Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. S1E12 - "Seeds" Recap

Some teens who are apparently smart enough to understand thermodynamics jump into a swimming pool. It begins to freeze and they swim to escape being stuck in it. One teen gets out and the other has his leg stuck in it. Another teen is able to smash the ice enough for the stuck teen to get free. All this is happening at the SHIELD academy!

The team heads off to the academy to investigate. Skye learns that the different academies stay separate from the others. FitzSimmons were in Sciences and Ward was in Operations. Coulson has been keeping to himself in his office. FitzSimmons helped to develop the technology that caused the accident so they're asked to speak to the students in a lecture hall. Ward and Skye look at the wall of valour for fallen agents, including Bucky Barnes. Clearly that's a tie-in for Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

May and Coulson fly to Mexico city to track the partner of the now deceased agent that delivered Skye to an orphanage.

FitzSimmons deliver a speech to the students on how science should be used for good, not evil, citing how SHIELD was able to take down Hydra because of its scientists. They plan to share some stories from the field but then the boy from the opening scene who smashed the ice, Donnie, cries out in horror as he is frozen. Ward locates the device responsible and Fitz tells them to smash it, which Skye does with her chic boot. FitzSimmons are able to get through the ice and inject him with something, too. Donnie was the original target. Ward tells Fitz to get chummy with Donnie to determine why he would be targeted. Fitz is impressed by Donnie's designs and helps him with a design for a new power cell.

In Mexico city, May and Coulson stake out the agent. May makes small talk by saying what her escape plan would be if she were to go rouge. Coulson asks why she's talking so much and she says it's because he's not. Coulson admits that he's tired of secrets, leading May to admit her sexual relationship with Ward. Before they can say anything more on the matter, they spot their target. They head off after him and May chases him down an alleyway. They end up in a fight, and Coulson helps to apprehend him after making Lola fly. He tells the story of how their team was sent to Hunan, China to retrieve an 0-8-4 (object of unknown origin). An entire village and many SHIELD agents died trying to protect the object (baby Skye). When he found her, she was asleep in a dead agent's arms. Skye has "powers or something," and wherever she goes, death follows. May tells Coulson that no one should know about this and he can never tell her.

Ward, Skye, and Simmons head to the Boiler Room, a nightclub in the basement, where they begin questioning the students. Ward discovers that Donnie and another student named Seth, had been talking about getting Fitz to the academy for weeks. The attacks were merely a means of baiting him there. After leaving Donnie's room and being called by Simmons who fills him in on what they have learned, Fitz returns to find a full-sized version of the ice machine that is now operational thanks to him. He's then knocked out by an air canon.

Donnie and Seth are on the run and call their backer, Ian Quinn. Quinn is displeased by SHIELD's honing in on them and tells the boys to demonstrate the machine's power. He wants to see what he is paying for. But then he tells his pilot to turn around anyway, so it would seem he's told them to unleash chaos for no logical reason whatsoever. This villain be cray, yo.

In private, Coulson goes against May's advice and tells Skye what he has learned about her origins.

The boys set off the machine at the academy and a storm begins forming. Massive hail starts raining down and things go from bad to worse. It's not just a storm - it's a superstorm. Donnie beings trying to reverse it while Ward gets the students to the boiler room. The team on the Bus needs to get to Donnie and the device so they fly over the storm and descend down the eye of the storm. On the ground, Seth is shot and by a shot of lightening as the machine explodes. The team lands and gets both Donnie and Seth on board and May flies them up. The team tries to save Seth but it's no use. Meanwhile, the storm simply runs its course.

May asks Coulson if he heard what she admitted about Ward. He says that he trusts her and she assures him that she will end it if it becomes a problem. Skye asks for a private moment to re-visit the wall of valour and pay her respects to the agents who died trying to protect her. Several questions remain now: What is Skye's power(s)? Who is after her?

We then see that Donnie has developed ice powers. Hello, future villain?

Coulson calls Quinn to inform him that SHIELD will shoot him out of the sky if his aircraft flies anywhere near any country allied with SHIELD. Quinn then tells him that the Clairvoyant told him to say hello.

Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. airs on Tuesdays on ABC at 8PM.