"I have to protect the one thing I can't live without. That's you." Tony said whilst pointing at Daisy.

"I don't need protecting! I just want to be free! I was held prisoner for 4 of the worst years of my life and made it out just fine. I'm pretty sure I can handle myself, Tony." Daisy said before walking out of the room.

     Daisy's eyes fluttered open as she realised that she'd just experienced a memory. She opened her eyes fully, revealing a room from her past that she'd hoped to have been destroyed. "Well, look what we have here." A man said as he walked into the room. "You didn't think you could get away that easily, did you?"

"What do you want?" The brunette asked in an eerily calm voice.

"Answers." Daisy rolled her eyes at the vague response before offering a sarcastic comeback. "Well then maybe you should start asking some questions."

     She was terrified, but there was no way in hell that she was gonna let this man know that. "I bet you remember those days, don't you? Watching them all suffer... die, by your hands." The man smirked with a sadistic glint in his eyes.

     Daisy felt her heart skip a beat as her mind processed the man's words. Realization slowly dawned on her, causing her to clench her hands into fists and pull against the restraints binding her wrists to the table. The look of triumph the man held on his face as he looked into her fearful eyes will forever haunt her memories. 

↤✭↦

     Tortured walnut eyes blinked repeatedly as they tried to adjust to the bright sun lamp above. Daisy lifted her hand up to cover her eyes as she sat up on the stark white bed. Swinging her legs over to the side, she notices three figures watching her. She sighs as she looks down at the floor, trying to ignore the feeling of holes being burned into her scalp.

"What were you thinking?" Being the first to speak up, Natasha stood and crossed her arms in front of the brunette. Shaking her head as she received no response, the redhead took a step closer to the woman she considered a little sister. 

"Never do something like that again." She says as she sits down on the bed next to Daisy, bringing the former vigilante into a side hug. "It's good to see you again, sestra."

     Daisy looks up at the ex-S.H.I.E.L.D. agent and raises the corner of her mouth into a small smirk. "Can I talk to the kid alone?" Her smirk falls as Tony speaks.

     Natasha stands up and nods before exiting the room, while Thor looks at Daisy with an unreadable expression before silently standing up to leave the room. Once the doors are closed Tony stands and starts pacing.

"That was reckless. You could've gotten seriously hurt." Daisy's gaze shifted back to the floor as she grimaces at the calm tone in her adoptive father's voice. Her mind was going through a hundred possible scenarios of what could happen next. Would he yell? Would he cry? You can never really predict anything with Tony Stark.

"I'm sorry." The words were almost inaudible to the genius-billionaire-philanthropist, making him look at his daughter.

"You had us all worried sick, Daisy! And now you come back after five years and all you have to say is 'sorry'!?" He was taking all of his stress out on her with his words, and she was okay with that. She honestly thought she deserved to take the punches after everything she's done.

"What do you want me to say?" She asks quietly as tears fill her eyes. 

"I don't know!" Tony yells as he sits down on the bed. "When we saw your face in the news, we knew something was wrong. We tried contacting him... to see if he knew anything. A S.H.I.E.L.D agent answered his phone, told us that you'd gone rogue because he sacrificed himself." He puts his head in his hands as he tells his daughter his point of view.

"We searched for you... for years. Until Thor told us to give up. He said you knew how to lay low, that we'd never find anything unless you let us." He looks over to his side to see Daisy looking the opposite way, her forefinger scratching the side of her thumb. 

"I understand the need to distance yourself from S.H.I.E.L.D., but we're your family, Daisy. We would've been there for you. ...I just wanna know why you hid from us." He finishes, waiting for her to respond.

     After a few moments of silence and Daisy still making no effort to look at him, he gets up to leave. Just before he reaches the door, she speaks up. "I still see his face." She says as she wipes her cheek.

"Everywhere I go... I see, and...and I hear him in the littlest things. Like certain shades of blue in the sky, or those glowing open signs in store windows. ...This is the first time I've stepped foot in New York since before I left. ...I can't even go near Ohio because I know his family is there. And Amanda kept calling me, trying to get me to visit, but I couldn't." She pauses as she takes a shaky breath. 

     Tony walks back over to the bed and pulls her into a hug, rubbing her shoulder in an attempt to comfort his grieving daughter. "He was all I had left..."

     He knew she was grieving. Hell, even the avengers that barely knew him were grieving. But knowing someone you love is in pain and seeing that pain firsthand are more different than he could've ever imagined. Daisy is one of, if not the strongest person he knows. So, seeing her break down before his eyes was something he never thought he would experience. 

     Tony Stark, for once in his life, actually took the time to think through what he was about to say. "...I can't say I know what you're going through. But I will tell you that we're all here for you. Every step of the way."