Chapter 22: The White Rabbit Lingers
"I don’t know. You’re really putting me on the spot here, Basilisk." Pietro responds, scratching at his head awkwardly, or rather, in an attempt at looking awkward.
"As much as I love playing around...I’m not quite in the mood anymore," contrary to his words, Orion’s smile widens, "or do you want me to beg you for information that you’re clearly going to give me?"
"Of course not, I’m not that stupid. I just need to know how this is going to go." His voice is now distinctly Asian— Japanese, Adrien thinks.
"Explain." Orion hums, gesturing to Adrien to join him on the sofa. He pats the seat beside him excitedly, eyes sparkling even more as Adrien’s features twist into one of disgust.
Pietro glances between them, then exhales tiredly. "I want to know what’s in it for me. If I tell you what I know, what do I get in return?"
"Oh," his eyes widen in fake surprise, "I thought letting you live would be good enough...how greedy you are, Pietro. Most would be grateful to walk away with their lives and limbs intact, you know?"
"Come on, Basilisk! There are tons of things I could do for you. I’m Pietro of a thousand faces! My kill list is a mile long— "
"And so is your rap sheet." He smirks contentedly as Adrien takes the seat at his side. "I already have assassins on my payroll, why would I want another? I’m not running a charity here. This is business, Thousand Faces."
Adrien subtly shifts away from him, but Orion’s hand comes down hard on his thigh, holding him in place. He fights back a wince as Orion’s fingers dig into the meat of his thigh.
"Because I’m not just an assassin, I’m the best man you’ll find for gathering intelligence," Pietro straightens up, his previous playful attitude gone, "I know enough secrets to bury most men."
For a moment— one single second— his gaze flickers to Adrien.
Orion’s gaze is focused on the way his fingers dig into Adrien’s thigh, so only his duckling catches Pietro’s look. He turns away almost immediately, before Pietro can catch the look on his face.
"Well, I don’t have many secrets in my head, but I can still bury most men, so try to convince me another way," Orion responds, not bothering to look away from Adrien’s thighs.
His fingers flex experimentally on his thighs. He hums pleasantly when he sees how easily his palm covers Adrien’s full thigh, then he goes back to digging his fingers painfully into it.
"That hurts..."
"I know," he looks up with a grin, "it’s a pleasant feeling."
Pietro once again glances at Adrien, but the other man refuses to look at him. He keeps his gaze straight and refuses to meet his eyes.
Though, as a trained assassin, he takes note of the tightness of his jaw and the tenseness in his shoulders. Right there, he makes a decision, one that he might regret later, but for now, he’ll stick with it.
"I can tell you that this was targeted." He looks away from Adrien, meeting Orion’s darkly curious gaze without flinching.
It’s almost like the man’s eyes manage to erase all the light in the room. Even from where he stands, Pietro can’t tell if Orion really has pupils or not.
"Targeted, you say?" He questions flatly.
"Yes. The selling of drugs in your hotel was to target you, but not in the way you’re thinking." His eyes change to a startling shade of blue. "They were going to set you up, Basilisk."
"They know that some of the radicals in the FBI have been watching and waiting for you to slip up for years, so they were going to plant this, amongst other things, on you." He adds, purposely leaving out any real detail.
"And are you going to tell me who ’they’ are?" Orion asks, voice deceptively soft.
"Only when you promise to make me one of your men." Pietro refuses to budge on this. To him, Orion isn’t just danger, he’s salvation.
He’ll pick the Basilisk over any other poison.
"I thought you enjoyed being a freelancer, Thousand Faces? What’s the obsession with being one of my men?" He chuckles lightly.
"You keep your men safe...and you’re not like these fuckers."
"Are you trying to tell me that there’s a group of people out there who are significantly worse than I am?" Orion scoffs lightheartedly.
"Is this coming from a moral standpoint? Or are you just flattering him?" Adrien cuts in, voice as sharp as a knife.
"If he’s flattering me, you could learn a thing or two from him," Orion replies, grinning widely, "his behavior is correct for a man whose life is currently in my hands. Pay attention to that, duckling."
"Maybe it’s because I already know that no amount of flattery is going to make you— "
"They deal in human trafficking!" Pietro snaps, drawing attention back to himself before the conversation spirals out of his control.
"...aren’t you an assassin?" Adrien asks slowly, brows drawn in confusion. "Why would that matter to you?"
"I chose to make my money ending lives but I’m not a monster," he huffs irritably. "These people sell anyone, even children. They have their hands in some of the nastiest things I’ve seen in my entire life."
"And am I to believe that you have some sort of evidence to back up your claims?" Orion asks softly, fingers digging deeply into Adrien’s thigh.
"Yeah, I do," Pietro responds, sighing tiredly. "I’ve got some surface stuff on a flash drive, but I don’t really have anything deep."
His voice lowers. "But what I’ve seen is enough to know that these bastards are involved in some really fucked-up shit. It’s so bad that human trafficking isn’t even the worst part."
"I’m not the police, Pietro. It’s not like I don’t understand your reservations," he says ’reservations’ in the same bland tone someone else would say ’hang-ups’, "but I’m clearly not a beacon of justice."
"I just want to know why they’re dealing this defective shit in my business...and I’d appreciate it if you could give me the name of this group too."
He might as well have shrugged off all of Pietro’s comments with how calm he’s being. Pietro might not see himself as a monster, but it’s clear what Orion’s role is.
"If I tell you this, then there’s no going back. I can’t work in the underworld anymore if you don’t take me as one of your men, Basilisk."
"All this for one measly name," Orion chuckles, "fine then, I’ll make you one of my men, so tell me what I want to know."
If it were any other man, Pietro would’ve asked for a contract in the presence of a proper underworld overseer, but it’s Orion Vassilis.
And that is enough for him.
He watches Orion pick up his empty glass of whisky. That empty, calculating smile no longer fills him with a sense of dread. Pietro can’t stop his shoulders from sagging in relief.
It could have all gone horribly wrong, but it didn’t.
"Tell me, have you heard of the group called Masamune?"
Two things happen at once.
The glass cradled in Orion’s hand shatters into fragments, and Adrien barely suppresses a full-body flinch— both reactions happen independently of each other.
"Masamune, you said?"
