A/N: I think quite a few of you have been waiting for this chapter, as it begins to explain things, Ward-style (e.g. not very well at all). Also, it focuses entirely on Skye, and not Coulson or anyone else at SHIELD.

Also, a lot of you have been asking for longer chapters. I know how frustrating it is as a reader to have short chapters, but to be honest if the chapters were longer it would take more time to write them and I would struggle to get them up as much, if at all. Sorry!

Sorry it took so long to update; there is a note on my profile saying that it's the summer holidays and I'm not around quite so much, so it might be a while until the next update too.

Enjoy and review!

When Skye woke, he was sleeping in the chair at the end of her bed. (His bed, she reminded herself sternly. She would never belong in it, and it would never belong to her.) She fought the urge to shudder - that couldn't be normal. Turning her head slightly, she noted that her hair was wet; and thus remembered what had happened.

Skye sat up with a gasp, ignoring the sudden rush of blood to her head that made the world tilt slightly. This, it seemed, was enough to wake Ward, who slowly opened his eyes and turned around to look at her. "You drugged me!" she hissed furiously. "You picked me up and then you stuck a needle into me so I wouldn't run away again!"

"I'm sorry," he said. "I'm sorry. But please - " he gently pushed her back down - "just hear me out."

"I don't know what there is you want me to listen to! I think you've made your motives pretty clear already."

"I was abused as a child," he told her, ignoring this. "Me and my brother and our older sister - though her not as much, and our younger brother Thomas not at all. But Christian - the oldest brother - he turned...bad. He turned on us, beat us up, and I learned to protect Thomas that way. And Ella protected me, or tried to anyway."

"Tried to?"

"I think, because she was a girl, our parents didn't want to harm her as much as they did us. So Christian went out of his way to make it clear to her that it didn't matter to him. One time I had to call 911 - he put her in hospital. And Thomas... Our parents doted on him. He was the favourite, and all three of us resented him for that."

"And Christian made you...?"

"Yeah," he said, his voice no louder than a whisper now. "And the Ella dropped out of high school at sixteen and ran away from home, so my parents disowned her. And we never heard anything from her again, except that the body of an unidentified girl in her late teens was pulled from a nearby lake. The police said it looked like a suicide."

"Was it her?"

"I don't know. I was arrested before I could find out."

Skye took a deep breath. "Look. That's crap, and nobody deserves that kind of childhood. I get why that would screw you up. But it still doesn't explain anything."

"The way I see it," he muttered, "it explains everything."

"So why did you torture my friend? Kill yours?"

He flinched and stood up so suddenly that she jumped. "Who told you I killed her?" he demanded angrily.

"We found her body with three bullets in her abdomen. They weren't SHIELD bullets and you were long gone. Who else would have done it? Most of our agents were unconscious, injured or dead." At this final sentence she glared at him fiercely.

"I didn't mean to shoot her." His voice broke slightly, harsh and dry with sadness. "She came round the corner and with the mask, I thought she was someone els-"

"So you thought she was May? Is that it? You thought she was May so you shot her, all the while claiming that you never wanted to hurt me? Do you have any idea how many times May has saved my ass? Any idea how much she means to me?"

He closed his eyes. "Skye, May wasn't going to rest until she killed me. Have you never looked into the eyes of someone and made a choice that you know is going to hurt?"

"No," she said, with a frown, but deep down she knew that this was a lie. "And that doesn't make it right."

"It doesn't," he agreed, and they lapsed into a tense silence.

"What about Bobbi?" she asked finally. "Can you think up some crappy explanation for what you did to her? And why you betrayed us to Hydra? Why you pretended to be in love with me just so you could use me?"

"I was Hydra because John Garret told me to be."

"Sure. And that's a great reason. If John Garret told you to jump off a cliff, would you do it?"

"Yes," Ward said quietly.

"Wow." Skye whistled. "You need some serious counselling."

He nudged her playfully, but the once cheerful gesture - a lapse of concentration on his part - seemed forgotten and mildly threatening to the both of them. She shifted away.

"How long have I been here, Ward?" Skye murmured after a while.

Ward hesitated. "Three weeks."

She choked on the air she was breathing. Three weeks. Three weeks. Hell, how long had she been awake for it? What had he done to her to keep her under for so long? Coulson would think she was dead! All her friends, everyone...

They were searching, and when they found her, Ward would try to kill them all.

Everything spun-

He was there, helping her sit back down-

(When did she stand up?)

Putting her head between her knees-

She couldn't breathe-

Trust me trust me trust me-

He wanted her to trust him-

She wanted to trust him-

No no no no no-

He had a hand on her back-

Get off get off-

Murmuring reassuring words in her ear-

Stay there stay there-

"Ah," she gasped out, and it was over.