Agents of SHIELD

The Deke Reveal

The Lighthouse Base, 2018

"We have an announcement to make," says Fitz, stepping into the control room with his hand on Simmons's back.

The team look up from their work.

Simmons smiles nervously. "I'm pregnant."

Daisy drops her pen and throws herself at them, hugging both at once, so tightly they can barely move.

Cries of "congratulations!" and "that's amazing!" echo through the room. Soon Fitz's hair is thoroughly ruffled and Simmons has to catch her breath from a particularly enthusiastic bear hug.

Deke smiles and glances at Simmons's still mostly flat stomach. Something warms in his chest.

*

Months later, they finally see Fitzsimmons' baby girl. She's born with soft curly hair already on her head and kisses dotting her forehead from both her parents. She's a quiet baby, and looks at home wrapped in a white blanket in Simmons's arms.

Mack smiles when he sees her, but hangs back at the door with his eyes slightly blurred by tears. Coulson awws and makes funny faces, causing May to smile.

Daisy sits down on the other side of the bed and touches the baby's hair. "What's her name? Did you name her after some famous scientist?" She grins at the baby girl. "I bet they did, didn't they, cutie? Didn't they?"

Simmons looks at Fitz and smiles. "Actually," she says, "her name is Skye."

Daisy pulls back and her lips part in surprise. "Really?"

"Skye" -Fitz kisses the baby- "Margaret" -his fingers brush her face- "Fitz."

Deke, standing in the hall, looks up. His face flashes briefly in confusion and he mouths the name to himself. Then his eyes widen. 

He steps inside the doorway. "Skye Margaret," Deke repeats. His heart beats hard against his chest. "But her husband always called her Peggy."

They all turn, confused.

"What?" says Simmons.

"Your Skye got married when she was twenty-five," says Deke. He swallows. "Making her full name, Skye Margaret... Fitz-Shaw."

Fitz steps back and lifts his hand. "Shaw," he repeats. "As in...."

"As in Owen Shaw, Deke Shaw, as in my mother's name, Shaw."

"Oh," Simmons breathes. "Oh."

Fitz touches his ear and folds his arms again, awkward. "You're our grandson," he says.

Deke chuckles nervously. "I guess so."

For a moment, silence.

"HA!" says Daisy. "That makes me the snappy great aunt! Do as I say, young whippersnapper."

"I'm too young to be a great-grandpa," Coulson says to himself.

May smacks him.

Fitz steps forward and pulls Deke into a hug by his jacket. "She did good, then," he whispers. "She did perfectly."

Deke's words die in his throat and he leans his head on his grandpa's shoulder.

"Excuse me," says Simmons from the bed. "I'd like to see my grandson."

Deke's mouth twitches into a grin. He turns to Simmons and his eyes dart over the baby, his mother.

Simmons makes a face and pulls him down into a brief hug. "You're a Fitz," she says. "Isn't that strange?"

"A lot to live up to, I guess." He looks down and gently straightens his mother's baby blanket.

Simmons grins. "I was worried about being a parent, but now I get to be the sweet old grandma with too many cookies, too."

"Not if I eat them all," mutters Daisy.

*

A few decades later, another Fitz lies in another hospital bed, in a Lighthouse in another time. She holds her newborn baby boy in her arms and kisses his forehead, whispering stories of oranges and destiny and a young man her parents once knew.