Idly, she watched purple strands of hair float in front of her face, blocking her view of the destroyed ship. Pieces of scrap floated alongside her, bumping against her arms and legs. She lazily tried to push one away, only her fingertips twitching in the effort. She blinked. Sound crackled in from her comms.
"Daisy? Daisy come on, stay with us! We're almost there!" A voice cried. Daisy wished she knew who, she should've known who, but her mind could not connect the voice to a face.
A new voice crackled in, this one a forced calm, belaying her terror, "Daisy if you can hear me, you need to use your powers to pull vibrations into yourself. Remember our practice with temperature? It's just warming yourself up, easy really, do you remember?"
She blinked again, focusing her blurred gaze on a faint light approaching. If they were this close… maybe. Maybe she'd try to hold on just a bit longer. With a deep breath, she reached out to the wreckage of the ship floating around her, her vibrational pulse skimmed along theirs, then pulled it in. Warmth buzzed against her skin, burning, searing, against her frostbitten limbs. Daisy gritted her teeth as the bones in her arms began to snap. Bruises appeared up and down her skin. Her fists clenched.
The light grew brighter, until it engulfed her. Daisy let out a gasp in relief as a wave of energy washed over her. Her powers pulsed. The solar energy engulfing her did as well. She closed her eyes.
Daisy sat up with a gasp, body tensing as she waited for the searing pain to hit. Except… it didn't come. Instead of the harsh buzzing against her skin, all she felt was a gentle hand. Her gaze traveled up the arm, to its owner.
"Skye? Are you okay?"
She sucked in a breath. Skye. He called her Skye. Her gaze snapped away from Coulson and darted to take in the room, heart pounding as she realized who surrounded her. May, Coulson, that she expected. But then she noticed fucking Victoria Hand, And beside her stood none other than Garrett, Sitwell, and Ward. Which meant… Trip. Trip had to be here too. Simulation or time travel be damned, she'd at least get to see Trip again.
"Trip…?" She questioned, before wincing internally at the surprise Coulson hid so poorly. Right. She wouldn't have known Trip long at this point. Unless… this timeline was different? No. Coulson's surprise seemed to match up with how long she knew Trip at this point in her own time.
"Agent Triplett? He's in the quinjet," Coulson answered, offering a hand to help Daisy up, which she took gratefully. "Ward, go get him please."
She almost snorted at the look on Ward's face. Almost. The man looked like he swallowed a lemon. He spared a quick glance to Garrett, and moved off to fetch Trip. God… How had they all missed that Ward wasn't loyal to them? He looked to Garrett for permission for just about everything when he was around. Coulson's gentle squeeze on her arm jostled out out of her thoughts.
"What happened, Skye?"
"I… Don't know. I just got a bit lightheaded… Maybe it's the altitude getting to me," based on Victoria Hand's face, they didn't buy it. She continued on, adding a false laugh, "or the stress. Creating a double blind secure enough to lock out level nine Shield agents isn't exactly easy, you know." There. That seemed to relax them a bit.
Victoria Hand spoke up, ever the efficient one, "Right, issue the information then. Skye, you're off the mission after this. We can't afford a liability."
Daisy gave a single nod. That worked for her. More time to figure out yet another plan to survive in an alternate timeline. Or simulation. Or whatever this was. From the corner of her eye, she saw May's gaze narrow ever so slightly. Fuck. Right. Skye wouldn't take getting kicked off a mission well. Too late to change it now.
She paused as she looked down to her phone. Should she keep the same teams? The same locations? One agent died last time… but he might have been Hydra anyway. None of her team got seriously injured. She'd keep everyone then. Even… Ward. Best to let Garrett believe the team bought Thomas Nash as the clairvoyant so he's willing to leave and give her more space to operate. Daisy sent the messages out to each agent.
"Done. Remember to leave discreetly. I didn't do all of this just so people can guess where you're going."
"Thanks, girl."
Daisy's gaze jumped up to meet Trip's. He leaned against the doorway with that big easy going smile of his, looking so… so real. So alive. She smiled back at him, deliberately keeping the rest of her posture relaxed, desperate to keep from throwing herself into his arms.
"No prob. About asking for you… I was thinking about how you should probably be at this little meeting before I went down. Guess it was just the first thing I thought of when I woke back up."
"Mkay. Yeah. You had us all worried. Glad it was just that."
And God isn't that what she loved about Trip. He didn't push. He didn't pry. He let you come to him in your own time and until then, well he just accepted what you told him.
"Yup, just that. Anyway, you guys gotta go. I'll stay here and stay out of the way, I promise," she spared a look to Victoria Hand, "buuuuut if you need me, I'll be right up here."
"Good," Hand responded, only looking a little skeptical of her.
Daisy retreated to her bunk as the team prepared to leave. She stepped into her room and flopped on the bed, taking a deep breath. She was home.