Phil Coulson was enjoying this way too much.
He knew that at a time when the world was rising up against the Inhumans and a book with untold power had found its way into the hands of a psychotic non-corporeal entity, it was necessary that he project a certain degree of gravitas. But this damn grin kept creeping up and eroding his composed expression.
It was hard not to be a little pleased.
He was back in the field on a mission. His team was as reunited as they had been since Hive. He even had Daisy with him, if only for a short while.
And there was that other thing.
"I saw you."
He heard May's warning, but he had still let it go to his head.
When the most badass, independent woman you know dies and yours is the face she sees on the other side of the Great Divide, it was hard to stay humble.
He had gotten under her skin. Her postmortem experience was the most tangible proof he had that, on some level, he had gotten through that suit of emotional armor she had worn day-in and day-out since Bahrain. In spite all of the brush-offs, barbed quips, and silent stares, he was in her head.
So yeah, after four years, he felt that he deserved a bit of self-satisfaction. Just as long as it didn't escalate to smugness. Smugness, she would smell a mile away. She would smack that grin off of his face just as fast as she had put it there.
So Coulson adjusted his mouth into a practiced frown as he rounded the corner and entered the control center of Zephyr One.
"Where are we on tracking Morrow and Bauer?" He asked.
Fitz looked up from the display.
"Ah, well, we're following up a lead from the information Joseph Bauer gave us," he explained. "He said that he buried the book where he found it. Now, I've cross-referenced that with the notes Mack and I were able to salvage from the hard drive at the Momentum Facility. Joseph and Lucy kept detailed reports of their search for the Darkhold."
"Last entry in their Grail Diary was the name of a professor, Dr. Robert Marks," Mack continued. "He was the last known person to have the book in his possession."
"'Grail Diary?'" Coulson repeated.
"Yeah," Mack confirmed. "Like in—
"Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade," Fitz interrupted eagerly.
"Exactly," Mack said.
Coulson glanced at May with a smirk, expecting her to roll her eyes. She did not look up from her smartpad.
"Okay," he said, turning back to Fitz and Mack. "So is Dr. Marks still around?"
"Not so much," Mack said. "He was murdered in 1985."
"We think that the killer may have been after the book," Fitz concluded.
"Do we know who the killer was?" Coulson asked. "Where they lived?"
"Working on that now," Fitz said.
"Alright," Coulson nodded. "Keep me up-to-date. It won't be long before the Director checks in and we have to come up with a plausible excuse as to why we haven't brought his plane back. Anyone have any ideas? May?"
May jerked up at the sound of her name.
"What?" she asked. "Oh, no… But Simmons checked in about half an hour ago. Said that there was some buzz about a press release. He'll probably have his hands full with Agent Burrows, going over 'optics.'"
Coulson nodded slowly.
"Okay," he agreed. "Fitz, Mack, let me know when you have something?"
Taking that as her cue for dismissal, May pivoted on her heel and marched out of the control room.
Coulson's eyes followed her as she disappeared into the corridor.
His grin was gone.
Something was not right.
________________________________________
"May? May! Hold on!" He called after her.
May slowed her pace slightly, but did not glance behind her.
"Where are you going?" He asked, jogging up to her side.
"Going to catch some rack time while we are waiting for new orders," she answered.
"Alright," he said. "But are you okay?"
"I'm fine," she replied, still looking straight ahead.
Coulson reached over and touched her shoulder. May paused in mid-stride. She frowned and glared at his hand, but did not shrug it off.
"No, you're not," he said. "What's going on? Is it Daisy? The mission?"
"No," she said, avoiding his eyes.
"What, then?"
He watched the fine muscles along her neck and jaw contract as she swallowed the reply she refused to divulge.
"Is it about what you saw?" He muttered. "About what you told me? I don't need to know the details, but if it's bothering you…"
The look in her eyes silenced him. It was an expression he had seen many times on many faces, but only once on her. She wore that look the day she was caught reporting on him to Director Fury.
"You lied," he realized. "You didn't see me when you died. You just told me that so I would stop asking questions."
"I didn't lie…" she protested.
"Then what was it?" He demanded. "It's obviously bothering you. What was so horrible that you can't tell me?"
"I don't want to talk about this here," May said.
"Fine," he said. He punctuated the word by banging open the nearest door and walking inside. May followed him reluctantly and raised her eyebrow as he closed the door behind them. The walls of the room were lined with enough ordnance to occupy a small city.
"Gun locker," she observed sarcastically. "Much better."
"What did you really see, Melinda?"
He tried never to push her past what she was comfortable with sharing, but this was different. He was one of the only people alive that understood how painfully different keeping this secret was. May wasn't sent to TAHITI. She had flat-lined for minutes, not days. But he was not lying when he said he still hadn't gotten over his death. That trauma, no matter how brief, had changed her.
He was not going to let her go through it alone.
"I told you the truth," May began. "I saw you."
"And?" He prodded.
"And you were dead," she spat. "With Loki's scepter sticking out of your chest. Is that what you want to hear?"
Coulson swallowed.
No. This was definitely not what he wanted to hear.
"If it's the truth," he lied.
"You were dead," May narrated. "But I could still hear you asking me why I wasn't there. Why I didn't protect you. Why I didn't stop him.
"I saw you and Andrew and Lincoln and the girl, Kataya, and Daisy and everyone else I couldn't save. You were all dead and you were all asking me why I didn't help."
Coulson was saved from having to respond as she ploughed on.
"I heard you that day in the firehouse, when you told the fireman that there was something beyond death and it was beautiful. I don't know if you were talking about Tahiti or heaven or you were just making it up, but it wasn't like that for me. It was hell," she concluded, her voice cracking. "When I died, I went to hell. Now tell me how anything you can say is going to make that better."
Coulson stared at her, unable to reply.
There was no way that that was true. For all of the horrors in this world that he had witnessed, he had always been a prevailing belief that there had to be some sort of balance in the end. He had to believe that. If he thought otherwise, there was no point in continuing to fight.
And if there was any justice in this universe at all then there was no way that fate or the gods or whoever had sent Melinda May to hell.
"You said Daisy was there," he said.
"Yeah, she was-"
"But she's not dead," Coulson interrupted. "Daisy's alive."
May rolled her eyes.
"Look at her, Phil. The girl we used to know is gone. She needed saving and I couldn't do it."
"But she's not dead," Coulson insisted. "And I'm not dead. Not anymore."
"What's your point?"
"My point is," he said slowly, putting the pieces together. "I don't think whatever you saw was hell, not literally anyway. It wasn't a place that you went to. All of those people aren't dead. Don't people have to be dead to be in hell?"
"So now you're a theology scholar?" May scoffed. "How do you know how it works?"
"I think it was all in your head," Coulson concluded.
"It doesn't mean it wasn't real," she whispered.
"I know. It was real. To you. Don't you think it's a possibility that this 'hell' was just something you created for yourself? Something your mind created as it was shutting down because you still haven't forgiven yourself?"
May was silent for a moment and Coulson hoped some of what he was saying was sinking in. Small wonder that she had been reluctant to speak about her experience. He could not imagine breathing with that weight pressing down on her.
"That's just it, Phil," she said at last. "I have forgiven myself. For Kataya, for Andrew, even for you. Mostly. It's taken a long time, but I made my peace with it. But something out there doesn't think I deserve to be forgiven."
His eyes darted around the darkened room as he thought. Lucy, Robbie Reyes, Momentum Energy, the Darkhold… all pieces to a puzzle that were somehow connected, but the picture was still a long way from taking shape. And now this. May was psychically tortured, died and woke up in a place where all of her nightmares became a reality.
"What are you thinking?" She asked.
"I think it's that book, May," Coulson said. "We don't have all of the answers yet, but whatever happened to you has to do with the Darkhold."
"Fury was afraid of it," she murmured.
"With good reason, it seems," he agreed. "Once we have it—
"We'll destroy it," May said firmly. "Do not go looking for answers in there, Phil. What happened… it's over. It's done. But that book, whatever it is, it has a power that is evil. It was not meant to fall into human hands."
"You're right," he said. "You're right. It has to be destroyed."
But he wondered, if there was a chance that the book could banish that haunted look in her eyes, if he would really have the strength to resist looking when the time came.