001 > TEXT.

[hydraated]

[Ward's throat still feels like shit and a half, but he's managed to process the following. He's no longer in jail (that's a plus), he's got super powers (he's unsure if that's a plus or minus) but he arrived and avoided the network for a few days out of fear of breaking the damn thing. He's decided long since then that he can't let Skye intimidate him.

She's here. And she's been here for awhile. She has home team advantage.

The only problem is they have a record of him. This whole registering thing was crap - what was the point of being given a second chance if he really couldn't leave Grant Ward behind? For the first time he wants to.

So time to test the waters. He's been to the ceremony, he's been sworn in, he's had a dramatic reunion with the woman he'd thought he cared about.]

New arrival here. Roomba salesman and repairman. Anybody else get a completely shit job? I know nothing about Roomba's.

Assuming Roombas here are the vaccuum robots. Y/N?

Also feel like shooting myself in the foot here, but is there some kind of a "so now you have super abilities" support group? Any help or advice appreciated.

[Reading over it two or three times he nods, satisfied that it's not incriminating, that it's blaise enough that even if people decide to ask him questions he can think up enough to talk about without screwing up.

He'd been in worse situations.

His roommates might have noticed that his doorknob on the outside was significantly bent and someone has been closing doors in their apartment very, very quietly.]

Comments

[hackitude]

Thanks, David. I really appreciate it.

Don't feel like you have to engage him just on my behalf, though. If he gets to be too much of a handful, just drop him. He's... not worth your time.

[xpostate]

Skye, I'm an imPort career counselor. Every case is a handful.

And I think it will be important to know what we're dealing with, but don't worry about me. I'll keep it as hands-off as I can.

[hackitude]

You're an actual lifesaver.

If you can keep him busy as possible, I'd be in your debt.

[xpostate]

I'm either keeping him busy with dogs instead of anything nefarious, or getting a possible terrorist the source of funds he'll need to get back into the game. There's no way this could possibly go wrong.

[hackitude]

He was going to find funds with or without your help anyway. Better he do it with dogs than... I don't know, being a mercenary, or something.

[xpostate]

Which is pretty much where he seemed to be leaning before. So, go me, I guess.

[hackitude]

Go you.

[xpostate]

But enough fake enthusiasm, I have a few more questions, if you're down for answering.

He was a sleeper agent, but for how long? How did the truth come out?

[hackitude]

Oh. Um. That I don't know. At least nine months, since I know he was Hydra the whole time I knew him. But before that...? Who knows. Maybe he was Hydra from the outset, before he even went through SHIELD academy. Maybe he wasn't. Could be anywhere from... a few years to a decade.

[xpostate]

Okay, so the possibility of recruiting later in his tenure is real.

But how did it come out? Did he reveal it himself, or was his cover blown another way? What did he do when that happened?

[hackitude]

... I found him out, actually.

He didn't reveal himself when Hydra did. He continued on with his role within our team. I guess the intel was too valuable so long as we were still operating. Anyway, we were alone with one other SHIELD agent in a bunker. The rest of the team had gone on a mission. They left the three of us behind-- Ward because he was injured, Koenig because he was the bunker's guard, and me because I was working on hacking some satellites for the rest of the team.

Anyway. Some time later I found Koenig dead, his body hidden in the roof. It was a rush job, but I probably never would've found him if I hadn't accidentally stumbled on his tracker. He had this device that could track where everyone was within the base, including himself, so I went looking for him using it, and... well...

When there's three people in a secret underground base and one of them's dead and you know you didn't do it? Kinda... only leaves one conclusion.

[xpostate]

Did he just try to play it off afterward? That doesn't sound like a situation he could have gotten out of with his cover unless he killed you, too.

But why did he kill Koenig? What kind of spy drops his tracking equipment? Something made him break cover, that's what's missing from this.

You said this was after Hydra revealed themselves, does that mean there were others like him?

[hackitude]

Sorry, bad wording. It was Koenig's tracking device, not Ward's. I was looking for something else on his desk and came across it. None of us-- Ward included-- knew it even existed. The trackers must have been on the security clearance cards he gave us. ... I don't know why he killed Koenig, though. We'll probably never know. Maybe he found Ward out too.

I didn't confront him about it right away. After all, it's like you said: it wasn't a situation he could've recovered from without killing me too. I'm no match for him, so I was pretty much imagining my imminent death slasher-film style. So instead, I... played him right back. Pretended I didn't know. I knew eventually there'd be an opportune moment.

And there was. Feelings aside, he needed me for something. To decrypt my harddrive. ... Er, not just any harddrive. A special one. ... Okay, that probably requires a little backtracking to explain, sorry.

You ask if there were others like him? You don't even know the scope of it. I would say almost fully a third of SHIELD was actually Hydra in disguise. Rotting the organisation from within. When Hydra revealed themselves and staged their attempted takeover a few days prior, Coulson told me to scrub our entire operation. All our research, all the things we'd found. Erase every trace. We couldn't risk any of it getting into the wrong hands. But I made a back-up on an encrypted harddrive. Stupidly, I gave it to Ward to hold onto for safekeeping. I was thinking that of all of us, he'd be the least likely to get captured and the least likely to give anything up under torture if he did. Little did I know. He took it straight to Hydra. They desperately needed something that was on it. I'm not sure what exactly, but I can make a guess. Anyway, it's not important.

Long story short, they couldn't get into it-- I set the harddrive to immediately erase every piece of data on it if anyone tried to hack their way in. They didn't want to risk it, so Ward had to try and play me. Get me to unlock the drive by pretending it was for Coulson. Said Coulson had rung him from the field, supposedly requested some information from a file that was on the drive. Needed help from us on their mission.

[xpostate]

This is why you never trust SHIELD. When the people running it aren't being extra shady on their own, there always seems to be some other organization subverting them from within. And all the while, Nick Fury's dead until the opportune time comes for him to reveal it was all a ruse.

Coulson probably wasn't even supposed to know about the drive, was he? Seems like the kind of thing a commanding officer might disapprove of, if he wanted you to wipe everything. But Ward wouldn't have known that.

But that explains a lot more about the situation. At least I have some picture of how he works and the dangers he presents now.

[hackitude]

[Skye isn't even going to touch that comment about SHIELD with a ten foot pole, because that's a whole new argument Skye doesn't particularly want to spend another half hour debating and feeling attacked over. So. Sorry David, no bite for you.]

No, he knew about it. I wouldn't do anything behind Coulson's back. ... Well. These days, anyway.

And no problem. Was there anything else you wanted to know? About him, or me, or the situation back home...?

[xpostate]

[ it's not like he's bitter or anything. ]

No, that should about cover it. Thanks for the info, I'll do what I can from here. You just take care of yourself, okay?

[hackitude]

... You too.