Title: There's No Place Like Home

Paring: Phil Coulson X Reader

Warnings: dystopian!AU, mentions of gangs and thugs and stuff, tropes that your English teachers probably told you never to write but your girl @susiephalange wrote anyways because I don't owe English teachers a thing 💥😎💥 

Spoilers: This story is spoiler free!

Dedicated to: 3AngelofDarkness3 who wanted more Phil Coulson. Happy to oblige, my friend!

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Phil had been out all night, and there was no sign that he was coming home any time soon. You hated being the helpless girlfriend, but sometimes, that's what it came to. The pair of you lived in the centre of town, in a little fixer-upper apartment on his wages as a security guard. Perhaps he'd meant to call ahead, but the phone had died? Maybe the employer needed more time for him on the job. That was probably it.

You often stayed awake, sitting up, waiting for him to come in the door. At first, Phil had dissuaded it; you worked a few hours in the store below the apartment, and he didn't think it would be very professional for you to just wait up. But after a number of incidents which involved a medkit and Phil hissing against the medicine to stitch him up, he nodded, and soon took to waiting until the end of the night, to see your face.

But this night, he looked haunted.

"What's wrong?" you wondered, rushing to him. There was no signs of him being hurt, despite the sad look in his eyes, no tells that he'd been jumped or attacked on the way home. He didn't look to you, only the floor, his feet. "Phillip Coulson, you're frightening me, what's wrong?"

He's already in the door and grabbing things, and chucking them into bags by the time he answers, rushing around in a flurry you hadn't seen him so animated to do so in ages. "I need to leave this place, with you. After working the Howlett job three weeks ago, there's been a little bit of discourse." He grunts. Almost everything in his path is being put into the suitcase bag; your books, your shoes, your - , "There's a gang, the main one, you know of them."

You nod, "The one Lehnsherr runs," you help Phil pack, reaching for his tie, laying on the couch. His hand stops you from gathering it, and it hits you. "They've threatened you, to hurt me, haven't they?" you whisper.

Phil nods. "It's no idle threat," he murmurs, taking the tie from your fingers. "I'm taking you away, to stay with some people who can protect you. It's going to be easier than sitting in here for all the nights you do, and coming home to see you..." He trails off, unable to meet your eyes.

"But what about you? Won't they come for you if I'm not here?" you're worried, and you're sure you're not helping the fact that Phil, a stoic man who you've been in love with for the longest time, since before the apocalypse, is about to cry. When is the last time you can say you remember him this emotional? You can't tell. "Phil, please. I can't go off and hide when I know you're still out in those streets where they are." your vice wavers.

He shakes his head. "You'll have to trust me on this, _________."

You nod, looking anywhere else but at Phil. "There's no place like home."

It's been a long night, what seems like the longest he's ever gone through. What the hell had happened? It had just been a standard extraction, and his team, and ______ had gone in, smooth. No red flags. But then Daisy and Melinda had radioed in, and rushed out with _______. He couldn't believe it.

It had been okay four minutes ago.

The next night, instead of watching Phil go, you come with him. You're wearing as much of your clothes as you can, and in the backpack, is all the things you rationally thought you'd need (unlike Phil's packing of everything in sight). It's dark, and it's scary, sure. But it's how you need to stay alive. It wasn't like the end of the world brought special powers along with it, no. The authorities cowered from the people, the people cowered from the gangs, and the gangs cowered from nobody. All it had taken was a nuclear war, the loss of healthcare in major states, and terrible leadership from people who never heard the words "doomsday".

Either way, you were being lead to a blue truck, loaded into the back like cargo. He stood by the back, and as you held on to the place where the seat-belt was supposed to be (it wasn't like the end of the world was consisted of regular vehicle safety checks), he nodded to the driver.

Before you could say goodbye, the doors were closed, and you were off. Away. You'd thought that he'd be coming, or at least, you'd kiss him goodbye, but no. Silently, a tear fell onto one of the scarves around your neck.

"Hey, cheer up Beanie Baby," a red-head gave you a sad smile in the rear-view mirror. She patted the empty passenger seat, and added, "Come, sit with me. Talk. You look as broken as my dumb-ass truck."

Shuffling up, you double over as the red-head swerves around a corner too fast, throwing you into the side with a thunk. She gave a chuckle, and raised a middle finger to a truck overtaking her, and a curse in Russian.

"What did you call me?" You ask, snapping the seat belt around your middle.

Besides the one around her middle, it was perhaps the only one in the truck that didn't smell of ranch dressing. She raised a single brow, "I just called that stupid idiot a inbred goat - oh, Beanie Baby?" She asked, and as you nod, she continues, "It's a toy, like, I don't know, for kids? My sister had them when we were yay-high." She snorts. "With all your clothes on you look like this sad floppy beanie baby that needs a good hug. You'll see your husband before you know it."

Your face flushed. "I'm not - we -,"

She hoots, smacking the steering wheel with her dry laugh. "I know, Phil always yammers on about you like you're this fantastic woman. So I just had to be the one to pick you up." She takes her hand from the wheel, and holds it out to you. "I'm Nat."

"________." You shake her palm. When you have your hand out of hers, you notice it smells faintly of gasoline and peaches after touching. "When will I see him again?"

Nat pulls the wheel, steering impossibly fast into a small lane way. "I'm not the leader, but if I were Rogers, say, a week. Stark, three weeks." She gives you a wan smile. "But staying with us, you'll hardly miss him once you meet Clint. Hey! Clint is Phil's nephew, you've got to bunk up!"

He's never seen you so still in your life; not even when you sleep. Fitzsimmons said it was something to do with dreams; it was just a part of you and your powers, and it made you constantly move. Phil guessed it was part of the packaged deal of constantly creating energy; it made you the most active of his agents, the smartest besides his science duo. But seeing you here, in the coma, he had to tell himself you weren't sleeping. It was induced. It had to be.

Melinda had said you'd been injected with something the H. Y. D. R. A. agents had been working on - Intel said it was a reducer, or a blocker. Something which stopped your natural abilities from working. Something which made your constantly moving form still, and become encased in yourself. They had a dialysis machine working, but would it be enough?

He'd never been able to tell you how he felt.

It was a week; you've met everyone; Stark and Rogers, the leaders, who wore armour which was a mixture of fireman uniforms. In fact, that was what mostly all the gang wore; after all, it was after the end of the world, and it wasn't like there were still factories and places selling on-demand clothes. Clint taught you how to always win at Blackjack, and talked often of his wife and kids (it wasn't until Sam told you they'd passed away in one of the nuclear air strikes you realised how sad it was). Nat had been cut off from returning to Russia after her passport had been pulled, and took to the underground business of spying. Sam had been a soldier, but after seeing what the country was doing, ran away just in time as his squadron had been targeted by the leader for "treason".

A week, a week of laying in your bunk, hoping for Phil. Waiting for Phil. Wishing all the wishes you could -

"Do you ever think when you're sleeping, people talk to you, and it becomes a part of your dreams?" Tony passed you a cup of something hot. "Telling you to wake up, we need you, come on; or something."

You shrug. "I'm not sure, I've never given it much thought," you whisper, taking a sip of your drink. His face turns dark, shrouded in a dark mist, like he was not human at all. Your heart stutters, the cup falling through your fingers. "What's - what's going on?" you feel your hands throbbing, but the broken cup at your feet has not cut you.

"She's been away too long," Steve's face was dark with the shadows too, voice not like his own, warping, changing. He sounded like...Leo Fitz? "We're going to need adrenaline, stat."

You might have read somewhere, that hurting yourself in a dream could trigger waking up. Or maybe that had been from an episode of Supernatural? You drop to the ground, and grab a shard of the mug, and scrunch it within your palm. Your eyes are squeezed shut, trembling. You don't belong here. Not in this world.

"There's no place like home, there's no place like home..." you whisper.

Just as the adrenaline is on hand, poised to be shot, Phil watches in disbelief as the heart monitor races, and at once, you are sitting in the bed, eyes wide, wild, one palm scrunched as if crushing something within it. His jaw loosens, heart running alongside your own.

"There's no place like home," you whisper.

Slowly, you see Phil, but without acknowledging your superior officer, you see the science duo Fitzsimmons and thank them, muttering something about their words triggering you to kick start your own awakening. At once, he notices that you're becoming more and more fidgety in the bed; a small smile finds its way upon his lips.

"I - we should leave you two alone," Jemma Simmons tugged at Leo's sleeve, dragging the curly haired young man with her from the hospital booth aboard The Bus.

Phil watched as your fist released, your heartbeat evened to a natural pattern, natural for you and your changed anatomy after the accident; he'd been there when the offshore base had breached, and you'd been left inside as if for dead, shocked by 7, 000 volts inside the laboratory where your experiment had gone sideways. Phil had loved you before that, and he loved you still.

"Sir. I'm - I should have been more aware of my place in the mission," you address your superior, head lowered.

He shakes his, edging his chair closer to the bed, taking your hand in his own. "It's not your fault. I really should have equipped you all better to deal with the enemy. But I'm here for a more selfish reason than to see my best agent's improving health," he admits.

You're puzzled, but instead of questioning it, you speak of what's on your mind. "I dreamed when I was under - I'm not sure if that's normal, for comas, or just for my condition," you tell him, voice low, "But the world was over, and ended, and we were still fighting the good fight. Sir."

"The team?" he wondered. "The team were fighting?"

You shake your head. "You, sir. And I. The members from the Avengers Initiative were there. I know it was a dream, it was clearly so, quite exaggerated. But...sir, it made me realise something about us. I've known you for ten years; longer than I can say of any other of my friends. And in all of that time, Phil, you've been the best person I've known, gone to hell and back, and still rose to occasions simpler men couldn't have." Your praise leaves his cheeks rosy. "Sir, I know it's inappropriate, but I have feelings for you. Sir."

He breathes out, a breath he's been holding for years now. Slowly, he gives your hand a squeeze, and replies, "It's not inappropriate if the feelings are mutual, Agent ________."