Fic post! :)
Title: Stuck In The Middle With You is the best I've got at the moment. It makes a lot of sense, although not yet. :D
Fandom: Marvel comicverse/Once Upon a Time in Mexico crossover
Pairing: Elektra Natchios/Sheldon Jeffrey Sands
Rating: R, although not this chapter.
Author's Notes: I've been switching back and forth between Elektra's POV and Sands' POV from chapter to chapter; now that they're together it's gonna change within the chapters, as it does in this one. You'll know when. (And it's gonna get more exciting soon. :D ) And I completely made up all the CIA-ish details; shockingly, cia.gov isn't very forthcoming, so I to create it. Government buffs will hopefully forgive me. Includes direct references to DD Volume 2, #37, by Brian Michael Bendis.
Word Count: 3,114
chapter one
chapter two
"LAX, Gate 47." Elektra slid gracefully into the backseat of the cab, and the driver screeched away from the curb before she had closed the door fully. She saw him glance uneasily at her in the rearview mirror, and she couldn't blame him – she looked mildly ominous, dressed all in black in 70-degree California weather, with sunglasses and skintight gloves to match. She had spent the entire morning cleaning every surface of her apartment that she had touched; she wasn't about to slip up now and leave fingerprints all over the cab. She only had one bag with her; she never needed much -– a few outfits, all equally as black as what she was wearing now (except for one, of course), a couple of wigs and some makeup, some food (to use the term loosely), an assortment of blades, the cash Hansen had given her the night before, and a small bottle of Drano –- very handy for pouring down drains after washing blood off oneself. She would buy everything else she needed once she got there, as always. She had left her apartment bare, having thrown her toothbrush, towels and sheets in a Dumpster twenty blocks away from her place earlier that morning.
She ran over her list in her mind, the list of points she always reviewed on the way to a new job. There were a handful of questions she normally asked a client upon first meeting; she cursed herself irritably for letting herself be distracted from them the night before because of Hansen's endless chatter. His words came back to her, for the hundredth time that morning -- therefore, you will have an escort -- and her jaw clenched in anger. She couldn't think about it too much, or else she'd be too mad to go through with the job. She placed a hand on her bag, feeling the stacks of crisp bills under the fabric, and tried to remind herself, yet again, of the very large amount of money she would be receiving. And that was what it was all about, wasn't it?
She continued to stare moodily out the window, not even noticing when the cab slowed to a stop. "Yo, lady," the cabbie said, somewhat annoyed, and she was jerked back to the present. She unzipped her bag, careful not to display the contents, and slid two twenty-dollar bills out from under the paper band wrapped around one of the crisp stacks. Without bothering to look at the meter, she dropped them over the front seat and opened the door. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the driver beam, and hastily scoop up the money, presumably not wanting to give her a chance to realize, and called cheerily, "You have a great day, lady!" at her back. She just shook her head, slamming the door.
Pushing open the door of the airport, she stepped immediately into the ticketing terminal, although she had no intention of checking her bag, as everyone ahead of her was doing. She swiftly scanned the various faces behind the counter, playing her usual little game with herself, trying to guess which porter was hers. She was remarkably good at it, and settled after a moment on a young man, the youngest there, from the looks of it, no more than twenty. He was rather boyishly good-looking, and as she watched, he attempted to lift an elderly lady's enormous suitcase onto the moving strip behind him, staggered under its weight, and dropped it with a deafening smack onto the ground. He gave the old woman (who looked frankly pissed) a sheepish smile, and Elektra snickered. Yes, this was definite the one. She waited until he looked back up at the line, and very deliberately caught his eye, dropping her head and shooting him a steely look over her sunglasses. He immediately quailed under her gaze, and scrabbled clumsily on the desk in front of him for a piece of paper. He glanced at it, and then back up at her – good Christ, he had written it down? –- back at the paper, and once more, back at her. She gave him a single, slow nod. He dithered on the spot for a moment, and then, apparently working up his nerve, mumbled something Elektra couldn't hear to another porter standing beside him, and stepped out from behind the desk and walked over to Elektra.
"Um," he greeted her, staring fixedly at her elbow. "Ma'am –- uh, Miss -– uh, would you follow me, please?" His name tag read, "Hello, I'm SAM." Elektra forced herself not to laugh.
"Of course," she replied, her voice sweet and mildly concerned. "Is there a problem, sir?"
"I -– " He didn't appear to know how to answer that one. "Just –- could –- follow me, please," he faltered, and took a step backwards; he appeared to not want to expose her back to her. She followed him across the lobby, through a door, and down a long hallway. He was, she assumed, taking her the long way round, down the employee's corridor. She was entirely accustomed to this, for she had done it virtually every time she needed to take a plane for the purposes of a job. It simply wouldn't do to place her bag on the scanner and have her razor-sharp, twenty-inch steel sai show up on the x-ray. Not to mention all the various issues with her identification. In the beginning of her career she had simply broken into the plane before takeoff and hid underneath on the baggage level, but this proved highly uncomfortable. She eventually decided, anyway, that it was the client's job to clear everything. Rule number three, make sure the client knows what they're responsible for as well as what they were entitled to. It was a business deal, not a favor, after all.
They arrived at a door marked "EXIT," and she knew that when he opened it they would be in the final terminal, well past the bag check and any x-rays. She made to step past him, but he made a strange sound, halfway between clearing his throat and coughing. She looked questioningly at him.
"I –- " he said again. He drew himself up, and attempted to speak again, but failed. Elektra rolled her eyes. This happened occasionally -– they got all noble and tried to stop her. (She had very nearly been stun-gunned once, in Italy.) She figured that Hansen had grabbed him the night before when he flew out to Virginia from this same airport and thoroughly threatened him with all sorts of violence should he not cooperate, as clients usually did, but apparently it hadn't really taken. She gave Sam an exasperated look, and said serenely, "Listen, dear, they really do know where you live. They really will kill you. So just be a good boy and step out of the way, hmm?"
He just continued to stare at her. "You -– "
"What, are you waiting for a tip? Get lost!" she exclaimed, waving a hand. He leapt out the way and back down the hallway, apparently trying very hard not to break into a run, casting looks back over his shoulder at him. Rolling her eyes, she pushed open the door and stepped into the terminal.
She'd been to airports on six continents, but LAX was possibly her favorite. It was big and noisy and had everything you could want –- it was just large enough so that no one stood out. She probably could have strapped her sai into her shoulder holsters and strolled around without a problem. She walked over to a newsstand and bought the thickest magazine there, the spring Allure. She sat down in one of the hard plastic seats and flipped idly through it until she heard her plane announced.
She walked calmly up to the desk, and slid her boarding pass and ticket across to the placidly smiling agent, who glanced at them briefly and said, "Have a lovely flight, Miss Galore." Elektra's mechanical smile didn't falter as she said, "Oh, I'm sure I will." She waited until she had boarded the plane and found her seat before furiously scanning the boarding pass, which she hadn't thought to check before -– Elizabeth Galore. As in 'Kitty,' as in..."Oh, perfect," she muttered under her breath, shaking her head. "Smart-ass." It was the client's job, of course, to provide her with a decent alias for things like boarding passes –- perhaps now she'd start doing it herself.
She massaged her bruised knuckles absently, smirking as she remembered the way Hansen had stumbled backwards, arms flailing comically, when she'd decked him the night before. He'd recovered himself quickly, though, gave her an approving smile as though she'd just performed some skilled geisha's trick, and murmured, "Feisty. I like that." She supposed it was bad form to punch a client in the face, but that crack about Matt had been too much. First of all, it was disturbing that he even knew about that part of her life–-she preferred clients to know absolutely nothing; he would have had to do a fair amount of research to find out about that. The mere thought of Matt, let alone the mention of him, made her want to smash things, anyway, although she'd sooner swallow one of her sai than admit to anyone how often she thought of him these days. She didn't know why, and didn't particularly want to, but she couldn’t seem to let go of him.
She had sources in New York; she knew far more about him than she probably should. She knew about all the women that had followed her –- Karen, Heather, Natasha, Glorianna, Mary....now this new one, Milla. Always need to save someone, don't you. She was still angry with herself about the last time she'd seen him; she'd been on a job, but had dropped everything as soon as she'd gotten the call that Matt wanted to see her. It had been a ridiculous thing to do, trusting a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent like that; it could so easily have been a trap--but she believed he needed her, and off she went. She couldn't help but remember the conversation they'd had, the way he'd opened up to her...and she'd fled, after all that, after all the trouble it took to get there, just because he did need her, and she couldn't face it the honesty of it. And after all this time. She looked down and realized she was gripping the armrests unnecessarily hard, her knuckles white.
The plane taxied and soared into the sky, and a few minutes later the in-flight movie began. As always, it was something stupid, this time something about a mobster and lesbian, and Elektra took out her magazine, glad she had thought of it this time. She'd once been on a nine-hour flight with only Weekend at Bernie's -- the first and second ones –- to entertain her, and it had been torturous. She flipped through a dozen pages before she remembered something, and her curiosity got the better of her. She closed the magazine and reached back into her bag, pulling out the manila folder she'd taken from Hansen the night before, Sands' file. She opened it and found herself looking down at his photo again. She looked at it for a long moment -– he was sort of good-looking, she supposed, in a sarcastic sort of way. His face held an odd combination of intelligence and shadiness that suggested he was good at what he did, but he certainly wasn't to be trusted to do it the way you wanted him to. She half-smiled to herself -– that, she understood.
She flipped past the photo and some preliminary information and found what she was looking for – the records regarding Mexico, his last assignment. "Received information of potential code 481-516," (she certainly knew what that meant –- assassination of a political official. She'd seen it often enough, having been the executer of said code many times) "agent sent to investigate and apprehend/annihilate AIP." (All Involved Perpetrators.) "Agency requested that agent remain on location for long-term investigation." Elektra chuckled softly –- in other words, the bureau didn't want him around, and sent him as far away as they could without arousing suspicion. They wanted to get rid of him –- well, if that psych profile she'd glanced at (page one of six) was at all accurate, she couldn't blame them.
She skimmed over the rest of the page –- "Agent failed to contact HQ at 0600...0700...0800...Potential involvement from OHF, reinforcements sent." Outside Hostile Forces – as if Barillo needs any help, Elektra thought ruefully, rubbing her shoulder with her free hand. Judging from the rest of the page, it looked as though Hansen had been telling the truth –- bodies of known criminals and henchmen of Barillo's had been found near where Sands was, apparently shot with an agency-issue firearm. "Subjects appear to have been deleted by agent post-procedure," the paper continued blandly, which Elektra translated to mean he really had gone out shooting blind. That was, she admitted to herself, fairly impressive -– revenge at all costs. Respectable.
Down at the bottom of the page was something Hansen had neglected to mention in his retelling of the story, though: another agent had been killed. Under "Casualties – Agency-Related" it read, simply, "Agent Eva Ajedrez: AFN." Under "COD" -– "single GSW to abdomen." She flipped the page over –- there should have been a section with notes under it -– but there was nothing. In fact, there was no page at all. Elektra frowned. That was definitely odd. Usually when a government agent was killed, there was a great deal more information surrounding it. Especially an agent working in the Alcohol, Firearms and Narcotics bureau, and stationed in Mexico – that was a special-interest sob story just waiting to be written. Something was off there. She supposed it didn't matter, though -– just another agent she didn't have to worry about.
She closed the file, not expecting to find anything regarding her job and his assistance; Hansen certainly wasn't stupid enough to write it down. Rule number four – never, ever, ever leave any physical documentation of anything. She had a bank account in Switzerland where clients were to send the other two-thirds (or in Hansen's case, half) of her fee, but that was unavoidable; she refused to allow anything to be traced back to her in any other way. For the most part she dealt in cash, which she carried around with her, taking great care to never touch it with her bare hands. She was meticulous to the last degree, and it had always served her well.
She spent the rest of the flight staring out the window moodily and stewing over the fact that she'd let herself be seduced into the job. An escort. She'd never heard anything more offensive in her life. This was kid's stuff. She was quite sure she could get into any buildings she needed to, retinal scan or no retinal scan. She'd worked three separate jobs at the goddamn Taj Mahal and hadn't even awakened the guards outside the marks' rooms. "We need the best," he'd simpered at her. Then why was she being treated like a reject from the Montessori Pre-school for Contract Killers? It was just so...so...disrespectful. She very seriously considered just taking the half she had, staying at the airport and avoiding Hansen, and catching another plane out of there and forgetting about the job. That would show him. But she had never bailed out of a job after taking it, not once, and she knew she couldn't now. She had a reputation to protect. The thought made her exceeding bad-tempered. She fumed across 3,000 miles of land and was surprised when the "fasten seatbelt" sign dinged back on (yeah, right) and the plane slowly descended into Washington, D.C. She checked her watch -- it was just about five PM. Time had a funny habit of slipping away from her like that. She realized, though, that Hansen must want to get this done pretty damn fast; he would have had to get on a plane directly after their meeting and take a red-eye to get back to D.C., and then turn around and pick her up. That was good -- if he wanted to get it over with, he was more likely to not annoy the hell out of her anymore.
The plane landed, and she gathered up her bag and got off. She strolled into the terminal, looking around for Hansen and his buddies. They weren't hard to find – she spotted them twenty yards away; they looked oddly formal in their dark suits, standing out amongst the T-shirt-clad tourists. As she approached, she realized there was a fourth man with them; a few more steps and she realized it was Sands.
She doubted there could have been more than an inch in difference between their heights. He was dressed in a T-shirt and a dress jacket, completing the bizarre juxtaposition between Hansen and the rest of the room. Dark glasses covered his face, and a ski cap was pulled down over his forehead. He held a tattered shopping bag in one hand. Overall, the effect was odd –- it was as if he was doing a very poor job off going incognito.
Elektra came up to the men and stopped. Hansen smirked at her. "Ms. Galore?" he greeted her, as if he didn't know her. She gave him a dangerously sarcastic smile in response. She was surprised he didn't have one of those signs. "Ms. Natchios, Agent Sands," he continued, by way of introduction. "Agent Sands, Ms. Natchios."
Neither of them extended a hand or said anything. They simply stood there, sizing each other up, more or less. She could faintly smell smoke on him. Great. His hand drifted lazily to his mouth, and she saw skull rings here and there on his fingers. And – was he laughing? She looked sharply at him – yes, he was definitely biting his lip, shaking his head slightly. Elektra narrowed his eyes at him. If she had hoped he'd be any less of an asshole than Hansen, it looked as though she was quite wrong. "Terribly nice to meet you," she said nastily. "Always nice to have a sidekick."
"Likewise."
+++
She smells like roses. Jesus. We've hired her to kill a man in cold blood, and she smells like roses. He can't help but laugh. What a woman.
Gotta go back for NYC! :) I'll be back Saturday night, and then I've got the wedding on Sunday, and my dad's b-day on Monday, so I'll be back...eventually.
x-posted eventually
EDIT: (re: what I'm listening to) R/T FOREVER OTP OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOFMGOOKGOKGOGOMO1!11!!!!!O
Title: Stuck In The Middle With You is the best I've got at the moment. It makes a lot of sense, although not yet. :D
Fandom: Marvel comicverse/Once Upon a Time in Mexico crossover
Pairing: Elektra Natchios/Sheldon Jeffrey Sands
Rating: R, although not this chapter.
Author's Notes: I've been switching back and forth between Elektra's POV and Sands' POV from chapter to chapter; now that they're together it's gonna change within the chapters, as it does in this one. You'll know when. (And it's gonna get more exciting soon. :D ) And I completely made up all the CIA-ish details; shockingly, cia.gov isn't very forthcoming, so I to create it. Government buffs will hopefully forgive me. Includes direct references to DD Volume 2, #37, by Brian Michael Bendis.
Word Count: 3,114
chapter one
chapter two
"LAX, Gate 47." Elektra slid gracefully into the backseat of the cab, and the driver screeched away from the curb before she had closed the door fully. She saw him glance uneasily at her in the rearview mirror, and she couldn't blame him – she looked mildly ominous, dressed all in black in 70-degree California weather, with sunglasses and skintight gloves to match. She had spent the entire morning cleaning every surface of her apartment that she had touched; she wasn't about to slip up now and leave fingerprints all over the cab. She only had one bag with her; she never needed much -– a few outfits, all equally as black as what she was wearing now (except for one, of course), a couple of wigs and some makeup, some food (to use the term loosely), an assortment of blades, the cash Hansen had given her the night before, and a small bottle of Drano –- very handy for pouring down drains after washing blood off oneself. She would buy everything else she needed once she got there, as always. She had left her apartment bare, having thrown her toothbrush, towels and sheets in a Dumpster twenty blocks away from her place earlier that morning.
She ran over her list in her mind, the list of points she always reviewed on the way to a new job. There were a handful of questions she normally asked a client upon first meeting; she cursed herself irritably for letting herself be distracted from them the night before because of Hansen's endless chatter. His words came back to her, for the hundredth time that morning -- therefore, you will have an escort -- and her jaw clenched in anger. She couldn't think about it too much, or else she'd be too mad to go through with the job. She placed a hand on her bag, feeling the stacks of crisp bills under the fabric, and tried to remind herself, yet again, of the very large amount of money she would be receiving. And that was what it was all about, wasn't it?
She continued to stare moodily out the window, not even noticing when the cab slowed to a stop. "Yo, lady," the cabbie said, somewhat annoyed, and she was jerked back to the present. She unzipped her bag, careful not to display the contents, and slid two twenty-dollar bills out from under the paper band wrapped around one of the crisp stacks. Without bothering to look at the meter, she dropped them over the front seat and opened the door. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the driver beam, and hastily scoop up the money, presumably not wanting to give her a chance to realize, and called cheerily, "You have a great day, lady!" at her back. She just shook her head, slamming the door.
Pushing open the door of the airport, she stepped immediately into the ticketing terminal, although she had no intention of checking her bag, as everyone ahead of her was doing. She swiftly scanned the various faces behind the counter, playing her usual little game with herself, trying to guess which porter was hers. She was remarkably good at it, and settled after a moment on a young man, the youngest there, from the looks of it, no more than twenty. He was rather boyishly good-looking, and as she watched, he attempted to lift an elderly lady's enormous suitcase onto the moving strip behind him, staggered under its weight, and dropped it with a deafening smack onto the ground. He gave the old woman (who looked frankly pissed) a sheepish smile, and Elektra snickered. Yes, this was definite the one. She waited until he looked back up at the line, and very deliberately caught his eye, dropping her head and shooting him a steely look over her sunglasses. He immediately quailed under her gaze, and scrabbled clumsily on the desk in front of him for a piece of paper. He glanced at it, and then back up at her – good Christ, he had written it down? –- back at the paper, and once more, back at her. She gave him a single, slow nod. He dithered on the spot for a moment, and then, apparently working up his nerve, mumbled something Elektra couldn't hear to another porter standing beside him, and stepped out from behind the desk and walked over to Elektra.
"Um," he greeted her, staring fixedly at her elbow. "Ma'am –- uh, Miss -– uh, would you follow me, please?" His name tag read, "Hello, I'm SAM." Elektra forced herself not to laugh.
"Of course," she replied, her voice sweet and mildly concerned. "Is there a problem, sir?"
"I -– " He didn't appear to know how to answer that one. "Just –- could –- follow me, please," he faltered, and took a step backwards; he appeared to not want to expose her back to her. She followed him across the lobby, through a door, and down a long hallway. He was, she assumed, taking her the long way round, down the employee's corridor. She was entirely accustomed to this, for she had done it virtually every time she needed to take a plane for the purposes of a job. It simply wouldn't do to place her bag on the scanner and have her razor-sharp, twenty-inch steel sai show up on the x-ray. Not to mention all the various issues with her identification. In the beginning of her career she had simply broken into the plane before takeoff and hid underneath on the baggage level, but this proved highly uncomfortable. She eventually decided, anyway, that it was the client's job to clear everything. Rule number three, make sure the client knows what they're responsible for as well as what they were entitled to. It was a business deal, not a favor, after all.
They arrived at a door marked "EXIT," and she knew that when he opened it they would be in the final terminal, well past the bag check and any x-rays. She made to step past him, but he made a strange sound, halfway between clearing his throat and coughing. She looked questioningly at him.
"I –- " he said again. He drew himself up, and attempted to speak again, but failed. Elektra rolled her eyes. This happened occasionally -– they got all noble and tried to stop her. (She had very nearly been stun-gunned once, in Italy.) She figured that Hansen had grabbed him the night before when he flew out to Virginia from this same airport and thoroughly threatened him with all sorts of violence should he not cooperate, as clients usually did, but apparently it hadn't really taken. She gave Sam an exasperated look, and said serenely, "Listen, dear, they really do know where you live. They really will kill you. So just be a good boy and step out of the way, hmm?"
He just continued to stare at her. "You -– "
"What, are you waiting for a tip? Get lost!" she exclaimed, waving a hand. He leapt out the way and back down the hallway, apparently trying very hard not to break into a run, casting looks back over his shoulder at him. Rolling her eyes, she pushed open the door and stepped into the terminal.
She'd been to airports on six continents, but LAX was possibly her favorite. It was big and noisy and had everything you could want –- it was just large enough so that no one stood out. She probably could have strapped her sai into her shoulder holsters and strolled around without a problem. She walked over to a newsstand and bought the thickest magazine there, the spring Allure. She sat down in one of the hard plastic seats and flipped idly through it until she heard her plane announced.
She walked calmly up to the desk, and slid her boarding pass and ticket across to the placidly smiling agent, who glanced at them briefly and said, "Have a lovely flight, Miss Galore." Elektra's mechanical smile didn't falter as she said, "Oh, I'm sure I will." She waited until she had boarded the plane and found her seat before furiously scanning the boarding pass, which she hadn't thought to check before -– Elizabeth Galore. As in 'Kitty,' as in..."Oh, perfect," she muttered under her breath, shaking her head. "Smart-ass." It was the client's job, of course, to provide her with a decent alias for things like boarding passes –- perhaps now she'd start doing it herself.
She massaged her bruised knuckles absently, smirking as she remembered the way Hansen had stumbled backwards, arms flailing comically, when she'd decked him the night before. He'd recovered himself quickly, though, gave her an approving smile as though she'd just performed some skilled geisha's trick, and murmured, "Feisty. I like that." She supposed it was bad form to punch a client in the face, but that crack about Matt had been too much. First of all, it was disturbing that he even knew about that part of her life–-she preferred clients to know absolutely nothing; he would have had to do a fair amount of research to find out about that. The mere thought of Matt, let alone the mention of him, made her want to smash things, anyway, although she'd sooner swallow one of her sai than admit to anyone how often she thought of him these days. She didn't know why, and didn't particularly want to, but she couldn’t seem to let go of him.
She had sources in New York; she knew far more about him than she probably should. She knew about all the women that had followed her –- Karen, Heather, Natasha, Glorianna, Mary....now this new one, Milla. Always need to save someone, don't you. She was still angry with herself about the last time she'd seen him; she'd been on a job, but had dropped everything as soon as she'd gotten the call that Matt wanted to see her. It had been a ridiculous thing to do, trusting a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent like that; it could so easily have been a trap--but she believed he needed her, and off she went. She couldn't help but remember the conversation they'd had, the way he'd opened up to her...and she'd fled, after all that, after all the trouble it took to get there, just because he did need her, and she couldn't face it the honesty of it. And after all this time. She looked down and realized she was gripping the armrests unnecessarily hard, her knuckles white.
The plane taxied and soared into the sky, and a few minutes later the in-flight movie began. As always, it was something stupid, this time something about a mobster and lesbian, and Elektra took out her magazine, glad she had thought of it this time. She'd once been on a nine-hour flight with only Weekend at Bernie's -- the first and second ones –- to entertain her, and it had been torturous. She flipped through a dozen pages before she remembered something, and her curiosity got the better of her. She closed the magazine and reached back into her bag, pulling out the manila folder she'd taken from Hansen the night before, Sands' file. She opened it and found herself looking down at his photo again. She looked at it for a long moment -– he was sort of good-looking, she supposed, in a sarcastic sort of way. His face held an odd combination of intelligence and shadiness that suggested he was good at what he did, but he certainly wasn't to be trusted to do it the way you wanted him to. She half-smiled to herself -– that, she understood.
She flipped past the photo and some preliminary information and found what she was looking for – the records regarding Mexico, his last assignment. "Received information of potential code 481-516," (she certainly knew what that meant –- assassination of a political official. She'd seen it often enough, having been the executer of said code many times) "agent sent to investigate and apprehend/annihilate AIP." (All Involved Perpetrators.) "Agency requested that agent remain on location for long-term investigation." Elektra chuckled softly –- in other words, the bureau didn't want him around, and sent him as far away as they could without arousing suspicion. They wanted to get rid of him –- well, if that psych profile she'd glanced at (page one of six) was at all accurate, she couldn't blame them.
She skimmed over the rest of the page –- "Agent failed to contact HQ at 0600...0700...0800...Potential involvement from OHF, reinforcements sent." Outside Hostile Forces – as if Barillo needs any help, Elektra thought ruefully, rubbing her shoulder with her free hand. Judging from the rest of the page, it looked as though Hansen had been telling the truth –- bodies of known criminals and henchmen of Barillo's had been found near where Sands was, apparently shot with an agency-issue firearm. "Subjects appear to have been deleted by agent post-procedure," the paper continued blandly, which Elektra translated to mean he really had gone out shooting blind. That was, she admitted to herself, fairly impressive -– revenge at all costs. Respectable.
Down at the bottom of the page was something Hansen had neglected to mention in his retelling of the story, though: another agent had been killed. Under "Casualties – Agency-Related" it read, simply, "Agent Eva Ajedrez: AFN." Under "COD" -– "single GSW to abdomen." She flipped the page over –- there should have been a section with notes under it -– but there was nothing. In fact, there was no page at all. Elektra frowned. That was definitely odd. Usually when a government agent was killed, there was a great deal more information surrounding it. Especially an agent working in the Alcohol, Firearms and Narcotics bureau, and stationed in Mexico – that was a special-interest sob story just waiting to be written. Something was off there. She supposed it didn't matter, though -– just another agent she didn't have to worry about.
She closed the file, not expecting to find anything regarding her job and his assistance; Hansen certainly wasn't stupid enough to write it down. Rule number four – never, ever, ever leave any physical documentation of anything. She had a bank account in Switzerland where clients were to send the other two-thirds (or in Hansen's case, half) of her fee, but that was unavoidable; she refused to allow anything to be traced back to her in any other way. For the most part she dealt in cash, which she carried around with her, taking great care to never touch it with her bare hands. She was meticulous to the last degree, and it had always served her well.
She spent the rest of the flight staring out the window moodily and stewing over the fact that she'd let herself be seduced into the job. An escort. She'd never heard anything more offensive in her life. This was kid's stuff. She was quite sure she could get into any buildings she needed to, retinal scan or no retinal scan. She'd worked three separate jobs at the goddamn Taj Mahal and hadn't even awakened the guards outside the marks' rooms. "We need the best," he'd simpered at her. Then why was she being treated like a reject from the Montessori Pre-school for Contract Killers? It was just so...so...disrespectful. She very seriously considered just taking the half she had, staying at the airport and avoiding Hansen, and catching another plane out of there and forgetting about the job. That would show him. But she had never bailed out of a job after taking it, not once, and she knew she couldn't now. She had a reputation to protect. The thought made her exceeding bad-tempered. She fumed across 3,000 miles of land and was surprised when the "fasten seatbelt" sign dinged back on (yeah, right) and the plane slowly descended into Washington, D.C. She checked her watch -- it was just about five PM. Time had a funny habit of slipping away from her like that. She realized, though, that Hansen must want to get this done pretty damn fast; he would have had to get on a plane directly after their meeting and take a red-eye to get back to D.C., and then turn around and pick her up. That was good -- if he wanted to get it over with, he was more likely to not annoy the hell out of her anymore.
The plane landed, and she gathered up her bag and got off. She strolled into the terminal, looking around for Hansen and his buddies. They weren't hard to find – she spotted them twenty yards away; they looked oddly formal in their dark suits, standing out amongst the T-shirt-clad tourists. As she approached, she realized there was a fourth man with them; a few more steps and she realized it was Sands.
She doubted there could have been more than an inch in difference between their heights. He was dressed in a T-shirt and a dress jacket, completing the bizarre juxtaposition between Hansen and the rest of the room. Dark glasses covered his face, and a ski cap was pulled down over his forehead. He held a tattered shopping bag in one hand. Overall, the effect was odd –- it was as if he was doing a very poor job off going incognito.
Elektra came up to the men and stopped. Hansen smirked at her. "Ms. Galore?" he greeted her, as if he didn't know her. She gave him a dangerously sarcastic smile in response. She was surprised he didn't have one of those signs. "Ms. Natchios, Agent Sands," he continued, by way of introduction. "Agent Sands, Ms. Natchios."
Neither of them extended a hand or said anything. They simply stood there, sizing each other up, more or less. She could faintly smell smoke on him. Great. His hand drifted lazily to his mouth, and she saw skull rings here and there on his fingers. And – was he laughing? She looked sharply at him – yes, he was definitely biting his lip, shaking his head slightly. Elektra narrowed his eyes at him. If she had hoped he'd be any less of an asshole than Hansen, it looked as though she was quite wrong. "Terribly nice to meet you," she said nastily. "Always nice to have a sidekick."
"Likewise."
+++
She smells like roses. Jesus. We've hired her to kill a man in cold blood, and she smells like roses. He can't help but laugh. What a woman.
Gotta go back for NYC! :) I'll be back Saturday night, and then I've got the wedding on Sunday, and my dad's b-day on Monday, so I'll be back...eventually.
x-posted eventually
EDIT: (re: what I'm listening to) R/T FOREVER OTP OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOFMGOOKGOKGOGOMO1!11!!!!!O
mood: 
creative
creativemusic: HBP - "The Phoenix Lament"
12 don't do sadness | whisper some silver reply
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