"Come on Simmons. You can't stay there. Skye is going to need that ladder soon and she will get eaten if you don't move." Fitz told her.
Realising that Fitz was right Simmons climbed the ladder. She was shaking badly but she made it to the top, swung her legs over and placed her feet on the hay bales. May and Coulson helped her down the 'stairs' while Fitz went back to work on the device.
When Simmons reached the bottom she fainted.
Ward and Skye walked down the path towards their next challenge.
An owl hooted in the distance making Skye jump. In the five minutes since the incident with the bat she felt like her nerves were overloaded, and as a result, every noise made her jump. She reached for Ward's hand for, what felt like, the millionth time that night.
He squeezed her hand in reassurance and they continued down the path holding hands.
Skye felt her fears leaving her and something else replace them.
Excitement.
They came to a clearing with a bench and a Punch and Judy stand. Looking at each other they sat down and waited for the show to start.
The curtains were drawn back and a story of their situation was played out using puppets, The background was of black trees with bright red balloons. It showed the team completing challenges and then outrunning the dogs, slowly dwindling in numbers until the puppets depicted the two of them sat on the bench. Then it showed them a bunch of balloons that the puppets then popped, before another puppet with a chainsaw appeared before it cut their puppets to pieces.
The curtains dropped and at the same time a clown wielding a chainsaw burst out of base of the puppet show straight at them.
Skye screamed and flew off the bench.
"Woah!" Ward yelled at the same time as Skye's scream. He jumped off the bench, pulled Skye by the hand and ran back into the woods.
When they had got their breathing and heart rates under control they cautiously edged their way back into the clearing. The clown had gone, but a bunch of bright red balloons had been lit high in another copse of trees, behind the Punch and Judy stand.
They made their way over to them and looked up.
"Pop them you idiot" The commentator from the puppet show said.
Ward looked around and found a knife attached to a piece of wood.. He picked it up and walked over to the balloons and tried to pop them, but he couldn't reach.
The gong went.
Ward knelt down so Skye could sit on his shoulders so that they could pop the balloons. As she did, slime, dust and blood poured onto their heads.
Skye quickly popped all of the balloons and the area went dark. Ward felt her grip on his head tighten.
Suddenly more red balloons appeared in a tree nearby. Ward, thinking it would be quicker to move with Skye still on his shoulders, than allowing Skye to get off his shoulders, them both making their way over and her having to climb back onto him, set off towards the balloons.
When they got there they quickly realised that the extra height was useless. The balloons were far too high. They had been provided with darts to pop them though.
Skye scrambled off Ward's shoulders and they both picked up the darts. As Ward hit a balloon with every shot (he does have off the charts hand/eye coordination after all) more white powder and slime fell on their heads. Skye was not doing very well hitting the balloons and was now scrabbling around the floor for landed darts.
Once all of the balloons had been popped the light went out again, only to reappear a little way out on a rather gigantic lone balloon on the floor.
They raced over to it and Skye popped it with the dart still in her hand. As it popped Ward had time to register the chainsaw carrying clown and pulled a screaming Skye out of the way before she lost a limb. The lights flickered and the clown was gone.
There was one small solitary red balloon left in the middle, which Ward stood on, revealing the key.
"That one scared you didn't it? You have 45 metres. You know the drill."