Changes | Marvel

TWENTY SIX. The Secret City

"I've seen some messed-up stuff in my day, turbo, but nothing quite like that." Fitz, Mack and I had moved into the lounge area. Fitz and I were just sitting, watching Mack play his video games and talk about everything we just saw. "Holding down the director like he's possessed."

"Yeah, well, what happened that's not - wasn't his fault." Fitz mumbles, keeping his eyes on the TV screen. I stayed quiet, knowing that if I was in Phil's position, I would be going through the same thing and instead, Mack and Fitz would be talking about me.

"I know. Someone jumbled his memories." Mack said.

"No, his memories weren't jumbled. They were replaced. Just some of them." Mack pauses it, offering the remote to Fitz.

"You're up." He states, picking up his beer with his other hand.

"No, I'm okay." Fitz declined nervously.

"Nah, come on. It's good for you. Helps your brain and hands learn to get their act together." Fitz shrugs and grabs the remote, unpausing the game and playing from where Mack was up to.

"Replaced memories, jumbled memories how the hell is he supposed to keep everything together? What if he forgets what team he's on? You know, I like my bosses un-jumbled at all times." Mack lectures, waving his hands around.

"Yeah, he is, or he will be. He'll recover. He did before. Besides, brains never delete files. They just lose connections. But there's always a backup. Just a matter of digging and finding them." Fitz says unconsciously. I smile slightly, knowing that all of that applied to him as well.

"So, you've got backup files, too?" Fitz shrugs, and I sigh.

"Can we just, not talk about this." I whisper, keeping my arms wrapped around my legs.

"Come on girl, what's up." Mack nudges me with his foot.

"You guys know what's up." I say bitterly. "All this alien stuff. You're talking about Phil like it's only affecting him. You all realise that I went through the exact same thing."

"But you're not irrational like he is." Fitz tells me. "This whole thing is just getting to Coulson's head. He'll be fine, like you."

"You guys don't think that this is getting to me head." I slightly cry out, tugging at my hair a little bit. Mack faces the floor and Fitz keeps playing quietly. "I wake up in a hospital room almost a year after I last saw the Earth. I'm told that I survived and fell into a coma, but then I'm told that I was dead for almost three days and I'm revived? Guys be real here." I whisper, falling back into the seat of the couch. "One day, I'm probably going to go insane, just how Phil's going now. You just said it yourself..." It was quiet until Simmons came it, looking fearful.

"Has anyone seen Skye?" She asks. Fitz pauses the game and we all deny that we have. "Oh, no." She turns to look at the security footage where we see Skye in the security room, waving her hands at the camera. "Guys quick." She tells us. Mack, Simmons and I race down to the cell and Skye looks at us frustrated.

"Where have you been. It's about time." She states.

"Coulson did this to you?" Mack asks, surprised. Well... obviously. No one else was down here with here.

"You think?" She tells him sarcastically.

"Is he going after the killer?" Simmons asks, but Skye shakes her head, walking out and up the stairs.

"Not the killer." She says.

---

"What the hell is Tahiti?" Mack asks, driving to the location that Skye told us to come to. She said that I had to come, because apparently Phil was sure that the answer to these symbols was hidden there. Absentmindedly, I was tracing multiple circles and lines into my hands, but it wasn't really impulsive.