A/N – First fic for this fandom. Obviously this is AU, so I'll keep some canon things and change whatever I feel like changing. I'm not sure I'm shipping this couple in current canon – I'm on the fence at the moment – but I do find their dynamic interesting. No beta, so any mistakes are my own.

Chapter 1

Agent Grant Ward slipped off his sunglasses as he entered the atrium of the Triskelion, the massive S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters located in Washington, D.C. Being called back to D.C. had been unexpected since he'd been preparing for a mission in the Middle East. While no details were provided over the phone, Agent Phillip Coulson had said there was a change of plan and advised him to report to headquarters immediately.

Swiping his security badge quickly, he took the elevator up to the 20th floor, not surprised to see Coulson waiting for him.

"Sir." Ward nodded in greeting and shook his hand.

"Agent Ward. Thanks for coming so quickly." Coulson tilted his head, indicating Ward should follow him down the hall to his office. Coulson closed the door behind them and took a seat behind his desk. "As you've probably guessed, you can scrap your mission for the Middle East. We need you on something else."

Ward nodded. "Okay."

"This will be a… unique situation for you," Coulson continued.

"Unique, sir?"

"You won't be working alone on this one," the older man explained.

"I'm going to have a partner?" That was definitely unique. As a specialist, Ward was accustomed to working alone. It was how he worked best.

"Yes, and an untrained one at that." Coulson's tone was faintly apologetic. "Are you familiar with Quinn Worldwide?"

"Yes, sir. Ian Quinn is the CEO – he's a billionaire and a philanthropist, and his company is known for technological advances. I wasn't aware he was under scrutiny by S.H.I.E.L.D."

"Billionaires working on technological advances are always under scrutiny. One of our computer science analysts was assigned to track him, and we believe he may have found a store of a very rare element called Gravitonium. Its existence was theorized years ago by Dr. Franklin Hall, but it's never been proven despite Quinn's relentless mining around the world. If he really did find it this time, we need to know."

"I'm guessing Gravitonium is dangerous?" He'd never heard of it before, but that was to be expected with a lot of the things the agency dealt with. Half of his assignments read like science fiction.

"Theoretically, it could be used to affect gravitational fields. Dr. Hall designed a device he called a gravity field generator which he believed would be able to harness the element's gravitational fields, though his theories have never been tested. Dr. Hall works at the academy now and is no longer associated with Quinn, but that wouldn't stop Quinn from experimenting if he's actually found his Holy Grail. And experimentation with something as dangerous as Gravitonium could have disastrous results."

Ward took a moment to process this information, wary now of where he suspected Coulson was heading. "Sir, when you say untrained partner – are you sending me in with a scientist?" He prayed to God he was wrong.

Coulson shook his head. "No. You'll be working with the computer science analyst who was originally assigned to digitally tail Quinn. She's familiar with his movements and habits, and she has a surprising level of expertise in hacking. Her cover will be a new hire in the computer sciences department. We got lucky, actually. A former acquaintance of hers works for Quinn Worldwide and was able to arrange the Skype interview. Quinn loved her so the job is hers."

"A computer science analyst." He felt the beginnings of a headache. "And my cover?"

"Yourself," Coulson told him. "Or at least the Grant Ward that officially exists for this assignment – a member of the Army's elite Special Forces who has recently left the service in order to settle down with his new fiancée. Your story will be that you're looking for work in the private sector. A job at Quinn Worldwide would be ideal, so see if you can work that angle."

His partner was a woman who probably stayed glued to her computers so often she rarely saw daylight and she was not trained for field work of any kind. And since they'd be living together, pretending to be engaged, he knew this had the potential to be a long term operation. This was literally his idea of Hell.

Coulson seemed to sense his reservations. "I realize this isn't your kind of mission, Ward, but the agent we initially had in play was recently injured on an op, and we can't send her in alone."

Ward nodded, suppressing a sigh. It wasn't his place to question orders or assignments. Ask him to infiltrate the KGB or drop him into the middle of a live fire fight, and he felt right at home. This assignment would likely test him and his abilities in new and unexpected ways. His partner was essentially a variable; something he'd been trained to eliminate, not cohabitate with. "How soon do we report?"

"You have a week," Coulson replied. "You'll travel to California next Friday and move into your new home over the weekend. It's a small starter home in a nice, family friendly neighborhood a short drive away from the coast. Who knows? Maybe sunny Cali will agree with you."

Somehow Ward doubted it. "I'll need to meet my partner as soon as possible, sir. We should get our mission profiles and discuss our backstory."

Glancing at his watch, Coulson said, "You can meet her now. She should be waiting for us with Commander Hill in the conference room down the hall."

Ward followed Coulson out of his office and down the hall. Commander Maria Hill was waiting beside the door of one of the smaller conference rooms, and she wasn't alone. Natasha Romanov, better known as Black Widow among the other specialists, was standing beside Hill.

She nodded at them, but her lips were curved into a smirk that made Ward uneasy. He nodded back. "Romanov."

"Ward. Heard you were tying the knot."

Trust Romanov to be amused by the situation. "It's an assignment just like any other."

"Hmm. At least your fiancée is hot. Could have been worse."

Ward glanced towards the conference room window, deciding to ignore Romanov rather than rise to her baiting.

A young woman sat alone at the table, tilting her chair back in a precarious way that looked destined for disaster. Long, wavy brown hair tumbled over the back of the seat, and the fingers of her left hand tapped out a rhythmic pattern against the sleek, black surface in front of her. A slender, white wire angling down from beneath her hair indicated she was listening to music. She was moving her entire upper body now, and one small hand suddenly reached up, twisting a curl between her fingers.

A jolt of recognition, of awareness, passed through Ward. No, it couldn't be.

"Sir, is that..."

"Skye," Agent Coulson finished his sentence. "I thought you'd probably remember her."

"I remember that we arrested her a year ago because she was working with Rising Tide," Ward said cautiously, struggling to keep his reaction in check. "I questioned her but she refused to give me any information. What is she doing here?"

Skye, no last name provided, had run verbal circles around him in that interrogation room. It had been borderline humiliating, especially since Coulson and Hill had been watching. After several hours, Coulson had called a halt to the questioning, and Ward spent the rest of the afternoon pounding out his frustrations in the gym and rethinking his strategy. But when he'd returned to the holding rooms the next day, she was no longer in custody.

"After I relieved you in interrogation, she and I came to an understanding of sorts. She started working as a consultant in the Computer Sciences Division. For this mission, she'll be bumped to Level 1 clearance."

"Really." Ward didn't bother to mask his skepticism. "And she what? Switched her allegiance to S.H.I.E.L.D.? I don't buy that. With all due respect, sir, if I can't trust her, this mission will never work."

Coulson spoke bluntly. "She didn't cooperate in the beginning because you pissed her off, Agent Ward. I've said it before but it bears repeating – your people skills? Not the greatest." The older agent turned his head to watch Skye for a moment. "Skye's allegiance was never aligned that firmly with Rising Tide. She had her reasons for joining them. She also had her reasons for letting us find her in the first place."

Ward raised a brow at that, wondering why a hacker would want to be arrested. "I can think of a few reasons a hacker would want to get inside this agency, and none of them are good."

"Her reasons were personal and not relevant to this mission," Coulson countered. "Suffice to say she's proven herself in the last year, and she's been vetted by Agent Koenig, Commander Hill, and myself. If she had field training, we'd allow her to go in alone."

"But she doesn't." The news that Koenig had vetted her was surprising since Ward couldn't imagine how she might have beaten his particular method of lie detecting.

"No. And there are no available field agents with her skill set that fit the employee profile we need to fill at Quinn Worldwide. They're known for hiring young, out-of-the-box thinkers, and Skye fits that description perfectly."

Out-of-the-box thinker was one way of putting it. Careful to keep his expression contained, Grant looked at Coulson. "And you're sure I'm the best person for this mission?"

Coulson smiled. "No one better."

Ward ran a hand over his jaw and looked at Hill. "You really think she's trustworthy enough for a mission like this?"

Commander Hill met his gaze head on. "Yes, I do. The question now is if the two of you can sell your covers."

"I can sell my cover if she can sell hers."

"I don't know, Ward. She got under your skin on your last go round," Romanov said, leaning against the wall and crossing her arms. When Ward shot her a look, she shrugged and smiled. "Interrogations are recorded, and Agent Ward chasing his own tail during an interrogation was something I had to see to believe. There might have been popcorn involved."

Ignoring Romanov, he turned to Coulson and said, "I'd like a few minutes alone with her."

"By all means." Coulson waved to the door and stepped aside. Ward opened the door and stepped inside.

Romanov took up a position in front of the window, using her foot to stop the door from closing all the way. When Coulson raised a brow at her, she shrugged. "Like I'm the only one who wants to hear this."

Skye tapped her pen against the table and wondered how much longer she'd be waiting to meet the new guy replacing Agent Triplett. She was both excited and nervous about her first time in the field; excited because her clearance level was bumped and it was actual field work but nervous about playing domestically blissful with a stranger. There was very little chance of that not being weird.

Suddenly a suit entered her field of vision and she jumped, pulling out her ear buds. "Sorry, didn't hear you come in."

"If you're going to do field work, you should be more aware of your surroundings," the suit replied. "That's how I got the jump on you a year ago."

That voice. Startled, her eyes flew up to meet those of Agent Grant Ward. Or as she liked to call him, Agent Toolbag. "You got the jump on me because I let you. I knew you were coming."

"Really."

She rolled her eyes. "Okay, I didn't know you were coming at that exact moment, and the black bag over my head as you violated my civil rights was a little unexpected, but you so didn't get the jump on me."

Agent Ward walked around the small conference table, pulled out a chair, and sat down. Folding his hands in front of him on the table, his expression unreadable, he asked, "Why are you here?"

Skye sat forward and folded her hands in a similar fashion, returning his stare. "Did S.H.I.E.L.D. teach you the death stare or does it just come naturally?" No reaction. "Because your Robocop impression is creepy. Just saying." Aww, there it was – that squeezed lemon look he got so often when she talked. Mission accomplished, she sat back and smiled at him.

"Agent Coulson and Commander Hill seem to think you can be trusted and you're serious about this assignment," he finally said, jaw clenched, "but I have my doubts. And going into the field with doubts is not something I do."

Going into the field… wait, what? "Oh no way. You're my new partner? Because that's just crazy. You don't even like me and we're supposed to live together?"

"Whether I like you or not is irrelevant," Agent Ward replied. "I'm trained to get the job done."

Unlike you. The unspoken accusation hung in the air between them. "Sure. And if your mission involved being a cyborg assassin, you'd be the perfect guy. You're supposed to be my fiancé. A loving fiancé who is changing careers so he can settle down with the girl of his dreams. And Coulson said this assignment might be long – like a year, or longer. Whose idea was this, anyway? Because it's a terrible idea."

There was no way she could live with Agent Toolbag for a year while pretending to be his fiancée. She practically had hives just thinking about the misery that scenario would produce. Sure, needling him and trying to get a reaction out of him amused her, but a year? She turned and looked at the window behind her, glaring at Coulson when she saw him watching.

When Skye turned and glared at him, Coulson heaved a sigh. "Well this is going well." He shook his head and pushed the door open to join Ward and Skye in the conference room.

Not wanting to miss anything, Romanov again propped the door open with the toe of her boot. "Actually, it is going well," she commented. "When's the last time you saw someone get this kind of reaction out of Ward? A hundred says they're at it like bunnies before the end of the assignment."

"Don't say that in front of Coulson," Maria told her. "He's become a sort of father figure to Skye in the last year. Besides, this is Grant Ward we're talking about. He doesn't get personally involved in his assignments."

Suddenly, Skye's voice drifted through the cracked door of the conference. "Look, I know he's all that and a ginormous bag of tools on his specialist missions, but a year of being Mrs. T-1000 is not what I signed on for."

Romanov snorted in amusement as Maria said, "Oh for crying out loud." Pushing the door open, she folded her arms. "Enough. You two have forty-eight hours to work this out."

Skye looked at her hopefully. "Or we're reassigned?"

"Or you're both in my doghouse and you will not like it," she replied evenly. "This mission is too important. Forty-eight hours – work it out." She leveled a hard stare at Ward, who looked resigned.

"Understood, Commander Hill," he said, pushing away from the table and standing up.

Skye looked confused as she watched Ward walk away. "Wait, what's understood? How will forty-eight hours make any difference?"

Romanov turned her attention away from the window when Ward walked out of the room, allowing the door to close fully behind him.

"Don't," he warned, running a hand over the back of his neck. Skye was every bit as frustrating as he remembered, and he hated how off balance she made him feel.

"I didn't say a word." Romanov leaned her shoulder against the window. "But if I did, I'd say your approach is all wrong with this girl. She's not an agent and like most normal people, she doesn't respond well to interrogation."

"Your point?"

"Try treating her like a girl. I've seen you work an asset, Ward. You can be charming – sort of. And you're obviously attracted to her."

Ward took a breath, rattled both by Romanov's insight and his apparent transparency when it came to Skye. Because as much as he didn't want to, he'd felt a spark of something in that interrogation room a year ago, and he'd felt it again today. Skye was frustrating and irritating, but she was also beautiful and smart. He'd never met anyone who stirred so many conflicting emotions within him and he didn't like it.

He gestured in Skye's direction. "Even if you were right, I wouldn't work her like an asset. We're supposed to be partners in this, not adversaries trying to one up each other."

"You don't have to work her like an asset to treat her like a human being. She obviously has a problem with Agent Ward, so try being Grant. You're going to be locked up together for forty-eight hours anyway. What do you really have to lose?" She turned and started walking down the hall. "By the way, that attraction isn't one-sided."

UP NEXT - Will a forty-eight hour mandatory cohabitation force Skye and Ward to start dealing with each other honestly? Stay tuned!