X marks the spot

The End (of the world, as we know it)

He'd lived in the world, seen the darkest parts of it; seen the lightest parts of it as well. He'd seen that one couldn't survive without the other. Phil Coulson was the man who introduced him to that idea that there was still some light both externally, but also internally. That there was a good person somewhere inside of the boy. Just clawing and begging to be seen. To be given the light of day.

The world would keep spinning without Phil Coulson. The world would fall apart both literally and metaphorically with Phil Coulson.

He'd never seen a world as cold, brutal and unforgiving as this one. He'd never met a man as warm, hopeful and forgiving as Phil Coulson.

The question was like a pendulum, at least in his own mind it was; swinging from one side to another and never once stopping.

"Davis said there was no change. Neither of you want to be in there?" Piper asked the two from the future. The two friends shared a look between them and shook their head in sync.

"This is for them to decide." Deke answered as they listened in on the carnage unfolding inside the room. The constant sway of the pendulum.

"I know it's terrible. I can't bear to see him like that. But this? This is the moment." Elena said, arguing her side of the spectrum. Fitz even backed it up.

"This is the exact circumstance that she warned herself about. Simon even came back to stop it."

Aaron let out a quiet chuckle to himself as he leaned against the wall. Daisy's anger at her friend rose even more. But, for now, she kept it intact. Instead funnelling it all into this discussion.

"We can change it right now."

"The odium mixture won't work if it can't penetrate Talbot's skin." Daisy pointed out. Simmons backed up her best friend. Adding on that bullets couldn't get close to him.

"There's no way to get the serum in his body."

"What if he absorbed someone?" Fitz's morbid plan made some sort of light come to Aaron's eyes. He even repositioned himself on the pillar he was up against. He sat up straight.

This is it, this is your chance. Make it right, make it alright. Make up for you constant fuck ups. Get this one thing right.

"Oh, don't look at me like that. I-It's hypothetical." Fitz clocked Mack's look. Saying those words to try and get it off of him. Or at least calm the man's troubled feelings about the comment.

"Exactly! All we have to do is have it in the right hands; and that maniac will take the bait." Elena continued her argument, backing Fitz's point up.

"Well, so who'd you have in mind, you?" The answer he got was not one he liked, "Now you want to sacrifice yourself, too?"

"No, but I'm willing to. We all should be." Jemma threw in the idea that Coulson would, if he was able to.

"And if it doesn't work? He would've died for nothing." Aaron's thoughts didn't really help himself there.

"Lots of people have. Coulson would just be another name to that list. Are you really going to let his name be on that list? Look at how it's tearing everyone apart. Your name would just fade. It would just be another one on a list of the dead." Aaron heard in his ear. He was too afraid to look and see if it was someone physically there, or just what he heard internally.

"Better than leaving this world in pieces."

"Robin said Coulson could put the pieces together. She thinks that he's the key to solving all of this." Daisy's desperation to save the man was always well known among them. This was the moment where it shone the most.