Affinity || GRANT WARD [1]

SE 1: EP 21 ― Ragtag

2014 ― Motel

"Rey, we're about to head out." Trip said as he stood in the doorway of the bathroom. Audrey was brushing through her hair to pull it back in a ponytail. She nodded her head, but she didn't turn around. "Coulson said you could sit this one out if you want to." That did make her turn around.

"No. It's fine... if I don't distract myself, I'm going to keep crying, and I'm so tired of crying, I don't even know how I still have any tears left." Audrey said. Trip sighed.

"I really am sorry, Rey... I can't even imagine." Trip said, and Audrey shrugged her shoulders.

"Sometimes things just don't work out." She said.

"Yeah, but Rey... look, I'm just as pissed as anyone else, but what you and Ward had, I don't even think the best spy could fake that. I know it probably doesn't mean much, and he is a lying son of a bitch, but I do think what you two had was real." Trip said, and Audrey shook her head.

"I don't even know what's real anymore, Trip. Let's just catch them."

⇎⇎⇎⇎⇎⇎

May and Coulson went into Cybertek pretending to be scientists trying to get them to buy a product. They found the data room, except it wasn't digital files; they were paper files. They found the files on Deathlok and discovered something about Garrett. Coulson and May sent the whole filing cabinet out of the window, which Audrey and Fitz-Simmons loaded into the back of their truck, and then they made their way back to the motel to discuss everything they found.

"Garrett started project Deathlok way back in 1990. Look at this; he was patient zero." Coulson said as they were flipping through files. They were all outside around the pool.

"We've been looking at all this backward. Garrett doesn't just want GH-325 for his centipede soldiers. He wants it for himself. So he can become a real, live boy again, and if he happens to create an army of programmed super soldiers for HYDRA along the way, triple bonus points." Audrey said.

"How do we know Garrett didn't do that to Ward, too? Maybe he's being programmed." Fitz said.

"He's not a super-soldier, Fitz!" Audrey said as she slightly raised her voice, which made him flinch. Besides Audrey, Fitz was the other person on the team taking Grant's betrayal the hardest. Then she took a deep breath and looked at him. "I'm so sorry, Fitz. I didn't mean to yell at you. I'm sorry. Grant doesn't have any kind of serum in his body; that's not the way Garrett controls him." Audrey said.

"Fitz, when are you going to stop clinging to the idea that Ward's the victim and not the perpetrator?" Simmons asked.

"Audrey just admitted that Garrett controls him; that sounds like a victim to me. So when I see something that tells me I shouldn't with my own two eyes. We don't know all of the facts." Fitz said.