The Rider on the White Horse
Disclaimer: none of the characters are mine, but belong to their respective owners.
...As soon as the plane landed, Grant's feelings of things going wrong yet again intensified. Ever since he had accepted the offer of Coulson and Deathlok back in Mexico things just weren't going right for him or Kara, and now the feeling of wrongness, incorrectness, etc had just intensified. His specialist's intuition was acting up - in a bad way, and it was not just intuition, either. He had been feeling slightly off for a while in a physical self earlier, and that was actually quite concerning - high-ranking S.H.I.E.L.D. agents got sick much more rarely than ordinary people did, in no part to all of the shots, vaccines and what-not that they recieved as part of their training; for Grant, (or May, or Coulson for that matter) to get sick meant something potentially much more severe than for an ordinary person...which was why when he entered the plane and saw Kara and Bobbi not engaged in battle, but sitting there, equally miserably, and all but huddling against each other, he was not entirely surprised.
"I'm not entirely surprised," he confessed to Kara, as he gave her a thermometer (the one that went into the mouth, not some other body part). "I've felt something under the weather earlier this week too. Now just take your temperature, please - this is important."
"I'm feeling under the weather too," Bobbi grumbled, as she looked askance at the other ex-agent. "Are you going to ignore me instead?"
"It's tempting, but, what are you feeling?" Grant asked the blonde as he gave her a package of penicillin. "Fever, chills?"
Instead of replying in a more mundane fashion, Bobbi answered with a lot of wet coughing - nasty one, which shook her powerful frame...well, powerfully.
"Is she going to be ok?" Kara asked meekly. "Am I going to be ok?" She twitched as she did her best to control her own coughing fit - with mixed success.
Instead of replying in a reassuring way, Grant took a good look at her temperature (on the thermometer), then another good look at her and Bobbi and grew visibly thoughtful.
"We got a problem," he finaly reached a conclusion. "You two got a virus - a nasty one, I bet."
"Tell me about it," Bobbi snapped and paused, when Grant noticably didn't rise to the bait but began to deliberate something. "What are we missing?" she asked in a more reasonable tone, which broke of in another coughing fit. "We're going to die, aren't we?"
"Excuse me?" Kara twitched as she look at the other woman. "Whare you talking about? Grant is going to help us now-"
"Kara," Grant exhaled. "I don't do diseases very well. Wounds and the like are more to more knowledge - I try to cure you two I might kill you instead." He paused. "We need to go to my sister - my stepsister, if you want to get technical," he gave a look at Bobbi daring her to challenge this statement, before switching his attention back to Kara. "It'll be trickier than what we did before."
"But she can help us-?" Kara meekly reached out and touched Grant on the arm with her own limb.
"I hope so," Grant nodded simply. "And Kara? We're taking Bobbi with us, ok? I know that she hasn't apologized to you and all - yet, but this is important. This is S.H.I.E.L.D., Hydra business important, ok?"
"Fine," Kara nodded, even as Grant strapped both her and Bobbi into the plane seats. "Once this is over though...no promises."
"Ok," Grant nodded, and the plane lifted off again.
"...Wait," Bobbi spoke after a brief while when it became obvious that so far neither Grant nor Kara were coming after her in any particular Hydra-like way. "This is it?"
"What did you expect? Us to torture you into apologizing?" Grant said flatly.
Bobbi fell silent.
Something was in the air, something very wrong - Skye was sure of that, since she was talking to Raina, who apparently could see the future for real (unlike John Garrett, cough), and who was claiming that something new in the way.
"Big brother is coming," she told Cal with a van smile as Skye walked in on them.
"Big brother?" Skye blinked, as did Cal (though neither of them could see each other, the family similarities between father and daughter were quite obvious here).
"My big brother," Raina nodded. "Well, stepbrother if you want to get technical. Father liked her better, 'cause he was a boy, but he is still family." She paused. "We parted in a bad way, though, so I wonder why is he coming here. This probably won't be good. It will be big-"
"A plane is landing!" someone yelled from the main square-slash-Li Shi's impromptu airport, and the trio went to look. Sure enough, a plane was there, and Grant Ward of all people emerged from it, looking...very worried, miserable even, but still very Grant-Ward-like here.
"Told you he was coming," Raina told Cal (and Skye) as she mosied to the front of the crowd. "Hey, bro-bro," she told the big man in an almost sucking-up style. "Why are you here?"
Grant gave Raina a good look. "Did you catch your dream?" he asked the InHuman woman in reply.
"Maybe," Raina's own face was carefully blank. "Why are you here?"
"I got two sick women in the plane, and I would like you to cure them," Grant gave Raina a careful, measured look. "Maybe you can ask Cal to stop trying to blend in with the environment and give you a hand? Because the way that life seems to be going? This might be Rhiannon's Spartan virus-"
"What? Impossible! Rhiannon was off this project for years..." Cal trailed away as Grant met his gaze. "Ok, Raina?"
"Cal?" Raina yelled from inside the aircraft (she snuck in unobserved while the others were observing his interactions with Grant), "you must get in here. I'm afraid that this is the whole White Horse problem-"
"What?" Cal looked clearly startled; he got up and promptly went inside.
"Um, shouldn't it be the Pale Horse?" someone unknown asked from the crowd.
"Yeah," Raina looked out of the plane. "The Pale Horse is ridden by the Grim Reaper, period. The rider on the White Horse is Pestilence - '...and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it had a bow; and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and to conquer', see?"
"And this is Rhiannon's creation?" Jiaying said quietly.
"Looks like it," Raina nodded as she turned to get back in. "Bro-bro, we're going to cure these women, yeah-"
"They were going quite badly when I was landing here-"
"But we know here that this is going to be something wider scale than just a couple of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents-"
"Oh God!" Skye blanched. "May! D.C.! Others! Gordon-"
"Um," Gordon, who had been sizing Grant up all this time (and not liking what he was seeing) turned to Skye's mother. "JIaying-"
"Yes, go please and see how they are doing. Then come back," the elder Zabo woman told the eyeless teleporter, who promptly vanished.
"Thank you," Skye told her mother, before sagging - slightly. "Now, what is going on? Who is Rhiannon? What has she done? I mean - what's the virus is doing-"
"Rhiannon is your father's sister - elder sister," Jiaying said with a grimace. "We- she and I- we don't like each other very much for...various reasons. She works, or worked, with - Hydra."
"But mother, Hydra hurt you, father put you together," Skye began as something clicked in her head and she stopped. "Oh. This is why you two don't like each other?"
Jiaying was quiet for a long time. "It's more complex than that," she told her daughter.
Something in her gaze reminded Skye of Grant, when he revealed himself - sort of - as a Hydra agent... "You're Hydra," she whispered quietly, "you're Nazi-"
"Daisy-"
"Hydra isn't Nazi death cult," Grant startled the two women by speaking up. "It is a part of a conscious alien effort to take over the Earth. AIM and the Secret Empire are the other two." He paused. "Only it doesn't matter, does it? The end result is still the same."
"Aliens. Want to take over Earth. They're using Nazis-" Skye blinked, but Jiaying interrupted her:
"My dear, you must understand. Humanity lives not just on Earth, but on other planets, in our systems. This planet is really the backwater for humans - humans are actually very powerful as far as space goes, able to stand up to the Kree and the like. This planet, this particular planet, is part of of the Asgardian territory - a realm called Midgard..." She paused. "It is perhaps the least powerful of the realms of the Asgardians, which is why various other aliens are trying to take over it, like now-"
"What about us?" Skye asked quietly.
Jiaying paused with her answer.
When Gordon teleported into S.H.I.E.L.D.'s HQ (temporary ones, located closer to Li Shi due to the previously on-going op), the scene there was chaotic. "Is this your doing?" Coulson asked the InHuman teleporter, ignoring the fact that the man was younger, taller and stronger than he was, plus he could teleport and all. "This, this plague-"
"How many?" Gordon asked quietly, 'causing Coulson to pause and to release him.
"Many," he told Gordon. "Most of Gonzales' crew for example; Leo Fitz-"
"What about the other scientist? Simmons, Daisy told us-" (Gordon didn't honestly know why he asked this question - he just did.)
"Jemma? Jemma is actually fine..." Coulson found himself growing thoughtful despite the severity of the situation S.H.I.E.L.D. had found itself in. "As are May and Mack,for example..."
"Excuse me," Gordon teleported back out as fast he teleported back in.
Several moments later Coulson's computer recieved an incoming message. "Yes?" he told the person on the other side, who just happened to be Raina, ('cause Cal didn't really want to talk to Coulson still - even at this moment).
"Hi," Raina said brightly - relatively so. "Can I speak to Simmons? I know how to cure this problem - well, me and Cal do-"
"Jemma!" Coulson's shout literally went through the base. "Raina's on the net - she knows how to cure this!"
Jemma's arrival in Coulson's quarters almost broke the speed of sound or something. "Yes?!" she yelled at Raina. "What is it?!"
"You'll need Coulson's stem cells for this," Raina told the Englishwoman. "Maybe one of the others, too..."
Before long the two scientists were quickly working together over the Net. Coulson wondered if he should leave them alone - it's not like he could contribute to the two of them. He wasn't stupid, but neither was he a scientific genius-
"Excuse me." Gordon was back, and this time he had brought JIaying with her. "We believe," she continued, talking to Coulson in a voice that was less confident than how she usually sounded, (and more reminiscent of Skye, actually), "that we have the way, the means of applying the cure onto a wide-area scale at one go. Maybe your aircraft can be rigged the right way to deploy it?"
"I think that we need to talk to Mack," Coulson looked thoughtful.
"Why? Is he healthy?"
"Yes, actually," Coulson was growing more like his old thoughtful self by the minute. "Why, what am I missing?"
Jiaying told him.
"Hey, Grant!" Kara greeted the man as the latter entered the plane, followed by Skye. "We're ok!" She paused, remembered that Bobbi still hadn't apologized to her, and toned down her good attitude a little. "What was that thing?"
"A Spartan virus, aimed at killing humans...without alien DNA," Grant replied, quietly. "Glad to hear that you're ok, too."
"Wait, what?" Kara blinked. "Humans without alien DNA? But that's...genocide?"
"Oh, and humans with alien DNA is fine?" Raina said acidly as she put away the tools. "But yes, you're right, agent - a while ago, few decades ago, an alien race called 'the grey' took over a Hydra scientists' cell, and the resulting merger has resulted in this nightmare of a day - and of the potential future."
"But we've survived! Bobbi and I survived! Maybe the others in the agency can survive? Maybe you can help?" Kara looked away from Raina to Grant. "Grant-"
"Raina has already talked to Simmons and the others; S.H.I.E.L.D. is already working on it at their end," Grant said patiently. "They're going to be ok."
"Besides, why do you care?" Bobbi added acidly. "You're with him now-"
"Well, yeah, but he was talking how S.H.I.E.L.D. was going to assign us a handler instead of brainwashing and we would still work with you from time to time," Kara shrugged. "After all, aside from the occassional poisonous bitch like you, the agency is stil a very good place to belong."
...If looks could kill, Bobbi and Kara would've killed each other right now, right away. "What am I missing?" Skye asked Grant (not that she cared, cough).
"Complex story made simple? Bobbi sold out Kara to Hydra and then forgot to rescue her, or to have Coulson and the others rescue her after Kara got brainwashed," Grant replied. "So now that Kara's memories are coming back, she's naturally peeved."
"Well, can't she forgive Bobbi and move on..." Skye trailed away: there was something new in Grant's eyes, something not quite frightening, but getting there.
"Fascinating," Grant said in an almost emotionless voice. "How does this sort of thing work?"
Skye glanced to the side; Bobbi, Cal and Kara were carefully looking away from the two of them, while Raina's golden glare was kind of similar to the look Grant was giving her at the moment, and Lincoln...
"Are you fondling Kara?" she whirled at her new friend, yes, going for the distraction, but still... "What are you doing here, anyhow?"
"Firstly, I'm a medical nurse," Lincoln flushed, but stood his ground - sort of, "and second, um, the others are getting restless - we do have families and/or friends outside of Li Shi," he fiddled. "Daisy, if your mother's away, can you tell them to- can you put their minds at ease?"
Skye exhaled. "Ok. First, let's contact D.C. and see how he and Jiaying are getting along. Second-"
"We're back," Jiaying said simply, startling the others (who, admittedly, had good reasons to be distracted). "Cal, Daisy, you're with me...and Gordon."
Judging by the expression on Gordon's face, this was unexpected - but he complied anyhow. (Of course, he also seemed tired enough not to argue - but not not to care.)
"People of Li Shi!" Jiaying proclaimed a short while later, looking very inch as being in charge. "We believe that there are things that concern you? About the new epidemic, perhaps?"
There was a general sound of agreement, and not very friendly, either.
"Then you shouldn't worry - the people of S.H.I.E.L.D. agency are already out there, helping your family and friends and others, even as we speak."
There were some mixed murmurs - apparently, the local InHumans did not expect this turn of events.
"I know, we know," Jiaying continued, unshaken, "that this is a new thing for us, an unexpected one, and not exactly welcome. But S.H.I.E.L.D. agents are good people, and some of them are our people too - agent Ward?" she turned to Grant, who alongside Bobbi and Kara, Lincoln and Raina, was lurking more in the background than in the foreground, unlike Skye and Jiaying, for example. "Would you come forth?"
The look Grant gave Jiaying wasn't near the intensity that he had given Skye when the latter had carelessly mentioned 'forgiveness' and 'moving on' to him (not the best topics, under the circumstance), but it was close enough. Still, he obliged well enough in coming forth and looking at the elder Zabo woman with a closed, inquiring, but also polite gaze.
"Can you show us your powers?" Jiaying spoke again.
Grant obliged - small flames appeared on his hands long enough for everyone in the crowd to notice and to witness, and then they vanished.
"Thank you," Jiaying told him promptly, before turning back to the InHuman crowd with a grand declaration that as you can see, S.H.I.E.L.D. agents are a mix of ordinary people and InHumans just as our community is, so we can work with them, thank you very much, so don't worry and keep soldering on, we promise. This was met with not so much a standing ovation but something close enough, and Jiaying's plan had worked.
"So, what do you think?" Jiaying asked her daughter (and maybe the rest of her family) some time later, in private. "It worked, right?"
"Yes, mother," Skye said quietly, in a more subdued voice than the one that she usually used. "You were wonderful." She paused, wanted to add something else, decided against it, and kept mum.
"You don't know if you can do it when your time comes?" Jiaying said with a small smile. "Don't worry. You're my heir - not just literally, but through genetics too - this is part and parcel of you too. Just believe in yourself, and when the time comes, you will make a great leader yourself."
"Thanks," Skye nodded. Her initial andrenaline rush from seeing Grant again had worn off; the realization that he apparently wasn't exactly Hydra anymore didn't give her much peace of mind; and then-
"How did you know that he's gifted too?" she asked instead.
"If he hadn't been, he'd be sick too," Jiaying replied. "The Spartan virus attacked people without alien DNA, remember?"
"Sorry," Skye blinked. "I guess I just want this to be over, to know where we're going from here-"
"This goes for all of us," JIaying confessed. "We all had our plans, and now they're gone."
"They are?" Kara spoke up. "No offence, but my and Grant's plans, for example, about a small house-"
Grant gave Kara a particular look and said something to her in Spanish. Kara flushed and the two began to have an animated discussion - still in Spanish.
"I didn't know that she could be, or is, so fluent in Spanish," Bobbi told the next person to her; unfortunately, it was Raina, who shrugged and said: "Looks like I will be acquiring another elder sibling now."
There was a pause as everyone fell silent and stared at the green-skinned InHuman, who just sat there with her mouth gaping open and her eyes just as wide - for a moment, before doing her best to act as a porcupine did (or a hedgehog, or a spiny anteater) - by curling into a ball.
"That's Raina for you," Grant said wryly. "Always seeking the spotlight, never knowing what to do with it when she got it-"
"Another sibling, hah?" Kara interrupted him, looking thoughtful, but also - like she did before she got sick, in a rather submissive sort of way. "That sounds nice - being an only child sucks. The fact that my mother- you know about my mother-"
"We'll figure out the paperwork...eventually..." Grant looked thoughtful. "Speaking of figuring out... Gordon, right? What are the two of you up to - by the 'two of you' I meant you and Raina. I don't need to rip out your legs, right?"
"Of course not!" Gordon said quickly; "there is nothing between me and Raina at all to begin with."
"Do you want there to be?" Raina unrolled very quickly, here. "Thanks to actions of Rhiannon and her masters the old future is gone, we all can have a chance here - maybe a change too."
"We have to change," Jiaying commented mildly, (but the others weren't really buying it). "Or else we'll die out, as the mammoths and the woolly rhinos did."
There was another pause, broken only by Bobbi working on one of Li Shi's tablets (they weren't that traditional, thank you very much) in regards to S.H.I.E.L.D.'s new (well relatively so) database. It was then when director Coulson made his appearance.
"We need to talk," he said.
TBC