Temper in Red *Editing*

Chapter Four

Chapter Four

"Skye!" I called after the brunette as she headed down the halls, towards the door we had come through. It'd been a few hours since we'd gotten here which likely meant Ward was going to get here anytime now.

At hearing me call her name Skye's pace only seemed to quicken, causing to me to do the same to catch up to her.

"What? Are you all just going to ignore me from now on?" I asked, honestly feeling slightly offended.

"You told us that Fury was alive." She turned on her heel, looking at me with a sharp glare. "We trusted you and you just lied to us, about something that important. What else are we supposed to do? Because it's clearly not trusting you."

"Look, I'm sorry." I tried to apologize. "I wish I could explain but-"

"Just save it." She cut me off. "And consider yourself lucky that Coulson won't let us throw you out for the guns to take care of."

I froze as she continued down the hallway, not bothering to look back at me. Over the years I had had a lot of things said to me, hurtful and spiteful things, but it had been a long time since they had come from someone who I had begun to care about. I watched after Skye as she stopped at the end of the hallway, now waiting for it to open to reveal her friend.

I bit back any emotions that began to swim inside of me and turned back down the hall, heading towards one of the rooms that Eric had pointed out to me early on my tour of the place. I just needed to be alone now. Away from the glares that everyone had been throwing my way all day.

Soon enough I found myself in the gym and taped my knuckles before going at the punching bag off to the side of the room. I didn't waste any time before I began beating at it, blowing off all of my steam, at least trying to. With every punch I found myself picturing a different face.

My father.

My mother.

Chandler.

Fury.

Loki.

Eric.

Melinda.

Coulson.

Myself.

Each punch seemed harder than the next as I kept going, the faces cycling through my head. All of the people who had hurt me over the years. Every reason behind where I was now. I hated it, all of it. I wanted to just be able to run away from it all but I couldn't. I knew that I couldn't.

"Argh!" I screamed at nothing in particular as I threw a hard punch at the bag. The force of it caused a stinging pain to spread from my knuckles, consuming my whole hand. Tears began to blur my vision as I just collapsed there in the gym, silent sobs racking my body.

"Nic?" I recognized Coulson's voice some time later. I heard his footsteps crossing the gym until arms wrapped around my shoulders. For a moment it almost felt like what I'd expect a parent to do to comfort their upset child, but the thought left as quick as it'd come. I looked up at Coulson to see worry shining his eyes as he looked over me, having seen me like this before. His eyes scanned over me until they landed on my hand. I looked down at it too, it was already swollen and still hurt. I wouldn't be surprised if it were bruised in a couple hours.

"Come on, let's get that checked out." He helped me to my feet and led me out of the gym. I didn't bother saying anything to him as he led me through the halls and he didn't try to strike up a conversation either, thankfully. In the end I found myself being led into a lab area where everyone else was already gathered as Jemma worked on cleaning up a man with bloody cuts on his face and some bruising.