Previously: Skye kissed Ward, begging him to let her leave and give herself up to Wolfe.
Chapter Twenty-Three
"Damn you, Ward! Damn you, damn you!" she shouted heatedly. Great. Now she was going to wake up the entire plane.
"I'm not going to let you do this," he had said. What made him think he could do this to her? What gave him the right?
"What gives you the right, huh?" Skye continued at a slightly lowered volume. "Why in the hell would you think this is ok?"
"Because Coulson deserves better," said Ward, surprising her with how well he stood his ground. She wasn't sure why, he was incredibly skilled at keeping his emotions in check. But when she'd started yelling at him – she kicked the wall too, it wasn't a tantrum she was very proud of – he looked startled and upset. Now he was all rough and tough again. "They all do. And it's ridiculous for you to leave before you have to!"
She was fuming now, though she wasn't sure what to say.
"It was a lie," she decided upon. "The kiss."
He looked unburdened by the information, but perhaps his indifference was forced.
"I figured."
Skye knew her declaration was only half true. She didn't understand her feelings for Ward. This man, who'd broken her trust, captured her and had made her suffer, didn't deserve forgiveness or retribution. And he certainly didn't deserve her. So in a normal situation, no, she wouldn't have kissed him.
But she'd been inexplicably happy to get the chance to.
"Can we please just shut the door and go back inside?" he asked her. "We can talk more in there."
"You really think I want to talk to you right now?" she seethed, just before glancing at the cargo ramp. It was wide open and she was closer to it than Ward was. She definitely wasn't stronger than him, but she could be faster.
"Don't do it, Skye," he warned, reading her thoughts.
Her head snapped back to him. "Why? Are you going to drag me back, kicking and screaming?"
"If I have to," Ward told her.
"You'll get off Coulson's good graces if you even try to touch me."
Ward's arms were crossed, and he casually walked passed her as though trying to calm down the situation. Make their chat more of a conversation than a confrontation.
"Maybe, but Coulson's a perceptive guy. Even so, the repercussions don't matter. I'm not letting-"
Skye bolted. She'd hoped it was random enough to catch Ward off-guard. That hope had been in vain as he was hot on her heels the moment she'd moved. But to her surprise, he stopped as soon as he crossed from the plane floor to the ramp. Was he second-guessing this? Was he letting her go?
A loud, blearing alarm told her this was incredibly wistful thinking, as all of a sudden a wall slammed down in front of her, blocking the way out.
She blinked a few times at her now dead end escape route, before turning around to glare at Ward. He held up his wrist.
"I'm not entirely on Coulson's good graces yet," he told her as he pointed to the bracelet on his arm.
Skye threw down her bag of clothes petulantly, not taking her accusatory eyes off Ward as she stalked away. She walked up the stairs, only to be met by a frazzled Coulson running at her when she got to the top. He was wearing pajamas, which Skye realized she'd never seen him in before. Still, she could have totally predicted the shirt would have a Captain America shield on it. Which it did.
"What's going on?" he hollered down at Ward who was holding his arms up in surrender.
"Nothing," Skye snorted. "I was trying to leave but don't worry, Hydra boy here stopped me."
The anger quickly dissipated from Coulson's face.
"You were trying to leave?" her team leader asked in a near broken voice. It made Skye's anger melt away too, until all she could feel was embarrassment. She was disarmed and near speechless from the look on his face.
"I was afraid…" she started, too quietly to hear over the alarm. She tried again. "I thought you might not let me leave with enough time."
"So you decide to pack up and leave days early?" he bellowed, anger definitely back. "I thought we were on the same page. You said you would wait for Fitz to see if he could make anything of the machine to take down Hall!"
"Yeah, and what if he does? We'd just try to go beat the bad guy and someone's going to get caught in the crossfire," she said heatedly. "This is the best choice, AC."
Coulson just stared at her, obviously in disbelief at what she was saying. She glanced down at Ward. He was looking up at her with pitying eyes, but the moment she caught them he veered away and began to pace the cargo hold.
"What is going on?" came Simmons' voice and followed by the girl it belonged to. "What's all this racket?"
"There a situation, sir?" asked Triplett, obviously trying to get his mind out of a sleepy haze when the alarm abruptly switched off. Skye guessed May was the culprit of that, as she came trotting over a moment later.
The hacker was just about to comment on how she felt left out of the pajama party, their outfits somehow raising her spirits, but Coulson brought them crashing back down with the question's answer.
"Yes, we do have a situation," Coulson said firmly. "Skye needs to be monitored."
"What?"
Coulson turned to meet her incredulous stare. "I'm going to assign someone to be with you for every moment until this deadline. Your room will be monitored, but if you need to be alone report to whoever is supervising you at the time and they can give you the privacy."
"Is… is this a joke?" she asked incredulously. "I mean it must be, but I am so not laughing."
"No," Coulson stated firmly, leaving no room for debate or second guesses.
She shook her head in disbelief. "You can't do this! What happened to giving me a choice?"
"You'll have your choice Skye, but you're being irrational. You're in a state of shock and jumping to conclusions. We need to wait and see if we can figure this out. The fact that you tried to meet with Wolfe so quickly shows your decision-making isn't up to par at the moment."
Skye was losing track of how many times she'd cried over the past few days, and despite her best efforts, the tears were making another appearance.
"You can't do this to me!" she shouted. "I thought you cared about what I think. I thought you respected me!"
"I do," he said, reaching out to put a hand on her shoulder. She backed up passed the length of his arm. She shook her head.
"No, you don't," she whispered.
She knew that wasn't the truth, but honestly, it sure as hell felt like it right now. He was betraying her. And Skye was getting pretty freaking sick of the feeling.
Coulson was taken aback and possibly about to defend himself when a sudden crash from below caused everyone to jump, and soon every person on the platform was sending a look of curiosity downward to Ward.
"That wasn't me," he said in defense. "It came from the lab."
"Ow, yeah, that was definitely me," mumbled Fitz, walking out of the lab and up to Ward. Cables were draped all over him and he took his time to take off each one individually.
"Fitz, what are you doing down there?" asked Simmons. "Wait, have you been down there this entire time?"
"Er, yes."
"Why didn't you say something?" Ward asked with annoyance.
"Well, it was a very awkward situation!" Fitz protested, and Skye felt her cheeks flush as she realized he would have seen their kiss. "So I thought it would be better if you never knew I was here. Obviously that didn't work…"
"What are you even doing at this time of night?" Simmons asked.
"Working on something to take Hall down, of course!" Fitz exclaimed. "You lot may have nothing to do before the meeting with Randolph, but I can be working."
"I could be helping you, why didn't you tell me?" asked Jemma.
"Sometimes I'm just more productive by myself, Simmons."
Skye was briefly reminded about their recent stint with memory loss and if they'd tried to run any tests on Fitz since then. He seemed much more open to it when they'd all forgotten their previous argument. But again, before she had a chance to voice her question Coulson's voice rang through.
"How fast can you rig up a feed to Skye's bunk?" he asked.
"Oh erm… it would just take a couple minutes," said Fitz.
"Good. Get on it," said Coulson, and after a moment's hesitation Fitz quickly scurried away. "Ward, seeing as you weren't sleeping anyway, you're on first watch."
Skye scoffed a hardy laugh, unable to contain it. "Oh that's rich. The guy who's so untrusted he has to wear a tracking bracelet and you're putting him in charge of me."
"He's obviously shown dedication to this particular job."
Skye blinked, mouth gaping and still unbelieving. "I don't- I can't-" She turned abruptly to the rest of the team. "Do all of you agree with this?"
Simmons was avoiding her eyes, hands behind her back as she scuffed her bare foot on the ground.
"Well, it doesn't exactly make sense that you'd leave before you have to, does it?" she admitted quietly. "Maybe this is for the best. You could be experiencing an acute stress reaction and it would be completely understandable!"
Skye couldn't believe this. She searched for anyone to tell her differently, but Triplett had been nodding along with Simmons and May was just as emotionless as always. Still, Skye wanted answers, so she gestured her head towards the seasoned agent.
"What do you think?" Skye asked firmly. May, of course, gave her a stare that revealed nothing, unlike her words.
"I think we need to respect Coulson's decision."
Skye could have laughed. The way that had been worded was just too perfect.
"So you expect me to respect his decision, when he won't even respect mine?"
"Seeing as he is the one in charge of this team and you have been acting recklessly, that is exactly what I expect," May told her coldly, and Skye couldn't help but growl in frustration.
"I've already been held captive for days and now we know I don't have much time left, and you all agree I should have to spend what time I do on a leash?"
No one said anything, but their blank stares held the answer.
Face scrunched up with anger and desperation, she spat, "Fine!" and turned on her heel to leave.
She didn't need to tell them how miserable, betrayed, and untrusted she felt. If they had a clue at all they would be able to read it from her face and her last venomous compliance of a word. Though, Skye began to doubt if any of them could gauge her real feelings at all.
Skye knew Ward would be on her in a moment to start his new duties, but if he were smart he'd stay out of sight. She was ready to lash out again if she saw another one of them anytime soon. This made it a good thing that Fitz hadn't been in her room to install cameras just yet. He would be up there any second, but she didn't need very long to do what she had to.
Striding into her room purposefully she immediately went to her desk, ripped up the papers she had worked so hard on just a few hours ago and pelted them into the trash bin.
She watched the pieces mournfully, as they floated to mostly miss their mark and drifted straight onto the ground.
Coulson was worried he'd made the wrong choice.
Skye hadn't spoken to anyone since he ordered her to have monitors. Even when Simmons went to sit with the hacker as she ate breakfast to try and have a conversation with her, Skye merely picked up the bag of banana chips and moved to another seat. The girl must have known how much that would hurt the scientists' feelings, even if she were being ordered to keep an eye on Skye.
If Skye spent her last days in a fit of silent rage, would it really have been worth it to take away her choice?
Even May had expressed feelings of doubt.
"You know I will always follow your decisions. But are you sure this is the right move?" she had asked him shortly after the incident the night before.
"Skye can make the choice to give herself up when the deadline comes, but she's not thinking straight right now. This is for her own good."
"Skye won't see it that way."
"She'll be grateful for it in the future if we can buy her one."
May raised an eyebrow. "I doubt Skye will ever be grateful for this."
Coulson couldn't help but agree with her. But he decided if they could give Skye any extra time, maybe even find a way out of this, it didn't matter. The choice was definitely the right one.
"I could get used to this," Skye admonished, breaking her vow of silence upon seeing the Italian city. "I feel like this is what Legoland would look like if they redecorated to like, idyllic chic."
Positano was unique in the way its buildings were set up: multicolored houses built upwards on one another. This was most likely the cause of Skye's comment.
"Yeah. Too bad we're not here for the view," said Coulson.
Skye glared at him. "What, I can't enjoy looking at stuff either? Any more restrictions you want to add? I've already got Ward the warden traitor person not giving me two feet of room."
Apparently she was switching from the silent treatment to her signiture sarcastic attitude, but with noticeably more spite.
Seeming perturbed by the comment, Ward shifted slightly away from her. Though there was still no more than two feet of space between them. Coulson just gave Skye a weary look, feeling unable to respond to her comment without repeating what he already had many times since the night before.
"Ward isn't specifically monitoring you right now," May reminded her, leaving unsaid that she was surrounded by four field agents. Any of them could keep her in their sights well enough.
"I know but… Ward the warden? It's kind of funny, right?" Skye asked hopefully, mood quickly turning sour when no one responded fast enough. "Sorry, maybe my jokes aren't as good when I'm pissed off and terminal."
Coulson sighed, rubbing his hand to his forehead. He sincerely wished that Skye would stop talking about her impending death as casually as if she was dreading some doctor's appointment, but wouldn't dare voice it with how much her anger was currently directed at him.
"I thought it was funny," admitted Trip after a few seconds. A few too late apparently, as the small window of Skye's cheery mood seemed closed as she just continued to frown.
"Meet's at 2:00," said May. "We should get going."
It was a small café at the bottom of the nest of buildings. All the tables were small and circular, only enough for two people, but this was fine for Elliot Randolph's current stance as he sat alone drinking his coffee.
"Agent Coulson," said Randolph. "Do you have something against being on time?"
"Not at all. We just have to be a little more wary nowadays," he answered.
"Well, from what you've told me if this man wanted you he could have done it easily enough when he infiltrated your aircraft."
He didn't infiltrate the aircraft, he was there as a prisoner, Coulson wanted to defend but second-guessed it. That probably wasn't something to really boast about.
"Mind if we sit down?" he asked, and the Asgardian opened his hands in an inviting gesture.
"By all means," he said. "Though you may have to pull up a few tables. I don't know why they feel the need to make them so tiny."
"Wonder if Thor wouldn't even fit in one," said Trip.
"You know, I really don't think he would," admitted Coulson.
They pulled up two extra tables. Coulson with Randolph, Ward and Skye at one, and May and Triplett at another.
"Shame you didn't bring your scientist. She was definitely the most interesting out of all of you," Elliot admonished, taking a sip of espresso.
Fitzsimmons had stayed back on the BUS to work on and research what could take down Hall. Though Fitz guaranteed he had it under control, it seemed to make sense to leave him with a partner.
"But I suppose you're rather interesting now, aren't you?" he said to Skye, just before looking at Coulson. "Based on description, I take it she's the Inhuman that's caused this little meeting?"
Skye stared at him. "Half-Inhuman."
"Right. To be honest, I'm not really seeing it. What's your other side?"
"Kree," Skye told him, seeming unsure about saying the word. "Um… the blue ones."
Elliot tilted his head. "You don't quite scream that race either. Even apart from color." He shrugged. "But I was never really one to mingle. Mainly soldiers and politicians who made trips to other worlds, and I signed up a little later in life."
"I guess they cancel each other out actually," Skye admitted. "I'm pretty much human, so I don't have like, powers or anything."
"But there's power in your death?" asked Randolph and everyone at the table tensed. He seemed to sense the hostility. "Well, that is why we're here, isn't it?"
"It is," said Coulson, trying to avoid Skye having to talk about it. "Do you have any information on the Inhumans?"
"Can't say that I do, really." said Randolph casually. "But prophecies and curses? That's definitely their forte. Kree or Inhumans. And there is no doubt that the Inhumans use the Terrigen Mists to gain powers through Terregenisis, but I've never heard of anything else coming of it. A sacrifice, ritual or whatever you're talking about."
"So you can't tell us anything about recent Inhuman history?"
Randolph laughed. "Not unless by recent you mean over one thousand years ago. And even then, I don't know much. But I do know whom you can ask."
He pulled out a piece of paper with a strange, spherical drawing on it.
"What's this?" asked Coulson.
"This is… well, how about we call it a phone number? You can use it to contact Heimdall, sentry of the Bifrost on Asgard," said Elliot as Skye's eyes widened.
"We're going to just call up an Asgardian?" asked Skye, excitement seeping into voice. "Like, while he's in Asgard?"
"Well no, you're not just going to be able to talk to him. That would be ridiculous," laughed Elliot. "You draw this on the ground, hopefully somewhere secluded that won't notice an alien disturbance coming from the sky, and he may be able to send you some sort of sign."
They all looked skeptical.
"Oh yeah, and talking to him was ridiculous," mumbled Skye.
"And we're expected to just… leave him a note that tells him what our problem is?" asked Coulson.
"Oh, no," responded Randolph lightly, his voice lined with a small chuckle. "He sees all. If you make contact he'll know exactly what you need."
Coulson glanced over the paper and took in its contents. It was a circle, but with a bunch of gibberish lining the inside of it. It didn't look particularly promising. Though it did resemble the markings Thor and Sif's transport would leave…
"And you're sure this will work?" he asked.
"Not in the least bit, I've never used it before!" Elliot exclaimed. "And who knows if Heimdall will even bother answering you?"
"How encouraging," said May flatly.
"Hey, that's what I have to offer," Elliot said as he offered his hands. "I'm still grateful for you helping me and I'm doing what I can to help you."
"And we appreciate that," said Coulson firmly, followed by a still silence. "Well, if that's all, I think we'll be taking our coffee to go."
"Alright. Please, tell your lovely bio-chemist I said hello."
"Will do," said Coulson, nodding to his team and they all got out of their chairs collectively. Ward seemed to have some trouble getting his legs out of the small table.
"Oh, and Agent Coulson?" Randolph called after him, so he turned back to the Asgardian. "I would leave her somewhere secure while you do this." He nodded towards Skye. "You never know just who's heads you'll turn by contacting another world, and you wouldn't want your half-breed to draw her attackers attention back."
Coulson nodded, dreading turning back around, as he was afraid to see the look on Skye's face. He prepared to hear some sort of protest.
Instead he only heard her sigh. When he did look towards the sound, he saw her managing to pull a light smile onto her face.
"That's ok," she said weakly, her voice small. "Seeing humanity use a cool alien calling card for the first time ever wasn't on my bucket list anyway." Her voice was full of resignation, and simple acceptance, as she shrugged and began to walk out of the café.
Coulson didn't think he'd miss her snarky silence or attitude, but the complete surrender in her voice definitely made him think twice. He wanted to throw out an embrace or offer words of comfort, but he wasn't sure she'd accept them. So instead he didn't say anything.
Skye didn't say much of anything else either as they made their way back to the BUS, the mutual silence the only thing holding them together.
A/n: This was two chapters I put together because I think the second half would have sucked on its own, so there may not be another until Friday... Thanks sooo much for the reviews and follows guys! Every time I get an email about em it makes me wanna write and post more :D