Agent Philip Coulson opened the door to the containment unit and stepped inside, studying the man who sat waiting for him. Agent Grant Ward almost seemed a part of the room, with his black hair, dark eyes, and black clothes. He was sitting back with his arms crossed in what could be mistaken for casualness, but Coulson knew to be defiance.

Agent Ward was scared to be corrected because he was afraid of being wrong. To him, wrong was life and death.

He had been assigned to this team (to make me a better person!) because Coulson had thought that a non-team playing, calculating, dangerous sack of mental issues was just what the team needed.

"Sir," Ward said, lifting his chin. He'd already tried talking.

"You shot the wrong person."

"What?" Ward hadn't been expecting that.

"The paralyzed man that you shot? A decoy. A prop." Coulson's voice was calm, and that made it worse. "He wasn't the one speaking. You shot an innocent man, and the Clairvoyant is still out there. That's all."

Garrett told me to go easy on you.

Agent Grant Ward had been beaten up, possessed, driven through flashbacks, and raped in the time Coulson knew him. Before that, he had been bullied, pushed about, and in one notable incident, tortured. Ward was still standing without help, and even cracked a smile sometimes. Ward had always been known as strong.

Coulson watched his eyes go wide at the knowledge that he had just murdered an innocent, watched his posture cave in as he realized that he had not saved the ones he loved – as it occurred to him that he had failed to protect anyone. And Coulson thought about how Fitz would say that an object was only as strong as its weakest point.

When Ward looked up at Coulson, his eyes were asking for a lifeline, but his lips were pressed close.

Agent Coulson, it had been said, had become kinder since he came back from death. He was known to smile sweeter (though as enigmatically as always), and reach out more, and worry about second chances. They said Coulson was kinder, but they were wrong. If Coulson were kinder, he would have upbraided Ward just then. He would have yelled until Ward looked ashamed, maybe until he cried. He'd have demanded a penance or an apology. Maybe he'd have offered to send Skye in to talk. Let May hit him.

Go easy on him? Garrett doesn't know Ward so well if he thinks that will help.

If Coulson were kind, he would not leave Ward alone with his thoughts and his failure.

But Coulson was not feeling forgiving today.

He broke eye contact with Ward and walked out of the black room, closing the door behind him.