The beeping was what woke you up. You slowly regained consciousness, becoming more and more annoyed at the noise. On second thoughts, you'd had the most horrible dream, so maybe it was a good thing you were waking up. Your eyelids felt suspiciously heavy, and you had to work twice as hard than usual to open them. When you did, you wished you hadn't. Because it all came flooding back. The pain that shot through your chest when you remembered that your dream hadn't actually been a dream had nothing to do with the fact that you'd been injured while fighting.

Hot tears leaked from under your eyelids, and you let your head fall back on to the pillow of the bed in the medical ward back at the compound. The beeping sound was your heartbeat on the monitor attached to you. Had you really been that badly injured? You didn't care. Nothing mattered.

All you could think about was Loki. What had happened to him? One minute he was there, and then the next... It had all been so hectic; you'd been hellbent on getting your friends to safety, you hadn't even realised, hadn't even thought about where Loki might be. Gods. How could you have let this happen?

A small snorty sound to your left made you turn your head, and you realised for the first time that Tony was asleep in a chair next to your bed. He looked utterly wiped out. A pang of guilt shot through you, he'd had to go back into that building for you, he could've been hurt. Turning your head the other way, you saw Bucky asleep on the bed next to you, his leg wrapped up and levitated. You could see him breathing, phew. Steve was slumped in a chair by his bedside, also asleep. But why was everyone asleep? How long had you been out for?

"Tony?" you asked tentatively, fresh tears of pain springing to your eyes as the sound grated against your throat and made a horrible rasping noise. You cleared your throat painfully and tried again.

"Tony."

Tony jerked awake and stared at you for a few seconds before clocking that you were awake.

"Y/N, oh my god, you're awake, you – are you okay? Do you feel okay?" he stammered, leaning forward anxiously. The palpable relief on his face bought more tears to your eyes, and then, all of a sudden, you couldn't stop crying. Tony flicked a switch which bought the top half of the bed up to bring you to a sitting position, and moved forward to hug you. You rested your head on his shoulder and sobbed, ignoring the renewed pain in your chest. Tony stroked your hair for a while, and then pulled away gently; you rested back against the pillows.

"We thought you were in a coma." Tony breathed, sounding immensely relieved.

"I'm sorry." you whispered, wiping your face.

"No, Y/N, I'm sorry, it was unfair what had to happen back there, but we couldn't go back. Even if it had been Steve or Nat, we had to leave before they could..." here he trailed off.

"It's okay, I don't know all the details. I just... we left him.." you couldn't finish.

"Y/N, he's Loki, I'm sure he's okay." Tony reassured you.

You nodded stiffly, praying that it was true.

"Don't you want to know what happened to you then?" Tony asked, tapping your chest.

"I thought I was passing out, but then the pain... I've never felt anything like that before." you answered, rubbing your chest.

"You had a heart attack, a small one, but it was still pretty bad. You inhaled a lot of smoke." he told you solemnly.

You blinked. A heart attack?

"Am I okay?" you asked nervously.

"Yes, thank god, but Steve had to do CPR on you until we got back, it was... yeah." Tony finished, unable to find the words.

"Where are the others?"

"Asleep – everyone was pretty wiped out after we got back, but no one would leave until they knew you two would be okay." he smiled, gesturing towards yours and Bucky's beds.

"What time is it?"

"It's... 9:47am, wow, I should probably wake the others and let them know you're awake and okay." Tony replied, standing up and stretching.

You were staring at your hands. Seven hours. Loki had been gone for seven hours, and you'd just been sleeping. Tony saw your expression and sighed.

"Y/N, I promise you that if he doesn't turn up later today we'll start looking okay? I'm not so cold hearted that I would just leave it. Besides, we'll have to go back sooner rather than later, those bastards need to be beaten properly next time."

You smiled obligingly, unconvinced, and watched Tony leave the room to wake the others. You didn't believe that he would be this laid back if anyone else had been left behind, especially you or Peter, but you wouldn't press it. You just needed to talk to Thor.

"Y/N? Are you awake?" Bucky's voice carried across the room to you.

"Buck! Yeah, are you okay?" you asked, leaning forward to see him.

He gave you a tired wave. "All good."

Then Steve was awake too.

"Buck, thank god, are you okay?"

Bucky chuckled. "I have a feeling we're gonna be asked that a few times today. I'm fine Steve."

"We?" Steve asked, and then turned and saw you. "Y/N, you're awake! We thought you were..."

"In a coma? I've heard." you said. "And I've also heard that a certain someone saved my stupid ass last night too... I'm sorry you had to do that."

"Hey, any of us would've done the same had it been a different person." Steve replied, glancing at Bucky. "I'll bet anything that no one would have been able to get Tony out had it been you or Peter, and Thor was right behind you when we realised Loki was missing."

"He was?" you asked, and Steve nodded. You hadn't even noticed; you'd been in such a state.

"We'll find him okay? If he doesn't find us first."

You nodded, feeling more tears spring to your eyes: you really needed to stop crying every two minutes. Crying wasn't going to get Loki back.

Tony re-entered the room and clapped Steve on the back, then addressed you and Bucky.

"The others are getting up and they'll all want to see you, Y/N you can get up but take it easy okay?" he said, coming over to your bed and starting to detach you from all the machines you were hooked up to. You shot Bucky a sympathetic look; Tony still acted frosty around him after all this time, despite you all trying to convince him to forgive him and move on. When you were tube free you stood up slowly, and felt fine. Despite this, Tony still walked you up to your room, waited outside while you got changed and then walked you back down to the kitchen, where everyone was sat eating. There was a chorus of "Y/N!" and then you were being sat down and having food thrust upon you, and a lot of sympathetic looks were being thrown your way. Bucky was getting his fair share of attention to, being in a wheelchair (he'd refused to stay in the medical ward).

After a few minutes, when you'd finished eating your three bites of toast, Thor came and sat next to you. He looked awful; it was evident he hadn't slept.

"Hey." you said, pushing your plate away.

"How are you? What you did back there was... extremely brave." Thor told you.

"You mean extremely stupid." you replied, looking down at your hands.

"He would've done the same for you." Thor said, with a sad smile.

"And you." you said firmly, putting a small hand over his large one.

"Maybe. Anyway, I just wanted to tell you... although we're not the closest of brothers, I would know if something seriously bad had happened to him – he's okay."

You exhaled sharply, going almost lightheaded with relief. "So he's not..."

"I would almost certainly know if he was... and no, he's not."

Neither of you could bring yourself to say it. You hadn't allowed yourself to entertain the idea that Loki wasn't okay, but now that the possibility of death had been ruled out you felt much better. There was no way he wouldn't find his way back to you.

"So, where is he then? Why hasn't he come back?" you asked, automatically looking out the window as if he was going to be stood on the grass waiting to be let in.

"Well, that's the thing... I think he's being held prisoner."

You nearly laughed, Thor thought Loki was being held prisoner by Midgardians? It was awful to think that the 'men' had just been normal Midgardians who had somehow (most definitely illegally) come across this powerful magic, and were using it against you, but the fact that they were holding someone prisoner with it? It would've made you angry even if it wasn't your boyfriend they were holding prisoner.

"I know, it sounds ridiculous, but they had some pretty powerful magic keeping us in that room, and if all of that was concentrated on one person, even a god..."

"Thor! What happened to top secret and dangerous? So that's what this is about, they've got their hands on some powerful magic and...?" you trailed off, waiting for him to finish.

"Here are your options: I don't tell you and stay alive, or I do tell you and Tony kills me." Thor replied.

You sighed. At least you knew some of the story now. Midgardians with magic powerful enough to restrain a god – that was pretty worrying.

Thor stood up as Tony walked over, and with a whispered "Don't tell him I told you anything!" he quickly departed.

Tony sat in Thor's vacant seat. "We're giving it until tomorrow morning, and then we'll start thinking about looking for him okay?"

"Thor thinks they're holding him prisoner." you replied. "They're trying to use him as bait; they want us to go back."

Tony opened his mouth, and then closed it again. "What did Thor tell you."

"Nothing, just that. Tony, I'm not just gonna sit here and wait for him if he's out there being held prisoner by... those people, they're dangerous – "

"Not as dangerous as him." Tony countered.

Suddenly you were on your feet, breathing hard; your magic right below the surface. Gods, you hadn't realised how angry you felt. The room was suddenly very quiet.

"Y/N, I didn't mean..."

"He's just like the rest of us. He made a mistake, and it had consequences! No on in this room can say they've got a clean record, no one." The silence that followed this statement was heavy with thoughts of the things everyone had done to earn them the status of not having a clean record. It lasted a while.

"I just... I don't truly believe that if anyone else had been left behind we'd all be sat here having breakfast like nothing had happened." you finished, sitting down heavily as pain spiked across your chest again.

"It's not because of who was left behind, it's too dangerous to go back there now, two of you were seriously hurt last night and the rest of us didn't exactly have an easy time either. We need to be prepared, and we also need to make sure they don't come after us again... we're safe here." Tony said, watching you rub your hand across your chest. "Does it hurt?"

"No, I'm fine." you replied, still breathing hard.

"It's just for today Y/N, then tomorrow we'll start looking, I promise."

The rest of the day passed excruciatingly slowly. You couldn't eat, couldn't read, couldn't go outside, couldn't do anything but worry about Loki. Around mid-day you started to feel tired again, even though you'd slept for about seven hours last night; Tony explained that it was common after something as fatal as a heart attack that your body needed more time to rest. You must have fallen asleep, because when you next opened your eyes it was dark outside; the time on your phone read 5:33pm. Another five hours. Loki had now been missing for over fourteen hours. You clenched your jaw through the pain in your chest as you stood up and walked through the compound looking for people, until eventually you came across everyone in the third floor living room.

"Hey Y/N, good sleep?" Tony asked. He looked tired.

"Yeah, thanks, I..." you trailed off as you looked out of the floor to ceiling window.

"Y/N? What are you... oh." Steve said, following your gaze.

Outside, stood on the grass, was Loki.