A/N: This is one of those random fics that pops into head and doesn't stop nagging until you write it down, so I'm not quite sure I should be continuing (especially since I kind of banned myself from writing anything else until I clear up some of my other unfinished stories). I will need a few reviews to let me know, even if it is just constructive criticism.

This takes place after the season finale, and so contains a few major references, but nothing too bad or spoiler-y. However, you might understand a little better if you have watched it.

Please enjoy and review!

Her head hurt. It felt like it had been split in two and indeed, when she put a hand to the back of it, it came away sticky with the blood just barely soaking through the thin dressing protecting the wound. Her hair was tangled and matted around the cut. She wondered how she had managed to get there but it hurt so much that she eventually gave up and let her mind wander.

Was she with Lincoln? No. Wherever he was, she thought, the room would be light and airy and pleasant to lie in, and the bed soft. This room was small and windowless and dingy. The walls were a nasty shade of beige - almost as if they had once been white but were now old and dirty and shabby. The bed was not undesirable (she could hardly imagine herself anywhere else), but not wonderfully clean and soft and fresh, either. The blanket on top of her was mildly scratchy and the single pillow did not elevate her head as much as she would have liked, but it was satisfactory enough that she would make do.

She opened her mouth to call out, but at that precise moment a jet of pain burst through her skull and she closed it again, an undecipherable, garbled mumbling coming out of her mouth instead. She closed her eyes, trying to banish the pounding in her head, the heaviness of the rest of her tired body. What had happened...? Why was she here? Where was Coulson - and Fitz and May and Simmons, who would be able to help her, and everyone else she cared about?

Was she in some unlived in section of the Playground? But why would she be there, and not in the lab or her bunk?

Her eyes flicked around dully, until she found the door, which promptly opened, and then shut again, to heavy to open. Footsteps moved closer to her bed, and she tried not to fall asleep (which was, truth be told, not easy at all), because she wanted to see who her mysterious captor was. He - she assumed it was a he, from the size and calloused feeling of his hands - stroked a lock of hair off her face, for which she was oddly grateful, and then gently slid his arm under her shoulders and sat her up.

She could hear his even breathing, could smell his clean smell - he had, it seemed, had a shower - as he unwrapped the bandage around her forehead, probably changed the dressing, and then replaced it, slightly tighter than before. She sensed that this was not intentional; a mere small change, easily overlooked were one not concentrating with all their might on it. She couldn't fall asleep.

He then slowly rested her head on the pillow again, which sent a knife of pain through the back of her head. His touch was overwhelmingly soft, as though he cared as much about not hurting her as she herself did. She drew in a deep breath.

And opened her eyes.

Then she closed them again. "Coulson?" she asked uncertainly. She heard his knee click as he crouched down beside her.

"Not Coulson," he said, quiet and calm.

She stopped drawing in deep breaths and started drawing in shallow ones, panic controlling her aching mind, freezing her body, quickening her breathing, because this couldn't be happening, he couldn't be here. He was here, in front of her, looking after her, nursing her, and what the hell was he doing? What the hell was she doing? This couldn't be right. No.

He laid a steady hand on her shoulder. "It's OK," he said, as though this were natural. "Take deep breaths."

Her breathing didn't slow, but she opened her eyes, her head numbed momentarily. The light was almost blinding, though it was, admittedly, very dim. But it was true. It was him, right in front of her.

She opened her mouth to scream but no sound came out. "No," she whispered instead, trying to shrink back, but she was so damn heavy...

Ward.

Grant Ward.

He opened his mouth and she knew what he was going to say, already, before he started to say it, because she had heard those familiar words so many times before: on the 'bus, on the phone, through her communications line, everywhere, but he said it all the same, a slight smile playing at his lips.

"Hello, Skye."