Work Text:
Upon stepping aboard The Carte Blanche, Benzaiten Steel was absolutely sure of two things. One: his brother was the happiest he’d seen him in a long, long time. Possibly in their entire lives. Two? Every single person on this ship was definitely a criminal.
Juno introduced him to everyone with the nervous excitement of a teenager bringing their first girlfriend home to meet the parents, though Ben wasn’t sure which side of the metaphor he was on. He introduced his friends one by one: Jet Siquliak, a man that towered above him even as he sat at the ship’s table, drinking from a comically small teacup. Buddy and Vespa. Like, the Buddy and Vespa. The ones that were the inspiration for just about every heist stream from Mars to the Outer Rim. And of course, there was Rita. Rita and Ben were good friends, they had called nearly every thursday since the former secretary had followed his brother off Mars. And then there was…
Peter Ransom.
His first impression was that he didn’t trust the man as far as he could throw him. He was all sharp lines and even sharper grins, reaching out to take his hand with a, ‘how do you do?’ All the while his eyes raked up and down, as if cataloguing every single weak point Benzaiten had on him, trying to figure out what perfect way to get Ben to give him everything he owned and make him think it was his own idea. Which, unfortunately, led him to his second conclusion: he was exactly Juno’s type.
He glanced back at Juno to confirm that, yep, he was looking at Ransom like a lovesick idiot. When he looked back, though, he was surprised to see that Ransom also had some tenderness in his eyes, staring at his brother like a lost puppy. Juno didn’t typically go for guys that were sweet. Then again, though, anyone could fake a goopy look or two. And sure, his brother might have been the (former) detective, but that didn’t mean he had the monopoly on snooping around. After a lovely family dinner, he headed back to Juno’s room to do a little investigating of his own.
Juno wasn’t there when he arrived. He took advantage of the moment to quickly scour the room like he used to when Juno was really going through it: looking for anything sharp, addictive, or generally dangerous. To the lady’s credit, it was pretty clean and organized. Hell, it looked like Juno had even vacuumed in here, probably in an attempt to tidy up for Ben’s visit. He quickly looked through Juno’s bedside drawers and immediately wished he hadn’t. “Flavored condoms? Gross, Juno.” Questionable taste in protection aside, the place seemed squeaky clean. Maybe working with a bunch of criminals really was the key for an improved mental health state.
He put his hand on the door’s button, starting a bit when it moved without making contact, revealing the equally startled face of his brother. Juno recovered faster, eyebrows furrowing in annoyance. “Ben, what are you doing in my room?”
Ben grinned lazily. “Just setting my stuff down. I’m staying in here, right? Unless you plan to have your favorite brother ruin his dancing career on that backbreaker of a couch I saw.”
“Only brother, and I’m considering it,” Juno scoffed as he pushed past him, but there was no venom behind it. “If you’re done snooping, Rita’s setting up a stream.”
“Hey Super Steel,” his smile turned into something he hoped wasn’t too mischievous.
“What.”
“You didn’t tell me you had a boyfriend.” Juno’s wide eyes and comical snort at the words were worth their weight in gold. Ben put his hand on his hip as a well-practiced pout formed on his lips, batting his best bambi eyes at Juno.
“I...he’s not my boyfriend!” Juno sputtered, still trying to catch his breath from the apparent shock of his twin having eyes. “We...haven’t put a label on it.”
“As if you could be happy in anything casual.” That was more of Ben’s realm of expertise: loads of flings and one nightstands, no one to bring home for the holidays. Juno had always been exactly the opposite. He fell too hard, too fast, too strong. It got him in trouble more often than not. In fact, as it currently stood, 100% of his previous relationships had ended with his heart getting broken.
“Yeah, yeah,” he grumbled, shoving his hands in his pocket and pointedly not looking at Ben. After a moment of this, Ben’s self control crumbled, and the idea that had been bubbling in his brain since he first saw Peter Ransom’s skinny ass tumbled out of his mouth.
“Say, Super Steel?”
“What.” Juno gave him a long suffering look, putting as much disdain into the single word as humanly possible.
“You remember the partner test we had? When we were teens?”
“Ben, we’re 38 years old. There’s no way in hell I’m letting you—”
An hour later, Ben was staring into a mirror, trying to perfect his look while also dealing with his newfound loss of depth perception. It was a lot harder than anticipated, wearing one of Juno’s eyepatches. It made for a convincing show, though. Luckily, Juno and Ben were sporting more or less the same hairstyles these days. Juno had filled out a bit since he last saw him (and good for him, it meant he was eating well for once in his life) and the baggy clothes he preferred didn’t seem too out of place on Ben. A quick dab of winged eyeliner pulled everything together, and—voila—one perfect boyfriend test set and ready to go. Ben grinned conspiratorially into the mirror, then headed for the room that Juno had informed him belonged to Peter Ransom.
~
Peter Nureyev was scouring over the schematics for a Venusian bank vault when he heard a knock on his door. Ah, Juno was right on schedule for their weekly stream night. He had offered to cancel for the week, after all, stream night would always be available to them while Benzaiten was not. However, his lady had insisted that it was something he looked forward to. And Nureyev was always weak to the whims of Juno Steel.
“Come in, dear!” He called, hurriedly packing away the schematic onto his cluttered desk. He had tidied up a bit a few hours prior, enough that you could see the floor at least. But his workplace was something sacred, something that needed to stay in a state of dysfunction to be functional to him. Juno didn’t understand this but also claimed to not mind the mess. Which was gracious considering exactly how clean Juno kept his own quarters. He heard the door slide open behind him and allowed himself a small smile, turning to greet his dear detective.
Immediately he could tell that something was off. This person looked like Juno, certainly. He was wearing his clothes and the plain black eyepatch he favored when he didn’t feel the need to look fancy. He had the same, deep brown skin and gorgeous amber eye. His hair was impeccably maintained with tightly coiled curls on on top of shaved sides. But something about how this person, this imposter held themselves—their posture, their facial expression—was wrong. It looked like someone was attempting to wear Juno Steel, and doing a pisspoor job of it. So Peter Nureyev did what he did best. He immediately threw on a mask and a smile, all the while reaching for his nearest hidden knife.
“Hello, dear. I trust you’re well?” The imposter’s eyes twinkled with poorly hidden mischief, apparently assuming that their transgression had gone unnoticed. Which—truly—how amateur of them. When Juno smiled it took up his entire face. When he was triumphant, he was as radiant as the sun. No, half smiles and sneaky looks were not Juno’s style at all. Nureyev’s stomach churned with disgust and anxiety. He could only think of the Dark Matters robot that had ransacked them a few months prior, taking each of the crew member’s faces and using it against the others. Was it happening again? Did one of the most powerful intelligence agencies in the known universe really think they could fool Peter Nureyev with such a poor impersonation of his lady love?
“Better now,” the imposter replied, fluttering his eyelids and taking a few steps toward him. He shifted his grip on his recently acquired weapon. The knife slid from its holding place in his sleeve and into the palm of his hand. He felt the coldness of the hilt in his palm as he coiled like a snake to strike. The imposter clearly wasn’t expecting it when he did. He quickly side-stepped the not-Juno’s attempt at a hug and wrapped his arm around their neck. The wickedly sharp edge of his blade pressed forward to gently kiss the front of his voice box.
“I’m going to give you thirty seconds to explain your purpose here and what you’ve done to Juno,” he hissed, pressing the blade against skin ever-so-slightly. The imposter went rigid with surprise, gasping out a questioning breath as his eye nearly bulged out of his skull. “Or I will slit your throat where you stand.”
“Uncle, uncle!” The imposter stammered, causing Nureyev to pause. That...hadn’t been the response he was expecting from a highly specialized spy robot. His eyes narrowed quizzically, craning his neck to see the imposter’s face. “Ben, it’s Ben!”
Now it was time for Nureyev’s eyes to bulge. He jumped back an (honestly impressive) distance from the imposter, who he was realizing now was not an imposter at all, but Juno’s twin brother . His twin brother that he had met that morning. He was visiting Juno for their shared birthday and Nureyev had just put a knife to his throat.
Ben rubbed awkwardly at the place Nureyev had stuck his blade moments prior, still staring at him with wide eyes. Juno’s eyepatch must have been dropped at some point. It truly drove home the differences between the two. “So. Uh. Do you always react like that when you see Juno?”
“Benzaiten, I am...so terribly sorry. I know that doesn’t excuse my actions, but—”
Ben’s throat bobbed. “Were you really going to kill me?”
“No,” the lie flowed from his lips as easily as breathing, “I was planning on subduing you and taking you to Buddy.” That is, after all, what any rational person would do. What any person that didn’t panic like a hunted fool at the first sign of conflict, at least.
Ben nodded. “How’d you tell?”
“Beg pardon?”
“That I wasn’t Juno. How could you tell?”
He thought for a moment, back to Ben’s actions, the way he held himself, and how sure he had been just moments before that it was someone that had been sent to kill him. “I suppose...the way you move. Juno slouches far more,” he hesitated for a moment, trying to decide whether or not to bolster that statement, “he also walks with a slight limp, from an old—”
“—Knee injury. Yeah...I’m surprised you picked up on that.”
They stared at each other in silence for two long beats, each barely daring to breathe.
“So...you knew I wasn’t Juno,” Ben’s voice was even, careful, and curious, “and so you just automatically assumed I was, what, coming to kill you?” Nureyev’s eyes narrowed without his consent, something that Ben apparently took as an answer. “Wow, ok, what exactly do you guys get up to on this ship?”
A laugh tore itself from Nureyev’s throat, eyes glittering as he sent a sideway glance Ben’s way. “Some of the things that have happened to us are so fantastical you would not believe them if I were to tell you.
Ben raised an eyebrow, “and this has happened before? People coming to kill you, dressed like Juno?” He let out a brief laugh that was quickly replaced with a frown. He hesitated for just a moment, clearly wanting to say something. “Peter, is my brother safe?”
That was a difficult question to ask. While he would like to believe that, yes, nothing bad could happen to the detective while he had anything to say about it, he knew that it was not so simple. There were moments on missions that he could not protect Juno from, just as there were moments in the detective’s past that he could not prevent from happening no matter how much he wished it were so. “I would like to believe Juno is happy here,” he mused, “as he has given me no evidence to the contrary. I feel that so often in his life, the greatest threat to his safety has been by his own hand. I cannot guarantee that nothing bad will happen to him, Benzaiten. But I can promise you this: if there is anything in the universe that wishes to hurt Juno Steel, they will have to go through me first.”
Ben laughed, long and hard. It was a similar laugh to Juno’s, that rich, raspy voice lilting into something higher and more joyous. But Ben’s laugh was louder, more clear. He laughed like life was a celebration, something he was excited to participate in. Juno laughed like he was stealing joy from the universe in doing so, a hesitant thing. He seemed to do more of it these days, much to Nureyev’s delight. “You know, that would be a lot less scary if you hadn’t pulled a knife on me, like, two minutes ago. You’re not exactly the most intimidating person I’ve ever seen.” He put a hand on his hip, glancing over Nureyev in a more obvious appraisal than the one he had tossed his way earlier over dinner. “Alright. You’re ok.”
“Just like that?” He couldn’t keep the surprise from his voice. He had, after all, intended to kill the man just minutes prior.
“Just like that. Water under the bridge.” Nureyev thanked the stars, not for the first time that night, that Benten was the more benevolent of the two Steels. “Oh, and Ransom?”
“Yes?”
“We will never speak a word of this to Juno, deal?”
“Deal.”
“I’m serious, he’ll break up with you on the spot.”
“I understand.”
“Like. Immediately. He wouldn’t even question it.” Ben’s eyes glimmered with mischief, smiling from ear to ear.
Nureyev shook his head. The Steel twins were going to be the death of him yet.