therearenostringsattached | WE HAVE NO IDENTITY HERE, NOT FOR US.

WE HAVE NO IDENTITY HERE, NOT FOR US.

This is what Grant Ward remembers.

He remembers agent 33, Kara. SHIELD agent level nine. It's enough that he could put a gun to the head of an enterprising hacker and make him find out enough about her to hold over her head. To help her find strengths and weaknesses. She's not level nine anymore, she's expired and neither of them are good people. Budapest, Sudan, hell there were protege moments with people that John Garrett despised.

Here's what he doesn't remember. John Garrett's face.

The good, the bad, the ugly, the desperate. It fades. It all fades. He remembers the name, he knows there are confusing feelings associated with it, but he can't remember his face.

Face, faces there's agent 33 and that's her face that's important here. Popping three vicodin pills he resisted the urge to embrace satisfaction over how his body was performing. He had to compartmentalize it and not share it with the woman going under the knife today. Zemo's doctors were working on her.

They had been for several hours.

He leaned against the window, arms crossed over his chest just in time to watch her buck against the bed frame. The doctors worked rapidly, yelling at each other in German before he pressed a gloved hand against the glass just in time for a nurse to slide a curtain over it.

minutes passed before a nervous man appeared in the doorway, ringing his hands.

"She's stable sir, we're going to attack it again tomorrow. There was...a complication."

"What kind of a complication?"

"It's ... in short the agents used have fused to her skin. We can take the time to detach it but it will take several surgeries."

He'd expected something like that he supposed (had he?) This was payment for her skill and his, for his...burden and hers. For taking Zemo's men and training them to be something better. It was easier to think about that, to think tactics and military and..." Hell I could probably perform the surgery if I'd been watching closer.

"I'll see her."

It's easier to live in the now. That's what Grant Ward knows. Sitting beside his partner's bed, attention divided between the television and her bed, watching the monitors and her bandaged face.

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[She moved to sit up in the bed, groaning softly and watching him walk off. Stay here. It was a order. He stayed, but she moved to sit, legs over the edge. The IV still in. She felt dizzy, but he needed to see where he was going.]

[When she heard the breaking glass she sighed, head lowering a bit. She wanted to see what she looked like. What had happened... But she stayed where she was, waiting. Obeying.]

[When he did return to the room, she lifted her eye, single eye looking through the gold mask.] They said they could fix it. If they can't fix it, what do we do now?

[Be Strong. Be Strong. Be strong]

[He put his hands on her shoulders and stared her down, looking forward. his gaze is still blank, still foggy, but then he's there.] You embrace this.

[His fingers tremble] You own this.

And you make them all afraid. No one can ever hurt you now, it's easy to be a monster.

Trust me.

[He drew a gun from nowhere, one of hers, and handed it to her.] Painkiller wearing off?

[The hand felt heavy on her shoulder, but strong. As he spoke about owning it, being the monster, he handed her one of her guns. It felt heavy as well, but comforting.]

[her fingers tightened and she glared with her one good eye behind the mask. She reached over to yank the IV out, feeling it. Then moved to drop her feet to the ground, looking up at him.]

Starting to. But I don't care. Point... point me the right way. I look... like a monster. Acting like one... would be easy.

[Later he would apologize but the explosion across his vision had made thinking difficult. All he wanted was revenge. To hurt and wound and she'd...well shit. Ugly as sin she'd help.]

They talk about how bad it is to give names to people with powers.

you're powerful. You deserve a name.

Pick one and go write it in their blood.

[Her small hands, weak feelings and shaky grabbed his shirt front, holding on a moment, tightly in anger. She's not in the best of shape to be doing this, but he can't stop her with out a struggle.]

Then a Name I will have. An Identity that you promised me.

[SHe shoved past him, single gun in hand she started past. He might ant to come with her because she's not exactly stable, but she moves on, on her own, past a glass window and sees her reflection. She's jarred at first. Startled.]

[Be Strong, he said in her head]

[Her cut up half scrunched up, and her eye narrowed. A yell followed t hat she couldn't hear anymore. A woman's screech. Just then a doctor in white showed up on the other side of the glass. She leveled the gun and fired instantly, through the glass and hitting the man, head on.]

[It brought others to attention. She fought, unloaded the gun, grabbed someone elses, shot more. In the end there was no one else coming forward. The doctor who did the operation lay at her feet, still alive, gasping for breath. She took the time to use his blood to write.]

[On the wall it said Madame Masque, dripping in red. The man at her feet struggled to try to crawl away. She left him for Taskmaster to finish off. Left him alive enough to know what he did was wrong.]

[She turned to lean on the wall, her head near the E at the end of her new name. She panted, the drugs still in her system effecting her, the pain of her face and head bothering her. She could hear someone groaning in the distance. Not everyone died. They'd learn at least.]

[She swung her hands out, as if to present her name to the other, panted, and leaned forward, refusing to cry, but wanting to. She hurt. But she would not be weak.]

[Awhile ago Ward had acquired a mask from their base. HYDRA's efforts at creating shock troops with an eye to inspire fear. Pacing down the hallway, guns at his sides he's shooting doctors and soldiers alike. Zemo's presence may have been total but he wasn't the only head of the monster, and the others would take the two of them into their protection.

Especially given what had happened to the men handling records. It was the reason for his hands to drip red. Enough files to keep Strucker happy for years. Keep them squabbling.

The headache has stopped however for the first time in a long time and when he comes back to Agent 33...Agent 33...

That name is written in red and he smiles behind his mask.]

I like it.

A lot.

[He can tell she's shaking and sore and on the verge of emotion. He can appreciate that. She's like him now. Outcasted.

He moves to hold her.]

Let's get the hell out of here. We've got ten minutes to get to the chopper on the roof.

[When he comes closer she sees the mask, liking it. She had since he used it the first time. It was fitting. She wanted a mask like that. Something to hide her hideous face. Something not this thing on her face.]

[She ingored the face of the other. Ignored that he came to hold her. SHe is light headed but nodded, pushing off the all and holding onto him.]

I've got about ten minutes in me, I think. Before I pass out...

We're going to New York. [A safe house. He's at least smart enough to have set up burner locations and a safe house. It's dangerous but it's the closest safe house.]

...We'll find you something pretty to wear huh?

[she gave a nod, a hand coming to cover her other half of her face.]

I can't stay like this. Pretty cloths won't fix this. They've ruined me.

[For the first time in a long time he's a creature of pure emotion. He puts his hand over hers for a moment before dropping it and wrapping an arm under her shoulders]

...Ruined? Did you see the work there? It's not about how you look. Madame Masque's a killer and that was beautiful.

[His laugh was hollow, ringing.] Keep talking to me til we get there. How'd it feel?

[she leaned into him, feeling heavy and starting to stumble step as they went. The adrenaline having washed off and pain kicking in. She was so tired feeling.]

It... felt good. [she mumbled, head down as they walked.] Felt like... it was needed. [a pause, then....] You thought it was beautiful?

You're my greatest student. It was the best kill I've ever seen.

[His steps don't waiver when he realizes that it really is. It's the best kill he's ever seen. It's the first memory he has.]

Madam Masque.

[He squeezed her shoulders.]

...I'll carry you.

[There is a small smile at the corner of her messed up face. The gold of her other half doesn't show a smile at all. She needs to get it fixed. HAS to. BUt she smiled at his words.]

Anger... does.. .a lot. [she leaned into him, head tipping in, and groaned] I can walk... on my own. [and yet she was leaning into him more and more. She wont fight if he carried her.]

[It's when he feels her waiver on the stairs that he lifts her into his arms. He's been working out with all the training. Broader in the chest and more capable of carrying her up two flights.

Still he's breathing heavy when he's on the roof, checking his watch.]

Anger's good. Hold onto that and use it but rest for now. It's fun isn't it? Living in the moment like this?

[he paused before cradling her close, grinning behind his mask.] I'll take care of you. You're safe with me kid.

[She doesn't protest, and leans into him. Almost apologizes for being weak, but she holds it back, silent a moment longer]

I... yeah, it felt good. It's wrong though, isn't it... but felt good. [she muttered softly, then leaned in and closed her eye as he said he'd take care of her. That she was safe.]

[Wrong. He didn't know. Nor did he care. For the first time in a long time he was unburdened. He had nothing weighing him down, no past regrets. Just here and now and the woman in front of him.

Buckling her into the seat beside him, he stares at her, features impassive before he took off.

She'll wake up later in a new york penthouse with an IV in and a view of the skyline. The best of everything surrounding her.]

[She slept for most of that trip. Most of getting anywhere. She slept and stayed knocked out until she woke up again to that beautiful skyline]

[She shifted, staring at the skyline a moment. New York. Mmm okay.]

[Sitting up in the bed she realized there as a IV again. She frowned down at it, then tapped it, smiling a half smile.]

Grant? [she called out...]

[There's silence. The space is small but well furnished, the sky outside gray and foggy. The fridge is fully stocked. There's a computer in the corner - professionally, and Ward, asleep on the couch.

Sleeping.]

[She doesnt get up at first, looking around, seeing the other sleeping. She wonders how long he's been asleep. How long SHE had been asleep.]

[Her hand felt over her face. Still tender, but either on good drugs or it was hell of a lot less painful.]

[Standing she had to stop, the IV holding her back. She pulled it out carefully, turning it off, and moving to the well stocked refrigerator. A bottle of water taken.]

[From there she slide down the front of the frige and sat on the floor, drinking water and silent for a bit. Let Ward sleep. He no doubt needed it.]

[After contacting a woman he knew, a night nurse who had tsked and clucked her way through knocking Madame Masque out, he'd confided his own condition to her.

She'd insisted he come in for test. He'd told her to screw off. Curling to the side he opened his eyes and stared at the skyline. Disoriented.

Thinking was difficult.

It was easier to slip into killing, to slip into murder. To kill...

He stirred, staring at the open door. Standing, he looked back over his shoulder at the fridge and stared at her, uncomprehending.

Before he drew his gun and pointed it at her.

He lowered it after a moment. Less then any moment.]

Masque?

[she lifted her head from her hands and knees, looking up to watch the gun lower. She blinked at him, blank eyes, and stared a moment.]

[Then lifting the bottle to take another sip, she simply stared, then lowered the bottle again.]

I wanted water.

[Then softer, resting her head on the gold side of her mask, she sighed]

Safe house?

...Yes. In New York.

[That should be obvious. He stared at her before looking blank at her and nodding slowly.]

...You should go lie down again. I'll bring you water the next time you need it.

Unless your...

[God.]

feeling better?

I'm fine here.

[she didn't want to move is all]

[And yes, it was obvious it was New York, she just wanted to make sure this was the safe house he intended. Seems things went off with out a hitch]

Where'd you learn to set up... an IV?

I called a friend. I can do it now without trying, but I had to have someone do it the first time. It'll be a useful skill to know.

[There was something uneasy about the way he stood. He checked his watch before pulling a notepad out of his pocket ]

...It's been a week since you woke up.

[That made sense. But huh... he had friends? Interestin--she nearly choked on her water. Taking a moment to sooth that down and clear her throat she blinked, wide eyed a moment, staring at the other.]

A week? I've been out a full week>

[she groaned and lowered her head to her knees, wincing as she did. She still didn't want to get up yet.]

She mumbled to herself] Am i really that weak...

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