Twisting the Truth Doesn't Make It Real

Chapter 2

-Present day, The Playground-

Groaning, Skye stumbled into her little nook of the base and flipped on her primary monitors. The cup of coffee she carried, her one salvation following the night she'd had, landed with a careful thump beside her keyboard as she dropped heavily into the spinning chair. Without thought, her fingers flew over the keys as she booted up her station and brought the security cameras for the base online. It was the first thing she did every morning- check the security cameras to make sure nothing was out of place. But as she brought up the cameras, she knew something else had to be done before she could even begin to think about looking over the base.

The dream that had woken her so early still hovered at the edge of her mind- Ward, his hands in her hair and his lips on hers. The couch beneath her, his firm body above. It wasn't a nightmare- not by a long shot. But she needed to remember that it couldn't happen too, something her mind seemed to frequently forget.

Settling into the chair before the main console, Skye entered the keys she wanted without thinking about it and brought up an external connection point. Quickly, she accessed the back door she'd hidden in the security system of the prison and started to race through the digital speedway. Ten seconds later, she was safely inside the security firewall and out of digital sight. It was stupid, but she hadn't been able to settle until she'd had the little program in place. Something about being able to see him actually in his cell helped settle her mind sometimes. Especially when she had dreams like the one last night; Ward wasn't a good man, and she needed to remember that.

As the prison security cameras came up, Skye tried to relax back into her seat. It was unsettling every time she looked at her former SO trapped in that metal and cement cage, but he belonged there all the same. And her mind needed to remember that so it would stop feeding her images of what she couldn't have. In so many ways, it wasn't fair that Ward turned out to be evil. It wasn't fair that not one, but two men she'd cared about betrayed her. In a row, for that matter. It wasn't even a personal betrayal either; both were moral ones. Somehow, that made it all the worse.

Checking the monitors, Skye only bothered to half pay attention as she hit a few keys and loaded up the feed from the camera outside Ward's cell. Only, the feed wouldn't load. Instead, she was left with a black screen. What the hell?

Furrowing her brow, Skye focused her attention on the camera as she began to poke around the system. It took a few minutes to find the camera's main control system, but once she had, bringing up the status of every camera in the prison was easy. Locating the camera she needed on the list though, Skye felt her brow tighten. The camera was listed as offline.

Why the hell would they turn off a prison camera? wondered Skye as she hit a few commands to check the actual state of the camera to ensure it was operational. The camera signaled back that it was functioning, which dismissed any thoughts she might have about malfunctioning hardware. So why is this camera off? Aren't the cameras the primary means the guards have of monitoring the prisoners?

Typing in a few more commands, Skye brought the camera back online but was careful to route the feed only to her monitor. If someone had turned that camera off intentionally, it wouldn't do her any good for them to see it had been brought back online. She was doubly careful to ensure that camera's status still read as offline as well. She'd worry about why the camera was off later- first she wanted to check on Ward. Every single bad prison movie she'd ever seen flashed through her mind as she waited for the feed to begin streaming, spiking her worry. What if the guards turned it off so the could beat the crap out of Ward? Or worse? What if the prisoners were the ones taking advantage of him?

It took a moment, but the feed flickered to life across Skye's monitor at last. The relief that rushed through her body, however, was very short lived. Almost immediately, she noticed what was likely the reason that the camera was off: Ward's cell was empty. Completely empty. The door wasn't even closed.

Panic flared through Skye like a wildfire. Every thought of him attempting to escape came rushing back to her, along with a list of people who could be assisting him. Raina sat at the top of that list, followed quickly by the still-missing Quinn and Hydra. Really, it could be anyone who was helping him escape and who knew how far of a head start they had.

Switching immediately to agent mode, Skye had the camera's time-stamped footage up in front of her in moments. Footage that showed Ward was still in his cell at 11:00, just before the camera was shut off. She was reaching for her phone to call and warn the Warden (she could always cite government observation of a traitor if he asked why she was monitoring the prison cameras) when movement on the camera caught her eye. Two men had appeared on the camera, a gurney stretched between them and a limp form thrown across the top. A very familiar, bulky, limp form. God had Ward put on some muscle. He'd been fit before, but now he looked like a god. Seriously, he was approaching Cap and Thor status.

In horror, Skye watched the two men half toss Ward back into his cell. It looked almost as if they were laughing as they turned away from the clearly unconscious former specialist. And the way they slammed the door spoke volumes about what had happened. These weren't a pair of men throwing a prisoner who tried to escape back in his cell- it was two men who had dragged a man they wanted to torment from his cell and were now reveling in their actions.

Skye's stomach lurched in horror and she almost had to bolt away from the computer. Yeah, Ward had messed up. He deserved to sit in a prison cell for a good, long time. But abuse by the guards? That was something he definitely didn't deserve.

It took several minutes for Skye's stomach to stop churning and it really only stopped when she saw Ward turn in his sleep. It showed that he was alive, at least. Now the big question was: what had they done to him?

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- 15 years earlier-

Garrett flipped through the file his "old friend" had given him on his target. And by friend, he meant the former assistant of a missing scientist he'd beaten the crap out of about an hour ago. He actually did know the guy from ancient history- some kid he'd been in high school with. He'd beaten the guy up then, too.

Smirking a little at the memory, his eyes focused back on the sheets of paper in front of him, so carefully chronicling the young life he was after. The file in question referred to an experiment that had been so rudely stolen from his Hydra associates nearly a fifteen years ago. Well, more like hidden. The lead scientist had vanished like some kind of ghost in the wind, possibly dead and likely so firmly buried they'd never find the man. And with him, all of his work disappeared, too. After fifteen years, any trails had long gone cold.

But they'd found what might be the man's greatest experiment ever regardless, and Garrett had been tasked with stealing the boy back. Leaning back in his chair, the S.H.I.E.L.D agent stared blankly at the file. This boy's scores were off the chart without training; with proper motivation, who know what he could become? Smirking a bit, he picked up the grainy surveillance photo of the target in question. "What potential do you hold, Grant Ward? What will they squash when they lock you in a lab to figure out what makes you tick?"

Setting the photo aside, Garrett reached for his phone and began to enter the number for an old associate. Hydra wanted their experiment back, and that was all fine and dandy, but Garret had no intention of making the same mistake the US military initially had during World War II. Super-soldiers were only good so long as they were in the field, and he was damn well going to ensure that Grant Ward ended up in the field. Screw Hydra's plans; he could make plans of his own, too. And his plans would always trump theirs.

A grin cut across his face when the click came over the phone, indicating his associate had picked up. "George?"

"Yes?" echoed back a hard voice, more akin to a growl than an actual response. Clearly, someone was pressing George's buttons.

"Hey, it's John," greeted Garrett, flipping the pages in front of him until he came to the one related to Ward's recent arrest. "How've you been, buddy?"

"Kids suck, never have 'em," advised George with a heavy sigh. The echo of his chair creaking cut through the line as the man shifted position. "And the government needs better funding for chairs. Otherwise, pretty good."

"Glad to hear it," stated Garrett with a nod as he picked up the photo of Ward again. "Listen, George, I need a favor."