I posted this story on AO3, but realized that I never posted it here!
I love the Bus Kids. I love how they take care of each other, and I want to write about it!
If you have an idea or a prompt, shoot me a message, leave a review, or send me an ask on Tumblr at the-cuddleslut.
There was not one part of Daisy's body that currently wasn't screaming in pain.
Daisy let out a barely suppressed groan as she lifted her pounding head from its resting place on the cold concrete ground to glance around at her surroundings.
Her vision had a slight spin to it, her ears rang, and something warm and wet was running from one of her nostrils.
How had she gotten here, laying face down on the ground when she had been fighting only moments before?
She suspected that she had been unconscious for at least a few moments, as her last fully coherent moments were centered around her having the upper hand against a cluster of 3 retreating Watchdogs, and not 3 fully armed and angry looking men converging on her resting place.
The two men on the ends were dropped a step back from the larger more terrifying man in the center. They held a standard issue Watchdog rifle against their chests as they jogged toward her, but the one in the middle held a stranger weapon, an elongated tube ending in what Daisy would describe as a satellite dish.
An explosive?
Daisy took no chances, she pushed herself up to her hands and knees, and sent out a powerful shockwave with her right arm.
The Watchdogs stopped their advance 10 yards away and the center attacker held up the strange weapon to his shoulder, bracing himself with a low stance and weight on his back leg.
The shock wave that should have knocked the man over seemed to peter out harmlessly, the low rumble that usually accompanied an airborne quake replaced by an overwhelming high-pitched whine that seemed to vibrate the very fibers of which Daisy was composed.
Standing now, Daisy shook her head once and tried to clear the fog setting in around her thoughts. She was quite dizzy, and it made her a little off balance as she settled into a fighting stance.
The central Watch dog grinned a little. He twisted the barrel of the weapon and the dish at the end contracted into a cone. The movement seemed a little familiar. Daisy could feel the vibrational energy building up in the tube.
Oh shit. Right. That thing was how she ended up bleeding on the ground in the first place.
The weapon released its pent up energy. A low rumble burst forth from the end of the satellite dish end and the air became unsettled around Daisy. Her body was too rattled to move fast enough, and the wave impacted her full on in the chest.
Daisy flew backward through the air until her lower body impacted a cement barrier, flipping her head over heels over the top of it. Her left arm flew out to stop her fall, and she impacted the ground hard, her left shoulder taking the the brunt force of her body weight as she crashed into the ground. The momentum from the shock wave caused Daisy to continue tumbling and rolling away from the three men. The roll stopped when her back finally slammed into a large steel storage container and her awareness fuzzed out.
Daisy was in major trouble.
Her eyes snapped back open when the vibrations of footsteps shook the ground above her head. Daisy shook her head and tried to clear the ringing in her ears. The spin in her vision hadn't gotten any better, and her stomach rolled with nausea as she blinked her eyes rapidly to try to focus her vision.
Daisy heard the unmistakeable sound of ICER shotgun rounds as she painstakingly flopped onto her back, turning her head to look towards the origin of the shots.
Two Macks, or so her brain processed, ran at her, slid up next to her, and then his hands were on her, checking her over for obvious wounds.
"Tremors! Are you alright? Can you run? We gotta move!" The words were blurred in her ears like her vision and she tried to nod, yes, of course she can run. She didn't train with May for nothing!
Mack swore loudly. Oh Coulson wouldn't like that over the comms.
Fingers wrapped around her left wrist and he pulled, and Daisy yelled in pain.
"Oh shit. Okay not that arm. I'm sorry Tremors. You're gonna be okay!"
A much more gentle touch pulled her into a sitting position, and then lifted her to her feet. Mack stood gingerly and tucked the smaller woman against his side, his fingers grasping her utility belt behind her hipbone.
"Sorry, kid, you're gotta have to move your legs. We have a few Watchdogs between us and help."
Daisy giggled a little and tucked her left arm between their bodies and grabbed a fist full of Mack's shirt with the other hand. Her legs didn't seem to want to work, but Mack was doing most of the work. He held her weight and steered her so her eyes could stay closed. The dizziness wasn't as bad when she couldn't see the world moving.
Daisy stayed there, tight against his side, until Mack pulled her through the halls and into the central room of the factory where communications and other support Agents are pulling back end. They stopped the mad dash, and Daisy's knees finally stopped supplying the half support of her weight as she collapsed into Mack's Side, her body swiftly leaving the ground behind as Mack lifted her into his arms.
Mack's booming voice rumbled through the small room.
"Simmons! Simmons, we need some help!"
Daisy opened her eyes for that. A blurred Jemma poked her head from behind a computer console, and then she was there, that fast.
"Mack, what happened? Oh, bloody hell! Set her down over here. Fitz! Bring the trauma kit!"
"She got hit with some kind of weapon, it sent her powers right back at her, twice. She wasn't very responsive to me when I tried to talk to her. I had to move her, more Watchdogs were coming in fast," Mack recalled quickly. Daisy felt herself being lowered to the cold concrete.
Wait, he had been talking to her? Maybe Daisy was more hurt than she thought. Everything felt alright to her now, except for the cold hand, hands, and her head. And everything else. Oh dear.
"Mack, I need you to stabilize her neck so that I can check her over," Jemma said quickly. Daisy opened her eyes again to see her friends leaning over her. Her gauntlets were quickly unbuckled and removed.
Fitz slid into view, a blue duffel bag thrown over his shoulder.
Fitz didn't say anything, he only handed off the bag, and reached down and squeezed Daisy's right hand. She squeezed back, and his hand pulled away.
Jemma worked quickly, she placed her fingers on Daisy's neck to take a quick pulse with one hand and fumbled in the bag with the other. A bright light shone in Daisy's eyes and she cried out, turning her head away. Hands quickly returned her head to facing forward, holding her head at both temples.
Jemma furrowed her brow, "Daisy, Agent Johnson, did you hit your head?"
Daisy blinked a few times. It was hard to find her voice. "Maybe, I don't remember, I think I hit my head too hard."
Jemma let out an exasperated sigh, "Daisy, this is not the time to…"
"Jem, i think my arm is broken again. It hurts right here" Daisy interrupted and reached across to touch the front of her left shoulder. Jemma pushed Daisy's hand away, brow furrowed.
"What happened to your arm, Daisy?"
"My arm?" Daisy reached up again to touch the front of her left shoulder, running her fingers over her collarbone, "My hand is cold. My left one. Simmons is going to kill me".
"Daisy, I'm right here". Simmons tried not to let the panic show on her face.
Oh. Right. That probably wasn't good.
"No, no it's not, Daisy!"
Wait, had she said that out loud?
Jemma turned behind her, calling out directions "Agent Davis, get on the radio, we need a medical evac at our position immediately. Agent Johnson has a head injury and is quickly deteriorating."
"Roger that, Agent Simmons, I will get the quinjet here as soon as I can."
Jemma turned back to the task at hand, smoothing down Daisy's hair, "you're going to be okay, Daisy, i've got you."
Jemma busied herself with getting Daisy ready for transport. She pulled down the zipper of Daisy's jacket and used her medical scissors to cut through the black tank top underneath.
Daisy giggled when the cold air hit her skin, "Jemma Simmons, are you trying to undress me?"
Jemma set her jaw and ignored Daisy's jests. She turns her head to Fitz, "Fitz, I need you to put a cervical collar on her and keep her awake until the evac arrives."
Daisy felt Fitz move around her so that he was above her head, his cold hands touched her neck and she shivered. He wrapped a blue plastic brace around her neck and velcroed it behind her head.
Jemma expertly placed electrodes on Daisy's chest, and an oxygen mask was placed over her nose and mouth, filling her mouth with a strange sweetness.
Daisy's eyelids fluttered, her adrenaline crashing, she was so tired. Her shoulder throbbed with her heartbeat. Her vision blurred and tunneled. Her hearing sharpened to a high pitched whine.
Daisy very vaguely realized that she should not be going to sleep, but the exhaustion was taking over. Daisy could feel Fitz next to her, holding her hand, his voice telling her to stay with him, and Jemma starting an IV on the crook of her injured left arm ("it's always so much easier to get the vein here, Daisy! I always get it on the first try!")
Daisy blinks twice, and her awareness completely fuzzes out and fades to black.
There was nothing on Daisy's body that wasn't pulsing with a low grade ache, the kind that was numbed by heavy pain medication.
There were a lot of noises in the background, a faint regular beeping, a fairly regular "click", and what was that last one, snoring?
Her eyes fluttered open and she glanced around, trying to ground herself by identifying sources of sounds. The beeping came from the monitor next to her head, attached to the leads emerging from the top of her shirt, the clicks came from the IV machine attached the pole on her other side. And the snoring, the snoring came from Fitz?
And there Fitz was, sitting in one of the uncomfortable med bay chairs next to the foot of Daisy's bed. He was facing her, his feet propped up on another chair near her head. His head was tilted back, mouth slightly open. One hand was holding his tablet to his chest, and the other hand rested on Daisy's shin bone. Loud snores came from his mouth.
Daisy smiled to herself. She wasn't quite sure how she had gotten to the medical bay, but the fact that Fitz was there with her, keeping her company and protecting her, made her not care that much. Daisy let her heavy eyes slip closed again.
"Okay Daisy, I'm going to give you another dose of morphine sulfate, and some more of the bone treatment via your IV. Your clavicle is healing quite nicely with it," the sweet voice of Jemma Simmons brought Daisy a little bit closer to consciousness.
"Jemma, do you always talk to your patients when they're clearly unconscious?"
Someone brushed Daisy's hair away from her face, bringing her even closer to being awake.
"Yes, Fitz," Jemma snapped back, " but only when it's Daisy," she added softly.
The aches in Daisy's body were worse than the last time she had awoken, and she could not suppress the groan that slipped past her lips.
"Daisy? Are you awake?"
Daisy turned her head towards the sound of Jemma's voice and experimentally opened one eye.
The room was dimly lit, thankfully, and her two best friends were staring at her hopefully from the foot of her bed.
"Hey guys," Daisy croaked, closing her eye again. The vibrations of her voice felt like gravel in her chest. It hurt, a lot, and Daisy groaned again.
Jemma placed her hand on Daisy's right arm and spoke softly, "don't try and talk, your throat is probably a little sore from the breathing tube from your surgery this afternoon. We had to re-set your clavicle, it was still pressing on the vein in your neck."
Daisy groaned a little again, opening her eyes to glance down at the black sling holding her left arm to her chest.
"Ow," she says simply.
Fitz let out a low chuckle, "Do you remember what happened, Daisy?"
Daisy gave him the hand signal for "kind of", picking up her right hand and rocking it back and forth.
"On a scale of one to 10, what is your pain?"
Daisy held up 5 fingers, and then closed her fist, and held up her middle finger.
"I'll record that as a 7."
Fitz laughed out loud, "at least she still has her sense of humor!"
Jemma laughed and planted a kiss on Daisy's forehead, "she always does. Are you ready for some more pain medication?"
Daisy nods. "Fitz was snoring," she deadpanned.
Fitz looked mortified as Jemma injected the pain medication into the IV line. Jemma only laughed, "Oh I know, Coulson was in here earlier and brought me a video. Would you like Fitz to stay with you for a little longer? I have to get back to the lab, unfortunately."
The pain relief and fatigue rushed through Daisy's body with the medicine, and she nodded, she needed him, needed both of them, near her.
Fitz smiled and settled himself back into his chair, he patted Daisy's leg and picked up his tablet.
"I will be right down here, Daisy. Go to sleep," he said, rubbing soothing circles on her shin.
Jemma placed another kiss on Daisy's forehead and pushed her hair behind her ear.
Daisy's eyes finally drift closed.
