SHIELD fic rec

The Girl from the Bus by evening_spirit
Gen; chamber music AU; characters: Ward & team (incl.Trip); teen; ~20,000 words
Summary: Something happened to Grant Ward fifteen years ago. Something that left him damaged. Music helped him survive and it still does but is surviving enough? Grant wants to live, but he isn't sure he remembers how. He doesn't know if he has what it takes to truly be alive.

I have no relation with music other than listening to it, so I had no idea if this AU scenario would work for me... but oh, it does! I got pulled into this world immediately. I found this story really moving (and very well plotted, rearranging and transforming parts of canon into something entirely new).

another SHIELD fic rec

Real by Scheherazade's Daughter
Summary: "How much of it was real?" Skye and Ward meet after the fall of SHIELD. Post-finale Skyward redemption fic ... sort of. You should know by now that nothing I write is ever that simple. (~5000 words)

"Name?" the triage nurse asked him.
"Grant … Simmons," former SHIELD Agent Grant Ward told her. "Grant Simmons," he repeated, with a little more conviction.
The nurse, a stern, gaunt woman with iron-gray hair and pea-sized spectacles, raised an eyebrow. "Chief complaint?"
"I'm sorry; what's that?"
"What's wrong with you?" she asked with exaggerated patience.
Ward gave a short, humorless laugh. That question would take several hours to answer.

Another one today, 'cause this one's gonna get jossed in less than ten hours.