The after effects of the truth serum (even with just a small dose) was still enough enough to knock Agent Ward out for three hours. It might of been the strain he put on his body from resisting the extremely potent drug, but it wore him out.
(And when Coulson found him in the cell room face-down on the desk drooling in his sleep, he couldn't help but snicker at the young specialist's predicament.)
Apparently, Skye and Coulson got along swimmingly, because she gave him their target, Mike Peterson's, name. They went after him immediately.
By the time Grant regained his consciousness, Agent Coulson was informing him that their asset was being held hostage. Another after effect of the truth serum was that it left Ward disoriented, and upon the first few minutes of his consciousness, Grant was stumbling around the bus in a drunken hurry as he strapped on his tactical gear.
(He might of admitted to Coulson that he wished he'd stayed in Tahiti. By the time Grant sobered up, Agent May and Agent Coulson were watching him with amused looks on their faces.
He wanted to tell them not to give him that look- a civilian shouldn't of been on the field in the first place, he had every right to be worried.)
Coulson didn't speak to Grant until they were on their way to rescue their 'asset'.
"You managed to convince her to lead us to Mike Peterson. Good job."
Grant let out a grunt in response, knowing that his superior was trying to tease him. Ward released the mag on his pistol, checking over his weapons calmly.
He also knew that Coulson was disappointed with the way that he handled Skye during her interrogation. Still, Ward refused to apologize. He wasn't going to forget the fact that she was a member of the Rising Tide. And he wasn't going to be tricked by the girl just because she was pretty.
"You should of got rid of her out the minute she stepped out of that cell." Ward told the higher ranking agent in a gruff tone.
Coulson lifted an eyebrow at the Specialist who was checking his weapons across from him. That wasn't the response that Phil had been expecting. He'd assumed there would be a lot more yelling and frowning on Grant's part, with endless complaints on how Coulson left him to fend for himself with truth serum in his systen.
But again, it was all about the girl.
Coulson pressed his lips together with a knowing smile, "Skye knows what she's doing."
Grant snapped the mag shut, resisting the urge to scoff.
(She doesn't know anything.)
...
...
Coulson told Ward to only take the shot if he had to.
The minute he saw that super-soldier-enhanced raging maniac dragging Skye by her arm- if Fitz hadn't- Ward wasn't sure-
..There was something begging him to take that shot.
And Ward has always had a little bit of darkness inside of him, but there has always been a line that he knew better then to cross while acting as Agent Grant Ward.
Mike Peterson wasn't beyond hope, he didn't deserve to be sniped right between his eyes- but Grant could do it right now. There was something in him that was just begging to tear the man who handled her so roughly apart.
Skye.
He watched with cold eyes as she struggled against Mike through the scope of his rifle. He slowly switched his aim towards Peterson, who was digging his fingers into her shoulders and shouting at her angrily.
Fitz (or Simmons, whichever one it was that made the weapons- he honestly didn't know, nor care) handed Ward a, what he called, 'night night' gun.
Ward quickly took the shot, knocking the target unconscious with the much less lethal weapon.
Peterson would live.
(But his instincts had screamed at him to protect her.
He wasnt sure why.)
"Skye? That girl's not qualified to be a Shield agent," Grant said, his tone incredulous when he heard the news of what Coulson was planning for the little hacker who somehow managed to talk her way onto the bus.
"Agreed. That's why I've invited her on as a consultant. Shield does it all the time, technically Stark is a consultant." Coulson defended easily.
"Technically, Skye's a member of the Rising Tide. She hacked our RSA Implementations," Grant argued. He hated the way Agent Coulson looked at him from the corner of his eye and smirked, as if he knew things Grant was unaware of.
It pissed him off.
"Twice. From her van. With a laptop. Imagine what she can do with our resources?"
"I am. That is exactly what I'm imagining during this frown." Ward retorted dryly. "You brought me on for risk assessment? She's a risk. She doesn't think like us-"
"Exactly." Coulson cut him off with a mysterious smile. "Your frown is noted, however."
"Officially, it's an airborne mobile command station. But we call it the bus. We find it best used for shorthand field missions. Everything has to be just so, you know? Because of the danger."
It was Fitz who was droning on, trying to impress the new girl while carrying all of her belongings (which, embarrassingly enough, could only fit in a normal sized box) as he lead her towards her bunk.
She didn't look too impressed, "Yeah, I've been here before. When Agent Ward threw a bag over my head. Nice guy, that one." Skye eyed the bus in wonder, now that she could see it without a blindfold over her eyes.
Simmons, the biochem scientist, let out a nervous laugh as she snagged a water bottle off of the counter top. "Oh, and we are so, so sorry about that. Water?"
Skye shrugged her shoulders with indifference, not really caring as she took the bottle of water and twisted it open, taking a sip. "Thanks," She said, and she followed them up the twisted stairs and towards the bunks.
It was hard for Grant to concentrate when he was so aware of her presence on the bus.
It agitated him, but he'd long since come to terms with the fact that he would either need to play nice with the new Shield consultant, or forever fear being drugged with truth serum when Agent Coulson wanted to prove a point.
Agent Ward knocked on the wall of her bunker, and when Skye peeked her head out to greet him warmly, he tossed the emergency pamphlet to her chest and told her coldly, "You might want to read that. This isn't like other planes."
He walked away, satisfied by the frown on her face.
Good. She shouldn't be here.
They had a mission at some archaeological site in Peru about an 0-8-4 sighting.
An 0-8-4 is bad enough. But Grant wasn't sure how Coulson expected him to protect two untrained scientists and a civilian on the field. They were attacked by rebels, and Grant grateful that the smartest thing Coulson has done so far yet was pull the Calvary out of retirement.
He managed to pack the 0-8-4 up despite Fitz's protests, swinging the duffel bag onto the panicking scientist back and pushing him towards the entrance of the temple.
"Stay close," Ward commanded his trio of untrained agents, gripping his pistol, and rolling out of the cave first.
He took down the two rebels that were in the bushes, and there were another three heading towards them. Grant quickly shot at their kneecaps before gesturing for his team to duck back inside of the temple for shelter from the incoming bullets.
Ward paused, making sure Skye and FitzSimmons were down before pulling out a metal rod, rolling down the steps of the temple, and detonated the electric shockwave, knocking all of the rebels off of their feet. He quickly turned back to the temple and gestured for the team to follow him while the rebels were knocked down.
And again, the best thing Coulson has ever done this far is bring the Calvary back in action, because Ward didn't notice the rebel at his nine o'clock.
Thankfully, Melinda May pulled up with her jeep, shielding them from the incoming spray of bullets.
Now she was definitely a sight for sore eyes.
"Everybody, in, now!" Ward pulled the backseat door open before hopping in shotgun. FitzSimmons stumbled in, Fitz (or was he Simmons?) struggling to keep the 0-8-4 steady. Skye boarded in last, and May stepped on the gas to slam the door shut.
When May pulled the SUV up the ramp of the bus, she hopped out of the car and began marching over to the cockpit.
"Ramp!" May commanded to Ward before disappearing.
"Already on it," He reassured her, heading towards the controls. FitzSimmons had already hit the ground and they were crawling to the corner of the bus where they won't be sprayed by incoming bullets thank you very much, and Skye was marching up the ramp like there wasn't four loaded cars filled with trigger happy rebels chasing after them at this very moment.
"What are you doing?! Coulson is still out there!" Skye shouted at Agent Ward, horrified at the thought of leaving without Coulson.
Grant pulled the lever to the ramp, before whipping his head towards Skye, who was looking at him with so much fear and anger. Grant snarled, because she had no right to be angry, she wasn't even supposed to be here. This was dangerous, and she had no idea what she was doing. At least FitzSimmons had enough common sense to hit the ground and get out of the line of fire.
Agent Ward's grip was tight as he clutched onto Skye's shoulder with bruising strength, pinning her against the wall of the bus. She was frightened at first, the impact had knocked the wind out of her, and she began to dig her fingers into the sleeves of his leather jacket, trying to break free from his grip.
"What are you doing?" Grant exploded back at her, seething with anger.
Skye relaxed her arms once she realized he was worried.
And not just about her, Skye noticed. He's been protecting her and FitzSimmon's ever since he heard the first gunshot. It was just hard for her to keep up- she wasn't prepared for this- Coulson said her job was just to throw the public off track.
(A.K.A., doing the number one thing she hated most in the world.)
"You're standing right in the line of fire!" Grant yelled at her angrily before shoving her to the floor.
Skye hit the ground hard, stunned as she watched Agent Ward load his pistol and begin to walk down the ramp, snapping at her,
"Can you just try not to get in my way, Skye?"
Skye watched with wide eyes as Ward headed down the ramp. She heard the sound of two cars pulling up, and then there were gunshots before some more cars came screeching to a halt. She felt her heart tug, because she could hear the soldiers footsteps crunching as they approached the bus. They were going to board and any minute and the only defense they had was Ward and she didn't even know how to fire a gun-
(This was happening. This was really happening.
And to think that just ten hours ago, the most exciting thing that's ever happened to her was finding out that truth serum was a real thing.)
She crawled closer to FitzSimmons, who were just as frightened as she was.
And she was in the way. Ward saved her life, and he told her she was in the way. Like it was her fault that she's a normal person who can't keep their cool when they hear the sound of a gunshots. Like it's her fault she was- she was scared.
But he was right though, Skye realized as Agent Ward returned back up the ramp with Coulson and his guest.
She was in the way.
"I gotta say it," Skye announced breathlessly as Coulson's friend and her soldiers boarded the bus. "I miss my van."
...
The team was sullen to say in the least. The mood was tense throughout the bus, and Ward was sitting at the bar reading one of the books Garrett gave him for his downtime. It was hard to concentrate on Matterhorn's tale of fighting your way to freedom when he could feel her. She was here, on the plane.
Grant let out his third sigh in the past hour, flipping the page of his book as he sipped his second (single) shot of whiskey. He usually didn't drink this much, especially not when there were armed soldiers who are clearly hiding something in his vincinity.
But Grant could feel her in her bunk, moping, probably upset with how roughly he treated her earlier. Okay, definitely upset with him.
He just hoped this was an eye-opener for her to realize that this wasn't fun and games. She didn't belong here, at Shield, on the bus, hanging with Coulson.
She needed to pack her bags, get back in her van, and leave.
Ward finished his shot of whiskey.
He didn't even want to think about the reasons why he felt this strongly for her. He wasn't going to even entertain the thought.
Grant could feel her approaching before she'd even left her bunker.
What he wasn't expecting, however, was the bottle of Peruvian whiskey she must of somehow snagged. It appears he wasn't the only one drinking tonight. Skye propped her shoulder against the wall, smiling at him as she wiggled her bottle of liquor at him suggestively.
"Hunger Games?" She assumed, nodding her head towards his book.
"Matterhorn," Grant corrected dryly, not expecting her to be familiar with the story. "It's one of the hundreds of books my SO gave me that I'm.. just getting around to." He explained, not lifting his gaze from his spot in the story.
It was strange, having her stare at him like that. So oblivious to how she affected him.
Wide, brown, inviting eyes. Just begging for his approval.
She looked confused, as if everything that just came out of his mouth threw her off. Grant's eyebrow raised even higher as he held his place in his book, finally giving Skye his attention.
"S.O? Supervising Officer?"
"Riiight.." She said, and he swears he could almost feel her embarrassment as she shifted nervously on the balls of her feet. "Hackers have their own lingo, ya know?" She said, clearing her throat defensively. "A-hem. No worries though. I'll pick up yours too. I feel like you and me? Wrong foot."
Grant snorted, because he considered being drugged and forced to answer ridiculous fucking questions ("Do you treat all women that you find beautiful women this way, or am I just the lucky duck?") as much more than getting off on the wrong foot.
Not waiting for an invitation, because Skye was pretty sure it wasn't hard wired into the T1000's system to invite a girl for a drink, she made her way over to Agent Ward and sat in the stool right next to him. He sucked in a sharp breath of air from his nose, hoping his discomfort to their close proximity wasn't noticeable.
If Skye noticed Agent Ward's unease, she did a good job at ignoring it, and Skye threw back her shot of whiskey without a care in the world. Grant brought his glass to his mouth, wetting his lips with the whiskey as he pretended to take a sip, before setting the glass back down.
Grant shot Skye a skeptical look as she already started pouring herself another shot. "Been at it for a while now?"
"Oh, not as long as whatever you're thinking." Skye rolled her eyes as she settled in the seat next to him. He was such a stiff ass, but he did save her life. He saved hers, and FitzSimmon's lives. She didn't want him to be angry with her. "I just figured you'd be drinking, too. Thought, why not throw em back together?"
Grant paused, glancing at Skye with an unamused look on his face.
"You figured I'd be drinking?"
He never drank on the job. He hasn't in a while, but tonight he needed something to rid his head of the irrational thoughts that kept popping into his mind.
Skye shrugged her shoulders and admitted to Agent Ward bashfully, "Because of me?"
This made Grant freeze. His gaze slipped towards the two foreign soldiers who were playing checkers, still nursing the same double shot of whiskey they've been drinking since they boarded the bus. They were no doubt listening, and he had no idea where Skye was going with this.
(Could she- could she feel, like he could? How he felt for her, like he could feel her emotions? Could she-?)
"What makes you say that?" He asked slowly, his monotonous tone not revealing the sudden skip in his heartbeat.
Did she know what she was doing to him?
Did she realize that, even without the truth serum, he had the dangerous urge to open himself up to her? And urge to open for her physically, to slide her into his lap and bury his head in the crook of her neck and just give in to the-
Skye shrugged, cutting Grant from his thoughts. She swirled the ice around in her glass.
"You were right, I was all over the place today. I was just in the way. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know what Coulson wants from me, here."
The tension in Grant's shoulders relaxed.
(She wasn't fazed by him in the least. Not like how he was with her.)
(And he was disgusted by the crash of disappointment that sunk into his gut.)
"I don't know what Coulson wants from you, either." Grant said easily now that he had control of the conversation once again. "Frankly, I've been against this from the start."
"Oh, I have no doubt that you were, big guy." Skye muttered into her cup sarcastically as she finished half of her double shot.
She bet he did just brush her off when Coulson suggested her. Because she wasn't strong enough, like him. Because she wasn't smart enough, like FitzSimmons.
(She could do important things too..!)
Grant literally felt her disappointment crash upon him like waves against a rock. He glanced down at her while she finished her shot. She did a good job at trying to hide it, but Skye desperately craved Agent Ward's approval, and it confused him.
What could she possibly want from him?
He didn't have anything to give.
(Garrett had made sure of that.)
"Listen," Grant told her gently, lowering his tone so that they wouldn't be overheard by the rebel soldiers who were pretending, and failing, to keep themselves occupied.
Skye peeked up at him from underneath her eyelashes as she finished the rest of her shot.
"I was trained to be the whole solution. I work alone, I watch my own back, I get the job done. Coulson- I don't know what he's thinking at times. Throwing not only two untrained agents in the field, but to bring along a civilian who we know nothing about? I don't know what he expects from me, but I can't focus on getting the job done if I have to babysit at the same time."
Skye made a face, deciding to ignore the fact that he was acting like she was some kind of trouble maker just because they couldn't find any records on her.
"I think Coulson believes that we all, someway, somehow, make a good team." The hacker explained to the agent, pouring herself one last shot.
"You heard what he said earlier, Fitz is literally a rocket scientist. Jemma has four different PhD's, and you speak six different languages. Not to mention, you're like, the perfect black suit government tool bag." She batted her eyes at him playfully, fingertips tugging on his sleeve of his shirt teasingly.
Grant's gaze darted to her small fingers which pinched the short sleeves of his shirt playfully, and then back to the soldiers who have been playing the same round of poker since they took refuge in the bus.
One of them looked like they were beginning to get nervous.
"Then there's me, and I'm here because-" Skye continued and then paused, clearing her throat as she remembered what Coulson told her before, 'If things go wrong, I need you to cover the incident up and throw everyone off'. "-I can make things go away, I guess."
Grant didn't miss the bitter smile that spread her lips. She shook her head, long brown hair tumbling over her shoulder as she continued, "The point is. I think he see's a little bit of potential in each of us. Like pieces of a puzzle. I think, Coulson believes, together we just click."
Ward took a drink of his shot for real this time- he needed it if she was going to start talking about things 'clicking'. She was so beautiful and good.
The burn of the liquor sliding down his throat was a reminder that he was not.
(He was just pretending that he was.)
He could feel Skye's sudden wave of panic in the air, and Ward glanced down at the brunette who noticed the bloodstain on his white shirt.
"Oh shit- did you get shot?" Skye announced loudly, voice filled with concern. She wasn't aware of their guests who were, very likely, eaves dropping on their conversation.
The urge to comfort Skye and tell her he was alright was overwhelming, it came naturally the moment he sensed her distress.
(A lot of things came naturally, the urge to comfort her, to calm her, to hold her..)
Grant tried his best to brush Skye's concern off, because honestly, he wasn't sure he'd be able to refrain from petting her hair.
"It's just skin deep," He said aggravatingly through gritted teeth.
Skye paused, noticing how tense the Agent suddenly became, and she slowly backed off with skeptical eyes.
She picked up her glass again, because he was giving her his 'hate' face and it was sort of creeping her out.
"Alright, fine." Skye tried to shrug it off, raising her glass to her lips.
(He gave her that same 'hate face' when he knocked the wind out of her and threw her to the ground on the ramp to get her out of the line of fire. Skye was just now beginning to feel the bruises from his grip.)
"That explains why you were so.. pissed off, though." The brunette mumbled to herself from behind her glass.
Grant could feel Skye's disappointment. 'He got hurt because of us. Because we were holding him back.'
Again, there was the urge to comfort her, to tell her it was alright. That it wasn't her fault, it was her first time on the field, that she shouldn't of been there in the first place. (That he would take a bullet for her anytime, no questions asked.)
Instead, Grant straightened his posture in his chair.
"If we're going to make this work, Skye. I need for you to do exactly what I say, no questions asked. Alright?"
She was looking up at him with sparkling eyes, taking his every word to heart.
"Now Skye," Grant said slowly. "Give me the bottle."
The hacker looked up at the agent with a somewhat confused smile, raising her eyebrows at him with amusement as she handed him her Peruvian whiskey.
"Okay.. weirdo. I'm guessing you want to be bartender, then?"
Grant smirked down at Skye, and she's pretty sure that was the first time she's seen him look remotely amused. Then, suddenly, Agent Ward was pushing Skye onto the ground and smashing her Peruvian bottle over a rebel soldiers head.
Skye gasped as she watched the alcohol burst everywhere, glass shattering. Ward had the nerve to look at her and actually smirk, like he didn't just crack a bottle over somebody's head. Like there wasn't eight different armed soldiers on their bus, trying to take over their plane.
(How did he know they were going to turn against them?! Skye wasn't sure if she was kidding when she said Ward is an actual robot.)
He easily evaded one of the soldiers punches by stepping to the side, and using his momentum to flip the terrorist over his shoulder. There were four of them, three on their feet, one who's breath just got knocked from him.
Grant could hold them off, but he couldn't allow himself distracted.
Thankfully, Skye scurried underneath the table and out of the way.
Grant grabbed the rifle off of the soldier that charged at him next, breaking his nose when he shoved the butt of the gun into his face. That was two men down, though one of them was trying to get back up. A soldier grabbed him from behind, but Grant ran backwards until they collided into the wall, or was it the table? It was enough to make the soldier let go, and Grant threw his elbow back as he cracked another one in the nose.
Three down, where was that last one-?
Grant noticed it at the same time Skye let out a startled gasp. On the monitor, Fitz was being held hostage, knife to his throat. Two hands grasped his arm, and one of the soldiers yanked Skye up from the table. Grant snarled, but was tempered down by the blood that was dripping from the soldiers face from when Grant broke his nose earlier.
There was nothing else they could do but stand down.
Coulson's 'new friends' managed to knock out May while she was piloting the ship. FitzSimmons were panicking, and Ward couldn't blame them. They were scientists, they weren't trained like how he and Agent May were trained. Fitz and Simmons were never taught how to handle situations under stress, how to do whatever it may tale to survive.
And then there was Skye, who had absolutely no training at all. She was the quietest of the bunch, all three of them plus an unconscious Calvary were tied up and being checked on every five minutes by a guard.
Fitz was blaming himself for getting them captured, Simmons was telling him it wasn't his fault, and Skye was staring at the ground intently. She didn't look nearly as frightened as Fitz or Simmons, but he could feel something was troubling her. The way her shoulders were hunched, eyebrows furrowed together in doubt. He could practically hear her thoughts, 'No. That won't work. I'll just get in the way.'
"Hey, it's nobodies fault," Grant said sharply to Fitz, who had just began to explain how he should of taken Kung-Fu classes. "Coulson put us on this team for a reason."
Skye glanced up from the ground, realizing that Agent Ward looking at her as he spoke. She cocked her head to the side, listening to his words.
Grant continued, hands tied behind his back so he had to scoot forward using his feet so he could get a better look at Jemma, "He believes that the four of us? Apparently, we work well together. Now, you don't need to come up with the whole solution, just bits, ideas. Pieces."
Skye was smiling by the time he finished, and she nearly lost her breath when Agent Ward returned it with a small smile of his own. She nodded her head slowly, "That's right." She agreed, the gears in her mind working as she examined the SUV in front of them. "...Like pieces of a puzzle."
They were interrupted by a loud snap, and Fitz shuddered with disgust at the sound.
"What, the hell was that!"
"Alright, what next?" May asked Skye in a serious tone, dropping her handcuffs to the ground. Grant smirked, confirming for Leo, "That, was her wrist."
Skye's eyes sparkled once she realized that Melinda May, the woman who she saw destroy a guy with her bare fists, was asking her for a plan.
Maybe she wasn't completely useless after all.
The second smartest thing Coulson has done so far was bringing Skye on board the bus as their consultant.
Only Skye could hatch up a plan so suicidal that it would actually work. And plus, it was the best thing they came up with. (Fitz's 'if I had a monkey-' ideas were not very helpful in the least) Grant couldn't help but feel a little helpless at the thought of the only thing they can come up with was to activate the 0-8-4 and blow a giant hole in the plane.
FitzSimmons and Skye were to stick together and retrieve the 0-8-4. Grant's job was to take down the soldiers, but he was quickly finding that hand-to-hand combat was a lot harder when the airplane you were riding was dropping at an alarming rate from 30,000 feet in the air.
Grant managed to knock another soldier down on his back, tying the rebel up with the seat belts on the bus's couch, before another soldier jumped on top of him. He didn't have time to check on his teammates, but by the sound of Simmons grunt and cheer, Agent Ward assumed they managed to retrieve the 0-8-4.
He took down a rebel who'd caught him in a headlock from behind, swinging him over his shoulder and slamming the soldier down on the floor. Grant panted, wiping his brow as he shot his gaze over towards FitzSimmons, who were still bungee together, but they were missing their third link.
Where the hell was Skye?
"Skye, what are you doing? We need you!" Jemma's voice was frantic when she noticed their consultant was unbuckling her belt and dropping to all fours, trying her best to crawl in the opposite direction as best as she could when everything around her was being sucked out of the plane from a 20000 drop now.
And they were only getting closer to the ground.
Yet for some reason, Skye found that she wasn't scared.
Agent Ward was fighting off the rebel soldiers by himself, protecting them because they didn't have the training to protect themselves.
But that didn't mean she needed to be completely useless.
(He was risking his life to protect her. There was no way Skye could do anything less but protect him as well.)
"You have to trust me!" Skye yelled out to Simmons, who scrunched her face in confusion and stumbled a bit from the air pressure, before climbing her way back up the bus.
The rebel soldiers were busy trying to fend off the wrath of Agent Ward. Even through all the chaos, Skye was awestruck by his brute strength. He was fighting to protect.
Grant knew what he was doing in combat, he handled each hostile swiftly. Even when the rebel soldiers came at him from behind, Grant somehow managed to gain the upper hand, disarm the rebels, flip them over his shoulder, and knock them out.
Skye sucked in a shaky breath of air as she watched him. He was so- he was good. At protecting them, at keeping them protected.
He was good.
The bus was hitting turbulence like crazy, and it was getting harder for Grant to keep his footing inside of the plane. FitzSimmons were able to keep their balance from the makeshift rope that they tied between their waists, but instead of Skye trailing behind them, there was a rebel soldier using the extra rope to start climbing after Simmons to retrieve the 0-8-4.
"Cut him loose, cut him loose!" Fitz was shouting to his partner, and Simmons was trying desperately to untie the rope from her waist, because the Rebel Soldier was climbing towards her quickly. Jemma was shouting wildly as she quickly worked at untying her belt, and when she finally threw it off, the soldier went flying towards Grant.
"Sorry Agent Ward!" FitzSimmon's called out in unison when the soldier nearly knocked Grant off his feet and sent him flying out of the giant hole in the plane right then and there.
The rebel soldier was clutching his arm, trying desperately to stay grounded on the flight. Agent Ward watched as the sleeve of his shirt was torn, the soldier was sucked out of the plane, and his grip on the seat belt he was currently holding was slipping.
Skye managed to make it to the emergency kit, cracking it open and pulling out the yellow inflatable lifeboat. She remembered briefly how the pamphlet directed how to blow the boat up, and Skye was quickly twisting the nozzle into the raft and was pumping air into it until it filled with life.
The emergency boat sprang open and flew from her grasp, covering the giant hole in the plane. Grant's grip slipped at the last second, and he was being sucked out of the plane like unwanted cargo going for a 20,000 foot drop. The boat managed to plug the hole right when Grant was about to be sucked out.
Agent Ward let out a long sigh of relief, because despite the fact that everything on the bus was officially destroyed, and all of his teammates were shaken up, they had somehow managed to survive this battle.
His head snapped up, eyes searching for Skye, because she was missing when he'd last searched for her.
She was already approaching him with a cautious look on her face. His eyes widened once he saw her- her hair was ruffled, cheeks darkened from the rush of riding on a plane that was descending about 500ft per minute. But she was alright, and she was so beautiful, and she was the reason he was still alive at this very moment.
Skye was smiling down at him shyly, and he couldn't take his gaze off of her.
Skye had her hand extended towards him to help him up, and Grant was staring at her as if he had never been offered help before. She paused, noticing his hesitation and figured he was still in shock.
"Almost lost you there.." Skye said sheepishly. She wasn't sure how she felt about the way he was looking at her. Skye faltered, thinking for a second that he wasn't going to accept her help.
Grant grabbed Skye's extended hand.
He felt as though he'd been sucker punched in ths gut.
The second their hands made contact, the feeling of relief was uncontainable. It was as if he'd spent his whole life frozen, and she was like a boiling wave of water washing over him. Washing over his senses, which had once been numb to the thought of losing her.
The fact that he willingly tried to cut her from his life- her, his soulmate.
(Now, he wasn't sure how he would ever be without her again.)
He gripped her hand tightly, dark eyes locked onto her chocolate hues. Grant felt like he was struggling for air.
It is her,
Daisy.
"Skye?" He asked breathlessly.
The sheepish smile she gave him in return nearly knocked the breath from him once again,
"I read the pamphlet." Skye explained to him, believing he was shocked because she'd managed to save them all with her quick thinking.
(She didn't know.)
Upon his instinct, Grant twisted Skye's grip in his hand so he could sneak a glimpse at her soulmark without her noticing.
It was blank.
"You'd be the first," Agent Ward responded easily as Skye helped him up.
She smirked to herself, figuring that was as close to a 'thank you' from the black suit robo cop she was ever going to get for saving his life.
And for some reason, she was alright with that. I mean, he saved her life too, didn't he?
They could make a good team.
The team had to take a few seconds to come to grips with the fact that they'd just managed to escape deaths claws. Grant wasn't too shaken up, at least not because of the battle they just survived.
Agent Ward leaned over the bar, panting heavily as he tried to catch his breath.
She didn't know.