If the Frame Fits

"You're sure about this." Phil Coulson stared at the form in his hand, occasionally glancing up at the young scientist that stood in front of his desk.

"Yes, sir. I've checked it myself a dozen times and had three of my best techs recheck it a dozen more. If you'd like I can send it out to an independent lab and have it checked there." Jemma shook her head, frustrated with the man's refusal to believe or just plain stunned by the test results before him.

Phil shook his head, set the forms down, removed his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. "How can this be possible?" He asked, not really expecting an answer. He stood and walked around the desk to the large window and stared into the distance.

Jemma waited a beat then stepped behind him. "I know it's somewhat of a shock, sir, but at the same time it is rather pleasant news." She kept her voice light, hoping to help him through the shock of the information she had delivered.

"All these years…" he ignored her statement and spoke more to himself than to the young woman next to him. "I never…I thought…I believed she was…that she…" He closed his eyes and took a deep breath before addressing the young woman. "Why wasn't this done before? Why now?" He wasn't accusing or blaming the scientist, just curious as to the reason it had taken almost five years for this information to reach him.

Jemma opened her mouth to speak, and then stopped trying to form the right explanation. It wasn't easy. The whole situation was more of an accident than anything else. "Well, sir…there just was never any reason to do this and then well, there was all that business with those wretched people and well…you remember…" She was hedging and she knew it. No sense dredging up all that sludge. It was water under the bridge. No one could change it. It was all in the past…well it was…in the past…maybe now, not so much.

Phil turned and looked the young woman in the eye. "You are absolutely sure, beyond a shadow of a doubt?"

"Yes, sir, absolutely," she breathed a frustrated sigh. How many more times was he going to ask and how many more times would she need to tell him she was sure? "Sir, we tested all five samples. We tested them in a dozen different combinations. The one on your desk is the only one that gives a ninety-nine point nine, nine, nine percent chance that the samples are biologically related. There is no doubt sir."

As the girl spoke, Phil had moved back to his desk and picked up the form, staring at it again. "Simmons, this just can't be possible." He breathed as he dropped into his chair and set the form in front of him. "How will I tell her…how can I explain…bring that all up after all this time?"

Jemma stepped to the desk. "If will help sir, I can explain to her how this occurred." The young woman immediately blushed. "Well, not how it occurred. I mean she is a grown up. I'm sure she knows…I mean I know she knows how this happens…she does have some experience…"

Jemma fell over her words trying to back out of what she had attempted to say.

Phil looked up at her for a moment, now holding the form again. "In light of this," he shook it lightly at her, "that is something I would rather not like to think about." Jemma shut her mouth with a snap and nodded quickly. "And I was not referring to her…"

"Ohhhhh, you meant Agent May," Jemma realized. "Well, I can help with that as well." She suddenly realized the fact in that matter and blushed again.

"I'm sure Agent May does not need a biology lesson either, Simmons. That is not what demands explanation. It's just how after all this time…" He trailed off, again studying the form intently.

"No matter how long you stare at it, sir, the results remain the same." Jemma reasoned. "The techs were cataloging samples and running control tests. It was merely by accident that those samples were chosen. Sir, they were blind samples taken from a variety of sources, routine medical exams, medical procedures, injury records, blood samples, tissue samples and in one case you certainly know the samples were from a post mortem procedure. The odds of those five samples being chosen not once but twice…well, they are astronomical." Jemma actually smiled at the unlikelihood of the situation. "And yet, there it is sir, in black and white…or blue and red and a bit of purple." She pointed over the paper with her index finger. He glanced up at her once, then set the form back on the desk.

"When Agent Collins, brought the results to my attention it was only because she was so surprised that there was a familial match within the agency. She was almost certain it was not protocol. That's when I took the samples and tested them myself. I got the same results and as the head of the department was able to ascertain the identities of the donors. I assure you sir, I was just as shocked. That is why I ran the tests again and again. I had Fitz run his own version, without telling him the identities, at first, but even he was amazed at the positivity of the match."

Phil stared into space and tapped his finger on the desk as she spoke. "I guess, sir…what I don't quite understand is…I mean I just never realized that you and…well, sir…I didn't think you were that close…" Jemma traced the wood grain on the edge of the desk, consciously avoiding eye contact with her boss.

"Once," he said softly, still tapping his finger. He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly.

"I'm sorry sir, it's really not any of my business. I just don't know how to help." Simmons sighed in resignation.

Phil rose and walked to the window, once again staring at some point in the distance or perhaps some point in the long distant past. "We were young and on assignment…Paris…a simple job, in and out. We celebrated…a bit too much, I guess." Jemma could tell he was smiling even looking at the back of his head from where she still stood in front of the desk. She smiled in spite of herself, unsure whether to stay and listen to him relive his memory or silently slip out give him his privacy. Before she could decide he turned and smiled at her. "Champagne," he said as he motioned for her to sit in one of the chairs at his side. "We splurged," he laughed a bit. "It was Paris, after all and we only had one night…just that one night…just one." His voice grew softer and slower as he remembered. "The next morning she was off to Copenhagen and I left for Melbourne. We didn't see each other for months." He looked at his hands hanging limply between his legs then interlocked his fingers and took another deep breath. "I tried to contact her…left messages that weren't returned. I heard bits and pieces through other agents. She was in Brussels and Shanghai then transferred back to the Hub for whatever reason." He looked up at the scientist who remained silent. "Even heard a rumor that she'd been hurt…that she'd been put on medical leave, but no one would validate it." He shook his head and seemed dejected but smiled weakly. "How we both ended up in Xiangtan is anybody's guess, especially in her condition." Jemma smiled, not really sure how to respond.

Phil stood and walk across the room toward the door. Jemma was sure he would now ask her to leave, but instead he paced back to the desk and tapped two fingers on that damn form before walking around the desk and back to the window. She remained seated and watched as he wrestled with what he was thinking or trying to put into words.

"I knew as soon as I saw her, especially the way she glared at me…accused me…blamed me." He laughed for real. "I told her she had no right being where she was in her condition. She told me I had no right to tell her what to do." He stopped and became serious again. "There was a report of a gifted in the area, we were…"

"The Welcome Wagon…" Jemma finished for him then cringed at her terrible habit of finishing people's sentences. She didn't' do it quite so much anymore but sometimes….

Coulson just nodded. "That's what we thought. We met with the team and got started. Someone figured a woman in May's condition might be an asset on this mission." He shook his head. "We didn't get far before it was clear we were not going to make it. There weren't a lot of hospitals in the area but our guide got us to what he said was a missionary clinic."

For a few uncomfortable minutes the room fell silent as Phil sat down next to Jemma and she considered once again the possibility of excusing herself. "There was one doctor and two women in the same condition. He was exhausted and going back and forth between them. I stayed with her as long as they'd let me…" He laughed and folded his hands together. "Guess they hadn't caught up with the rest of the world in that little place. That was no place for a man unless he was the doctor…at least I thought that was what the older woman was scolding me for as she pushed me out of the room." He grew quiet again and looked toward the window, drawing deep breaths and letting them out through puffed cheeks. "It was about twenty minutes…twenty minutes…the doctor came to me and offered his sympathy, held my hand and patted my shoulder…then left me alone with May…we held each other and cried…cried for the loss of something neither of us ever had a chance…twenty minutes…" He looked at Jemma and blinked away tears. "It was the longest and shortest twenty minutes of my life."

"I'm so sorry, sir." Jemma fought to control her own tears.

Coulson stood as his sorrow turned to anger. "He told us she was dead…that she was stillborn. He let us hold that cold, blue little body and helped us make arrangements. We put her in the ground there and walked away. We didn't talk about it, ever. We just let it die…just like we thought she did." Coulson walked to his desk again and opened a small panel inside the top drawer. A tiny flap opened on top of the desk revealing a small black button. He pushed it twice then moved to the wall directly across the room. A large round clock resembling a ship's porthole clicked as he opened it as one would a small door, revealing a numbered panel. Coulson tapped in a code then placed his palm against the panel. It made a soft ping before it clicked opened. He reached inside and withdrew a manila envelope. He held it for a moment then nodded to himself.

Walking across the room in silence he handed the envelope to Jemma and nodded toward it, giving her permission to look inside. Jemma could not understand the Chinese characters on the forms but she recognized the information someone had scrawled in English. The date was familiar. Time of death was listed at nine fifty-two in the evening. Her breath caught as she looked at the name 'Baby Girl Coulson' and then to the names of two people she held dear listed as parents. The second form in the envelope was even more heartbreaking…a birth certificate for a baby that never drew life's breath. A form completed and signed seconds before the doctor also signed the death certificate. She held one form in each hand almost as if she were weighing them.

Coulson gently took them from the woman and held them in almost the same fashion. "I am so very sorry, sir." Jemma rose and placed a hand on his arm, not really sure it if were proper to offer sympathy for this child.

Looking from one form to the other, Coulson smiled sadly. "We didn't even name her."

"Oh sir, it must have been so devastating…for both of you." She comforted, patting his arm gently.

He dropped both forms to the floor and walked back to the desk. "I never thought we'd have to revisit this and now…." He picked up the form from his desk. "Now, after all this time…she's alive…and we never knew…never had the chance…never…"

Simmons retrieved the forms from the floor, examining them more closely as she moved to the desk. "But sir, you've found out that your daughter is alive…and…" She spoke without raising her head, squinting at the matching signatures on the forms.

"And I have to explain all of this to both of them." He started for the door. "We never had the chance to be a family, Simmons. I never got…we never were her parents…her life…we ne…"

"Sir," she interrupted with a start, walking toward him still staring at the forms in her hands. "Sir, look at this. Look at these signatures." She held the form out to him. Coulson looked for a moment then gave a slight shrug and handed them back. "Don't you see it sir, right there," she tapped the form in his outstretched hand.

Coulson pulled it back and stared at it again. "I am sorry, Simmons, but I can't really decipher doctor's hieroglyphics."

Jemma snatched the forms back and pointed at the small signature at the bottom of the form. "C. Johnson, sir, it says C. Johnson." Coulson could only return a perplexed look. "Do you remember the doctor, sir?"

"Simmons," Coulson sighed, "it was twenty-five years ago and he was the least of my concern that night. He could have been Dr. Jekyll and I wouldn't have noticed."

"If I'm correct sir, it is very possible that he was on call that very night." Simmons said with a quick nod.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Give me that!" May growled, masking every emotion boiling within her inside anger. Anger was easy. Anger hid everything. Anger kept all of her feelings in one neat package…one that no one would dare peak inside.

Coulson pulled his hand back and she snatched the form from his hands. He took a deep breath, quite astonished by the adverse reaction his friend had to his announcement. He expected a lot of things but never absolute fury.

"Is this some kind of joke? Because I will make someone's life very unpleasant." She crumpled the form in her fist and shook it in his face. "I don't like pranks, Coulson and this one is in very poor taste, even for you."

"Me?" His eyebrows rose to his absent hairline. "May this is not a joke. Simmons assures me she is absolutely certain this is accurate. It has been checked and rechecked, several times."

She took short breaths and blew them out in little puffs through her clenched teeth. "And who gave her permission to perform this test?" She spoke through the same tight jaw.

Phil moved closer and wrapped his hand around her clenched fist. "I explained that May. It was just a twist of fate."

May pulled her hand away and turned swiftly away from him, taking a deep breath. She hadn't thought of that night in years. She'd pushed it to the farthest corner of her mind and after Bahrain she'd convinced herself it was for the best. She never would have been a mother. How could she ever explain to her own child how she had taken the life of someone else's child? In her guilt ridden mind she called it even…a life for a life. Fate had taken her baby knowing she would one day be forced to take the life of a child who had no control over what she was or what she was doing. She drew a deep breath and brought her emotions under control once again but lost her hold as he placed his hands on her shoulders and squeezed gently.

"I know…it's hard to think about that night…about…" Phil began.

Melinda twisted shaking him off. "Don't" she snarled through her teeth. "Don't," she closed her eyes and breathed the word.

Coulson dropped his hands and took a step back offering a wordless apology. "We believed we lost her, May. We didn't know she was right beside us." His words were almost a whisper, telling her while trying to console himself.

"We have to tell her, Phil. We have to tell her everything." She spoke without turning toward him, staring at the paper still squeezed in her fist.

Again Coulson wrapped his hand around hers and gently pried the form free. "We don't have much to tell other than this." He attempted to flatten the now wrinkled form, knowing Jemma could produce an exact duplicate.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Daisy lounged back on the couch in the empty common room, feet on the coffee table and a large bowl of popcorn balanced on her belly. She tossed a kernel into the air and caught it easily. Her interest in the movie playing on the television had waned but it was quiet. No missions, no problems, nothing major knocking on their door…everyone just taking a breather….waiting for the next axe to fall.

Coulson cleared his throat as he entered the room. May followed close behind. The girl pulled herself upright in her seat, quickly dropping her sock covered feet to the floor. She placed the bowl on the table, quickly chewed and swallowed the handful she had just shoved in her mouth. As she started to rise Coulson dropped down on the couch next to her motioning for her to stay put. May lowered herself into the chair next to them.

Daisy looked from one to the other, suddenly fighting the ominous feeling that someone must have died. "What?" She sat up at the edge of the sofa, smiling nervously and looking from one to the other. "What's wrong? Who? Who's hurt?" She ran through every agent's name that was off base, then tried to remember where trusted allies might be.

May dropped her gaze to her hands, leaving the deed to Coulson. He reached out and took Daisy's hand. She pulled it back and bounced on the seat's edge. "Come on, just tell me." Again she looked at May, who refused to look back and then to Coulson who again reached for her hand.

"No one's hurt, Daisy." He offered. "We…May and I…we have something to tell you about your parents."

Daisy's scrunched up her face in confusion. "My parents? It's been like, what, two years. What…Did something happen to Cal?" Concern laced her tone.

May expelled a disgusted huff and turned away from the girl. Daisy narrowed her eyes, clearly confused by the older woman's reaction. She turned back to Coulson as she scooted even farther forward.

"Daisy," he began, then stopped realizing that really wasn't her name. No they hadn't named their baby, someone else did. He looked at the anxious young woman seated before him. Had he always known? Is that the connection he'd always had to her? "Daisy, some new developments have come to light and it's pretty certain that Cal and Jiaying aren't your parents."

"What?" Daisy reacted somewhere between a laugh and an 'I don't believe you'. "Well, they sure believed they certainly were." She snapped pushing away disturbing memories. She glanced quickly at May who still refused to meet her eye.

"The techs were cataloguing some samples in the lab. They compared some blind samples, testing a new piece of equipment Fitz developed and found this. He handed Daisy a piece of paper. She took it and glanced at it quickly, shrugged and handed it back.

"Lot's of squiggles and numbers, Coulson…means nothing to me." She told him.

"The blue…squiggles," he turned the paper and pointed to the figures using Daisy's terminology. "That's Cal's DNA, the red is Jiaying, purple is you. The numbers are the percentage of familiarity or the possibility of relationship."

The girl looked at Coulson, grimace and took the paper back, examining it a little closer. "Point zero three, two, four, four, one…" She looked up at the man seated next to her and laughed through her nose. "Snowball's chance in hell, huh?" He pursed his lips and smiled as she handed the paper back. Although her shoulders fell in defeat she quipped. "Well, I guess we can all rest easy then. I'm not a monster after all." She smiled and looked to May who let out a quick breath and shook her head but still looked away. "This some kind of a joke, Coulson? Simmons and Fitz getting bored with nothing to do but develop new technology?" She reached out and tapped a gentle fist on his shoulder. "Okay, tell them you got me and I owe them one…."

Coulson stared at the girl, his demeanor not changing. "This is the second test they did." He shook the paper a few times before he laid it on the table and picked up the other form he had placed there. "Here's the first." He handed it to her.

Daisy looked at the man and then at form in her hands. She studied it for a few seconds. This form had the same blue, red and purple squiggles but she could plainly see the places where they overlapped, where the bumps and curves matched like a kid's puzzle. She glanced at the number in the bottom corner…ninety-nine point nine, nine, nine. Even without that number she knew in this case that blue and red definitely made purple. She smiled as she realized what she held. "So if they got it right the first time, why screw it up the second?"

Coulson handed the original form to Daisy and nodded toward it. She put the form together, one in each hand and noticed the blue and red lines were completely different. The two individuals on the first form were not the two on the second. "So the lab rats accidentally found my parents, in a SHIELD data base. They're SHIELD agents…all along." She could feel the anger prickling up her back, in the tingle that threatened her fingertips as the pages vibrated in her hands.

Coulson took the forms from her and placed his hands over hers, feeling the same tingle. He locked his fingers around hers and waited for it to calm. "They weren't just any agents, Daisy. They are agents that have been close to you since the beginning, that have thought of you as their daughter from practically the first time you met." May let out a fluttery breath and both looked to her. Coulson smiled, "Even though one might not admit it readily."

Daisy stopped and looked from May to Coulson and then back again. She pulled her hands free and picked up the form again. "You? This is you? You and me?" She slapped the back of her fingers against the paper and forced herself not to yell. Coulson raised his brows and nodded. A feeling spread over her…she wanted it to be anger, but it was like warm honey just covering her in a comfort that was the thing she always needed. It was the feeling she kept waiting for with Cal and Jiaying…the feeling that never came.

"We understand you're angry." Coulson started. "There's a lot we need to tell you, but you have to believe that we did not know. If we did we would have moved heaven and earth to get you back."

Daisy wasn't listening. She'd turned away from Coulson and faced May watching as the woman struggled with her own feelings. Part of the girl wanted to jump from the chair and embrace the woman she had thought of as a mother for as long as she could remember. The other part knew that was impossible. Too much had happened between them, too many bridges had been burnt.

May finally looked her in the eye. "I tried to tell you once. I…"

"I know," Daisy smiled. "I'm sorry I didn't become what you wanted but I want you to know that my mother is everything I wanted her to be…everything I needed her to be."

Melinda was on her feet in an instant, Daisy wrapped in a tight embrace. "Don't you ever say you aren't what I wanted you to be. You are all that and more."

The family gathered together on the couch as Phil retold the story he had shared with Jemma hours earlier. May filled in the blanks.

They had drunk themselves silly at a sidewalk café on the Champs-Elysées and wound up in a little hotel not far from there. She was sure they walked or staggered there arm in arm singing some silly nineteen eighties love song. They woke in the morning, hung over and picking up the clothes they'd dropped throughout the room. Daisy groaned. Once it would have been an exciting look back at their secret life, now it was just creepy. May laughed at Coulson's blush and told the girl that was all she needed to know about the night a little spark became what would be her life force.

May knew something was not quite right a few weeks later. She used a home pregnancy test and stared at the little blue lines for almost fifteen minutes before she let herself believe what was happening. The decision was easy. She made an appointment with her doctor and began the trek of being a single parent. It wasn't until she ran smack into Coulson in China, after all that time did she have any intent of telling him about her 'condition'. He knew with one look.

Then it happened. She had six weeks to go, six weeks before she had to worry about quitting her job to become a mother. This was a simple welcome wagon mission and Fury felt she and her condition would help calm the gifted they were sent to bring back. When her water broke on that crazy jeep ride, she knew it was not going to happen.

Labor had not been horrible, but she did a lot of yelling and called Coulson some things she did not care to repeat and he could not recall. She remembered that little woman telling Phil he had to leave, that some times were not for men to witness. She laughed wondering if the woman knew how she'd gotten to that point in the first place. Then the doctor…he was young, she remembered and soft spoken, kind and concerned. He was in and out…tending to another woman who must have been having difficulty as he was much more concerned with her needs. She remembered feeling the pressure and him telling her to push and then hearing the wail of newborn life. It was then things got fuzzy. The doctor wrapped the baby in a white cloth and left the room quickly. She tried to call after him, but her throat was dry and she was strapped to a table with Phil nowhere in sight. It seemed like forever before he came back and told her he had done all he could but he could not help her child. Then he was gone, when he returned Phil was with him. The doctor explained to both of them that the child had not been breathing, he tried to revive her but there was little he could do. She insisted she heard the baby cry, but he told her that was the woman in the next area…that their babies had come within minutes of each other. However her baby was too small and could not survive. He said it was better this way and left. Phil held her. They cried together until they exhausted their tears.

Coulson pulled the certificates from the envelope he had carried to the room and handed them to Daisy. She stared at both recognizing the signature on the bottom. "He switched me?" She whispered then looked up at Coulson and May. "He took me. He started everything." Daisy didn't want to cry, it was just silly to cry over something that could not be changed…something that she had lived and survived. They all had, but the tears fell despite her fight to stop them. "I'm sorry," she apologized as she quickly brushed the errant tears from her cheeks.

Wrapping an arm around her shoulder Coulson comforted, "this is a lot for all of us to take in and it's going to take a while to figure it all out. I'm not even sure we can find out what really happened, but we're going to try. As far as Cal goes, he's already paid the price. I think what we all need is a good night's sleep before we delve into this any further."

"But he took it all away," Daisy protested. "I never got to have a family…never got you to be my mom and dad because he tried to make me his and lost me anyway."

May thanked the fates for what had happened and that her daughter had not grown up under the influence of Calvin Johnson and his deranged wife. What he and she could have turned the girl into was too frightening to imagine and that was if Jiaying had allowed her to grow up in the first place. May pushed the terrific scenarios out of her head. She did sympathize with Daisy's complaint. She had never held her baby, never watched her nurse or changed her. She missed her first steps…her first words…her first tooth and first day of school. She never tucked her in or read her a story or sang her a lullaby. She never scolded her or taught her manners or helped her with homework. The more she thought of everything she had missed in Daisy's life the more her heart broke. The more she thought of those things the more she realized Daisy and Phil had missed the same things and there was no way to get them back. No matter far they moved forward from this point, there would always be so much missing. It was like a void that would never be filled. One look at Phil and she could see the hole in his heart as well.

Again Coulson suggested they all sleep on it. Nodding in agreement May rose and waited for the others to stand. Daisy stopped and looked at the form she had laid on the table, tracing one line on it with her index finger…'Baby Girl Coulson'. "Did you have a name…I mean were you going to name me?" She wondered out loud.

May smiled. She'd never had a chance to tell anyone the names she had chosen for her child. "Phillip Robert for a boy. You would have been Chyou-far…lovely Autumn flower, but Daisy suits you."

Hours later Daisy lay awake in her bunk, staring at the ceiling and tapping her finger on the hands she had folded across her middle. There was a way, but getting anyone to agree to it would be almost impossible. She'd need Fitz's help…if he'd help…if he'd go there…