Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Author Note: Contains references to episode 1x03 'The Asset'. Set before 1x05 when Skye's online activities and technology use became SHIELD-controlled. This is fic is a sequel to 'Declassification.'

A NEW KIND OF CLASSIFICATION

It had been a day full of doors, virtual and not-so-virtual, being slammed in Skye's face and she was sick of it. Most of the time she'd been busy making a difference and had narrowly missed out on a gross head-wound. She shoved her phone into her jeans pocket and scuffed a foot against the plane's flooring. They were grounded for a while, apparently the man in charge had a few things he wanted to say to Melinda, Coulson, and Ward. Skye had tried to use that time to splunk into a few SHIELD dark corners, in search of her answers, but no dice. God, she was better than their security. Secret government group versus Skye? Skye always won. She was not enjoying this annoying new Shyamalan twist.

The plane was kinda quiet. She'd expected Fitz and Simmons to be blowing shit up when unsupervised. That could be fun. She took a left and headed down the stairs into the lab to find, woah, holy hot person. A spectacular-looking redhead, all wicked glossy curls past her shoulders and a to-die-for suit jacket and skirt and she was...holy shit, she was Black Widow!

And Fitz, Fitz was chattering quietly, a calm almost-sweet smile on his face as he showed his visitor a computer tablet, pointing something out, talking about gamma radiation? It was beyond freakish seeing him so calm and without Simmons there to finish his sentences or talk over him. Shouldn't a knockout like the Black Widow be sending him into a babbling tailspin? It was extremely weird.

And crap, Black Widow was now looking at her, with a cool eyebrow raise. Skye tried for a friendly totally-not-creepy smile, but the Widow just somehow seemed amused, which was probably not good. Skye felt like a complete slob in her jeans and pink vest, but nobody had told her that amazing company was on-board.

Fitz glanced up to see what had caught the Widow's attention and noticed Skye. "Hiya, you're back then?"

Skye felt frozen, because fuck, Black Widow was sat right there and was now turning back to the computer tablet and to Fitz. "You'll send all of this to my account?"

"Of course." Fitz looked suddenly nervous and eager, more like his usual self. "Could you maybe see about getting some of it across Mr Stark's desk? Nothing obvious, you know, just somewhere he'll glance at it."

"Mr Stark glances at everything," Black Widow replied, her smile a touch warmer when fixed on Fitz. "You don't want to be his focus."

Skye managed to take another step forward, still feeling stunned and starstruck. This was seriously amazing and hey, she should definitely be saying something. "You're Black Widow!"

She thought about maybe poking a nearby arm, just to reassure herself that this wasn't another dream, but the look on Black Widow's face stopped that idea. Okay, don't touch the superhero who can kill aliens, noted. Skye went for her phone instead.

"Wait until I..."

"No!" Fitz was looking at her with only a hint of nervous apology. "Sorry, Skye. She's classified."

Black Widow was smiling that sort-of-warm maybe-a-smile towards Fitz again, one elegant but deadly finger tapping on the tablet. Skye shook her head, then paused, gripped by a sudden thought.

"Wait, am I allowed to know she's here? I'm not going to get tranked with amnesia serum, right?"

Fitz checked something on a nearby screen before answering. "No, you're fine. Everyone with an internet connection has clearance to lay eyes on Black Widow. Only their eyes though, that's been made very clear."

There was some sort of experience talking there and Black Widow's mouth curled up just a little. How did she keep everything so…so controlled and locked down? Skye was itching to photograph her every expression, to study them and work out just what everything meant because every little twitch was clearly important and fuck, this was Black Widow! The mysterious one-woman wrecking crew who'd beaten down aliens and had held her own alongside Captain America and Iron Man. Skye had tried digging up all she could on the Avengers but Tony Stark was extremely prejudiced with encryptions and firewalls. Not even Skye had been able to make an interesting-sized dent there and God, she'd tried, frequently. Because, superheroes, the Avengers! It was totally the public's right to know about them and Skye was kind of interested, well, maybe a lot.

Black Widow was a black hole of mystery. When Skye had started digging, she'd come up against a lot of Russian crypto stuff that had carried the kinds of warnings that SHIELD could only dream of. Whoever Black Widow was – or had been – it was apparently some kind of foreign state secret. Skye had only stopped investigating when a friend had suddenly gone silent and nobody else in the group had been able to get in touch with him again. Okay, message received, for now.

Black Widow held out a hand. "Natalie Rushman."

Wow, unexpected. Skye eagerly shook her hand, unable to control her smile. "So I'm authorized to know your name?"

"You're authorized to know that one."

Okay, the mystery deepened. Did that mean that Coulson's name wasn't really Coulson? Like they took on whole new identities when they wore suits? Were the Avengers classed as part of SHIELD? Skye was about to ask when Simmons rushed in, her expression brightening as it locked onto Natalie.

"Ms. Rushman! How wonderful to see you. How is Stark Tower? Has he looked at our...?"

Natalie's sort-of-smile was back. "It's a possibility."

"Great, thank you. Oh, and please thank Darcy for the numerical data, her collating was a great help."

"She'll be there Thursday."

Simmons looked delighted then deflated a little. "Mission dependent."

"Of course." Natalie got to her feet and wow, those were killer heels, maybe literally. "I'll let you know the location, and Doctor Banner's reaction to your information."

She indicated Fitz's computer tablet and Fitz and Simmons nodded in tandem. Natalie looked as though she was going to leave and Skye really did not want that to happen. So she made a move towards Black Widow which naturally got her the Avenger's full attention – scary but also awesome.

"Sorry, hi, big fan." Skye smiled, trying to catch her breath as Natalie looked at her expectantly, clearly waiting on Skye, no pressure. "Okay, now I actually don't know what to say."

Natalie checked her watch. "Well, I have a meeting with Miss Potts and several committees, so maybe you'll know what to say next time."

Awesome. Maybe, maybe Natalie had some of the answers that Skye needed, answers that could erase those agonizing redactions. "Next time? You're coming back, to visit, or help out or..."

Natalie's expression sharpened just a little and the scary factor correspondingly heightened. "To visit old friends."

Why did that sound like a threat and why did Fitz and Simmons look more than a little guilty. Fitz was the first to speak. "You know we would have said something if..."

"...if we'd known you were being kept in the dark. We thought you had to know already, definitely before us," Simmons finished earnest and worried. "Is he...?"

"He's working on forgiveness," Natalie replied, her lips thin.

"Working is good," Fitz sounded like he was guessing.

"Not for the weapons range."

Natalie walked towards the door, her footsteps sounding sudden and very loud. She fluttered her fingers briefly towards Fitz and Simmons and was about to exit when Ward appeared in the doorway. He looked a little surprised to see Natalie before his expression smoothed out. He didn't offer his hand in any kind of greeting.

"Ms. Rushman."

"Agent Ward," Natalie didn't sound frosty exactly, but there was something there, some kind of sizing-up maybe. Oooh, superheroes versus SHIELD? "Is Director Fury free now?"

"I didn't exactly loiter."

Natalie raised her eyebrow again, there was definite amusement there. "Good."

She disappeared without another word, Ward watching her before turning back to the rest of the lab. "Side work?"

Simmons looked pleased and proud. "We've been sought after, you know, when we're actually here. It's very exciting."

"As long as we get credit," Fitz put in.

Ward's expression did something almost...was that a smile? But it was too quick and wow, did he and Natalie have the same training? Was she trained by SHIELD? That didn't explain the Russian thing, or why she'd be in a meeting with Stark Industries CEO Virginia Potts. Skye hated having more questions than answers.

"So..." she broke into whatever SHIELD conversation was going on. "Old friends? It's May, right? She and Natalie were some kind of super-Terminator-team, back in the day?"

Ward looked amused now, combined with the brand of patronizing that made Skye want to read all his emails, again. "That's classified."

Skye smirked back. "Well, it can't be you, Mr. Friendly. Nice people skills, she'll probably kill you in your sleep."

Fitz piped up. "That's classified too."

Skye gave him a look. "The Avengers ran a wrecking ball through New York, Fitz. Kind of impossible to classify Black Widow's mean streak."

"Sure, but I meant how many people Natalie's killed in their sleep, that's classified."

That was a thought. Skye swallowed, remembering how her own finger had felt on the trigger of a gun, and how very sure she'd been that she wasn't going to be able to squeeze it. Natalie looked like she could probably kill somebody using only her heels and that computer tablet and she probably wouldn't have a hair out of place afterward. Skye folded her arms tight, unable to suppress a sudden shiver because wasn't that the kind of thing she'd spent years digging up and painting across the web so that everybody would know about it? Overturning government rocks to reveal the nasty stuff that the rocks didn't want anybody to see? Like the fate of certain people.

And here she was, working with the rocks – with hope of getting to know that fate from within, but still. Her metaphor had kind of fallen apart but the point still stood. She was becoming a rock.

"Skye."

Ward was close all of a sudden and concern was very obvious in his eyes. Skye was getting good at reading him and there was something approaching friendship/trust there but, she couldn't do this right now. Ward probably thought that a few more rounds with the heavy bag were a good cure for the discomforting blues.

She plastered on a smile. "I've got some stuff to do. Busy day. Call me if there's a crisis."

She exited before anyone could say anything, her hand already reaching for her phone with only a twinge of guilt. It was time to erase more redactions and overturn more rocks.

Simmons smiled as she unbuttoned her blouse. "Didn't Natasha look well? I think that incident with the flytrap must have been exaggerated."

"No, I saw the report; it was pretty…disgusting actually. Next time we're on base for longer than a minute, I'm taking a look at the plant sample they've got. I've heard there's legs and an extra mouth."

Ward might have smiled as he listened to Fitz and Simmons. He leaned against the door and enjoyed the view, Simmons's creamy skin, a simple blue bra trimmed with lace, a couple of necklaces swinging loose, and Fitz's slim body, devoid of the usual toning and obvious muscles that Ward was used to being surrounded by during field work. A change was turning out to be good though.

"I'm assuming Skye still doesn't know...?"

Fitz looked offended. "Hey, we've been keeping secrets here longer than you. Wait, that sounded…"

"As far as Skye knows, Natalie Rushman is one of the Black Widow's designations. I'm sure she's trying to find out more right now," Simmons cut in and then checked a monitor. "Yes, there we are. It's okay, SHIELD doesn't deal with that file."

Ward's eyebrows lifted, because there were a lot of rumors about Agent Natasha Romanoff, a lot of Russian rumors, and so far, he hadn't been able to substantiate any of them. There were a lot of bets going on about Natasha's story. Everybody had a story at SHIELD, some more hidden than others. And there was the fact that she'd first appeared at headquarters in the aftermath of a solo mission of Specialist Barton's…

"Your thoughts are classified," Simmons told him with a sunny smile. "Sorry."

Ward gave her an unimpressed look, but there was no changing the fact that just when he'd thought he'd reached an impressive SHIELD confidentiality level, he'd discovered that there was a lot more going on than he'd realized. And no matter what he tried, Fitz and Simmons weren't going to reveal anything that they weren't permitted to. He was still impressed by that, and by their tenacity and loyalty. He was impressed by them, every day, even if he wasn't always able to find words to tell them that.

He walked close enough to slide a proprietary hand around Fitz's waist, enjoying what it did to Fitz's breathing. This, he could do, and it told them what they needed to know. Fitz and Simmons – Leo and Jemma, his brain uncomfortably insisted – were skilled at reading between the lines and were getting very good at reading the gaps between Ward's words. It should have left him feeling exposed, vulnerable, and it did, but it also…well, there was something warm and unexpected in there too. Ward had been trying to analyze it but it wasn't making the kind of sense he was used to.

For now, he tried to ignore it, leaning close to mouth behind Fitz's ear. They still didn't have a big enough bed, but they always made good use of what they did have.

-the end