Work Text:
The thunderclap makes Anya jump and Bond whimper. Twilight looks out the window to see rain beginning to fall in thick, heavy sheets. He checks the time. Yor should be leaving work – he hopes that she doesn’t get caught in the spring rainstorm. He makes a mental note to make sure she keeps an umbrella at work in case this happens and sets about making some hot tea. His wife is made of iron, but even she dislikes getting soaked.
“I want cocoa,” Anya calls from the couch. Twilight nods at her, adding a half-hearted remark for her to focus on her homework. Her odd moments of prescience don’t surprise him anymore. He’s chalked it up to being six – she’s completely obtuse in some respects, but uncannily sharp in others. Perhaps she had picked up on Yor’s habit for tea as well.
He wasn’t like that, but he wasn’t a regular six-year-old either.
The kettle is just beginning to whistle, however, when the door opens. Yor walks in, not at all soaked.
“Welcome back,” he tells her, trying to hide his surprise that it’s ten minutes before she should be home at all. “I’m glad you didn’t get caught in the storm. Did you get off early?”
She lifts her hand to her mouth, hiding a pleased but polite smile behind her fingers. It’s another tic of hers he’s memorized. “My coworker drove me home,” she explains. “Good thing, too – I forgot to bring an umbrella!”
That piques his interest. Camilla, Millie, and Sharon didn’t have licenses as far as he knew. “Did Dominic get that car he was thinking of buying?” he asks. It would be good to know how her co-workers got around.
“Well, yes, but he and Camilla live in the opposite direction from work,” she says, waving her hand. Of course, Twilight knows that, but he wouldn’t have put it past Dominic to offer. “The new hire drove me. His name is Kyle Keyes; he lives a couple of streets from here.”
“That was very kind of him,” Twilight says, brain racing. He hadn’t heard anything about a new hire. “You should pick up some pastries or something as a thank you gift tomorrow.”
That makes Yor’s cheeks flush. Twilight’s gaze lingers a bit too long on the spread of pink across her fair skin. “I will, I will.”
“I made tea,” he adds. “I thought you’d be soaked to the bone.”
She hops closer to him, smiling and inhaling the scent. It’s the rosehip tea she likes; he’d gone out of his way to pick it up yesterday when he’d seen they were running low. “Yay!” she cheers. “Anya,” she calls to their daughter, “Papa made your cocoa!”
Anya’s squinting at him as she climbs off the couch to join them in the kitchen. He shrugs it off.
Kyle Keyes’ file is unremarkable for someone with such a pithy name. He’s 28, the son of two teachers, studied accounting at Berlint University, worked for a pharmaceutical company in Liepsig for six years before moving back to Berlint to do in-house accounting at City Hall. It’s not hard to see why, either – his father was diagnosed with colon cancer four months ago. He’s unmarried, but had a short-lived engagement to a C-list actress a couple of years ago that made the papers when it ended. Overall, a regular Joe, and likely no threat to Operation Strix.
That is, until the next morning when Yor comes back from walking Bond. Anya’s already sent off to school, picked up by the Blackwells’ discerning chauffeur for an early-morning exercise activity. Yor smiles at him in greeting as she unhooks Bond’s leash, the dog bounding off to parts of the home unknown.
“I ran into Kyle on my walk, can you believe it?” she tells him as she slips her feet into her work shoes and gathers her coat and purse. “He offered to let him know if I need help getting to and from work. What a gentleman!”
“You’re not having trouble on the way, are you?” Twilight asks her. The concerned husband cover for the mission is intact – but with a stab of real concern, somewhere, deep within.
“No, no. I actually said he didn’t need to pick me up most of the time,” she replies. “I like the walk to work. It’s helpful if another storm comes around like yesterday, though!”
“Of course,” Twilight says. Good; the last thing they needed was for the neighbors to see Yor regularly getting in and out of a young man’s car. “Remember to take an umbrella with you,” he adds, making her jump. That makes him smile.
“I know, I know! I keep forgetting.” She picks one up by the stand they’ve started keeping by the door, since the advent of spring has made sudden rain more common. “Are you happy now?”
He watches her by the door. “Yes,” he says, and it’s truer than he’d like to admit. “Have a good day at work, Yor.”
In the doorway, she turns her head to look at him, dark red eyes glinting in the light. “You too, Loid.”
“This is dumb,” Frankie says into Twilight’s earpiece. “I pored over and triple-checked that stupid file for you. It’s legit. He’s just a regular guy.”
Twilight does not dignify it with a response. He’d already given Frankie the excuse run-down – that anybody getting close to the family should be vetted, that any untoward events from Yor’s social circle might draw scrutiny, that they had to ensure that the cover was secure and he wasn’t a rival spy, and if not, he might be carrying some useful intel from Leipsig anyway that it wouldn’t hurt to know.
“Oh, hello,” he tells the doorman, slowing his speech a little to mimic the middle-aged man he’s supposed to emulate. “I’m here on behalf of Weissman Waste Management. We have a contract with the city in the sixth district and I need to file some paperwork.”
The nonplussed doorman shrugs. “Fifth floor, turn right,” he says.
Twilight follows the instructions and gets into the elevator, patiently watching the elevator ticker reach five. Then the door opens and he finds himself face-to-face with his wife.
Well, almost.
“Welcome,” Camilla greets from the other side of the glass pane. In the space next her, Yor offers a polite smile. It strikes him that while he knows City Hall like the back of his hand, he’d never given much thought to how Yor is at work.
It isn’t lost on him either that the smile she puts on at home is much different. Warmer.
“Hello,” he greets the women. “I’m Raymond Pike, here on behalf of Weissman Waste Management, for the 1:30 appointment?”
Yor perks up. “Of course,” she says. “Come with me, sir.” She stands from her seat, takes Twilight to an adjacent meeting room and sits him down. “Let me just get your accounting department representative,” she adds, before returning promptly with Kyle Keyes. He’s handsome enough, a slender face with floppy brown hair and blue eyes, well-dressed in a fitted suit.
“You’ll forgive Ms. Forger overseeing this meeting,” Kyle Keyes says. He has a strong baritone. “This is my first account with the city, and she’s been assigned to ensure that I follow all procedures.” Humble enough, then. Twilight half-listens for any coded phrases but deems it unlikely. In the thick of a job at City Hall any agent would be focused on maintaining their cover.
“Mr. Keyes undersells himself,” Yor says, clapping her hands together and beaming at the man in question. “He was Accountant of the Year two years in a row at his old company. Don’t worry, Mr. Pike, between the two of us, we’ll get you out of here in no time!”
They do. Kyle Keyes is efficient with numbers, and Yor ensures that all the paperwork is in order. Yor is friendly, if distant, throughout the ordeal. Twilight learns many other things about Kyle Keyes – the way he ties his shoes, that he does not carry a weapon on his person, and that he speaks Spanish at a rudimentary level – but no immediate red flags. It seems the initial assessment of him being totally normal was correct, and Twilight tries to let himself feel relieved.
After he ditches the Raymond Pike disguise and gives Frankie an update Twilight hails a cab back to the hospital, musing all the while. It might not be the worst thing to keep Kyle Keyes around. Yor works hard. She wasn’t going to be his wife forever, and once Operation Strix ended he would want her to live a nice, quiet life. He wouldn’t want her to be lonely without a husband and a daughter to come home to, and he’d like for her to have an easier time shedding the “Mrs. Loid Forger” name. It’s the least he could give her when it all ends.
The thought makes him oddly melancholy.
Anya tugs on his hand when Yor walks out of the building, Camilla, Millie, and Kyle fanning out behind her. “Papa, it’s Mama!”
The woman in question turns in their direction, a surprised look forming on her face. Twilight and Anya approach her.
“Mama, I wanted to eat out, the three of us!” Anya says.
Twilight schools his face into a hapless but pleased expression, playing the part of the doting family man to a tee. It’s true; it was her idea. I want to surprise mama after work! she had said, stomping her foot. “Anya suggested it,” he says, diplomatically gesturing to their child. “But it turns out the seafood restaurant on 35th is having a special, and we’ve been meaning to try it, haven’t we?” He pretends to just notice Kyle behind her. “Oh, and you must be Kyle. I’m Loid Forger, Yor’s husband,” he says, sticking out his hand. “And this is little Anya. I wanted to thank you for driving her home in yesterday’s storm. Our daughter and I were very worried about her!”
If Kyle Keyes is surprised by the revelations of husband and daughter, he doesn’t show it. Offhandedly, he wonders if Yor has told him anything about her personal life. “A pleasure to meet you both.” He takes Twilight’s offered hand and shakes it. His grip is firm, but not so strong; Twilight figures he’d easily best the other man in a fight. Yor would too, no problem. “It was no problem,” Kyle says. “Yor has been looking after me during the transition. You know how new jobs are!”
Only new operations, new names and faces and roles to play, but Twilight nods genially. “Absolutely. I’m glad she’s been helpful!”
“It was no problem at all!” Yor pipes up. “Would you like to join us for dinner?”
“No, no, I couldn’t intrude,” Kyle says, polite. “But I have been thinking of doing a small housewarming party for my new apartment. All three of you must come.”
“We’ll be there,” Twilight affirms. “Just let Yor know the details.”
Yor nods next to him. “See you tomorrow, Kyle!”
Anya runs ahead of them, humming some offbeat tune about shrimp and squid. Yor falls into step beside Twilight, as easy as breathing. “You need to stop acting surprised when I pick you up after work,” he comments.
“Oh!” Again with the fingers covering her mouth. Off the clock Yor is quite predictable, but instead of the triumph he would usually feel at having learned a target inside out, he finds his lips ticking upward at the quirk instead. “Was I really that surprised-looking?”
“A little bit,” he says, making the teasing in his voice obvious.
“I’ll work on it,” she says, nodding firmly.
That draws a chuckle out of him before he can think. His wife looks pleased with herself at the noise. In the Berlint sunset, with the wind in her hair, she really is quite lovely.
Then he catches himself, remembering the mantra of emotional distance. This is enough, he tells himself, and almost fully believes it.