A/N: Hello again! I've done some rather odd pairings in the past, but I think this one takes the cake. To set things up, AoS is pre-HYDRA Ward and pre-anoxic Fitz while WD is somewhere after the destruction of the CDC but before the prison. For simplicity sake, I can't include everyone but I will try to incorporate as many as possible and obviously neither show strictly follows cannon because that would be neigh impossible.

As always, reviews let me know you care ;)

Chapter 1- The 50 Yard Dash

"What do ya think they are?" Fitz whispered only mildly curious as he glanced up from his tablet with which he controlled his array of drones. Even two years ago he may have been giddy at the prospect of unraveling such an impossible riddle, or more likely he may have been slightly terrified, but ever since the day the skies over New York opened up and the earth was saved by a group of incredible humans as well as a demigod from another dimension, he was almost numb to such anomalies these days.

"I'm not sure," Simmons responded in a hushed voice so as not to draw attention as she observed via Fitz's tablet, "it seems impossible but…"

Almost intuitively sensing her trajectory, he blithely hummed "…it's like they're dead, but not dead exactly." After he thought about it for a moment he furrowed his brow and added, "It's a bit sad, really. One minute you're mindin' your own business and goin' about your day and the next you just ramble about aimlessly until you fall to bits."

"It doesn't make any sense." She agreed although her tone indicated she was very much trying to make sense of it. After all, it was her duty and supposed area of expertise. In her world everything had a perfectly rational explanation even if it was something no one else on the planet had ever encountered. "The tissue is clearly decomposing and they appear to be visually impaired, likely due to cataracts or something of the like, yet hearing seems to be intact. It looks like that's how they navigate. And as long as they have a steady supply of acetylcholine, the muscles will continue to contract assuming they can locate a source of protein to fuel chemical synthesis. Theoretically the body can continue to function even in the absence of cortical activity, sort of like how a chicken can run about even after the head has been cut off." She sputtered excitedly as she continued to watch the screen. "Or it could be a parasitic infestation like ophiocordyceps unilateralis." She turned enthusiastically to him and whispered in a rushed tone as she was prone to do when the pieces of the puzzle started to fall into place for her. "It's a fungus that finds its way into the brain of the carpenter ant. The fungus in effect takes over the mind of the ant and forces it to wander away from the nest until it eventually grows to the point the cranium splits open." She looked somewhat sheepish and concluded, "It kills the ant unfortunately, but it's an ingenious way to spread its spores."

Fitz wrinkled his nose slightly as he glanced from the screen to his partner. Although he knew she didn't intend to seem so excited over such a macabre phenomenon, he couldn't help but think of the time she was so engrossed in dissecting the cat at the academy she had absentmindedly left its liver by his lunch. "Bloody hell." He murmured in distaste. He was naturally driven to understand systems and how things worked just as much as her, but his world was made of wires and bits of code rather than blood and guts and he very much liked it that way. But as he watched the wretched and ragged creature shamble through the trees, seemingly oblivious to them some distance away, he couldn't help but feel unsettled and a knot twisted tight in his stomach.

"I need samples." Simmons stated emphatically.

Fitz blinked a few times in surprise as he slowly surmised what she was up to. "Well…ya' can't go out there." He replied, trying to sound equally authoritative although he was never really good at such things. He knew if he ever had half a chance at convincing her, he would have to appeal to her logic. "We don't know anything about them, how they got that way, or if we can get the ant fungus thing." He hissed wide eyed while jabbing at his forehead for emphasis. He often enjoyed the semi-psychic bond he and Jemma seemed to share, but at times like this he felt they spoke two entirely different languages because in reality they did. Biochemistry just wasn't his thing, but thanks to her he would probably never be able to erase the wonderfully horrific mental imagery of helpless exploding ants.

"Fitz…" Simmons smiled coyly at him, "Coulson sent us here to gather intel on the outbreak and I can't very well do that if I don't have samples to run tests on." She tried not to sound patronizing, but sometimes he was irrationally overprotective and anxious. She found it somewhat endearing that after all this time he had never come to fully embrace the fact he was indeed a bonafide S.H.I.E.L.D agent despite not passing his field exams, and he never hesitated to project his neuroses on her as if he could ever convince her they should never leave the safety of the lab.

He knew she was right. She always was and it irked him because he was usually right too but she was notoriously slower to admit it. His full lips hardened into a straight line as he returned his gaze to his tablet in concentration and poked furiously at it. In a determined, low voice he muttered, "Well you're not goin' out there and that's the end of it."

"But Fitz…" she began to plead.

"Not when we can do it safely." He continued patiently. He glanced up at her with a small smirk to let her know he wasn't upset with her and added in a playful tone, "That's why I'm here, right? I bring the gadgets so you can get your samples and we both get home disease free." While he readied the small drone he nicknamed Doc to swoop in for a fly-by grab at the rotting flesh, he darkly grumbled "And then I'll have to burn it before it contaminates my workspace with the putrid smell."

Simmons pretended she didn't hear his last snide comment and smiled broadly as she watched the little machine he built and programmed with his own hands buzz off into the unknown to secure her prize while she waited safely behind the tree with Fitz. "That's brilliant!" She beamed. "Try to aim for a bit with lots of oozing discharge." When he gave her an utterly revolted look, she quickly explained "Tissue is helpful, but some lovely serum or infectious material would be wonderful."

"Lovely and wonderful are not the sort of things that pop into my mind exactly." He said darkly as the knot in his stomach grew tighter still. In the end Fitz was a practical man and he thought it better to sacrifice a drone he spent many hours hunched over his workbench creating and tweaking than risk a close encounter with one of the things he wasn't so sure was even human anymore. The fact that somewhere deep down inside they may actually still be people with thoughts and memories bothered him most and he tried his best not to think about the implications.

He and Simmons had been sent to figure out the nature of the pandemic that essentially left a parade of walking corpses and to find a cure if at all possible when other more traditional agencies had failed or were simply overwhelmed. He couldn't be of much use when New York was under attack as he was still at the academy, but he might be able to help save America and for him, that was what he joined S.H.I.E.L.D to do. No one would ever know his name or put up a statue of him anywhere because he didn't have the same exposure or panache as the Avengers, but that was fine by him. He preferred working quietly behind the scenes in his lab where it was generally free of rampant disease and flying bullets, although even that was no guarantee. Still, he never would have imagined the "other duties as assigned" clause in his job description could have included this.

"Careful…" Simmons bit her lip as if the smallest breath could alter the flight path of the drone through the screen of the tablet she watched intently.

"I don't need a backseat driver, thank you." Fitz grumbled somewhat irritated as he skillfully guided the quadcopter with deft movements of his fingers across the controls, moving the bot up and around the target until he located a suitably juicy patch to extract a sample from. The monstrous being appeared to take note of the buzzing machine and began lazily grasping for it, but Fitz was able to outmaneuver the flailing limbs and circle back to activate the pincers which tore a bit of flesh off the body, causing a spray of blood and other unknown fluid to splash the drone's camera. He expected more resistance, but to his disgust the tissue came off easily…too easily.

"Excellent work, Fitz!" Simmons smiled as she gently grabbed his arm in a celebratory squeeze. Her mind began to spin theories as to what she may find once she was able to analyze the cellular structure and chemical signatures. The answer to the conundrum was in flight back to her and she was sure if given enough time she could solve the puzzle and perhaps develop a cure to save the population from the same fate. However, her smile faded when the drone inexplicably fell from the sky into a dense patch of grass at the edge of the tree line with the unwitting donor in slow pursuit.

"Shite!" Fitz quietly swore under his breath as he jabbed at the screen in a futile effort to resurrect the machine. "Circuits must've shorted out from exposure to…whatever…stuff…" he gestured helplessly with a distressed look on his face. "They're not waterproof for Christ sake. They're not meant to be drippin' in blood and god knows what else!"

Simmons tried to remain upbeat because she knew that as usual, Fitz was probably internally berating himself for his inability to foresee this particular application when he designed the drones even though the very idea was ludicrous. "Let's consider our options, shall we?" She asked in a bright and hopeful tone. But after a few tense seconds and awkward sideways glances, she admitted "We don't really have any, do we?"

"Afraid not." He sighed while keeping a wary eye on the shuffling shell of a person. "I think it's on to us now and it's too late to set up another drone." After another pause to calculate the velocity and geometry of their relative positions, his face and posture took on an air of purpose and determination. "I think I can get it."

Simmons followed his gaze toward the downed robot which was almost exactly halfway between the undead and her location. "Fitz, no! You can't!" She hissed desperately. "It's not safe. You said it yourself."

Fitz's blue eyes were set hard as concrete with resolve. "I'm not leavin' Doc, Simmons. I can run out there and be back before that…" he glanced back toward the clearing at the animated corpse who ambled toward him with outstretched arms as if it wanted to give him a very unpleasant hug, "…thing…person….whatever it is gets there. Here," he stated shuffling out of his backpack and handing her the control tablet to reduce the extra weight he would have to carry, "take these and run like hell. I'll catch up with you."

Simmons reluctantly took the items he had shoved at her and looked at him dubiously. She had reservations to say the least and she simply couldn't believe he would risk himself to retrieve a bit of metal, plastic, and wire even if he did come to view them as something like his own children. "Fitz, I…"

"Now isn't the time to debate risks and strategy! Every second counts. Just go. Go!" He ordered while he pointed in the opposite direction. Although he knew she was less than enthusiastic about his idea, he felt it was worth the risk to get his drone back along with her sample because the truth was, he didn't want to spend one more minute in the field and he knew they would have literally camped out until she got what she came for. He just wanted to get back to the safety of his lab, but he waited to make sure she took off running to make it back to the drop site for pick-up before he did. He knew how stubborn she could be and if he didn't watch her go she would likely have stayed right where she was or worse yet, ran alongside him the whole way because that's what she always did.

After she was a sufficient distance away to make it illogical even for her to turn back, he took a deep breath and launched himself in a blind sprint toward Doc. He ran as fast as he could manage, each gigantic gasp of air feeling like fire in his lungs and each footfall feeling like a hammer striking metal while he ducked and weaved among the trees until he reached the edge of the clearing, but as he arrived he realized the true value of the precious seconds he had lost in trying to convince Simmons to leave him to his insane plan. She was right. She always was.

It was even more terrifying than he could have conceived of up close. The smell of decaying flesh in the hot sun was dizzying and the way the milky white dead eyes seemed to look though him made him stop dead in his tracks. But above all, the thirsty growl that emanated from its tattered throat and chattering of teeth laid bare hinted at such relentless desperation that Fitz found himself momentarily startled and again he wondered if they were still human in any respect. They had to be in his mind as he searched the face of what once used to be a person for any sense of recognition that he too was human. Even though he realized the sense of danger and instinctually backed away to avoid the hideous being, he felt sorry for it because they no doubt didn't ask to be infected, to spread such misery and fear, to be reviled. If the time and place were different it could have been him, Coulson, Simmons, anyone he knew.

He took one last look at the pitiful monster reduced to rags and quickly bent to retrieve his drone, trying to ignore the wet stickiness that covered his hand. Blood never really bothered him, but he hated the idea of holding the stolen flesh of what used to be the person in front of him. For some reason, it just felt terribly impolite and he reflexively muttered, "M' sorry." Just as he turned and took a deep breath to again propel himself away, he felt a surprisingly strong grip on his shoulder. Startled, he collapsed and fell face down with the weight of the monster on top of him. He could hear the groaning in his ear growing almost frantic as the beast clawed at his back and arm and snapped its teeth like some sort of shark.

He struggled mightily and tried to throw the thing off him, his body fueled with pure adrenaline and panic. He managed to buck and kick enough to loosen the monster's position and was almost free enough to roll over when he heard a dull click from deep in the trees. He immediately felt a sharp pain in his left shoulder and he let out a small agonizing growl and clawed at the dirt with his hands. He thought the monster had succeeded in its quest to bite him. However, he quickly realized it was no longer moving and had fallen silent. He got up the courage to glance over his shoulder to see the shaft of an arrow sticking out of its head and he was overcome with a perplexed yet relieved sense of finality. As he let his forehead rest in the dirt while he caught his breath he secretly wondered if he had been saved by Hawkeye. He would have personally preferred Tony Stark, but he was grateful to whomever it was.

"Hold still." Came a gruff voice laden with a decidedly southern accent.

Fitz turned his attention back to the woods where a scruffy looking man wearing a black leather vest was walking cautiously toward him carrying a crossbow. The man may have been worried, mistrustful of him, or simply trying to keep the sun out of his eyes while he squinted hard at him. No matter the reason, Fitz found it very unsettling. Whoever he was, he was definitely not Hawkeye.

When the man got within two feet of him he again slowly raised his weapon and pointed it at his head in a threatening manner, suspiciously asking, "You bit?"

"I…um," Fitz stammered while he stretched his hands outward to show he was unarmed and was definitely not going to be of any trouble, "I don't think so?" Unfortunately he couldn't say for certain and the mysterious man didn't appear to be the type that would take an error kindly. He had never been bitten by another human, so he had nothing to compare the experience to. He heard some people enjoyed being bitten during sex, but if it felt anything remotely like his shoulder did then he wanted no part of such a thing and couldn't fathom why others might either.

The man glowered at him seeming to debate if he should believe him, but ultimately he took a few well-placed steps closer to have a better look at the situation, although he apparently wasn't ready to abandon his plan of putting an arrow through his head just yet. Fitz squeezed his eyes shut tight and let out an involuntary cry of pain when the man attempted to kick the body off his back, but it seemed to be stuck. The man finally lowered his weapon and squatted to determine the cause. "Mph." He finally grunted. "Sorry 'bout that man."

"It's fine." Fitz squeaked. "It's no bother, really." He had no idea what the man was talking about, but nonetheless he felt it was in his best interest to let bygones be bygones. He didn't want to seem ungrateful or in any way provoke him because it just seemed the man could make his life so much worse if he really wanted to. But if he was honest with himself, he was not fine. Hurting like hell with a smelly rotted corpse lying on top of him in the midday sun was the furthest thing from fine he could think of at the moment.

"Alright then." The man smiled with something approaching mild respect or simply masochism in his eyes. "But you're probably gonna mind what's about to happen." With a more somber expression, he lowered his voice and instructed, "Keep your mouth shut and don't holler."

With that Fitz felt a jolt of searing hot pain as the man used a knife to saw through the shaft of the arrow. Each push and pull felt like a stab wound and he fought to remain conscious through the pain, but as directed he swallowed the scream that was building in his throat as it dawned on him that the arrow had gone through the monster's head before entering and tearing through his own flesh to pin them both to the ground. Suddenly he felt irrevocably contaminated and he wanted nothing more in that moment than for Simmons to be there to tell him he would be alright, that he wouldn't develop any type of strange or debilitating disease, that he wouldn't somehow become one of them….