For Mars.
I do not own Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. blah blah blah. Trigger warning for Major Character Death.
"In this part of the story I am the one who
dies, the only one, and I will die of love because I love you,
because I love you, Love, in fire and in blood."
— Pablo Neruda
i.
The first time he sees Jemma Simmons, he isn't paying attention.
There is too much noise inside his head, too much happening in him that he just can't ignore. But it is easy to get lost within yourself when there is no one else around. He'd come to define himself by this hollowing loneliness, by way his shadow only seemed to follow him because the laws of physics simply left it with no other choice.
He's too busy with himself to notice the warm, friendly smile she'd cast in his direction, a clear indication that the brilliant young biochemist did not want to be seen as a threat, but as an ally.
So they spend the first few months as rivals, competing for the higher grade, racing to make the more clever observation in class discussions.
He didn't work this hard or come this far to settle for second best, after all.
ii.
If there's anything Leo Fitz learned the fastest in his eighteen years of living, it's this: you only exist to people when they want you to. It was funny how he was invisible until someone decided they needed his brain for something.
Still, it comes as a surprise when he looks up from his studies one January morning to find Jemma Simmons shifting nervously in front of him, a stack of books cradled in her arms and a sharpened pencil stuck behind her ear.
"I was wondering," she began, chewing on her bottom lip, "if for Weaver's project… you wanted to pair up and work on it together?" She sounded smaller than usual, quiet and gentle where she was usually loud and confident.
He didn't know it then, but her proposal - brought on merely by convenience and the simple desire to be the best - would be the beginning of a lifelong partnership.
From the moment he agrees and she sits at the empty seat beside him, his perspective of her changes - she is less of a threat and more like him that he'd care to admit, and all the more intimidating for it.
iii.
The first time he sees Jemma Simmons, she is piss-drunk and sobbing on the floor of his dorm room.
He'd caught enough glimpses of her over the year to know bits and pieces of her, but she was very particular about the parts of her she'd let you see and the parts she'd keep hidden.
Her heart was broken in too many places for alcohol alone to repair (by some foolish boy with a carelessness that was too reckless for her), and for some reason, the only person she wanted to see was him.
He didn't take that lightly.
When he calls out her name, she gravitates towards him, crawling onto his bed and collapsing into his arms. She feels so small and fragile in his embrace - almost like she could shrivel up and disappear without a moment's notice. And by God, he could feel it, that is exactly what she wants. But he is too selfish to let her give in.
iv.
He doesn't realize he loves her until he nearly loses her because isn't that always the case?
He realizes it the moment the truth escapes his lips: she'd been beside him the whole time. He was who he was because of who they were together; she was as much a part of him as the blood in his veins. Which was a toxic way to regard a person, but the truth nonetheless.
It's not until he's in his bed alone, her words ringing in his head, her lips still lingering on his skin, that it registers in his mind: Today Jemma Simmons was almost gone from the world. Today his world was almost gone from him.
He doesn't sleep a wink that night, his mind plagued by the image of the expression in her eyes just before she sacrificed herself to save the rest of the team. There is so much compassion, so much love and strength in her tiny little body and he hates her for it.
She'd called him a hero, but that was far from the truth. She'd been a hero that day. She'd been selfless and brave and strong. All he'd done was act out of fear and a selfish need to have her around.
He realizes for the first time just how truly different they are, and decides in that moment that she is who he wants to become.
v.
He loves her without telling her. He decides early on, for the sake of their friendship, that she could never know.
She continues to inspire him; he stands and fights in the midsts of every hell he'd ever known because she is right there with him. He stays because they are together.
And even when they are not, they find each other. Because after all this time, she still gravitates to him and he is pulled towards her without either of them ever saying a word.
They are bound to each other in ways his mind cannot make sense of; a mystery even to a mind that never rests.
vi.
She'd somehow found her way in and refused to find her way back out; etched herself so deeply in his skin that she seeped into his bloodstream - a familiar sting and cleansing pain that he refused to let out.
It ate away at him - she was still so much a part of him, that if she died, so would he.
Only one of them could live. It was a cruel joke, really - two separate people who could not exist without the other, and now one of them would have to.
He almost blamed it on fate - of course nothing good could happen to him, why should Leo Fitz be so lucky to get to live side-by-side for the rest of his life with the woman he loved?
But he realized that that wasn't true. He'd gotten the chance to know Jemma, to memorize the way her eyes gleamed and crinkled at the corners when she laughed, the furrow in her brow when she was upset, the sound of her voice when she was excited about a discovery or idea. He'd gone from having no one to even call a friend to having someone with whom he could share so much of himself. He was lucky enough to love her. If it all were to end for him here, he'd gotten much closer than most.
He makes his peace and says his goodbyes.
She is the last thing he sees before it all goes black and, knowing that his sacrifice would ensure her survival, he smiles.
vii.
Miraculously, he survives, and it is because of her. So it is fitting that she is the first thing he sees when his eyes finally open again.
Her name does not cross his lips, or his mind, for that matter, right away. He recognizes her face, faintly, but it does not register with him. So many things do not register. And it frightens him.
It takes him awhile to recuperate, but as he slowly regains the bits and pieces that make up Leo Fitz, he remembers that these are the same bits and pieces he faintly recognized in the face of the woman he'd seen when he opened his eyes.
When he tells her that he loves her, it is not because he wants a response. It is because he finally remembers, and it feels so good to remember. It feels so good to know her again; so good to be held in her arms, almost like he'd never left.
viii.
The last time he sees Jemma Simmons, there is a hole in his chest and a mess on the floor and all of the pieces of him are no longer pieces of him; they are hers.
It's for good this time, and he can feel it. There is nothing she could do - no foolish act of strength, intellect, or bravery that could save him (even though, if there was anyone who could do it, it would be her?).
He wonders for a moment if he lived a life she'd be proud of until he realizes that he knows he had. He was so proud of the person he became because of her. He remembers again how lucky he was to have been touched by her, and holds that close.
His only regret is that their time is cut short - but he knows that you can't win 'em all.
He spends his last breath the same way he had lived, the only way he knew how: with her name on his lips and her grip on his soul.