Jemma Simmons is a terrible liar (needanewplan) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2015-10-15 06:30:00 |
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You really have changed, Simmons. I’m disappointed in you. The words hung in the air, one more weight to add to her shoulders. It wasn’t that she had much time to respond or process. She needed to get back to Mike and Skye’s friend. Her goal on the mission was to take out Ward, but she also was there to be a doctor to those who had been experimented on. The taste of ash was on her tongue, Bakshi’s scream in her ear. They weren’t coming back with them. Bakshi was dead and Ward… well it seemed he knew that he wouldn’t be welcomed by the team. And why should he be? He was still out there though and maybe it would have been better had he shot her. At least then the team would realise they couldn’t trust him. At least her death would have done some good.
By the end of the dream, Jemma woke up and looked at the clock. 3 AM. She wasn’t going to be getting back to sleep anytime soon, so she carefully got out of bed so as not to wake Cosima. An hour on the treadmill, shower, change and into the kitchen to make tea. It was when she went to the table to sit that she noticed it. The splinter bomb. Setting her mug down, the biochemist reached over and held the device. It looked innocuous enough, but she knew exactly what it was capable of.
Staring at the device, Jemma sighed and placed it back on the table and picked up her tea to take a sip. She was trying to process the dream. Process what had happened and then compartmentalise so that the self loathing at her failure didn’t take control. She should have brought a second one, just in case. She couldn’t have expected Bakshi to mindlessly jump in front of the attack. Not when she had grabbed the splinter bomb and convinced Coulson that she would be needed on the mission…
Did she feel bad about Bakshi? There hadn’t been time to process in the dream. She felt bad because she knew that had the Hydra agent not been brainwashed, he never would have jumped in front of the attack. But he was a Hydra agent as well. He was dangerous and she had taken out a threat. He had been the face of her nightmares while under cover. Always worrying she’d be found out. He could have had her killed any number of times, or brainwashed. Maybe she felt bad because she didn’t feel bad. Just that she should have been more prepared.
As for Ward? He was still out there in the dreams, and because she had failed, all those he harmed would be on her. Sighing, Jemma sipped her tea as she stared out the window blankly.
There had been good news for Cosima, the bone marrow transplant had helped. For the time being, she could be mistaken for being healthy, even. She didn’t need to be on oxygen all the time as she had a month ago. Then her dreams had given her the H.G. Wells novel The Island of Doctor Moreau in which Duncan had apparently written his code. Now it was simply figuring out how to crack the code. But Cosima knew the answers where in it, so she and Jemma were figuring that out.
Or trying to. Duncan was a genius, and the code was proving difficult. Needless to say, Cosima was more or less waiting for her dreams, or Sarah’s or Felix’s, to provide the answers because it was starting to get obvious they were missing a key piece to decoding the book. Which tended to prove frustrating.
But the bone marrow from Kira had bought them time. She hadn’t had a coughing fit or another seizure since the procedure had been done. Though it was still a race against the clock. Cosima and Jemma both knew the bone marrow was nothing more than a bandaid to cover the wound that wouldn’t quite stop bleeding. They needed an actual cure sooner or later. At least if the bone marrow stopped working, there was stem cell therapy they could use to help buy more time.
Cosima had actually slept that night. Some nights she was restless, too worried or consumed with the problem that was her health to really sleep. But tonight, she’d managed sleep. Eventually she’d half woken up and rolled over, shifting to slide an arm around Jemma, but her arm only hit an empty mattress. The realization that something was odd brought her more fully awake and she opened her eyes. Though as it was both dark in the room and she had terrible sight without her glasses on, she couldn’t really see anything. She felt around on the bed just to confirm Jemma wasn’t there. She then rolled onto her other side and grabbed her glasses off of the bedside table and slipped them on.
Spotting light coming from another room, Cosima slipped out of bed and headed out of the bedroom. Seeing Jemma sitting at the table and staring out the window, she could tell something was bothering her. She noted the thing that wasn’t the tea cup sitting on the table.
“Jemma?” She asked as she drew close. She didn’t ask if she was alright, it was kind of obvious she wasn’t. So she’d left it at giving Jemma the opening to say something without her prodding at first. Though she would prod if Jemma deflected.
Blinking as she heard her name, Jemma looked away from the sky which was growing light to where Cosima stood.
“I’m sorry, did I wake you?” Nevermind the fact she’d been up for two hours already and had already gone through her morning routine. Routine was good. Routine had kept her alive in Hydra and focused. It usually helped to clear her mind, and while it hadn’t this time, she at least was going through the motions and making sure to try and process things, or to just push them away.
Admittedly, it was push them away more often than not. The only times she had really discussed any aspects of her dreams were with Natasha or Kitty or Peggy and there was always a reason for that. Usually it was gathering information as they dreamed of the same world, or versions of the world. Or it coming up in an awkward elevator ride. But as a rule, Jemma didn’t speak about the dreams, not anymore. Cosima knew bits and pieces, she knew that she’d been undercover at Hydra and worked for SHIELD, she knew the basics of each organisation, which had come up at the dinner. But she didn’t really discuss it. She didn’t discuss the details or Ward or Fitz or any of that. Just that she missed her team sometimes.
“Are you feeling okay?”
Because even with the temporary salve that was the bone marrow transplant, Jemma would worry. It was easier to worry about Cosima’s illness than the unknowns and guilt from her own dreams. True it was the same thing she did in them, push aside what she was dealing with to focus on someone else. Her problems weren’t so big, not in comparison. Besides, she already had come to terms with the fact she didn’t feel as bad about killing Bakshi as she perhaps should. She was just worried on what Ward would do next.
While she didn’t know many details about Jemma’s dreams, Cosima did wonder if Jemma had dreamt something that was bad. She hoped that Jemma wasn’t looking the way she was over worry for herself. Cosima knew she talked about her dreams a lot, possibly even too much, but she also sort of needed to. First it had simply been the clone thing and trying to come to terms with that. Now it was her illness and how most every dream seemed to have relevant information to the overall picture of what was happening in the world of her dreams.
But Jemma. Jemma rarely spoke of hers beyond the bare basics. Even with those bare basics, Cosima had concluded bad things happened rather often in Jemma’s dreams, considering the opposing factions, the superheroes, so on and so forth. It made her wonder just what exactly Jemma dreamt of. Perhaps she could get her to talk a bit more about them now, if it was indeed a dream that was troubling her.
Well, whatever was troubling her, Cosima hoped she could get her to open up about it.
“No, you didn’t,” she assured her. Which was the truth. Jemma’s routine had not woken her, she’d naturally partially woken, and then upon feeling Jemma wasn’t in bed, she woke up the rest of the way. Now, she moved to sit across from Jemma at the table.
“I’m feeling alright, nothing to worry about right now.” Also that was the truth. Cosima sometimes said she was alright when she actually wasn’t, but she didn’t want to concern anyone. She didn’t like being fretted over or treated like she was sick. Right now she was relatively healthy and wanted to stay that way.
“How long have you been awake?” And now she was turning the question back to Jemma. It wasn’t asking what was wrong, but Cosima wasn’t going to simply let Jemma deflect from herself much.
Jemma didn’t mind that Cosima talked about her dreams a lot. Each person was different and given there was the fact she was a clone and now they needed to glean any and all information about the illness that they could, it made sense. Plus for Jemma, it gave her something else to focus on instead of her own dreams. Because even if she should have tried to process the things that happened to her in them, there was always something bigger and more pressing at hand and Jemma’s own issues often were pushed aside. Which worked for her because she didn’t want to deal with them.
Still, it was good that she hadn’t woken Cosima. She tried to keep the fretting to a minimum, especially now that she was currently doing better thanks to the bone marrow transplant. But she knew it was temporary and she was always ready to jump into action if necessary. Sometimes it felt that, even with her job at the Agency, Jemma found herself feeling inactive here and it left her anxious.
So she nodded. That was good. Really, there was enough to worry about without having to deal with Jemma’s failures. Though as Cosima sat down, Jemma made sure to move the splinter bomb. It wasn’t that she thought her girlfriend would activate it, but there was always the risk that she might just because it was new and unknown and she was a scientist. No need to run the risk of it getting activated.
“A couple hours? It was about three when I woke up.” With that, she took a sip of her tea. As if it were perfectly normal to wake up at three am and not try to go back to sleep.
Cosima had also been an odd mix of talking about her dreams and not talking about some of her inner feelings regarding her illness. They did manage to come out now and then, but Cosima tried to keep them in, tried to approach everything as a scientist because it was the only way she felt she could keep her sanity in the matter. She hated knowing that she could die from this illness, and it was something she didn’t vocalize because there had to be a way to cure her. She had Duncan’s book, even if it was proving difficult to crack the code of, but there were clues in the dreams, things they could use to help.
Still, even with everything on her mind, she was worried about Jemma. Especially at the present moment. Cosima didn’t press her for details on her dreams, she tended to be more of the letting Jemma bring it up if she wanted. Unless it seemed like Jemma needed to be prodded, then she would prod. Which, Cosima was thinking this was one of those prodding moments. She did look at the object Jemma moved when she sat down, but she managed to keep herself from trying to touch it.
“Did you have a dream?” Obviously she meant the dreams they all had of another life. And she wasn’t about to let Jemma off the hook here. Not yet.
Jemma wouldn’t have minded it and probably would push Cosima to actually deal, except for the fact that she herself wasn’t the best when it came to such things. Not by a longshot. Especially thanks to the fact that she herself didn’t know how to deal and when she didn’t know how to deal, she hid behind the science. Worked herself to the bone if necessary. Science was familiar. Science didn’t lie to you. (Usually)
Of course, being asked if she’d had a dream, Jemma could have lied, except she was a horrible liar. And she didn’t make it a habit of lying anyway. Brushing things off and not talking about them? Sure. The art of I’m fine. Outright lying? Not her thing even if she was able to do so convincingly. Half truths, play on both strengths and weaknesses, all the while remaining herself.
“I did.” She just didn’t elaborate and instead finished her tea. “Did you want some tea?” And changing the topic since she needed to make herself a new cup anyway.
Cosima was actually relieved that her dreams hadn’t given her the video diary that Jennifer had made while she was ill. As much as it may have provided information she and Jemma could potentially utilize, Cosima could not sit through watching that again. Watching it once through the dreams had been horrific enough. But hiding behind science was a good way to deal with things, she thought.
Still, there were times that hiding behind science was a negative and one needed to actually talk about what was going through their minds. As such, she could tell Jemma was bothered by something.
“I would, thank you,” she said. Because she actually would like some tea, but she wasn’t letting Jemma get out of the conversation that easily. Cosima looked at the thing that Jemma had moved out of her reach, though she made no move to try and touch it. Scientist she may be, combined with naturally curious, but Cosima did know when not to touch things that she didn’t know what they were. “A gift from your dream, I take it?” Considering she hadn’t seen it before, she was going out on a limb and making that assumption. Not that she claimed to know where every little thing in Jemma’s apartment was and what all she owned, but chances were she would’ve seen it before given how often she was here.
There were times the dreams could be kind in not giving things. Jemma would have been perfectly content not to receive the splinter bomb as it was just a reminder of her failure to take out Ward. A feeling of guilt that had crossed over upon waking. Really, she didn’t need any reminder for that, yet here she was with a splinter bomb. She would definitely need to take it to the Agency. Better to have it there where it would be guarded. Also, she would better be able to study it and try to find a way to reverse engineer it if possible.
For now though, the soothing motions of making tea so that she wasn’t thinking about what was going on or the current trend within her dreams. It felt like something was coming. Something more than there usually was to deal with. And given the way they had been going as of late? She wasn’t exactly thrilled by that fact.
Or Cosima could ask if the item was from her dreams. That… wasn’t something she wanted to talk about but of course her girlfriend would figure it out and ask. Which was why when she gave the answer while coming out with tea, it was simple, straight to the point. “Yes, it is.”
No elaboration. If pressed she would answer of course, but she was hoping to get out of the entire conversation itself. Then again, she was so used to being ignored in the dreams, or fighting with Fitz (well, it had gotten better with the reveal of “Real” SHIELD as they had needed to band together and it was almost like she had her friend back), that she wasn’t actually used to people noticing if something was wrong. She had perfected the mask of being fine long ago.
At least, so she felt, even if in the dreams she always felt on the verge of a breakdown as things continued to pile on. Failing to kill Ward was just one more thing to add to a long list of things she had failed to do and would have to carry with her.
Jemma may have mastered the mask of being fine long ago, but Cosima was wise to that. She herself wore the mask. She did it in her dreams so her sisters wouldn’t worry about her as much. Putting on the brave front always helped her feel like she had some control over what was happening to her, and that it wasn’t killing her.
So of course she was going to push the topic when Jemma gave a simple and straight to the point response. Cosima wasn’t going to let Jemma hold whatever was bothering her in. That would make her a shitty girlfriend to just ignore the signs that things were not okay.
“Jemma, what’s wrong? You’re obviously bothered by something from your dream because you wouldn’t be awake now otherwise.” Well, she possibly would be, but she’d be doing something other than just sitting there with that splinter bomb as her only company. Obviously she was torturing herself over something. And Cosima wanted to know what it was so she could try to help.
It shouldn’t have been so shocking to Jemma that Cosima was going to push for answers, that she would actually pick up the fact that there was more going on than she was saying. But given the nature of her dreams, given the fact everyone was always so busy and she was so quiet and guarded, the biochemist had grown used to her own issues being ignored. So while it shouldn’t have shocked her that Cosima would pick up on it, it did.
There were a lot of things in her dreams that bothered Jemma. It would be a very complicated web to explain. There was the entire situation with Fitz. Everything with Skye and the Inhumans. Trip dying. The two SHIELDs working against one another. But there was one thing she could focus on. One answer she could give that was the immediate issue at hand.
“Ward.” Which..wouldn’t make much sense as Jemma never actually went into everything he had done in the dreams. The most she had ever really explained was that she worked for SHIELD and that there was a stint of being undercover at Hydra and a basic overview of the two and that her best friend was Fitz and basics on the team. “Who was on our team only to be a Hydra mole. He threw Fitz and me out of a plane into the ocean, where we should have died. He’s fixated on Skye. He’s killed countless people, good and innocent people.”
Sighing, she took a sip of tea before picking up the splinter bomb as she looked at it before placing it down again.
“I had the chance to kill him, and I didn’t.” Which wasn’t exactly accurate. She had tried. She had killed Bakshi instead. But the fact of the matter was her lack of being prepared meant that Grant Ward was still alive and still a threat in the dreams. But she didn’t want to really go into all of that, but depending on how the conversation went, it would undoubtedly get mentioned regardless.
Cosima was remarkably emotionally stupid in the sense that she could get the blinders on when she cared about someone. Case in point being her dream self and Delphine, and that was a trait that she had in her waking life here as well. But even with that negative, Cosima knew when someone was upset, and she wanted to do whatever she could to help them.
Especially when the person that was upset was her girlfriend.
So she let Jemma explain. And, well, suddenly something clicked in Cosima’s head. The mention of Jemma and Fitz having been thrown out of a plane and into the ocean must have been the dream she’d had prior to having to cancel their trip to the beach. Though she didn’t mention that, she simply moved on to the current topic at hand.
“Of course you didn’t because that’s not who you are. You’re a healer, not a killer, as is evidenced with everything you’ve been doing to help find a cure for my illness. And really, he’ll get what’s coming to him. Everyone like that does.” Was she idealistic in that respect? Probably. But there was some truth that terrible people had terrible things happen to them in return. Of course terrible things also happened to good people who didn’t deserve it, but that was how the world operated.
Or Cosima could be idealistic about her. Which, admittedly made sense. One, it was in Cosima’s nature to see the best in people and perhaps miss the darker aspects. She had gotten that from conversations about Delphine. But also? People often felt that Jemma was a certain way because of her inability to lie and the fact that she was usually excited about science and new experiences. She had been fresh out of the lab before everything had gone wrong.
You really have changed, Simmons. I’m disappointed in you.
And again with Ward’s disgusting taunt. Words that were calculated and meant to cut the biochemist who hated to disappoint people. Just like she knew the words she’d say next would do just that for Cosima, but she deserved to know the truth.
“The thing is, I did try to kill Ward, but I failed. And I’m kicking myself because the next bad thing he does will be on me.”
Which was her take on it. It also showed how much she put on her shoulders. The responsibility. The stress.
With a sigh, the biochemist stood up.
“Though it really doesn’t matter as he isn’t here.” Reaching over, she picked up the splinter bomb, “But I should get to work. Log this in.” Her features were unreadable for a moment, “I’m sorry.”
Since Cosima was over there so often, Jemma wasn’t worried about leaving her flat if her girlfriend were there. But she didn’t have the energy to see the reality of who she was, a failure, hit Cosima. She didn’t have the energy for any more conversation. She needed to work. She needed to feel useful.