Work Text:
There were many times in the past that he’d thought Chester had had it easy. His position as Arthur was, for all intents and purposes, a desk job; after working his way up through the ranks he’d earned himself the most prominent position at the head of their table, and that was where he’d stayed. No more undercover operations, no more getting his hands dirty, no more running on as little sleep as he could manage. There had been many times in his youth that Harry had thought running an organisation such as this would be smooth sailing compared to defusing bombs in Algeria while under heavy fire from the opposition.
But now the duty fell on his own shoulders, Harry thought he would much rather be defusing bombs and dodging bullets than going through more of this blasted paperwork.
The large desk before him was strewn with files ranging from high level mission reports to company expenses. There were transcripts from various phone taps and wireless bugs Agent’s had planted, receipts for room and board, standard reports from Merlin regarding the closure of recent cases. Despite the recent move to upgrade their systems to the newest technology, their files still seemed to be largely paper based. It seemed no organization, no matter how high-tech, was without its paperwork.
A brief, firm knock broke the hushed silence of the office. Harry’s gaze sharpened, the report in front of him coming back into focus once more, and with a frustrated sigh rubbed a hand over his eyes and settled back into his chair. Blast it. “Come.”
The door opened. Harry lowered his hand in time to watch Roxy enter. “Lancelot. Please, sit.”
“Sir.” She folded herself neatly into the chair opposite, back straight and suit neat as a pin. He’d always admired women who could carry themselves with elegance and grace whilst still giving the air of being able to fuck shit up if the situation called for it. Roxy had that in spades. He gave thanks to Percival for not backing down in the face of Chester’s initial scoff at his proposal. Sexist arsehole, he thought darkly.
“Drink?” He offered, motioning to the decanter on the sideboard, but settled when she declined. “Then report.”
“As you know we managed to trace the car that the individual known as The Chemist used on the night of Galahad’s abduction. It came from a private leasing company who cater to his kind of people; filthy rich and extremely paranoid. Enough money gets them a car fitted with wire detectors, bug scanners, signal blockers, and all without any questions asked.” She motioned to the big screen on the wall to their left, “May I?”
Harry inclined his head and let her continue. She flipped over the tablet in her lap and tapped away while she spoke, “Breaking into their accounts was actually pretty simple. Considering all the effort they go to to secure their cars, their systems are pretty useless. All bark and no bite, Merlin said. However, combing through their client list and corresponding car logs, we came up with a name: Alexander Jacobsen.”
His eyebrows lifted just as the screen flickered to life, bathing the room in artificial blue light. “Fake, I presume?.”
Roxy spared him a glance, “Yes. But that fake name netted us this.”
The large Kingsman logo that rotated leisurely on the screen was suddenly replaced by two crystal clear images of a man. Harry leaned forward slowly. Tall, dark, and classically handsome was the only way one could describe him. While the angle of the photographs was not brilliant, it was enough to see a side profile and the approximate proportions of his face. It was enough to match it back to the images they had from Eggsy’s glasses cam. It was enough to spark the memories of watching the footage from Roxy’s contacts, watching the way his eyes lingered on Eggsy as he passed.
The muscles in neck tightened, then eased as he forced himself to relax.
“It’s him.”
Roxy nodded her agreement. “He used the fake name to purchase tickets to Morocco, I tracked his flight to Casablanca but…” She trailed off, then sighed. “I lost him after he landed.”
“I understand we are still running facial recognition?”
“Merlin has had it up and running since that night. I’ve sent these to him to add to the search.” She answered, “Permission to follow up in Morocco, Sir? I know we have a few contacts in that area that may have encountered him. It may give us some intel on the terrorist cell he’s been connected with.”
“Granted.” Harry sat back in his chair, rubbed a tired hand over his face, “Although I doubt he’s still there. He’s too clever to make so obvious a mistake.”
A silence settled on them then, broken only by the soft ticking of the clock on the large desk. Strange that it wasn’t uncomfortable; but then he’d never felt uncomfortable with either Roxy or Eggsy’s presence. It was true that both were his subordinates but he’d come to like and respect both of them over their time in training and indeed after.
In the case of one of them, a little too much like.
“Have you spoken to Eggsy?”
Her gentle question brought him out of his thoughts and he shook his head, mostly to dispel the fog that was determined to creep into his brain. “No, not since he was in the Infirmary. He was discharged last week and is spending time with his mother and his sister. As far as I know he’s well. No lasting effects from the drugs but only time will tell on that matter, and as such is not cleared for duty until sufficient time has passed.”
Roxy smiled fondly, “I can imagine he wasn’t too impressed with that.”
“No, he was not.” He looked at her then, “I would imagine he’d benefit from a friend’s presence, if only so he has company when he gets inadvisably shitfaced.”
For a moment her smile turned positively wicked, then settled into the perfection of innocence. “It would be careless of me to let a friend drink excessively when he’s been through such a terrible time.”
His lips twitched. “Quite. You are dismissed, Lancelot. I’ll have Merlin send you your flight details in the morning. Go home and get some sleep.”
“Sir,” She nodded, tucked her tablet under her arm and stood, smoothing down her suit. Harry turned back to the papers on his desk as she made to leave, pushing one report away in favour of another. This one was a detailed description of a mission wrapped up not long after he’d returned to London, concerning their Knight Tristan and a weapon’s dealer by the street name of Crack.
“Harry?”
He glanced up at the use of his name, surprised the young woman was still there. She regarded him with concern from the open doorway. “It might be wise to take your own advice. It’s late, go home.”
With that, she was gone, closing the door softly behind her. Harry took a moment or two to blink, and when the clock chimed the hour with it’s soft, musical trill, he let loose a soft laugh. Spent too much time with Merlin, he thought as he started filing away the paperwork cluttering up his desk. He made a mental note to properly check on Eggsy’s progress at a more decent hour. He doubted the Scotsman would be amenable to him dropping by at one o’clock in the morning.
The thought made him smile as he left the office for his car. Arthur or not, he’d have a few choice words to say to him if Harry were to disturb his beauty sleep. Most of them ending with ‘off’.