A/N Thanks for the kind reviews! Also thanks to my creative consultant (aka my girlfriend) for all of her help and ideas! I hope you enjoy!
Eve just sat and stared at the little note for several minutes. Glancing at the jewelry, she noticed that the earrings were missing. Immediately she went to track them, but the results were less than helpful. The map showed one as only a few hundred yards away from the warehouse and coming toward her. The other was unmoving at a building almost two miles away. That didn't make any sense, she assumed the assassin just dropped one but had ultimately decided to come back.
She decided to meet her at the door. This whole leaving in the middle of the night was not funny and it was unacceptable. After clumsily coming to stand and getting over the initial rush of pain she managed to put on some new clothes and she trudged slowly to the main door of the warehouse.
"I swear to god, you are..." She began yelling as she pulled open the door expecting to see the assassin, but the rest of her words died on her lips as she was greeted by a police officer.
To say she was shocked would be a gross understatement. "Officer?" She knew some amount of greek, hopefully, it would be enough to get by.
"Hello, ma'am, I am here to inquire about an ongoing investigation regarding an incident that took place this morning," He spoke gruffly.
"What happened?" She had a very bad feeling about this, and her mind was calculating how fast she could get the crew over here the burn the building. She could not have the police snooping around here.
"A young woman, above average height, long blonde hair, grey eyes, wearing this," He produced a plastic bag containing the earring and she froze. "She was gunned down in the street, would you know anything about it?"
"No, why would I know anything about that?! There are thousands of people in this city," She got a little defensive. Her thoughts left what to do about the building itself and now focused on how this could have happened. How could her assassin be gone for real and it wasn't just a lie she had told her coworkers anymore. If it proved anything, it confirmed Eight's theory that someone else in the Twelve wanted this mission to fail and wanted them all dead.
"No need to get upset ma'am, if you didn't know her," The police officer continued, interrupting her thoughts.
"Why are you asking me?"
"I'm just asking everyone along the street to see if anyone saw anything or knew who she was. She had no identification on her," He responded evenly. "What kind of operation do you have going on here anyway?"
"Renovations, my company has owned this building for a long time and we finally want to put it to use. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get back to it, sorry I couldn't be of more help, have a good day," As soon as the officer bid her farewell, she shut the door and leaned against it.
She looked up the location of the other earring once again, she didn't want to believe what the officer had told her. A quick, stress-filled search gave her the results she never wanted to see. The local morgue. She sank to the floor, even as painful as it was for her, but her legs couldn't support her anymore. "Fuck," she yelled louder than she intended into the emptiness of the building, but she didn't have the mental capacity to care. She was completely alone now. She couldn't get her head around how the hell this happened? Was it a random attack? Was it a targetted hit? Her assassin was so smart and so quick, she should have been better than that. Granted the broken arm would have slowed her a little, but she should have been able to fend off pretty much anyone. Eve sat there for several minutes, just crying and thinking about things she should have done differently with her assassin when she had the chance. Whoever did that was going to pay severely for this, and she was not going to let it go until she figured out who had taken her assassin from her. She wouldn't figure it out sitting there on the floor though, so she wiped off her eyes and painfully pushed herself off the ground.
The whole rest of the morning was a struggle, but she forced herself to focus, otherwise nothing would get done and she would never get justice for her assassin.
She made several calls to cleaning crews and she was boarding a private plane by the early afternoon. It was a horribly unpleasant flight, but at least she wasn't completely alone. She had dragged one of the doctors along in case something happened.
The doctor she brought had initially warned her again about traveling with injuries like this but she ignored him and told him to just sit there and shut up. She was not in the mood to deal with anything or anyone. His name was Adrian, and he was better looking than Niko and a little younger too. He was tallish with dirty blonde hair and had a slim physique. She ignored him mostly, but he was able to help her get around easier than if she would have been completely by herself, so for that, she was grateful.
Had she been awake for the plane crash, the ride would have been even more excruciating. Thankfully that wasn't the case, but it was still a little unsettling. She wondered how her assassin would have been if she had been on that plane with her instead of dead on that cold hard table. She would have liked to imagine that her assassin would have had a harder time getting on a plane than her.
The flight was relatively long, taking them to Denmark, where they met up with three other associates. Organizing all the logistics and plans for what she was going to do next kept her mind mostly off the loss of her assassin.
After that brief stop, they all boarded a helicopter that would take them all to the prep facility out in the North Sea. Two of their new companions were trainers to prepare the assets for the mission, which Eve was even less sure about now, and the third was one of their psychologists that was going to evaluate each of them for their mental stability.
Upon arriving, Eve briefed the trainers and went off to find Konstantin.
"Where is she?" He asked in his thick accent when she finally found him watching Xenon and Laura sparring through a window.
"Dead," Eve clenched her jaw and leaned heavily on her cane.
"Dead, are you sure?" He narrowed his eyes at her, but she just hobbled around him so she could look through the window into the gun range on the other side of the room. Keres was firing off near-silent rounds down the range, obliterating the dummy targets.
"I'm pretty fucking sure. Do not question me!" She said roughly.
He just nodded slowly. "That's unfortunate, she was good,"
Eve sighed frustratedly. "Yes, I know that. Which is why I can't deal with it right now, there are other things to take care of first,"
"I've got this under control if you need to go," He offered carefully, but Eve glared at him.
"No, you don't. The real trainers are here now, you and I are leaving in the morning," She pulled open the door and left him to follow along after her. As they approached the two fighters, it appeared as though Xenon had Laura beat, but at the last moment, she made a quick move that flipped them over pinning him to the floor. "Good, that's enough," Eve nodded in approval. "Get Keres," She said over her shoulder to Konstantin.
Xenon and Laura, both out of breath, came to stand by her.
Eve saw Laura was about to speak but Keres cut her off.
"News on the mission?" Keres questioned as she walked up to them along with Konstantin.
"Make sure the helicopter is fueled up and see to it that my doctor is comfortable until our departure tomorrow," She commanded to Konstantin.
"You need a new assistant," Konstantin grumbled.
"Oh, I think you'll do for now," Eve retorted as he walked away. "Right then, all is going well then?" She looked across all three of them. They all looked tired, but Xenon and Laura looked more so. "Xenon?"
He nodded in affirmation. "As well as it could be, since we don't know what we're doing here," He spoke gruffly.
"In due time, you still have about a week and a half before the mission, and the trainers are here to help you prepare," She paused. "What about you two? Laura? Keres?"
"Fine," Laura said shortly, crossing her arms.
"I'm with him, I'd feel better if I knew what we were doing," Keres stated unhappily.
Eve turned on her, taking a step toward her. "If you really want to be the best in this business, you will do more to remember your place," Eve hissed. "You will get as much information as you need, when you need it, and not a moment before! You get paid not to ask questions, is that clear?!"
"Yes ma'am," Keres responded a little taken aback.
"Great, anything else?" Eve looked across their faces once more.
All three of them shook their heads.
Eve brought the trainers in who then ordered them to spar some more in different combinations, then to do another hour's worth of target practice before allowing them to stop for the evening.
Eve had watched them for a while, but she already knew how good Xenon and Keres were. The one she was most worried about was Laura, as she had been out of practice for so long. Being her bodyguard was a pretty easy job and didn't involve too much action.
Towards the end, she left them alone to finish up and made her way around the facility to find some dinner. Afterward, Adrian had changed the bandages on her wounds, and she found a comfortable seat in the dining area to read in an effort to forget after the hellish day she had.
Xenon and Keres had both ventured to grab a quick bite before retiring for the evening, but Laura had yet to make an appearance. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed someone walking slowly up to her.
"Good evening," She greeted the younger woman and set down her book. She motioned to the seat across from her after Laura heated up some food.
"Still hurts I imagine?" She spoke softly to her boss.
"Like a bitch," Eve laughed. "And the bastard said I couldn't drink,"
"Sorry about that," Laura looked a little uncomfortable. "So…"
"She's gone, Laura," Eve said grimly, knowing the question before the younger woman even asked.
Laura just looked at her. "What do you mean gone? Why do you say it like that?!"
"I'm sorry, she's dead,"
Laura shook her head. "No, no no no, she can't be, what happened?!"
Eve felt bad for her but worse for herself. She knew Laura had loved the assassin once upon a time, and she knew it would not be easy news to process. She, herself, barely believed it. "I don't know what happened," She explained her talk with the police and Laura just listened.
"So what now?"
"The mission goes ahead as planned but I need you to take more precautions in light of everything,"
"Why me?"
"You've worked with me directly for several years now, you and...Vill...were the only ones I could trust, now I only have you, so I need you to report to me if either Xenon or Keres do anything suspicious during the rest of your training up until the mission, anything at all, I want to know about it,"
Laura looked at her skeptically. "What does this have to do with...her?"
"Yesterday, I got a visitor...someone high ranking but not more so than myself, but he suggested that the plane was sabotaged by someone else. It is unknown who it was and who helped them," She paused and leaned back. "Anyways, she wasn't there at the time, I may have given him the impression that she did not survive the crash. When she came back she wasn't happy about it, but we watched a movie, went to sleep and she was gone this morning when I woke up,"
Laura pondered that information for a minute. "And she wasn't kidnapped?"
Eve laughed humorlessly. "Right, why didn't I think of that, except she left this," She pulled out the note. "She definitely wrote this herself,"
"So what are you going to do?" Laura asked as she inspected the small piece of paper.
"I made some calls and I have people on the inside of the investigation in Greece, but I have other things to deal with first," She explained.
"Don't you think you need to know what happened to her?!" Laura raised an eyebrow at her. Eve knew it was only because they'd known each other for so long that she had dared to ask that.
"Yes, but there are more pressing matters,"
"Will you be able to resolve these matters without knowing what happened?" Laura got up to clean up her dishes. She returned with two cups of tea after a few minutes, allowing Eve a moment to think about her answer.
"What was that supposed to mean?" Eve took the cup offered to her.
"If another council member is behind all of these things, wouldn't it be beneficial to know why when you confront them?" Laura paused to take a sip of the hot liquid.
"Ugh, fine. When did you get so talkative?!" Eve scoffed.
Laura just shrugged again before she got up. She put a hand on Eve's shoulder. "I'm sorry, I know you really cared about her. So did I,"
Eve nodded but she didn't respond.
Eve was alone again sitting in silence with a book she didn't want to read and a half-empty cup of cold tea. "You asshole, why did you have to go?" She asked the empty room. Exhausted from keeping herself composed in front of everyone, she dragged herself to bed and cried until she fell into a restless sleep.
A/N Thanks for reading!