phil coulson + rose ward
mention of death | complete
Rose had a lot of questions when it came to Phil Coulson, of course, she’d heard about him, and she’d seen some files but that didn’t mean she knew him and she was well aware of the differences between some files and who someone actually was. He’d been assigned the commander of the current mission, and she was running the home base team.
After they had their briefing, she caught up to him as they were headed out to get ready to leave Atlantis. “Coulson,” she called as she fell into place with him. “Rose Freeman,” she offered her hand. “Looks like it should be an interesting mission.
Coulson took the hand and shook it with a smile. "Phil Coulson. Interesting is certainly one word for it." Despite having worked for SHIELD when Buffy aired on tv, he'd caught more than a few episodes which did nothing to reassure him about this mission. "I can honestly say vampires is a new one for me. How familiar are you with the setting?"
"Not very," she admitted. "I remember watching a couple of episodes in passing but I never really got into the whole vampire fad, I was more of a spy thriller kinda girl, or cop shows." Rose knew it was best, to be honest about her knowledge of it. "Although I did like that weird vampire show moonsomething or other."
"I think I watched most of the early seasons - it was a change of pace from work," he said with a shrug. He couldn't remember why he started watching Buffy, but he'd gotten sucked into the storyline. Not to mention he found the watchers interesting (even if they were incompetent at times). "Cop shows, eh? Are you a Law and Order person? Or are we talking Hawaii 5-0?"
"You know more about the world than I do," she smiled tapping the file she had in her hand. "Hopefully this crash course is a good one." She smiled at his question. "I watched all of Naked City, but I'd say I'd lean to Hawaii 5-0 over Law & Order, or MacGyver."
“It’s a fairly normal world - by which I mean it’s not like Avatar - the blue one or anything like that.” Coulson gave her a smile. “MacGyver and Hawaii 5-0 - I have to respect that. I’ve been told the intel on these missions is usually pretty good. Angelus is supposed to be quite the opponent though. What’s your background with stuff like this?”
“MacGyver, always fun to watch,” she liked the problem-solving bit. “I’m actually from the same world as you, but CIA.” She didn’t usually just flat out admit that kind of thing but he was going to be mission lead and it was best to know.
Well, that little tidbit earned the arch of an eyebrow from Coulson. "Is that so? Desk job or the more involved sort?" Phil gave Rose another look, trying to figure out if he'd ever crossed paths with her. "Is this the part where you tell me you know everything in my file and that I should have never tried to resurrect SHIELD after Rogers destroyed it?"
"That'd be a waste of time and pointless given the situation we find ourselves now," Rose didn't bother letting him know if she'd read his file or not. "And field work, to answer your question." Rose wouldn't have handled a tedious desk job well.
Fieldwork got a smile from Coulson. “Sorry, I suppose I’m just used to hostile interactions with folks from other agencies in our world.”
But Rose was right. They had to work together on this mission and what had happened in their world didn’t really matter here. “Anything you want to ask before we get going?”
"We don't all decide to hate other agencies in petty rivalries, although if you threw the NSA at me I might roll my eyes." Rose was mostly joking, but she really didn't like the NSA.
"I think the better question is what else do you want to know about people you're working with?"
"True, but SHIELD has rarely been anyone's favorite. And nobody likes the NSA." Phil gave her an easy smile. "Well, favorite type of caffeine is always a useful thing to know. Working style? Bad habits? Pet peeves on a mission?"
"CIA isn't always that popular either, we just haven't been making as many headlines in the last few years or so." Rose could remember a time when the CIA wasn't liked, hell she knew it still wasn't exactly liked.
"I'm not that picky when it comes to caffeine, but I did become partial to a good flat white a couple years ago." Indicating she'd worked in Australia at some point. "Direct, don't bullshit me, and I tend to not always remember to share all the details of an op, years of working undercover make it difficult to trust."
Phil managed a small smile. "I'm a man of simple tastes - who's drunk a lot of bad coffee over the years. Black is good. As long as it's not dirty water or tar."
"Bullshit isn't my style," Phil continued. "Deadpan humor on the other hand… Occasionally I'll function on a need to know basis, but people in leadership need to have the intel to be successful. The last few years have given me an appreciation for collaboration. If I'm missing something, call me on it."
Rose knew that people in positions of making choices needed the intel, she just knew sometimes some things were better not there if they were just going to be distractions, regardless she nodded. “I’ll keep that in mind, the coffee I mean.” She joked. “Listen, one other thing you should know unless you’ve already heard.” Rose paused knowing that her next words might change a lot.
“I wasn’t born Rose Freeman, Grant Ward is my little brother.” She wasn’t sure how much Phil knew about all the family history but she knew it was likely he knew Grant’s older sister disappeared.
The pieces slid into place in Phil's mind, the reason she looked vaguely familiar to him, everything. His face remained impassive as if they were talking about the weather. "Is that going to prevent you from working with me?" he asked, fixing her with a look. "I've moved past my history with Grant, and I won't hold his actions against you, but I recognized I'm asking you to overlook or forgive the fact that I killed your brother."
"He made his own life choices," Rose said matter of factly. "Honestly, I hadn't seen him since I was 18. From what I've gathered what happened happened, I can't very well be angry with you for killing someone who is perfectly fine here."
"Fair point," Coulson said, glad this wasn't going to be an issue as he tried to remember what he knew of Grant's sister. He knew it wasn't fair to her, but old habits died hard. And whatever intel he could remember might serve him well. "Well then, I don't foresee any problems working together. Are you free to meet over dinner to go over the intel?"
"Well be just fine." Rose was sure of it. There was a lot of other things she imagined they were going to face that'd be more of a worry. "Yeah, I'm free." She didn't hesitate, the more of a working relationship they built and the better they knew each other, the better it'd be for everyone in the field. "What are you in the mood for? And don't say curry, I had too much yesterday."
“Tacos?” He offered as an alternative.
“Tacos.” Rose agreed gesturing for him to lead the way.