Skye patiently sat on the bed for as long as she could, wringing her fingers nervously on her lap. Knowing that Ward is piloting the quinjet to god knows where is not exactly soothing to the nerves. Still, she chooses to wait it out. She can't risk any sudden movements while their flying at thirty thousand feet anyway, not with the electric gizmo he's installed on her arms currently at play. There has to be a way to disable it somehow.

She suddenly wishes that Lincoln is with her. For sure he can do something, after all, electricity is kind of his thing. Maybe he could even give Ward a taste of his own medicine.

And what the hell is going on with Ward? Yeah, you should have? He made it sound like it is somehow her fault that she didn't go shooting holes through his skull in San Juan. What is that about?

Well, whatever. He is still a bastard.

"We're almost there." Ward's emotionless tone suddenly booms through the intercom, startling her out of her thoughts. "Though I wouldn't recommend trying to escape when we land. I can navigate through this terrain even with my eyes closed."

See? A real sweetheart, that one.

"Just wait until I get this wretched arm ornaments of yours removed." She irately mutters under her breath. "I'll show you how familiar with the terrain you can really get."

They land swiftly on some desolate clearing in the middle of nowhere. Nothing but huge trees can be seen for at least a hundred or so yards in all directions. Skye couldn't see the quinjet behind him anymore, on account that Ward has turned its cloaking mechanism on. There goes the chance for satellite detection.

Ward gets out of the plane first. He didn't even glance back to see if she's following him. Silently, he takes in the place, nothing but a small shudder to betraying his impeccably stiff posture.

Without giving it much of a thought, Skye trails after him. She thinks she knows where they are. "Is this—"

His reply is quiet, pained, "Yeah."

"Those five years..." Skye begins, worrying her lip as she thinks of the best way to broach the subject without risking some sort of psychotic episode from him. She doesn't think he would actually go nuts per se, but then again, this is Grant Ward. Predictable has never been an accurate word to describe him.

"Yes." He says. "This is where Garrett trained me."

The broken voice that reaches her ears makes her insides to twist into little tight knots. It is clear that tension is radiating from him from every pore. She sighs. He's a bad guy, she knows that, but still, being here—on this very ground—she feels like she's invading something private. Something she doesn't have the right to see. "Why did you take me here?"

"Honestly," He stares at the forest before him for a couple more beats before releasing a heavy sigh. "I don't really know."

"You don't know." Skye repeats. He's got to be lying. Everything seems too elaborate just for a simple impromptu abduction.

"Flew here without thinking. It must be fate."

"Fate?" She scoffs. She wonders when she'll stop needing to deliberately remind herself how evil this man can be every five minutes. If only it was that easy. "Bullshit."

"Yeah, maybe it is," he answers vaguely as he walks on.

While slowly following suit, Skye also begins to assess her chances of escape. She looks around for possible exit routes, or at least any weapon that she could use against Ward. There's a lot to choose from, really; however, before she could even get the chance to pick any, Ward momentarily halts on his steps and mumbles, "There's a dirt road a couple of miles east from here." He offhandedly informs her. "That would be your way home."

"Um, what?" She asks, dumbfounded, as she tries to hide the fact that his erratic behaviour is starting to worry her. She kidnaps her then tells her a way out without at least trying to do anything? That doesn't seem right. There's an angle here that she's missing. A plan.

He chuckles, perhaps at the obvious uncertainty that she hears from his voice. "Bet you expected me to take you to a Hydra facility of some kind."

"I still haven't completely ruled that out." Skye says as she folds her arms across her chest. "What game are you playing, Ward?"

"No game." He assures her. "And if I did plan on taking you to our base, what do you expect me to do to you there? Torture you?" The way he said it makes it sound like it's the most ridiculous thing he's ever heard.

"It crossed my mind." She admits, giving her new arms ornaments the stink eye. "You did give me these hair-raising cuffs from hell."

He shrugs. "Call it my insurance. You and I both know how easily you can kill me."

Insurance, it could much as well mean that he had been planning to do this for some time now, and it doesn't sound good. "Where did you take the girl?"

Ward snorts. What he promised to her was never telling her another lie, and as far as he's concerned, not answering her questions does not exactly constitute lying. "As if I'd ever tell you."

"You are not going to kill me, and save for this cuffs you don't seem like you're planning to torture me for information so at this point I believe your only accomplishment has been—" She trails off as a realization hits her.

Oh shit.

He removed her team from the base, disabled them, then took her far away. Without a single powered person manning the ground, the Playground is left vulnerable state. "You took us all out-you're planning an attack on our base!"

Ward sharply turns to face her. He looks offended by her accusation. "You've set me too high on the pedestal of evil, Skye." He notes. "Sorry to disappoint you but SHIELD does not interest me that much. I couldn't care less about your stupid base."

"SHIELD doesn't interest you, and yet, here I am." Skye snaps. "You do remember that I am a SHIELD agent, right?"

"As if I could ever forget that." Ward replies. "Though I must admit, leather does suit you way more than your usual flannel."

"Now we are talking about my wardrobe?" She scoffs. "You know what, I don't have time for this. If you are going to shoot me, just shoot me."

He purses his lip and looks away. "I almost shot you, while you were asleep."

A mere raised eyebrow is all that admission earns. "Am I supposed to thank you?"

Ward shakes his head. "I'm sorry. I don't know what came over me."

Fuck this. Whatever he's trying to do, she would not let him succeed. Clearly, he's just messing with her. "Are you trying to get me to pity you? Let me tell you Ward, I'd take more than a little field trip to the woods to make me forget even one of your many, many crimes. Your past is messed up, I get that, but so was mine. Your past may have contributed to what you have become, and sure, Garrett was not any help either. But the choices were made by you. Your S.O. didn't pull the trigger to all those people, Ward. You did. Garrett may have dragged you to the dark side, but it is you who fucking chose to stay there!"

He does not say anything. He merely stares at her, a blank expression taking over his features.

She blatantly refuses to look at him as she speaks. "You let yourself become a monster, Ward."

This is a mistake. This, bringing her where it all started, is not helping him finds his closure at all. It only makes him feel worse than he already is. Ward finds his eyes closing in defeat. "You know what, you can go."

Confusion clouds Skye's features. "Wait, what?"

"Just go!" Screams Ward as he turns away from her questioning stare. A soft click rings out, and all of a sudden the gauntlets on her arms spring open. They unceremoniously drop to the ground, freeing her completely. As soon as her restraints fall off, vibrations assault her from all directions. It momentarily overwhelms her senses.

"Go, before I change my mind!"

The sudden onslaught of her powers causes her to stumble slightly. A muffled curse runs past her lips. "I'm done believing your crap, Ward. For all I know, there's a trap waiting for me once I get to the other side of that forest."

"Trap?" Ward rolls his eyes. He waves at her dismissively as he walks away. "Whatever. Blast me with your powers. Force a tree to fall down on my head. I don't care. Just leave."

She chooses to do neither. She's stubborn like that. "I am not leaving." The absurdity of her words is not lost to her. Her captor is letting her go, and yet she is the one who refuses to leave.

"I forgot how stubborn you can be." Ward deadpans.

"You brought me here for a reason."

He chuckles mirthlessly. "I thought I needed the closure with you, guess I was wrong."

"Closure with me?" Her eyebrows knit together. "I don't understand."

"Let me put this simply: You have two choices here Quake, it's either you kill me, or you leave me alone." He maintains his pace as he walks away from her. "I didn't know what I was thinking, dragging you all the way here."

She doesn't know why, but she senses no deception in his words. "Okay." Tentatively, she moves toward the direction of the dirt road he told her about. She's almost at the edge of the clearing when she changes her mind and storms back to where he stands. "You seriously think that I would simply let this go and buy this whole conflicted thing you're playing? After you going through the trouble of abducting me and flying me all the way here? If this is still about the talk we've had before you've jumped to the dark side, believe me, I regret all the words I've said to you that night. You are not a good man alright."

She continues on, "Those were perhaps the only honest words you've ever said to me."

"That's not true, and you know it." He mutters between gritted teeth.

"Do I, Ward?" She asks. "Let me tell you what I do know. I know that you don't act impulsively. I know that every time you do something, you've already thought ten, fifteen, steps ahead. And do you know what else I know? I know that you are lying to me right now."

Ward opens his mouth to speak, only to find his mind useless and completely blank.

When she hears gets no response from him, she huffs in frustration. "Might as well be talking to the wall." She says under her breath and turns around to leave. Gives him a small wave. "To hell with whatever trap you have set up in this woods. May you have a crappy life ahead of you, Ward."

Hearing those words, seeing her leave, it causes something inside him to snap. He chases after her. And then…