Title: Can't Go Back
Author: Katie
Story Summary: This is a collection of non-chronological one shots about Ward's redemption. All happen in the same universe.
Spoilers: Season One
Ratings: PG
Pairing: SkyeWard
Authors Note: This will always be marked as complete since I don't know how many there will be. When I think of a story I want to write, I'll add it. If there is a story you want to see, let me know!
Distribution: Please! Just let me know.
Feedback: Please…Please!
Disclaimer: I don't own anything…at all…

19 Weeks, 6 Days, 23 Hours Since The Events At CyberTek.

Everyone reacts to Ward's presence on the Bus very differently. Simmons keeps as far away from the Cage as she possibly can at all times. Fitz's wants to go talk to Ward – and asks Coulson if he can just about every day – once Coulson let him go with Tripp to take Ward's lunch in and he'd talked to Ward happily for about twenty minutes before Tripp tugged him out. May and Tripp are constantly on edge, feeling as if they need to keep Ward from hurting anyone on board. Coulson…well Coulson is too wrapped up in everyone else's reactions to have the luxury of his own.

Skye…she has taken to watching him on the security monitors…a lot. Two days after his arrival he is provided with a shaving kit and she watches his beard come off; his clean face in combination with his still too long hair makes him look young.

Later that night, when he is given a new set of clothes to change in to, she watches him pull his shirt over his head to reveal an odd mix of purple and blue littering his torso, underneath it is a patchwork of scars (She'd asked Coulson about the bruise on his arm…it had been a Shield guard at the prison – she had to think these were the result of that same anger. Coulson had also told her that Garrett had hurt him; she won't allow herself to feel badly for him, even while looking at the scars. That's what she'll tell herself, anyway.) She doesn't care…she keeps saying it, hoping to convince herself.

She watches him sleep for a couple hours at a time – constantly jerked awake by nightmares she can't quite hear. He tries to shake them off when he wakes, looking around the room trying to bring himself back to reality while looking unaffected, though he can't know when or if anyone is watching him. He rolls his shoulders, as if giving in to his lack of sleep and moves into a work out routine.

She doesn't know why she does it; if she's looking for proof that he isn't the man she thought he was, or if she's looking for proof that he is. She knows it's unhealthy, and if she didn't, the team tells her often enough. She waves off their concerns, tells them that she's fine while knowing she's not. They let her though (at one point she hears Tripp telling Simmons that she has the right to cope however she wants).

She's not sure how much longer she can do this.