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Get in. Get out.
It should be easy to take Status Quo apart, to scoff at the disgustingly juvenile display every single hired gun this place had to offer. The streets that led up to the building stunk like trash and smoke (but to be fair, everything in Nexus city smelled like that.) The agency had been careful when they relayed the information, and kept warning the agent to keep up his act and keep his cool, as if this place was worth any ounce of seriousness.
For the organization that had the Hank J. Wimbleton, it was more than disappointing.
The building itself was even more pathetic, dilapidated and old. This was the place his agency had been so worried about that they had to send him to check up on it and gather as much intel on? It was almost insulting to be treated like he’s just another simple mercenary to be paid off.
He had class, dammit.
When he swings open the creaky doors, the musky air assaulting his lungs, making him hold back the urge to hack out the dust that had stuck to the back of his throat. When the agent composes himself, he spots a geezer behind a counter, propping his legs up and reading through a newspaper through his scratched-up glasses. The agent grimaces, rolling his eyes at the uncaring display before approaching the old man and clearing his throat. The man jumps at the sound, scrunching the paper in his hands as he leans forward to look at the stranger in front of him.
Squinting at the agent for a moment, the old man lets out a knowing little ‘oh’ and a look of recognition falls on his face.
“Hey there, rookie!” He greets, leaning over the counter and thoughtlessly dropping the forgotten newspaper to the ground. “They finally got someone to take over this damn dump, eh?” The man chuckles, and the agent stays quiet to assess him further.
Again, a disgusted — almost angry feeling wells up at the core of the agent’s stomach at being called rookie. He didn’t spend his days with utmost professionalism and complete accuracy within his missions to be called lesser than what he deserved.
But no, the agent steeled himself. Eventually, these people were going to realize just how much they’d underestimated him when he pulls the rug from beneath their feet and spilled all of their little secrets to his agency. They’d all gape at him, wondering how they could have been so blind to miss his deception, unable to even grasp their sheer incompetence.
“I am.” The agent says smoothly, ushering his thoughts away. “Transfer from another department.” He adds.
The man raises a brow at that. “Huh, and you haven’t met Doc yet?” There was genuine confusion in his tone, one that got the agent feeling like he’d said the wrong thing. “He usually meets up with guys like you, something about seeing them face-to-face and all that.”
Eyes narrow beneath his shades, the agent grits his teeth and sets his jaw stiffly as he hears the unfamiliar name, or perhaps, it’s a title. His agency had never mentioned any sort of ‘Doc.’ They gave him all that he knew about the organization, but it wouldn't be the first time he’d have to improvise...
A choice was laid out for the undercover agent; he could lie and say that has met this enigmatic ‘Doc’ beforehand, and possibly make the geezer assume things about, ask more questions that he might not know the answer to, or maybe even expect him to know things that ‘Doc’ might have said to him before hand. On the other side, he could tell the truth, think up some probable excuse and avoid any sort of further questioning.
The answer was obvious here.
“No, I haven’t.” The agent replies, keeping his tone steady and flat. “The...leader of my department was contacted instead, I was never told I had to see him.”
Perfectly executed and said. The agent smirked inwardly. The agent didn't want to incriminate himself by agreeing to or saying something that was completely false. He didn't want to pretend he knew anything about this 'Doc' the geezer kept yapping about.
A small hum escapes the old man’s throat, and he shrugs his shoulders. “Well, he has been kinda busy.” He muses, rubbing the back of his neck. How lucky the agent was that this guy was an idiot.
“I guess you can just get yourself acquainted with the crew, starting with me!” The older man walks out from behind the counter, holding out a hand for the agent to take. “Bossman.” He says simply, and the younger stares down at the offered palm before taking it. He doesn’t bother with trying to make the handshake last, giving a good impression to people he didn’t quite care about was something that did not interest him.
Clapping a heavy hand onto the agent’s shoulder, the old man leads him up a set stairs. The building wasn’t a complete dump from the looks of it, some essentials had been added by the previous tenant. At least this place wasn’t as pathetic as he thought it was. There was even a small dorm for recruits, and a shooting range.
It was all connected by a small, empty room, the only thing of importance in it being a little radio and screen perched upon a desk. “Doc usually lets the guys ring him up whenever we need some extra info from here, but I doubt he’d answer you now...” Bossman casually says, already moving past the agent to walk into another room.
“Why’s that?” The younger asks, and the old man raises a brow at him before answering.
“Well, he’s still kinda pissed about the last guy that had your position.”
The agent furrows his brow, he’d known that he was here to take someone’s place, but he didn’t really know why. With the way Bossman spoke, it was obvious that the topic was a little raw.
He couldn’t help but open his mouth to ask.
“I feel as though as the current tenant here, I deserve to know, at least.” He tries to keep himself from sounding too demanding, to let his tone soften to give the idea that he was letting Bossman have the choice to explain it or not.
But he was still making it evidently clear that he wanted to know.
Bossman looks at him, his expression a little unreadable before a tense moment before a familiar crooked grin shows up on his aged face. “You’re a demanding kid...but hey, I respect a guy who knows what he wants.”
The agent couldn’t help but smile back. “I’m not just asking out of curiosity, it’s my job to know what happens here, current or not.” He replies, and Bossman lets out a little huff of laughter.
“Yeah, well you can be as curious as you want when Doc shows up.” The old man retorts, shaking his head. “It ain’t my place to talk about.”
Disappointing. Though, it was a response that the agent fully expected, and he couldn’t ask again. Trying to force out answers would make him look desperate to know sensitive information, which would definitely implicate him. Even an idiot like Bossman would find all the questions suspicious.
So, they kept walking through the building. It was obvious to the agent now that Status Quo was a lot more well-stocked despite his initial notions. Maybe his agency’s paranoia about this place was soon going to be justified. But what really shocked the agent was the fact that they had a working helicopter.
Now, the agent believed that there was something genuinely strange about this place.
“You can get up to the helipad if you wanna get some missions done.” Bossman explains, “It’s hard work out there...by the way, you know how to shoot a gun, kid?” He says with a grin, and the agent couldn’t help but shoot him a wordless glare behind his dark glasses. Of course, he knew how to shoot a gun, among other things.
The old man cackles, slapping the agent’s back in his laughter. “I’m just kidding you, rookie!” He says in-between snorts. “Jeez, you’re a cranky kid, aren’t you?”
With a shake of his head, the agent rolls his eyes. “Whatever, let's just keep going, I do not want to waste my time.” He grumbles, and thankfully, Bossman relents, leading him into another part of the building.
They walk up a steep slope, and as soon as the agent sees the green light emanating from this new area, the scent of sterile alcohol and blood fills his lungs. It immediately tells the agent what this place was; a med-bay.
Sweeping his gaze, the agent sees what seems to be some makeshift clinic, steel examination tables being scrubbed down by grunts dressed in scrubs and bright cloning vats reflecting off the tiled floors. It was better than most medical stations, some agencies just relied on basic knowledge and survival skills that most had learned just by simply living in Nexus city.
In the corner of his eye, the agent could see a tall silhouette behind the medical screens, humming a cheery tune as they hunched over and worked behind the privacy of the curtains.
“Skinner!” Bossman suddenly yells, clapping his hands together. The sound was so sudden that the agent had almost jumped in place. The large silhouette behind the medical screens freeze and straighten up. “New guy is here to take over!”
Some shuffling is heard before the medical screens are pushed away to reveal the hulking mass of a G03LM. His hands were covered in blood, soaked down to the wrist and almost rendering the rubber gloves he wore absolutely useless.
The G03LM lets out a cheery little hum as he stares at the agent, and without much warning, he grabs his hand and shakes it firmly.
It was tight. He knows that the tight grip is more a result of the way GOL3MS were made, their sheer strength and bulkiness useful in the work they were made to do. It was obvious that this GOL3M was simply unaware of his own strength, and probably too cheery to think twice of it. Though, the agent has to physically steel himself so he doesn't tense at the tightness caging his smaller hand.
“Ahoy, there!” Skinner greets him like they’ve known each other for years. The GOL3M’s hands roam up to the agent’s shoulders, and suddenly, the shorter man finds himself being turned around and assessed. “You’re so healthy! That’s good!” The agent opens his mouth to say something, anything to get Skinner to stop spinning him around.
Skinner makes the agent face him again, his wide hands still settled on his shoulders. “It’s about time we got someone new, that last fella was really no good!” Again, the mention of the previous tenant. The agent was really starting to hate how that specific piece of information was being kept from him so adamantly.
No good. That could mean a million things, and the agent wanted to know all of them. Still, he keeps his mouth shut. There was a time and place for everything.
Clearing his throat and adjusting the rumpled cloth of his suit from Skinner spinning him around, the agent looks up at the medic up and down. “So, I’m assuming that you’re different from that ‘Doc’ that Bossman seems to keep mentioning, hm?” The old fuck snickers from behind him, and the agent has half the mind to turn around and smack him, but once again, with his ever unwavering patience and his need to keep his cover, he keeps his cool and waits for Skinner to respond, who seems rather surprised at being compared.
Skinner himself gives a kind-sounding but dismissive sound of laughter, it was a wonder that he could still manage to make himself seem so friendly despite GOL3M’s intimidating voice and stature. “That certainly is the first time I’ve been put next to Doc!”
There’s a barely held back snort that accompanies Skinner’s words (the agent once again considers hitting him upside the head.) “Yeah, trust me, you won’t be mistaking them from each other when you meet Doc.” Bossman adds. “No matter how chummy Skinner might get with you, you’re gonna appreciate him a lot more when Doc comes around and chews you out.” The agent grimaces at the information.
That certainly wasn’t a good thing to hear. It was already complicated enough to find out his agency had forgotten the chance to give him all the information he needed, especially since it was information that was about Status Quo’s enigmatic leader.
How delightful. The agent groans inwardly, already sensing the trouble this mystery man could bring him if he truly did have as much power as Bossman was implying. Still, the agent had to finish his mission. No matter the threat that loomed before him.
“Doc is a special man.” Skinner says lightly, moving to the side to peel off the bloodstained gloves that he wore, which had dried off into dark, sticky stains at this point before throwing them in a bin. “I certainly wouldn’t have been able to stomach what he did to the last tenant—”
Skinner immediately stops talking as Bossman raises a brow at him together with a pointed look. A seriousness settles in the air, and then the agent feels his muscles go taught, his tendons pulled tight like he expects something explosive to happen next.
But Skinner simply tilts his head at Bossman.
In the next moment the GOL3M raises his hands up in the air, as if showing some sort of surrender. “Oops! Not supposed to talk about that!” The medic simply scratches the back of his head, like he’d accidentally slipped out some high-school drama the teachers weren’t supposed to hear about.
It really is getting hard not to talk about this. The latent hostility whenever the last tenant would be mentioned was so potent the agent could taste it, bitter on his tongue and leaving something foul at the back of his throat.
Bossman shakes his head at Skinner’s casual excuse, stomping off to leave the little clinic. “Whatever, we’re done dawdling. C’mere, kid.” The older man actually grabs the agent this time, yanking him away. “See you, Skinner.”
Skinner waves at the duo, putting on a new pair of mint-colored gloves. “Toodles!” With that polite farewell, the GOL3M walks behind the medical screens once more, pulling the plastic shut.
The agent could barely keep up with Bossman’s fast steps, and he would about to snap at the geezer before he suddenly stops walking, almost causing the other man to crash into his back. Though, it most definitely doesn’t stop the agent from groaning and baring his teeth at him.
Pulling his arm out of Bossman’s grip, the agent looks to assess him with a scathing glance. “You know, with how pissed you’re acting, I’m more inclined to ask about—”
“This is your room.” Bossman interrupts, pressing a button on the wall and opening the door, revealing a rather plain and absent looking room.
The agent momentarily forgets what he was about to say as he takes this chance to see the place he would be spending the rest of his time in. It was a bit of a disappointment to see that this little tour of theirs would be ending on such a boring note, but the agent supposes that the room was enough, it wasn’t like he would be adding anything to it anyway.
Bossman scratches the back of his head. “It’s not much but...”
“It’s fine.” The agent says before the older man could say more. “I don’t need anything else but the essentials.” He walks up to the edge of the bed, sitting down on the stiff mattress. Looking up, he sees that Bossman still hadn’t left, and he raises a brow at the other man.
“What?” The agent asks rather pointedly.
There’s a strange look on Bossman’s face, almost like he’s debating whether or not to say what he wanted to say.
“You know—” Bossman cuts himself off, putting a hand to his mouth before sighing through his fingers. The agent couldn’t decipher what he was thinking about at all, and he furrows his brows at the other man. “You can still leave, it ain’t too late for you to—”
“I’m not leaving.” The agent looks almost disgusted at the prospect, and Bossman deflates at the firmness in the younger’s voice. “If you think I’m some sort of greenhorn who needs his hand held at every waking moment, you’ve got it wrong.”
Bossman sighs. “Alright,” He mutters. “Get some sleep while you still can, kid.”
The agent does.
It was about a week in that the agent began to get used to the monotony of this lifestyle. Wake up, check whatever weapons had come in for that day, make sure the recruits were up and ready, set out on a mission, come back, bring back whoever was unlucky enough to croak on the job, and then collapse back on his bed.
Nothing would really change about this routine, unless some of the recruits would get pissy and pick fights with one another, and if Bossman didn’t break it up then he’d definitely had to be the one to break it up.
Sometimes the days would be so painfully boring that he’d looked at that little radio in the center room and had the thought to dial the strange and enigmatic ‘Doc’ that no one seemed to want to talk about. But he had stopped himself at the last second, thinking better of it.
He had been doing so well, he couldn’t break that streak simply because he was bored.
So it shocks him that one day when he wakes up and does his morning routine in checking the barracks, he spots two men he most definitely doesn’t recognize. Bossman didn’t tell him that there would be any new recruits today. The agent narrows his eyes at the two, feeling trepidation well up in his chest.
One of them laughs loudly, a husky noise that accompanies the smell of cigarette smoke well. The suffocating scent clings to the stranger like a blanket, shrouding him in a way that almost makes him unapproachable if not for the grin that he throws at the other man across him on the table. It oozes with charisma and playfulness.
And it makes the agent frown.
The other man, bulkier and holding a stricter expression graces the agent with a blank glance behind dark shades. He nudges at his partner, pointing at the agent with his chin before a set of red eyes settle on the lone man. A clone. It's the first thought the younger has as he notices the blood tinged irises. Something heavy pools at the agent's stomach as the thought that this seemingly forgettable organization had somehow taken a clone from the AAHW, free from the endless indoctrination and propaganda spouted off by the Auditor himself.
Suddenly, the agent feels as if he's being watched by everyone in the room — not just by the two men, but the rest of the recruits as well, as if he’d done something forbidden by daring to focus his attention on the strangers and being concerned about it.
Really, he hates the amount of information his agency had left out.
A slithering and rough sounding laugh fills the silence, sick with smoke and the curious yet hardened stares the two men were giving the agent. "Hey, new guy." Sharp teeth peek behind thin lips as the smoker speaks, grinning up like he's trying to warm the air, but it only serves to unnerve the agent even further. Every part of this man seemed overwhelmingly hostile; smelling like smoke, the red eyes that only clones would have, and the insulting way he treated the agent like he’s the squeaky toy thrown into a pen filled with rabid dogs.
His partner shakes his head — snatching the cigarette that had been pinched between his fingers and rubbing it out onto the table. The other man clicks his tongue in annoyance for a quick second, but he doesn't do anything more to argue.
The smoker lifts a hand up, motioning for the agent to come close, and he does, but not because the man had told him to.
"I don't think I know you." The agent says, trying to sound strict at the face of the smoker's nonchalance and obvious amusement. "No one told me that—"
"Deimos," The stranger drawls, and he points to his partner, who peeks from behind his shades to look at him before sweeping his eyes towards the agent. "That there's Sanford."
The agent opens his mouth to speak, to question their reasons for him, but Deimos doesn’t even let him speak as disrupts his train of thought with that disgustingly rough voice of his.
"Doc sent me, he wanted to see how you're doing, considering you're new and all..." The agent bristles. That name again. This damn place was really eating at his patience, speaking of that damned ‘Doc’ like he was being kept out of some sort of juicy secret to play a prank on him. With how much people liked to mention the name around him, he was sure that people were starting to do it just to get him mad.
There’s a soft sigh. "Stop trying to scare the kid." Sanford, finally breaking his silence, and the smoker shoots him a cheeky little grin which earns him a slight curve on the edge of the taller man's lips. The agent almost groans, thinking that he should just walk away from the two and go on with his day, after all, he had better things to do than watch these idiots—
"Why not? You know what happened to the last guy...”
The agent promptly freezes up, and he feels all of the annoyance in his system bleed away.
"Doc told us not to talk about the last guy." The other cuts, his response prompt and casual.
When he sees the way the taller man so quickly shushed his partner, the agent can't help but open his mouth. "What about the last guy?" He grits, arms across his chest. Deimos grins from ear to ear, and the other man shoots him a glare to shut him up, but it's too late.
The next words that slip from the smoker's mouth is teasing, like he's regaling some fairytale to a starry-eyed kid. "You don't know about the last guy?" His eyes narrow, curved from the way he smirked, and Sanford sighs, seemingly given up from stopping the other man.
"I expected you to know...but I’m not surprised that you don’t know, talking about the guy is kinda taboo.” The agent doesn't like the tone Deimos says that in, but he doesn't say a word, more interested in hearing the story than defending himself. "Well, Doc got rid of him cause it turns out he was some stupid ass undercover agent from some no name agency."
Like a deer caught in headlights, the agent stares at Deimos with wide eyes. For a quick shameful moment, his heart seizes, but the agent quickly swallows down the dryness across his tongue. He does not dare to speak a word, sure that he’d say something wrong in the wake of his fear.
"Poor guy didn't stand a chance, Doc made a good example of the fucker." He chuckles, and Sanford huffs from where he sits.
He's trying to scare you, there's no way he actually knows what you're here for. Keep your calm, and think of something to say.
Opening his mouth and fighting down the quiver in his voice, the agent speaks. "Well, that's unfortunate." It's all he says, and Deimos drops his smile almost immediately at the lackluster reply. Perhaps, he had been waiting for the agent to say something to incriminate himself, to jump at the chance to defend his honesty and convince them that he was different.
That was the trap. To make the agent nervous and slip his mask off a bit. Because why would he jump to reassure them of his loyalty if they weren't even speaking about him?
"Not really." Deimos hums, his expression painted with something bored, and Sanford cracks a small smile. "The guy was kind of an asshole."
The agent feels the tension release from his muscles.
Deimos and Sanford stand up, the smoker clapping a hand on the agent's shoulder and giving him a blinding, toothy grin. "Good luck, kid." He says, shaking the younger man slightly. "Doc is gonna love what you’ve done with the place when he comes over." Sanford gives an approving nod as both men walk away and out the door.
When he comes over. The agent feels his thoughts come to a halt, stirring and drinking in the words as he slowly pieces together in his mind.
Doc was coming here?
The nights were completely sleepless the next few days. The thought of Doc coming here , seeing him — it brought forth a sensation that the agent hadn’t felt in years. He hadn’t been able to take the idea of the man being here at any day, at any moment now.
When he opens his door and he sees Bossman standing there, the agent actually lets out a yell and throws his fist towards the older man, which was easily caught in the air by an aged hand. If the agent’s were any clearer, he might have been embarrassed at the fact the older man had been able to stop his punch so easily.
“Whoa!” Bossman says, letting go of the agent’s wrist, his face tight with concern as he sees the younger man heave like he’d just run ten miles. “Shit, kid...the hell is up with you?”
The agent clenches his teeth, head pounding as he presses his fingers between his eyes. “What the fuck are you doing standing in front my room?” He grumbles, and his voice was almost akin to Deimos’ smoke-ruined baritone.
Again, that strange look crosses Bossman’s face, and the agent really wants to try punching him again. “I was just gonna say that you could take the time off for a bit, the recruits got all the jobs handled, and we’re gonna be getting a visit from—”
“Go fuck yourself.” The agent hisses, and he can’t help but hate the look of pity that crosses Bossman’s eyes. He would have handled it better if the older man downplayed his skills, better if he just straight up insulted him even. Because showing that fucking look , it ticks the agent off more than anything else.
“If you think that you need to coddle me like some kid, you’re dead wrong.” He snaps. “I’ve done this before, and whatever it is you think is going on with me, get it out of your head.”
“Kid—”
The agent doesn’t listen to whatever Bossman has to say. He rushes off, quickly grabbing two recruits he sets eyes on as soon as he reaches the barracks and goes on a mission, not even thinking of where it was or what it was really about, which most definitely ringing alarm bells in his head for things that he probably shouldn’t do, but he could care less. He just needed to get out of the building for a bit.
Anything to prolong the inevitable.
The mission ends horribly.
It earns him his first trip to Skinner’s clinic. It would be a lie if the agent says he didn’t expect it, unprepared as he was. In the back of his head, the agent had a horrible, quiet wish that he couldn’t be brought back from the disaster that was that mission, but alas, killing him off could never be so easy.
Even if he wanted it.
The thought was bitter, and the agent felt disappointed that he’d been so quick to resort to that escape at the thought of his plausible failure. He didn’t want to end up like the other tenant, didn’t want to see Doc and have his true intentions laid bare and exposed, all the more prolonging the humiliation that he simply wasn’t good enough to even go under the nose of Status Quo.
“Fucking hell, kid.” Bossman whispers as he sits beside the metal examination table the agent was laying on. Skinner was standing beside him, arms crossed and the softest scolding look the agent had ever seen. He doesn’t bother trying to defend himself, he knew what he did, and it was admittedly, absolutely stupid of him to do.
“Stop calling me kid.” The agent grumbles instead, deflecting the obvious explanation that he had to give by complaining. His torso still stings whenever he tries to move, so he knows he can’t get up and leave like last time.
Bossman slams his hand on the table, making a loud bang across the cold metal, the agent is unfazed, simply looking at the older man with a raised brow. “Listen,” The geezer grits. “I don’t know what’s up with you, but you better goddamn straighten the fuck up because if you keep Doc waiting, he’s going to put me and you in hell, and I mean that literally, you hear me?”
“What?” The agent slurs dumbly, and he rapidly sits up, which causes his wounds to flair painfully. Skinner sighs, reaching out to push the stubborn man back down, but the agent keeps himself up, a fervent worry in his eyes that none of them have seen before. “The hell do you mean by that? He’s— Doc is here? Right now?”
There’s a deafening silence, and the agent carefully speaks again.
“Does he know that I—” He begins to say, but Bossman groans, clamping his hands onto the agent’s shoulders so tightly that Skinner scolds him for it.
When the agent is forced to look at the old man, what he sees is seething outrage that immediately makes him snap his mouth shut so fast his teeth clack loudly. “Yes, he knows.” Bossman clips out. “Way to show him your professionalism, kid.”
From some stupid part of the agent, he finds himself snapping back at Bossman’s words. “You think I did this on purpose?” It was a weak defense, considering the fact that he partially did mean to head out unprepared to avoid the idea that he might fail this undercover mission because both he and his agency had bitten off more than they could chew by trying to figure out Status Quo in the first place.
Bossman takes in a sharp breath, and Skinner readies himself for when the old man throttles the agent, the kid being close to death just mere moments ago be damned. The medic lifts a heavy hand, placing it on Bossman’s shoulder, and the geezer gives Skinner a scoff before letting his head fall between his shoulders.
“Don’t make this worse.” Skinner whispers, the seriousness in his tone is something that the agent instantly hates.
“Just get the hell out there.” The older man says between his teeth, looking at the agent from beneath the hooded lids of his eyes. “If you go now maybe you’ll be lucky enough that Doc will leave you intact.”
The agent grumbles, swinging his legs over the table and carefully sets his numb legs on the floor, and he has to physically keep Skinner back from carrying him. He was shaking, and he genuinely doesn’t know if it’s because he’s scared out of his mind or because it feels like his guts are gonna pop out from between his stitches.
He certainly hopes it’s the latter. It’s less embarrassing that way.
Ignoring the way Bossman’s glare edges into concern, the agent drags himself to the center room. His head feels like a seed had been planted in it, sticking deep into his brain and weighing him down as thorny branches stretched over his skull to keep itself in place. He was sure that if it would hurt any more, he’d just drop onto the floor and promptly pass out.
But he powers through it, and before the agent knows it, he’s standing off to the side of the center most room, the one with the tiny radio and screen. He’s a few steps away from the desk.
And a man stands in the center of it all. Looking down at the radio and twiddling with the exposed wires between the metal.
Seeing him, the agent feels his bones lock up, like he’s looking at someone he shouldn’t be looking at. The light from the windows pour into the room, framing the man in a bright red that makes the agent feel like his head being stabbed in with an ice pick, and the more he looks at him — at Doc, the more he wants to throw up.
Doc turns, and the first thing the agent focuses on is the red lenses of his mask, the way they gleam and hide any hint of expression behind the dark steel. The agent stares, because really, it’s all he could do. His mouth felt like it had been filled with his own blood, heavy and sifting through something thick and metallic, but he knows that nothing is there.
“Hey.” Is all Doc says, and it brings the air back into the agent’s lungs. His voice is a deep, rumbling thing, different from anyone he has ever met. He walks closer, boots creating a soft tapping noise against the grey tile.
The agent didn’t know what he was expecting to happen when Doc came close, but he most definitely didn’t expect to feel a gloved hand reach behind his head, grasping him almost gently at the nape. The touch grounds him, and for a moment, the deafening reality of his situation is little more clear to him.
“Sir.” The agent replies, trying to keep himself steady even though he felt like his bones wanted to turn into jelly.
Doc has a tablet in his hand, and the man seems to pay more attention on the device than the agent. If this were any other scenario or person, maybe the agent would have been upset at the lack of regard for his presence, but now, he doesn’t dare voice whatever complaints he had.
The hand on his nape is still there, and the agent really wants to tear it off and run away.
But it’s like Doc’s presence is an anchor, keeping him in this room until he decides to break the silence and finally return his attention back onto the other man. Is this what the previous tenant had to go through? This gut-churning presence that was Doc before he was “taken care of?”
“You know, when they said that there was a new guy taking care of this building, I was kinda surprised.” Doc suddenly speaks, and the agent has to will himself not to jump out of his skin. “Because, I mean...usually I’m the one who meets them all first before they start doing their jobs, and a department suddenly transferring some guy I haven’t met before to take care of such a serious job was kinda out of pocket.”
Doc chuckles. He fucking chuckles.
“It’s almost like...” Doc hums, his attention still on his tablet and his hand still on the agent’s nape. There’s an almost amused tone beneath it all. “Someone didn’t do much of their research, huh?”
The hand on his nape curls, nails digging in slighting at the skin there. “But, I have to say you were pretty good at what you did here.” Doc adds. “Certainly better than the other guy.”
The agent wants to scream.
Out of all the dangerous men here, who had killed, maimed just as much as the agent had, even through Deimos and Sanford who both boasted knowledge and experience that dwarfed his own — nothing could make him more horrified at hearing those words come out of Doc’s mouth.
Every single person in Status Quo were lethal, and even housed a man so deadly he had a whole agency dedicated to stopping him, but no, that was nothing compared to the threat of Doc, of the man that could simply have his name repeated over and over again to the agent and to strike a cord so deeply within him.
Doc surrounded himself with killers, in cutthroat idiots like the agent himself, all boasting their prowess and their skill. But no matter how many of them could flood the room around Doc, he alone would remain the most vicious.
“No one told me that I needed to see you first—” The agent starts, his voice not sounding like his own.
“Nah, don’t give me that.” Doc cuts, finally looking away from his tablet, and the agent suddenly wishes those red lenses weren’t focused on him again. “You know what I’m saying.” He sounds like he’s talking to a child, and with how this was playing, he might as well be.
A choice was laid out for the undercover agent; he could continue to lie, push the idea that he was a genuine recruit for Status Quo, hope to whatever God was out there that he’d somehow convince this man that he wasn’t here to steal all their information and rat them out to his own agency. On the other side, he could let the lie go, and beg.
For once, the agent finds that the answer wasn’t obvious.
But he makes a choice anyway.
“Sir, I’m not sure what you mean...” He mumbles, and Doc sighs, his shoulders sagging as he lowers his head down. When he looks back up at the agent, his eyes are a bit visible now.
Roiling and barely held back anger. The agent felt like his tongue had been cut from his mouth.
“I’m going to give you another chance.” Doc drops his tablet onto the desk now, his full attention on the agent in front of him, his hand not only something to ground the other man, but a reminder that he had no other choice but stay here and bear the brunt of his proximity.
The agent looked down, which was against one of his many codes, but he couldn’t handle looking at Doc any longer, not when he was about to speak once again. His tongue is already moving to form the words in his head, lips parting to let his voice through.
I’m sorry, I lied. I came here on a mission, to infiltrate Status Quo to uncover your secrets. I planned to betray every single one of you, to run back to my agency once I had my fill of information. Please, don’t kill me.
He wanted to say that.
But it was like his tongue was stolen; replaced by something that wasn’t his. Maybe it was his pride, his need to scrape up whatever he could to salvage what was left of his mission.
“I’m not like the last tenant.” The agent blurts. No thought. No planning. None of the finesse he usually had.
Doc sucks in a breath. And before the world turns into a blur to the agent, he feels that hand on his nape grip him painfully before—
Slam.
The agent feels his nose crack against the desk. A sharp, erupting pain spreads throughout his head, reverberating into his skull and then back to the center of his face. He bounces off the desk a bit, making his blood flow and down to his lips before he’s held back down against the cold surface.
Gasping and writhing like a mouse stuck in a trap, the agent’s sight swims, and he heaves through his mouth because he just knows he won’t be able to with his nose now. Doc’s hand is still on the back of his neck, pinning him down and staring at him as he struggles against his hold. Blood splatters against the desk now, trailing dark red lines above the agent’s lip and pooling just below his cheek.
The agent chokes. “Please—”
“Save it.” Doc drawls, and he sounds bored now.
It took a while, but eventually, the agent did stop moving, opting to simply breath heavily and ignore the pulsing pain in his most assuredly broken nose. “If you wanted to steal information from me, then you should have just asked, you know.” Doc muses, and the other man looks up at him, his eyes straining because of his position.
“You didn’t need to make such a fuss...sneaking in here and making up some story...” Doc leans his head down, something so cruelly teasing in his voice. “Because no matter what you did, it would have ended the same for you.”
The agent clenches his jaw as Doc hovers his face just over the back of his head.
“You have no agency to go back to.” He whispers.
The hand finally releases, and the agent is left to simmer at the revelation. He slips himself off the desk, legs collapsing beneath him as he lifts a hand up to cradle his aching head. The blood from his nose trickles down between his knees and onto the tile, a stark dark red stain on the light grey.
From where he sits, he could see Doc’s legs beside him, waiting for anything else he might do. When nothing comes from the agent, the other man simply hums and walks off to the door.
And thinking that it was all over, the agent finds his tongue once more.
“I did well though, didn’t I?” He mutters it, and perhaps if the room hadn’t been dead silent, it wouldn’t have been heard by Doc at all. But the older man does hear it, clear as day, and it stops him in his tracks. “If I wasn’t an undercover agent...was I worth keeping?” Doc turns as the agent finally wills himself to stand up, albeit with some difficulty. Doc flicks his eyes up and down, a huff of laughter bubbling from beneath the mask.
“Sure, if you're talking about what you did for the building.” He says. “You can still continue, but honestly this time.”
The agent wipes the blood from his nose. “I am an undercover agent...I was sent here to collect information and give it to my agency.” He confesses it all, feeling the fear flow out together with his suddenly steady voice. “I was sent here to ruin Status Quo — ruin you.”
Absolute delight fills Doc’s eyes as soon as the agent finishes talking. “Good.” He says, something deeply proud in his tone, like the agent finally understands it.
“Welcome to Status Quo, agent.”