A/N Thank you for reading, it is going to get complicated, but if you stick with it, it should all come together in the end :)
Enjoy!
Taking the helicopter to Amsterdam, then the private jet to Alexandria, Egypt, put Eve at a total travel time of around eight hours. That gave her plenty of time to sleep, stare at the tracker, and plan out what she was going to do when she saw her assassin again.
Should she slap her for putting her through all of this pain and for disobeying her? Or should she kiss her, because she really did miss her? Maybe she shouldn't do either, she could demand an explanation of why she went through all of the trouble if she just wanted her to find her anyways. Eve didn't know what she should do, but she thought about every possible combination of events.
In the rest of her time when she wasn't sleeping and she wasn't imagining kissing or slapping her assassin, she was considering why Egypt of all places, she knew her assassin didn't speak Arabic.
Eventually, the moment arrived and Eve was out of time to imagine. Following the tracker on her phone, she took a taxi to within a few hundred yards. She half expected to walk into one of these buildings and see her assassin waiting for her with that smirk on her face. At the same time, she was still wary of the whole situation, and she was upset that her assassin had made her feel this way, that she had so much power over her, and that she flew all the way out here to find her. That thought just angered her, and Eve was sure as soon as she saw her she was going to slap her so hard.
Stopping in front of a pawn shop in a touristy area, she knew this had to be the place. Eve braced herself mentally for seeing her again as she pulled open the door. Her heart immediately sank when she saw the small store was empty except for the man working behind the counter. Not deterred though, she walked further in, looking across all of the merchandise. It was not very big and the alls were covered in various framed photos and posters and other artifacts that were for sale.
Her breath caught in her throat when sitting in one of the glass cases was the shiny little red earring she had flown partway across the globe for, and her assassin was clearly nowhere near it.
"Can I help you?" The man asked.
"Yes, I'd like to see this earring please," She pointed to it. He nodded and set it on the glass counter. "Do you have the other half of the set?" She knew he didn't but she had to ask.
"No, I'm afraid not,"
Eve examined it closely. There was no mistake, this was the one. "May I ask where you got it? It is gorgeous,"
"A scruffy-looking guy came in here with it this morning. It was odd, didn't seem like the type that could afford such a pretty thing,"
"You mean you think he stole it?!"
Eve wasn't stupid, she knew if some man came in with this, obviously, he stole it. The only explanation Eve could come up with was that her assassin really was dead, and whoever this man was, killed her for her earrings. It was a stretch, but whoever was capable of killing her assassin, was likely also more than capable of robbing the cop who had showed her it. Killed for a pair of earrings. Eve could barely fathom how it went down. He must have caught her off guard or shot her from behind without even giving her a chance to defend herself. She felt sick. None of this would have happened if their damn plane hadn't crashed.
Something clicked just then. If they hadn't crashed her assassin would still be alive. Eight had told her Two could have been behind it. If that was true, Two killed her assassin. She would not stand by and let him get away with it.
"I'll take it," She said hastily, voice cracking. She had places to be and people to kill. She threw some money on the counter. "Thanks for your help," She said over her shoulder as she left.
Eve got in a taxi back to the airport and was back on the plane headed for Paris within the hour. The flight felt longer than the first one. With the information confirming that her assassin was truly dead, she spent most of the time crying and feeling sorry for herself. When she wasn't doing either of those things though, she was plotting what she was going to do with Two. She couldn't let anyone know it was her, but she didn't see a way she could let him live. He had caused her too much pain both physically and emotionally, not to mention he put the mission at risk.
When Eve landed in Paris at 4 am she didn't bother to book herself a place to stay. She couldn't have any record of her being there so she went to the one place she knew of that would be both safe and available, her assassin's old apartment.
Walking in she recalled when she walked through there the first time, she remembered when they first met. The whole place smelled like her, and nothing had changed from the last time she had been there. Eve let herself collapse from grief and exhaustion on her assassin's bed.
The next morning, or afternoon rather, since she did not wake up until much after 1 pm, she just laid around and looked through her assassin's place. Eve got another call from her associate in Greece who was still stating that they had come up empty again and there was nothing about an earring and nothing logged in by the police officer. She commanded them to send her everything they had on that officer but she was becoming increasingly frustrated by their incompetence, surely there was some information somewhere.
Soon enough, 5 pm rolled around and she got ready to go. Still being injured made it incredibly difficult, but she still managed to put on a nice dress. It was missing something though when she looked in the mirror. The only jewelry she had, had belonged to her assassin. Eve didn't feel like any was more fitting than the blood-red set she had gifted her. Even though she didn't have the earrings to match, she still put on the necklace. It didn't entirely match with the bracelet her assassin had given her, but that didn't matter to her, she couldn't fathom taking either off.
Perfect, she thought, as she secured the necklace and glanced at herself once more before she left.
The whole way there she contemplated what she was going to do with this man until she finally arrived outside the door to his penthouse. She managed to control herself enough to not pound the door down and instead calmly rang the doorbell.
"Eve?" Two said wide-eyed when he saw her standing there expectantly.
"Hello, Two," Eve said with false sweetness. "We need to talk,"
"Come in then," Two opened the door for her. "Wine?" He offered her as she took a seat on his couch.
"Why not," She accepted the glass and watched him carefully as he sat down in a chair across from her.
"So, to what do I owe the pleasure of your company on this fine evening?"
"Oh I think you know," She said flatly. "We need to discuss what really happened to my plane,"
He almost choked on his wine but smirked. "I may know something about that,"
"Oh, and what is it that you know?" She questioned, now avoiding drinking her wine.
He stood and walked around the room. "You might not be aware, but I've grown exceedingly tired of One's leadership. Let's just say the loss of his son in the crash has not done him any favors, in terms of his ability to make decisions that is."
"What are you talking about?" Eve eyed him cautiously.
"I thought it would be a good idea to put his son on as one of the pilots for your flight," He shrugged. "How was I to know it was going to crash? It's such a shame, about him, about Villanelle, about the other assets. The whole thing is just such. A. Shame."
The way he said her name made Eve grit her teeth. "Did you have any part in making the plane crash?"
"Do you know how utterly insane you sound?" He waved her off flippantly.
"You will answer me, damn it, did you have a hand in making the plane crash?!" Eve slammed her fist on the coffee table and shot to her feet in rage.
Before he even spoke, the look he gave her instantly told her that Eight was telling the truth. "When you say it like that, maybe I did,"
That was the last thing she needed to hear. She was overcome with blinding fury, but she somehow resisted the urge to kill him right then and there because she needed to know more. "Why?"
"Look, you can join me. We can take One out of the equation. I just need you to do something for me, and you'll be my number two," He tried to persuade her. "The crash didn't go according to our plan,"
"Oh no, poor you, how was it supposed to go, you dick?!" Eve spat. "I could have died!"
"And that would have been a tragedy for the organization," He tried to sound sympathetic but Eve didn't buy it for a second. "I need the mission to fail. The crash was supposed to render the mission impossible, I did not count on as many of the assets surviving. That's where you can help me though, order them to stand down, or somehow stop them from completing the mission,"
"I see how it will help you, but how would that help me?" Eve growled and continued to glare daggers at him.
"I would know it was not your incompetence that prevented the mission from occurring, and like I said, you would be my number two. I could trust you," He explained.
"I don't think that's going to work for me," She pulled out her gun now and trained it on him.
"Woah woah, Eve, let's not get crazy here," He took a hesitant step back from her.
"The only crazy one here is you, crashing my plane with me and our top assets aboard, purposely killing One's son in the process, and putting our entire organization at risk, all so you could grab a little power!" She stalked up to him and shot him twice point-blank in the chest sending him stumbling to the floor. He cried out in pain but she had no sympathy for him as the blood began to stain his shirt. "Not to mention you got my girlfriend killed, asshole!" She shot him five more times in the chest before her gun was empty and she was left standing over him covered in blood splatter.
Eve was out of breath, and she really was feeling the pain in her side from all of her rapid movements. She knew she couldn't stay much longer. She washed as much of the blood off of herself as she could and left, careful not to step in any of the pooling puddles of blood that oozed from her ex-coworker's corpse.
She could have easily hopped on a helicopter and made it back to the training facility that evening, but she couldn't pass up the chance to stay one more night in her assassin's bed; as close to her as she would ever be able to get again. Once she got back to her assassin's apartment she was still in a state of heightened energy and needed someone to talk to. She let herself fall back on her assassin's bed and called the only person she knew she could still trust. Laura.
The phone connected after two rings. "Eve, are you alright?"
"I killed him," Eve stated tiredly, rolling onto her side.
"Who?" Laura's voice was concerned.
"Two," She probably should have been more careful with this information, but at the moment, she couldn't bring herself to care.
"Why?"
"He is the reason she is dead. He caused the plane crash," Eve looked at her bracelet, toying with it with her free hand.
"Oh my god,"
"Inform the others that I will be back at the facility to oversee the rest of the mission tomorrow afternoon," She hung up and sighed in a mixture of pain and exhaustion and tried to fall asleep surrounded by all things Villanelle. How she wished she was there. Eve couldn't help but cry herself to sleep while holding one of her assassin's sweaters close to her.
"I've done it," Eight announced to his group of supporters: Six, Seven, Ten, Eleven, and Twelve. "I would like to let you know that everything is going according to plan and I have kept my word. Three is under my control and Two is out of the equation, just as I promised,"
"I can't believe she went through with it," Ten shook her head.
"As I told you all, she is easy to manipulate," Eight boasted.
"Bravo," Eleven clapped his hands. "What is the next step then?"
Eight grinned. "Next, we vote out One, and vote Eve in,"
The rest of them nodded in support.
A/N Thanks for reading!