A/N: Hey guys! I can't believe how quickly time is passing now. It's already almost March! I see one, maybe two more chapters in this story. Things are winding down now, but there's still some surprises to come... so keep reading! Tell me what you think of this chapter!

Jemma wet a paper towel and gently wiped of Fitz's face. There was a bit of dried blood on the side of his mouth, and he had landed in dust. They were back at the base, in a secure room. May and Hunter had walked with her, Fury, and Coulson as they brought Fitz here, and then they'd locked him in place. He was in a cell like Ward's, but Coulson had taken the added precaution of locking his arms in front of him with thick metal bands. He'd told Simmons she had until he started to wake up before she needed to leave. And he was stirring, his eyelids fluttering.

She placed a hand on his cheek and then turned and walked out of the range of the cage. Coulson and Skye stood on the other side of the room, and as soon as she was free Coulson pressed the button that activated the barrier.

"How long have you been here?" she asked.

"A few minutes." Skye said. "How is he?"

Jemma glanced at him. "Nothing's broken. In fact, he's probably perfectly fine by now. He only collapsed because of the number of hard hits in such a short time, to such vulnerable places."

Skye kept her gaze on Fitz, her expression solemn.

"I'm proud of you." Coulson said. "Both of you. It's because of you that we got him back."

Then Fitz groaned and started to sit up. He looked at Coulson, Jemma, and Skye and narrowed his eyes. "Where are we?" he asked.

"The Playground." Coulson said.

Fitz stood and walked a few steps closer, then put his locked hands on the invisible wall. "I know this." He said.

"That's right." Jemma said. "You know this place. And you know us."

"What do you remember?" Coulson asked gently.

"Everything's fuzzy." Fitz said. "I see flashes, but nothing's concrete." He looked at Jemma. "Except you."

She met his gaze and smiled.

"I still don't remember you fully, but I know you're important to me. I couldn't let anything happen to you."

"Do you know what happened to you?" Skye asked.

"No." he said.

"That narrows it down." She said under her breath. But she smiled. "We want you to try to remember as much as you can."

"We'll help you fill in the pieces." Coulson said.

"That could take awhile." Fitz said, raising an eyebrow skeptically.

Coulson walked toward the stairs and pulled out folding chairs. "We've got time." He said. "I want you back to normal."

Fitz studied him. "You're a good person." He said slowly. He looked at all of them. "I think you all are."

Coulson nodded, looking pleased. "Maybe they messed with your memories, but inside you're still Fitz. Let's start at the beginning." He looked at Jemma expectantly. "I imagine you have a lot a say."

"Quite a lot." She said. She sat down on one of the folding chairs after moving it closer to Fitz and crossed her legs, folding her hands on her lap. "I've known you for a long time." She said, locking eyes with him. "I'm closer to you than just about anyone else, excluding parents."

"When we first met, I considered you my greatest rival. You were always there, in classes and competitions, pushing me to work my hardest. You were the brightest person I'd ever met. Before I knew it we weren't so much enemies as friends, and as we made this transition, I realized how similar we were. We bonded in a way I never have with another person." She blushed. "I was never very good at making and keeping friends. Until you, that is. And you told me you felt the same way."

"You're engineering, I'm bio-chem." She said. "You love monkeys, and have always wanted one. I still don't know exactly why, but there you go. Your favorite sandwich is prosciutto, buffalo, and mozzarella, with just a hint of-."

"Pesto aioli." He finished.

A small smile lit up her features. "Yes." She said. "Exactly."

"You're very protective of your friends and family. You've saved my life a few times over. And you always doubt your own strength, though you shouldn't. You're one of the strongest people I know."

As she spoke, memories seemed to swirl in his mind, as if in a river waiting to flood. They lurked just out of reach in his subconscious, tickling his consciousness with an infuriating persistence but avoiding his grip whenever he tried to capture them. He listened with the greatest level of attention he could, and his eyes rarely left her while she spoke. At times when she needed to collect her thoughts, Coulson spoke, informing him of his official records with S.H.I.E.L.D.

Jemma's knowledge seemed inexhaustible. She spent ten minutes talking about how they used to watch Doctor Who after late studying. It had to be two hours before she really slowed, though Fitz knew she had more to say. She just didn't want to say everything at once.

So Skye spoke. "When I came onto the Bus, I wasn't part of S.H.I.E.L.D." she said. "I didn't trust anyone involved in it. But you and Jemma were different. You weren't the typical agents I expected." She looked past him for a moment, reliving it. "None of you were the people I expected." She murmured. "You're so quirky and smart and… Fitz. And you and Jemma are perfect together. You have this connection that I noticed immediately but couldn't understand until I got to know you. Now I know it's because you two are the same. You complement each other. I think that's part of why I joined this team." She said. Her tone had dropped. Fitz could tell she had never shared this with anyone. "I figured if you two could be like that, maybe S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn't so bad. Maybe I could be a part of it. And you took me in right away, trusted me before you should have. I don't think anyone else would have done that."

There was silence in the room after she finished, and she stood and walked to the door, her arms crossed in front of her. But she didn't leave.

"I didn't know that." Jemma said.

"Me either." Skye said. "I just sort of realized it now."

"Well I'm glad." Coulson said. "We need all the good memories and thoughts we can get right now." He looked at Fitz. "Anything coming back?"

Fitz wasn't looking at him. He barely heard him, in fact. The dam finally broke. The river finally rushed free, his memories incredibly jumbled and mixed, but there. They were damaged, but there. He exhaled and felt himself start to smile, and then a laugh escaped him. He looked up at the others, saw their worried expressions at his laughter. "It's all coming back." He said. He felt so happy at the sudden ability to recall his memories that he felt tears prick at his eyes. He didn't even care that they were there.

"Fitz, are you sure?" Coulson asked. "You remember everything?"

He stood up, still smiling. "No, but it's all here." He said. "Jumbled up, but if I concentrate I can sort through it. Everything."

"Fitz, that's fantastic!" Jemma cried.

"I can't believe it happened that fast!" Skye exclaimed.

Coulson walked up to Fitz, still separated from everyone else by the invisible barrier of the cell. "What do you think of HYDRA now?"

Fitz didn't hesitate. "What I thought of it before all this started. It's evil. When Doc and Archie told me I was working for HYRDRA, my mind was like an empty slate. I didn't remember it as being a bad thing. I was never brainwashed into loving it, though my brain certainly dealt with a lot. I just worked for what I was told to."

Coulson studied him for a few more seconds and then nodded, relief evident in his face as he pressed the button that sent down the invisible wall. "Welcome back." He said, reaching out his hands and unlocking the restraints on Fitz's arms.

Fitz shook his hands out once they were freed. "Thank you sir."

Coulson nodded once more and backed up. "I can't clear you for anything, but I can let you get back into a normal routine. We'll have a doctor come and do a psych evaluation, just so the record's straight, and then we'll be set."

He walked up the stairs. Fitz walked over to Skye and Jemma and smiled. "It's weird how weird this feels, isn't it?" he asked.

Skye shook her head. "No way. You had your memories stolen from you and your body… buffed, and now you're back but still changed. It makes sense." She blinked. "I think."

He looked down at himself. "I forgot about that for a minute." He clenched his fist and then released it, watching his arm muscles work. "What do you think of it?"

They were quiet. "It doesn't matter what we think." Jemma said.

"I want to have my old body back." He said.

Skye grinned. "Good."

Jemma looked at her in shock, but Skye's smile didn't waver. "What?" she said. "He made up his mind, and then I said what we were both thinking."

Jemma spoke quickly. "We like your body now, of course, but it doesn't seem as… you." She met his eyes and then blushed and darted her eyes to the floor.

Fitz chuckled. "I feel the same way." He thought for a second. "And I think I know how to make the transition."

"How?" Jemma asked.

"Time." He said simply. He watched their reactions as they waited for him to elaborate, and after relishing in their hanging on his words, he did. "Doc couldn't recreate the original super soldier serum, though he came really close. The only thing he couldn't replicate was the longevity of it. He said I would need it every so often, or it would lose effect."

"Seriously?" Skye asked. "That's awesome!"

Fitz nodded. "It's a waiting game now."

"Maybe we can speed along the process." Jemma said. "If you want to."

"Maybe." Fitz said. He looked between the two of them, smiling and shaking his head from side to side slowly. "For now I just want to relax."