Chapter Text
He held the mobile between him and his brother on speaker phone. Their Handler (or at least one of their more frequently used handlers) had been trying to get ahold of the twins for the past two days. Of course, those past days the two brothers were rather occupied shoving bodies in wood chippers over in Bolivia. Something the handler should have known seeing as he was the twat that forwarded the Bolivia gig to them in the first place.
The Twins now sat in their second hot-wired car of the day, on the phone with their piece of shit disorganized Handler. The shorter twin tapped his fingers impatiently against his knee and the rings made a muffled crackling noise against the plastic rain poncho he still wore over his blue suit.
Handler was obviously stalling this conversation. Drawing it out to avoid telling the boys something he knew they wouldn’t respond well to. Well. More like something he wouldn’t respond well to. His darker-skinned twin tended to adapt to plan changes a little... easier.
He had enough of this, “So- let me get this fucking straight. The job that you’ve had lined up for us for weeks, now has another fucking person taking it.”
The Handler’s voice crackled over the long distance call, “no, no, not at all… er…”
“Saturn. And my brother is fucking Pluto, I mean how fucking difficult is it to remember the bloody names you give us.”
“Er, sorry. Saturn. But it isn’t what you think, she’s not taking the job from you. The client, uh, just wants there to be an extra set of hands to make things go…smoothly.” the Handler finishes lamely, the words at the end an obvious sugar coat for what the client really said.
“So the client think that me and my brother are going to make things go all to pot, and so he’s sent in some fucking bird to keep tabs on us?! We are fucking professionals that don’t need a sodding babysitter, ta.”
Pluto had been uncharacteristically quiet. Saturn had a bad feeling this meant he was actually considering a third member on their job.
Pluto’s next comment confirmed his suspicions. “I don’t know, bruv. Having another person might be a benefit. Thomas says-”
“Oh my fucking god.”
“Thomas says any opportunity for teamwork is an opportunity that shouldn’t be wasted.”
“Oh. Thanks, Pluto. That’s actually really fucking helpful except we are contract killers and this isn’t a fucking kids programme!”
“That feels unnecessary.”
“Your fucking sticker sheet is unnecessary.”
“Fucking mature.”
Saturn was about to point out which one of them was obsessed with PBS kids shows when he was cut short by the Handler, whom he’d forgotten was on speakerphone, “The client has been pretty firm about this, he won’t give you the job unless you take the girl.”
Fuck. Saturn knew he and Pluto needed the payout. Fucking hell. Fine.
He let out a few deep breaths, trying to control his anger before he did something dumb like shoot the windshield and make them have to hotwire a third car. “Fine. Who is this broad?”
Her name for the gig was Jupiter. The Handler said she liked thematic symmetry. Raised in a crime family, wouldn’t say which one. Only been doing snatch and grab, hacking, and blackmail jobs so far. Expert in demolitions and anything explosive. In fact, the bomb fetish had gotten her almost pinched a few times. Always got away though. Bit of a manic streak. Couldn’t fight.
Couldn’t Fight.
Couldn’t Fight?
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Saturn all but growled into the receiver. Even Pluto seemed a tad more apprehensive after learning this.
“Boys, I’m telling you she can hold her own. She’s resourceful. Can escape any captor, and make a bomb using just about anything.”
Saturn ground his teeth together, handing the phone to Pluto to talk so he wouldn’t break it in two. He left the car, slamming the door shut behind him and pacing around the abandoned parking garage they were hol’ up in. His bloodied rain poncho snagged against one of his rings and he ripped the plastic off him in frustrated rage before balling it up and angrily throwing it.
Fuck this job. Fuck the Handler. Fuck the bomb fetish bird. Fuck Thomas the Tank Engine.
By the time he had cooled off and slid back into the passenger side of the car Pluto had already gotten the job details and ended the call with the Handler.
Now here he was, three days later in Budapest waiting for the demolitions expert to grace them with her presence at the airport. Pluto drove, as usual, and insisted they get out of the car to help her find them better. Stupid git was probably gonna help her with her fucking bags too.
Saturn leaned against the side of the car watching Pluto scan the crowd a few paces in front of him, his fingers tapping an annoyed rhythm against his crossed arms as he waited. Pluto, who kept looking at his phone for the description of what she looked like, perked up. Saturn raised an eyebrow as a young woman with a pink backpack made a beeline for their car.
“Oi, Saturn, I think that’s her.” His brother said, reaching an arm behind blindly to smack Saturn’s shoulder “Maybe you could trying being a fucking gentleman for once.”
Saturn rolled his eyes and straightened his back so he was no longer leaning against the car. His brother was right, it was the girl they were looking for. He wasn’t sure what he expected but it wasn’t this.
She was young, for starters. He isn’t sure why he expected a woman in her forties, but he did. She was also dressed like someone out of an artsy New York fashion mag with a long leather jacket and a sheer top that looked like a bunch of green hankies sewn hastily together. Her dark hair was mostly pulled back into intricate braids, save for a few wispy strands at the front.
And she wore huge, face encompassing sunglasses.
Saturn decided that if this mission goes tits up, it was definitely going to be this weird bird's fault.
She approached his brother, smiling and offering a hand. “Hello, I believe you're looking for me?”
Pluto seemed hesitant, but took the hand and gave a firm shake before dropping it, “You must be Jupiter?”
“I am, are you Saturn?” her voice is an odd mix and American and something he can’t place. Like she’s forcibly repressing an accent of some kind. Something on the r in Saturn. Fuck that was going to bug him.
“Nah, I’m Pluto. Saturn is my brother over there, just ignore him. He’s being a fuckin Diesel today.”
“Like from Thomas the Tank Engine?”
God fucking damnit. She hasn’t even been here more than two minutes and she’s already managed to say the magic words to get Pluto to trust her implicitly.
“Yeah!” The excitement is palpable in Pluto’s voice, and Saturn resists the urge to bang his head against the car door. “Do you watch the show?”
“I do! Loved it when I was a kid, my cousins always asked me to put it on whenever I had to watch them.”
And just like that, Pluto and Jupiter are talking about Thomas the Fucking Tank Engine.
The car ride is torture, with Saturn trying his best to tune out his brother and the new recruit (a task made difficult by his decision to sit in the front seat, meaning both of them had to raise their voices to talk over him). He was thankful when Pluto pulled into the hotel they were staying at and parked. The three got their keys and went their separate ways to their rooms, Pluto and Saturn taking one, Jupiter taking the other across the hall.
- - -
It was about 3 am when Saturn woke to the sound of a door opening in the hall. He rose, deciding not to try and wake Pluto in the case that it was nothing, and made his way to his door. The peephole, while scratched up, provided the blurry image of Jupiter leaving her room and turning right down the hallways towards the elevator.
Fucking bitch. She was trying to cross them. Or sneak away. Or sell them out, or something.
He made sure to grab his gun.
He waited to hear the elevator ding open and then close again before leaving the room and stepping out into the hallway. He glanced up at the floor indicator on the lift. She had gone to the lobby.
He took the stairs, skipping steps in an effort to make it there in time to catch whatever she was doing.
As he exited out into the lobby he found it dark, all the light having long been turned off. Even in the dark, however, it only took a moment to find her. She sat on a couch with her back turned to him, staring at an illuminated fish tank. He approached her slowly, careful that his sock-clad feet didn’t make any noise that could alert her to his presence.
She didn’t seem to be doing much of anything, really. Her legs were crossed in front of her as she sat, and she had brought nothing down with her. She was just… watching. Watching the fish tank in the silence of a dark hotel lobby.
“I would’ve held the elevator for you, you know.”
Saturn nearly jumps out of his skin at the sound of her voice breaking the quiet of the large room.
“Jesus, fuck. How long did you know I was there?” He demands. Her back is still turned to him.
She laughs a little before responding, “Your reflection. In the fish tank.” She lazily points at the glassy surface.
She’s right, he can see the silhouette of his legs in the tank.
“Are you going to shoot me?” Her voice once again manages to startle him, though he does a better job hiding it the second time around.
“Huh?”
“I said, are you going to shoot me?” Jupiter doesn't sound like someone who feels like they are in danger, if anything it feels like she is teasing him.
Oh. She is. He realizes he’s drawn his gun in surprise at her voice. He sheepishly puts it back in the waistband of his trousers.
“No.”
“...Do you think they are happy in there?” She asks, as if the context of her cryptic ass inquiry were obvious. Is this bird actually fucking crazy?
“Who?” Saturn finds himself asking, though his better judgment says to leave this nutter to her 3am musings alone.
She turns her head to look at him out of the side of her eye, He realizes she is once again in some type of mirrored lens. “The fish,” She starts, “Do you think they are happy in that tank?”
Saturn huffs out a breath, “I’d bet not, it’s a sorry excuse for a life- to live in a half-meter of water.”
“You think? I thought maybe they’d like the security of it.” She turns her head back to the glass tank and silently pats the couch cushion beside her.
Saturn sighs to himself before rounding the couch to sit. She wasn’t trying to bugger up any of his plans at the moment, he may as well try and get a better sense of who she is.
They sit in thick silence for a minute or two before she speaks up again, “I can tell you don’t like that I’m here.”
“And here I was, thinking I was doing a bang-up job concealing that fact.”
She laughs, and Saturn resents the twinge of satisfaction that follows the noise.
“Do you and your brother not usually take on others?”
He sniffs, “We work best just the two of us. Another person is just another opportunity to muck shit up. And no offense, love, but it’s getting on my fucking tits that my brother doesn’t seem to grasp that.” he lets out a frustrated exhale before adding “And of course you had to like Thomas the Fucking Tank Engine.”
She full-on laughs this time, throwing her head back against the couch. Saturn once again feels an uncomfortable spark of pride in knowing he elicited that response.
“Well,” She stands, and he notices for the first time she’s wearing an oversized Momomon shirt and fuzzy pink socks. Jesus. Saturn starts to think the Handler is fucking around with him about her credentials. “I’ll make sure not to have anything else in common with your brother.” She approaches the fish tank only to tap on it twice and turn away towards the elevators.
Saturn sits in silence watching her leave before making his way upstairs to return to his own bed. He dreams of fuzzy pink socks and a giant fish tank.
- - -
The next morning had a slower start than Saturn would have liked.
Pluto insisted on eating breakfast in the room so he wouldn’t miss his "Thomas Time", and Jupiter decided to start her day with a jog, a shower, and 2 hours of doing her hair and putting on makeup that was just going to be covered by her planet-sized sunglasses anyway. No amount of bitching from Saturn was able to get either to give up their “rituals” as Pluto had put it.
It was now 11am and Saturn and Pluto were standing in the lobby waiting for Jupiter to make an appearance. Pluto, uncaring that they were behind schedule, spent the spare time trying to smack a bag of chips loose in the vending machine. Saturn was just sitting there doing everything he could not to look at the fish tank.
Where the god-forsaken fuck was this broad?
As if summoned by the mere thought of her, Jupiter happily trotted across the lobby to where the boys were standing near the exit. Saturn glanced up at her as she greeted Pluto, only to do a double take at what she was wearing.
“Well now I feel fucking underdressed,” Pluto’s voice chimes up, “Am I the only one content to not work every day in a fucking monkey suit.” He smooths out his leather jacket self consciously, muttering something about not like we work a sodding desk job, bruv
Saturn was too busy taking in Jupiter’s appearance to hear him fully.
“Hey, Saturn, looks like we match.” She had that teasing quality to her voice again and it made Saturn clench his jaw in irritation. She was right though, they did match. She wore a fitted Italian suit, just like him. The only true differences were the colors (Saturn wore blue, Jupiter wore red) and the heeled combat boots.
“Nah love, I’m not wearing shoes that look like they’ve seen more mosh pits than I have bodies.”
Pluto snickered at the dig, and Jupiter's lips quirked up at the comment, “Hey these are sturdy, let’s see how well your Santonis hold up if we have to leg it.”
Saturn tried not to let his amusement show. He didn’t want her thinking his opinion of her involvement was changing. It wasn’t.
“You both look like you’re going to a fucking bar mitzvah.”
Jupiter laughs at Pluto’s comment, still not taking her eyes off Saturn.
“Let’s get moving, you both have the plan?” Saturn asked, striding towards the exit. He just wanted to get this job done with, get paid, and leave.
“Yep!” Jupiter chirpped her response from somewhere behind him. He approached the car, still waiting for Pluto’s answer. He slid into the passenger seat still with no response.
He took a deep breath to control his anger.
“Pluto? You have the plan?” He looks at his brother, who’s busying himself with starting the car.
Pluto nods, three times in quick succession before absentmindedly responding as he throws the car in reverse “Yeah bruv, I got it. Fucking relax.”
He does not, in actuality, got it.
Saturn finds this out about three hours into the mission.
Shit has officially hit the fucking fan.
Pluto came to the wrong exit, which means the actual exit, the one Saturn is at now, Is still swarming with their Target's crew. The job had been a simple assassination and retrieval of the data from a laptop. Pluto was meant to take out the ground level threats at the exit while Saturn downloaded information off the laptop onto a hard drive. Then after they had a clear way out, and the data they were hired to retrieve, they were going to make their way up to the penthouse of this stupid building and kill their Target.
Saturn had not let Jupiter come very far inside before parking her in a surveillance control center and putting her on “watch”. It wasn’t his best thought-up excuse, but even if he had given real reasons for a lookout she would have seen through it. The simple fact of the matter was Saturn wasn’t in the mood to babysit a non-combatant through this whole thing. She couldn’t fight, she couldn’t shoot, and he was pretty sure the pin-striped suit she was wearing didn’t have any grenades in the pockets.
She hadn’t fought him on it at least, he’d give her that. She had plopped down angrily in a chair and kept her mouth shut, responding with a murderous tight-lipped smile when he made her promise to stay put until they were leaving. He almost felt bad about sidelining her. Almost.
Though he especially didn’t feel bad about it now, as he was quickly cornered by eight of the Target’s men.
He uses 5 bullets to kill three of them before the handgun is knocked from his hand by some type of flying billy-club. He curses out loud as the gun skids across the polished floor away from him. He turns his attention back to the men.
Five left. Two of them were perilously close. All armed with what look like iron police batons. Fuck.
Saturn waits for the closest one to swing. He ducks under the arc of the baton, using his body's momentum to throw his shoulder into the gut of his attacker. The first man doubles over, dropping his weapon in surprise. Saturn grabs the baton before it can even hit the ground and puts all of his weight into swinging the metal club upwards into the underside of the man’s jaw. It connects with a sickening crunch, and Saturn doesn’t have time to enjoy the knockout before another man has jumped onto his back, attempting to choke him from behind.
He uses the man’s own body weight to sling him over his head and onto the bleeding prone body of the first man. He uses the club still in his hand to swiftly smack the man’s nose- pushing it far enough into the skull to kill. Three left.
The rest of the men all come at him simultaneously. Saturn’s movements become a familiar dance of instinctive blocking and attacking, managing to take down another two with the club before he was overpowered and it was wrenched from his hand. He takes a club to the temple before being able to dodge.
His vision gets cloudy for a moment and he retreats slightly.
His eyes clear in time to see another swing coming at his face- he bends backwards, letting himself fall back rather than be brained by a club. As he crashes to the floor he feels the unmistakable feeling of the hard drive fling out of his pocket.
He jumps up, eyes searching the marble floor for the drive. Fuck. He ducks again to avoid another hit, and uses the swing of his body weight to kick his assailant in the chest. The man has the wind knocked out of him for a moment and Saturn takes the opportunity to pick up a forgotten baton and raise it above his head ready to strike.
He hears the noise of a crunch before he’s even able to swing.
His head jerks towards the sounds as he sees the other goon still standing. Fuck. he forgot about that guy. The goon in question seems to have brought his baton down on the misplaced hard drive. Smashing it to bits in one clean stroke.
While he was distracted by the loss of the data, the other man regained his breath and delivered a retaliation kick to Saturn’s sternum.
Saturn was once again knocked on his ass, chest constricting from the blow. He saw the two men move for just a moment before the violent arc of a metal pole came down on him.
Then blackness.
He woke up kneeling on the hard floor of what looked like a cellar, wrists zip-tied behind his back. The two undamaged men stood before him with another three men wearing slightly different security uniforms. Target’s personal security then. Fuck. One man stood in front of the others, looking a tad to fucking smug for Saturn's liking. He talked in an overly casual tone as he paced back in forth like a fucking pigeon.
Now, Saturn didn’t know a whole lot of Hungarian. His understanding and comprehension of the language was rudimentary at best, but he definitely knew the words for “caught” and “information” and “fucked”
He was fucked.
The man reached into his holster for his gun. However, the second the man pulled back the hammer on the gun- the power was cut.
The basement was instantly thrown into darkness and Saturn heard a feminine voice from somewhere behind him shout
“Saturn, down!”
He flung his body down, folding his upper half over his bent knees. A bullet tore through the space where Saturn’s head had been a second before. He stayed like that, bent over while chaos erupted around him. Men shouted into radios, running into shit and knocking stuff over in a panic to find out what was going on.
Saturn felt someone’s hands on the wrists behind his back. He bolted his body upright, swinging the back of his head into what he hoped was one of the goon’s noses. He misses, and someone catches him by the back of the neck before his body can over-correct and send him sprawled backwards.
“Jesus fuck!” the feminine voice from before hissed. Suddenly the hand on the back of his neck shifted to grip his jaw tightly. When she next spoke, Jupiter’s voice was directly in his ear. Her lips brushed his skin as she spoke in a low commanding voice. “Stop. Headbutting. It’s me. Be a good boy and follow my lead.”
Saturn was going to chalk up the spark of liquid fire that now danced down his spine as a byproduct of adrenaline. Not her. Not because of her hand firmly gripping his jaw. Or her dominating tone. Or the use of “good boy” in reference to himself. None of that. Just the adrenaline.
His denial was cut short by the sound of a knife cutting through plastic, and the blissful feeling of the pressure at his wrists letting up.
She tugged him up before spinning him around so she now stood behind him. With her hands on his shoulder she steered him around in the pitch blackness of the basement. He worried briefly he was being used as a shield, but a brief second of tuning into the angry Hungarian shouting confirmed they were too preoccupied getting the lights back on to even realize he was no longer in front of them. She maneuvered him into the stairwell leading back up to the main floor of the building. She only uttered a soft trust me before pushing up to walk up the stairs completely blind. She counted down the steps in each flight to prevent him from tripping.
8-7-6-5-4-3-2-end…8-7-6-5-4-3-2-end
Soon enough they broke out of the stairwell into the main lobby again. He made a move to go to the exit (now devoid of guards) when she stopped him, wordlessly yanking him backwards until they both stood in the utility closet to the left of the stairwell.
“What the ever-loving fuck-”
“Shh! just watch.” Jupiter then turned to what looked like a touch-screen cellphone she had wired into the wall though a light switch socket, tapping a few commands in. Instantly the lights came back on, a small sliver of light from the now-illuminated hall brightened the dark closet. Saturn could faintly see Jupiter's profile in the low lighting. She was wearing some type of dark vision goggles. “Okay. Any second now.”
The sounds of Hungarian yelling filled up the stairwell they just exited. The remaining five men barreled straight past their utility closet hiding nook and into the main room.
“NOW!”
Jupiter swung open the door before Saturn could stop her. The action immediately gave away their hiding spot, but the woman seemed unconcerned. Saturn looks incredulously at Jupiter, then back at the men now pointing weapons at them.
“What’re you-”
The whole building was rocked with a series of three explosions. The main room lit up in a flash of white, and Saturn turned his face away from the offensive brightness.
He was now looking at her, not the blast. She had peeled off the goggles and watched, unguarded, with complete fascination.
He understood the glasses now.
Her whole face was expressive. Her eyes, her brow, the scrunch of her nose. The brief few seconds of light the bombs provided him and he had seen her face enough to tell exactly what emotions ran through her blood. Right now? With wide, fascinated eyes and a slightly manic smile-
All he could read was elation. Exhilaration. Euphoria.
Bomb Fetish. He remembered dimly, Handler said she has a habit of making explosives.
The second the white faded into a smoldering orange she pulled the sunglasses off her collar and stuck them on her face again. Just like that, he could no longer read her.
She turned to him, facing up at him expectantly. He looked between her and the wreckage she caused. His own confused face reflected in her lenses. What the fuck was she staring at him for?
“Well?” She said, as if it was obvious what she was waiting for
“Well? Well what?”
“What did you think?”
Was this bird serious? Saturn realized with a start that she hadn’t needed to kill those men. They could have simply gotten out. She did it to prove she could handle herself. She was trying to earn his favor. To impress him. He thought for a moment how the Handler had said she had a “wild streak”, and considered calling him right now to correct him. This broad had the type of insanity only associated with world famous geniuses and serial murders. He thought both descriptions probably fit her pretty well.
“... well, for starters, love, I think you’re a fucking nutter. And probably a psychopath-” she gave a nod of agreement as if he’d just told her something stupidly obvious like her hair was dark brown, “And if this is how you do when I give you the bare fucking minimum of help or instruction then we might just keep you around.”
He meant it. She’d saved his ass completely and thoroughly, he suspected Pluto’s too. He wasn’t about to admit he was wrong, because he isn’t. She needs to learn to fight properly. But he will admit there is some truth to the glowing recommendations of the Handler.
She seems happy with his response, directing her express energy to jumping up and down in place.
“Oi you look pretty self-satisfied for someone who let me do all the fucking work.” Pluto’s voice rang out across the marble parlor room. Saturn whips his head up away from the giddy bomber and towards his brother.
Pluto stands over the mangle bodies. The whole front of his button up and slacks are drenched in blood. Saturn doesn’t bother asking if he’s okay, Pluto’s always miraculously okay.
Pluto doesn’t bleed.
Jupiter snorts out a laugh before piping up, “All the work? I took out five, and saved Saturn from a pitiful end.”
“I took out seven, plus the Target. Which was the objective of the mission. I win.” Pluto responded.
“Mmm not quite,” Jupiter fishes something out of her front breast pocket. It’s a USB. Saturn almost shouts in relief. They aren’t fucked. “I finished the download, it’s a tie at the very best, dear Pluto.”
“Such a fucking James.”
“What?! You’re the fucking James! I’m a Thomas!” Her voice was shrill as she broke away from Saturn to walk over to Pluto, stepping over chunks of Hungarian bodyguard as if it was nothing.
He watched the two bicker about which Thomas The Tank Engine characters they were with a slightly baffled expression. She held them together, and as much as he hates to admit it. They would have been pretty fucked if she hadn’t been there.
He realizes he’s been staring at the bloody mess on the floor when Jupiter calls his name to snap him out of it. “You coming, Saturn?”
“Yeah, just trying to step around the fucking wreck you made.”
He didn’t like the idea of adding a third person to him and his brother's job. Especially one that didn’t know how to shoot or fight. But, that being said, this went a lot smoother having a capable third person. And he had to admit she was capable.
Capable. Resourceful. Clever. Quick thinking. Got along well with Pluto.
He could admit she was a valuable asset. He would even consider giving her another gig if his brother was on board.
Oh who was he kidding, of course Pluto was going to be on board.
- -
They went out to celebrate a job well done, staying and drinking in a bar near their hotel until last call. Saturn was about nine drinks in when he concluded she was also kind of fun to be around. Plus she…
He thought about the hand on his jaw. The low sound of her voice. The slightly unhinged look in her eyes when he saw her without the mirrored lenses. How she had smelled so completely of vanilla when they were in that utility closet… Fuck. Stop. You can’t think that way about her. She isn’t some bird at a dive bar, she’s someone in the business.
He shook the thoughts from his head, attributing his straying mind to alcohol. He downed the last of his glass, silently watching Jupiter as she cheerfully decided to by the next round.
She stood from the table on wobbling legs and practically swayed her way to the bar. He wouldn’t be surprised if she vomits on the walk home.
“I like her.” Pluto’s voice broke him out of the image of her puking on her annoying boots.
“What?” Saturn's inebriated mind struggled to connect dots.
“I like her. She’s funny, she gets things done. She even buys us rounds.” he finished off the last of his drink as well. Maybe he’d puke too. Saturn grimaced at the thought while Pluto continued, “I say we bring her on another job.”
“Yeah. Alright, she gets shit done, I'll give her that. But she still has to learn to fucking fight. She can’t always be lucky with improv explosives.”
Pluto grinned widely and punched Saturn on the shoulder, “knew you liked her too.”
Pluto and Saturn ended their sidebar conversation in time for Jupiter to return to the table with three shots of an overly-sweet special Pluto had talked up. Tasted like lemons.
The three stumbled back to the hotel, Pluto needing to puke once on the walk, and Jupiter twice. Saturn laughed merrily at his brother and their companions' misfortune. The group disperses to their own rooms to sleep.
- -
Around 3am, Saturn once again woke to the sounds of Jupiter leaving the room.
This time he did not bring a gun as he stepped out of the room after her, the two taking the lift down in silence. The two found their perch without communicating it. Sitting in silence on the couch in front of the fish tank.
“You still think it likes the security of it?” Saturn broke the silence first. He could still feel the effects of the alcohol in his system.
“Doesn’t everyone?”
He snorted, “What do we do for a living again, love?”
She laughed, nodding her head in concession, “I guess you're right, but I don't think the ocean would be much more enjoyable,” she turned her head to look at him, “Maybe just a tank with better company.”
Saturn wishes for the briefest of moments that she wasn’t wearing her glasses. He then catches himself before the thought can go further. He keeps his expression carefully blank as he turns his head away from her. They sit like that for sometime, in the dark, staring at a fish tank.
“Pluto and I think that maybe it’s time we add another player to our team.” His voice breaks the silence, and he can hear the rustle of her whipping her head to the side to look at him.
A smile crept its way onto her face, stretching her lips in a wide grin, “Are you offering me a job?”
He doesn't turn to face her as he talks, choosing instead to address the glass reflection of himself in the aquarium. “You have to learn how to fight, I won’t save your fucking skin if you get pinched because you don’t know the fucking basics. And you have to learn how to shoot a gun, though I'm pretty sure giving a firearm to someone as fucking certifiable as you is signing my own fucking death sentence.”
“You’re offering me a job.”
“Maybe. Learn to fight. Go to a fucking shooting range.”
She turns back to the tank again, that stupid fucking grin still plastered on her face.
Saturn hopes to god he isn’t going to regret this.