Tony P.O.V

It's been about an hour since dinner and something just feels off, I'm not sure if it's the fact that I didn't really get to spend any time with Callie today or if it's the way she was behaving at supper, but I feel completely unsettled. I find myself pacing around the lounge with a scotch in hand aimlessly.

"Tony you're driving me crazy," Pepper whines, startling me out of my musings, "I thought we were going to spend time together. Stop brooding and come sit with me."

"Sorry, I'm feeling a little distracted tonight," I admit, joining her on the couch. I'd actually entirely forgotten she was there, but I don't intend on clueing her in on that.

"Tell me what's bothering you," she insists, clasping my hands in hers.

"It's Callie," I confess, pulling a hand away to rake through my hair. "I feel like I haven't spent any time with her since we got back, and she was just behaving so strangely tonight."

"Tony, she's a strange child," Pepper says slowly.

"Okay sure, but she was acting stranger than usual," I insist.

"She's fine Tony, this was the entire point of the nanny.... so you didn't have to spend every waking moment with the kid." She says, her voice taking a slight edge.

"Not every waking moment, but I should spend some time with her, I should go check on her." I decide, promptly pulling my hand from Pepper's and getting to my feet.

"No!" She says hastily, but she remembers herself and plasters on a smile, "I mean, she's probably sick and needs her rest, you don't want to wake her."

"You're back pedalling," I state, eyes narrow with suspicion. "What's going on Pepper? First you find this creepy, Russian nanny insanely fast, and then Callie basically passes out at the dinner table after acting super abnormal, and then the nanny dismissed herself before she's even finished eating and we haven't seen her since!"

"I found her before we left okay? She was the first one to respond to my ad and I figured it'd be hard to find anyone that would be interested in watching that child so I hired her." She says the word child as if she isn't entirely convinced that Callie is one.

"Alright that answers my questions about the quick employment of 'nazi-nanny' but it doesn't explain all of the other strange happenings at dinner time." I say, crossing my arms skeptically.

"Tony, don't call her that, that's awful," Pepper tuts with a whisper, "and I can't explain the dinner part, like I said, Callie is probably just unwell." she shrugs casually.

"She seemed totally fine until she drank that milk!" I huff, "I'm going to go check on her, the whole event left a bad taste in my mouth."

I spin around and start making my way up the stairs towards Callie's room but Pepper leaps off the couch with surprising agility and grasps my arm, "Tony please don't." She pleads desperately.

"Why? What's going on?" I growl in frustration.

"It's nothing, I just wanted to...spend some time with you." She purrs seductively, pulling at my belt buckle.

I swat her hands away angrily, "Knock it off! I know somethings going on, and it's time you told me."

Pepper backs away, running a hand through her hair, "this is better for everyone," she says half-heartedly.

Suddenly the room feels like it's shrinking, and a feeling of utter desperation takes over me, I shake my head blindly and frantically propel my body to Callie's room.

Reaching the door knob I pause for a brief moment, I'm terrified of what I might find, or not find, on the other side of the door. Slowly I turn the knob and swing the door open.

But it's empty.

"No! No, no, no, no," I say over and over while I rip the blankets off the bed. 

"Tony, I'm sorry." Pepper whispers from the doorway, reminding me of her existence.

I pull in a shaky breathe, "what did you do?" I whisper through the lump in my throat. "Who is that fucking witch?"

"She said she was from social services, that she'd find Callie a proper home. She said she is a missing child or something and that they have been looking for her for awhile." Pepper blurts all this out hastily, as if she'd been rehearsing it. "But now you don't need to worry about trying to take care of her, you and I can be together." She says, grabbing my face in her hands, and forcing me to look into her eyes.

I push her away, my emotion replaced by blind rage, "get the fuck out of my house!" I yell, my hands trembling, "we could have been together if you would've just opened your fucking heart to the kid, but you've made that impossible now."

"Tony, you're not thinking rationally," Pepper chokes, taking a step back.

"I said get out!" I scream, grabbing the lamp off the bedside table and shattering it against the wall.

Her eyes are big and fearful, almost making me feel guilty, but not quite. She turns and runs from the room sobbing hysterically.

I turn and grasp Callie's bedding again, closing my eyes tightly, allowing myself to break down slightly. The blanket is soft and warm to the touch, 'it's still warm,' I think, shaking myself out of the panic attack I felt threatening to take over, 'they couldn't have left more than 10 minutes ago if it's still warm—she was stalling, giving them a chance to get away.' Fresh anger coming over me, I'm glad Pepper left because if she was here I'm not sure I could've controlled my impulse to throttle her.

"Jarvis, get my suite ready!" I shout, breaking out into a run to get to the shop as fast as I can. As I'm running I dial Cap.

He answers on the first ring, "Tony? What's going on? You never call me."

"Cap, she's been taken. Come right away and bring the team." I rush the words out and then immediately hang up. I don't have time for pleasantries, the faster I can adorn my suite and get surveying the area, the faster she will be found. Bruce, Steve and Natasha will be here within an hour, I'm certain. All that matters right now is finding Callie.
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Callie P.O.V

I wake up abruptly to the sensation of being jostled around, but though my eyes are open it's pitch black. I am laying on a carpet that feels slightly coarse, giving me a bit of a rug burn on my elbows from being tossed about. I lift my arms up to steady myself but immediately my hands come into contact with a cold metal, it has curves and ridges and suddenly it hits me—the rough carpet, the metal roof, the way I'm being jostled about and the low mechanical whirring, I'm in the trunk of a car.

I clench my eyes shut, trying to conjure up the memory of how I got from my warm bed to this cold, damp compartment, but it's all a fog.

I remember dinner and the nanny... and the milk! That damn milk! I don't know why I drank it, I think I wanted to prove a point but it was a stupid thing to do. After drinking the milk everything is a blur—the hazy memory is exactly how I remembered everything after being poked by mother in the dark basement, just brief moments of memory that don't piece together very well.

Suddenly the vehicle screeches and shudders, halting abruptly, throwing me against the back wall of the trunk. I hear a door open and slam shut hastily, and the sound of boots scraping across gravel follows. I brace myself as the key turns in the lock of the trunk and the door swings open.

"Oh you're awake," breathes the thick Russian accent of Madame Beatrice. I look up into the face of my kidnapper, she's looking very unkempt in comparison to her harsh, clean features from earlier today.  Now her hair is pulling out from her bun, wild fly-aways framing her sweaty, panicked looking face.

"Where am I?" I ask, despising the tremble I hear in my own voice.

"No time for questions," she hisses, grabbing my arm and pulling me from the car. She clasps a hand around my wrist and begins dragging me across the gravel driveway to what looks like a large warehouse.

I hear a sound like a jet whooshing coming distantly behind us, and I pause looking up into the night sky, and then I see it—a small figure with light shimmering from the bottoms of it's feet—it's Daddy, I'm sure of it. He's flying towards us at a shocking speed but not directly, he is zig zagging across the terrain, searching. I need to get his attention, if I lose him now I may never find him again. I look up at my captor, desperately trying to think up a way of getting the man in the suit's attention without giving away his identity.
But to my dismay it seems that Madame Beatrice hears it as well, she turns her head slowly, eyes wide in terror. "Shit!" She hisses and digs her claws into my arm and begins dragging me faster.

Knowing my plan to be subtle is impossible now I decide that I can't take any chances of him missing me. I whip my head around until I spy a large stone and using my free hand I levitate it and send it zooming into the skull of kidnapper. She gasps, releasing my arm and bringing her hand to her head before collapsing into a puddle on the floor.

Immediately I begin running the opposite direction, waving my arms and screaming at the top of my lungs. Tony, remarkably, seems to spy me, likely with the help of Jarvis and makes a beeline in my direction. I've never loved a robot more in my entire life.

I keep running, my heart is pounding but just when I think I'm safe a coldness comes over me, "Callie, where do you think you're going?" Asks that deep, slow voice that cuts fear through the very core of my being.

"No!" I scream, but it's too late. My dad didn't make it in time. I'm just a few strides he is on me, and before I know it he is injecting me with a needle and I'm being dragged back towards the warehouse that I just escaped from.

He steps over the unconscious body of Madame Beatrice, I look up at my Dad, my eyes are getting blurry and my head is heavy as the euphoria over comes me.

Save me, please save me again, is the last thing I think before everything goes dark.