There was knock at her door, quiet and hesitant.

"Simmons?" Fitz called. "Can I come in?"

She'd been sleeping, or about to be sleeping, but she was glad he'd come to see her because, in truth, she was scared.

"Come in," she invited, sitting up.

He entered and blushed when he saw she was in her pajamas, that she had been going to bed.

"Oh... sorry... I didn't mean to..." he mumbled, backing out. "I'll let you-"

"No wait," she said quickly, not wanting him leave. "It's alright, I was up anyway." She patted the empty space beside her and he walked over to take it.

"How are you feeling?" he asked, studying her face.

"Better," she assured him, smiling warmly. "Thanks to you."

"It was a team effort," he added, smiling back before they fell silent, at ease in each other's presence.

"Why did you want to see me?" she asked politely after a moment.

He looked confused and she realized that he'd already told her why he'd come to find her. He wanted to be sure she was OK.

"Oh," she said softly. "I'm fine, really. There's nothing to worry about, my temperature has been normal for the past few hours, nothing metal has been spontaneously floating around me." She laughed nervously. "I'm ready to go to bed, I'm perfectly fine and I'm not going to have nightmares because that would be ridiculous." her nose crinkled, dismissing the thought of bad dreams. "The virus is gone, I'm not planning on taking any sky diving lessons and what happened today... it was a fluke, an irregularity. It isn't going to happen again." She remembered the ocean rising up to meet her, remembered being sick and helpless, and her face fell as she lost her feigned courage. "It isn't going to happen again," she repeated in a whisper.

"Jemma..." Fitz murmured, gentle, understanding, his eyes shining with concern. She wasn't fooling him, not even a little.

He touched her hand lightly."I'm proud of you," he told her, smiling warmly and melting away the outer edges of her fear. " You were so brave," he marveled. "So brave and so clever but..." he looked away, frowning unhappily, his grip on her hand tightening gently. It was several seconds before he continued. "You gave up," he whispered. "You should never give up Jemma," he asserted, shifting his gaze back to meet hers. "You're too important for that."

She took his hand in her own, sneaking her fingers through the spaces between his and feeling better for it.

"We should never give up," she corrected, smiling fondly at him. "And you never do."

He smiled again and leaned forward to softly kiss her forehead, something he very rarely did, had only done a handful of times in the years they'd known each other. It spread a quiet, pleasant calm through her body and made her feel safe.

"Not on you," he answered, his voice like a summer breeze through long grass. "Go to sleep."

"OK," she agreed wearily.

Fitz moved so she could lie down before tucking the blanket around her, once again invoking a soothing sense of security, which settled over her like a second covering, and reminding her that she could always depend on him, that he loved her.

He stayed, without her needing to ask, watching over her like a human dream catcher as she closed her eyes. She wouldn't have nightmares tonight, of that she was certain, and she allowed the sound of his steady breathing to lull her to sleep.

/-/-/

Simmons had fallen asleep, Fitz's death, his empty room, had been the finishing blow to her dwindling energy and her exhaustion had finally overcome her.

She woke with a start to a pounding knock and forgot, for half a second, what had happened before the fresh memory of it tore a new rip in her shredded heart. How was she going to live like this?

"Simmons?" it was Skye, her voice higher than usual and it sounded like she'd been crying. "Simmons are you OK? I mean... of course you're not OK, what am I saying? None of us are OK, Fitz is-" she whimpered and was silent for a minute. "Do you need anything?" she asked, barely a whisper.

Simmons didn't reply. She didn't want to ignore Skye, knew her friend was hurting too, knew she was only trying to help, but she couldn't find the strength to speak.

"That's fine," Skye told her softly. "I came to tell you Fitz's mother is coming." Oh God, Simmons had forgotten. She couldn't face her, not now, maybe not ever, but she'd want to see her son's room so eventually Simmons would have to leave it. "The plane is landing in nine hours and...twenty two minutes," she informed her, likely checking the time on her watch. "I don't know... what she's going want to do, but... well we've all been sitting with him, saying goodbye."

Why did Simmons suddenly want to go to him so badly? He wasn't even there anymore. She sniffed, sitting up and rubbing the tears from her eyes. What harm could it do? She'd give herself this brief reprieve from rationality, nothing that was happening made sense anyway.

There were footsteps, someone stopped beside Skye.

"Have you asked her?" May inquired sombrely.

"She's done enough," Skye hissed, suddenly angry.

"We need this," May objected. "Simmons should be able to make her own decisions, you can't shelter-"

"Watch me," Skye snapped.

Simmons didn't want to do whatever it was, she didn't want to do anything except see Fitz, but that didn't mean she wasn't going to.

'...you should never give up Jemma...'

Despite her pain, the world continued to turn, continued to revolve around the star called the sun and people continued to live in it, people who were depending on her and her team to keep them safe.

She drifted like a specter over to the door and unlocked it before sliding it open.

Skye let out a sigh, her sad eyes narrowing sympathetically as they took in Simmons' face. May's were bright, like she too had been crying, and they stared at her as if seeing the aftermath of a hurricane.

She didn't want their pity, she wanted to get back to work. Maybe she could distract herself from the storm wreaking havoc on her insides, maybe she could do some good and put a few sparks of light into her murky, dark world.

"What do you need?" she asked.

/-/-/

"You don't need to do this," Skye told her, grabbing her shoulders and stopping her in front of the door.

"I've already agreed to it," she mumbled, examining her feet, unable to meet her friend's eyes. She didn't want her to see how frightened she was, Skye was already acting like a mother-hen.

"She's right," Coulson added. "We want to know what he has to tell us, or-" he glanced at May, "write to us- but if this is too much-"

"I'm fine," she insisted lifting her chin and trying to look brave. "I'm a SHIELD agent, not a civilian, you don't need to coddle me. I can do this."

"We'll be right outside," Skye assured her, rubbing arm soothingly and she nodded numbly. Then, before Skye could say anything else, before Simmons could give in and allow herself to hide behind the protective fortress her friend was trying to build around her, she pushed open the door and walked into the interrogation room.

She couldn't look at Ward without feeling like she was falling, without being afraid. He twitched his fingers and she flinched, receiving a glance filled with what might have been guilt but she doubted was anything so human, as he reached for the felt-tip pen.

On the small, square whiteboard he'd been provided he wrote, 'Bring short range EMP device.'

Fear again. She didn't want to be afraid of him, she wanted to yell at him. She wanted to hurl every profanity she knew at him like sticky balls of mud, she wanted to glare at him instead of avoiding his gaze, she almost, almost, wanted to hurt him.

That wasn't her job though.

"No," Coulson said over the speakers, jolting her back to the message on the board.

'Be brave,' she told herself. 'You give Ward your time, he gives us information, we can save a few lives. Time, information, save lives. Time, information, save lives.' She repeated her new mantra in her head, over and over as she reached into her pocket and ran her fingers over the smooth, familiar plastic of the monkey figurine she'd taken with her, taking strength from it.

Ward frowned at the mirror/window, erased the first thing he had written hastily with his wrist and quickly scribbled out his next message.

'No deal then.'

The words hit Simmons like a slap in the face. Who the hell was he to be making deals? To be sitting across from her, practically unscathed while Fitz was gone. Her best friend, her soulmate, was dead because of him and he was making deals? Something inside her snapped.

"Give us the EMP," she demanded, talking to Coulson while jerking her head up from the board and glaring at Ward. There must have been hot flames shooting from her eyes because he moved back, ever so slightly, in his seat and swallowed. "I'll be fine, but you had better talk after," she warned him fiercly. "Or whatever the bloody hell you do to communicate at the moment, write on that stupid whiteboard."

'I'll talk,' he wrote, 'but this message is only for you.'

'I hope it isn't a damn apology,' she thought bitterly, 'Because it's too late for that, ninety feet and a box full of ocean water too late.'

/-/-/

"He wants to be alone with her," Coulson said, only hinting at how worried he actually was. Not another one, he couldn't stand to lose anymore of his team, of the people he was responsible for.

"And if we give him this he'll tell us the names of five Hydra agents still undercover," May reminded him, expression unreadable.

"Is it worth it?" He muttered, almost to himself.

"We're already vulnerable," She pointed out. "We can't afford to ignore his offer."

"But she's-" he began miserably.

"I know," May cut in, eyes sad. "She's only a kid. A kid who's already been through far too much, she's hurting-"

"She's broken," he corrected angrily. "She's been shattered into pieces and this isn't going to help put her back together."

"She's strong Phil, she can do this," May insisted. "If she says she can do this, we need to trust her."

"He could hurt her," he worried.

"Simmons knows the risks," she objected. "She can do this."

He sighed, weighing his options before coming to a decision. His index finger pressed down the bottom on the intercom.

"Alright," he said, an edge to his voice. "We'll bring it."

/-/-/

A few minutes later May delivered the short range EMP, eyeing Ward as she dropped it on the desk in front of him.

"You will not hurt her," she declared. "You will not touch her. If any harm comes to her I will personally ensure that your life becomes a living hell."

Ward raised his cuffed hands defensively, unreadable.

May turned to Simmons. "You're sure?" She checked, meeting her gaze.

Simmons nodded. "I'll be fine," she promised.

Her friend glared at Ward one more time before leaving them alone, casting Simmons one last concerned glance from the doorway and then shutting it with a click.

"I'm guessing you want me to use this?" Simmons ventured, lifting the device, the device she and Fitz had made together, and tearing another shred of her heart slowly off as she realized they'd never make anything together ever again. She swallowed back her tears as he nodded.

"Alright," she muttered, taking a breath and activating it.

Nothing seemed different but she knew that they were now truly alone. The others wouldn't be able to see or hear what was going on until they fixed the equipment. Which could be a while, considering their engineer was dead. Another shred peeled painfully.

'Focus,' she ordered herself. 'Stop thinking about Fitz.'

However what Ward wrote next threw any chance of that happening out the window.

'You can save Fitz. Be at Little Hill Park in one hour.'

"Fitz is dead," she spat at him, unable to reign in her rage. What did that even mean? What was he playing at? "We lost him almost an hour ago. His mum is coming to say goodbye and then we're probably going to unplug him." Another agonizing tear. At this rate she'd soon have no heart at all. "You killed him you bastard, are you happy now?"

He frowned again and wrote more down beneath the first message.

'You can still save him. The GH 325. Raina has some, she is perfecting the formula.'

Simmons heart was completely mangled now, gone. She was sitting there with a gaping, empty hole in her chest, baffled at how she was still alive and she hated herself for asking the next question, practically shriveled with shame.

"What do I need to do to get it?" she inquired, almost inaudibly.

It could work. It had worked on Skye when she was beyond saving, had worked on Coulson when he was beyond living. There were consequences, unthinkable consequences in just using the drug. Her terror at what she might do to Fitz, the agony she'd potentially unleash on him to get him back, was unbearable, never mind what awful, evil things she'd have to do to acquire it.

And yet...

And yet she leapt at the possibility, was drawn to it like a ravenous animal. Fitz, alive. She'd hear his voice again, his laughter. He'd be her Fitz again, a bright, beautiful miracle lighting away the horrific darkness.

Ward underlined the time and meeting place unhelpfully.

"I mean after that," she snapped. She was a fish on his hook and she hated him for it. He was tapping the information, staring at her questioningly. "Yes, I've got it. I know where I'm going." she barked impatiently. "I mean what am I going to need to do when I get there."

He rubbed the message away, expressionless, and wrote another message.

'Perfect the drug.'

'That's not so bad,' she told herself. 'It heals people, it's what you wanted to do anyway. How much harm could it possibly do?'

A lot. In Hydra's hands, it could do a lot of harm. She grit her teeth, thinking it through miserably.

Ward was writing again.

'He's your best friend.'

"Thank you for that, I'd forgotten," she shot back harshly.

'He loved you.'

Her eyes filled with tears. "Stop it," she whispered painfully.

'Don't you love him too?'

She yanked the board out of his hands and threw it has hard as she could against the wall, cracking it in two and sending splinters of it flying at them. One pricked across her skin but she ignored the sting.

"I hate you!" she screamed. "I hate you and you can just go to hell!"

At that, she shoved her chair back roughly, screeching the legs across the floor, and left the room, slamming the door behind her.

She needed to see Fitz. Whatever state he was in, she needed to be with him, even if it made absolutely no sense to her.

/-/-/

When she entered his room he was alone, he shouldn't have been alone, (why did it matter?), so she took the chair next to him and wrapped her hands around his good one. While she stared desolately down on him, she wondered if she'd just blown the deal. If she'd just failed her team.

Ward's offer buzzed around her, nagging her, landing on the raw flesh of her ragged, empty chest like a fly on carrion.

A vicious battle was being fought inside of her.

'Little Hill Park, one-' 'No.'

'It could save him.' 'It could make him wish he were dead.'

'The formula has been modified.'

'You're going to get innocent people killed.'

'Maybe not.' 'Definitely.'

'You can't know that.'

Simmons didn't know what to do. Risking the lives of dozens, maybe even hundreds of people, for a slim chance at saving one who was already dead was ludicrous, entirely unimaginable.

Except it was Fitz.

He wasn't a variable or an abstract concept, he was someone she loved and, right then, whether he remained dead or possibly survived was up to her.

She imagined his fingers wrapping around her hand, his eyes fluttering open, recognizing her face, smiling. She could have that. He could have that, she could give him the universe back. She could give him back Twizzlers and monkeys and science and the feel of a warm breeze on his skin.

If she helped Hydra become more powerful, and how many people would she be taking those things from to give them back to him?

"What am I going to do?" She whimpered as she pressed her face into his side, tears soaking into the covers (would she ever stop crying?) while she sobbed uncontrollably, clutching his hand like a lifeline.

Whatever decision she made, she was certain she was going to regret it for the rest of her life.

/-/-/


Thanks for the reviews, reads and follows :). You are stupendous and great and lots of good things.

The Fringe reference is the place, Little Hill. In first season episode, In Which We Meet Mr. Jones, it is the answer to the question 'Where does the gentleman live?'

The title of this chapter, And Those We've Left Behind, is the title of a fourth season episode of Fringe in which a man creates a time bubble to keep him going back in time over and over so he can try and save his wife from dying of Alzheimer's Disease.