Drabble 83: Verita Serum? No, but it's close.

A/N: Idea from ShipperKid.

Jemma looked at him with raised brows. "It's impossible."

"S.H.I.E.L.D. already has the basics of it down. We could make it work perfectly."

"Fitz, we can't make a perfect truth serum!"

He leaned back in his chair across the room and looked at her. "We can try."

Ah, those magic words that always managed to work on her. Not you can try, or it can be done, but wecan try, a promise to work together and not expect success. But however much those words made her want to start right away, she had to reason through it.

"S.H.I.E.L.D.'s truth serum is almost perfect. Ward may not admit it, but when Coulson used it on him interviewing Skye, at least some of his answers were because of it."

"But the fact that we don't know exactly how much, that's what makes it imperfect. We can develop a better serum that forces the person to be truthful when asked something. It just needs some tinkering."

Jemma bit her lip. He made a valid point. And it would be fun to try to make a real truth serum.

Fitz saw her start to smile and stood up, grinning. "I'll pull up the specs of the original serum."

"And I'll get a sample." Jemma said. She shook her head as she walked to get it from one of the many cabinets in their lab. This would be interesting, that was sure.

"How do we test it, though?"

"We should probably test it on ourselves first." She said. Then a thought crossed her mind. "Once we've tried it, we'll give it to the others,"

"Without them knowing," Fitz supplied,

"And see how they react." They finished.

The look that passed between the two scientists was more than curious. It was downright mischievous. And they liked it.

"What's your full name?"

"That doesn't seem like a very deep question."

"I'm leading up to it, Jemma."

She sighed. "Jemma Anne Simmons."

"Good. Do you like homework?"

"Absolutely." She shook her head. "Fitz, something more personal! We need to know how effective our serum is."

He wrung his hands out, thinking, and then seemed to come up with something a little deeper. "Do you sleep with a special item? Like, something of great personal value?"

She wanted to say no, but her mouth couldn't seem to form the word. "Yes." She said. She was worried that the next question would ask her to specify, but it seemed she wasn't done speaking. "I have one of your old shirts from the Academy that I wear some nights."

She clapped a hand over her mouth in horror. Why had she said that? She looked at Fitz and saw a shocked look on his face, his lips tight. He obviously hadn't been expecting that.

"You… you wear my shirt… which one? When did you… get it?"

She heard the awkwardness in his voice and sighed. "Fitz, we spent nights together in the Academy. Before we got the offer to join this team, when I wasn't sure how often I was going to see you anymore, I couldn't bear the thought of leaving you behind! So the last time you spent the night, I hid your shirt in the morning." She put her head in her hands, groaning. "I didn't want to make things weird by telling you. I only wear it occasionally, when I need comfort or something familiar."

She stared at the ground from between her fingers, slightly mortified. She hadn't been able to stop talking. It hadn't even been like an irresistible urge to tell the truth. It had been compulsory. She couldn't lie, or omit anything.

"We've made verita serum." She said.

"Should I call J.K. Rowling?"

She glanced up and saw him looking at her with a half-smile, and her lips tugged up in a small smile in response. He came over and touched her arm. "Everyone's got little things like that, Jem."

"What are yours?"

"Oh, we don't need to go into that. Let's go test this on the others."

Jemma bit the inside of her lip. This wasn't over. But she wanted to see how her teammates would react to this serum.

They decided the first test subject should be someone who was usually honest and open, so they didn't get suspicious too quickly. They found Skye in the training room, working with a large bag. Jemma looked at Fitz with a smile. This would be perfect. She pulled out the mini water bottle they had mixed the serum with and walked up to Skye, who wiped her brow and smiled when she saw them.

"What's up guys?" she asked. "Wanna work out?"

Fitz chuckled. "Yeah, I don't think so."

"We wanted to get out of the lab for a few minutes." Jemma said. This was true. But she felt her mouth opening to say more, that they were running an experiment, and coughed to cover it up, glancing at Fitz and trying to tell him the serum was still working on her.

"Whoa, you okay?" Skye asked.

Jemma turned away, still coughing to try to keep from talking. "Fine." She managed.

"Maybe you should drink some water." Skye said with a gesture at the bottle she was holding.

"We actually got that for you." Fitz said. "Figured you'd be thirsty, working out."

Jemma took a few deep breaths, her composure returning. The need to say they were experimenting was gone finally. "There. See, I'm fine." She held out the bottle. "You go ahead. Count this as a break."

Skye looked between them with a funny expression but took the bottle, opening it and drinking half of it. Then she capped it and sighed. "You guys are doing an experiment, aren't you." she said flatly.

"Yes." Jemma said, at the same time as Fitz said "no." They looked at each other, and Jemma chuckled. "I've tested it too." She told Skye.

"What exactly is it?" Skye asked.

"A truth serum."

She shook her head. "I've got to stop trusting you two when you come in like that."

"It won't lead to any harm!" Fitz said. "Now, to test it." He thought for a second. "Do you like us?"

"Of course I do. You guys are like siblings."

A shocked expression crossed her features. "That stuff is freakishly effective. I can't even be sarcastic anymore? You guys su- are too good at this." She grimaced. "I can't even insult you! Why did you do this?"

"Science." Jemma said. She grinned at Fitz after she said it. "I think it's worn off!" she didn't feel like she had to say more. She wanted to, but she had choice again.

"I'm going to my room until mine wears off." Skye said.

Fitz held up a hand. "At least answer one more question. Do you have a crush on a certain specialist?"

Skye looked away, clenching her jaw, but Jemma could see the effort it was taking. She knew that feeling. "Maybe." Skye said, her jaw still locked.

Jemma saw Fitz's smile, but she also saw the absolute glare Skye was giving him. "You're not going to let us get away with this, are you?" she asked carefully.

Skye smiled thinly. "Absolutely not." Then she walked out.

Jemma looked at Fitz, who had lost his smile. "We did it for science!" he called after Skye. They waited, but she gave no response. Fitz looked at Jemma. "You're sure she couldn't have exaggerated?"

"Fitz, if Skye couldn't even use sarcasm with that serum, I doubt she could have exaggerated."

"I know." He said quietly. "It was just a little hope."

"If that's how Skye reacted, think how the others would be." Jemma said. "Coulson would be okay, but Ward…"

"He would toss out another of my sandwiches at the very least." Fitz muttered. His eyes widened. "Can you imagine if we'd gone through with our original primary subject?"

May. She met his eyes and shook her head. "Abort. We have to abort the experiment now."

"But didn't we put the other bottles in the fridge?" he asked.

They locked eyes for a second and raced to the kitchen, throwing open the door and counting the number of bottles. Jemma swallowed heavily. "There's one missing."

"Were these not for everyone?"

They turned as a unit to face May, holding up an empty bottle. "I wanted to make a muffler." Her eyes narrowed slightly, and Jemma realized May hadn't been planning on sharing that.

"Abort." Fitz whispered.

"What?" May asked.

Jemma grabbed Fitz's hand and ran from the room, as Fitz said "Abort!" louder. They dashed to the lab and sealed the door behind them, and Jemma looked at Fitz.

"We forgot to take the other bottles with us."

"We can't leave this lab again." She said. "Not today."

"Agreed." They looked at the remaining sample of the truth serum they had created.

"We should probably keep this to ourselves." Fitz said, mirroring Jemma's thoughts. "It's too powerful."

"Probably best if we forget all about it, actually." Jemma said.

Fitz nodded. "Consider it erased from memory."

"Of course I do still need to test it on you."

Fitz looked at her and took a step back. "Jemma, we've established that it works."

"I know." She said, smiling sweetly. She grabbed the sample and walked closer to him. "This isn't about science anymore. Now it's revenge."