Coulson briefs his team on what they’ll be facing, including the fact that Marcus Daniels was an assistant at a physics lab which was trying to harness the energy of something called “Dark Force.”  “And nothing bad ever happens when you’re work with something called ‘Dark Force’,” he sarcastically adds.  Fitz tries to explain that it’s a form of cosmic radiation, but he looks at Trip’s face and realizes that Trip knew that already.  Daniels was exposed to the Dark Force, giving him the ability to absorb all forms of energy, including the life energy from people and the energy of normal weapons.  Last time they exposed him to pure light and overloaded his system to stop him, and Fitz promises to find a solution.  “That’s what I was hoping you were gonna say,” he tells Fitz.  He wants Trip to come along as specialist/pilot on the mission, and when he accepts Coulson tells him, “That’s what I was hoping you were gonna say.”

In the orientation room, Koenig runs down his list of questions from Ward, although his baseline readings are somewhat skewed by the pain he’s still feeling from his injuries (how convenient).  He thinks eggs are for eating while a rock is a weapon, in his island box he would have a pistol, and he’s still with the team because of duty.  Something about his last answer doesn’t suit Koenig, who pulls out a gun and points it right at Ward, asking if he’s associated with HYDRA.  Ward surprisingly answers yes, but goes on to explain that they all are, given how far HYDRA penetrated into SHIELD.  The readings keep getting worse as Koenig cocks his gun, asking if Ward has another agenda, wanting to know why he’s really here.  Ward hesitates, and eventually answers, “Skye.  I came back for her.  I want to spend time with her.”  “Cool,” Koenig replies, buying his answer and letting him leave.

Outside the room Ward leans up against the wall and pulls a thin piece of metal out of his thumb.  (Ouch!  I’m not sure what that was about, unless it helped him beat the lie detector by causing pain to fool the readings.)  Fitz corners him, ranting that Trip is going with him.  “He’s terrible, he’s a horrible person.”  Ward thinks Fitz’s issue is really about Simmons, and encourages him to tell her how he feels before it’s too late.  Fitz is taken aback by this change in behavior from Ward, but Ward covers it by switching gears and saying that he doesn’t care.

May is pissed that Coulson isn’t taking her with him, but Coulson wants her to stay and repair the Bus.  She tries to reminisce about how personal this mission is for Coulson, but he tells her that they “don’t do personal.  Not anymore.”  She’s frustrated that the polygraph cleared her but Coulson still doesn’t trust her.  He knows that she may not be hiding anything else, but that she chose to let him struggle to uncover the truth behind his resurrection instead of helping him, something he’s not ready to forgive.  “Our job is to follow orders,” she tells him.  “It’s also our job to determine right from wrong,” he replies.  But if she wants orders to follow, she can follow his.

On the small plane, Coulson fills in FitzSimmons on Marcus Daniels.  He tells them that Daniels was obsessed with a woman in Portland, who he called his “only light in the darkness,” which Simmons thinks is almost romantic.  He thinks he’ll still be obsessed with her despite being locked up for years, because “some people are hard to get over.”  Especially considering his powers basically fried his brain.  The woman’s name is Audrey Nathan (Amy Acker), who we flash to in the middle of jogging in a park.  She’s stretching against a light post, before putting on her headphones (with classical music, of course) and setting off.  Suddenly her music cuts out, and when she turns around she sees Daniels walking towards her, the streetlights going out as he passes them.

Trip and Simmons pull up in an SUV, as Simmons yells at Audrey to get in the car, because they’re CIA and are there to protect her.  As they drive away, Coulson and Fitz pull up, and Fitz sends his Dwarves to blast Daniels with light.  They try to talk him down, but he tells them that SHIELD experimented on him in the Fridge, making him stronger.  He blasts them with the Dark Force and escaping.  “This is where we’d normally call for reinforcements,” Coulson observes.

Back at Providence, Skye discovers that Koenig is tracking them all on his tablet using the locators in their lanyards.  He thinks she’s clever for figuring it out, while she thinks he’s sneaky for using that trick.  They realize they’re getting nowhere in tracking the escaped prisoners with the information at their disposal, so Skye proposes hacking the NSA satellites to give them more access.  Koenig thinks that’s a horrible idea, “Why poke the bear?  The big, scary, waterboarding bear?”  Skye criticizes his agent skills, saying she didn’t know he was the “agent of playing video games while hiding in a bunker.”

Ward shows up, and she encourages him to convince Koenig to act more like Steve Rogers and suit up, grab his shield and head into battle.  Ward obviously takes her side, and offers to backup the hard drive while she hacks the NSA.  However, Skye reveals that the hard drive has a location based encryption, meaning they’ll have to be in a particular place to decrypt it.  Koenig is impressed with her skills, deciding it’s time to live dangerously, and he gives her permission to hack the NSA, which should only take her an hour.  “Let’s see if being sneaky pays off,” he says to Ward, who looks like he’s trying so hard not to roll his eyes at the irony of Koenig’s statement.

Trip and Simmons have whisked Audrey away to a safe house, under cover of being part of the CIA.  Audrey sees right through Simmons’ horrible lying abilities, knowing that they’re really a part of SHIELD.  She doesn’t believe all of the horrible things that have been said about SHIELD on the news, and she starts to tell them the story of Daniels.  He used to come to all of his concerts, and at first she was flattered to have a groupie, until he showed up at her house one day and he shut down the power to the neighborhood.  However, SHIELD showed up when the cops didn’t believe her, and one SHIELD agent in particular.  He had a handsome, trustworthy face, swooping in like out of a movie.  They became very close, and he promise he’d stop Daniels, and he did.  That’s why she trusts SHIELD, because Phil never lied to her.  That’s Phil Coulson, by the way.

They’re all taken a little aback, especially Fitz who is listening from another room with Coulson.  Audrey says that she was informed that he was killed in the line of duty, right as they were planning a trip together.  She really misses him, and she still dreams about him and feels like he’s watching over her.  Fitz suggests that he go talk to her, but Coulson says that she’s healing and he doesn’t want to interfere.  Unfortunately, Fitz’s plan to stop Daniels might just involve using her as bait, something Coulson’s not at all thrilled about.

Ward goes to check on May, with a gun in his pants that is a literal gun and not a euphemism.  She tells him the Bus is ready to fly, with a patched fuel line and a full tank.  She grabs her duffel bag and starts to walk off, fed up with the fact that Coulson can’t forgive her for lying to him.  Ward understands why she did, particularly as she was just following orders.  She feels like she’s lost Coulson, and he doesn’t need her any more.  She heads away and Ward asks what he should tell Coulson.  “Whatever you want.  He won’t hear it.”  May heads out the secret door and off into the frozen tundra.

Ward goes to check on Koenig, who is thrilled that Skye’s hacking seems to have paid off.  They now have access to all of the NSA’s satellite feed, and Koenig now gets why Ward likes her.  “I guess living on the edge really pays off sometimes,” he says, as Ward menacingly closes the door behind him.

In Portland, Audrey is set up as bait during her normal rehearsal time, while being reassured that the agents will be close.  Simmons even points to a window where Coulson is hidden watching and tells her that their best agent is keeping an eye on her.  Fitz has rigged a device to a stage light that amplify its power to the point of turning the light into gamma rays.  The device was designed by Bruce Banner, and as Coulson sarcastically points out, “Then I’m sure it’ll go off without a hitch.”

Skye shows up in the communications room looking for Koenig, who is nowhere to be seen.  Ward is there, however, and he tells her that May has left.  Skye is hurt and betrayed by that, but it reinforces her pain from May’s actions.  “She never felt anything for us, did she?  She just played us so she could keep an eye on Coulson.”  Skye asks if Ward felt anything for May, but he says no, that what they had was comforting because they knew they didn’t have to feel.  “You can’t choose to feel,” Skye says, but Ward says that usually he can choose.  “It’s different with us,” he confesses.  Skye’s a little surprised by his use of the word “us,” especially since their kiss was more one of those “we’re going to die” sort of kisses.  Ward puts on the charm, however, telling her that they have to start somewhere, while finally offering her that drink that they’ve talked about for so long.

Fitz wants to know why Coulson doesn’t tell Audrey that he’s still alive.  What they had was nice, but Coulson doesn’t want to hurt her again, particularly because it’s not like he can say.  Fitz, on the other hand, makes a comment while watching Simmons wondering about being too afraid to say anything, which isn’t a problem for Coulson.

Skye grills Ward on his unusual way of showing his feelings, which he passes off on being a Specialist trained to keep his emotions in check.  He wanted to stay focused, but Skye was different in a way that was bad for him in terms of his ability to do his job.  But when he saw her after she was shot, fighting for her life, that’s when he realized his feelings.  Skye tells him that he doesn’t have to shut people out, but he replies, “Yeah I do.  There are things about me that you wouldn’t like if you knew.”  These things aren’t like the skeletons in Skye’s closet, they’re much darker.  Skye’s good, but Ward says that he’s “not always” good.  He tells her that he lied when he told the story of his brothers.  It wasn’t his older brother who beat up the younger brother, in reality it was the older brother forcing Ward to beat up the younger brother, which he did because he was afraid to stand up to him, and his parents were even worse.  “I am not a good man, Skye,” he says, sounding broken.  She moves closer, saying “Yes you are,” and in a moment they’re kissing again.  Before things go too far, however, she gets some blood on her finger from a spot behind his ear.  She looks confused but he tells her one of the cuts on his face must have opened up and he runs off to clean up.

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