Author's Note: I may have a chapter up tomorrow or Friday - however, much to my regret, it's not going to be until at LEAST the following Thursday that there is another chapter. I have a friend coming to visit me, and I plan on being nowhere near a computer for those days.

So thanks all for telling me Coulson sounded okay. Because that sassy bastard is really hard to get right - he has the balance between snark, seriousness, and badassery with a touch of paternal instinct. I think much more like Ward and Zola, so that Coulson is a tricky dicky dolphin. This is also the first chapter in a very long while that is neither Fitz nor Ward's point of view, so that took a minute to get used to. As always, read and review! I love hearing from you guys and you definitely make my day better with your awesomeness.

'Cause they took your loved ones
But returned them in exchange for you
But would you have it any other way?
Would you have it any other way?
You could have it any other way

'Cause she's a cruel mistress
And the bargain must be made
But oh, my love, don't forget me
When I let the water take me

Coulson stared at the unconscious double agent on the bed, mouth open in shock.

He wasn't the only one.

"What the hell was that?" Hunter demanded. "I mean really, what the bloody hell was that?"

Hunter hadn't even been there for the whole show. Just the tail end when Ward went ballistic over the external fixator on his leg. He wasn't unfamiliar with the device, but he'd reacted as if it was meant for torture instead of healing.

Too much of his behavior made no sense. He seemed to lose time and place every time he had what the monitors were registering as severe panic attacks. He didn't scream or shout – it sounded more like he was trying not to but couldn't help it. And every time he snapped out of it, he looked lost, as if he couldn't understand what just happened or even remember it.

The fact that he seemed to unknowingly cause himself pain wasn't the bothersome part. He had, after all, repeatedly tried to kill himself when they had him in custody in the Vault, and his tolerance was remarkably high, even for a specialist. It was the way that he seemed to black out and forget what just happened.

Ward could fake a lot of things. That's what happened when you had top marks in espionage, only topped by the one spy that managed to out-manipulate the actual God of Lies. But not even Romanoff was this good. He seemed just as confused every single time he realized that he was crying steadily after his first episode. The final one when he lunged for the fixator was by far the worst. Coulson could hear the stitches tearing and popping from his shoulder surgery as he fought to keep Ward down before he could similarly try and tear the fixator off. Even restrained, Ward put up enough of a fight that Hunter came running when he heard the alarms shriek in protest and Coulson yelling for a doctor. Before the sedatives took hold, he'd forgotten once more what happened.

And Jesus. That noise. Like someone in agony but afraid to scream. Coulson shuddered at the memory of it.

"I don't know," Coulson said for what felt like the hundredth time. "He's out for now, but I don't know how long that will last or what he'll remember when he wakes up."

"Maybe we should move him to some place with better security," Hunter suggested.

Coulson shook his head. "We're on a plane. There's only so many places he can go, even if he was capable of walking. Whether he feels it or not, if he tries to walk on that leg it's going to collapse on him and he won't be able to use it again."

"I don't like it," Hunter grumbled, crossing his arms.

"Neither do I. How's Fitz doing?" Coulson asked.

Hunter scratched the back of his head. "About that…"

The short answer was: not good.

Coulson could hear the irate Scotsman shouting from the other end of the corridor, and as they got closer, there was a loud crash followed by even louder cursing in Gaelic.

Before Coulson could even open the door, it opened from the other side and a very, very angry engineer was glaring at him, red faced and determined.

"What's going on?" Coulson demanded, putting one hand out to stop Fitz from going anywhere. He peered around him and saw Jemma in the room, arms folded acoss her chest petulantly, looking anywhere but at Fitz. A tray was upended on the floor, meager contents splattered against the wall from where Fitz obviously threw it. "You're not even supposed to be up, Fitz."

"He's being unreasonable, sir," Simmons protested. "I tried to get him to lay back down but he didn't listen."

"Where's Ward?" Fitz asked, cutting off the last part of Simmons's complaint. "You didn't stick him back in the Vault, did you?"

Coulson shook his head. "No. He's in the medical bay. Are you going back to bed?"

Fitz glowered.

"Fine. Then sit down." Coulson indicated the couch in the common area. "You're still not supposed to be up, but this is better than standing."

Fitz looked ready to protest, but Coulson pointed to the couch. "Sit."

Fitz heaved a sigh, shuffled over to the couch and dropped down, wincing as it jarred the healing wound in his side. "I need to see him."

"Not until I get some answers," Coulson said, sitting opposite him. Jemma hovered at the doorway, arms still crossed defensively. He could see the agitation on Fitz's face, the way he kept glancing at the hallway back towards medical. "He's asleep for now. If you can answer my questions, I'll consider letting you visit when he wakes up."

Fitz frowned. "That sounds like I'm under house arrest."

Coulson shrugged. "In a way, yes. You were a prisoner in a HYDRA science and research compound known for human experimentation for over a month. We don't know what happened to you, and we don't know yet that you can be trusted. You could be a sleeper agent at this point, and neither you or anyone else would know. Until we can be sure HYDRA hasn't done anything to you, I'm going to have to ask you not to walk around on your own."

"They didn't do anything to me," Fitz protested.

Coulson took a good look at the young Scotsman for the first time since they'd recovered him from the compound. He'd never had a lot of extra weight on him, but now he looked gaunt. Pale skin stretched over hollowed cheekbones, his pale eyes sunken in and dark circles underneath. The loosely defined muscles of his upper arm were gone, and even his hands looked thin and stretched. According to Jemma and the initial assessment, Fitz had been starved of sleep and food long enough that they were going to have to strictly manage his diet for the foreseeable future to prevent refeeding syndrome. Even the new set of scrubs he was in hung loosely off of him, but the next size down was too small even for Skye and Jemma.

"Your behavior says otherwise," Coulson said mildly. He wasn't trying to push, he wasn't trying to insinuate that Fitz was a threat to the team. He was more concerned about the threat he posed to himself.

Fitz sneered, his lip curling up in disgust. "I'm sorry. I didn't know there was a way I was supposed to act. How would you like me to behave?"

Coulson again shrugged. "However you would like. I just want you to understand that from our point of view, you are behaving very contradictory from the Fitz we last saw. I would like to exercise caution, for all our sakes. I think even you can appreciate that, given this agency's recent history," Coulson explained, making sure Fitz understood it wasn't personal. First May, then Ward, then Bobbi and Mack and then May again…betrayal and secrets and lies were becoming the norm for his agency, and he wasn't pleased with it. He supposed it should be expected though, since he employed spies.

Fitz sighed and seemed to deflate in front of him. With the rosy tinge of anger gone from his cheeks, Fitz looked even unhealthier. "Yeah. I can understand that. But they really didn't do anything to me. Not like him."

"You mean Ward?" Coulson asked.

Fitz nodded, dropping his gaze to his hands as he idly picked at them. "How is he?"

Coulson decided to go with honesty. "Not good. He seems to have some memory issues and trouble processing recent events and-"

"Is he having panic attacks?" Fitz interrupted. "Like he doesn't know where he is or what just happened?"

Coulson frowned. "Yeah. That's pretty much exactly what happened."

Fitz leaned forward until it pulled painfully on the stitches in his side and he leaned back again.
"Does he seem really emotional, especially for him? Like…" he snapped his fingers, trying to come up with the phrasing he wanted. "Not like he can't understand it, but like he can't process it?"

"You mean like he doesn't know why he's panicking?" Coulson asked.

"Like he can't ignore it," Fitz clarified. "Like that?"

Coulson nodded. "Do you know what's going on?"

Fitz ran a shaky hand through his longer than normal curls. "Yeah. Yeah, I do. I was hoping it would've worn off by now but…" he shook his head. "How long has it been?"

"Forty eight hours. We're en route back to base. We stopped at a hospital to treat both you and Ward to stabilize you before taking off. Does this have something to do with the weird chemicals we found in Ward's system?"

Fitz looked haunted. "Partly. Sir, do we have to do this now?"

Coulson sighed. "I would like to tell you no, but I can't. I need to know what we're dealing with and what I can expect, from either of you. I don't know how much you remember of your extraction since you seemed pretty out of it, but when we found you, Ward was about to shoot both of you and –"

Fitz exploded with such ferocity that Coulson found himself flinching back into the couch.

"That wasn't what fucking happened!" Fitz shouted, jumping to his feet. "He was the one who got us out of there when it took you a fucking month to show up! He was injured helping me when that psychotic doctor got a hold of him and damn near fried his brain and beat the hell out of him! He wasn't going to shoot us, I was!"

"Fitz…" Jemma breathed, looking horrified. "Why…"

"Because being dead was better than going through that again!" Fitz shouted, turning on her. "Once was enough for me, and I damn sure wasn't letting Ward go through it a third time!"

Third?

"We were in hell," Fitz spat, face turning red from anger, accentuating the gaunt and hollowed look to his face. "They didn't do anything to me because they did everything to him and he let them because of me. And I can't…" he heaved, like he was struggling for breath and Coulson realized that Fitz was crying. "I can't let someone do that again."

Coulson had a reputation – several, actually. Director Lazarus, risen from the grave to take over SHIELD from Fury. Tough but fair. He'd even heard Mack reference him as Captain Sass. The one he minded the least, however, was when his team referred to him as their pseudo father.

Which is why he couldn't stand there and watch as one of his team broke down sobbing in the middle of the cabin. In two quick strides, he was across the room and wrapped his arms around Fitz as he shook, tears coursing down the side of his face as everything caught up to him. He didn't turn away and instead buried his face in Coulson's shoulder, holding on to him as if it was life or death.

For him, it might very well be. Fitz wasn't trained for combat. He was never supposed to be in the field, and Coulson was the one who sent him in to get the information in the first place. He was the second youngest on the team, and ever since last year, Coulson couldn't help but want to shelter the poor kid from the storm. Fitz proved more resilient than Coulson would've thought, and it was his heart that Coulson envied at times.

And now he could count the ribs even through Fitz's scrubs and his own suit. His shoulders stuck out prominently where Coulson held him. The frame wracking sobs indicated something much darker, much deeper than him simply watching Ward be tortured instead of him. Even if Fitz took Ward's betrayal the hardest, something terrible must have happened in the month they were missing.

There were too many questions. Ward's bizarre and erratic behavior, as well as the various scars and tissue damage in the process of healing (who knew when he was going to walk again) coincided with torture, and Fitz clearly knew more than he'd said so far about what happened.

Jemma stood back, mouth open in shock as her hands fluttered uselessly at her side, clearly unsure of what she should do. He knew Fitz and Simmons had a complicated relationship, but the poor biochemist seemed entirely at a loss as she watched her best friend break down in front of her. She settled for one hand over her mouth and Coulson didn't miss the way that her eyes looked awfully shiny as she looked away. He didn't think he could handle any more crying. It was definitely not covered in the handbook.

"I'm sorry. I pushed. I shouldn't have," Coulson soothed as Fitz's sobs began tapering off. "We can discuss what happened later and what they did to Ward-"

"It's my fault," Fitz whispered. There was something in his voice that didn't sound like he was just feeling misplaced responsibility. It was horrified realization, as if he'd just admitted something out loud that he'd known for a while.

"No, Fitz. What they did to him, that wasn't your fault," Jemma said, quick to try and assuage misplaced guilt.

Coulson felt Fitz's hand clench tighter, balling up material in his fist.

"They didn't ruin him," Fitz said, so quietly Coulson knew Jemma didn't hear it. "I did."

So. The first real outside look at Fitz and Ward. Yes, the others will make an appearance, but I have very, very serious issues writing Skye, Bobbi and May in relation to being sympathetic. I also realize that I run a risk of making both Ward and Fitz sound effeminate or weak compared to their TV persona. I work with a lot of combat PTSD sailors/soldiers, and a lot of this is played down compared to some reactions I've seen. Review and let me know how it reads!

aaaaaskyward - I would PM you, but you're just listed as a guest, so this is for you: I do agree that it appears that they completely forgot what they said at the beginning of season 2, but what you have to put into context is just how angry Ward has got to be at SHIELD. One, he WAS helping them when he was their prisoner. He was genuinely trying to win back their trust because as far as he showed on screen, he has a tendency to latch onto a person for their approval, and that was his driving force for the first season. When Garrett almost killed him through Deathlok, he started to break away from him and latched onto Skye and Coulson (one as a romantic interest and the other as a paternal figure he wants the approval of). However, I think that side of him was gone the second they tried to turn him over to Christian. SHIELD/Coulson knew his family history, and they even mention it several times. but they STILL turned him over to Senator Ward would get Talbot off their backs. Ward does show a little bit of his desire to do good when he captures Bakshi and wipes out several heads of HYDRA and leaves them for Coulson. He pretends to go back to HYDRA so that he can turn on Whitehall in an effort to appeal to Skye and his reward for his effort is she shoots him four times. At that point, I think it's fair to say that he really no longer cares what others think of him, and falls back on his training of manipulation when he starts trying to help Agent 33. Ward is ultimately a spy. He is convincing enough NO ONE realized he was a double agent. I think he legitimately feels like he's helping Agent 33, because that's his twisted version of justice. When he kills her, thanks to May, I think that's when you see him decide that SHIELD isn't the hero of the story, and in that same twisted sense of justice, I think he's decided that he needs to make SHIELD answer for their crimes. They have no betrayed him, and his only companion (romantic or otherwise) that understands just what it feels like to be betrayed and manipulated like he was. Pretty much it's his version of "You want me to be the bad guy? Fine. I'll be the bad guy". At least, that's how I look at it.