Author's Note : A lot of people guessed the places they all were at were important for more than just Checkerface being a dick, even if Sonya's and Lal's was the only obvious one. I'm impressed, or at least bewildered, how few of you needed the hints to figure that much out.
Russian Roulette : Second Chamber
Chapter 65
(Saturday the 6th of November, 1971 continued. Cape Town, Western Cape, Republic of South Africa, Africa.)
Verde returned to the already impatient hitman as quickly as he could with as most of the dusty earth wiped off his form as physically possible with a wetted cloth and a borrowed comb, only to stall in the living room of an African home at the sight of the Mafioso carefully paging through what looked to be a family photo album. "Reborn?"
It was bizarrely incongruous, a dirty Mafioso regarding a photo album not his own in a well-kept living room of an unknown family unit.
The still dirt-streaked man barely twitched an eyelid, sliding one of many pictures out of the plastic sheets provided to safeguard such keepsakes and letting the heavy album slap close softly in his other hand. "Done? Go clean up the dirt then while I clean up, no reason to leave an obvious sign of where we were here."
He peered at the Italian suspiciously, detecting an unknown switch in attitude he did not have all the information to understand correctly. "…do you know who lives here?"
Reborn didn't look up from the small photograph for a long moment, mouth pressed into a single harsh line. "No."
Tossing it negligently to the end table that the album was presumably taken from, the hitman brusquely strode off back past Verde to where the main residential bathroom was to likely clean up his dusty appearance to something that would not raise eyebrows in public.
Unable to quite help his curiosity, the Lightning examined the discarded object for any hints of what this strangely wistful if angry change in his 'contemporary's' behavior.
Penciled in on the back of a small professionally glossy family portrait were the names 'Marcel & Irene Arendzen and baby Carolien, December 1968'. The picture was of a redheaded very obviously Irish woman and a blonde European man, likely Dutch with that name, with a blonde baby girl wrapped in a hospital baby blanket in pale pink cradled in the presumed father's arm the equally presumed mother was gleefully cooing over.
Verde was… regretful over his curiosity for the umpteenth time. Not entirely to make the investigation worthless to immediately put out of his mind, but obviously this was not his place to poke his nose into.
He pointedly reopened the album to slot the picture back to where it should've been, then went to see about sweeping up the dirt still getting tracked everywhere in a home with a young child present.
…obviously, the hitman was lying. About what was beyond his limited information currently but given Verde's past romantic entanglements… only one of which ended satisfactory, he wouldn't be asking.
He did not believe he would like to belatedly realize he had broken into an ex-girlfriend's home she shared with a husband and child either. He didn't know how the hitman and the woman in the photograph had parted ways, and all the regrets this realization might have dredged to the surface.
He could afford to give the other man some privacy in it, whatever the situation really was. They hadn't intended to be here, this was not for him to witness.
…then again, the preoccupation could've been with the man of the little family they had inadvertently trespassed upon. An old friend, or a fellow hitman?
What, exactly, both pissed Reborn off at the same time he seemed… glad?
(ooo000ooo)
(Saturday the 6th of November, 1971 continued. Unknown.)
Barely getting a moment to explain to Viper just why Luce had the front door open, the Sky was 'stolen' for her own 'one-on-one' with Checker Face. That she was aware of it was unusual instead of merely being 'returned' after some hours of a refreshing nap, but not entirely unexpected for what could be.
Not the best sign, but not a bad one. It was always possible, but a sign something was drifting off course a little too far for what must be done. Kind of unfortunate, after the scare earlier she could've done with a nice nap.
A theme to recent events. Nothing ever quite worked out for the best, despite her best efforts. Then again, she had so little time with the others to order things within now that the number of Arcobaleno candidates was established as a fixed point in time instead of a fulcrum upon which it swung on.
Kind of. The Rains… well. The Rains of this Era were always going to be a handful, even when they were trying to be helpful.
With a wry shake of her head as she shifted gears to account for a surprisingly long-odds face-to-face meeting she hadn't expected to occur, she regarded the ancient and powerful but exhausted Mist posing as something fundamentally different yet still true to his real self. "Enjoying yourself, Uncle Kawahira?"
"Immensely." Breezily batted away the figure even as his disguise evaporated off his form in a swirl of white and black licks of Mist Flames, rearranging their surroundings from a murky twilight nowhere particular to a vaguely Oriental styled teahouse with strong sunlight streaming in from the glass-less windows.
An empty teahouse, faintly Japanese in function and form, with cushions to sit upon rather than more Western chairs. As close to where he really was now than what he'd show any of the others, since Japan would never be a place they would look for him in her lifetime.
Then enough time would have passed for him to nicely muddle the waters to slip away from them when they did.
"Indulge me, young Luce. I have… a few things to speak with you about."
The others were semi-suspicious of her already and he was still dedicated to what little remained of his race to offer her a warning to help her foresee her way through, she knew. However, if she did not require some hours of speaking with Checker Face the others would be even more hostile in their suspicions from this point on. Being aware of her few hours was not particularly a hardship to bear.
She shrugged instead of stating the topic herself. Investigating the two pots provided to identify which was coffee to make up for the mug he smashed separating out the more clashing of his Arcobaleno candidates took up the moments in which the two of them seated themselves across a small table intended for two.
"A limitation to Sepira's gift to your line, you can only 'foresee' what you know is of consequence and might come to be. Knowledge your future self will have is easier to 'know' and knowledge you will never know will remain out of your reach if something you are tangentially aware of is mentioned. You know all the hindsight before it becomes hindsight."
Luce jerked at the unexpected words of her childhood lessons at her father's knee, snapping her eyes up to the now white-haired true form of Kawahira. He removed the mostly just straight glass reading glasses to sit on the low table they had sat at, leaning over the image of wood to continue in that serious semi-lecturing tone.
"If you do not, or no one in any of your future visions, make clear of something you deem you must know… you will not know it, just that whatever is a concern. Then the order of likelihood of what you can foresee might then tell you what the situation is. What is unspoken goes forever unheard."
"And freewill of those involved will decide what of any possibility will come forth not directly under our family's control, I know this Uncle Kawahira…" It was why they were information brokers, to know the information at any time meant her Famiglia would always have that information.
The further out anything she attempted to foresee was, the less accurate her information could be by sheer probability of chance. Her ancestors had not bothered to look beyond their lifetimes or the first few years of the next generations for a reason, not even to possibly avoid the situation she herself was now trapped within.
Without the Sky's guiding hand continuing to echo through the turns and twists of the future, Luce wouldn't have been able to make sense of what was to come with any accuracy much less glimpse the most ideal ending for their 'Curse'. Her daughter's and her granddaughter's actions yet to be taken muddied the probabilities exponentially, but she had strained herself to at least chart out some of what was beyond her lifetime to be sure what she did in the now would not close off what could yet become.
He gave her a completely bullshit polite little smile, a halfhearted effort of an expression he didn't actually know how to give, as she poured them their individually preferred drinks in the teacups now before them both. "I now know of two topics you are unaware of completely that impact the futures you might see. One of which you couldn't focus upon without my aid anyway. Luce… I now know this will end."
She froze, shocked.
The green tea she was pouring him overflowed the cup.
"It's not for you to see." Kawahira informed her placidly, flicking a ringed finger to have the hot beverage spilling over to return to the pot. "So you will never know more than that. Your actions on my behalf… well, is half of it. And now you know there is something else afoot. You should never have exempted anything I might inform you in your search of future issues yet to be had, little Sky."
Luce jerked the little pot back upright, to at least stop the outpour. "Uncle Kawahira?"
The Ancient Mist smiled the smile of a being who had absolutely no idea how to smile reassuringly. "Do what you will, you will anyway. It changes nothing."
(ooo000ooo)
(Saturday the 6th of November, 1971 continued. Ma Fischer's, 2214 N Farwell Ave, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States of America.)
Stone Creek Coffee wasn't where it should've been, and that was a damn shame.
Neither was Bartolotta's Lake Park Bistro, which would've been her second choice. Not exactly open at this time of night/morning, but a solid second choice to appropriate the seating of.
Sonya eventually found one of Rachel's old favorite places around the campus of the University of Milwaukee-Wisconsin still open some decades before her birth, an all-night diner thankfully, and dragged Lal Mirch there to plan their next move.
Her leg was not broken. Her thigh was perfectly whole. She did not badly miscalculate how much force she had needed to cancel out what momentum they had been under and sheared her thigh bone apart under the strain of landing them safely, while she attempted things with force she had never experimented with before under duress.
There might be two perfectly formed craters of her boots in the concrete where they landed now, that she had to wrench herself out of just to leave that thrice-cursed place, but hey. Mysterious new feature, or oddly shaped pothole. Either would amuse the locals to speculate about.
It was Wisconsin. With the winters here, and the snow threatening to unload overhead to boot, those wouldn't be found until fucking spring anyway.
How the thief managed one leg right but not the other was… well, fuck. Who knew.
She was going to punch Checkerface in the damn face.
Or at least, half-assedly throw a hammer through his head. The dull, aching throb in her leg was setting her teeth on edge. Even when she was holding herself perfectly still, Cloud Voodoo was painful.
As Ma Fischer's was a twenty-four hour, seven days a week, kind of place it wasn't that odd they placed orders for breakfast and both opted for coffee. At two in the damn morning. They could now pay, at least. So there was that.
"Alright. First things first, we need to get down to Georgia."
The Italian across the little booth from her, so Sonya could stretch out her 'injured' leg down the plastic cushion to not jar accidentally, pursed her lips together. "We're going to need paperwork, right?"
"…no not really."
She lifted a finger, still confused and now actively so. "We're in a state. Right? Wisconsin you said. There's the state borders."
"What about them?"
Lal scowled at her. "We need papers to get past the borders, right? So we need to get identification somehow."
Sonya blinked at her blankly, twice. "Lal… if you're in the States, you do not require identification to get past the state borders. There are places you can go and stand in five states at once in the country. There's… no control between state lines. Everyone here just… goes where they fucking want."
She flung a hand out to where Lake Michigan was, they had passed it trying to find somewhere open and possibly 'innocent' two women would be out to do in the middle of the damn night. "This country stretches from one side of the damn continent to the other. Are you telling me once you reach the shoreline, there's nothing that keeps track of everyone moving within it?"
"Yep." Aside from census records, law enforcement spot checks, and the whole 'need identification' to work or obtain a place of residence issues. So long as one was law abiding, it actually wasn't that hard to move across the country without identification.
Which they did have, it was just Italian.
Speechless, the military woman stared at her.
"Hence why we need to reach Georgia. It's got one of the main ferry arrival and departure points for my alternate workplace there, and we can work up enough money between here and there to pay the fees for safe passage out of the country there easier than trying to find wherever the fucking terminals are here to do the same shit."
Shaking her head, as if to knock loose whatever faith in a foreign country's emigration policy she just broke into tiny pieces, Lal slumped back against the little booth they were seated in. "Okay. Okay, so. If there's terminals here… couldn't you do whatever from here?"
"Not without my island ID card, just the number won't work for smuggling people. These are more… cargo, than travel around here." Her ID card wasn't safe to have when she wasn't on Mafia Land business, but it looked to have been an oversight on her part. "We can bribe the guys in Georgia pretty easily, they'll let us kill ourselves if we really insist that way, but not the guys that work the port here."
"But we can get there easily, right?"
"Easily enough." The crux of the issue was… well, Sonya was going to be good for jack shit right now. "Lal, I know we agreed you're not exactly… fit for my line of work. But. We need a disgusting amount of money, I couldn't reach Bjǫrn or my castle staff so we have to get out of here ourselves."
"The amount you have in your pocket isn't enough?"
"It might've been for just one of us. Both? And while I'm basically reduced to being only threatening what is in my reach?"
The Rain pressed her lips together but eventually shrugged that off while straightening up to let the waitress put their orders in front of them. "You can overlook what you know better to raise the rest of the funds, sure. I'm not unwilling to be your hands right now, Sonya. You kept us from pancaking into the ground. Whatever you need, just let me know."
"That was not the brightest idea I ever had, but I'm glad it worked." Turning to the waitress working the midnight shift to feed all the college students that had late cramming sessions or research projects and forgot the time, she gave her a small smile. "This looks great, thank you."
Tired, probably seeing all kinds chattering in all sorts of languages and states since this was part of the city that had a massive local campus nearby, the greying woman just nodded as she tucked her serving tray under an arm. "Let me know if you need anything else, dear."
"How long will it take us to get to Georgia?" Lal questioned, skeptically eyeing the mugs of American coffee they got to go along with the food.
Italian, apparently the military didn't quite prevent the other woman from becoming a coffee snob.
"One very long day of driving." Thirteen hours straight down, if they made no stops or side-tours.
Which they had to do.
Sonya could get them a set of wheels, but with a broken right leg she wouldn't be driving either. "This is going to be a little more hands on than I prefer you start on."
Her companion for this 'race' of that utter fucking asshole's shot her an amused look, nibbling on a breakfast sausage as far as Americans were concerned. "Worse things could've happened instead."
"Knock on wood." Shot back the thief flatly, reaching for the little caddy of half-n-half and sugar to doctor her mug of coffee even if the woman across from her shot her a scandalized look for it.
(ooo000ooo)
(Saturday the 6th of November, 1971 continued. Saint Petersburg, Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic.)
Skull woke up and immediately wiggled his toes.
…sticky. His boots were full of blood again.
Cracking open an eye earned him a whole lot of nothing, either he was blind or in pitch dark. Knowing better than to move right now, given how bad his entire left side felt, he wondered.
A figure in the dark clicked on the bare bulb dangling from the middle of the tiny cupboard room, and Fon gave him a cautious once-over. As if the change from eye-catching bright red robes to drab worker's garb he was now wearing wasn't worth a second look. "How do you feel?"
…right.
"Ah… been better." Skull answered as honestly as he felt like, wasn't a point to bluster and try to smooth over just how ragged he was with a full-body Voodoo at work. Fon was a master martial artist, he probably knew how to break someone to his current state and just how crippling it all should be. "Where are we?"
"A… slightly abandoned off-shoot shed of a local textile factory. I could not find us a way out of the city that would allow me to carry your… ah…"
"Yeah." There were dried blood crusts in his jumpsuit, Skull got the picture. He probably had been still leaking for a bit even after passing out. "Not surprising."
A second more to just lay here, then Skull swung his upper body upright. The cracking of bone resetting itself back into place had thankfully all died down, and while it all burned and he probably had one hell of a bruise from shoulder to both fingertip and toes on that side of his body… sitting here wouldn't help shit.
They needed to get out of St. Petersburg. Out of the Soviet Union. This was his homeland. So up he got.
Fon had reacquired his poker face sometime while he was out of it, nothing aside the pinched frown stubbornly on the man's face gave any indication of his thoughts about the stuntman moving around. "I have acquired something less… destroyed, for you to wear."
"Unless you've got a bit of dye to disguise my hair, it's not really going to do us any good."
"I have located you a hat."
"That'll have to do."
Handing over the pile of cloth at his side, the assassin pointedly regarded the ceiling. "What are the odds against us? I have been cautious until I found this place, but I do not know if it was cautious enough."
"The KGB knows full well I've defected from the Soviet Union. And my coloring is hard enough to fake and rare enough that I'll be getting side-eyeing until we're free of this place." Skull started listing off, tossing the clothing to the pile of collapsed crates he woke up on and carefully reaching behind his head to start in with shucking the ruined and blood-crusted leather off him. "The Grekov Gang, the largest syndicate in the city… well. Nya and I don't have very good reputations with them. Likely, since your Triad made arrangements with a Moscow syndicate means you don't have one with anyone around here either."
"Thankfully," mused the other man a bit more than just dryly, "those unfamiliar with Asian features tend to be… less than adequate at identifying the differences between a Korean man and a Chinese man."
"If we get caught, Fon… odds are you'll either be killed or ransomed and I'll…" It wasn't likely anyone squealed enough for unrelated syndicates to know Skull couldn't be killed, but that really was only a matter of time now.
Either through the so-called 'Arcobaleno candidates', or through St. Julian's hospital staff. Hopefully he'd just get shot through the head and left there as 'dead', then be able to walk it off too.
"…well. Either faction. So let's not, okay?"
"You will hear no objections to such a plan from me." Agreed the assassin, getting up and opening the only door to fetch a metal pail containing water and a scrap of cloth that had been sitting out there. Placing a hand under the bottom, he flashed boiled the water to be hot and plopped the whole thing in the middle of the floor. "I will be outside. Join me when you are ready."
Skull might not like taking stock of himself after 'death', but given the opportunity to scrub off the pain and blood?
He'd take that immediately and without care. Even if that meant he got to 'see' just how badly off he was.
Immediately grabbing for that cloth scrap with his bruised hand, uncaring the water was still boiling hot, the other pulled the strip of black ribbon tied to his zipper that let him unzip his jumpsuit without help. It took several repeated attempts and about half the pail of water to work in enough leeway, but peeling himself out of the leather attempting to fuse with his skin via copious amounts of drying blood did happen.
Eventually.
He winded himself undressing, which probably meant he popped a lung or two smashing himself into the ground and his internal organs weren't fully working yet. The bruises basically taking up his entire left side was… grotesque. An agonizing deep purple, fading through a bluish brown to deep muddy yellow depending.
The webbing of dried blood sticking his skin to leather was only somewhat annoying to scrub off, especially over his sore left side. The heat of the water, while it lasted, was pretty damn nice for the start of a Russian winter season… even if it made his Voodooed injuries ache more.
Then he cleaned his damn boots out. Which took even more out of him by the time they were reasonably good since they had been overflowing and he didn't take them off before passing out. However his boots would trump just about any kind of footwear that could be found on this side of the Iron Curtain, and they were a birthday gift from his sisters. There was no force on the fucking earth that would get him to leave these behind.
Skull used his Flames to burn off his waterproof makeup, a lot easier to do than having to use a special chemical wash, then scrubbed the cloth over his face to be sure he was as clean as he'd get.
The clothing Fon got him wasn't exactly middle-class fare. Though the patches weren't in the worse places, and the cloth wasn't threadbare yet, and his mother would still throw it all out the moment she got him out of it. Probably off some poor factory worker's drying line, maybe he could guilt the assassin into telling him who and leave the guy some money for the trouble.
Thankfully, there was a pair of replacement socks. Small hole in the pinky toe and still as used as everything else, who cared.
They were clean.
Stomping back into his boots, bitterly regretting doing it for five full seconds, he left the 'remains' of Skull de Mort behind him as he stepped out of the little closet room. Fon had his red Triad uniform bundled up into an eye-catching bundle tucked under an arm, waiting near a bank of small windows attached to this random hallway. "Right, I'm ready."
"Hold this."
Cherep nearly dropped the cloth, since it was shoved into his weakened side. As the other man hadn't bothered closing the door behind himself, he got an eyeful of the Storm Flames applied to everything remotely bloody or red left behind. Including his stunt suit, but then again the whole fucking thing was a loss given all the holes, and the rejected pair of clunky shoes he wouldn't wear.
A hand dipping into it was all that was needed to boil the bloody water off, leaving behind a charred bit of residue that was once a stained rag. Fon had to pick up the bloody and not so bloody leather he left behind to burn it away, but then that was it for any evidence this was where the guy brought him to recover.
There was a floppy woolen mess that could be a hat, it had ear flaps too. Two of them in the bundle of red cloth in his hands now. Which was awesome because he couldn't really check to see if he got everything, and he forgot to scrub his ears.
Fon came back, accepting the bundle of his uniform thing with merely a short nod. He withdrew his own floppy false-ushanka thing and spent a second winding up his long braid to fit under it. "I am uncertain to what degree of a thief you have been trained to…"
What a great leading statement that was. "Carjacking. I'm not… great with the rest of it."
"Reduces complications to secure transport." He countered calmly as he started walking off probably to however the hell he got in here.
To a limited point, sure. Cherep didn't like stealing cars, not even when there was a good cause for it. He didn't wander around with massive amounts of money on his person to buy a set of wheels if he got caught out without one, so he'd not bitch about it.
The Storm suddenly came to a flat halt unexpectedly, so suddenly he very nearly whacked his sore side on the man's ridged back.
"There you two are!" Exclaimed a blonde, who had distinctly unfriendly brown eyes instead of neutral grey. Her almost familiar coloring did not disguise her malicious glee as she finished shoving a rolling barn door on this part of an unused half of a warehouse fully open. "The Grekov Gang sends their greetings, Cherep Bazanov."
He rolled his head to the side to address the martial artist between him and four distinctly unfriendly people advancing on them. "Your stealth sucks."
"I wear bright red." Fon countered shortly, eyeing their 'company' in sequence and very obviously plotting.
"…you have no stealth."
"With assistance, I do. Or just the simple basics. I do not require stealth." Argued the man, then shot out a palm to strike the woman square in the throat before she could interject something.
When she scrambled backwards, hands clasped over her neck, Fon darted forward to the first guy to get a gun free of his clothing to drill a knee squarely in his chest then used his unfortunate victim to roll himself right into the middle of the group confronting them.
Cherep blinked, then the two of them were the only ones left standing and the Storm was disposing of the weapons that both had and hadn't been revealed yet. "How are you an assassin without knowing how to be sneaky?"
"I do not require stealth." Insisted the other man in what really could've been exasperation, actually it might actually be exasperation. "My Mountain Master requires an inevitable assassin, not yet another 'stealth' assassin."
…he was stuck in the Soviet Union, which they had to sneak out of, with a guy who could not sneak. Great. At least he knew when to ditch the eye-catching red.
They were going to need the old man's help with this one. Lisa could get them set on a route out if they were skilled enough to make it, sure. Arseniy was the only way they'd get Sonya's best friend out without harm too.
(ooo000ooo)
(Saturday the 6th of November, 1971 continued. The Arcobaleno Manse, far outside of Farindola, Province of Pescara, Abruzzo, Italian Republic.)
Viper was charging Reborn and Sonya some three million in euros for this indignity. Separately.
Alek's escape attempts had already broken some part of the porch railing, in three places. Two windows had come afoul of Leon's overenthusiastic attempts and disinclination to remain a palm-sized lizard in her distress, the dog breaking the screens in his gleeful attempt to escape after her.
Their young hedges were ragged from a rather large dog landing on them, repeatedly.
Neither overpowered, Flame-tainted animals really knew what they were doing. Exposure to steadily burning Flames at their sides nearly at all times made them both, however 'normal' Alek started out, just a bit… more. They weren't just pets, to be protected and sheltered and valued for being 'normal'.
They were Flame user companions, who worked with the net results of Flames on or nearly daily.
A Mist-touched dog with the ability to use a pitifully limited internalized store of Cloud and Storm Flames… on himself or what might be in his way.
An already half Mist Flame chameleon with an unmistakable touch of Sun ensured they both came to no great harm.
Then the idiots decided to work together.
They would not be accepting blame for the gigantic hole in the front door. It was Alek's fault, and since the canine was not to the point of intelligently plotting out his actions… therefore it was Sonya's fault. Leon, the spiteful little enabler she was, now kept bee-lining straight for the dog whenever Viper separated the headaches knowing she'd find help there in the Cloud's companion.
Three broken fangs so far, and Alek's maw showed little actual damage from thankfully only breaking his canine teeth. The fangs regrown, the dog's ability to utterly destroy what lay between him and his mistress unaffected.
Worse yet, aside from an enthusiastic shapeshifter… the dog was trained to be stealthy. To sneak, to fake amiable acceptance of unknown attention, to fake it all until left alone to do his 'thing'.
A thief-dog.
What the bloody fuck had Sonya been thinking?
Viper was not up to feeling anything as stupid as 'fair' or 'reasonable', so the point that the thief probably likely assumed she would never be without her dog for long went unacknowledged. Reborn too likely would never have willingly given Leon up for even a short while, the lizard probably went her entire life so far with the Sun being only a meter away at best.
Even if Skull would pout at them for refusing to entertain reasonable arguments, the bill for damages and stress on the Mist was mounting still.
Finally defaulting to wrapping them both up in their own little bubbles of Mist Flame nothingness, the Mist irritably warped to the phone to answer it on the second ring. "What?"
"…problem, Viper?"
"Reborn, your stupid lizard will not calm down." Hissed the miser with every drop of aggravation they were feeling, shutting both eyes as with a pop both animals somehow magically divined a way free from them by burning almost all of their stores of their masters' power on the only arguable weak point.
The 'ground' they had been situation upon. Fuck Checkerface and his offer of teaching… they'd have to use his technique for layered Constructed temporary prisons.
No. A Construct of a bubble of anti-gravity. Therefore no platform weak point to escape through.
"For that matter, neither will Sonya's overly stubborn dog. I am charging you both for the destruction and Mist Flames required to slow them down."
"Ho? Slow, not stop?" Chirruped the asshole hitman brightly wherever the hell he was. "Delightful."
"I am charging you for your fucking mouth too!" Viper shrieked, pissed off at yet again being confined to this place even if it was better equipped for habitation this time and the man's malicious amusement at their expense.
They did not know where Skull was, or where Sonya was, or where Fon was, or even where Lal or Verde or Luce were. Their Thoughtography was useless, two upset animals to mind to not be murdered by their respective owners?
Viper was the one that knew, this unknowing was for others. The murder-thing would just be yet another way to secure their position via extracting more things of monetary value from two already lucrative contacts.
"…fine. Verde and I ended up in Cape Town, in South Africa. I can't get a hold of anyone but you, which means the others can't just call up their own associates or minions to escape where they were put." Reported the Mafioso, more to himself than the Mist which meant it was likely Verde was listening in on that end and needed that detail to be stated. "Viper, get a pot plant. Put it on the counter of the kitchen and put Leon there every time she escapes you. I'm not sure if you require a real one or if you can supply it yourself. It'll probably only work for a couple hours before she gets suspicious that I'm not just away for a little while."
Flinging a hand towards the kitchen counter, they willed a Construction of a small hydrangea bush to form and plopped the headache-inducing chameleon there instead of digging up one of their garden plants. Leon took a second to take stock of where she was now, eyes at first rapidly flicking through everything able to be peered at then more slowly, then very slowly clamped a branch between her divided feet and hung there like a sulky little lizard-shaped green fruit.
"Mou… I will knock twenty percent off the bill of damages, but you will be paying."
Reborn unceremoniously hung up on them without answering.
In an admittedly change of habit, Alek had to be the one to slink to Leon's position while shooting Viper wary looks. The dog fearlessly reared up to his hind legs to poke his nose at the chameleon once he was in range to do so, nudging the shapeshifter but thankfully the plant had Leon clinging to it instead of attempting to get a grip on Alek's short muzzle fur to clamber aboard.
Unhappy with the sudden unwillingness of his partner in crime, the dog barked.
When that failed to budge the lizard, the canine dropped back down to all fours and set his mismatched sight on the miser trying to keep him from harming himself in his attempts to find his mistress and growled lowly.
Viper rolled their eyes again, using the Ancient One's technique to repair the damages now there wouldn't be quite so much.
Constructions eventually faded, yes. The effects of Construction, where they intersected reality, didn't.
The heat used to fuse glass and metal back into their former forms was Constructed, the shape they ended up in was just as natural as their previous forms. Wood could be tricked into thinking it was still alive, then the illusion of life faded and left whole pieces of carved wood back in place as if healed. The front door required more effort than the porch railings, but Luce had opened it for a reason and Viper failed to heed that. Paint could be re-liquified, change in pigment possible via heat or the addition of extra materials found all around, then there would be no sign the animals had run roughshod all over them all morning.
Now that he wasn't quite so Storm-touched, putting the dog to sleep finally worked as instantly as it should.
Leon righted herself on her perch, one eye affixed to her erstwhile troublemaking companion and the other squarely on Viper's form. Apparently her willingness to at least wait a couple hours had been strained by dropping the canine where he stood, but not enough to get the lizard to restart her campaign of terror or reawaken the drowsy dog in a twisted form of vengeance.
Viper finally had five minutes to themself, so of course that was when that asshole Checkerface decided to drop Luce back in the manse.
The Sky looked slightly shell-shocked, teary, and on the verge of some great waterworks. Unharmed, more importantly. "Do we have any ice cream, Viper?"
"…mou, chocolate?"
"Please." Instead of taking a bowl, the woman seized the entire carton Lal bought for just in case sympathy ice cream and one spoon from Viper's Misty construct that offered the supplies. "Excuse me, I'm going to go cry."
"Have fun." Deadpanned the Mist, slightly irked that wouldn't be available for 'grabs' after the weekend.
At least Luce wasn't crying all over them.
"I will not, can not, betray my family. I'm so sorry, Viper."
They eyeballed the woman's back suspiciously, who didn't turn around from her fixed path to the staircase leading to the second floor and the bedrooms. "No one asked you to."
(ooo000ooo)
(Saturday the 6th of November, 1971 continued. Cape Town, Western Cape, Republic of South Africa, Africa.)
Verde immediately and without blinking reoffered the roll of cash he had apparently been picking pockets to get all morning. While he found a better place to establish communication with anyone. Reborn slowly took it to peel off what he'd need now they had a good idea what help they'd be getting.
Which was none.
Most of it would be going with him, but at least it wouldn't be like he was leaving Sonya's pet scientist without any help or aid whatsoever while he did what needed to be done.
"How good are you at thief-skills?"
"I was trained by thieves." Grumped the Lightning quietly, but clearly spoken enough he didn't have to strain to pick out the words over the ambient sound of the public park just a few steps away. "Neither would have wanted to be associated with me if I could not steal something with any skill. Pickpocketing is not particularly hard, merely requires some fine motor control and a discerning eye."
"And anything else?"
"…my Tutor has been forcibly and medically retired for the remaining duration of my instruction." Verde admitted slowly and unwillingly, knowing this reduced his capabilities in a way they might not be able to afford and sounding appropriately aggrieved by it. "I was… also slated for support, by my own insistence. Adrik attempted to instruct me in more universal criminal actions… before the gunshot wound to the lung that reduced his capabilities so sharply. Without a healthier instructor at hand, it was too risky to fit in on whim."
"I get the picture." Reborn resettled his fedora more firmly forward as he tossed back the much-reduced roll of local cash to the man that 'earned' it for them.
Seed money to germinate the start of any assistance they needed to escape Africa was an unexpected bonus. More help than he expected, truthfully.
However, the other man had a point. Sonya didn't have nearly as much snobbish selective opinions to her as he did for non-hitmen, even now years after they met, but she did have some. Other thieves likely could have just the same outlook on non-thieves he once did.
"Do you have one of Anna the Mirror Lady's glass baubles?"
"Even if I did, we are too far from Italy for the Mirror Lady to be able to respond. We would need to be near Egypt at best if she is to hear the ring."
So he didn't, but likely would correct that soon.
That limitation for how far out Anna could hear wasn't shocking, Mists rarely had interests that went outside of their individual expressions of Mist Flames. Viper was damn near omnipresent for being one of the few that did, of the known far-reaching ones. Unless attached to someone they deemed interesting that moved around, most Mists didn't go outside of their individual shadowy corners.
Except, apparently, both the 'dead' and 'ancient' ones.
"Are you unwilling to learn now?" Reborn pressed, half his attention on what he'd have to do to just even find a Mafia Land terminal on the wrong side of things.
This was a port city, there likely was one nearby. However, it was possible it wasn't actually the city's dockside or airport but a quieter township away instead of in Cape Town itself. There were only a few actual major hub cities that contained full terminal connections to Mafia Land, and that generally depended on the strength of the arm of whatever local criminal faction to keep them secured.
When those underground powers died or got arrested, the terminals picked up wholesale and moved themselves. Mafia Land was the only established connection, the web of airline or ferry connections shifted where they ended as needed.
"I… am not a moral man, Reborn." Verde informed him instead of directly answering that, which was mildly irritating. "I have accepted Soviet sensibilities when it comes to murder, or at least the Soviet sensibilities I have been exposed to longer. Wantonly, no. If need be, I will learn."
Discarding most of that, anyone that thought Reborn was anything but a moral Catholic either required a head shrink or a bullet, he instead batted the rest off with one hand. "Continue as you've been doing getting funds together, I need information to apply it right and that is more a thing your Tutor should cover with you."
"I do not mind."
"…Verde, we do not fuck with the rights of a Home Tutor."
"Adrik has been medically retired." Stressed the Lightning pointedly, still quietly out of respect of the fact they stopped at a public payphone and there were innocents around. "He will not protest if you require me to do something he cannot train me for. It is unfortunate, but if a correction is needed now he will acquiesce to an interloper's lessons. We have discussed this event if it ever arose, and what I should do if an opportunity happened."
He could work with that. The glaring lack was one unfortunate thing, securing a future possibility to correct it before it was ever needed was fucking delightful competence.
Sonya's idea to have Adrik pose as Verde's Mafia Home Tutor had paid off beautifully, even past the point the political side was required.
Instead of saying something to that effect, he wasn't to know how that arrangement occurred and the man was already suspiciously helpful in nature even if Reborn was the greater skilled individual between them, he instead nodded. "Continue as you have been, then. Stand near a large gathering if you think suspicion is on you, go to a bar and order a drink if you aren't sure but it could be possible, or otherwise just keep gathering whatever funds you can. I'll check on you every now and again, but I still require information we can't get by asking politely around."
He could then also figure out just what Irene was doing. His ex-girlfriend having a husband and a kid in some backwater country was strange enough, that Checkerface dumped them here exactly in her backyard…
…he was not stupid, however little he appreciated the manner of the reveal and with a witness to boot.
So that asshole decided Reborn needed to be here, it was possible it was not just to be aware a woman he once had relations with had her fairytale husband and child and the white picket fence dream come true ending.
There was no such thing in their lives, but if it was what the lady wanted regardless… then while he could never be that husband delighted to be a nine-to-five worker in some office space somewhere, he could at least let her keep the one she had.
Furthermore, Irene wasn't Reborn's ex.
Revealing a connection to Renato Sinclair in front of Verde made the hitman less than pleased, though the other man's failure to question for what reason they were here for was a surprising omission.
He didn't put it past Verde to not have suspicions, but nothing was spoken. He appreciated it, sure.
Reborn was still suspicious of such non-comment.
(ooo000ooo)
(Saturday the 6th of November, 1971 continued. Williams Bay, Wisconsin, United States of America.)
Lal folded her arms and glared. "What part of this is 'leave it to the one woman not in crippling amounts of pain'?"
Sonya flatly ignored her, breaking apart the collection of electronics she had disappeared on her to find. Somehow. In a stupid little retirement town near the Wisconsin State border, just before dawn's break, next to yet another lake, and without warning the poor Rain she suddenly abandoned.
There were a lot of lakes around here.
At the very least, with the last of the pawn shop funds and a little of what the bloody thief pickpocketed on their way out of a massive sprawling port city on the edge of a lake and the help of a sympathetic young girl who spoke Spanish on night shift, she got them a hotel room. Only until ten in the morning, but they could use the bathroom there and maybe get a bit of sleep to fit the local time of day better.
Which would've also been a nice place to lay out the injured woman. If, you know, she would lay the fuck down and stop hurting herself.
Just saying.
Now that she had a jumble of electronics spread out over her lap and park bench overlooking the damn lake Lal found her at, Sonya brought out a roll of electrical tape. "I got us a new car."
…great. Fantastic. Lal knew just enough of how to drive a car and what might go wrong to also know how to hotwire an engine to turn over and start. She couldn't get into a locked car, but she damn well would have replaced the car they were using herself if someone had mentioned it. "Sonya. Lean on me, not just to keep your weight off that leg."
She instead wrapped a bundle of wires together using the electrical tape, giving her a slightly lavender tainted steady stare instead of searching through her electrical components. "Lal, there's no reason to let you loose without even a half-assed idea of what to even do. This will let me speak to you and hear what you do, while I sit wherever you want me to sit."
A preparation to rest while she was in danger instead was easier to swallow than for any criminal-specific reason, not that Lal appreciated the lack of a heads up about it. "So what are you doing?"
"Cobbling together a functioning earpiece."
"…isn't that more of a thing the police do to catch criminals in the act?"
"I could go rob a police headquarters if you'd rather."
She plastered a hand over her face, exasperated with just… everything. "No. Why is this something you need to do now?"
"We need to get out of the area of the US that's under the thumbs of the American Dons. Quickly and without drawing attention to ourselves until we're safely far enough away. We're not really that close to New York, but Chicago and Milwaukee both are semi-notorious Mafia Dens." Sonya ripped more tape out of the roll, winding it around yet more wires to keep things contained in the bundle as she deemed fit. "And we're about to pass right by Chicago. If luck's on our side, no one will know I'm here and critically injured. Arguably unaccompanied. Or only accompanied by a loose and relatively unknown Rain. You don't know how to figure that out, I might have to coach you through it sooner than I'd like."
Lal cocked her head to the side, a creeping amount of ice starting to thread into her guts. "What do you mean by that?"
"…unlike Europe, and a whole lot of the 'old world' countries, those like you and I are pretty rare in the Americas. It seems as if our… abilities… are genetically linked to some degree. Those that know this, don't let their assets 'retire' to America. Even temporarily. For the obvious, and less so, reasons. It doesn't prevent everything, bastard children lines and all go where they can, but there's no great number of us in America."
She held up a hand, able to read between the lines of that admission and to keep her from saying the obvious reason two Flame using women would be at a disadvantage if they tried to ask around. "That's… disgusting, but I suppose that's also part of why you want us to go straight to a… island port of call than see if your reputation would get us anything from the locals."
"Oh. It'd get us something." Sonya glanced at her broken thigh, then back to her. "Not anything either of us wants to bother with, I think."
"Let's skip that."
"…the Gulf Coast won't be something we can skip, and the Dixie Mafia is trying to force themselves to their feet. Right where we're going to have to go."
Lal couldn't help the snort. "The what?"
"It might sound stupid, but so did Murder, Inc. And Murder Incorporated killed a great many people." Sonya shrugged that off, finished with her cobbled together bunch of wires to offer to her. "The Cornbread Mafia, the Wall Gang, how about the 'Circus Café Gang?' We're not known for our creative names, we're known for murder and crimes."
Thankfully she had blue hair, there'd be no way in hell they'd be able to hide the wires in Sonya's blonde mop. She didn't take it yet, because the other woman had made no promises about resting that leg of hers. "Are you ready to go sit on your ass somewhere safe yet?"
"I'm ready to move on from here."
Eyeing her severely, much to her own confusion, the Rain recrossed her arms under her chest and snorted. "No, are you ready to go take a nap Sonya? We're not going to be able to move quickly even if you make yourself ten times worse than you are, so don't. Take a load off, while we can. Stop disappearing on me and getting into shit."
The thief pondered it. "That sounds like a challenge."
"Sonya. Please. Stop moving around."
"I already put off your instruction." Countered her Mafia Home Tutor, who apparently felt bad about not being in the perfect place to uproot her entire life to give Lal some logistical help on a coin-flip. "Just because I'm-"
"Critically injured?" She cut her off pointedly, snatching the mishmash of wires and parts from her to stick in a pocket. "In a lot of pain? I said at the time I was fine if you needed time to get to me, and that still holds true to this day and in this shit situation. It's still okay."
"It might not stay that way, and had I shoved just one thing off we could've already started on what skills you need. So shit like this won't be as dire."
"And we have two months after this shit where we'll fix that. You already promised me that." When the other woman rolled her eyes, as if they both didn't have points, and pelted her in the forehead with a leftover bit of plastic… Lal found the justification to throw the damn thief over a shoulder instead of letting her walk. "It's not something that's going to be fixed by you stealing from some kid's damn toy chest. Even if it's an old adult kid."
"…it's not like he deserves them."
And just how did a Russian thief know that for sure?
"Are you getting revenge for one of your ex-classmates? That's adorable."
"Shut up." Groused her armful mulishly, lightly swinging her one good knee into Lal's chest but bouncing off… well, her chest as she pulled back too much force. "I never said that."
"It's what I'm going to believe. Just try and stop me… unless you want to tell me all about it."
"I'd rather nap."
"I'm glad to hear that."
Her armful of injured thief heaved an exaggerated, put upon sigh.
(ooo000ooo)
(Saturday the 6th of November, 1971 continued. Saint Petersburg, Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic.)
Uncertain of how much effort he should allow Skull to get into, given his current state of 'undead' on his behalf, Fon uneasily waited while the man fiddled with the engine compartment of some possibly abandoned vehicle.
Without the damaged leather suit or the blood splatter, it was hard to keep in mind the other man was at all injured now. His movements had smoothed out with a bare few hours to sleep it off, though cautious none of his motions could be described as 'jerky' any longer. The moments when his left hand was visible made it easier, however little he liked to contemplate the rather eye-catching amount of bruising darkening on what pale skin was visible.
He was alive. That was… that should be enough. They both were alive.
Fon caught the latest man to attempt to apprehend the stuntman in one hand, hauling hard enough on the other's arm to ram him into a brick wall and at least stun him for a short while. "Nine."
Skull made a dissatisfied sound, rubbing one side of his face with the back of a wrist as he pulled back out of the engine space. "Why the hell are they so damn intent on my ass? I've been through St. Petersburg several times before, but they weren't interested in me then."
"Convenient opportunity?"
Reproachful purple eyes glowered discontent at the assassin, before the other man stuck his head back into their chosen vehicle to 'steal'. Once Skull identified the issue that left this car abandoned on the roadside instead of tucked neatly away near a personal residence, and it was possible to 'steal' it.
It was odd, decidedly so, that it was the famous stuntman a semi-powerful local criminal syndicate was so intent on 'obtaining'. Not that Fon felt a once-winner of an Underworld Martial Arts Tournament and somewhat infamous assassin was any more 'notable' to deserve at least some of the attention. However, the fact his actions on Skull's defense raised no words of scorn or at least even a little hostile attention of his own… from either their opponents or the self-proclaimed pacifist?
"I did not believe you had much dealings with the lands beyond the Iron Curtain these days."
"I don't."
He pondered the situation a little longer, feeling as if they were missing something. "Then perhaps it is not on your own merits this attention has centered on you, but as you are a known associate to another?"
The metallic clinking and soft muttering suddenly stopped. "What, like the entertainers I work with? Wasn't aware there was another Soviet escapee in that crowd…"
"Less civilian in nature. Would there be any reason they are desperate for leverage over your younger sister, or elder for that matter? Like, perhaps, an attempted hostile takeover of a business Sonya owns? Or perhaps, Tatiana's major top-secret project at the hospital that is weeks if not only a few months from being revealed?"
"…and their brother just so happens to fall into their lap from nowhere. Would make a little bit of how we've been running into them all morning somewhat sensible rather than just odd." Skull pulled back from the car with a more dissatisfied expression than before, rounding the assembly to the driver's door to attempt to yet again start the engine. "This is all still a maybe, mind you. It might just be because I'm the son of the local Academy's principal, or the old man's oldest son. My sisters aren't the only semi-notorious individuals in my family."
Fon stomped on the chest of the latest in a bizarrely long line of opponents that had attempted to waylay the pair of them. "Perhaps… we should take 'your old man' a… gift? This attention is unusual enough I would advise some investigation into the reason."
His erstwhile companion, against expectations yet again, shot him a mildly amused look. "Mom. Dad's the one you go to for gratuitous murder if Nya's not around. Mom's the one that makes sense of it, or points the others in the right directions. Tatiana's more like her than dad."
The interloper clutching on the assassin's ankle and foot gave a choked-off whimper.
"Throw him in the boot, then let's get the hell out of here." Skull suggested easily, reaching under the dashboard to pop the catch to release the lid.
Doing so with perhaps unseemly haste, the martial artist only barely got fully within the vehicle before the engine finally gave in to the stuntman's insistence and coughed to life. Against any protocol about driving these deathtraps Fon only vaguely knew, they were not yet all that popular in China or Hong Kong's busy streets so he had only gotten used to buses so far, Skull immediately floored the gas pedal while releasing the brakes.
The tires squealed, the entire contraption jolted forward and shut the passenger's side door on him without needing anyone to touch it. He gripped the flimsy shelf-like thing his legs were awkwardly stuck under, as something to hold on to as things got moving at an entirely terrifying rate.
"The 'oh shit handle' is over your head." The Cloud informed him cheerily, wrenching the wheel on his side of the cabin so the motor vehicle took the turn on only two wheels. "It'll help keep you in place better, if you don't want to wear your seatbelt. I should really insist, they're there to keep people in their seats, but if you don't want to-"
Fon scrambled for the belt, which was apparently only belted at his waist and was instead located over his shoulder. The car bounced back on all four wheels only momentarily before the stuntman then took evasive actions in what little traffic there was on the street to get out of the city with all the speed. "I have a question… if you would indulge me."
"Depends." Mused the other man, still cheerfully, as he took another turn and had them join the cars venturing up a ramp at a significantly lower breakneck speed than before.
"You seem… oddly alright with my actions since we arrived. For a man who claims to be a pacifist." He jammed his knees against the plastic, suspicious that would not be the only incident of unseemly speed before them however more… reasonable the motions seemed now. "Even if I have killed three of the individuals sent after us."
Skull glanced at the various mirrors attached to the body of this contraption, then at him for only a moment, before responding as his attention centered back on the pavement. "You killed… three of them?"
"…they would not cease their actions."
"Huh. Okay, look. I appreciate your attempts to respect my views in your actions near me… but don't do that." Almost starting more with words that eventually just went unspoken, the man tapped his fingertips on the steering mechanism a few times before seemingly finding the way he wished to continue. "I very nearly made my own sister miserable trying to impose what I believe on her, and I learned my lesson and all that. Don't. You don't live in the same world I do, even if we kind of do. You guys leave the 'innocents' alone, and I opted out of your lifestyle to be one of those 'innocents'. I can do that, I've been left alone for the most part because of it. That's great. More than great. It's enough."
Grimacing as the car made a sudden lurch to slip between two others, a narrower gap than he appreciated at this speed, Fon transferred his grip to the fabric 'belt' over his chest and waist before he accidentally Disintegrated something. "And this understanding translates to enabling the likely painful detriment of a man who was admittedly attempting something not to your benefit."
"He's not going to die." Skull stressed almost resignedly. "Mom won't do that. Dad might. My… I suppose, 'working outlook' on all you guys is kind of… more or less that. I do have a problem with just straight out killing people. Sorry. But. Some people really don't deserve to be in charge of other lives and that whole… murderous thing can get out of hand, and you cull that down again. I don't like it, never will… but I gave up my right to complain about it when I decided not to have anything to do with it."
"It is not likely," he stressed to the other man pointedly, "that the 'left alone' part of your argument will last the longer Checkerface has us… under his thumb. What will you do then? When you are no longer left alone?"
"Bitch about it, probably." Skull admitted resignedly. "Then watch everyone that insists try to get that shit past Nya. And likely laugh my damn ass off. I'm lucky to have been left alone this long, I'm fully aware of that. I'm famous, that should've been enough to scare off all you Mafia assholes. It didn't in the end, and to be frank I was half waiting for it. Nya tried to be with me while I got famous for two years, and we both know how that ended."
…Sonya spent two years helping her brother?
That was why Fon and his Triad found her with a traveling Russian circus?
He couldn't regret it, for Mingxia's sake if nothing else, but it did make him wish they met some other way. "My apologies."
"Eh…" Skull again checked the mirrors, frowning slightly. Which was easier to see with his bare face not caked in snow white and deep purple makeup. "We're being followed. Not too surprising, we were standing there for a while until I got this girl running again. Sorry, Fon… you're going to be a little green by the time we reach Moscow."
"Why do you-" Not quite able to finish the question, Fon hastily braced an elbow against the window on his side of the car as things… escalated.
More than he appreciated.
Trying to brace himself didn't work, he ended up slammed against the door as the entire car made a full circle under Skull's hands only to straighten out again in the furthest 'lane' from where they had begun. The car took that down-ramp fast enough the wheels left the pavement for a split-second, and then there was another harrying turn where only two wheels were required.
Fon warily eyed the up-close view of the road he was then given, swallowing uneasily and attempting to measure his breathing in order to not destroy the vehicle they needed to leave this city. Eventually.
He hoped it would be sooner rather than later.