his hand and returned to the little girl, who was still looking at him with wide, frightened eyes. The silence that descended upon them for a moment was broken by the girl's stomach rumbling, and the girl looked sheepish for just a moment.

"Sorry," she whispered. Steve smiled at her; a comforting smile meant to communicate that she had nothing to be sorry for.

"Are you hungry?" Steve asked. The girl hesitated and then nodded. "Wait right here, okay? I'll get you something eat."

The girl nodded and Steve stood. He walked over to the small case of rations on the far side of the Quinjet, casting occasional looks over his shoulder to make sure that the girl was not going to make a run for it down the ramp. He opened the case and found the usual supplies – some dried fruit and nuts as well as some water bottles. He also found some of the additions that Stark had made to the case, additions like candy and other junk foods. It was mostly for after mission snacks than for any real value in the case of emergencies.

He pulled out a package of cashews, but then eyes caught a packet of M&M's sitting in the corner. In a moment of rash thought, he grabbed the candy too. He remembered when they first were introduced during the war, and they might help to calm the girl, if she had something sweet.

She kneeled back down in front of her. He opened the bag of cashews and held out a handful to her. The girl did not immedailty reach to take them, but her fear disappeared some beneath a bit of curiosity. She dropped her knees and leaned forward to look at the nuts in Steve's hand, blinking.

"Food?" the girl asked. Steve realized that maybe the girl had never seen cashews before.

"Food," Steve replied. He reached down and popped one of the cashews in his mouth to prove it was good to eat. "It's safe. Promise."

The girl seemed to speak simply, even if she seemed to understand more complex sentences. Maybe it would make her more at ease if he did likewise.

The girl cautiously reached out and picked one up out of his hands. She examined it between her fingers for a long moment, tilting her head back and forth as she looked at the lone cashew. She then frowned and brought the cashew to her mouth and took a small nibble. Her eyes widened and then she popped the whole thing in her mouth, chewing quickly on the item.

"Good," she stated. She reached for more and began to eat the nuts quickly, as if nervous he was going to take them away from her. As soon as his hand was empty, Steve pulled the bag out and handed it to her. The girl took it without a moment hesitation and began to eat them hungrily.

"These are cashews," Steve explained. "They're pretty good, huh?"

The girl nodded and continued to eat. "Really good."

Steve looked down at the package of M&M's in his hand and questioned if he should give them to her too. If she didn't know what cashews were, most likely candy was completely off the table. Then the girl's stomach rumbled again as she finished the bag of cashews, and Steve decided it was worth it convincing her this was safe too if it made her less hungry.

Steve opened the brown paper packaging and poured the multi-colored candies into his hand.

"These are M&M's, and these are really good too," he assured her. "Safe too, I promise."

She was markedly less hesitant to take the food this time. She waited only one reluctant moment, before she took one yellow M&M in her hand and put it in her mouth. She gasped as she chewed and she stared down at the candies in awe.

"What?" she asked.

"This is candy," Steve responded. "And I like it too. Very sweet."

She tilted her head to the side. "Sweet?"

Steve's heart broke. Had she never had anything sweet before?

The girl paid no mind to Steve and continued to eat the candy out of his hand, and Steve wondered once again what this girl was doing here.

Steve sat on the other end of the couch at Avengers Tower, the little girl pulled tight into a little ball on the other end of the leather couch. She stared out at the cream-colored wall, eyes dark and afraid. The little girl had returned to being frightened as soon as the other Avengers had returned to the Quinjet, and had not said another word other than then to ask where the nice doctor's friend was. Steve didn't have it in him to admit that they had no clue where they were or who they were, so he just kept lying to her, telling her that they were going to take her to them eventually.

The little girl had quickly been deposited into this room the moment the Quinjet landed, a room just south of the main commons of the Avenger Tower. It was a small room, colored cream. A TV was shoved in the corner and a shelf full of board-games was stacked in the corner. It was some kind of game room from the looks of it.

The Avengers Tower didn't have a holding cell, and even if it did, Steve was not going to let the little girl be put back into one. A little girl did not deserve to put in a cell. Especially one who seemed to have spent their whole life stuck in one. Steve also had not had the heart to leave her alone again, so he had settled on remaining here with her, even if the girl remained quiet.

After an hour of the two of them sitting there, alone, the door finally opened. The girl's head whipped to the doorway, of possible shrinking back even furtherer from the doorway. Steve followed her line of sight to see Natasha standing in the doorway, her gaze steady as she held a flash drive in her hands.

She steppe deeper into the room, shutting the door behind her. Steve walked to meet her, and he pulled her off to the side, away from the girl, as more and more fear entered her features as Natasha got closer.

"Did you find anything out?" Steve asked. Natasha frowned and held out the flash drive.

"We've been sorting through the data we managed to get from the base," Natasha explained. "We've managed to uncover something call Project Mother. We haven't got much from it, but whatever it was, it was centered on her." Natasha peeked over Steve's shoulder and empathy crossed over her features for the slightest of seconds. "Have you got a name from her yet?"

Steve shook her head.

"Just says she's 'the girl' when I asked." He frowned and looked over his shoulder sadly, where the girl was watching them with both fear and curiosity. "I don't think they gave her one. Or if she did, she's forgotten it."

Natasha was not overly emotional, was not one to wear her heart on her sleeve. If someone did not know her, they would never know what she was thinking from her appearance alone. Steve was still learning how to read her, and he doubted he would ever understand completely the book that was Natasha Romanoff.

But he could tell now that there was empathy was rolling off of her in waves. Sadness too, for this little girl. Steve did not know her whole history from the Red Room, but he knew it must have resembled the life of the little girl before them.

"Let me try," Natasha said. She walked past Steve, not waiting for his response. She kneeled down in front of the little girl, face steady but full of patience.

"Hello there, little one," Natasha murmured. "I'm Natasha. I'm not going to hurt you, I promise. Can you tell me your name?"

The little girl looked up over her knees and frowned.

"The girl," she answered, parroting her answer from the cell. Natasha furrowed her brow.

"Does anyone call you anything else?" Natasha asked. The girl thought for a moment, and then she nodded.

"Stupid girl," the little girl responded. Steve blinked and then stepped forward on instinct. How could this girl have no name? No other way to signify herself other than 'girl' or 'stupid girl'. There must be something in the files that could tell them something, anything about her. "Men with guns called me that."

Men with guns? This girl didn't know her own name, but she knew what a gun was? What had Hydra done to her?

"Alright," Natasha said gently, in a tone he had never heard out of her before. "Do you know how old you are?"

The little girl frowned. "Old?"

Steve frowned as well and he came up behind Natasha. He held up four fingers for her to see.

"Are you this old?" he asked. The girl shook her head.

"Three," the girl responded. "They said I three."

So, she was three. What was a three-year-old doing in a Hydra cell? Surely, she couldn't have been there for anything she did. Was she some kind of enhanced? Was she an experiment?

What was she? Who was she?

"Alright, thank you for answering our questions," Natasha said. She gave the girl a smile. "You're such a good little girl. Me and Steve are gonna step outside for just one minute, okay? We'll be right back."

"No!" the little girl yelled. "No alone!"

It seemed despite her fear, she seemed even more afraid of being alone in a new place. She had been alone when Steve found her, and something told him she had been alone for most of her life. Steve nodded at her and leveled a soft, genuine smile.

"We won't leave you alone," Steve assured. "We'll be right here, okay?"

Natasha stood and they stepped into the corner of the room, and Steve positioned himself so he could keep his sights on the little girl, eyes casted over Natasha's shoulder.

"You know we're going to have to get a blood test," Natasha whispered. "DNA. The whole works."

The room with the needles.

"She's been through enough," Steve said. Natasha sighed and ran a hand through her short, red curls.

"I know she's been through it, but we all have," Natasha said. "We have to make sure she's not a threat."

"She's three-years-old," Steve whisper-shouted. "How is she a threat?"

"It seems she barely knows what numbers are," Natasha said bluntly. "Do we really know she's three? And we can't be sure of anything, you know that. If Hydra was keeping her in a cell, it must have been for a reason."

Natasha was someone that Steve could trust, perhaps more than the Avengers. And that was because Natasha, for all the lying and deceiving she did for a living, was brutally honest when she needed to be. She was wonderful paradox, an oxymoron in human form. And what she was saying was made sense. Even if Steve didn't think, no, he knew this little girl wasn't a threat, a blood test would answer so many questions about her.

Steve sighed and looked at the frightened little girl, who was staring at him in confusion beneath all that fear. He stepped away from Natasha and walked up to the little girl. He kneeled before her and smiled at her comfortingly.

"Remember how I said I'm not going to hurt you?"

The girl nodded.

"Well, I mean it," Steve said. "But we're going to have to go somewhere that's probably going to scare you. I'll be there the whole time, I promise. Making sure you're safe."

The girl was silent for a long moment, as if testing if she believed him. She then swallowed thickly and bit her lip.

"Promise?"

Steve nodded.

"Promise."

The girl hadn't even flinched at the needle in her arm. She was more afraid of the new people in the lab she had been taken to than the needle or the other medical instruments. She was looking at Tony and Banner with wide, frightened blue eyes. Steve sat by her, making sure to keep his promise. Maybe it was for his own selfish need to make sure she was safe than it was to comfort her, but ever since he found her in that cell, he had known this little girl had no one to look out for her.

Just like he did when he came out of the ice. So, he would look out for her, at least until they found whoever she belonged to. Because she had to belong to someone.

Tony was on his best behavior for once, cracking smiles at the little girl to put her at ease. Bruce was kind to the little girl, making sure to explain to her what he was doing and why it had to be done.

"I'm just taking some blood," Bruce said to her, taping the needle with a butterfly bandage. "We're going to run some tests on you, just to make sure you're healthy and strong."

"Like nice doctor and mean doctor?" the little girl asked, as if asking what the weather was like.

"Not completely," Bruce managed to stumble out after a moment. Tony smiled at the little girl and pulled out one vial of blood to replace it with an empty one.

"Don't worry squirt," Tony said easily. "We're just gonna run some tests. Just making sure you're not some kind of alien or something."

She cocked her head to the side. "Alien? What that?"

Tony put a hand to his chest, flabbergasted. "Okay, after this, we're having a sci-fi marathon. You will learn what an alien is, little squirt."

The girl didn't seem to understand what he was saying, but she seemed at ease by his tone. Steve was surprised by how good Tony was with the little girl. It seemed maybe he had misjudged him a little bit.

The rest of the time in the med bay passed without incident. Tony offering a comment here and there about this and that to put her at ease. Steve just remained where he sat, waiting beside her. Bruce left the room to run the tests in the adjacent room through the window, and Tony followed him soon after.

The little girl turned to Steve with a look of confusion and curiosity.

"Them nice doctors friends?" the girl asked. Steve shook his head at her.

"No, not them," Steve explained. "But we'll find them, and we'll take you to them."

The girl was quiet again, before she looked up at Steve shyly.

"You my friend?" the girl asked. Steve grinned at her.

"Yes, I'm your friend. If you'll let me be," Steve answered. And the little girl smiled for the first time since he pulled her out of that cell.

"My friend," she whispered quietly, in awe almost. It seemed that she must have not have many friends in Hydra. Perhaps Steve supposed she counted the nice doctor, given that she talked about her with a kind of reverence and affection.

They stayed there for a little while, just wrapped in silence. The little girl didn't seem to speak much of her own accord, waiting to be spoken to or asked a question, aside form asking where the nice doctor's friends were. Steve didn't mind the silence, he found silence to be welcoming at times. And he would not press the girl to speak if she was not willing or ready to.

After a period, Bruce walked back into the room, eyes wide and face ashen. He cleared his throat and motioned for Steve to stand.

"Hey, Steve," Bruce said. "I need to talk to you." His eyes cast to the little girl, and then he frowned. Steve walked over to him, the little girl watching them with quizzical eyes. It seemed the longer she was here, the more her fear started to disappear as she got used to her surroundings. It was not gone, by any means, but it was better. Slightly.

Steve landed in front of Bruce, and Bruce shifted the tablet in his hands, giving it to Steve. Steve looked at the results of the blood tests and found startling results. Results….that looked like his statistics. Startingly like his.

"The little girl seems to have the super-solider serum in her system," Bruce explained. "Her senses are enhanced, just like yours. Enhanced strength, her cell counts are up and higher than they should be for someone her age."

Steve furrowed his brow. A child with the super-solider serum? But that had been lost with the death of Dr. Erskine in 1943. How could a little girl in 21st century have it?

"That's not all, she's almost a complete genetic match to you," Bruce explained. "Down to the letter, except for being a different gender and all that comes with that, she's….she's you."

But….how? Steve didn't have any kids, which eliminated that first possibility. He hadn't even been out of the ice yet when she was born, if she really was three. So that was off the table. But….but what else could it be?

"She seems to be some kind of genetic copy of you," Bruce explained. It clicked in Steve's mind what it could be.

"She's a clone. Or she was meant to be, and –"

Something must have gone wrong with the process, making her a girl. Hydra still had his blood and DNA from the forties, and it's highly possible it had lasted this long given the advancements done to his body.

He turned back to the little girl, who was staring at him with wide eyes. She may understand complex sentences, but she was still three, so most likely all of this went over her head. He stared at her for a long time, the little girl staring back at him with wide, fearful eyes. It struck him why her eyes were so familiar.

They were his eyes, reflected back at him.

"Cap, you're the closest thing—"

"She has to a father."

Shit.

"For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end." - Jeremiah 29:11

I wanted to include how Emma got her name, but this was dragging on a little long. So one day. And next will be fluffy, I promise. I just have had this in my drafts for a while, so I wanted to get it out.

Accepting prayer requests.

Review Replies:

CaprpeNoctemm: Thank you! I wanted to establish their relationship with something sweet and fun, and I adore looking at a parent's perspective on a child. I love Emma, and I'm glad you liked the story. Thank you for leaving a review, have a blessed day!

Guest: I'm glad you wanted to see more, I enjoyed writing more! And it's not exactly how he adopted her (that's a story for a different time), but I wanted to show how they met, even if it's a little dark. Thanks for leaving a review and have a blessed day!

Questions, comments, or concerns? Let me know, have a blessed day!

-PrincessChess