"I can't answer that."

"Why not?"

"Because there is no answer. It's a mathematical problem without a solution."

-Astrid and Oliva, Fringe 3x03 "The Plateau"


Fitz was looking at her, realisation written on his face so clearly, that there was no doubt he saw right through her. How could that happened? She was sure she behaved perfectly normal, each of her actions was exactly what Simmons would do if she were the one facing the situation. Well, not all of them; there was this one tiny exception, but it was too marginal to give him enough evidence.

This whole mission was far more complicated than expected. She had to make things simpler. Solve one problem at a time. Starting with the one standing in front of her with wide eyes and a pale face.

He asked a question. She had to answer.

"No, I'm not. Not exactly," she admitted. There was no possibility of denying it now.

"Do-don't hurt her," Fitz said, his stuttering more prominent when his nerves took over.

She furrowed brows that were not exactly hers. She should be careful about those habits of the vessel. There was no reason for following them now that he knew, but yet here she was, doing things without thinking, just because this human body decided it was a good idea. She was getting impulsive and this wouldn't get her anywhere.

"I won't," she tried to assure him. "I have every intention of keeping my vessel in perfect shape."

"Vessel? Jemma's not- not a thing! Who are you?!" He demanded taking a step back.

"Simmons refers to me as 'Illya'," she told him, not really sure how to answer that. Humans held names important, she knew this much, so maybe if she gave him one, it would calm him down and help her gain his trust.

"Refers? Not referred?" He asked in a whisper, a tiny bit of hope flashing on his face.

Subtext. She had to deal with tons of that lately; humans seemed to love hinting things without explicitly stating them. It was a little like riddles and she'd always enjoyed them, but with the amount she had to endure lately, it seemed more like unnecessary obstacles than fun.

"There's an implication in this question that's not clear to me," she admitted. No time for games, she had a problem to solve.

"You said that in present tense," he said, his hands trembling and his eyes looking around. "She's still alive? Where is she?" He was getting angry now, words escaping his mouth faster and faster, his hands curling into fists, indication of possible aggressive behaviour. "What have you done to her?! What are you?!"

She was just looking at him, not knowing which question to answer first.

"You're a clone?" Fitz asked taking a shallow breath.

"No. This body is an original."

"Where's Jemma?"

"Here," she shrugged. He was supposed to be intelligent, why was he asking all those senseless questions? Getting used to the limited knowledge of those around her was challenging; she kept forgetting that they didn't have access to all the data she had and they had to operate with such limited knowledge.

"What have you done to her?! Let her go!" Apparently her plan of calming him down was not working.

"No." She shook her head.

"You can't?"

"I can. But I won't."

"You have to!" Fitz's eyes were so intense, as if he wanted to set her on fire. "You have to or.. or I will get her out. We all will. We will find a way," he mumbled, stealing a glance at the corridor behind her.

He was going to tell Coulson, it occurred to her.

She couldn't let him, that would make things way more difficult for her. She had to stop him. Now, before it could get too complicated.

There was a fire extinguisher on the wall just a few steps away. She could grab it and swing it at his head, should be enough to knock him out. Though that would create a problem of explaining his disappearance to the rest of the team without rising suspicions and it would make him less prone to cooperate in the future, when she could really use some help from him. There was also the matter of Simmons screaming inside her head to leave him alone and not hurt him, especially not his head, he suffered enough, echoing over and over, like a madness mantra.

This solution would make the situation more complicated instead of simpler, she had to think of something else. Strangling him would make him unconscious without the head injury, but just the thought made the chaos inside Simmons' head even worse. Illya wouldn't be able to complete the mission while fighting with her vessel all the time, this much was certain. She had to come up with something else and fast. Fitz was not standing there idly, he would take action soon. Knocking him out would work well in short term but terribly in long term, so she had to do something that would stop him from tangling her plans and at the same time convince him to actually help her along.

There was one thing that might work, but Illya was determined to avoid it as long as possible - it could be a straight way to madness and that could ruin her mission.

Great, now Fitz was obviously looking around to search for a weapon. This would end in tragedy if she didn't find a solution soon.

"Simmons," she broke her resolution and called the vessel within the head they were sharing. "I'll let you take over for a second, convince him not to tell anybody and help me, so that I don't have to hurt him."

It was as humiliating as she predicted it to be, having to ask for help, but it seemed as the most reasonable course of action and she would do anything necessary to complete her task.

"What?" Simmons voice sounded surprised with the realisation that not only Illya could hear her but also talk with her.

"You have two minutes. Convince him or I'm knocking him out."

"Don't you dare hurt him," Simmons reminded her.

"He won't be hurt, he wouldn't be operational for a while. Long enough to not disturb my mission if necessary. I'm capable of doing it without doing permanent damage. I'd rather not, so you better convince him," she said letting the real owner of this vessel take control and regain her body for a moment.

This was a strange sensation and she hated it. Being trapped and chained in this vessel, now without any influence on what's going around her, made her anxious even though she knew it was just temporary.

It was all just temporary, she reminded herself while watching through Simmons' eyes how she tried to convince Fitz. This was not something Illya could calculate or do on her own. She wouldn't think of putting hands on Fitz's cheeks and looking him straight in the eyes repeating "it's me" (well, she couldn't say that anyway, since it was not exactly her) and "trust me" along with some other, more logical arguments. How could she predict this course of action when never before had something similar happened? Not enough data. But there seemed to be some correlation between this behaviour and the engineer's willingness to listen and cooperate, and somehow he seemed to believe Simmons more than her. Another mystery.

And now they were hugging. Why did humans insist on such a vast amount of body contact in communication? But Fitz clearly was on their side now, and that was a huge relief.

"Come on, time's almost up," she nagged the vessel.

"Just a minute," Simmons mumbled into Fitz's neck.

"I said two minutes," she reminded her. "I can't hang in here for longer, you have to back down," she insisted.

"Just a sec," Simmons tightened her arms around Fitz.

"I can't wait longer," she pushed. "Do you want to end the deal?"

Simmons was silent for a second.

"No," she admitted to her. She moved a few inches away from Fitz. "She can't lie," she told him fast. "She can be here only for two weeks, then she will be gone. If not, do something," she added rubbing his arm gently. "And keep something silver on you, just in case," she added as if an afterthought.

"I'm not a vampire Simmons!" Illya hissed while taking over control and getting a little stiff in the uncomfortable hug Fitz was holding her in.

"I'm back," she told him and tried to wrestle out of his grip. There was no need for this act anymore.

Fitz let her go, his face pale and sad.


Humans were, without a doubt, strange creatures. Both her vessel and this engineer were scientists, and as such were supposed to, by social standards alone, be reasonable beings, who based their decisions and actions on logic.

They were not.

Things around her were getting more and more unnecessarily complicated mostly because people insisted on not behaving in predactible, logical ways. This started to irritate Illya, and the realisation of that irritated her even more. Stupid chemicals circling in the vessel's bloodstream were now not only affecting Simmons' perception, but also influencing her own behaviour. It was hard to pinpoint it, but for one she was unable to feel irritation before. Tiredness, satisfaction or lack of it, responsibility, yes, but not irritation or joy or impatience or this insects crawling in her insides whenever Fitz smiled. What kind of reaction chain was that? And what was its purpose? It didn't make sense to her no matter how long she thought about it.

One good thing that came from Fitz discovering the truth was how freeing it was for her - no need for all those meaningless tiny things, like thinking of excuses to get rid of watching movies in the evening, or smiling at him when they were working alone, or brushing his arm when they were walking on the corridors. Now she could be herself. As herself as it was possible while chained in this material world, but still that was something.

Illya knew it was a bad idea to call Simmons for help back, but there was simply no better option for her. Now, just a day later, Simmons was talking to her all the time, constantly trying to chit-chat about meaningless things. Logically she could understood that - Simmins probably was bored, it wasn't like she had much to do. Well, she had absolutely nothing to do, to say the truth. But after a few days she was not only trying to chat with Illya, she was also trying to read her thoughts or at least guess them, constantly asking if she was right. It was maddening.

Fitz on the other hand was mostly silent. He hadn't told anyone, that much was certain, but he was constantly watching her every move like a hawk, just waiting for her to give him any reason to take more drastic actions. The atmosphere in the lab would be hard to bear for any human. But she wasn't human and as long as he was not an obstacle, she couldn't care less for his silent treatment. Simmons unfortunately did, and was clearly affected by it. Illogical again, but Illya just had to deal with that.

"You're ruining everything!" Simmons whined in the morning when Illya was working in the lab and didn't bother reacting when Fitz entered the room.

"I saved you," Illya reminded her, focusing on her experiment. It was about fish oil. According to her previous calculations, that would be very important in the near future. "You should be grateful."

"I am. But you are still ruining everything."

"I'm doing what I'm supposed to do." She tried to defend herself, wondering why she even bothered. Everything was so much easier when Simmons was not speaking.

"We were on a good road with Fitz and now you are just destroying it all!"

"What do you want me to do? It was you who didn't want the kiss after the date, I told you it was against probability," she hissed trying to not lose her concentration on the probe she was working on.

"That would be cheating. He wouldn't kiss you if he knew who you really are."

"But he didn't. He thought it was you."

"But it wasn't me! It was you and that didn't feel right," Simmons added in a lower voice. "That wouldn't be fair. I don't want our first kiss to be like that."

"Technically it would be ours not your first kiss," Illya pointed out. "You just said so."

"Doesn't matter! You shouldn't have even gone on this date in the first place, it wasn't for you!"

"That would have made him more suspicious. Or he would start thinking that you don't want this anymore. How would that be better?"

Judging by the silence that fell after that, Simmons had to admit that Illya was right.

"I did the best I could," Illya reminded her. "I ran after him and told him to wait until it is over. What are you so angry about?"

"You're not supposed to be so cold to him," Simmons pointed out.

"He knows I'm not you, there's no point. What do you want me to do?"

Another silence. She knew pretty well that there was no right answer to that question.

"He's taking more meds now," Simmons pointed out after a moment, apparently not able to stop talking. "He was getting better before I disappeared and now he's back to taking more of them."

"Probably because of exhaustion and stress," Illya shrugged.

"You think he got worse?" There was concern and worry in Simmons' voice.

"Not worse than he could have, that's for sure."

"That's what you keep saying. There's no proof."

"Fitz," Illya asked, rolling her eyes. Why humans insisted on analysing details that were not crucial? Especially when there was absolutely no way for them to know all the necessary data. "What happened five days after Simmons disappeared?"

"You mean five days after you kidnapped her?" And they insisted on this sort of behaviour. Illya supposed he tried to make her feel guilty or ashamed with that comment. Why couldn't he understand that trying to make her feel anything was pointless?

"Yes. That."

"Coulson wanted to send me on a mission, I declined. That was our first real argument about all this. In the end I didn't go and lucky me - it appeared to be a trap."

"Told you so," she whispered to Simmons.

"You haven't predicted that he would notice you're not me," Simmons pointed out.

"Small aberration. I operate in tolerance of errors around 2%; this was within the border. I can't predict results of my own actions; that would be impossible. I can't predict every tiny detail, some of them have to be moved to the side as unimportant for the whole plan. The universe will find the way to come back to it's track."

"Then what's the point of you?" Simmons hissed.

"That shouldn't be your concern." Illya cut the conversation when she dropped the beaker. Apparently, now she was able to experience anger first hand too.


Coulson trusted her more and more with each passing day. Illya estimated that just two days more and he would let her work with what she really wanted - the Inhumans DNA. It should be enough. One or one and a half of a day more, and she would have everything she would need, then she would just have to convince him to let her go in the field or escape from the Playground if he didn't agree. The transportation may become a problem then. She could take a flight probably, and than a train and a taxi, but Simmons wouldn't be able to afford it from her savings and besides, that would be stealing. Maybe Fitz would give her some money? Or give her a ride with a little help from his new friends?

"You keep tilting your head to the left when you are thinking" Fitz noticed, looking at her with sharp eyes from his desk.

"Oh." Illya never noticed. Probably another reflex of the vessel. "Simmons had this habit?"

"No. Actually it's a primitive instinct. A way to get more stimuli. We don't really… follow it anymore."

"Oh," she said quietly. Apparently controlling the vessel's body was not getting easier with time, quite the opposite.

"So, are you enjoying being in... Well, here?" Fitz asked.

"I think that there's a high probability that I will end up mentally ill," she admitted.

He laughed as if that was a joke, but calmed down when he saw her serious expression.

"Hmm, so you don't like it?"

"Of course not! If I were meant to be trapped inside a material vessel I would have my own! Just because I'm capable of something doesn't mean it's my dream to do so. Believe me, I'm as happy about all this as Simmons is."

"So, you don't usually have a, um, material form?" he pushed, using the fact that she said too much.

"Why are you asking?"

"Just curious," he lied.

"You won't be able to understand who I am even if I explain it to you."

"You could try and check," he answered stubbornly.

"I can," she nodded because that was truth. "But your mind doesn't have schemes developed enough, or even words, that could describe it. It would be like trying to explain advanced physics to someone who doesn't know integrals. All you can do is follow the pattern and learn it by heart, without comprehending."

"You can still try." Really, his stubbornness was stalling them both and she had work to do if she wanted to convince Coulson. But there was something warm in it, something she couldn't name or comprehend. It made her confused over the influence the material vessel, with hormones and other chemical compounds, had on her and how it was all reacting to him.

"I am... I am, for simplifying things, a force that makes sure that things don't fall apart. Important things. I'm in charge of maintenance, if you will"

"Well, that's a lot of big words that don't explain anything."

She looked at him for a moment. She missed times when she was back home, when she hadn't had to explain anything because it was simply understood. When others knew her and simply trusted her because they knew she was simply her. Now she had to twist her knowledge and put it into words simple enough for a human to understand and make sure they sounded convincing.

"I'm a kid who broke a vase and tries to fix it before her parents are back. Does that carry more meaning for you?" she tried. Surely this sentence should be easy enough for him.

"What did you break? Is that the reason why you are here?"

"I have a mission. There's a hole in the world and I have to fix it," she said while closing her eyes with irritation, cursing herself for giving away too much again. Will she ever get rid of these sensations? "Now, if you excuse me, I have work to do. My mission won't complete itself."

"Sure." Fitz nodded. "But you are aware that even if you put the vase back together, there will still be cracks on it?"


"What are you working on?" Illya asked Fitz the next day, curious and bored. Another new experience.

"Nothing," he said, clearly lying.

She looked at his screen.

"Oh," she murmured with surprise. "You're trying to build the Blue Field."

"Actually it's quan-"

"No, it's the Blue Field. It was discovered in some other worlds already." She shook head. "You're trying to find a way to force me out of this body." Somehow admitting it hurt more than she expected. She should have predicted that. Why hadn't she predicted that?

"You're going to stop me?" he challenged.

"No. This technology is years beyond this world. Even if you manage to come up with a theoretical idea, and the probability of that is 61% with normal circumstances, 87% given your current motivation, you won't find tools to implicate it and build the device." Now the calculations were clear and obvious for her. Why weren't they before? Why was she so surprised, and even worse, what was this sting of hurt in her chest implicating? "The worst you can do with it is hitting me in the head with the Nobel Prize." She looked at the screen again, a little closer this time. "You made a mistake in the calculations. Here," she pointed to the screen. "Besides, I will be gone in eight days at most," she added.

"That's what you keep saying." He didn't look convinced.

"Because it's true," she signed. "Listen. I have a feeling that both you and Simmons think that living like this is my dream come true. This body," she waved at her vessel. "Evolved for thousands of years to make living in this world as smoothly as possible. It didn't evolve for it to be shared by two consciousness and be controlled by an outside power. Every second I have to control every atom to do what it should be doing so that everything is functioning well. A body is not a car, you can't just switch drivers. I'm using 90% of my power just on keeping myself in here and making blood run and give oxygen to the cells and all those other things you don't even have to think about, all the while fighting with all those hormones and emotions that try to affect me. I can't wait for it to be over as much as you. I would really appreciate some help instead of constant stabbing in the back." She waved at the monitor and stormed out of the room.

It took her a while of pacing inside Simmons' room to notice that she just used the word "feeling" as a part of the argument. She had less time left than she thought.


Soon it will be over, she tried to convince herself the next day. Coulson let her experiment on DNA samples of a new Inhuman, and after a little bit of begging, Skye let her take a look at hers too. It took her just a day to make something that would be necessary in her mission.

Soon. Soon she would be out. Although Illya had to admit that after all this time she had gotten used to some aspects of operating from inside the vessel. Some of the food was pleasantly reacting with the tongue for example. There were some sequences of sounds that made muscles twitch and urged the body to sway. There was also this nice flutter in the stomach when she saw Fitz or when he was close. Not to mention how engrossing looking at him was - his hands and eyes were intriguing and appeared to create some kind of field that was attracting her closer.

"Are you hitting on my boyfriend?" Simmons said, the accusation clear in her voice.

"He's not your boyfriend," Illya pointed out.

"Are you hitting on my almost-boyfriend?" Simmons was clearly decided on not letting this one go.

"I am not, I'm just observing."

"Well, I would strongly appreciate if you observe someone else."

"Like Mack or Hunter? Fitz might think it's you, since I have no emotions, and get jealous over it," Illya said becuase it was quite probable and she hoped that Simmons would give up on trying to distract her.

There was a few seconds of blessed silence.

"You are joking!" Simmons noticed with surprise.

"I am not. Shut up," she grunted with shame.

This whole body business was more dangerous than she predicted. She had to act faster. She had a world to save and she had to deal with two scientists who were too dumb to realise they loved each other for 10 years, how crazy was that? No wonder they were not helpful at all.


Illya was happy when she heard that Coulson was sending her into field with Fitz. This would simplify everything and she was really fed up with complications. It was high time for something to actually work the way she would like it to.

The mission was not hard - it was about getting a weapon before Hydra beat them to that, so nothing she couldn't handle. She even made sure to keep Fitz in a relatively safe zone. There was a gunshot though, and Simmons was obnoxious ever since she saw Ward on one of the monitors.

"You have to go after him!" She shouted at Illya over and over. "I failed at ending him once and look how that ended! I can't let him run away again. Ward deserves to die!"

"Yes, the probability of that is very high," Illya admitted. "But I'm neither judge nor executor, so it's not up to me to make him die. He will, when it's his time. Besides, I have my task."

"He's dangerous! You should do something good and make him disappear from this world."

"No."

"But the next bad thing he does will be on me if I won't stop him!"

"No. It will be on him."

"You!... You idiot! You have to do this! You have to make it right or let me do this!"

"I won't, and even if I could do that, I have other priorities right now."

"What can be more important than that?!"

"And here I was, thinking that you learned something during those three months." Illya sighed while she was walking down the stairs and carefully avoiding any Hydra troops, glad that her abilities came in handy.

Simmons nagged her for a while but Illya didn't let it stop her. She turned away from the corridor Ward was in, and went ahead, took a few turns only to finally arrive at her destination.

"Mack?" she called and noticed him on the floor, just a few steps away from her. She got closer and bent over him. "Are you okay?"

"I got shot," he muttered holding onto his arm. She noticed the blood sweeping from the wound.

"Hold on, I've got a med kit." She reached inside it to start treating his wound. "We will patch you up in a sec, just hold on. You'll live."

Simmons was silent.

It was on the next day, when Illya checked on Mack in the hospital room and then Fitz thanked her for saving his friend, that Simmons quietly said that maybe she indeed made a good choice.

Illya just nodded, too busy with planning her two last days in this world.

The mission was still not completed, and tomorrow she had an even more important field mission.


A/N:

Illya's name is a reference to Illyria character from "Angel" as well as Irisviel von Einzbern from "Fate/Zero" whose daughter was named Illyasviel, in short Illya.

Please, don't get your expectation about "the mission" too high, I'd hate to disappoint and it's a Fitzsimmons fic, not Illya story so I won't focus on it more than necessary. I just hope you will be surprised - that was my aim ;)

The Fringe reference in this and previous chapter is head tilting- that's what Observers did and it is a "primitive instinct that humans moved beyond long ago" as said Nina Sharp.

Thanks for reading! There's a correlation between feedback and motivation (not that I'm a like/review terrorist, just stating facts ;)