Summary:
Hive's back! But Ward is back, too!
Comments are greatly appreciated: please, let me know what you think!
Chapter:
At that point all faded away and he found himself standing by his dead body once more.
He kneeled and entered it.
He was surprised: that body was still warm, and tough, and strong, and harmonious, but so, so heavy! He felt like he entered in a soft armour that was pressing him on all sides. It wasn't unpleasant, because he felt a strong sense of familiarity, but the speed, the immediacy, the lightness, the instantaneity of his previous state was something else!
He was still adjusting to the familiar sensation, tuning on his senses to the outside world, his hearing to the silence, his touch to the feeling of sand and rocks under his body, his sight to the bluish light on the planet… when he saw it: a tentacle, right in front of his nose!
A tentacle was approaching his face, menacing, ugly, slimy… and it was getting nearer and nearer… what the hell was it doing?
And then he felt the tentacle insinuating and entering in his mouth and pushing, pushing inside, entering his throat, forcing his epiglottitis, and going down both in his lungs and in his stomach, and from there down in his intestines.
He felt violated, ashamed of that thorough intrusion, then he started choking, his lungs filled by thousands of mini-tentacles that prevented him from breathing.
And then with his eyes he saw a lot of other tentacles approaching: but this time an entire body was coming. It was a monster, horrible, with semi-human features: It had legs and arms and a head, and a torso, but it was like Its grey skin was swarming, as it was composed of millions of particles.
It was cold like ice, like a snake far from any source of heat. And then It grabbed his head in an iron grip with both of Its pseudo-hands and penetrated his skull, his eyes, and his neck, like melting in them.
The pain he suffered then was excruciating, but his screams were mute: it was like his brain was exploding, pierced by a million of white hot long pins, and his head in the meantime was filled by an huge amount of memories, starting thousands of years ago, when the world was primitive, and then on and on, during the flow of history.
He felt like all Its particles were melting his body, fusing with it, legs, and arms, and everything else.
The creature overwhelmed him completely: It took everything from him and placed firmly Itself inside, leaving almost no space for him.
He ended up feeling like an intruder in his own body!
Then he felt his body moving potently, standing up and sprinting towards the portal, that was still open: he realized that everything he experienced before (the flow of life, the falling, Hell, Satan, the angel, the doors, God), happened in no time. So it was true: time didn't exist without materiality.
Running at a neck breaking speed he managed to arrive to the portal an instant before it closed, and he hurled into it.
He found himself on the castle floor, with all the walls shaking and falling down in debris, dust and smoke filling the air: Shield was bombarding the facility and he felt the creature inside him panicking and struggling to find an exit before it was too late.
He found it and sprinted towards it, finding quickly the outside field, and then he ran and ran and ran, till he reached the near wood to hide in it. His body was trembling, shaking for the superhuman effort. They were safe by the skin of his teeth!
And It managed to come back to Earth, after thousand of years! They managed to come back to Earth! Ward couldn't distinguish his own happiness from Its. But Ward's was tainted by a deep anxiety… This creature was the most dangerous threat Earth ever faced!
Then something happened: he felt a strange sensation, like himself expanding, magnifying, beyond his body boundaries. He was swallowing all the surroundings, growing wider and wider, spreading around… and up. He felt up above the presence of a huge plane and inside it a crowd of people. Yes: they were them!
Hive knew them through Ward's memories… most of them, at least: Jemma, May, Fitz, Coulson, Skye… and she was embraced and kissed by that blond guy he saw once…
Ward felt a jolt of jealousy… what the hell was him? And why did she cut her hair? He liked her long hair, a lot… it was so feminine… how many times he had imagined to put his fingers in her hair and comb it! Definitely this tomboy cut didn't suit her.
In all of that, the strangest thing was that he could feel their thoughts. He could feel Jemma's sorrow for some loss he couldn't individuate, May's fondness for Coulson, Fitz's both regret and relief, Skye relaxing in the blonde's arms, but not completely, keeping a little detached…
But the strongest feeling was Coulson's: he was broken.
He could see what he was thinking and all he saw was the image of himself while he was crushing him. He could feel that hate and that want to kill and that powerful sensation in squeezing life outside a body and then fear, terror:
"What have I done? What have I become? I'm not better than him! I became a monster! A monster!"
Ward felt himself thinking all of it, but in parallel it was like he could perceive Hive's thoughts: he felt how It was cataloguing all the people, pinning down their names and their emotions, for future use.
Then he felt Hive's disinterest: It was descending from above on the ground, searching something around. It was like It was swarming nearby to find something else. That plane and its people were useless, now, for surviving. Instead It felt the presence of so many soldiers in the vicinity, and among them there was him: Malick.
It accessed to Ward's memories and immediately knew It had to reach him. It knew Malick entire life's goal was to bring Itself back, so he was the right choice.
It felt Malick's disappointment, and rage, and his sense of loss: he was thinking he would never reach his objective and that he lost any possibility to open another portal.
"No, Gideon, you're wrong. I'm here. I've returned.
And now it is time to show you what true power really is."