FitzSimmons were sitting on the BUS couch one quiet evening, plotting their benevolent conquest of the world using science and technology, when Skye bounced up to them from who knew where.

"Date me!" she said in her most melodramatic voice, before gracefully collapsing across their laps.

FitzSimmons stared down at her in surprise for several seconds, before Fitz finally asked hesitantly, "Did she just say 'Date me' before collapsing in our laps?"

"That's what I heard," answered Simmons. "And I think the collapsing in our laps part is pretty self-evident."

"Okay, just wanted to make sure," replied Fitz, before asking, "So who do you think she was talking to — you or me? And are you a lesbian? Wait, no — are you bi, because I definitely still remember you dating multiple guys early Sci-Ops. Wait, no — you could still be a lesbian, if you recently changed from being straight to being —"

"I'm not a lesbian — or bi," interrupted Simmons before he could talk himself into a never-ending loop. "But I don't think she was asking you or me — I think she was asking us. If you'll pardon my use of the word, I think she was asking FitzSimmons to date her."

"But we aren't together!" exclaimed Fitz. "And she's been on board long enough to know that. Because if what you just said is correct, then she wasn't asking each of us to date her simultaneously, she was asking us to date her as one, which means we would have to be dating each other first in order to then date her together."

Simmons looked over at her best friend, studying him for several seconds even after he turned to look at her when she didn't immediately respond to what he had just said, before finally saying seriously, "You are cute — for a Scot, that is."

"And you're the smartest, most amazing, prettiest girl that I have ever met, and you have no idea what it did to me when you jumped and I briefly thought that I'd lost you forever," Fitz replied, looking at Simmons with an intensity that she had never seen out of him before, that combined with his words made her blush slightly.

So to distract herself from what that could possibly mean, she looked down at Skye and asked, "What about her?"

"She's pretty. And she hacked Shield from a laptop, something I certainly couldn't do," answered Fitz. "And she's been fun to have on board, even if she did betray us with her ex once."

"And you did flirt with her a little around that time, before I jumped," added Simmons.

"What about you, then?" asked Fitz.

"Well, I've never looked at a girl like that before, but — I guess as far as girls go, Skye seems nice enough," answered Simmons. "I still like her as a friend even though she can't understand us like you do, and honestly, I'm probably better friends with her than I've been with anyone besides you since I started going to college for the first time at such a young age."

FitzSimmons were silent for a while, both looking down at Skye and lost in their own thoughts, until Fitz finally said, "Did we just justify having a relationship with each other so that we could justify having one with Skye as well?"

"I sure hope so," answered Skye, speaking up for the first time since she'd fallen in their laps.

"You really want us, dating each other, to date you?" asked Simmons.

Skye rolled onto her back so that she could look up at the Brit. "It's not so much that you have to date each other in order to then date me. It's — well, it's that I'm not interested in dating you separately, like two different but simultaneous relationships. I want to date you — the amazing science duo that I can never understand, but constantly save the day with your combined knowledge — your perfectly in sync oneness. And I know that you're two separate people, I'm not trying to downplay your individuality, because I know you take the fact that you're two separate people very seriously given how many people over your careers have referred to you as just one person. But like you told me once, Jemma, together you really are twice as smart. You're individual, but you're also something very special by being together and pooling everything you are together, and not just your intellect.

"But my point being, I guess you don't technically have to date each other, you just have to date me together — which I have a feeling would kind of end up with you two dating each other anyways simply from the nature of dating me together . Or you don't, and this works out, and a couple years down the road we get married together and you just kind of end up by default romantic husband and wife to go along with the lab husband and wife that you already are."

"What about Section 17, though?" asked Simmons.

"Section 17? What's that?" asked Skye.

"Shield's 'you can't date your lab partner' rule," answered Fitz. "We always expected to get called into our superior's office for it after we became inseparable labmates, and then even more so after we became flatmates when we started at Sci-Ops, but it never happened for some reason."

"I always suspected that everyone over us thought that we were already sleeping together and had been since we became labmates, but since we always worked so perfectly together there was no reason to bring it up and risk losing their best scientists because we would quit if they tried separating us over our relationship that didn't actually even exist," added Simmons.

"Oh — that could be a problem," said Skye. "Getting called up to Coulson's office for violating Section 17 probably wouldn't do too well for my attempts to become an actual Shield Agent."

"It probably wouldn't, but…" Simmons began slowly, before pausing for a second. When she continued on, she said, "And I'm never one to suggest breaking any rules, a minor test of an algae bio-fuel hydrogen cell powered Quinjet not to be mentioned, but…I don't think Coulson would actually report us if he found out. I mean, everyone's thought we were breaking it anyway for most of a decade and they never did, and Coulson already runs things differently around here. No one else would have invited you to join their team, Skye, and certainly wouldn't have kept you around after betraying us. And he never reported us to anyone when we hacked in to find out that Fitz and Ward had no extraction team, despite that being very much against the rules and me shooting a superior officer in the chest — both actions that should have led to disciplinary hearings, but he never said a word to anyone at Shield and never disciplined us for it himself, either."

"Your suggestion is that we just ignore a Shield rule because you don't think we'll get punished if we do get caught?" Fitz said in shock at his best friend. "I think I may be more surprised by that than the fact that you're considering a three person relationship in the first place. Who are you, and what have you done with Jemma Simmons?"

"I know, I know," Simmons replied with a wry smile. "I have no clue what's got into me tonight — must have been all that one glass of wine I had with supper tonight."

"I would tease you for being a lightweight, but I've seen you drink gin," smirked Skye, before asking seriously, "So are you two actually going to date me?"

"Just promise me you won't make me regret not telling you not to."

Fitz, Simmons, and Skye's heads all snapped up to see Coulson standing in the doorway to the command center looking at them. So absorbed they had all been in their conversation that none of them had heard him come downstairs from his office on the far side of the command center.

Simmons nodded quickly. "Of course, Sir. We'll be very careful, and you'll never see our relationship during work — or too much outside of work, either."

"Just don't hurt yourselves, and how well you work together as a team," replied Coulson. "You're three of the best there are in Shield, but far more than the loss to this team, I don't want you to lose each other and the force for good you three are together. But FitzSimmons, you two were made for each other, so if you think including Skye in that is a good idea, I won't discourage you. And you know the spiel I'd give you about the dangers of being involved with a coworker, anyway. So just give it to each other for me, and give it together to Skye since she hasn't heard it yet, and I won't mention anything more about it unless I start seeing problems."

"Yes, Sir. Of course, Sir. Right away, Sir," replied Simmons, nodding her head again.

"Very well — goodnight, I'll see you in the morning," said Coulson, before turning around and heading back towards the stairs up to his office/room, soon disappearing up them.

Once he was gone, Skye looked back up at Simmons and said, "I thought you said you two were never called in on Section 17. How could you know the spiel?"

"We weren't. But during Academy orientation, they warned everyone about the dangers of dating their fellow cadets, since they knew that it was likely to occur, and also doesn't fall under Section 17 yet since we weren't technically working together yet," answered Simmons. "Also, we did have multiple supervisors both at the Academy and early Sci-Ops who would warn us in meetings we were already having with them about the possible dangers of getting involved with your lab partner. What I was saying earlier was that we were never specifically called in for a meeting about Section 17, nor did anyone ever name that rule to us outside of orientation to everyone. At the time I thought it was just a warning speech that they gave every opposite-sex lab pair, but looking back I think it might have just been us, and they were just warning us because they assumed we were going to ignore Section 17 and do it anyway, or else had already been together for a long time and were just reminding us to be careful."

"Oh — so what is the speech?" asked Skye.

"Everything can go to bloody hell if you start sleeping with your labmate," answered Fitz.

Simmons rolled her eyes at him before turning back to look down at Skye.

"Short version, like any other relationship, if things go south you can come to hate each other, which if you have to work together every day — well, as Fitz so elegantly put it — 'can go to bloody hell'. We can give you the real speech tomorrow sometime, but for now I think we should take this to one of our bunks before Coulson changes his mind about not reporting us for a violation of Section 17 because we're being too romantic in public."