Shailee Thakkar and Natasha Romanoff are not (thesavior) wrote in doorslogs, @ 2012-06-01 21:53:00 |
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Entry tags: | black widow, hawkeye |
Who: Shailee Thakkar and Callum Westerberg
What: Shailee gets a new assignment. Things get a little tense.
Where: The airport, then Shailee's car.
When: Right before the group plot
Warnings: It's Shailee so we're going to assume language.
It was a long time before Shailee said anything. She sat there quietly, across the desk from her boss, just staring at the case file in her lap. A photo sat on top of the sprawled pages, and as Shailee sat there looking at it, she couldn’t help but appreciate what a bitch life could be at a time. A fickle bitch with a cruel sense of humor. “Everything okay, Shailee?” Her boss’s voice cut through Shailee’s reverie, forcing her to look up into the man’s concerned face . “I know things with him didn’t end... pleasantly, but he’s working with us now. D.C. thinks you’re the one who should handle him, and I told them I agree.” Shailee sat back, surprised.
“You did?” She paused, trying to wrap her words around the thoughts churning in her head. “Why?”
“Because you did a damn good job, back then, Thakkar. You got us what we needed then, and have continued to do so ever since. I’ve seen you lead missions and support them, and I think you ready.”
Shailee nodded, swallowing the line of questions waiting at the tip of her tongue. How was she supposed to argue in the face of that? “Thank you, sir. You... D.C. made the right choice. I’ll get on it right away” She closed the file and pushed to her feet, coming to a stop right beside the door. “I just have one question: does he know I’m going to be the one handling him?”
“Not a clue.” A half smile made its way across the man’s face. “Now get to the airport, Thakkar. He lands in little over an hour.”
Callum’s flight was late, as flights tended to be, and when he finally walked through the last security checkpoint, it was nearly forty five minutes after his scheduled arrival time. A backpack was slung over one shoulder, and other than the slight changes that the years brought on, he looked nearly exactly as he did several years back, except a bit more on the groomed side. He glanced around, wrought with a sudden feeling of awkwardness because the one bit of information he had asked for had not been given to him. In fact, the agent who had given him his flight and travel information, had outright refused to reveal the identity of who was picking him up from the airport. For all that he knew, it was some big joke to them, some prank pulled on the new guy.
No one is playing a joke on you, the voice in his thoughts reassured him. Just be patient. If they told you someone would be here, they aren’t lying. Callum gave a roll of his eyes at that response, mentally shunning the voice as he slipped his hands into his pockets and strode forward, looking this way and that for anyone who seemed to be looking for someone else.
The delay had been a lucky one, giving Shailee the time to stop reliving her last contact with the man and focus on the present. Callum Westerberg. A man she had actually never expected to see again. In hindsight, Shailee realized that her expectation had been more than a little naive, but then again, so had she at the time. The mission to Prague had been early on in her career, and even though it had technically fallen into the ‘success’ column on her scoresheet, Shailee had experienced a lot of “firsts” while out there, including her first experience with volatile and openly hostile personalities. Callum hadn’t exactly been either of the two, but suffice it to say, memories of him were intricately linked to others she had never planned on revisiting.
But that was before today.
She leaned against the black sedan she had been given, a lithe figure swathed in blue and grey. For one of the few times in her life, Shailee Thakkar actually looked as though she belonged in Law Enforcement, which of course, was the entire point. Callum Westerberg would need to see right away that the girl he knew was nothing more than a fiction the CIA had created, and that she was very much in charge in their relationship. Appearances tended to help with that sort of thing.
She spotted him scanning the crowd as he moved away from the arrival gates, but waited until he was close enough to call without raising her voice. “Westerberg. Over here.” Shailee watched him carefully, curious to know if he’d recognize her at all.
Of all the people Callum might have listed as possibilities for picking him up at the airport, the owner of the voice was not one of them. It was her eyes that he recognized, deep and dark and just as intense as he recalled from that time in Prague, but nothing else matched. The clothing was different, the demeanor, and the fact that nothing meshed into a recognizable memory put Callum on edge. Someone else then, he determined, because what were the odds that someone from his shady past would be here, working for the former enemy?
Adjusting the grip he had on his backpack, Callum weaved his way through the groups of other travelers that cluttered up the terminal, coming to stand just feet away, giving her a long look up and down before he glanced away, gaze moving towards the sky. His posture was relaxed, hardly official, feet shoulder-width apart and a slouch in his shoulders. “Plane was late. If you’re looking for apologies, find the pilot,” Callum said with no remorse in his voice, glancing towards her for a moment before he stepped to the side with every intention on taking his seat in the car.
“It’s fine. We knew the flight had been delayed.” Shailee was a big fan of technology, especially the kind that made things like flight statuses more efficient to work around. She had been waiting for a reaction, but had been rewarded with next to nothing. He must not have concluded that Shailee and the girl from Prague were the same person then. That worked well enough for her.
Pushing off the car, Shailee took a step towards the man, with a held out hand. “Shailee Thakkar. As you might have guessed, we’re going to be working together.” Without waiting for further comments, she slipped around Callum to the other side of the car, unlocking the doors as she went. “If you have any questions, we’ve got plenty of time. You got here just in time for rush hour.” Shailee knew the trivialities were not anything either of them cared about, but she knew that there was a procedure to follow here. He was her asset, and she was his handler. The handbook said that building rapport and opening lines of communication was the first step to a successful relationship. Shailee didn’t think the handbook had been anticipating a situation like this one, but she wanted to be able to say she had at least given it a good old college try.
Sidelined by her greeting, Callum took a long look at her hand before slipping his own from his pocket and giving her a firm handshake. “Names are good, but what should I call you?” he asked, because he was aware of how things were in the agency; there was protocol to follow, and with time in prison hanging over his head should this not work out, Callum was the tiniest bit eager to be on his best behaviour, or what passed for good behaviour from him. A lift of his eyebrows and he released her hand, opening the passenger door and sliding in, throwing his backpack in the backseat behind him before buckling in. There was still something painfully familiar about her, though the feeling was all wrong. The same, yet different. Familiar, yet strange. A contrast that he couldn’t settle on as he gave her a long look from his seat.
“I really doubt rush hour here is any worse than D.C., and you’ll find I’m not one for a lot of small talk.” Callum pressed his lips together for a moment, rubbing a hand over the rough stubble on his jaw. Authority figures and him didn’t usually get along that well as he was used to, at least for the past handful of years, of working as a solo project. But concessions had to be made, one way or another, and this was his to make. “Do I know you from somewhere?” Callum finally asked, the question directed towards the windshield where his eyes were fixed on the world beyond.
Shailee pulled her door shut, glancing towards Callum only briefly before switching on the ignition. “You can start off by calling me Thakkar. I’m the only person you’re going to be in contact with on our side from this point on, so anything else would be... strange.” She nodded as she pulled into the flowing traffic on the outer lanes. Shailee was good at small talk under normal circumstances, but she remembered the man’s preference for silence from all those years ago, and didn’t want to push him.
She bit her lip and stayed silent for a moment, using maneuvering through tricky traffic as an excuse to focus elsewhere. “We’ve met before,” she finally said, her voice quiet. Where and when was for him to figure out. She was volunteering nothing.
He rubbed his palm along the thigh of his jeans, giving a small nod of understanding at her simple response to his question. Of course there was no other information offered; that was for him to figure out on his own, and therein was the key to the entire thing, Callum thought. He didn’t say what he thought immediately, instead skirting around the answer in wide, arcing sweeps. “Were you with these people back then?” he finally asked, giving her a sidelong glance, his attention as focused on the road as though he were the one driving, not her. “Because I wouldn’t have willingly associated with someone if I knew they worked with people like these.”
Shailee swallowed. ‘These people’. Of course he thought of the CIA as ‘these people’. He wasn’t there of his own free will, and it would be best of Shailee remembered that. “Yes.” There were a few agents, some of them even famous one, who hadn’t always started out on the right side, but Shailee wasn’t one them. No, Shailee was the one who had always known what she wanted to do, and had used single-mindedness and determination to get where she wanted to be, everything else be damned. She had never wavered in her faith or dedication to her job or country, and she was damn proud of it. “No, I don’t expect you would have. You prefer to work for the people blowing innocent civilians out of the sky.”
The words were out of her mouth before she could stop herself. So much for establishing a rapport. Maybe Shailee wasn’t as much over Prague as she pretended to be.
The ire that ran through him at that comment was almost palpable, his jaw tight, the hand that had rested loosely on his thigh now curled into a fist, thumb wrapped over his folded fingers. He could hear the disgust in her voice, the way she put him down with his words, and it pissed him off in a bad way. Not everyone was born to being able to do what was right all the time. Some people had to do everything they could just to get by, and damned them for ending up on a different path, apparently. “You know what?” Callum said, his voice sharp, the words bit off, shortening them. “How about you pull over. Let me out. And I’ll call D.C. and request a different ‘handler’, because obviously? This isn’t going to work.” Callum was already unbuckling his seatbelt, flipping the lock up on the door, twisting around in his seat to grab his backpack and pull it into his lap.
Shailee laughed. She couldn’t help it. It was short, and sardonic, and whatever mirth there was in it died before it could leave her lips. There were so many things she could have said to him just then, ranging from ‘What, are you going to lose your temper again?’ to ‘Sack up you little shit, and be grateful you’re not some prisoner’s bitch,’ but she swallowed back the worst of them. Instead she simply said, “Why, you think someone else is more likely to forget you don’t want to be here anymore than they want you here? I wouldn’t hold my breath if I were you.” She didn’t slow the car down any (they were crawling through traffic anyway), but turned her head a fraction to see if he was going to follow through on his threat to leave the car. “Besides, I’m pretty sure this is a one time opportunity for you, but if you want to walk out, the door’s unlocked.”
“So you’re saying I have to deal with someone who obviously doesn’t like me? And who’s likely carrying a grudge from several years ago against me?” Callum replied sharply, but he didn’t make any move to leave the car, some measure of self-preservation kicking in and keeping him seated in the passenger seat. “Where I’m from? If you don’t like someone, you get away from them.” He gave a shake of his head and angled his body towards the door, shifting and kicking one foot up on the dash, just daring her to say a word to him about that. She had a point, as much as he didn’t want to admit it. This was a one-time deal. That had been pressed upon him more times than he cared to think about. Fuck this up, he had been told in no uncertain terms, then he’d be coming back in handcuffs, and as much as his pride might have been bruised, he didn’t want to risk that.
“Apart from the loathing for the people you worked with and for, I’ve got no grudge against you.” It might have been strange, but it was true. Most of Shailee’s feelings about Callum Westerberg were connected to the men she had been pretending to work for, but when it came down to it, he had been alright. Sure, things had gotten a little intense when he had lost his temper at her, but she was a trained CIA agent, and it hadn’t been anything she should still have been carrying a grudge about all these years later. “That’s a smart idea where you’re from. But don’t worry, we don’t just shoot people because we don’t like them around these parts.”
She rolled her eyes as he stuck his foot on the dash. He could act petulant all he wanted, since it wasn’t going to get a rise out of her. This wasn’t her car and she sure as hell wasn’t his mother.
“No, you just make their lives miserable,” Callum muttered under his breath, resting his head against the cool pane of glass, his gaze distant, not really seeing a thing that rolled by outside their window in the slow-moving traffic. Hostility surrounded him, but it was a reserved sort of anger, all pulled in, bundled up, and shoved where people might get a whiff of it, but not really experience it. “So where the hell am I staying? They didn’t give me any of those details when they shipped me off,” he said a moment later, fingers picking at one of the torn knees of his jeans, pulling out a loose thread. “Or are we bunking up?” This was accompanied by a sidelong glance in her direction, the corner of his mouth pulled up in a smirk.
“Only on Tuesdays,” she replied with a flippant eyeroll. Shailee was sure Callum had received the ‘you’ve made your bed and now you have to lie in it’ speech no less than twelve times by this point, and she wasn’t going to otherwise rise to the bait. She could sense the anger coiled around him, a deadly serpent waiting to strike, and even though she would never admit it, it affected her more than she was willing to admit. Shailee had been caught off guard once by his quiet, yet explosive rage, and she had vowed never to make the same mistake again. Today, she had taken a page out of Natasha’s book; there were at least three objects she could use to defend herself within arms reach as she drove. Overkill? Perhaps. But Callum Westerberg got under her skin.
Shailee took a moment to look away from the road and quirk a perfectly arched brow at him. “You wish, Westerberg. Look in the glove compartment. There should be an envelope in there with everything you need.” The CIA would be putting Callum up in one of the shadier motels off of Fremont street. The place was decent enough during the daylight, and Callum Westerberg was the type of man who could certainly watch his own back at night. Despite being the most elite of the government agencies, the CIA still ran on the taxpayer’s dime, which meant they were ready and willing to pinch a penny any and everywhere they could. “Housing’s covered, you get a stipend for the rest. It’s not a lot, but it’s a hell of a lot better than minimum wage.”
At the prompting from Shailee, Callum removed his foot from the dash and leaned forward, popping the glove compartment open with one hand. Sure enough, there was an envelope in there with the promised information, and after shutting the glove compartment with his knee, he slouched in his seat and picked through the contents. His brows raised at the motel information, giving her a long look in response. “They sure go classy for the newcomers, don’t they. This place isn’t gonna give me mints on my pillow, are they?” He gave a roll of his eyes and folded the envelope in half, shoving it in his pocket before settling back down in the seat, arms folded over his chest.
“So. What kind of freedom do I have? Can I leave the city, or is some kind of alarm gonna go off the minute I step out of some sort of CIA-approved comfort zone?” His tone was sarcastic, sharp and narrow, leaving him prickly to the touch with no signs of softening at all in the future.
Shailee let silence fall as Callum made his way through the literature, giving him the time to soak in the information contained in the unreasonably dense packet. Bureaucracy loved its paperwork, and Callum was going to have to learn what it was like being (but not really) one of them. “The short version? You’re stuck in town, and they’re going to track you. Closely at first, but if things look okay, they might start being a little less big brother about it.” Actually, Shailee was pretty sure no one was going to be monitoring Callum unless some alarms went off (there were more efficient ways to allocate CIA resources), but she didn’t feel the need to share that little piece of information just yet. If invisible eyes in the sky would work to keep the man in line, so be it. “There’s a phone in there too, and that’s the only one you should be using. Don’t try getting a burner. We’ll know.”
“Awesome.” His answer was short and to the point, but she had given him enough to think on, to digest and mull over. He didn’t have any immediate intentions on skipping town, but it was good to know what kind of boundaries he had before he ended up crossing something he had no idea about. There was no reason to doubt Shailee’s answer, so he took her at her word. But there still had to be a challenge in there somewhere. “And how would you know if I got myself a burner? I spent the better part of a decade keeping off the radar. Old habits? They die very hard, Shailee.” He used her first name to make a point, brows raised, a challenge in his words.
“We’re the goddamn CIA, Westerberg. That’s how.” The real answer, of course, was much more technical and detailed than that, but the details were in the fine print in his hands, if he wanted them. “You’ll still be off everyone’s radars, just everyone except ours.” Callum wasn’t the first person the agency had turned and certainly wouldn’t be the last. Over the years, more and more backup plans to deal with surprises their CIs threw their way, and at this point, Shailee doubted there was anything the man could do that didn’t trigger a very detailed, very specific contingent action plan. “You’re more than welcome to try to sneak one by us, it just won’t look very good for you when you fail.” Now it was her turn to be cocky.
Without a warning, Shailee slipped the car down an exit ramp and onto the city streets. The traffic was a lot lighter at this level. “Any other burning questions you’ve got for me?” They’d be at the motel soon.
And of course that would be what she had to say. He gave a roll of his eyes at that answer, turning his attention again to the city, shrugging his shoulders up towards his ears and giving her the finger in one smooth motion. “I’m not planning on trying to leave,” Callum said bluntly. “I know what’ll happen if I try, and I’m not looking forward to life behind bars. So sorry to disappoint you,” he finished acidly, folding his hands back together across his chest, broody and moody.
As the scenery shifted slightly to the pace of the city, Callum let out a sigh, tipping his forehead towards the window. “I know how to get hold of you if I do,” he said. And he’d find a good time to do it. Three in the morning, maybe. Just to be an annoying asshole.
Shailee didn’t think he’d be stupid enough to try to run, not after all he was willing to go through to stay out of jail. The trackers the CIA was going to put on him had never been skipped on, and if was willing to agree to one of those, it had to be as a last resort. “Not disappointed. Believe it or not, working with you is actually supposed to be good for my career.” That wasn’t exactly the reason Shailee had accepted the job, but it hadn’t hurt. They both had something to gain out of this arrangement. As long as they focused on that instead of their animosity towards each other, they might actually get through it.
She continued to ignore his sullen mood on the assumption that there was nothing she could say or do that would affect it whatsoever. “Yeah, you do. It goes without saying that you should only call me from that phone and if you know it’s secure. Otherwise you follow the drop protocols listed in the packet.”
“Don’t worry. I won’t fuck this up,” Callum said as he grabbed his backpack from the floor at his feet, pulling it up on his lap. “I’ll read everything in that packet. When I do a job, I do it well. It wasn’t my fault that I got caught in the first place.” Sitting up straighter, sensing that they were nearing the hotel, Callum angled his body towards her, arm on the edge of the door, the other resting across the seats at their back. A hint of a smile, just a sliver, pulled at his lips. “Just keep that in mind.”
“I hope you’re right, for both our sakes.”
Shailee pulled the car to a stop outside the motel, idling her engine instead of putting it in park. Instead of pulling away when he angled in, she turned in her seat to face him. Her expression remained carefully neutral, not giving him the satisfaction of seeing any effect he might have on her. “Your fault or not, you’re here now. You’ll have until the end of this week to settle in, so rest up. We start Monday.”
Callum’s look was his only response as he watched her, eyes narrowing for a moment before he turned and opened the car door, slinging his backpack over his shoulder. A week to settle in. They were oh so generous. But still. It was better than the prospect of prison. Glancing back towards her and the car, he gave a smack to the frame, indicating that he was off, and then he disappeared into the motel to check in to the roach nest that would be his new home sweet home.