Chapter Thirteen

Now that all the Avengers knew Red Skull had taken Reuben, they were all concerned. The one who was most concerned was Tony. It was his daughter that has been taken by Skull two times now, and I think he is blaming himself. The last time he had a "conversation" with Reuben, she was screaming at him. I wanted to tell Tony it'd be alright, but even I can't convince myself that. The one thing that I did know was that Tony couldn't lose Reuben, not after he just walked back into her life. He would blame himself even more than now thinking what would happen if he never even came back into her life. I also know that Reuben wouldn't go down without a fight. Red Skull took her and there has to be a reason why. Maybe, just maybe, he knew that Reuben was connected to the tesseract. Was he going to use her? What if she thought Red Skull was the good guy and we were the villains? There are so many things that Skull could do, but I don't think killing Reuben is on the list of those things... at least I hope not....

“I never should have let her go. I should made her stay with me, or at least walked her back to her room. God, what was I thinking?” I said quietly to Kyle.

“You couldn’t have known that this was going to happen, James. It’s not your fault. It’s no one's fault. Red Skull acts rashly, and no one could have predicted that he would strike so close to us, especially on the helicarrier. All we can do is find Skull AND Reuben.”

“There is an unknown signal, and I think it’s Red Skull.” Said Scott.

“Where?” Asked Nick.

“About two hundred kilometers north off the coast of Ireland.”

“Avengers, assemble.” Said Tony.

“Wait, Tony. There is no guarantee that the signal is Red Skull. Scott, see if you can hack into the signal and come up with an identification.” Said Nick.

“Already on it.” Said Scott.

“We don’t have enough time, we need to find Reuben, as soon as possible.” Said Tony.

“I’m almost through. Just one more firewall.” Said Scott.

A look came over his face, and I could tell something went wrong.

“What is it?” I asked.

“I got through, and into the cameras.” Said Scott.

“Isn’t that a good thing?” I asked.

“Not if you’re seeing something bad.” Said Tony.

Scott pulled up the video feedback on a holographic screen, and there was Reuben! The thing was, she wasn’t moving, and was a heap in the middle of a jail cell. This wasn’t normal for Reuben, she would be standing up, yelling to get Skull’s attention. She looked…. dead. She didn’t look like herself. She was olive skinned, but there on the floor, she was more pale than a ghost. Her lips had a bluish purple tint to them, and she wasn’t moving. What shocked me the most was her hair. It was white, white as snow. Seeing her like that, I couldn’t even think of what to say. I couldn’t move, the fear was so strong, I was frozen in place.

“Avengers assemble.” Tony said in a deeply enraged voice.

Nobody really knew what to do. There Reuben was, lying on the floor in a cell, and here Tony is, telling us to suit up, and just go busting in to save her.

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