Hey guys! I'm back with another overdue update! I think the reason I'm having such trouble continuing this story, is because I had started binge-watching Criminal Minds and I'm obsessed with it right now. I MAY have watched 12 out of 14 of the seasons in a month heh heh heh...

I feel like sometimes when I'm writing this I start to write Fitz' character more like a similar character from Criminal Minds— Reid (my other precious cinnamon roll next to Fitz) for those of you who also watch the show— so I end up having to re-write some of the scenes.

Also, the timeline of the plot is a little off, like they're giving the Gravitonium to Deke, but it's a little while before anything after that goes down, just so I have room for this side story.

Anyways, thanks so much for all of the wonderful comments, I wouldn't have the motivation to continue without them. So just for you guys, here's an EXTRA long chapter (1000 words more than usual)!

Enjoy!

"Children are gifts. They are not ours for the breaking. They are ours for the making."

― Dan Pearce

Part IV

Fitz slides to the edge of the bed in the quiet room with apprehension. He's been doing nothing but resting for the last few days and its driving him mad. He leans to the side and reaches for the heart monitor, shutting it off as to not set off alarms once he removes the wires. He peels the small pads off of his chest and grabs the rail of the bed with a renewed purpose.

He stands with some difficulty, before searing bursts of pain stab at his stomach with each small step he takes. Sweat gathers on his skin from the effort of exerting his stiff muscles. He observes with satisfaction that each step is easier than the last... that is until his knee decides not to carry his weight any longer and folds underneath him, causing him— and his head— to smack onto the cold, merciless tile. He slams his hand down in frustration. He moves to sit up, reaching up to touch the lump forming on the back of his head, but vision blots out suddenly. He blinks rapidly to clear the darkness, his head swimming. He suddenly feels cold and panic grips him. The air he breathes feels thick in his lungs.

He lies down flat on his back to try and alleviate the unsettling feeling. Gripping at his hair, he pleads with himself and his defective body to stop blacking out.

How valuable am I if I can barely stand?

He loses the battle, eyelids drifting shut and arms falling to the floor as unconsciousness overtakes him.

He awakens a few minutes later, relieved that no one was present for his accident, but spots, to his chagrin, a large reddish bruise forming on his elbow where he tried to catch his fall. He slowly gets onto his hands and knees, muscles aching from being idle for that short period of time. Reaching over to the bed, he pulls himself up to his feet, staggering. Now onto the next line of duty: changing out of his hospital gown.

The Scotsman slowly sneaks through the halls undetected until he reaches his room for a quick change. He grabs a dark navy button-up shirt— one of his only remaining non-bloodstained garments— and a pair of black trousers. Dressing takes him longer than he's willing to admit, at around ten minutes. After his endeavor with the clothing, he sets off for the lab.

oOo

Jemma has always considered herself a relatively organized person. She has a place for everything and tries to keep everything in its place. She normally doesn't have any problems with her things being moved since everyone respects her possessions and her organized equipment in the lab. Everything usually stays where she puts it.

Except for her husband, apparently. Who is, at the moment, nowhere to be found.

She huffs in exasperation as she stares at the empty bed in the hospital wing. She kicks herself for not expecting it at this point. Time to stop Fitz from almost getting himself killed for the second day in a row. And she knew exactly where he would be. She confirms her suspicions when she enters the lab to see Fitz transferring the tube of Gravitonium into a safety capsule.

He looks no better than death warmed over.

Deke— who is also present— is oddly quiet, which is an unexpected shift compared to his usual hyperactive behavior.

"You look tired," Deke voices Jemma's thoughts, oddly subdued and obviously feeling as if he's walking on eggshells.

"Yeah, thanks. I couldn't tell. That's probably the exhaustion. Oh, and it also could be the blood loss." Fitz replies sarcastically; his headache pounding, sharp and heavy.

"Jeez. Someone's cranky..." Deke mutters.

He huffs in frustration before his expression changes to one of relief when he registers Simmons' presence. The younger man strides over to her and leans close to her ear so only they can hear what he's saying.

"Is he okay?" He whispers, " 'Cause I don't want to disappear just because he doesn't like to take breaks."

She internally rolls her eyes at the vast understatement.

"He'll be fine." She says, more for convincing herself than him. 'At least he still has a good amount hydromorphone in his system to help with any pain.' She thinks to herself to assuage a small portion of her worry.

"Is he always like this when he's hurt?"

"More or less." Jemma moves towards the containment module where Fitz is hunched over, squinting and tapping on a tablet intensely. She places her hand gently on his back, feeling him flinch slightly before the muscles of his back tense up under her fingers. He turns his head and gives her a tired smile. Remembering that Deke was still in the room he snaps up and grabs the capsule to be delivered. Jemma doesn't miss the small wince he gives when snapping up straight so quickly.

"Now, you need to be extremely careful with this. Gravtonium is too volatile and unpredictable to just throw around haphazardly." Fitz states, and hands the capsule over to Deke apprehensively.

"Of course. I got this," Deke responds, tossing the tube from one hand to another.

"No- oKAY—maybe I should just take it to the Zephyr myself—" Fitz reaches forward quickly preparing to catch the Gravitonium should it fall, but has to stop and catch himself on the module cube when a jab of pain lances through his abdomen. Jemma notices immediately with worry, but Deke doesn't seem to catch it.

"Oh quit it. Relax, Gramps. I've been carrying this stuff on my belt for years. Besides— didn't you guys made a pledge to stay by each other's side?" Fitz knows where Deke is going with this and closes his eyes with annoyance. "You need to do that. You know, for the good of humanity and all that."

Fitz rolls his eyes at the obvious self-serving motives behind his words. He does not have the energy or patience to deal with this kid right now. He's already dealing with one headache; Deke is another. Jemma catches his jaw muscle tighten. He slams his hand on the surface next to him.

"You—"

Jemma intervenes by leading Deke around the corner, and toward the exit by the shoulders.

"Okay! I appreciate how invested you are in our future, but for now, let's worry about the future of the planet." She gives him a gentle shove and he exits the lab. She watches the doorway for a few moments before turning on her heels and facing the direction she came from, but still out of sight. Her brows furrow in confusion when she sees Fitz' reflection on a blank monitor screen. He's holding himself up on the module heavily with one arm, and the other is wrapped around his ribs. She quickly comes around the corner again, but he must have heard her return because she finds him back to his normal posture.

Stubborn idiot.

"You should go rest. You did your part, now let me do mine as your doctor."

He glances up at her with those irresistible blue eyes, looking so... raw. Back when they had first joined the team, He had been so innocent and bright. Even after she had come back from being undercover, he still had that spark. For a second, she wonders what exact moment that innocence was broken away. He's endured too much to count. He looks back down and nods, and she spots the pinched expression on his face.

"Oh, do you need more pain medication? If you're still in pain I could give it to you early."

"No— I'm okay. I can still feel it working substantially, I mean." He gives her a tight smile. She eyes him critically for a moment before conceding.

"Alright, well if you start to feel anything just let me... know..." She trails off as she notices that Fitz is just staring blankly at the wall behind her.

"...Fitz?"

His eyes flutter and for a moment she's afraid he's going to pass out, but he blinks and peers around the room. His eyes land on her worried, anticipating expression, and he realizes that she must've said something.

"Sorry... what?"

"Are you alright? You were just staring off into space..."

"Oh, I guess I was just lost in thought. We should probably uh, get the Gravitonium ready."

Jemma stands in shocked silence. Deep down, a little niggling voice in her says its all the symptoms of an absence seizure, but the thought is suppressed almost as soon as it occurs. He hasn't had a seizure since the hypoxia. 'He's probably just tired. Plus, the medication can make your mind a little jumbled.'

"We already gave it to Deke, remember?" She urges. He looks confused for a moment before pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Right. Sorry."

"It's alright. It's most likely the medication."

"Yeah... You're probably right. I'm gonna go rest for a bit." Fitz says, with no actual intention of resting.

oOo

His intentions and his actions didn't work out. Fitz is jolted from his impromptu nap as his chin slips from the hand he was supporting it with, spilling the coffee still in his other hand in the process. He hadn't meant to doze off, but sitting at a desk in a silent room staring at a piece of paper after being exhausted mentally and physically, can cause one to drift. He must not have been out of it too long, because the coffee was still scalding hot and currently burning his skin. He was originally in the mood for tea, but it doesn't seem to have been thought of when the Lighthouse was stocked. Coffee has more caffeine anyways, which he needs direly.

Swearing, he shakes his hand to dislodge the sepia liquid. He had holed himself at a desk in one of the many huge storage rooms trying to memorize the Lighthouse's layout via the blueprints, that are now covered with coffee stains. Thankfully, it's just a copy. He doesn't need to ruin anything else important. His whole body aches and his mind is screaming for sleep. The lengthy list of the effects caused by sleep deprivation run through his head unwittingly— mood swings, irritability, high blood pressure, paranoia, nausea, memory loss, depression, migraines, hallucinations, seizures, suicidal th—

Stop.

He blocks it out. He doesn't need any other hindrances right now. He already has to deal with the wound on his abdomen, not to mention the possible concussion from his earlier fall. He presses his palms against his eyes to try and abate the building pressure in his head.

"You're a mess."

He spins around at the sudden voice. He expects to see himself again, but to his shock, it's Alistair Fitz standing right in front of him. He gets up from the chair quickly as urges of obedience resurface. Painful memories from two lives come streaming to the front of his mind. He thought that seeing the Doctor would be bad... but this is so, so, much worse. A chill runs through him as the blood drains from his face.

"You're not real... You're just a hallucination. A delusion caused by exhaustion, and head injury..." He mutters to himself.

"Is that what you've been telling yourself?" His father inquires. The sound of his deep, rasping voice alone sends stabs of fear into Fitz' chest. "You always did have an overactive imagination."

"You died— No— you left." Fitz corrects.

"Now, why would I do that? If I would've left you with that pathetic excuse for a mother, you would be just as soft as her. She was a coward who couldn't discipline her own son properly. I had to teach her almost as much as I did you, a child."

Fitz clenches his teeth at the mention of his mother. He knows all too well what Alistair means by 'teach'. It wasn't as bad in real life as it had been in the Framework, but it was still there.

"What you did was cruel."

"Oh, so you've grown soft now too? I thought I taught you how to be strong! I thought you understood that!"

Fitz flinches at the sudden change of tone, his body trembling.

"You taught me to be a murderer." Fitz states.

"I didn't make you kill anyone. You were second in command at Hydra, not me." He responds, tone dropping back to unsettlingly calm. "Everything else we did was for the good of the people. The Inhumans needed to be studied so we could learn how to apprehend them if they decided to come against us."

"They were people too. It's— it's not right..."

Alistair rolls his eyes at Fitz' insolence and takes a step forward, causing his son to back away.

"Am I going to have to teach you how to be a man again?"

"This isn't real..." He near-whispers, backing up until he hits a wall.

"Oh... I'm very real, boy." Alistair crows antagonistically, staring at his son like a lion stalking a cornered gazelle.

This all seems too real.

'So did the Doctor, but he was all in your head too...' His mind supplements.

His hands are flat against the concrete wall behind him as he presses himself as close to the wall as he can, wishing with all of his being that he had the power to phase through objects. His breaths quicken as his heart speeds up to an insurmountable rate.

"This... this has to be a dream... This isn't real..." He stammers shakily, "I don't— Please..." He begs, his fear overwhelming his ability to fight back. As Alistair steps forward again, Fitz snaps up his shaking arms defensively to block any oncoming attacks.

"Look at you... quivering like a child." The older man sneers with disgust. "Do you know how much work I did to get you a good life?!" He surges forward grabbing Fitz' thin shoulders with a bone-crushing grip.

"Without me, you would be nothing! An idiot and a coward!" He punctuates each hurtful word with a violent shake to Fitz' frame. Both men's eyes are wide, one with rage, the other with terror. The elder Fitz slams the younger into the concrete wall cracking his head in the same spot as before. Fitz squeezes his eyes shut in pain as his vision bleats out with spots of white and black simultaneously. "There's no hope for you. I should just end it before you do anything else you'll regret." Alistair strikes his fist into his son's face, re-breaking his healing nose, and throws him to the side viciously, causing him to slide on the floor a few feet.

This isn't real

Fitz tries to drag himself up, he knows he should be using his training, fighting back, but a voice in his head tells him he deserves it. Deserves the pain. Deserves to be punished. Those thoughts are drowned out by the pain from a swift kick to his stomach, slamming into the edge of his stapled incision. Two more kicks to his bruised, screaming ribs have him curled in on himself trying to protect himself as much as possible. His attempts are futile, he realizes, as he receives one more kick to the head, making his already muddled brain turn half-delirious. Fitz drags himself across the floor as much as his arms allow, coughing out a glob of blood. Alistair's shadow looms overhead, causing Fitz to cower once again.

This isn't real

"I should've known that you would defect. You're no better than the rest of these SHIELD scum. You disgust me." Alistair veers out, but Fitz barely hears him over the pounding in his head. Fitz screams as Alistair viciously steps on his hand, crushing the bones under his heavy weight. He unfurls Fitz by kicking him in the side to roll him on his back.

This isn't real

Getting down to straddle Fitz, he raises his right arm and strikes the boy again, head whipping to the side with a grunt and a splatter of blood. He joins his left hand with his right on his son's throat and smashes his head on the cement for the third time today. Alistair squeezes relentlessly, cutting off his son's air and blood flow.

This... isn't...

Being only half coherent already, his brain gives up and he loses consciousness.

oOo

Daisy didn't really know what she was doing. She hasn't had the motivation to really do anything since Fitz' incident. Deep down, she knows she's wrong. That it's petty to refuse him the chance to earn forgiveness, but she's not going to admit that... Not out loud at least. She just got back from digging up her mother's grave and is wandering the halls, trying to find something to keep her occupied until someone needs her. She comes to the end of the hall she's currently roaming, planning to turn on her heels and head to the kitchen for a snack, when she hears a voice she doesn't recognize coming from one of the storage wings. It could just be one of the new agents, but something feels... off. She couldn't make out what the voice said, but it sounded heated.

She moves slowly through the maze of shelves, trying to distinguish which direction the voice is coming from in the large echoing room. As she gets closer, she's able to make out some of what the person is saying.

"You're no better than the rest of these SHIELD scum... You disgust me." The gravelly voice fumes.

What? Do they have a traitor?

The voice has a familiar accent. She hears the rustle of fabric and an agonized scream that's achingly familiar. She quickly moves in closer and is startled to hear the sound of something hitting flesh, liquid splattering, and a pained yelp. Breaking forward, she stumbles into a scene that leaves her shocked. Alistair Fitz on top of their Fitz, choking the life out of him. Fitz chokes and sputters, blood bubbling and leaking from his mouth as his legs kick out from under his father to try and dislodge the larger man to no avail. Only when Fitz' movements slow does Daisy snap out of her stupor.

She lifts her hand and quakes the wretched man off of her friend. The man flies into the wall and disappears in a puff of black smoke. Daisy takes a moment to try and process what she just witnessed.

She had only seen Alistair once before in the Framework, but she was pretty sure that was him.

I thought everything from the fear dimension was gone for good...? Did he remove her inhibitor for nothing? Or is it residual? And why would he be attacking Fitz?

Broken from her ponderings, she remembers Fitz and decides to finish that thought later. She turns around and sees that young man isn't there. The only thing left in his previous spot being the many spatters of blood.

"Fitz?" She calls out, getting no answer.

She moves to the end of the shelves and peers down both ends of the aisle, before noticing the trembling form huddled in a corner next to some shelves, cradling his broken hand. She's never seen Fitz this terrified in all the time she's known him. She stalks closer slowly, fearing she might frighten him even more. He only sees her shadow looming over him and he cowers, whispering something to himself. She can't make any of it out, so she moves closer.

"This isn't real, it's all in your head wake up thisisntrealpleasewakeup—"

For a moment she thinks he's having another mental break, but she inspects the rest of him closer. She can't see much of his face, or torso, so she goes off what she can see. The brown curls on the back of his head are matted with blood which seems to be stemming from multiple places on his head. No wonder he's so freaked out. With all those hits to the head, he probably can't see straight, let alone think properly.

She needs to see the rest of the damage to make sure there's nothing life-threatening, but it's not gonna be easy.

"Hey... You're okay..." She extends her hand to lightly touch his shoulder. He tenses and tries to curl up tighter— which doesn't seem possible at the moment.

"I'm s-sorry, Father. I'll be good now I prom-promise—" He whimpers heartbreakingly. Daisy has a sinking feeling that this isn't the first time he's said those words. She never even dreamt his childhood was... this. Maybe it was just in the Framework, but even so.

Pity and remorse accumulate in her stomach. The only thing Aida changed was making his father stay. If this is what he was like in the real world too...

She cringes. When she met Fitz, he seemed so innocent. So kind. Nothing like Grant Ward. He and Ward may have had similar childhoods... but they turned out nothing alike. Now that she thinks about it with new clarity... Fitz has always been apprehensive around strong male figures that he isn't close to.

She realizes now, how much she's taken Fitz for granted. How much she takes the surprising amount of compassion he has left, for granted. He may be broken, and he may have made some mistakes, but it was nowhere near the full betrayal Ward had done to them.

She also realizes how wrong she's been.

If anyone deserves forgiveness, after everything that has happened, its Fitz. She returns her gaze to the young man in front of her. He's still shaking with delirious anticipation.

"Fitz..." Her voice cracks slightly with emotion. "Fitz, it's me..."

"I'm sorry—" He stutters.

"Hey, hey, it's okay..."

Fitz slowly lifts his head to look at her. Dry and wet blood, originating from his nose and mouth, cover his chin and part of his lips. His broken nose seems to still be bleeding. A small black bruise stretches from the inner corner of his eye, feathering outward a bit before fading back into normal skin tone, and his cheek dons a dark patch of red specks from burst blood vessels under the skin.

His eyes refuse to focus, and the pupils are twice their normal size. He apologizes again and his face crumples. She knows that even though he's not directly looking at her, he's apologizing for the inhibitor again. His lip curls and he chokes a sob, blood trickling from his mouth. She stares at the broken form in front of her as she tries not to cry herself.

The memory of Fitz' arms wrapped firmly around her on the floor of the quarantine cell flashes in her mind's eye. Fitz was there for her when she was at her lowest, so she's going to be here for him too.

She scoots closer to him and pulls him into her embrace. He stiffens at first, staying stock still other than the involuntary tremors and the hitches of breaths in his lungs. Then his posture melts and he wraps his arms around her tightly, tucking his head in her shoulder, clutching the fabric on her back desperately. He whispers apologies over and over again in the midst of his silent sobs, barely coherent enough to grasp what happened or what's going on.

"Shh, it's okay... I forgive you."

And it's true.

To be continued...

Aww, I almost cried while writing that last scene. I'm pretty satisfied with this chapter and I hope you guys enjoyed it. Tell me what you think, and if you think I should keep going? Or end it here?

I think I might have some more creative juices for this one. (I'm also open to any requests or suggestions of what you would like to see in this story if I do continue further.)

Edit 12/08/18: I am continuing the story for those of you who were wondering. The next chapter should be out soon!