It’s the penultimate episode of Agents of SHIELD, and things are shaping up for a thrilling finish to the season.  After last week’s exciting showdown between Ward and Skye, as well as the rest of the team discovering Ward’s treachery and a great appearance from Maria Hill, tonight’s episode saw our crew digging for more information on HYDRA’s plans while we also got to see a bit of how Ward became the traitor he is today.  We also got some new revelations on a variety of fronts, and a killer cliffhanger leading into next week’s finale.  So let’s jump into tonight’s episode, “Ragtag,” written by Jeffrey Bell and directed by Roxann Dawson.

We open 15 years ago at a secure juvenile detention center in Massachusetts.  We see a teenager being led into a common area by some guards, and who should be waiting for him but a younger John Garrett.  Garrett came to meet him because he belongs to a group who likes to recruit young, pissed off guys who went AWOL from training camp, stole a car and burned down their parents house, with their older brother still inside.  Of course, Ward tells Garrett that he had no idea that his bully of an older brother was inside.  Garrett doesn’t seem to be buying that, however.

Garrett tells Ward that his parents are pressing charges on arson and attempted murder, and Ward’s brother is trying to get him charged as an adult.  Garrett offers an alternative, for Ward to join him and let him “teach you how to be a man.”  Ward’s not eager to trust Garrett, which pleases Garrett.  “Don’t trust anybody, ever.  Especially me.”  He promises that no one will ever screw with Ward again, that it’ll be hard but fun, and gives him 10 seconds to say yes.  Ward uses half of those seconds to think before agreeing, just as men with guns burst in.  “I told you it was gonna be fun,” Garrett says with a smile.

At their motel, Coulson and his crew watch the news, who are reporting on a drug lord in Columbia who was killed by something that burst through walls to get to him.  The reporter wonders whether it was a man, a monster or a machine that did it, but Fitz points out that the answer is “all of the above,” meaning Deathlok.  Coulson calls the team together around an easel with circles drawn on it filled with the names of their enemies, all gathered around a large, blank circle.  Inside that circle Coulson writes “Cybertek,” and proceeds to draw complicated lines showing how all of the people they’ve been fighting are all connected by Cybertek, who designed Deathlok, shipped supplies to Quinn, who worked for the Clairvoyant, who is really Garrett, who sent Ward to spy on Coulson in order to find GH-325.

Despite Coulson’s observation that he should have used a bigger piece of paper, the team gets what he’s saying, that GH-325 is most likely the final ingredient in the Centipede project.  Skye reveals that she put a Trojan Horse onto the hard drive that Ward stole from her, but in order to use it to track Garrett she’ll need to plug a flash drive into any computer that’s a part of HYDRA’s network to activate the Trojan Horse.  In order to do that, they’ll have to break into the Cybertek office.

Coulson points out that, “We’re no longer SHIELD agents.  We’re–.”  “Vigilantes,” replies Fitz.  “I was going to say doing it because it’s the right thing to do, but yeah,” Coulson responds.  “I’m going to finish what I started.  I’ll be damned if I’ll let Garrett and Ward get away with murder.  And I want my plane back.”

Onboard the Bus, Garrett is overjoyed that the killing of the drug lord is all over the news.  He tells Ward that he wanted to make a spectacle, which is why he sent Deathlok to punch the drug lord’s head clean off.  He even suspects that Mike Peterson is starting to enjoy his job, a thought which seems to disgust Peterson.  However, Garrett points out that working for HYDRA is full of rewards, and makes a phone call requesting that the person on the other end send Peterson some videos of his son.  Garrett feels like he turned Peterson into a new man, but Ward isn’t interested in discussing that.  He’s pissed at Garrett for ordering Peterson to stop Ward’s heart as a ploy to get Skye to confess how to decrypt the hard drive.  Their conversation doesn’t get very far, however, because Raina has word that she’s close to unlocking the secrets of GH-325.

At the motel, Fitz still refuses to believe that Ward is really a traitor.  He wonders if HYDRA might have put an exploding eyeball in his head, like with Peterson, but Skye points out a more likely scenario: Ward is just evil.  “I don’t believe people are born evil,” Fitz says.  Trip arrives with an old suitcase he took from his grandmother, full of his grandfather’s Howling Commando gear (which he used while fighting alongside Captain America).

Coulson is thrilled and wants to do a complete inventory, but is distracted by all of the antique gadgetry, including a handheld hypno beam.  He and Trip geek out, but Skye thinks that most of the stuff looks like it was ordered from the back of a comic book.  She picks up what looks like a joy buzzer and pushes its button, only to short out everything within ten feet with an EMP.  Fitz picks up an ordinary looking pack of cigarettes, takes one out and twists it, turning it into a laser.  And then he casually sets the drapes on fire.  “Watch out HYDRA, here we come,” dryly observes that constantly wise-cracking Melinda May.

Back 15 years ago, Garrett and Ward are walking through the woods with a dog at their heels as Garrett carries a pair of ducks.  Ward looks thoughtful and Garrett says, “Speak up son, I’m not a mind reader.”  (Hah!)  Garrett tells him that he has to earn his dinner, as he did less to kill the ducks than Buddy the dog.  Ward says that it’s not fair, but Garrett tells him, “Stop blaming me for your own failure.”  If he wants things easy, Garrett says, he can go back back to juvi, where they’ll give him a bed and three meals a day.  It would confirm his family’s opinion that Ward is weak.  Garrett tells him that he’ll be back in a couple of months to pick Ward up, but leaves Buddy with him to help.

The team heads to Cybertek, where Coulson and May pretend to be former SHIELD scientists applying for a job, and who happen to be dressed up exactly like FitzSimmons, complete with adorable glasses and sweaters.  The Cybertek brains say that they’ve met with other former SHIELD agents, but have been more impressed with HYDRA, whose employees seem to have less morals for some reason.  They’re apparently also younger than Coulson and May, which prompts Simmons to radio May to reassure her that she doesn’t look a day over 30 and that she’s “gorgeous.”  May touches a pin on her sweater, and we hear from Skye and trip who are hiding in a van outside.  The pin is another one of Trip’s grandfather’s gadgets, which uses outdated UHF signals to scan for digital information nearby, however it doesn’t seem to be working.

Coulson pulls out an ICER bullet to impress the Cybertek guys, but they’ve seen that before from HYDRA, who used it in something they called a “sleepy-sleep gun” and built a grenade from the technology.  Coulson and May, relaying what Fitz and Simmons tell them over the radio, argue adorably about how great the ICER is, particularly as it has a cooler name.  The Cybertek guys aren’t impressed, however, but Skye has discovered that the computers they’re looking for might be a secure room on the fourth floor.

Security escorts May and Coulson into the elevator to show them the way out, but his ass is easily kicked and they head upstairs instead.  As they drag the body out of the elevator, May asks Coulson if his sweater itches as much as hers does.  In the hallway they spot a conspicuous red phone on the wall, just as a guard at the other end of the hall spots them.  There’s a mad dash to the phone, with the guard running and May doing gymnastics down the hallway, knocking him out just as he reaches the phone, catching it in midair and hanging it up.  “I don’t know if I’ve said it enough,” says Coulson, “but I’m glad you’re back.”  He pulls out some laser cigarettes to break into the secure room, and May warns him not to set the drapes on fire.  However, once inside they’re surprised that it’s not full of computers but instead of metal cabinets full of paper files.

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