After the break we find out that some of the SHIELD agents are going to stay behind and surrender (though somehow I can’t imagine that going particularly well for them).  May also informs Coulson that there’s no fuel left in the facility, so they’re stuck with only what was in the Bus when they arrived.  Coulson thanks Trip for his help with the repairs, but when Trip asks for a bunk in return Coulson says no, despite the fact that the team is down a specialist with Ward gone.  Trip spent a lot of time with Garrett, and while Trip says he was just as fooled as everyone else, Coulson doesn’t trust him.  Simmons says that she thinks he should be allowed onboard, and when Coulson reminds her that “this isn’t a democracy” she contradicts him and says they should all get a vote.  She reminds him of how Trip was willing to die both for her and for SHIELD, and Coulson relents, although he tells Simmons that Trip is her responsibility.

Onboard the Bus and in the air, Coulson makes the rounds, checking in on the team and their status.  He tells Fitz that they’ll need a way to hide from Talbot, but Fitz informs him that they don’t have the ability to cloak, so they’ll just have to try to avoid encounters with other aircraft.  Simmons says tells him that they only have a few days of rations left.  Trip tells him the fuel line is busted and that they only have four hours of fuel left.  “Awesome,” Coulson replies dryly.  He goes to Skye looking for good news, who helpfully tells him that “we have internet.”  “Yay!… and boy have I lowered my expectations,” Coulson responds.  He tells Skye to go online and erase every trace of the team’s existence, turning them into ghosts.  She thinks that’s a little extreme (she calls it the “nuclear option”), and observes that now they’re just “Agents of Nothing.”  Oh, and Coulson wants her to collect everyone’s SHIELD badges, too.

No one’s heard from Ward, so Skye gives him a call.  He’s surprised to get it, but he quickly slips back into the role he’d played for months, telling Skye that Agent Hand ordered a detour for the flight to take Garrett to the Fridge in order to avoid Talbot’s forces.  Skye tells him that she erased his identity, but he’s not too concerned as it’s not the first time his identity has been compromised.  She asks who he wants to be now that he has a clean slate, and he answers “Tom Brady,” which Skye thinks was a predictable answer, what with the millions of dollars and the supermodels.  They also talk about getting that drink once they’re reunited.

Once he hangs up, Garrett points out that Ward always hated the Patriots, but Ward tells him that the version of him that Skye knows doesn’t hate them.  Garrett’s impressed with the depth of Ward’s deception of the team, telling him that not even Romanoff could pull it off.  Ward, however, is still pissed that Garrett had Skye shot, and Garrett observes that it would have been easier for everyone if he’d had Skye killed when they first encountered her.

Raina comes in, and Garrett commends her for her work thus far, particularly the “tip about the cellist.”  He tells her that they’re going to implement phase three of Centipede and Raina will be in charge.  She’s confused, because they were never able to obtain the information they needed about Coulson’s resurrection, but Garrett shows her several vials of drugs which he took from the Ghost House.  They’ve been testing them on subjects but haven’t had the results they’ve expected.  Her eyes light up at the prospect of working on the project, and Garrett promises her all of the money and resources she needs.  Ward hands over the backup hard drive from the Bus which Skye gave to him for safekeeping, which might be of some help to Raina, but in the meantime Ward and Garrett are going to go raid the Fridge.

On the Bus, which is flying just a few feet above the water, Skye has collected all of the SHIELD badges from the group. Apparently, Simmons choked up when Skye asked her to hand it over.  Skye’s not happy about the situation either, particularly considering she just got her badge and was finally a part of something.  However, what she’s feeling probably can’t compare to what Coulson must be feeling, considering he “literally gave his life for SHIELD.”  As he gathers up the badges and goes to put them in his safe, he tells her about how he was recruited just out of high school by Nick Fury.  As if waiting for a mention of that name, Coulson’s badge lights up, revealing a set of coordinates under the SHIELD logo.

He gathers the group together to share this new information, which he believes must have come from Fury, himself, as it’s “totally his style.”  He’s determined to head to the coordinates, hoping it’s some sort of rally point for SHIELD where they can regroup and reform.  “So far everything’s been a trap,” Trip helpfully points out, but Coulson isn’t interested.  He’s convinced that he’s right, and reminds them of the oath they swore to SHIELD.  And if “anyone wants off, ‘chutes are in the bay.”  I guess he’s really not interested in discussing it.

Garrett works on preparing his troops to infiltrate the Fridge, though interestingly when one soldier enthusiastically offers the HYDRA salute Garrett tells him to calm down.  It seems like Garrett’s less interested in the cause than in the power that he wields.  Raina and Ward share a moment, while Ward observantly notes that Raina is disappointed that Garrett isn’t actually clairvoyant.  She confesses that she had a question she wanted to ask if he had been what was advertised.  She asks Ward how he could stand to get so close to Coulson’s team and just betray them, but Ward says it was easy, as “I’m everyone’s type.”  He talks about jumping from a plane to save Simmons, as acts of self-sacrifice are good at earning trust, but it’s also about giving people what they need to see.  “I gave Coulson a person he thought he could help… the plane’s full of them.”  Raina points out that despite being on different sides of this war, Coulson is a good man.  Ward agrees, and says that he owes Coulson, but that he owes Garrett everything.

May heads in to Coulson’s office for a chat, but he’s not having any of it after learning that she was spying on him from the beginning.  He tells her to skip the part where she acts like she cares about him, and she jumps straight into asking him to surrender his weapon.  Coulson says he has faith that Nick Fury is still alive, but May thinks HYDRA might be controlling him.  She lets slip that Fury may have ordered Coulson’s resurrection, but someone else was actually in charge of T.A.H.I.T.I., although she doesn’t know who.  Considering that they implanted false memories in Coulson’s head, who knows what else they might have put in there.  Coulson refuses to hand over his gun, and looks May straight in the eye and asks, “Do you want to try to take it from me?”  She thinks about it for a second and then backs down.

Down below, Fitz tells Simmons and Trip that he has to trust Coulson, while Trip thinks that Coulson’s “chasing the white whale.”  “Have you even read Moby-Dick?” Fitz asks.  “Yes, have you?” Trip replies, and Fitz’s lack of an answer clearly shows that he hasn’t.  Simmons has some doubts about Coulson and their current destination, but Fitz is more loyal than she.  “Now’s the time for sticking with the guy you trust,” he says.

The Fridge, which is 100 stories tall, is on lockdown and only accessible from the roof.  Ward and Garrett are dropped off by the small plane they were originally taking with Hand, which leaves as soon as they’re clear.  Garrett’s in handcuffs and Ward is acting as his escort.  The entrance on the roof is watched by two guards, who stand behind a glass door and tell Ward that they have orders from Hand not to let anyone in unless Hand is with them.  Ward tries to act like Hand just dropped them off, and it’ll be a waste of her time to turn around and come back just to prove that, but the guards won’t budge.  Suddenly a helicopter arrives and starts shooting at Ward and Garrett, who take cover behind a vent as the bullets bounce off the glass doors of the entrance.  Ward again asks the guards to let them in, and they finally relent and the four of them board an elevator.  After the doors close, Ward shoots the two guards and Garrett removes his handcuffs.  “Let’s go shopping,” he says, as he and Ward pull out gas masks.

A short while later, after the building has been gassed, Garrett, Ward and the HYDRA forces set about looting the building.  Garrett talks about one of the early prisoners he sent to the Fridge, Johnny Horton, who gave himself lion’s paws for hands.  He reminds Ward of the Slingshot program, which supposedly sends dangerous things that SHIELD has discovered into space, but which in fact is just a cover as most of the rockets were empty.  The items were in fact stored at the Fridge by Fury, which Garrett enthusiastically calls the “toy store.”  He tells the troops, “If it looks dangerous, good… alien, even better.”  They comb through shelves and shelves of mysterious, hazardous items, and Garrett finds something in particular that catches his eyes, a plasma particle beam.

The Bus sets down in the middle of a snowy plain beside a forest.  Coulson informs the group that it’s about 7 miles to the coordinates on his badge.  Trip suggests a recon mission, but they don’t have time for that as a satellite will pass over in 8 hours which will easily spot the enormous black plane in the middle of the snow, so they’ll all have to go together.  He tells them that a lot has changed in just a short amount of time, but he has no doubts about going to the coordinates.  He tells everyone that the choice to come is up to them, but that he’ll be going with or without the rest of them.  But, of course, everyone decides to come along.

At the Fridge, Garrett has freed all of the prisoners, telling one confused guy to chase his dream.  “This ought to keep Coulson busy for a while,” he says to Ward.  Garrett’s ready to leave, but Ward tells him of a secret hidden beneath the lowest level which Garrett doesn’t believe exists.  They bet a dinner on it, and Ward takes the plasma gun from Garrett and blows a hole in the floor.  The two lean over and look down into it, as a shiny, reflected light plays across their faces.

Coulson’s crew hikes through the woods, with Coulson looking determined while the rest follow rather reluctantly.  Simmons is worried about bears, but Fitz isn’t detecting any on his scanner, or anything else, including some sort of hidden base or other agents.  In a touching moment, Simmons tells him that at least they still have each other, but when Fitz says that he doesn’t want things to change she tells him that it’s too late for that.  May and Skye walk side by side, and Skye asks why May spied on them for Fury.  May, who I guess has decided there’s no harm in coming clean at this point, tells her that Fury was concerned about negative consequences if Coulson found out the truth of what happened to him.  Skye points out that that hardly matters anymore, because Coulson’s entire world has fallen apart, and May sadly and quietly adds that “he’s not the only one.”

They finally find the spot, but there seems to be nothing around.  Simmons wonders how long they should wait before heading back to the Bus, but Coulson tells them they’re out of fuel so there’s no point to that, shocking some of the team.  Coulson, finally starting to believe that it’s hopeless, gives a speech about how they can’t let HYDRA win because they world still needs us.  “We’re not Agents of Nothing,” he says, instead they’re still Agents of SHIELD.  He brings out his badge and says that it still carries weight, in spite of what’s happened.  After a moment, however, the burden of the past few days gets to him and he seems to break down and give up.  His shoulders slump and he quietly apologizes to them before throwing his badge away as hard as he can.  Just as it leaves his hand, an automated turret emerges from the snow and blasts his badge out of the sky, as Fitz helpfully observes that he thinks they’ve found what they were looking for.

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