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They find the dagger and then the book, and things are looking up for them. Peter’s a little on edge because when isn’t he, and Jet keeps muttering that it’s been way too easy, but maybe for once the lot of them deserve easy.
Buddy has been spending extended amounts of time locked her room, letting only Vespa enter on occasion as she puzzles out the final leg of their plan. They all wonder if they’re really going to get out of this with nothing more than some slight trauma and two broken fingers between them, but none of them voice the fear least they blame themselves for everything going wrong.
So the days are filled with bickering (Juno, Vespa) and snack eating (Rita) and mooning over past mistakes (Peter, Jet) but not a whole lot else. At nights, Rita insists they all “cuddle up” and watch movies about earth creatures (penguins are her favourite) or Jupitites or crime lords in galaxies far, far away, and they all moan and complain but indulge her anyway, because Buddy provides her with all the best snacks - and most of them refuse to admit it, but they do love Rita too.
This particular evening was much the same as usual; Juno moodily perched upon a stack of pillows as far away as humanly possible from Vespa, who was showcasing a new knife trick to Peter who curiously asked a dozen questions a minute much to her resigned delight. Jet was trying his best to focus on the giraffe-centered movie that was being projected onto the blank wall of the make-shift theater room, but between Rita’s excited explanations and his mind which sat at the other end of the Carte Blanche with Buddy, he was having little luck doing so.
It took all of thirty three minutes for Vespa to start throwing nuts as Juno, who screeched and flung his fists in response.
Peter moved to grab his lady, but before he could make it, Rita was tackling Juno to the ground instead, pummeling him apparently with the closest object she could find.
“Stop ruining my movie nights Mister. Steel! You always ruin my movie nights!”
Juno yelled in pain, arms flailing, still trying to reach Vespa who was being held captive in Jet’s strong grip. “Rita, stop! Just let me- why are you hitting me? Hit her instead!”
“I” thwack “will” thwack “not” thwack “stop” thwack “until” thwack “you” thwack “promise” thwack “to.”
“Quiet Rita, please.” Peter had regained his composure enough to wrestle the object out of Rita’s hands and tug her away from Juno.
She sighed in defeat and slumped to the floor. “Sorry Mister. Thief,” she muttered, tears forming in her dark eyes, “I just want us to get along, y’know? When Miss. Buddy ain’t here, all we do is fight, I want us to be family too. The good parts, not just the fightin’.”
Peter hesitated for a moment, before placing his arm awkwardly on her shoulder as she sobbed. Jet had finally released Vespa with a warning glance, and walked stoically over to Rita, picking her up in his arms and wrapping her in a tight hug.
“Please do not cry Rita,” he urged her, voice laced with more emotion than any of them had ever heard from him, “there will be much time for crying once we retrieve the cure mother, for now, Juno and Vespa will put aside their differences, and we will continue to watch this movie.”
Rita sniffed, and peered up at him. “Did you like the giraffes Mister. Jet” she asked, and he smiled wryly at her.
“I do not understand why their necks need to be so long, surely there is enough food for them upon the earth, but they do have a certain charm to them, yes.”
Rita seemed to brighten at this and continued to chat away still in Jet’s arms, as Vespa and Juno turned away from each other huffily. Peter tried to retain his neutral expression, dropping onto the floor next to Juno. He reached out one of his hands to slip into the detectives before remembering he was still holding the item that had been used as a weapon against him only moments before.
He examined it for the first time, before dropping it in a panic. Juno looked over curiously before Peter managed to exclaim “Rita! What are you doing with this?”
Rita frowned at him for a moment, before her face once again brightened. “Oh, Miss. Buddy told me to put it in a safe place, and what place is safer than with RITA!”
Before Peter could process this, Vespa reached over and snatched the book from his hands. “This can’t be the book, surely Buddy wouldn’t…” she trailed off, her face twisted into a frown as she flipped through the pages.
They all watched silently as Vespa turned page after page, the expression on her face becoming strange - none of them had ever seen her looking confused.
“Rita..” she seemed to be struggling to find the words to ask the question she wanted answered. “Why are all the pages blank?”
Rita grinned, the kind of grin that meant “I know something you don’t know!” Vespa steadied her breath, and asked again. “It’s a magic book,” Rita whispered conspiratorially. Vespa scoffed, and even though Juno had just been about to do the same, he glared at the green-haired woman anyway.
Rita’s grin did not falter, as she plucked the book out of Vespa’s hands, and lay it gently onto the small table laden with snacks, pushing them gently out of the way.. “Miss. Buddy trusted Rita to look after the book, because Rita is good at figuring out how things work, watch this!” They all do so wearily as she pulled a pen out from her messy ponytail, and started scribbling on the ragged pages.
Peter made a strangled sound at this, and Juno had to stop himself from giggling at this. “Of all things you could have a moral objection to, you choose people writing in books?” Peter huffed, jabbing Juno in the side as he did so.
Then, they waited.
They waited.
“I do not mean to criticize you Rita,” said Jet slowly, “but it appears that n-”
A small puff of purple smoke seemed to escape from the point Rita’s pen had first hit the page, and all of a sudden, the words were glowing a brilliant crimson.
Rita clapped delightedly and gestured for the others to read them.
“What is the name of the ship we’re on?” read Jet slowly, and Peter answered with,
“The Carte Blanche.”
They all looked quizzically at Rita, who rolled her eyes. “Mister Steel, why are your friends so st-”
“I don’t get it either Rita,” admitted Juno a little guiltily. She sighed deeply, tugging the book towards her once again.
“The book holds every secret in the universe.” she flipped onto an empty page and pushed it towards Jet, “but it won’t tell you unless you ask reeeeeal nicely.”
“So Buddy wanted it to find out how to use the Cure Mother Prime once we have it in our possession”
Rita beamed at him, “you’re so smart Mister Jet.”
He laughed in that special way he had reserved only for her, and moved to close the book.
Before he could do so, Vespa had snatched it up off the table, pulling a stump of a pencil out of one of her holsters as she did so.
She placed the book back on the table after a moment before smiling triumphantly at Juno. “I win.”
“What’s the most embarrassing thing to ever happen to Juno Steel.” Each word was punctuated with glee as Juno’s face turned white as he remembered the ‘prank war’ Mick had insisted on instigating their final year of high school. Ben had been utterly thrilled, and Sasha and Juno had been pulled along for the ride. In glowing silver script had appeared every horrible detail of the one prank Ben and Mick had decided to pull off together. A prank Juno had hoped never to think of again.
“We’re supposed to be a family,” he spat angrily, before tearing out the page and ripping it to shreds. “You’ll wish you’d never done that.” He slashed into the book with his own pen, whilst Vespa snarled at him.
What’s Vespa most afraid of.
“Butterflies?” Juno couldn’t stop the tears from rolling down his face and he gasped for breath. “You’re afraid of butterflies? They’re not even real.”
“HAVE YOU SEEN THOSE THINGS?” Vespa screeched uncharacteristically caught up in the moment, before regaining composure and scribbling something in herself.
“Doesn’t Buddy have a butterfly tattoo?” Juno was babbling excitedly at Peter, forgetting the book for a moment, “I’m pretty sure Buddy has a butterfly tattoo.”
Peter only smiled in response, his eyes still trained on Vespa, who in that moment he did not trust at all.
What’s the one thing Juno doesn’t want us all to know about him.
“Ohhh, Mister. Thief, your name’s on here!” Squeaked Rita, who was once again interested in their conversation, “it says that Juno left in the mi-”
“That’s enough Rita,” said Jet quietly, coaxing her back towards the tv, “please tell me again how giraffes digest their food.”
Rita’s proceeding babbling more than made up for the utter silence that had overcome the other three. Vespa grinned toothily in triumph, before picking up the book and laying one final blow upon Juno.
Peter had suddenly become collateral. There was something she’d always wanted to know the answer to, and here was her chance.
What’s Peter Ransom’s real name.
Time seemed to slow down as the room fell deathly quiet. Even Rita’s chewing seemed to suddenly become inaudible. All of them (even Jet) turned to look at Peter, whose face was a swirling mixture of anger and complete utter calm.
“If you read what’s on that page Vespa, so help me, I will destroy you. Then I will leave this boat, and this family, ruining every carefully calculated plan of Buddy’s, and it’ll be all. Your. Fault.”
Vespa held his gaze for a long, steady moment before her face twisted into her patented sneer, and she promptly left the room, slamming the door loudly behind her.
Peter visibly sagged, dropping to the floor and resting his head on Juno’s shoulder with a groan. “That was - that was. Close. I-”
Juno could only pat his arm in apology, as Peter fell apart beside him.
That night saw Peter tossing and turning in his comically large bed as his mind sifted through the evening’s events. Would he really have - Did it really matter that - Would it mean -
He tried not to think about the book that sat under a pile of notebooks and discarded papers on his desk not two feet from where he lay. He didn’t know what Buddy wanted with it; not really. Could guess, perhaps - but he needed to stop thinking about it. Stop letting it control his thoughts. Stop coaxing him over with the promise of knowledge.
The things a thief could do with a book like that! The things he could Know. The things he could Do.
He thought about jewels and riches and fortune and fame and promises. He thought about all the reasons he’d ended up here on The Carte Blache in the first place. He thought about all the secrets he wished he had the answers to.
About his childhood. About his parents. About Mag.
About being a thief and about saving the world (were it possible to save the world? Surely the book would -)
He thought about his Family - this one. This new one. Jet and Rita and Buddy - they had their uses, but more than that, he cared about them. Really cared about them. He didn’t need a book to tell him that.
Vespa was a work in progress. She made his skin crawl, and his heart ache with anger, but he wondered if part of that was just because he feared for Juno. The book would know that too, surely. He needed to stop fearing for Juno. He could - he could take care of himself. Vespa was clever and strong and crafty and proud. Peter could see her trying. He wanted to try too.
He thought about Juno.
He tried not to.
He didn’t want to be that person; that person who became so wrapped up in another that he-
But Juno.
He thought for a moment what it would be like to be Juno. All the things that Juno didn’t know. He knew Peter’s real name; certainly. But that was only the beginning.
He didn’t know about the debt or the promises, or the ring that sat next to the book under the piles of nothing on his desk.
He didn’t know the real reason Vespa hated him; but Peter was perceptive enough to figure that one out. Maybe Juno just didn’t want to know. Knowledge can be dangerous, as much as it can be a safety net.
There were other things Juno might want to know too. Things they’d spoken about only in whispers in the middle of what their timepieces marked as ‘night.’
About Sasha, and Dark Matters. About what he’d pictured for his life, and about how wrong everything had been before it’d fallen into place, this place. About how guilty he felt leaving Mick, and how desperately he wanted to know he was okay - but couldn’t risk trying to find out.
About his mother. His brother. He never spoke his name, but Peter could hear it so clearly in his mind. Benzaiten Steel. Why had he stayed?
Juno wanted to know. Could never know. Except maybe he had a chance now. To find out. To Know.
Peter sat up in bed, eyes fixed on where he knew the book sat in the dark. He could feel the pull of it, as though it were emitting a low hum of energy, calling for him. Beckoning. He knew it only in his head, but what difference did that make?
Here was his chance to do something for Juno. To uncloud a part of his past that tainted every bit of his present. To remove one tiny weight off his shoulders. To make it easier for him to-
Except he couldn’t. Peter couldn’t.
He couldn’t Know without telling Juno, and that wasn’t his decision to make. If Juno wanted to know, he could find out himself. Peter also knew that Juno had made peace with that part of himself a long time ago, even though it were still part of the burden he carried into each day. Life didn’t work in ways that always made perfect sense. It was messy, and painful and a left people grasping to understand the ‘why.’
If Peter found out the ‘why’ it would be to satisfy his own selfish curiosity, and he was better off not knowing if that were the case. It wasn’t his knowledge to have. It was Ben’s. Ben who had his reasons and then died for them (which would never make sense to Peter, and that was okay. It was okay.) And it were Juno’s. There were parts of Juno that Peter would never know; and he had to learn to be okay with that.
There were things Peter did know, and that had to be enough.
He knew the kinds of snacks Rita liked, and the kind of movies she liked watching.
He knew the things Jet didn’t want to talk about, and the ones you could coax out of him if he was feeling generous.
He knew the ways to push Vespa’s buttons and to make her smile at the end of a long day (if only for a second before she realized and replaced it with a scowl.)
He knew the kinds of things Buddy wanted from him - honesty. Trust. Dedication and moral righteousness. He knew most of all that she just wanted her family to be safe, happy. Whole. He shouldn’t have threatened to leave. He’d have to apologize for that one. To all of them.
He knew things about Juno, too. He knew the way his eyebrows furled up in concentration when he was trying to figure something out, and he knew that he didn’t really like the eyepatch but that it had been growing on him because Rita liked it. He knew that he liked wearing bright colours that clashed horrifically because then people would focus on the fabric and not the disaster that lay underneath.
He knew Juno wasn’t a disaster.
He hoped that Juno knew that too.
He knew the way Juno’s firsts curled up when they kissed, the way all the misery seemed to leave both of their bodies as they folded effortlessly into each other. He knew that the intensity of his feelings for Juno scared him, but that he was letting them (because life scared him. Everything scared him. He was scared always and about everything, but the fear felt worth it with Juno.)
Except there was one thing that scared him most of all. He’d been thinking about it earlier - it sat on his desk.
So, he made a decision.
Pushed back the covers, slipped quietly to his desk, flipped on his lamp and took a seat on the ridiculously uncomfortable chair Buddy had provided for him.
Who is Juno Steel’s soulmate. He penned the words carefully in his flowery cursive, before closing his eyes and waiting.
He counted to two hundred. Then two hundred again. Then a third time, just for good measure. He breathed in deeply, counted to ten to make sure he wanted to know, before nodding once to himself and opening his eyes.
He smiled at the little glowing ‘Rita (no surname)’ that had appeared underneath his question. He’d known that too, really.
The rest was worth finding out for himself.