It's midafternoon, though it could be midnight. No windows. No clocks. Just screens.

Suki sits straight-backed in a chair too low for her posture, legs crossed at the ankle, paperwork spread in perfect symmetry before her. Her pen glides steadily across a case report. She doesn't look up. She doesn't speak.

Across the room, Dex slouches beside Agent Lim, two chairs crammed together against the wall like punishment. A stack of forms sits between them, untouched. Their conversation is low and inconsequential, Dex making some dry comment about the quality of the takeout from last night, Lim responding with exaggerated disgust, neither of them moving their pens.

Lim laughs once. Dex smiles, a half-thing, small and unreadable.

But his eyes keep straying.

To her.

Every few minutes.

Suki pretends not to notice.

She's good at that.

Behind her, another agent scrolls lazily through camera feeds. Two more guard the hallway outside Fisk's room, standing so still they might as well be fixtures. There's noise here, murmur and shuffle, chair legs scraping laminate tile, but no clarity. It's all clutter.

And Suki hates clutter.

She closes the folder in front of her. Gathers her materials in silent, fluid movements. She stands, her chair sliding back just an inch. Then she walks.

Across the room. To the opposite corner, where Ray Nadeem's desk sits slightly isolated, still within the boundaries of the group, but just far enough removed that conversation doesn't reach it easily.

Ray looks up when she approaches. His fingers pause over his keyboard.

"Hey," He says, eyes crinkling into a tired smile, "Everything alright?"

Suki nods once, efficient, "It's loud over there."

He glances over at Dex and Lim. They're laughing again. Lim's leaned back, chair on two legs. Dex still hasn't touched the paperwork in front of him. His eyes flick toward them and away again, fast as a reflex.

Ray smirks softly, "You're not wrong."

Suki gestures to the empty side of his desk, "Mind if I join you?"

"Be my guest," He says, waving a hand like he's offering her half of a kingdom.

She places her files down carefully. Reorganizes them without comment. Sits. The chair here is still uncomfortable, but it creaks less. The light doesn't buzz as loud. She can feel her thoughts settle back into order.

Ray watches her for a moment, then says, "I owe you an apology."

Suki's pen pauses over a form, "For what?"

"For screwing up your name."

She glances at him, mildly surprised.

He shrugs, a little sheepish, "People always butcher mine too. Nadeem isn't hard, but you'd be amazed how many people just give up halfway and call me Ray like we're best friends."

Suki nods once, "That's why I correct people."

"Good. You should. It's yours."

There's a silence that isn't awkward. She goes back to her form. Ray goes back to his.

They work side by side for a while, the shuffle of papers and the clack of keys the only sound between them. Suki finds it... tolerable. Pleasant, even. Ray doesn't fill the space with noise. He doesn't try to impress. He just works.

But she's watching him in her periphery.

Reading him.

His tie is slightly loose, the second button of his collar undone. Not out of comfort, fatigue. His eyes are red at the corners. Not from tears. From lack of sleep. Stress folds in the corners of his mouth even when he smiles. His phone buzzes once in his coat pocket, and she sees the flicker of dread in his face before he ignores it.

Suki doesn't ask. She could. She knows how to. Knows how to ask a question that makes a man think he's volunteering information instead of being dissected. But she doesn't.

Because she sees the wall in him. Same as hers. Same as Dex's, though Dex's is made of darker things.

Still, Ray is different.

He's kind.

Kind in a way that doesn't demand reciprocation. Kind in the way of men who've had to beg, who've had to keep the peace in places where no one else would.

"You've got good instincts," Ray says after a while, voice low, "Some agents freeze when they're thrown into something like this. But you didn't flinch."

"I've flinched before," Suki replies, evenly.

Ray exhales a breath that might be a laugh, "Yeah. Haven't we all."

She doesn't smile. But she lets her shoulders drop a little. She allows the quiet to become companionable.

She's not here to make friends.

But if she had to pick one--

It would be him.

He doesn't ask about her file.

Doesn't mention her languages, her medals, her past.

She likes that.

And she likes that when his phone buzzes again, he checks it with a grimace and doesn't make an excuse. Doesn't explain.

She doesn't ask.

She just returns to her paperwork.

Their hands move in rhythm for a few moments.

Two agents.

Two people.

Side by side in the strange quiet of a temporary war room above a city that never stops bleeding.

And somewhere behind them, Dex watches from the corner.

His eyes don't stray to the cameras anymore.

Only to her.

He sees her lean closer to Ray to point out a line on a file.

He sees Ray nod. Smile again.

He sees Suki glance at the coffee cup in Ray's hand and not recoil.

Dex turns a page in the file on his lap.

Doesn't read it.

His pen doesn't move.

Because Suki's found the quiet she was looking for.

And it's not beside him.

The maroon tray is always the same.

A square of dull plastic, warped at one corner from heat or time. Every agent refers to it as the "cafeteria tray," but it's been procured specifically to remind Wilson Fisk that no matter the Egyptian cotton sheets or the penthouse air, he is still a prisoner. The tray is part of the illusion. The illusion of restraint. Of control. Of the FBI playing jailer in a high-rise cage.

Today's meal is pasta-- overcooked penne drowning in a watery tomato sauce that smells vaguely like copper. Two small meatballs, neither round nor convincing. A plastic cup of iceberg lettuce, limp beneath a single packet of vinaigrette. And a dry, cold roll.

Hotel room service, demoted by procedure.

The meal arrives in a silver dome-topped cart, accompanied by a printed slip detailing its contents. Suki is the one who inspects it. Her gloved hands lift the lid with slow precision, her eyes skimming over every inch of food like it might bloom into danger. No weapon too small. No detail too unimportant. She checks for the unexpected, a foreign glint, a change in pattern, anything that suggests a bribe or a message has slipped through protocol.

She finds nothing.

She nods once to the waiting junior agent and steps aside.

The food is transferred carefully to the tray. Every item shifted like it might explode. The room quiets as the tray is secured. It hums like a stage being set.

Then, as procedure demands, they move.

Suki leads, flanked by Dex on her left. Agent Lim follows behind, his posture bored but alert, and another agent trails last, hand near the weapon at his hip. No one speaks. The silence is built of rules. Of order. Of the unspoken knowledge that inside this room is a man who once controlled a city's veins and choked it slowly with silk gloves.

Dex unlocks the door.

It clicks open like the mouth of something that doesn't breathe.

They enter.

The suite feels larger than it is, somehow hollowed out by absence. Everything unnecessary has been removed, chairs, decor, personality. What's left is a white-walled box dressed up as civility. Thick curtains sealed over glass. And Wilson Fisk, seated alone at the table, his massive hands folded in front of him like a sermon waiting to be spoken.

He looks up as they enter.

He sees Suki.

And pauses.

He doesn't smile.

But something flickers across his pale face, curiosity, maybe. Or calculation.

Suki's gaze meets his, unflinching. Then she moves wordlessly to the wall opposite him, her back pressed to the plaster beside Dex. Lim and the other agent remain closer to the door, watching.

The tray is placed in front of Fisk without ceremony.

He glances at it like it's a joke, then begins to eat.

Plastic fork. Measured pace. Each bite chewed slowly, deliberately. He eats like a man still in control of the world around him, like he's choosing to be here, like it's a favor.

Dex crosses his arms.

Suki watches.

Time ticks, slow and stretched.

And then--

"You're new."

Fisk's voice cuts the room like a rusted blade, heavy, low, uninvited.

No one answers.

He lifts his gaze to Suki, "Agent Higashikokubaru, isn't it?"

Dex's jaw tenses. His arms unfold.

"Convict," He snaps, "Eat your food and keep your mouth shut."

Fisk turns slightly toward Dex, almost amused, "You're still rude, Agent Poindexter."

Dex steps forward once, but Suki's hand moves, a small motion. A signal.

He stops.

She doesn't look at him.

Her eyes remain on Fisk.

"Let him speak," She says.

Dex stares at her, stunned, "He doesn't get to speak."

"Words can be useful," She murmurs, "If you listen close enough."

She steps forward, just one pace, enough to indicate that she's not afraid. That she's not impressed, either.

Fisk watches her carefully.

The other agents don't move.

Dex's mouth presses into a line, his fists curling tight at his sides.

Fisk speaks again, gently, like someone telling a bedtime story.

"Your father was a diplomat," He says, "Stationed in Washington. Japanese embassy, if I remember correctly."

Suki doesn't confirm.

"And your mother-- a martial artist. Trained champions. Your name came up once, years ago. A scandal, wasn't there? Photographs. The president's son. You disappeared after that. And now... here you are."

He smiles, but it doesn't reach his eyes.

"Do you believe in redemption, Agent Higashikokubaru?"

Suki watches him in silence.

Then: "I believe in leverage."

Fisk's brow lifts slightly.

She continues, voice even, "I believe people talk when they think they're being listened to. And I believe most people lie unless you let them monologue first."

Fisk leans back slowly in his chair. The fork clicks gently against the plate.

"You're sharper than the others."

Dex takes a breath through his nose, "Keep talking and we'll revoke your privileges. Every last one."

Fisk ignores him. His gaze is fixed on Suki now. Like she's a puzzle he's just begun to unravel.

"There's a darkness in you," He says quietly, "You hide it well. But it's there."

Suki doesn't respond. Doesn't blink.

"I used to think hiding the worst of yourself was strength," Fisk adds, "Now I wonder if it's cowardice."

She tilts her head, "Then maybe you've changed."

He smiles, softly, "I haven't."

Silence falls again.

Dex watches her, jaw tight, the bones in his face carved in tension. Lim shifts behind them, murmuring something to the other agent, procedural, likely, a check-in, but Suki doesn't hear.

Because Fisk is still watching her.

And something in her, something cold, disciplined, untouched, watches right back.

She doesn't blink.

She doesn't nod.

But she files every word away.

Because words are useful.

Especially when they're spoken by men who believe themselves gods in cages made of glass and cameras.

Eventually, she steps back.

"You've had your fun," She says, "Enjoy your meal."

Fisk bows his head slightly.

They turn.

Dex opens the door.

And as they exit, he says nothing.

But she can feel it.

His silence is not agreement.

It's restraint.

And restraint, in Dex, is never quiet for long.

The door closes behind them with a soft click, one of those luxury hotel sounds, muffled and expensive. But there's nothing soft about the tension humming between Dex and Suki now. It sizzles in the carpet, burns in the overhead lights, clings to the space between their shoulders like static before a lightning strike.

Suki says nothing.

Not at first.

She walks ahead, fluid and precise, like her bones are made of command. Not a glance backward to see if he's following.

She doesn't need to.

He always does.

Dex is behind her by five paces, hands in his pockets, jaw tight. Every footstep is practiced restraint. The quiet click of his shoes against tile. The way his shoulders twitch slightly like he's running old movements in his mind, throws, shots, breaks. Things he could do but doesn't. Things he might.

He watches her back. The way her spine never bends. The way her hair moves slightly with each step. He wants to speak but doesn't.

Not yet.

She presses the elevator button.

They wait in silence.

Somewhere above them, the machinery groans, a cage in motion. Dex steps beside her, not too close, but close enough to smell her, something clean, not sweet. Soap and cold air. Something surgical.

The elevator arrives.

They step in together.

The doors close.

And then finally, finally, he speaks.

"You let him talk to you."

His voice is low. Not angry. Not scolding. But tight. Coiled. Like he's trying to hold back something heavier than words.

Suki doesn't answer.

She presses the button for the ground floor. They descend in silence, thirty seconds of slow, humming steel breath between them.

"You let a criminal speak to you like you were equals."

Still, she doesn't respond.

Dex glances at her, the muscles in his cheek twitching like a glitch in a calm exterior.

"He doesn't get that," He says, "He doesn't deserve that."

And just when it seems she won't respond, when the quiet has stretched thin as piano wire, Suki moves.

She turns and slams the emergency stop button with the palm of her hand.

The elevator jerks, stutters.

Then stillness.

Red light bleeds from the small panel overhead, casting the tiny space in a soft warning glow.

Dex blinks.

Suki turns to him slowly.

Her face is unreadable. But her eyes? Her eyes are surgical.

"How do you know so much about me?"

The question hits harder than the stop.

Dex doesn't move. Doesn't breathe. Just watches her.

His voice, when it comes, is the voice he keeps tucked behind charm and habit. Quiet. Controlled, "FBI database. It's standard protocol to review all transfers."

Suki nods.

Once.

Not buying it.

Not rejecting it.

She steps closer, not threatening, not aggressive. Just... closer. Until there's nothing between them but his silence and her precision.

"Exactly," She says, "You have a reason. It's your job to know about me. It's my job to know about you."

Dex watches her carefully, expression still.

She continues, "But he doesn't. He's a convict. He's not my handler. He's not my superior. He's not even my partner."

A pause.

Then, softer, but sharper, too:

"If he knows about me... even if it's just those trivial details... it means he cared enough to learn."

The words are glass on tongue.

She says them not with fear. But with the kind of awareness that's colder than fear. Tactical. Clean. Like she's already running the worst-case scenarios in her head.

Dex shifts, but not much. Just enough to let her know he's listening.

Not pretending to.

Actually listening.

"I don't know why he looked me up," Suki says, "Maybe he wanted leverage. Maybe he's just arrogant. Maybe he thinks if he can map out the people around him, he can control them."

She takes another step forward.

The elevator doesn't move.

Neither does Dex.

"But I know the look," She says, "The look he gave me. It wasn't casual. It wasn't accidental."

Dex stares at her.

Suki tilts her head slightly.

"You ever seen that look before?"

Dex swallows once. His Adam's apple bobs, quick and tense.

"Yeah," He says finally, "I've seen it."

Their eyes lock.

And in that moment, she knows.

She doesn't flinch.

But she knows.

Dex speaks again, quieter now. Like he's afraid of breaking something sacred or dangerous or both.

"He's a predator, Suki. He watches people the way people study prey. He learns their weaknesses. Their rhythms."

Suki doesn't break her stare, "And do you?"

The question doesn't accuse.

It invites.

Dex doesn't answer.

Not out loud.

Instead, his expression shifts—barely—but Suki catches it. The flicker. The break in the wall.

"I don't hurt people I care about," He says eventually, almost inaudibly.

She lets that hang.

Then: "You don't have to hurt someone to turn them into something you can own."

Dex takes a step back. Just one. A recalibration.

Suki lets him.

Then, after a long pause, she reaches over and disengages the emergency stop.

The elevator stutters, then hums back to life.

Neither of them moves for the rest of the descent.

When the doors slide open again, they step into the lobby together.

But not side by side.

Not anymore.

Outside the hotel, the air smells faintly of rain on concrete and last night's cigarettes ground out against brick walls. Morning traffic thrums low on the avenue, the pulse of a city that never dares to sleep. Even now, just past ten, the sidewalks are thick with the usual mess of humanity, tourists with suitcases, men in thousand-dollar suits shouting into Bluetooths, women in four-inch heels already late for a meeting.

And two federal agents in dark coats and darker expressions walking the block like shadows.

Suki walks one pace ahead. She always does.

Dex doesn't mind.

They don't speak. Not out here. Words are wasted on a city like this. Instead, they scan, windows, alleys, rooftop ledges, parked cars with their drivers waiting too long. A man steps out of a deli with coffee. A woman argues into her phone. Everything is ordinary. Everything is suspect.

Suki's eyes cut across the skyline like a blade. Dex watches her watching, cataloging the way her gaze moves, how long she lingers on a reflective surface. She sees what others don't. She sees everything.

When they round the block and approach the service entrance, Dex takes the lead. He flashes his badge at the rear security panel and presses his thumb to the scanner. The steel door opens with a mechanical hiss.

They step inside.

Cool air and fluorescent hum. The back corridors smell of industrial cleaner and overworked HVAC. They pass through a narrow hallway, walls lined with folded laundry carts and empty ice chests, until they reach the staff elevators.

Here, they pause.

They are statues by the wall now. Dex with one hand resting casually near his holster, Suki with her arms folded, expression unreadable. Above them, the elevator lights blink softly, floors shifting, numbers climbing. The building breathes around them. Somewhere above, the monster eats his lunch on a maroon tray.

Time stretches.

Then--

Movement.

From the lobby's edge, just past the curve of the bar, a figure emerges. A man in a baseball cap and dark glasses, his steps slow but steady, his body loose in that particular way people get when they're pretending not to be tense. Dex sees him first.

He nudges Suki with his elbow-- barely a touch.

She sees him now too.

The man doesn't notice them immediately. Or pretends not to. He's heading toward the elevators like he knows where he's going.

But something about him itches.

Dex steps forward.

"May I see your room key, sir?" He asks, tone professional but firm.

The man halts. Looks up slightly.

"Yeah, I got it," He says easily, patting his pockets in that distracted way people do when they're trying to appear harmless.

Dex's eyes narrow.

"No," He says, "I need to see it."

The man offers a half-smile, one corner of his mouth ticking up as he slips his hand into his coat.

"Oh, sure. Yeah."

His voice is casual. Calm. But there's something practiced about it. Too smooth. Too measured.

Suki steps closer now, flanking Dex.

"Sir," She says flatly.

The man adjusts his baseball cap, still digging through his pocket.

"They gave me, like, three of them," He says, "I must've left it in my car."

"Then I can't let you through," Dex replies, already angling his body in front of the elevator doors. No weapon drawn, but the message is clear.

A pause.

The man nods once, lightly.

"Sure," He says, "I... I'll be right back."

He turns on his heel and heads back toward the bar, movements easy, fluid.

Suki watches him disappear into the crowd. She doesn't move.

Dex exhales slowly, "Huh."

"What?"

"He was too calm. Knew how to sound harmless without trying too hard."

"Former military?" She asks.

Dex shakes his head, "Too fluid. Probably not trained the way we train. Could be private sector. Could be nothing."

Suki watches the bar's reflection in the elevator doors. The man is gone now, swallowed by the crowd. A bartender is wiping down a counter. A bellhop wheels luggage through the center aisle.

Suki finally speaks, "He didn't smell like alcohol."

Dex raises a brow, "You got close enough to smell him?"

"I always get close enough."

A brief silence.

Then Dex exhales, running a hand over his mouth.

"You think he was casing the place?"

Suki shrugs, "Maybe. Or maybe he just forgot his key."

But she doesn't believe that.

And neither does he.

They fall back into position by the elevator.

Still. Alert.

Suki watches the door.

Dex watches her.

The city, oblivious, continues to spin.

The elevator doors close with a sigh behind them, steel folding in on silence. It's the kind of silence that isn't quiet-- not really. It hums with unsaid things, with glances that don't meet, with the weight of what might've been and what might still be.

Suki stands on the left, posture sharp and immovable, her arms folded as though she's holding something in. Dex stands on the right, rocking ever so slightly on his heels, chewing the inside of his cheek like it owes him something. Between them, tension coils in the narrow space like wire stretched to the edge of breaking.

"We sure he was nothing?" Dex asks, eyes flicking to the floor number glowing overhead, "Guy had that... ease. Like he knew what he was doing."

Suki doesn't look at him, "That's what bothers me."

Dex nods, shifts.

"You think we're being watched?"

"We're always being watched."

He smiles faintly at that, "Good. Makes it harder for the monsters to hide."

"Monsters don't hide," She says, "They wait."

Dex's smile fades.

The elevator climbs.

"You think we should report it?"

She hesitates.

Then: "Not yet. We don't even know what 'it' is."

The elevator dings.

Penthouse.

The doors slide open.

They move in sync down the hallway. No longer just partners-- they are agents now, gears in the machine. They walk like law and order, like they've done this a hundred times, like they'll do it a hundred more. But inside them both, something burns. Something restless.

The suite door opens with Dex's badge and thumbprint. The lock hisses open. They step in.

Fisk is seated at the table in the corner, chewing his last bite of that overcooked penne with all the ceremony of a man still pretending to have taste. He doesn't look up when they enter.

Dex claps his hands together, loud enough to startle a ghost.

"Up! Up! Up! Room check!"

Lim enters behind them, grinning, already clapping along. It's a game to him. He doesn't know better.

Suki follows last. She doesn't clap. She watches.

Fisk looks up, slow and heavy.

"What is this?"

"Convict," Dex says, stepping forward, posture snapping into place, "Stand and face the wall."

Fisk rises without protest.

Lim moves to the bed, "Comb the area. We'll be conducting a mandatory sweep of the room. You're to cooperate with all instructions. You understand?"

"I understand," Fisk replies, his voice level, patient.

Lim yanks the bedding back, tossing the stiff hotel sheets to the floor. He flips the mattress. Dust drifts through the air like ash, "Check."

Dex circles Fisk now like a shadow with teeth.

"I am searching your person to ensure you're not carrying anything that might be harmful to yourself or others. Do you understand?"

"I understand," Fisk says again.

Suki remains near the monitors, watching-- not just Fisk, but the performance unraveling around him. Dex is too tense. His voice too sharp. Lim is too casual. She watches how Fisk holds himself-- still, unbothered, like none of it matters.

"Check," Lim says again, patting down the seams of a couch cushion and coming up empty.

Dex steps closer to Fisk.

"Turn around."

Fisk turns.

The two men face each other, nearly the same height, but where Dex is lean and tense like a spring, Fisk is heavy and still like stone.

"Are we finished here?" Fisk asks, tone as cool as glass.

Dex holds the stare for a moment longer, then nods once, "All clear."

Lim stretches his back and starts toward the exit, "Coffee run?"

"Get me something strong," Dex mutters as he follows.

But Suki doesn't move.

She stands beside the monitor wall, unmoved, unreadable, her hands folded behind her back.

Dex pauses by the door, "Suki?"

She looks at him then, not with irritation, not with defiance, but with something closer to decision.

She tilts her head just slightly.

And says, "Kill the cameras."

Dex stares at her.

Lim freezes halfway through opening the door.

"What?"

"You heard me," She says. Her voice doesn't rise. It doesn't need to.

Dex walks back into the room slowly, watching her like she's someone new. Like something has changed and he's only just now noticing.

"You planning on doing something you don't want documented?"

Suki blinks once, slow. Then says, "I'm planning on listening. Which is apparently something no one else here knows how to do."

Fisk, behind them, doesn't move.

Doesn't smile.

Doesn't speak.

He waits.

Dex's jaw tightens. He wants to protest. Wants to make her explain.

But she doesn't.

And he doesn't push her.

Instead, he nods once. Slow.

"Fine," He says, "But I'm staying."

Her eyes flick to him, "No."

He doesn't answer right away. His fingers flex once at his sides.

Then: "You're not safe alone with him."

"I'm not alone. I'm with me."

She turns back to the monitors and presses the kill switch. The screens flicker once, then go black, one by one, like dying stars.

Dex and Lim leave.

The door closes.

And for the first time since this operation began, Suki Higashikokubaru is alone in a room with the man who knows her name-- and the man who shouldn't.

But the only sound now is the breathing of two people who understand the power of silence.

And how much you can learn if you stop pretending not to hear.

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