#aos 7x10
Haunted Hallways
A quick little oneshot after 7x10 because how is this ship making me write episode tags?!
One of these days I might actually edit/triple check errors, but today is not that day.
The last time Daisy had seen her mother’s lifeless body it had been only moments after Jiaying had nearly drained the life out of her. That time, she had been so caught up in the chance to get to know her mother that she had nearly believed her every lie, now, she had been so caught up in her own past, that she had nearly refused her the chance this time.
Cradling the lifeless head in her hands, the grief she felt was also different, this time she was actually losing something, not just the lie of the chance of something. She had had the chance to see how her mother was before Hydra, before all the horrible things that made her capable of trying to kill her own daughter, and she would be lying if she said she had hated what she heard.
There was a pit in her stomach, she had spent too long watching those she loved die, and somehow she was in that position once again, even though she had spent so long trying to convince herself that she didn’t care about her mother, not after everything she had done. Deep down though, she was still just that little girl wanting her family to come back for her, to tell her everything would be okay and that they had always been searching for her, that they loved her.
When she first heard her mother had had another daughter, one she spoke so highly of her relationship with, one she cared so deeply for that she would go to any lengths for, it had gutted Daisy, but now, now she felt gutted that this was the mother she could have had, the one that she could have loved. She pushed aside the thoughts shadowing her mind of what this all meant, of what it meant that her mother died before she had even been born and continued to stare ahead, trying to refocus herself to get back in the fight.
She heard the footsteps approaching, but made no move to react to them, they held no malice to them, so she didn’t have the energy left to waste. They stilled once they were closer to her side, she had still yet to turn, but she knew who it was, the one person who always seemed to find her, whether she wanted him to or not.
“I’m so sorry, Daisy,” Daniel’s voice cut through the silent corridor, but she still made no move to even look at him.
Crouching down next to her, he placed a hand tentatively on her shoulder in an attempt to give some sort of comfort. The contact breaking her resolve as she turned into him, a sob breaking out as she ducked her head into the crook of his neck, his arms engulfing her small frame as he drew her closer, trying to provide as much comfort as he could in the moment.
Her sob’s had subsided for the most part by the time another set of footsteps distracted him, as he moved them into a standing position to allow him to turn his head slightly to see who was joining them and ensure her safety. He sighed in relief that it was only Mack that was approaching, and not yet another threat, the other agent glancing between the woman in his arms and the one of the floor, and making some quick, calculated guesses as to what had gone down.
“Tremor’s,” Mack spoke softly, his nickname for her drawing her attention slightly as she turned to meet his eye, but not enough to break her contact with the man holding her close, “I’ll move her some place better.”
Daisy nodded in agreement, not quite trusting her voice to hold out, and trying to not think about what that meant exactly, instead focusing on Daniel’s hand running up and down her back, grounding her. She watched as Mack bent down and very carefully picked up the lifeless body of her mother, and she knew he would treat her with respect.
“Coulson wants to see you, whenever you’re ready,” he told her, something to his tone unsettling her slightly, like whatever he had come to talk to her about, warn her about, was going to be even more for her to take now.
Watching as he walked away, she turned back to face Daniel, his hand still on her back, his eyes on her, waiting for whatever she needed him to do next. She closed her eyes and took a shaky breath, opening them quickly as she felt his finger brush aside some more tears that had fallen, adverting her gaze back down to the ground as he gently traced the nasty bruise forming on her forehead.
“We should ice this,” he stated, dropping his hand but keeping his gaze on her as he caught her shake of the head to his suggestion.
“Is everyone else okay?” she questioned shakily, a part of her afraid of what his answer might be and another part of her still caught up in the events of the day.
Turning her head back to face him, she furrowed her eyebrows at his lack of response, between the look on his face and his hand on her back stilling, she knew there was something he wasn’t saying, something that she wasn’t sure that she wanted to hear. She blinked back a few more tears, trying to force herself to hold it together; the mission was far from over after all.
“Tell me,” she pushed, her voice barely audible as she requested, knowing that he would the second time and a voice in her head had tried convincing her not to ask.
“They got Simmons,” he ducked his head ashamedly, as if he was blaming himself for that fact and any other time she would have pushed it further, pushed for more information, but she didn’t feel she had the energy to.
“We’ll get her back,” she nodded sadly, swallowing thickly as she leaned into his side, near whispering out the truth of the matter, “we have too.”
“We will,” he echoed her statement, sounding like he was trying to convince them both of the fact.
“I should find Coulson,” she told him after a moment, making no move to leave, as if she was still in the process of talking herself into it.
“I’m sure he can wait,” he countered, his response acting as a prompt to get her moving as she slowly started to head towards where she figured she would come across the others, unsurprised as he followed closely next to her, never dropping his hand from her back.
The slow pace that she set, slowed even more when she could hear the others up a head, she was still not sure she was ready to face them yet, and even less sure she was ready to face whatever it was that they wanted to talk to her about this time, knowing, after all that Coulson had been on the mission to Afterlife and to get her half-sister. The split second before they turned to corner on the rest of the team, she felt Daniel drop his hand and she instantly missed his contact, glad at least that he stayed close, ready to support her at whatever it was.
