Chapter Text
Anya Forger had never known her birthday.
There had been dates attached to her before- numbers on forms, numbers changed on other forms- assigned randomly by the orphanage or the adults who adopted her.
So when Becky Blackbell asked, one afternoon at the swing set-
"When's your birthday?"
Anya blinked at her. "...Birthday?"
"Yes! The day you were born!"
"Obviously she means the day you were born, not, like, a random Tuesday," Ewen chimed in, uninvited.
"We know that, Ewen." Becky dismissed.
"I'm just saying, some people don't know things."
"Some people," Damian muttered from the next bench over, not looking up from his book, "should learn to mind their own business."
"Nobody asked you, Damian-sama."
"I'm sitting right here. You all made me part of this."
Becky ignored all of them and leaned toward Anya, undeterred. "Well? When is it?"
Anya looked down at her hands. "...Anya doesn't know."
The playground went quiet for a second.
Becky recovered first, and loudly. "Oh! That's fine! You could just ask your parents!"
Anya's head snapped up.
Becky was already counting on her fingers. "Birthdays need cake. And decorations. And-" dramatic pause "-presents."
Anya's eyes went round. "Presents?"
"Lots of them."
"Lots?"
"Extravagant ones," Becky said, with the gravity of someone revealing a state secret.
Ewen leaned in too, unable to resist joining. "My cousin got a whole pony for his birthday."
"You don't have a cousin with a pony." Damian pointed out.
"I might."
"You don't."
Anya was no longer listening to either of them. Somewhere behind her eyes, gears the size of dinner plates had started turning.
Cake. Decorations. Presents. Everyone.
Anya have never celebrated birthdays.
And now, Anya needed one. Immediately.
That evening, Anya arrived at the dinner table with a resolute.
"Papa."
Loid looked up from his newspaper. "Yes?"
"Anya wants a birthday."
There was, Loid realized in the space of half a second, one small operational problem.
He did not know Anya's birthday.
Her records were fabricated. Her background was deliberately vague. Whatever date sat on her paperwork was just another manufactured detail for Operation Strix, forged by Franky, not a calendar.
He had simply never expected her to ask.
Fortunately, Yor had taken Bond out for his evening walk, leaving just the two of them at the table. Loid was quietly grateful for the timing.
"When is your birthday?" he asked, gently, already knowing the shape of the answer he was about to get.
Anya's smile faltered. "Anya doesn't know."
Loid noticed the shift in her mood. He set the newspaper down.
"Then," he said slowly, "we'll pick one."
Anya blinked. "Pick?"
"The day you became part of our family." He glanced, almost involuntarily, at the calendar on the wall- the date circled in his own handwriting, the day he'd brought her home. The day she'd first called him-
Papa.
Anya's whole face lit up like he'd handed her the moon. "Anya birthday is in a week!"
Bond, trotting in from the hallway, gave a single supportive borf. Yor came in right behind him, unwinding his leash, catching only the tail end of it.
"What's this about a birthday?" she asked, smiling.
"Anya's birthday is in a week," Loid said smoothly.
"I think that's wonderful," Yor clapped her hands.
Anya, riding the high, immediately remembered the rest of the checklist. "Birthday needs cake."
"Of course," Loid said.
"And presents."
"Certainly."
"And many people."
Loid hesitated. "...How many?"
"Many."
She leaned across the table, deadly serious. "Extravagant."
Loid's eyebrow twitched. "Extravagant?"
"Becky said birthdays are supposed to be extravagant."
Loid made a mental note that Becky Blackbell was, apparently, a threat to WISE's budget.
Two days later, Loid visited the WISE hideout.
He expected an operational update.
Instead, he was given a file. The first line read:
REQUEST FOR EXPENDITURE APPROVAL: OPERATION STRIX- SOCIAL EVENT
Loid stared at it. Then read the attached proposal.
Potential presence of Donovan Desmond.
Subject Damian Desmond confirmed as attendee.
Recommended venue: high-end private function room.
Additional entertainment facilities available.
He lowered the paper slowly.
...A birthday party.
He read it again, in case the words had rearranged themselves into something less absurd. They hadn't.
The handler tapped at the file.
"If you're going to gather the child, her classmates, and other relevant social contacts in one location anyway, we might as well make use of the opportunity."
A pause.
"It was approved by the headquarters. Keep her happy."
Loid stared at the ceiling for a long moment.
WISE had officially classified Anya's birthday party as an intelligence operation.
He genuinely could not decide whether to be impressed or concerned. He settled, after some thought, on both.
The venue was admittedly impressive- a private function room in one of Berlint's more prestigious hotels, complete with a dining area, a stage, seating for every guest on a rapidly-expanding list, and- at Anya's specific, non-negotiable insistence-
"Anya wants Spy Wars!"
- a small private theatre.
Loid had briefly considered explaining that a birthday party did not require a movie theatre.
Then he remembered that Anya was the entire reason the operation existed, and let it go.
The plan on paper was simple: the children would eat, Anya would open presents, Spy Wars would play quietly in the background.
If Donovan Desmond happened to appear anywhere in the vicinity- Twilight would observe.
Simple. Efficient. Perfectly reasonable.
The guest list did not agree.
Becky and Martha arrived first, trailing a present nearly large enough to require its own chair.
"It's not that big," she said, to no one who had asked.
Ewen and Emile arrived together, already arguing about something neither of them could later explain.
Damian arrived looking personally victimized by the concept of birthdays. "Why am I here."
"Because you're friends with Anya," Becky said.
"I am not-"
Becky smiled. “Sure, Desmond.”
Damian's eye twitched.
Henderson arrived to supervise, with the bearing of a man attending a state function, but mostly because he was invited.
Yuri arrived because Yor was attending, and made this fact known to at least six separate people within the first four minutes.
Franky arrived because Loid had made the tactical error of mentioning there would be food, and was already eyeing the buffet with unsettling focus.
And Yor, Yor had brought a few presents, a bit haphazardly packed. She tried her best to hide the cuts on her finger.
In the middle of it all, Anya stood very still, turning slowly on the spot.
Cake. Decorations. Friends. Presents. A giant screen. Her family, all in one room, all here for her.
Her chest went warm in a way she didn't have a word for yet.
This is the best birthday ever. She thought.
Loid watched her from across the room. For once, there was no target in front of him. No deadline. No enemy.
Just his daughter, smiling.
Somehow that mattered more than any operation he'd ever run.
For a while, it was simply a party- no operations, no targets, nothing but noise and sugar and Anya in the middle of it, thoroughly overwhelmed in the best possible way.
Ewen and Emile presented their gift with the solemnity: a small, alarmingly detailed model rocket.
"It actually launches," Emile said. "Sort of. A little."
"Define 'a little,'" Loid said carefully.
"It's mostly safe," Ewen offered, which did not help.
Anya's eyes went supernova. "ROCKET!"
"Don't let her near the ignition switch," Damian muttered.
He had his arms crossed, very pointedly not looking at any of them. "That was Emile and Ewen's idea. I am only here because they wouldn't stop talking about it at school. I had no say in the matter whatsoever."
Ewen frowned. "You picked the color,"
"I did not."
"You said red was 'acceptable.'"
"That is not the same as picking it."
Anya, mid-hug with the rocket box, turned toward the cake table, where an enormous, absurdly elegant three-tier cake sat looking wildly out of place next to the paper plates.
"Cake is so fancy," she said, awed.
"Isn't it?" Becky said. "Where'd it even come from?"
"No idea," Damian said, too quickly, already inspecting his own shoes with great interest. "Nothing to do with me. I did not instruct my butler to have it sent over this morning. That would be a strange thing to do. For someone who isn't even friends with the birthday girl."
Nobody had asked.
Becky turned to look at him very slowly. "...Okay."
Damian straightened. "I'm simply making sure the record is clear."
"Nobody said anything, Desmond."
"I know that. I'm saying it preemptively."
Anya, cake fork already in hand, beamed at him from across the table. "Anya loves cake, Syon-boy!"
Damian went bright red.
“It's not from me.” He said it far too loudly and sat down. He didn't get up again for the rest of the cake portion of the evening.
Yor, meanwhile, had arranged the gift pile beside Anya's chair till it rivaled the cake in height.
Yuri had positioned himself close enough to comment on every single one. "That's a lovely bow, sis, did you tie it yourself-"
"Yuri, you'll topple it," Yor said.
"I'm just observing." He grumbled.
Somewhere in the middle of all of it, candles were lit, an off-key round of happy birthday broke out with roughly four different tempos happening simultaneously, and Anya- surrounded, loud, full of cake, utterly certain this was the best day of her life- closed her eyes and made a wish she didn't tell anyone.
It was, for about twenty minutes, a completely ordinary, completely wonderful birthday party.
Then Franky walked back in, holding a small battered box like it owed him money.
"Happy birthday, kid."
Anya's eyes went huge. "For Anya?"
Franky raised an eyebrow. “No. For the other six-year-old I know.”
Anya stared.
Franky sighed. “Yes, obviously for you.”
She tore into the box before he'd even finished speaking. Inside was an old, dented reel to reel film tape.
Anya stared at it. "...Spy machine?"
"Close enough," Franky shrugged.
"Where did you even find that," Yor asked, peering over.
"Flea market. Figured she'd like it." Franky scratched the back of his neck. "Didn't overthink it."
There was a faded label stuck crooked to the side. Anya sounded it out like she was decoding it.
"Spy..."
"- please tell me it's not what I think it is," Yuri said quietly, to nobody.
"...Family. SPY FAMILY!" Anya shrieked, delighted, hugging it to her chest. "Is it a spy movie?"
"Uh," Franky said. "Yeah. That's- that's what it says on the box."
Loid looked at the label. Something about it sat wrong in a way he couldn't immediately name.
"There's a tape in it too," Franky added, unhelpfully. "Some old movie."
Anya went rigid. "Movie?"
Her eyes slid, with the slow inevitability of a searchlight, toward the theatre.
Then to Loid. Then to the screen.
"Papa."
Loid already knew he wasn't going to like the next sentence. "...Yes?"
"Can Anya watch?"
Loid glanced at the tape. Then at the theatre. Then at his daughter.
He had a very bad feeling about this. He had absolutely no operational grounds whatsoever to act on it.
So he sighed. "Of course."
The lights dimmed. Chairs scraped as everyone found a seat.
Yor smiled, settling in with her tea.
Becky leaned forward, already thrilled.
Damian crossed his arms like he hadn't chosen to be there.
Henderson adjusted his glasses with the solemnity of a man walking into a lecture hall.
Yuri claimed the seat beside Yor before anyone else could.
Franky reached for the popcorn before the lights had even finished dimming.
Anya hugged the box to her chest, eyes fixed on the screen.
The title flickered on.
And none of them knew it yet -
but the movie was about to reveal secrets that several governments had spent years trying to keep hidden.
Anya knew that. Bond already predicted this.
And everyone else?
They were going to need a lot of convincing.
Especially when the screen showed the first familiar scene from the news.