Chapter 1 – The Ambush

"Fitz get down!" Coulson yelled and May leapt towards the young scientist, throwing him towards the ground before Hydra's version of the night-night gun could hit him. At least they want him alive, Coulson thought begrudgingly as he swung round to shoot the person who had tried to incapacitate Fitz.

Fitz groaned and looked up to see Jemma offering him a hand, he hadn't yet fully recovered from his time in the ocean but had demanded the team let him take part in this mission. As he got to his feet he put a hand to his forehead, leaning on Jemma and waiting for his head to stop spinning.

"Coulson face it!" Simmons yelled. "Ward's not here, it was an ambush!"

"Simmons is right," Skye agreed. "He set it up and let these agents," she emphasised her words by disarming a Hydra agent and knocking him out – coincidentally both moves that Ward had taught her. "Do his dirty work while he hid behind the scenes like a coward,"

"I doubt he had anything to do with this, that's not his style," argued Coulson, kicking a guy in the head, elbowing another in the face and shooting the third with an I.C.E.R.

"Yeah, well what is his style?" Skye pointed out. "The man played us all Coulson, how do we know who he really is?"

Suddenly the doors slammed and a pinkish greenish gas came pouring through the vents. ("That's why crawling through them is always such a bad idea," Fitz informed them as he gazed curiously at the possibly deadly concoction.)

"The dwarves say it's mainly comprised of methyl propyl ether," Simmons hurriedly told them.

"Sleeping gas," Coulson muttered darkly.

"Trip do you have any air filters in your grandfather's gadgets?" Fitz asked frantically to the person who was effectively Ward's replacement. Triplet shook his head, which did not earn him any favour points from the Scot; even though Simmons and Fitz had been on their first date – undercover at a science convention, but that counts right? – a few nights ago, he still felt jealous and yes, Ward was Hydra, but he still hated the thought of someone replacing the man he had thought of as a friend.

Whatever the others said he was certain that Garret had brainwashed Ward.

"Hold your breath for as long as you can!" Coulson ordered, trying to force open the doors as everyone else helped to search for an alternative exit.

May rolled her eyes. I thought that goes without saying? She mused.

However, whatever they tried the gas continued to unrelentlessly pour in and after five minutes, even Coulson was sound asleep on the floor.

He opened his eyes and looked around, scanning the room for possible escape routes, two men in front, two behind, one to each side and presumably at least four outside.

"Ah Ward, you're awake," a Hydra agents stated the obvious and Ward raised an eyebrow, reopening a cut on his forehead, he didn't wince as the small stream of blood ran down his already bruised and blood-stained face.

The agent smirked. "Are you ready for another session?" he asked.

"Are you?" Ward shot back, this was nothing, he could deal with this, Garret had trained him to deal with much worse.

"I'm looking forward to it," the agent told the ex-spy sadistically and Ward cursed himself for being so careless, he'd thought he was off the grid, but, apparently not. "Did you think, Ward, that after you'd escaped what was left of SHIELD, that Hydra wouldn't come looking for you? You have information about the drug that we need,"

"That drug turns people crazy, if you think I'm going to tell you anything about that, you're wrong!" Ward told he agent clearly and calmly.

"Then think of this as a punishment for your betrayal and failure," he said, punching Ward in the face. There wasn't really much Ward could do seeing as he was very securely tied to a chair, but he hated the feeling of not being control, not being able to do anything, it reminded him of when his brother used to beat him and his younger brother up and he could do nothing to stop it. He just had to sit there and deal with it as all the agents in the room took it in turns to beat him. Well, not much until one decided to get creative and stuck a knife into his shoulder. Ward gazed up at the man through bruised eyelids and smirked, Melinda May told great stories.

Fitz groaned as he slowly came into consciousness, his head ached and he was pretty sure he was handcuffed to a cold metal chair.

"Finally," a woman exclaimed. "We were worried the gas was having side effects,"

"Yeah, well, where's Jemma, and what's Ward up to, what happened to the rest of the team?" he demanded.

"They're safe," the woman told him patronisingly. "Though of course their continued wellbeing depends on you,"

"Save the cliché's" Fitz said angrily. "What do you want?"

"You to build some of these," she held up the plans for some very complicated weapon. "Unfortunately we don't know many alive people able to build this and Ward was perfect bait,"

"When you say bait, what exac-"

"Don't try to screw us over, or your friends will end up like this," she threatened whilst emptying a box of warped metal pieces onto the table.

"The dwarves!" Fitz yelled in sadness and horror.

"Your choice," she grinned evilly and walked towards the door.

"You know the same sort of thing happened to Tony Stark," Fitz told her as she opened the door and closed it behind her, the lock clicking into place. "I distinctly remember that not ending well!" he shouted as she stalked off down the corridor.

Suddenly there was a quiet scraping of metal above him and Grant Ward landed softly on the table, jumping down onto the floor and beginning to un-cuff the bewildered Fitz.

"We need to get out of here," he explained. "Do exactly as I say,"

"Ward…what are you doing here?" Fitz asked, as Ward began disabling the lock on the door. "And what the hell happened to you,"

Ward glanced at his aghast face before shrugging casually (pretending that that action wasn't agony) and replying coolly. "That doesn't matter right now, all that matters is that you, and Skye, and the rest of the team get out of here,"

He gave up trying to figure out the lock and kicked down the door, internally wincing at the pain that action brought him, before stepping out into the corridor and gesturing for Fitz (who did not look happy about Ward's answer) to follow him.

"Why did you chuck us in the ocean?" questioned Fitz after about ten seconds of silence.

"Well, it was between putting you in a metal box that floated, where you'd be safe, or shooting you, so…" Ward said sarcastically, indicating that it was hardly a difficult choice.

"It didn't float," Fitz said and Ward's eyes would have showed remorse if he hadn't been trained to show no emotion; like Skye had said, he was a robot. "Did you know that before you nearly killed Jemma?"

Voices came from round the corner and Ward pressed a finger to his lips

Meanwhile…

"Where are we?" Simmons asked, bleary eyed.

"Rise and shine, sleepy-head," Skye greeted. "We're in a box."

The scientist groaned and looked at the untasteful metal walls set about 4 meters apart, to form their square cell.

"Where's Fitz?" she questioned frantically.

"Finding him will be our first priority when we get out of here," explained Coulson calmly.

"In five, four, three, two," Skye counted down and the door slid open.

"Well that was quick!" Simmons said brightly.

"We're been in here for over two hours," May told her.

"That's May!" Fitz exclaimed happily and darted round the corner before Ward could stop him. Ward quickly followed in case the team weren't alone.

The tams' half-second happy faces changed immediately to cautious (hatred in some cases) as Ward rounded the corner, all of them ready to fight him.

"The exit's that way," Ward helpfully pointed to a corridor on their left.

"Why should we trust you?" Skye scoffed. "You set this whole thing up!"

"You think I set this up?" he said disbelievingly, about to make a comment on her naivety before deciding it probably wouldn't help things.

"Yeah, I do," she shot back icily before barely masked concern mixed with anger came into her voice. "What they hell happened to you anyway?"

"I-"

"Actually, save it, I don't care, whatever they did to you, you probably deserved it," you probably faked it too, just to gain our trust again. Skye thought angrily.

"Sir, give me your gun," Ward said, gesturing to the gun that Coulson had 'borrowed', ignoring Skye as the team began to hear far-off shouts.

"Don't do it Coulson, he'd probably love to shoot you with your own gun!" Skye exclaimed and Tip nodded.

"Skye, shut up, I am trying to buy you more time!" Ward said through gritted teeth.

"Skye has a point," Coulson interjected. "How do we know we can trust you?"

"Because-" Fitz tried to explain but Ward cut him off.

"Screw it," he told them and sprinted towards the voices.

"Run!" ordered Coulson, but Fitz stayed frozen to the spot, looking worriedly in the direction that Ward had gone, listening to the grunts of pain and yells of 'this way'.

Jemma grabbed his wrist and pulled Leo away, yanking him out of his trance and together they flew along the corridor after the others.

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