Still Not Ready
The thing about recuperation, or convalescence, or whatever term best fits the definition of "healing from a booboo" in the most hip and medical-sounding way possible...is that it's not fun. What makes this whole process less fun is if one has to do it while in a bad situation, such as a crappy, demanding job, or a bad home life. Being jobless because of the injury is also a non-good thing. Being Grant Douglas Ward beat all these options to crap. Oh, lost a job? That's truly sad. Try being raised to hate yourself and not being aware of any choice other than to do what psychopaths tell you; try realizing that not only did you screw up everything, you did it better than all the best; and THEN try making attempt after attempt to reconstruct yourself mentally. Try realizing, between breathing exercises and the mining of the "good and pure", that during the whole process of deception, you really didn't care that you were going to hurt anybody, even though you cared about them, because something in the back of your mind made you go "well this is what's familiar so why regret watching it burn". That made you a bad person--by choice. Whether or not you had a bad past to contribute to all that good character development didn't matter; you got out of that situation somehow, didn't you, Ward? By fire and blood, Ward, right? In your own way you were surviving and thriving and guess what, you burned everything. You messed it all up. Good job. Highest grade. Top marks.
And all of it was your choice, Ward, right? Fire and blood. Watch it burn. Nothing has changed, it's all so familiar, it all happened so fast... You watched it happen. You helped it happen. You hated yourself for liking it when it happened. You shut your ears and eyes to the screams and looks of betrayal. And they trusted you. Tell the truth, Ward, since it's just you: do you realize how you divided your brain between "loyal trusting golden retriever" people and "people like me"? If they're like you, they need to die. If they're loyal and trusting, they probably need to die, too, because that makes more sense, depending on the situation. Sometimes they don't. But when it's you, guess what happens next. And shouldn't you feel bad, Ward? Shouldn't you keep trying to smash your brains out on the wall and shouldn't you render yourself braindead or just the good old classic sort of dead? Shouldn't you just stop breathing? Isn't this your cue?
Listen to your instincts and panic.
Ward listened, and came back to reality a few minutes later groggy and confused. He reoriented himself and went about picking through his mind for a memory to stabilize himself. Dimly he realized: I'm not GOING crazy. I'm there. There was no way to rationalize it out of his head. But when he admitted it, it explained a lot. Added a new dynamic. He could work that into his schedule, discuss the specifics over lunch; it'd be a nice time. Him, himself, and his busted-up mind. The room came back into focus with its dark gray concrete, scuffed and chipped in the spots he'd used to try to exit stage right. (What, you egg? [Ward stabs himself])
On the other side of the screen and the yellow line that Ward could hear scraping back and forth across the concrete, fainter though, because he was physically faint. AND, and, he had drugs in his system, so when he saw Coulson he spent a few seconds trying to decide what the protocol was. Speak? No. The larynx might be in better condition, but Ward knew he didn't have anything worth saying that Coulson couldn't justifiably shoot down. (He went through the scenario in his head: "I'm sorry." "Good." The end. Roll credits.) Simmons had probably debated faking a welcome accident when he was sedated, too, because who wouldn't? If Simmons ever went to the dark side, quite sincerely: God help them all. Simmons wasn't a cutesy sweet child who wanted to find fascinating ocean creatures and sprinkle science-induced happiness over the uninitiated; she was efficient, brutal, protective, and as dark as they came. This wasn't always in her favor, either. Sometimes she transcended the "loyal golden retriever" category and headed over to being more like Ward. And that didn't mean he wouldn't hurt her. The point would be to vanquish a worthy adversary.
'Really, Wardy McOut-Of-My-Gordy? That's what you'd think the point of it would be? She almost whacked you. She didn't make sure you lost your shirt, she cut it off of you. And she still didn't kill you. That is the definition of being at someone else's mercy. (Except Simmons has no mercy left to give you.) You broke your own rules. Now Mr. Loco Parentis is in your personal space, and it's going to get personal. You are too doped up to not be truthful and your hand, it's probably going nice and fast out in the open so that Coulson of the Pure Heart can see it. You're an idiot and you pretty much just scheduled yourself an impromptu therapy session. Go die already.'
"You're using poor grammar," Coulson said.
Ward couldn't focus. He couldn't count. He couldn't remember his habits. He didn't know if Coulson was real or if he was real. Bed, he wanted to go to bed and wake up as someone else. He wanted to wake up in Paris. He wanted to wake up and realize that he'd just walked back to his bunk after watching a rocket head up into the sky. It didn't matter what he wanted now; the reason he'd gotten here at all was because he'd decided that he wanted something else back then. Still, he wanted to do something. Go to bed and cry and not talk ever again, not eat ever again, just die already, fire and blood, Ward! Fire and blood! And what's the point of regret? What'd be the point of regretting doing what everyone else spends their free time wanting you to do, waiting for you to do? There are cameras here for a reason. They're watching you for a reason. They're waiting for you to take your cue.
"Dude." Coulson used his voice to speak, not his hands. The real reason that Coulson did this was to calm Ward down before he hurt himself. The reason that Ward thought Coulson did this was because he was trying to distance himself from Ward in some way, even though he apparently had found a use for Ward, at long last. Was this a teeny bit self-centered? All pain comes from me because I am currently in pain? Yes. It's also heartbreaking. Anyway: "I remember when May recruited you. You looked as self-assured as she did, but she wore it better. And there was that light." Coulson lifted his shoulders and nodded his head slightly, then said, "I didn't know about T.A.H.I.T.I. It hurt, not knowing. And it hurt when I found out. The people on your team are always the people that you're supposed to trust."
If Coulson didn't add on 'I'm not mad, just disappointed', Ward wouldn't be mad, he'd just be disappointed.
"The only thing I respect about you now is that you haven't begged us to forgive you. I mean, you tried. Then May snapped your voice-box."
Ward wanted to go to bed. He wanted to find the exit. He was an egg that wanted to stab himself, just as angst-y as anything any of the great playwrights would have wanted. The audience members would throw roses at the end of this performance. The drugs were not doing him any good. He could see leaves growing out of his prison's walls, and he could see Coulson in high-definition, the most rigidly defined object in Ward's field of vision. Dark spots appeared in his vision, too, before he remembered to breathe. How could somebody forget to breathe? Easy. Practice.
"Ward," Coulson said, pulling him back out of his warm snuggly bed inside his head. "If you let this win all your work has failed. If you let this win there's nothing left."
'Be a dream,' Ward said.
"I'm not."
'That's what a dream would say.'
"No, it's what a liar would say. You'd know.'
Ward took the time to spell out, 'Burrrrrrn'.
Coulson stood up so that he could look down into Ward's eyes. Ward felt too tired to even turn his head, so he looked back at Coulson, glassy-eyed. "I should lie to you and say that you're safe. You're okay. It's fine and it's all over. I wish I could. That's just me, though. I can't help myself." ('I'm not mad, just disappointed.') "Every time I come down here, I watch you, and I think, I miss him. All those parts that started growing, all the good things you had in you, and you couldn't remake yourself in time. I miss our team. I miss the Bus. Do you know how many people there are upstairs who want to kill you for what you've done?"
'Gotta be at least eleven.'
"Well, you're not wrong." Coulson was "loyal trusting golden retriever" material. Ward remembered seeing Coulson's collections, all the memorabilia of old spies and their ideas, and he remembered listening to what Coulson said because he'd never heard anything like it before. He also remembered dismissing it. No more regret, though. Just resignation. Sometimes that's all the villains get.
"Do you want to fix part of it?"
'I won't let it happen again.'
"You said that last time. Look at the nice bed you're in, now," Coulson said.
'Then let Simmons come back down. Have May turn off the cameras. Shut your eyes.'
Coulson looked at Ward's hands. He looked Ward in the eyes. Ward could barely focus, and he didn't care anymore. He didn't care. He was done. Let the yellow line be a noose and choke him, and let the walls move in and crush him, but God forbid anybody came close enough to get crushed themselves. He was alone, he was going to be dramatic about it, and he was going to die laughing in his isolation. If that was true, then why was Coulson turning off the barrier and stepping inside Ward's domain? Why was he upsetting the order that Ward had carefully assembled? Referring to Coulson's previous statement, it likely had something to do with the fact that Coulson couldn't help himself. Optimists didn't believe in emotional personal space, and Coulson, the man who obsessively collected anything related to Captain America or anything from the past, well, he would knit Ward a snuggly afghan in the time it took for him to get to Ward's bedside and throw it over him before initiating a long conversation about feelings and mending burned bridges.
'It doesn't matter. Simmons would thank you. No one would blame you.'
He shut everything else in his mind off. He thought of the fox and the ducks, of Paris and its quiet streets, and he thought of cold mornings with bare tree branches, and he thought of rockets going up, up into the sky. He closed his eyes and refused the world.
"Are you going to let yourself lose, then?"
Not let myself, Ward thought, allow myself. I don't lose often. I think I'd like to try it. Sometimes accepting failure is all the villains get.
'What did all this fighting mean?"
Nothing. And wasn't that hilarious. It wasn't surprising, but it made Ward want to laugh. Instead, he went to sleep.
*****
The first few days, Coulson thought that Ward would come out of it, as long as no one went back down to try and coax him out. Then it stretched into two weeks, and Ward started looking starved. He lay in the hospital bed, strapped down, not moving. His hair grew as the camera logged all its time on Daisy's computers. One morning Fitz came into the room to find Jemma at the monitor, staring at Ward, her thumb running up and down the handle of her mug of tea--it was a light blue one he'd gotten for her from one of the gas stations they'd been at while on assignment. Six month anniversary. Fitz was the romantic half of their relationship, and Jemma hid the bodies of her enemies whenever the mood took her, or she made plans to, anyway. Fitz walked into the room the rest of the way and put down some blueberry scones, vegan-friendly, because Jemma thought they tasted nice, not because she was really into veganism. (Veganism? Was that how you put it?)
Fitz pulled up a chair and sat down. He wanted to lean over and kiss her cheek, or her neck, where the corner of her jaw and her ear met. He sipped his tea and waited for her to speak. She came back to him within a few blinks, putting on a smile. "Good morning." Fitz smiled, tried to frame his words, but his mind was too slow. He pushed her cup forward and her smile deepened, not out of real pleasure, just because she was over-compensating. Fitz thought of beautiful things to say to her throughout each day and night. Although they could sit together in comfortable silence and read or fuss with their own personal projects on their laptops as they sat next to each other on the sofa in Jemma's room, or on the bed with some music coming from Fitz's laptop, and although they both understood that recuperation from the kind of injuries Fitz had sustained because of Ward would take time, Fitz knew that Jemma didn't want to take the time to wait. She wanted to take time back. She wanted to hurt things. Jemma didn't process grief; she catalogued it for further experimentation. She could be kind, and that was part of the reason Fitz had fallen in love with her. He had to remind himself of that, though. Fitz could be smart, and was smart, just not smart enough right now. He had to wait. He had no other choice.
Jemma's eyes went back to the screen and ugly things drifted over her face. She took a drink of tea and reached for a scone. "He doesn't deserve anything. Not a bed. Not help. Coulson should just leave him."
Fitz shook his head and put his hand over Jemma's hand, trying with whatever strength he still had to say, "NO." No one could hear him, though, that was the thing: he wanted to keep everyone safe, and he wanted to make sure that they all moved on from even the worst things, because he was moving on, he was trying to move on, and if he moved on without anybody, ahead of everybody, then he'd have to wait! He'd have to WAIT! And he didn't want to wait any more than he had to, not even if it was for something good to happen, something that he knew was coming. Each day he did his therapy and tried to work on the hard science that everyone else needed to solve their problems, and he tried to connect with Mack, and he tried to connect his mind and make it back into what it was before, and he tried... he tried... Everything drifting around him, so much rage, so many thoughts of revenge that he KNEW had started to grow in his teammates' heads. They were waiting for Coulson to give the order. May could probably have marched down to the cell where they kept Ward, and she could have snapped his neck, or she could have made him die more slowly, but she didn't because she respected Coulson. She'd already broken his trust once; it wouldn't happen again. Jemma, though. She wanted Ward to suffer. That was understandable.
But Fitz wanted her smile to be genuine again. He wanted her to laugh and not pause when she thought of Ward down below them. He wanted her kisses and hugs to be full of warmth instead of feeling like medicine she wanted to make sure Fitz took. He wanted her not to be so preoccupied. Jemma didn't forgive the people who hurt the ones she loved. She had rules. She had methods. And she had her limits. Fitz got an idea. And like a good scientist, he went to see if it would work. He leaned over and kissed Jemma in the spot he'd been eying, then picked up his scone and his cup of tea and hurried out to find Mack, who he'd need for translation.