Owner	Pose
Clint Barton	Cal spent most of his days pacing in the guilded cage SHIELD had stuck him in. It was the standard apartment set, two rooms, beds, a couch a TV, a bathroom and a kitchen. It was comfortable but dull...terribly dull. The door was locked, but Cal could rip his way through easily enough, even without his formula. The long term effects left him more than strong enough. Though once he was through the door he had a pair of guards to deal with and another pair down the hall, all of them armed with gas masks, and dendrotoxin grenades, that R&D thought might slow him down or stop him. And beyond that, he was sure SHIELD had tagged him even if he didn't know where. So, even if he escaped, he was sure he'd have a tactical team on his heels in minutes. Not that he wanted to escape, not really, Daisy was here, this is where he wanted to be here but plotting how he /might/ escape kept the boredom at bay. That, and burning through crossword books and the medical journals the British woman had nervously delivered when she came to draw some blood. Stopping his pacing, Cal flops down on the couch, grabbing one of the journals and flipping listlessly through the pages wondering when Daisy would vist, that's what really made this situation tolerable, Daisy, he was with Daisy, he'd made it. Even if the situation wasn't exactly what he had envisioned. "My own fault," Cal mutters tossing down the magazine. "Shouldn't have lost my head."
Skye Johnson	Skye had tried to visit her father more than she was actually able to. Once Kate had collected Lucky (who, as it happens, had been quite happy to stay with Cal), other things kept cropping up grabbing her attention and multiple visits a day dwindled down to stollen moments with apologies given. Tonight it was Clint she gave an apologetic kiss to the cheek to, taking his portion of the ramen dinner she'd picked up on the way home, and handing it to him. "Make up for it later? Need to spend some quality time with my dad." If only to make sure Cal didn't climb the walls. Plus, there was the whole matter of making things squared away with him so that May had no reason to pull rank and make bad things happen (tm). She pauses outside Cal's quarters, nodding to the detail there. "Just me. I know the drill." Still, she lets them pat her down if they must, and check out the dinner she's brought, then prepares to visit her father. Something she's actually looking forward to.
Clint Barton	The detail is gas masks (easier, if more annoying than trying to put them on during a break out attempt) and one of them, Agent Walters nods, "Sure thing, Agent Johnson," she says giving Skye a wave over with the metal detector wand and then a quick pat down. Her partner checks the food. "All clear," Walters says and steps out of the way for Skye to enter. The other agent, Crawford hands back the food. "Bon apetite" he says smiling behind the mask.
Skye Johnson	~ "Sorry," Skye apologizes. "Didn't think to bring you guys a snack too. Can I have the caf send you down something when I'm done?" She's okay with the routine security check by now, though the first few times she'd gone through it; now it was old hat. She did stop to wonder just what she was supposed to do if they actually had to use measures, given she didn't have a handy dandy gas mask, but oh well.. Skye knocks on Cal's door and calls out, "Someone order dinner and a Daisy?"
Clint Barton	"Oh, and don't forget," Walters says, passing Skye one of the portable breather units, barely larger than the sticks of glue they gave out at St. Agnes for arts and crafts. "And food would be great," she adds. Then the way is clear for Skye to go inside. At the sound of her voice Cal springs up from the sofa. "Daisy," he says excited as a child. "I was wondering when you'd come," he says noticing the food. "Here let me help with that," he holds out his hands for the food glancing back towards the sofa.
Skye Johnson	Skye happily hands the bags over and lets Cal go at them like a kid in a candy store. The ramen place had prepared 3 'specials' for her, and each plate was different. She didn't actually know what was left in the bag, only that they'd not let her down yet.. and that she still hadn't made it through the menu since the kitchen staff had decided to adopt her and let her have off menu concoctions as a matter of course. "Yeah, I know. It's been a bit. Crazy place this week. Have a new recruit. There as an attack on one of our own. The girl we brought in. Plus the whole Zola thing - you'd be amazed at how much SHIELD data is still in carboard boxes and not on the system." Which might, ultimately, be to their advantage, as anything on their systems (another reason she kept her gack free and clear whenever possible) was also in Zola hands. At this point he didn't know what they knew about him and his history with SHIELD. Then again, so far, it wasn't a whole lot. Going through the old papers was painstakingly slow.
Clint Barton	Cal takes the bags back to the sofa setting them down on the coffee table before looking to Skye his arms spread, "Can I get a hug?" he asks her. However the hug works out, Cal nods, about the busy times. "Sounds like it, this girl, not another powered person is she?" he asks, curious. He was still shaking the idea of SHIELD as some monolithic enemy to anyone with powers, tagging them and cataloguing them and locking them away. Though the mention of Zola, gets him off that track. "Zola," he grits out. "Would like to get my hands on him," he says. "He's the one that did all this you know? Broke up our family. Without him, things would be different."
Skye Johnson	Skye has reached the point where hugging Cal seems like a thing that's reasonable, and is happy to give him one without a second thought. A quick, warm thing that has her slipping away from to find a spot on the couch, pulling her legs up to sit cross-legged across from him, her breather unit stuffed into a pocket. "Mmm, you mean like me? Not sure yet. Not that I really should be telling you." Skye grins at him. "We're not really sure what happened to her or what she is, but her story doesn't line up to anything like my own." Which isn't to say it wasn't within the realms of possibility - other than her bloodwork hadn't show any similarities to Skye's transformations. "But we should talk about that. So far, there haven't been any new reports of transformations, but we figure that's what Zola" - she thought of him as that, now, not Karl or the Benefactor - "was up to with where that Hydra base was situated. But we don't think he has the materials to make more crystals on the scale he needs. We were hoping you could help us?"
Clint Barton	For Cal hugging Daisy is still a literal dream come true, proof positive that he'd made it, after decades, he'd done it he'd gotten his daughter back. He hugs her fiercely, and when she slips away he lets her go after holding on just a second longer, like he was still dreaming and the next moment he was going to wake. Cal nods, "Well, if your people need a second pair of eyes, I am really very good when it comes to powered people, even the ones that aren't like you." he says about the girl. Though it's Zola that really has his attention. "Yes, the problem is always material. Terrigen is delicate, and a real pain to store let me tell you, your mother's people are much more advanced than we are but even they have troubles with it, I am guessing whatever Zola, managed to /steal/," he grits out the word. "From the village after..." his jaw clenches and he clamps a tight hold on his feelings holding up a finger while he composes himself. "After the attack... is mostly depleted, which means he'll be looking for a new source. Which, let me tell you is harder than you'd think, but he does have a lot of resources." There's a smile from Cal then. "But I think I know where to look."
Skye Johnson	Skye's lips purse as she listens. "I have the crystals you tried to make in the village. I don't know about any terrigen. That's not in any records I have, but yeah, that's about what I thought. You might be our only lead on where to find the materials Zola is going to need, so that we can get to them before he does." Of course there is also the matter of finding a way to nuetralize the crystals - a thought that Skye wasn't sure how she felt about it. "Can I ask you something? About, well, me. And my mom."
Clint Barton	"You do?" Cal asks pondering if he'd warned the real Skye or the imposter about them. "They're not my best work," he says of the crystals. "Their results were...unpredictable, plus they're deadly to anyone who isn't like you. The real thing is much more stable...." he stops, thinking. "The terrigen might be recoverable though, but tell your science types they should be stored in saline, as best as I can tell it extends the life of the material." As to finding Zola, "Well I'll know the chemicals he'll need, that should give you some leads." Though he was ready to push on and mention about where to look for more terrigen before being distracted by Skye's question. "Of course, you can ask me anything, Daisy," he asks looking at her earnesly reaching for her hand.
Skye Johnson	Skye nods. "Do. I have them. We found.. well, they were given to me by someone who was there that day. He'd hidden them away at the shrine. Jemma says they're incomplete. That the matrix they're built from wasn't stable enough to withstand the time between then and now? Something something science. But yeah. I have them." It's the other, though, that really has her pausing over her meal. "I was just thinking about all of this, and how we kind of want a way to stop it. But that's the thing, isn't it? I mean.. I don't know. I didn't know her. I've never met another one of me. I mean, for all I know I'm it. But if there are more people like me out there, who could become like me, is it right for us to stop it? I mean, not like Zola plans, but.." She looks helpless for a moment, before saying quietly, "I'm not a thing to vaccinate your kids against like you're worried they'll get measles. I know what people think about mutants, and how they'd stop that from ever happening if they could. I guess I'm afraid?"
Clint Barton	"Someone survived?" Cal says suddenly curious. "Did you get his name?" he asks her. Though at the mention of the crystals being incomplete. "Well, like I said, not my best work," he admits. "But if you've got scans, I could take a look, and see if they can be fixed." "Oh no, you're not a disease, you're special, you've got a destiny, a purpose, or at least that's what your mother said, that all of you are born with a purpose, a reason for being, a reason for your powers... even if it's not always easy to see." He says patting her hand. "So, no, we shouldn't stop more of you from being made, but, not Zola, not HIM. He'll take them and experiement on them, CUT THEM TO PIECES, or turn them into THINGS, little soldiers wasting their gifts serving HIM," Cal says suddenly on his feet. He steps away from the couch, balling and unballing his fists while he tries to make himself breathe "Sorry, I'm sorry, just that man," he makes a face. "Well, not even a man, /thing/ disgusts me." Walters steps through the door then, hearing the noise. "Everything okay in here?"
Skye Johnson	Skye winces as Cal gets worked up. "yeah. None of us want him to do that." Though she'd not thought of that angle. She'd thought about how bad it would be.. and how horrible it would be for people who had no clue who or what they were to go through what she had. It had been bad enough knowing what would happen - sort of - let alone if Zola found a way to essentially weaponize the stuff and turn folks all unsuspecting. "We can get you to look at them -" She stops at Walters steps in. "Fine. Things are fine. My fault." In a way. She'd brought up Zola's plans. Cal seems to be calming? "Hey, dad? Food? The kitchen made this special for us. Totally off menu." Hoping to distract.
Clint Barton	Cal nods, "Good, the man's a monster, what his people did to your mother..." he says shuddering before nodding about looking at the scans. Walter's entrance earns a scowl but he holds his hands up. "Don't believe her," he says pasting on a smile. "The fault was all mine. Sorry, very sorry." Walters ignores Cal but Skye's answer is enough for her, he gives a sympathetic look through the eyeguard of the mask and then returns to her post letting the door shut behind her. "Oh right, the noodles," he says like they'd just popped back into existance. "Let's give this place a try, I admit, I was curious to try it when I found out about it," he says sitting back down like the outburst hadn't just happened. "Which one do you want? You brought them all the way from the city, so, I don't want to be greedy."
Skye Johnson	"Clint and I sometimes share," Skye suggests with a small smirk. "He still orders off the menu. The kitchen likes me." She's secretly glad that Walter's is willing to take the assurance that everything is okay. Midway through a mouthful of noodles, Skye says, "I don't know anything about my mother. I don't even really know anything about you. All we had was that I wasn't human. And the attack on the village." She considers, before sharing the name of the man who had helped them on their China visit. "He said she was a good woman. He was glad that I had been saved. Oh! And he gave me a picture of us. As a family." It was one of her most treasured possessions, and knowing Skye had so very few of those, that said a lot.
Clint Barton	"Of course they like you," Cal says beaming. "And we can share too. I promise I don't have cooties. Do people still say that?" he shakes his head. "Should I get us bowls or do we share out of what you brought?" He looks to Skye to show him the way. "You got a picture? I'm glad, I have a few, too few, back where we met, if Zola's people didn't take them," he says with a frown. "I can tell you where to find them if you want to look." Then he seems like a kid in a candy store, so many stories to tell he doesn't know where to begin. He takes a breath. "Well, your mother was very old even when we met, but you can probably tell from the picture she still looked young, that was her gift, a long life, and healing." He smiles fondly and sadly. "Anyhow when we met, I'd just graduated med school, and was doing some time with Doctors Without Borders, to try and give back. Anyhow, I was only supposed to be in China for a couple of months, but when I met your mother, I knew that wasn't going to be long enough, so I overstayed my Visa and just sort of moved into the village. The people liked me there, I liked myself, we were happy." Another bittersweet smile claims Cal's features as he remembers. "I remember the day you were born, your mother woke up first and for some reason she decided to clean the house before telling me, then it was all rush, rush, you see there was only one car in the village and we didn't own it, so I had to go negotiate, except my Chinese was bad... anyhow, it was a real mess until Mr. Yang understood what the car was for and we managed to get to the hospital in time." He smiles at her. "I still remember when they gave you to me to hold, I promised you I wouldn't let anything hurt you," the smile crumples as his eyes moisten with unshed tears. "I am sorry I failed. I am sorry I couldn't protect you, from Zola, from SHIELD, from all of it. I tried, I honestly did."
Skye Johnson	Skye nudges her chin towards the takeout containers. "Right from the cartons. Stealing is fair game. Like these pork bits - you have to try one!" Her bowl is offered over for Cal to snag a bit of the heaven of which she speaks. Then she's watching his face as he tells the story. It's all the things she wanted when she was a child and never had. Skye has so many, many questions, until he starts apologizing. "Hey, hey, wait. You didn't fail. And SHIELD didn't hurt me. They're family. They're the people who've looked out for me all along. It took me a long while to figure that out when I learned that Fury knew who I was all along. I had all this angry in me, only when things happened, they all put their lives on the line for me. They didn't care that I wasn't human. Or what I'd become. I was Skye to them. I was worth dying for. Made me realize it had been like that all along. All those agents who died trying to make it so that I lived and Hydra - Zola - never got me." It's still rather humbling to consider. "Hell, Fury is who got my ass cleared after the whole Rising Tide thing. Really, if they were going to shit on my parade, that's when it should have happened. And Zola.. Nobody could have stopped that. It was inevitable once it became known who I was and that I was alive." Skye was pretty sure, now, that that had been one of the initial pushes behind the affair that had led to the Rising Tide mision. "All that was different was who had a part in changing me. When it happened. Could have been better circumstances, but you wanted to do it, too. The rest? Part of my job. And I like my job. It makes me happy." A gentle warning that saving her from that wouldn't be taken well.
Clint Barton	Cal picks up some chopsticks and steals some pork from the bowl. "Mmm," he says before swallowing it down. "This is very good." "You were taken, of course I failed," Cal says. "I'm your /father/ it's my job to protect you." The rest though softens his mood a little. "You were happy then?" he says. "You /are/ happy?" he asks her, as if he hadn't been sure until this moment. "With all of it, except for how, /it/ happened?" meaning the change. "I wish I could have been there for it all, that we could have all been together, but I'm glad you found SHIELD," it seems a supreme act of will to admit that. "That they accept you, but I hope you still have room in your heart for your other family too, even if I'm a monster."
Skye Johnson	"We really need to talk about that monster bit," Skye points out, then quiets as she considers an answer to the other. "I wasn't happy," she admits. "I felt like a monster. Like I'd been lied to all my life. Or like I'd stopped being me.." She shrugs, knowing the truth might not be what he wants to hear, knowing that he'd like to hear differently. "But now?" Her answer is complicated. "If if could have chosen to have this or not, I don't know what my answer would have been. I didn't get to think about that very long. But I like me. I like who I am. And what I've become. Even if this is part of it." A small grin settles on her lips and lights the brown of her eyes. "I can do some really neat stuff. Turns out I'm not just a one trick pony like everyone thought. Turning out to be a pretty kick ass Agent, too." Nodding. "Yeah. I'm happy. And yeah, I have room for you. For.. well, you make it sound like there was just her, but you're my dad. Like everything else, took me a bit, but I'm glad."
Clint Barton	Cal nods, looking into his noodles, saying "Sure," about the monster bit. He takes a sullen slurp of what's in his bowl as he listens to Skye tell her tale. "I am still sorry you had to go through all of that, even if you are happier now..." he says but leaves off, looking back at his noodles. He smiles faintly at the last. "Of course you're a kick ass agent," he says. "You're my daughter. And what sort of neat stuff?" he asks. "Are we talking powers or things you learned along the way?" The smile broadens and his own brown eyes light up as she says she has room for him. "I'd hug you but it'd spill the soup," he says with a little bit of laughter in his voice of the silliness of that. "But see, growth. Old me would have hugged you anyway, mess be damned, in this case though I'll just have to owe you until we're done." He says before he adds quickly. "If that's okay?"
Skye Johnson	"Owing me? Sure thing. Clint would have hugged me anyway. We're kind of messy people." It was true. They had a maid service for a reason. "And I didn't mean it like that, the monster bit. I mean, you're scary, and that's what people see you as, but you weren't always like that. I guess that's what I want to know is why, and how." Then she asks him directly, "Are you happy like that?"
Clint Barton	"Well then," Cal says and leans over through the take out to give Skye a brief hug, only managing to splash soup a little bit. He dabs at his shirt with a napkin. "There," he says about the hug. Then it's time to talk about being a monster. "Of /course/ I..." he begins before stopping himself letting out a long slow breath. "What I mean is of course I'm not happy to be a monster, I only became this because my family was gone, /you/ were gone and I had to be stronger to get you back. I had to make people give you back." He shakes his head. "I didn't want to be this way, I wasn't like this before, I wasn't I was a /good/ man... but /Zola/ he took it all away and I had to change, had to be stronger."
Skye Johnson	The hug leaves a slosh of soup on Skye as well, but it's not unexpected, or the worst she's had. She slurps up some of her remaining noodles as he dabs himself off, listening to his explanation. "SHIELD will probably want to know how, but, do you ever think about before? About going back. I mean, do you miss that person who you were?" She doesn't mean to imply that he's not a good man still, but she's curious. And even more than that.. "If we could find a way to make it go away, would you want to be that man again?"
Clint Barton	Cal nods without hesitation, "I can give them the formula if you want, the stuff I took to make me like I am. Though when they took my injection device off me I bet they scanned it and know most of it already. I hope they don't expect you people to take it, like crystals, it was a... work in progress." If Skye's had time to check the files on her father's intake, the formula was a nightmarish mix of amphetamines and steroids. Effective, but toxic. "Of course I do... I don't want to be a monster forever, but... Zola, he's still out there," his eyes take on a murderous glint. "I still owe him pain."
Skye Johnson	Skye isn't sure whether to be relieved or not by all this information - that her father has the formula for the crystals she's not surprised by, all things considered, but there is still that worry that it could be used against those who are like her. Then again, it could be used to create ones like herself - only without the benefit of any warning, or supports. Of the two contingencies, she'd rather they were all aware and prepared. Of her father's concoctions... she's heard.. some. The looks on Fitzsimmon's faces told her that what they weren't saying was unpleasant. "I worry about you," Skye says quietly. "I just found you. I don't want to lose you.." She understand, though, the need he holds within - it was the same with her, and her need to know where she came from, who she was. Everything. "I'm glad you're willing to help us."
Clint Barton	Cal had meant the formula that turned him into a monster, but he knew the formula for the crystals as well and was equally willing to share that with Skye. "Worried? About me?" Cal asks with a cock of his head. "I'll be fine, but I don't want to lose you either, now that I've found you. We're so close..." he lets that trail off, lips drawing into a line. He's quiet a moment then says, "Oh glad to help," absently before he takes a breath and says, "Daisy, there's something else I need to tell you."
Skye Johnson	"Yes, worried," Skye says with a scowl that she immediately regrets, tempering it to something softer and more vulnerable. "You're still my father. Of course I'm worried about you." She almost adds, 'and I've met Zola' - but then again, so has Cal. She expected he knew the formula to the concoction that kept him the rage monster that he was. She wasn't sure if he could even stop taking it now. To be truthful, Skye was afraid to ask. What she could ask, though, was, "You'll help them, then? To refine the formula for the crystals?" Adding, "If we knew what was necessary, we could stop Zola by removing the source?" She's stopped by his words, a small furrow of brow creeping back over her features. "Okay?" Something 'else' was a rather wide and vague territory.
Clint Barton	There's a frown for that scowl. "Make faces like that it may get stuck that way," he says lightly, eyeing her, trying to see where he might have gone wrong. The rest of her words explain it. "It's a new concept for me.," he says. "Very few people worry about psychotic rage monsters." He says failing at making a joke of it. He nods, "Sure, glad to do it. Whatever they need. They should also have some original crystals too, that was what I was hoping to trade for, the crystals SHIELD got in the forties. Your mother's original crystals." As for Zola, he nods, "Yes, cutting off his supply of Terrigen should take care of Zola's plans, but so would letting me rip his..." he stops himself. "But yes, that'll stop him from making more crystals, it can't be synthezied, better minds than his have tried for centuries." That last bit though, he frowns gathering his thoughts. "I'm sure I should have said this sooner, but I wasn't sure... Daisy, your mother is still alive."
Skye Johnson	The scowl, of course, was how Skye still often defaulted to having emotions. It had served her well for years at keeping people away from her - this whole concept of letting people in was relatively new to her. She's glad when her father understands and relaxes, because, of course, she'd meant no harm by it. "Terrigen," Skye repeats, nodding. That's what she'd been told by Fitzsimmons once they'd had more information to go on. As for the original crystals, Skye knew they existed, but she's been reluctant to hunt them down up to this point. That, and she's had a lot of other things on her plate of late. "You can't rip Zola's head from his body. He's not got a body. Not really." That much she knew now. She'd seen what had happened to him after her change. She'd also started finding enough information in the files SHIELD had on him that she was becoming uncomfortably suspicious of a few other things as well. When her father drops the bombshell, Skye is lost in thought about the whole Zola matter. The whole whole how /did/ they deal with him anyway? Then... "Wait. What? My mother - I thought you said he.. they.. huh?"
Clint Barton	Cal's emotions change on a dime and so as quick as he had concerns they're let go focusing instead on Zola. "Right... he's a computer or a robot or something now, isn't he?" Cal says with a frown. "I'll rip his robot head off, you can delete him," he says with a sage nod as if that solved everything. Then it was on to the uncomfortable subject of Skye's mother. "They did, Zola and his people cut her to pieces and threw her away like trash," Cal explains, his voice taking on a darker tone. "But I found her, and I put her back together," he pauses, wetting his lips a haunted look in his eyes. "Her powers did the rest." Looking down at his hands where they clench and unclench. "We tried to find you, for years, but when Lumley vanished and the trail got cold..." he swallows. "She left." He turns, looking at Skye, his eyes imploring her to listen. "It's not that she didn't care, but, it had been so long and she had been through so much... I am sure you're very angry with her, but she was," he pauses. "She is a good person. She just lost hope." Cal's eyes examine Skye's face for what she might be thinking or feeling. "I was hoping when this is all over we might be able to find her together, and be a family again."
Skye Johnson	There's a slow look of dawning horror on Skye's face as the story is related - even with the explanation that her mother had 'healed' herself and was alive. The idea of her being cut into cubes and bits and pieces and tossed aside like /literal/ trash made her feel like she needed to be sick. And, of course, along with that, there was the familiar lurch and spike of her pulse. In her hands, the liquid in her bowl of ramen shimmies and ripples. "That's.. that's.." Skye swallows hard, and looks a little desperate to be rid of her bowl, holding it out to Cal pleadingly, and once divested of it, "She's aline. She's alive." Skye repeats the words to herself like a mantra, trying to calm herself, and failing as added to the horror of what was done, the fact that her mother was out there.. somewhere.. was another shock. That, and something about how he said she'd lost hope didn't sound very promising.
Clint Barton	Cal takes the bowl at once, setting it on the table before reaching for her hands. "Shhh, Daisy, it'll be okay, we mustn't lose our heads," he says. "She told me that a lot, musn't lose my head. It will be okay. We'll find her, then we'll be a family again. She can tell you all about your powers. She knows how to help you. She's been through it, helped others through it too, so she told me." He looks at her again, hoping for calm inspite of the fresh surprise of her mother being alive and what had been done with her.
Skye Johnson	"How could you have kept that from me?" Skye asks softly, her voice strained, even though she knows that she and her father have barely had time alone, let alone time to talk about such things. Still, the shock of it all is enough to leave her desperate to say something - anything - and that's what comes out. She manages, barely, to keep herself under control, only slight tremors of her hands giving her away. The surrounding furniture and other sundry items remain still, though. There's improvement for you! A sudden shock, and despite the surge in heartrate, Skye is keeping it together.
Clint Barton	Cal eases back when the shaking stops, but his eyes are fixed on Skye. "I didn't want to hurt you. Make you feel like she left you. She loved you, I just failed. But before I surrendered I'd hoped I'd find her now that I'd found you and we'd be a family again, and after... I didn't want SHIELD to go looking for her. To scoop her up and lock her away. But I was wrong, I should have told you right away." Looking up at his daughter Cal says, "Can you forgive me?"
Skye Johnson	It's than that Skye realizes how literally and personally her father takes things, and what a mistake it was to blurt the first thing that had come to mind when he'd told her. "No.. it's okay. I just was surprised is all. You - that is we - we didn't know what was happening. How things would be. I wouldn't have been able to hear it then. Before you agreed to come back here with me. Maybe not even when we talked the day I was kidnapped." She gives him a weak, and lopside, grin. "This has all been really hard for me. So many things that I've had to accept and get used to and try to figure out what they mean for me and who I am.." She shrugs and holds out a hand. "I.. I'd like to meet her. But you make it sound like she's, well, like something is wrong?"
Clint Barton	Nodding Cal says, "That's what I thought, it would be hard to hear. She's a really good woman but she's been through so much..." he shakes his head. "I should have found you sooner, given all she'd been through it was too much to ask her to go on..." Cal goes quiet, his eyes distant and sad until Skye asks if something is wrong. "What? No, nothing's wrong. She's just missing, and I am not sure where to find her, but we will," he reaches out to take Skye's hand. "I promise you that. We will find her, you'll meet her, and we /will/ be a family again," his hand squeezes a little too tightly before he lets go. "But, we might not be able to find her right now but, something she told me might help us find Zola. Did you know she's very old? Born over a hundred years ago now, when she was young people found her, your people, and took her to a place in the Himilayas to change and to be taught how to use her powers. But unfortunately, their refuge was found by the Nazis, by /Hydra/ and she was taken away along with some of her crystals, crystals harvested from that site. Zola did that. So, if he's looking for more terragen... that's where I bet he looks."
Skye Johnson	Skye frowns as she litens. It's not only a lot of information to take in, it's also important information for SHIELD. Not only because of Zola, but to prevent the haphazard turning of unsuspecting people. While she'd meant it when she said she didn't want to deny any who might be like herself, she also knew how traumatic it was to change - and she'd at least had a hint of a warning about what might happen. She couldn't imagine what it would have been like without any inkling of what was going on or why. Which was why they had to get to the terragen before Zola did. "We can't let him, or Hydra, get it."
Clint Barton	Cal, clear eyed for the moment nods. "Agreed, he needs to be stopped. I wish I had more information, but I suspect SHIELD won't have any trouble tracking him down from what I said, I think you have more details locked away in your files somewhere." Though given the vintage it's likely in a box in sub-basement 87-A or some place like that. "And I have a friend who can help too if you need it. Whatever I need to do to help stop him, you've got it."
Skye Johnson	"Oh, we have files," Skye says dryly. "I'm sorting through them now. I ran out of digital copies of things a while ago now." Though she suspected that some things, like Zola's files (and her own) had been left off computer records for a reason. And.. given what Zola was, Skye wasn't putting any of what she was finding out on any computer systems that connected to SHIELD. In fact, she'd been reluctant to put much of anything she was finding out on anything that connected the network at all. If there was one thing she'd learned in Rising Tide, and from the Tidepool mission as well, it was that nothing was safe, no matter how many filters and firewalls you threw up. It was, after all, one of the reasons she'd agreed to work with Oracle in girding up SHIELD's net loins so to speak - because Oracle was an entity unto itself. "Wait, a friend? Who?"
Clint Barton	Cal nods, though it's clear SHIELDs records don't interest him as much as finding Zola does. That last question it's met with a grimace. "You have to promise not to get mad... but Wendell Levi." The name is familiar, an early cyber-terrorist and master hacker, caused a lot of chaos in the early 2000s, stole money, crashed planes to manipulate airline stocks. Nobody in the hacking community wanted to touch him, then he upped and vanished. "SHIELD found him, put a chip in his arm, made it so he couldn't use computers... I removed it. He helped me keep track of you once your file was out there, and helped me find Lumley and a few of Zola's people. If you want him, I can tell you where to find him."
Skye Johnson	Skye groans and facepalms. She actually facepalms. "Oh, dad. You realize I'm an Agent of SHIELD, right?" Albeit one who had a VERY long track record (given how short a time she'd been an agent with them) of not following the rules. "Speaking of Lumley, I'm still angry with you about that. And yes, I'd like to meet Wendell. And no, I'm not going to.. okay, I may report him, but Fury and I have this thing. May, too. I'm not exactly your usual agent. Which you should be very happy about, because otherwise you would be in a lot of trouble right now."
Clint Barton	"Oh, you can report him, arrest him or put another chip back in his arm. He's got two powered people from the Index with him too. Angar and Noches. I found them in Madripoor. Don't need them anymore though, now that I've found you," Cal says of his former associates. "So, if it helps smooth thing over with SHIELD round them all up. They're really bad people, shouldn't be left to running around the streets." If he feels any loyalty to them it's burried deep. "As for Lumley... I'm sorry that went the way it did, I didn't want us to meet like that."
Skye Johnson	"Yeah. That was a bit of a shock," Skye admits, moving to sit cross-legged and face her father. "No more doing that. Okay? It's really hard to convince people not to shoot you full of tranzquilizers if you do that. And Lumely is kinda back with us." A warning, in case the two met up, and there were hard feelings. "I'll talk to the Assistant Director about them," Skye says thoughtfully. She's not sure what they'll end up doing. It may well be they'll be useful free and loose as much as under wraps. "Hey, wait. How did you take the tracker from his arm?" If it were as simple as just digging it out, the man could have done it himself. Then she laughs, "You know they keep threatening to lojack me, huh?"
Clint Barton	"I gave you my word, no more hurting people," Cal says lifting his hands in surrender. "I am not going to risk you not speaking to me again." He settles on the couch turning to face Skye while she turns to face him. "I'm not worried about Lumley." Though, that said, Cal wasn't the rage monster anymore, so, no matter how things used to be, Lumley could definitely be a threat. Cal simply bypasses talk of what will happen to his former associates and instead replies to the question about the tracker. "I'm a very good doctor, plus their anchoring mechanism wasn't as good as they must have thought. No explosive either, sloppy, but it did do it's job when he got near technology. So, I'll give them that." Though when she mentions being lojacked herself, Cal's brows raise sharply. "I hope you're joking or I may need to have some /words/ with this Director of yours, nobody is going to tag you like some wild animal."
Skye Johnson	"I'm not sure if they're joking or not," Skye says, grinning. "It's been noted that I have a very bad habit of disappearing when I've been told to stay put. And bypassing Trisk security. I'll pass on the info about the anchoring, but we don't put explosives in people. That's a Hydra thing." She frowns at the memory of her sojourn in Hydra, and the torture there. Hydra were not good people.
Clint Barton	"Sure, happy to help them with their tags as long as they don't end up going in you.," Cal says about passing on his info about the anchors. "Disappearing? Like the time you snuck out to see me?" he asks with a smile. "I am shocked." The last bit is met with a nod. "I hope so," he says of that line between Hydra and SHIELD.
Skye Johnson	"Maybe," Skye says with a grin. "But it's not the only time I've escaped." She's serious, though, when she nods and reaffirms, "We're not Hydra. Not even close. Most of our gear, even, is meant to neutralize, or hold people in place - not kill. We don't ever want to forget who we are and why we're doing this. It's too easy to become someone else if you let yourself excuse your actions." That said, she confesses with a frown, "I killed a man."
Clint Barton	There is pride in Cal's smile as he pats her arm, saying, "That's my girl," about the escapes. Though the humour drains from his face at the rest. He gives a nod to the differences between SHIELD and Hydra, a dismissive thing as if he didn't quite believe it. But then, SHIELD had been the big bad agency who took his daughter away for so long, the image of them as the enemy was hard to shake. That confession though, cuts to the core, and his expression is pained as he reaches out to touch her arm again this time letting his hand rest there. "I'm sorry," he says. "Do you want to talk about it?"
Skye Johnson	Skye shakes her head, nose crinkling. "Not really. It happened. Sometimes it can't be helped. It was the only weapon I had at hand. They were going to kill a hostage. Everyone faces it at some point, at least that's waht they told me. Said it's kind of a thing that tells you a lot about yourself when it happens." She sighs and gives her father a pained expression. "I'd do it again if I had to, but it was pretty horrible. A lot worse then when I shot Clint."
Clint Barton	"It's always hard," Cal offers. "I've never liked it," he says. "Oh maybe in the moment, when my temper is up, but after... there's always an after." He squeezes her arm, taking care to be gentle. "I hope it's not something you have to do it again." Though that last gets a blink. "You shot your... you shot Barton?" he can't quite make himself say that word: boyfriend.
Skye Johnson	"Yes, I shot Clint. And you realize I'm living with him, right? I mean, I know he's still pissed at you, and maybe you don't like him, but I happen to love him, and he makes me happy." She treats her father to a stern look. "You get that, right? That he's likely going to stay in my life, just like you. And I'd like it if you two maybe could get over this thing at some point?" Noooot that she expected Clint to forgive Cal for kidnapping him, but it certainly didnt' help that Cal insisted on calling Clint 'Barton'/