Summary:Jemma comes out of surgery and things don't go well. Kelly and Roy are needed to help get her back under control Log Info:Storyteller: None |
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Jemma Simmons lapsed into a coma at approximately 0400 this morning. The SHIELD biomedical team, led by Doctor Eli Nicholls, worked tireless to save her life by using an experimental technology based on the Death Lok protocols.
That's the rumour that's been circulating The Triskellian all day. Of course some people closer to Jemma know it's truth. Whether they'd been with her when she lost consciousness or not, they'd been briefed by Doctor Nicholls of the known risks.
It's now 2100 hour and Doctor Kelly Dehaven, she might have someone with her, has been called to the medical bay. When she gets there, it's in chaos. Jemma is out of bed and going wild but it's the Jemma they left earlier. Not really.
This woman has a cybernetic patch over her left eye, one on the right side of her face and her right arm has been replaced with a cybernetic one, similar to the one the current Deathlok uses. These are Cybernetic that Kelly is familiar with - even if they aren't in common use.
The woman is standing in the middle of the med bay, the door to the containment room she'd been housed in completely torn free.
It might be that sets that sends Kelly's heart racing or it might be the feral look in Jemma's remaining good eye that does that. That and the fact that she's growling.
"Doctor Dehaven, thank goodness you're here." That's Doctor Nicholls who's nursing a black eye. "We need to help her get control of the impulses. The Deathlok protocols have disoriented her…."
Two TAC agents arrive behind Kelly, neither of them powered. "We need to restrain her, Doc. But you're going to have to tweak the implants."
It's late, but Kelly often works late. Roy was trying to coax her to Go Home Damnit when the alert came through. The short redhead is rushing down the halls, her athletic shoes squeaking on the flooring as she turns a sharp corner and then draws up abruptly when she gets a look at the medbay. She's staring, wide-eyed as Nicholls and the TAC agents are talking to her, and it takes an extra tic or two for their words to get through to her. She turns to look at them with those deep green eyes going wider. "What?" It ends on a bit of a squeak.
Let's remember, that Kelly isn't an Agent. She's a relatively low-level egghead that's been with SHIELD for less than a year doing her postDoc that's been tossed in way over her head. Of course, SHIELD had probably always planned to use her for a lot more than her expertise in BCI systems. Like, apparently, reigning in their resident biochem.
"Uhm! Right!" Kelly looks back at Jemma and considers for a moment and then nods. Pointing to Jemma's right hand, Kelly looks at the TAC leader. "I need you to hold her down so I can get to that hand." It's the direct link to the computerized systems. She turns over to Roy and grabs his hand, but not to hold it. A small bit of her psisteel peels off, forming a ring around one of his fingers and she looks up at him, almost grimly. "You grab her head and hold her still." Because Kelly's going in on two fronts.
With his mental link to the telepath, Roy can almost see as Kelly's thoughts that were flailing around nervously start to get in line. Logic overriding emotion. Critical thinking to a solution.
Having kept Kelly company for the evening, when she got the call, Roy came down after her the hallway, his expression pulled into a tight frown as he hears the orders and instructions. Then he glances towards Kelly when she forces that psisteel ring on his finger. "Got it!" he says as he turns towards Jemma. "Sorry, doc." comes the concerned tone.
With that, his right arm, the cybernetic one, hums to life as he uses it to try to help hold Jemma down. "This is to help." he tries to offer in quiet encouragement as he places that ring on his right hand against Jemma's temple.
Jemma had once been a low level egg head. Bright eyed and bushy tailed out of the Academy. If she could, she'd be feeling a lot of compassion for Kelly about now - but she can't. She's too busy growling, the hospital gown hanging from her frame.
"Got it Doc." The agents approach Jemma cautiously. "Come on, Doc, give us break. You know us. Gresham and Mallory. Remember the Kuwait mission?" Gresham steps foward trying to grab her arm, only to be backhanded across the room. Leaving Mallory and Roy.
Mallory manages to get hold of the arm, not that he can hold it still for long. She's strong.
Roy is met by a similar strength, but manages to get the metal to her temple implant. There's only moments that Kelly has to make the connections she needs and hopefully get Jemma to stop flailing. Stil, Roy has work cut out for him as Jemma strains against his arm. Hopefully she doesn't break anything on him.
The connection to the neural implants is interesting. Kelly connects with Jemma's mind. She can the order in the chaos that is currently swirling around. Chaos caused by confusion and things just not firing right. She can also feel how scared the woman is - so scared she's operating at a primal level.
Seeing Gresham hit the wall and sliiiiide down is really not encouraging. There's a hiccup in Kelly's focus, the spike of emotion threatening to scatter her courage. Mallory keeps going though, managing to wrestle Jemma's arm into place and Kelly slaps her own ungloved hand over Jemma's.
Kelly's hand goes liquid, hardwiring her into the access port there and giving Kelly the connection to the hardware. Roy gets the ring up against Jemma's head and that's all the redhead needs to make the telepathic connection. Primal terror blasts through the mini-network that Kelly has set up, with all of Roy and herself on it and the redhead knows she can't weather that kind of emotion long. She sends the equivalent of a 'kill' signal out to the hardware and the wetware, to try and paralyze Jemma so she doesn't kill anyone with her frantic flailing. She knows that's not going to help the terror though.
"« How do we calm her down? »" Kelly has to yell it across the link to Roy, her own pulse racing as she starts to sweat just from being connected to that kind of fear. It leaves a sour taste on her tongue that, after last night, is all too familiar.
"I'm at full power at the arm, but she's fighting me!" Roy snaps out at the staff as he tries to keep him down with that powered arm. But it was only meant to give him a stronger draw on his bow - not punch through walls.
Then comes the flood of emotions. "Augh!" he yells, his mind nearly overloaded as he plays the link between Jemma and Kelly. This is /not/ a hot threesome. At all. He tries to focus on the question he had. "Pull into her head — find that happy spot!"
He looks up at her, thinking about everything he knows of Jemma - which isn't blessed much.
"Make her think she's in her lab!"
——
The medics are seeing to Gresham, he's groaning on the other side of the medbay. Mallory grunts as he leans on the arm, assisted by Roy. They're holding, at least for the moment.
Kelly has to try a couple of times with the KILL command. The arm goes rigid, frozen in place, fingers curled in a ball.
There's still the emotional and mental turmoil to deal with. Which gets worse when Roys thought of a threesome filters through the connection. Now it's not just emotional turmoil, it's EMBARASSED emotional turmoil and she's actively fighting them.
Kelly gets a glimpse though, when Roy says 'happy spot'. It's not her lab at all, though that's a close second. It's the backyard of a house in Devon at night and there's a bed there.
"« You and your inappropriate running mental babble! »" Kelly snarks back as embarrassment floods through. But at least that's a little easier to deal with than the terror, if you have to choose between the two.
Kelly pulls back away from Jemma's hand, leaving psisteel still 'plugged in' to the data port there and then moves to place her hands on either side of Jemma's head so she can take over keeping the telepathic link while they've got Jemma subdued. Psisteel flows over Jemma's face and head, forming a 'crown' tight around her temples. Kelly gives Roy a nod that he can let her go and then backs away herself. "Keep everyone back!" She warns the room as she releases the enforced paralysis on Jemma. It's hard to calm someone down when they're being restrained.
Find her happy place. Right. Kelly's mind reaches for Roy's, using him to augment her power as she reaches out for Jemma's mind and *pulls*, trying to bring that frantic consciousness over into her own brainspace where she's taken Jemma's memory and constructed it into a room for the three of them.
"Innuendo's the only thing I'm good at!" Okay, he's underselling himself on that one, but Roy knows Jemma's jacked in, and hopefully keeping her attention focused on something other than rage and fear.
There's that hijacking of his mind again, as he serves as the halfway ground between Jemma and Kelly. There's a grunt as he closes his eyes, trying to concentrate - at least she's not overloading him this time. He works to shove away his own thoughts and history - this is about Jemma.
"Good thing I only have two cells up there to bang together, huh?"
Jemma snarls as Kelly's hands touch her face, her meat arm trying to knock the womans hands away. She can't. Without the cybernetic implant she's still just human in the rest of her body. But it might hurt Kelly a bit.
As the paralysis is released, Kelly's timing is nearly flawless … she manages to pull Jemma's consciousness into that room. Her fist flexes but the body relaxes … first part of the crisis averted at least.
The world narrows for Kelly and Roy. Whatever is going on in the lab doesn't matter. The memory Kelly is recreating is vivid - this is one that is very special to Jemma.
There's the scent of night blooming jasmine and the sound of crickets, as Jemma lays, flat on her back looking up at the night skies. There's an older man beside her - not in a creepy way at all. Roy gets sucked into him … it's Jemma's father.
"And that there is Orions Belt. Now where's Venus?" Roy might think he's actually said those words.
The context - is patchy but Kelly can glean the important part. Jemma has scoleosis and has been bed ridden for months. Her father has been doing this for weeks, sating his brilliant daughters need for knowledge.
This is… different, but honestly so much of the telepathy side of things is new that Kelly can't really say if it's 'unusual'. Kelly's own presence is sort of ghostly, and she lifts one hand to look at, or rather through, it before looking back to the scene on the bed. She sees Roy sitting there, but he looks different as elements of Jemma's father blend with the archer.
"Jemma. Can you hear me?" Kelly's voice is kept even and not too loud. She doesn't want to disturb Jemma's Happy Place too much. But they also can't just let her stay here.
Roy /freezes/. How many times had he done similar with Lian when he was younger? How many times did they make a blanket fort, turn on the little plantearium that she had gotten for Christmas and done this. Or just read stories to her. Or spent time with her. He was never a neglegent father - not in the least. He loved his daughter.
And being shoved into the role of Jemma's dad causes a lump in his throat and a tremble that races through him. He hears the voice from his lips that's not his own - but he waits for Jemma to answer the question.
A tear appears on the corner of Roy's eye out in the real.
——
"Kelly?" The memory shimmers and suddenly it's Jemma standing there, with Roy and Kelly in the garden. The bed a ghostly image in the background.
"What what's happening?" beat "Roy? Aren't you supposed to be in Afghanistan? Why are you crying?"
"Why are we back in Devon?"
Tellingly, this projection of Jemma is herself. Without the cybernetics and the modifications that were just made.
Now they've got her calm, all they have to do is keep her that way, while Kelly makes the necessary adjustments so she can return and not be a rage monster.
It's a damned good thing that *Jemma* is calm now, because Roy's grief added to her earlier emotional turmoil as well as him not being able to help Kelly calm the storm would probably have been a disaster. As it is, Kelly sinks down to her knees, and then sits on the floor out in the medlab while her focus stays turned inwards. She really, really wants to be able to comfort Roy, but the Deathlok systems are still freaking out and taking way more attention than they should.
Like Jemma, in this memoryspace, Kelly's arms are both normal and not chromed-silver and she reaches them out towards Jemma in a placating manner and offers a strained smile. "Your memory is very strong and special. It reminded him of one of his own." She doesn't want to open up Roy's grief for everyone to see, but she's not sure that he's up to answering the question just yet. In that shared mental space, Roy's grief brings clouds over to cover the stars and the moon, and rain starts to fall like his tears and Jemma can feel that the echo of that sadness, though she might not realize what it's from.
"Do you remember the mission to neutralize the AIM weapon? You were hurt. They had to do surgery." Kelly says, trying to keep things on-track even as the rain matts her hair down around her face, turning the deep red to blood.
"Got delayed." Roy says as he reaches up to brush at his eye. "And allergies." he says with a shake of his head.
And then Kelly is trying to explain things, and Roy closes his eyes. "Alright. So you got hit with a bio-weapon. And it was eating you. Like literally. So.. they're having to fix some things. Kinda like they had to do my arm. But I was more a prototype. You look much better."
For Jemma that echo of sadness is for the time she'll never have again with her father, but it's strangely amplified and she doesn't understand why.
She will though.
"I'm sorry. I didn't know …" This is pure Jemma Simmons. The strength of her compassion filters through the link even as she looks up at the rain. "It never rains in Devon at this time of year." she says with wonder.
Taking Kelly's offered hands, Jemma squeezes slightly as she tries to get her mind in her order. Both Kelly and Roy experience the speed and the organisation - it's phenomonal. No wonder she had a phD by the time she was sixteen and a couple more a few years later.
What they'll notice is the thought patterns aren't linear. She connects things in unique ways that might make her conclusions and assumptions seem inuitive. Intuitive but generally right.
"Are you alright, Roy?" Loosing one hand from Kelly, Jemma holds that out to Roy. "I remember being bought back in, talking to you two and then … nothing."
Kelly seems to have withdrawn. She's working on the implants and the connections to her body. It's going to take a few moments to fix that but with Jemma calm at least, it will be easier.
"What do you mean, kind of like they had to do with your arm?"
"Yeah. Well. No." Roy shrugs his shoulders. "But this isn't about me." Isn't it though. It's probably raining because they're currently co-opting the space in his head. And the sadness over the lost opprotunities with his own daughter lay like a lead weight on his heart. "Take a seat." he offers to Jemma with a sigh.
He moves over to sit on a tire swing. Where did that come from? Maybe Jemma had one. Maybe Roy wishes he had one. Emotions are a hard thing.
"So the bio weapon. It dissolves flesh. It opened on you." he explains. "We were able to get you out, but you experienced.. a lot of exposure. They're working on trying to make you whole again."
Jemma blinks as the tire swing appears but she takes a seat as Roy explains. He can almost see her thinking as she processes what he's saying.
"Make me whole? You mean … they're cybernetic implanting me?" All he needs to add is Death Lok and her horror will be complete. "That's not possible, it was cellular necrosis. That's terminal."
It starts to click then. "Did I die, Roy?"
She didn't, but she could be forgiven for thinking so given her current knowledge.
"You're not dead." He can't answer the other question. If she died. He's not privvy to that information. Roy draws in his breath. "You're still mostly here. Kelly.. Doctor Dehaven is working on trying to stabalize the cybernetics. They may have gone with the max setting and trying to dial back to something your mind can adjust to." he reaches over and rubs his arm. It feels so real in his shared mind.
But it's not. And he knows that.
"It's a lot to have to take in. But you're still going to be you. Just you know. Enhanced." he says with a sigh, reaching up to rub the back of his head and that crop of red hair near where Kelly implanted him with a bit of herself. His other hand is held to his side, because he's using that hand to keep contact with Jemma.
"It's not possible. The cellular degradation wasn't reversible. I saw the results for the myself." Jemma says again. "There's only one process that could stop it …" she doesn't complete the sentence.
It's not Roys fault and he doesn't have the knowledge to answer her questions.
"Right. Well then. I … " They can both feel the uncertainty from Jemma. The fear is still there but controlled. Kelly must have the adjustments almost made.
The memory fades and they're back in the medlab. The 'mask' Kelly had put around Jemma's face, disipating. The biochem stumbles and looks at her arm. She swallows as she starts to shake.
"Doctor Simmons." No one is going near her at the moment.
Wrong. Someone is.
Roy hasn't moved from where he was standing, holding her down. Instead, that hand drops down - that mechanical arm moves to settle on Jemma's /real/ one. A reminder that she is still here. Still alive. Somewhat, at least.
Because he doesn't know what else to do.
——
"Ro Roy? Where's Kelly?" Kelly is recovering in the corner at the moment. They'll see to her soon.
"Let's get Doctor Simmons back to bed so she can rest up." That's Eli Nicholls. He must have come in during all the commotion. "And then we can tell her exactly what's happened."
Jemma's here. Jemma's alive. But does she want to be?
Either way, Jemma appreciates the warm comfort of a friend.