So this story has been ruminating in my mind pretty much since I posted Hide. I had a rudimentary idea of where I wanted the final part of my trilogy to go as well as some idea of how I wanted it to go yet every time I sat down to write I drew a blank. Thursday I came home excited to start typing because I finally was not only in the perfect mood to write but I had this story just begging to come out, then I logged into Tumblr, quicker than snow in July my mood evaporated. I was angry, hurt and feeling very homicidal, had I wrote that evening it's likely Director Coulson would have met a much worse fate than the one I currently have in store for him, as it is he won't be getting a happy reunion with Skye in this fic, if you want happy Skye/Coulson family feels I recommend you go read someone else's fic because this one isn't for you, while my original plan for Coulson was a much happier end than the one I currently have planned for him it still likely wouldn't have made any Skye/Coulson family shippers happy.
This story is titled Begin Again and while not actually being a song fic it will call to mind several songs including At The Beginning by Richard Marx and Donna Lewis from the soundtrack of Anastacia and Taylor Swift's Begin Again.
Disclaimer: I own nothing save the idea the characters belong to Marvel I'm merely playing in their playground. This story is the culmination of the story line I started in Run and continued in Hide I recommend going to read those first if you haven't already.
Summary: Written for SkyeWard week day one prompt beginnings, well not written for it but I was hoping to have it done by then. Skye and Grant's journey from strangers, to partners and friends, to something more….
Begin Again
Strangers…..It's just like the first time all over again only he's not wearing a suit and rather than taking her to the government agency he's rescuing her from them. He doesn't say much which again is very reminiscent of their first meeting where initially Coulson did all the talking but there's no Coulson and the silence hangs heavy between them as he pulls her hurriedly out of the van, negligently tossing a grenade into the van behind them as he tugs her along out of the alley.
Neither one turns as the van explodes behind them they walk arm and arm with hoods up blending into the crowd even as several agents rush the alley where they had been moments before and now sits a smoking pile of rubble.
When they get to the safe house is when she finds out that they've been paired together, Steve and Natasha don't want her running solo from the van any more they want someone to watch her back. It doesn't surprise her that they chose him, she vouched for him after all, it surprises her that he came. It's a Tuesday and they are back to being touchy strangers forced into close quarters. That they are strangers again is truer than Skye would like to think.
She knows Grant Ward Agent of Shield, she knows Grant Ward Hydra, and she knows Grant Ward Prisoner, but she doesn't know this Grant Ward the man who survived three bullets from her gun and still pulled her out of a dangerous situation. By the same token she knows that he is encountering a stranger as well, he knows Skye Shield Hacktivist, and he even knows Mary Sue Poots the lonely orphan, he doesn't know Daisy and she's torn with whether or not she wants him to.
They don't talk about the past, it lies between them like a gaping chasm, or perhaps like a festering sore that neither of them wants to open. It pops up in the fact that she hacks his phone to track his location and screen his messages, it pops up in the fact that when she has a weapon in her had he doesn't turn his back on her.
They don't talk about personal things or the past, where they've been since they last saw each other or what they've done. They communicate silently and if it didn't feel so right, so normal to communicate wordlessly with him she might have found it strange. Surprisingly enough things fall into somewhat of a normal routine for them aside from minor hiccups it's almost like being back on the bus again.
He stutters over Daisy in a why so much like her father it hurts but she doesn't mention it because she has to bite her tongue to keep from calling him robot or using robot quips at him, some days its hard to forget that she's not Skye and he's not her SO mainly because working together feels so natural.
Things come to a head when they are ambushed. She's hasn't been in a combat situation since her father's death but she doesn't feel out of step or off balance. They may not have be working out or training together but they fight together naturally as if they've been doing it all their lives.
His back is to her for the first time in a long time as they fight back to back. He flinches when she shoots the man aiming at him while his back is turned but neither of them mentions it. After the fight it's as if the chasm has healed a little bit as if the wound is slightly less sore. Neither brings up the past nor mentions the betrayals on both their parts, it's almost as if they've decided to let sleeping dogs lie and start fresh.
Partners…..After the ambush things change between Grant and Skye. Conversation becomes easier; teasing repartee becomes the norm again even as life around them devolves. The Registration act is gaining more and more rules and regulations; it's becoming harder to operate in the normal world.
She doesn't blink the first time she finds her picture on the wanted list SHIELD has for dangerous gifteds; Grant squeezes her shoulder in a silent show of support before she wipes the list and plants a bug in SHIELD's mainframe just for kicks.
Things aren't stilted anymore between them, Grant calls her Skye almost as often as he calls her Daisy but she never bother's to correct him anymore, it's nice to have someone who still remembers her when she was Skye before she changed before she became more, someone who liked her before she was special who still likes her now.
Anytime a refugee comments on it Grant has fun coming up with quips for why he calls her Skye, She's the Skye of my life, She is my sun and moon and stars what else am I to call her but Skye, She's an air head so of course she's Skye, She's flighty as a bird so Skye, She was born to soar so why call her by such an earth bound name as Daisy, she knows he does it to get a giggle out of her because anytime someone comments on her name it's a reminder that she wasn't always Daisy. It's funny how that is Grant can call her Skye and she doesn't think of the past or the other people who might call her Skye still but the second someone asks why Grant calls her Skye her mind instantly flashes back to the people from her old life and a part of her hurts so much.
Natasha often tells them to get a room already and Steve shakes his head at them when they have a meeting that all of them can attend because it usually will devolve into a snark fest or a pun off. Somehow despite spending more time in varied parts of the world they've developed a friendship, a camaraderie born out of the situation that they are in.
Perhaps they should have argued more maybe then Steve wouldn't have done what he did, perhaps maybe they all seem so grand in hindsight.
When Steve tells them his plan of a compromise, that this war has to end sometime and maybe if he goes in and registers maybe he can stop this before they get to the point that gifteds have to go off grid completely before gifteds are tattooed and herded up like animals.
They all argue against it, they all can see the cons in this situation but Steve is resolute, there has to be a way to end this bloodshed to end all the fighting and brother against brother, it has to end.
In the end none of them can convince him other wise and they go their separate ways again. Skye and Grant to Vegas in the hopes of finding a permanent base in the city so many can get lost in and forget, Natasha to check in with other allies and Steve for New York.
Skye hugs him extra hard before he leaves, this man who has somehow become a surrogate big brother to her in the past few years, perhaps a part of her knew that this would be the last time she saw him.
When the news breaks in Vegas, Skye is eternally grateful that Vegas is next to a desert. She doesn't remember much of the trip out there but the earthquake she unleashes in her sorrow is devastating enough to cause a fissure in the earth had they still been in the city it's unlikely that there would have been a city left.
Grant doesn't leave her side even for a moment and perhaps that's when their relationship changes again as she sobs out her agony into his arms.
When she wakes up its morning and they are far from Vegas, Grant held her all night long but neither mentions the change or that from that moment on they start sharing a bed. Like so much about their relationship since they've gotten back together it simply happens unsaid, merely understood.
Something more….She supposes it was going to happen one day. After the death of Steve Rogers things changed, he became a martyr for the cause and altered the public's viewpoints on gifteds. Tony Stark himself went before congress begging them to repeal the registration act.
A part of her hopes this isn't all coming to late, that things aren't to broken to fix.
When it comes out that the assassin was a former Shield agent who had been brainwashed into following HAMMER but that no one had even tried to help her, a harsh spot light is shown on SHIELD and all the nastiness that they've been trying to keep buried all the hidden secrets not unleashed in Natasha's data drop are brought to life. Their experiments on gifteds, experiments on aliens, the abusive way they train their specialists, the lack of therapy offered to their agents and just about everything they've been trying to hide since being rebuilt is brought into stunning color in a joint operation by Tony and Tasha.
The agent was getting the help she needed no thank goodness, though Skye's heart broke as more information was revealed and it came out that it was Sharon Carter a legacy shield agent and the captain's girlfriend someone who had been working for them inside of Shield.
They buy a home in the middle of nowhere and start building a halfway house, safe haven. Helping gifteds and others build a new life, helping those who have been broken heal. The home becomes a stopover for every member of Steve's team of Avengers and they all count the pair as friends family even. Skye and Grant's life settles into a quiet domesticity. Fitz turns up on their doorstep six months after the death of Captain America and is brought into the fold. It starts out awkward as neither Skye nor Grant is quite sure how to act around their former friend. It changes when they find out Fitz hasn't been Shield since shortly after Skye herself left, he'd been recruited by another member of the network Steve had set up but hadn't been able to find the pair until everything had settled down.
Word comes in through the grapevine that Director Coulson suffered a heart attack after the death of Captain America and had to be medically retired; he left behind a legacy of corruption and double standards that would take years if not decades for Shield to recover from. Skye doesn't let herself feel sad for him instead, felt bad for the man who had preached about second chances and gave her the chance to become who she was today.
It never occurs to Skye to go see Coulson, even though she knows where he is. He's one piece of her past she has no intention of regaining now that she can be herself openly again.
To many bridges burned for a chance at a reunion, perhaps she could forgive how he had treated her but the way he had treated Grant the way he had encouraged her to treat Grant no something's couldn't be overcome.
When Melinda May shows up on her doorstep with Maria Hill Skye's first inclination is to slam the door in both their faces.
She does initially but they don't leave and in fact wait there patiently until Grant finds out they are there and lets them in before the neighbors call the cops.
The meeting doesn't get off to the greatest of starts with both Melinda and Maria questioning why Grant is there. Skye is quick to remind them that they don't exactly have very firm ground to stand on either of them in regards to passing judgment on Grant. Things spin quicker out of control when Stevie comes racing into the room like the two year old whirlwind she is and instantly confirms for both women that Grant isn't just staying here as a stopover but actually lives there and that they are together.
Grant is fast but somehow their daughter always has him beat it doesn't help that the tiny little girl has him wrapped so tightly around her finger that he would let her get away with murder.
Before things spiral further out of control she brings the meeting back to order and demands to know why SHIELD agents are currently sitting in her living room. When they tell her what they want she starts to laugh hysterically then throws them out, by now Bucky, Tasha and Kara have shown up and helped her.
Her run SHIELD they have to be out of their f***ing minds. She wouldn't touch that agency with a ten foot pole.
Much later after their daughter is in bed they discuss what Maria and Melinda wanted, they don't keep secrets from each other. They might not discuss something openly when it happens or tell each other everything immediately but they always tell each other everything at the first available opportunity. To Skye's surprise he thinks she should accept.
They've both been wrong by SHIELD but doesn't that mean they can make it better. They, better than anybody, know how badly SHIELD had fucked up so doesn't that mean that they know what not to do.
It takes a lot of convincing and a lot of concessions on SHIELD's part.
Grant is going to be her deputy and they can all go float a boat if they have a problem with it, no she doesn't see a problem with having the center of SHIELD be in Nebraska as opposed to NY or CA, yes she's certain that the schools will be regulated and brought up to standardized regulations with every military school and college of the USA.
Six months later she and Grant walk into the new SHIELD office building built in Omaha, Nebraska and head to her new office. The name on the door is Director Daisy Johnson Deputy Director Grant Johnson. Grant squeezes her hand again and after taking a deep breath the pair starts on a new journey, one they take together.
Notes: So there you have it the end of my three part series that all started as a bet between starshinehp and myself and now it has spawned into a trilogy. I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I have enjoyed writing it and I hope you all have a wonderful SkyeWard filled week. Sorry there was no Jemma but I couldn't figure out a way to put her in, I thought about having her leave with Fitz but I couldn't see Jemma leaving SHIELD even for Fitz, after all it's already been canonically proven that Jemma would leave Fitz for SHIELD so well any ways I hope everyone enjoyed this story.
P.S. Yes Grant took Skye's name he didn't want the Ward name anymore the only thing he had associated with it were bad memories.