A/N: incandescentlysilver asked: ""Rule never one: never take your off your opponent." + biospecialist"

Working with the team again goes just about the way Grant expected it to.

They're all unhappy with his presence—even Coulson, despite being the one who drew him into this in the first place—and said unhappiness manifests itself in pretty predictable ways.

May, who was very vocal about how bad of an idea she thinks this is, keeps a suspicious eye on him at all times. Fitz is trying to ignore him with mixed success; when he fails, there's usually a minor outburst, which is why one of the new ones—Hunter—is sticking close to him, trying to keep him calm.

Grant honestly couldn't care less about the team's new additions (except as possible threats, but he's already got their measures), and Skye's not here.

Which just leaves Simmons.

She's ignoring him, too, and with much more success than Fitz. She hasn't looked at him once; even during the debate back at the base, when she argued against his inclusion in the op, she addressed every remark to Coulson. And when Grant spoke, she acted like she couldn't hear him.

It's exactly what he expected going in. What he didn't expect is for it to annoy him so much.

The last time he saw Simmons, she threatened to kill him. She was furious and, though she did a decent job of hiding it, scared. The time before that, he was dropping her out of the Bus. She was terrified.

The time before that, she was patching him up and telling him to give his body time to heal. She was worried, eyes gone soft and sad, and there was a hell of a lot of emotion packed into her please.

He enjoyed her worrying over him. Her fear was less fun, but it was still something. This—blanking him out, pretending he's not even in the room, like she can't see him even when he's literally standing right next to her—pisses him off.

But that's okay. He knows something she doesn't.

The op goes south, because it's one of Coulson's plans, so of course it does. They get made halfway through the door and, in the hail of gunfire that follows and subsequent confusion, he and Simmons get separated from the rest of the team.

(It's enough to make him glad that Kara didn't want to be involved in this op. He didn't like leaving her alone in SHIELD, but she refused, point blank, to set foot in HYDRA again. She's safely back at the base they call the Playground, far away from this clusterfuck. It's a relief.)

Simmons might hate him, but she's not stupid; she lets him get her out of there and a safe distance away without a fuss. But as soon as he pulls her into an alley to catch their breath, she starts blanking him out again.

"Don't suppose you managed to hold on to your comm," he says.

She ignores him, eyes locked firmly on the street at the end of the alley, but the fact that she's not making any move to contact the rest of the team suggests that the answer is no.

"Yeah," he sighs. "Me neither."

He got grazed in the fray; nothing serious, but his arm's still bleeding. He presses his hand against it and, because there's no point in stoicism, doesn't bother to hold back a hiss at the white-hot pain the pressure sparks.

Simmons' eyes flicker towards him and then away again.

"What about your phone?" he asks. "You bring it?"

No response, which he'll take as a no.

"Hidden tracker?" he suggests. "Smoke signals? Psychic connection to Fitz?"

She sighs heavily and pointedly turns her back to him. It's the confirmation he was hoping for: she's got no way of reaching the team. He does—his phone made it through intact—but he'll give it a minute. There's something he needs to take care of, first.

Simmons startles when he grabs her, but whatever half-hearted training she's been given in the last year is no match for his, and he backs her against the wall without any trouble at all. (Though not without pain; she claws at his arms and actually bites the hand he has over her mouth—hard enough to break the skin, even, which is impressively vicious of her.)

"Rule number one," he says. "Never take your eye off your opponent."

Whatever she has to say in response to that is muffled by his hand, but the look in her eyes speaks volumes—mostly about exactly how much violence she'd like to inflict on him right now, but there's also a hint of I knew it.

"Yeah," he confirms. "You were right. We're definitely not on the same side." He smiles down at her, and maybe it's petty of him, but he really enjoys the way it makes her go still. "Yet."

She makes another futile attempt to shove him away, and even though he's perfectly capable of immobilizing her completely, he lets her exhaust herself trying. Partly because it's honestly kind of endearing (seriously, she's gotta know she's got no chance of getting away, but here she is, trying it anyway; he always did like her optimism), and partly because it means that when he finally gets to the point, there's not much fight left in her.

"Take a deep breath," he orders evenly. Simmons' eyes go wide, and she shoves weakly against him. "Calm your mind. You know what is best. What is best is you comply."

He can actually see the fight leeching out of her, the anger in her eyes dimming. Her struggling slows and then stops; her hands fist in his shirt and stay there.

It's…actually kind of creepy.

"Compliance will be rewarded," he says. "Are you ready to comply?"

He removes his hand from her mouth cautiously—they're on a time limit, here, and if she screams and draws a crowd they'll definitely go over it—but there's no need.

"Yes," she answers brightly. "I'm happy to comply."

He searches her face, but there's no sign of deception. Just weirdly blank happiness.

Bakshi's intel paid off after all. It's a surprise, but a good one.

"Good," he says, and lets go of her. "First things first, do you have any medical supplies?"

Her eyes lock on his arm, and the blank happiness on her face is replaced by equally blank worry.

"You're injured," she says unhappily. "May I fix it?"

"Yeah," he says. "Do that."

Watching her fuss over his arm is…interesting. Her words and expression are familiar from his months on the Bus, from the hundreds of times she patched him up after missions gone wrong, but there's something weird about it. It's like she's very slightly off-key; very close to normal, but still distinctly not right.

"It needs stitches," she tells him, seriously, as she tapes a square of gauze over the butterfly bandages she's already applied. "But I don't have a suture kit. So this will have to do until we make it back to the Playground. Please take care."

"I will," he promises, amused by her earnest worry. "Are you done?"

"Yes," she says, returning her first-aid kit to her pack. "What's next?"

"Next," he says, "We're gonna rendezvous with the others. You're gonna act like nothing's changed—like you can't stand the sight of me. Can you do that?"

She looks distressed by the order, but nods resolutely. "Yes. I can do it."

"Good," he says. "You wait 'til we get back to the Playground. Coulson's gonna spend a few hours arguing with May about whether or not the op going wrong was my fault. If they ask, you just say that you trust Coulson's judgment, but you don't trust me. Understood?"

"Understood," she confirms.

"After a few hours, Coulson'll call it a night, decide to regroup in the morning," he continues. "When that happens, you come find me. If you can't find me, find Kara. We'll get you out of there, back to our base. Okay?"

"Okay," she echoes.

Compliance is creepy. He didn't mind it so much on Bakshi, but on Simmons? There is such a thing as being too agreeable, and he doesn't like it. He'll have to see if he and Kara can tweak her programming.

But that's for later.

"Okay," he repeats. "Come on. And remember, you're ignoring me."

"Yes," she says. "I'm happy to comply."

And sure enough, she looks pointedly away from him as he tugs his phone out of his pocket. She doesn't move away, however; she sticks right by his side as he leads her out of the alley, close enough that her shoulder brushes his while they walk, and it takes a lot of effort to keep the satisfaction out of his voice when Coulson answers his phone.

Coulson's plan might have gone FUBAR, but Grant's is proceeding right on schedule.