12717/Secret, Secret. I Got a Secret...

Secret, Secret. I Got a Secret...
Date of Scene:	08 September 2022
Location:	Secure Storage: Triskelion
Synopsis:	Jemma pulls in Leo on a secret she has been keeping for a long time. That of Jane's rather unique current existence.
Cast of Characters:	Jemma Simmons, Jane Foster, Leopold Fitz

---

Jemma Simmons has posed:
"I have something I need your help with, Fitz..."

It is a statement that Jemma has said in the past, certainly. However, it hasn't been a statement that she has said *recently*. Usually, it is other people that are asking for help of the two of them. But, this is different. With the way that Jemma said the phrase. The not-so-subtle glances in one direction, then the other. The purposeful positioning so that Jemma's back is to one camera or another, almost as if she is purposefully obfuscating her conversation. And, the tell-tale sign when she bites her bottom lip....a sure sign as any that Jemma has a Secret.

With a capital S.

And, with a certain astrophysicist in tow, too. It has to be a big secret if Jane is involved.

"Rather, I need to show you something. Something that really only Daisy and Jane know about. Oh, and probably Director Carter, too. I have no doubt she knows, but is gracious enough to look the other way. But...you need to promise to keep it secret, keep it safe."

Oh....now that sounds serious. Even taking out the Tolkien vibes, it sounds rather serious, indeed. A glance over to Jane to see if they should even continue onward. Then, a decision made, seemingly all on Jemma's own volition.

"Come on. We need to go into the storage area."

And no, Jemma doesn't seem to be taking no for an answer.

Jane Foster has posed:
After all her running around strange and varied realms lately, Jane probably needs a holiday on her favourite Greek island purchased by some Inhuman king. Basking in the balmy Aegean breeze or lolling on a reclining chair while soaking up the rays would suit well right about now, even if the temperatures are scorching and the hillsides burnished by wildfires and a grim pallor of smoke. Alas, the Mediterranean burns along with a weary world.

Jemma's dodgy treatment might be owed to the dwarven ale that Jane brought back -- perks of not getting inebriated -- or possibly a few herbs and flowers from Vanaheim. Could be something about a neat scroll that talks about light elf medicines, something far advanced beyond certain corners of magic with sensible balancing of hormones rather than humours.

Jane, for her part, may have opted to curl up asleep on a box for a bit of sleep before all Mordor breaks loose and Fitz questions the madness of Doctor Simmons, his better half.

Mostly asleep on a box. The storage area is full of them, of course, ever since they returned from Delaware.

Leopold Fitz has posed:
Where would one find Dr Leopold Fitz but his lab. He's used to working the hours of the day, only to continue working far into the night; it's when he can actually //get// any real work done. When there aren't others around to bother him. On and off recently, he's had the presence of another just in the next lab over, and glancing back and forth, he's been content in working out his experiments, his inventions for weapons and armament, from the very large to the, well, tip of an arrow. Literally.

Then words are spoken that Fitz hasn't heard in some time; not from Jemma, anyway. He hears it a million times a day from others, and it's usually something simple, something elementary that had been missed steps previously, and only then had been noticed. When //Jemma// speaks those words, however, Fitz looks up from what he's doing and sets his soldering iron down, the tip touching the wet sponge with a *hiss* before he sets it on a stand. His attention is fully on the other woman, brows rising before he looks around in regards to her actions. His jaw drops slightly before he dips his head, "Yes? What is-"

Show him something? "What?" It's both a request for more information, and a question to be sure that he's hearing her properly. "What are you talking about.." and it's here where the telltale Scottish accent broadens his words. "Is everything alright?"

Still, doesn't mean he doesn't follow, and follow immediately.

Jemma Simmons has posed:
"It is just best if I show you."

That is always a lovely answer from Jemma. It means that even the biochemical genius has few words to attempt to describe....whatever it is she is about to show Leo. And yet, Jemma doesn't bother to wake up Jane. At least, not yet.

But, there are answers to be given, and Jemma starts with the last question. "Well, that would depend on your definition of 'alright.'" Jemma starts to lead her lab partner through the storage area, which is large, by any standards. A turn here and a curve there as she picks through the area on a path that she has obviously taken before, for she is barely paying attention to her surroundings.

Instead, Jemma continues to talk to Leo. "You do remember the situation that we have been asked to help resolve, regarding those poor individuals that are experiencing an out of body event? The ones where their souls or psyches or what have you are no longer part of their physical bodies?" A few more twists and turns and the scientists find themselves in front of a door, locked with an alpha lock. "The situation in which we were theorizing that we may be able to use the Framework as a basis to rejoin the mind to the body, as it were?"

Jemma extends a finger, tapping a combination into the lock. A. L. Y. A.

"Well, I may have more experience with that particular issue than I had demonstrated during that conversation. I do not understand it entirely, but, I can honestly say that I am rather motivated in finding a solution that works. And...I am about to show you why."

With that, the door handle turns....and the door slowly opens...

Jane Foster has posed:
Never mind that these two intellects could spawn worlds that Reed Richards and T'Challa might look askance at. They need no dinosaur to indicate their puissance in the world's upper tiers of smart folk. There be riddles here.

Perish the notion of any dusty byways, cluttered bankers boxes or stuffed cardboard under faded labels encrusted by yellowed, flaking penmanship. Not here, the castoff relics of desks long emptied and missions since passed. The entire archive from 1959 to 1979 was probably digitized ages past. Peggy Carter's original administration may have seen to it. HYDRA would've ransacked more than a little bit, anyway.

Not that the storage is quite hermetic in seal or scope, not exactly. There are still deep cellars and chambers, a warren of racks that put Costco to shame. Delaware was just a measly holding facility for the secrets kept by one J. Simmons and D. Duke. Err. D. Johnson.

When the door opens, there may be the usual assortment of oddities altogether kept in cool temperatures, strident order. Maybe not; Daisy could well have rigged up a tent or something for macabre sleepovers. The network is the wall of thorns, nigh impenetrable, the mundane security absent a visible dragon save those wyrms ruled by a biochemist.

Then, there's that oblong tube reminiscent of late Cold War construction, something large enough to contain the likes of Captain America. Possibly an absent American sidekick presumed dead, revived countless times by Russia. Slightly more advanced, though laughably 'Weird Science' next to the modern take. Smoothed glass bears spiderweb cracks at one point, evidence of a repair not perfectly accomplished. A cradle of ice, intended for more than just a Mariana Trench monster or something plucked from beyond the Iron Curtain, instead holds something quite else. 'Tis no Winter Soldier caught up in SHIELD's hidden bank vault.

Nothing in Jane Foster's file says she has a sister, much less a twin.

Much less a /dead/ twin.

But she's there, frozen and still, skin pale under the nacre patina left by the hoarfrost that coats her stiff clothes.

And the woman outside, still groggily blinking and stifling a yawn into her sleeve.

Leopold Fitz has posed:
The time when Jemma doesn't have the words, if Fitz isn't fully attentive now, he is, coupled with a touch more concern than even mere heartbeats before. "Jemma.." comes out softly, the word filled with a host of 'what ifs' that he couldn't even begin to imagine. And as he is with SHIELD, he can imagine a great deal.

There's a touch of relief, if one can call it that, or more a matter of 'standing down' just a little when she does begin with the explanation. The storage area is familiar to him, and as she navigates through, his hand, too, is up, touching the shelving, the boxes, the containers of various and sundry objects taken from missions past. Some things have been studied to the Nth and deemed unusable, but yet not unclassified, and others haven't been touched.

"Aye, and I do still speak with Dierdre." One of the most coherent, alert and oriented of the body-switched. She was the one that was able to work out things logically, and she's housed within the Trisk itself. "An' I do still believe the Framework is the best chance, though.." and the pause should give the indication that he's about to argue that the way they'd left it wasn't sitting well with him. Still.

Those next words, however, has Fitz stopping in his tracks, right before the door, and he's staring at her for a long moment. He sounds almost hurt when he utters the word, "Why?"

She said she was going to show him..

And show him she does. Some force has pushed him forward once more, and as he takes everything in, brows beetle, his expression turns to that question that all minds seek the answer to, even without utterance. It's there, gone, and something else takes its place; the wonderment of a scientist. It's a mystery wrapped in an enigma, with a side order of, "Oh, dear Lord," is whispered, finally.. the soft Scots carrying it away. He takes a step forward again to find himself beside it, and reaching out, he twists around to Jemma, his eyes wide, "An' you didn't think on tellin' me about this? Jemma, I thought.. I mean, if I knew.." The engineer in him is.. well, his expression does probably say it all. Late to the party, now settled in, but..

Movement beyond the door isn't quite caught, so set up Fitz is in what he'd consider righteous insult. "Is this.." and his voice drops, "...who I think it is?"

Didn't she say she needed his help on the onset?

Jemma Simmons has posed:
This time, there isn't an immediate verbal answer. However, when those brown eyes flicker over and lock on with Leo's own, the answer is there. Unspoken, but as clear as anything.

And the answer is exactly what Leo believes it to be.

"Oh, but I thought to tell you, Fitz. Countless times. Over and over again. But, you see...I didn't have any solid notions on which to proceed. Bloody hell, Leo, I could barely believe it myself, despite all the scientific proof to the contrary."

Then, even though there was no need to, Jemma confirms Leo's suspicions. "It is Jane within the cryostatis chamber. At least, it is her physical body. It is alive and well...and has been in this state for quite some time now. Muscles have not atrophied. Body functions are normal for cryo sleep. Every test I could possibly think of and a few more that I fabricated from whole cloth confirm that this is Doctor Jane Foster."

Then, with a slight shake of disbelief, Jemma turns to regard the waking form that is also Jane. "And...she is also Jane. Yet, she cannot see her own physical form. And....don't ask her to try laying in the cryo chamber. I did that. It...didn't prove anything conclusive."

Nope. All it did was made Jemma seem insane, to ask her friend to lay in a cryo tube. It wasn't a good look for her. "Daisy knows. She helped to procure our little corner here and was with me when we were attempting to track Jane's essence. Which, as you can see, we certainly found. We just had no idea how to..." Jemma holds up her hands, miming trying to fit pieces together..."....you know. Make her whole again. Not that it seems to be adversely affecting her."

No, not at all. Jane is Jane. Just...it seems there are two of her.

Jemma's voice trails off as she lets Fitz digest the information given. The medical doctor herself, however, starts what appears to be a well-practiced routine of checking the frozen physical form of its vitals. Well-practiced means that there had to have been some time passed, to allow Jemma to do what she does so calmly.

Jane Foster has posed:
The scrub of her palm against the hollow of her eyes doesn't bruise the delicate flesh there. Funnily enough that lilac rarely stamps the warm porcelain complexion with its hint of an olive undertone, tracing her origins to somewhere in the Mediterranean probably around the time Crusaders stamped across Antioch or earlier still, on backs of Roman sailors and soldiers. Jane doesn't leave a mark, only pushing her chestnut hair off her brow.

Smudged strands that have come free behind her ears get pushed back in place, for all the good it does. In her habitual long-sleeved shirt and jeans, she looks just like any other New Yorker civilian who also daylights as an award-winning physicist known to most and sundry. Her footfalls echo weird and strange among the dampening contents of the corridor, rendering any point of stealth moot. After all, who is there to sneak up on? Hide from?

"Carter doesn't know," she states quite baldly, by way of hello. A wave, then, for the poor Scotsman making his murmurations to a woman who understands everything he says. "Nor that Jemma borrowed her cryochamber that preserved her from, what, 1985? Some time around then? Remember how long ago that was, when we concocted the methods to stabilize her genetics. Dane, Jemma, Daisy, and me. Those were the days, back when there was no darkness and the lamps stood in place of the sun and moon in the sky. Listen to me, that wizard makes me sound nostalgic for a made-up history."

Jane. And Jane. Obviously the pair of them are totally dressed differently, but they look all but exactly the same.

Lovely not aging at all appreciably in 19 months. Also explains why someone can eat anything she likes and never gain a pound. So. Unfair.

Leopold Fitz has posed:
It's an all too familiar gesture; after touching the cryotube, he's reaching up and grasping at the back of his neck, swinging around to the side with an exasperated, forced breath. "Bloody hell.." is echoed with a slightly different sound to it, but the meaning is the same. As the hand drops heavily, Fitz looks at Jemma, and his voice lowers, "I want to see all your research on this. All of it." The words tumble out as his head is ducked slightly to make up for their slight height differences. "I need to see what you've tried, what you've measured, everything." He's past his pique, and forming more complete pictures of it all, though not in terms of Jemma's specialty of biochemistry, but more.. engineering. Bioengineering he'd taken up; the man-machine interface that he's been slowly perfecting for one Phil Coulson and the hand.

Fitz is quiet for a long moment as he stares into those brown eyes of hers, and when he tears his own away, he shakes his head and he reaches out for Jemma's hand, if only to give it a brief squeeze, "Not crazy at all. I'd have done the same."

Jane's appearance manages to pull Fitz' attention away from the engineering and the body.. the form that lies within, and his head tilts slightly as if seeing Dr Jane Foster for the first time. In what reality? The regard that is given can be considered almost.. clinical now, where before it was warm regard. He's not cruel in that, but this is now a real... question.

"Doctor Foster," the words hold that soft burr of his, "I don't tell anyone anything that doesn't know what I'm on about anyway." So, Chief Carter doesn't know. "You've got the power rigged so it won't ping from here." It's a statement. "Shielding." Protecting her from their own SHIELD. This, this is Leo Fitz.

He shakes his head, finally looking between the two; one in its repose, and one seemingly waking from a short nap. "Oh," sounds from a breath out, and the rest is almost whispered, "I need to know all."

Jemma Simmons has posed:
"Yes. Of course."

No argument. No negotiations. Just simple agreement.

And, with that, Jemma produces a familiar sight. Her tablet....the one that she has on her person at nearly all times. This time, however, she takes a minor precaution and takes it off of the wifi network, leaving it as a stand-alone device. Then, a flick of a finger and another password later and everything Jemma has gathered on Jane's unique condition is accessed. The way Jemma was able to track Jane's essence via her bracelet's unique power signature, when Jane's body was delivered and by whom (notated as 'Asgardian sorceress'). How Daisy and Jemma tracked Jane to London after the bracelet had just disappeared. And, notations on possible methods, including harmonic resonance with Daisy. All very detailed in Jemma's usual manner, yet nebulous in methodology.

After all, no one ever asked Jemma to put a soul back into a body before. It was new territory.

All this information is handled to Leo. And, his statements are confirmed. "The power grid was relatively easy to construct. The cryostatis chamber was in use for some time. So, in all actuality, the power usage just looks the same as it has for the past 40 years. The machines in here are pre-internet, so there is no worry about automated network backups. And, this room was selected due to its unique lack of surveillance."

Yes, indeed. Jemma and Daisy certainly outdid themselves in the matter of keeping a secret. Though, it might have been more Daisy's expertise than Jemma's at the time.

"Not many people know of this. And, I would prefer we keep it that way."

Jane Foster has posed:
The cryochamber's chill remains a constant, a matter of circulating gas, fluid or possibly Nick Fury's lunchbox of negative emotions. Truly, whatever fuels such a device likely exceeds typical security clearance or owes something to HYDRA's documents recovered from the back-end of Novgorod. Functionally it maintains the point of stasis wherein time no longer functions, the finger pressed flat to the minute and hour hands. They no longer rotate, the hourglass neck clogged.

Within, a woman of no particular significance. The ghastly hole punched through her shoulder severing all manner of lifegiving veins and arteries was at least fixed by Asgardian purpose. So there's that! Whatever she wears is -- or was -- up to her caretakers. Jane doesn't match on the outside, at least, trappings of the seasons donned as pleases her.

Specific details being what they are, contained by the effortless chill of temperatures teasing deep into the frigid plunge of winter, are all laid out before them. Jane doesn't look at the tube; she watches Jemma and Leo in equal measures of steadiness and pointed curiosity. More for the man's reaction than her Furiae sister's, which itself exposes certain bits to be savoured later. This is a banquet for the inquiring mind, after all.

"I'm to be no help with the immediate matter, so you know. As I'm sure somewhere in there dictates, I see you both and an empty pod," she applies in that crisp, straightforward fashion. Sometimes it's easier to compartmentalize than try to understand the improbable, the way Jemma excels at with magic. "Though it becomes extremely inconvenient to speculate on whether any security systems around here inherently would notice an additional presence or not."

Her wry smile turns up slightly as she glances askance at Jemma, almost apologetic after a fraction of a pause. "Congratulations, this makes you a cadet branch of the Furiae, I suppose. You're in on the apparent secret, unless you don't see anything there either, and that further deepens the mystery?" Wouldn't it be nice? She lingers on that stray hope for a moment, perhaps two, letting the silence stretch a measure more before she sighs faintly. "I suppose this is the appropriate time to add a wrinkle into your evolving solution to remedy the peculiarity that Jemma discovered. You'll need to take into account that I seem to have a broadened perceptual system capable of the active, multi-modal reception of ephemeral signals independent of the electromagnetic spectrum or scent molecules." That's the blithe way of putting it. "Possibly associated among a highly distributed system between the cerebral cortex and the cerebellum, if the writings of Professor Charles Xavier are to be trusted. Something to consider... though not too loudly, please."

Leopold Fitz has posed:
It's a testament to the trust, both professional and personal, that the doctors' have,. There's a reason why, outside the lab, they are oft-times simply referred to as 'FitzSimmons'. Time and work sometimes separates them, but when they circle each others' orbits, real work is done that would stagger the greatest brains. It's for that reason, really, that Jemma is able to quickly and easily turn over what research she has on her patient. Fitz' experienced eye scans the detailed reports; he obviously knows her writing style, how she charts, how she thinks and progresses. It's that second set of eyes that he, too, appreciates when he gets wrapped around the proverbial axle as well. He would just as easily turn over his own progress notes, but only.. only to her.

Fitz would destroy them before anyone else got their hands on them.

"Aye," and the word is more an utterance; an acknowledgement of actions. He looks back at Jemma, and his expression says it all. He'd just indicated that this has to be shielded even from the powers that be, and he understands the gravity of it all.

"Well, I think this calls for another pot." What else can he say after being handed the research, and seeing everything lying before him in such a state? Particularly after Jane's had her say as well? It looks like he's in for a long night, in this room. He's not willing to take the research out of the confines, no. It'll go back into Jemma's hands before the night's out.

Fitz breathes out in a breath that he apparently didn't realize he'd been holding, only to murmur, "'Keep it secret, keep it safe,' indeed."