Previously: Skye's been taken by the Skrulls. Ward was alone with her double when he realized she wasn't real, and is now taking her back to the team. Earlier the power was taken out when Bobbi hit Graviton with a weapon that knocked him out after he flew away.

Chapter Forty Five

"What the hell happened?" Coulson exclaimed. "Is she ok?"

It was not the most pleasing sight to see: Ward, obviously irritated and worried, carrying an unconscious Skye over his shoulder. They'd obviously already gotten into trouble after barely being gone much time at all.

The specialist let the girl roll off of him roughly when he approached Coulson, and he felt himself wince at the force of her head bluntly hitting the ground.

Anger boiled over. "Ward-"

"It's not her," Ward said, sounding resigned. "They took her. They took Skye."

Again?

No, this was not happening.

Coulson steeled himself. He swallowed. "You're sure?"

"Positive." He pointed to the alien that looked like Skye. "She confessed it to me."

He nearly shook with rage. Just when things were going kind of well, too. Wolfe and Mack had the machine all ready to go, the area was evacuated. Sure, finding Hall was probably going to be a long shot but once he started attacking the city again, it wouldn't be too difficult (They'd just prefer getting to the man before such a kerfuffle started up again). But maybe if Coulson promised Graviton Skye as bait, he'd come back easily. Not that he had the tiniest intention to actually give her up.

"We need to find the Short Bus. That's where Skye is supposed to be," said Coulson.

Ward nodded eagerly. "We'll have to get her restrained first. She's strong…"

"Skye said they would be."

There was a small monument nearby, an arch of some kind, and just in front of it was a gate to keep tourists from intruding. Ward propped up the Skye look-alike while Coulson handcuffed her around the gate. He let go of the girl's arm when he was done, watching it slump uselessly to the ground.

"Think that will be enough?" asked Ward.

"I think Skye meant they were just pretty strong. Not like, Captain America strong."

"Could Captain America get out of handcuffs, sir?" Ward asked curiously.

Coulson didn't even feel the need to dignify that with a response.

"You stay here with her," started Coulson. "I'll go get-"

Skye began to cough.

Well, not Skye. But… yeah.

She winced, her eyes still not open as her head mainly supported itself with the help of her shoulder. Her arms hunched up but were met with the tug of the cuffs. She wearily opened her eyes, and Coulson saw the panic hiding there.

"Coulson?" she asked cautiously. "What's… oh god." She seemed to become alert. "Coulson, Ward's gone nuts!"

"Don't try these games again, Skrull," Ward growled.

"Coulson, listen to me," she pleaded. And whether it was against his better judgment, whether he knew she was an alien trying to play him, he couldn't refuse such a simple request from this girl's mouth. "I'll admit it: something's wrong with me. My powers are giving me memory problems or something. Like, gaps? I was trying to cover it up just because we shouldn't be dealing with that right now, but I guess that made Ward think I was a Skrull!"

Coulson didn't let any emotion through, but he looked at Ward in askance. "This true?"

"It's actually what I thought at first," said Ward. "But eventually she was trying too hard and the context clues didn't add up. When I questioned her, she plainly told me she was an alien."

"Yeah, when you punched me over and over again!" she said heatedly, her voice cracking.

Coulson felt his heart break. Just a little.

There were bruises blooming on her face…

"How about the way you grabbed my fist while that was happening?" Ward sneered. "Revealed a little too much strength there, huh?"

She shook her head in despair at Ward, then seemed to opt for Coulson again. "Please! I didn't do anything like that, he's lying!" she sobbed. Then growled in frustration. And finally, ended with an abrupt gasp. "Coulson… maybe he's a Skrull!"

She looked so desperate. He couldn't tell if it was Skye in front of him, as the story made sense. She hadn't had gaps in her memory thus far but… maybe she had been covering it up.

Having the alien look like Skye while being interrogated would have been a road bump, but not unbearable. If Coulson knew without a doubt it wasn't really his hacker, he'd get passed having to see her body harshly questioned or even in pain. It wouldn't really be her body.

But doubt was instilled, and now he couldn't be sure.

"Coulson," Ward started. "If I were a Skrull, or even just crazy, why would I bring her back to you?"

Valid point.

"I don't know," he admitted, and turned his gaze on the girl. "Do you?"

"I… to trick you? Look, I don't know his freaking plan! All I know is he hit me and then you both tied me up! My wrists, by the way? Really starting to cramp."

She struggled at the bonds, and Coulson kept an eye out for any semblance of super strength. Not that she would most likely be trying to use it. She needed to keep up the act. If it was an act.

Sheesh.

"Ward, I have to be sure…" he said delicately.

"You can't be serious! Our Skye is out there, and this thing may know where she is or how to find her!"

"We can interrogate her, but I refuse to go to drastic methods unless we're sure beyond a doubt that it's not Skye."

"But she told me-"

"And isn't that convenient?" sneered Coulson. His ICER was out now, pointing directly at Ward. "Came right out in the open to you, but now she's clammed up? What's changed? Maybe the answer is nothing. You've just got a new story."

"Dammit, Coulson…" Ward muttered, his arms beginning to rise in surrender.

"I'm sorry, but I need to get to the van to be sure."

Phil pocketed his gun, sauntering over to the man as he pulled his arms behind him. Ward wasn't resisting, and Coulson felt a pang of doubt that he was doing the wrong thing.

"What's going on?"

Coulson turned his head to the concerned voice to see Wolfe standing there. But it was Skye-Maybe-Not-Skye who got the first word in.

"Well, Ward there is either totally insane or a Skrull. But Coulson can't be sure, so he's going to check the van to see if there's another one of me. Which I can assure you there won't be, because I'm right here!"

Wolfe was staring at Skye with pitying eyes. He didn't seem to even catch her explanation.

"You tied her up?" he asked Coulson sadly. The leader just nodded sympathetically.

"She may be a Skrull."

Now Ward was seated and cuffed just a few feet away from Skye at the gate. She was sending death glares his way, to which he graciously returned. What he did not return was the taunting sticking out the tongue that Skye did, though.

This needed to happen fast. One of them was fake – or yes, insane-, but they needed to find the real person fast. Coulson almost couldn't believe he actually cared enough to rescue Ward after such little time had passed since his betrayal, but it didn't matter. Because somehow, he did.

"Wolfe, can you keep an eye on the two of them? I need to find Fitzsimmons."

It was at that time that a black van drove up, and Coulson's mouth dropped open in sheer disbelief who popped out of it.

"Fitzsimmons?" he asked incredulously. Seriously, talk about timing.

"Hello sir!" Simmons said. "See, I told you they'd still be here."

"But it's not like it was absurd to think that they'd move!" said Fitz.

"Well with comms down it would make sense they'd like to keep a general meet point that everyone was familiar with – oh. Skye!"

"Heya," Skye said sheepishly from her chained position.

Fitz looked from Ward to Skye tentatively. "What's… what's going on?"

"One of them is a fake. Probably," said Coulson. "Now tell me, is Skye with you?"

Fitzsimmons exchanged worried stares.

"No… I'm afraid you, Ward, Triplett and May came and picked her up about a half hour ago," said Simmons.

Damn it.

That had not been him, which meant the Skrulls really did have Skye.

And here he was wasting time.

"Then with her gone, we were just feeling bloody useless…" Fitz continued for her.

"So we came to check up on you and see if anything could be done."

"It's a good thing you did," said Coulson. He was already walking over to unlock Ward's cuffs when he heard a dark chuckle come from beside him.

"Super good thing," said the Skrull. "Otherwise, how could you tell how entirely screwed you people are?" She giggled to herself again.

The noise was cut off when there was a sound of metal being hit.

Wolfe had lunged forward, grabbing the Skrull's shirt at the shoulders and knocking her into the gate. Her head bounced off the bars.

"Tell me where my daughter is," he growled.

"Poor little Inhuman," the Skye mocked through obvious pain. "That's all you've wanted for so many years, isn't it? Pretty disappointing. Well, at least you got to meet her… before we gut her."

A hand moved to her throat so quickly Coulson was afraid he'd crushed it on contact.

"Stop it!" Coulson ordered. "We need her alive to find Skye."

Wolfe's face was distorted in anger, frustration, and grief, but he let go.

So Coulson took a swing.

"I think you'll find it's going to be in your best interests to start talking," he said. He liked to avoid physical interrogation when possible, but they didn't have a lot of time. Well, it probably helped that he already had some bad preconceived notions about this thing.

She whipped her head back, moving the hair away from her face to reveal a now bloodied nose. "My best interests? How about we talk about your best interests. Like, getting out of here before we tear this city to the ground."

"Lyja?" Wolfe asked out of the blue. It sounded like a name. She grinned.

"Nah, but nice guess. I'm a little more… tame than her, usually. But this Skye kid's got spunk. It's making me feel all feisty."

Every word was bit out with a taunting confidence. Skye could be snarky, and probably would be in certain captivity circumstances, but somehow the Skrull in her body seemed to be landing words with much more intent to damage.

"Where is Skye?" Coulson asked again.

She shrugged. "I already told Ward there," she said, nodding to the man, "I don't know. She's bound to be around here somewhere though, right?"

"If you have Skye, is Graviton done attacking the city then?" Fitz piped up.

Coulson didn't really prefer the way the question the worded, as though Skye wasn't coming back at all, but knowing Hall's intents was probably good as well.

"Psht, no way Fitz!" FakeSkye said, and if her hands were free Coulson thought she would have put a waving dismissive gesture along with it. Instead her shoulders just shrugged. "Paibok's going to let her think she's doing some good in trying to defeat the gravity dude, then let her watch him kill all those innocent people. I mean, they are only dying because the insolent little bitch didn't turn herself in."

Coulson was angered by the comment, but stilled himself.

Ward showed no such restraint.

"Call her that again, and I get to see if you change back to your real body when I snap this one's neck," he snarled, hand on the girl's throat.

She studied him for a fairly long moment.

"Yes sir," she said haughtily.

"Do you know what happened to the city's power?" asked Coulson, trying to get back on track as Ward slowly released her.

"Uh, no," she said, her voice tinged with disbelief. As though it were a ridiculous question. "You guys are the ones that hit him with that gun thing. Which, by the way, kind of inconvenient! I guess it's not a huge deal because it didn't kill him. He'll be back to finish what he started pretty darn soon, I'm thinking."

Suddenly there was a loud screeching noise that had everyone covering their ears, save for the girl bound in front of them. She seemed to try and reach her own by desperately hunching her shoulders, though.

And then, light by light and flicker after flicker, the power was back. It was daytime so the change wasn't staggering, but it was surely noticeable.

"Speak of the devil," admonished the Skye-Skrull. "Or the… lights."

Coulson spun back around to the alien after taking in the now lit city, and she met him with an over-zealous grin. "You did that," he accused.

She shook her head. "Nope. Like I said, coincidence." There was another sound, and Coulson watched the girl's eyes widen at the sight of something behind him. "As is that," she commented.

Coulson turned about. Not too far from the Colosseum there were ruins of the ancient city. Pillars of temples and statues that tourists would usually walk through, to see what remained of the old Rome.

Now they were crumbling more.

And Coulson could just make out the shape of the flying man doing it, just as he heard his communicator switch on.

"Coulson," May's muffled voice rang out of his pocket. He brought it out of his pants. "You there?"

"Yep." The comms must have turned back on with the power.

"Morse and I found Hall, he's-"

"At the Forum. We know, and we're coming your way."

Coulson put the walkie back in its place and was met by the stares of Fitzsimmons, Wolfe, Ward, and a rather infuriating smirk made by the alien.

She cocked her head tauntingly. "Guess the game's back on."

Coulson didn't like her tone, and was about to get back to interrogating, when his phone pinged. A text. His eyes widened.

"I think you may be right," he muttered, to which the Skrull looked decently confused. Which was nice. "And I think we're heading into the fourth quarter."

A/n: God Coulson, stop wasting time you nutter.

Ahh I've been sucking at replying to reviews lately. Sorry about that. I don't reply to them all cause I don't want to bug you guys, but I usually try respond to the longer ones. But I still really appreciate them, so thank you!

I did finish my other ongoing story Mark to Match, so updates maaay speed up? Ok don't hold your breath xD