Kidnapped at Christmas

It had been an age since they'd been out together, just the two of them. But Christmas was coming, and Alya was just old enough to notice if they tried to buy her gifts in front of her.

"So nice of Daisy and Daniel to watch her," Jemma said as they wandered hand-in-hand through the crowded shopping mall. It was decorated for the season, with colored baubles and Christmas trees everywhere. A festive version of "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" was being piped over the speakers.

"It's rare enough they're in the same spacetime with us," Fitz agreed. Alya had been thrilled to see her aunt and uncle. At this very moment, they were probably smearing the kitchen from top to bottom with icing and sprinkles.

He grinned at the thought and squeezed his wife's hand; she bumped his shoulder, beaming contentedly.

Their life might be unconventional by most standards—raising their daughter while consulting on the occasional SHIELD project—but it was perfect for them.

"Ohhh, look at that," he breathed, stopping short in front of the toy store window and staring at the oversized plush monkey on display.

"It's bigger than Alya," Jemma breathed in wonder.

Fitz tightened his grip on her hand and charged in through the door, a man on a mission.

They had a rule: they never left each other anymore.

So when the masked man leaped out from behind a car in the car park and grabbed Fitz by the hair as he juggled the enormous plush monkey and the neatly wrapped packages, Jemma fisted the car keys she'd been fumbling and hurled herself at him.

She'd taken self-defense—they both had.

Unfortunately, the masked man's sidekick hit her first.

Jemma screamed as her knee gave way with a sickening pop, sending her thudding to the pavement. She scrabbled at the sidekick's legs, trying to hold him back even as tears of pain and sudden panic blurred her vision.

"Jemma!" Fitz was hollering and fighting as the masked men tried to drag him into a van—and who knew he had a punch like that.

From the other side of the car park Jemma heard someone call out—heard approaching footsteps. They were attracting attention—and for just a second Jemma thought they had a chance.

Then a third man grabbed her.

For a brief moment she was weightless. Then she crashed into the back of the van.

And it worked because then Fitz, instead of fighting to get away, was fighting to get to her.

"No, Fitz!" she tried to shout, but a bag yanked roughly over her head cut off both her vision and her voice. Fitz landed half on top of her with a pained grunt—and then the van doors slammed and they both slid sideways into the wall as the vehicle turned on a dime and sped out of the car park in a cloud of burnt rubber.

And even as somebody taped her wrists together, and Fitz's muffled voice told her that he'd had a sack yanked over his head too, Jemma's pain and panic and fear was almost entirely swamped in one great wave of relief.

Sure, they'd just been kidnapped.

But they were together—and that counted for quite a lot.

Fitz woke up alone in a white-walled, sterile lab.

His head hurt.

He had no idea what was going on.

"Jemma?" he tried to say, but all that came out was a strangled croak. Scrambling to his knees, he reeled with the dizzying pain. When the world straightened out again,, he was on his side, cheek pressed to the cold white tiles.

Panic clutched at his rib cage. Fitz squeezed his eyes shut and then opened them again, looking wildly around. Cautiously he edged himself to his knees again, curling his fingers tightly into his hair in case it could help keep the pounding, whirling thing that was his head on his shoulders.

"Jemma?" he whispered.

She wasn't there.

The lab was entirely empty.

No. No, no, no no no—this couldn't be happening again. Fitz crawled to the door. There was no handle, so he hammered his fists against it. "Jemma!"

The hammering made his head even worse. Fitz squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his forehead against the cold metal of the door, panting almost hysterically until he could gather himself together. Forcing himself to breathe more slowly, he waited as the pain and panic subsided to a more bearable level.

Then he closed his shaking hands into fists.

Right. They'd done this before.

And they'd do it again.

The kidnappers couldn't decide what to do about Jemma.

She sat on the cold floor of the truck, listening to her captors arguing about what they should do with her, her mind torn between two equal and opposite types of pain.

The first was in her knee, which blazed like a white-hot poker was being rammed beneath her kneecap. She couldn't bend her leg at all, and already the leg of her trousers was tightening uncomfortably as the joint swelled.

The second pain was in her heart, and was so distracting that at times she almost forgot about the knee.

She and Fitz had been together in the truck. The ride hadn't been long, and they'd leaned against each other even as one of their captors had duct taped their hands behind their backs.

Being together had made it bearable.

Which made it all the more awful when the truck had stopped and they'd grabbed Fitz—but held her back.

Fitz had fought. She'd heard him, his yelling muffled by the sack over his head as he struggled against their captors. There had been a confused scuffle of steps—a breathless oath from one of the kidnappers—and then a horrible thunk against the metal of the truck.

Then silence, broken only by her panicked cries, and a dull scraping as something heavy was dragged away.

From what she could guess, he had fallen or been tripped up, and hit his head.

And that scared her more than almost anything else.

Fitz had a history of traumatic brain damage, of psychic splits. And if he'd been struck hard enough to lose consciousness…

"Please," she tried again, pitching her voice loud enough to be heard over the argument. "I'm a doctor. Let me help him."

"Shaddup," one of the kidnappers snarled.

"You don't understand," she persisted, trying to keep the edge of fear out of her voice. "He's got a complicated history of traumatic brain injury. If he hit his head, he needs medical attention immediately."

Nobody answered for a minute. Jemma held her breath, praying wildly that they'd believe her.

"It couldn't hurt," one of the kidnappers eventually muttered in a low voice.

"We only meant to get him, though," the other kidnapper hissed back. "We weren't prepared for two."

"She's not an escape risk—she can't even walk." That one must be the driver. She didn't recognize his voice. "I say let her stay." He lowered his voice, but Jemma could still catch the words, "...can dump them both together."

She shivered reflexively, but didn't fight when rough hands grabbed her and lifted her from the floor of the truck.

If it got her closer to Fitz, then anything was worth it.

Fitz's hand was spasming.

It had been the weaker hand for years, ever since Ward had dropped him into the ocean and he'd struggled with hypoxia-induced brain damage. Years and years of physical therapy had slowly built back his strength and dexterity, but in times of emotional or physical stress it still tended to go out on him.

With an impatient exhale, he flattened the hand against the counter and massaged it with his good hand. Squinting, he tried yet again to read the labels on the chemicals in one of the large cupboards. If there was anything here strong enough to eat through the door or blow it off its hinges, he needed to find it—but his vision was blurry and the labels kept splitting into two or three images that danced in his aching brain.

And Jemma was out there, she was somewhere out there, and she was hurt, and he needed—needed—to get to her.

The door slammed open.

Fitz spun around, snatching up the nearest object—a roll of tape—but before he could take even a single step forward, someone was shoved into the room, toppling to the floor as the door slammed behind them. The sound of the lock engaging echoed around the room, but Fitz didn't pay any attention, because the overwhelming rush of relief had turned his knees to water.

"Jemma!"

"Fitz?"

Scrambling across the floor, he reached her side, fumbling the sack off of her head. Her hair was fuzzy, strands of it pulled out of her ponytail and hanging in her face, and she was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.

For a long minute they could only hang onto each other, talking over each other almost desperately. He bit and tore at the tape around her wrists even as she tried to touch his face. Her fingers came away bloody, and for the first time Fitz realized his head was bleeding.

"Your head," she was saying, even as he hauled her into his arms and just held her. "Fitz, you're bleeding."

"Shut up," he mumbled into her hair. The room was spinning—he tightened his grip. Hugging her felt like finding a missing piece of himself. "Shut up. You're okay. I'm okay."

Eventually Fitz let go of her long enough for Jemma to tend to his head. She couldn't stand to get to the sink, so he filled a beaker with water and brought it to her. His earlier attempt to find something that would break the door down had yielded a first aid kit, and he brought that to her as well.

Fitz had a concussion. His pupils were very different sizes, and from the greenish tinge to his expression he was probably very nauseated, though he vehemently denied it. The enormous lump on his head was the clear cause, though Fitz couldn't remember how he'd got it. His memory of the truck was hazy at best.

He did remember that she'd been hurt though, and could barely sit still long enough for her to bandage his head.

"Your leg," he kept stammering, but she batted his shaking hands away.

"Dislocated patella," she answered gently each time, despite her increasing concern that he couldn't remember what she'd just said. "Likely a torn MPFL. I can't walk, Fitz."

The fabric of her trousers was beginning to get tight enough to cut off circulation in her foot. There was a small set of scissors in the first aid kit. It was an awkward angle for Jemma, and Fitz couldn't steady his hands, but between them they managed to slit the outside seam of her jeans to mid-thigh.

Jemma tried for twenty minutes to put the patella back in place, until her hands were quivering nearly as badly as Fitz's and she was sick with the pain. Sinking back with a groan, she grudgingly admitted defeat. There was too much swelling. She would have to wait.

"Find something to immobilize—oh, thanks," as Fitz produced the roll of tape and two or three long pieces of metal.

They had just finished securing the improvised brace when a hidden loudspeaker screeched. They both jumped violently, Fitz clapping his hands over his ears as he turned even greener than before.

"Leo Fitz," a voice said over the speakers. "We need your expertise."

Fitz gagged, moving a hand from his ear to clamp over his mouth in a desperate battle with his nausea. Jemma put a protective hand on his shoulder and answered for him. "What do you want?"

"Instructions and parameters are in the binder on the table," the voice continued. "If he completes the job within 48 hours we will release you both."

Jemma couldn't see the binder from her place on the floor, but Fitz dragged himself to his feet, fumbling for the edge of the table with one hand. Jemma noted with concern the way he groped for it even though his eyes were open—apparently his hand-eye coordination had been affected by the head injury.

It took an age before Fitz sank back down beside her, flipping the binder open. They stared at the first page for a moment, and then Fitz brought a shaking hand up to his eyes, bowing his head. The formulas and specifications danced a wild sarabande through his skull.

"Jemma," he rasped faintly. "I—I…"

Jemma snapped the binder shut and laid it aside. Then, with infinite care she put both arms around her husband, easing him down until his aching head rested in the crook of her shoulder.

"You should be ashamed of yourselves," she addressed the ceiling sternly. "Fitz is experiencing abrupt neuronal depolarization, release of excitatory neurotransmitters, and impaired axonal function, so either let us go, or back off and give him time to heal."

The speakers in the ceiling remained silent, but Jemma felt better for the outburst.

Against her shoulder, Fitz's head shifted. "I've got what?" he slurred wearily.

"A concussion," Jemma murmured tenderly into his hair. "Try to rest a little. I'll look through the binder."

She thought he fell asleep after a bit. Her knee was still hurting far too badly to even consider sleeping, so Jemma tugged the binder back into her lap and tried to forget the pain by reading it carefully.

It was mostly tech, she quickly realized—but she hadn't spent years at his side without plenty of it rubbing off on her. She understood what she was looking at.

And what she saw worried her.

Fitz woke up an unknown amount of time later. Their watches had been taken, so Jemma had no way of knowing how much time had passed, but it had been enough for her to have read through the binder.

"Here," Fitz mumbled, wincing as he looked at the binder. "Whazzit—wha…?"

Jemma walked him through it, murmuring the pertinent bits as he leaned against her, his eyes half closed. The further she got, the more still he became.

"Erm," he said when she finished. "That thing, that—it…"

Jemma nodded. She didn't need him to finish his sentence.

They couldn't build the thing.

Well, they could, but that wasn't the point. The point was that they could never let a thing like this fall into any hands outside those they trusted.

Fitz's fingers laced between hers in reassurance as they came to a mutual, silent understanding. Then, in a tone that was a little too chipper, he said "Well, let's see what they've got for us to work with," and staggered to his feet.

The lab was fairly basic, they discovered, and equipped with all the tools they would need. At one end was a little curtained alcove—a lavatory. A single cot was pushed close beside one end of the counter, and a cupboard beside the sink held a stack of granola bars.

There was a sink, but no cups. Apparently their captors though that drinking directly from the faucet or using one of the chemical beakers would be sufficient.

The trip from her place on the floor beside the door to the cot was an agonizing one for Jemma. Fitz half-carried her despite his own condition. Gasping, she settled onto the cot (which was admittedly far more comfortable than the cold floor), and leaned against the counter.

"Let's get started then," she said, and they both pretended her voice wasn't wobbling.

They worked in near silence for the rest of the day, focusing on the parts of the design that were the least sensitive, the parts that any old tech could complete without trouble. There was little need for words, except when Jemma quietly read the labels that Fitz couldn't see, or when he drifted and she had to remind him where they were and what was happening. They were too tense and too much in pain for their customary banter or back-and-forth, unsure just how much their captors could hear.

Untold hours into their captivity, the lights snapped off, plunging them into total darkness.

It caught them unprepared, and Jemma froze. Then Fitz's groping hand found hers, and they clutched each other with almost feverish relief. The cot was barely big enough for two and there was no blanket, but they made it work, cuddling close on the taut canvas, mutually cautious lest they jostle Jemma's knee or Fitz's pounding head.

And now, at last, they could talk. They conversed in whispers, lips grazing each others' ears in an attempt not to be overheard. No matter what escape idea they came up with, they always ended up circling back to the same conclusion they'd wordlessly come to during the day.

It was clear to them both that their lives might actually be in the balance here. There was nothing for their captors to gain by releasing them once they'd made the weapon, and everything to gain by keeping them prisoner or simply removing them from the picture altogether.

And sure, Daisy and Daniel were certainly looking for them right now, but that didn't change the fact that nobody knew where they were.

Ultimately, it came down to what they chose to do.

"You're sure we can do this," Jemma breathed into her husband's ear at last, and felt him nod ever so slightly.

"Yeah," he whispered. "If you're with me."

"Always," she responded simply, and squeezed his hand.

When the morning came, they would be ready.

The lights snapped back on six hours after cutting out. Fitz yelped, burying his light-sensitive eyes into Jemma's shoulder. The bandage around his head was bloody, and Jemma felt as though her knee was three times its original size.

After a brief break to wash up and rebandage Fitz's head, and a halfhearted attempt to down two of the truly ghastly granola bars, they set to work with a renewed determination.

Fitz was clearly still hurting badly, and his coordination was miles off, but he was thinking more clearly than he had the day before. Jemma silently held the tools for him, assembling some of the more detailed components when his hand shook too badly to do the work. When she wasn't actively helping him, she began measuring out some of the cleaning chemicals they found below the sink.

The loudspeaker crackled. "The job doesn't require those chemicals."

Fitz didn't even look up. "No, I need them," he snapped. "Look at this lab; it's a total disaster. Jemma's cleaning up the space so you don't get dust in your precious components."

Jemma held her breath, but the loudspeaker stayed silent. Apparently they were satisfied with his excuse, because nothing happened when she reached for the chemicals again.

By noon, Fitz was pale and shaking badly. Jemma made him lie down on the narrow cot beside her and laid her cardigan over his eyes to give him the darkness he needed so much.

He only got a few minutes of rest. The loudspeaker crackled again, and Fitz startled awake. Jemma jumped—her knee panged viciously, pain radiating from her ankle to her hip.

"You're not here to take naps. Wake up!"

The hours stretched out endlessly. Twice the loudspeaker cut in again to find fault with the components Fitz was building—both times to point out that they didn't look like the designs.

Fitz, blinking with unfocused eyes, didn't even try to keep his temper.

"They're better than your designs," he stammered fiercely, pressing one hand against his eyes. His Scottish accent was stronger than ever, if slightly slurred with pain and weariness. "Yours are flawed. You know who I am, and you dragged me into this. If you want a working prototype, then let me do my job."

And hazy as he was, it must have done the trick.

By the time Fitz slid the last piece into place, Jemma estimated they only had a hour or two left before the lights would snap off for the night. The desk was still covered with half-finished components, but they were just for show.

The necessary work was complete.

Fitz took a deep breath and looked across at her.

Jemma bit her lip and then nodded.

They hadn't discussed the next part much. Fitz was hurting badly, and his coordination was still miles off. As for Jemma, she couldn't even make it from the cot to the little curtained washroom without hanging onto the counter and hopping on her good leg.

But it was the only chance they had.

Moving carefully, Jemma levered herself up off the cot and inched across the lab while Fitz occupied himself at their work area. It took her nearly five minutes to get into position. Once there, Jemma took a deep breath and then slid down the wall to the floor, sheltering behind the refrigeration unit—the only thing separating her from the door.

Then she caught Fitz's eye, and nodded.

It was all the signal he needed.

Sweeping up one of the partially-completed components, Fitz swung and leveled it at the door. With his free hand he twisted together two, three wires.

If he'd been anybody else, if he'd built the components the way the blueprints had called for, this would have been completely harmless. This part of the device was made to emit signals, nothing else.

But he was Leopold Fitz, and the component in his hand was nothing like the deliberately useless ones spread out across the counter.

A blue light lit up the room—and then an explosion that blinded them both.

Almost before she could see again, Jemma was shoving herself out of her hiding space, reaching through the smoke toward where she'd last seen Fitz.

"Fitz!" she shouted, barely able to hear her own voice above the ringing in her ears—the explosion had been much bigger than either had expected. "Fitz!"

Her groping hand collided with fabric, and then Fitz was there, tugging her arm around his shoulders. He dragged her to her feet, but then hesitated, swaying badly.

He was completely disoriented, Jemma realized. Between the concussion and the noise and the smoke, he probably had no idea where he was.

"Left," she panted. "Turn left."

Together they got through the remnants of the door, Fitz half-carrying her even as Jemma directed him. Beyond the door was a long, windowless hall. A neon green EXIT sign glared from one end.

Apparently even criminal organizations had to follow fire safety laws.

They were only perhaps four steps down the hall—Jemma hopping, Fitz staggering—when the building's alarms began to go off.

"That's done it," Fitz gasped. When Jemma looked sideways at him, she saw his eyes were screwed tightly shut. The shrieking fire alarms and flashing lights weren't doing him any favors. "Which way?"

"Keep going straight," Jemma gasped.

They were halfway down the endless hall when a shout came from behind, coupled with pounding footsteps. Jemma fumbled in her cardigan pocket with her free hand, and then threw them both off balance as she twisted around to face their three captors, hurling the little bundle she'd hidden in her pocket into their faces. The catch came loose, and a hiss of noxious gas accompanied the sound of the three bodies hitting the floor.

Cleaning chemicals could be dangerously potent when combined by someone who knew what they were doing. She could only hope they'd got enough of a dose to keep them down while the two of them made their escape.

"Hurry," she tried to hiss, but it came out as a half-sob. Every step was accompanied by pain so intense it felt like she'd be ripped in two. At this point, she thought hazily, it might be less painful to leave the entire leg standing in a corner somewhere.

Fitz's eyes were open again, but he was reeling badly and steered them both into a wall. She knew that confused look on his face all too well—he was seeing double at least.

"Close your eyes," she gasped between gritted teeth. "I can see—I'll guide you out."

It felt like a small lifetime of pain and confusion by the time they stumbled out the door and into what appeared to be a storage room of some kind.

No, not a storage room—some sort of stockroom. The place was fairly jammed with stacks of Christmas decorations and toys. In the distance, beneath the whooping fire alarm, they could hear a version of "I Heard The Bells on Christmas Day" that was oddly recognizable.

Had they actually been held captive in the mall all this time?

She'd meant to guide them both to a hiding place behind a stack of boxes, but Fitz's feet tangled in something laying across the ground, and then they were falling together into a sea of tinsel. Fitz clutched at her, doing his best to break her fall, but the impact with the ground still sent a stabbing agony through her leg.

On the other side of the door they heard footsteps again. Jemma was out of breath, but with the last of her strength she swung a hand upward. The mountain of oversized plush monkeys above them wavered and then toppled to slide down over them in a soft, fluffy wave. She had no idea if they were sufficiently covered or not, but by that point it barely mattered.

They had done their level best to escape.

The rest was up to luck.

The door crashed open. Footsteps raced past them, further into the stockroom, where another distant door was slammed open and shut. Another set of footsteps passed more slowly.

Neither Fitz nor Jemma dared move. Her knee was pounding, and she knew his head had to be half killing him with the pain, but they lay quiet as mice, arms tight around each other. For the moment it was enough to lie still, and hurt, and wait for things to settle down.

It took an age for the steps to pass. Even when they seemed to be gone, the two remained curled together, straining their ears for the echo of the distant door to tell them their captors had gone out.

At long last, Fitz moved. Sitting up slowly, he shoved a few of the oversized monkey toys away. A few strands of tinsel were stuck in his hair; Jemma grinned a little wearily at the sight.

Then she sobered. Sure, the euphoria of escaping the lab thrummed almost as strongly in her veins as the pain in her knee, but they weren't out of the woods yet. Neither one could run far.

"Phone," she ordered briefly. "Should be…"

Fitz tipped his head back, squinting painfully at the cables on the ceiling, strung along the exposed beams.

"Got it," he interrupted her.

Even with an eye on the cables, he lost his way two or three times crossing the stockroom to get to the opposite wall. The whole reason for his search kept floating in and out of his head, which was concerning even to him.

The phone was set into the wall. It took precious minutes for Fitz to dredge up a number out of his head, and two tries to get his trembling fingers to dial the number. Gritting his teeth against the pain and frustration, Fitz clenched his fingers into a fist in an attempt to steady them. He'd always hated the feeling of his body and mind betraying him.

The stockroom revolved in a slow circle around him. Distantly he thought he heard footsteps again. There was nowhere to hide, so he simply let his legs fold and sank to the floor, sinking into the meager shelter offered by a low pile of cardboard boxes, hanging onto the telephone receiver even as the cord stretched.

"Come on, pick up, pick up," he breathed inaudibly as the phone rang in his ear.

And then—Daniel's tinny voice. "Hello?"

Fitz never knew what he whispered into the phone, but apparently it was enough. Ten achingly long minutes later, they heard the distant door on the other side of the stockroom fly open with a crash. And then Daniel was there, and a white-faced Daisy, and Fitz could only grin and hope it wasn't all a welcome hallucination before the world spun out of focus and he was drifting once more.

When he came to, it was to find himself in a white hospital room. The throbbing in his head had receded, and a brief exploration revealed that the bandage around his head had been changed and an IV was hooked into his arm.

Probably to rehydrate him, he realized. And judging from the fuzzy, floating feeling, it included something to help with the pain.

"Jemma?" he croaked, and then made a face at the sound of his voice.

Something shifted beside the bed. Fitz turned his head to see Daniel in a chair, a paperback open in one hand.

"You awake?" Daniel asked, and then in response to the question probably painted clearly across Fitz's face, he added, "Jemma's safe, by the way. She's in surgery. Daisy's waiting for her, and Alya's with Jemma's parents."

The surge of relief nearly swamped him. Fitz let his head drop back to the pillow. "Good, good," he muttered.

He didn't even notice when his eyes slid shut.

When Fitz opened his eyes again, Daisy had replaced Daniel in the chair, and a doctor was bustling around the room.

As he'd known, Fitz had a concussion. He was also apparently suffering from low blood sugar and mild dehydration, thanks to the two days of captivity. He'd need time to heal and medication to reduce the swelling, but the white-coated woman who delivered the diagnosis assured him that with sufficient rest the effects of the concussion should wear off, and he likely wouldn't suffer any long-term effects.

After the doctor left, Fitz turned his head to find Daisy looking at him.

"Alya?" he managed.

Daisy smiled a bit wanly. "She's fine," she assured him. "When we realized what had happened we took her to Jemma's parents for a 'sleepover.'" She made air quotes with her fingers at the word. "We've been looking for you ever since. Who knew those psychos had a secret lab built in the basement of the mall? Setting off the fire alarm was brilliant by the way—we heard it over your call and were able to call dispatch and find out which store had the alarms set off. They're all in jail now."

Fitz nodded blearily. The whole fire alarm thing had been a completely unintentional side effect of blowing the door open, but he wasn't about to say so. Instead, he braced himself and slowly worked to a sitting position. "Jemma?"

Daisy's smile turned warmer. "She's gonna be fine. She's out of surgery," she said—and that sounded familiar. Had Daniel told him the same thing? Fitz couldn't remember. He thought laboriously over the conundrum for a minute until he realized Daisy was still talking. Fitz struggled to fix his drifting thoughts back on his friend.

"Would you like to go see her?" she repeated patiently—probably for the fourth or fifth time.

"Yeah," Fitz managed. "Yeah."

The world was still too wobbly for safe navigation, and the stuff they were giving him in the IV wasn't helping, but Daisy found a wheelchair and helped him into it, tugging the IV after them as she wheeled him down the hall. Fitz was pretty sure the white-coated doctor would have a fit if she knew what he was doing, and was just as sure that he didn't care.

He just needed to be with Jemma.

Her room wasn't actually all that far from his. Fitz blew out a breath of relief when he finally saw her, fast asleep in a hospital bed. She was clearly still sedated from the surgery, and his vision was still too blurry to read the monitor beside her bed, but there was color in her cheeks and that was enough for him.

She would be okay.

Daisy saw the tension leave her friend's shoulders in a rush when he caught sight of Jemma. Carefully she navigated Fitz's wheelchair close beside the bed so he could reach out and take Jemma's hand.

There was something just so right about the two of them together.

A sound from the doorway made Daisy turn. Daniel was there, waving his hand to get her attention.

"Doctor's coming," he whispered. "Need me to head her off?"

Daisy shook her head. "I'll do it," she answered, crossing the room and closing the door behind her to give Fitzsimmons a moment of privacy.

Jemma blinked groggily awake, confused and chilly from the sedation. The first thing she saw was the door—and the second was Fitz's face. His head was freshly bandaged. There was color in his face, and he was smiling.

"Hey," he said softly.

She squeezed the hand she found in hers. "Hey."

"They've put your knee back together," Fitz continued. "Some doctor will probably come in a minute to talk your ear off about what you're supposed to do with it."

"Mmm." Jemma blinked and had to struggle to get her eyes open again. "Alya?"

"Safe," he promised, his eyes warming in the way they always did when he spoke of their daughter. "She's safe."

The pull of the sedation was too strong, and Jemma let her eyelids slide shut. "Love you," she murmured, and felt his hand squeeze hers in response.

"Love you too," he answered, his low voice the last thing she heard before sleep overtook her.

It took longer than Daisy had expected to convince the doctor that Fitz and Simmons needed to be in the same recovery room, but Daisy never believed in taking "no" for an answer, and Daniel could be disarmingly reasonable when he wanted to be. Between the two of them, they talked the doctor around until at last the woman grudgingly agreed.

"As long as they let each other rest," the doctor insisted.

Daisy simply smiled. "They're more likely to rest if they're together," she said truthfully. "But my boyfriend and I will take turns sitting with them to make sure they behave themselves."

Once the doctor had retreated to inform the nurses about the change, Daisy leaned her shoulder into Daniel's. "We should get back to them," she said. "We need to tell them we found their stuff in the parking lot." She grinned. "Trust Fitz to find a monkey bigger than Alya."

As it turned out, the news would have to wait. When Daisy opened the door to the hospital room again, she found Fitzsimmons fast asleep, still holding hands. Fitz had leaned forward in his wheelchair until his head was beside Jemma's on the pillow.

They were both smiling.

Daisy felt Daniel come up behind her, his shoulder solid behind hers.

"There's something inevitable about them, isn't there?" he mused.

Daisy found herself smiling as well. "Yes," she agreed, and found Daniel's hand with her own, squeezing it. "They're unstoppable."

Author's Note: Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to nerdyduckrants from your Fitzsimmons Secret Santa! Thanks for the fun prompts and great suggestions! This was actually my first time writing a Fitzsimmons story, so it was fun to branch out and work with this couple we all care about so much. Your prompts were "hurt/comfort, secret dating, kidnapped"—so I went with two out of three.
Best wishes for a great holiday!

Disclaimer: While Fitz's symptoms are all possible symptoms for a concussion, I am not a medical professional and I'm sure I got stuff wrong. Also, in a rare (for me) move, I didn't go overboard with the research due to the short timeline. So just take it with a grain of salt, okay thanks.