Hey guys! This is just something that has been playing around in my head since the finale. Not sure if I'm completely happy with it, but here it is.
Leave a review if you have time please.
A/N: I do not own AOS or any of its characters.
If they knew one thing, they knew that pissing off the director of SHIELD first thing on a Monday morning was not a good idea. Yet, here they were in Melinda May's office telling her that Daisy had yet again given them the slip.
They did not know how they were going to get the jump on her. Not only was Daisy trained by May, she was an inhuman with powers that aide her in running.
May made a noise of displeasure as she paused the video. "So let me get this straight, Daisy can control vibrations to the point that it will let her leap several stories in the air?"
Coulson stood up and walked over to stand in front of the video screen. "We know now. So when Mack and I get another lead, we will be prepared for it."
May sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. "No."
"No?" Mack asked. "What no? No, we are not going to use that against her? I don't see why not? If it means that we can bring her in and stop this crazy manhunt-"
"No. I mean that I am taking the two of you off of this. It's up to the National Guard now. We are down agents and we are wasting resources on this. I miss her as much as you guys do. But she has clearly made her decision, and that is to not be here. That's final. You're dismissed." May sat back down in her chair and shuffled some papers.
Mack and Coulson looked at each other, knowing that it would do them no good to argue with May at this point.
After the door closed, May sat the paperwork that she was holding down and turned her tablet on and opened up her latest search. "Ok, where are you Daisy."
"I can't just say goodbye. I- I have too much I want to say."
"Me too. Come to think of it I just did. I mean, I tried and we didn't even realize it."
"Realize what?"
"A moment ago. It's the first time I said I lo—"
Daisy jerked awake and looked at her clock groaning. Just like every night she has only managed to get a few hours sleep before the nightmares took over. No. Not nightmares, memories.
She rolled over and faced the wall of the van. She acquired another van after she left base. She missed having an actual bed to sleep in, but she needed to keep moving so the team wouldn't find her. And this was the easiest way to do it. She groaned again and rolled back over to face the door.
That's when she heard it, the unmistakable sound of somebody walking alongside her van. She continued to lay still; maybe it was just somebody walking by. Then she heard the minute sounds of somebody messing with the lock on the side door of the van. She started to scramble up and tried to get to the driver's seat of the van when the side door flew open.
Melinda May was there with an icer drawn. Daisy raised her arm to use her powers against May, but like everything else, May was quicker and Daisy felt herself losing consciousness.
Melinda released the breath that she was holding. She turned around and sat on the step of the side door as she composed herself. She shot Daisy. It was just an icer, but still, she shot her. She shot her rookie, the girl that somehow brought the team together as a family. She shot the closest thing that she has as a daughter. Sighing she realized what that actually meant. She found Daisy. She was going to be safe, away from the National Guard, FBI, CIA and every other intelligence organization that was after her. She didn't care if she had to keep daisy in a containment module for the rest of her life. She was going to be safe.
May stood up and set out the beacons to call the containment module from the Zephyr. After the containment module landed she lifted Daisy out of the van and carried her over the module. Laying her on the bed, she pulled the gauntlets out of her pocket and secured them on Daisy's hands. As much as she did not want to inhibit Daisy from using her powers, she needed to make sure that they could contain Daisy at the base. Maybe after Daisy woke up and they talked for a bit, she would be able to remove them. She shook her head to clear her thoughts. Nothing with Daisy from now on was going to be that easy. Not that anything with her was easy to begin with.
She exited the module and closed the doors, hitting the button on the external panel to send it back to the Zephyr, making a mental note to disable to the panel once the module was back in its room at the base. May walked back over to Daisy's van and got in the driver's seat, knowing how much Daisy loved her vans, she needed to make sure that it would be at the base for when Daisy got out of containment. She needed to drive it to a secure location so an agent could pick it up later.
Once in an abandoned parking lot away from the town that Daisy was hiding in, she set the coordinates for the Zephyr to land. As she was waiting, she complied a list of certain things that she needed to do when she got back to the base. First thing, she needed to disable the external panel and any electrical devices in the room so that Daisy could not find a way to hack her way out of containment. She could get Fitz on that, he was good with that sort of thing. Second she needed to talk to the team; well first she should talk to Coulson, considering he felt the same way about the girl as she did. She sighed again and rubbed her temples getting out of the van and walking over to where the Zephyr had just landed. Today was a long day and it wasn't even half way over yet.
"So when you told us to let it go, the National Guard was going to take over, you actually took over the investigation yourself?" Mack questioned when Melinda returned to the base. The entire team had gathered to hear the news.
"No. When I told you to let it go, I did turn it over to the National Guard. It was the only way for us to still operate without any interference from the government. But I knew that I could get there before them. So I did." Melinda replied stoically.
"So did you just let us go on a wild goose chase every time we went out after her?" he challenged.
"No. The information that I had, I gave you. After I told you to let it go, I kept digging. I needed to make sure that I got to her before they did. I needed to bring her back."
"How did you find her?" Fitz spoke up. He was one of the ones that was most concerned for Daisy's return.
"Classified. Any more questions?"
"How is she doing?" Jemma voiced quietly.
"Honestly I don't know. She tried to attack me before I shot her with the icer. I would say, judging by the look of her, not to well. I will find out more when she wakes up. Which brings me to the next subject; no one is to go into the containment pod except Coulson and me. We are the only ones with badges that will allow access. Until we can get a read on her mental status, I think that it would be for the best. Slowly we will start letting you guys go visit. Is that understood?"
"Clears," and "copy that," came from around the room. With that May nodded to them dismissing them. One by one they left the room and Melinda returned to her office to try to come up with a plan to reach Daisy.
Daisy groaned as she started to wake up. Right away she knew she was not in her van. She kept her eyes closed as she pulled at her memory to try to find out what happened. It started coming to her in pieces. She was in her van in an alley. She heard footsteps outside. She tried to get away but the door opened and May was-
Her eyes flew open and adjusted to the bright light of the containment room. May was there. May shot her. Panic started to fill her as she looked around, the bright white of the containment room filling her with dread. She was back at the base. Looking down at her hands, she noticed the gauntlets. She raised her hand and tried to use her powers. Nothing happened. Not even a little vibration. Panic started rippling through her even faster now. The room should have been shaking with how much she was panicking. How was she supposed to escape when she didn't have her powers?
Looking around the room again she saw a person standing in the module behind the containment glass. How long had she been standing there? Why wasn't she saying anything? Daisy internally rolled her eyes at that. May hardly said anything.
"Are you done yet?" May's question came out of the box. "You're safe. No one is going to get you here." Seeing that Daisy was not relaxing any she tried a different tactic. "Daisy, look at me." She saw Daisy focus on her for a minute. "Daisy you need to control your breathing like I taught you." That didn't work; Daisy was on the edge of a full panic attack.
Without thinking about what she was doing, May released the lock that was on the containment pod and entered the room. She grabbed Daisy's shoulders and spun her around so they were face to face. "Copy me." May started to take exaggerated slow breaths for Daisy. She began to copy May's breathing and slowly her breathing returned to normal.
Once her breathing was normal she launched herself into May's open arms and sobbed. Everything that she was feeling, everything that she kept locked away while she was on the run came out. May simply held her while she cried. When her sobs softened, May sat her down on the bed.
"Do you want to tell me what that was about?" May asked her softly.
"What, what was about?" Daisy returned quietly, hiccupping at the end.
May rolled her eyes. "Daisy, why did you run?"
"Because he was right."
"You want to elaborate on that?" She was met with silence so she prodded again. "Who was right?"
"Agent Lumley." May knew at that point what Daisy was talking about. "Wherever I go, death follows. Nobody is safe. You guys are the closest thing that I have to a family. I couldn't stand it if something were to happen to you. And you and Coulson are the closest thing that I have had to actual parents, since my real parents were crazy. And I know that it's stupid, and you guys probably don't even feel the same-"
Daisy was cut off as May pulled her into a bone crushing hug. "Don't ever think that Coulson and I don't care. Or that you are not loved here. Everybody has been barely hanging on since you left. We've all buried ourselves in our work. And when we are not working, we were trying to find a lead on you. You are the closest thing that Colson and I have to a daughter. I may not show it as much as Colson, but I do care about you. More than you think."
"But May, I have to leave. All that is going to happen is you guys are going to die and I'm going to be alone. Again. I can't let anything happen to you guys. That means I have to leave. Please, just let me go." Tears were pouring down her face again at the thought of her family dying.
"Well I can tell you one thing, you are not going anywhere. I don't care if I have to keep the gauntlets on you and keep you in this containment pod for the rest of your life. You are not leaving us again. We are a family and we are going to stick together. We will face whatever comes together."
"You can't keep me in here for the rest of my life." She mumbled looking down at the ground her hair moving forward shielding her face.
May moved over closer to Daisy and pushed her hair behind her ear. "I'm the Director of SHIELD. I can do whatever I want. Plus, I seem to remember a time that you wanted to live in a box," she smirked looking over at Daisy for her reaction.
Daisy smiled slightly at that. "What does Coulson say about that?
"He agrees with me. I believe he is trying to get Fitz to develop some type of tracker to be put under the skin that even you couldn't disable." May bumped her shoulder against Daisy's tying to get the girl to smile again. "Daisy can I ask you a question?"
"Didn't you just?" Daisy mumbled.
"Did you think that I wouldn't find you? Did you think that I would ever stop looking?"
"I was hoping that after everything that I did that you wouldn't want to find me. And if I stayed away long enough you guys could just forget."
"Like I said before, what you did was bad, but now you just need to balance the scales. Whatever you do, it will never make us stop loving you. Please believe that."
Daisy nodded her head and leaned into May for another hug.
"When was the last time you got a decent night's sleep?" May asked her arms still around Daisy.
"Before I left. When I was gone I was too afraid to sleep for too long or too deep. Or nightmares would keep me awake for days." Daisy replied.
"Well, it's late. Get some sleep. I'll be right her for you if you wake up." May brushed the hair out of her face again. Realizing as she was doing it, it was a very motherly move. I know the team all want to come see you tomorrow. And Coulson should be back from his mission later tonight. You know he will be the first in line to come see you tomorrow. And for now, the gauntlets are going to stay on. And don't even try because I made everything in this room Daisy proof. You can't hack your way out of here."
Daisy nodded as she lay on the bed curling up on her side. She began hoping that she would actually be able to sleep longer than a few hours now that she felt a little safer under May's watch.
Daisy woke several hours later to a dark room. She didn't know what time it was, but she could tell that she had slept longer than the entire year that she had been on the run.
As her eyes adjusted to the dark, she looked over to where she could hear quiet breathing coming from. She smiled at what she saw. Coulson and May were sitting on the sofa in the seating area wrapped in each other's arms. She could tell by the way that they were sitting that they were watching her when they fell asleep, something that parents would do.
That thought struck her hard. Her parents. Through everything, May and Coulson had been there for her, supported her and welcomed her back with unconditional love. She smiled at them. She was glad that they seem to have finally pulled their heads out of their asses and realize that they do love each other.
Her parents. She didn't think that she would ever get over that. A feeling of love spread through her. These people may not be biologically related to her, but this team was her family and she was glad to be home.
She was home.