Notes: Chapters one and seven contain sex. Chapters ten and eleven contain descriptions of childbirth. None of it is graphic.
In hindsight, he should have expected something to happen. His life had been calm, almost happy. Yes, there were problems, but they had solutions. They were working on it as a team and he had a really good team. Phil Coulson should have known that this strange kind of a steady, happy life was never going to last. He'd been resurrected and that had a price.
A few months ago, infrastructure seemed like a logical place to start. Directing a mostly defunct agency wasn't that different from running his team. Less protocol and his reports were written to himself, which took some getting used to. He still wanted to start with Director Fury at the top, but he couldn't. Phil deleted and started over, a lot.
May, who was as efficient at administration as she was at everything else, helped him set up a new central filing system in the South Pacific base Skye called the Filing Cabinet. Everything had names, which was a good start. He missed the Hub and the Triskelion, but they were building from scratch, it would take some time. Maybe they could do without a Fridge for awhile. Ideally they wouldn't need one. Some of the terrible things that had happened there couldn't be blamed on HYDRA. Parts of S.H.I.E.L.D. had tarnished and lost their idealism in the darkness of the present.
They would do better.
Skye collected information, often presenting it over breakfast. It was less a meeting and more like planning missions while everyone attacked Simmons' pancakes (which she was really good at) but it was routine, and a good one. Phil still wore his suits because that made him more comfortable sitting behind his desk and signing his memos (with their extremely limited distribution) iDirector Coulson/i.
Simmons was quieter, more reserved than she'd been. She'd hadn't worked much without Fitz and his absence was palpable. Phil made sure she knew he was available, and Skye spent more time with Simmons than she had in the past. Often they worked together, side by side. May watched them too, from a greater distance. She'd volunteered to be Skye's Supervising Officer and his heart had jumped when she'd brought it up. She'd be great and perhaps she could mend some of the trust Ward had broken. Trip stayed because he needed a team; he had no desire to join the corporate world. He was a legacy and he'd stay with S.H.I.E.L.D. as long as there was a S.H.I.E.L.D..
The biggest change was the most silent. May came to him at the Playground. Neither of them intended to seduce each other, or even for them to continue to sleep together, but they did twice, then again. Then she invited him to her room at the Library. The taste of her became familiar and the sound of her breath next to him helped him sleep. She always curled against his back, her breasts pressed against his skin and while she was there, he tried not to fear the hypergraphia that struck in the night.
The patterns lived behind his eyelids, waiting for him to rest, to quiet and let them be free of his attempts to control them. He traced the circles and lines on her skin while she slept, imaging the whisperings in his mind could make as much sense as the softness of her.
When she caught him tracing alien marks on her body, she kissed his hands and promised over and over that whatever happened to him, whatever was coming, he was not Garrett. Garrett had been HYDRA before his experience with the Guest House drug. He had turned his anger outwards, hating S.H.I.E.L.D. for leaving him to die. Phil's worry was that he lived, which was different. It had to be.
May ran her hands through his hair in his sleep and suggested they talk about it. That he show the drawings to Skye, that they make it part of their mission and that he face it instead of burying it in the darkness.
He wasn't ready.
So she held him and kept his secret. He hadn't understood her loyalty, how much she was willing to risk for him, until he saw it in her eyes, over and over as he covered sheets of paper, and the walls, with endless streams of circles and lines. He didn't know what they meant, but he knew when one was out of place. If May changed the pattern, he could fix it. Keeping the secret hurt her, but she let ask that of her.
She shouldn't have. He owed her more than that, but he feared what had happened to him, what was happening still.
So they went through the motions. They ate together, spent long hours in his office, and retreated together. If their team was watching them, they weren't subtle, but Skye and Simmons were both healing, and Trip didn't press.
Looking back, it might have been easier if they'd been caught. If he'd been stupid and kissed May in the corridor where Simmons could see, or if he'd confessed to Skye how much his heart was wrapped in May and all the wonder of her.
He didn't. May was quiet because she had always been. She respected his secrets, even when she was part of them.
She insisted Skye and Simmons work on their combat training and drilled them until they ached. Skye turned up to dinner one evening with a black eye, blaming Simmons. Simmons complained of how hard it was to use a scalpel when her hands were so abused by hand-to-hand combat. May smiled and made them keep practicing. The mats were nearly always out now, and he and May avoided each other because touching like that, even fighting, might have given them away.
Not that it had to be a secret. S.H.I.E.L.D. was new, the rules were what they'd make them. May was the closest person to him and regulating a distance between them felt false.
So they left it.
They walked on the beach of Sri Lanka, barefoot in the sand. He wanted to go back when the sun set, but May dragged him into the tree line, up towards the woods and pinned him between the warm, flat rocks and the sky. She rose above him, naked with sweat beading her skin, and the stars lived in her hair. Birds and insects hummed around them and the sounds of their bodies blended in with the jungle.
There were leaves in his jacket he had trouble explaining to Skye when they walked up the ramp onto the Bus late at night. He said he dropped it, but that didn't explain why his suit was so rumpled and everything he said seemed a transparent excuse. Somehow May's hair escaped scrutiny, even though he picked stray pieces of the jungle out of their bed that night.
Simmons nearly caught them in a Korean market. May had been eating her way through the food stalls, pancakes with squid and green onions, deep fried pastries shaped like fish, chicken in fantastic sauce that was almost too hot for him to handle, and she ate half of everything that was supposed to be his. Even thought they'd had lunch, she was hungry. He'd reached for her lips, trying to get sauce from the corner of them without licking it off. He used his thumb but she kissed it, coyly, and if the crowd had been thicker, he would have kissed her because no one knew them. It didn't matter if the nondescript guy in a suit kissed the beautiful woman in black. In that moment, they were anonymous: free.
He saw Simmons a moment later and waved because there was nothing suspicious about walking through the market. Even though he didn't get to kiss her, May was adorable. She'd roll her eyes at him, but he could watch her smile all afternoon. Simmons had found the cell cultures she wanted and she didn't seem that surprised that they'd just been walking together, waiting for her.
They collected Skye from a computer shop and stopped again for the deep fried pastries shaped like fish because Simmons had to try them. May had another, because they were good.
He had several days of paperwork after that. Fury had always complained about it and Phil thought he exaggerated, because he would have made more of a thing out of it than it was. Yet, even without a much greater agency to report to, Phil spent much of his time at his desk. He tried to get away for meals, because he didn't want to become the type of leader who buried themselves away. He needed his team, even when it was as simple as laughing over dinner with them.
That Tuesday, he couldn't avoid eating at his desk, and Trip brought him lasagne. It was hot and delicious when he started, but as he worked and forgot about it, it cooled, the cheese hardened and by the time May comes to check on him, it sits abandoned.
Perching on his desk, she leans over and examines his work, a piece at a time. "You could have let this wait."
"I wanted it done."
"You could have done it tomorrow."
He sighs, flexing his fingers. "Tomorrow there will be more."
"This is a requisition statement for dry goods for an uninhabited base. It currently has three years worth of food. How urgent is it to restock when we only have three active teams?" May moves his forgotten plate, balancing it on her lap.
"I want everything to be ready."
She picks at his lasagne idly with his fork. "There's ready and there's paranoid over planning when you should be eating dinner."
"Paranoid?" he asks, sitting up. "Really paranoid?"
"Overly cautious," she replies, smiling to calm him. Paranoia's one of the things he fears, and she knows. "You're overworked."
"I don't really have a staff."
"Would you like me to find you a secretary?"
He stacks the papers he'd been working on and shuts his laptop. "No, that's all right. I'll manage better."
"Eat with us," she suggests. "You love dinner with the team."
She is sometimes in the cockpit while everyone else eats, but he knows she listens to them; that she loves their conversations. She learned about her team through the intercom and he did it face to face. Phil can't be with them behind his desk. May scrapes his fork across his plate, eating the dinner that he'd shown so little interest in. It's cold now, but she devours it as if she hasn't eaten her own.
"It's your turn to cook tomorrow anyway."
"When did we get turns?"
"We set up a schedule last week," she says. "You thought it was a great idea."
"I did." Chuckling, he sits back and unknots his tie. Letting it hang from his neck, Phil watches her finish the last of his dinner. He's had enough to eat, his unpredictable nights ruin his appetite and she must have been working hers up training Skye and Simmons.
He slips his tie off and she sets his fork aside to tug his tie off his lap. Phil reaches for it, but it is gone across his desk and lunging to get it back over the papers is hardly the act of a reasonable, rational man. He wants to pin her to the leather sofa and wrap the tie around her wrists and she knows it. May can read his desire all over his body and that is why she smiles, wicked.
Apparently she isn't above blackmail to get him away from his desk. He'll be hers, later, when their duties are completed. May's coy flick of his tie at him when she takes his empty plate suggests that he shouldn't stay too long.
Later, when he passes Trip in the corridor, Phil realises that being without his tie is conspicuous, especially if May had carried his tie around the Bus, but he says nothing. Trip is always teasing him about dressing down more. Maybe Trip will see it as a good sign.
After he's in his room, May crawls into his bed in the darkness, his tie still wrapped around her wrist as a trophy. She takes his attention from the book he's been wearily reading while waiting for her. Looping his tie around his wrists, she pulls them back. May makes him forget everything he'd intended to ask when she straddles his waist, stripping off her shirt. He loves it when she doesn't wear a bra. May's too practical to spend much time dressed in a way that isn't ready for combat, but they'd been in a hurry that morning and he's known that she's only had her shirt all day.
She moans when he nuzzled her breasts, as if they are sore. Maybe Skye and Simmons had got a hit or two in earlier. She offers her lips instead to distract him from the soft roundness of her breasts and they kiss while the plane glides over the sea. She keeps him tied until it doesn't matter about orgasm, or the wetness that was her and him between her thighs. He holds her while his teeth tingle.
May leaves him tied while she ducks into the bathroom and then watches him lying there as she returns. His eyes are glued to her as she crawls into the bed, naked and mysterious in the weak light.
"What do you want?"
"You."
"Again?" Her smirk quirks.
"Always, Qiaolian."
She corrects his inflection but smiles. "Qiaolian, but that was close."
"I'll get it eventually."
May straddles his stomach and unties his hands. beaming down at him. "You've said that for decades."
He strokes her breasts when his fingers were free, wondering if she had bruises that were making them sore. He can't see anything, but the light is weak. She moves slightly when he touched them, as if pulling away.
"What is it?"
"They're sore." She sighs. "Heavy. Maybe my implant's acting up."
"You were spotting yesterday."
She shrugs, running her fingers down his chest. "For a few days. I don't know if I would have noticed much if we weren't-" she pauses and smirks. She might not have noticed if they hadn't been in bed together. "I'll have to check with Simmons about my implant. I can't remember when I had it put in. Maybe it's almost expired. Not that much of an inconvenience."
He rises on his elbows to kiss her chest. "We ruined my sheets, not yours."
"They washed."
Phil sighs. "Simmons was folding her socks when I brought them to the laundry. Then she thought I was injured and hiding it from her."
"I could injure you, if you want." She scratches lightly across his stomach, teasing.
"Do we need to talk about-" he lets it trail off. She'd tell him if they needed to change their method of contraception. He has toyed with having a vasectomy for years because children aren't going to be part of his life. Maybe if things with Audrey had gone better they might have made that decision together, eventually. On his own, it seems that he's made his choice.
"It should have a few years left," May answers his unfinished question. She stares at his chest, then flicks her eyes back to his. "I wouldn't worry."
"I'm not."
"You had that look."
"Which look is that, May?"
She lets her face go soft, innocent. "Like that. Like a puppy."
Phil cups her breasts in his hands and holds them, supporting them with his palms. "Better?"
Covering his hands with his, she smirks. "Are you available to follow me around all day?"
"Might give away our secret," he says. He grins up at her as her expression turned serious again.
May puts a little pressure on his hands. "This is not a secret."
"So we could-"
She smiles, the motion of her lips soft, even sad where her emotions reach her eyes. "Should we?"
"We're not breaking any regulations."
"It changes things, you and me. The others need stability. You need to guide them."
His thumb runs across her nipple. "I can't guide them from here?"
"You could run S.H.I.E.L.D. from your bed, if you wish." Her smile still seems to be forced onto her lips. "I'm not sure if that's the message you want to send."
"What message does it send if you're by my side instead of watching my back?"
She lifts his hand and kissed it. "I'll always watch your back, where ever I'm standing." She slides down his stomach, bending low to kiss him so her weight rests on his chest. He returns her affection, letting the conversation stop in favour of other pursuits.
HR
Phil is nearly as hungry as she is at breakfast when they finished off the eggs at breakneck speed. Perhaps it is their mutual exercise in bed. He hasn't done much else for physical activity, not since the fight at Garrett's base. He meant to join in their sparring, to take out the mats so they could go a few rounds. May will leave him bruised and panting, but it would be worth it. She is always worth it.
He sets the budget for the Library base aside and left his office. He doesn't have the time to spar, but he can watch, at least for awhile. Phil leans over the rail, resting his arms.
May and Trip argue over a grab, taking turns demonstrating on poor Simmons until she throws up her hands and backs off of the mats. Both of them start to bristle, feeling each other out. Their conversation remains light, but their hits are less of a demonstration.
Trip takes a step back. "Are we ready for this?"
May glances at their audience, noticing Phil at the railing. She almost smiles up in his direction before she nods to Trip.
Skye retreats, staring up at Phil. "What are they-" she calls up.
"Sparring."
May drops into her stance and waits for Trip to move.
"Just like that?" Simmons asks. "Why?"
"Because they're specialists," Phil explains. "It's what they do."
Skye and Simmons wait, standing together against the wall, deciding between each other who will win. He knows May will take Triplett down. What surprises him is the excitement in Triplett's eyes. Hasn't he heard the legends at the Academy?
Bone and muscle make a unique sound. There's something percussive about their hands striking flesh; bare feet slapping against the mats. They circle each other, feeling each other out. May takes it easy on him at first, letting him feel confident before she takes him down. He's seen her do it before, usually with opponents who are bigger. Trip fights well, knocking her down twice before she really takes the upper hand.
Then he goes down, hard, lying on the mat on his back, panting up at her as he forces his eyes to focus.
Phil beams down at her. Skye and Simmons argue about how she's done it, whether she's swept out his leg or knocked him off balance, or if it is all in her thighs.
"Where'd you learn that?"
"Macau." She offers him a hand up, favouring her right ever so slightly.
Phil wants to ask if May is all right, but he'll have to wait.
"That's not standard."
"No."
"Show me?"
"It'll be harder for you," she says, studying him. "Your centre of gravity is much higher. You'll need to practice with someone closer to your size. Ideally taller."
"Thor," Skye jokes, elbowing Simmons.
"Could you teach them?" Trip asks, tilting his head towards their students.
May nods and a hint of a smile toys with her lips. "You might not like it."
Phil returned to his office and the budget. Later, when he is on his second cup of coffee, he hears the familiar thud of someone hitting the mats hard enough to take their breath away. He waits, then it comes again, followed by Trip cursing. Skye and Simmons are learning.
She's just put on the electric kettle for tea when Simmons peers around the corner.
"Is there enough?"
Melinda stops the kettle and adds more water before she puts it back on. It begins to rumble, building bubbles as it heats. "You're up early."
"Burning the midnight oil.." Simmons yawns into her hand. "I'm running a gene sequence on a protein I found in Skye and Agent- Director- Coulson's blood. I thought the GH-325 drug had vanished completely into their biochemistry because I couldn't find any trace of it in their tissues. Then I looked on a cellular level and found a stray enzyme that I wasn't able to identify. That enzyme codes for a protein that I've been trying to isolate and it's completely different. Nothing I've seen before, except in the notes on the GH series of medication. If I can isolate it, I might be able to synthesise enough to see if it would help Fitz-"
Resting her hand on Simmons' shoulder, May nods. "Still, you need sleep."
"I know, I just wanted to see if I could synthesise it properly and I had to find a suitable growth medium and time just got away from me." Simmons stares at the kettle, watching the water roil within. "You always get up now, don't you?"
"Most days."
"Why do you look as tired as I do?"
May smiles while Simmons yawns again. "I guess I didn't sleep well."
"Coulson was up too, wasn't he?"
Turning her attention to the now boiled kettle, May pours hot water over her tea leaves and Simmons' tea bag. "Yes."
"Did you help him?"
May digs a spoon out of the drawer and hands it to Simmons for her tea bag. "Help him?"
"I saw you going into his room when I grabbed a jumper from mine. I thought maybe you were able to help him sleep." Simmons takes the milk from the fridge and sighes. "You know, UHT milk just isn't the same. I know it makes much more sense from the perspective of storage, but it really doesn't add the same flavour to tea." She looks back to Melinda before she finishes. "He still has dreams about T.A.H.I.T.I., doesn't he?"
"Not every night."
"Did you stay up talking? Fitz and I used to, when one of us was particularly worried about an exam. It probably didn't help us sleep in the short term, but it was nice. Kind of calming."
Searching Simmons' face, Melinda can't find any hint that she is trying to trap her, or that she suspects something is going on. Melinda had gone into Phil's room to talk, and the sex that followed was almost more of habit. They sleep better wrapped around each other and both of them needed the distraction. She isn't ready to say that they need to spend the night touching, or that she likes the scent of his skin to lull her to sleep. She can sleep adequately on her own; she sleeps better with him.
"We talked."
"Good, I'm glad. It's great to have someone you can talk to." Simmons brushes her eye, as if it stings.
Melinda squeezes her shoulder again. "He'll be fine."
"Of course," Simmons agrees, forcing a smile. For a moment, something else bothers her and she reaches for May's hand. "He'll be fine. I just, I miss him. He's always there when I working."
"Skye and I will be just through the glass. You can look at us if you need company."
"Skye does tai chi with you?" Simmons has that far away look, as if her brain's running too fast.
"She has for several weeks. She's learned most of the forms now."
"And you do it in the corridor across from the medical lab?" Simmons turns her hand over feeling May's hand with the back of her own. It's an odd gesture but Simmons is sometimes strange. Her mind runs faster than the rest of the world.
"We will today. To keep you company."
Simmons' smile brightens. "That would be nice."
It is easier to work when she's not alone. When she needs to think, she watches through the glass as May and Skye do tai chi together. It's incredibly soothing the way they move in unison. May's right: Skye has picked up most of the forms. She stumbles on some of them, following May's arms and laughing when she gets it wrong.
May smiles at her and waits for Skye to get it right before they move on. Even exhausted, Jemma's mind races. Perhaps it hurries more because she's pushed herself so hard over the last few days. She's close to figuring it out, close to finding a solution. Maybe she can help Fitz after all. There has to be something.
It nags her that May's skin was so warm. She's not usually; her hands are cool, Jemma's sure of it. She wants to ask Skye if she's noticed anything. She should ask Coulson but she can't, not yet. There's something there. She doesn't want to have to confront him. It's not pleasant.
She knows what the rules are and that they're agents on an equivalent enough level that even if they're in a relationship, which is the only way May could have the concentration of residual GH-325 that she has, it's not breaking protocol. It's just, well, a little weird because she knows both of them and they're, well, they're steady. They're not the kind of people who'd have sex because it was convenient or because they weren't thinking. So if they're together, it's the most complicated kind of sex.
The computer beeps and reports her latest round of tests. The protein assays show that Coulson and Skye have nearly identical concentrations, but May's is thirty-five percent of theirs and has held steady for the last three weeks. Before that, it rose from barely detectable in her first round of samples, to where it's settled. It seems to have found an equilibrium in her system, but it's high. Especially when it's only part of the serum.
She doesn't know what was in GH-325. No one does. If Garrett's body had been available for autopsy, she might have been able to piece it together better, but Coulson destroyed him. She doesn't blame him for that. Garrett's one of the few people Jemma has ever really wanted dead. She stares at the blinking read out for the GH protein assay and sighs. Why doesn't she have more data on the team's biometrics? They've been out of combat for awhile, training, building up. She only has her blood tests to work with from the beginning of her experiments into GH-325. It's not enough
Jemma drums her fingers on the table. What does she have to work with? Physicals for the last few years, which are less than useful, and she doesn't have any information for Skye prior to her involvement with S.H.I.E.L.D.. Skye's a better comparison because her hormone levels are more similar. She needs something else. Pouring through May's medical data, she runs a quick algorithm that quantifies May's recorded body temperatures over the last two decades that she's been with S.H.I.E.L.D..
The computer reports an average of thirty-seven point four. She'll have to adjust for circamensal rhythm and for hormonal contraceptives because those raise body temperature. There are several outlying events to consider and remove. Three infections related to combat, six uncomplicated viral infections, pneumonia following injury, dengue fever, several ailments that went undiagnosed by anyone with formal training but have been recorded. Four of them have Coulson's signature on the bottom.
Coulson's name appears in May's medical record, over and over. He was her partner on several missions that brought them both back battered, her always the worst off. A few times he notes, with clinical detachment, that her injuries were sustained defending others, twice it's him.
After the incident in Bahrain, all of her fieldwork stops. She has a few mild illnesses, but nothing noteworthy. Coulson's name is no longer on her file, not until she's on the Bus. Bahrain is the incident that made May 'the Cavalry' and after that, she stopped leaving the office.
Her algorithm runs again, removing the cases that sway the average. In more than twenty years of medical records, May's average body temperature has been thirty-six point eight one. In the last few weeks, thirty-seven point eight. On a hunch, she places the graphs of May's body temperature and the concentration of the GH protein and they correlate.
She stares at May through the glass. She seems so serene, so calm. Would she tell them if something was wrong? Would she notice if it happened so slowly?
Jemma smiles weakly when she's caught staring and waves Skye over when they finish. Skye comes into the lab, still yawning.
"You're still up."
Jemma nods. "Is Agent May hot?"
Skye blinks, then grins. "Uh, yeah. Really hot. Have you seen her arms? I mean, wow. But you- I mean- we, we're not. It's just tai chi. Emotional control and all that shit. I didn't think you-"
She's too tired to even engage in a discussion about sexual orientation. "I meant temperature. When she touches you, is her skin warmer than yours?"
"Oh!" Skye's eyes widen. "Right. Uh, let me think." She reaches for Jemma's hand and touches that, almost as if looking for a baseline. "Yeah, I think so. She's mentioned it."
"Mentioned what?"
"Thinking the Bus was hot and the Library. I swear one time she nearly made us go outside and it's freezing outside the Library."
Jemma paces, staring at the graphs on the wall. "Recently?"
"Last week, when AC had us down in the Library organising stuff."
"Anything else?"
"Anything like what?"
"You said she was hot. Does she have any other symptoms? Anything out of the ordinary?"
"What's going on?" Skye's afraid and Jemma hates that she's made her that.
"She might be ill."
"Ill?"
She shouldn't say anything. She needs information from Skye but Skye always ends up getting information out of her when she tries. "You know the Guest House serum?"
Skye pales just a little. There is something horrible about that drug, and she knows what it is. "Yeah."
"I found a protein in your blood from the serum, and it's in Director Coulson's blood as well." Jemma turns Skye's attention to her graphs. "This one is my blood, and this one is Triplett's."
"You guys aren't even a line."
"I know, we've had no exposure."
"And this one? The green one?"
Jemma fidgets with her hand on her sleeve. She should shower. Staying up all night always makes her feel awkward and dirty. "The green one is Agent May."
"Why does hers go up?"
Jemma looks at Skye. She doesn't want to say. It isn't her business to say. Normally she wouldn't care. May and Coulson are old friends. They're really sweet to each other and it doesn't matter. Except she has a duty to make sure May's all right.
"She must have been exposed to the serum. I believe she's been exposed regularly to trace amounts of the GH protein. As it's built up in her system, it must have started to integrate itself, as it has in you and Director Coulson."
"You've been watching me since AC gave me the drug. GH doesn't make me hot. Why were you asking about that?"
Jemma sighs and switches the graph. "I think she has a fever, she might have for weeks. Not all the time, it must come and go, and I don't think it's been high enough for her to notice, but I think it's related to the GH protein."
"So somehow she's been exposed to this GH protein, and it's making her sick?"
"A fever is a normal bioregulatory response to potentially dangerous stimuli. It doesn't necessarily mean she's sick, but it's an area of concern."
"You have to tell her."
Jemma stiffens. "Tell her that I imagine the only way she could have been exposed to the GH protein is through the bodily fluids of someone who's been treated with the drug?"
Skye's mouth opens. She shuts it quickly but she still stares past Jemma up towards Coulson's office. "You mean they?"
"I think so."
"But they're like-"
"They're very good friends."
Skye continues to stare up towards Coulson's office then looks away abruptly. "You and I are good friends."
"Romantic relationships between friends are often some of the most long lasting. My parents were best friends all through university."
"Your parents."
"Yes." Jemma nods for emphasis.
Leaning against the table, Skye looks at the floor. "You do know that you just compared May and AC to your parents."
"They're people I admire very much."
"Who are having sex with each other."
"Perhaps they'd call it making love."
"Perhaps they'd call it the horizontal mambo." Skye says. "May and Coulson?"
"The only other possibility was that you and Agent May were, but you clarified that."
"We're not." Skye half-smiles, almost guiltily. "I mean, I'd be flattered, really damn flattered and a little terrified, but we didn't."
"Agent Ward was not exposed to the GH compound, nor was he present when Agent May's blood began to show signs of infection-"
"So it's like a disease?"
"I don't know, Skye." Jemma switches the graphs again, then changes to a view of the protein. "Proteins can have many purposes in the body. They build cells, repair muscle tissue, regenerate damaged organs and bones-" she trails off. Regeneration is one thing proteins can do. They can also build from scratch.
She turns, typing her next query into the computer system carefully, hiding it from Skye's eyes. Skye might not know what human chorionic gonadotropin is, but she's smart. If Jemma's not careful, Skye will know before she can even tell May and that seems wrong.
"What is it?"
The computer returns her answer in another line that starts from the x-axis and grows continuously. That shouldn't be possible. May's contraceptive implant has a failure rate of one in ten thousand, if not more. She asks the computer again, and the data agrees.
"What did you find?"
Jemma shakes her head. "I need to tell May first."
"Is she okay?"
"The GH compound had some side effects I didn't think of."
"You mean you didn't think of these until right now while you were talking to me?"
Jemma reaches for Skye's shoulder. "I wish I could tell you. I can't."
"Tell me she's okay." There's something so frightened in that request that Jemma hugs her, tight.
"She's fine."
"So whatever was in the Guest House-" Skye stops. She wants to say more. She knows and she desperately wants to tell Jemma the truth, but she can't. There are so many things they can't say. "The Guest House serum didn't hurt her."
"No."
"Okay." Skye takes heart in that, but she still looks lost. "You might want to tell Coulson first. There's things about the Guest House, it's complicated." Her eyes are haunted when she looks at Jemma. "Coulson probably needs to know."
Downloading her information into a tablet, Jemma nods. She'd rather go straight to May. She should, but there's something wrong. Something she doesn't know. If the secret of the Guest House could affect the her, she owes it to May to find out. She has to be able to tell her the whole truth.
"I need to see Coulson," Jemma says.
"Yeah," Skye replies. "I think he's in his office. He got up when she did." She winces. "Not that like. Not like what I just said. I'm going to go spend time with my laptop. Alone. Watching Disney movies."
