Chapter Text
Bullets pierced through the door, narrowly missing him as he leapt aside. He looked around wildly, trying to find a way to escape the room in which he found himself. Admittedly, he wasn’t thinking when he dove into a random room, but it was hard to think straight when being interrogated and tortured. He certainly wouldn't have chosen a room that was on the second level with no windows from which to escape. No, instead he found himself in exactly that: in a study lined with rows and rows of books and a large desk in the middle. Nothing else.
He spun around, the ends of his once crisp jacket lifting up to reveal blood stains on his crumpled white shirt - blood that didn’t belong to him. The same sticky red fluid was smeared over the gun he held in his hands, something he barely noticed as he swiped at the sweat that painted his brow. The shooting on the other side of the door subsided, only to be replaced by loud thumping and angry yells belonging to the remaining guards he escaped.
The loud cracks in the door only made him look for an exit more desperately. “Shit! Shit, shit, shit,” he muttered as he slammed himself against a bookshelf, his trembling hands fumbling against the books in hopes to find some secret passage. Along one of the wooden panels was a slight indentation in the shape of a circle with an odd pattern. He squinted at the markings and realised it looked familiar. He reached in and pulled his necklace from under his shirt, inspecting the circular disk against the wall. Slowly, he lowered the pendant, feeling a sort of magnetised attraction under his fingers.
Click.
“Well, fuck,” he said when a bookshelf moved aside, revealing a secret passageway. “I didn’t think that would work.” Without wasting time, he jumped into the darkened hallway and moved the bookshelf back to its rightful place, concealing himself just as the study door broke down. He held his breath and didn’t dare move a muscle, listening closely to what was happening on the opposite side.
There was heavy stomping with a scream of rage. “Where the fuck did he go?!”
“Dunno, but the boss isn’t going to be happy.”
“Fuck, we need to find him! You three! Sweep the halls in case he went through the vents or some shit. You, stay here in case he reappears while I try and explain how his highly skilled men couldn’t keep track of one person. This Kylo Ren guy is starting piss me the fuck off!”
There was some shuffling inside the study before the sound of fading footsteps met his ears. He blew a sigh of relief and relaxed against the wall of a dark hallway. From what he could see in the minimal lighting, it looked to be a cold and decrepit hallway, most likely unknown to the occupants of the house.
As he moved down the unknown hallway as quietly as possible, the sting of his cheek kept reminding him of what had transpired earlier that day, and of how spectacularly south things had gone. He certainly hadn’t expected to find her so quickly, much less be on the receiving end of her fist.
-
She went by Rey. Just Rey.
Depending on the mission, she could be Kenobi or Palpatine, but for all he knew, she had no last name. She constantly labelled herself as no one. To others, she was someone. To him, she was everything.
Her codename was H2, short for Hellhound Two, used by everyone during work hours. Not many had the courage to use her given name casually. She was part of a small team, a group of spies that were legendary amongst analysts and desk jockeys. They were worlds apart and yet, she always greeted him with familiarity, smile reaching her eyes as she waited for whatever gadgets he had ready for her.
“They have fingerprint recognition so only you or your partner, FN-2187, are able to use them, in case they falls into the wrong hands,” he said, silently sliding the guns over the velvet covered table, back upright with stiff shoulders.
Heat crept up his neck at her next comment. “You always know what I like best, Ben,” Rey said, holstering the weapon before passing two to the dark man next to her.
“H2, you have to be careful or O might hear you,” FN-2187 warned.
Rey snorted and brushed him off. “There’s no reason to be so strict here. When we’re in the field, that’s different, but for now, it’s easier to call you Finn.” Suddenly, she turned to Ben. “Isn’t that right, Ben?”
“I much prefer to refer to you as H2, especially before a mission,” Ben finished hurriedly, not wanting to get caught up in the disagreement between the two agents.
Finn threw him a thankful look. “See, Q knows what’s appropriate for work.”
“Q is short for Quartermaster, which is not Ben’s name. It’s his title,” Rey said.
“And calling him Ben is not appropriate, given how sensitive our line of work is. Sorry,” Finn apologised quickly. “But you know what I mean. If we let your name slip and someone hears...”
Ben, the Quartermaster for The Resistance, a sector of the Secret Intelligence Service of the New Republic, tilted his head slightly. “No need to apologise. FN-2187 has a point, H2.”
At the mention of their work, much less what could happen if their enemies found out the identity of the genius responsible for The Resistance’s weapons and gadgets alike, Rey sighed in defeat. “Very well, Q. FN-2187, let’s get this over and done with.”
As the pair slung black backpacks over their shoulders, Rey threw a wink at Ben before heading out. A small pout curled on her lips when Ben stared back at her with a passive face.
Once the agents left his personal lab at the Resistance headquarters, Ben blew out a long sigh and let his shoulders sag. He really hated being put on the spot when Rey visited before missions. They were both on the clock and couldn’t afford to be so friendly. His eyes slid to his computer screen, playing the black and white footage linked to the hallway cameras. Rey and Finn were deep in conversation, most probably about the assignment they were about to start. Ben’s hands busied themselves with packing up any leftover weapons that weren’t needed, his eyes still focused on the small woman with her hair up in a tight bun.
“Save travels, Rey,” he whispered before he turned away to pack his devices.
-
“I’m home,” he called out, dropping his keys into the bowl by the door. Most lights were off inside his apartment, save for the kitchen that was at the end of the hall. He quickly checked his watch with raised brows, not realising how late it was. “Luke?”
“In here, Ben.”
Upon entering the kitchen, Ben saw Luke busily tapping away at his laptop with a thick stack of papers and a cup of tea next to him. “It’s late. I didn’t think you would still be awake.”
Luke peered over his glasses. “Well, I didn’t think you would be at work until 1am.”
Shrugging out of his coat and draping it over the chair across from Luke, Ben went to the fridge to get a bottle of beer. “Yeah, I didn’t think I would be too,” he muttered, taking a swig from his bottle. He knew it was unlikely, what with missions taking longer than expected sometimes, but he had hoped that Rey would be back before the night was out. He forced himself to socialise with the night crew, but when midnight came and went with no word from Rey, even Ben knew he had to call it a night. He was still expected to work in the morning, and he had a meeting with O to prepare for. “Last minute work came up,” he said lamely.
“What kind of bank has you working this late?” Luke fixed him with a look, taking in the suit that he always wore to work.
Ben leaned against the fridge, one hand buried in his pants pocket and the other cradling his beer. “The one where I have to be in a meeting tomorrow and forgot about something I had to include in my report.” Luke hummed, losing interest, and turned back to his work. Ben came up behind him and took a paper from the top of the pile, skimming the heading along with a the first few paragraphs. “Heavy stuff to be marking this late at night.”
“For you, maybe,” Luke said, tapping his pen against his stack of papers. “Remember when you used to panic about these topics when you were still studying?”
Ben scoffed. “That was a long time ago. I don’t stress about that stuff anymore.”
“No, you don’t, since you waste your engineering degree at some bank.”
“Yeah, I know, I know,” said Ben, waving around his beer offhandedly. “But if a job came up right when you finished studying and it paid that much, you would have taken it too.”
“A job did come up when I finished, probably double the amount you're earning, but I stayed with my studies-”
“-And became a decorated Physics professor, I know, Luke, but we can't all be like you,” Ben finished, collapsing in the other chair at the dining table with a sigh.
“Is there something on your mind, Ben?” Luke asked suddenly. “Feeling dissatisfied with your job perhaps?”
“No, it's not that,” Ben said absentmindedly as he took out his phone to check the time, a habit he couldn’t seem to break despite having a watch. He noted that his lock screen was still void of any messages.
“A girl, perhaps?”
Ben jerked at the question. “What?”
“Have a girl on your mind?” Luke asked again.
An image of Rey swam into the forefront of his mind. It was the very first time he met her. She wore a dark pantsuit, making either him look very out of place with his track pants and loose tee, or her look very overdressed. Her mouth was in a straight line with a no nonsense vibe about her, but the smile that blossomed across her face when he agreed to work for The Resistance was something he’d never forget. It was like she was relieved and genuinely happy for him, but that was Rey. Or so he kept telling himself.
With the cherished memory dancing behind his eyes, Ben chuckled softly, taking a swig of his beer. “It’s complicated.”
That got Luke’s attention. “So there is someone,” he commented, leaning back on his chair to survey the other man properly.
“No!” Ben corrected himself. “No, there really isn’t. There’s a strict no dating policy at work so it’s useless to even entertain the idea.”
“Ben, you’re thirty-six. You dated a bit when you were younger, but not since you started that job. It’s been five years, right? No job is that important to put your own happiness on hold. And with your work hours, you barely have time for yourself.”
“Oh, like you’re one to talk? You don’t need to worry about having children since you have me, but I’ve never seen you date anyone. You’re not getting younger either, Luke.”
“Well, I guess we’re on the same boat then. Both of us too involved with our jobs to really find anyone appropriate. Hey, maybe we can do some double dates together,” Luke suggested with a grin that Ben couldn’t take seriously.
“Urgh, hard pass.” Ben quickly finished his beer and left his empty bottle on the counter. “I may call you Luke, but you’re still my dad, even if you’re my foster dad.”
As Ben busied himself with gathering his coat and backpack he had dumped on the floor earlier, Luke chortled and resumed his marking. “Well, the offer still stands, kid.”
Ben rolled his eyes. Stopping at the place where a small pile of papers sat, he quickly glimpsed over the paper at the top of the ‘marked’ pile. “You should look at the middle section again. You might have missed something,” he said, brushing past his dad without another word.
-
The meeting with O went smoothly, with Ben proposing new inventions for the agency as well as submitting his budget report for that quarter. As he sat at the other side of her desk, Ben forced his hands to remain still in his lap, waiting for any response from the head of The Resistance. She was an older woman with greying hair in a tight bun and years of experience on her face, though whether from being in the field or behind the desk, he did not know. There wasn’t much he knew about the head of The Resistance, only that she had run the agency for the past forty years. Hell, he wasn’t even sure what her real name was. He heard Rey address her as ‘Leia’ one time, but having nowhere near her level of clearance, Ben left it as O. He wasn’t going to ask his boss her life story any time soon.
“It looks good, as usual, Q,” she said, snapping the manilla folder closed and sliding it back across the table. “I’ll submit the changes to accounting and get your budget authorised.”
“Thank you,” Ben said, taking back his file and standing up to excuse himself.
“Q, do you mind if I ask you a personal question?”
Stopping his movements, Ben raised a brow and waited for her to continue.
Hands folded on top of the desk, O looked at him in the eye and asked, “Security mentioned that you didn’t leave the office until late last night. Now, I know how close you are to H2, but I need to know: is there anything going on?”
“No!” Ben tried his darndest to calm his heart, but being interrogated on his ever growing crush was the last thing he expected that morning. “No, ma’am. We’re just friends. Afterall, H2 recruited me and was my first contact with the agency.”
Satisfied with his answer, O relaxed in her seat. “Very well.”
Knowing a dismissal when he heard one, Ben didn’t waste any time putting space between them. Just as he placed his hand on the doorknob, he stopped, back still facing her. “Have you heard anything from H2 or FN-2187, by any chance?”
“No, nothing yet.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” Ben said, hand now gripped tightly around the doorknob as he stared intently at the grains of wood that made her office door. He tilted his head down slightly and exited, not daring to look back at O.