Hive thought he'd gotten all the things she needed but Jemma quickly added a few things to the list. While she waited for the items she took a much needed rest. It was a good thing too, because once she got started she could hardly stand still, let alone sleep for any period of time. Hive liked to stand and watch her work, which Jemma found very distracting.
"Don't you have something better to do?" Jemma grouched once after he'd been staring at her for a particularly long time.
"Nope. You're a clever girl. I've got to make sure you don't try to do something stupid. Like sabotage, for example."
"I think you know I wouldn't risk Fitz' life like that. The least you could do is make yourself useful." She shoved him a tray of used vials and a cloth.
Hive frowned but picked at them anyway. Jemma had a moment of peace before It decided to enact revenge. "He's leaving you know."
Jemma instantly felt ice in her chest. She tried to play it off like she didn't care. "What do you mean?"
"Yeah, the transfer papers were sitting on his desk. He's going to the Bus. Can't stand to be with you anymore."
Jemma halted unconsciously, but then reminded herself not to give him a reaction. "Well that's his choice." She replied tersely. Inside, though, she was beginning to panic. It was exactly what she'd been afraid of. He'd been planning on doing it before Shield fell, before she told him that she wanted something more. Of course he would do it now, when he believed they were "cursed" and there was no future for them. Clearly, Hive could be lying, but she suspected he didn't need to about this. When she finally brought herself out of her thoughts she noticed that It was smiling at her. "What?"
"You're adorable. You think that you can punish me by pretending you don't care. But it's rolling off you in waves, dear. That terrifies you. Do you think you'll be able to go to work without him? Or will you just finally roll up and die?"
It took everything she had to unclench her fist not break his jaw. The only thing that stoped her from hitting him in the face was knowing it would hurt Fitz more than the Hive. She was going to have to be a lot more careful, try to bury or cover over her feelings more. At this point she decided to turn the tables.
"You're an empath then?" It tilted Fitz' head at her so she explained. "You can sense and control the emotional states of others. That explains a lot actually."
It smiled again, giving her chillls. "That's part of it. But I can do so much more than that, darling. Will was right when he said the planet had moods. Every living ecosystem does, even though humans don't realize it. And when you can change those moods…" Jemma heard a thunderous rumble coming from outside the caves, and then a his of rain. "You can control the elements." Jemma saw how much joy It took in demonstrating its power. She made a mental sticky note of that, could be something she could use later.
"But you feed off negative feelings I see. Anger and fear. How unusual."
"They are far more powerful than the positive ones." Hive reasoned.
"Maybe. Or maybe you were made to be a tool by the Kree, and they had the most use for someone destructive. And you're being just what they wanted you to be." Jemma prodded to see how easy it was to press his buttons, just as he had done to her.
If it was a reaction she was looking for, she found it alright. His faced contorted and he hissed, "I was never their tool. They wanted to destroy me because I was too powerful for them. They wanted to destroy us all because I made them afraid. But I defeated them. They left because of me!"
"Hm. So who was it that banished you then, oh mighty one?" Jemma poked.
She never heard his answer because suddenly she was back on Maveth, blinded by the sandstorm. Will was calling for her to help him. She tried to follow his voice, but stumbled over something… And then that something was Fitz' corpse, half buried in the sand, bloody face frozen in a look of terror. Jemma screamed and fell back...
...And caught herself on the table on which lied the serum. She snapped back to the reality of the cave, like waking from a nightmare. Hive had gone, so she allowed herself to lower shakily against the wall and get her bearings. 'Can induce hallucinations.' Jemma traced into the dirt floor between deep, steadying breaths, relying on her old habit of documenting her conclusions to calm her. She recalled Will's warning: 'It will do anything to fool you.' Terrorizing visons were no doubt part of that. And unnerving as the experience was, she had set out to test his limits, and she'd just found one. Test: Successful.
As she worked, Jemma's plan to save both Fitz and herself took shape. Just as she predicted, all the remnants of the pyrokinetic man's blood was gone, so she had to use an earlier version of the serum – the one Centipede used on Mike Peterson. The only reason he didn't blow up was because they'd hit him with the dendrotoxin at just the right moment, fortuitous but quite accidental. So her task was to figure out just the right point to administer the toxin in order to fully integrate the serum into the body. And then figure out how to use that as leverage.
Even though she was trying to be diligent about not feeling, she couldn't keep from getting increasingly anxious as she was doing the final preperations. The time to act on her admittedly risky plan approached. Of course, It noticed. "Getting a little nervous there, are we? Not trying anything clever, I hope."
"I'd say I have good reason to be nervous." If Jemma couldn't hide her feelings, she could at least come up with an alternative explanation. "I'm about to give you exactly what you want. You will have no reason to hold up you're end of the deal. You could kill us both."
"Why would I kill either of you when I could have two perfect little pawns instead?" It sneered. "It's ready then?"
"I believe so, yes."
"And this will heal the body?"
"It should reanimate the body without resurrecting the mind, just as you asked."
Hive nodded his approval. "Good. We can get started then." It helped Jemma remove Ward's body from the stasis chamber. Jemma was able to observe the crushed rib cage that lead to his death, bruise putting the injury in sharp relief. Momentarily, Jemma wished Fitz had burned Ward's body instead of Will's, but at the same time she knew that Fitz didn't really have a choice in the matter while fighting for his life. Jemma hooked up the body to large bags of saline solution and used a heart-lung machine to move it through his circulatory system. If this was going to work, the serum had to be able to spread throughout the body. Then she attached monitors that showed the body's temperature and that would show the heart rate once it started beating on its own.
As the final step, she injected the serum into Ward's corpse. "Now, we wait." She announced, as much to herself as to Hive. The next part of her plan was especially tricky. She was relieved that there was only three of them present for the operation- herself, Fitz/Hydra, and Trinity- because when plotting her scheme Jemma only planned on having to overpower one lackey. Still, she would have to be quick; she wasn't exactly sure what Trinity's power was, but she knew she had the ability take control of her body. Which is why she needed to be taken out first. It couldn't be too soon or too late though; too soon and It would have too much time to stall, too late and they would all be incinerated.
It was only a few minutes, but it felt like hours standing there, waiting for the serum to show its effects. At last, something started happening. The body temperature started rising and the body exhibited a faint glow. There were some popping sounds that must have been bones going back into place. The heart restarted as it was supposed to but there was no sign of consciousness, which was good.
But of course, the body temperature kept rising, just as Jemma knew it would. It was soon well over 120 degrees and climbing.
Hydra started watching the thermometer as it approached 150. "Is that normal?"
"Yep. Perfectly normal." She assured him. 'Not yet' she told herself.
Jemma watched the thermometer carefully. The more heat the body put off, the faster the fever accelerated. Jemma held her breath until it hit 225 degrees. Then she sprang into action, triggering a booby trap she'd set up with a flick of her wrist, which shot a dart full of dendrotoxin into Billi. In the same smooth motion she placed the last of the dendrotoxin under her shoe. It pleased her to see Hive have a sincere look of fear in his eyes, even if they were actually Fitz'.
"Ach, Jemma. I told you not to do anything stupid. What have you done?"
"Since you don't have any pyrokinetic blood, I had to use an earlier version of the centipede serum, the kind that you need to freeze the reaction at just the right time to complete the integration with the body, lest it causes a rather nasty explosion. Look in Fitz' memories, you'll see I'm telling the truth." She explained smugly. "Now, under my shoe I have the last of the dendrotoxin, which is what I used to knock out your minion. You try to take it from me, I crush it. I don't give it to the body at exactly the right moment, we all get cremated."
"What do you want?"
"You're going to leave Fitz' body before I give you this. You will go into Ward and then I will make it stop."
"Like hell I am! Who do you think you're fooling?"
"Have it your way. But do you think you'll survive when we're all vaporized? You have 1 minute to change your mind." Jemma's heart was racing, but she did her best to be filled with determination so that It would believe her.
It considered her for a second, then asked, "And how do I know you aren't going to just leave me to explode?"
"Like I said, that explodes and we all die. And if I have Fitz I am not going to let that happen." She answered matter-of-factly. "30 seconds." Her heart was really pounding now. But then she was at a hospital in a child's room. The child was in the bed, feverish and propped up weakly. The antidote was laying on the ground, she'd dropped it. Thankfully it hadn't broken. Fitz was there, urging her, "Come on, Jem, hurry. She's going to die." She stooped quickly to pick it up, and then remembered that this didn't make sense. There was something she needed to remember, something very imporant... Fitz. There was something wrong with Fitz. What was it again? She squeezed her eyes shut and forced them open, and she was back in the cave, just about to pick up the dendrotoxin.
She heard Hive groan angrily and rush to lean over Ward. "Give it the toxin!" It yelled. She watched It closely and saw It hold Ward's mouth open and hold Fitz' open mouth above it. Just as she was getting ready to avert her eyes at how intimate this appeared to be, she saw a grey slug drop out of Fitz' mouth and drop into Ward's. Fitz nearly fell over again, but this time he caught himself and she instantly injected Hive/Ward with the dendrotoxin. "Are you alright?" Jemma asked Fitz, watching carefully to make sure the toxin was working. He only nodded, and the temperature gauge showed that Ward's corpse went cold, just as it should. "Can you find your way out of these caves?" She asked, and he nodded again. She quickly grabbed another vial of the centipede serum before telling him, "Okay, lead the way."
Fitz grabbed her hand and pulled her through the labyrinth of tunnels and they quickly found themselves outside. Now it was her turn to pull him down a highway, flagging the first car they saw. The drivers were willing to give them a ride to town, but both she and Fitz were looking over their shoulders the whole to make sure they didn't have anyone following them. When they got to town 10 minutes later, Jemma found a tourist restaurant and begged to use the phone. The owner allowed it and she immediately dialed Mack.
"Jemma? Oh thank God. Are you okay? Is Turbo with you?" Mack's voice carried more anxiety than she'd ever heard from him before.
"We're okay, relatively. But we need transport as soon as possible. We may have enemies pursuing us. We're in San Juan, Puerto Rico. How long before someone can get here?"
"We have a plane an hour out. Stay hidden, I'll send them right away."
"Yes sir." Jemma thanked the owner and returned to Fitz, who was sitting nervously at a table. "It will be about an hour. We should probably work on some disguises in case Hive and Trinity make it here." Fitz nodded again, still not saying anything, causing Jemma to detect something wrong. "Fitz, are you alright?"
Fitz looked down, and then back at Jemma before taking a napkin and spitting in it. It was all blood. "Oh my, Fitz! Wha-" And then it dawned on her: Fitz said that it needs a wound to get into and out of the head. And It had come out of Fitz' mouth instead of the original cut on the back of the head. "Open." She commanded. Fitz shook his head vehemently. "Do it, now!" She insisted. But he looked around to the other diners, enjoying their food like it was a normal day, because for them it was. Then she admitted this was probably not the place for a bloody examination. "Alright. Come with me." She tried very hard to walk casually so as to not attract attention or cause alarm. They left the restaurant and found a hotel with a public pool and bathroom, and to his distress she casually lifted a bottle of water from a street vender on the way. She assured Fitz they would make good, but it was a desperate situation. She checked that the coast was clear and then tried to lead him into the ladies' room. He balked initially, but a stern look from her and he slunk inside, looking miserable.
She locked the door and passed him the water bottle and instructed him to rinse. He took it hesitantly, but opened it, took a swig and swished it about and then spat it into the sink. Jemma was normally very comfortable around blood and all manner of bodily fluids, but seeing that much coming out of Fitz made her feel a little sick. She pushed that feeling aside, though, and once again asked him to sit down and open his mouth. He complied this time.
"Ugh, what I wouldn't give for a proper pair of magnifying spectacles." Jemma lamented, twisting and turning Fitz' head every which way to get the best light possible. "I can't tell much to be honest," she admitted to him. "But from what I can see the puncture is right behind your sinuses. You haven't passed out yet, so we can assume It didn't burst your artery. It doesn't seem to be very large either, which means that the blood should start to coagulate soon and seal the wound. But it still hurts to talk and swallow I bet?" She asked, and he indicated she was right. She put her hand on his knee to express her sympathy, and after a moment's consideration, he put his hand on hers. Out of nowhere the exhaustion of the past three days caught up with her all at once. She moaned and slid down against the wall to sit down. Fitz moved over to sit next to her and he let her lean her head on his shoulder. 'So tired' is the thought that ran like ticker tape through her mind again and again. And despite everything, in this instant, she felt safe being there with Fitz.
"Thank you Fitz." She mumbled. She could practically hear the question he wanted to ask: 'For what?' So she humored him. "For everything. For… coming back to me." Those words hurt a little, knowing what she did about his intentions to move. But she meant them. She wanted to work with him, yes, but for now knowing he was safe was enough.
He surprised her when he leaned his head down so that it was close to her ear and croaked, "Always." It made her smile and gave her just a few butterflies in her stomach. She snuggled closer to him. Then an aggressive knock came at the door. "Hey! Do I need to call security!?" shouted an equally aggressive voice.
Fitz and Jemma both sighed, exhausted, but nevertheless they helped each other up and exited the bathroom in front of the lady, who gave them a scandalized look when she saw the two of them file out. Jemma almost defended them, but then decided if the lady was going to be that way she wasn't worth it.
"We need to find somewhere to sit and wait. Out of the way, lots of people, but where we can see the sky to know when they arrive. Should only be a few more minutes." Jemma reviewed, mostly thinking out loud to herself as they walked down the street.
But Fitz was paying attention because he pulled her into a gated courtyard. Meant as a tourist trap, but never attaining that status, it was a sleepy little garden. The ivy grew over the gates and fence, providing a decent amount of privacy. "Perfect." They found a bench and sat next to each other, both of them either too tired or too hurt to converse, trying to stay alert for imminent danger, and yet it was still nice. And there they stayed until their saving grace arrived.