November 9, 2013
"So, A.C., you got anybody waiting at home?"
Phil looked up as Skye plopped down on the opposite chair. It was late and the only light in the Bus' lounge area aside from his small book lamp was the light emanating from the full moon.
"Shouldn't you be asleep by now?" he asked.
She raised an eyebrow and kicked her feet up onto the coffee table. "Who are you? My dad?"
He snorted softly, acknowledging the jab.
"So…?" she prodded.
"Why so curious?" he countered.
The young woman shrugged. "Kinda want to know if my life will still be a life years from now, or if it'll just be the job."
He pondered the comment a moment before answering. "I do."
Skye made a "go on" motion with her hand.
Phil sighed. "My old team."
"Any girlfriends? Boyfriends? Romantic partners outside the gender binary?"
He didn't answer, and Skye seemed to take that as an answer on its own. "Do any of them know you're alive? I know that's Level 7 Classified." She had a concerned look on her face.
He chucked softly. "They weren't supposed to."
Her head tilted in consideration. "So how did they find out?"
"She threatened Director Fury. I hear it was a sight to behold." He smiled proudly.
Skye's eyes widened, impressed. "How the hell did she do that?"
"She was using her authority as next of kin and health care proxy to take custody of my body for a proper funeral. The director tried to misdirect her and she threatened to go to the press."
Skye bit her lip. "He can't have taken that well. How did she even make it out of the building?"
Phil's grin widened. "She brought Tony Stark with her."
Skye burst out laughing- doubled over, belly laugh laughing. She brushed the tears out of her eyes. "Oh, that's epic!"
Of course it was. When Tony Stark focused on something, he was like a dog with an old bone. He'd gnaw and gnaw and gnaw at something until he got what he wanted. He had the annoyance factor and the influence. Once you got Pepper Potts involved, you had another genius and a team of high-priced lawyers to deal with.
"She sounds amazing."
Phil sighed wistfully. "She is."
"When did you last get to see her?"
He worried the edges of the book he had been reading absentmindedly. "It's been a few months." Phil didn't mention that he was sure Fury assigned him to the mobile response team as payback for the shit Laura pulled to prove he was alive.
"I'm sorry."
Phil did his little head-tilt version of a shrug. "It's nothing we haven't had to deal with before. She has her job and I have mine. We make it work."
"Yeah." Then she froze, "Shit. Coulson, do you have any kids?"
He deduced the track her brain took to get to that question. Serious relationship of clearly many years… long periods of separation. It didn't take a detective to figure out that she was concerned he was an absent father.
"No. We decided a long time ago that having children wasn't for us."
Skye nodded. "Hey, that's your decision and I respect that."
Phil looked at his watch and rose. "I'm going to leave you to it." Before he turned to walk away, he added, "I'd appreciate it if you kept this conversation between the two of us."
She smiled. "You got it, Coulson."