Taffer Notes: In which Sadja finds herself haunted and is visited by a furnace washing up to her door.
Another odd one. This is the last chapter in which I will be introducing some more of Sadja. A bit of who she is, a bit of who she was and what she likely won't ever be.
After that we'll enter more familiar territory. One with a lot of Redfield in it. I promise.
THE SPECTER
》》 "Where are we going?" Sadja pulled the cowl of her coat a little tighter and tugged her elbows against her sides. There were too many people here, she decided. And the air was too hot and humid, making things a whole lot worse than they had to be. Sweaty people pushed too close for comfort, all glistening greasy skin and bright scarce clothing in all sorts of yellows and reds. The sidewalk reeked of stagnant water, and the only breeze worth mentioning carried dead things on it as it crept from the alleyways. Everything stank, and she hated it. Hated her too, Sadja reflected and glowered daggers at the Keeper's back.
And she hated her own shoulders and her arms. Hated how they throbbed with dull pain and how the crusted skin wouldn't stop itching. Her hands slid into the wide sleeves of her coat, traced up along sweaty skin. The tips of her fingers paused at the edge of the oozing wounds. She wanted to start scratching at the fresh scabs, tear them right off. But then the Keeper would get all worked up and slap at her ear and tell her to stop being such a baby.
Sadja wasn't a baby. She was hurt, and she was lost, and she should be dead, because that's what waited for murderers, did it not? There were laws for that sort of thing. Elaya herself condemned whoever took the life of someone they'd bound themselves to, judging those particular sinners guilty without mercy and seeing them dead.
The thought of a noose relieving of her suffering pulled Sadja's legs to a halt. Ahead of her, the Keeper paused with her.
That stupid woman had eyes in the back of her head. Or just an invisible tight leash on her that she couldn't shake. The latter, Sadja suspected, because Elaya's bloody knickers be damned she couldn't even think about killing herself without getting Sinvik right up in her face, chiding her as if she was no more than a stupid child.
Sadja scoffed, and as if on cue, Sinvik turned, amber eyes finding her as she stared back at the Keeper with as much defiance as she could muster up. Sinvik's light steps carried her backwards and she slipped a gloved right hand into the crook of Sadja's arm.
Then she started walking, marching Sadja right along with her.
"I don't know about you, Love, but I'm not going to be living in a dump for however long we're stuck here. We're going to be making money tonight."
"How?" Sadja hated her hand where it sat. It squeezed gently as she pulled her closer, bumping her shoulder into her side and keeping her there.
"Tonight, we'll start at the bottom of the ladder. Find us a crummy den filled with a choice pick of villains and beat them at their game."
"Huh?"
Sinvik's hand squeezed again. "Gambling. We'll be gambling, Love. And we'll be winning too, cross my heart." 《《
Sadja wove through the throng of misery that shuffled down the packed sidewalk. The revels of two nights past had come and gone, and what they'd left behind was a whole lot of litter, but very little cheer.
The city had quickly reverted to an uneasy routine. It woke early, slunk through its grey and dreary days, and then came to a troubled rest for the night. Much like her.
'We fit right in,' Sadja thought and sniffed at the cold, yet oddly stuffy air. She half expected the Beast to mock her from the hollows of her heart, but that bloody thing had decided to wrap itself in silence for the time being. Maybe it sat waiting for the right moment to pounce, to knock her off her game again when she least needed it. Or maybe it had gotten spooked. Spooked by the specter that had come to haunt them.
Her eyes flicked up and she scanned the people going to and fro. She hid behind the comforts of the barr, and yet her shoulders felt tight as they pulled together with anticipation that she'd see him again. Maybe he'd wear a hat this time. A wide brimmed, fancy and frilly thing from below the Buckle maybe. Or maybe he'd have his beautiful, black locks tied atop his skull and he'd smile at her.
She shivered. Not from the cold, but the prospect of seeing the impossible Ceat walking the streets with her.
Impossible because the dead did not do any such things. They didn't stand by the foot of her bed either, like he'd done this morning.
She'd dismissed him at first, of course. Dismissed him for a memory. A dream. Not an inherently bad one, because sometimes she remembered only his gentle voice and his bright smile and his warm hands in hers. But then she'd realised she'd been awake as she stared at him standing there, his eyes turned down towards her, black locks dangling into his forehead.
She'd screamed. Picked up a pillow. Thrown it at him. Then she'd slid off the mattress lying on the floor and kept kicking her legs until her back collided with a wall. He'd vanished then.
And she'd sat with her arms wrapped around her knees and tried to catch her heart before it could beat its way up her throat and take off through the window.
A few minutes later she'd tried to cut a few slices of bread with wildly shaking hands, and then he'd sat down across of her at the table and watched her as she'd tried to eat. Her appetite had taken a hike and she'd thrown the bread at him.
It had gone straight through him, of course, since he wasn't really here.
Sadja bristled at the memory. She fiddled with the fabric of the barr and tore her thoughts back to how her feet went forward, left and right and left and right and how she had to squeeze herself past a well dressed man with a fitted suit and a shiny pair of black shoes.
His ear was firmly attached to his talking gadget. His voice rose and fell, hurried along by his arm jabbing at the air. He almost knocked his elbow into her, and Sadja had to skip aside.
Everyone was in such a bloody rush here. At first, Sadja had thought it a side effect of the conflict somewhere out in the distance, but as the days passed she'd started to think that this was how life ticked here. You moved through it quickly, trailing a flimsical soul behind you as you went, and reduced the world around you to a blur.
Maybe that was why their souls were so frail, mere vapours drifting along Elaya's sheltering hem. Sadja's eyes skipped between the shoulders she had to navigate through. She frowned. No, she thought. It was the lack of predators. No Sare walked amongst them. No Cad'his prayed on their malleable selves, eager to string them along. No Reapers came to sniff them out.
They'd never had a reason to grow.
Which, Sadja had to admit, was just down right wonderful. They were so quiet out there, even if she'd decide to walk without the barr on her. There'd be a murmur lapping up against her gates, but it'd be muted, and she liked it that way.
She also rather liked how it had made getting herself sorted out after her tumble into this world almost laughably easy. Right after she'd cleared her head of all the fear, of course. And those wayward thoughts of the Wasting eating away at whatever time she had left. Or the loneliness. And the anger. And all those other distractions that had her wallowing in self pity. That wasn't how a Keeper acted. Fledgling or otherwise.
A swiped wallet here, a game of chance won there. That had been enough to get her started, and from there on all she'd had to do was find the professional racketeers that flourished in the turmoil of the city and, to quote the Keeper, beat them at their own game.
That her favourite place had marched her out last night was, admittedly, a little bit of a setback. They'd accused her of cheating, or at least that was what she'd gathered since she'd not understood a word of what they'd said. There'd been a lot of heavy staring though, and some course suggestions she figured, and then had come the subtle lifting of a few jackets to reveal mean looking guns. So she'd walked right out of there, leaving her winnings and her stakes behind.
Tosspots. The lot of them.
Sadja cracked a grim smile. Little did they know that messing with a thieving cunt that had too much time on her hands (and needed the distraction) was a terrible idea at the best of days. She looked up, scanned the shops along her right and found the one she'd been looking for. If tomorrow night was going to be a success, then she would have to equip herself accordingly.
Piss poor planning, and all that. Sometimes you had to think ahead a little, especially if you didn't quite know what you were getting yourself into.
Sadja grabbed for the door and pushed through, having herself greeted by a shy little bell ringing her arrival. The place smelled fairly pleasant - clean metal and earth, and a hint of leather. Shelves packed with tools and rugged clothing ran the length of the room, and it was almost empty, too. A lone shopkeeper raised his head at her as she entered, then returned to sorting a shelf. Sadja decided that she liked the numb silence in here and took her time as she picked the gear for tomorrow.
On her way back out, the fledgling Keeper saw him cross the street ahead of her. Her knees locked. Her heart stalled. Her head numbed itself with a chilling fog that left her thoughts disorientated and altogether useless.
Ceat walked without concern between the steady flow of vehicles. No one cared to slow. No one cared to swivel out of the way. They brushed past him with a hairs width from knocking him over. Or some, her benumbed thoughts insisted, did just that. They clipped his long arms, slipped through his knobby elbows, and they ran right through his long, gangly legs.
Sadja's heart returned to a stuttering rhythm, each beat its own private squeeze of pain. The Beast roused, too. It rattled its cage, and then howled with delight as she watched Ceat blend into the crowd once he reached the other side of the street.
Fourth time today, she counted miserably and stumbled down the short flight of stairs, away from the shop behind her. The gear she'd bought weighted heavily on her back, and as she craned her neck to look at her shoulder, she half expected him to perch atop of it.
She'd have liked to be able to explain him away. Find a good reason why her mind conjured him up, and why it was so damn insistent and detailed about it. But she couldn't. He was an impossible figment. A symptom, maybe, the Wasting driving her insane?
Sadja pulled the barr up to her chin, yanked her hat deeper over he ears, and walked with her eyes focused on the ground.
'Poppycock…'
Dark shades tonight. A fitted shirt, simple sturdy trousers and an agile, slim jacket. Just right for the occasion, Sadja thought and grabbed the matching dark backpack she'd bought yesterday. She hoisted it onto her back and clicked the harness into place. Tonight was the night. The sort of night with a plan and purpose.
'Might even be fun. Who knows.'
It'd definitely feel a whole lot better than staying cooped up in her crib with the impossible Ceat hovering around her.
She slipped out the door, threw a last glance at the dead man as he stood by the window at the other end of the room, and slammed the thing shut.
"Bye. Don't wait up," she growled to herself and headed for her target.
Her target took twenty minutes to get to. It was a squat building sitting at a bend of the river, nestled in-between two drab looking warehouses. Sadja knelt at the top of one of them. To her left, a ladder led to a rickety looking walkway halfway down. And further down still, and with a decent gap in the way, was the flat roof of the stash. Snow covered most of it, except the vents, which spilled warm air into the frigid night. If it wasn't for those, one might have thought the place deserted, much like the warehouses at such a late hour. But it wasn't. Two men were in there, and soon they'd be joined by a third. He'd be carrying her price; the one they'd denied her three nights ago.
Tosspots, the lot of them.
Movement caught Sadja's eyes. Headlights lit up the street, and a single vehicle rolled to a stop in front of the building. It idled for a while longer and she could hear loud, rhythmic booms of music all the way from up here. Sadja scrunched up her nose and tapped her fingers against the makeshift weapon resting in its equally makeshift scabbard at her left hip; A solid piece of heavy iron, wrapped in leather from tip to bottom, and a few rounds of tape for a handle.
She'd have preferred to find her sword there, but swords didn't seem to be in fashion here. She'd looked. Thoroughly. All she'd found were bloody big knives with thick blades. Not like it mattered, since it didn't seem fetching to go strut about the streets, day or night, with one of those strapped to her.
No, it wasn't her sword, though when push came to shove it would probably do just fine. 'And now stop stalling. Get off your lazy bum. Go-Go.'
She slid around the ladder and carefully descended towards the walkway. She tried to be measured about. Calculated. The last thing she'd need was to slip on the snow or a patch of ice and make a racket. Or break something. Either or.
Once she got her feet down on the walkway, which gave a muffled rattle under a layer of snow, Sadja turned her eyes to her next obstacle. She inched towards the edge of the platform, climbed atop the railing, and then leapt across the gap towards the other roof.
More snow met her down below and she tucked herself into a roll just as she hit the roof. The momentum carried her back onto her feet, and a heartbeat later she was crouched by the door of the roof access.
Locked, as expected. But she'd cased the place the night before, so she knew it was a plain lock. Plain, much like a whole lot of other things here.
Sadja pinched her (yet again) makeshift lock-picks from her breast pocket and got to work. The frigid air made her fingers stiff, but the lock gave way regardless. She nudged open the door, strained her ears to listen, and slipped inside.
A short flight of stairs took her towards the top floor of the stash. It was dark up here and smelled dusty, unused. Barren rooms sat on her left and right. She ignored them and beelined for another set of stairs. Light spilled upwards from the bottom floor. Voices too, Sadja noted. It sounded like they were having a merry good time too, all laughs and cheers. Then again, no one ever said that scum wasn't allowed to have a little fun. The more fun they had, truth be told, the less likely they'd be paying attention.
Sadja closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and nudged her gates open. She fled through a narrow gap, allowed her inquisitive soul room to stretch, and gave the hall below a tentative sweep.
'Clear.'
Her gates still slightly ajar, Sadja hurried down the stairs. She quested for a third soul within the building. The courier, the one with her prize, the one that had come in from the night carrying what she hoped was a big enough haul to make even Sinvik blush. She found him down the hall, in the room farthest from her rooftop entrance.
When Sadja slipped through the door, he was busy kneeling by the safe, twisting the lock around. Then he pulled the heavy door open and lazily reached for the folders of currency lying next to him. Not suspecting a damned thing.
'Surprise.'
Sadja slid her makeshift bludgeon from its scabbard. Crossed the distance between them. Lifted her arm and - TWACK - brought the thing down hard on the back of his head. Hard enough to knock him out, and if things went right for him not hard enough to do any permanent damage. It didn't matter to her. Couldn't matter.
He went down with a racket, and Sadja paused to listen. No concerned calls or hurried steps. Good. She dragged the roomy backpack off her shoulders, stuffed it with anything she could fit. Slabs of paper bills, folders filled with the same. She piled them in one after the other until she could barely get the thing closed any more. And just when she thought she was about compensated for her troubles, Sadja heard the footsteps.
'Crap.'
Up the hallway he came, straight for the door. Straight for her. She closed the backpack, dragged it along with her and slid behind the table at the centre of the room. With her left hand she removed the makeshift baton from its scabbard again, with the right she clung to the pack.
He stopped at the threshold.
"Janos?"
Cloth rustled. Feet shuffled.
Sadja locked her jaw and adjusted her grip on the pack. Her heart beat steadily. No need for panic. No need to rush. Take your time. Listen. Wait.
He spotted the crumpled figure on the ground. His steps hurried.
Sadja sprang to her feet. She vaulted over the table, the pack flying with her as she swung it at the startled man. It hit him square in the face. He staggered into the wall behind him. She followed, slid off the table and swung the baton. His arm came up. To grab her. To slap her. To do something, but she ducked below the grasping hand and slammed the steel into his hip. He cried out. His hand went for the sidearm at his belt. The baton came back around, cracked against his wrist. Then her knee snapped up into his groin.
He jackknifed forward, but before Sadja could follow through with a box against his head to send him sprawling onto the floor, a hard tug at her spine changed her mind.
She sidestepped, ducked. The room exploded with noise, displaced the air around her and shook her teeth. Two shots slammed into the space where she'd just stood. Good number two stood in the doorway. His weapon tracked her and she threw the steel rod at him before he could fire again. He dodged it on instinct, shifted his shoulders and shuffled his feet. He didn't dodge her though. Sadja followed the baton, slapped the goon's gunhand wide, and leapt onto him. Her knees knocked into his chest, her free hand drove his head back, and the lot of them met the floor hard as they came down.
She didn't wait around, swung off him and scampered back into the room where she'd left the pack. Last thing she needed now was to leave her prize behind. Make the whole night mean nothing.
Goon number one had recovered just enough to slink across the floor on his knees and grope for the sidearm that she'd knocked from his hand. He pointed, fired. Missed. She covered the distance with two light steps and kicked his chin.
"Just quit," she hissed and snatched the pack from the floor. She swung it over her shoulder, felt the comforting weight that promised her success, pivoted about and— " Sadja… "
Sharp, white pain flared behind her eyes. Sadja stumbled and turned, whipped her head around in search of the voice.
"Sadja, please… ", Ceat pleaded as he lay broken on the floor. He reached for her, brilliant green eyes upturned and hopeful. Sadja hugged the pack to her chest, backed away. Her throat was dry. Her heart had stopped beating.
Then Ceat shot her.
She rocked back, felt the impact at her side, but not the pain. She saw his lips turn up in an ugly grin. Saw his eyes fall to the white of death. Saw her own death mocking her from where it lay on the ground, the barrel of a gun dancing after her.
The fledgling Keeper turned and fled.
Ceat sat at the raised edge of the bath. His hands rested in his lap, shoulders slightly hunched forward and head tilted to face her. She'd tried to get him to leave. She really had. But no matter the effort, he refused to budge. At first, she'd ignored him. Then she'd screamed at him. And then she went and held her breath under the warm water long enough to have her lungs burn for air. That too hadn't helped. He still sat there, his clear green eyes staring down at her and his lips lifted with a tranquil smile. Persistent. More so than he'd ever been in life.
Infuriating.
She sunk deeper into the warm water, puffed at the white bubbles of foam.
"They've got the strangest songs here," Sadja told the dead man. "Soft ones, loud ones, booming ones, 'ruff ones. I… I think I like them. Some even sound like a winged Reaper is trying to sing. Bit disorientating. All wonky and wobbly like."
She looked at him, flicked water at him. It went straight through.
"You'd have hated those." Sadja tried to steel herself, tried to properly look at him without feeling like the very air around her had frozen and was squeezing her between unyielding layers of ice. He looked happy, almost. Content.
She frowned. "Though then again what do I know? We never talked about music. Never talked about much at all. Too busy keeping ahead of things. Staying all on the straight and narrow like good fuckin' heroes. No time to for the little things."
Sadja let her shoulders sink below the water and grimaced down at the mounds of white foam. So much to washing the edges off her frayed nerves. The hot bath had been meant to give her respise. Peace. Instead her heart had forgotten what it felt like to beat without painful effort, and every inch of her ached with a desperate need to cease being.
'Why can't you just leave me alone…'
"Heroes, right. That's what you thought we were. You were. I was."
She looked back at him. "I suppose you'd be disappointed by now. If only you knew the things I've done. There'd be no end to the ranting."
Her heart twisted. "You might even get mad. Can you imagine that? Ceat vil Marrk, flipped off his rocker. All foaming at the mouth and calling me names for the shit I've pulled."
Her heart ached as the Beast slunk past it, racking its claws across it.
"Like last night, I've gone out and gotten myself shot—" She sat up in the tub and lifted her left arm. The bullet had been slowed by the pack, and graced her just enough to tear a bloody nick into her side, third rib up. "—you shot me, actually. But don't worry, it was worth it. See, I found this den. Right after I got here. They've got games and gambling there, and I swear shit 's like nicking candy from a toddler here. 'cept the toddler would probably put up a bigger fight."
Sadja cupped some of the foam in her hands, puffed up her cheeks, and sent bubbles flying into the air. Then she sank back into the water, tried to get away from the chill that seemed to hover around Ceat, and ultimately her. "But then, I guess, they got tired of me winning. I think they thought I was cheating, though really I wasn't. Not in the conventional way anyhow. They walked me out, them tosspots. Kept my stakes, too. So then, I followed their courier when he left after closing. He's carrying all their money, see."
She glanced at Ceat. He was still smiling. Still looked all happy. "Trailed him to their stash. Right by the river. Twenty minutes from here, if you're quick about it. And since you won't let me get any sleep, I spent the last two nights casing that sorry place.
Yah, I know. 'We're not thieves, Sadja.' That's what you'd like to say, right? Well, it's too late for that now. Picked the place clean yesterday night. Sure didn't go down as smooth as I'd have liked, but whatever does?"
She blinked at him. He didn't care much for her confession and didn't seem inclined to get up and leave either. Frustrated, Sadja lifted a leg from the rolling clouds of foam and pushed her toes against one of the short levers worked into the wall on her right. The shower head spat icy cold water at her in response. The shock certainly didn't make him go away, but it spurred her out of the tub. She climbed to her feet and stood under the steady stream of icy water, allowing her teeth to chatter and goosebumps to come racing along her skin.
Then she turned the thing off and swung her legs out of the tub. One of them went straight through the impossible Ceat, a reminder to herself that he was just a figment. A specter. No more.
She padded across the bathroom, found her simple, dark red robe waiting on a hook on the wall, and wrapped it around her shoulders, not bothering to tie it. The wound on her side itched unpleasantly, but she tried to ignore it and focused on the soft cloth against her damp skin instead.
Had Ceat still been alive, he'd have worn a look of sincere disappointment on his handsome face by now. And that would have been it, Sadja knew. Quiet and stoic disappointment. That was the extent on how he'd express his feelings to her betrayal. For stealing. For not behaving. No foaming at the mouth. And certainly no demeaning names thrown at her.
Ceat the good-man. Ceat the Gentle.
Sadja bit her bottom lip, hard, and stared at her reflection in the mirror. He was standing behind her, hovering just a few inches from her shoulder. She could almost feel his breath on her neck.
"What else I have been up to?", she mocked herself while staring at the dead man in the mirror and beginning to hike the sleeves of the robe up as far as she could.
"Well, Redfield hasn't come back, but I've been trying to get that communication-da-ching working. Its out of juice, but I think I found a cable for it today."
As she talked her thumb flicked over the scar line reaching for her elbow. This was real. Ceat was't. Her eyes cut up— not real, but still there. Sighing, Sadja picked up a rubber band from where she'd dropped it in the sink, and wrapped her wet hair into a knot.
"It's been four days now," she continued while she headed from the bathroom. By the time she reached the winding stairs, Ceat was already waiting for her at the bottom. She sucked in her bottom lip. Felt it pull down. Felt it quiver.
"He might have moved on. Maybe ran farther." She padded down the stairs. "Or burrowed himself under a rock. Can't blame him though, with that thick skulled noggin scrambled like it is. I'd do the same."
Sadja stopped dead at the last step, looked at the dead man. Her voice had started breaking itself up her throat in miserably little murmurs. Not the stubborn quip she'd have liked.
"Did the same," Ceat corrected as he watched her.
"Mh…", she agreed, before her fogged up mind tripped over the fact that she'd heard him. Her head snapped to him. Had that really been his voice? Was this what he'd sounded like? Silky. Gentle. Yet upbeat, a tremble of joy at the edge of her hearing.
She couldn't remember.
A miserable whimper bubbled up her throat and Sadja stared at Ceat with his eyes now a milky white. Blood welled from his right temple. Sadja's stomach twisted as the beast rattled its cage. She shivered, pulled the robe closed around her.
"Please," her voice cracked. "Leave me alone…"
And if it hadn't been for the harsh, demanding knock at her door, Sadja thought she might have dissolved into tears right then and there.
Her spine tingled and she straightened her back as her wayward thoughts came staggering back in. Sharp and clear and altogether alarmed. For a heartbeat she forgot about Ceat. This was last night catching up with her, wasn't it?
Sadja let her feet carry her down the last step of the staircase, her eyes fixed towards the door. Definitely last night. There'd be a gaggle of goons outside, ready to shake her down and claim back what she'd taken. She looked towards the chestnut console standing by the door. The top right drawer held her working and loaded firearm, or at least what she thought to be working.
She exhaled slowly, nudged her gates open, and took a gander towards the- her teeth clicked shut and she scampered back into the confines of herself. Heat came racing after her. Angry heat. Confused. Pained. There were terribly ill-tempered flames hunkering out there, a furnace ready to burst. No ill intent though, she noted. Just a whole lot of familiar discord.
"Speak of the…" She looked towards Ceat, but found the room empty. Her brows rocked into her forehead and she puffed out a started Huh before wandering over to the door.
