“Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.” Season 2, episode 17 finally gave fans answers about Bahrain. Melinda May (Ming-Na Wen) and Coulson (Clark Gregg) have referred to it several times over the course of the series, and it even earned her the nickname “The Cavalry.” It turned out that the case was actually connected to Skye's (Chloe Bennet) family.

The episode flashed back to seven years ago. May and her husband Andrew (Blair Underwood) were trying to have a baby. Coulson showed up at May’s house early for a mission, and it was clear that they were already close. She was smiling and friendly with her other co-workers.

Coulson quickly mentioned that he wanted to bring May onto the Avengers Initiative, but first they had to deal with another case. Eva Belyakov (Winter Ave Zoli) was a person who managed to destroy a car with her bare hands. She was clearly strong, so they were going after her in Bahrain to see if she was dangerous. If she was a risk, they would bring in the cavalry, a group of 12 armed soldiers.

Coulson approached Eva on the street and offered to help her. He said there were more secure places for them to talk, but Eva didn’t want to leave with him. May saw two men with guns walk past a little girl (Ava Acres) and told Coulson he had limited time. He asked what Eva was looking for and she said, “Pain.” Two of Eva’s men took the little girl hostage and locked themselves in a nearby building.

When Coulson tried to get in touch with Eva and the kidnappers, the man on the call said, “Leave us alone.” The cavalry were sent in, but the agents disappeared from all of their communications devices a minute after they went in.

May promised that she could pull people out rather than make some sort of attack. As Coulson heard the sirens of the local military, he made a quick decision to send May in. She called her husband, who gave her advice on how to handle the little girl and told her to come home safe.

May went in the building and took out a few of Eva’s militiamen easily. She saw one of the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, but he was in some sort of trance. He said he needed her pain and tried to shoot her. Of course, May disarmed him, but she was faced with a group of agents who were in a trance. The cavalry was compromised, so she locked them in a room and went after Eva.

In the present day, Skye was learning how to control her powers at the Inhuman facility. Jiaying (Dichen Lachman) told Skye that her powers weren’t about earthquakes. Everything has a natural frequency of vibrations. With her mother’s guidance, Skye moved a mountain and caused a small avalanche. “Remember that feeling. It’s not something to be afraid of,” Jiaying said.

She told Skye that she was proud and went off to attend to other business. Skye told Lincoln (Luke Mitchell) that she really liked Jiaying, and Lincoln said she had to be special if Jiaying offered to be her guide. She never trained anyone.

Later, Jiaying had Skye make music with the vibrations from glasses of water. Skye ended up breaking the glasses, which brought back memories of a time she had been kicked out of a foster home for breaking a decanter. She admitted that she didn’t want to get comfortable at the facility. “It feels like home, which never ends well,” Skye said.

She told Jiaying that every time she felt at home, she was abandoned. She was 25, and she never stayed anywhere for more than two years. One foster family even decided to ditch her on her birthday, though Skye mentioned that she wasn’t even sure of her real birthday. Jiaying said they wouldn’t leave her, but Skye said there was no reason they wouldn’t.

“July 2,” Jiaying said. She revealed that was her birthday, and she was Skye’s mother.

Jiaying said joining the Inhumans had to be her choice, and that’s why she didn’t reveal her identity earlier. She explained that Cal (Kyle MacLachlan) “pieced her back together” and searched for Skye for years. Jiaying decided that they had to move on, but Cal took the opposite approach.

Her parentage had to stay secret. The Elders have strict rules and could see Skye as a threat. Her mother explained that she was responsible for all of the people at the facility, and favoritism wasn’t accepted. Jiaying explained that Eva in Bahrain was once her trainee. However, she ignored Jiaying’s advice. She stole the crystals and went off.

In a flashback, Eva attacked May with a chandelier and the two had a pretty epic showdown with one of Eva’s men. May even got shot in the leg, but she impaled Eva with a pipe. However, it seemed that Eva was just in a trance too. After she was dead, the little girl came out of the corner and said she liked the pain.

Eva stole the crystals for her daughter Katya to get powers too. Jiaying saw darkness in Katya and didn’t want to give her powers. Eva ignored her decision, and Katya went insane with power. With just a touch she could have people under her influence. She reached out for May, and May shot her.

Jiaying explained that she should’ve been the one to take care of Katya, not S.H.I.E.L.D. It was clear that May would’ve preferred that.

May was shaking and crying in Coulson’s arms after the incident. She went home, and she was cold and distant. Andrew saw a letter on the counter from Maria Hill that indicated May had been switched to desk duty.

In the present day, May was trying to convince Bobbi (Adrianne Palicki) and the new S.H.I.E.L.D. that Coulson was one of the good guys. However, they found secrets that she didn’t know about. They told her about a project called Theta Protocol, but she'd never even heard of it.

Mike Peterson (J. August Richards) was part of whatever the Theta Protocol is, and Coulson was funneling tons of money into it. May talked to Simmons (Elizabeth Henstridge) and revealed that a generator she was working on was for Deathlok. However, Simmons had no idea that she was working on Deathlok’s technology.

Simmons discovered that Coulson was burning through money. She also revealed that Coulson had been consulting with May’s now ex-husband. Mack (Henry Simmons) said that his purchase of 100 bunk beds might have been related to a potential training facility for people with powers. May needed Simmons to open Fury’s toolbox to find out what was really going on.

Yet Simmons couldn’t do that because her box was a fake. Fitz (Iain De Caestecker) unlocked Fury’s real toolbox in a public restroom and called Coulson’s tablet. He said that he figured it out, but he had agents following him. They were even knocking on the bathroom door.

“Maybe you could show me how to shake a tail. Maybe like now?” Fitz suggested. Hunter (Nick Blood) assured him that they could get him out.

Back at the facility, Skye had a nice little family reunion. Jiaying explained that Cal was once a good man, and he never gave up on Skye. She asked Skye to have one dinner with Cal, and then he’d be taken away. He was anxious to see Skye and started telling her about the night she was born. She discovered she was actually 26.

Raina (Ruth Negga) was still struggling. Lincoln told her that her powers would show, but Raina was angry. She felt that Skye got everything she ever wanted. She was even angrier when Gordon (Jamie Harris) revealed that she couldn’t leave the facility. He could teleport her to beautiful places, but she couldn’t be around people. Raina agreed, but only as long as Gordon was the one to show her the world.

The thorn-covered Inhuman also told Lincoln about a nightmare she kept having about Skye with her father. They were having a happy dinner and she was holding a bouquet of daisies. Lincoln walked in on Skye’s family dinner and realized that Raina’s dreams were visions of the future. She’s psychic.

“Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.” Season 2 airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. EDT on ABC. Do you think Skye should have kept avoiding her father or are you happy they reunited? Sound off in the comments section below!

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