#jupeter week

It’s big enough to make her shiver with nerves, anyway. She looks back at the boss--at Mistah Steel. If anybody here is the boss now, it’s the tall lady with the big red hair nodding to Mistah Jet as he wheels his bike up the ramp. Rita looks at Mistah Steel, but she just misses catching his eye. It’s already well on its way somewhere else, and Rita follows it because if anything is putting that expression on Mistah Steel’s face and it ain’t the ship, all lit up like a zero-gravity circus when they bring the cyberlions out, then it’s gotta be something worth seeing.

Turns out, he sure is.

Rita recognizes him immediately, of course. You don’t forget an impression like the one Mistah Glass made so easy. More importantly, if you’re Rita, you don’t forget the impression Mistah Glass made on Mistah Steel so easy--especially after he was gone.

The settling sand and the sound of the engine drown out whatever Mistah Glass says to Mistah Steel. It must have been pretty mean, though, because Mistah Steel’s face crumples like an empty packet of salmon bites in the gutter. Rita’s seen a look like that on his face before, once or twice. Usually when he’s just been stabbed.

And Rita doesn’t know the whole story, she knows that. She knows Mistah Steel has a habit of being... Mistah Steel, which is good until it isn’t, and people have their reasons for leaving when they have to.

If you ask her, sticking around ain’t that hard to do, but not everybody can be Rita.

Which means, though, that she ain’t gonna march over to Mistah Glass and harangue him for abandoning Mistah Steel. Rita is an expert in knowing the whole story, even the parts the people telling the story forgot about. You don’t complain about a plot hole ‘til you’ve seen the finale. At the very least, that’s a good way to get someone saying something real uncalled for on ‘net forums. Or wiki comment sections. Or a fuel station parking lot, once.

Rita was young. You live and you learn.

“Juno,” the new boss lady says. If Rita weren’t so distracted by whatever’s happening over by the fancy car with the fancy man on it, the sound of this woman’s voice would probably have made her knees give out. As it is, they wobble. “Introductions are in order, I think. This is--”

“He knows,” Mistah Glass says. He’s raised his voice enough that Miss New Boss Lady can hear him, and by extension so can Rita.

He sounds... different. Flatter. Rita wonders what’s happened to make him like that. A lot’s happened to Mistah Steel in the last year--and Rita, too--so she guesses plenty’s happened to other people as well.

It’s funny. She almost forgot the two of them didn’t steal all the character development in the whole galaxy for themselves.

“Ah.” Miss New Boss Lady raises an eyebrow. She might raise two, but her hair is in the way and Rita can only see the one of them. “We are on a bit of a tight schedule, darlings. If you have catching up to do, I suggest you do it on the ship. More spare time in deep space than you’d think,” she adds as an aside to Rita.

Rita wants to respond with something witty to show off how she’s actually a gorgeous genius, really, honest, but what comes out is more like a squeak. It’s probably for the best, considering the gal with the green hair standing next to her and the look the two of them share as they disappear up the ramp behind Mistah Jet.

When Rita’s reattached her jaw and turned around again, Mistah Steel is standing by the car. Mistah Glass is still on the hood, but now he’s sitting flat with his back straight and his long legs crossed. There’s a foot of space at least between him and Mistah Steel and Mistah Glass doesn’t look like he plans on moving anytime soon. Mistah Steel would have to climb on the car himself to reach him. From his posture, it looks like it took enough work just to force himself as close as he is already.

He’s talking, low and stilted. One hand is at the back of his neck and the other is so deep in his coat pocket he might just punch through the other side. Rita can’t make out the words, but the tone is familiar.

It’s familiar ‘cuz she’s heard it recently. She heard it in the Oldtown sewers a month ago. She heard it infrequently but historically across sixteen years of ups and downs and lefts and rights and Mistah Steel being Mistah Steel.

He’s apologizing.

Rita doesn’t know the whole story. She wants to, she really, really, reallyreallyreally wants to. And she wants to know how it plays out, and how they’re all gonna work together if it doesn’t go the way Mistah Steel hopes it will, and if Mistah Steel even has a plan for how he hopes it’ll go and ain’t just flying in without a thought in his head for anything called “consequences,” and and and...

But Rita can read a room, more or less. She can read this right now, anyway, and it’s saying in big, pink, neon letters so bright she might want to put her visor back down, LEAVE IT ALONE.

So Rita leaves them to it. She wheels her suitcase up the ramp and thinks about finding Mistah Jet again, asking him what his fourth favorite werewolf space opera is--the best icebreaker known to Mars. She lets Mistah Steel and Mistah Glass have their moment, whatever it is. Whatever it was between them. Whatever it’s gonna be.

One does not have a lucrative career as a master thief without ferreting some savings away, however, so Peter is not rendered immediately destitute. However, the well is running a little dry, so when he is put into contact with a group of thieves looking to expand their number, he’s hardly going to say no. Especially not to Buddy Aurinko, living legend that she is. She seems to know that he hasn’t taken a job in quite some time, but isn’t bothered by it, if he can assume by her voice over the comms. But he assumes very little about her, so it’s hard to be sure. 

She made contact with one of his more broad aliases, Adrian King, more of a placeholder name than anything. He has to have something of a professional reputation, but cannot use his own name, so Adrian was born. He’s very similar to Peter in most aspects, mainly in that he doesn’t share much personal information, so it will be a simple enough guise. And, if Peter is being honest with himself, he could use the company. Perhaps in working with a group he’ll regain whatever it is he lost along with Juno. 

He comforts himself with this thought as he follows the broad back of Jet Sikuliaq across the bustling Venusian spaceport. This, in and of itself, is a bit disconcerting. He’s never met Sikuliaq directly, but when the RUBY7 went missing right out from under his own nose a few weeks after his and Juno’s… departure from one another, he had assumed it had been the original owner come to reclaim her. 

Jet is not a talkative man, which suits Peter just fine. The fifteen minute walk to the rather unassuming ship is silent, save for the moment that Jet pointed the ship out to Peter. The gate to the cargo bay is open, hanging open like the bottom jaw of a great yawning mouth, and Peter can see several figures standing around just within it. 

He slaps an easy smile on his face and affects casual posture, hauling his rolling luggage behind him. His eyes take in the distinctive red hair of Buddy Aurinko and a narrower, green haired woman standing next to her, like a shadow with teeth. The RUBY7 gleams a slightly sickly shade of lime in the harsh lights of the spaceport, but this is not what makes Peter stumble over his own feet. 

The lady leaning against the car is short, and stout. His hair is dark and in tightly coiled curls, a bit longer than Peter remembers. His face, too, has more scars, particularly around his right eye, which is made of glass. But his tan trench coat is the same, Peter is sure of it. He can see the tear in the left lapel that was there the last time he saw it. 

Juno’s mouth quirks into a slightly surprised smile. “Hey, don’t I know you from somewhere?” he asks, jokingly. But his eyebrows are pulled down worriedly, and Peter distantly knows that he must look like the universe’s biggest fool. In that moment, whatever disguise he had managed to cloak himself in slips away, leaving him utterly exposed, visible to the naked eye. 

“Juno,” he chokes out, mounting the ramp up to the ship and dropping his luggage, throwing his arms around Juno tightly enough that he almost topples them both over. But Juno catches them on the side of the car and then wraps his arms around Peter, who has his coat held fast in two tight fists. “I thought you were dead,” Peter hisses into the side of Juno’s head, face nestled against his temple. 

The part of Peter that is a thief more than he is even human knows that they’re being watched, but he doesn’t care. If he lets go of Juno now he might die, or worse, he’ll cry. The only thing keeping him grounded, and the tears from flowing, is the feel of Juno’s hands on his back, one of them shifting a little as if to comfort. 

Juno shifts his face so his mouth his hidden from view and says, “I’m fine, Nureyev.” At that, Peter pulls away far enough to look at him, really look at him. He looks healthier than Peter has ever seen him. The dark bags and deep lines under his eyes are absent, like he’s been resting, and the shoulders under Peter’s hands are stronger, a bit more packed with muscle. For once, he isn’t injured. No scrapes, no bloody bandages, no broken bones. 

Peter sniffs, trying to regain a bit of dignity. “So you are.” 

“I didn’t know you knew Adrian, Juno,” Buddy says, eyebrow arched. Peter feels hot embarrassment flood him, but she only looks curious, and a little sympathetic. 

Juno deflects that, saying only, “I didn’t know how to get in touch with him after Hyperion,” to explain away Peter’s reaction. Buddy’s mouth quirks, and Peter knows she noticed, but she only nods. 

“I take it you can handle the tour, then,” she says, already taking the hand of the green haired woman and walking away. Jet claps Peter on the shoulder hard enough that he nearly topples, and follows, leaving them alone in the cargo bay. After a moment, the great yawning door closes, the silence ringing. 

Peter is at a complete loss of words, simply staring at Juno, waiting for him to disappear. Juno takes Peter’s luggage in one hand, and Peter’s hand in the other, leading him out of the cargo bay. His skin is warm and calloused, and Peter revels in the contact. Juno begins talking, rambling about the ship as he leads them on a rather stunted tour before heading to Peter’s assigned room. “It’s small, but it locks. Rita can override the lock, obviously, but you know,” Juno stops in the doorway, shrugging. “Uh, you’ll have to get creative about storage.” 

Peter nods dumbly, following Juno inside, sitting on the bed when Juno indicates it to him. Juno sits beside him, the door hissing closed behind them. “I’m… I’m really sorry, Nureyev. I would have told you, if I could,” Juno finally whispers. Peter suspects this is an apology for more than one thing, but what happened between them is a conversation for later. 

“I saw on the news that you died,” Peter says hoarsely. 

“Yeah. A lot of stuff happened with Hyperion, more than anyone really knows. It was too much, I decided I needed to disappear. Before Mars killed me for real,” Juno says, shrugging again. 

“I missed you so much,” Peter says, and it feels ridiculous and childish to say aloud, but it’s the truest thing he can think of. Every day since he saw that news stream, he had missed Juno. As if the very universe was darker and more bleak without his presence somewhere within it. “It was horrible, I. It’s been horrible, Juno.” Now, it seems, Peter’s body has finally rebelled against him completely, the first hot tears leaking from his eyes. 

Juno reaches over and gathers Peter against him, holding onto him tightly. Peter mashes his face into the side of Juno’s neck. 

“I’m sorry,” Juno says again and again, until they lapse into silence. Then, once Peter looks up at him, bleary eyed and face wet with tears, he smiles. “You changed your cologne.” 

Peter gives a wet laugh. “And you kept this stupid coat,” he plucks at a loose thread in Juno’s sleeve. 

“It’s comfortable,” Juno protests. 

“It’s hideous,” Peter replies, voice rough. 

“I’m so sorry. For everything,” Juno says. 

Peter shakes his head, wiping his face before settling again into Juno’s side. “Can we not do that conversation now? I think I need some time.” 

“Of course, Nureyev. Whatever you need,” Juno agrees quickly. Peter kicks off his shoes, leaning more firmly into Juno until he shifts and they both lay back on the rather narrow bed, folded against each other.

Juno sheds his own shoes and goes to take off his coat, but Peter grips him tighter. Juno smirks. “I thought you said you didn’t like it.” 

“I said it’s hideous. There’s a difference,” Peter disagrees.