That crazy girl was watching at him again.
"Stop that."
She cocked her head to one side.
"You're angry." She said, voice matter-of-fact.
"You're goddam right I am! I don't like people watchin' me work. 'Specially not you."
Blink.
Brown eyes.
Silence.
"Clear off."
"To watch is to learn." She said, slowly. "If I am not to watch, how am I to learn?"
"Figure that out somewhere else." He muttered, and went back to cleaning his gun.
Maybe she'd go away if he ignored her. He reached for a package of cartridges, only to find they had gone.
He looked up to see her still staring at him.
"Give those back!" he demanded angrily, holding out his hand.
She reached into her pocket and pulled them out, but held them out of reach.
"Goddamit, girl."
Brown eyes.
Silence.
"To watch is to learn." She repeated, brown eyes eerily never leaving his face. "But without this, there is nothing to watch." She gestured to the package in her hand. "I have halted function. Stopped clock."
She giggled. The sound unnerved him.
In fact, it really unnerved him.
"Give 'em back." He made a grab for them, but she spun gracefully out of his reach.
"If I give them back to you, you'll let me watch?" she asked, in a singsong voice.
"Like hell I will." He stood up quickly and tried to lunge at her, but she wasn't in front of him anymore.
"You're angry again," said her smug voice from above him. She was sitting on the rack above his table. "Just an object, but you are angered when I take it. Why is this?" She held the package teasingly over his head. "Why do you grow attached to something that will soon be lost?"
"I ain't attached to it! I don't want you stealing my things!"
She blinked at him slowly. "But I didn't steal it." She said calmly.
"What?" He raised an eyebrow, trying to figure out how she had gotten up onto the rack so quickly.
"It's on the table, next to your gun. Look."
He spun to look at the work bench, ready to snort. And saw the cartridges.
"How did you-" he turned back to look at her. The rack was empty.
Shaking his head, he sat back down to work. "Crazy." He muttered, never noticing that his knife was no longer on the table.