Sincerity
December 23, 2006

Now—

“What the hell are you doing?”

Everyone in the room forgot, for a moment, why they’d been waiting for this.

Five Weeks Ago—

They are alone. Five tubs of acid—she’s not entirely sure what type, just that it’s steaming in the stale air of the building and burns right through her bow staff—crowd around them in their small compartment, and they are alone; they aren’t happy.

“I’ve missed you.” She tries to whisper, but it comes out as more of a muffled grunt.

There’s a glare, she’s sure, but it’s too dark to see and too predictable to look for. “I told you. I warned you,” he growls, turning away from her to face the little detonator he’d stuck to the wall. “Why don’t you ever listen to me?”

That--

A chuckle is never appropriate at times like this…but neither is bringing a gun to a girl’s 21st birthday bash.

Four Weeks Ago—

The boss is not happy.

“Look,” he tries to sound sincerely contrite, “the job’s done. We did what you hired us to do: your people are out of that now and there’s no one willing to testify against--”

She doesn’t have time to warn him, only enough time to steel over when the yelling starts. It ends with a bitter handshake or five, a few grunted threats, and a loud, “As of last week you do not exist!” that greets them just before the back end of the door slams shut behind them.

“Well,” she quips, “that went by faster than I thought. How long before the goon squad catches up?”

Ever the gentleman, he holds the taxi door open. “We got a head start, kid. Don’t waste it.”

You--

No one is entirely sure who started it, but they all have their money on someone, all have good reasons and back stories to their adamancy; they only know it’s going to end tonight. It’ll be a good show.

Just the same, neither one of them seems too inclined to back down. There are no pointed fingers, no death threats, just a tense silence and a staring contest that ends too soon for all the wrong reasons.

Three Weeks Ago--

Their apartment stinks.

“Ugh! What died, anyway?”

He looks up from the kitchen floor where he’s kneeling in front of the stove, broom in hand; it comes out from under the depths with, unsurprisingly, nothing to show for it. He’s still in his boxers but his scowl is as fresh as a new hair cut. “A rat.”

She shrugs and heads back into her room to pack, un-pack, whatever it is that hadn’t been done the night before. She almost forgets to flinch when her bruised arm collides with the nightstand.

Whether he’d fished out the little stink bomb or not, he’s standing by the sink, drying his hands on his shirt; he doesn’t look up until she’s by his side, opening the window, throwing her own little corpse out into the street. It’ll cause only a little disturbance: they live on the third floor. He asks with his eyebrows, never his eyes.

“One, yes, I’m ready, so don’t lecture me on the frivolity of house keeping; two, that was another rat, by the way, but I killed it humanely; three, no, this bruise is from last night, which I blame you for completely.”

“If you’re implying that the infestation is my fault,” he starts, “stop it. We haven’t used this place in months. It’s not my fault it’s gone to the dogs.”

“But it is your fault we had to come back here.”

Know--

It’s been a month. It’s been only an inch on their deal and he’s broken away to find her dining with the enemy. Instead of heads being busted, it’s a glass, a flute swilling with red wine, shattering over and over in the slow eddy that used to be his mind’s eye. Everything is slow now, everything is clear; there she is, in that special place in life where everything is a prompt away (never mind it’d be granted by the hounds that’d chased them for years now), seeming only a little annoyed to be interrupted about it. Her glove is spotless, her sigh unrepentant. The boss is happy.

Yeah, he thinks belatedly, it’s a trap.

Two Weeks Ago—

They are tired.

“I hate being on the run with you.”

She’s not sure if that is an insult or not. “Have the rest of my…um, burger-thing. It’s still kind of fresh. I just got it.”

“From the dumpster;” He ‘phft’s her offer in that infuriating way of his that always makes her feel like arguing; then, he turns to her in that serious way that always makes her feel like agreeing and tells her to, “stop sugar coating this, it’s not going to help.”

“I know that, ass. But you haven’t eaten in days and…” because he’d never accept her real reasons, “you’re slowing me down.”

“We’re in the middle of this city living like moles because you couldn’t go through with a simple order, got an entire organization to target us, and you’re complaining because I’m being cautious enough to stay under the radar?”

“You’re complaining because I’m doing what you taught me to do?” She shoots back. “Please, man. You knew as well as I did that there was something wrong with that whole assignment, so don’t throw it off on me because you ended up in the wrong.”

There. His weakness. He stands up and for all the world, lit up by street lights and passing tour buses, looks like this was the man he was always meant to be, wounded pride and all. “I took you in because you wanted out. You stayed with me—you learned from me—because you ‘found’ your calling. No one’s in need of your assistance here anymore, so go; wasn’t there always that special life you said you’d make once we were through? Can’t you go back to that?”

A small part of her is breaking, crumbling underneath her too-big boots. She’s used to this now. “Fine. Only if you tell me you’ll be okay and at least try not to get us both killed, that you’ll eat something and stop getting shot at in front of little kids. If you can promise me they won’t find you within the next year I’ll go. Then and only then.”

“You’re overreacting.”

For--

This isn’t fair. He never listens. She never listens.

One Week Ago—

This isn’t goodbye.

“Yes the hell it is!” She screams! “I could have taken that shot any time but you blew the plan and I was still covering for you and those god damn civilians. It’s your fault and you know it, Mr. Action Is Everything Guy!”

Over the phone, this is only a little less infuriating than it would normally be. “I called…I wanted to let you know this is it. You’re safe right? You’re all set to cut it off?”

A string of curses. “Yeah, I’m fine. I’ve settled somewhere you should never find me.”

“I never want to see you again.” He never pleads, but this is as close to it as he can manage.

“Can we go back to how this is all your fault to begin with?”

“No. Promise me you’re done.” He stops, because that sounds too much like an order and he knows she’ll rebuff on reflex. “You’re clearly not made for this.”

“I could have stopped that entire ring without breaking so much as a god damn cuss word if you hadn’t insisted on going all commando on them. They’re men, not robots; you…”over the line, her voice softens a bit, as if she were giving advice, “need to remember that. Promise me you won’t do anything rash. I don’t want to see you go near them again, got it?”

“You won’t because you won’t be there!”

She holds her stubborn silence.

He doesn’t like how she hadn’t promised him anything. “Just like I don’t want to come into contact with you –for your own safety—I don’t want to find you going behind my back on this case—it’s for your safety. Stay away from the boss.”

“Oh, please.” She laughs. “Why on earth would you think I’m a threat to you and your precious quota? I count streets not body bags.”

“If you were ‘hero’ material, you would have done something back then when we had the Boss in our grasp; you’d have helped out instead of overreacting.”

Instead of blowing up, she hangs up.

Sure--

It makes too much sense. Whether or not she’s playing for the other team, she still knows too much, too much of everything; if this is an act, she’ll play it for all it’s worth, to the last bow, for the last curtain call, something that’s always worried him. How she managed to make it to the top this fast should not be his top concern right now. He forgets his weapon and that’s his downfall; there is a blankness behind her eyes, her stare, that tell everyone in the room it’s just another extreme--she smirks when he asks her what she’s doing, what the hell she’s doing with them, her answer: Overreacting.

--

AN: Too much adrenaline and not enough recipes to bake this cookie with. NO fandom or background whatsoever. Just some vague little plot and a few tries at continuity that might or might not have worked; somehow the style seems to have stayed the same as most of all the stories I write these days, but this time there’s a reason. The only type of romance I’m capable of is the fugitive kind. Domino might have had been some kind of influence, but I'm not sure.