A/N: Sorry for the long break between chapters - this one was a little complicated in terms of logistics and tied me up in writer's block for a few days. Thanks to R.C. and Marvel-Tolkien Fangirl for the encouragement and beta'ing! :-D

"Right. Okay then," Fitz said, after a moment's awkward silence. "See you in a few."

Skye blinked at him. "Wait - what?"

"Oh." Fitz blinked back, realizing. "Coulson, ah, he wants you to meet us there. In the briefing room."

"Oh. Okay," Skye replied automatically.

She stood matter-of-factly, closed the laptop, and unplugged it, beginning to wind up the cord, as Hunter watched her carefully.

"Hey," he said softly, reaching out to touch her hand with his own.

Skye stopped, her jaw working briefly, and turned to meet his gaze. Her chocolate-brown eyes were unwavering, composed, but he was well-versed enough in her moods by now to recognize the apprehension she was subduing beneath that veneer of professionalism. He was pretty sure the promise of "peculiar" test results was making her uneasy.

He stood, cautiously pulling her into a hug, and was relieved when she softened against him. He murmured into her ear, "You're not alone. Remember that."

Skye snaked her arms around his waist and squeezed. "I have a bad feeling about this," she replied quietly.

"We're gonna get through this," he assured her, overdoing the confidence for her sake. "Whatever this is."

She nodded against his shoulder, and he just held her for a moment, until she let go, flashing him a tight smile, and turned back toward the table to pick up her laptop.

As they left the Cage, his hand found hers, twining their fingers together lightly. Skye's fingers reflexively tightened around his, before dropping his hand as they left the privacy of the hallway and came out onto the catwalk.

It was weird, Skye reflected almost absently as they made their way across the hangar. So many times over the last months, she had daydreamed about finally being out of the Cage. She had ached for a glimpse of even the boring, blank walls of the Playground; she had fantasized about her bliss at being able to walk more than fifteen feet in any direction.

But, both earlier in the day and now, she found that her mind was too full and her thoughts too heavy for the unaccustomed freedom to really sink in. Even now, a faint breeze coming in from an open door somewhere ruffled through her hair, and she thought she probably ought to be transported with rapture. Instead, she was just powering through the uneasy twist in her gut.

Last time the whole team was in danger because of me, somebody died. Her mind swerved away from Trip's name, from the memory of his face, from his laugh that threatened to crowd into her thoughts and undo her. Whatever's happening here, now...it's because of me. Again. Her face settled into resigned, determined lines, as she focused on putting one foot in front of the other, all the way to the briefing room.

Beside her, Hunter was a steadying, quiet presence, and Skye admitted to herself that it felt really nice to have someone around who saw through her composed facade to the chaos at her core. She had a feeling Coulson and May saw right through it, too - but with them, she felt obligated to keep it up. They had enough to deal with, without her being an emotional train wreck.

Hunter, on the other hand, had a way of making it safe for her walls to come down. Two months ago, she would never have expected that. But since then, he'd seen her at her worst. And he'd shown that he could handle it.

Her hand brushed against his as they rounded the corner down the hall from the briefing room, and she glanced over at him, taking in the lines of his face in profile, the funny crinkle of his ear, his stubble, which seemed scruffier than usual today. His eyes were fixed somewhere further down the hallway, his jaw still set with what she recognized as concern for her. She felt a faint, not unpleasant flutter in her chest.

It was surreal, walking down the hall next to him. Being anywhere with him, really, that wasn't the Cage.

It felt even more surreal when they entered the briefing room to find Fitz, Coulson, and Simmons waiting for them. Coulson was standing at the end of the briefing table, his body language stiff and his face impassive; Simmons, seated on the right, had a strained smile. Fitz, seated opposite her, couldn't stop glancing incredulously back and forth between Skye and Hunter, as if trying to make his brain catch up with his new knowledge.

Hunter followed a step behind Skye, hesitating at the door to glance cautiously at Coulson and make sure it was okay for him to be there. Coulson nodded toward two chairs at the end of the table. "Have a seat," he said tightly.

It was the first time Skye and Coulson had been face-to-face since he learned about Hunter, and Skye felt somewhat as if she'd been caught doing the walk of shame. She caught Coulson's eye, almost apologetically, and he softened slightly, nodding a reassurance that things between them were okay.

She breathed a little sigh of relief, sinking into one of the chairs. Okay. That's all good. On to the serious stuff now.

Hunter settled in beside her, his body slightly inclined toward her in an unconscious expression of protectiveness that Skye found reassuring, rather than smothering.

Coulson pulled out a chair and sat as well, looking back and forth between Simmons and Fitz. "Okay," he opened. "Why don't you two catch us up on what you've discovered?"

Fitz and Simmons exchanged glances, and Simmons nodded to Fitz. He cleared his throat. "Uh, yeah," he began. "Well, to begin with, the weapon is going to require a bit more time to come up with a decent analysis. It's using tech that, uh - I've really never seen before. What I've been able to make of it so far, given the components and your report of its effects, sir, is that it discharges some kind of electrical pulse that overloads the nervous system without causing damage to the tissue. Once the lab is, uh, cleared out a bit, I'd like to run some additional tests." He glanced at Coulson for permission.

Coulson nodded. "And the little black box?"

Fitz shook his head slowly. "That thing is incredible," he said with awe. "It took me a while to realize what I was looking at, and even then I had to ask Simmons to double-check and make sure I wasn't just seeing things. I've never seen tech like that so effectively miniaturized. It's unbelievable, really."

"And what is it?" Coulson prompted.

Fitz blinked, refocusing. "It's a miniaturized - and incredibly rapid - DNA sequencer. It can analyze sequences off of a blood or tissue sample in a matter of minutes - which is...hours faster than what we can do, and days faster than anyone outside of SHIELD can do." He glanced at Jemma, who nodded in affirmation. "Once we figured that out, we fed it a few samples to see what would happen. It analyzes, and then returns a result as a percentage. I'm still not sure exactly what it's analyzing for. But my blood and Jemma's both came back at less than 10% - so clearly we don't have what it's looking for."

Skye glanced from Fitz to Simmons and noticed that the biochemist's lips were pressed together, worried creases surrounding her eyes and mouth. She knew something else that she wasn't volunteering yet.

"A DNA sequencer?" Coulson echoed, a puzzled expression on his face. He glanced at Simmons, and she nodded.

"I've been thinking the same thing, sir," she said quietly, her face clearing. "We've been assuming, for months, that the needle marks were the result of something being injected. Obviously, with the type of attacks they've been, it makes sense for it to be something aggressive like that. But...I think what they've been doing is taking and analyzing blood samples."

A look of relief washed over Coulson's face. "So, the quarantine...?"

Simmons finished his sentence cautiously. "...may be unnecessary. I'd like to complete toxicology testing on both May and Bobbi, just to make sure they come back clear. But then...it seems reasonable to consider releasing them. As well as the rest of the agents who are presently in quarantine."

Coulson let out a long sigh, leaning his elbows on the table and pinching the bridge of his nose. A moment later, his voice came, muffled by his hands. "So what are they looking for?"

"Well," Simmons replied reluctantly, glancing over at Skye, "I have a theory on that, sir, given the DNA analysis I completed."

Skye's muscles tensed. She was vaguely aware of Hunter glancing over at her.

Coulson lowered his hands from his face, folding them on the table, and looked steadily at Simmons. "Go on. What do we know about this creature?"

"Well, that's just it," Simmons said frankly. "He wasn't a creature at all. In fact, according to the analysis, he's essentially...human."

Skye was pretty sure that the surprised and perplexed expressions on the men's faces mirrored her own.

Jemma's face, on the other hand, was carefully expressionless. "Obviously, there are some differences in physiology, and the results confirm that. I found a number of unfamiliar genetic markers, about two to three dozen." She paused, drawing a deep breath. "80% of them are the same as Skye's."

Skye's jaw slackened, and she was vaguely aware that everyone in the room had turned to look at her. A whirlwind of new thoughts began swirling through her mind, even as the old thoughts settled into a pattern that made sense. The pieces were coming together.

"They're looking for me," she said slowly. "That's what they've been doing this whole time."

She glanced at Simmons, whose tight expression evidenced her agreement with that conclusion.

Skye continued. "They've been drawing out and ambushing SHIELD teams, because they knew I was here somehow. But..." There were some pieces that didn't make sense. "They didn't know who I was, or they wouldn't have been testing everybody."

Simmons shook her head. "They must have just known somehow that a SHIELD agent was changed."

"But how would they...?" Skye stared at the tabletop, her forehead scrunched up. How would they know?

A thought struck her, and she opened her laptop. The room remained silent as she booted it up and began clicking furiously, until she had pulled up the archived satellite footage of the theater in San Juan from just before the earthquake.

"That's it," she muttered, then turned the laptop around to show them.

There, on top of the theater, its oversized logo plainly visible from a birds-eye view, was the SHIELD quinjet.

Hunter let out a low whistle, and a look of comprehension wiped away the creases on Coulson's face.

"That's covert," Hunter observed dryly.

Fitz muttered, "Nothing like advertising our involvement."

"So they knew SHIELD was there," Skye summarized, her voice stiff. "They knew somehow that the Diviner had been activated, and they assumed that a SHIELD agent was affected. And they've been trying to figure out who it was."

Coulson nodded slowly.

"The last few attacks, they've only been testing the women," Hunter pointed out, his brow furrowing. "What changed?"

Skye thought for a minute.

"Make yourself known, Skye, and they will find you."

"Raina," she replied firmly. "They found Raina." It made sense now - Raina's deliberate courting of the cameras at the hotel in Florida hadn't been just for SHIELD. She must have gotten wind somehow that if she popped up on the grid, they would come and find her - and, presumably, take her home. The note for Skye had just been a bonus, in case SHIELD was watching.

"Oh, God," Skye murmured, pressing two fingers to her temple.

"But all the women?" Hunter pressed incredulously. "I mean, if they're going off a description of you, you don't much resemble May or Bobbi."

Skye shook her head slowly, looking over at Simmons, who pursed her lips, thinking. "Perhaps they weren't sure you would still have the same appearance. Or perhaps they don't fully trust Raina?" She arched an eyebrow, as if to indicate that she wouldn't blame them. "Or they could just have been being thorough."

Skye nodded doubtfully.

"I think the part that we're all wondering," Fitz broke in, "is, what do they want with you?"

An icy chill swept through Skye's core, the same chill that she'd felt that morning, before the mission. "I don't know," she whispered.

"And why did they erase May's memories of you?" Hunter chimed in abruptly, concern making him brash. His brows knit together in confusion. "Wait - if they didn't know who you were, how did they know which memories to erase?"

Skye's eyes flicked to his, as a terrible realization set in.

"They read them first," Coulson said grimly.

Skye nodded, her eyes still locked on Hunter's concerned ones.

"So now they know who you are," Hunter realized quietly, searching her eyes, and Skye nodded again.

"Depending on their capability to retain the information they were sifting through, sir..." Simmons broke in apprehensively, "there's much more they may now know." Coulson pinched the bridge of his nose again as he began tracking with her thoughts. "All of our identities, the location of this base, security protocols...anything Agent May knew, they may have had access to."

"And there's no telling what they may be planning to do with it," Coulson finished heavily.

Under the table, Hunter's hand moved to cover Skye's, squeezing firmly.

Coulson looked up decisively. "These are formidable opponents we're facing," he said tightly. "Hunter, why don't you tell them what you told me about what happened in the warehouse?"

At the sound of his name, Hunter's eyes pulled from Skye to Coulson. He nodded matter-of-factly, taking a deep breath. "We were going in in two waves, Martin and Ramirez up ahead, May and I hanging back to cover from ICER distance. We'd taken cover in a side hallway and had just let off the first shots, when there was a flash of blue light behind us. We turned around, and there were two of them there in the hallway with us - the big fellow and the guy with the sunglasses."

Fitz exhaled sharply. "Did they teleport?"

"S'the only thing I can figure," Hunter confirmed. "The big fellow took on May, and I was facing off with Sunglasses. It all got a bit confusing after that. Flashes of blue light and a knock upside the head, and I was down for the count."

A nauseating ache settled dully into Skye's chest, as her eyes flicked up to the stitches across his forehead.

This is about me. If I wasn't here, none of this would be happening. To any of them.

She closed her eyes briefly against the guilt.

A wide-eyed Fitz was looking from one end of the table to the other, back and forth between Hunter and Coulson. "So what's the plan?"

Coulson glanced sidelong at the empty chair next to him, and Skye could almost hear him wishing that May were there, so he could run his thoughts by her for confirmation before acting on them. But then a new determination came into his face, and he spoke decisively.

"Security protocols need to change in the next fifteen minutes," he began. "Our enemies will be taking time to regroup, but I don't know how much time we have. Hunter - Koenig is out on business. Can you go to security and make the new protocols happen?"

Hunter sat up a little straighter. "Yeah," he replied, caught off guard. "D'you want me to go now?"

"Go. Just know that after you're done, you'll need to come back here for further orders." Coulson sighed, shaking his head. "We can't stay here. Not if this location is compromised."

Hunter nodded crisply and hightailed it out the door.

"Shall we start packing up the lab, sir?" Simmons inquired lightly, and Coulson nodded to her.

"We'll leave in two hours, and we're going to have to make everything fit on the Bus. Make sure we bring everything classified, any tech we don't want our enemies to have access to. Anything else that we don't need can be left behind."

"Got it," Fitz replied, and he and Simmons both rose and made their way to the door.

"Where are we going?" Skye asked with difficulty.

Coulson turned to look directly at her. "I've got to get on the line with Koenig and see if he can dig us up another secret base. One that May doesn't know about." He lifted the receiver of the phone on the table in front of him, beginning to dial a number by heart.

Skye pushed back her chair to stand. "I'll go back up the server and wipe the system."

Coulson nodded to her silently, his eyes briefly checking in with her. Skye flashed him a tight-lipped smile and left the room, concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other.

Two activity-blurred hours later, they gathered in the briefing room of the Bus before takeoff, along with Martin and Ramirez.

"It's a good thing we have another pilot around now," Coulson said to Martin, trying for a lighthearted tone.

The attempt at levity was lost on Martin, who simply nodded, though Ramirez cracked a smile.

"Where are we going?" Skye piped up curiously, tapping her fingers on the tabletop.

Coulson raised his eyebrows. "That is classified, at the moment. For security's sake, I think it's prudent that as few people as possible know our location." He handed a slip of paper to Hunter, who accepted it with a perplexed expression. "Martin's going to get us in the air, and then he'll talk Hunter through programming the coordinates into the autopilot system." He turned to Hunter. "Can I rely on you to forget what's written on that piece of paper?"

"Wish all my assignments were that easy," Hunter quipped. He glanced up from the paper to Coulson and hastily added, "Just joking, of course."

Skye thought she caught a faint flicker of perverse amusement beneath the Director's inscrutable expression. She stifled a laugh, surmising that something must have happened during the "dad talk" to put Hunter on his best behavior.

"Fitz and Simmons, is everything secure down below?"

"All ready, sir," Simmons confirmed.

"Let's get in the air." Coulson nodded to Martin and Hunter, who headed toward the cockpit. "Skye, come with me."

She followed him to the Cage, which was stuffed from floor to ceiling with black SHIELD duffel bags containing the belongings of all the agents - things that wouldn't break under the force of vibrations, Skye noted wryly. There was just enough space left for the table, chairs, and Skye's bed, with her belongings stuffed underneath it.

"They did an efficient job packing," she observed dryly, flopping into one of the chairs, as Coulson sat down in the other.

He nodded, looking around, then sighed heavily. "You know, I always expected Hunter would be the one responsible for us having to burn the base," he joked.

He caught Skye's wounded expression and backtracked. "This isn't your fault," he tried to reassure her. "You can't blame yourself."

Skye nodded, avoiding his gaze. The wall of black duffel bags was much more interesting to look at.

Coulson drew a deep breath. "You know I won't be able to let you leave the base. Not until we know what's going on and we're sure that we can keep you safe."

"I know," she said quietly.

"With that said," he continued, "you're clearly doing well outside of the Cage. I want you and Simmons to spend the next few days doing that stress testing she was talking about, just to be safe, and then you'll be a free woman. You can come back here to sleep at night, if you're worried about nightmares."

Skye nodded, drumming her fingers on the table. "From one cage to a slightly larger one, huh?"

Coulson grinned. "From what Koenig tells me, this base might not be so bad."

She caught his eye curiously, and he answered with an enigmatic smile.

Figures.

Oh well. His optimism helped a little. "Anything's an improvement after this," Skye conceded.

Coulson's eyebrows furrowed briefly. "This hasn't been all bad, though, has it?" he said, more of a statement than a question. Skye turned to look at him, noticing the bemusement in his blue eyes. "Hunter? Really?"

A hesitant smile brushed across Skye's lips. "Yeah," she admitted. "Kind of crazy, huh?"

Coulson equivocated, bobbing his head from side to side. "Unexpected," he observed.

Skye mustered up a teasing tone. "It's your fault, you know. You force people together like that, for that long, you can never tell what unexpected things might happen."

Coulson smirked, then his face softened into a vaguely paternal smile. "He's a good guy," he affirmed, almost (but not quite) reluctantly. "A better man than I would have pegged him for at first."

Skye searched Coulson's face, a genuine smile of relief coming to her lips at the grudging approval in his tone. "He is," she agreed quietly.

A shadow passed over the Director's face for just a moment. "You're sure he's over Bobbi?"

Skye hesitated, her lips pressing together, then nodded. "I don't know that he's totally over what happened, but I think he's ready to move on."

Coulson nodded slowly, studying her with concern. "Good." He held her gaze for a beat, his lips twitching wryly. "I threatened to sic May on him if he ever hurts you."

An incredulous laugh escaped Skye's lips, despite her strong sense that she probably ought to be horrified. "You didn't! Wow." She sized him up admiringly. "You really did play the overprotective dad part, didn't you?"

Coulson grinned back irrepressibly, looking for all the world like a mischievous ten-year-old. "I was also cleaning my antique blast gun when he came into my office to talk about it."

Skye covered her mouth, her shoulders shaking. "Oh, my God," she finally managed to choke out through the laughter. "If that didn't scare him off, nothing will."

Coulson smiled, his eyes resting on her fondly. "I hope for your sake that nothing does."

Skye sobered. "I hope so, too," she replied quietly. She smiled up at Coulson, relief momentarily lightening the heaviness of her heart. "I'm really glad you approve," she added. "And that you know - it was killing me not to tell you."

"Good to know you have trouble keeping secrets from me," Coulson replied with a wry smirk. "I'll keep that in mind."

If he'd been watching more closely, he might have noticed that Skye's answering smile seemed a little forced.

A little while later, Coulson left to check on the crew, Skye opting to stay behind in the Cage, ostensibly for some "decompress time." But once he had gone, she just sat staring at the floor, moisture shining in her eyes, until abruptly she turned to open her laptop.

Tap, tap-tap-tap, tap, tap, tap-tap.

Her fingers flew across the keys almost feverishly, her brow creasing with effort and the accumulation of strong emotion. At last, she stopped, hesitating, before deliberately clicking the mouse. Then she slumped back in her chair, letting out a long, slow breath.

In a warehouse not far from the Playground, a brown-haired man, apparently in his twenties, looked up from a bank of computer screens. "They've cleared out," he announced, concern flickering across his face. "Cloaked, so we can't track them."

"We expected they might put the pieces together," the tall man with sunglasses reminded him patiently, pacing the room. "It doesn't matter. We have their descriptions now. It's only a matter of time."

A third man called from a second workstation set up across the room. "Excuse me, sir? You should see this." Beside him, a printer flickered to life. He pulled the freshly printed sheet from it as soon as it finished, handing it to his supervisor.

The man with the sunglasses took the paper, running his fingers deftly over the Braille. He paused in the middle of one sentence, then continued, looking pensive.

"What do you think?" the man at the computer asked. "They're already putting together plans for retrieval back at home."

The corners of Sunglasses' mouth twitched up. "No," he replied decisively, tapping the paper. "I like this. This is better." He ran his fingers over the last few lines again. "Send a message home and tell them to shelve the retrieval plans. I want to pursue this."

"Yes, sir," replied the other man, turning back to his computer and tapping away at the keyboard.

A genuine smile came across the tall man's face. He ran his fingers over the paper again, repeating quietly to himself, "This is much better."

A/N: I thrive on follows, favorites, and feedback, both positive and constructively critical! :-D

Pause for brief, unrelated fandom announcements: First, I had the lovely opportunity this last week to co-write a Skye/Hunter baby fic with Marvel-Tolkien Fangirl (in her collection SkyeHunter ficlets) and learned that I love, love, love writing birth stories. I am a childbirth educator by trade, so I suppose that ought not be surprising. ;) I have to take a break from heavy writing sometimes to write things that are just fun, and I'm thinking about starting a collection of birth fic one-shots for various AoS ships, so if there's a pairing for which you desperately want a baby fic, let me know, and I'll see if I can get some inspiration! ;)

Second, Skye/Hunter fanvids exist! These two (youtu. be/ZXpn90LUt90 - very short - and youtu. be/Wfc-u6EU3As) have been up for about a month and a half, and then this one (youtu. be/nX63E0zEfOw) is an AU vid that was just completed by the lovely Arisa as a request for more S/H YouTube love! If you enjoy the pairing, will you go check them out? (Make sure you take the spaces out of the URLs!) And please be sure to like and comment, especially on Arisa's, as she made it just for us! :-D