Grant had expected to be nervous on his first day at the Academy, but when he said goodbye to Skye that morning and walked into the Academy with Fitz on one side and Simmons on the other, he had never felt so excited. He fell in love with the Academy the moment he crossed the threshold.

It was infinitely better than his old school. For himself and the other cadets still in high school, the first block of the day contained classes that fulfilled high school disciplines. These classes, however, were practical enough that Grant wondered how he had ever hated going to school.

Instead of the average American history class, they learned a detailed history of extraterrestrial encounters the world had experienced prior to New York, complete with a lesson in how the complex political workings of the American government had played a role in covering it up from the general public. Instead of a simple speech class, which Grant would have hated under normal circumstances, he took lessons in diplomacy and the art of negotiation, including hostage negotiation. He had language classes as well, which was by far his favorite. He was already fairly proficient in Russian and Chinese, but he continued to study those, as well as beginning courses in Spanish and Arabic.

The latter part of the day, however, was directly and practically related to field agent training, mainly physical training in fitness and hand-to-hand combat, which Grant excelled at. They also took classes in the art of espionage, including an introduction to deep-cover tactics.

Coulson didn't bring up active field ops again until his third week at the Academy. Grant had been adjusting well—better than anyone had expected, really—and he had just finished recounting his day to Coulson and May, who both listened with smiles on their faces.

"And Skye is coming over tonight," Grant finished. "She likes the academy, though I think she hacked the principal's computer on the first day and got into a bit of trouble. And everyone loves FitzSimmons, of course. Fitz started a fire near explosives and almost blew up the entire lab yesterday and the teacher only laughed and said that things like that are bound to happen. And Simmons helped one of the teachers with a chemistry problem that he couldn't solve, and now they want her to be a teacher's assistant even though she's so young."

"I'm glad it's going well," Coulson said. "Did you get some supper? Or are you and Skye eating when she gets here?"

"I'll do both," Ward said. "I'm starving."

May grinned. "When I was in the Academy, my mother said I barely stopped eating long enough to do anything else," she said. "Their training regime is a tough one."

"Nat's tougher," Ward said through a mouth full of bread. "She wants me to spar with her tonight. She says she can do better than any teacher at the Academy."

"Maybe she's better at kicking ass than any of them," May said wryly. "But there's a difference between the ability to do something and the ability to teach it."

"May?" Grant asked between bites of his sandwich. "So I'm in most classes with the older cadets because I know so much Russian and sparring stuff already, and some of the cadets were telling me that… well…they wanted to know"—

He stopped, and she turned to him, her face dark suddenly. "What did they want to know?"

"What happened in Bahrain?"

May stood abruptly, knocking her chair to the floor, and left without a word.

Coulson re-entered the room, and looked at Ward sharply. "What just happened?"

Ward shook his head. "I asked a stupid question."

"Did you ask about Bahrain?" someone interrupted from the door, and Grant looked up and saw Skye standing there.

"Hey," he said. "Do you want dinner?"

"Hey," she mimicked. "Do you want to get your ass kicked?"

He rolled his eyes. "I"—

"Two rules, Grant," Skye said, dropping into a seat next to him. "You don't ask the Avengers about New York, and you don't ask Melinda May about Bahrain."

"I like both of those rules," Coulson interrupted them. "Grant, I have a meeting with Agent Hand, so I'll be back late tonight, and then I've got an op to brief early tomorrow, so I probably won't see you before school." He shrugged on his coat over his suit. "If Steve's home early enough, you can go to Amie and Aziz's tonight, but otherwise just stay here, okay?"

Grant nodded and then turned back to Skye, who draped an arm over his shoulders.

"So," she said conspiratorially, leaning in closer. "What do you say we have some fun?"

Grant looked at her suspiciously. "What kind of fun?"

"S.H.I.E.L.D. computer kind of fun," Skye said nonchalantly. "You know the control room that has about a dozen computers?"

"You mean the one where only level seven agents can get into?"

Skye nodded. "Fitz wanted case files from this op that he heard about, because he wanted to look at the actual field value of this—science thing, god I don't know what he wanted to know from it, I just wanted to get him the file. Are he and Simmons coming over later?"

"Yea," Ward said, leaning down to pet Buddy, who was wagging his tail frantically. "But Skye, they'll have agents all over down on that end of the building. We won't be able to get close."

She paused, and then he shook his head.

"You're not serious."

"I—well, it would just be a minor distraction. Very minor. You wouldn't have to do much. You and Fitz could do something—I don't know—something that would cause a lot of noise. Maybe set off some fireworks? Or I could hack the security and have the gate opened, and you could be down there acting like you might be in danger. Everyone in this building loves you, they'd be down there within seconds."

Grant shook his head. "Why does it have to be me? If Fitz wants the files, why don't you just have him cause another minor explosion in one of the labs?"

"Fine," Skye said. "I'm sure Fitz'll come up with something. Do you think Jemma will mind if I ask her to come with to the computer labs? If we do get caught, we could pretend that she was just looking for her mom."

"Jemma will have a meltdown if anyone asks her questions," Ward said, grinning. "She's got the worst poker face I've ever seen."

"I know," Skye said nonchalantly. "That's why if anyone finds us, I'll tell them she wants her mom because she got her period for the first time, and they'll stop asking questions."

Grant, who had just taken a sip of water, nearly snorted it out his nose. "Jemma will kill you."

"Yup," Skye nodded cheerfully.

"What's the case Fitz wants to see?"

"Some active op that went down last week in Santa Fe," Skye shrugged. "There was this new tracking device that they had put on someone they'd been secretly monitoring, and Fitz wanted to see how it had worked."

"I heard Steve talking about Santa Fe," Ward said, his forehead creasing. "I heard some stuff went wrong."

"And it's classified," Skye said.

"Which means it's not just Fitz who's curious. It's you."

She smiled, pushing back her chair. "Of course I'm curious. Aren't you?"

He hesitated, looking across the room towards Steve and Nat, who were leaning against the kitchen counter, beers in hand.

"Okay," he said. "But we have to take the long way down so we don't have to go past Agent Hand's office. Coulson has a meeting with her tonight."

Fitz eagerly agreed to cause a commotion in one of the labs, and Grant followed him to the labs with equal parts worry and anticipation. Simmons followed Skye in the opposite direction, looking over her shoulder every few seconds so obviously that it made Grant cringe.

They never made it to the labs, however.

They were just outside when they had to duck into a storage closet to avoid a group of level six agents who paused just outside to talk.

"Are Agent Hand and Agent Coulson done with the briefing yet?" one asked, and the other two laughed.

"There was no briefing," one answered, and Ward froze.

"They said"—

"They're keeping it on the down low," the third interrupted. "Coulson is on an active op to check out an 0-8-4 just outside of Tijuana. It's a short op—he'll be back by tomorrow afternoon—but I think they didn't want the kid to worry."

"The kid's in the Academy now, isn't he?" the first asked casually. "Heard he was good. Kenzie from intelligence says he's the best they've seen since Romanov, and Hill said"—

Ward flung the closet door open, and Fitz lunged to stop him a second too late. All three agents jumped.

"What"—

"Did you hear"—

"Move," Ward snarled, shoving past them and ignoring them as he stalked down the hallway. He ignored Fitz, too, who caught up with him as he reached the corner.

"Grant, I'm sure Coulson is fine"—

"No," Ward snapped. "He should have told me."

"I know, but"—

"It's an 0-8-4, Fitz. It could be anything. Alien shit, probably. Last time there was an 0-8-4 mission, there were bullets flying from three different government intelligence agencies and one rebel group, and two of our own got shot."

"What?" Fitz demanded. "How do you know?"

"Skye and I looked it up the other night," Ward answered carelessly, shoving the door at the end of the hallway open. "Fitz, do you have one of those prototype guns you're building with you right now?"

Fitz's eyes widened. "You mean the night-night guns?"

"Yea, give it here. And are you really calling them that?"

Fitz handed him the night-night gun. "Where are you going? Ward!"

Ward shoved open another door and entered a long, high-ceilinged room that contained several transports, including a shiny, vintage red car with the word Lola imprinted on the back in fancy gold lettering.

"Ward. You're not."

"Tell Skye I hope this distraction was good enough," Ward said recklessly.

"Ward, stop. You have to think about this, Ward, please"—

"Coulson could be in danger right now," Ward said stubbornly, hopping into the front seat of the red car. "I'm going. I know how to fight, and if they're in trouble, I'll help them out of it."

"Ward, you're not serious. And you don't have keys"—

But Ward had already hotwired the car—a skill he had learned from watching Natasha—and Fitz's words were lost in the sound of the engine revving.

"You won't get the gate open," Fitz protested feebly.

"But you'll open it for me, right?" Ward asked. "Fitz, you know I need to do this. I need to go."

"Coulson will be pissed. Really, really pissed."

"Well, I'm pissed because he freaking lied to me," Ward snapped, and Fitz nodded finally.

"Okay. How do I open the gate?"

Ward gave him directions in a clipped, terse tone, and Fitz succeeded in opening the gate just as the door at the opposite end of the room opened and the level sevens they'd eavesdropped on entered, concern plastered across their faces.

Ward dropped the car into gear and hit the gas hard, and within minutes he was out in the greater compound. He had very little practice driving, of course, though Nat had let him behind the wheel of a car before unbeknownst to Coulson. Lola, of course, was different than any other car, so Ward only had to get clear of the main building, enter the coordinates for Tijuana, and set the plane into aerial mode.

He was sure they would come after him as soon as they knew, though they wouldn't be able to communicate with Coulson. Since it was a classified 0-8-4 mission, there wouldn't be much ground communication, and Coulson or a member of his ground team would have to initiate any contact.

As for the rest, Ward didn't have much time to wonder about it—or to care. He knew what they would all say—that it was reckless and stupid and he should know better—but right now, the thought of Coulson facing down the end of a gun drove every other thought from his mind.

Grant Ward, S.H.I.E.L.D. cadet, was on his first rescue mission.