I'm Iron Man, And I'm Agent Coulson

Chapter 26 Fences

For a few quiet minutes he watched as she twitched, and mumbled in her sleep. The sun shined over black hair, and light brown colored skin, but her voice cracked and he had half a mind to wake her from whatever nightmare plagued her dreamscape.
Agent Coulson looked back towards the open plane doors, leading outside, and reluctantly advanced a few feet closer, but he just tilted his head and frowned down at her small whines.
It wasn't like him to agree with Barton and have a green agent become a part of something so important, but even he was astonished at how fast she'd adapted to her new job.
(Y/n) had an unyielding drive to succeed, whether from her need too, or to keep her mind off what had conspired in the last three months. He refused to believe it was because she was out of options, like Fury assumed, not after hearing her admit, during her interview, that she'd been toying with the idea since he gave her his card. Meeting Natasha seemed to be the catalyst she finally needed in order to take a step forward.
She fought Vanko head on, and did well, all things considered, and she survived his later brutal assault, and torture, displaying the kind of fierce warrior she was.
He'd always remember walking into that room, seeing (y/n) on the floor, bleeding and utterly destroyed by what she went through, not only with Vanko, but Stark, and it made him so angry for her, which he didn't want to explore.
(Y/n) had gripped his jacket, and called out his name as he layed her down in the backseat of the suburban, too scared to let go. Her left arm was eviscerated, her scalp was bleeding, and her lip was mangled, but she held onto him, until he climbed in next to her and pulled her onto his lap, as Tasha and Barton headed to the facility to get (y/n) medical attention.
It had actually become a privilege to watch (y/n) succeed, and even offered to help her after hours when he had the time, which surprised a few people, as it did him. He had no doubt she would succeed here at SHIELD, because her file spoke to the challenges she'd already faced.
She lost her parents to a murder suicide, but became an all state high-school athlete, and a marine. She was an excellent pilot, but retired once she lost half of her crew to an accident in Kandahar. From there she graduated with honors, became a liaison, and major cog in Stark Industries.
Through all that, he noted a few strange things about her innate ability to read situations, before shit hit the fan, Tasha mentioned it too.
She knew about Stane, her flight in Kandahar, and was the one to locate Stark in the first place. He believed it was her devotion, but once he began training her, he too noticed her uncanny ability to read the layout, almost as if she knew where the hits were going to be coming from, or the training games she became a part of. He'd never seen someone acclimate to her training exercises, and high stress, so fast. Romanoff and Barton were as lethal, more lethal than most agents given their background, but (y/n) had a more natural ability, and he began to believe it was something other than determination.
(Y/n) was a fighter, she had to be in order to survive all that trauma, and he was privileged to be a part of this new challenge she was facing.
Plus, he didn't admit it to anyone, but (y/n) was constantly on his mind since he met her a little over a year ago.
Coulson remembered her hair, the dress she had on, her once bright amber eyes, and smile, but it was also her fierce determination to take hold of the situation with Stane. If he'd let her do what she intended to do in the first place, the Stane situation probably would of ended differently, and with less damage. That's just how lethal she was.
In the silence he confessed he was a little taken with her, and her resilience, but after seeing her fall a part, he knew she needed something else from him, not his adoration.
It'd been a long time since a woman had broken through the chaos of his job, but after she left Stark, something changed, and he noticed it the day Stark announced he was Iron Man. The brightness in her eyes was gone, like a candle blown out by a strong wind, turning her eyes more of a dark brown than the beautiful amber he remembered.
He knew first hand how important Stark was to her, but he felt a surge of pride once she pushed herself away, in the conference room and stayed with SHIELD, or at least with Natasha, even though Stark begged her to come home.
Of course, their conversation took a strange turn when Stark mentioned Coulson by name, and used him as one of the reason's she decided to stay, along with Tasha, but she shrugged it off, and her curse laced retort almost had a smile stretching across his mouth.
Yet, the damage it took for her to walk away, appeared all over her face, and for the life of him all he wanted to do was comfort her, but they had a job to do, one he hoped she was ready for.
Her attitude, and common sense already had him questioning their orders revolving around the physicists, but they had a job to do, and they would do it.