That night I sit up and wait for Seb to come and rescue the Angel.
He's always been weak for her. I'd be trying to offer her essential deprivation training and he'd be giving her little sweets and sneaking her out for coffee. He took her up to Scotland once, up into the mountains away from everybody, and rather than bring me back her heart in a filigree casket like any good huntsman should, he was teaching her to shoot. That sort of thing, y'know, slight kindnesses and underminings.
It's not, therefore, much of a stretch to dream he might drag his petty little arse out of retirement for just one night when he believes his dear Angel is under duress. Is it? This all crept into my head as I stood outside that door this morning, listening to her pick up the phone. Not her fault, of course. We've all answered calls we shouldn't have when we were peeling our heads from the pillow, haven't we now? Could hardly hold that against her. But she let him believe she was captive and kept and afraid (and the one thing the Angel has never, ever been with me is afraid, ladies and gentlemen… not unless she knows she's got it coming.)
No, it's not much of a stretch.
It won't have helped that, when she slipped away to the bathroom to make that secret call to him, I waited in the doorway. Watched her do it, that urgent hush on her voice even as she sat on the edge of the bath swinging her feet. She was nearly done when I raised my hands to show I meant no honest harm, stepped in with a thump of the door and dragged her out by the hair. She was still squealing when I pointed at the phone in her hand and she cut it off abruptly. So no, not much of a stretch.
I sit up by the widest of the windows and pretend to be watching something on a computer screen. The television is off, and tipped down because it then offers a decent reflection of the street below. If the bike pulls up (or, heavens forfend, a cab) I'll know.
I wonder how he'll go about it.
I've had friends in past where I might have been worried right now. I might be sitting here while my assets all over the world are frozen, one to the other, passing it on like Ice-9, isolating me alone in this flat with nothing to fall back on. That would have been Charlie. Penny Corcoran, Poison Penny, I'd have a gas mask on by now, because God along knows where she would have gotten something lethal in here. Morgan would have come barrelling through the door like a well-tossed caber and kept barrelling until him and me went right out the window together. There's another who would have been hanging out there in the dark, working at another window, to slip in and silently draw a razor across my throat.
But Moran's none of these. A blunt instrument when it comes to the kill, yes, but where he's got a little knowledge, he knows too how to use it. He'll just buzz, and just ask to be let in. He'll try and tell me he's changed his mind and wants to talk after all. He'll come in and we'll talk. It'll all be very much like what I was imagining before. Moran will try, bless him, he'll have a damn good go, at talking me into releasing the Angel. Just let her go, get her out of here, let her have a life. That's the only place where he's quite daft. The Angel has nothing else. Even at that, it would still be an interesting argument to have, except that she doesn't want to leave.
But I might have to turf her out, just for appearances' sake. This done, Moran will turn. He will attempt to walk away from me. And should I attempt to keep him close, by any means, that's when finally some harm might come to me.
I'm ready for that. Don't worry about me.
It's just such a pity that I have to be ready for it. It hurts a bit, having to ready for it, when the old days were so good. We were so good. All of it, the network, the jobs, the global reputation, but especially that which was close. I moved people to London, y'know. Pulled Penny out of the arse end of Limerick and Yusuf Shikra over from Pakistan. Charlie kept straying back to America, but he always came home to me. And Moran? Last time round, a different flat to this but similar, Moran would have been here nine days in every ten. Whether or not he did anything of use while he was there is another tale entirely, but he was there. For the longest time he was just there. It was nice to have that.
It just used to be so good, y'know. All I want is some little part of that to stand on. Sherlock's probably looking for me already. If he remembers the Angel, he's probably figured out she's disappeared. It's too close to the wire. I can't afford to fight with Moran much longer. No, if this doesn't work tonight then…
Then I suppose I'll just have to let him…
Let him know that argument is no longer an option. That's all. He's not got a choice in this. The sooner he accepts that and comes back to me, the sooner he'll feel better. All this stress can be over the moment he just says, right, fine, I give up, do what thou wilt.
So when the intercom rings by the door, I get up gratefully and with this assurance in my heart. All very easy. Get him in here, tell him in no uncertain terms he never really left and never really will. He'll know that. He'll recognize when the words are put in front of him, and the window at the end of the hall shatters, drawing my eye over my shoulder just in time to see the bullet pass not inches from them, and bury itself with electric crackle in the little screen. The intercom, understandably, stops ringing.
After all of that, the speed of sound and the actions of shock on the human body being what they are, I hear the gunshot, and the Angel panicking, banging at the door of her room. "I'm fine!" I shout, to shut her up. Wish I could shout it at the rest of me too.
Jesus Christ, a shot. A shot fired at me. A gunshot, a bullet flying through my own home, Jesus, Christ on fire, a shot.
I turn where I'm standing and look through the broken window. The spiderweb of its crackle obscures things, but there's a clear view all the way across the street, across to the roof of this next building. It's a little shorter than this one. The shot (Christ, a shot, a shot at me) would have been straight and true and easy. Either I imagine it or there is just the flash of gunmetal as a rifle is disassembled and put away.
Beyond her door the Angel is crying. I steady myself enough to unlock the door. It doesn't open right away. She's sitting down against it, but rolls away when she feels me coming. "There now, pet," I tell her. "Nothing to worry about. He's had his little tantrum now."
"I just heard it and I heard the window break and I didn't know what to do."
"It's alright, love. Stop shouting. Neighbours, remember?"
She lets me help her up. Stands a second looking over my shoulder at the shattered intercom. Slowly goes to it and touches the bullet through the break. "He tried to kill you? Really? The Colonel did?"
No. If Moran had tried to kill me, at least in that cowardly, long-range fashion, I'd be dead. No, he didn't try to kill me. That was just a warning shot.
Why am I not saying any of this out loud? Why am I leaving worries and doubts in her little head? They make her edgy and dangerous, why aren't I explaining anything to her?
"You're shaking," she tells me.
Yeah, obviously I am. I just watched the bullet pass me, that tiny little square of airspace bordered on one sloping side by the lines of my nose, yes, I am fucking shaking, thank you Angel for that moment of staggering insight. She'll be telling me I've gone white next.
But she doesn't. She wraps both hands around my arm and takes me back to the living room, back to my chair. But it's too close to that widest of windows, so I move as soon as she lets go of me, back behind the wall where I can't be gotten, I can't be, where I'm safe, they can't get me. Then, and this is the really great thing about keeping humans instead of cats or dogs or bearded dragons, she goes away and comes back with a drink for me. While she leaves me to level out, she gets a stapler and a couple of bin bags and covers over the broken window. Comes back, "Do you want me to put towels up for the heat or go out and look for a board?"
"It's late, nowhere's open. You can do that in the morning. Don't go out." Don't go out anyway. Liable he's still hanging around somewhere. Even if he isn't, don't go out. I'm thinking all this before I realize it just isn't me. Trying to find my place again, I shout after her, "And don't use good towels. Use your duvet."
"…Yes, sir."
A warning shot. I wonder who he got to ring the bell for him. Teasing me out into the hall, just to show me how easy it would be. That bullet could have been in my head. I could be dead on the floor and the Angel screaming her little lungs out until the police came. The message clear and unequivocal, "Back the fuck off."
And a message so well delivered.
The mellow warmth of the whiskey starts to hit, and the real meaning of what actually happened here along with it. By the time the Angel comes back, little sliver cuts all over her hands from sweeping up the glass, she finds me smiling. "What?" she says, trying to get in on it. Sits up on the arm of my chair to be close. Maybe watching for hysteria, if those I used to keep around me have taught her well enough.
"It's perfect," I tell her.
"What, the Colonel trying to kill you?"
Which still isn't exactly correct, but I nod along anyway. "Yes. It's perfect. It's so perfect, do you not see that? This was the plan anyway, and I didn't even have to guide him into it. He arrived at it all by himself. Angel, are you not seeing what this means? Get a drink yourself, darling; this needs a toast."
She reaches out again, just gingerly putting her hand on my shoulder. "I don't understand how you getting shot at needs a toast, though."
"And you never will until you fetch yourself a drink and I explain it to you." She's still doubtful. Thinks I've lost it. But at this particular moment, that's forgivable. "Have a bit of faith, Angel." She goes and gets herself one of the lagers out of the fridge. Those were for Moran, which just makes this all even nicer. I raise my glass and she dutifully tips the tin against it. "Here's to Former Lieutenant Sebastian Moran of her Majesty's Armed Forces, the once and future Colonel of this depleted organization. His first reaction to a problem he can't see a way out of always has and always will be to wave a gun at it. Long may it last. Here, my Angel, is a toast to the killer born. Slàinte."
