Author's Note: Sorry it took so long to write this! I had to finish my proseminar paper (it's about the functionality of Klingon, Quenya and New Speak... My professor called me a nerd but it's a compliment, bc she's one too :P) plus I needed to change some things about the story. Not that there's anything I don't like about it - holy Bellamy there's still so much awesome stuff coming and aaaah I'm so excited about reading your reactions *rubbing hands and chuckling like a maniac* - but bc of the trailer. Like I said before, it's FUCKING GREAT. Buuuuut the only bad thing about it is that it contained scenes which resembled some of those I have planned for this story too much (just to remind you: I planned all this back in 2015), so I needed to decide on which to keep and which to throw over or at least change to such an extent that they don't look like copied from the trailer. But don't worry, the level of greatness remains stable :D
Now, please enjoy, Ladies and Gentlemen, and keep reviewing! Love y'all :D
Like A Drifter
It couldn't be, could it? Letting your look linger just a tad, a millisecond too long couldn't possibly lead to horror and pain. No, this had to be some bad dream, a... a nightmare! Yes, it was a nightmare... which he didn't wake up from upon pinching his own arm. It was a nightmare, that's for sure... but it was a real one.
"I didn't mean anything by it, I swear!", David tried to soothe them in a pleading tone. His attempts were to no avail, though.
"Look how scared he is all of a sudden!", one of the four hooligans laughed. Then he shoved David. "Not so confident now, eh?"
Confident. David wasn't confident at all! Why, of course, he was in general, to a normal extent at least - he was delivering a quite good performance in his apprenticeship - but he certainly hadn't displayed any inappropriate confidence towards these four strangers, hadn't tried to provoke them. Dear God, he'd merely glanced at them! And who hadn't?
He'd just been waiting for the night bus to take him home after an exhausting shift, when suddenly those roaring and bawling men turned up. It wasn't anything special, granted; the local football club had just won some game. Maybe this was why they'd taken so much offence against him glancing at them, because they actually rooted for the other team, the one that lost. Or maybe it was because they couldn't understand that a teenage boy didn't share their enthusiasm about sports.
It didn't matter, though. What mattered was that they had taken offence, that he had been too unathletic to outrun them and that he had been forced into this dark alley, encircled by four obviously drunk men. Whether that was on alcohol or euphoria he couldn't really tell.
"I swear, I didn't-" Another push. He tumbled, almost fell, if it weren't for the brick stone wall his back made contact with now.
The men laughed... until snarling silenced them.
It was a dog, a young one, though not less frightening as it was standing there, in semi-darkness, all tensed up and teeth bared. Its tail was stiff, like the one of gundogs in cartoons when they've just picked up the scent of their prey. And like prey the dog fixated the hooligans with its sparkling amber eyes.
"What the hell...", one of the men said under his breath.
The one closest to David gave a whistle. "Hey, good boy! You're a good boy, right?" The dog, however, didn't react to any of it, just seemed to tense up even more.
"What the fuck is it doing?"
"He's waiting for my command to tear you to pieces."
David - and two of the hooligans for that matter - started with fright at the voice coming from the other side of the alley. It was the one of a woman, soft and rich with a posh accent. When she stepped into the light it was clear that the voice belonged to an actual proper lady.
Leaning on an umbrella, the beautiful young woman in the navy blue suit that emerged now from the dark adopted such a casual posture, she almost looked bored. Her appearance reminded David of Snow White, with the dark of her hair clashing with her smooth pale skin and the red lips that formed a smile now.
"Good evening, gentlemen. A poor choice of words, admittedly. After all, you four are neither worthy of the title of a 'gentleman', nor is this going to be a pleasant evening for you... at least in case you do not leave this young man go immediately."
The hooligans exchanged a perplexed look, before already bursting into laughter.
"You're some funny tasty bir',", the one who'd pushed David exclaimed loudly even though there weren't more than a few feet between him and the woman. "bu' you shou' really call ya puppy back and fuck off."
"I will go,", Snow White said. David wondered how she managed to keep her calm. "but I'll take the boy with me." That's when she directed her smile at David. "Come on. Let's leave those... 'gentlemen' to their own business. I'm sure they've got better things to do than hanging about in such a scruffy place."
David wanted to follow her instructions, but again he was pushed back against the wall. "You little tosser stay where you are, ya hear me?", the man grunted, visibly growing angry. "Who the fuck do you think you are, bitch? Fuck off -" David froze at the sight of the small hand gun he took from his pocket, pointing it at the still snarling dog. "- or I'm gonna send ya little friend here to dog's heaven."
David didn't know how Snow White got there so fast, but suddenly the woman was behind the man, the handle of her umbrella around the arm he'd extended towards the dog. The smile had vanished from her face, had made way for a more than hard expression. "Huge mistake.", she hissed, and then everything went quickly.
The woman kicked him in the small of his back and jerked on his arm so that it cracked. The man screamed. Another one too. David barely got to see the dog jump when blood was already streaming from its target's hand. Metal flashed in the corner of his eye suddenly and before he even realised that it was a jackknife one of the remaining men had whipped out, Snow White had already dodged his thrust gracefully, disarmed him and knocked him out with an umbrella-hit against his temple. Another quick move, another precise blow and all of a sudden David found himself surrounded by unconscious men on the ground.
With eyes as wide as an owl's he gaped at the young lady, who, impossibly enough, didn't seem distressed at all. Hell, she wasn't even out of breath! Almost leisurely she fixed her appearance, brushing some loose strands of her dark hair back into her ponytail and tucked at her suit.
"Are you alright?", she asked calm as a clock, though, only when she directed her questioning look at him did David realise that she hadn't addressed the dog which was walking over to her now, its mouth still dripping a little with blood.
"Um, I - I don't... I don't know..." It was embarrassing, but it was all he managed to bring forth.
For Snow White it seemed to be a sufficient reply, though, as she just gave him another one of her beautiful smiles, crouching down to scratch the happily panting dog's neck and complementing him on his good work. It was such an absurd thing to do, not that she was treating her pet like an actual person, but... that she did it within a circle of men she'd knocked out. In just a few seconds. With an umbrella. With a fucking umbrella!
"Who are you?!" His sudden outburst made David himself wince, whereas the woman remained her calm self, merely raised a brow at him.
Standing up, she said: "Why, you should tell me."
"Me? Why me?"
"It's your dream after all." She winced, as if something startled her, and cupped her face with her hands. "Oh dear, I'm not supposed to tell you that!" She turned to the dog. "And you didn't even try to stop me!" The dog gave a bark, which made the woman visibly relax.
David, on the other hand, didn't relax at all. The whole concept of relaxation seemed so incredibly far-fetched right now, that it was utterly impossible for him to do anything but blink in confusion. "Wha-what?"
"Oh, see? He didn't hear it! Great!"
"I-I did hear what you said..."
"Oh."
"... but... but it doesn't make any sense. I can't be dreaming. This... this is just..." He glanced down at one of the men on the ground, the one with the bloody hand. "... too real..."
The woman didn't seem one bit impressed, however, simply shrugged his argument off. "It's a lucid dream."
"A... what?"
"A lucid dream. The kind that resembles reality in perception, mostly due to the dreamer's awareness of it being a dream."
"I am not aware of any of that."
She smirked. "Your subconscious is. You'd be surprised how much is lingering there beneath the surface of your thoughts, the things your subconsciousness can do when being unleashed. I mean..." One hand was on her hip, while the other gestured down her body. "... it generated this, so I dare say that your subconsciousness is pretty amazing." Then her vicious smile vanished all of a sudden, gave way to a frown. "Are you sure you're alright? You're as pale as a ghost."
Only now David noticed the dizziness spreading in his head, accompanied by his legs going weak. His face felt hot and cold at the same time, and black dots started to form before his eyes. "I-", he started to say, but there the Snow White was already at his side, supporting him and gently pulling him down to the ground, which instantly made him feel better.
"Put your legs up.", she said, but he waved it off.
"I'm fine, I..." He took a deep breath, rubbing his eyes. If this was really a dream, the woman might be gone when he opened them again. The prospect relieved him a little... after all he almost fainted in front of her. Fainted! Gosh, that was so embarrassing! "I'm sorry...", he murmured, sheepishly looking up at her again.
"What for?"
"That was... I swear I usually don't faint..."
She smiled softly. "I know, silly. I'm part of your subconscious mind, remember?"
"So... so this is a dream?"
"Of course it is."
"Then... then I can do whatever I want?"
"Sure. Well, at least until you reach the next slow-wave sleep pha-" David leant forward to kiss her, so she quickly held the aerosol in her hand up to his face and sprayed, whereupon he slumped down immediately. "-aaaand there's it coming already!"
As cautious as can be, Victoria leant him back against the wall, paused for a second to check if the anaesthetic didn't show any unexpected repercussions and, then, turned to Harry. "That was exceptionally close, wasn't it?", she sighed, rummaging about the boy's pockets. "That's the... What? The fourth time that happened already? I don't get it; why do they all want to kiss a dream figure?" From the corner of her eye, she saw Harry cock his head, making her glare at him. "I don't do that! Stop looking at me like that!" He didn't, though, just kept communicating with her through stares. "It happened one single time and- Oh, shut up..." Her hand found the wallet it had been looking for, which, fortunately, even contained a driver's licence, making time-consuming deductions of where this boy might live redundant... the whole drag-to-the-car action, on the other hand, not.
"The down sides of being a secret hero...", Victoria whispered and buckled down to work.
6th October, 1999. The newspaper's content had been the primary reason why she'd halted at this kiosk, though, the date now struck her before anything else did. After all it was the proof that it had indeed already been a month since she'd been turned down by Kingsman, a month since her breakdown in front of their shopwindow and a month since her decision to do a Kingsman's deeds nonetheless. Well, to some degree at least. She did satisfy most criteria to do so: she's got the skills, the attitude, the armour, the weapon and a partner for more complex situations.
Judging from the look on his brown spotted dog face back when she'd umboxed Galahad's gift, his association with it had been akin to hers: A Kingsman suit must be worn by a Kingsman. Thus, it was her responsibility to play this part. Everything else would dishonour this extraordinary piece of fashion, wouldn't it?
The first time she'd worn it, she'd confined herself to patrolling through lesser pleasant districts of London in hopes of catching some ordinary criminals in the act, since, even though she might be equipped like a Kingsman, she was far from being as coordinated. More than once had she considered tracking Alasdair down after all, making him use his brilliancy and technical affinity to become her personal Merlin. Oh, what a team they'd form! Him, the master of information and coordination, and her, the knight who executed most dangerous missions. Together they'd be virtually invincible, not official but truly worthy Kingsmen... However, she wouldn't search him out. If he wanted to see her, he'd gotten in touch with her by now. But, as it seemed, he still needed space and time, understandibly so, and Victoria wouldn't interfere with that. So, for the time being, she would work alone... save her animal partner.
Harry was still a young dog, not fully grown, yet he'd already proved so valuable a companion that Victoria barely went anywhere without him. His incredible speed had been what stopped the last of the burglers they'd prevented from robbing the house of a family that was on holiday; his good nose had been what eventually led them to that small drug ring's leader; and his bite force had been what kept one of those hooligans yesterday away from her... and what made it into the papers.
"Look, Harry,", Victoria whispered, crouching down to show him the short article with the heading 'Fans in Hospital'. "his hand needed twenty stitches. They reported having been attacked by a group of the other team's fans and their pit bull." As reply he growled, which made her pat his head with a smile. "Yes, I know. No pit bull could ever be a patch on you." Handing a pound to the saleswoman, she tucked the rolled-up paper in the waistband of her running pants, put Alasdair's headphones back on and, to the rhythm of Whitesnake's Here I Go Again, the two of them continued their run.
As strange as this city and its habitants had appeared upon her return, now Victoria felt like she had settled back in. As she was jogging down her usual route, she delighted in every detail of those familiar surroundings with a soft smile on her face, sunlit old buildings, golden trees in small parks, ordinary people who would never guess her to be a trained spy, just like those in the gym she'd signed up for. The faces they made when she first particupated in martial arts training had been so pricelessly hilarious!
Yes, it just felt good to be back, especially with carrying out her new profession, though, it was doubtful if it could actually be called like that with that little money she earned through bounties. Since she still aspired to be a spy, she naturally never let herself be the one to deliver the wanted persons she found, but hired some random scapegoat every time for half of the mostly tenous bounty. After all, a lady's name as well as a gentleman's should not appear in the papers more than thrice. Thus, as bounty hunting in London exclusively didn't pay a living, she'd still have to come up with an idea how to make use of her skills properly. For today, however, Victoria was more than content with knowing that somewhere there was a boy named David going about his business, thinking about this peculiar dream he'd had last night.
Mouthing the lyrics to the song, Victoria entered her brothers' apartment hopping from one foot to the other, as she was still full of energy. After months of extensive Kingsman training, two hours in the gym and one hour of running felt like a visit to a spa, even though the maximum sleep time she could gain was five hours a day. Restrained laughter coming from the living room eventually made her calm down, though, and curiously go after the cause that lay behind it.
She found her brothers jammed together in front of a computer screen, giggling away like school girls.
"What's so funny?", Victoria asked, not able to avoid grinning too.
In an instant they had their slightly widened eyes directed at her and one finger to their mouths, silently ordering her to stay quiet while beckoning her over to see for herself what caused their amusement.
The screen was showing a relatively spacious and modern looking office furnitured with two desks, a broad shelf filled with files and electronical devices and a white board, and in the middle of it stood a charlady wearing the most perplexed expression on her face.
"Look!", Charlie whispered, then pushed a button on the key board in front of him and spoke into the microphone next to it: "Want to play?"
The middle-aged woman winced, looking around in confusion, then checked under one of the desks, just to end up looking around again, which made Victoria's brothers burst out laughing. Shaking, Nick held up his index finger, which carried a tiny grey thing on its tip.
"We were developing this mini-speaker/-microphone for months now, you know, for journalists, politicians and the police, and now we wanted to test it, and, oh boy, it's so mUCH FUN!" The two young men kept laughing so hard, they had to clutch to their belly, whereas Victoria just put her arms to her hips, scowling.
"That's mean!", she said. And useful, she thought.
So many new possibilities regarding crime fighting could present themselves, in case she managed to smuggle such a device into a police station, or even better, into the office of some high ranked MI6 agent, or... even better...
"No, it's fun!", Nick insisted, gesturing towards the microphone Charlie had spoken into earlier. "Here, try for yourself!"
Victoria hesitated before leaning over. Her brothers fell quiet again and Charlie pressed the same button as before. In the creepiest low pitched voice she had to offer, Victoria breathed: "... You missed a spot."
The lady jumped with fright and ran out, screaming, leaving the Norwood family cracking up.
Brood parasites was what teachers in school had taught them as a term related to cuckoos. Laying their eggs in other birds' nests, they saved labour in a way Victoria thought herself unable to make use of. However, she'd be a fool if she wouldn't grasp the opportunity of letting Kingsman unknowingly provide her with information about criminals, which placing this mini-microphone in some hidden spot in their headquarters above the Kingsman shop in Savile Row most definitely entailed. As close observation revealed now, though, this constituted a fairly difficult task.
Naturally, it wasn't as secured as the fortress their headquarters in the countryside had posed - after all, one of Kingsman's premises was that noone expected super-trained spies in a tailor shop - and yet Victoria spotted hidden cameras everywhere around Savile Row, especially beneath the windows of that room with the not so 'Round Table' Galahad had led her into during her first meeting with Arthur. This was due to there not being any motion detectors affixed to them as it was the case with every other potential entrance here, probably because of practical reasons. Otherwise, they'd constantly have to turn the sensors off in summer when they wanted to let some fresh air in, wouldn't they?
Anyway, Victoria had to find another way in, since manipulating the cameras in any way, which Merlin would surely be able to realise in a matter of seconds, would raise too much suspicion within Kingsman, and now that she was actually not monitored anymore - it had stopped after a mere week, indicating a flattering level of trust... or Galahad's urging perhaps - Victoria certainly didn't want to lose this kind of freedom again. Besides, they may not even spare her just because she was known to them, but probably treat her like any other intruder... a surely not desirable treatment. So, no to direct exposure to cameras, which left her with only one highly risky, but reasonable option.
Pulling her cap down low into her face - even though that might not even be necessary now that it was pitchest night and she was wearing that blond wig and contour-changing makeup - Victoria stood in front of Kingsman & Sons with the group of small-time crooks she'd recently befriended for this purpose.
"I still don't get it.", one of the group of seven, including Victoria, raised an objection to what felt like the twentieth time, which really started to get on Victoria's nerves. "Why don't we just rob that jeweller? I mean, this is a fucking tailor! What are we supposed to get from a tailor?"
Victoria sighed. "I already told you, stupid, they got jewelry in there too, but the suits are worth much more. The black market's full of people buying stuff they believe their favourite star wore on a premier or somethin'. Besides, robbing a tailor is surely much easier than a jeweller, I mean, they're not expecting anyone to do that-"
"Because it's dumb..."
"- because noone's done it before, stupid. I mean, they surely got some fancy alarm system, but not the same jewellers have. We just have to be quick."
The leader of the group, a beanpole of a man, grinned down at her. "Told ya the girl's smart. Alright, you and you keep watch. Shout when the cops're coming. You others grab whatever you can, as fast as you can, you get me?"
Everyone gave him a nod, whereupon they already got into position, two of them at one end of Savile Row each, the others up the stairs at the entrance door. Uneasiness krept into Victoria's mind at the sight of the leader producing a crowbar from his gym bag, though, she swallowed it down, concentrated on her goal. With both hands wrapped around it, he held the crowbar up, and then drove it between door and wall with such force that it didn't need much more to crack it open. Right at the contact a shrill sound rang out, which seemed to be even louder inside the shop.
"Quick, quick, quick!", the leader shouted over it, as he and his colleagues frantically packed everything that was not nailed down into their bags, not noticing Victoria scurrying past them.
She ran up the stairs at the back of the room, down the corridor to the large double door, where she knelt down, taking two hairpins from her wig to pick the lock. It took her two seconds longer than it normally did, but eventually there was a *click* and the doors swung open.
The usually forest green walls shone in a silvery grey from the moonlight streaming through the windows on the left, which still left much to be desired in illuminating the rest of the room. Mere silhouettes of the dressers and the objects placed on them were discernible in the blackness of the night, the large mahogany table in the middle lightly shimmering on the side facing the windows, while the other just formed a great black spot stretching from entrance to the far back of the room, which was exactly where Victoria was heading now.
As innovative as her brother's mini-mic was in size, its radius of recording was rather small, meaning that she had to place it somewhere near to where information was being uttered and where else but around Arthur would that be more the case? Crouching down, Victoria cautiously placed the tiny device at the bottom of the backmost chair, when suddenly shouting drowned the alarm signal, not of the two watchers. No, it was the others downstairs, shouting and screaming across each other as if being caught, as if being attacked, as if... a Kingsman had just arrived through the underground transport system.
Victoria cursed, finished affixing the mic and hurried towards one of the windows to scram before the agent could find her up here. She cursed again upon finding it locked. The sound of rapid steps on the stairs outside kept her from picking it. He was coming.
What should she do now? Where should she go? Should she smash the window? Should she face him, escape him? She was quick but Kingsmen were too.
Steps in the corridor. Victoria ran to the chimney opposite the windows, jumped up inside it, spread her limbs and like this she held herself above the ground, hopefully invisible for the eyes of the man entering.
He audibly lowered his pace, crept through the room in a soft-footed manner. Even with her extraordinary perception skills it was hard to tell where he was exactly, especially since she needed to concentrate on making her breathing inaudible, which was virtually impossible considering the supreme efforts she was making.
Her own weight pulled on her arms, her muscles began to tremble from extreme tension. Her whole body was screaming at her to at least change the position, maybe with her back against the brick wall, but she couldn't do that. Not without attracting the Kingsman's attention... who stepped right in front of the chimney now.
Victoria ground her teeth, stared down at the man's shoes, mentally preparing for seeing a face appear there as well. Whoever it belonged to - irregardless of whether that was someone wonderful such as Galahad - she'd have to kick at it, buy herself time to dart past him, destroy the window and finally escape.
But the face never came. Instead there was the faint sound of police sirens, making the Kingsman pause for the blink of an eye, then he hastened back the way he'd come from. Only when she heard him hurrying down the stairs, Victoria slowly let herself down.
She allowed herself one quiet groan, a short but deserved break for her arms. Rubbing her face, she eventually pulled herself back together, sneaked to the window and picked the lock. Before she climbed out, she drew her cap down low over her face again. Unlike the mini-mic under Arthur's seat, the cameras in this alley would catch little to no information about her.