Chapter 14
“I thought they only had four levels of infection?” Fury asked Johnson as they made their way towards an armory.
“When an infected gets to level four, they go berserk.” She said “They lose all ability to reason, they just all seem to want to escape. To flee to where ever Stark is. Our working theory is they transform into level 5s once there.”
“You’ve never tagged one with a bomb and…” Scott began to ask before stopping himself. “You tried that, and the bomb didn’t go off…”
She nodded.
“Actually, it did, six months later in a parking lot in one of the breakaway states.”
“Breakway states?” Fitz asked.
“They didn’t explain that to you? The Second American Civil War?”
She started to tell them about what had happened.
“Come on, at least eat this.” Skye said holding up a bowl of soup. “Come on… here comes the choo-choo train…”
“Wrong Daisy…” her sister said. She didn’t need Skye pretending she was one of her toddlers.
“Actually, Sprout likes it when I do Airplane. It’s Scotty who like the train.”
“Another way he takes after his uncle… You know he suggested for our Honeymoon a train trip around the country?”
“That sounds nice…” Skye said before Daisy made a face “You do realize the risk you’re facing with this pregnancy? Maybe he doesn’t want you in a tin can in the air or on a ship if there’s a problem.”
Daisy stopped and remember what her doctor had said. Her HG bouts were just the tip of the iceberg. She was a high-risk case for multiple reasons, including the fact the baby wasn’t exactly human. Her future mother-in-law said her pregnancy with Scott had damaged her uterus, which is why she didn’t have other children, something she’d kept from Scott and had begged Daisy not to share.
“I haven’t thrown up since we got here.” Daisy pointed out.
“Because you’ve got nothing in your stomach to cough up…”
“Fine…” Daisy said, taking the bowl.
Skye made a small fist pump.
“Skye…” Daisy said “How can you be so chipper. You’ve been trying to cheer me up but… what about Jas and the twins? Aren’t you worried you’ll never see them again?”
“I’m trying to cheer you up so I don’t have to think about them.” Skye admitted. “Jas is stronger than she once was. And with Jemma and Fitz around, I think she’ll be alright. So, right now… EAT!”
“And once the walls sprang up.” Johnson continued “Communications between the sectors became almost impossible. Different factions started trying to fight for control and within a few years, War…”
“What sort of war?”
“attrition… terror… Each side vying for the other’s resources.”
“This is insane…” Fitz said.
“So are the people running things.
To Fury, Jemma and Fitz, this explained what they had seen back in New York. A nation on lockdown.
“So what happened with that Fritz Lang reject?” Scott asked as they got to armory.
Jemma shot him a look.
“She came to us two years ago, said she’d escaped from Stark’s custody. Every test we did on her said she wasn’t infected. We got to work trying to use the information she’d given to try and stop him… but she was a mole. She lead us into a trap. A lot of good men died that day.”
Johnson showed a tiny bit of emotion.
“There’s more to this, isn’t there?” Scott asked
“Simmons, while she was here… Before we found out…” Johnson said, “She was my lover.”
The four went back to prepping, ignoring her.
“That doesn’t shock you at all?” She asked.
“You never told her about Jas and Skye?” Fury asked Scott?
“Don’t think it ever came up.” He said as he slipped a tacticle vest over his head “Oh well…”
Once kitted out the five stood in the hallway.
“Ok, so, Stark has sent raiding parties on a few occasions, usually when he wants something badly and his agents can’t get to them.”
“Like the other me?” Jemma asked.
“Or some chunk of hardware. But he’s never sent this many. It’s usually only a small handful.”
“Could he be trying to get back the suit I’ve been working on?” Scott asked her.
“That’s a possibility, but he’s never shown interest in discarded tech. It usually self-destructs.”
“Maybe we should finish it before he has a chance to take it back. Fitz, come with me.”