"Skye! Skye!" Coulson raced into the temple. He'd just put one of the body covering things on, because he was not about to take any more risks than necessary. "No! Trip!" He recognized the face even though it was now stone but the man was falling apart. "Skye! Skye!" He couldn't even bear to think about what would happen if the same thing had happened to Skye.
"Who's Skye?" Coulson turned around and saw a little girl who looked four years old, sitting in a pile of rocks. "Where am I?"
Coulson forced himself to stop thinking about Skye and turned to the little girl. "We're underground, but I can get you out. Can you tell me your name?" He'd contemplate how a child got there later.
"My name's Mary."
"What's your last name Mary? Maybe I can use it to help you find your family."
"I don't have any family, but my name's Mary Sue Poots, and I live at St. Agnes Orphanage."
Coulson tried as hard as he could not to faint in shock. It was possible there was another explanation; maybe they gave the same horrible name to all the girls who came through their doors. Deep down, he knew that that wasn't the case. Now that he thought about it, the girl did look a little familiar and he could see the resemblance to Skye.
"Are you taking me back there?" she asked, in a very neutral tone.
"No. You're never going to have to go back there. I promise."
"Really? 'Cause I don't like it there. All the nuns are mean, and they don't like kids, but they also told me that being there is the only way I would get to have a family."
"I will find you the best family ever, and you won't have to go back there. How does that sound?"
On the inside, Mary wanted to scream and dance. "That would be really good. Thank you, sir."
"It's no problem, Mary, and you can call me Coulson, not sir. Is there anything you want me to call you?" He remembered how much Skye hated that name, but he wasn't sure if she hated it at age four or however old she was.
"Call me Mary. I don't really like it 'cause other kids make fun of me, but I don't have any other names."
"Why don't I give you one? What do you think of Daisy?" He didn't want to add to her current confusion by suggesting Skye.
"Okay. I like daisies."
"That's good. Why don't you come with me then, Daisy?"
He had a lot of explaining to do when he got back to the bus.
"Coulson. What happened? Where's Trip? Where's Skye? Who's the girl?" Coulson was relieved to see that Mack was there and back to normal.
"Everyone, quiet. I'll be back in a minute." By some miracle, everyone shut up. "Daisy, look at me." The little girl who had started shaking slowly looked up at him. "I'm going to take you to my friend Skye's room. You're going to wait there for a bit and then I'll come and get you. If you need anything, you can yell and I'll come get you." He wasn't worried about her doing it for no reason. The poor thing seemed terrified of him. He walked up with her to Skye's room, found Skye's phone and downloaded a game that seemed like it would be suitable for kids. He walked down the stairs.
"First, I'm afraid Agent Triplett did not make it out of the temple. Despite not touching the obelisk, he was showing the same reaction as those that had. We will have a proper time for mourning, but right now we have another issue on our hands. I think the obelisk did something to Skye."
"What do you mean? Is she dead? Where is she?" A million questions came flying at him at once.
"Hold your questions for a minute. Also, I believe you just saw her. Instead of dying, I'm under the impression she was de-aged. I have no idea why, but hopefully Fitz-Simmons will be to sort that out and return adult Skye back to us. I will talk with Skye's father and see if he knows anything about why this happened. For those of you that are interested, Raina was nowhere to be found. For now, Skye is being called Daisy as I don't want to confuse her by calling her the name of a missing friend. Now, any questions?"
No one said a word. Finally May spoke up. "What are we going to do with her?"
"That has yet to be decided."
"Sir, I hate to bring it up, especially since Skye is now so young, but being exposed to the diviner could have had even more repercussions. I can't see any way around her being quarantined."
"Simmons, is there really no other option? We can't just leave a scared, young girl in an empty room for months.
"The only alternative would be sending someone else in there so that she'd have company, but that could potentially be extremely dangerous for that person. The same thing might happen to them as what happened to Trip."
"Very well. I'll do it."
"Sir, you can't. You're the director. S.H.I.E.L.D. won't function without you."
"Well, who else? Fitz-Simmons will need to be running tests so it can't be one of them, and I don't-"
"I'll do it." interrupted May.
"May, you can't. We need you."
"Coulson, you know perfectly well I'm the best option. You were just about to say how unfair it would be to ask this of Bobbi, Hunter, or Mack. Plus, they're just as useful as I am. Any one of us is going to be a loss, but it should be me."
"Are you sure?"
"I'm sure."
"Okay, Simmons how soon will the quarantine have to start?"
"As soon as possible, sir. You're very lucky you kept the suit on, or you would've had to go in, too. May, are you aware of the possible dangers?"
"Yes, I am. Stop bothering me. Daisy can't be there alone, and I'm the person most suited to be with her. That's it. Simmons, is there anyplace that would have a better quarantine location? There's no need for either of us to stay on the bus, and I'm sure there are better options than what we have on the plane."
"Of course. The Playground actually has a very nice one. We can keep our course."
"Excellent." She went upstairs to grab any stuff she might want from her room, and packed it. It was going to be a long three months, but it was the least she could do.
Finally, they arrived.
"May, could you call into Koenig and tell him the plan before we open the door."
"Already done. He says for you all to go in first, and he told me directions to get to the quarantine room. I'm going to go grab Daisy." They all filed out except for Coulson.
He grabbed her arm. "May, are you sure you want to do this? You don't have to."
"Yes, I do."
"Well, I'm going to miss you."
"You too." she muttered gruffly.
He left out the door of the bus. He needed to contact Skye's father.
"Daisy? Are you in there?"
"Yes. I'm here."
May heard words from a long time ago play in her head: She's gonna be scared. Take a knee. Get down to her level. She didn't want to think of the fact that Daisy and Katya even looked slightly similar. She opened the door and walked over to where the little girl was curled in a ball. She took a knee.
"Daisy? You can call me May. You're gonna be living with me for a while. Is there anything you want to bring?"
"Can I bring the phone, ma'am?"
"Of course, and you don't need to call me ma'am. May is fine."
"Okay, ma-May. Is this Skye?" Daisy held up a picture of the future her.
"Yes, it is."
"She looks nice."
"She's very nice. Do you want to bring the photo with you?"
"Can I?"
"Sure. Is that all you want to bring?"
"Yea-I mean, yes." May would deal with the girl's obvious worry of being anything less than perfect later.
"Okay. Let's go then. We're getting our own mini-house."
"Really?!" Daisy sounded slightly excited, which May knew meant she was ecstatic on the inside. She was worried about how expressionless the little girl was. It reminded her too much of herself, and she knew what it had taken for her to get to that point. Skye wasn't like that at all, so what had her life been like at this age?
"Yes. Follow me."
The girl diligently followed her, carrying the phone in one hand and the picture of the adult Skye in the other. May opened the door labeled 'QUARANTINE' and took Daisy to her room first. "We're going to be living her for three months, so get used to the room." A conflicted look flashed behind the girls eyes, quickly pushed away. "I'm going to go put my stuff in my room. You can do whatever you want."
May hadn't been around children for far too long. She briefly considered whether it had been a mistake to volunteer for being alone with the girl for three months, but she knew it was the only option. She resisted the urge to call the one person who knew about everything and would understand everything. She prayed the kitchen would have something that all she needed to do was warm up because she didn't want Daisy to die of food poisoning. She found frozen pizza, warmed it up and called Daisy to the kitchen.
"Are you okay with pizza?"
"Yes, ma-May."
Dinner was eaten in silence, and May took note of how quickly Daisy devoured her food. At this rate, she was going to need to make the call just for Daisy's sake.
"I'm afraid we don't have dessert, so you'll have to make do without. Do you know if there were any pyjamas in your drawers?"
"I don't think so."
"Very well. You can wear one of my shirts as a nightie."
Daisy suddenly looked very scared. "No! You don't have to. I don't want to be a nuisance. I don't need anything." May wanted to torture, then kill, whoever had made the poor girl feel like this. She got down on one knee and looked the girl in the eyes.
"Daisy. I might not have to give you clothes, but I want to. You are not a nuisance. You never have been, and you never will be. You do need things, and that's normal. It is not a bad thing, and it is definitely not your fault." Daisy started to walk towards her, and then stopped herself. May saw how desperately the young girl wanted to believe her and wanted some sort of physical affection. She sat down and pulled the young girl into her lap and stroked Daisy's hair as Daisy held on to her with all her might, quivering with restrained tears.