Chapter Text
Watching as May and Daisy hauled the last of the unconscious Kree into the ship’s escape pod, Jemma anxiously chewed at her bottom lip, throwing a glance at the empty hallway behind them.
“Enoch said that Mack went to find Fitz,” May said suddenly, recapturing Jemma’s attention. Directing a knowing look at her, she finished, “He’s fine, Simmons.”
“I know, I know. I just…don’t like not knowing,” Jemma admitted, clasping her hands together and grimacing.
“Listen to May – she’s pretty smart.”
Her eyebrows rising, Jemma turned to watch as Mack approached them, what was actually the last of the unconscious Kree slung over his shoulder. He grunted with effort, tossing the man into the pod with the others.
“Fitz is alright, then?” she pressed, bringing her clasped hands up to her chest and holding her breath as she waited for his answer.
Chuckling, Mack clapped one of his large hands on her shoulder and nodded. “Yeah, he’s alright. A little banged up, but that’s about it. He was just as worried ‘bout you, last time I saw him.”
Breathing a sigh of relief, Jemma smiled warmly up at Mack and murmured, “Thank you.”
As May closed the doors on the pod, Mack explained to them, “Fitz wants to regroup as soon as we can; he called a meeting in the commissary in five.”
May gave a nod of understanding, then pressed the button to launch the pod out of the ship, and into the empty space beneath it. Then, slapping the button to communicate with the Kree ship that was still on their tail, she said shortly, “You might want to go retrieve that pod – your people are on it.” And then, with that, she turned on her heel and headed in the direction of the commissary.
For a moment, the three of them simply watched her striding away, but then Daisy commented aloud, “Dude, she’s amazing.” As they began to follow her, she asked Mack, “Hey, what do you think it’ll take to get her to train me?”
He gave a deep chuckle at that, throwing his arm around her shoulders briefly and giving her a little squeeze. "Don’t worry about it – if May wants to train you, you’ll know.”
By the time that they arrived in the commissary, everyone else had already gathered there. They were all circled around one of the tables, and as Jemma approached it, she could see Fitz sitting at the head of it, slouching slightly and with drying blood caking his paler-than-normal face here and there, but alive.
Without really paying any mind to the others, she made a direct beeline toward him, feeling that she was only able to breathe properly once she’d found his hand with hers, once she could reassure with her own hands and eyes that he was okay. “Fitz,” she breathed, a wide, relieved smile curving her lips.
“Jemma.” His tone matched hers as he gazed up at her in clear relief and awe, a little smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. He gave her hand a small squeeze, his thumb stroking her knuckles.
Someone pointedly cleared their throat then, and Jemma felt her cheeks heating with embarrassment as she suddenly became aware once more that they most certainly were not alone. She turned to face the others, and had the feeling from Coulson’s amused, slightly awkward smirk that he was the one that had interrupted their moment.
“Sorry,” she murmured, briefly dropping her gaze to the table between them.
-
“Er…right,” Fitz started, dragging his free hand through his hair and not quite meeting anyone’s eyes, “I’m…ahem, I’m glad to see that everyone’s alright and in one piece. I called you all here to…to apologize for what happened today, as it was my actions that brought the Kree after us. That’s not to say that I regret them,” he added quickly, giving Jemma’s hand another, brief squeeze, “but I regret that any of you had to be involved.”
There was a beat of silence, then Mack spoke up. “Well, those are the breaks of doing the right thing, sometimes. It’s just part of the job.”
Relieved to find that he still had the support of his crew, even after what he’d brought upon them, Fitz offered Mack a grateful smile.
“Do you think that they will keep chasing after us?” Elena asked from where she stood beside Mack, her eyebrows arching in concern. “Not that we can’t take care of them.” At that, a pleased little smirk crossed her lips.
“Knowing Kasius? Probably not,” Jemma answered, shaking her head. “He’s proud, yes, and we’ve wounded his ego terribly. But, we’ve shown that we can defeat his warriors, and he doesn’t enter into a conflict that he isn’t sure that he’ll win.”
“Smart move,” May muttered, folding her arms over her chest.
Daisy slapped her hands down on the table then, gaining everyone’s startled attention. “Are you all kidding me?” She glanced around at each of them, her eyebrows high on her forehead in disbelief. “I thought it was clear what we had to do. We have to go back there! You saw what we did to those Kree – working together, as a team, we could take them out for good, and free everyone on the Lighthouse.”
For a moment, all that followed her statement was a slightly stunned silence; even Fitz wasn’t quite sure what to say to that. But, finally, Elena reminded her quietly, “That’s not what we signed up for.”
“No, maybe not,” Daisy agreed without missing a beat, “but you know that it’s the right thing to do. I thought that’s what you guys were all about.”
In response, Elena simply dropped her gaze to the table in front of her, possibly in guilt, possibly in shame.
Daisy waited another moment, but when no one said anything else, she then went on, “I mean, with my powers, and how May apparently kicks some major ass, and – I saw all of those other Kree. I didn’t actually see you guys fight, but it’s clear that you can cause some damage too. It makes sense. Jemma and I, we lived on the Lighthouse our whole lives. It’s miserable, all because the Kree are controlling everything that we do. They control how much we eat, when we eat, what we do and don’t have. They even make us kill each other, just because they can.”
“Daisy’s right,” Jemma murmured, and Fitz glanced up at her to see her eyes shining with unshed tears, her jaw clenched slightly at what were no doubt horrible memories, and his heart absolutely ached for her. “We may have gotten out, but there are still so many people left there under Kasius’s reign. All of the horrible things that he does are still happening; selling Inhumans, enslaving people, it didn’t all go away just because we escaped.”
“Well,” Coulson started, planting his hands on his hips and nodding toward Fitz, “Fitz is the captain, so I say we leave it up to him.”
Suddenly finding himself with all eyes on him, Fitz shifted uncomfortably and cleared his throat. Before he answered, he glanced up at Jemma, and found her gazing at him encouragingly. It was obvious to him that she would support whatever decision that he made, and he was grateful for that – though it didn’t make the decision any easier on him. “I…I may be your captain, but I won’t ask any of you to enter into a battle that isn’t yours to fight,” he finally said.
He was the captain, their leader, yes, but that didn’t mean that he would ask his crew, his friends, to potentially die for a cause that they might not even believe in.
“You don’t have to ask,” Coulson told him simply, reaching over from his spot on Fitz’s other side to rest a hand on his shoulder supportively. Turning to the others, he arched an eyebrow and asked, “Are we all in agreement?”
-
Jemma felt relief and fear blossoming inside of her simultaneously as she listened to Fitz’s crew members agree with Coulson one after the other, until they had come to a final decision. Of course she wanted to help free everyone that was still there, under Kasius’s thumb, but on the other hand…she wasn’t sure that she was ready to go back to the place where she’d experienced so much pain quite so soon.
However, it didn’t appear as if she had a choice, as Fitz then said, “Well, it looks as though we’re heading back to the Lighthouse, then.” Turning to May, he told her, “Set us a course, May.”
She nodded in understanding, then wordlessly left the commissary to follow the instruction. The rest of the crew began to disperse then, and Daisy stepped up to Fitz to say softly, “Thanks.”
“No problem,” he assured her, waving away her gratitude. “Like you said, it’s the right thing to do.”
Daisy smiled warmly at him, but then winced and reached up to touch a deep cut on her cheek. “Ouch,” she muttered, pulling her hand back to look at the blood on her fingertips.
“Oh,” Jemma murmured, releasing Fitz’s hand to get closer to her, inspecting the cut carefully. “Does this ship have a first aid kit? I could sew that up for you.”
“I’ll get that for you,” Mack offered, and she thanked him as he left the room to retrieve the kit.
Glancing around at the others still gathered there and seeing minor injuries here and there, she offered, “I can take care of any other wounds anyone may have. My mother’s mother was a nurse, years ago, and she passed the skills down to my mother, who passed them down to me.” After all, she’d like to do something productive with the skills – something to maybe wipe away the memory of being enslaved by Kasius for them.
“We have needed a medic on this ship for some time,” Elena told her, a little grin ticking her lips up as she joined her and Daisy.
“Well, I’m glad to be of assistance, then.”
Jemma spent the next half an hour or so patching up everyone’s minor wounds, from wrapping up Elena’s bruised ribs, to stitching up a cut on Coulson’s upper arm (and she’d been in for quite a shock when he’d rolled up his sleeve, and she’d noticed his detachable arm – he’d apparently lost it in a fight years ago), but finally, she’d fixed everyone up and sent them on their way.
Then, she went to move onto Fitz, who had insisted that he could wait until everyone else had been seen to, but she was startled to find that he was no longer in the commissary with her. Quickly realizing that he’d probably disappeared while she was busy tending to the others, Jemma rolled her eyes and packed up the kit, intent on finding him and taking care of him, whether he liked it or not.
It didn’t take her long to find him in his bunk, lying on his bed with his hands folded over his stomach. “There you are,” she said by way of greeting, closing the door behind herself and setting the kit on the bed beside him. “Here, this will help a bit with blood loss; you looked pale earlier.” She handed him a cup of water, eyeing him critically.
“M’always pale,” Fitz muttered, but he took the cup regardless, taking a long sip before setting it on the table beside his bed.
“Now, where did all of this blood come from?” Jemma asked, crouching slightly to get a good look at his face. Fortunately, the cuts there seemed to be mostly superficial, but it didn’t appear to be the only place that he was bleeding from.
With a great, heaving sigh, Fitz pushed himself up into a sitting position, grumbling, “S’nothing,” even as he lifted the hem of his shirt and revealed a bloodied wound from what appeared to be a bullet graze.
“Fitz!” she gasped in horror, dropping to her knees on the floor in front of him. Carefully, her trembling hand reached out to lightly press against the angry skin around his wound, and tears immediately built along the rims of her eyes as he flinched, hissing in pain. “I should’ve seen to you first, why didn’t you tell me?”
“S’nothing,” he repeated, shaking his head.
Angrily, Jemma opened the kit, shooting a dangerous glare up at Fitz as she grabbed a clean cloth and began to carefully wipe away some of the blood. “It is not nothing, Fitz. This is…” Not quite able to put the horror, the anger, the sadness into words, she simply shook her head at him.
-
Fitz watched Jemma warily as she stitched up his wound, noting that the tense set of her shoulders hadn’t eased, and that her brow was still furrowed in clear annoyance with him. He didn’t dare try to speak to her when she was so upset with him, and knew that he just had to give her time to stew about it – she had the right to be angry with him, after all.
Jemma didn’t speak again until she’d finished, sitting back on her heels and finally looking up to meet his eyes as she asked, “Is there anything else I should know about?” Instead of the hard tone that she’d used with him before, her voice was now just soft, tired, and it somehow made him feel even worse.
“My…um…” Swallowing, Fitz thumbed over his shoulder, at his back. “I think I’ve got some cuts on my back.”
She nodded wordlessly, collecting her supplies and replacing them in the kit before standing. Climbing onto the bed behind him, she carefully grasped the hem of his shirt in her hands, then began to lift it. He raised his arms to help her (only indulging in his pained wince at the movement since he was sure that she wouldn’t see it), and once it was off, she tossed it onto the floor, at his feet.
After a moment, Fitz felt her gentle fingertips caressing his skin, and he had to briefly close his eyes and take a deep, calming breath. Once she’d finally gotten started on cleaning up and bandaging them, he finally spoke up to tell her what had been on his mind since the Kree had invaded, needing to just get the words out, needing her to understand.
“Jemma,” he started, his voice low and rough with emotion, and he felt her fingers briefly pause, “I… When I realized that we were being attacked, that it was the Kree…my very first thought was of you. Not myself, not my crew, you.” He was quiet a moment, then took a deep breath and went on, “I care about my crew, ‘course. They’re my friends, a bit like family, and I wouldn’t want to lose any of them. But…but I have never cared for someone the way that I…that I care for you. I’ve never had someone that I just can’t lose, that I can’t imagine no longer having in my life. It’s…terrifying, I suppose. But…in a good way.”
With her behind him like she was, Fitz couldn’t see her face, let alone her reaction to his raw, honest words (most likely some of the most soul-bearing words that he’d ever spoken, which was terrifying in and of itself), could only feel as her hands stalled against his back.
When her silence began to drag on, he began to fear that he’d pushed her too far too soon, or that her feelings weren’t on the same level as his, that she needed more time. A bit worriedly, he prompted her, “Jemma?”
Jemma was silent for another beat, then she shifted on the bed so that she could kneel beside him, cupping his face within her palms. Meeting his gaze unwaveringly, she murmured, “Fitz…I feel the same way.”
“You do?” he asked, unable to help the little sigh of relief that he gave.
Laughing quietly and rolling her eyes, she replied, “Of course I do. I’m terrified by the way that I feel about you too, Fitz. That’s why…why I was so angry with you for not telling me how badly you’d gotten hurt. You can’t… Don’t hide things like that from me, okay? It’s only going to drive me even crazier with worry.”
Reaching up to cover one of his hands with his, Fitz gave her a small, apologetic smile, promising, “I’ll do my best.”
“That’s all I ask.” She gazed at him warmly, and he felt his stomach do an odd little flip as she tenderly carded her fingers through his hair. Then, she leaned in to brush her lips against his, her hand sliding down to curve along his jaw.
Jemma’s lips met his softly once, twice, three times before she leaned in to press against them more firmly. His hands automatically moved to grasp at her waist, needing something to hold onto as she tilted her head and deepened the kiss, cupping the back of his head to keep him close.
And, then she leaned into him a bit more, dropping her hand from his jaw to his shoulder to give it a little push. More than a little caught off-guard, he went along with it, falling back against the bed and taking Jemma with him.
Fitz broke away from the kiss to meet her gaze in concern, prompting softly, “Jemma?”
But, she simply smiled and nodded, then leaned back in to capture his lips once more.
-
Though space was much colder than she’d imagined it would be, Jemma felt warmer and safer at that moment than she had in years. Truthfully, she thought that lying in Fitz’s arms with her cheek pressed to his chest and all of his warm, bare skin pressed against hers was now her absolute favorite place in the universe to be.
Idly, she trailed her fingertips over his abdomen beneath the blankets, a little frown crossing her lips as she felt the rough edge of the bandage that she’d placed over his gunshot wound. But, she fought down her reaction to it, reminding herself that Fitz was alright, he was in her arms, and they were together. That was what was important, after all (even if she was still a little mad at him).
Turning her head to drop a kiss over his heart before settling back in, Jemma thought to herself with a little roll of her eyes that she’d been worried over nothing earlier that day. Sure, just about everything that she was experiencing in her relationship with Fitz was new to her, but it all felt so, so utterly right. Daisy had been correct about that, of course.
Suddenly, she couldn’t help but let out a quiet laugh, remembering Daisy’s statement about having to ‘tell her all about it’ once they’d actually gone through with it.
“What?” Fitz questioned softly, pressing a kiss to the top of her head and stroking his fingertips up and down her arm.
“Nothing,” Jemma replied, giving a little shake of her head.
He grew quiet once more, then gave her shoulder a small squeeze and asked gently, “Jemma…how do you feel about going back to the Lighthouse?”
She frowned at the question, closing her eyes and absently tapping her fingertips against his ribs as she thought about her answer. Finally, with a soft sigh, she murmured, “I’m…afraid. Afraid of us failing, and ending back up in Kasius’s servitude, afraid of losing you, afraid of going from being so happy to being miserable once more. But…I know that it’s what’s right, and I want to help those people. And, well, I imagine that I’ll be able to sleep better knowing that I didn’t simply abandon everyone that’s still enslaved there.”
Jemma felt Fitz nod in understanding, his thumb drawing an absent circle on her upper arm. After a lengthy moment, he asked, “How long have you been having the nightmares?”
The previous night came back to her in a rush, her nightmare still playing before her eyes as Fitz had done his very best to comfort her, to get her through it, even though he’d probably had no idea what was happening at the time.
Releasing a sigh, she gave a little shrug. “Well, that’s…complicated. I’ve been dreaming of my parents ever since Kasius took me, but they’re only nightmares every so often. Usually it’ll be when I’ve had an especially tough day, or something awful has happened. And…they’re always soundless.”
“Soundless?” Fitz repeated, his interest obviously piqued. “Because of the implant?”
“Yes,” Jemma answered with a small nod. “It was quite…traumatic, having my hearing taken in such a way. Up until he had me start working with Inhumans, the only thing that I was able to hear for so long was his voice.”
She felt his hand clench around her shoulder, just briefly, before it relaxed. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, dropping another tender kiss on the top of her head.
Shaking her head to tell him wordlessly that it was alright, she went on, “After the dreams, I’m always left feeling…profoundly empty, alone. I’ve been abandoned, and Kasius has me trapped; there’s no hope left to be found.” She was quiet, contemplative, for a moment, then smiled softly and went on, “If only you could save me in my dreams like you did in reality.”
Fitz gave a quiet chuckle, stroking her shoulder with his thumb and turning his head to press a kiss to her temple. “I’ll do my best,” he replied, repeating the words of his promise from earlier.
Pushing herself up onto her elbow, Jemma reached up to cup his beloved face in her palm, drawing her thumb lightly over his bottom lip. Never having been more certain of anything in her life, and never having been more grateful for the ability to speak and listen as she pleased, she whispered, “I love you, Fitz.”
His eyes grew incredibly soft, his lips parted to let out a rush of breath, and she felt his hand tremble, just slightly, against her back. And even though she was reasonably sure that from his earlier confession that he loved her in return, her heart still skipped a beat as he murmured, “Jemma… I love you. I love you.”
Laughing around the brilliant smile that spread across her face, Jemma leaned down to kiss him, mumbling over and over against his lips, “Love you, love you, love you.”
They may have been headed back to the Lighthouse, to the place where she’d experienced years and years of misery and emotional trauma, but just then, it simply didn’t matter.
She and Fitz were in love, and she had never been happier.
And, that night, Jemma fell asleep and found herself having the very same dream that she always did – however, this time, Fitz was there. He rescued her from her enslavement, and together, they took down Kasius, escaped, and flew off into space, into a brighter future.
When she woke the next morning, it was to find herself curled up in Fitz’s embrace, her new favorite place, her new home. Feeling completely safe and loved, a warm smile curved her lips, and Jemma knew then with absolute certainty that everything really would be alright, as long as they were together.