agent phil coulson (magicalplace) wrote in thedoorway, @ 2014-06-02 00:40:00 |
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Phil had spent a long time thinking about this meeting with Jasper -- whether or not it should happen, what he wanted to say, what he should say. There were a dozen different answers to his questions, and none of them seemed helpful. Letting someone in, even someone like Jasper, was a big risk. The number of people Phil thought he could trust in SHIELD was slowly dwindling to a handful of other agents, and one of his dilemmas was that he wasn’t sure he could trust Jasper with the secrets about why he’d survived. He wasn’t sure he could trust anyone with it. The things he’d seen, in memory and in the Guest House, those things had been hidden for a reason. He understood that. What he didn’t understand was why they were being hidden from him. What convinced him to reach out was, in part, the fact that Jasper had trusted him while he and Fury were in hiding. Jasper had trusted that Phil would keep his secret, and he had. He also hoped that Jasper would help shed some light on what happened, and help him get in touch with Fury. It was a long shot, but Phil was running out of options. Twelve minutes after seven, he walked into the cafe and slid into the booth. “Cozy.” "They have so much space out here, cramming the tables in's the only way remember it's New York." Jasper hadn't been worried when Phil showed up on the later side of seven. Ish was how they operated and the only way he and Phil seemed to meet up these days. It'd been like that since he came back. A lot had changed since New York. The whole world had. But it'd changed in SHIELD too. Ever since Jasper had finished academy, he'd followed in Phil's shadow until a mad Asgardian changed that and thrust Jasper into what everyone quite rightly said was Phil's spot. But it wasn't. That was when Jasper had found the Communications side of his training tying him closer and closer to the center of SHIELD. Phil came back the opposite. Sometimes Jasper wasn't sure which was more enviable. But he knew Nick needed both. But talks like these, outside when he was so deep in he'd stopped looking for light, Jasper needed them. It seemed Phil wasn't so at ease in his new role either. Maybe he did too. Jasper wasn't sure where to begin so he handed the menu across the table. "I ordered you coffee." “Presumptuous of you,” Phil joked, his sense of humor dry and almost falling flat. He’d gotten used to most people not catching his jokes, but Jasper knew him well enough to catch on. “I hope you ordered it how I like it.” And then he fell silent. It was difficult to keep up the charade when he’d begun uncovering things that Fury never meant for him to find out, things that good people had died to keep secret. That was their burden to carry now, his and Skye’s. It was their responsibility to make sure no one else was killed for it -- but to do that, they had to understand what had happened to them. Phil considered the agent sitting across the table. They’d known each other a long time. How many times had they kept something from the other? How many times had they been ordered to? This job was going to leave them old and alone, if they made it to old. “You’ve been busy lately.” "Damn," Jasper made a show of stretching then continuing his shoulder's roll to reach forward and across the table. He slid a finger through the handle of the cup turning it more towards him. There was a challenge in the tilt of his head and the quirk of his mouth that even as he spoke was waiting for a response. It was early, but Jasper'd been up for a while. Career military made you a morning person. "Guess I might be stuck with two cups." “Hey -” Apparently his jokes just weren’t hitting home in the right way that week. Phil reached out to grasp the cup and pull it back. “It’s too early for you to be taking my coffee. You’re supposed to be better at knowing when I’m not serious.” Maybe they’d spent too much time not working together. He didn’t have it in him to try again, so he just leaned forward a little. “You have any idea why I wanted to see you?” "See." Jasper withdrew his hand without argument and offered a plastic grin. He didn't usually feel it these days, but there was something just as genuine about faking it. "I thought you were always serious." It didn't matter if Jasper was in DC or Djibouti, Phil was making waves and too big a figure to be ignored. Ever since he'd come back, he'd been different and even moreso since Mike Peterson's apparent death. Jasper had maybe thought to ask. But it was better he not know. Jasper could tell when Phil was going off book; Phil had taught him how to do it. But given the current environment, maybe that was best. "Because Fury doesn't pick up the tab?" “You got it. I need...” Phil wished he hadn’t needed to do this. He didn’t want to bring another person into the line of fire. But he needed help, and he needed answers. If Fury wasn’t going to talk to him about it, he’d find them anyway. Fury had to know that. “His help.” The waitress arrived then, which provided Phil some much-needed time to plan what move he wanted to make next. He wanted Jasper to understand how important it was; maybe if he knew, he’d be more agreeable. After ordering (blueberry pancakes for Phil; he was still a creature of habit, even after coming back from the dead), he leaned forward slightly. “What have you been told about what happened after New York?” That was not an easy admission for an agent to make. Fury's help never came unless Fury was ready to give it, and asking was usually a fool's errand. Jasper tilted his head, thinking as Phil ordered more than when he placed his own. He waited for the waitress to leave and took a long sip as he debated how to answer. He had been level six--well seven. But he'd been fed the party line. And until he started suspecting everything, he'd believed it. Jasper set down his mug and sat back with an appearance of ease to counter Coulson's intensity. "You mean officially?" Everyone knew the official story. Agent Coulson had faced Loki on the helicarrier. He had been stabbed in the chest. He’d died. And then their medical staff had managed to save him. That was all true. The official record had just left out a lot of details. “I mean, what do you know, Jasper?” "Not much more than that." And it was true. Jasper'd heard rumors that something was up with Phil. That he was a clone, or an LMD, or a brainwashed evil alien twin sent through the Tesseract. But even if Jasper hadn't been over R&D when Phil died, he was before he came back. It would be hard to hide something like that. Hard but not impossible. Until the past few months, Jasper hadn't made a habit of digging through medical records, his own or otherwise. "I was sent on retrieval pretty much as soon as we realized New York wasn't a smoking crater." "I actually didn't know until you got back from Tahiti." It's a magical place. Phil held back the reaction that he always used to give when someone asked him about Tahiti. He knew better now, and he knew where that phrase had come from. It'd only been altered memories. It wasn't real. He could see it now, and that made him grimace. "Tahiti sucked," he grumbled, though the frown on his face passed quickly. He was running out of options and he knew it. Phil didn't like being backed into a corner. He released the breath he'd been holding, and took a sip of his coffee. "Listen. There are only two options here. Either he gives me the answers he's been keeping from me, or… " Jasper had known Phil long enough that he didn't need to finish his thought. It was clear: Phil would find the answers himself. Jasper had been about to comment. He'Td never been to Tahiti, but he always had to comment. But Phil cut him off and Jasper suddenly understood why he had dropped his voice. "I mean. Okay--" He recognized the look in Phil's eye. As unassuming as Coulson might be, there was an edge that sometimes defied sanity that took you to level 8. Jasper had seen it a lot in the mirror lately too. He didn't doubt for an instant Coulson would follow through. "Or what about a third option that's not insane?" Phil shook his head, almost sadly. "That's it, Jasper." Then, he smiled a little. "Everything about our lives is insane. It has been ever since…" He thought back to the moment when he knew his life was never going to be the same again. Being sent to keep an eye on Tony Stark years ago had been the first step, but it wasn't until he met Thor that Phil had realized just how big the world was, and just how little they understood. "Ever since New Mexico, I guess." Maybe coming here was a bad idea, Phil thought. If Jasper already thought it was insane, he wasn't going to be an ally. "This is my life. I gave up everything for this, and I never looked back. I deserve to know." There was no need to clarify. There was only one New Mexico despite years of working globally for SHIELD. And really, Jasper supposed if they were going to pick a starting point for the world spiraling madly, that would be a good one. What a week. First contact and not of the entirely friendly sort (though more friendly than New York), Banner and Blonsky trashing Harlem, and the blowout at the Stark Expo in Flushing. They'd had a busy few years with SHIELD before that, but that was terrorists, spies, soldiers, normal guys with specialized skills and classified motives, after New Mexico, SHIELD shifted to gods and monsters. It was easy to ask what chance did normal guys have? But they didn't need luck, they had SHIELD. "I think it's always been there," SHIELD was always more movie than real life, even for people who were career military or CIA or criminals or whatever most of them had been (Vic had been an accountant). People never joined SHIELD with resumes and letters of recommendation. Nick Fury tracked them down in the charred remains of a building whose destruction he'd orchestrated and said Come with me to save the world and he always did it too. "Just you know, easier to look away from when it's not single-handedly destroying a city." Jasper looked at Phil for a long moment, studying him silently behind his glasses. He took a long sip of his coffee before leaning in closer as well. Jasper would probably regret this one day soon, but that list was filling up so quickly that he didn't expect to actually ever have to pay it down. "Alright. What do you need?" "Just a little research about Tahiti," Phil commented lightly. This hadn't all been about trying to get Fury to talk; Jasper didn't have that leverage. None of them did, no matter how much they wanted to believe they did. Not Coulson, not Hill, not Carter. None of them could get the big man to do anything but what he wanted, but Phil was tired of that. He'd given up the chance to have a normal life for Nick Fury. He had to know why. Saving the world wasn't enough of an answer anymore. After a moment, he continued, more seriously. "No one else. Just you and me." He hesitated and looked sheepish for a moment. "Not even May this time." Jasper kept his coffee cup in his hands and stared across the table as if this wasn't quite yet interesting enough. "You've gotta give me more than that or I'm pretty sure google'll only turn up lonelyplanet and priceline. And if it sucks, you're probably not wanting a return trip." This wasn't the sort of thing that would turn up on google anyway, but he couldn't do a blanket search for a tropical island not with everyone as goddamn paranoid as they were these days--as they should be. Jasper was beginning to think there was something more to medical records. His own miracle surgery paid for by an unknown benefactor--HYDRA? Fury?; Phil's miraculous recovery; Barnes in their fucking basement all along. Jasper wasn't quite sure how deep R&D ran outside his knowledge, but if he'd missed so much, maybe he was right where he deserved to be with the people destroying SHIELD. All this was incredibly painful, confusing, and disorienting for Jasper Sitwell who since Academy had been a fervent champion of SHIELD. They had to Trust the System, because it was bigger than them. The phrase came to mind easily and settled his nerves. It always did. But wasn't that further proof? No one's nerves should be settled right now, least of all by the System. "How about I email this time? Does she read that?" “I wouldn’t put it past her.” It was a joke, but Phil wouldn’t be surprised if she knew how to get to his. Not that he didn’t trust her, of course. He trusted Melinda more than he trusted most other SHIELD agents. He also knew that if something was necessary, Melinda would see it done. Phil pulled a thumb drive out of his pocket and passed it across the table. There was more information on that than he wanted to say aloud, but not everything he knew either. If Jasper dared, he’d learn about what Phil remembered of the procedures, where it’d been performed and who he knew had been involved. Phil had left out the most dangerous aspects, and though he felt guilty for not warning Jasper ahead of time, this wasn’t the time or the place. “Tahiti’s not what you think it is. Maybe we’ll be able to have breakfast again. Or sushi. You still owe me for last time.” "Or sushi for breakfast." Jasper dropped a hand to the table, sliding it over the drive casually. Things were rarely what he thought they were. "Face-to-face meetups only then. I think I'm pretty much full time in DC until this project I'm on launches in three weeks." He said it lightly enough but there was a weight to those words and an ashen pallor under his dark complexion. Insight was looming closer and closer, it seemed every meeting wanted to push up the launch even further. Every morning he came into more done than he had left. It was if the Architect never slept. "Give me a week or two, but then call me if you're going to be near the Triskelion." Jasper looked to the counter, wondering if they'd get a break from this heavy talk in the form of the waitress. The theme of 2014 was that there weren't breaks from the serious talk. "I'll probably be tailed." "I'm still on the road a lot, so whenever you can. It's not an emergency," he assured Jasper, because although it was important to him, it wasn't an emergency. It was deeply personal, but there were bigger things going on than Phil's own demons. As much as he would have liked to spend all of his time answering his questions, he couldn't disregard the rest of his job. Neither could Jasper. Phil's face remained impassive, but something seemed strange about Jasper mentioning a tail this time. Phil generally assumed someone might tail him at any given moment, and they were good at shaking them. For Jasper to mention it specifically, like a warning, was suspicious. "Is that any different than usual?" Jasper shrugged, sliding his hand into the pocket to secure the drive as far down as the fabric would let it go. "Not an emergency but we're on a timetable." Jasper couldn't say more about Insight even if Phil deserved to know. But either way: Insight sought to destroy a huge swath of humanity--including Potts Tower's residents who no one would admit they were growing fond of--or the chips worked and they'd destroy three helicarriers over DC. If this wasn't an end game it was the close of a chapter. Jasper wondered who'd fall where. "Things are changing." As concerned as he might have been about his friend, Phil knew how SHIELD worked, and he knew that despite his clearance level, there were always things going on that he wasn’t a part of. He had his job; Jasper had his. That was how it worked. But he was worried now. If it wasn’t an emergency yet, how long before it would be? Phil frowned slightly. “Yes, they are.” He’d been feeling that way for a while now. “Hopefully for the better.” That was what they were there for, after all. “If you need anything… let me know and I’ll be there.” "What I need?" Jasper looked over his shoulder and raised his voice slightly. What he needed he wasn't sure and couldn't say. He'd already said a lot and truth be told with his mentor, Jasper was dangerously close to the temptation to say more than he should. He tilted his head down slightly with a knowing flippancy. He appreciated the offer, but his part of this conversation was done. "What I need's another cup of coffee." |