Flying High
The flight was about seven hours, you slept most of the way, Simmons was busy freeloading off of the WiFi I hacked for her and studying rare plants and creatures found inWakanda. You told her that it probably wouldn’t come to that point, but she assured you she was doing it purely out of genuine interest. Genuine interest my ass.
Like you’d expected, the security was a bit tougher than that of the States, given recent events, but that actually just meant a thorough background check, fingerprint analysis, passport check, and two security screenings, one through a metal detector and one with a handsy TSA personnel. You thought you heard Simmons mutter “I can’t believe I learned all of the regional flowers for nothing.” as you got in the cab, but it might have just been your imagination.
The cab took you as far as the end of the province, which you paid for and then called another cab to take you to the other side of that province. By the end of the day you were in the closest city to the lab hidden amongst the jungle, so you checked into a cheap hotel room indefinitely and made yourselves a nice little home for the time being. While you set up all of your computers and notebooks, Jemma sat opposite the room from you setting up all of her portable lab equipment.
As you were both lying down to get a good night’s rest you remembered you never asked her how she figured out a way to remove 70 years of Hydra brainwashing. At this inquiry she squealed with excitement. “I’m so glad you finally asked, I had almost forgotten about it! Hypnosis has been an effective tool for getting over phobias and mental blocks in people and personality types for decades, however few people actually take the time to realize what the science is capable of. If we can hypnotize Sergeant Barnes into a deep sleep and reassociate the trigger words that bring out the Winter Soldier, to bring out something else than he won’t be able to lose control, because the urge will be gone! Isn’t it great, instead of triggering the Soldier we could just make him have to pee, or want to make cookies, or even just tie up his hair, I mean the gentle possibilities are endless, no more death and destruction. Of course he’d still have the memories from the past, those I can’t take away unless we pulled a Coulson and implanted fake ones, but that’s torturous and cruel, and should never be done again, not to mention dangerous.” she rambled.
“Hypnosis, Jemma that’s genius. I wonder why no one has thought of that, it’s simple but it could work.” you realized.
“Simply brilliant, that’s what they call me.” she joked.
It didn’t take long for you to fall asleep with the jet lag in play, but you didn’t stay asleep for long.
A chorus of glasses shattered around you, windows, mirrors, whatever could break, broken and shattered around you. The echoes of your mother’s voice rang in your ear, “I thought I’d survived all that torture for you, because you were my gift. But you’re not. This is.” You prepared yourself to feel the life drain out of you, but nothing came. You opened your eyes as she began to drain the life out of your friends, those who had sacrificed everything for you. Images flashed before your eyes; Tripp’s body crumbling to the ground from your earthquake, Raina’s blood dripping from her neck, stabbed by your mother, Charles taking the final hit from Malick that was meant to end her life, James stabbing Lash through the heart as he carried you to safety, and last but not least Lincoln’s voice cracking over the comms system between the Quinjet and Zephyr-1 as he confessed his love for you. The dream came back to your mother holding a gun to you, pulling the trigger, and shooting you twice in the stomach, this time knowing you wouldn’t wake up eventually.
“Daisy! Daisy!! Daisy wake up! You’re having a nightmare! You need to wake up!” you heard Jemma shout in the distance, but all you could focus on were the bullet wounds, pouring blood.
“Daisy wake up!!” you felt her shaking your shoulders vehemently, causing you to jump awake, just in time to see some of her beakers fall from her work table. Everything was vibrating, to a small degree, but getting worse by the minute. You took a deep breath and let out the fear from your nightmare, and sure enough the vibrations swelled and then subsequently disappeared. Looking at the clock you realized it was almost four in the morning, Wakandan time, and you realized you’d never get back to sleep. “Thanks Jemma, for waking me up.”
“Don’t worry about it. Was it the same one, or was it different? It’s been a while since you lost control like that.” she noted.
“It was the same one, a little different, it ended with Jia-Ying shooting me in the stomach twice, again, right where Quinn shot me the first time.” you explained. “I think I’m just anxious from the traveling, maybe some Tai Chi will help.” you suggested. As you got up from the bed, Jemma gave you a sympathetic look and nodded.
“Alright, I’m going to try and go back to sleep. If you need anything don’t be afraid to wake me, we’re in this together Daisy.” she reminded you.
“Until the end of the line.” you replied.
"That's really cheesy." she retorted.
"You're right, see you later." With that she smiled and returned to her cot, quickly falling back asleep.