By the yellow moonlight
Early the next morning, still before dawn, Skye and Scott were the only two still awake. Scott was driving, keeping them on the move after taking a few hours sleep. Fitz, Daisy and Jemma were slumped on top of each other in the back seat and Skye, who’d been riding shotgun, needed a bathroom break.
As she walked back to the car from behind a tree, she found Scott sitting outside on the hood.
“Needed to stand up and walk around.” He told her.
Scott was looking up at the moon through the hazy, polluted tinge of the night sky.
“Air’s so yellow here it almost does look like cheese.” He said “How long has it been like that?”
“As long as I can remember.” She told him, sitting next to him.
“Can’t be good for breathing.”
“Having seen what it should look like, it’s part of the reason I don’t want to stay. When you opened that door and showed me New York, for a split second, I’d thought I’d died and gone to heaven. It was so clear and fresh and beautiful and shiny. You think I want to be a mother to a child who has to breathe that knowing something better is out there?
“I didn’t say anything.” He said “You don’t need to defend your decision to me. It’s yours to make.”
“Sorry. I’m feeling a lot of stress. I feel very emotional right now for some reason. Head still hurts like all hell… What are you doing?”
“Taking a picture” He said, holding out his phone.
“Why? It’s the moon. You’ve got one two.”
“You know what the difference is between your moon and my moon?”
She shook her head.
“July 20th, 1969. The day humanity first set foot on another celestial body. We’ve been to the Moon, Skye. Two decades before any of us were even born. Daisy, Fitz, Simmons and I grew up in a world where that is just a fact of life. Where everyone knows the name Neil Armstrong and his “one small step” line as he set foot on the surface. I’m looking up at what is basically the opposite of what you saw in Manhattan. A mysterious wonder in the sky, untouched by man.”
“Wow…” Skye said “What’s it like?”
“A big, grey beach…”
“have you ever been?”
“Space Travel isn’t like what you see in the pulp novels and on screen. We only went to the moon a few times and it’s still a massive, expensive idea. To get two men onto the moon in a craft the size of a camper van, it took a rocket 36 stories tall. If you want to know what it’s like in short, ask the others.”
“Ask them about..?”
Scott sat on the hood with Skye, telling her what he knew about both the team’s trip to the future and Daisy’s ride into space to save Coulson.
“Wow…” Skye said when he finished. “makes me feel almost small. Worthless… Pointless…”
“Your world has been turned upside down. It happens. Tell you what; you want to try driving for a little while? Might take your mind off everything.” He asked, getting up
“I… I can’t drive.” She said, somewhat flustered.
“Come again?”
“I can’t drive. I’m not allowed to.”
“Not allowed as in ‘never took the test’ not allowed or not allowed as in ‘you did something stupid and they took your license away’ not allowed?”
She looked down at her feet.
“Skye… we’re fugitives.” Scott said “As far as your former employers care, we’re criminals, dare I say terrorists. Driving without a license is the least of your concerns if they catch us.”
“No it’s… “She swallowed “I’m a bit nearsighted. I’m supposed to wear glasses when I drive and I don’t have them and I don’t want to wrap the car around a tree.”
“Why don’t you have them?” he asked flatly.
“Well I… I…” She said, before muttering something under her breath…
“SKYE!” Scott hissed
“They make me look like a dork, OK? Happy?”
Scott put his hand on her shoulder. “Skye, I’ve known you for nearly 48 hours now, and by every indication, you ARE a dork.”
“No I’m not!” she fussed.
“Coney Island…”
“I was excited. I don’t know what came over me.”
“So? I don’t know if you noticed, but we’re like the Dork Patrol, the Dork Squad. It’s Dork Central Station around here. Daisy used to squeal every time she came across a gifted. Jemma and Fitz are in the dictionary under “Nerd” and you should have seen me back in the old days every time I ran into Daisy. I couldn’t get out a complete sentence I was so enamored.”
“Do you love her?” Skye asked
Scott looked at her. “Why are you changing the subject?”
“Just answer me. Do you love her?” She repeated. “Do you love Daisy?”
Scott turned and took a few steps away from the car.
“Yes” he said, turning around. “I love her. She’s smart and beautiful and tough and yet still so kind. What’s not to love?”
“So why don’t you tell her that?”
“What does this have to do with you and your glasses?”
“It’s a touchy subject for me. Like I assume telling Daisy the truth is for you…”
“I’m sorry, you’re right” he sighed “Come one. Let’s get a move on.”
They climbed back in the car.
Scott looked over at Skye, into the back seat at the sleeping Daisy and back at Skye..
“What are you doing?”
“Thinking what you two would look like wearing glasses.”
“And…” she asked.
“I think the both of you would look extremely adorkable.”
“That is not a word.”
“It is where we come from.”
Scott started the car and they took off down the road again.
Not long after, Skye’s stomach growled.
“I’m starting to get really hungry.” She said “My Jemma always has a ration bar or two on her for me…”
Her eyes widened and she smiled “I think I know how we can kill two birds with one stone.”