Cold Enemies, Warm Romances

Chapter Nineteen - WB039

Saleen could feel the tension between everyone as they looked at the supposedly "dead" agent's hologram. Finally, she tried breaking it. "Isn't he the guy who was killed by Loki?" 

"Supposedly," Thor replied, narrowing his eyes. "I saw my brother stab him, right through the chest." 

"Fury should've told us if he was alive," Bruce stated in a tense voice. 

"It's Fury," Tony growled. "When does he ever do something he should've done?" 

Natasha slapped the ID onto the counter, shaking visibly. "Starbucks reported this missing a few minutes after Jess left." 

"And I got a hit on the woman," Clint added, pulling up the hologram. "SHIELD Agent Melinda May." 

Saleen heard her blood roar through her ears. "I thought Fury told all SHIELD agents Vertigo and I aren't to be feared now." 

"Which is why I'll kill him next time I see him," Natasha muttered. She looked up. "Can we get a track on her?" 

"Who, Coulson, May, or Jess?" Tony asked, snorting. "Fat chance." 

"I might have something," Clint said slowly. 

Everyone crowded around the spy as JARVIS began hacking through a secure file. After a few moments, it pulled up a woman a few years older than Saleen with long brown hair and a smirk on her face. "This a woman Coulson's new team has taken in," Clint began. "Her name's Skye. No one has any idea what her last name is, which is why she joined the group the Rising Tide. She's a brilliant hacker, if our cracked open files say anything at all." 

"And she's still with them?" Steve asked incredulously. 

Clint nodded. "She wears a bracelet that tracks her computer activity. SHIELD will know if she steps out of line." He looked at Bruce and Saleen. "Could you two track the signature it carries?" 

Saleen chewed the inside of her cheek before shrugging. "I don't see why we can't try." 

Bruce nodded. "Tony, we'll need your help, too." 

Tony grinned. "Then what're we waiting for?"

***

Jessie woke up to a pounding headache, and she couldn't stifle to groan of pain that escaped her mouth. 

"She's up," a familiar voice spoke above her, and something was whipped from over her head, and suddenly she could see everything, including the handcuffs locked around her wrists. 

The supposed to be dead Agent Coulson was sitting at a table, smiling at her. The dark haired man was wrapping up a black bag, so she assumed that he was the one who knocked her out. She was sitting in a metal chair in what seemed to be an interrogation room, although she felt engines under her feet. She raised an eyebrow. "Is this a plane or something?" she asked, her voice in a croak. 

Coulson chuckled. "Yes, it is. We took the liberty of returning to the bus." 

Jessie blinked. "Bus?" 

The dark-haired man rolled his eyes. "For someone who gets on SHIELD's bad side, you sure do't know a lot about us." 

"Ward," Coulson sighed. 

Jessie grinned. "Well, I sure didn't know that you were alive. Y'know, since you were reported dead." 

Coulson's smile vanished, and he leaned forward. "That file was classified, unable to be accessed by anyone." 

Jessie shrugged, leaning back in her chair, swinging her legs up so they were on the table. "I'm not just anyone, Coulson." 

The agent, Ward, smirked. "We know that, Vertigo."