Author's note: hey guys, there is no news today. Sorry for the late update, I hope you enjoy this chapter x (this gif isn't really relevant I just really like it)

...

A week had passed since the New Year's party, and life was slowly but surely returning to normal. You and Loki had stayed in bed for the best part of two days afterwards, insanely hungover, and you discovered later that so had everyone else, only occasionally seeing someone on your infrequent ventures to the kitchen.

You had started training again with both Nat and Loki which had been extremely painful after over a week of eating more food than you usually did in a month with little to no exercise. Obviously you hadn't been able to hide what had happened between you and Loki from Nat, and by now you suspected the others knew about it as well. Or perhaps you were just coming up with excuses to not have to explicitly tell anyone about it. Loki wasn't exactly what you would call 'publicly affectionate' anyway; he still looked at Thor like he wanted to stab him whenever he projected a particularly loud thought about to two of you across the room, knowing you would hear. Which he did frequently.

You began to spend a lot of time training with Loki, which you were certain didn't go unnoticed by the others. It seemed however that everyone else was just as reluctant to talk about it as you were, which suited you just fine. Now that you and Loki had both opened your minds, training had become a whole new playground. You were picking up magic quicker and easier than you'd ever done before, and Loki had even agreed to try and teach you how to teleport which you were insanely excited about.

You were in the training rooms with Loki right now, practicing conjuring objects from thin air, sat cross legged on the floor frowning in concentration at the palm of your hand. You had a lip balm in your back pocket, which you were trying make appear in your hand. Loki was sat against the wall, twirling a knife which he'd used to demonstrate between his fingers, watching you. You decided not to ask where he'd got the knife from.

Try the paperclip again.

No, I already did that.

Loki fell silent again, letting you concentrate. Right as you were sure you were about to get the lip balm, you were interrupted by JARVIS.

"Miss Y/N, Mr Stark requires your presence upstairs. There may be a mission."

You reached into your back pocket and yanked the lip balm out, gripping it in your hand.

"That's easier. Thanks JARVIS." you told the AI.

"The second it took you to reach for that could be the difference between life and death." Loki said, standing up and offering you a hand.

"Yeah, this deadly weapon would really help in a life or death situation." you grinned, letting him pull you to your feet, tossing the lip balm in the air and catching it again as you made your way to the door. Once upstairs, you were greeted by a tense atmosphere.

"What's up?" you asked, and Clint pointed to Thor for his cue to look towards the sky, looking shocked when he didn't.

"I've learnt your Midgardian ways now Barton, don't look so surprised." Thor said.

"Tony's talking to Fury now." Bruce told you, and you turned to see Tony over the other end of the living room with a serious look on his face. Right as you looked he turned to you and waved his hand which you assumed meant 'suit up', mouthing "we're on". You couldn't help but feel a bit put out as you followed the others towards your rooms, it was almost seven pm and you hadn't had anything to eat in hours.

You were suited up and ready to go in less than two minutes, equipped with the bracelet Tony had made you and given to you for Christmas. He'd shown you how to use it properly earlier this week, it had loads of cool settings which on one hand you didn't want to be forced to try, but on the other hand you really wanted to try them out. You were just about to get Loki to come in when he materialised in front of you. He was worried.

I'm not worried.

Liar.

Just don't get hurt. Or kidnapped.

You laughed, reaching up to kiss him.

"I won't. Don't get into trouble while we're gone." you told him, wishing that he was allowed to come with you.

"Go on." he said, giving you a gentle push towards the door, but you resisted. It was ridiculous, but you didn't want to leave him. He rolled his eyes.

I'm not the one you need to be worrying about.

I'm not worried.

Liar.

You gave him a playful shove, grinning.

Seriously, go. Just be careful.

Loki kissed you again and then took a step back and disappeared. Why were you so cut up about leaving him? You'd chalk it up to being in the honeymoon phase.

You went out into the corridor and decided to take your mind off of it by racing Thor, Bucky and Steve in the elevator up the stairs. You lost, but at least it got you ready and raring to go, and you couldn't help but feel slightly excited as you entered the Quinjet. Your good mood didn't last long however, as Tony explained the situation to you. It didn't sound great.

As the Quinjet took off and flew away from the tower, you told yourself that you were just imagining the tugging feeling in your chest. You tried to ignore it as Tony spoke to you all about the mission. Apparently this was just something you were going to have to get used to.

...

The journey to wherever it was you were headed had taken about twenty minutes, and the mission itself had gone on for just over two hours. You had spent most of the time keeping watch with Bucky while the others surrounded the buildings you were infiltrating and took down guards, but you weren't complaining. You were starving, as your stomach was reminding you every couple of minutes. You'd been sat with Bucky for about an hour and ten minutes, regularly checking in with the others through your earpieces, when finally three cars approached the gates you were watching.

"We've got company." Bucky told the others, and then gestured for you to proceed.

"After you."

You jumped down from your high perch on a grassy bank where you'd been hidden by bushes and foliage to land in front of the first car, using your magic to break your fall. The first car slammed its brakes on and the car behind almost went into it. In the space of about ten seconds you had about seven different guns aimed at your face. You held your hands up.

"Shall we have a chat before you shoot me?" you suggested amicably.

One of the men pointing a gun at your forehead barked something in a language that you didn't understand and you pulled a face.

"Sorry dude, no comprende. Do you speak English?"

The man looked confused, and turned to another man in the car behind, shouting something else in the language that you didn't understand.

"He says, move or be moved." a heavily accented voice emerged from the car behind the first.

"Are you sure you don't wanna talk? Maybe we can work something out." you asked, taking a step towards the car before you, pre-empting what was about to happen and surrounding yourself with magic. The bullets flew through the air towards you, but simply ricocheted off of the protective shield you'd formed around you. The shooting ceased pretty swiftly when the men realised that they weren't hurting you. Bucky jumped down from the bank and joined you. The men in the two other cars were piling out and aiming their guns at you both.

"I'll handle these guys. Can you take care of them?" Bucky asked, nodding towards the men who had just got out of the back two cars.

"I'd love to." you replied, right as an alarm started blaring from inside the building the rest of the team were in. The men launched into action, and so did you and Bucky. Once they had been taken care of you'd joined the others inside and helped carry some stolen equipment and files back to the Quinjet while the others cleaned up.

No one had been hurt too badly, and the mission had been an ultimate success. Apart from the fact you felt as though you might faint from hunger any minute as the Quinjet took off again. As you approached the tower you felt the tightness in your chest begin to lessen; you almost forgotten about it while you'd been away.

Are you okay?

Yes, fine. You were worried.

Not at all.

The second you got back you made straight for the kitchen, craving any food you could get your hands on quickly and easily. Loki waited until everyone had gone to get changed before appearing in front of you, giving you a once over and healing the tiniest scratch you'd acquired on your cheek.

"Thanks." you smiled, before he gave you a quick forehead kiss and disappeared back to his room.

Most of the others joined you in eating and you ended up having a late dinner all together. Not long after you changed out of your gear and showered, putting your pyjamas on before re-joining the others back in the living room, knowing you weren't going to last very long having tired yourself out on the mission. Thankfully the others seemed to be thinking along the same lines as you and started drifting off to bed, which gave you an excuse to go as well.

Loki was already in your room when you entered, lounging on your bed watching something on the TV.

"Comfortable?" you teased with a smile. You didn't mind, your rooms had become both of yours in the past few weeks.

"This show, do you know it?" he asked, keeping his eyes fixed on the screen. You knew it just from a quick glance.

"That's Sherlock. Do you like it?" you grinned.

"It's clever. Is it on... what's it called?"

"Netflix? Yeah."

"Good." he said, grabbing the remote. You chuckled, disappearing into the bathroom to brush your teeth and take your make up off before joining Loki, who was still trying to work out how to get Netflix up on the TV. You showed him how to do it, and then pressed play on the first episode of season one of Sherlock, knowing that you weren't going to make it until the end of the episode.

"Wait." Loki said, and you paused it.

"What?"

Did you feel it? When you left earlier?

Yeah, like a tugging feeling, here.

You brought your hand up to your chest to demonstrate.

It was weird, wasn't it? Not painful, just uncomfortable if you thought about it.

Did the book you found in the library say anything about that?

No. But I don't know how else you would explain it.

Soulmates still sounded ridiculous in your head, despite everything you knew. Loki nodded in agreement as you thought this.

"I'm tired, I need to lie down." you said, giving Loki the remote and getting under your duvet. You were physically exhausted from using your magic on the mission and feeling pleasantly full of food.

"Are you not going to watch?"

"Yeah, sure." you replied, turning around to rest your head on his chest so that you could see the TV.

Minutes later, you were fast asleep.