She scoffed when they approached her with the mission. She chuckled and scoffed when they said everyone else failed. She ignored them when they told her to be wary of her target. She was in this for the money, and the bragging rights over everyone else who had failed.
Katarina was on top of a guard tower overseeing the small village of Amity where her target was located, the sentries posted there knocked out cold due to some sleeping gas she used on them. Some big wigs from a renowned agency offered her a hefty reward if she could eliminate an individual who had been a thorn in their sides for quite a while. When they told her about her target she laughed at them when they said this one individual he had been their main concern for the past five years and he was barely twenty one now, a few years her junior. Well until she made sure he never reached another birthday.
Her target was a young man named Daniel Fenton. From what she had been told by the men at the G.I.W. Agency, her employers, he was a pretty regular guy. He went to work as a baker, had a few amicable friends, no family to speak of, and he was a pretty straight and narrow guy. Yet he somehow always managed to sneak into their facilities and retrieve top secret hush-hush company secrets of the illegal variety. He has managed to slander their name a bit, but their under the table dealings with those in government and news coverage positions had made it possible for them to still be in business.
Recently he managed to get in the HQ of their operations and steal some of the worst company secrets and illegal project plans from them. Katarina had been told she wasn't on the need to know side of what he took, just the side that ensured he wasn't able to bring it to the light of day. She wondered how good this guy was if they had to hire her, after about ten others that failed. Honestly, it hurt a bit she wasn't their first, second, third, or fourth choice. Contrary to what they believed it seemed like the guy was far from average.
She jumped from the tower, landing on a nearby rooftop with little more than a thud to indicate her landing. She blew out that stray bang that always found its way in front of her right eye. She thought of cutting it, but she really found no reason, plus she was fond of twirling it in between her fingers in her free time. She raced over the rooftops at a steady pace while staying fleet footed, barely letting any dust fall from the ceilings of the inside of the abodes. Her target was near the center of the town living above the bakery he worked at.
She stopped on a three story building, directly across from the bakery in the shadow of the roof top access doorway. She looked down at street level to see the bakery light was off, but in a window situated above the bakery a light flickered on in the room, allowing for a fish bowl effect to help provide cover for Katarina. She looked through the open window to find it held just about the basic essentials a person would need and an occupant.
Her eyes zeroed in on her target: Daniel Fenton. He was sitting at the desk writing down in a journal with intense concentration on his face. Katarina was a little curious as to what was in there, but for now the mark came first. After a while Danny put his pen down, closed the journal, and got up. Katarina figured he'd turn off the light, but what he did was strip down all the way to his boxer briefs. She was used to seeing near naked men from fights, some humiliated for wandering hands, a few times to lull her marks into a defenseless state, but the innocence he seemed to have as he stretched the upper torso muscles he had from kneading dough made her turn away for a second in a slightly flustered state.
'Never let passion interfere with duty.' She repeated her mantra as she turned back.
Danny wasn't in view from her vantage point anymore, but the light flicked off so she assumed he was going to bed. She would wait for him to fall asleep and pull off a sandman kill. Less noise, less chance of being noticed. She waited for nearly an hour before she emerged out of the shadow of the brick wall and effortlessly jumped from the roof, across the street, to the still open window a floor below.
'Careless idiot. He knows he's targeted right? Well he's managed to stay alive this long, so I shouldn't underestimate him.' She cautioned herself. She scanned the room to see Daniel under his covers and smirked.
She leaned forward a bit in the window sill only for it to creak under the shift in weight. She winced and waited for any sound to indicate she was detected. Danny kept snoring the whole time, a kind of soft snore despite his stature. Katarina let out a silent breath, chastised herself, and jumped silent as a cat and landed on the floor. No creak this time. She withdrew her blade as she approached his bed. She covered his mouth firmly and slit his throat. Danny's eyes popped open suddenly, but fluttered closed right away when she plunged the blade through his heart.
She took her hand off his mouth and wiped the blade on his sheets, to get rid of the oxidized blood. Satisfied with her work she moved on to her secondary objective of finding the stolen files. She surveyed the simple room wondering just where a baker/master thief would hide top secret documents. Her eyes drifted until they landed on the journal he was writing in, alight in the invading moonlight. She strode over to the journal and opened the notebook, most of the entries mundane everyday things, a few notes on how to improve his bread here and there, and a few personal thoughts. She got to the last page he was writing in before she killed him and there were only scribbles surrounding a few words.
~~~~~~~~ Gonna~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~Have to try harder~~~~~~~
~~~~Than that beautiful.~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~xoxo Danny~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~P.S. Wanna go out?~~~~~~
Katarina dropped the journal and whipped around, simultaneously drawing both blades this time. Danny was still lying motionless in his bed. Was it just him trying to mess with her after death? She went to lean over Danny and inspected him for any sign of life, but didn't find any. She lightly chuckled at the guys sense of humor, writing her a message right before-
Wait...
He saw her. He knew she was there. Yet he just lied down and went to sleep knowing she was there to kill him. Suddenly everything felt off with the whole situation, alarms going off in her head. When she looked back at him she didn't see nothing. She unconsciously tilted her blades and one caught the moonlight to reflect off of it, catching her attention. That's when she saw it. The light casted by the blade she used to end him highlighted the section of his blanket she used to clean it with. It wasn't blood red, it had a greenish hue, and it was dissolving away.
She had a mini freak out before looking back at Danny. Only to see him melt away in a pile of green goo, clothes and all, before dissipating. The little freak out she had came back with a vengeance as she started scanning the room for him. Humans, Yordles... whatever else, nothing did that that she knew of.
Not even Zac, he usually stayed dead for a while on the Fields of Justice like everyone else before respawning.
"Your expression is funny and pretty cute when your scared. Liked my decoy there?"
Katarina's skin crawled, she jumped away from the bed so her back was to the window. She peered around the room certain the voice came from the chair that sat alone in the corner, yet nobody was there.
"Where are you?" She called out.
"Sorry didn't mean to frighten you, but for the reactions I got from you I'm kinda glad I did. It's all really cute."
Now she was sure the flirting voice was coming from the chair in the corner. A camera and microphone maybe? She walked over to the chair to find the devices, picking the chair up and turning it on end before setting it back down.
No luck.
She stared down at the seat wondering what was going on.
"Hey my eyes are up here perv."
Katarina looked up to see a pair of floating neon green eyes looking back at her. She let out an uncharacteristically girlish yelp and hurled two throwing knives at them. Of course she initially thought they would hit her target with her uncanny accuracy. Well they did hit their mark, and then harmlessly passed through them to safely embed themselves in the wall behind them.
"Well that was dangerous." The voice sarcastically commented. "I could have gotten hurt ya know? *snort* Yeah right huh?" He joked, laughing a bit to himself.
Katarina held up her blade at the male eyes, even when she had a good bet it was ineffective. It was mostly as comfort, like a security blanket.
"Who... What are you?" She demanded in her coldest voice she had.
"Ooh, shivers. So cold." The voice joked. The two knives in the wall wiggled before they came out and floated in midair. "I believe these are yours, please aim away from people next time." He said as they floated closer to her.
'This guy isn't even taking me seriously!' Katarina thought pissed off quite a bit. She snatched the knives away from the air and put them back in their sheathes while keeping her blade level with the shining eyes.
"And as for who I am, I believe your my newest assassin. I gotta say, your much better looking than the last few that GIW sent. So you got a name?" The floating eyes, now revealed to be Daniel Fenton, conversed.
"You're Daniel Fenton?" Katarina asked confused but with realization in her eyes. "Well this may explain how you were able to slip in and out unnoticed. You seem pretty relaxed about all this too"
"Mmm, partially yes. Your not exactly the first one to try and take me out this month. You learn to take it in stride, especially when you know they can't touch you."
"How is it they didn't have this in your file?" Katarina wondered out loud a bit sourly.
"They have a file on me? That's pretty cool! Super spy status." Danny said not exactly feeling the gravity of the statement, putting his hands together like a gun even though she couldn't see. "And to answer that other question, nobody knows. Not even those other assassins. Surprisingly those GIW bastards let them be, to the best of my knowledge at least. Might be a different story if they paid upfront."
Katarina quirked an eyebrow at that, "And why don't they? Assuming they are still alive from the way you refer to them."
It was at this point that Danny became visible, if see through as well, a full grin on his face. "Simple," he said as his hand glowed and he raised it to her head. "Memory wipe."
Katarina usually is never caught off guard, what with her training and all, but against an invisible opponent pretty much everything is up in the air. She reacted a bit too late to evade the blinding light he unleashed, making her close her eyes and stumble back a bit until the back of her knees hit the window sill. All of a sudden Katarina felt her world flip as she became weightless, she knew she was falling, but she was still a bit to dazed to try and land safely. She accepted this would hurt a bit, probably dislocate her shoulder or something when she landed, but she found herself landing in something hard, but also soft. When her vision cleared she was looking into the twinkling and concerned eyes of Danny as he had caught her in midair. He was slowly floating them back up into his bedroom.
"Hey you alright there? I didn't expect you to fall out the window like that. Good thing I got to you in time before something bad happened." Danny asked and stated full of concern.
Katarina was genuinely touched. "Yeah I'm FINE!" She yelled the last word as she pinned her dagger in Danny's chest while he had his hands full. 'Oh well such a nice guy couldn't last in this world forever. Shame.'
"You know I never did get your name. What is it? Amber? Willow? Koran? Ella?" Danny listed off as he tried to guess her name.
Katarina gave him a puzzled look as she kept looking between him and the blade. He didn't even flinch, or show any signs of discomfort or death. She twisted it in him, but again something was off. He was still talking, not showing any signs of agony. It felt like she was stirring batter. She wasn't hitting any bone even though she pierced his ribcage. The blade jest seemed to be in water because there was no trace of it being turned at all. The initial point of entry was perfectly fine.
"Libby? Delilah? Happy? June? Katie?" Danny continued.
"What?" She responded to the shortened modified version of her name.
"What? It's Katie? Well ok then." Danny beamed having figured it out. "Well Katie even though I saved you from a nasty fall, you kinda stabbed me in the back... well front. So... sorry about this. Maybe we could go on that date sometime. If you ever come around here, not trying to kill me." Danny said as he took his hand out from under her legs and pressed it against her forehead enveloping it in light.
It felt weird for a second, having your mind entered and your memory wiped, then it hurt like a small fire was ignited in your brain as the neurons holding the memories were burned away, then it cooled down to a relaxing feeling as you drifted into unconsciousness.
Danny's frown broke into a small smile as Katarina's twisted face of agony fell and she calmed at his cooling ice touch. She started breathing in shallow breaths signifying that she had passed out. Usually he just let them pass out from the pain, but he didn't have the heart to do it to her. Even if she did try to gouge his out. He laid her down on his bed and took a good look at her for once. She had quite an amazing figure, a lithe frame clad in black leather. She had some generous looking 'assets' that he did his utmost best at not to look at, but a few glances were thrown their way. She had really nice long legs that he wished were wrapped around him, but not if she were trying to kill him again.
She groaned and her face bunched up like she was having a bad dream. Danny moved Katarina's favorite falling piece of hair as he stroked her face and cupped her cheek. She seemed to calm at his touch and she actually nuzzled into his hand. Danny smiled as he stared at her studying the features of her face; the thin eyebrows that have her a serious look, her dark pink lips, the proud chin capping her smooth face. Her eyes slightly fluttered, those emerald eyes that stared at him with such indifference, fear, and gratefulness. Her flawless portrait marred by a single scar ever her left eye, but Danny thought it to be quite sexy. After his observation he pulled the blanket that layed at the edge of the bed and pulled it over his sleeping guest.
"Goodnight Katie." He softly whispered.
He took a seat back in the comfy chair he was waiting in and pulled a spare blanket over him and fell asleep in the chair, dreaming about a redhead.
