Maka grumbled as she sat in her car, drumming her fingers on the steering wheel. Uptown Sydney traffic was hell on a Monday morning. Her mood was not helped by her dull headache—the result of a weird dream that made her lurch awake, fall out of bed, and knock her head on her bedside table—or the monotone voice of the news reader coming out of her car's radio.
Eventually she switched it off, preferring the silence, or at least the relative silence of the running car surrounds by hundreds of other running cars.
She moved forward to a traffic light just as it turned red, and sighed deeply. Typical.
As she waited for the lights to change again, she glanced over to her passenger seat. Stacked on it were the paperwork files she had finished over the weekend and the day's main assignment. Why her unit still insisted on keeping a paper copy along with an electrical one she would never understand.
And on top of the pile sat her pocket watch.
She reached over and grabbed, and after checking that the lights were still red, she opened it to and read the inscription inside. She wondered who Lillian was, what kind of life they had led, why there was a pocket watch made for them, and what sort of the journey the watch had taken to get to her mother's hands, and so to her own.
Her gut twisted uneasily at that thought though, and something in the back of her mind rang about time and a mission, but she shook it from her head. Just a remnant from her dream, though she could barely remember anything about it aside from the idea that she had to move quickly.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw the lights begin to change and gently tossed the watch back onto the passenger seat, readying for the green light to let her go.
As she got closer to her station, Maka forced her pocket watch and her dream to the back of her mind so she could focus on her assignment.
As part of Sydney's main police force, and as one of the best on said police force, she had been assigned to the protection detail of a renowned Jazz musician. Though it seemed tedious and trivial, and far below her skill set, her boss had told her it would look good and help her get promoted.
And that was what she wanted. To be promoted. To be as good as her mother. To make her proud.
From his personality file at least, pianist Soul 'Eater' Evans seemed a pretty decent guy, not at all the diva his elder brother was (also a famous musician). Previous details had noted his quietness which could almost be called shyness, and a willingness to follow instructions with a good amount of common sense.
He seemed the ideal charge, even if his wealth and upper class upbringing had given him the privilege of money few could boast.
When she walked into her station after parking her car (and slipping the pocket watch into her pocket and paper work under her arm), and as she was about to go to the conference room with the rest of the group assigned baby-sitting to go over their strategy and paperwork before their charge arrived at noon, she was stopped by her boss.
"Miss Albarn," Chief Superintendent Sid Barrett said lowly. "Come into my office for a second."
She raised an eyebrow in surprise, but nodded and followed him. Once the door was shut behind them and they were both seated, she asked, "Am I in trouble, Sir?"
Sid laughed a little and shook his head. "No, no, Albarn, not at all. I just needed to tell you something and I thought it would be best to do it privately." He leaned forward over his desk and sighed. "You've been reassigned. You're back on beat with Blake."
Maka squinted and paused for a moment before speaking. "Can I ask why Sir?"
Sid grumbled and rubbed his face tiredly. "Mr Evans' father has expressed a desire to only have men on his son's protection detail. Apparently he has concerns about conflicts of interest with female officers, as well as whether they'd be able to deter some of his son's more…enthusiastic fans."
Maka glared down at the desk and clenched her hands in her lap. There were many choice words she wanted to call Mr Evans Senior in that moment. Instead she said, "Surely it's not legal for them to discriminate like that. It's complete bullshit anyway, like only women could have conflicts of interest."
Sid nodded and sat back in his chair, looking tired despite it only being Monday morning. "I'll be honest with you Maka, that's the kind of leader I am. Old Mr Evans is from lots of old money, and holds quite a lot of sway with the political scene in America. Apparently pressure has come from the American ambassador for things to go their way, and there are still people up top who prefer money to equality."
Maka fumed in her seat. "You'd think, after all this time—." She cut herself off before she could say anything else.
Sid nodded again. "You'd think that, yes. But right now there's nothing we can do about it. Let's just look on the bright side: you won't have to baby-sit, and you won't have to keep long hours standing in one spot checking for fangirls. We'll get this sorted out though. I don't like this sort of nepotism affecting my station." He waved a hand and hunkered over some paperwork. "You're dismissed now Albarn."
Maka rose from her seat after thanking him, and left, cursing the Evans family in her head.
Black chortled when he heard about it as they gathered their gear to head out on patrol once Maka had handed over her paperwork to her replacement and signed the necessary forms.
"Damn," he said. "So all it would take for me to get rid of you is pay the top brass shit loads of money and be a sexist dick? Pfft, if I'd know that before, I'd have saved all my wages and got you off my ass long ago."
Maka threw her empty paper coffee cup at his face and scowled. "Shut up Blake, this is serious."
He huffed. "Yeah, yeah. But like you said the old man said, we can't do anything about it now, so let's just do what we're supposed to do. Catch criminals and scare off little shits who think they're bigger than the great god Blake!"
She chuffed and followed him as they walked out to their car. "I can never tell what's bigger. This country, or you ego."
"Whatever pigtails, let's just go fuck shit up—," she glared and he continued hurriedly "—legally of course! Gotta lead my people by example."
As they slid into their car and buckled up, Blake caught her slipping her pocket watch out of her pocket.
He glanced at her, but said nothing. He had known her since they were children, when her parents had worked with his, before her home life fell apart. Before her mother left to find herself and her father became bogged down in work and women.
He knew what the watch meant to her.
She stroked the front with her thumb, breathed deeply, and put it back in her pocket. She would be strong. She would make her mother proud.
Maka sighed as she fell back into her worn couch. The morning she had been un-assigned to Soul Evans, a triple homicide in progress had been called in and they'd spent the next twenty-four hours working non-stop to both chase the bastard that did it, and then be de-briefed on their first response to the scene and the chase. Then today had been filled with paperwork about the whole ordeal and how she had managed to nearly wreck her car.
So much for not 'keeping long hours'.
She took a long sip from her wine glass and flicked through hologram channels. She cycled through to the news and paused when she saw the headline about one Jazz pianist. She grimaced a little, but did not change the channel.
The reporters were talking about what a success his first night had been, and how sharp he had looked in his designer suit, as well as who had been there, and who they had been with. It all seemed incredibly trivial and unimportant compared to the work she had been dealing with over the past forty-eight hours. It had involved a kiddy too.
A small clip played of Evans playing one of his pieces, and another of him getting into his limo after the concert, giving a small smile and wave to his fans and the media before shutting himself behind tinted windows.
She rewound the holo to play the music clip again, and felt herself strangely moved. Music had never been her thing, something she had never quite understood. Perhaps it would be worth looking for his album online and giving it a listen. Maybe all his music had the power to move her. Maybe she was just having a bad day.
She let the music play again before letting the programme continue, and then snorted loudly when a close-up of Soul Evans appeared on screen.
White hair? Red eyes? Sharp teeth? He was so pretentious. She wondered how much it had cost for him to get it done, and how much of his own money had actually paid for it.
But, while she was still angry about the whole affair with his father and the bribery and the bigotry, she felt a sense of longing and loss settle into her heart, like she had missed out on something great. She paused the holo and stared at his face intently. She wondered what it would be like to actually stare into those red eyes of his, and felt a sudden sense of déjà vu.
However, she un-paused the holo and let the news go on, pushing down those feelings and draining her glass. She did not miss anything, not really. He was a pretentious musician used to getting his own way because of his money and familial status. Nothing more, nothing less.
She ignored the little whisper in the back of head that told her she was being unkind, that she really had missed something, and refilled her glass.
It was stupid to get drunk on a week-day, but she had been given the next morning off to recalibrate after the previous day's work. She deserved a little numbness.
The pocket watch from her mother was cradled on her lap, one of the few things she had from her. That, and the damned wedding invitation that was sitting on her coffee table.
It had arrived only that morning, announcing that her mother was to be remarried. To a man she had never met. To a man her mother had never mentioned in any of her scant letters or postcards.
She tried to convince herself that any sadness or longing she felt was because of that, because her mother had left her behind and built a new life for herself. A life she was not wanted in. Apparently all she did to try and make her mother proud was for naught.
She drained her glass again and blinked back the stinging in her eyes.
She passed out a glass later, pocket watch clasped tightly in her hands, damning everything to hell—mothers and musicians alike—as she fell asleep.
Maka nearly fell over when she appeared in a large room that was nearly empty and not clearly lit, alcohol still clouding her brain. But that haze quickly vanished as the faceless man welcomed her back and her memories returned.
She ran a hand through her hair, trying not to connect the mother she had had in the future to the one she had in her own time. The similarities were too great, and it made her heart hurt. Tears pricked at her eyes again and she rubbed her eyes to will them away.
"I hope the other watch owner isn't as gross as his father," she said hollowly as she made her way towards the faceless man and the mannequins. Thoughts of her mother were swirling too fast for her to really feel what she was saying. "Would suck to have a soulmate that…."
She trailed off when she saw the new clothes on the mannequin. The kimono draped over it was beautiful, sparkling a little in the illogical light.
She turned to face the faceless man in the suit. "What…?"
She could have sworn he was smiling again, even if it was still nearly impossible to tell. "Your next destination is early sixteenth century Japan."