AN: So it seems clear that one of the conflicts of the show is going to be Skye's fluctuating loyalty between SHIELD and Rising Tide, who are waiting for her to start feeding them information. Given the nature of the genre, it seems a safe bet that after a few stops and starts, she'll eventually choose SHIELD. But I started wondering, what would happen if she chose Rising Tide? And that led to this fic.
Because the show has only had three episodes so far, it's hard to get a really solid sense of character, so this is based on a lot of assumptions about who I think these characters are now and who I think they could be in the future. Also, it seems like a recurring theme of the show is going to be the morality of SHIELD; are you justified in hiding the truth from people to keep them safe? It's an interesting idea and I'm excited to see where they go with it, but for the sake of this story, I've chosen to assume that we've all decided that SHIELD is good and justified and moral. Whether that's where the show goes as well remains to be seen.
Anyway, enough rambling. Enjoy!
. . . . . .
On your third day in the SHIELD Trident Center detainment facility, Ward comes to see you. You knew he would, just like you knew Melinda May and the wonder duo wouldn't. (You can't confirm it, but you'd bet that FitzSimmons debated it fiercely and then decided not to come, and that May never even considered it.) You're not sure if you expected Coulson or not; half of you thought he'd come to give you disappointed looks and gentle reprimands, and half of you figured he'd be too angry to want to see you. It looks like the latter half was correct.
But Ward—you were always sure Ward would visit. You could feel it. After all, you've always known him better than you know the rest of the team. Better than you know the rest of the planet, actually.
He sits in the chair on the other side of the window; even though he could subdue you one-handed and blindfolded, he's not allowed to come into your cell. You really think I'm a risk? you wanted to ask when they first put you in this high-security area, your only access to the outside world the slot through which they deliver your meals. They know perfectly well you're not a threat. You've learned a lot in the past year but you definitely can't fight your way out of a SHIELD facility with only your bare hands.
With a subtle movement of his shoulders that could be a sigh, he reaches out and presses the intercom button, and a single beep informs you that you are now conversing. The trouble is, neither of you seems to have much to say. Finally, after sitting in a long awkward silence—which you make no attempt to break, because he's the one who came to visit and anyway somehow you resent him for being free while you're behind bars—he speaks.
"All that time? You were leaking intel the whole time?"
You force your expression to remain steady. "Most of it," you admit flatly.
His brows furrow, just a bit, and you can read the struggle it is to put his feelings into words. Ward never could talk easily about things that went deep. And apparently your betrayal went deep.
"We took you in," he says, eyes fixed on the intercom button on the desk. "I trained you. We . . . we were your family."
He's right, of course—they were family—and you hate knowing you hurt him this much and the only way you're going to get through this conversation sane is to take refuge in flippancy. "You knew who I was when you brought me in," you shrug. "You've really only got yourselves to blame."
"I trusted you," he says, and the use of the past tense almost makes you flinch. But you knew. You knew perfectly well what would happen, and you did it anyway. You convinced yourself that this conversation wouldn't hurt.
You were wrong.
"Which is weird, because you don't really trust easily." You force yourself to speak lightly, like the words are flower petals you're tossing into the wind, not rocks you're using to shatter the only significant relationships you've ever had.
He shrugs a little. "Coulson trusted you."
And that hurts too, just hearing that name. You didn't know how much you craved a father figure until Coulson took you in, and knowing you destroyed that bond, knowing that you made one of the kindest and most trusting men you've ever met just a little less trusting . . . it hurts.
"He hasn't been to see me yet," you offer. "I kinda thought he'd come by." At first you think that you don't know why you're prolonging the conversation, but then you think, Of course you know. You're trying to keep him here as long as possible, because you have a terrible sinking feeling that this is the last time you'll ever see Grant Ward.
His gaze drops back to the intercom button. "We've been busy."
"Apparently. I've been interrogated about sixteen times already. They're trying to assess the extent of the damage I did." You told those interrogators the truth, but you don't know if they believed you, and you wonder if they sent Ward here to get more information from you. But even if they did, this is at least partly a real conversation on his side; he could never fake emotions very well (except to suppress them)—definitely not well enough to fake this whole quietly-wounded thing. He came here to try to understand.
"Well, you made a lot of people very angry." He shifts uncomfortably in a way that makes you thinking he'd like to have a punching bag to take his feelings out on right now. "And now the whole team has to deal with the fallout from the mistake we made in bringing you on."
You flinch. He doesn't notice. Back to flippancy; back to not caring. It's better that way. "That's what you get for bringing a hacker into your secret organization. I don't get how an organization that monitors people is so bad at judging them."
When Ward slams his hands down on his desk, it's so unexpected that you actually jump up out of your chair. "This isn't a joke, Skye. You've damaged SHIELD, they might disband the team, and they've got Coulson in disciplinary hearings while they decide whether to fire him. All because he decided to put his faith in a lonely girl in a van."
Fire Coulson? No one told you that. Maybe it's not his personal feelings that have kept him from visiting you; maybe it's that he's been sitting in endless meetings with his superiors while they decide whether you have destroyed his career. Either way, tears well up in your eyes faster than you can turn away and hide them. It's easy to screw over a faceless organization. It's painful to screw over someone you care about.
"Are those tears?" Ward is up and out of his chair, staring in through the glass, and you haven't heard his voice this harsh since you first met him. "Please don't pretend that you're suddenly so remorseful about what you did that you're crying."
It's a strange thing, how sometimes the more you try to stop your tears the faster they come. "Drop the act, Skye," he insists. "It's not going to convince me of anything. I know what a liar you are."
But it's not an act, and you can't drop it. All you can do is stare down at your hands until you trust your voice. "I never meant to get Coulson in trouble."
"What did you think was going to happen?" he demands. "You let him think he could trust you, and then you leaked SHIELD secrets to your Rising Tide buddies. We all trusted you. I trusted you." He's silent a long moment, and you dare to look up at him. His defenses are down, and you can see the hurt in his eyes, and that hurts worse than anything so far. "Why did you do it?"
You know perfectly well that this could be an interrogation technique, a scene planned to manipulate you just like the fake truth serum your first day at SHIELD. But you don't care. You know you screwed up royally and that you should own up to it, and you know that even if Ward was sent here by his superiors, he's also genuinely hurt.
"I—" You break off long enough to clear your throat and furiously wipe your eyes on your shirtsleeves. "Look, I joined the team with the intention of spying on you. That can't have been a surprise to anyone."
"But you claimed you changed. You told me you wanted this."
"I did," you admit, and suddenly you realize that you've leaned against the window, as though without your asking it to your body has decided to get as close to Ward as possible. But what does it matter now if he thinks you're foolish? He already hates you. So you stay where you are. "For a while I really believed that this would work, this . . . me-as-a-SHIELD-agent thing. But then my hacker buddies kept nagging me, 'When are you going to give us any good information? Why aren't you getting back to us? Are you turning into one of them?'"
"So peer pressure was more important than saving the world?"
"No, it's not—" You fiddle with the cuff of your sleeve for a moment. It's wet from your tears. "You know how it was for me growing up. I never belonged anywhere, I never had anything permanent, and anything good that happened turned out to be a trick or was taken away."
His face softens, just the tiniest bit. "I know."
"So I come here, to SHIELD, and surprisingly, it turns out to be amazing. I learn a lot, and I make friends, and I do crazy astounding things . . . and I really wanted in. I wasn't lying about that. But then . . ." You hesitate. "When you grow up like I did, you stop trusting happiness. So the fact that I was happy at SHIELD made me nervous. I started thinking about all the reasons you guys might want to kick me out, and then all I could ever think about was that eventually you would all realize that I'm a hacker with a checkered past and an unstable personal life and a junior high education and you'd kick me right off the plane. And then what would I have?" You search his face, looking for understanding, and you think you maybe see it, buried under layers of sternness. "I've been part of the Rising Tide for four years and it's the only constant thing in my life, and the only place I've ever felt secure . . . maybe because no one there knows me personally. And the thought that I was alienating them for this crazy ride at SHIELD that I was so certain was going to end any moment . . . I panicked. Looking back now it seems so irrational but at the time I was positive I was doing the right thing."
You're both silent for a long moment, and Ward's gaze is fixed on you. "We were never going to kick you out."
"I probably should have realized that," you say, and then the only sound you hear for a while is your sleeve against your skin as you fight away a new onslaught of tears. "I only gave them information I didn't think could hurt the organization," you say when you have yourself under control again. "Actually some of it was stuff I'd figured out before I joined but hadn't released yet. And I tried really hard to make it stuff that couldn't be traced back to me." A hollow laugh. "Turns out it could."
He fights back a hint of a smile. "You've always been bad at estimating other people's intelligence."
"So that's it. That's the tragic sob story of a stupid hacker who can't let herself be happy. I hope your friends upstairs have been taking careful notes."
And now he does smile. "You knew we were being monitored?"
You roll your eyes, and for a second it feels like the old times that will never be again. "I'm not an idiot, Ward. I've been reading out of your playbook for a year. I do understand how you guys work."
"So can I trust anything you said?"
"I think you have more reasons not to trust me than my knowing that Big Brother is listening. But I was telling the truth, if that's what you're asking."
This seems to be the logical stopping point in the conversation, and he seems to agree because he reaches down to pick up the bag he brought with him, but you find you're not ready for the conversation to end. "Ward," you blurt out, "what will they do to me?"
His smile is lopsided and sad. "I don't know. Maybe jail time, maybe . . . but hopefully since you're still technically a citizen, not a member of SHIELD . . ." He throws the bag on his shoulder and nods to the guard at the door, and you find yourself speaking again.
"Ward, are they going to fire Coulson?" You're desperate to know, and you're also desperate not to let him leave.
"I don't know," he repeats. "But hopefully all his years of service here . . ."
The guard has the door open now and is saying Ward's name, but now that the end has come, your former SO doesn't seem to be in a hurry to go. He stands still, watching you watch him, with a look on his face you saw a few times in your year of friendship. It's a look you sometimes suspected you understood; it's a look you now wish desperately that you'd done something about.
"Ward," you say softly, "I'm sorry."
His gaze doesn't leave yours. "I know."
. . . . . .
The verdict gets handed down that very afternoon in a windowless conference room. Director Fury holds court among a flock of serious-looking agents, some in jumpsuits, some in business suits. You stand in the middle, looking tired and miserable in your detention center–issued sweats.
"Skye," says Director Fury, fixing you with his one terrifying eye, "we have been deliberating and investigating the evidence at our disposal, and we've come to a decision."
Can SHIELD authorize a firing squad? you wonder as you clench your hands into fists to keep them from shaking. You have no idea what the normal punishment for a SHIELD employee leaking SHIELD secrets is, and your overactive imagination has run through every possibility in your mind, from a slap on the wrist to immediate execution.
"Leaking information from inside the organization is a very serious offense," he says, and it's too late, your hands are definitely shaking. "However—" However? "—we have to take into consideration that you are technically still only a consultant, not yet a real member of SHIELD, and therefore cannot be tried according to the same regulations."
A man sitting just behind Fury looks disgruntled at this, and you wonder if he was pulling for a really terrible punishment.
"We have also investigated your claims and seen that you seem to be telling the truth: the information you leaked was not nearly as damaging as the information that a hacker of your caliber could have accessed. That does not excuse your behavior but it does put us in a more lenient mood."
Some of the agents look anything but lenient right now, but he can't dampen your mood. This is sounding much better than you feared.
"And given the undeniably good service you gave during your time with SHIELD, and out of a hope of fostering good will, we are inclined toward clemency."
Good will? Oh, you see. He knows the Rising Tide, and the whole hacktivist community, is waiting for the outcome of this trial, and the last thing he wants to do is make you into a martyr (you can see the protests now: activist jailed for speaking the truth!). This annoys you—it's like you're a pawn on a chessboard in a game between SHIELD and its international audience of detractors—but not enough to say anything. You don't want to be a martyr any more than SHIELD wants to make you one.
"However, this is not a light matter, and it can't go unpunished. And investigating this incident has required a great deal of time and resources from us. Therefore, it is the decision of this committee to release you but to charge you a $50,000 fine. You will wear a tracking anklet until you have paid this fine, to make sure you don't try to skip out on it. And you will be arrested if you are spotted within a hundred yards of any SHIELD facility."
Your dazed mind is still so stuck on the phrase "release you" that it barely registered the rest of the sentence. You have no idea where you'll get $50,000—most of the time you're lucky if you have $50—but you're being released. You can never visit SHIELD or your friends again, but you're free.
But there's one concern you can't ignore. "Thank you, Directory Fury, sir." You hate calling people sir but if there was ever a time to brownnose, this is it. "May I ask, sir, what will happen to Agent Coulson?"
He scowls. "Agent Coulson is no longer your concern."
That scowl is potent, but you force yourself to speak again. "I hate to contradict you, sir, but he is. I may not work for him anymore, but he's a good man and I got him in trouble."
The director fixes his good eye on you, considering, weighing, debating. Finally he sighs in defeat. "Agent Coulson has been fully reinstated and put back in charge of the team, no thanks to you, but has been stripped of the authority to make new hires." He makes as if to leave, but then turns back. "And that one is thanks to you."
You don't even mind Fury's disdain. You screwed things up, but Coulson's going to be fine. The team is going to be fine. You're going to be . . . well, you won't be in jail.
Twenty minutes later you're dressed in your old clothes and being signed out of the system at the detention center's records desk. A stern-looking agent is fitting the anklet on—you have no idea how you're going to make this work with all the skinny jeans you wear—and a kindly old woman is typing merrily away.
"Yes?" says the agent, and you glance down to see that he's not talking to you, he's talking into his communicator. "Yes, understood." And he removes the tracking anklet again.
You stare at him, baffled. "Is this . . . not a thing anymore?"
"I was just informed that you paid the fine and the anklet will not be necessary."
All you can do is blink. "But I didn't pay the fine. You've been with me since I left the cell area. You would have seen me do it."
The man looks unconcerned. "Well, someone paid your fine."
You stare at him until a flash of movement catches your eye, and you turn to look out the window and see that a cherry red 1962 Corvette is pulling out of the parking lot. And there's two people in it: a middle-aged man, with a mild-mannered face and thinning brown hair, and a younger man, dark-haired and broad-shouldered. You watch them drive away until they disappear from sight.
. . . . . .
"Shawarma," comes a voice from behind you. "Good choice."
You freeze, but not out of fear. You'd know that voice anywhere and you have nothing to fear from it, and anyway this time you actually haven't done anything wrong. No, you freeze because you've been expecting this conversation for a long time now, and you want to prepare yourself for it.
When your breath has steadied, you close your laptop lid and turn around. And there, looking incredibly out of place—not normally a lot of black-suited types carrying sidearms in this shawarma restaurant—stands Coulson, with Ward and May behind him making a perfect V formation.
"Good restaurant," you say casually. "Free wifi." Coulson smiles, then turns and nods his head at May, who nods back and walks off, presumably to watch the perimeter. That leaves just you, Coulson and Ward, who is determinedly not looking at you.
"So you know a lot about looking for secrets online. I was wondering if you could help me." Coulson smiles his business smile, and you know what question is coming. "Nine times in the last six months, we have gotten anonymous tips—very helpful tips, I might add—hours or even days before anyone online gets wind of these things. Sometimes these tips don't ever make it to the public. You wouldn't know how that happens, would you?"
"Someone really talented must approve of your work."
Coulson shakes his head. "Skye, you can't—"
"I know," you break in. "And I won't cross any lines. But if you happen to keep getting these really useful anonymous tips, it'd practically be negligence on your part not to do something with that information, right?"
Your former boss fixes you with a cool stare. "What are you getting out of this?"
"Some shred of my former self-respect, if I'm lucky." You can see the honesty of your answer has surprised him as much as it has you.
"That's a noble goal."
"Look, Coulson. For that whole year, you trusted me when I definitely did not deserve it. I thought I'd just . . . finally get around to giving you some of the good behavior you thought you were getting when I was on your team."
His gaze has turned warmer. "I don't consider that year a waste of trust. You did good work; you were a valuable asset to my team. You would have made a good agent."
That statement hurts more than it helps—a reminder of what could have been—but it's kindly meant, so you mumble a thank you.
Coulson watches you a moment longer, and then smiles. "Well, I'm not going to refuse such useful information when it arrives, so as long as it keeps showing up, I'll be glad to have it." He hesitates, then adds, "Maybe we'll see you around again some time."
And it's amazing how that's all it takes to brighten your day.
There's something else you need to say. "I've been wanting to ask you. The fine—was that you?" Coulson's face is all the answer you need, and you laugh in something like surprised disbelief. "Thank you so much. I could never have . . ."
"It was Ward's idea," offers Coulson, looking back at his subordinate. Ward, however, is still staring at the napkin dispenser on the table next to yours as though it's the most fascinating thing he's ever seen. Coulson looks at him, then he looks at you. "You know," he says, "I should probably use the bathroom before we leave. Ward, are you all right here with Skye? Excellent." And without waiting for an answer he's off, leaving the two of you standing in a cloud of discomfort in a dingy shawarma restaurant.
You're both silent for a few moments until the tension is too much and you just have to break it up with small talk. "A guy tried to mug me last week," you say conversationally, and that's what finally gets him to look at you.
"Oh," he says, sounding surprised, although you're unsure if the surprise is that you got mugged or that you thought it was a good conversation starter. "Did he . . . succeed?"
"Are you kidding?" you demand. "I got trained by the best there is. He ended up on the ground with a bloody nose."
That makes him laugh, and for the first time today he doesn't look uncomfortable, which gives you courage to ask, "How are FitzSimmons?"
The answer is accompanied with the fondly exasperated look that everyone gets when they talk about FitzSimmons. "They're good, I think. They're always happy when they've got science problems to solve, and we've had lots to deal with, so . . . they're happy."
You laugh your agreement, then venture, "Are you happy?" He looks at you strangely and you grimace. "Sorry, slip of the tongue. I mean to ask if you're . . . good. I mean how are you."
"I'm doing fine," he says. He doesn't say whether he's happy.
"How's . . . the team? How's the bus?"
"Fine. We have a new computer expert."
"Replaced so soon," you sigh.
"It's been six months and you've been forbidden from coming anywhere near SHIELD again," comes the flat response.
"Humor never was your strong suit, was it?" But knowing he still can't always pick up on jokes, seeing that flash of the Ward you knew, is immensely comforting. "Is this new expert any good?"
"Yeah, he's pretty good." There's a silence, then, "But not as good as you."
"No one's as good as me," you state confidently.
"So what have you been up to?" Ward asks, and you smile to see that he's actually initiating conversation now.
But it's a ridiculous question. "Yeah, as if SHIELD hasn't been monitoring me since I left." His uncomfortable expression tells you he knows that's true. "But since you're trying to make polite conversation, I'll answer politely. A little bit of hacktivism, although I've made a new rule for myself that I have to thoroughly research a group before I decide if they deserve me targeting them. I've . . . been wrong before."
"Very."
"And I've been doing some freelance work in cybersecurity. Teaching people to avoid the very tricks people like me would use on them. But only if they really deserve my help." You raise your eyebrows. "Does that match what your surveillance told you?"
He looks abashed but laughs. "Yeah."
And here's that silence again, filled with memories both good and bad. There are so many things you wish you could say, so many things you wish you'd said back then, and though you're too afraid to say the deepest, most meaningful ones—it's out of the question anyway, why bother bringing it up—you let yourself say a little one, around the edges of what you really feel. After all, what's the worst that could happen? You've already lost everything you had back then.
"I've missed the team." Then you add, "I've missed you. A lot."
"Skye—"
"I know, it's my own fault and it doesn't matter now, but I miss you. I mean, we had a solid year of morning training and evening training and missions and checkers games . . . I've probably spent more time with you than anyone else in my life. And I miss that. It doesn't change anything, saying that, but I want you to know that . . . you were a good friend. And a good SO. And I don't think there's anything you could have done to make me feel more welcome and included at SHIELD." You smile. "I mean, after, the first little while when you hated me."
"I did hate you." He smiles at the memory. "But after that . . . you were a good friend too." His expression has softened, become warm and sincere, like Ward as you knew him in the last months before your treachery became known.
And that gives you courage to say something you didn't think you dared. "Then," you say, your voice picking up volume, "can we still be friends? I mean, obviously we can't see each other much, and I assume that if SHIELD saw you hanging around me there'd be questions. But I mean—at least—can I still think of us as friends?" You shrug helplessly. "You're one of the few people in this world I care about, and I'd hate to lose you again. I hated losing you the first time."
His gaze intensifies, pinning you in place, and there's that look on his face again, the one that used to make your heart pound, the one that made you wonder if maybe you were more than just a colleague in his eyes. When he speaks, his voice is soft, hesitant. "I hated losing you, too."
Your pulse is picking up and for once you don't have a glib remark on your tongue. Neither does he, apparently, because you stand in silence, staring at each other, until suddenly a door slams.
"Where is Coulson?" May demands, and Ward blinks and looks away, and you curse May for her timing.
"Right here," Coulson speaks up, and you look over and realize he's been standing nearby, watching you—who knows for how long. Long enough, it seems, because he's giving both you and Ward long, considering looks. "Come on, May, let's go get the car. Ward, are you—"
"No, I'm good," Ward says, and pulls himself back into his professional posture, his professional face.
"Let's go, then," says May, and with the tiniest nod at you, she leaves the restaurant. Ward follows, his shoulders and arms tense.
"Coulson," you say, "I wanted to tell you—I know you could never officially ask me to consult again. But I still feel like I owe you—like I'll never stop owing you. So if you ever need anything done, computer-wise . . . off the record, of course . . . you know where to find me. Clearly, you guys always know where to find me."
"Thank you for the offer," he nods. You don't know if he'll ever take you up on it, but you had to make it.
He leaves then, turning back at the door to smile at you, that kind smile that first convinced you that maybe you'd been wrong about the agents of SHIELD. "I do hope we see you again soon, Skye," he says, and with that he's gone.
You lean back against the table, reeling a little. They don't hate you. May might, but she never liked you much anyway. But Ward was civil, even kind, and Coulson hopes they see you again soon. You might be estranged from these people you call family, but they don't hate you.
Then the door opens again, and you glance up in time to see Ward striding toward you, a determined look on his face. The kiss is so brief that you've barely realized what's happening before it ends, and then he's giving you a look so intense that you catch your breath.
"I miss you too," he says. And then he's gone again. When you turn your shocked gaze out the window, the black SUV with the bird logo is pulling out of the parking lot.
And you don't know if that was a first kiss or a last; you don't know when or even if you'll see any of them again. But for the first time in six months, you dare to hope that the future might be bright.
. . . . . .