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The paper was smooth under her fingertips, thick and aged, like all old ICA files were by this time. The file itself was heavy, putting weight on her wrists that echoed the weight in her heart at seeing the slashed pictures of her parents' faces. This was the evidence that Arthur Edwards, the former Constant, thought he could sway her from her loyalty to 47. It's good information, a precisely aimed bullet. Diana never spoke about her parents and her motivation to change the world, but she hadn’t erased her past either. It was there for Edwards to find.
Diana let her stare go slightly distant, the way Edwards would expect. She would never show the shock outright.
A slightly straighter spine and even more subtle tremble as she set the file down was all she needed to convince him of the sincerity of her shock.
"I'll await your call."
Diana could hear the smugness he barely tried to bury and didn't let her hands tighten or her lips do more than flinch towards pursing before smoothing back to impassivity.
The gall of this man.
He’d found the information on her parents, information that was never destroyed, and he never once thought that maybe there was a reason for that. Maybe it was there for men like him to find, people who wanted to drive a wedge between her and 47.
He never even considered that maybe the information was a trap.
She remained a statue as Edwards left the room, victory in every step; staring out the floor to ceiling windows that left her completely on display.
Open yourself to a show and your enemies will see only what they want to. It's why 47 was such a good agent, he looked beyond the obvious opportunities. He saw what was there, not what was presented to him. She would hope that he would continue to do so, as she'd done for him in the past. A mobius snake of trust and betrayal.
Edwards was not so gifted. He was arrogant and smugly self assured of his own skill. But he didn't know Diana. Not truly.
Her parents' file seemed to be a sniper bullet, aimed for her temple. A surefire kill. But Edwards hadn't checked the safety, hadn't checked the magazine, hadn't looked into the history of the model of rifle to find its idiosyncioses and where dirt could lodge and jam it.
Her face stayed forcibly passive, as though she was suppressing her reaction. She wanted to scoff. Edwards had no idea who he was approaching if he thought she didn't already know who killed her parents.
Blue Seed Pharmaceuticals made the contract and Ort-Meyer accepted and sent out his best agents. They were the people responsible.
She and 47 had destroyed them years ago. Ort-Meyer died by 47’s hands for more personal reasons than being the facilitator of Diana’s tragedy. Blue Seed, well. Diana stifled the smile she normally allowed herself when she thought of accepting that contract from the ICA. It turned out there were more people than her who were affected by their chemicals leaking into the water. And some of those people now had the money and connections to hire the ICA. She hadn’t allowed anyone to know that the contract meant more to her than any other. No one but 47 who somehow could tell.
It was a vicious and bloody job, unlike 47’s normally tidy work.
So no, she didn’t blame 47.
47 was just the bullet.
She'd never asked if he remembered fulfilling her parents’ contract. Because it didn't matter if he did. Theirs wasn't a trust that could be broken by this knowledge. Diana didn't blame him for it and until recently she was fairly certain 47 wasn't capable of guilt. (With the introduction of Grey and the antidote, 47 was opening himself to more emotions than the dry pleasure he always took in taunting his targets with death puns (and making Diana suffer with them, hiding her own amusement like he hid his).)
She still wasn't sure if he ever felt guilt. That would imply regret. And there were very few things 47 regretted. If any.
Diana was the same.
She turned from the window and waved the guard away, she only ever needed the appearance of being guarded, to make her enemies think she was more on edge than she was, that she was less competent than she was.
Allowing Edwards to escape was a momentary regret, but he was turning out to be more useful than expected. He was so taken in by her appearance of stoic repressed emotion that he failed to realize who she truly was. What she was.
She created the dossiers for 47. She picked the targets. 47 might do the killing and take advantage of opportunities his targets gave him, but she made those opportunities. She had eyes and ears everywhere. She was at locations weeks before 47, casually asking a bartender about the local wine or calling local mechanics about electrical access. She physically walked through the streets and chawls, toured famous mansions and landmarks, locating opportunities. She was a sympathetic ear to many maids and gardeners, finding out their masters' idiosynchroses. Each act nothing suspicious on its own.
She was good enough that the acts were never connected.
She was only ever noticed in public when she wanted to be. When it was advantageous.
She was the voice in 47's ear, the knowledge in the back of his head, the safety on his trigger finger.
That Edwards didn't think to question her performance was an insult. That he thought she'd never looked into her own history when her parents' murderer was never found, that no one even truly tried.
It was either a compliment - that he thought her morally too upright to go digging into the ICA the moment she had the ability to do so without raising any flags, that she wouldn’t use her access to find the people who were responsible for her personal tragedy. She’d been working with 47 by the time she had the trust and skills to dig without setting off any alerts and she was glad of that. She knew him by then, knew who and what he was and thus had an appropriate response to his involvement (no response at all).
She sat at her desk and began to organize her campaign to become Constant, face neutral and hands steady. She glanced at the file by her right hand. A hint to any sniper who might be watching that she wasn’t as composed as she seemed.
Or Edward’s assumption was a deep insult, he thought her not intelligent enough or too sensitive to question her past.
Diana buried a sneer.
Regardless, it made him useful.
What better way to destroy an organization than from the inside out?
47 would understand her betrayal for what it was.
(Not a betrayal at all.)