The Asset stepped onto the ship slowly, carefully, his movements calculated. The handlers had made it clear that this one was not to be lost under any circumstances - but that she knew he was coming, and she could fight. That hardly registered to him. They all fought . They just were all helpless in the face of a weapon like the Asset. Still - he tread carefully. He obeyed orders.
Поверніть ціль живими. Ніяких свідків. Бути тихим.
[Bring back Target alive. No witnesses. Be silent.]
He crossed the deck in a matter of seconds, silent except for the faintest rub of rubber on damp metal, and lowered himself off the opposite side of the ship with his metal arm, head craning a little as he judged the distance to the open window below. The smell of cooking sausage drifted out of it, and with his free hand he pulled the knife out of the back of his belt.
A second of rushing wind later, and he'd dropped to grab the window ledge - another instant of wedging himself through the window, and he was standing in the ship's galley. Empty, for the moment - but the sizzling sausage on the stovetop indicated someone would be back shortly.
The thud of two pairs of footsteps came from the hall, and the Asset took four long steps to stand behind the doorway, the blade in his hand ready. The steel door opened a couple of seconds later, and an old, fat man passed the Asset's still form, but the second pair of footsteps stopped outside the door abruptly. The old man didn't notice, just kept talking.
"... щодо спальних місць екіпаж би задав занадто багато питань, якби ти зайнявся ними."
[...for the sleeping arrangements, the crew would have asked too many questions had you bunked with them...]
The old man made for the stove, still chattering away about nothing, where he picked up a skewer and prodded at the sausage, to a chorus of sizzles and spits. The person in the hall took one step in, and through the crack in the door, the Asset could see a sliver of a red braid. He held his breath. The person took another, very short step, the toe of their boot peeking past the edge of the door, and the old man turned around.
He spotted the Asset a moment too late to do anything about the knife sailing towards him, and died around the blade buried in his brain through his eye socket a moment later, but neither the Asset or the red-headed woman were there to see it. The boot had pulled back into the hall the second the knife had left his hand, and he'd whipped around the door in pursuit in the same moment. He got his first full look at her in the stairwell as she went around a corner, and his gut did something he didn't comprehend, but his feet didn't falter. They exploded onto the deck with a thundering drumming of heavy feet on metal, and he realized that she was faster than him - that if he let her reach the shipyard, she would likely escape.
The second knife was on its way through the air in a trajectory to meet with her hamstring when she whipped around and kicked the thing out of its path, both of them skidding to a halt, meeting gazes for the first time. The hair stood up on the back of the Asset's neck as she stared at him, and he fought the urge to check over his shoulder to make sure nobody was sneaking up on him. But that wasn't what this sensation was. Her eyes slid from him to the knife on the deck, and his followed. She'd knocked the knife from the air without seeing it - something he could do, based on sound and some innate understanding of air pressure changes on his skin - but nothing he could remember anyone else doing. His handlers' warnings were becoming more clear.
Their eyes met again, and he was struck with a heady wave of deja vu.
Her foot turned slightly, and he snapped through whatever had been keeping him rooted to the spot and burst forward.
Her turn towards the side of the ship was cut short as her urgency and the damp of the deck conspired together to make her foot lose purchase - she slipped and went down with a resoundingly loud BANG, and he descended on her, metal hand clamping around her throat, flesh hand catching hers as it tried to land a blow in his side. Her right, however, plowed into his side, and he nearly lost his grip on her. He adjusted, pinning her down with his weight as best as possible - he managed to get her left hand trapped under his knee with a little straining, grimacing as her right slammed into his side again, and risked going for the sedatives in his belt with his flesh hand.
It was a mistake. She heaved under him the second his center of balance had shifted backwards, and his grip on her throat tightened, but she got a leg free and brought her knee up hard into his chin. She followed up with a blow aimed at the side of his head that finally made him release her throat. She scrambled onto her hands and knees, pushing off like a sprinter, and made it a step before his metal fingers wrapped around her ankle, dragging her back towards him, and she finally made a noise - a snarl of frustration - and turned to kick him - but he grabbed that foot too, and a yank was all it took to put her back flat on the deck again.
She was immediately trying to get to her feet again, though the punch he connected to her face flattened her again. He took another blow to the head as she kicked out again, and she made it a few inches away again before he plunged the needle into her thigh through her trousers. She fought for another fifteen seconds, fighting against his hands every time he dragged her back from the edge of the ship, and then she went limp. He took a deep breath, listening to her for a moment, but her heartbeat was so slow she couldn't have been conscious. He bent to pick her up, heaving her over his shoulder, his back protesting in a way it normally didn't when carrying people. He adjusted her a little, trying to balance her weight (she was heavier on her right side) and then walked off the ship.
A/N
1 more glimpse today!