Stayin' Alive (Or 4 times Jemma gave CPR and one time Jemma had to be given CPR)
1. Academy Days
Everything happened way too fast.
One moment, Jemma was frantically writing notes for her Advanced Transport class as Dr. Landon ranted on and on during a "quick review" of the uses of GTP over ATP, and the next moment he was on the ground, clutching his chest and gasping for breath.
Jemma, sitting in the front row of the class, was one of the first people to reach the older man, but even though she had made it that quickly, her professor had already fallen unconscious, the gasping breaths he was taking ceasing entirely.
Jemma kneeled next to Dr. Landon and pressed her fingers against his jugular to take his pulse. When there was no pulse beating against her fingers, Jemma gave herself less than 1 second to panic before she went into crisis prevention mode.
She caught the eyes of one of the other students milling around, "You!" She called, pointing directly toward him, "Go call for help. Tell them when we have a man in cardiac arrest!"
The young man she delegated to call for help nodded once and took off sprinting down the hall, yelling for help the entire way.
Jemma turned her attention back to the task at hand. She had just recently been re-certified in cardiopulmonary resuscitation, and actually knew exactly what to do. She sent one of the students near her to her seat to fetch her CPR mask from the spot it was clipped on her backpack. (If anything, Jemma Simmons excels at preparation).
She got two of the larger guys (she was 18 and barely 5'3") to help her roll the professor onto his back. Jemma rubbed her knuckles against Dr. Landon's sternum, noting no movement. She checked his pulse again, still nothing.
Jemma placed the palm of her left hand to the back of her right hand and laced her fingers together. She took a deep breath and started performing chest compressions, humming the tune of Stayin' Alive to keep her tempo at the correct pace. Dr. Landon's sternum moved with each compression, and it gave Jemma a strange feeling in her stomach. She counted the compressions out loud, and when she reached 30 she gave him two breaths, watching his chest rise and fall each time.
After 7 more rounds of compressions and rescue breaths, Jemma started to feel fatigue deep into her body. The CPR took a lot out of her, each round becoming more difficult than the last.
After 8 rounds of CPR. Jemma was completely exhausted. Compressions had become incredibly arduous, her knees ached from sitting on them, and Jemma could barely draw her own breaths, let alone breathe them into someone else.
"Simmons," someone said, putting a hand on her shoulder, "you gotta stop. Help is going to be here any second!"
Jemma shook her head and started the next round of compressions.
The paramedics swept into the room just a few seconds later, and Jemma stepped back, or more, she collapsed backward into the desk in the front of the room, completely spent.
One of the paramedics smiled at Jemma, "hey kid, we have a pulse! Good job," He smiled at her and turned back to his work. Jemma beamed, her tired body relaxing a little more. She had done it, she had saved someone's life.
A few days later, Jemma received a personal letter of thanks from director Fury, and a plaque in her honor was placed outside of Dr. Landon' office.
Not bad for the first time Jemma had ever attempted CPR.
2. Lab Days
"Honestly, Fitz, I don't understand why we couldn't just take lunch on campus like we normally do," Jemma grumbled to her friend as he dragged her through the doors of the Greek restaurant.
"I already told you, Simmons, I've been wanting to try this new place, and you agreed to come with me!" The curly-headed Scotsman argued back, putting his hands up in front of his face.
"Yes, Fitz, but I assumed we would come for dinner, or on a weekend when we were not elbows deep in new tech," Jemma countered, stepping up to the hostess station.
"Just the two of you?" The hostess, a teenager probably no more than 17, asked them.
Fitz nodded and waved his hands at the girl, "Yes, yes, just the two of us. Jemma, what more reason is there to get out of the lab when we have so much work to do? We need to take time for ourselves!"
"Follow me please," the hostess said flatly, picking up two menus and lead FitzSimmons to a booth near the back of the restaurants
"Enjoy your meal!" She quipped cheerfully. Jemma smiled at her as she walked away.
Fitz and Simmons never did get to enjoy the meal, because, before they could even order drinks, a woman at the next table over slumped in her chair and slid to the ground. Simmons was barely out of her chair to help her before the convulsions started.
Jemma quickly surveyed the situation. She kneeled next to the woman and pushed back all the chairs within a dangerous radius, and started timing the seizure using her watch.
It took 2 minutes and 37 seconds for the woman to stop seizing. During this time, Jemma learned the woman did, in fact, have epilepsy from the terrified woman accompanying her and that the accompanying friend was an old friend from high school. When the convulsions finally did stop, Jemma pressed her fingers to the woman's neck to check for a pulse.
Jemma's own heart skipped a beat when she didn't feel a pulse beneath her fingers. "Shit!" She muttered.
"Fitz, I need your help here!" She called to her friend. Fitz scooted up next to her, untangling Jemma's CPR mask that he had gotten from her purse. Jemma entwined her fingers with one another to start chest compressions.
Jemma counted out loud as she compressed the woman's chest at a steady rate. Fitz had commanded someone to call emergency.
FitzSimmons alternated giving compressions and rescue breaths as the time ticks onward.
Jemma had exhausted herself by the time the paramedics come to take over care for the woman.
The paramedics took over CPR from FitzSimmons seamlessly. Simmons collapsed backward into Fitz as they watched the paramedics place sticky defibrillator pads on the woman's chest. It took them two rounds of shocks to get a pulse back, and the paramedics load her onto the ambulance to transport the woman to the hospital.
One of the couples in the restaurant asked to pay for FitzSimmons lunch, and Fitz gladly accepted that offer. Jemma, however, was pumped up on adrenaline and took to nibbling on her meal (that was actually delicious) and taking most of it home.
She never found out what happened to the woman after she tried to save her life. But that was okay, because there were so many other things to be involved with that distracted her from the wondering.
3: Bus Days
The next time, she knew the person. The next time, it was one of her best friends.
Jemma felt completely helpless when Skye started coding on the hospital bed, the ventilator whirring wildly as it tried to help Skye regulate her breathing.
Trip was next to her, injecting Skye with an auto-injector of epinephrine.
Jemma threaded her fingers together, and started compressions on her friend's chest, trying to bring her heart back into rhythm.
She couldn't think about who was under her hands, only trying to call her training to the front of her mind. If she didn't, she knew that her emotions would catch up with her the minute she stopped thinking in doctor mode, she would fall apart. This was her Skye under her palms, this was her Skye struggling to keep her heart in rhythm.
It took almost a full minute, almost too long for Jemma's taste, for Skye's heartbeat to stabilize. Her blood pressure was low, her heart rate was slow and weak, but Skye was alive.
Skye coded twice more in the next 2 hours, and each time Jemma pushed down on Skye's chest to be her heart beat. Trip stood next to her each time, helping pump more medication into Skye's veins to keep her alive.
The final time that Skye coded, Jemma knew that Skye was about to slip away from her. Skye was no longer responding to epinephrine, and defibrillation hadn't shocked her heart back into the correct rhythm. Jemma was almost ready to call it, call the death of a friend that she had grown so attached to when Fitz came careening around the corner with the miracle drug.
She injected the eerie blue medication into Skye's vein, and in no time at all, Skye was stabilizing. Her vitals were strong, and she started to reject the respirator and trigger her own breaths within the hour.
Hours later, when Skye was breathing on her own, Jemma sat next to her in the pod, holding her hand with her head rested on the bed. Skye was alive. Jemma had to press her fingers into Skye's pulse point every so often, just to feel the validation that her heart was beating.
"Simmons," said a soft voice from behind her, coupled with a soft hand on her shoulder, making Jemma jump in surprise. She snaps her head up to see Coulson standing behind her.
"Hello, sir," she said softly.
"How's our girl doing?" Coulson asked, pulling up another plastic chair to sit next to Jemma.
Jemma sighed, "She's stable, sir. She's breathing on her own, her stats are leveling out, but she hasn't woken up yet."
Coulson smiled and grabbed Skye's hand, "I know she will soon. Skye is a fighter, she'll be back with us here soon." He rubbed Skye's fingers with his own, smiling softly. "I came down to relieve you of watching duty, Simmons. You need to get some sleep," he said "That's an order, Simmons," he added when Jemma opened her mouth to protest leaving.
Jemma protested further, "but what if she codes again, sir?"
Coulson shook his head. "I don't think that she will. She's stable, yeah? Has been for a few hours?"
Jemma reluctantly nodded, "Yes, sir."
"Well, then please go get some rest. We're going to need you at full strength when Skye is trying to break out of her imprisonment here."
Jemma chuckled, knowing full well that Skye would indeed be a nightmare to keep in the pod when she was awake. "Alright, but I'll be back down here tomorrow morning to check on her," she said, standing up. She took one last look at her sleeping friend- just sleeping, no longer comatose- and slipped away for the night.
She made it until she was back in her bunk, cuddled under her blankets, until she finally completely broke down, hoping she never had to give CPR to someone that she loved again.
4. Mission Days (ambiguous future)
"Go, Simmons! Jump! I'm right behind you!"
Daisy's voice spurred Jemma into the last bit of action she needed to take the leap over the edge of the cliff. She knew (or hoped) that Daisy had carefully examined all routes of escape in case of the mission going wrong, including the prospect of leaping from the cliffside fortress and landing in the waters of the lake below. Jemma let out a scream as her legs left the ground behind her. Her screams mixed with the sound of the air rushing past her and what she thought was Daisy's yells as they both plummet towards the water below.
The water rushed up to meet Jemma faster than she had planned for. Her arms flailed wildly as she tried to set herself up to hit the water, straightening out her legs and crossing her arms over her chest, trying to take as deep of a breath as she could.
No matter how she prepared herself, nothing could have made her ready for the force of her body hitting the water. The wind was knocked right out of her lungs as her body quickly sunk into the water. Jemma spread her legs to give a powerful kick toward the surface of the water. She fought hard until her head broke the surface of the clear water and air rushed into her lungs.
Jemma frantically looked around her surroundings, scanning the water and shore for signs of Daisy. When she didn't automatically see her friend in the twilight, she panicked a little, and decided to head to the nearby shore to get out of the water and have a better vantage point to find Daisy.
Jemma pulled herself up onto the thin sliver of sandy beach between the water and the treeline and slipped her arms out of her backpack as she coughed and gasped for breath. But as soon as her breath was back, Jemma was again searching for Daisy in the still water. It took a few seconds, but Jemma finally caught a glimpse of a black tactical suit under the surface of the water a few meters away. Jemma blinked her eyes to focus more and was able to make out the shape of her friend floating facedown in the water. There was no movement, and Jemma felt her stomach drop to her feet as her body caught up to her brain. She sprang forward into action.
"Shit!" Jemma cursed, wading back into the water. She kicked her feet hard to reach her friend quickly. Jemma hooked her arm around her friend's chest and turned her over in the water, having Daisy's head rest back on the front of her shoulder. Jemma tried not to worry when she didn't hear an immediate intake of breath and tried not to think about the last time that she held a friend like this in the water.
Her adrenaline was pumping, giving her a push to get the other woman back to the shore. She swam as hard as she could and dragged Daisy against her body to shore, taking note of the blood running down the right side of Daisy's face, originating from just below her hairline.
Jemma finally got Daisy flat on her back on the shore and pressed her fingers into her pulse point on her neck. She knew that Daisy was definitely not breathing, but had no idea whether Daisy's heart had stopped yet. Jemma's heart leaped into her throat when she didn't feel the flutter of a heartbeat under her fingers.
"Dammit, Daisy," Jemma swore. "I am going to end you when we get back to the base!" Jemma tilted Daisy's head back to open her airway, pinched her nose, and pressed her lips to Daisy's blue ones to give her two rescue breaths. She laced her fingers together and pressed down on Daisy's sternum in rhythm. She gave 30 compressions and stopped to breathe more air into Daisy's lungs. Jemma placed her hands back on Daisy's sternum and pressed down with her weight, only to cringe deeply when she felt a 'pop!' as one of Daisy's ribs broke under the pressure.
It took a few rounds of compressions, but eventually, Daisy took a deep breath and started to vomit up water and the contents of her stomach. Jemma quickly rolled Daisy to her side, rubbing her back in slow circles.
"Good, that's good Daisy. Just breathe," Jemma murmured to Daisy as her breath came in sharp gasps. Daisy didn't regain consciousness, but her breathing slowly evened out and a more natural color came over her face. Jemma took a moment to brush some sand over the vomit spot near Daisy's head, too afraid to move her friend away in fear of a head or neck injury.
Jemma busied herself dressing Daisy's head wound with her soggy first aid kit. It would need some stitches, but that wasn't something Jemma would be able to do out in the field. Jemma needed to call for help. Daisy was breathing okay at that moment, but Jemma had no way to accurately assess her friend for other injuries that she most likely sustained in the fall. Daisy was going to need more medical care, but Jemma had to get her home first.
Jemma pulled the emergency transmitter from her pack and typed in the codes for rescue, injury, near drowning, and her and Daisy's identification codes. The light on the black box flashed from yellow to green, signaling that the message was received and rescue was on the way. Daisy's groan caught Jemma's attention away from checking over the supplies from the first aid kit.
"Simmons?" Daisy asked, her voice breaking off with a cough. Jemma started and
Daisy groaned as she tried to sit up, Jemma dropped down next to her and placed her hand on her shoulder to keep her lying down in the sand. Daisy squeezed her eyes shut against the little light that was filtering through the trees.
"Hey, don't try and move too much. You hit your head and I'm not sure how badly you're hurt," Jemma said while taking Daisy's pulse. It was elevated, which wasn't surprising.
Daisy groaned in pain and opened her eyes again. Her head throbbed with a vengeance, her throat burned, a deep ache echoed in her right side, and she felt a sharp sting in her left hip. "Simmons," she rasped. "What happened? I feel like death. And why are you covered in mud?"
Jemma laughed despite the gravity of the situation they were in, which made Daisy all the more confused.
"We jumped, and you almost drowned, Daisy," Jemma started. "I had to give you CPR." Daisy groaned in embarrassment and laid her forearm over her eyes. "Rescue should be here soon," Jemma continued, checking Daisy's pulse. "I activated the emergency beacon for extraction. The team should be here any minute."
Daisy groaned again. "Coulson is going to kill me," she said, her voice low and gravelly. She closed her eyes and tried to relax over the screaming pain in her chest. "Jemma, my chest really hurts," she added, tears springing into her eyes.
Jemma smoothed back her hair in comfort. "I know, I'm sorry. I think that I broke a rib or two during CPR. Does anything else hurt?"
Daisy nodded, "My head, and my hip. What did I hit on the way down?"
Jemma took another look over Daisy. A dark bruise was starting to form around the cut on her forehead, and the sand under her left hip was growing dark with a small blood stain that hadn't been there moment before. Jemma gasped and leaned forward to search for an injury on Daisy's hip. Daisy hissed as Jemma's fingers brushed a laceration that ran across her hip. A bullet graze. It wasn't too deep, but Jemma was sure that it was painful.
Jemma pushed her hand against the graze with one hand and reached for the first aid kit with the other. Daisy groaned in pain and her eyelids fluttered.
"Daisy, stay with me, okay?" Jemma said sternly. She tried not to let her panic show on her face. That rescue jet needed to get there, and get there now. Daisy only nodded, her eyes clenched tight. Jemma continued to try and dress the injury with slightly dampened gauze and soggy tape, murmuring words of comfort to her injured friend.
Eventually, the emergency transmitter beeped once, and Jemma looked up as the sound of jet engines came closer. Jemma still jumped when the Quinjet came uncloaked just beyond the tree line, and she let out a huge sigh of relief when Coulson climbed down the ramp of the jet, flanked by two medics.
"Hey," He called, "Need a lift?"
Jemma smiled and nodded. "Would love one!" She called back.
The medics wasted no time beginning to stabilize Daisy. They hooked her up to monitoring equipment and placed an oxygen mask over her face. Jemma held herself together as Coulson helped her up and pulled her away from the working medics. Her adrenaline was crashing, and deep aches had started to take over her body. It had barely been 30 minutes since taking a leap from the fortress, but it felt like so much longer to Jemma.
Coulson noticed the change in Jemma and immediately pulled her into his arms. "You did great, Simmons. You did great," He murmured.
Jemma sighed deeply and leaned into Coulson's embrace, her head pressed against his chest to hear his heartbeat.
1: Seychelles
Seychelles was everything that Jemma could have wanted for their vacation.
It had been a wonderful few days of relaxation, food, languages, and ...other activities… that Both Jemma and Fitz so desperately needed. Daisy was gone, and they both needed something positive to focus their energy into.
Jemma and Fitz were spending their second to last day exploring the shallow reefs around the islands. Their guide parked the boat in his "favorite place to bring those of scientific minds" for their day snorkeling in the beauty of the reef.
Jemma pulled in a breath of air with the snorkel and glanced down at the busy reefs below her. Her eyes scanned the colors of the reef, and she saw the most beautiful fish she had ever seen slip under the rocks on top of the white sand of the bottom of the sea. Jemma just had to get closer to it.
She glanced up, seeing that Fitz was still within a close distance, and Jemma smiled and dove a little deeper into the water, her flippers propelling her along quickly in the clear water.
The reef was even more breathtaking up close. Jemma swam closer to a small alcove at the seafloor, bracing herself at the overhang with a hand as she looked into its depths.
Jemma looked at the floor of the alcove and took in the small ecosystem taking place there. She started when a school of brightly colored fish darted out from among the plants. Her body reoriented itself, and Jemma's head cracked across the rock of the alcove. Her vision flashed white and she drew in a sharp intake of breath, her mouth filling with seawater.
Jemma's vision darkened a little as she reached her hand back to touch her scalp above the strap of her dive mask. Jemma numbly pulled her hand back in front of her eyes, watching as the red blood dissipated into the surrounding water. Her vision started getting fuzzy around the edges as she let herself start to float back to the top, not wanting to create waves in the water as she came to the surface. Wasn't that how sharks came?
Jemma' consciousness completely left her as someone grabbed her around the waist.
Jemma started to come around slowly, feeling sensation first. There was warmth pressing against her lips and her chest felt wrong. Air was forced past her lips and Jemma reacted to the intrusion, expelling the air in her lungs out with a painful series of chest shaking coughs.
Water rushed up her throat and out of her mouth as she sputtered for air, and she felt herself be rolled onto her side.
"That's it, Jemma, keep breathing," a familiar voice reached her ears as Jemma gasped for breath, more and more water coming out of her nose and mouth. What little air she could get in around the water burned her throat and each breath hurt her chest.
She heard Fitz's badly accented Italian rambling filter through the haze surrounding her head. Jemma didn't understand what he was saying, but she could feel the tone of his voice, Fitz was terrified.
Sleep reached up and started to pull Jemma back toward the darkness as she was rolled back to her back. Her consciousness faded away again.
The next time Jemma woke up, she was in a hospital bed. There was an IV in one hand and an oxygen tube wrapped around her head and under her nose. The back of her head throbbed with her heartbeat as she looked around, confused.
She spotted Fitz nearby, sitting in a chair with his arms crossed and head tilted back, resting his eyes. He was wearing a set of teal scrubs with his beach sandals. Jemma blinked in confusion.
"Fitz?" She asked, her voice was raspy and low.
Fitz jerked awake at the sound of his name, and he was on his feet in a second, moving to be by Jemma's bed. He placed a kiss on her forehead. "Hello there, sleeping beauty. Do you remember what happened?" He asked, rubbing his hand along the length of her arm.
"Vaguely," Jemma responded. She was so tired. "My head hurts."
Fitz nodded sadly, "Yeah, it's going to hurt a little. You took a good knock to the head."
Jemma groaned and turned her face away from Fitz's. "Oh, Fitz. I'm so sorry that I ruined our snorkeling trip!"
Fitz chuckled deeply. He ran his fingers along the side of Jemma's cheek. "Don't worry about it, Jemma. I'm just glad you're okay. You scared me."
"I'm so sorry, Fitz!"
"Don't worry about it. Let's just try and relax, and enjoy the time that we have left here?"
Jemma smiled.
FitzSimmons spent the day before the last day of their vacation in Seychelles watching bad Italian soap operas on the television, and eating pancakes in the hospital bed.
Fin