Somewhere between Dallas and Ft. Worth, October 2001:
Early morning in Texas, October in the air and biting. Weekending suburbanites cook breakfast, read newspapers, watch morning shows on television and sleep in. A scant few admire the lingering remnants of yet another stunning sunrise. Even fewer go for morning jogs, runs, power walks, or whatever the latest craze may be. The lone occupant of the fourth house on the less crowded half of the block would ordinarily be one of those running health nuts. She's opted to stay in this morning.
Michelle Sattler rarely needs more than two hours of sleep a night, but every now and then her nocturnal habits catch up to her. Yesterday was one of those days; she slept 27 hours almost straight, staggering out of her old bedroom just once, because she'd had a bad dream and wanted her Aunt Sarah to comfort her. Halfway down the hall, surrounded by framed photographs of her younger years and her dead father, Michelle had remembered that her aunt was dead now, too. Empty of any more tears, she had turned around and gone back to sleep.
Now she is wide awake, well rested and fully coherent. She wanders down the stairs in a man's dress shirt and white cotton socks, a toothbrush in her mouth while she rakes shower wet hair back from her face. She manages to turn on the computer she bought for her aunt the year before and switch the television to CNN as she makes her way to the kitchen, weaving through tasteful furniture that has never quite suited her own tastes. For a moment Michelle stares at the empty coffee machine, as though willing it to life. When nothing happens, she scowls at it and goes about rinsing toothpaste from her mouth at the kitchen sink. Perhaps not fully awake, then.
Leaving her toothbrush on the counter, Michelle grabs a box of cereal that could rightfully call itself healthy were it not coated in sugar, and yawns in such a manner as to resemble a big cat. She takes the similarity a step further when she arches her back, seeming to contort more than stretch. When she hears a series of pops, she seems satisfied, and seats herself at the computer desk, opening an Internet connection and digging through the cereal box. She likes it except for the dehydrated marshmallows, and does her best to avoid them as she watches the computer monitor with sharp, pale green eyes. Michelle is a beautiful woman when she's relaxed like this, but she'll never believe it. For the most part, her looks mean little to her, or so she likes to think, and that is that.
Getting to her e-mail account -- one of many -- takes only a minute, but her attention span wanders nevertheless, settling on the television across the room. She alternates between computer and TV, but the latter seems to continually win out. Or at least until she comes across one of the more recent letters inside her inbox. The handle Land Shark causes Michelle to rivet an unblinking gaze on the computer, and the letter from said carnivore seems to rouse her like nothing else has this morning.
She reads it several times, although it's unnecessary. Michelle has a memory like a steel trap, unless she deliberately wants to forget something.
Tapestry,
the letter reads.
I was unable to contact you at home or on the road. Since when do you leave your cell off? If anything's wrong, luv, give me a ring. You know which line to use. I've got a job offer for you from the King himself, and I think you might be interested in it.
R.
Michelle smiles without appearing to notice, but it's hardly the kind of smile that people would respond to. No flash of teeth, no laugh lines. It's a humorless smile, one that's still strangely pleased. And though a normal one would be preferable, it looks strangely at home on her.
The letter is quickly deleted since there is no further need of it, and while Michelle continues to breakfast on sugar-coated wheat, she grabs for the handset of her late aunt's telephone. There are two phone lines in this house; Sarah Sattler, while aging, was always a woman to keep up with the times, and she latched onto the Internet with an ease people half her age would be quick to envy.
From that steel trap memory of Michelle's, she dials a long series of number. It's an international call, and as the phone takes its time in ringing, Michelle watches a report on the stock market. The man she's calling, the man who e-mailed her in the first place, is rightfully paranoid, and when he doesn't recognize the number that pops up on his caller I.D., he lets the machine and its pre-recorded message take it.
"Ritchie, it's Tapestry. I'm visiting some old ghosts, which is why you couldn't get me."
Nothing.
"Pick up before I get bored with talking to your answering machine, Ritchie."
Still nothing, and Michelle rolls her eyes.
"Did I mention that I'm only wearing a pair of socks?"
"H-h-hullo, l-luv."
Much better. Even Ritchie's intense stuttering combined with that thick Dublin accent of his is preferable to silence. Michelle smirks and slides the office chair she's sitting in back, propping her feet up on the computer desk and crossing her legs at the ankles.
"Hi, Ritchie. Do you fall for that every time?"
"N-no. Only wh-when it-it's y-y-y-y--"
"Me?"
"Aye."
Neither one of them knows of any Irishmen that use "aye" in conversation anymore, but in Ritchie's case it's easier for him than "yes." It seems a shock that he would use the telephone at all in this age of information highways. Ritchie tends to think the same way -- he's a modern day Don Juan in e-mail, but his conversations with Michelle always seem to go better when they're on the phone. She has, he knows, little patience for computers and emoticons.
"So what does big, bad Shinobi Shaw want?" Michelle asks. Ritchie picks up on her excitement; she hates Shaw, finds him a loathsome little worm, but he always pays well, and for the adrenaline junkie like Michelle, his jobs -- as dangerous as they come -- are just as worthwhile as his checks.
"H-he w-wouldn't g-give m-me any s-s-s-s--"
"Specifics?"
"Aye. J-just t-th-that it involves th-the H-H-Hellf-fire--"
"Hellfire Club."
"Aye. And th-the R-R-Russian m-mafia and th-the Y-Y-Y-Y--"
Michelle thinks for a moment. She has abandoned the cereal to chew on her thumbnail, and her interest in the television has waned. "Yakuza?"
"Aye."
"Shit."
"Aye," says Ritchie, amused.
"That's seriously heavy."
"Aye."
"Will you stop that?"
"Aye," Ritchie says again, and it's no task at all to hear the smile in his voice. Michelle rolls her eyes another time, but she's smiling, and now it's a normal smile.
"Did he say what kind of job it was? Wet job, heist, whatever?"
"P-pinch, although I th-think it m-m-might b-be s-s-s-s--" Ritchie gives up on whatever s-word he might be trying to use this time: "something." "--another th-thing, t-t-too."
"Such as?" Michelle asks. Her patience with this man is infinite, it seems. Anyone else would have given up on making sense of what Ritchie has to say long ago. Tired of CNN, Michelle spies the remote control across the room. She doesn't contemplate getting up, but stops chewing on her thumbnail and makes a little come hither gesture. The remote raises up into the air and flies its merry way into her open hand. On CNN's current broadcast, yet another commentator is discussing the mutant threat. Michelle switches to the Sci-Fi channel.
"H-he s-s-s-s--" Somewhere in Belfast, Ritchie growls in frustration. He isn't going to let this word beat him, goddammit. "--s-s-s-sounded angry."
Michelle smiles privately, pleased at her friend's success. "So he wants me to steal something from two of the most powerful pieces of the organized crime puzzle?"
"Aye," Ritchie interrupts, rather pleased himself. It's a minute triumph, but a triumph nevertheless.
"--but hasn't said what?"
"Aye."
"And you think there's something else at work here, too? A wet job, maybe?"
"Aye."
"How much is he offering?"
Ritchie grins. This is going to be the best part.
"A b-blank ch-ch-check."
Silence rides over the phone lines while Michelle takes what she just heard in. She has, of course, quite a nest egg stashed away thanks to a good number of years taking jobs as a mercenary, but after her aunt's death three weeks ago, she divided it up and sent a large chunk of it off to various charities in Sarah Sattler's name. Plus, money is money. A blank check could take her far. Far enough to screw Shinobi Shaw over.
"Tell him," Michelle says after several minutes of silence, speaking slowly. "Tell him that I need more details, or it's no deal, and he can see how well Deadpool will do a job for him."
Ritchie lets out a bark of laughter. "Aye. Anyth-thing e-else?"
"Not really, unless you've got more news for me."
"N-n-no. B-but..?"
"But what, Ritchie?"
"Off th-the r-r-record?"
"Yeah?"
"Are y-y-y-y--?" Another growl of frustration. "G-going t-to t-take th-this?"
"Aye," Michelle says, the less disturbing of the two smiles back on her face. "Off the record, me foine bucko," she warns, and though her passable Irish accent is teasing Ritchie with bad slang, there's steel underneath it. Shaw isn't to know that particular little detail quite yet.
"Aye," Ritchie agrees. They part without good-byes, phone lines clicking once before they're hung up.