A/N: This chapter has been ready to go for a while, but I didn't want to post it without getting some sort of reader response… without hearing whether people actually wanted it to continue. So far this story has no reviews on both publishing sites (FF dot net and AO3) so I'm not sure what to think. If you like what you read, please, please review. I'll never put a review quota on my stories (I respect the people that do but I'm not that bold), but feedback is half of what makes writing fun for me and for pretty much every other fanfic writer out there. Also, I really like to know who I'm writing for!

Chapter 3: I've Been Doing My Best (What Else Can I Do)

Grant didn't hurt her. Jemma made that abundantly clear to Fitz and Skye when she later regaled them with the tale. No sooner had his hand gone to her neck than Coulson intervened, followed closely by May. She hadn't realized either of them were watching. Apparently Coulson had stayed close by when she walked into the room, keeping an eye on the pair from a respectful distance. May had engaged the Bus' autopilot and was monitoring the cage via video feed. As soon as she spotted Coulson pinning Grant to the table, she rushed to his aide. The two of him got him restrained easily.

It never occurred to Jemma to use what little hand-to-hand training she had received to fight against Grant in that split-second. She was glad she didn't need to; she was still trying to wrap her head around the knowledge that he was alive, and suddenly having to defend herself against him? That really would have been too much. As it was, even when Coulson and May had him subdued, she chose not to run from the room immediately. She stayed where she was, watching aghast as Grant struggled against the people who were his co-workers - his friends- and continued to stare her down with that same strange expression. His eyes were narrowed as he glared at her, the hard angle of his jaw betraying that his teeth were clenched together tightly.

"What happened?" Coulson asked sternly when he had relented the fight.

What happened, indeed? The whole incident had taken less than thirty seconds. Next to no time at all had lapsed between Grant to waking up and responding how he had. She had no idea what made him react to her that way. Not with love, like she (perhaps foolishly) had been hoping; not with indifference, which she would've tolerated even if she didn't understand, but with unmitigated hatred. That's what she'd seen on his face, she realized. That was the force behind his narrowed eyes and clenched teeth, behind his hands that stretched out not to console her, but with apparent intent to harm. No wonder she hadn't recognized it. He had never looked at her like that before.

There were a dozen possible explanations for why he had tried to hurt her. Had he mistaken her for someone else? Perhaps. Had she startled him? Hindsight being 20/20, she saw it was probably foolish on her part to get so close, and so quickly. Coulson had warned her that they believed he was subject to experimentation. It was only reasonable to guess that, believing himself to be in danger, he reacted in self-defense.

"Sir, can we speak privately?" Grant replied coolly. His eyes never left Jemma, his gaze intense. She got the sensation that, if he no longer regarded her as a threat, she was still seen as at the very least a pest. A wasp in the room.

Coulson looked first at May, then to Jemma. "Give us a minute, please." he said.

When Jemma didn't immediately move toward the door, May took her by the arm. Her tight grip was firm but not painful and left little room for argument, so she had no choice but to let herself be marched away, presumably to safety.

xxxxxxxxxx

"Safety", as it turns out, was just the briefing room where May had previously assigned herself to the post of surveillance. She called up Fitz and Skye, who soon joined them.

"Are you okay?" Skye asked, rubbing Jemma's arm in a gesture of comfort.

She nodded. "Yes, I'm fine. He didn't hurt me."

Both Skye and Fitz blinked. They looked at one another, clearly confused.

"She was asking about your head." Fitz explained. His mouth hung open as he processed the implications of her reply.

Skye was quicker to pick up on it. She turned to Jemma with wide, concerned eyes. "Wait a second. Did… did Grant try to hurt you?"

"I'm fine. I promise." She answered a little too quickly before adding, "May was there. She can tell you."

"He had his hand on her throat," May replied flatly as she turned up the volume on the video feed.

The picture was a little grainy, but they could still make out the shapes of Coulson and Grant easily. Coulson stood at attention near the foot of his bed, his posture rigid and tense. From his cot, Grant mirrored him; his back was as straight as a broom handle, hands balled into fists at his side. He didn't look at Coulson, but his gaze was directed upwards.

"What is he looking at?" Fitz asked. They all peered in for a closer look.

"The camera." May answered as Coulson began to speak.

"You haven't answered my questions so far, Agent Ward." he said.

"To be fair, sir, I asked to speak with you privately." Grant replied.

"We're alone, aren't we?"

He looked at Coulson pointedly, then back at the camera. Coulson followed his eyes.

"Ah. That." He didn't exactly sound apologetic. "Well, I'm sure you can understand surveillance as a security measure. You did just attack one of my agents, after all."

Grant's face remained impassive, but he did venture to ask, "Is she okay?"

"We stopped you before she could sustain any injuries, although I don't think she'll be keen on being alone with you for quite some time." Now it was Coulson's turn to look directly at the camera. Jemma didn't need to hear the words "that's an order" to understand that was what it was.

"What do you remember?"

Grant didn't answer.

"Do you know where you were in the three months you were missing?"

Again, no reply.

"Agent Ward, do I have to order you to answer my questions?"

That got a response. "Sir, respectfully, I again ask to speak with you privately. I have sensitive intel that I'd like to keep between us."

Intel? About what? Centipede? That was Jemma's guess, at least. But they had all been working on the Centipede case together. What could he have to say that he couldn't share with all of them?

"He's talking like he's still on a mission." Fitz noted in a whisper.

Coulson looked at the camera a final time. "May," was all he said, and no sooner had the name left his mouth than the feed went silent. They could still see Coulson and Grant, but the sound was muted.

The three of them stood and watched the interrogation play out for a few minutes. Grant, assured by Coulson that they could not be overheard, relaxed back into the bed, his eyes frequently slipping closed as he spoke. Coulson's rigid stance softened, too. He clearly didn't regard Grant as a risk. Jemma wondered if that was ill-advised. Yes, she still believed that Grant's reaction to her was mostly instinctual self-defense, but still. She was worried.

"He'll be fine." May said. Sometimes, Jemma swore she could read minds. "If Grant were going to attack, he would have already."

"I wonder what he's saying." Skye peered at the monitor, trying to read their lips.

"I have a program for that," Fitz said to her, but May stopped him from saying more on the subject.

"Coulson promised privacy. We won't infringe on that."

"Does he deserve privacy, though?" Skye asked. She glanced briefly at Jemma before letting her gaze fall. "He tried to hurt you. How do you feel about this?"

Jemma shrugged, trying to feign nonchalance when what she really felt was conflicted. "I want to refrain from passing judgment until we have all the facts."

"Wise choice." May said, pushing away from the table with her palms. "I suggest we all do the same."

She stalked away, leaving the younger three agents alone.

"So, like… are we dismissed, or something?" Skye asked after a moment's silence had passed.

"I guess so." Fitz answered. He turned to Jemma. "Feel up to coming to the lab? I tried to get the samples from the Centipede base all nice and Petri-dished for you, but I know you're particular."

She smiled at him, but shook her head. "No, that's all right. There'll be time enough for that tomorrow." To be honest, she just wanted to return to her room. She wanted nothing more than to be alone to process everything, but she also didn't want to be seen making a hasty retreat, lest she arouse anyone's worry unnecessarily. She waited until the other two had gone before her, remaining in the briefing room a few extra minutes after they had left.

Grant and Coulson were still talking, and though she couldn't hear them, it seemed to be going well. Coulson had even brought a chair over from the corner of the room and was seated near the head of his bed. She was glad to see that Grant wasn't being treated like a prisoner, or worse, like a criminal. She could only imagine what he'd endured in the months when they'd thought him lost; he deserved better than captivity.

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When Jemma returned to her bunk, it was with the intention to rest. The surge of adrenaline she'd felt from Grant's reappearance was beginning to wear off, and the knot at the back of her skull was beginning to make her head ache horribly. She went to her bedside table, rifling through the top drawer for some paracetamol. She punched two pills from the bubble pack, but dropped the second.

"Damn." The pill had hit the carpet noiselessly and rolled beneath her bed. She crouched, stretching blindly into the space beneath her mattress, but her fingers did not find the pill first. Her fingertips grazed something rough and scratchy. For a second, she was confused. What had she placed under her bed? Then she remembered. Forgetting the painkillers, she grabbed the cardboard box and pulled it out.

She hadn't taped the box shut, just folded the flaps one over the other. Maybe it was some subconscious signaling; her way of refusing to close the door on Grant entirely, no matter how far she shoved the thought of him away. She only need to lift one flap to see that yes, the box was just as she'd left it. All of Grant's belongings were present.

Well, all but two. The boots were still by the door, waiting for him, as ever. The ring was about her neck, and suddenly it felt as heavy as a millstone.

She didn't need these anymore, she knew. They were given to her conditionally, under the circumstances of his death, and well… he wasn't dead. She had no right to keep what wasn't hers when the rightful owner was just a few doors down. She was fine to return every single one of his belongings, wouldn't mourn their losses necessarily… except for the ring. She'd become accustomed to the sensation of it, hanging solid and cool beside her skin always. She was by no means superstitious, but she'd let herself treat his ring around her neck as something of a talisman. A little piece of him left behind, protecting her.

"Packing up?" Coulson said to her from the doorway of her room. She hadn't realized she'd left her door wide open and had failed to hear him approach.

"Sir!" she exclaimed, jumping to her feet. "No sir."

"Sorry. I didn't mean to startle you." He stepped inside the room and shut the door behind him. "Can we talk?"

She nodded. "Certainly," she answered and motioned to the bed, the only available seating in the limited bunks. Once he sat, she did the same. "How is Agent Ward?" she asked.

Coulson's face betrayed nothing. "He'll be fine. I think he might be sorry about hurting you. Er, trying to hurt you."

"Oh, that's all right. It's truly nothing." She lifted a hand to her neck, rubbing the skin there as she remembered the way his hand had begun to wrap around her throat before May and Coulson intervened. "I know better than to surprise a startled agent. I'm sure he meant no harm. Why, there was one time when I managed to surprise May, and how quickly she turned on me-"

"Jemma."

"Sir."

Coulson's expression faltered, the corner of his lip twitching just slightly as he spoke again. He spoke slowly, no doubt hopeful that by pacing his words, she would grasp their enormity. "He was trying to kill you."

To Jemma, the idea of Grant meaning her any harm -let alone death- was laughable. She was ashamed that, when Coulson had finished speaking, she chuckled drily. "Is that that American wit at work, sir?"

"I'm sorry, but no. I wish it were. But he told me so; he meant to kill you."

"But… you said he's sorry?"

He hesitated. "We talked for a long time. He's… come to the realization that he may have been mistaken in attacking you."

"I'll say."

Coulson appeared uncomfortable when he spoke next. "Jemma… the intel Grant had seemed to implicate you as working with the organization known as Centipede."

She felt her cheeks grow hot. Scientifically impossible as it was, she knew her face was flushing an angry red even as the rest of her seemed to go cold. Her pulse was thundering in her ears. "Sir, I would never-"

"- I know." He assured her, putting one hand on her shoulder in a gesture of consolation that almost felt fatherly. "Besides being able to account for your location for the past year, let alone three months, I know that you're about as likely to turn on SHIELD as Steve Rogers himself. Trust me, I'm not worried about having a traitor in our midst." Then, his mouth turned down into a concerned frown. "But there's still the matter of Grant's account to consider."

She was relieved to know her innocence was not in question, but anxious to find out what would possess Grant to make such a claim. "Was he…" she stammered, "h-he was detailed in what occurred while he was in Centipede?"

"Yes." Coulson's voice was grave. "Quite detailed. The things he endured…" he let out a deep sigh,"Jemma, it's nothing short of traumatic."

She was grateful that he did not elaborate. She'd seen the research; her imagination filled the gaps easily, and a shudder passed through her. "But sir, I don't see why that would make him attack me. Even if he believed me to be Centipede-"

"- It's not just that he believes you work for Centipede. He believes you… well, to put it bluntly, he's convinced you are the one who experimented on him. Obviously, we all know that's ridiculous, but it was very hard to persuade him otherwise."

Oh.

Oh.

Oh no.

"He's confabulating." she whispered.

"Sorry?"

She shook her head quickly from side to side, as if she were trying to shake loose some information just out of her reach. "It's something we studied in the one psychology course I took for my first PHD. His memories are… well, basically they've been distorted. Compromised."

"Distorted? Compromised? How? What do you mean?"

Her head swam as she rushed to explain. "Remember when that American journalist 'misremembered' his experiences in the Middle East and said he conflated memories? That wasn't quite right. Provided he wasn't outright lying to save face, what he would have been doing was confabulating. You yourself said Grant had endured great trauma as a hostage, and the brain is a tricky thing. If he was sedated for long periods of time, or subject to brainwashing-" she stopped suddenly, swallowing hard as all the pieces came together for her. Suddenly, everything made sense. Why he attacked her… it was a hard thing to forgive, but if what she was assuming was correct, she can hardly say she blamed him.

"If Grant thinks I'm Centipede, then in all likeliness…"

"- He's mistaken all those times you treated his wounds in the field with experimentation in Centipede." Coulson finished.

She nodded slowly. Sadly. Because if Grant believed her to be Centipede, if the only memories (however incorrect) he had of her were of him receiving harm at her hands… then what had he forgotten?

She ventured to ask. "Did he…" God, how could she even phrase this? "Did he remember us at all?"

"Us? As in, the team?"

Not quite, but, "That, too." is how she answered.

Once she had qualified her question, Coulson understood. "Ah." He shifted uncomfortably on the bed as he fumbled through a reply. "He remembered me. He remembers May. Don't know about Fitz and Skye." He didn't meet her eyes as he said, "I'm sorry, Jemma."

Yes. So was she.

"It's all right, sir." she replied, even though it wasn't. It really wasn't…. but what good would it have done her to rage against it? It was no one's fault, least of all Coulson's, and certainly not Grant's. It seemed just another trick of an increasingly cruel universe that the man she loved was returned to her, only for him to despise the very sight of her, and remember none of what they had once shared.

They discussed what would be done next. Jemma appreciated having her opinion considered by her superior; she knew it was a testament to the unorthodox, collaborative way Coulson ran his team that her input was not only asked for, but valued. It also spoke volumes about the level of care he had for the people working for him. They really were a family.

Once a plan had been formulated by the pair, Coulson reached out to HQ to inform them of Grant's rescue and to receive approval for their actions henceforth. It was after 9 pm EST (4 am EAT) when Coulson called a meeting in the briefing room with five of the six members of the team; the newly-recovered sixth was fast asleep in the cage, aided by a mild sedative administered by May. For the time being, Grant would stay on the Bus until the extent of his trauma was determined. Coulson had spoken directly to Agent Hand, who had been quite insistent that they keep Grant on board. Agent Simmons was their most gifted biochemist and therefore, SHIELD's best shot at determining what had happened to Grant while he was missing; there was also the matter that, if anything should happen, a team of six was a recoverable loss.

"Oh, how sweet." Skye had said sarcastically when Coulson alighted on that particular point. The others felt the same, but said nothing.

"There's just one more thing," Simmons began. It was very hard to keep her voice from trembling, and the easiest way to accomplish that was by removing all emotion from it. "Grant isn't how we remember him. He doesn't remember how he and I were connected." It was getting harder and harder to define what they were without saying "boyfriend and girlfriend", "significant other", etc., but she didn't feel comfortable using terms they had never landed upon themselves. "I'd appreciate," she continued, "if everyone were discreet in discussing our past, or better yet: don't bring it up at all."

It was a request the others all agreed to without question, though Skye's brow and nose wrinkled a little as she nodded and wordless glances were exchanged between May and Coulson. She wondered what conversation they might have about her behind closed doors later. When they were dismissed, Fitz walked Jemma back to her bunk.

"Are you sure?" he asked her in a whisper.

She nodded slowly, her mind made up. "It's better this way." she said with a forced smile, and looked toward the cage. "It's unfair to both of us for me to expect things to go back to the way they were, and with everything he's endured, I think he's in more need of a physician than a girlfriend. I can hardly do both well."

"Well, that's not true." Fitz replied with a scoff. Yes, not entirely true. Jemma could -and had- managed to do both without issues before, but he made no further comment to contradict her. Instead, he conceded, "If this is what you want…"

She nodded again. "It's what I want." And again, that was not entirely true either. She didn't want any of this. If she'd had her way… but it was out of her hands. She'd always considered herself an optimist (or rather, as much of an optimist as a scientist could be), but was pragmatic enough to know when to accept a thing as an immutable truth.

This was the new norm. After months of living like he was dead, Grant was back and greatly changed. It would take adjustments on all of their parts, but perhaps none more than her. She could handle it. After living through losing him, this would be easy by comparison.

At least, she hoped so.

xxxxxxxxxx

They landed in the states early the next morning. Once safely on the ground, Jemma went to the cockpit to retrieve May. Remembering Coulson's indirect order, she was not permitted to be with Grant alone when she performed her first assessment.

She let May open the cage door, following her in after taking a deep, fortifying breath. Jemma was determined to keep her emotions in check, her head high… herself calm.

"Good morning." she said as she entered to find Grant sitting on the single chair in the room. He stiffened as she entered. She determined not to take offense as May wisely stepped forward on the off-chance Grant tried anything again. "You're probably ready to get out of this room, aren't you? Do you feel like you can walk down to the lab?"

He stood to his feet. "Lead the way." he said to her. It was the first time he had spoken to her directly since they found him.

She faked a smile and turned on her heel to walk out. Grant followed behind her, his pace slow. Melinda went last, keeping a close eye on both of them, no doubt.

Once in the lab, Jemma directed him to take a seat on one of the tall metal stools. Fitz had wisely made himself scarce, so she had the lab to herself.

She wouldn't do a full work-up; she was less concerned with his stamina and physical abilities than what may be going on with him internally. She had him stand on a scale and weighed him. She listened to his heartbeat and checked his reflexes. That was done easy enough. May stood a little closer when the time came to stick a needle in his vein and collect his blood sample. Jemma kept an eye on his reaction peripherally; even as the needle went it, his face remained unchanged.

"What will you do with my blood?" he asked.

"I established a baseline for every member of our team when we first started working together. I'll compare your new sample against the baseline and examine any changes." Then, she withdrew a long cotton swab from a glass jar. "May I?" She carefully put her hand on his chin, drawing down his bottom lip with gloved fingers. She moved slowly and deliberately, careful not to jerk in an unpredictable way, lest she trigger another reaction.

When all the samples she needed had been taken, she asked him to remove his shirt. His eyes narrowed immediately. Finally, a reaction!

"I'm looking for possible injection sites," she explained. "And atrophy."

"I'm not atrophied." he groused, but nonetheless did as she wished and removed his shirt. She tried not to blush as the discarded clothing landed on the table to his right.

Well, he was right about not atrophying. His biceps and pectorals were… it was hard to land on an adjective to describe his physique without sounding lecherous, but the longer the silence bore on, the more she felt pressured to speak.

"Things appear normal." was the answer she went with before walking behind him to check his back. Forgetting herself for a second, she ran one gloved finger over three of his vertebrae. He recoiled slightly from her touch. "Sorry." she whispered. "Does that hurt?"

"No." he answered after a tense moment. May, just a few feet away from him, stood straighter, her fingers twitching at the ICER on her hip.

One of her fears materialized when her hand trailed lower, near where his spine connected to his hips. Four red dots. They almost looked like allergy shots. She made a mental note of it, but said nothing. It, like everything else would go in her final report.

"How is your leg?" she asked, handing him his shirt as she walked around him.

"My leg?"

"Your wound. You were injured in the field." It was an image that she could not scrub from memory, no matter how she tried, but Grant did not seem to comprehend what she was saying. He was wearing a baggy pair of Coulson's athletic shorts, which made her next request easy. She pointed to his left thigh. "May I?" He made no move away from her. She only needed to roll the fabric up an inch or two above his knee. The skin there was smooth and clear, not jagged like she would have expected from stitches, not even raised and silver like a well-healed scar would be.

She wanted to look closer, was sorely tempted to make him remove the shorts and strip to his boxers so she could be sure that she had looked in the right place… but she knew she would find nothing, and she wasn't about to ask Grant to make himself more uncomfortable just to sate her curiosity. She had more than enough to work from for now.

"Sorry." she said, returning his pant leg to normal. "I must have been mistaken." Jemma looked to May then. "He's finished for now." Her gaze returned to Grant then, meeting his eyes finally after avoiding them for most of her examination. "I'll take a look at your samples, see what I find. You should continue resting for now. Doctor's orders." She tried to smile at him, but it, like her joke, fell flat. He may have even rolled his eyes. Fine, telling him to rest probably went without saying, but she felt it necessary to make a statement about his well-being. Perhaps by seeming concerned with his welfare ("Seeming"? She was concerned) she could win some of his trust back over time.

As she watched Grant walk away, May at his side, Jemma felt all the emotions she had successfully suppressed in his and everyone else's presence come welling up. Unable to wrestle them into submission any longer, they came bubbling to the surface in one choked sob. She ran to the supply closet, leaning with both palms pressed against the steel shelves as the tears came. She hated crying. She felt as if she'd cried more in the past few months than she had in her entire life. She wanted to be past this. Why couldn't she be past this?

Why was the world so determined to be unfair?

The sobs subsided soon. What felt like forever was, in all honesty, just a few minutes. She wiped her tears with her sleeve, stood up straighter, and faced the lab again. There was so little she could do, so much that was outside of her control. At least here, in the lab, she was the master, subject only to the rules of science.

In the back of her mind, Jemma began to mull over the details she had gathered about him in the past twelve hours. Memory loss. No atrophy. No significant weight loss. Four injections. No scar. There was a chance that Grant returned to them in better physical shape than they'd left him in, and rather than please her, it scared her.

She picked up Grant's blood sample, walked to her microscope, and set to work.