AN ~ Sorry for taking so long, I've been distracted by a number of other projects. How deadly is season 2 r/n oh the pain. Hopefully those of you who follow me on tumblr (theclaravoyant) have benefitted from this. Otherwise, feel free to check out my tumblr and retroactively benefit! On my home page I have a link to a page of all my AOS fanfiction - far more extensive than the collection here. Anyway, enjoy!

Chapter Eight - Feet on the Ground

"Okay." Coulson let his breath out in a huff, steeling himself. "You ready for this?" He tried to keep his tone light and full of bravado, to keep morale afloat in the rapidly darkening mood of the hangar. They'd had a few hours in the air to think about it, but being on the ground would be a whole other story.

Skye raised an eyebrow at Fitzsimmons. Fitz glanced back at her, grateful for her concern, but words were already hard enough. His heart was somewhere in his stomach being disintegrated. He was pretty sure he'd had a nightmare about this at some point. The case of DWARVES, who'd been born here, felt heavy in his hand.

Simmons turned her attention to Doctor Banner. He smiled reassuringly as he flipped the cover of his satchel over and lifted the bag onto his shoulder. He stepped close to her, until she offered a timid smile back. Simmons clung tighter to her own satchel. It had come from the Academy. It had travelled with her all this time. And here they were. She bit her lip and swallowed hard.

"Ready as we'll ever be," Skye summarised, on their behalves. She checked the pistol at her waist and stepped a little closer to them. Trip trailed behind her, and then Clint and Bobbi. All were lightly armed, just in case.

"Alright." Coulson nodded. "May?"

Coulson checked his own pistol as the ramp began to lower. May joined him a few moments later, solemn faced, and followed Fitz and Simmons out onto the charred landscape of one of SHIELD's greatest institutions.

At first there was nothing to be done but breathe through the horror. Charred papers, sometimes whole pages of books, fluttered around the black skeletons of buildings. Twisted glass spoke to the heat of the flames, an acrid smell its largely chemical fuel.

"Oh my God," Skye muttered, unable to resist the urge to crinkle her nose. If she didn't speak she was going to be sick. "D'you think they were still here?"

Fitz picked up a pen that had fallen on the walkway. It was a cheap ballpoint, easy to buy in bulk. It could have been anyone's.

Skye's heart sunk.

"It doesn't look like a bombing," Banner noted. "Not an aerial one, I mean."

"It looks like somebody walked through here with a giant blow torch, is what it looks like," Bobbi retorted. She ground her teeth together, not entirely certain that she wasn't going to pummel and electrocute the next person she saw who wasn't supposed to be there. She remembered how it felt when her colleagues had turned. How hard she'd had to fight to get out of there. What she'd had to do to keep herself safe and unsuspected. She wondered how much worse it could have been for students whose teachers had turned on them. Whose tutors and classmates had tried to kill them – or who had been killed.

But there were no bodies.

"Where is everyone?" Tony voiced the thought before Bobbi could. "Do you guys have a bomb shelter or something?"

"There's one under the oval," May said. "Another in administration, but that one's smaller."

"There's also the Boiler Room, isn't there?" Skye suggested. "If there wasn't time - and if it wasn't a bombing – some students might have gone there."

Fitz and Simmons nodded, a little listless but glad for the progress.

"Okay, good. Good." Tony scanned their surroundings. Good was most definitely a relative term, but he could work with it. "What about a chemical attack, anywhere safe from those?"

Fitz shrugged. "Most of the lecture theatres in um. In…um." He waved his hand.

"In biochemistry," Simmons filled in. "It's that way." She pointed across a quadrangle, to where a smooth, stone, round-fronted building had once joined the earth and sky. Now, on the one glass panel that remained intact – at least so far as she could see – a botched Hydra logo in red spray paint covered the imprinted SHIELD logo. Her breath caught, and she had to look away. Skye and Banner looked away from her, and the others took the hint, letting her have this moment to bite down the grief again and wipe away her tears.

"Jemma," Fitz whispered. "We're okay."

He touched her elbow gently. She turned at the contact, and smiled at him, a sad and broken but honest smile.

"Yeah," she said. "We're okay."

The moment passed, Fitzsimmons reappeared to the world.

"Are you sure you don't want to go back to the Bus?" Coulson offered. Simmons shook her head.

"I'd only wonder."

Fitz nodded in agreement.

"Okay. Let's split this thing up then. We're looking for survivors, and any hint as to where they might have gone. If we can figure out what happened here, that's good too. Anything…else…we'll take back with us if we can, and send it home."

Nods ran around the circle.

"Skye, May, Bobbi, you go through Admin. Check the shelters, check the safes, check any computer you can break into. I wanna know what happened here, I wanna know who turned and I wanna know what they took.

"Banner, Clint and Fitzsimmons - check the dorms. Again, safes, computers – if anyone posted about this or took pictures, I want them. Take a look in the Boiler Room. Be careful. No one goes anywhere alone. Radio in anything you find.

"Trip, Tony, you're with me. We're going to Biochem."

Another round of nodding heads. The group split quietly, fully aware that burn-out buildings might not be the worst things they saw today and unable to pretend otherwise any longer.

"No point thinking the worst until it shakes your hand," Trip murmured. But even he was having a hard time keeping his chin up this time. He looked back at Fitzsimmons, who were practically huddled between Banner and Barton. Fitz moved his arm as if to put it around Simmons' shoulders, but decided against it. He still had that pen between his fingers. Trip remembered how it felt when he'd found out about Garrett. The dizziness, the nightmares, the insurmountable anger at how he could ever have so deeply trusted somebody like that. Hydra had done a lot more to Fitzsimmons than they'd ever done to him. He had to marvel at their strength, but at the same time, he had to wonder how long they were going to last.

"Trip," Coulson's voice distracted him. "Come on, we're moving out."