The Flu

"Sir?"  Coulson said as he answered the phone.  He probably should apologize for how Jemma had spoke to him.  Fury was under stress, after all, thinking he was about to lose a lot of good agents, but still, he had bought a COFFIN for Victoria without making sure she was dead first!  He was going to be lucky if Jemma was the only one who yelled at him.

"Victoria's got a little defender there, doesn't she?"  Fury said.  

"Simmons and Skye have spent the last two days in Victoria's office, taking care of her and nursing her back from the brink.  I don't think either one of them is willing to take any chances with her after that."  Coulson said.  "Sir, you need to trust Jemma, and Banner seemed to be backing her up.  Victoria's getting better."  As he talked, he headed back downstairs.  Better to get away from Victoria's office if Fury was still going to try to demand tests.  For a reason he couldn't explain, the notion of brain scans made a wave of uneasiness wash over him.

"I would like tests, but they can wait until your agent says they're safe."  Fury finally agreed.  And if they were looking at brain damage that might call for therapy, maybe it would be better to delay the tests a bit anyway, to see how much Victoria could bounce back on her own first?  He would have to ask Banner about that possibly.  "Can you get together a list of parts you need to fix whatever's going wrong at the Hub?  What happened there anyway?"

"Edwin Tuttle, level 4 maintenance, is what happened."  Coulson said.  "Apparently he decided that the way to make level 5 was to keep maintenance costs low, and he did this by not ordering replacement parts for damage, but by pulling things from seldom used areas of the building.  Fitz says he can fix the damage.  He's been working with Ward and they've got a lot of the things that were critical fixed, but two thirds of the building is still without power so…."

"Is Tuttle in there?"  Fury demanded.  That many problems, Fury was suddenly worried about the potential for an attack once more.

"In the cafeteria, curled into a ball of flu induced misery.  He's so sick that Fitz has even held off on yelling at him for the trouble he's caused."  Coulson said.  He spotted Fitz at the other end of the hall, half buried in an opening in the wall, with Ward handing him tools.  "Fitz, the director's going to send us more parts for the repairs.  Think you can get together a list of what you need?"

"I already made one, in the event that we could get some help sent."  Fitz called, not pulling his head out of the wall where he was working.  "Ward?"

"List is in the cafeteria.  I'll go and get it." Ward said.  He knew exactly what Fitz was talking about.  The engineer had ranted and glared at Tuttle enough while writing it.

"Good.  We'll have that list of needed parts for you in a few minutes."  Coulson told him.

"What about other supplies?  Meds?"

"We seem to be doing alright there.  More food would be good, but having a place that isn't the BUS to prepare food would be even better so if you could just get the parts Fitz needs so we can get the building working again…."

"Right.  Oh, you should know that Rogers, Stark and Banner found the man responsible for the defective shots."

"They….  Wait, someone was responsible for this?"  Coulson demanded.

"Everett Dalton,  works for the company who provided the shots."  Fury said.  "Apparently their CEO is in debt to the Maggia and has been making cuts to keep the company afloat.  One of the things he cut was Dalton's paycheck, so to get even, Dalton sabotaged the flu shots."

"I hope he has a will."  That was all that Coulson could think of to say in response.  When Victoria found out about this, that she had been infected with the flu and had nearly died as a result, there probably wouldn't be enough of the man left to bury.

"I'm going to have Romanoff have a little talk with him.  She's been locked in here for two days now, and she isn't happy."  Fury smirked slightly imagining Natasha and what she would do to the man to blame for the situation.

"Make sure the video feeds are running.  You know Victoria's going to want to see when she's feeling better.  Here's the list."  Coulson said as Ward hurried up and handed over the tablet Fitz had been writing on.  He hit a few buttons and clicked send to forward it.  "Sending it to your email now."

"Fine.  I'll see how fast Stark's people can pull this, and then get you an ETA on delivery."  Fury said before ending the call.

"Phil, did I hear you right?  Someone did this, it wasn't an accident?"  John called from where he was standing by the door.

"Someone at the company that supplied the vaccines apparently had a grudge against their boss, and sabotaged the shots for revenge."

"They….  Does Fury have them?"  If he did, John was half tempted to head for the Triskelion to have a few words with whoever was to blame.  Vic could have died so easily.

"We have him.  Natasha's going to be having a little talk with Mister Dalton."

"Romanoff.  I hope she doesn't turn off the video feeds.  Vic's going to want to see that, if she can't have a talk with him herself."  Romanoff handling it, he wasn't going to worry about the man being punished.  "Did Fury say anything about if I can come in or not?"  Maybe he couldn't actually see Vic, but he would feel better just being nearby in case.

"Fury said you're camping out.  I'll see about finding a sleeping bag to toss out a window for you."

"Well, it won't be the worst place I've slept."  John said.  And he was pretty sure that he could figure out which window was Vic's.  He would just wait there, until things got sorted out.

"Stark!"  Fury called as he spotted Stark standing at the end of the hallway, talking with Rogers, Banner and Natasha.  "I've got the list of the supplies they need at the Hub."

"What did whoever was handling maintenance do, break the entire building?"  Tony said after scanning the list.  "We can get all of this, but it's probably going to take five or six hours to have it ready to go."

"Fine.  Hopefully they've got the things that are most likely to catch fire fixed, so they should be able to hold out until then.  Have you talked to Mister Dalton yet?"  he asked Natasha.

"I was just about to.  Video feeds on or off?"

"On, for Victoria's viewing pleasure when she's feeling better."  Fury told her.

"Are you sending her a get-well video?"  Maria called as she came down the hall, carrying a bag.  "Can someone drop this off for her, when your people drop off the parts?"  Luckily she had paid for one day shipping on the outfit she had ordered.  Victoria could probably use fresh clothes, and she would never need to know that the outfit had been originally intended for her funeral.  Add a fluffy robe that she had managed to find in supplies, and that ought to help a bit with making her happier once she work up.

"Slippers, too."  Jasper called as he hurried to join them with his contribution, a pair of pink bunny slippers and a large get well card.  Hopefully the news would stay good, and Victoria would actually be getting well fast now.