FAGE 8:Soul Mates
Title: Sins of the Father
Written for: nathyfaith
Written By: Silverspoon
Rating: M (for language)
Summary/Prompt used: Person A travels to visit his/her family after some tragic events and meets Person B.
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Author's Note - For the purpose of this gift fic, Ward was telling the truth when he left Kara with S.H.I.E.L.D. to be rehabilitated. She never kidnapped Bobbi, they didn't torture her, Ward never rejoined Hydra, and Coulson didn't kill him. Enjoy!
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November 30th, 2015
The Playground, Washington
Being summoned to Coulson's office was nothing new, at least not these days, and yet the young agent found her steps quickening as a kind of urgency she could not explain flooded her body. Thoughts of one specific person filled her up to the brim and, since being roused from her bed by a po-faced Agent Morse, she had already begun preparing herself for the worst; after all, he had been sick lately, and the hospital records she had hacked into had insinuated that it was perhaps the kind of sick from which one might not recover.
She stalked down the corridor as fast as her bare feet would allow, ignoring the curious and somewhat amused glances directed at her by members of the night security team as they went about their business. She took a moment to school her features, smoothing her worried frown away until her face was near expressionless. Then she hammered on Coulson's office door three times in quick succession before inviting herself inside without awaiting a summons.
"This better be good, D.C.," she drawled, plopping down into the leather armchair adjacent to the desk and slinging her legs over the side of the arm, "it's like ass-crack o'clock and some of us still need our beauty sleep."
Carefully, Daisy watched Coulson's lips, eyes almost narrowed to slits as she searched for even the slightest traces of a smile; there were none, and Daisy's heart immediately plummeted. Her distress must have crept into her eyes because Coulson reached across the desk with his still-flesh-and-blood hand in order to squeeze her arm.
"I'm so sorry," he began, soft voice and sympathetic eyes almost more than Daisy could bare. She swung her feet back onto the floor, snatching her arm away from her pseudo-father's grasp as though it was his touch and not his words that had burned her.
"No," she said firmly, almost calmly, "he's fine. Everything is going to be okay. He's strong."
Coulson only shook his head, reached out to Daisy again and then seemed to think better of it. He withdrew his hand and instead fumbled at the desk drawer, searching for something apparently relevant to the ruining of Daisy's life. She sucked in a breath whilst Coulson wasn't quite so focussed on her and reminded herself to slide the mask back into place; she was a commander herself now, and it wouldn't do to exhibit her weakness. After all, the doe eyed little girl living in the back alley van who laughed too loud and hoped too much was just a shadow from the past now. Daisy Johnson was a realist.
Coulson finally retrieved the papers and slid the drawer shut before pushing them across the table to the waiting agent.
"There have been certain... changes... in his condition," Coulson began, imploring Daisy to sit down again with a wave of his robotic hand. She obliged and fidgeted with the hem of her pyjama shorts as she kept her eyes trained on the director.
"Go on," she said, some of her previous desperation reigned in by her desire not to disappoint Coulson.
"By day, he remains much the same; the doctors suspect a type of catatonic schizophrenia. He's uncommunicative, responsive only to pain, and requires round the clock care, so he's being kept under pretty close observation at St. Winifred's. They've managed to rule out a tumour, epilepsy, an infection, or vascular disease," Coulson stated, his eyes roving the page in front of him, although Daisy suspected the information was already committed to his memory.
"Can we skip ahead to the part where you tell me things I haven't already illegally discovered?" Daisy snapped, her limited patience very rapidly fraying.
Coulson nodded, not even bothering to reprimand his agent a little bit for the blunt admittance. He had known that any warnings to Daisy not to go seeking out information regarding Cal Johnson would go unheeded.
"Last night, a prominent neurosurgeon at St. Winifred's was murdered in his office," Coulson explained. "Given the sensitive nature of your father's condition, we already had men stationed at the hospital in the event of an unprecedented emergency."
"Coulson!" exclaimed Daisy, her annoyance escalating to slightly eclipse her concern. Everything about Coulson's speech seemed rehearsed and that idea bothered Daisy to an extent that she could not explain.
"At approximately twenty-three forty-five hours, the security cameras in the corridor outside your father's room appear to show Cal making his way to Dr. Kendall's office. He leaves fifteen minutes later and returns to his own room. At approximately zero one hundred hours, the doctor's body was discovered by a nurse. His neck had been broken in several places," Coulson swallowed audibly, affixing Daisy with a look that she was hard pressed to read, "this morning, Cal is once again unresponsive."
Daisy sat back in her seat, her movements stilted and her confusion scrawled across her suddenly drawn features. Coulson watched her in silence, waiting for some cue from the agent as to how best to comfort her.
"How is that even possible?" she eventually demanded, her words tumbling out on a shaky breath.
"We always knew that undergoing T.A.H.I.T.I. was a risky move," murmured Coulson, "your father carefully evaluated that risk before agreeing to the procedure. Our best guess is that, due to the lingering physiological and psychological effects of the serum Cal subjected his body to for a number of years, the programming has begun to unravel to the detriment of his mental state."
Daisy's mouth gaped and she visibly appeared to struggle for words for a few seconds, before half yelling, "What the hell does that even mean, Coulson? Are you telling me my father is suddenly a cold blooded murderer?"
"It means that there is nothing more we can do for him, Daisy," he replied, head cocked and eyes bleeding sympathy for the young agent trembling in the chair before him. "Our agents at the hospital were able to recover and destroy the security footage, but there is no way I can allow Cal to remain at St. Winifred's given this new development."
Daisy shook her head, struggling against the tears pooling in the corners of her eyes.
"No, of course not," she mumbled in a rush, raking a hand through her messed curls. Her eyes snapped to Coulson's and she continued, "So we bring him here, have Simmons see what she can do. I mean, I know she's still finding things difficult since... Well, you know, what I mean, but if anyone can find a way through this it's her, right?"
The silence that descended was almost deafening and Daisy had only just begun to realise her mistake when Coulson rose from his desk, crossed the small space between them, and dropped down onto his knees in front of her chair. His hand rested on her knee and he gazed up at her with such a look of imploring sadness that she could no longer maintain her composure. Her nostrils flared and a second later tears began splashing onto the front of her pyjama shirt.
"Daisy, I wish... I wish I could allow that," Coulson whispered earnestly, his grip tightening on her knee as she sobbed soundlessly, "your father... So many lives have already been lost, and now the doctor is on me. We tried... But sometimes, despite our best intentions, people are just beyond our help."
Her own shaking hands swiped at the wetness on her cheeks and Daisy managed to nod her head. A whisper in the back of her mind told her that she should really give voice to her questions about her father's fate, but somehow she knew that her heart already had all the answers. Philip Coulson was not a man without mercy, but even his benevolence must have a limit.
"Will I..." Daisy began, grimacing when her voice emerged as a strangled croak. She cleared her throat and tried again, "Can I see him? Just to say... I have to tell him some things."
Coulson paused, indecision flickering across his face. He climbed to his feet and leaned back against his desk, propping up his body weight with one hand.
"The doctor's all agree it's very unlikely that he's aware of what's going on in his surroundings," he explained, desperately attempting to ignore the wrenching sensation of guilt in the pit of his stomach as Daisy's eyes flashed to his face.
"I know but... I just need..." she stumbled over her words, falling silent when it became apparent to her that all coherent thought had for the moment evaded her. Finally, she licked her lips and peered up into Coulson's face as she whispered, "Please?"
The director's face fell. He watched Daisy carefully for several moments, conflicting feelings as her superior and her friend fighting for dominance. He shook his head to clear his thoughts, and then offered the agent a thin, compassionate smile that told her all she needed to know.
"I am so very sorry, Agent Johnson," Coulson stated, emphasising every word as though they brought him physical pain. "For what it's worth... He... I won't let him suffer."
The crushing silence fell once again and Daisy sat unmoving in her chair, unable to protest the injustice and no longer able to even succumb to her tears. She wondered vaguely if she were in shock; certainly, everything suddenly seemed to have become surreal, almost as though she were watching events unfold before her on a television screen, rather than actively participating in them herself.
Coulson was the first to speak, shattering the quiet all too soon for Daisy's liking and causing her to flinch.
"I can have Agent May escort you back to your room if you'd like," he offered, "I'm sure she wouldn't mind staying with you a while."
Something inside Daisy snapped, and she drew her slumped body suddenly upright before rising to her feet. Her movements were once again fluid and controlled, and the dried tear tracks on the apples of her cheeks were the only evidence of her previous sorrow. She shook her head, taking several deep and calming breaths before she turned to address Coulson again.
"Thank you, but that won't be necessary," she stated, her voice even and controlled, "I'd just like to be left alone for a little while, if that's okay, sir?"
Coulson quickly nodded, drawing himself up to his full height as he reached out to pat Daisy's shoulder.
"Of course, take all the time that you need," he replied, his hand lingering on her upper arm as he reiterated, "we'll all be here for you when you're ready."
Daisy set out towards the closed door, only hesitating when her fingers closed around the handle. She did not bother to turn back to Coulson though, choosing to call her question out over her shoulder instead.
"When?" she asked simply, her fingers tightening around the cold metal as she reminded herself to focus on some other small, insignificant thing in order to keep her emotions in check.
"It's best I don't disclose too much but... within the next eight hours," Coulson said, punctuating his sentence with a hearty sigh. "I wish there was some other way."
"Me too," Daisy interjected, although she seemed far from angry. She pushed through the door without waiting for a further response from Coulson, and she found that her heart rate was surprisingly measured as she strode down the corridor to return to her quarters.
She had barely closed the door to her own bedroom before she had pressed her back against the wood and allowed her body to sink boneless to the floor. She gathered her knees into her chest and carefully balanced her chin on her folded arms, allowing herself those few seconds for panic, sorrow and fear to overwhelm her. The trembling returned and a chill invaded her body that made it feel as though she might never be warm again. The collection of knick knacks on her bedside table began to jitter, signifying that for the first time in a long time, her fragile emotional state was beginning to have an impact on her control over her powers.
Knowing that no amount of breathing techniques could help her in that moment, Daisy instead crawled across the floor towards the space beneath her bed. Her hand disappeared into the darkness and she swept her fingers around blindly for a while, brushing aside stray socks and balled up pieces of note paper that had been hurriedly discarded there. When her hand closed around the canvas strap of her overnight bag, she pulled it out and flung it onto the unmade bed, determined to waste no more time. As she tossed clothes into the bag, a renewed sense of determination began to overcome her where just moments before only sorrow and anxiety had existed.
Although she was indeed much changed since she had first joined S.H.I.E.L.D. and Coulson's fledgling team all those months ago, there were just some things that Skye would never have given up on without a fight; and it seemed that Daisy Johnson was in agreement.