‘Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’ Recap: ‘End of the Beginning’

Agents Garrett and Triplett are at a safe house in Austraila, calling Coulson about The Clairvoyant. Suddenly Mike Peterson, now Deathlok, bursts open the door and attacks the agents. They fire at him, and although stunned, Deathlok launches through the roof and escapes.

Agent May lands the plane on the ground and agents Hand, Garrett, Sitwell, Triplett, and Blake come aboard. Agent Hand states to Coulson she doesn’t understand why they have to meet on the plane and Coulson states he’ll tell them once they’re 50,000 feet up.

Coulson briefs the other senior agents about the high altitude and hovering over the North Pole so it wouldn’t be possible for The Clairvoyant to hear their discussion. Garrett and Triplett have been tracking Deathlok in hopes of finding The Clairvoyant. They have also been researching anyone with psychic abilities and indexing them. Garrett suggests Skye to prioritize the candidates, and split the agents into random teams of two, sending each team to the candidate’s location. Agent Hand states she’ll need S.H.I.E.L.D. clearance to do that, and Coulson agrees.

Fitz-Simmons are still worried, and curious, about Skye’s condition after receiving the GH-325. They take blood samples from Skye. Ward summons Skye to the meeting, and they brief her on what needs to be done. Confused, she states she’s doesn’t have authority to access the index. Coulson then hands her a badge making Skye an official S.H.I.E.L.D. agent.

Deathlok looks at metal underneath his skin on his head. There’s a knock at the door and he receives a message through his eye implant that there is a package for him. He opens it up, and it looks like a metal guard. He places it on his arm and the metal arm band quickly attaches itself to Deathlok. He receives another message stating they need to meet because S.H.I.E.L.D. is close to finding him.

Sitwell expresses concern to Coulson about the plan, and Coulson admits that one team will be walking into a trap. Agent Hand states she needs to go back to HQ. Sitwell accompanies her.

Skye prepares phones where each person will receive the information for their destination, and hands Garrett a phone. Garrett formerly introduces himself to Skye. Skye thanks Garrett for help in saving her life. Garrett comments that Ward seems different then when he first trained him, that he seems to be fighting for a cause, or even a person, now.

In the lab, Fitz is giving tracking bullets to May when Simmons comes in talking about Skye’s blood sample. Trying to keep her quiet, Fitz tries to change the subject but May knows they were talking about Skye. May insists that if Skye, or Coulson, act different to let her know first.

Coulson tries to assure Skye, and that he trusts the mission she is sending them all on. Coulson advises her to find The Clairvoyant’s weakness.

Ward and Triplett are paired up and head to Milton Keynes Prison in England. Triplett says The Clairvoyant had his partner killed, leaving a son behind. Ward advises they need to take The Clairvoyant in, not out. Triplett asks if Skye hadn’t made it, how he would he feel.

Blake and May are paired together making their way to an assisted living home in Macon, Georgia.

Garrett and Coulson are paired together headed to Muncie, Indiana. They come to a detour and assume it is a trap.

May reads to Blake their person of interest is Thomas Nash, who has been catatonic for the last four years. May heads to the office as Blake looks for a room number.

Ward and Triplett enter the prison but there is no one standing guard.

Coulson follows the detour and a dump truck pulls in front of them, as another car pulls in behind them.

Deathlok attacks Blake. Blake shoots at him but is quickly disarmed. Blake calls him Mike and reminds him that he has a son, and he says Mike is dead. May comes but Blake is out on the ground, and Deathlok fires a missile from his new armor at May, and runs away. May calls HQ for back-up.

All the teams back on the plane, head to the hub. May reports that Nash wasn’t at the facility, and with Deathlok attacking them, Ward figures they must be close to The Clairvoyant.

Simmons is packing for her stay at the hub and Fitz can’t help but wonder why she is so happy. He realizes she’ll have S.H.I.E.L.D.’s tools and resources to test Skye’s blood sample. Triplett comes in and advises he’ll be at the hub also, which Simmons is happy about.

Skye goes over Nash’s background with May and Coulson. Originally a bond trader, Nash was recruited by the Canadian government because he said he could predict people’s behavior. Thoughts now suggest that being catatonic was just a trick. Coulson checks Blake’s gun and realizes he was able to shoot a tracer bullet into Deathlok.

They trace Deathlok to an abandoned racetrack in Pensacola, Florida. Several agents descend on the property, led by Coulson’s team and Garrett. Fitz releases tiny drones that can give thermal imaging throughout the building, pin pointing Deathlok’s location.

As they get attacked and follow Deathlok, Fitz reports that there is something else down there too. Coulson and Garrett find a room with more than a dozen monitors and Nash sitting, paralyzed, with only a tube he uses to project his voice through a computer. Nash, who states Po gave him The Clairvoyant name, starts to chip at Coulson, saying the reason he couldn’t see him after his death was because Coulson himself couldn’t see himself.

The rest of the agents come in, including Ward and May, and hears Nash continuing to talk to Coulson, then starts in about Skye, and her history, and that she will die giving them what they want. Shots fired and Nash is dead. Everyone looks and realizes Ward is the shooter.

Ward sits in the back of a truck waiting to be taken to S.H.I.E.L.D. for a review of his actions. May advises Coulson that Nick Fury is back, and Coulson has every intention of talking with him.

As the plane takes off, Skye talks to Ward in the interrogation room. Ward tells her that The Clairvoyant would never have stopped, and he did it for her safety, and the safety of the team. He states he’ll take whatever punishment is coming, not regretting taking the shot.

Fitz goes to the avionic bay to call Simmons on an encrypted line. As he calls he realizes there is already an encryption attached to one of the phone lines. Simmons states something is going on where she is and the line goes dead. Fitz tries to trace where the phone line is going.

Skye goes to talk to Coulson about Ward, but Coulson is more concerned that Ward may have killed the wrong person, suggesting Nash was only a prop, and the voice coming out of the computer may not have been his at all. Skye states The Clairvoyant may not have any power, that they have looked at the personnel and psych evaluations of everyone. Coulson realizes the only way anyone would have access to that information would have to be an agent themselves.

Coulson goes to Ward and demands to know if someone ordered him to kill Nash, suggesting Ward may be in on it too.

Fitz traces the line into the cockpit, where her finds a phone that is only activated with a thumb scanner. Suddenly May shows up behind him, just as he closes the locker door to his discovery. Fumbling over his words he finally makes an excuse to get out of there.

Fitz runs into Skye and tells her about May’s phone. Skye tells him he needs to cut the line before she can call out again.

May makes a call but is quickly cut off as Fitz cuts the line. May pulls out her gun and looks for Fitz.

Skye finds Coulson and Ward arguing and tells them they may have a problem.

May finds Fitz and fires. Luckily he is behind the bullet proof glass in the lab. Coulson draws his gun on May, and May states she only fired Icers at Fitz. Skye comes in and aims a gun at her, and Melinda insists that they have no idea what they're doing. She finally lowers her gun and says that she can't explain there, and refuses to say who she has been calling. Coulson figures that Melinda is the traitor and demands to know who the real Clairvoyant is.

Before Melinda can answer, the plane suddenly reverses course. Melinda says that she has no idea what is going on.

At the hub, Agent Hand tells her people to bring in the team when the plane lands, except Coulson. She promises to handle him personally.

In Washington, Nick Fury is driving through traffic with the police in pursuit. They open fire and slam into Fury's SUV. He manages to evade them. Fury then calls to have a route to “get him off the grid” but a masked man steps out onto the road in front of him and it is the Winter Soldier. He fires an explosive at Fury’s SUV, knocking the SUV upside down with Fury in it.