Author's Note: I've been really floored by the reactions and reviews to this series. Thank you guys so much for the comments, favorites, and follows! They always make my day!
My other work in progressed "Ducklings" has been completed with its fifth chapter all done. Thank you for all the favorites and follows on that. I was really impressed with the feedback on that story.
This chapter is a smaller filler, but we get to see a little more of the girls point of view before moving settings. I've been doing a lot of research for the upcoming chapters so hopefully it will pay off and come across believable and realistic.
Reviews and feedback are greatly appreciated! c.e.
CHAPTER THREE
"We need to find somewhere more secure. They're not going to be able to last much longer here. FitzSimmons especially," May's tone was casual as they watched their group play cards on the edge of the pool.
There was a sharp buzzing on the glass table and the Chinese woman leaned forward to look at the screen of the phone. May rolled her eyes before declining the call.
"All right?"
Annoyance flashed through May's eyes and she leaned back in the chair, her aviator glasses falling back onto her face. "It's just Stark. Don't worry about it." Phil frowned slightly. What did the Avenger want with Melinda? He wasn't aware they even knew each other.
"Stop thinking so hard, Phil, I can hear it from here."
He forced himself to try and clear his mind, but the curiosity was an annoying nag in the back of his mind. Meditation was a skill he never managed to grasp.
"All our current safe houses are compromised. Anything we had through S.H.I.E.L.D. are off the table, too. We don't know how far the extent of HYRDA's reach is."
He sighed, but knew it was true. They literally had to start from scratch. Everything he had built since he was twenty and starting in the S.H.I.E.L.D. academy was gone, reduced to ashes.
"What's he want?" He tried to sound nonchalant, casual, but knew by the pause in his best friend's voice that he failed.
"To offer me a job."
That made him jump to attention and flip to face her. The thought of May leaving him to work in the private sector with Stark rip a hole in his chest more painful than being stabbed by an Asgardian septum. She'd like it though; working with Maria again, calling all her own shots, her own picking her own team.
May hadn't moved from looking out at the pool and the kids, but it was hard for her to keep a smirk off her features.
"Take a breath, Phil."
The phone buzzed again and Phil leaned forward to clearly see "ANDREW" buzzing on the front. May's face had gone intentionally blank and he was sitting close enough to feel her breathing pattern change from her natural, controlled in and out to a much for forced, lengthy exhale.
"You gonna answer it?" he probed gently.
She swallowed once and didn't meet his eyes.
"Nope."
He didn't say anything else and leaned back in the chair, waiting for her to continue, if she was going to say anymore on the subject at all. A few seconds later after the buzzing was silenced and the light on the phone faded, she spoke again.
"If he's that worried he'll call my mother."
The two partners turned to look at each other as the same thought coursed through their minds. "Her house wouldn't be in any database. I'm not even sure it's accessible by roads. All my safe houses outside of S.H.I.E.L.D. are overseas. The closest is in Turkey. We can't get through TSA together without getting spotted."
"Would she be okay with all of us coming?"
On the few occasions he had met May's mother, she remained just as much a mystery as her daughter.
"I don't see why not."
The part she left off was clear as he glanced over at FitzSimmons and the rest of the team. He and May could make it out of the country and through the roadblocks Talbot had set up easily, Tripplett too, but the rest of the group had no experience trying to disappear. And this wasn't the time to learn.
"You never did like this country."
May didn't respond to that, but graceful moved to her feet, the sat phone in her hand. Her hands pressed the numbers quickly as May moved into the shadows. The call was answered quickly and Phil could hear May slip quickly into Chinese.
"Xǐ māmā."
The little Chinese May had taught him over the years wasn't enough to follow a full conversation with her mother and he didn't try to keep up. However the sound of the language, despite it being foreign, was soothing.
"What's happenin' A.C.?" Skye said taking May's now vacant seat, watching the Chinese woman pace back and forth between the pool and the hallway that led to their motel rooms.
"May and I think we have a place to lay low for a while."
"Really?"
There was a light in her eyes that Coulson hadn't seen since before Providence. He nodded and she smiled brightly. For a moment, he realized that she had lost the first home she actually chose for herself. He and May weren't the only ones whose only home had been reduced to nothing in the last few weeks.
"Is that Mandarin?" she asked, leaning back in the chair and exaggeratedly crossing her legs. Coulson hid an amused smile. She acted so much like a very young May sometimes.
"Cantonese, I think. Or a mix of the two. May's mother—"
"May has a mother?"
Phil shot her a look.
"Sorry, it's just…you're sure she wasn't born of dragon fire? Forged from the golden sword of an Asgardian warrior? I'm just sayin'."
Coulson chuckled and Skye beamed at his reaction.
"I'm glad she's back," the hacker said. Her voice had lost some of its teasing and deflection, revealing something harder, more concrete underneath. "It just feels safer with her here. Like we're gonna make it you know."
Coulson's eyes found May. Her back was turned away from them and as he looked at her she must have felt him watching because she turned back around to meet his gaze. Her sunglasses shaded her eyes from his, but he felt the sides of his mouth turn up slightly.
He nodded knowing exactly what she meant.
Skye was bouncy with excitement. She had packed in a rush and then moved across the hall to Coulson's room. The door was cracked open and she knocked a little before skipping inside.
"Hey A.C."
Her eyes marked that both sides of the bed had been slept in, May's leather jacket slung on the back of one of the motel chairs and her heart leapt a little bit at the prospect. "So what's May's mom like?" Skye asked interestedly as she sat on the bed, watching Coulson pack precisely. Her mind was running a million miles an hour with questions.
What was she like? Did she look just like May? Were they going to see the house that May grew up in? What should she call her? Mrs. May sounded strange even inside of her mind, but Mama May? Would May be okay with that? She had never seen May in that kind of position—would she act differently around her mother? Would her mom tell stories from when May was a teenager?
Coulson looked up briefly from his packing before shrugging, "She's intense and serious and strict. She worked pretty high up in her own agency before she retired—"
"So she's just like May?"
Coulson chuckled, "No, not really," he said.
It was true. Though the two women were similar in looks and in occupation, they were two very different people. Having lived with his mother, even through his father death, up until he was recruited for S.H.I.E.L.D. he never quite understood their relationship. For the time both he and May were in the Academy together and into their first few missions, he knew they were basically estranged over her choice of agency.
"Secretary May? You mean one of the most powerful women in—"
Skye and Coulson glanced up to find Jemma walking inside after gently setting her black duffle bag down next to Skye's book bag. The young scientist wore a purple knitted sweater over her jeans and boots.
"That'd be the one," Coulson said with a smirk as Jemma came to sit down next to Skye on the edge of the bed, folding her hands in her lap. "She however doesn't like me very much."
"If she didn't like you, you wouldn't be still walking around."
The two glanced up from Coulson's packing to see May in the doorway watching their exchange. She looked calmer than she did earlier that morning.
"Maybe she's just waiting for me to make a wrong move," Coulson suggested, an eyebrow raised for emphasis. The two girls turned towards the doorway, waiting for Chinese woman's reply.
May simply rolled her eyes.
"I'll protect you."
He smiled brightly and zipped the duffle bag on the table loudly. When he glanced back up May held up a pair of keys between her two forefingers in response.
"Where'd you get that?" Simmons asked interestedly, "I thought Commander Hill took Lola back to Stark Industries with her, not that we could all fit in anyways."
Coulson and May shared a knowing look and Skye choked back a snort.
"Don't ask questions you don't want answers to."
