Espionage

Author's note: This chapter is a oneshot. Following chapters are ficlets from the same universe. Enjoy. :)

"There's a bomb threat on a flight from LAX to Heathrow."

A sigh on the other end of the line, a sound so familiar it made Alfred's heart sigh a little in response. "Buy off all the seats, or try to catch them?"

Alfred twirled a pen between his fingers. "I think I can catch 'em."

"Think or know?" Arthur said dryly. "This isn't something I'm willing to leave to chance." Chance: Alfred could never get used to that English accent.

"Don't you trust me?" Alfred asked with a grin. He knew Arthur would be able to hear it in his voice.

"Trust you? You're American."

Alfred snorted. "Come on, my coworkers might screw you over, but I wouldn't."

"It's not just your coworkers, it's your entire system." Arthur sighed again, heavily this time. Alfred sometimes wondered if Arthur was higher up in MI6 than he let on – or if he just took his job way more seriously than Alfred did. (It wasn't that Alfred didn't take his job seriously; it was that he didn't take the paperwork part of it seriously. In his opinion, that wasn't really his job anyway. You didn't train to be a secret agent so you could file papers all day, even if they were top secret.)

"People not giving you the documents they're supposed to?" Alfred stifled a yawn.

"That file for the case we're working on right now? If I'd had it two days ago, I could have actually done something. I had to drop a lead because I couldn't confirm it. Every time I ask where it is, they tell me they'll send it soon by express mail. Soon. Do you know how useless that is?"

Alfred grinned. "Lettin' your anal side show through, Artie. Be more relaxed about it. It's not that time sensitive."

"Of course it's time sensitive!" Arthur groused. "We asked for your cooperation on it for a reason!"

"I'd help you if I could," Alfred said not very apologetically.

"Any information on the primary mission?"

Alfred shook his head. "Nope. Haven't heard anything from HQ in a while either. I'm wondering if they're going to drop it."

"They had better not. Inform them they should stop stalling. We worked on this case for years before you joined in."

Alfred snorted. "You're the ones who asked for our help."

"Because we assumed you'd give it."

"I'm giving it," Alfred pointed out.

The slightest of pauses. "I suppose you've been tolerable to work with." There was the sound of papers being shuffled. "So, can you catch them or not?" Arthur demanded, returning abruptly to the original reason for the call.

Alfred glanced at the files spread out on his desk. "Yes. We have several suspects, and security will be extra tight."

"Good," Arthur said, sounding satisfied. There was a slight pause and Alfred could tell he was going to say something else. "I do trust you," he said finally.

"Thanks," Alfred said. He smiled. "I trust you too, Arthur."

"Goodbye, Alfred."

Alfred hung up on the man he only knew as Arthur, whom he had spoken to at least twice a month for the last three years. In the last year and a half, the calls had gotten a lot more frequent. Still, he knew little more about Arthur than that he was a high-level agent of MI6, liked cats, drank tea, and was English. It was unfortunate, really. He seemed like a nice guy.

"Important lead on primary mission." Arthur's voice was firm and clear. "Primary suspect spotted O-400 hours, leaving a shop across from the suspected manufacturing plant."

"Gottchya." Alfred quickly jotted it down. "That's what we needed. I'm gonna move in."

"If those are your orders," Arthur said crisply.

Alfred sighed. "I know you don't like it, but this is enough. If we wait any longer we're going to lose it."

"I know," Arthur snapped. "Just . . . be careful."

Alfred smiled. "I will."

"Bad news," Alfred said slowly into the phone. He doodled on the notepad in front of him. He hated having to tell Arthur stuff like this.

"Hmm?" Arthur said encouragingly. His voice buzzed over the phone line.

Alfred made a face. "Lost the lead. We're back to square one."

Arthur made an exasperated noise. Alfred's mouth twitched a little in amusement. He had no idea what Arthur looked like when he made that noise, but he imagined it had to be adorable. "Alfred–" Arthur started, but he gave up with a sigh. "Alright. Nothing we can do. We'll pull everyone out."

"We at least know where it's not," Alfred said, trying to point out the (admittedly not very) bright side of things.

"Thank you so much for narrowing it down," Arthur said dryly. "I'll be sure to send teams out to everywhere else we think it might not be, just to check."

"Uh-huh. Don't ask me to apply to the higher-ups for teams to help you, though. I hear we're booked checking all the ducks around here to see if any of them are spying for other countries."

Arthur snorted. "Maybe you should check the people first."

"Nope. Agents like you and I are going to be outdated soon, Artie. We're all going to be replaced by–"

"Robot ducks?"

"I was going to say remote-controlled mini helicopters, but that works too."

Arthur chuckled. The noise was deep and warm over the line. Alfred grinned. He wished he could hear it in person.

"You know, when we've been replaced," Arthur began, "We should–"

"Retire somewhere and never apply for a job involving the words 'secret agent' again? Because this is seriously way more boring that what I signed up for."

"I was going to say go out for lunch."

There was an awkward pause. "Oh," Alfred said, hoping it didn't sound as squeaky as he thought it did. "Yeah. That would be nice."

There was a frantic noise of paper shuffling. "It's just, well, we've known each other for so long–"

"Right, we're practically friends already and I still have no idea what you look like." Alfred laughed, though it was too high pitched and too short.

"Friends go out to lunch all the time," Arthur agreed. Alfred repeatedly clicked a clicky pen while Arthur drummed his fingers on the table. "Well, I should–"

"Go see about that report, yeah. Bye."

"Goodbye."

Alfred groaned and put his face in his hands after he hung up. "Thanks for giving me something to look forward to that can never happen," Alfred muttered to the black, government-issued phone. He puffed out his cheeks and let the air out in a rush. Sometimes he almost hated his job.

(Okay, that was a lie. Sometimes he wished he hated his job. It was the best part of his life.)

"You know that lead we lost?"

Arthur rolled his eyes. "Yes."

"Turns out we found it again."

Arthur paused. "Are you sure?"

"Yup!" Alfred was ecstatic. "The plant went back online yesterday. We're sending in a team to check this afternoon."

"Alfred, that sounds like a trap," Arthur warned. "Wait for confirmation. If you wait until tomorrow, I can send some men–"

"Nah Artie, don't do that. I got this."

"This is a high-level mission," Arthur insisted. "I know it seems too good to be true, but that's because it is."

"Look," Alfred said seriously, "If there's any chance this is the real thing, I have to take it. You understand that, right? No matter the risk. I let down a bunch of people the other day. I can't do that again."

Arthur pressed the heel of his hand to his forehead. He hated how worried he got. It was just a mission, it was just Alfred. This was what they both did for a living. Was it so hard to accept that? "Just . . . be careful."

"I will. Bye, Artie."

"I mean it, Alfred–" But Alfred had already hung up.

Arthur smirked when the phone rang. Only one person called him on this line, and that was Alfred. He picked it up. "Hey, you'll never guess–"

"Line's compromised," Alfred's voice interrupted, hard and desperate like nothing Arthur had ever heard before. "Get out now." Before Arthur could react, the line went dead.

The line is compromised: Not just this line, this time, but this line all the time. Everything they had ever said to each other had been listened to.

Get out now: Destroy everything you can get your hands on, pull out any agents you can, and for God's sake, leave everyone in deep cover where they are.

That Alfred had hung up immediately: He was already compromised. If they didn't have him already, they would soon.

"Fuck," said Arthur and dropped the phone. By the time the phone hit the desk, he was already out of his chair.

The room was small and box-like. Its walls were painted a harsh white. The florescent lights shone unrelentingly on the very few pieces of furniture in the room. There was a drying splatter of blood on one wall. Alfred tried very hard not to look at it.

Torture. He'd been trained in how to resist it, of course, but even that had given him nightmares for days. He had never been so terrified in his life. Don't give them anything. That was all he needed to do. Rescue – probably out of the question. He didn't know how long he'd been gone, but before he had left he hadn't had enough time to do more than destroy his part of the information. It was doubtful anyone knew where he was. Don't think about it. After all, he was here now, and he was just going to have to deal with it.

Time had stopped mattering a long time ago. It was only the things that happened that mattered. He opened his eyes a crack. He could hear yelling, somewhere, and distant banging . . . That certainly qualified as something. There were gunshots, the sound of a small explosion, and someone kicked the door open. Suddenly the room was swarming with people. Bullets ricocheted off the walls. Alfred would have tried to help if he hadn't felt like someone had broken his arm and then given him a bunch of drugs that were doing nothing to help with the pain.

Oh right, someone had.

Eventually the gunfire was replaced with the occasional shout and quick, barked orders. Someone yelled, "Secure the door!" in a crisp voice with an English accent that was strangely familiar. Alfred vaguely hoped that someone was going to tell him what was going on, because they had taken his glasses away some time ago and all he could see was blurry shapes. Some of them looked dead.

Suddenly someone was in front of him, undoing the straps that secured him to the chair with deft, strong hands. Alfred looked up into a pair of gorgeous green eyes. The person they belonged to was scowling, but that didn't keep Alfred from feeling like he was falling in love. "What's an angel like you doing in a hell like this?" he slurred, because it seemed like the right thing to say at the time.

Green eyes locked with his for an instant, and then the man gave an exasperated noise and returned to his task. "Dear God, he's gone around the bend. He's really flirting with me." Alfred felt the last strap fall away. The man turned his head so all Alfred could see was messy blond hair. "Someone help me lift him up." Alfred felt two pairs of arms hook under his armpits and drag him upwards. One of them bumped into his broken arm. That was about the last thing Alfred remembered.

When Alfred opened his eyes, he was in a neat, clean hospital bed. He was groggy and exhausted. He felt as though he'd overslept and would never be able to fully wake up. His arm ached, though he didn't know why, and his mouth felt awful. He turned his head and saw a cup of water. When he tried to pick it up with his right hand he nearly passed out. Eventually, he was able to pick it up with his other hand and take a sip. He was definitely on an IV, his right arm was in a cast, and there was a heart rate monitor beeping along merrily to his left. Huh.

Sometime later, an orderly came in to check on him and found him sitting up, experimenting with how much he could move his broken arm before his eyes teared up from the pain. He was promptly given a sling and told that yes, he had fractured several bones (or rather, someone had fractured them for him) and no, he couldn't take the cast off himself, that day or ever.

Once Alfred had been given something to eat and the opportunity to clean himself up and dress in a suit (one of his – apparently someone had thought about this, he thought idly), he was told that his presence had been requested at a briefing. Immediately. When he stepped into the room, he found two people waiting for him: his boss and the man with the green eyes. Alfred's eyes rested on the latter for much longer than was necessary. The man looked back at him, and a smirk slowly revealed itself on his features. Alfred grinned in response. There was no way he could have mistaken this guy for an angel, he thought; his eyebrows were impossible to get past.

"Alfred, sit down," his boss said. "Glad to see you looking better."

"Thank you, sir," Alfred replied. He sat on the last remaining chair and casually crossed his legs. The man with the green eyes was rivaling his casual attitude with one elbow on the arm of his chair, a tilt to his shoulders that spoke of absolute relaxation, and crossed legs. It looked perfectly natural. Alfred knew he held his head too cockily for his pose to look completely relaxed, but he didn't care. He grinned.

"Alfred," his boss continued, gesturing to the man with the green eyes, "This is agent Kirkland. I believe you have been communicating with him for some years now."

This information surprised Alfred less than his boss had probably expected. He had assumed this was Arthur the moment he had heard his voice. However, the name did surprise him; after having known him only as Arthur for so long, it was strange to hear his last name – though whether it was real or an alias was impossible to tell with these people. Alfred grinned and inclined his head. "Arthur."

"Alfred," Arthur returned amusedly.

"Agent Jones," Alfred corrected him with a wink.

Alfred's boss waved a hand dismissively. "He already knows all about you, Alfred," he said. "He was surprisingly adept at getting us to surrender all our files on you when he told us you had been compromised."

Alfred laughed. "How'd he find me? You tell him that too?"

"No. It wasn't easy," Arthur muttered.

"Where was I, anyway?" Alfred asked curiously. "Even I don't know that."

Arthur smirked. "I can't tell you. That's top secret information."

Alfred's jaw dropped. "What? But we have the same level of clearance!"

"Not anymore," Alfred's boss said dryly. "Agent Kirkland got a promotion in the last day and a half while you were sleeping."

"36 hours?" Alfred looked around so fast he nearly hurt his neck. "No way."

"32," Arthur corrected. "We were worried you were going to go into a coma."

Alfred looked surprised. "I wouldn't–"

Alfred's boss cleared his throat. "And I am certain you would like to go back to sleeping. I do apologize for calling you here so soon after you woke up, but there are important matters to discuss." He steepled his fingers. "Alfred," he said quietly, "How much did you tell them?"

Everyone in the room abruptly became much more serious. Alfred sat back and kept his face carefully blank. "Nothing that I recall."

"Nothing?" Alfred's boss leaned forward. "I'm sorry for having to ask, but I need to be certain. You understand that."

"Of course." Alfred looked away. "I can't . . . I just can't remember everything. I'm sorry. But as far as I know, I said nothing." He worried his lip as the room remained silent. He closed his eyes briefly and then opened them. He looked back at his boss. It was easier than looking at Arthur. "How long was I gone?"

"18 hours."

Alfred's heart sank. He supposed he remembered maybe half of that, though it was almost impossible to tell. That was a long time. He looked at Arthur and tried to crack a smile. "Geez, Artie, what took you so long?"

Arthur avoided his eyes. "You didn't give me much to go on, you dolt," he said quietly.

Alfred's laugh was strained. "I didn't give you anything to go on." Something occurred to him. His smile fell. "Actually, I didn't even tell you I had been compromised."

"You think I wouldn't be able to tell?" Arthur said it with a short chuckle, but there was something pained in his eyes as he looked at Alfred. "After three years, you thought I'd take a 'get out now' at face value?"

Alfred frowned. "Yes. They tracked me just from that phone call and they might've tracked you too. I only risked it because they would have been able to track you down anyway, and I wanted you to have a head start."

It was Arthur's turn to frown. "You let them track you? Are you an idiot? I thought they already had you."

"Practically!"

Arthur uncrossed his legs. His shoulders had gone tense. "Risking the safety of yourself and your entire team in order to help a team across the Atlantic Ocean is hardly protocol."

"I had the time, I knew I was as good as caught anyway. You really think I'd let them get to you?" Alfred demanded. He hadn't been thinking at the time, he had just known that it was the right thing to do. Why didn't Arthur understand that?

Arthur's eyes widened almost imperceptibly, but before he could say anything, Alfred's boss interrupted. "Regardless of how it happened, we're glad to have you back," he said firmly. "You'll be off duty for a while and you'll go through counseling. If your memories can be retrieved, they will be." He put a hand on Alfred's shoulder, the first physical contact Alfred had had since walking into the room. "I know 18 hours is a long time," he said quietly. "We don't blame you for anything that could have happened. We can wait. I just wanted to see if there was anything you could tell us now."

Alfred shook his head. He didn't trust himself to speak. That they wouldn't blame him: that was a lie. If he had gone through all that for nothing, if he had given it up in the end, he would blame himself a thousand times over. What if he had given up Arthur? He didn't even know. Maybe he had. That was the worst part. He looked down at his lap and realized his hands were shaking. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. They couldn't have gotten to Arthur because Arthur was here. Arthur was fine. But what if they were waiting for him, what if when he got back . . .

"Alfred." A voice so familiar there wasn't anything Alfred could do but look up. Arthur was leaning towards him and looking at him intently. "You're safe now. The information doesn't matter. If it's gone, it's gone." Alfred let a breath out in a woosh and took another in preparation to say something angry. Arthur, however, just kept talking. "We can deal with the aftermath. We do what it takes. That's our job. Right?"

Alfred smiled thinly. "Right."

"That's all, then," Alfred's boss said.

They all stood. Alfred was the first to turn to leave. He paused and glanced over his shoulder. "Oh, Artie," he said, "By the way, that was most careless op I've ever seen. You tell me to be careful, but seriously? Storming a place like that?" He snorted. "You could have been killed."

He heard the soft voice as he left: "So could you."

Arthur stayed for a few days longer than he was strictly supposed to. Alfred kept expecting someone to tell him that Arthur had left, but every time he asked he got the same answer: "Oh, he and the boss are just finishing up some paperwork." Alfred finally stopped waiting and went to see him.

Arthur was alone in a conference room with the remains of a meeting spread out before him. He was frowning at the paper in a way that made Alfred want to laugh. He settled for a smile and leaned casually in the doorway. "You know, you aren't like what I expected," Alfred said after a moment.

Arthur didn't even bother to look up. "Oh? What were you expecting, then?"

Alfred thought for a moment. "Sweater vests," he said finally. "And loafers." Arthur looked up at him and raised an eyebrow. Alfred looked pointedly at his lace-up, doubtless custom-made Italian leather shoes. "Frankly, your choice in shoes is just too good."

Arthur laughed. It was infinitely more wonderful than over the phone. "This is my work outfit. For all you know, I wear exactly that when I'm at home."

Alfred raised his eyebrows. "Do you?"

Arthur smirked. "I'm not telling."

Alfred tried to look thoughtful. "So that's what you wear when you drink tea. And pet your cat. And read romance novels."

Arthur rolled his eyes at the last one. "How'd you know?"

Alfred grinned. "Wild guess. Bodice-rippers, am I right?"

Arthur blushed up to the tips of his ears. "Don't be daft. I wouldn't read that rubbish." Alfred laughed. Arthur started smiling, and then laughing, and pretty soon Alfred was laughing so hard he was crying. "It really wasn't that funny," Arthur protested when he finally caught his breath.

"It's just – the image!" Alfred gasped out. "Like – a little old lady!"

Arthur turned bright red all over again. "Like a perverted old lady, apparently!" he cried indignantly. "I wouldn't!"

Alfred snorted. "You would."

"You don't know that!"

Alfred grinned and took a step forward. Somehow, they had ended up only a few feet apart. "But I know you."

Arthur huffed and looked away. "Hardly."

"Three years."

"And a half," Arthur reminded him. There was a pause as they looked at each other.

"Three years, seven months, and, uh, ten days."

"You're making that up," Arthur accused.

Alfred grinned sheepishly. "Just the days. I can never remember if I first talked to you on the 12th or the 21st."

Arthur smiled a little. "I hope your memory is usually better than that, agent Jones. A detail like that could be the difference between life and death."

"Oh, my decisions always mean the difference between life and death." Alfred stretched casually. "And I do an excellent job, if I do say so myself."

"Best of the best," Arthur agreed.

"Cream of the, uh, not cream."

Arthur cracked a smile. "I think it's crème de la crème."

Alfred waggled his eyebrows. "Ooo, the secret agent knows French. I bet it gets you all of the ladies."

Arthur gave Alfred a knowing glance. Alfred grinned. "Of course," Arthur said, which meant almost exactly the opposite.

Alfred put his hands in his pockets. "I suppose we won't be chatting over the phone anymore. You kinda ruined the whole not-supposed-to-reveal-each-other's-identities thing when you rescued me, you know."

Arthur stopped smiling and looked down at his papers. "I know." For a moment he looked as though he were going to say something more, but then he just shook his head.

"Geez, Artie, for a second there I thought you were going to apologize for saving my life." Alfred grinned and patted him heartily on the back. "Personally, I'm actually pretty happy about it. You know, being alive."

Arthur smiled a little but drummed his fingers on the table. "We'll probably both be taken off our current cases."

Alfred shrugged. "I'll talk to the old man, see what I can do. There's gotta be stuff that's just as confidential that we can talk about in code or something, right?"

Arthur smirked at him. "You should work on getting that promotion, then. You're not cleared to work on the cases I'll be taking."

"They're just waiting for me to recover, duh." Alfred grinned. "Hey, when are you leaving anyway?"

"Probably tomorrow afternoon." Arthur gathered up his papers and tapped them into a nice stack. "Speaking, of I should get going."

"Oh. Yeah." Alfred's face fell and he looked away.

Arthur started for the door and then paused. "You know, I think I might have some time in my schedule tomorrow at, say, noon?" He looked at Alfred and raised an eyebrow with a smile. "What do you say about that lunch?"

It was funny how things worked. They didn't know each other's favorite colors, or where they lived, or what their childhoods had been like. They didn't know their favorite foods or their dream vacation. What they did know was how to make each other laugh, how they felt just by the sound of their voice, how they acted under pressure, and that they could keep secrets. They knew each other already. And really, to fall in love, do you need to know anything else?

They had time. They followed each other up, promotion by promotion, so they were nearly always on the same cases. They were both busy and had tight schedules, but they understood that. Meetings in person were few and far between, but they were all the more wonderful for it. Sometimes one of them have to go on a mission and they wouldn't be able to speak for a month or more. They worried, and they had hard times, but they survived it all.

The funny thing was, by the time they got to the point where they could retire, they didn't want to anymore. They wanted to keep doing what they were doing, working together and in the service of their countries. Maybe one of them applied to work for his country on foreign soil, and maybe they bought a little house together. If they did, it was kept a secret, of course; what government could possibly allow it? But they didn't mind keeping it a secret; they were used to doing that. After all, that was their job.

Author's note: This was vaguely inspired by Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, which, by the way, was a great movie. You know Benedict Cumberbatch from BBC's Sherlock and Colin Firth from everything awesome? Both in it and both totally adorable. :D