Chapter Text
Daisy had never felt more like a spy in her life. SHIELD had to have some kind of medal for hiding in a hallway in a fancy old hotel, waiting to sneak up on another secret agent. This was, oddly enough, exactly how she’d pictured SHIELD operating, back when she was living out of her van, hacking for the Rising Tide. She’d never seen herself as one of the spooks, though. Funny how things worked out. Next to her, May poked her head out from the wall that had been providing cover for herself, Daisy, and Coulson’s LMD, and looked down the hall where they knew their quarry was.
“He’s making the handoff now. Are we sure this is going to work?”, May whispered.
“It has to. I won’t let HYDRA kill a good man.” He might have been an LMD, but Coulson’s personality was definitely the same as it had always been, as if his fanboying over Sousa hadn’t made that obvious enough. Daisy had been the one to activate? wake up? robo-Coulson, forgoing the ethical debate that some of her team had wanted. Even though it had saved the world, she’d never forgiven the real Coulson’s decision to accept his impending death, rather than to fight it. His decision to abandon her and the team. In smaller moments like this, she knew in her bones waking the LMD had been the right decision. Besides, she’d missed him.
May suddenly moved behind Coulson and Daisy, and all three of them readied themselves for a fight. Coulson slipped an ICER into his hand as the rhythmic, hurried clicking of Sousa’s cane grew louder. He turned the corner, saw them, and froze. His shoulders slumped, and he became the spitting image of a film noir detective- trench coat, hat, resignation and exasperation playing out in equal measure in his expression. It was almost cute.
“I thought I shook you?”
“This’ll make sense later. Maybe.”
Sousa collapsed as the dendrotoxin round hit him, May immediately taking the weapon from Coulson and sticking it in her waistband. The LMD stooped to pick up the trench coat, hat, and cane, and once the ensemble was complete, Daisy couldn’t help but snicker.
“I knew you were into SHIELD history, A.C. I didn’t realize you were a cosplayer too.”
He just glared at her, and pointed at Sousa’s limp form with his own cane.
“Can you two get him up to the roof without me?”
“We’ll be fine. See you back at the Zephyr.”
He smiled, and was gone, off to take Sousa’s place in the history books. Daisy and May each bent down and scooped one of the real Agent Sousa’s arms over their shoulders, grimacing with the effort. He was taller than them, and heavy, but they managed to half-carry-half-drag him to the elevators. Thankfully, the hallways were empty aside from them
“So if we’re taking the real Sousa to the Quinjet, and Yo-Yo and Simmons are posing as the coroners to get Coulson back to the Zephyr… what’s supposed to have happened to Sousa’s body? Won’t anyone get suspicious?”
“It’s a bit late for that, Daisy. It’s not that weird to lose a body, they’ll have to figure something out.”
“That’s not reassuring at all. But better than the alternative.”
The elevator dinged, and the doors slid open. Daisy was surprised by the lack of an operator, but she supposed that it couldn’t have been that uncommon, at this time of night, in a fancy hotel. She and May semi-gently placed their cargo on the ground, propping him up against a wall, and he grumbled something in his sleep. May rolled her eyes and hit the button for the highest floor, and the doors slid shut.
“The cloaking won’t be all that effective in the rain, we’ll have to hurry. And hope no one sees us.”
“There’s only stairs to the roof, right? How are we supposed to get Weekend at Bernie’s here up those?”
“We’ll be fine. He might wake up with a few bruises, but I’m sure that’s nothing new for a decorated SHIELD agent.”
The elevator dinged, and opened to the fifth floor- much too far from the roof. Daisy prepared herself to explain that their friend here had just had a bit too much to drink, but instead of being met with a family on vacation to see Hollywood, or even a businessman, there were three stone-faced men with terrible fashion sense and very large guns halfway down the hall, aiming directly at their elevator. Daisy cursed and unleashed a wave of vibrations down the hall just as they opened fire. The Chroncioms were blasted backwards, and their shots went wide, blowing chunks out of walls and ceilings. Thankfully they were using human weaponry. The two agents pressed themselves against the side walls of the elevator, desperately trying to get into cover. The Chronicoms were getting back to their feet, and Daisy gently quaked the unconscious Sousa into the opposite wall, leaving him crumpled in a painful-looking position next to May. He grunted in pain, but remained still. It was far from comfortable, but they didn’t have time to drag him. She could see May analyzing the situation, her mind running through near-instinctual combat training to figure a way out of this. Daisy was doing the same, but aside from brute force, she was stumped.
The older woman knelt next to Sousa, patting around his waist and chest. Daisy raised an eyebrow, but May was too preoccupied to notice, so she just sent another blast at the approaching Chronicoms.
“Really, May? Groping the unconscious- oh.”
May stood up, Sousa’s gun in hand, and fired down the hall. She hit one of their assailants directly in the forehead, but it didn’t flinch. Screams and commotions were coming from most of the rooms, and one of the Chronicoms kicked a door open, disappearing inside. More screams came from the room, and Daisy’s blood ran cold. The fuckers were going to take hostages.
“He had a chest holster. Haven’t seen one of those in years. If you can take these two, I’ll shoot the one taking hostages.”
Daisy nodded and rolled out of cover, putting everything she had into snapping the necks of the gunmen. Gun-bots. Whatever. One of their heads spun around like an owl’s, and the Chronicom collapsed to the floor. The other was only thrown down the hallway, smashing into a large vase and shattering it. The third- and hopefully last- one stepped out of the hotel room, holding a pistol to the head of a man in nightclothes. Despite the seriousness of the situation, Daisy almost laughed at the absurdity of it all. She’d never seen those sorts of pajamas in real life, and always associated them with old movies and Sleepytime Tea. The 50s were weird.
“Quake! Melinda May! Surrender, or he dies. He has no consequence to us, but you are a nuisance that must be eliminated. Step out of the elevator and-“
Two shots rang out, and the Chronicom had gleaming holes in its face instead of eyes. It fell just as the last survivor was disentangling himself from the ruined vase, and Daisy hit that one with another wave of power. Its chest caved in, and it was still. She turned her attention to the hostage, who was still standing in the middle of the hallway, dead Chronicom at his feet, and shaking with terror.
“Are you alright? Did they hurt you?”
The man started to sputter out a reply, but stopped when the three bodies on the ground began to smoke. After a moment, they were just puddles of silvery liquid, and he passed out from the shock.
“Daisy, we need to move. We’re almost out of time. The police will have to handle this.”
She cursed, hating that her mentor was right, and pressed the ‘close door’ button. She leaned against the elevator wall as it restarted its journey to the roof, rubbing her aching forearms.
“So. Your full names are Melinda May and ‘Quake’. That’s a stupid superhero name, but better than ‘C, I, and A’. Why did the puddles want you dead? What the hell did you shoot me with? What sort of power is that? And where are you taking me?”
The last thing Daisy expected was for their unconscious companion to wake up. Clearly, May was in the same position, because both of them let Sousa spit out his rapid-fire questions before they could find their voices. He was glaring at them, somehow managing to look angry and slightly intimidating despite sitting on the ground like a toddler. His spiel only ended when he pressed a hand to his forehead, wincing in pain. ICER headaches were a bitch.
“Uh- wow. Okay, you really shouldn’t be awake. Sorry about the headache. Look, the people out there want to conquer the planet and kill us all. They’re alien robots. We’re the good guys, and we just saved your life from HYDRA, who tried to kill you. My powers are really complicated, but they’re genetic, not from a serum or anything. We’re SHIELD, from the future, and if you don’t come with us you are going to die.”
“What she said about sums it up.”
The elevator dinged, and the door opened to the thankfully-empty top floor. Daisy offered Sousa a hand, since it would be hard for him to get to his feet on his own.
“Do you trust us? We risked a lot to save you.”
He considered them for a moment, taking in May’s combat-ready stance and the way she held his gun, the bullet holes on the elevator wall behind them, the futuristic-looking ICER in May’s waistband. He met Daisy’s eyes, looking for something she couldn’t quite place, and he took her hand. She hauled him up to his feet, and she noticed all his weight was on his left leg. She kept her arm out in case he needed to lean on her due to his cane being with Coulson, but he released her.
“Yeah. I don’t know if I trust you, but. I’ve seen crazier. And you did have eagles all over that plane, I knew they looked familiar. You should’ve just led with all that back in Nevada”
Daisy nodded to May, who touched Sousa’s arm, before returning Daisy’s nod.
“He’s telling the truth. He’s not going to run this time.”
Sousa’s brow furrowed, and he looked between the two women for a moment, before shaking his head to himself and leading the way out of the elevator, despite his gait being slow and off-center.
“I don’t even want to know what that’s about. Or how you two can silently communicate.”
“We’ll fill you in later. If we don’t rendezvous with our team in time, we’ll be stuck here.”
Clearly, a decade of soldiering and spycraft had taught Sousa the value of shutting up sometimes, and he held back his questions. The three of them made it to the roof access stairway, with Daisy blasting the lock open. Sousa raised an eyebrow in response, but hurried up the stairs as best he could. May and Daisy heard Simmons’ frantic voice in their earpieces when they were still only halfway up the stairs.
“May? Daisy? Everyone else is back and the countdown only has a couple minutes left, where are you?”
“We got attacked by some Chronicoms, we’ve got Sousa and we’re almost at the Quinjet. Can you bring the Zephyr closer?” Sousa looked at her oddly, probably confused by what a ‘Quinjet’ and ‘Zephyr’ were, but he seemed to make the connection with the planes he’d been on earlier and just continued up towards the roof.
“On it. I just wish we had time to go back for Enoch.”
“Next jump. He can wait, we can’t.”
“No, you can’t. The countdown just cut in half! Fifty seconds! The Chronicoms must be jumping early!”
Daisy and May both cursed badly enough to make Sousa blush, and they burst onto the roof, sprinting towards their cloaked Quinjet. The very confused Sousa had to follow them, knowing they had cloaking technology but not knowing where they’d parked.
“Jemma! Isn’t there anything you can do to slow it down!”
“No! We’re just hitchhikers! Hurry!”
The roof was slick from the pouring rain, and all three of them had slipped at least once and were soaking wet by the time they ran up the plane’s ramp. Sousa was faster than she’d expected, but he probably had a lot of practice running for his life. Daisy could hear the Zephyr’s engines nearby, they were so close , they just had to boot up the jet’s systems and dock. But in her bones, she knew it was too late, even as May leapt into the pilot’s seat and started flipping switches. The quinjet’s engines roared to life, but Daisy saw a flash of blue light out the window in front of them, and suddenly there was only static in their earpieces. They’d been left behind. She screamed in anger and frustration and helplessness, sinking into a seat when her knees went weak. She barely registered May setting a course for New York, or her and Sousa arguing over what to do next. It had been more than twenty years between the last two jumps. It could be twenty years or more until the next. By the time she saw her team- her family - again, she’d probably be in her fifties. And for them, a second will have gone by. She was stuck in the 50s, when she had no civil rights, couldn’t even open a credit card in her name, would be segregated against in most of the country, HYDRA was trying to kill her, and there weren’t even any computers to hack. All she had for company was Enoch and May. May, who was famous for handling impossible situations, could fight her way out of anything and guide Daisy through anything else even before she had empath powers. May, who’d taught her how to keep herself alive, and who had saved her life a dozen times. With May there, she might just get through this. She pulled herself out of her stupor and paid attention to the ongoing argument.
“I get that you’re 2019 SHIELD, and that you technically outrank me. I’ve seen the eagles. I’m grateful to you for saving my life. What I don’t understand is why the hell we’re going to New York, and not going back down there to where I’m in charge and we can start hunting down HYDRA.”
“We have a friend in New York, he travelled through time with us and got left behind at our last stop, in the ‘30s. He’s a Chronicom, a robot like the ones we were just fighting, except he’s nice. He can help us. And you need to stay dead.”
“I’m not dead! I have family, friends, people who are going to freak out if I pretend to be dead! A life! An important job!”
“And you’re humble, too.”
Daisy cut into the argument before they could give her a headache.
“Enough! May, you’re right, but you’re feeling Sousa’s frustration. Find a way to get it out of your system or you two are going to tear each other apart. Sousa, as far as anyone in this time knows, you died at that hotel. As long as you’re dead, HYDRA won’t go after you or your loved ones, and we have the advantage. We can hunt them down without them having any idea that anyone in SHIELD knows they’re around, and-”
“Daisy, we can’t ‘hunt down’ HYDRA, we’re supposed to be protecting the timeline. Ripples, not waves, remember?”
“I think that went out the window when the Chronicoms shot up a famous hotel and stranded us in 1955! We need to take the fight to HYDRA before they kill us, we know more than anyone does, even if we just tell Peggy Carter and work in secret we can save millions of lives. HYDRA attacked Sousa on the train before he got to the hotel, the Chroncioms must have fed them that information. They’re working together.”
She saw May thinking it over, working through the problem with cold logic as she recovered from feeling Sousa’s frustration. The other agent also seemed to be considering whether he should stay ‘dead’, but neither of them could argue with Daisy’s suggestions.
“Fine. We’ll find Enoch, regroup, and reach out to Carter. As long as we’re stuck here, we’ll make ourselves useful.”
“Peggy will listen to me. She might not be too happy to see me, even if that does mean I’m alive, but she’ll listen. Then we can beat those squidhead bastards and I’ll get my damn life back.”
Without any warning, May burst into tears, and both Daisy and Sousa looked at her in shock. She cried silently for a moment, before looking up at the ‘dead’ agent with a look of shock and horror.
“You really hate this. Being separated from your family, letting HYDRA run free, having to tell Carter. But you’ll do it, because you know it’s the right option.”
Sousa opened and closed his mouth silently, looking like he was about to say something, but he just nodded. Were his emotions really strong enough to affect May just from being in proximity, or were her powers growing? Could May categorize the emotions she felt from others that well? Did he really feel like crying, even though he looked only mildly grief-stricken? The hell was wrong with 50s masculinity? She bitterly realized she’d have decades with the two of them to get answers to her questions. After a moment of stunned silence, Sousa took the seat across from Daisy, and he buried his head in his hands.
“Hey, Sousa. We’ll figure something out. This isn’t even our first time being stuck in another time. You’ll see your loved ones again.”
But I might never see my family again , she thought to herself.
“Thank you. I hope you're right. And I’ll have to hear the story about the other time this happened to you two.”
May chimed in from the cockpit. “It’s a shitty story. Started with a piece of rebar in my thigh and ended with a good man dying.”
Sousa looked between the two of them in alarm- he was doing that a lot, it made him look like a sad puppy- and Daisy just shrugged in confirmation.
“You know what? I’m gonna get some sleep. That’s enough for one day. I don’t know how fast this future-plane is, just… wake me when we get to New York. Then you can explain in detail what the hell’s going on.”
He took off his soaking-wet jacket, threw it into the seat next to him, and was asleep in thirty seconds. Daisy was jealous that anyone could pass out that easily. She sighed, stood, and took the copilot’s seat next to May.
“We’re stuck in the fucking fifties.”
“Yup.”
“I know you’re still emotionless, but aren’t you even a bit pissed about this? We might never see the team again.”
“Nope. Not worried, not bothered, not angry. I know I should be, but I’m only feeling what people around me do.”
They sat together in silence for a few minutes, watching the night sky above them and the clouds below, before Daisy finally spoke.
“Can I hug you? Please?”
May hesitated, then nodded, and the younger woman almost knocked the plane off course in her haste to hug her mentor before the offer expired. Daisy felt May stiffen, then relax, and they started crying at the same time.
“It’s alright, Daisy. We’ll get through this. Enoch will get us home, we’ll survive HYDRA. At least this time the Earth’s still intact.” Daisy laughed in spite of herself, and retreated to the co-pilot’s seat, but May kept a hand on her arm.
“And there’s no blue aliens.”
“Just alien robots. Much easier to kill.”
They stayed like that a while longer, watching the sky lighten and the clouds grow thinner, until Daisy fell asleep.
In his mansion in Los Angeles, Wilfred Malick was relieved. The loose end had been tied up: Daniel Sousa was dead. HYDRA’s secret was secure. He had only a moment to ruminate on his victory before he spotted movement out of the corner of his eye.
“What the hell?” Malick’s gun was pointed at the man in the shadows before he’d finished speaking.
“Not necessary, Mr. Malick. I have been left behind to help you.”
“You’re the man who called, told me Sousa was on the train.”
“You and I share an enemy, Mr. Malick. The only difference is that mine is from the future.”
“I think I might’ve met one of them.”
“You certainly did. As it is certain SHIELD will destroy all you have built. It is time to prevent that.”
“How?”
“By doing exactly what I say. Your attempt to kill Daniel Sousa failed, as did my people’s attempt to do away with our own enemies. They are now all here, in 1955, alive and well. This needs to be rectified if our plans are to succeed.”
“And what plans are those, exactly?”
“The destruction of SHIELD.”