A/N: There are at least three other writing projects I "should" be working on right now, but this plot bunny kidnapped my brain and held it for ransom all day until I wrote this. Hopefully you'll be glad! :)

For those who aren't familiar with the Soulmates AU (on the off chance that some of you are not!), the basic premise is that soulmates receive a soulmark on their skin, which is the first words their soulmate will say to them, written in that person's handwriting. The younger partner is born with the words; the older receives them the moment the younger partner is born. While I'm not actually a believer in real life soulmates, per se, I find this idea to be completely fascinating!

This work contains semi-spoilerific and completely wild speculation about things that could (but probably won't) happen in the future on the show. You've been warned!

Skye was pretty sure she'd been cursed with the most generic soulmark ever. From as far back as she could remember (and even further back, according to the records at the orphanage), she'd had tattooed across her hip in angular silver lettering the word, "Hello".

"As if that isn't the first word everybody says, ever, when they meet somebody for the first time," she grumbled, repeatedly.

She had gone through a phase in her teens where she eyed like a hawk any guy her age or older who randomly said hello, but eventually she had given up, burned out on hoping (and tired of coming up with excuses to acquire handwriting samples from prospective candidates).

Life was easier without sitting on the edge of your seat, wondering when and whether your soulmate was going to show up.

So it came as a bit of a jolt one day when, examining a sample of handwriting, she recognized a very familiar capital H.

It came as even more of a jolt that the sample of handwriting in question was Lance Hunter's signature on a cocktail napkin.

"Told me this was his contract," Coulson explained, a wry smile on his lips. "I suppose that meant he was up for whatever." Coulson stuffed the napkin back in the pocket from which he'd produced it.

Skye covered her confusion with a genuine smile. He was a sentimental guy, Coulson. Trust him to keep that in his pocket. Skye could imagine how Hunter's unexpected loyalty had boosted his spirits in a really dark moment. She was grateful that someone had been there to stand alongside him.

Was Hunter -?

She shook her head sharply, banishing the thought.

Coulson tilted his head, examining her curiously. "What is it?"

"Nothing," she hedged.

They'd first met after Skye, May, and Trip had returned from a mission, intercepting a buy of SHIELD tech by a terrorist group operating in Canada. Skye had slid out of the van tired, bruised, and dirty, ready for a hot shower followed by a long nap, and Coulson had stopped them for a few minutes to introduce Isabelle Hartley and her team, newly arrived at the Playground.

The dark-haired merc with the leather jacket - something Hunter? Skye hadn't been sure whether that was his name or his job description - had had his eyes on her from the start. After Coulson had finished the introductions down the line, he'd smirked at her with an overblown confidence that had really rubbed her the wrong way.

"Hello," he'd said, too casually.

"Hi," she'd replied witheringly, turning a cold shoulder to head off toward that hot shower and long nap.

Crap. That was the first (and only) word he'd said to her. If she'd still been a paranoid teenager, she'd have stalked him for a sample of handwriting for the next two weeks. But instead, she hadn't even given it a second thought.

What if he -?

Skye pulled a bottle of Coke out of the fridge and turned around, taking a swig. Her eyes settled on Hunter, who was sprawled across one of the relatively uncomfy chairs in this, what surely must have been one of Fury's least palatial safe houses. At least here, they were under the radar of pointy SHIELD. (That's what Hunter had taken to calling "real" SHIELD, on account of their angular logo, and it had caught on.)

Hunter was glowering at the wall, apparently deep in thought, tapping his fingers absently on the bottle of beer in his hand. This had been a hell of a month for him - choked out, then kidnapped, locked up in a trunk, chained to a sink, lectured interminably by all of Hufflepuff, then twelve hours underwater in an escape pod with no GPS, all compounded by Bobbi's searing betrayal. Skye was pretty sure he was shooting long-distance daggers at the blonde agent with that glare.

"How you holding up?" she asked lightly.

Hunter started, sitting up straighter in the chair. "Fine," he replied offhandedly, his response clearly at odds with how he'd looked just a moment earlier. "And you?"

Skye raised her eyebrows ironically, with an obviously fake smile. "Just dandy."

Hunter sighed. "Yeah. Hell of a month, eh?"

Skye nodded, hesitating. "Sorry to hear about everything you've been through."

Hunter brushed it off. "Yeah, well." He leaned forward onto his knees, looking down at the floor, then back up at her. "Haven't heard much from you since you came back. How was Disneyland?"

"Not the happiest place on earth," Skye quipped, settling into the chair opposite him. After the Inhumans' plans had come to light and Lincoln had helped smuggle her out of Afterlife, she had had a long walk through the mountains before she found any tech she could commandeer to get a hold of Coulson. Thankfully, one of the emergency numbers he had forced them all to memorize had worked.

"Sorry the family reunion didn't go so swimmingly," Hunter empathized, and Skye found herself actually appreciating his words. He wasn't always a total jerk, she supposed. And the way he'd stuck by Coulson when everything went down was...kind of admirable, really.

She studied his face as he turned the bottle of beer around and around in his hands. "Whatcha thinking about?" she ventured.

He glanced up at her, surprised, then let his eyes drop. "Are we having a group therapy session, then?"

Skye rolled her eyes. "Just wondering how you are. I know it's been crappy. I..." She took a deep breath. "I was glad you stuck by Coulson. He needed backup. And I couldn't be there."

Hunter's lips twisted wryly. "Well, I'm not sure I pack as heavy a punch as you do, not any more."

"But you were there," Skye pressed. "Thanks."

Hunter looked up, momentarily disarmed. "Glad to've done it." He looked around the room, then sighed. "Sort of wish we were on a beach in Mexico right now, though."

Skye laughed. "That sounds like a way more pleasant option."

Coulson, Fitz, and Mike came to join them after a while, and Mike used some gadget in his fingertip to light a fire in the fireplace, offsetting the crappy heating system in the safe house. It was a quiet gathering, but at least it was secure.

Skye kept stealing glances at Hunter, the firelight and shadows flickering across his face as he stared into the flames. He wasn't bad-looking, she admitted to herself. Kind of handsome, really. Obviously, he had to have some qualities to recommend him, if a woman like Bobbi had kept coming back to him over and over.

Her eyes drifted downward from his face, and she had to admit, he was pretty nicely built, too. Definitely nothing to sneeze at. And...oh, crap; she was ogling Lance Hunter.

She sighed and turned her head, resting her chin on her hands as she watched the flames dance.

Half of her brain just wanted to let it drop - forget about the H on the cocktail napkin, pretend nothing happened. I mean - this was Hunter. Lance Hunter. Her soulmate? Not a chance.

Unless, of course, he was. And then...what would that mean? That she had missed something. Something big.

That maybe there was more to him than she realized.

She was starting to feel the urge to stalk him for a handwriting sample.

Three days later, after following him around surreptitiously for most of every day, she had pretty well become convinced that the man never wrote anything down, ever. She was impressed, in fact, that he had managed to remember how to sign his name for Coulson.

Okay. That was probably an overreaction.

Skye tried to shove it all out of her head. After all, this wasn't the way it was supposed to work. You were supposed to meet your soulmate, and all at once, you'd instantly know. It would be like fireworks and angels singing and a thousand happily ever afters rolled into a single moment.

Not like this, realizing that maybe the last person you ever thought would be the one was, in fact...the one.

His was probably Bobbi, anyway, she reasoned. With the way they'd been back and forth so many times, they had to be soulmates.

She tried to forget. But the question, once raised - and the possibility of finding him, or of missing him, after waiting for so long - wouldn't leave her brain alone.

Which was how she found herself sinking into a chair, next to the fire and across from him, a few nights later, ready to do some subtle interrogation. His expression was a little less steely this evening, which gave her the impression that it might be a good time.

"How are you doing with the whole Bobbi thing?" she asked quietly, after they'd sat in silent camaraderie for a few minutes.

"I'm sure you can imagine," he replied, ironically but without bitterness.

Yeah, this was a better night to talk than the other night had been.

"You guys were together for a long time," Skye observed, and he nodded in affirmation. "Is she your soulmate?" Skye asked quietly.

Hunter shook his head slowly. "No." He sighed, kicking his feet up on the coffee table. "Thought for years that she might be - I hoped for years that she might be, that there'd been some kind of mistake." He was apparently in a talkative mood, for which Skye was grateful. "The words were right...but apparently, I'm not the only one whose first words to her will be, 'Hello, beautiful.'" He smiled bitterly. "And the handwriting - well, her mark was all wrong. Wasn't my handwriting at all. Mine is short enough that we could've fudged it. But the kicker is really the date."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm only a year older than Bob. My mark showed up when I was seven."

Skye's breath caught in her throat. She remembered having heard on Hunter's birthday, which had passed a few months back, that he was turning 33.

She'd be 26 this year.

A little, quiet thrill pulsed through her, followed immediately by a wave of skepticism.

She forced a teasing grin. "You get a younger woman, huh?"

He chuckled. "Yeah, I guess so. Good thing it didn't show up when I was twenty. I'd question my own judgment."

Skye smirked. Hunter gave her a lopsided grin, then took a swig of his beer and rested it back on his knee, picking at the label absently.

"So...have you met her?"

Hunter laughed, tracing the label on the bottle with his index finger. "I dunno," he replied dryly. "I'm sort of hoping she'll tell me."

Skye's brow creased. "What do you mean?"

Hunter glanced up at her. "I have a very common phrase," he explained matter-of-factly. "Probably hear it half the time I meet someone for the first time. So...not much to go on, there. It's gonna be up to the lady."

Skye nodded slowly. So his phrase was short, and common.

I wonder if it's "Hi".

She felt another little thrill of excitement, almost in spite of herself, and only the meagre control she'd learned in Afterlife kept the furniture from starting to rattle. "What, uh -" She had to stop and clear her throat. "What does it say?"

Hunter glanced over at her, eyes full of dry amusement. "'Hi'," he drawled deliberately. "That's it. Two letters." He rolled his eyes. "Like I said, not much to go on."

Skye tilted her head, examining him. "So, 'Hi,' and she's seven years younger than you."

He nodded. "That's a lot of women out there, apparently. I've given up trying to investigate every hi. Now I just hope I'll have something distinctive to say at our first meeting."

Or maybe not, Skye mused.

Her heart was thudding loudly in her ears again, as decisively she reached across the coffee table to a stack of napkins. She pulled a pen out of her pocket and wrote "Hi" across the napkin. Then she slid it across the table to Hunter.

He looked at it idly, and then his eyes went wide as he realized what it said. He stared at the napkin for a moment, then his eyes lifted to Skye's face, his brow furrowing in confusion, before he looked back at the napkin. He looked up at her again, his eyebrows lifting and his eyes wide and clear.

Skye swallowed nervously.

Holding her gaze, Hunter unbuttoned the buttons on his Henley and pulled the shirt to one side, revealing her letters scribbled just over his heart.

Skye bit her lip. She stood up and untucked her shirt, lifting it just enough to show off his "Hello" across her hip.

A quiet, incredulous laugh escaped Hunter's lips. "Couple of articulate people we are, huh?" he observed, with a softness to his voice that Skye had never heard before.

She laughed uneasily, torn amongst panic, hope, and worry about what his reaction might be.

But he was looking at her wonderingly, as if he'd never seen her clearly before, a touch of intensity in his eyes. It occurred to Skye that she really liked being looked at like that.

Her breath hitched as a flush of warmth washed over her. "I think we have a lot of catching up to do," she murmured.

His smile broadened. "Agreed."