#thestarfishdancer

Still, as nice a sight as Simmons in her bra would probably be,Grant’s riding a nine-month-long dry spell here. The last thing he needs is more sexual frustration, which—as heseriously doubts she’d let him do any touching—is all that could end in.

A distraction is in order. Except he also really wants answers. So…

“Why are you wearing my shirt?” he asks.

For a second, she turns that disgusted frown on him. Then shepointedly returns her attention to the tablet she’s holding like he’s not evenworth her notice. Something she doesn’t wanna admit to him, then…which presentssome interesting options.

“It’s okay if it’s because you missed me,” he says, careful tokeep his tone understanding instead of taunting. “I don’t mind.”

Actually, it’s a pretty appealing thought. The idea that all thatwork he put into her is still paying off, that even as she hates him she’slonging for him…the image of her sneaking into his bunk to steal a few of hisshirts, hating herself even as shetakes them back to her room…

Hell, the image of her curled in her bed, wearing his shirt andnothing else. Touching herself, thinking about him, fucking her fingers andpretending they’re his—

Fuck. So much for avoiding sexual frustration.

“I’ve missed you, too,” he adds, ripping his mind away from thatvery appealing scenario.

Simmons turns her nose up at him.

“No one misses you, you berk,” she claims. The disdain in hervoice might be convincing, but her white-knuckled grip on that tablet saysotherwise. “This was just an accident.”

“You…accidentally took a shirt from my bunk instead of yours?” heasks. He pulls on his cover just a tiny bit to give her a teasing kind of smile—anAgent Grant Ward look that invites her to laugh at her own terrible lie.

Back on that Bus, this smile got her to confess to a lot of things—everythingfrom a soon-to-be-dead enemy goon hitting her mid-mission to that time she andSkye snuck away in the middle of the night to get milkshakes.

Here and now, it only gets him an impatient frown.

“If you really must know,” she says sharply, “all of your thingswere moved to storage shortly after we settled into this base. I must havegrabbed one of your boxes by mistake when I retrieved my own last night.”

…Okay. Grant’s things being in storage, he gets—he’s a prisonerafter all. But… “Why were your things in storage?”

“None of your business,” she says, and hits the screen of hertablet rather forcefully. “I have questions about—”

“I’m sorry,” he interrupts. “I don’t know if Coulson told you, butI’m only speaking to Skye.”

Slowly and with a great deal of visible irritation, Simmons liftsher eyes to meet his. “We’ve been speakingfor several minutes now.”

“We have,” he agrees. “But anything else, I’ll only say to Skye.Sorry.”

Grant has to hand it to her—Simmons is beyond stubborn. UnlikeCoulson, who’s never lasted more than five minutes, she actually keeps talkingat him for another thirty before finally throwing her hands up and leaving indisgust.

If it were Coulson, he’dprobably be annoyed, but as it’s Simmons? Those thirty minutes give him plentyof time to memorize the whole scene—the way his shirt hangs off her curves, thev above the button framing her cleavage, the sleeves she has to keep shovingback up as they fall past her knuckles…

He’s not gonna lie, Simmons looks damn hot in his shirt.

In all honesty, there’s no avoiding sexual frustration after allthese months he’s spent locked in a hole in the ground cell. And since he’sgonna be frustrated either way, there’s really no point in denying himselffantasies, is there?

So once Simmons finally gives up, Grant retreats to his bed andsettles in for some good old fashioned day-dreaming. She’s just offered him awhole new class of things to think about, after all—it’d be rude to ignore it.

He feels more sorry for Jemma Simmons though — he can see how strained her smile is starting to look in interviews. It doesn’t help that her image — the image of her whole band — is just a lot more wholesome than his own.

And it probably doesn’t help when he gets in a fight over her. 

It’s not his first fight, not even his first fight defending a girl band and it probably won’t be the last — cheerfully it goes with his punk image and his bandmates support that sort of violent self-destructive behavior — but it’s the most widely publicized fight they’ve ever had, even counting when he’d just broken free of John and was trying to f with the whole world — even counting the time he was arrested.

Agents of SOS are definitely more popular than the Spliterbombs, and apparently Jemma Simmons dating is a big deal to a lot of people. 

But he’s pretty sure it has to blow over eventually. They’ve literally never spoken and haven’t been seen in even the same area since the first collision.

But it doesn’t die down. 

He’s deciding if there’s a right way to contact someone and offer to have a public breakup for a nonexistent relationship when he gets a message from her via his agent from her agent.

Deborah’staken her own seat facing both of them, though the distance doesnothing to lessen the effects of her powers. “You’re telling whatyou believe to be the truth,” she says. “There’s a differencebetween personal truth and actual truth. For instance, my husband was quite truthful when he said he loved me. He just loved sleeping with my best friend more.”

“I’mtelling you the actual truth of my experience. I may not have had abrain full of parasites but I’ve been just where you are.”

“Iam one with Hive. You know nothing of our peace.”

Jemmasquirms—not to escape her bonds, but in revulsion. The eerieexpression on Deborah’s face is one she can only describe asblissful. And that’s how Daisy feels. She’s been swayed by Hivetoo.

“I’msorry.” The words slip out without her meaning them to. There mustbe a compulsive aspect to Deborah’s powers as well. That’sunfortunate, as she was counting on simply keeping her mouth shut toprevent spilling all of SHIELD’s secrets. She’ll have to findanother way around this.

Deborah’sinky blackeyes land on her. “Why is that, Jemma?”

The use of her first name startles her, but not so much as to prevent hersaying, “Because this is my fault. If I’d only stayed on Maveth,Hive never would have returned.”

“Bullshit,”Ward says again. She’s grateful; his rebuttal draws Deborah’sattention and allows her to break away from her stare. “None ofthis is your fault. Bad people do bad things, you’re not to blamebecause you survived.”

Thebreath freezes in her lungs. “Are you talking about Hive oryourself?”

Hesmiles tightly. “I’ve told you,I dropped the pod to save you-”

Shelaughs. “You dropped the pod because you’re a coward. You weretoo afraid to do the right thing-”

“BecauseI was brainwashed just the way this bitch is!”

“No!Because she has a wholenest of parasites preventing her from breaking the chemical cycle ofobedience-reward; youjust didn’t want tobreak free.”

“Youthink I didn’t break the cycle? You think letting you gowas obedience? John ordered me to kill you both after Fitz tried to murder him. If I’d wantedto follow through on that, you’d be dead.”

It’snothing Jemma hasn’t heard before, but with Deborah’s powersstill influencing her, she finds she has nothing to say in response.

“We’regetting off track,” Deborah says.

Jemmaflinches, but restrains herself from turning to face her. It’sdoubtful it will make any difference at all, but the prospect ofbeing caught in her gaze again makes her feel physically ill.

Wardseems to be of a similar mind. His lips stretch in a half-smile sheinterprets as saying like it or not, we’re in thistogether.

Theirdetermination irks Deborah and she asks, “Why won’t you look atme?” in an almost petulant tone.

“Thisview’s better,” Ward says. His response halts Jemma’s, but itdoesn’t stop her nod of agreement.

“Really?I was given to understand you hate each other.”

Jemmawonders what that means, what reason she would have to interrogate them together likethis if that were the case. While she’s wondering, her mouthanswers. “That doesn’t make him any less attractive.”

Ward’sface lights up and Jemma scrambles to offer some excuse.

“He’san utter ass,” she says and smiles to herself. That, at least, is100% truthful. “Which makes how very handsome he is all the worse.”

Shescowls. That wasn’t the defense she’d hoped it would be.

“Aw,Simmons,” Ward says, “you still like me?”

“Ihate you,” she says immediately.

“Notwhat I asked. You’ve still got that little crush on me, don’tyou? I’m flattered, really.”

Justa few months ago she told Coulson that she had, pasttense, a crush on Ward, that she flirted and giggled like aschoolgirl and gloried in every ounce of attention he tossed her way.She opens her mouth repeat it now—hopefully sans the embarrassingadmissions about how hard she was crushing on him—but the wordswon’t come. She would die before she flirted with him again andshe’d never giggle or preen under his attentions, but withDeborah’s powers flowing through her, demanding honesty even withinher own mind, she can’t deny that she still wants him.

“Physically,”she grunts, forcing the word out. “You are physicallyattractive. Everything else about you is-”

Hewatches her closely, waiting with a gleeful smile for words she can’tsay.

Shehates him. She just said it so it must be true. But she can’t denythat this whole head of Hydra persona he’s adopted—whilecompletely evil—isdangerously attractive. She refuses to think of one particular dreamshe had weeks ago in which, rather than leave her interrogation toMalick and Giyera, he handled it himself with much more pleasurableresults. But she can’t deny that she’s thought of it more thanonce since.

“Same,”Ward says and she enjoys a brief view of his surprise before he locksit away. “On the Bus you were cute, like a girl. But when you wentafter Malick, I could’ve sworn you were gonna go for his throatwith your teeth. Whatever that planet did to you, I like this wildSimmons that it sent back. She’s hot.”

Jemmahas no idea what to do with that information or with the warmth that fillsher chest, so like the happiness she used to feel on the Bus wheneverhe smiled at her.

“Asedifying as all of this is,” Deborah says, causing them both tostiffen, “we do have a purpose here.” She comes forward and laysher hands over theirs on the arms of the chairs. That nauseating coldsweeps through Jemma again, only this time she realizes it’s notthat her body wants to expel her last meal, it wants to expel hersecrets. Every last one until there’s nothing left and maybe then,when she’s empty of all those burdens, this ache will finally leave her. “Hivewants to know what the unbelievers are planning.”

“Sorry,”Ward says. Struggling as she is, Jemma can’t see him, but she cantell he’s gritting his teeth against the same pain she feels. “ButHive’s gonna be disappointed.”

Deborahgasps and her hand lifts away. Jemma just manages to look up in timeto see Ward break the woman’s larynx before catching her in achokehold. Her face turns red before deepening to adangerous purple. Jemma tried to save her from Hive, forced herself toset aside her grief over Will and reenter the field for just thatpurpose.

“I’mnot sorry,” she says just as Deborah’s eyes roll back in her head andWard finally drops her to the floor.

Hedoesn’t hesitate to step over her and begin undoing Jemma’s restraints with a knife he produces from who-knows-where. “See,that? That is what I’m talking about. Hot.”

“Istill hate you.” It feels good to say it, to remind herself of thetruth of it.

“Yeah,” he agrees. Her wrists free, he drags her up, pulls her flush against him. “Whenwe’re out of here, how would you like to show me exactly how much?”