A/N: This story was written for guest commenter GW, who provided the prompt: "Ward gets the flu and Skye has to take care of him". I'm not sure this fic is how GW imagined it might be, but I hope everyone enjoys it all the same! ^_^ One-shot, no spoilers, hints at Skyeward.

"Illness is the night side of life." ~ Susan Sontag

Agent Grant Ward had not been thrilled with the idea of bringing his trainee into an active military zone. When he and Fitz had infiltrated South Ossetia last year, well… Fitz was still a trained agent, even if he hadn't managed to pass a field exam yet. But Skye? She still couldn't tell the magazine release from the safety on a gun yet. He'd marched right into Coulson's office to complain immediately after the mission briefing.

"Trust me, I share your concerns," Coulson had sighed. "After Italy… after Quinn… let's just say that I'm keenly invested in Skye's safety right now. If there was anyone else I could send, I would. "

"What about Fitz?" Ward had protested.

Agent Coulson shook his head curtly as he shuffled papers around his desk. "I already grilled him, he was adamant that he doesn't have the coding skills. He and Skye have been holed up for days on this, I can't even pretend to know what a quarter of their technobabble means. Every time I stuck my head into the lab, it was all 'cyclic redundancy checks' and 'satellite handshakes' and God only knows." Coulson rather aggressively slammed a file folder shut and look up at Grant with a sigh.

"Look, Ward," he said quietly. "I feel the same way, really, I do. I attacked this from every angle, and it boils down to you. I can't coddle her without suffocating her. I can't hide her in the middle of a SWAT team without her noticing, but I can send her in with a Specialist that she trusts. Skye's not going to realize that I'm paranoid about her safety… she just thinks she's going in with her S.O. Right?"

Ward and Coulson had shared a meaningful look, and eventually Ward nodded.

"Understood, sir. I hadn't thought of it that way."

"I'm counting on you, Ward. Take care of our Pollyanna, will you?"

"You got it, sir."

Days later, he found himself in a grimy little apartment in Krasnyi Mak, watching nervously as his rookie drank endless pots of coffee and never left her computer. She spent hours on the radio with Fitz, doing some sort of surreptitious reprogramming of satellites and radar antennae. He wasn't completely sure what was going on, but he knew it was important to disrupting extremely well-funded secessionist terrorists, and that whatever techno-wizardry Skye was engaged in was ultimately going to save a lot of lives. He asked her once if she knew that and she replied with a baffling remark about enjoying her new white hat. He had no idea what she meant… she wasn't even wearing a hat at the time.

Grant passed his time peering out the windows and grabbing his gun every time a tank rumbled down the street. He was trying not to project his nervousness onto his rookie but found himself growing increasingly unsettled. It wasn't until late in the second day that he realized he wasn't becoming ill at ease… he was simply becoming ill.

"You look terrible," Skye casually tossed out that afternoon, glancing up briefly from her monitor. "Did you eat something funny? It was the salo, wasn't it? I warned you! I Googled it! It's just pork fat!

Ward scowled at her. "Well pardon me for being adaptable to local cuisine!"

"It wasn't even cooked," Skye muttered. "It's like… bacon sushi. Ewwwww."

Had she been looking at Grant, she would have noticed him turning distinctly gray. "I'm gonna lie down for a bit," he told her. "Don't answer the door and stay away from the windows."

"I know, I know!" she rolled her eyes. "And if all my friends jump off a cliff, that doesn't mean…. Oh Hell, Ward, you really do look terrible," she digressed when she looked up.

"I'm fine," he snapped as he pulled his holster off and put his gun down on the small table beside her. "I'm going to leave this here. THIS is the safety switch, Skye. Do you need me to attach a Post-It note?"

"Har har," she retorted, but she pushed her laptop back and stood up. "Seriously though… you just gave me your gun. This has gotta be one of the first portents of the Robot End Times."

"Don't be ridiculous," he frowned. "It's just my lunch, it didn't settle right…. Okay, move, I'm going be to sick hang on…."

He shoved Skye out of his way and barely made it to the dingy kitchen sink before violently expelling the contents of his stomach. He felt like he was turning inside out, the effort of it making him shake like a newborn colt. He was vaguely aware of Skye coming up behind him and turning the tap on. She briefly pressed her hand to the side of his face before moving to rub soothing circles on his back.

He retched into the sink well past any food remaining in his body, but strangely didn't feel much better. He eventually straightened, glassy-eyed and trembling, and Skye silently handed him a damp cloth and turned the faucet off. He gave her a faint but grateful smile.

"Don't ever let me eat bacon sushi again, okay?" he joked weakly.

Skye frowned. "I don't think it was the salo," she informed him. "You're burning up, Ward. You're sick."

"Naaah," he denied. "I never get sick, are you kidding? They vaccinate us against everything. It's the flu shot to end all flu shots!" His protestation was cut off suddenly as he began to sneeze several times.

"Okay, fine," Skye sighed, "I'm not going to argue with you. Let's get you into bed and worry about it later." She extended a hand out to him, and he stared at it with a grimace.

"I don't need your help to get into bed," he mumbled, moving slowly towards the tiny bedroom. "I'm just fine. I just need to…." he froze, his eyes going wide, "…justneedtogettothebathroom!" He pushed past her and slammed the restroom door so hard that it rattled.

Skye winced. She thoughtfully walked over to the apartment's ancient little television and turned it on at full volume. The reception was terrible and she couldn't understand a word of it, but it was the best she could do to preserve her supervising officer's dignity. Back at the kitchen table, she made some quick additions to the code she was writing and checked her timer. She had 23 minutes until the next satellite was overhead, but after she uploaded her malware to that one, she had a few hours she could spare.

She went to work in the kitchen. She made some weak tea and found a few cans of broth, and had just located a large mixing bowl as the faint noises from the bathroom took a distressing change. Ward was throwing up again. She went over to the restroom and knocked sharply on the door, before opening it a crack and pushing the bowl in without looking. She got a strangled moan in reply…. She thought it might have been "thank you".

He was in there for quite a while and Skye tried studiously to ignore him. She rebuffed Fitz's complaints about the overly-loud television in the background when she contacted him for the next satellite interface, grateful that everything went off without a hitch.

She reset her timer and walked over to the bathroom door. She listened against it, all was quiet. "Ward?" she asked softly at the door, knocking a couple of times. "How are you doing, Mr. Invincible?"

He groaned in response, and the toilet flushed. She hovered at the door as the bathroom sink ran for several moments, and stepped back when it opened.

"Ohhhh, my poor Wardling!" she exclaimed in a consolatory tone. He was in his boxers, shivering visibly, pale and sweating, as he slouched against the doorjamb. His eyes were baleful when they met hers.

"I'm miserable," he admitted petulantly. His voice came out haggard and congested.

She muffled the laughter that escaped her mouth, and reached for his shoulders. This time, he didn't repel her. She wrapped her arms around his back and began to guide him to the bed.

"The satellite…" he worried, glancing back towards the kitchen.

"It's fine, I already tagged it," she assured him.

"Why is the TV so loud?" he whined as she helped him up onto his narrow cot.

"I'll turn it down," Skye promised. She ran her hand across his forehead with a frown. "You've got a fever, Ward. It feels fairly high and I don't want to take any chances. Do you think you could keep some Tylenol down?"

He moaned. "I don't think I'll ever keep anything down again."

She ran her hands through his damp hair and he was mildly distressed at how good it felt. He realized with a start that he was leaning into her touch like a cat, so he pulled away before (hopefully) she noticed. Given the smirk on her face, though, he wasn't sure he succeeded.

"Okay, well, I think we should try some anyway," she told him in a non-nonsense way. "And you need some fluids, even if they are going to come back up, okay?"

He screwed his eyes up tight. "Call for extraction, Skye. We gotta call this off…"

"No way!" she protested, her hands flying to her hips in an angry gesture. "Do you know how long this took to set up? If we walk away now, we lose all that work AND the opportunity to try again."

"I'm useless, Skye," he wheezed. "I don't think I could even stand, let alone shoot a terrorist if one busted through the door."

"They aren't going to find us," she waved dismissively. "Even if they knew what I was doing, I've never on long enough to triangulate my location from."

"That doesn't make us invisible, Skye! People have eyes! People who may be terrorists or related to terrorists…"

"I'm not giving up my window, Ward!" she keened. "I can do this! I can tag the satellites and shoot invaders and take care of you, all at the same time, I swear! I just need another 24 hours, one more orbit, to catch 'em all! Like Pokémon. Please!"

He stared at her with a pained expression. "I need the bowl," he replied in a strained voice, and she dashed to the bathroom to retrieve it.

Skye made it back just in time, and held her shaking S.O. as he retched forcefully into the large metal bowl. The whole time, she murmured soothing words at him and brushed his hair from his eyes. When he collapsed back onto the bed, she took the bowl away and returned minutes later. She brought tea, Tylenol, a cold cloth and the freshly clean bowl.

"I don't have the energy to argue with you," he said pathetically. "I'm begging you to call it off, Skye… I can't protect you like this and I promised I would."

Her face clouded. "You… you promised? Who? Coulson?"

Ward nodded weakly, and she scowled.

"I can't be an agent if everyone keeps babying me," she exclaimed as she draped the cool cloth across his forehead. "At some point, you guys are going to have to trust me. The person who is responsible for protecting me is me, Ward. I don't need a knight in shining armour or a bodyguard or a dad. I need a partner! That means you've got my back, yeah, but I've got yours, too."

He looked up at her through half-lidded eyes and choked out a short laugh. "You drive me crazy, Rookie," he protested.

"That's because I'm right," she responded cheerfully, handing him the tea and painkillers. "If you can fall asleep, maybe you'll keep that down."

"I'll try," he smiled, and she beamed in response.

Skye pulled the sheets up around him and tucked them around Ward's neck. "Call me if you need anything, okay?" she murmured. He nodded gingerly and she pulled the curtains closed when she left. Within minutes, he was asleep.

Hours later, when he woke up drenched in sweat and panicking, she was at his side in seconds. The cycle repeated into the night: vomiting, bathroom, fever. Around midnight, a deep cough appeared. She moved her laptop into the bedroom and sat on her cot, hacking satellites while he quivered with nausea. He was pretty sure at one point she was typing with one hand and holding his bowl with the other, moving her lips silently as she saved the world and himself at the same time.

When her timer showed a few hours grace, she pushed her cot over to abut his and collapsed eagerly… her fingers entwined with his. Ward woke again in the early morning with his head on her pillow and his arm curled around her waist. He gazed into her face, only inches from his, somewhat hazily… watching her eyelids twitch, soothed by the light puffs of her sweet breath as it brushed across his cheek. He realized she was still clutching the damp cloth, the bowl cradled at her knees. As he drifted back into oblivion, he realized he'd never felt safer in his entire life.

He wasn't sure what exactly time it was when Skye gently shook him awake, but the full light of midday was peeking in around the curtain edges. "Ward," she was whispering softly. "Hey, Sleep-o-tron, it's time to bug out."

"What?" he mumbled groggily as he pulled himself upright, fighting off a wave of nausea. He squinted at her, noticing that she looked pale and exhausted… but she was brilliantly smiling.

"Time to go," she told him in a hushed voice. "Ex-fil will be here soon. Do you want to grab a quick shower? Clean clothes and some Tylenol? I bet you'd feel a bit better."

Ward glanced around the ugly little room, as though confused. "The satellites?" he asked.

"Happily transmitting our corrupted data, no one is the wiser," she proudly informed him. "We did it!"

"You did it, Skye," he murmured, reaching out to her. She took his hand and smiled shyly.

"Come on, Robot," she teased him. "Let's at least get some pants on you. We don't want to give anyone the wrong ideas."

Skye tugged gently at his arm and held him as he swayed to his feet. He looked down at her, her huge doe eyes gazing back up reassuringly, her arms wrapped around him for balance. In that moment, Agent Grant Ward had the unshakeable thought that maybe the wrong ideas weren't so wrong after all.