She particularly liked Bugs Bunny. She liked his spunk, his pizzazz and his obnoxious, almost worse-than-a-Brooklyn-hag tenor, with a nasality that could not be matched.
…But what she loved the most about Bugs was that fact that, while he never died, he fucked up. Bugs won in the end, but there were times when he made mistakes.
When he got overly cocky.
Ding-ding, did that just ring a bell?
Hailey is remembering most vividly about childhood-slash-Bugs-Bunny the times when Bugs would run himself off a cliff, or out of a plane, or SOMEHOW manage to be free-falling in midair. In disbelief, he'd stare at the audience, hovering as the phantom of a jackass plastered itself over his terrified frame.
And then he'd fall, gangly rabbit-jackass ears flopping in the wind.
Let's be frank: Hailey feels like a jackass. As she sits, curled up in the corner of elevator with the cold blue eyes of—is that the Interloper?—staring down at her, Hailey realizes that she has made a grave, grave error.
Hailey fucked the big one.
She made a mistake when she dressed as a tourist in Flushing Meadows. She made a mistake as dismissing the Interloper as a simple threat. She made a mistake when she called up her boss—damn him—and told him that everything was under control. And she especially made a mistake when she followed Gordon Webb this morning and told herself that nothing was wrong.
…Was that why she was expelled from Quantico?
She got cocky?
Damn right, sister.
Hailey turns her gaze away from the penetrating eyes of her attacker and stares at the shattered remnants of her last (that she can reach, anyway) weapon. Her beloved barbiturate, her heart-stopping savior, is now oozing into the carpeted floor, and unless Hailey can, say, dip a knife into it and stab the bastard across the way, she doesn't having a fighting chance.
A voice sounds abruptly, pulling Hailey out of a momentary reverie.
"Who are you?" the Interloper asks, voice low.
Hailey keeps her eyes downcast, focusing intently on the smashed shards of the hypodermic. They taught her a valuable lesson at Quantico—the second you make eye contact with your questioner, they know your weakness.
Her weakness is very obvious, a vivid scar ripping its way across her eyes and scoring marks in her face.
Hailey's scared.
…But she's not gonna let this sonofabitch know that.
Silence.
"I'm going to ask you one more time," Interloper says, now lowering himself to a crouch with eyes boring into hers. "Who are you?"
Hailey blinks slowly, and then it seems like the world twists again. She's up against the wall, a knife at her eye and an arm firmly seated on her windpipe, no longer on the ground but now pulled up—standing—against the elevator. The Interloper is in her face now, still calm, still expressionless, with the blue glint of a blade held level with her eye.
…It is only the voice that belies irritation, belies impatience. It has gotten sharper, cleaner and very cold.
The question has been cut down to one word.
"Who?" He asks, gently putting weight on his arm.
Panic time?
Hailey
tries to be tough. Honest-to-fucking-God, she tries. She tries to
think of all the time she's pulled this shit on other people, got
in their faces and scared them, pulled a piece and told them very
cleanly that if they didn't cooperate, they'd die. She tries to
remember that this is merely a bluff, that he is merely toying with
her and has no idea about Gordon or her job, but then Jesus,
she can't breathe and suddenly the knife is too close for comfort
and oh my god…
"—Ley." She gasps out, trying to pull a hand up to grapple at the arm at her throat. He glances down at the pathetic attempt, then stares back up at her and relaxes some of the tension.
"Who?" Interloper sounds mildly interested.
Hailey tries to swallow. The spit gets stuck halfway down.
"A-a-iley." She chokes.
More slack. More air coming through. The knife reluctantly backs away from her eye.
"Who?"
"Hailey." The name slips itself through Hailey's lips like a half-uttered curse, and she feels disgustingly lame. The Interloper releases full tension on her windpipe but rests the forearm there as a warning.
"Is there a last name?"
Training tells Hailey to clam up.
She does.
And instantly pays for it. The knife lungs back at her eye, and the forearm lays itself fully down on her only way of air, patiently pressing downwards.
Hailey starts seeing stars.
"Pike." She spits out. "The last name is Pike."
Interloper blinks leisurely, giving her a moment to contemplate how absolutely heartless the bastard looks before leaning down on her windpipe once again.
He doesn't buy it.
"Really?"
Completely ignoring the blade inches from her orbital cavity, instead focused on the reality that my god, she can't breathe, Hailey nods her head vehemently from side-to-side.
"Yes!" she croaks out, desperate.
Something happens in those eyes. She only has a nanosecond to see it, but disgust flashes through the Interloper's face and then she's back down on the floor, choking and gasping for air and gingerly massaging her windpipe. The Interloper has backed off again, returning to his corner in a flash of blue, and now watches her, arms crossed.
Hailey's gaze returns to the barbiturate stain on the carpet. No longer is she avoiding eye-contact to put up a tough front.
She simply doesn't want to have to have the Interloper staring her down again.
Briefly the question arises as to who this bastard is. Who this, this monster is and why—of all people—he's pursuing her.
And then, then in her oxygen-deprived state, Hailey remembers.
Gordon Webb?
The mind jumps quickly, trying to move in its confused and frightened state.
Other killer? Other boss? Body guard? Man who has grudge against me? Man who has grudge against employer? Man who's simply psycho?
Instinct interrupts the tirade.
He's none of those things, dear. None of them.
…That quiet reality sends ice streaming through her veins.
Jesus, she's dealing with a ghost…
"Hailey," Interloper says, calm and controlled once again, "who do you work for?"
Training tries to reinforce itself (avoid eye contact, don't talk, don't react), but Hailey won't allow it. She can't—god—she can't deal with that nightmare again. She is shaken far beyond her normal state to act cool. She is shaken, now, not stirred, and nothing can change the reality that she's frightened as hell.
"Hailey?"
Oh, no…the Interloper has crouched down again, though now the knife is dangling loosely in a hand. It's an open and very certain threat.
Don't talk, don't see. Doesn't that make sense?
"…Employer."
Interloper shakes his head. "That won't work, Hailey. It won't."
It is at this moment in time that Hailey realizes the importance of the name, the importance of an identity.
When you're faceless, attacks against you mean nothing. They're not personal, not meaning any harm towards you as a human being—most assuredly, they're simply there to agitate or frighten you slightly. Being anonymous is more of an upside than down.
But once you add the name into the equation, once you have on your lips someone's identity, the whole thing goes sideways. No longer is the assault towards you impersonal…it's very close to home. It's very real.
…It's an attack on you.
Now that the Interloper knows Hailey's name, he knows how to worm his goddamned head into her brain. Now he knows how to make her crack, make her tip-toe the line with Insanity.
Hailey knows the ropes enough to understand that now she has a very low chance of keeping secrets. She knows that life might very well be ending.
All because he knows her name.
"Who is it, Hailey?"
She doesn't know what compels her to keep fighting, but it does. Instead of spilling like she so badly wants to, Hailey simply shakes her head.
What surprises her is not what he does, but what he doesn't do. He doesn't attack her with the knife again, doesn't choke her. Instead, the Interloper glances down at the knife in his hand, then looks back up at her and smiles gently.
…Jesus Christ, if the abuse she experienced seconds ago wasn't terrifying enough, this sure as hell is.
"You don't know who you work for, Hailey?"
Uh-oh. Realization hits like a brick wall.
…He doesn't give a shit about who she works for, does he?
It's something else. It's that Gor—
"Go ahead," Interloper continues. "You can shake your head. It's okay if you decide that you can bullshit me. I guess what I really want to know is why you're hunting Gordon Webb."
Without meaning to, Hailey blinks. The name unsettles her and instills recognition.
The bone-chilling smile on the Interloper's face grows wider.
"You recognize the name." He states simply. "Good."
…The world is turning far too fucking fast for Hailey to reconcile what's going on, because now she's choking again, pushed into a semi-seated position with the knife tenderly coaxing at the skin of her windpipe. The Interloper maintains his weight on her thrashing legs and arms calmly, staring unflinchingly into her frantic eyes before leaning forward towards her ear.
"If you want to live, you will tell me why you're hunting him," Interloper whispers gently. "If you don't tell me, in ten seconds your face will no longer resemble Hailey Pike. Do we understand each other?"
Hailey's mind snaps. She gives one frantic stare into the blue-eyed devil in front of her and realizes that there's nothing in those irises. Nothing that will stop this madman from killing her, and nothing that will stop her from becoming a monstrosity. The flicker of disgust she saw a moment ago, the flicker of confusion and fear at what was happening, is gone.
Hailey does what she never thought she'd do.
She confesses
A/N: Ladies and Gentlemen, meet the real Cain. Heartless, cold and creepy/bipolar bastard, isn't he?
I'm sorry if this chapter didn't entirely keep interest, as well as the fact that my drug facts might've been a little bit off; I researched earlier today for some cardiopulmonary arresting drugs and didn't exactly find what I wanted. Barbiturates are a family of drugs that have anesthesic properties, but have been known to cause death if overdosed with. They are also sometimes used in lethal executions. If anyone can get more specific with the drug--as to help me out--that would be great.
Questions, comments? Feel free to post 'em.