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"The strategy of it is a bit shaky, but I think we can pull it off," Phil said as they walked down the hall together, going over some mission specs on his tablet.
"It's more than a bit shaky, Phil," she replied with a sigh. She nearly bumped into him as he paused in the doorway of the rec room, watching their team with that familiar fond smile on his face. She leaned in the doorway and folded her arms, feeling her own small smile touch her lips. They were all gathered round, joking and laughing and drinking beers. It was nice to see them all so relaxed, given the recent events.
Hunter was standing in front of the assembled team, a sheet of paper in his hand. "Remember, last week when we nearly got killed-," he started, but was cut off by Daisy.
"Was that last week? Or this week? Or the week before that?" she quipped, earning a glare from the Brit. "What? I'm just saying, we nearly get killed like every week."
"She's got a point," Mack shrugged, and Hunter huffed.
"GUYS. Anyway, last week when we nearly got killed, remember how May totally saved our asses and I said something along the lines of us being like tiny ducklings following her?"she said, a large grin growing on his face. "Well, I got bored, so I did this."
He holds up the paper in front of them, and May hears a round of laughs and giggles from them.
"That is so adorable," Jemma chuckles, and May's frown deepens. If Hunter had superimposed her head on a duck she was going to kill him and nothing Phil or anyone else said would stop her.
"It's slightly alarming. But erm, I suppose it's cute," Fitz says, scratching the back of her head awkwardly.
Daisy snatched the page from his hand and produced a marker from somewhere on her person. "There. I made it better," she said with a proud grin.
"Mama May and the Duckling Squad?" Bobbi read. "Forgive my pessimism, but I'm thinking you guys should probably get rid of that before May actually comes in here and starts kicking asses."
"No way," Daisy said, grabbing a few tacks and pinning the page to the corkboard in the far corner of the room. May won't admit that she can't see that far without her glasses, not in a million years. "Look, May might not know it, but she is practically the 'mom' of our team. She cares for everyone here, and even if she doesn't say it, she shows it to us everyday by not letting us die."
"Pretty sure she's told me she hates my guts," Hunter said, prompting another round of laughs.
"Daisy is right, though. I mean, when we still lived on the Bus, we all referred to May and Coulson as 'Mom and Dad'. They never knew of course, but I think they both care about all of us as though we are their children," Jemma told them.
"Did you know about that?" May asks, looking over at Coulson suspiciously.
"About what?" he asks, a pseudo-innocent look on his face. He's rocking on his feet now, a sign Melinda knows to be a tell for when he's lying.
"Phil."
"Well, alright, maybe, yeah. Daisy started it a few weeks after she came onto the Bus, when we were working the Akela Amadore case," he replies, shrugging. "It seemed harmless enough, heck it was even flattering as they continued. Look, I know that children is a bit of a sore point for you, all things considered, but, well, to me, I couldn't have asked for better pseudo-children. And I do care for them all as if they're family."
May gives him a small frown but her attention is drawn back to the team in the room.
"Mama May and Papa Phil!" Daisy crows, and they all begin laughing, but it's cut off when Phil steps into the room. "D.C! May!" Daisy squeaks, embarrassment turning her cheeks red.
May takes the opportunity to wander over to the corkboard where the page Daisy had pinned rests, lazily flapping from the air conditioning vent. She rolls her eyes when she actually makes out the photograph. It is a picture of a mother duck and a line of ducklings following it. Each of the ducklings' heads have been replaced with a headshot of one of the members of the team, and the mother's head had been replaced with a picture of her own profile. Scrawled beneath it in Daisy's scrappy handwriting is indeed 'Mama May and the Duckling Squad'. May suddenly felt a very light, warm feeling building in her stomach.
"Who did this?" she said, spinning around to face them, interrupting Coulson's speech.
They all shot her an uncomfortable look, squirming in their seats. Daisy suddenly shot her finger out and in the most childish gesture, said, "It was all Hunter's idea!"
"Oh for the love of....! Honestly, you've just given her a reason to hate me even more!" Hunter cried, cringing when he looked over at her and saw May's unreadable face. "Besides, you're the one that wrote on it!"
May arched a single brow and looked at each of them, they really did look like scolded children. She sighed when she realised that she really did care for each of them, though her care for Hunter was considerably less than the others.
"I don't hate you quite as much," she finally said, and her eyes met Phil's. He was smirking at her, the one that said he knew exactly what she was thinking. God, sometimes she wished she could wipe that goofy grin off his face. She rolled her eyes and left the room, leaving them all gobsmacked.
"Did she just...?" Daisy said, looking over at Coulson.
"I think she did," Fitz continued.
"She did," Coulson finally said, "but I wouldn't try my luck calling her that all the time." He smiled at the assembled team of 'kids', before snapping back to the present. "Anyway, mission debriefing in a couple hours, okay?"
With that the Director left the room, leaving his agents staring after him and wondering what just happened. (Hunter was honestly just glad that May didn't try to kill him again.)
XXX
"You like it," he said to her with a grin folding his arms and standing in front of her where she sat at her desk, reading over some paperwork.
"I never said that," she replied, glancing up at him before scribbling at something with her pencil.
"You don't have to. Come on, Mel, I've known you for what? Thirty years now? I know when you like something," he snorted, sitting on the edge of her desk and looking down at her.
She rolled her eyes at him. "And? What would it matter if I did like it?" she said, arching one perfect brow at him, sitting back in her chair and folding her arms.
He shrugged, that dopey grin on his face again. "It means you think it's sweet, you're flattered, and you now see yourself as a mother to the crazy, mismatched, thrown together team of kids downstairs," he replied, his smile growing wider.
She rolled her eyes at him again. "I do not," she huffed.
"Do too. And, now that we're finally on the same page where our kids are concerned, I've been noticing some very strange behaviour coming from Daisy and Lincoln-," he started, but May cut him off with a groan.
"Phil, you are such a dork. And Daisy and Lincoln can do whatever they want, so long as they keep the noise down, unlike Bobbi and Hunter," she said, looking up at him.
Phil frowned, shuddering at the thought. "May, please, I'd rather not think about my little girl in that kind of situation," he huffed, folding his arms petulantly.
"She's twenty-six, Phil. Ugh, honestly, you're being such a dork right now," she said.
He pouted at her, but finally said, "Your dork?"
May sighed, allowing a small smile. "My dork."
He grinned and leaned down, cupping the side of her face with his real hand and kissing her gently. May hummed against his mouth, covering his hand with her own gently as she tipped her head up to kiss him deeper.
"Oh. Woah, sorry! Forget I was here, like totally, you guys carry on!" Daisy said, suddenly appearing in the doorway, wide-eyed at seeing the position of the Director and his second-in-command. She backed out the room with a large grin on her face and then skipped down the hall screaming.
"SIMMONS! SIMMONS! GUESS WHAT I JUST SAW!! MOM AND DAD ARE TOTALLY MAKING OUT AND FITZ OWES ME TWENTY BUCKS!"
May groaned and thumped her head down on her desk.
"She gets her prankster side from you, you know," Phil said, laughing.
May shot him a half-hearted glare.