She is not shy about her body
But she is around me
It's the day after she accepted the offer. I instructed her to clean up and meet the receptionist at the station the next afternoon. It is 1:25pm when I finish the necessary paperwork, a totally of 43 forms, half of which designed to simply deter me from enlisting her, no doubt the commissioner's work. I finally meet up with her at the medical room of the station. She is in the middle of the physical examination when I walk through the door.
When she sees me, she's seated in only her underwear on the bed, her hands dig further into the mattress, she's already on edge from the man in the lab coat. We had sent for our female examiner but she apparently fell ill the evening before and couldn't make it to work.
Dr. O'Neil was always a judgmental woman.
Vi didn't care, she demanded everything to be done no matter what, she didn't want to waste time in limbo.
Straight forward
Impatient
There is a chemical burn that runs from her ankle to the middle of her left shin. An incision scar marks the skin right above her liver. Multiple injection sites dot her arms, neck, and hips. There is a scar that runs along her scalp, disguised as the part of her abnormal haircut.
There are many more scars hidden beneath the artwork of her tattoos.
He instructs her to redress and leads me back out with him. He hands me his medical list and excuses himself to finish the blood tests with the vial in his hand. I scan over the notes Dr. Tobi made as I reenter behind the human resources representative.
He has missed 14 items. I pen them in myself.
The woman asks her generic questions; she has no birthday so one is assigned to her, any medical conditions we should know about, if she has any blood relatives in the area. She states something along the lines of a bum left knee, which is why she wears a sleeve to support her knee cap. She doesn't give any more detail on the matter.
I tune out the rest of the rep's questions, the answers Vi give her are obviously completely made up, she wouldn't give any true information to a complete stranger.
List of answers I want to know:
1) Has she ever killed anyone in cold blood (undeniably yes, most likely below 100)
2) What happened in the mine (She was never formally linked to the event)
3) What kind of drugs does she use (Something to help her cope with her past, perhaps Brilliance)
4) What happened to the other two test subjects lost in the Zaun fire
Of course, these questions will slowly be answered. Remember the note; one must gain trust in order to gain information.
A form of exchange, unless interrogation is utilized
The doctor returns with another clipboard in hand and a frown on his face. Shoulders tense, eyes glancing between the clipboard and the woman, he rechecks something, pinching the area where he had drawn blood earlier. He is baffled.
Vi hisses, eyes murderous and teeth clenched. She's annoyed both with is prodding and the fact that he's wearing a lab coat. She doesn't have the best memories of people in lab coats. She wants to kill the man when he inserts her identification chip into her wrist, she doesn't trust his reassurance.
Its only procedure.
He murmurs to me the word "Zaun" before pulling me out of the room, another vial of blood in his hands.
"There are traces of enhancement chemicals in her bloodstream. I already ran the tests; three of them can be traced back to the Emerald Chasm Orphanage turn governmental testing facility. I'm going to run the tests once more to confirm it, but it's pretty much set in stone that she's not exactly a normal human being." He tells me what I already suspected. It doesn't faze me, most of the league champions aren't exactly human either. But he spends his life examining simple humans, deciding what is normal and what is not.
He hands the reports to me and before I can open the door again, his hand grabs onto my arm. I beat down the instinct to reach for the sidearm strapped to my leg.
"Sheriff, I advise you have as little to do with her as possible. Nothing good comes out of Zaun, she's a ticking time bomb."
I understand.
But understanding doesn't equal agreeing
I wrench my arm out of his grip and tell him that his opinion has been noted and that if he were to do something like that again, he would find himself out of a job with a bullet in his chest. He meekly nods, scurrying away.
Selfish man, all he cares about is not being held accountable for her.
And yet I am so eager to take her under my wing.
Focus Caitlyn
I ease the door open, catching the woman stiffen in her seat once more; the flicker of annoyance in her face melts away to reveal a faintest of blushes. Odd, very odd, surely besting her in the warehouse did not earn me a status that puts her on edge at the simple sight of me.
Her past; strength and perseverance allowed her to survive Zaun. Trust is hard to come by with a childhood like that, so does she trust me or does she respect me?
What does her personality now tell me about her past?
She didn't go through the struggles alone…no, so far too compassionate, she has a big sister complex. She cared for someone, someone weaker than her, more innocent; someone she couldn't protect then, so she does everything to protect the weak now.
She's seen death; it's the life of a criminal to do whatever it takes to get the goods. But regret is resident in her mind; she aims each punch to inflict the most amount of pain to disable the person without doing life threatening damage. Two conflicting morals, but she makes it work.
She punches first, never lets her guard down, has an affinity for protecting people.
So why does she act like this around me?
When I want information, I'll go straight to the source.
Earn trust
Earn information
I humor her, gently.
I tear up the biasedly filled HR files the woman had given me. She judgmental, it's out of my power to get her replaced. I'll decide what the mayor reads up on my partner. She is my responsibility, after all.
I tell her to walk with me and leave the door open behind me, I can hear her slink out of the examination room and fall in step beside me. She keeps quiet; her footfalls are casual, head shifting back and forth. She's mapping the area in her mind, most likely a force of habit.
As we near the cafeteria, her posture straightens instantaneously, she smells the food.
Humorous.
"Let's get some food then." I answer her unasked question; she was no doubt going to charge into the hall either way. She probably didn't eat all morning.
We walk over to a table in a secluded corner, my eyes drinking in her body language. The moment she walks through the doors, into the eye of the few officers present, her strides become longer, more confident, a mask of confidence. Her darting eyes show that she's still nervous on the inside, but the eyes themselves; angry, judging. She is out of her element here.
There are only a handful of officers in the hall, 5 to be exact; most have already left to carry on with their business. The ones that do pass us nod to me but their jaws instantly tense at the sight of her. It's obvious they don't trust her, and that she doesn't care for them. I know something's going to happen soon or later, something violent.
Vi wants to prove herself to me
The officers want nothing to do with a criminal unless it involves putting them under arrest.
"So, how old are you Vi? " I start easy, she already answered the question on the HR sheet, but she looks far too young to be 32.
I expect her to stiffen at the question; she doesn't like being questioned by strangers. She surprises me, however, when her shoulders relax and she smirks, replying before taking a bike of her burger.
"Take a guess, detective."
Crumbs fall from her mouth and onto to the table, her elbows rest on the smooth surface.
Uncultured
She likes games
"24"
I'm never wrong
"And a half." She chuckles.
Never
I scoff and take a bite of my ham sandwich, noticing the difference in our eating habits; her legs are spread, she hunches over to wolf down her meal. I have my parents to thank for drilling etiquette into my brain.
"Okay-"
"Ah aha. My turn."
Blatant interruption.
"How old are you?"
"31…and a quarter."
I humor her some more, a smile pulls slightly at the corner of her mouth. It's not often I am this informal with my officers, but there's something about her.
I just can't quite put my finger on it.
"What exactly happened in that mine 10 years ago?" It's the gentlest the list of questions I had in mind. Her eyes darken for a moment; she brushes the crumbs from her mouth with the sleeve of her maroon jacket. It takes a moment for her reply.
"I made a choice, it was between running off with my so called 'buddies' or saving the bunch of folks we had fucked up. I didn't want any more innocent blood on my hands, not when it's a group of middle aged men begging you to save them, saying they got a family back at home."
She pauses, the story is about to take a turn, something that wasn't in the reports.
File said there were a total of 13 men working in the part of the tunnel that collapsed; the crooks had made off with the day's find and various mechanical equipment, all totaling about 33,000 credits worth; the arms of a mining rig were listed in the report. There something else that was never recorded.
"There was a kid in there."
Of course, she has a soft spot for children.
"Man's wife recently passed, so he was forced to take his daughter to work since he couldn't afford day care. He probably never told the police seeing that a whole can of worms would be opened of safety regulators found out. She made it out alright, carried her back home myself. She drew me something before I left."
She pulls up her left sleeve and shows me a small tattoo on the inside of her forearm I had taken note of during the examination. It's a crude crayon drawing of the Vi holding hands with a mother, father, and daughter, a house behind them and a pile of rocks on the other side.
It must mean a lot; family was something she never grew up with.
"I keep the original in a compartment in one of my gloves." She wrinkles her nose, an attempt to dispel the somber mood that had set around us, and returns to engulfing her food.
The story only strengthens her profile. She's creative, resourceful, and insanely strong; as proved by being able to use mining equipment designed for a grown man at the age of 14. I only fear that her brash attitude may keep her from fitting in.
She lets out a loud belch, muttering an excuse me, probably for my sake.
I don't believe she intends to try fitting in.
"How many people have you killed?"
Absurd question. Does she wish to know more about me, or is this a test of who is better? Perhaps she wants to compare herself to something. I am not proud by the number, but it's what needs to be done to keep law and order.
"142, over the span of 17 years" I remember each one of them and their story.
"Whew impressive,"
Sarcasm
"37 for me. I can't say that most of them deserved it though."
Not in cold blood
She seems to be stuck in a rut at the moment. Her motions are slower, her eating has slowed, eyes staring at moments. Her mind is wandering. For a woman of her upfront audacity, she is easily dejected when the subject is up her past.
"I'm working on it." She flashes me a toothless smile. Genuine.
It's true, the recipients of her brand of justice are always hospitalized with injuries never exceeding a few cracked ribs and/or a concussion; it's usually both.
She gets up, eyes glancing at the clock on the wall; it reads 2:34pm. Her hurried movements tell me that she has plans to have to get to. Most likely concerning her neighbors in Warehouse 10C.
"Sorry to cut it short, I gotta get going; helping Old Lady Boyle paint her flat today."
Predictable
"One last question." I want to know. She stops, eyes expectant.
"What happened to the other two subjects that were reportedly lost in the fire at Zaun."
The shift is fast. Her muscles tense, brows furrow, her back stiffens, the paper plate in her hand crinkles under the pressure of her fingers. She doesn't look me in the eyes; she simply stares behind me, narrow, lost in thought. I have brought up a delicate subject. She'll brush me off, more trust must be earned. I'll try again another time.
As fast as her demeanor darkens, it brightens back up, all evidence masked by a sudden cheeky grin and a flip of her hair. She straightens out and rolls her shoulders.
"That's a story for another time. I'll catch up with you in a couple days Sheriff." She waves to me and walks away. Her shoulders are raised, back slightly hunched; she is hurting on the inside.
I want to know
I am unsure how long it will take for that time to come.