Simmons stood at rigid attention with Dr. Radcliffe, Piper and Fitz at her back. The Director closed the door to his office and turned to face them. She could feel the blood pounding from her head to her feet, throbbing painfully with each heartbeat. He would not cause her physical harm, not in front of witnesses. Being terminated from SHIELD was looking like a best-case scenario at this point though.

She had not done anything wrong, Simmons reminded herself. She was not the one who had bound a mentally unstable agent against her will and sent her off to be experimented on at a secret energy facility. She had saved May's life. She had no regrets on that point.

And she was not going down without a fight.

"You know, the middle of a global crisis is not an ideal time for the Director of SHIELD to have to initiate a manhunt for three agents who have gone AWOL and kidnapped an asset," the Director began.

Asset? Simmons thought, incredulously. May was an Agent of SHIELD, not some pawn to be used in whatever game the Director thought he was playing.

His cavalier tone only strengthened her resolve.

"If you are going to sentence me to court-martialled, you should probably have some objective witnesses present," she said.

The muscles along Director Mace's jaw twitched as he gritted his teeth.

"Do you have any idea what you have compromised with your little operation?" He asked.

"Compromised?" Simmons scoffed. "You sent Agent May off-base to a defunct energy company that has ties with the Watchdogs! A crime organization that is hell-bent on killing off Inhumans! People like you! What were you thinking?"

"Not all Inhumans," Mace corrected. "Just the ones that have been determined to be too dangerous to continue."

The four of them stared at the Director in wide-eyed astonishment. He took their collective silence as an opportunity to explain.

"The American zealots that you know as the 'Watchdogs' are a small branch of a much larger syndicate that has existed in China for over a millennia," he said. "They are an ancient brotherhood that has hunted down and eliminated any Inhuman that has used their powers to kill, maim or terrorize the public. For many years, they oversaw Afterlife, with the aim of protecting and educating the Inhumans who came through the terrigen mist."

"Wait," Fitz chimed in. "They knew about Afterlife?"

"Of course we knew about Afterlife!"

"'We?'" Simmons repeated.

"When Jiaying went on her power-trip and the terrigen crystals were released into the ecosystem, the Watchdogs recruited affiliates all over the globe to help with the cause," Mace continued. "I was asked to join their ranks because I believe in their mission. Their reach extends further than you can possibly appreciate."

"Does it include members of Congress?" Piper asked, catching on.

"Yes, it does," he confirmed with a sardonic tilt of his head.

"Yeah, well, where were all of these 'affiliates' when we were trying to stop Hive?" Fitz snapped.

"Do you think that Hive was the only Inhuman threat to the planet, Dr. Fitz? Or still is?" Mace asked rhetorically. "The Watchdogs work in the shadows. Most of our work goes unnoticed. Not unlike SHIELD itself."

Simmons's head was swimming. There was a horrible chill creeping up her neck and filling her insides. She was starting to feel like she had been looking at a slide through a filmy lens and it was only now starting to come into focus.

But it still did not add up. The Director was working for the Watchdogs. He made them sound like they were a force for good. It didn't make sense.

"But the Watchdogs recruited xenophobic domestic terrorists!" She accused. "Those people didn't care who an Inhuman was or what they had done! They wanted them all dead."

"Mistakes were made," Mace admitted. "Word got out and people joined who were not in-line with our mission parameters. Their funding has been cut. Your friend Daisy seems to be doing a good job of cleaning up the rest of their mess."

"So you joined SHIELD…"

"Because the Watchdogs and SHIELD have the same goal. To protect."

"I think your methods differ slightly though," Fitz muttered.

"What were you doing with May?" Simmons asked. If she was going down for this, she wanted to get all of the facts straight first.

"The Watchdogs, the ones locked up the containment facility, stole a weapon that we were told help with our mission," Mace said. "It seems we underestimated its power."

"So you took her to the Momentum facility to cure her," Simmons concluded.

"We had nearly succeeded, Dr. Simmons, before your untimely arrival," he affirmed. "Your actions not only put the lives of several of my men in danger, but you almost killed Agent May in the process."

"Technically, she did die," Radcliffe pipped up helpfully. "But only for a couple of minutes."

Simmons swallowed and closed her eyes. She wanted to hide her face in Fitz's chest, but stood firm.

Secrets within secrets.

Working for SHIELD as long as she had, she should have been used to her world being turned upside down. It had happened before and it would happen again. She just hoped she would still be allowed to be standing with SHIELD when it did.

"Which brings me to you, Dr. Radcliffe," Director Mace said. "I think you have some explaining to do about your new friend, AIDA…"

"Simmons is going to get raked over the coals for this one," Coulson said. "It should have been me. I should have stayed."

May rolled her eyes, apparently still more than capable of conveying the magnitude of her dissent while lying battered and bruised in a hospital bed.

"Sounds like you had your hands full," she said. "Besides, you never did complete that resuscitation course. You wouldn't have done much good."

Coulson smirked.

"How are you feeling?"

"Like I was thrown against a wall," she replied bluntly. "Do I have you to thank for that?"

He snorted at the accusation. They both knew the likelihood of him being able to take her down single-handedly.

"I was too preoccupied with keeping my remaining limbs to do any damage," he replied.

May's mouth curled into a wince.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.

"I've been hurt worse when we've sparred," he said honestly. "You weren't trying to hurt me. I think, in some weird way, you were trying to protect me. Underneath all of that paranoia, you were still you."

She did not have a reply to that. His words seemed to wash over her, unheard. There was something else on her mind. She stared at him for so long, he started to wonder if she had said something that he had missed.

"What is it?" He asked.

May swallowed.

"Simmons said that that thing, whatever it was, is gone."

"It is," he assured her.

He had seen the fMRI results comparing May's brain activity to those of the Watchdogs' that were still infected. He had no idea what he was looking at, but even to him it was apparent that there was a difference in the scans. One of the lab technicians explained to him that her scans were identical to previous tests conducted before her psychotic episode. She was back to normal.

"I still feel… like something's not right," she said.

"Well, you did die."

"Barely," May scoffed.

Flat-lining on an operating table for two minutes must have seemed like a minor inconvenience when she compared it to the days his body had laid in cold storage in the Triskelion's morgue.

"Well," he said. "I've heard that an experience like that can change you."

May shook her head, refusing to find solace in his knowing look.

"It's not that," she insisted. "That thing is still out there somewhere. It had power, Phil. It made me see and think things, horrible things. I have never lost control like that before."

"I know."

"I just…" she paused, considering. "I don't think we've seen the last of it."

Coulson did not know what else he could say. There was so much about the events of the last few weeks that he did not understand. They were working in the dark, as usual. They both knew that the only thing they could do was plough ahead and face the next crisis as it arose.

Having no words of comfort to give her, he settled for squeezing her hand and holding it for as long as she would let him.

Thanks for reading, you guys! This was fun to write.

Now we just wait for the real thing!