Chapter Text
The stale smell of coffee and mildewed carpeting wafted through the air of the abandoned office building. Under the cool, bright light of the full moon and sitting above the hazy lights on the street, a lone figure sat at a grimy window, barely noticeable from any angle on the street or from any neighboring structures and not at all if passersby weren’t looking for someone. Just the way he wanted it.
The figure was completely still, hands positioned gently next to the trigger and scope of his firearm. Had he been less experienced, they would have locked up in a cramp hours ago, but after so many years of this work, his posture was second-nature, ingrained in every fiber of muscle and skin. His deep brown eyes - nearly black but still shining in the dark - locked on the target’s apartment two streets away, unmoving. The only signs that he was still alive were the even rise and fall of his chest and the occasional blink.
He had been there for hours - or had it been days? - patiently waiting for his chance, and it was about to pay off. Everything his team had done in the past eight months - gathering pages of texts and emails, photos and video clips, records of international bank accounts - was about to pay off. The shadow of a young woman passed in front of the thin window curtains, and they ruffled as she pulled them apart to step out onto her balcony.
“Mom, this is Eros. Target sighted and acquired. Waiting for confirmation.”
The figure spoke quietly into the mic attached to his earpiece, knowing that no matter how low his voice, it would still pick up the vibrations. A slightly husky voice came over the line immediately, just as eager as he was for something to happen and having more freedom to express it.
“Roger that, Eros! Target confirmed. Fire at will.”
Eros smiled slightly, his posture sure and his aim true. He took a deep breath, letting the stale air fill his lungs just like he had before every hit he’d ever made, and gently placed his finger on the trigger. In a second and with no noise at all, a bullet traveled through the woman’s chest and hit her straight in the heart. A practically fluorescent red stain - menacing and angry - appeared through her clothes, and as she collapsed, she left a spatter pattern on the balcony railing. She was dead before she could even register what happened.
The figure scrunched his brows together in confusion; that hadn’t been his bullet, of that he was 100% sure. He looked away from his scope to let his eyes adjust and looked around at the surrounding buildings for any sign of another assassin. He moved out of his position by the window, already gathering his equipment and erasing his presence from the room. On instinct, his concerns were quickly relayed into his earpiece.
“Mom, I’m gonna need immediate extraction. We got a rogue bullet.”
“Copy that, Eros. Sending a car for immediate extraction. We’ll be tracking you, so pack up and get out.”
“Find that rogue bullet.”
Eros quickly disassembled his gun with practiced motions. In less than five minutes, the pieces were packed into an innocuous dance bag and slung over his shoulder. The only remnants that anyone had been sitting there at all were the table and chair sitting innocently in front of the window and the indents they made in the carpet. Eros pulled them away, gave the indents a quick scrub with his foot, dumped the rest of his now cold coffee over them and hightailed it down the twelve flights of stairs and into the chill of the Montreal night. He was about to make a right turn down the alleyway next to the building when he spotted a flash of silver and dark blue out of the corner of his left eye, like a fox trying to make a break out of a decimated hen house.
“Mom, I have eyes on our rogue. Requesting permission to follow.”
“Negative, Eros. Do not follow. Get to ground level for immediate extraction.”
The figure rolled his eyes, hiked his bag onto his shoulder and took off after the silver fox.
“Eros, this is a personal message from Mom: “Stop being a stubborn dick and get out of there.””
“I’m out, and I have eyes on our rogue. Requesting permission to engage.”
“Negative, Eros, negative! Do not engage!”
Eros ignored the orders reverberating through his head and picked up his pace. His feet in their rubber soles made barely a sound on the sidewalk, the naturally even tread only enhanced by years of dance experience and conditioned into his body by his many masters. His gear merely rustled with each step. The cool air did well to prevent what little he sweat from dripping off his face, and he thanked whatever gods he would have to answer to that he hadn’t cramped up sitting still for so long. Pulling a hamstring was the last thing he needed right now. If anyone had seen him running down the street in his black skin-tight ensemble, they would think he was late coming home from a dance rehearsal somewhere.
The thought made Eros smile and as he emerged into a wide open parking lot, he once more caught sight of the figure in silver and dark blue, this time hissing into what Eros assumed was his own earpiece.
“Legend requests permission to engage. I’ve been spotted. No time for extraction!”
Eros spoke six languages fluently and another handful conversationally, but he always had trouble determining which to use until the target spoke first. This “Legend” had an impossibly smooth voice, mid-ranged and even with just a hint of an accent that was maybe Slavic or Eastern European, definitely not anywhere provincial. Had he encountered it somewhere other than during a hit, Eros would have fantasized about that voice moaning his name - code or real - in the throes of pleasure. As it was, he stopped about fifty feet behind Legend, not hiding but waiting for the perfect moment to strike. Legend noticed him stop and acknowledged his presence by slowly straightening to his full height and dropping his own gear - concealed in a worn gym bag - to the ground.
“Affirmative, Beloved,” he intoned. “Non-lethal weapons, only.”
Eros dropped everything and slid subtly into a defensive stance, right leg back and left leg planted, arms held a little away from his torso. He drew two small knives from a flat compartment hidden in his belt.
“You really don’t need those.” Legend called softly, a technique used quite often to avoid drawing unnecessary attention. He turned to face Eros completely, hands at his sides but posture alert. At a distance, Eros could see the other assassin was close to six feet tall, all muscle. “We are men of action, after all. Don’t you think it’s better we settle this with our hands?”
“You took my shot. Months of work wasted, because you took my shot. ”
The wind blew Legend’s shiny silver fringe over his face, adding a rakish charm to his smirk. “The shot was mine, I assure you.”
“Wasn’t.” Eros sheathed his weapons and took a step closer, watching Legend take a step to the side. The two of them began to circle each other, sizing up their opponent and looking for obvious weaknesses. Where Legend was tall and broad, heavier but definitely stronger, Eros was clearly slightly smaller - built for dexterity, lithe and quick. This wasn’t the mention that the two of them had no idea what each other’s specialties were, hand-to-hand combat, weaponry or even psychological manipulation. Deep brown eyes locked onto ice-blue ones, critically aware of every step and gesture. Eros felt something burn within them - something foreign and dangerous but enticing and entrancing nonetheless.
“I have orders that forbid me from killing you, you know,” Legend said conversationally. He stepped gracefully around their circle, closing in on his target inch by inch. Eros smiled condescendingly as he did the same.
“Are you gonna follow them, Legend? ”
He nodded, face void of any emotion and bearing a fake smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “I always follow orders. It’s how you get to be the best.”
“I don’t have those orders, though.” Eros briefly paused in his path about five feet away from Legend to indicate his earpiece. “Total radio silence. What’s to stop me from killing you?”
“If you do, you’ll miss out on one hell of a fight. They don’t call me Legend for no reason, after all.”
By now, the two assassins stood shoulder-to-shoulder, like dance partners, not quite touching but close enough that Eros could see the flecks of green and gold in Legend’s blue eyes and Legend could make out the subtle shades of dark brown in Eros’s.
Eros smiled seductively. “Let’s dance,” he said, dropping to the ground suddenly and swept a leg under Legend. The silver fox managed to anticipate the move, and barely caught himself in a weird pseudo side-plank position before pulling himself back up to face Eros again. This time, he left a larger gap between them.
“Interesting opening move.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“But you just gave yourself away.”
“And how’s that?”
“Because now I can do this!” Legend landed a quick three punch combo on Eros, who deflected a fourth and used the momentum to swing himself behind Legend and put him in a chokehold. Legend dropped to his knees and attempted to throw the smaller assassin over his own head. He succeeded, but wasn’t quick enough to prevent his opponent from latching onto his wrists and flipping him onto his back, giving him the opportunity to effectively straddle his thighs on the asphalt and pin him there. Eros smirked at the obvious effect he had on Legend.
“Is that a gun in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?” he asked. His voice showed no signs of effort or exhaustion.
Legend pulled Eros in close by the collar of his shirt . “Very funny, but let’s try something more original, like maybe--” He used the brief moment of surprise to roll the two of them over and bounce to his feet.
“You know, you have a lot of potential as an assassin.”
“I am an assassin!”
“Are you sure about that?”
Eros launched himself off the ground, ready to slap the pretty, perfect smile off of the Legend’s face. Instead, with the speed and accuracy of nearly 15 years of practice, he pulled out one of his concealed knives and set his aim on Legend’s head. Just as he was about to release the weapon, a voice broke his concentration.
“Eros, this is Mom. You have orders to stand down. I repeat, stand down. The rogue is a friendly. Do you copy?”
“...Yes, Mom. I copy.”
“Bring him with you to the rendezvous point. A car is waiting for you both. Eros are you listening?”
“Yes, Mom, I hear you.”
Eros relaxed his arm but kept his eyes on Legend, still smirking as if he were pleasantly surprised by the night’s events. From the slight tilt of his head, it appeared he had gotten his own orders to stand down. He picked up his bag and Eros’s, and offered the other assassin a hand. Eros ignored it and stalked away, not waiting for Legend to follow him but hearing his light-footed steps behind him anyway. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Legend gently massaging his own wrists.
“We have an extraction waiting for us?”
Eros noticed a sharp pain in his shoulder and hip but ignored them. He’d have time later to check out the potential damage. Besides, there was nothing that a hot shower and some painkillers couldn’t cure. Instead, he focused on keeping his voice void of emotion in an attempt to hide his irritation. “Yup.”
“You had excellent form with that knife, by the way. I would be dead if it weren’t for those eleventh-hour orders.”
“Yup.”
“Not a talker, okay. So, where are we going? Somewhere discreet, I presume?”
Eros spun around to face Legend, his eyes alight with fury and indignation.
“We? We are going to figure out what the hell is going on here: why you took my shot, why you're here in the first place, and who the hell you are!”
Legend tilted his head again, listening to the voice in his ear and smiling in fond exasperation.
“Affirmative, Beloved. We’ll await your call at the rendezvous point.” He looked at Eros from under his long silver bangs, almost totally bleached of color in the moonlight. Against them and his pale skin, his blue eyes stood out even more. Eros could feel his penetrating gaze move up and down his form for a moment and nearly shivered at the invasion.
Just as Legend looked about to say something, a nondescript black sedan pulled up to the curb down the street. The headlights flashed twice before they went out completely. Eros recognized the signal and jogged up the door, trusting that he’d know the driver. Legend jogged around to the trunk and tapped it twice, throwing their gear bags in when it popped open. By the time he slid behind the passenger seat, Eros was buckled behind the driver, his face set and voice commanding.
“Drive.”
The car started again and pulled out into the empty street.
A majority of the drive was spent in silence. Eros very pointedly kept his gaze on the passing cityscape while Legend kept his on Eros. The smaller assassin tried not to show how much it made his skin crawl; nobody had looked at him like that since Singapore, and it had ended with a broken pair of Gucci pumps, a few fractured ribs, thirty four stitches and a terrible rendition of “Anything Goes.” Plus, doing all that to his aggressor took so long that he had gone home without having been able to get himself a birthday present. Worst trip ever.
“Cyberpunk, how much longer until we get to the rendezvous point?”
The goat-teed driver smiled at Eros in the rearview mirror, his eyes alight with something familiar and teasing.
“Not long now, maybe 20 minutes. The higher-ups want to speak to the both of you in conference, so once you’ve both had the chance to shower and change, Mom will set up a call for you.”
“Mhmm,” Eros hummed noncommittally. The last thing he wanted was a chewing out from his sensei and whoever is in charge of Legend, but he couldn’t do anything about it now. “How are the Wonder Twins doing, by the way. Mom said they were driving everyone nuts now that they were full-time operatives.”
Cyberpunk laughed unabashedly, which made Eros smile himself. “The Knight and the Princess are doing fine. One is adjusting better than the other, I’ll let you draw your own conclusions about which. They’ll be leveling up in the next few weeks if they manage to hold it together long enough to pass their qualifying exams.”
Legend looked between the driver and the assassin, openly curious about their conversation but trained well enough to know that a good assassin didn’t ask for more information than he needed, especially concerning other agencies. He settled for smiling at their good-natured ribbing for the rest of the ride, and soon enough, the car pulled up to a modest hotel.
“The reservation is under Hikaru Sato,” The driver said, handing a folder over the seat to Eros, who took it and flipped through the identity briefly before tucking it into his jacket. “It’s a double room for the two of you. It’s best for Legend to wait for you by the elevators just in case someone suspects you of traveling together. Eros, always a pleasure. Legend, I hope never to see you again.”
Eros cracked open the door and said as he stuck a leg out, “Thanks, Cyber. Tell the twins I wish them luck.” He and Legend got out of the car and grabbed their gear from the trunk. Legend tapped it twice to signal Cyberpunk to drive away and he once again followed Eros, this time through the glass doors of the hotel and nearly up to the check-in desk until Eros nudged him towards the elevators. He rolled his eyes at the almost sheepish look the blond gave him.
Still, Eros felt the absence of Legend’s presence and let out a strained sigh at the entire situation. All he had wanted was a textbook kill: locate the target, take them out, finally go home. Was that so much to ask? But no. He had to get stuck with the blond bombshell who was too charming and too clever for his own good.
Wait? Bombshell? What the frick? Whatever, I’m an assassin, not blind. I can appreciate beautiful things. And people.
He checked in for the both of them without any trouble, and when he reached the elevators, there was Legend waiting for him - the cocky smile on his face and silver bangs falling in his ice-blue eyes. Eros pulled Legend in as soon as the doors opened and pounded the button for the fifth floor, the only sign of his waning patience and rising overstimulation. When the doors finally closed, Legend spoke up.
“Eager to get me into a hotel room?”
“More like eager to find out how I can get rid of you.”
Perfect pink lips took the form of an endearing pout. “Mean.”
The elevator chose to take pity on Eros, who stalked out and down the hall to their room. He swiped the key card and shoved open the door, not bothering to see whether Legend had made it inside. Dropping his bag and flopping on the closest bed, he saw a flash of blue and silver and covered his eyes with his hands.
“We have orders,” Eros said tiredly. “Go shower. Then conference call.”
“It’s two in the morning. Can’t it wait until we’ve at least slept?” Legend took stock of the room around them, specifically the tantalizingly inviting bed calling out to him from in front of the wall-to-ceiling windows. He barely held back a pitiful whine under Eros’s unamused response.
“Look, I don’t know how it works with your agency, but at mine, we don’t wait to debrief. Go shower.”
Blue eyes suddenly fixed on Eros, intrigued. “Which agency do you belong to? And how do I know you won’t try to kill me?”
“Not telling until I have permission. Too tired to work right now.” Eros gestured towards their shared bathroom from his prone position on the bed. “Shower.”
Legend cocked his head from where he leaned casually against the wall, his arms crossed defensively. He pushed off and sat on the edge of Eros’s bed, poking his ankle for good measure. “Hey, I know we just met, but do you hate me or something?”
Eros sighed. “Probably not, but I’m not exactly your biggest fan right now, and I am under no illusion that you’re mine. So please, just leave me alone until I’ve had time to sort out what happened tonight.”
Legend nodded thoughtfully and got up to look around the room.
“There are clothes for you already in the closet. Take what fits and just leave the rest.”
“I...Thanks.”
Eros could hear Legend rummaging around in the small wardrobe and then pad into the bathroom. The water turned on after a moment, and Eros relaxed minutely into the mattress. He was just about to decide whether or not to pass on the shower entirely when his phone started vibrating in his bag. With a groan, he pulled himself up and shuffled over to it, smiling at the silly contact photo lighting up. He accepted the call and put it to his ear.
“Hi, Mom,” Eros intoned softly.
“Hello, my son! How was work today?”
He ran a hand through his already-disheveled gelled-back hair to unstick the rest of it and sort of paced around the room, not that there was a lot of space to do it. “Oh, you know, awful. I met a boy today.”
“A boy? And here I thought you’d be spending your dowry on booze and pills to numb the loneliness.”
“Uh-huh. He’s pretty. Blond hair, blue eyes, skin like friggin’ alabaster. If looking like a god doesn’t do it for you, he has a great voice. He could read to me anything he wanted, including my death warrant, and I would gladly listen. Smart, too, from what I’ve seen. Even managed to get the jump on me for a minute when we were fighting.”
“Wow, he sounds like your type of guy. Looks like a god, sounds like a saint, fights like a demon. What’s the problem?”
“Well, other than the obvious fact that our jobs have doomed us to live our lives without any personal attachments? He would be perfect, except that he is a complete ass. You should have heard the things he said.”
“Harsh. You’ve only known him for what, a few hours, and he’s already in your bad graces? You should get to know him a little bit better before you lay judgement.” The soft sounds of squeaking travelled into Eros’s ear, and he pictured his best friend and analyst with a few hamsters in his lap and one in his hood for good measure. He smiled at the thought and put on his best British accent to respond.
“My good opinion, once lost, is lost forever.”
Eros could hear the laughter in the analyst’s voice. “Okay, first of all, you are not Mr. Darcy. You are Jane Bennett, and we both know it. Second, I’m going to put a pin in this until later. Is the Legend with you?”
The water had stopped in the bathroom, and there followed a few moments of silence and then the door opened. Legend was dressed in black sweats and a white t-shirt, his hair damp and towel around his neck to stop it from dripping. Eros flicked him a quick glance and put on a professional face. “Just got out of the shower. Are you ready to patch us in?”
“Are you clean, because you’re gonna be talking to your sensei and Legend’s.”
Eros froze. His eyes flicked one more to Legend, who was still standing in the bathroom door but now looked like he was holding back a smile at Eros’s sudden change in demeanor. Eros turned to face the large windows overlooking the city skyline. He hissed into the phone as if it would hide his irritation.
“Are you kidding me right now? Sensei doesn’t talk to me directly unless I’m in trouble or did something phenomenal.”
“Well, let’s hope it’s the latter. You’ve got about fifteen minutes, so go make yourself pretty and I’ll patch you in on your laptop.”
“Alright. Thanks, Mom,” Eros sighed.
“Go forth and make friends, my son!”
Eros hung up with a fond shake of his head and turned back to face Legend. “My analyst,” he said, gesturing to his phone. “He’s a little...eccentric.”
Legend nodded sagely. He finally walked out of the bathroom and walked around to the bed closer to the window. Sitting and folding his legs underneath him, he said, “Yes, my analyst is the same way - quite a character.”
Silence enveloped them for a moment before Legend spoke again. “You should probably go shower. I don’t know exactly when we’ll be patched in with our bosses…”
“About fifteen minutes. We can share my laptop to make things easier if that works for you.”
“Perfect.”
Another beat.
“Shower. Right. I’ll be right out.”
“I’ll be here!”
How does he do that? That was the only thought Eros had as he scrubbed the dried sweat and dirt from his hands and face with the warm water and hotel soap. He went from “detached killer” to “the boy your parents don’t want you to date” to “puppy dog eyes” in the span of 90 seconds. What is with this guy? This Legend was going to be even more difficult to decipher than he thought.
Eros’s brain mulled over their interactions so far, dissecting and pulling apart nuances and wording to determine the best course of action. Unfortunately, he had little to go on after basically icing Legend out post-fistfight. He cursed himself and his own stubbornness, having forgotten the best way to get to know a person was to let them talk themselves into a corner. His train of thought derailed, however, when a tentative knock came to the door.
“They’re going to call soon. You should finish up if you haven’t already.”
“Yeah, thanks.”
Eros sighed, abandoning his thoughts on Legend for the time being. It wasn’t like they were ever going to see each other after tonight anyway. There were two certainties in life as an assassin: you were bound to get hurt, and if you ever saw someone twice, you were dead if you didn’t kill them first. He shut off the water and wrapped a towel around himself, cursing his mind for forgetting to grab clothes. Just as he was about to open the door in his damp state, he saw a pile of soft-looking gray sweats and a blue shirt laying on the counter.
Oh, that’s creepy on so many levels. And kinda sweet, I guess. Weirdo.\
Eros shrugged into them quickly and stepped out into the cool hotel room where Legend waited for him, back in his spot on the far bed but with a familiar laptop in front of him.
“Did you go through my stuff?” he asked, stalked towards his forced companion.
Legend smiled innocently. “I found your laptop in the first pocket, don’t worry. You obviously keep a very organized gear bag.”
“Please tell me you didn’t open that computer.”
“I’m may be nosy, but I’m not stupid.”
Eros rolled his eyes and perched himself on the edge of the bed with Legend behind him. Normally, he wouldn’t risk being in such a vulnerable position, but he was too tired to care, and he suspected Legend was, too. When he opened his computer he ran the ring finger on his right hand over the biometric scanner and typed in his username and password, the ones he’d had since he started. The screen lit up in recognition.
“You might wanna brace yourself for this,” Eros said quietly. Behind the apps and icons, a picture of a toy poodle - light brown fur and pink tongue lolling out - graced the screen. Legend’s gasp would have gone unnoticed had Eros not been six inches away from him. The image was only up briefly, though; it was replaced by an app opening to a video chat where a remarkably youthful-looking Asian woman and an impossibly irritated man with a lined face looked out at the two of them. The woman spoke first.
“Glad to see you two haven’t killed each other.”
Eros suppressed the urge to sigh at his long-time mentor. “Hello to you, too, Sensei. It’s been a while since we last spoke face-to-face.”
“Almost a year,” the woman agreed. She must have been in the Multiple Threat Assessment Center, with how they could see her standing in a large room covered with monitors and only a few analysts. She crossed her arms over her loose sweater and tilted her head appraisingly. “I had hoped to be calling under better circumstances, Eros, but there seems to have been a failure to communicate.”
The man with the lined face spoke up. His gruff voice held no affection for his operative, but it wasn’t cruel or aggressive. “Agreed. The Living Legend has better things to do than squabble in a parking lot over who gets credit for a mid-level kill, but we get ahead of ourselves. Eros, I hear from your teacher that you are a talented assassin, the best she has to offer.”
Eros flinched at the praise, but accepted it all the same. His mother raised him with manners, after all. “I appreciate the compliment, sir, but I wish I could thank you properly.”
The woman raised a hand to interrupt. “Introductions. Legend, my name is Minako, but please call me Sensei. My operative with you goes by ‘Eros’ about 90% of the time, I’ll let him explain later.”
“You may call me Yakov,” the man said. “Everyone does. The Living Legend is the one currently sitting behind you. I’ll let him decide when to share his name with you.”
“Many thanks, Yakov, but why are we here?” Eros asked. His curiosity was starting to chafe at his nerves. Yakov stared down the camera as he answered.
“To get right to the point, our two agencies have been tracking the same targets for a while. Tonight, both of you were tasked with taking out Elizabeth Frances Arnold, and while the Legend succeeded, it threw a wrench in your own operation. We have reason to believe that this has happened before and will continue to happen as our agencies pursue future targets.”
“Sensei, are you telling me that our hit lists have overlap?”
Minako nodded once stoically. “More than we’d like, and that’s why you two are here. Our agencies are considering teaming up for the foreseeable future, comparing hit lists and combining our resources to more efficiently take out our targets. Should this come to pass, you two, being the best assassins we each have, will be tasked with each hit as it comes up.”
“This brings us to our second development. While you wait for each hit, we want you to be actively training a few new recruits from both agencies who have passed the evals to become assassins,” Yakov added, his tone leaving no room for discussion.
Eros smiled at what he knew his best friend and analyst would think. “Our very own assassination classroom…”
“What’s that?” Legend asked, smiling sweetly. Eros had to do a double-take at the sudden chance in his expression.
“Nothing.” The smile slid off Legend’s face as he turned back to the camera. It’s just a stupid joke. There’s no need to look like I just kicked your dog. Minako continued as if nothing had interrupted them.
“Gentleman, this pilot program is going to forge a new era for our agencies. It’ll be your priority to show our clients how international relations can strengthen our individual efforts.
“Sensei--”
“Eros, this is not an offer. It’s an order.”
Eros snapped to attention as much as he could on the edge of the bed. “ Hai, Sensei. ”
“The same for you, Legend. For the time being, work with Eros. Do not bring shame to our agency.”
Legend looked almost bored, but the glint in his eyes gave away his excitement. He managed to keep the rest of his face neutral as he intoned, “Yes, Yakov.”
“We will have more information for you both in the next few days. Currently, the only people that know about this program are the four of us, your two usual analysts and eventually, the few recruits we decide to funnel into it. Make sure it stays that way.”
The two assassins nodded in unison, making Minako smile and Yakov grunt in acknowledgement. The woman addressed her operative directly, her softer voice revealing the fondness she had for him.
“Eros, our agency will lead this for now. If you run into any snags, talk to Mom. Legend, I expect nothing but the best from you after all I’ve heard from Yakov about your work. I must say it is impressive.”
“Arigatou gozaimasu.”
Eros startled at his native language coming from such a beautiful, but definitely European mouth. “You speak Japanese?”
“Enough to find a bathroom and buy a good bowl of ramen,” Legend teased.
Yakov cleared his throat loudly, making the two of them feel like young boys getting chastised for smooching under the bleachers during school hours. “For the next two days, get some rest. Get to know each other professionally. We’ll get you back here to talk through your aliases and your cover stories before we send you out again.”
Eros looked over at Legend. The two of them locked eyes for a moment and something unspoken passed between them, something neither would ever be able to explain. Their partnership solidified in the moment before turning their attention back to their superiors. Luckily the meeting seemed to be over.
“Two days, Legend,” Yakov warned. “Don’t cause any trouble.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it, Yakov, you know me.”
This guy and the puppy dog eyes, come on!
“I do. I pity the assassin who has to put up with you.”
Minako couldn't stifle the small laugh on her lips and smiled warmly at the two of them. “Goodnight, gentlemen. Be safe.”
“Hai, Sensei.”
“Da svidaniya, Yakov.”
The screen went black. Eros shut the laptop and tossed it on the other bed. His hands were now free to dig the heels of his palms into his eyes, a desperate attempt to massage away what he knew was going to become a massive headache. “Well, that was fun.”
“I certainly think so! And now that we have the go-ahead from our superiors, we can be properly introduced.” Eros felt Legend shuffled around to his side. When he peeked out from between his fingers, he saw a large yet somehow graceful pale hand extended towards him. “Hello, my name is Victor Nikiforov. Feltsman Agency.”
Eros observed Legend’s - Victor’s - hand and his optimistically expectant expression. WIth a sigh he slid his own hand into Victor’s grip and shook it. “Nice to meet you, Victor. I’m an operative for Okukawa Studios. My name is Katsuki Yuuri.”