Money, Money (part 1)

Disclaimer: none of the characters are mine but belong to Marvel™ and Josh Whedon.

Note: this story contains spoilers.

Tumbes, Peru

It was dark. It was late in the evening, almost night. An elderly man was getting into his car after a long day's work. Carefully, for the old man was not exactly paranoid, but still cautious, or even timid, in his habits, he checked his mirrors – mostly to see any late night traffic and what to avoid.

No, nothing, all was clear. Good. The old man put his car keys to start up the car – and it was when the shadow rose from his back seat and grabbed him before the man could respond. The car rocked back and forth some in the struggle, but that was brief – after all, the man was elderly, and the shadow that had not reflected in his car's mirrors had been a vampire...

Elsewhere, S.H.I.E.L.D.

Agent Coulson had had better days. Certainly he had had worse days too – when he was stabbed through his heart, for example – but mostly better. He never expected Skye's semi-defection to go over easily with his team, but somehow he had not quite imagined this.

It was also his fault, he had to admit – not just Skye's about-face, he had not expected it – but also how he handled Fitz when the latter got self-righteous on Coulson's part. Coulson never enjoyed righteousness, not even from director Hill, and frankly Fitz was no director Hill, as Coulson told the younger man. Sadly, Fitz did not handle criticism so well – after he e-mailed Coulson the finger he kept quiet...

Some elaboration was probably necessary at this point. Among other things that Coulson failed to recognize was just how quiet his people could get. Skye, for all of her faults and usual sarcasm, had lived in a van for a time, and so she could keep quiet for a long period of time – just as long any regular S.H.I.E.L.D. agent could. Ward and May, of course, were naturally quiet, especially when no one prodded them to talk, and Fitz had Simmons for company and for quiet conversation in their lab – yes, the FitzSimmons duo could be quiet if they wanted to, on a reasonable level at least. And as a result, Coulson's team had become as quiet as previously it was noisy – and Coulson did not like it.

Make no mistake, Coulson could do quiet, no arguments about it, but he did not like it either. That said, there was not a lot he could do, especially since the problems ran deeper than the sound of silence.

Skye... Coulson honestly did not know what to do with her. In the beginning, after the entire Hooded Hero situation, if Skye had refused to cooperate he would have simply passed her on to the local law enforcement and been done with her. You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make it drink, and working in S.H.I.E.L.D. was not for everyone either. Now, however, after the street-smart hacker had been involved in too many S.H.I.E.L.D. operations that was no longer an option – Skye would come around or her expectations of the agency would come true: a self-fulfilling prophecy if there ever was one...and a very disappointing one as well.

On the other hand, there was the family of the late agent Kwan. Coulson did not expect that money sent from Milton's account would make things easier, but still the Kwan were almost overly hostile, frankly suggesting that whatever else Coulson said, it was S.H.I.E.L.D.'s fault for not shipping the self-proclaimed Scourge over to the Xavier institute and be done with him. If only! The truth was that the relationship between S.H.I.E.L.D. and the mighty mutant telepath was much rockier than how it appeared, the professor and Fury had locked horns in the past, and the colonel was not always the winner...

"You got mail!" the computer voice beeped.

Coulson frowned. Not many people knew his email and most of them were his coworkers. Considering that right now most them were beginning to chose sides between Fury and Hill it was unlikely that any of them would contact him right now, so odds were that it was Fitz with another finger or some other childish gesture of defiance. Maybe this time he should actually talk with the youngster about sulking and attitude in general... he opened the message.

Immediately a new window opened. "Yes?" Coulson said with obvious surprise when a face of a balding, middle-aged, moustached and bespectacled man appeared on his screen. "Agent... Agent Drake, right?"

"Yes, it is me, thank you for remembering me," the other agent nodded gratefully. "So sorry to bother you sir, but we have a bit of a situation on our hands-"

"I'm listening," Coulson nodded warily: he did not tend to be prejudiced and he generally left profiling to the experts, but he never liked Drake – the man was just too politically perceptive for an agent...

And as he listened to Drake's requests, Coulson's suspicions grew.

"We'll be there," he said flatly and turned the internet connection off. "May? Where are you and the rest?"

Naturally, May and the others were found in the company of each other, though once again, unlike earlier weeks, the entire group was keeping quiet and ignoring each other...except for the FitzSimmons duo, but even they were much more subdued than the usual.

"Ok, we're going to Tumbes," Coulson said briskly.

Pause, just five pairs of eyes staring at him silently: somehow, in all of their fall-out, they became united in their distrust for him. Either that or blind obedience – Coulson did not know what was worse. "Right, so it's in Peru – northwest Peru if anyone's wondering, so get to it."

"Yes sir," May replied with a generous amount of sarcasm. "Will we be running into your old flame again, as when we did with the 084?"

"Maybe," Coulson said when he noticed something in the corner of his eye – he turned around and the younger agents were gone, to their battle stations, most likely, but still.

"You asked me on purpose-" Coulson turned back to May, but she was gone as well and judging by the sounds of the plane - to her cabin, as she prepared to lift off.

"Well, that's just great," Coulson muttered to himself. "I just hope that I am not making a mistake."

Silence was his only answer

TBC