THIRTEEN

Beckett had just succeeded in breaking the infuriating blinds on the window of his room when the door slid open. He frowned slightly. Had these people never heard of knocking? Never mind, he thought, I'm sure it's something of... utmost importance. This thought brought a grimace to his face—he did not like being bossed around.

"Lord Beckett," said a sharp voice... one he recognized as belonging to Adele Merritt, Benjamin's subordinate.

"Yes?" he turned around, and saw two people had entered the room—Adele, and some other girl. She was gazing around the room as if in wonder, her face pointed upwards, like a small child gazing at the world's biggest Christmas tree.

"This is Renee Stratford," Adele said curtly, "I've brought her here as a sort of... guide for you. To make sure any questions you have are answered." Adele hadn't bothered thinking of much of a backstory. She wanted this plan to fail, after all, so what was the point in putting effort into it? The girl was going to die anyway.

"Thank you," Beckett said politely, though he seemed slightly wary. He was pretty certain that he didn't need a guide—and that this was some sort of trick. Also, her skirt was scandalously short.

"I'll leave you to get acquainted," Adele said softly, and then turned to leave, but Beckett spoke as she pressed on the door-handle-pad.

"On whose orders is Miss Stratford here?"

Adele turned her head a fraction, "Benjamin's, of course," she said, and then she left. Suspecting already, Beckett turned towards the other woman—well, no more then a girl, really—who was now looking at him. She gave her little smile.

"Hello," she said. Her voice was kind.

"Good day," Beckett said. His voice was not. In fact, it was rather cold. "I think I know why Benjamin sent you."

"Do you?" she didn't stop smiling at him warmly. But Beckett didn't let the fact that she was smiling at him warmly put him off. Why would he? Beckett was well aware on how emotions could be manipulated.

"Yes. You are a wenchy whore or a whorish wench—whichever way you like it." Beckett walked towards her, and she walked towards him, until they were at ordinary speaking distance.

"I like it both ways," she said, evenly enough.

"What?" Beckett furrowed his brow—not getting it. Of course, he wouldn't.

"Do you not know what that means?" Renee asked, tilting her head. Beckett paused for a moment, as if searching his brain.

"No, I don't. Please, do explain." Was he joking? Ah, who knows?

A long, and... interesting conversation followed.

----------

"Is she in there now?" Benjamin asked.

"Yes, sir," Adele said, examining her nails—what she usually did to project the feeling of boredom, and hopefully get the subject over with. It worked.

"And when shall we send Beckett and the team back for the heart?" Benjamin began fiddling with a pen on his desk—hardly anything was written on simply pen and paper these days, but pens never ceased to be useful.

"I suppose when the whore I presented him with comes back to us," Adele said.

"We wouldn't want to interrupt anything," Benjamin agreed with a smirk. Adele tried not to let a grimace come to her face, but failed. "You can go, Adele," Benjamin said with a wave of his hand, "I need to do some work. I'm sure there are plenty of productive things you could be doing too."

"Yes, sir," Adele said blankly, turning and walking out of the room.

----------

"Say 'heart' again."

"Heart?"

As Beckett said the requested word, Renee giggled again. Nearly two hours had passed, and conversation had moved to more... tasteful subjects. Still, Beckett was learning a lot from this girl. As Beckett looked at her, perplexed, she leaned down and pressed the button to turn on the computer.

"Your accent," she said, shaking her head, "It's so... British."

"Quite," Beckett said, "But Britain consists of England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland, each of which contain their own accents... and each of those have their own accents too." He had noticed the weird accents that these people had—he was in America, after all. Future America.

"What?" Renee asked. She asked that question a lot. About one hundred times per day, on average. Probably more. She turned to the computer—which, in these times, could also be used as a television and god-knows-what else. She turned it to television-mode, and Beckett jumped as people began moving around on the screen. It was a soap opera.

"How does this work?" he asked, trying to look around the monitor—and seeing that it was flat. The people were in excellent detail, and the sound as if they were in the room. The screen was also huge... and this made things even more confusing for Beckett.

"I don't really know... but it's the fact that it works that matters, isn't it?" Renee asked. This was a deep observation for someone like her.

"Hmm..." Beckett leaned back, "I'm not sure I like this place."

"What place?" Renee asked. Adele hadn't bothered briefing her on the fact that Beckett was not of these times—anything to make her job harder, she reasoned.

"I'm... from the seventeenth century," Beckett said, after a brief hesitation. "Didn't you know that? Hence the clothing," he wrinkled his nose, "Which I find much more tasteful then any future clothing, by the way."

"You... what?" Ah, her favourite word again, "Are you really from the past? This is like a movie!" Her eyes sparkled as she clasped her hands together. Beckett rolled his eyes.

"Anyway, seeing as I've confided in you something of... relative importance," Beckett said, turning away from the perplexing screen that she had called a 'computer', and fighting the urge to ask what a 'movie' was, "I would like to know what you are really doing here."

"Oh," Renee fiddled with a strand of hair, "Well... Adele hired me," she said with a sigh, "To get your guard down. I'm a prostitute."

"I guessed," Beckett sneered.

"Yes..." The insult bounced off of Renee. Beckett felt that she was surprisingly... innocent, for a prostitute. He couldn't really imagine her having a night on the town. Then again, for money... what had to be done, was done. "But I told you. Because I like you." She smiled at him.

"Right," Beckett said, "Well, that was stupid, wasn't it?"

"What do you mean?" She asked him.

"Now I know, so... I don't have to trust you, I don't have to trust Benjamin, and I am basically in control of you." He smiled at the end. It was not a smile of kindness.

"...what do you mean?" she asked again. He leaned forwards.

"Listen, you silly girl," he said, and his voice now had a hardness in it that she had not heard him use yet, "Do you have any idea what you've let yourself into? This isn't a simple 'get-the-man' job—if you fail, you'll not be allowed to live. This mission is top secret. These people are ruthless, and they're not afraid to kill you."

"They wouldn't do that," Renee said, with a small smile.

"I think they would," Beckett leaned back, and the climatic moment was ruined by the television suddenly blaring a little jingle loudly... I'm having chicken tonight, I'm having chicken tonight, I'm having chicken tonight... Beckett threw it a filthy look, and Renee laughed.

"Don't be silly, that sort of thing isn't real," she said, resting a hand on his shoulder. Beckett shot her hand a bemused look; Renee had always been a touchy-feely person, whereas Beckett... not so much.

"It's real alright, Miss Stratford," he hissed, "Now, I want information about this place. As much as you can spare."

"What sort of information?" she asked, slowly.

"I don't know. Politics. Economics. Architecture, too. Everything." Beckett doubted that she knew what any of those things meant. Nevertheless, she dutifully connected the computer to the internet, and gathered up some articles. Beckett watched interestedly. "How do you know what to do?" he asked.

"I don't know..." she said, "I've just always known." She shrugged. It was one of those things—who'd ever heard of someone who didn't know how to work a computer? Not in this day and age.

"Huh," he said, leaning back, "You're quite smart."

"Uh, thanks," Renee smiled at him again. She always smiled at him. She smiled at everyone. "No-one's ever said that to me before. You're quite nice."

"...thanks," Beckett frowned, "No-one's ever said that to me before."

----------

After another hour, Beckett was well and truly confused. He'd managed to find out a lot, but it was breaking his brain trying to figure it out. And that took some doing. Renee tried to help, but she wasn't of too much assistance, being dumb and all. Beckett sighed and turned away from the weird computer screen, which Renee was still having to manipulate, as he had no idea what he was doing. He didn't like it, but he had no control over it.

After the rather terse conversation before, things had gotten back to a reasonably sub-friendly tone again—mainly because Renee seemed incapable of arguing. If he pointed out something, she would agree. If she pointed out something, and he said he disagreed, she would somehow turn it around. Beckett would have been annoyed by such weakness in a person, finding it pathetic, but Renee had such an earnest way of doing it, that he didn't find himself pitying her—just shrugging it off. He found her idiocy endearing, in a way.

Finally, the topic of conversation found itself back to where it used to be; the Situation. Obviously, they couldn't simply leave it at that; Beckett knew that Renee's life didn't mean a flying arse to Benjamin or his creepy sidekick, and that she didn't really understand what all of this was about.

Beckett could sneer at them about how pathetic their plan was, send Renee packing out of his room, and rub the fact that he outsmarted them and they underestimated him into their faces.

And then Renee would be killed.

He had not grown emotionally attached to her or anything, and neither was he too concerned whether she lived or died. 'She's a sweet girl' was not high on his reasons for saving her life. To be honest, he needed an ally. Renee was friendly, dumb, naive and—for some mad reason—trusted him. She was just the sort of person he needed to help him crack this place.

"Renee, I am going to save your life," Beckett said, his tone become patronizing, "And we are going to have to do some acting. Do you know what acting is?" Renee nodded, looking completely serious. Beckett couldn't believe this girl. "What, exactly, did they order you to do?"

"You know," she said, "Come in here. Get close to you. Then go back and 'report' to them, or whatever, once I was done."

"I see," Beckett said, wondering if Benjamin really believed him to be that much of a complete and utter ingrate. "Well, then. You will go back to them, and tell them that we had a jolly good time and all is well."

"What do you mean?" Renee asked him. If she asks that question one more time, Beckett thought, I am going to rip her head off.

"You are going to lie to them, Miss Stratford," he said, slowly, and pointedly.

"Lie? Like what?" Renee was not the type to be at home with lying. She was far too... nice for that sort of thing. Or perhaps dumb would be better. She wasn't the most inventive of souls. "Why?"

"Why? To save your life. I'm doing you a favour. And it'll mean they don't keep such a close eye on me, because they think I'm here willingly." He smiled, "As for exactly what you say... well, anything that comes to mind. Friendship. Kisses. Frenzied lovemaking. Knock yourself out."

"Alright..." she said, not seeming fazed by the whole, 'one slip up and these people will kill you' thing, "I never thought I'd be in a real life adventure. With someone from the past and everything." She smiled. Again.

This girl was awfully repetitive.

"Yes, now remember to keep the act up," Beckett said, pressing some urgency into his voice, "Or who knows what'll happen?" She just laughed, "I'm serious... look, this is the real thing, alright? They have these weird... 'lasers', and they use them to kill. They threatened my associate... eh... friend with one. They're holding him hostage—it's all part of a plan. You wouldn't understand." At least she didn't deny it.

"Alright..." she said, again, "I wont give it away. Okay? But... how's this all going to end? Am I going to have to keep lying forever?"

"I don't think so," Beckett said kindly. He was being sort of truthful. The second he was transported back to his old world, she would probably be murdered anyway. But she would have served her purpose, so... that would be just fine with him!

NB: Beckett's a bit of an arse, isn't he? Updates are hectic on this story, I'm afraid!