bravejemma | IC Inbox

-- I didn't learn until afterwards that he had what could perhaps be called a sort of spotty history with interrogations.

[ because no matter what was in the report issues months ago, nothing had quite prepared her for the revelation that he'd attempted to kill a man, however vile, in an off-record session. ]

Some sour feelings got dredged up. I'd like to know how he's doing, but I imagine he wouldn't find my concern all that welcome right now.

[Ah. If that was got dredged up, as Peggy said, things now make perfect sense.]

Grant Ward is something of a special case. [Which is putting it mildly.] He will be fine -- he is feeling somewhat better, I think, but those feelings... are difficult. It will pass.

[ it hadn't only been about grant ward, of course, but this is as good an access point as any -- and peggy nods, turning the tip of her finger across the rim of her whiskey glass. ]

I hadn't intended to cause him any distress, you understand. [ well. that's true enough. ] But I'm not convinced there's a way to tell him so that won't make him feel patronized.

[ she can relate to that, at least. ]

Of course not.

[That Peggy hadn't meant to upset him, and the latter part.]

Trust me, that is the trick. He may forgive weakness in others, but if he finds it in himself he finds it deplorable... inexcusable, even. And to acknowledge that you've seen it is worse.

[It's all very British, in a way, so she suspects Peggy understands. Jemma knows where it comes from, the place deeper than cultural norms, and it makes it all the sadder to her. What Fitz has been told is weakness is where his strength lies -- and she's told him, time and again, though how much ever makes it over the walls he builds around himself she never knows.]

But you're right. Being direct about it usually ends with him still in a strop and you in an even deeper hole than before. [All true, but not so much advice -- if that's what Peggy had even been looking for.] I've found time is the best balm. ... And food.

[She's found you can never go wrong in giving Fitz food as an apology.]

[ it's a helluva chestnut, isn't it? the sensitivity that fitz displays. some occasions, it infuriates her. other moments, it's downright humbling. but the very thing that sets him apart from the pack seems to be (if simmons is right, and peggy suspects she is) the same thing that he dislikes in himself. ]

I'm afraid it was something a bit more than a strop. [ she tips her glass. she drinks. she lets the whiskey burn sort out her words for her. ] I -- I may have called into question his scientific objectivity. Can food fix that?

[Jemma opens her mouth as though to make answer, but then is forced to reconsider it. After a moment, she continues:]

Well, I can't say I've ever had to try it for that reason but it certainly couldn't hurt to help grease the wheels.

[ grease the wheels, she says. peggy offers a hum. truth be told, apologies aren't a strength of hers. never were, might never be. and she knows that asking for a strategy now is little more than making certain she knows what hoops she might have to jump through if she needs fitz before he comes back 'round.

surely, he will. won't he? peg worries at her drink -- tapping the glass with tidy manicured nails. ]

I don't suppose you'll go as far as to drop some hints? Favourite treats?

[ oh, intel is intel. ]

[She chortles at that.] Anything sweet or crunchy, especially if it has ingredients fifteen syllables long.

[Every once in awhile she shakes something green and leafy in his direction, but that's about as close as the two get. She considers sharing the Sandwich, but in the end she keeps it to herself.]

Anything that goes well with tea -- he likes his tea time treats.

I really think that this will blow over. Knowing that you don't judge him or treat him any differently will be the biggest help. After... well, it's important to him that he not be handled with kid gloves.

[ that's just it, isn't it? peggy hadn't considered her kid gloves to have been in use on that particular afternoon. or maybe she's slipped them on (so to speak) once things started charting south. she presses her lips together.

no, tea treats won't solve this one. as lovely as the thought is.

but then, of course, jemma leaves a little gap in her sentence and peggy can't help but go excavating. ]

After what? [ a tip of her head. ] Are you talking about -- about the injury? The one that showed itself so unavoidably during not that event? You were both a touch younger.

Yes.

[She sounds a touch regretful in bringing it up, but it had just been an automatic explanation that she hadn't thought to check until the beginning had left her mouth. But it sounds like Peggy knows, at least a bit of the tale.]

I suppose it's... a few years, when you combine our timeline with the time in Wonderland. He nearly died. After a nine-day coma he woke up, and had trouble with -- well, you name it, I suppose. Speaking, movement -- I think his hand still bothers him sometimes. But it just compounded what was already ingrained in him.

[ -- already ingrained in him, hm? well. peggy doesn't make too much of a show of mulling over those words, perhaps it once again boils down to culture, but they certainly don't go unheard. ]

Yes.

[ a huff of breath. they'd talked about that, hadn't they? the way your vulnerability after a near-fatal (should be fatal) injury knocks you down and makes you question your place. indeed, it'd been that path that had brought them hard against the topic that had unwound everything: the portal.

she wars with herself. how easy it might be to tell jemma to tell fitz that she's got no interest in pursuing that path -- not really, not any longer. only peggy can't be certain saying so would be truthful. ]

Yes, he would have had a lot of ground to recover. Living it again, thanks to the event, might have exacerbated those feelings. [ feelings, those pesky little things are always the problem. ] He did acquit himself marvelously during the -- interrogation itself, I'll say. I hope our little disagreement doesn't convince him otherwise.

I'm sure a therapist would say the same. [Not that Fitz would have played well with a therapist. The physical therapy had been trial enough.]

I'm sure he did, and I'm sure on reflection he'll remember that he did will.

[Well, she's sure about the first part -- the second will come in time.]

Actually -- just how much field training have the two of you had?

[ fitz might stand uniquely endeared to peggy for a great many reasons, but she isn't so blinded by that favouritism that she can't see the writing on the wall: simmons is, by far and large, the more reliable source.

somehow, these questions come with baggage when she asks them of fitz. maybe she'll find a more satisfactory and straightforward response with the other half. ]

[Jemma tries a smile and a laugh to cover what is going to be a bit of an embarrassing reveal, but it comes out as a grimace.]

Officially, none. We failed our field tests before we left SciOps to be on Coulson's team, but... he wanted us anyway.

[Coulson wanted them and she wanted to go, and that was that.]

[ ...oh.

remarkable, really, how her expression doesn't shift an inch. but inside she's humming with a rare chorus of uncertainty. did she do wrong, then, to go dragging the fellow into a caper like monday's? but no, no, no, she still meant what she'd said: he had acquitted himself well. ]

But you've both had plenty of experience since then. [ the reports certainly implied as much. and simmons herself had discussed doing undercover work at...hydra, good lord, of all places. ] More than most, would it be fair to say?

[Somehow, her not saying anything says everything, but Jemma understands.]

It's been a few years, and experience has certainly been a grueling teacher. I don't know that we'd be effective specialists, but we can get the job done.

Specialists. There's that word again. [ a puff of breath; a shake of her head. ] We don't use it in the SSR. There are field agents and there are otherwise.

[ she pauses while she takes a drink. ]

Not that being designated as one guarentees you any time in the field.

Lots more probably changed between your hey day and mine. Specialists work alone in the field, when things might require... well, they're probably a lot closer to proper spies than anyone else.

[She considers that. The only specialist she's really known before things collapsed was Ward, and she had been forced to conclude that none of them really knew him.]

I suppose it's a gentler name. Specialists. [ a quirk of her smile. ] Spy is such an ugly one -- and a dangerous one, to boot. Espionage isn't something anyone wants to be caught doing.

[ the rules of war don't protect them, after all. ]

Gentler name for some not terribly gentle people.

[She supposes she shouldn't tar them all with the same brush that she would happily blacken Grant Ward with, not that he needed the help, and even more to the point she probably shouldn't have said anything, but it's done and she takes another swallow of the whiskey, grimacing at the burning in her throat and studies what's left in the glass.]

They have their place in the organization.

[ hmm. ]

Some rivalries never end, it seems.

[ the labcoats vs the field agents. ]

[Those had been the fun days -- gentle ribbing, showing their pride in their profession and their academy. She smiles a bit.]

Someone has to keep the field agents on the cutting edge.

And, for me, that someone was always Howard Stark. [ perhaps it's rude to suggest it, but: ] I tended to prefer his gadgetry over what the SSR labs produced.

[Jemma can't blame her. He was probably the best of the best.]

In my experience, scientists keep all the fun stuff in their private labs anyway.

Oh, Christ. [ a small laugh -- perhaps the first of the evening. and she drinks a little more and shakes her head and confirms exactly what jemma suspects. ]

Stark's private vaults got cracked, about a year ago, and some truly ghastly technology started hitting the black market. Things dangerous enough to convince just about every bureaucrat in Washington that Stark must have set the whole thing up so he could sell to America's enemies.

[ peggy can talk about it now with a touch of levity, even though at the time things had gotten...quite bad. ]

Hogwash, of course. But he had some truly terrifying stuff in those vaults. He called them his bad babies.

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