Hello everyone! I'm so so so so sorry that I haven't updated until now, life has been super hectic but now most of that stuff is done so I should be able to (hopefully) upload the last two chapters within weeks of eachother as originally promised
This chapter is supposed to take place after episode 1x06 "FZZT" which was the episode that made me change from "oh they're such sweet friends and it'd be kinda cute if they were together, I could maybe ship it" to "OMG I WILL GO DOWN WITH THIS SHIP" so obviously it was impact to my view on these two and therefore it gets a chapter (:
Thanks to all of you who've been reading, you are all amazing beautiful tropical fishes.
Again I sadly do not own any of these characters
Reviews are love and will get you a virtual persimmon ;)
It's a week after Simmons almost died. Exactly seven days after what Fitz would forever consider the worst hours of his life. She's still shaken, he can tell by the way she jumps every time a piece of equipment zaps, and flinches if she, or anyone else, gets shocked.
He wants to put her at ease, but he's not sure how. Both of them knew that signing up for fieldwork was dangerous, but even after they tried apprehending Mike Petersen and blew a hole in the Bus, neither had danced so close to death until now. It was a life changing experience and they're both still unsure of how to react, so they don't.
They go about life as they did before, working side-by-side in the lab, hardly talking because they know each other so well. Sometimes Fitz makes jokes that she shakes her head at disapprovingly, but thinks are funny just this same. Life seems normal.
It isn't.
He can't pretend that he doesn't see the dark bags under her eyes that mean she is getting the exact same amount of sleep he is (none). He can't fake that he doesn't know why she's not getting sleep. It's the same reason he isn't; every time he closes his eyes he sees her fall out of that plane, except with worse results. Every night he wakes up screaming her name, and he can't shake the dreams. He can tell it's the same for her.
As he watches her day-by-day, he tries to think of a way to take her mind off of it, at least for a little while. His ideas are countless, but none of them are plausible (there's no way that he can get them a Tardis or arrange a meeting with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle or Albert Einstein) and if they are, they wouldn't help much. That is until, on that seventh day, he sees her carefully picking the peel off of an orange while they silently eat lunch together.
He smiles delightedly as the idea hits him. Immediately he jumps up and sprints to Coulson's office, ignoring Jemma's confused voice calling after him, "Fitz? What in the world…?"
"Sir!" he gasps when he bursts into Coulson's office. Agent Coulson swiftly mutes the screen on his wall, which he's using to talk to someone. Fitz barely registers Agents Barton and Romanoff on the screen, looking confused as well as amused. If he hadn't been so mentally preoccupied he would have fangirled over Strike-Team Delta. As it was, however, he didn't realize until later and would convey his disappointment to his partner in the months following.
"Fitz this is- " Coulson begins scolding him, but Fitz is too excited to listen.
"Sir, this is very important." he pants. Coulson looks at him attentively, no doubt expecting news of a scientific breakthrough or random calamity. Once he's absolutely sure he has his superior's undivided attention he continues, "How fast can you get us to Georgia?"
Merely five hours later they have gone to Georgia, Fitz has collected what he needed, and they're back in the air. Two hours after that he exits the small kitchen in the back of the Bus wearing a frilly apron and a broad smile, holding a steaming, orange-colored pie in gloved hands.
Fitz makes his way to his and Jemma's lab as quickly as he can without dropping the newly made pastry on the floor. Even though it's late, Jemma is sitting at one of the tables, feverishly writing down whatever findings she's getting from a microscope. There's a slight popping sound when he accidentally bumps a table and causes an instrument on it to emit sparks. At the sound Jemma jumps terribly, reinforcing why Fitz made the pie in the first place.
"Where have you been?" she asks him, obviously irritated by his absence, "I thought we were going to work on the DWARF drones today, but apparently not, since you decided to disappear on me."
"I-I well, I thought… I mean I wanted to…" Fitz is so taken aback by her anger that he can't string words together coherently, "I… I baked you a pie." he sheepishly holds up the object in question.
"Why." it's a statement rather than a question.
"because I thought you might like it…?" he tries, not wanting to tell her the real reason.
She gives him a long measuring look before sighing, "Fine, cut me a piece, I'm starving."
Fitz grins at her before setting the pie on his desk and using the knife he'd stored in his apron to cut her a large piece of his creation. She hands him a plate that she took from a drawer in his desk and he carefully places the slice on it.
"Thank you." she says, picking up the plate. He hands her a fork that he had also put in his apron, and watches eagerly as she takes a bite. Her eyebrows raise in surprise as she chews, and he can't tell whether it's a good or bad surprised.
"Well?"
She blinks a couple of times as she swallows, "That was… unexpected. I thought it would be pumpkin. What is it?"
He simply smiles, "Guess."
She thinks for a moment, looking utterly confused. Realization finally dawns on her and she looks ready to slap herself in the forehead because the answer is so obvious, "It's a persimmons pie, isn't it."
"Yep."
"Oh, silly Fitz." she mutters shaking her head, "It's really good, thank you."
For a moment he sees that the shadow of her ordeal has lifted. For a moment she's smiling with her eyes again. For a moment she doesn't look haunted. The effect of the persimmons pie doesn't last for more than a day, but it begins the recovery process far better than anything else had.