Chapter Text
"sylvia," buddy calls. she doesn't have to wait long; she knows he's just in the next room, and the walls are paper-thin. without raising her voice or changing her inflection, she says, "sylvia, jet is collecting the last two members for this little escapade, if you would care to listen in with me."
he slinks into the room, light and lithe as a cat. this is not how peter nureyev walks--no, this is how peter nureyev walks, just when he is putting on a show--playing himself up, perhaps, just turning up the volume. sylvia regent has, after all, been his most honest facade. "i'd be delighted to," he says breezily. "any particular reason you have to suspect these individuals, ms. aurinko?"
"please, darling..."
"old habits die hard, m..." he catches himself on the last word before repeating the title and settles for a brief, genuine smile.
she returns it, and then swivels to sweep her hands dramatically over controls and dials. "not a bit," she says, in response to his earlier question. "but juno was just so stubborn with his conditions on our last job together that i'd quite like to ensure that they will be met this time as well. we cannot afford..."
her last words die out into the background as all of the liquid in peter turns to ice. he stares at her, heartbeat pounding in his ears and bringing the rattle and hum of machinery to a muted roar in his nerves. the staccato reverb of his panic brings a pure rush of thrilled fear and hot, repressed anger through his body in place of his momentarily-suspended functions--those like breathing.
buddy looked up, expression changing when she saw the nearly vacant look in his eyes. around them, the static crackle of a wire being activated echoed in the hollow of peter's throat, bringing him back into a smooth, if glassy-eyed, smile. buddy had just opened her mouth, concern scrawled across her face, when jet spoke.
"i am approaching juno's office," jet intoned distantly, audible but tinny over the device. peter swallowed back a choked sound.
"sylvia," buddy began. he waved her off, regaining composure by the second--straightening his spine and his smile by the millimeter.
"a story for tonight, i think," he said lightly, and laced his fingers together. it was an assurance that this would not go undisclosed--he owed it to her, as his employer, after all. buddy accepted this silently, and with good reason: it was only seconds before jet's next words.
"juno," jet greeted, and despite his best efforts peter's heart spasmed painfully at the sound. he closed his eyes, bracing himself. "i hope our current meeting is more enlightening than your comms call."
"happy to see you too, big guy." a brief pause, in which the air was ripped soundlessly from peter's lungs. "and don't worry. i know what i want, and either i get it or you leave. "
the familiar cadence of juno's voice, if not the strangely confident, self-assured quality, was like an anvil to his carefully composed heart. he wondered if he would live every day of this mission hearing that voice like that life-saving antidote held tantalizingly out of reach. he wondered if there was a way to cut out his heart and keep his nervous system taped to the floorboards of his body, for the sake of, say, his discretion. dignity. professionalism, maybe.
juno, or a distant, flimsy approximation of the voice that continued to saw at peter's chest, laid out his conditions. bile filled peter's throat at juno's insistence that he will not be made a murderer. ("that's just my rule, and you have to deal with it.")
peter is a murderer.
he pictured the ruby 7 as it blasted through the garage doors, and had a brief, silent war with the fucked-up urge to laugh.
he had almost managed to space out to the point of collecting only the words and none of the sound when juno invited someone out, bringing jet and his silent audience to condition number three. something reared in his chest--a molotov cocktail of jealousy, and guilt, and something more terrible and painful that he's never quite felt and can't quite place.
then it became obvious that this was his secretary. a more practical voice in peter's head asks the obvious, practical obstacles to his secrecy this now brings up. he chokes it down.
buddy clicked her tongue upon hearing rita's voice, and peter glanced over, startled. he had almost forgotten her, having nearly mentally escaped the dark, cool room with glowing knobs, buttons, controls, and the speakers trotting out peter's death warrant. the dialogue continued on into lighthearted territory: juno's voice becoming high-pitched and indignant when jet introduces himself, demanding unnecessary answers. he hadn't been half as concerned with peter's name, peter thought, and smiled humorlessly to himself. the resentment he had buried with sparrow wills began to bubble through the cracks of his foundation, and he swallowed it down with a lingering taste of bile.
when buddy hit a button and the feed cuts away, she turned to look at him. the stars are shining through the skylight, illuminating her pale skin and lighting up her eyes.
"i take it you know this man," she said lightly. he closed his eyes for a count of three and let the thoroughly overwhelmed, rising tears drain back into his head. he looked at her again from under a heavy fringe of eyelashes. in some ways, he felt like he was sixteen again, rolling a bottle glimmering in starlight between his fingers, the heavy edges of his consciousness laden with blood and guilt and desperation.
"in some sense of the word, yes," he said, in a voice of polished glass that carried in it no trace of emotion.
at least he still had that.
at least he still had his bitter craft.