Leo Fitz was in distress. Complete and utter distress.

First he lost Ward, someone who he thought of as an older brother; a role model. But then again, Fitz probably never would have had a lasting relationship with Ward anyway, what with him being Hydra and everything.

Fitz had also lost something – no, someone – that meant more than the world to him.

Jemma, his Jemma.

She'd been there for him since the day they had met, back at the science academy. Of course, he at first detested the sight of her. They always bickered, always competed for the top slot in their class, always was fighting about something.

Until he realized that his life was better with her in it. He was smarter when she was around.

No matter where he went, he wanted her with him. Every step of the way.

And that's how it ensued.

Up until this moment. When he finally noticed the weight of the situation.

That he would probably never see her again.

It's been a few months – he had begun to lose hope in the first month.

But he never let that show to the other members of the team, especially when they had given up at the same moment he had.

He wanted the others to see that there's still a chance, a possibility, a hope that she'll come back.

Fitz had spent countless hours, night into day and day into night in the room where she was taken, looking for clues that could lead him somewhere, but to no avail.

He even slept in the room for a few nights, having conversations with the monolith, hoping that wherever Jemma had ended up, she could hear him.

Every night before he went to sleep, on the cold hard ground next to the glass box, he whispered, "I love you."

But really, the doubt had crept in and it became a reality to him that she was really gone.

Fitz stands up from the roll around chair he was sitting in, looking around his lab with a frown on his face. He had been sitting in the lab, staring into space for the past two hours, just thinking. Thinking about the date he was supposed to have with Jemma 2 months, 20 days, 3 hours, and 24 seconds ago. Yes, he had been counting; yes, he had been ever since the moment she said "okay."

He was also thinking about certain objects in the room, as his eyes focused on each non-living thing he thought about what it meant for him and Jemma.

His eyes trail on the night-night gun resting on the table beside him. He remembered the day he had met Ward, when Jemma had specifically told him that there was "no way we're calling it the night-night gun."

A smile appears on his lips as he remembers the good days. Before he found out Ward was Hydra, before Jemma was taken by the monolith, before he lost the oxygen to his brain…

Before everything broke apart.

But Fitz knew well that he couldn't get anything back. He could never get back the friendship he had with Ward, he could never get back the ability to put a string of words together in a sentence without stuttering.

But he can and he will get Jemma back.

He has to.

Because he won't know what he will do if he can't.

Probably jump out of the bus like Jemma had that one day she was infected with the Chitauri virus.

He clearly remembers that day as if it just happened. She had put her life on the line, jumping out of the plane so she wouldn't live with the misery of dying. Just ending it right there and then. That's why she knocked him out with the fire extinguisher…so he wouldn't see her leave. She thought he would live on after her death and that he would get over her.

But she had no idea that even sometimes he can't even go through one night without thinking about her. She had no what one day without her did to Fitz.

He's even more broken now than he was a few months ago.

Fitz grabs a nearby object, not even looking to see what it is, and throws it at a wall, breaking whatever it was that was in his hand.

"Fitz? You in here?"

Fitz turns around to see Skye standing in the doorway, a concerned look on her face. She had just recently gotten her hair chopped, and had recently requested to be called Daisy Johnson, the name her parents had given her at birth.

Fitz still desires to call her Skye.

He turns back around and stares blankly at the wall where a board is set up. Skye moves closer to Fitz, seeming hesitant to do so as she had just witnessed what he did to the object in his hand. She puts her hand on his shoulder and he crumbles under her touch. His shoulders sag and start racking with sobs as he lets his tears fall down his nose, fall to the floor, and some end up on his shoes.

Skye uses another approach and moves in front of him to hug him fully instead of from the back. She wraps her arms around him, and Fitz immediately flings his arms limply around her back as well. For the next minute, the only noise heard in the lab was the sound of his quiet sobs.

Once he pulls apart, she gives him a reassuring smile. "We will find her, Fitz. We'll find Simmons. And she'll be okay and…you guys will be just fine."

She hesitates at the last part, making Fitz wince slightly. Does Skye even have hope anymore? he asks himself.

But that's when he really reasons with the fact that Simmons might not come out of this okay, if she comes out at all. She might come out hurt and broken, like Fitz had been when he had arisen from the coma that he was held captive in for 9 days. She might come back with permanent memory loss, not even remembering who she is

Not even remembering who Fitz is.

This part really struck Fitz hard.

What will happen if she doesn't remember Fitz at all? What if she doesn't remember all the fun times they had back at the Science Academy, or their timeat S.H.I.E.L.D., working alongside each other every day in the lab, or even worse.

What if she comes out of this and doesn't remember how much he loves her?

Of course, he had interpreted his feelings through different words than the three he should've uprightly used, but that was because they were in a life or death situation, one in which he would've died if Jemma had never saved his life at the bottom of the ocean. But, if she doesn't remember any of that, or any of the times he showed her how much he cared, would it really be worth it to live?

Would he give up, like she had that day she jumped out of the bus?

He snaps out of his thoughts, so many different ones overwhelming his mind, and he doesn't even realize that Skye had left the lab, leaving him alone again. He wipes away the tears that were still present on his face, and looked into a small mirror placed in Jemma's workspace. His eyes were bloodshot, making his blue eyes even more vivid and brighter than before. His nose had a trace of red on the sides, and his cheeks were stained with the trails his tears had taken down his face. He walks over to the sink in the corner and runs cold water over his face, trying to wake himself up but also to wipe away the evidence of his breakdown.

He dries his face off and walks back over to the chair, which was settled next to the table where Jemma and he were standing that one day she went to the Hub and he went out into the field. He had risked his life, and he didnt even bother to tell Jemma that Ward had thrown his bloody sandwich into the drainage pipe. He had lied to Jemma, and from that day forward, he had sworn to himself that he would never do it again.

Fitz slides down the side of the table, his back rested against the cold surface and his bum on the ground. He closes his eyes and leans his head back, and even with his eyes shut, he can see the bright light shining above him in the ceiling panels.

He sits there in silence until he hears the lab doors open again.

A quiet whisper saying, "Fitz?" in a similar British accent causes Fitz to spring up a lot faster than he expected.

But his face becomes stone cold.

Because he is 100% sure that Jemma is still in the monolith and that this is just his subconscious Jemma.

Subconscious Jemma came around after he had come out of his coma and found that Jemma had gone to visit her parents, until he found out later that she had taken an undercover job in Hydra instead. The Jemma that his mind had made up was the same Jemma he had almost lost that day. The same clothes, same hair, same everything. He wasn't particularly sure why exactly his mind had thought up that specific Jemma, but he guessed that was better than no Jemma.

She was the one that comforted him in his time of loss. She had always put her hand on his shoulder because that was the last conscious thought he had before he lost the oxygen to his brain.

When he admitted out loud that she wasn't real, he really wanted (and hoped) that she wouldn't come back.

But a few days after the real Jemma disappeared subconscious Jemma came back. However, she was different than the first. This one was the same Jemma he had last saw before the incident. Same hair, same outfit, same everything.

It made him miss her even more.

But right now, standing in front of him, is the subconscious trick that has been haunting him for some time now. He didn't want to deal with it right now.

"Are you actually here?" He hated how his voice sounded. Fragile and weak.

Tears formed in the corners of her eyes, and for a split second, a look of hurt washed across her face. It confused Leo, until Skye walked back in and everything became clear.

Skye was carrying a plate of food in her hand, and a mug of coffee in the other. They were in her hands one second; the next they were on the floor, shattered. Tears sprung to her eyes, and that's when he knew.

The Jemma he knew – the Jemma he loved – was standing right in front of him.

Before Skye could move an inch to hug her best friend, Fitz made the first move. He practically falls toward Jemma, enveloping her in one of the biggest hugs he could muster in his weakness. Jemma wrapped her arms around him, crying into the crevice of his neck and placing kisses along the same places she lefts her tears. Tears are silently falling from his eyes, along with shivers appearing down his back from the contact her lips are having with his skin.

She gently pushes back and Fitz notices her hair sticking to her face from her tears, so he pushes her hair back softly, and releases his hands from her face, a blush forming in his cheeks.

She in turn sniffs loudly and places her hands on his face, grinning lightly. She runs one hand over his hair and places it on the back of his neck, gathering his curls in her hand. Her other hand caresses his cheek, her thumb wiping away the stray tears on his cheek.

Jemma runs that same hand over his forehead, the same forehead she kissed in the medpod as he spilled his feelings for her. She runs it down the side of his face from his extremely vivid blue eyes to the stubble growing on his chin.

Fitz puts his hands on the middle of her back, and both her hands are gathered at the back of his neck.

"Can I kiss you, Jemma?" He whispers, looking straight into her brown eyes with no hesitation.

She smiles and whispers back, "I'd be disappointed if you didn't."

And that's all she needed to say before he connects his lips with her own.

And its as if every thing has led up to this moment right here. Her jumping out of the bus, Ward's betrayal, the two of them in the medpod, her being taken by the Kree Stone...everything.

Everything that's ever happened in his life resulted in him loving her even more than he did before.

And he planned to spend the rest of his life loving her more and more each day.

They pull apart, and Simmons rests her head on his chest, clearly defining the height difference between the two.

Fitz kisses the top of her head and hears her mumble something, but he wasn't sure what it was. "What was that?"

She looks up at him and says, "We never discussed what you said to me at the bottom of the ocean."

A smile forms on his lips and he responds, "Well, I was going to tell you on- on our date, but you had other plans."

They had both found it odd how what had happened to Jemma was now a joking matter now that she was here. But she just counters with a question. "When were we supposed to have our date, Leo?"

God, he loved how she said his name.

"I gave up counting when I realized you had come back."

She takes his hand and entwines it with her own, creating a mold that neither of the two wanted to break anytime soon.

Jemma opens up the doors to the lab and Fitz follows, their hands still jumbled. She turns around and kisses him lightly on the lips, leaving him dizzy by the swiftness and not wanting it to end. "How about you and I...have our first date right now."

By the way she looked at Fitz, he didn't want to say no.

So they walked, hand in hand, back to his bunk... Where they spent the whole rest of the night watching Doctor Who like old times.

But as new people.