– Chapter Seven –
"Effing Katja and her effing cookies," Leigh grumbled a few days later. She and Aila were wandering around their new town after deciding to take a day out. Katja stayed home, but made a point to tell the clones she required a very specific brand of cookies from a very specific bakery. Leigh and Aila had been waiting for at least twenty minutes to be served, only to be told the flavour Katja wanted was unavailable.
"Pfft," Aila shrugged as they walked out onto the street. Leigh irritably placed the bag of alternative cookies she'd chosen for Katja into her rucksack before swinging it over her shoulder.
"If she doesn't like these, I swear I'm gonna…" Leigh trailed off. Aila simply ignored her. If Katja wasn't going to eat them, she would instead. It was a waste of money otherwise.
"So where to now?" Aila asked.
Leigh shrugged. "Dunno. Wasn't looking for anything in particular, to be honest. Just needed to get out of that house for a bit."
"Mhm," Aila agreed.
The women looked into various shops before deciding to stop at a small café for lunch. The sun was bright, and the day was warm, so they chose a table outside to enjoy the fresh air while they waited for their food to arrive.
Aila smiled. "This really is a pretty town, isn't it?" she commented, watching as the townsfolk went about their business, many enjoying the nice day.
"Yeah," Leigh responded with a nod as she gazed at the old buildings.
The town reminded Leigh a bit of the smaller towns in the English countryside. Her eyes travelled along the rows of shops, before she paused, noticing something. Ducked into an alleyway between two shops was a person in a thick black coat, who seemed to be staring right at her. It was a middle-aged man with a dark beard, long hair and a moustache. Leigh raised an eyebrow, but before she could say anything, the man vanished further into the alley.
Aila noticed Leigh staring at something and blinked. "What's up?" she asked, slightly concerned as she looked around.
"Nothing," Leigh said with a shake of her head. She was probably just being paranoid.
Aila looked unconvinced, but shrugged and smiled when their food arrived. The doctor smiled at the aroma of her food, a black-bean burger with chips and pickles, along with a glass of ice-water. She wasted no time in diving into it.
Leigh began eating her lunch when it arrived, but stopped when the mystery man caught her eye again. When she hadn't been looking, he must have exited the alley and perched himself on the edge of the brick wall by a patch of grass opposite the café. He did not look back at Aila and Leigh; at least not while Leigh was paying him any attention, but the hairdresser found herself feeling too uneasy to finish her food.
"Not like you to waste a good meal," Aila noted, observing her. "You feeling OK?"
Leigh did not respond. She stared past Aila at the strange man. He was now looking directly at her, and Leigh couldn't decide how to read his expression. She gripped her fists together tightly and fought the urge to shout obscenities at him from across the street.
Aila raised an eyebrow and glanced over her shoulder, but didn't see anyone. "What are you staring at?" she asked, looking back at Leigh.
"There was someone there, but he ran off," Leigh said, keeping her eyes on the spot where the man had been.
Aila blinked. "There are a lot of people around," she pointed out.
Leigh shook her head. "This guy was dressed weirdly and kept staring at us…" she said, though she realised she probably sounded paranoid.
Aila just stared at her, beginning to feel a bit uneasy as well. Was someone really watching them? Or was Leigh just being overly cautious? The doctor paid the bill for their food and stood. "Well we'd better move in case you're right. Should we stay out or head home?"
"Anything else you need to get while we're out?" Leigh asked. Aila shook her head. "I'd like to head back then."
"Sure," Aila agreed.
They began making their way home; Leigh looking over her shoulder every few minutes to check they weren't being followed. Aila began to think Leigh really was only being paranoid, because everything seemed ordinary to her. She became even more convinced of this once they arrived home and Leigh hurried straight up to her room to sit by the window and stare out over the land.
Aila shook her head when she too made her way up the stairs and spotted Leigh through the door frame. The hairdresser was barely moving. Aila considered speaking up before a curious Katja opened her own bedroom door and peeked out, having heard Leigh and Aila's footsteps up the stairs.
"Hallo. Did you get my cookies?"
Aila reached for Leigh's rucksack sitting just inside her room. She took out the bag of cookies and tossed them at Katja. "They were all out of the ones you wanted, hopefully these'll taste fine just the same." Aila looked into Leigh's room again as she dumped the rucksack back inside. "Leigh thinks she saw someone staring at us when we were out today, but I didn't see anything unusual," she added, deciding Katja should know to keep an eye out. "She said it was a guy who was dressed weirdly, but didn't say much else."
The doctor glanced over again to see Katja looking displeased with the cookies, and she fought the urge to roll her eyes. "Did you hear a word of that?"
"Ja," Katja nodded, putting the cookies back in the bag. "I vill keep eye out."
Aila nodded and made her way back downstairs. She wanted to go back outside, but it was safer to stay put for now. If anyone was coming up the path, they clones would see them before they got close.
The day passed quickly. At some point, Leigh wandered down the stairs to get dinner, but then resumed her window-staring activities immediately after, this time choosing to stand in front of the living room one with the curtains open. Whenever she willed herself to move away to distract herself, she would jump straight back at the slightest sound or movement coming from outside.
"It's just zee vind, Leigh," Katja grumbled irritably. She was sitting on the sofa with the laptop on her knee, while her bag of cookies lay open on the coffee table before her. Aila had been helping herself to them. Katja had eaten one, and rejected the others, which led to a disagreement between her and the doctor about wasting good food and buying her own next time if she couldn't trust Aila and Leigh to get the right ones.
After a while, Aila attempted to coax Leigh away from the window with alcohol. Leigh accepted a few beers, but once again returned to the window, where she was now sitting on the sill, hugging her knees, with her forehead against the glass. Aila wondered if she might fall asleep there.
"Leigh!" she snapped angrily later on. This was really getting quite annoying. "You've been sitting there for nearly five hours! Honestly, just give it a rest!"
Leigh huffed miserably and took a swig of beer. Five more empty bottles lay scattered on the large windowsill at her feet. In her drunken state, Leigh managed a sad giggle. "Rachel…Rachel…I blame Rachel," she explained poorly. "Shit, I'm turning into Rachel…"
"Rachel's not here, Leigh…and I think you've had enough," Aila said, eyeing all the empty bottles on the ground. "Unless you're planning on sleeping there, give it a rest. There's nobody out there. I think we would have heard about it if DYAD had sent someone here."
With a grumble, Leigh tried to get up, but ended up misjudging the distance to the floor and fell off of her post. She hit the floor with a hard smack and cracked one of the bottles open on her hand.
"FUUUUUUCK!" Leigh screeched, and Aila quickly got up to look over the bleeding cuts on her palm.
The doctor sighed wearily. "Clever. Come on, let's head to the bathroom so I can take a look," she said, instinctively tapping into her A&E training. She helped haul Leigh to her feet, making sure the hairdresser didn't step in the broken glass.
Katja simply watched them, unmoving, only allowing her eyes to follow them to the stairs as they headed for the bathroom. When they were out of sight, the German turned her attention back to her laptop.
"What the HELL is going on over there, or don't I want to know?" questioned the clone she was currently in a video call with.
"Dunno, Rattyrat," Katja responded, blinking slowly. "Zese clones, zey are crazy."
Aila sighed and looked over the cuts under the bright bathroom lights, reaching into a first aid kit as she cleaned them. Leigh winced and muttered but didn't try to fight, and Aila was thankful for the alcohol that was likely making the pain seem less than it would be when she sobered up. She'd cleaned up most of the blood, and was currently slowly and carefully extracting the small shards of glass wedged into the cuts.
"This is going to hurt," she warned Leigh, before carefully cleaning out the now glass-free wounds.
"Oooooooow, stings like a bitch," Leigh winced. She fought the urge to pull her hand away from Aila, but clenched her other hand into a fist.
"Well, that's what you get for getting yourself drunk."
"It was you who got me drunk," Leigh challenged her, raising her eyebrows.
Aila rolled her eyes slightly. "I thought it'd make you relax a bit, not make you injure yourself on glass…"
Leigh huffed, but continued rambling as if the doctor had never spoken. "This…this never happens to Rachel. Rachel…she can drink way more than this and still be a robot…all perfect, you know? Why's she so great, anyway…how the hell does she do it…"
Aila watched her for a moment or two as she finished cleaning the wound. "What's the deal with this Rachel, anyway?" she asked before she could stop herself. "You mention her quite a bit."
Leigh huffed, shrugged, and forced a false laugh. "Rachel's everything a clone should be, according to her, anyway," she muttered, looking slightly cross-eyed now. "Nah…I dunno. Maybe she wouldn't be like that if…never mind. Bad shit happened to her. I never really…well…figured her out. But hell…I wouldn't be here with you and Katja today if it wasn't for Rachel…I dunno…maybe she does sort of care, in her own messed up way."
Aila frowned as she listened to Leigh. She now knew for a fact that this Rachel was another clone, and if she was in England like Leigh, why wasn't she targeted by the killer? It seemed odd, but she knew Leigh wasn't in the right state of mind to answer any questions.
The doctor put on an anti-bacterial ointment and carefully wrapped the bandages in gauze, securing them with medical tape. "There. You should be fine. I'll check it over again periodically to change the bandages out and make sure it's not getting infected. It'll probably hurt a whole lot more in the morning, though you can take regular painkillers for it when you've sobered up a bit."
"Cheers…" Leigh said, looking over her now wrapped hand before leaning back and sighing. "I miss Rachel…"
Aila nodded. "Maybe you could call her or something?" she offered, though Leigh snorted and shook her head.
"Can't do, she'd drag us all back to DYAD…she friggin' embraces everything they have going on," she explained, and Aila nodded in understanding. Leigh frowned to herself as she stared at her bandaged hand. "I spent the last ten or so years wishing she'd shut up and leave me alone, so I shouldn't miss her." She bit her lip before speaking again, in a near whisper. "So then why do I miss her?"
Aila remained quiet, and slowly shrugged. She couldn't answer that for her.
It wasn't long before Aila and Leigh joined Katja again downstairs, who was still chatting away to Rat. Aila beckoned for Leigh to sit on the sofa, and then disappeared to make tea. Leigh sighed, curled up on the end of the sofa, and hugged her knees.
"Zee drunken clone has returned," Katja informed Rat.
"Oh God," Rat responded.
Leigh eyed the laptop on Katja's knee. "You're talking to Rat?" she mumbled sleepily. "Ugh, I'm scared to know what you've been saying about me."
"Nothing, beyond the fact you're drunk and you've injured your hand," Rat said curtly, leaning back in her chair. "Katja wishes for us to speak and attempt to bond, though I hardly think now's an appropriate time. To be honest, I fail to see the point of such an exercise regardless…"
"Aw, you know you could use more friends," Katja said, looking at the computer and receiving a sharp glare in return.
"I have no need or desire for friends. Only allies," Rat muttered, and Leigh gave her a disbelieving look before shaking her head.
Katja didn't seem to take offence though, and merely smiled. "Vhatever you say Rattyrat," she said, stretching.
"Like I wanna be friends with a rodent anyway," Leigh whispered to herself, but from the accusing stare and raised eyebrows Katja gave her, she was sure the German heard. "I'm going to bed," the hairdresser added, standing up and crossing the room to the stairs.
Neither Katja nor Rat said goodnight; they simply allowed her to go. Katja watched Leigh stumble and drag herself back up the stairs, only to turn her head to see Aila enter the room from the kitchen moments later. She was carrying a mug of hot tea she had made for the English clone, looking confused and slightly annoyed at Leigh's sudden absence.
Aila sighed, looking out at the landscape as thunder cracked and boomed above. Though it was still fairly early, it was raining hard, and Aila wondered if they might lose power. She'd gotten out some candles just in case, and sat in the chair beside the window with a cup of strong coffee.
It was just before seven in the morning when the doctor heard footsteps and glanced over, expecting Leigh. She'd noticed that if Katja didn't have to wake up early, she liked to sleep in for as long as possible. Another loud crack of thunder echoed from overhead, making the lights flicker as it did.
Aila then noticed that nobody had bothered to clean up the blood and glass on the floor, and decided to do it herself before anyone else got hurt. She also picked up and washed out the intact, empty beer bottles.
Leigh rubbed an eye as she came into view. She sighed heavily, watching as Aila finished cleaning up the mess. "Shit, Aila," she groaned guiltily. "I would have done it. You shouldn't have to clean my mess up."
"Don't worry about it," Aila replied with a yawn. "How's the hand?"
Leigh flexed her bandaged hand, stretching her fingers and glancing at her palm. It was very sore, but she shrugged. "Not too bad. Thanks, by the way."
"It's fine," Aila told her. "So how come you're up so early?"
"Could ask you the same," Leigh said with a grin.
Aila stood up straight and crossed over the window. "Friggin' storm woke me," she told Leigh with a sigh. "Suppose we'll all be staying in today."
"Yeah, don't fancy venturing out in that if it's gonna stick around. We could do with trying Danielle or Aryanna again, anyway. Or maybe start to think about paying them a visit. I feel like we've been hanging around here long enough."
Aila nodded. "Yeah, could do. We need to be smart about how we approach Danielle though. She's bound to have a ton of security. Aryanna should be easier to approach. I think she works at some kinda spa or something, but we have no way to communicate with her." Aila wandered into the kitchen as she spoke. "I saved the tea I made for you last night before you vanished. Just need to heat it up." The doctor retrieved the covered cup of tea from the fridge before putting it on the counter. She leaned against the door frame and sipped at her coffee as the lights flickered again. "Hope we don't lose power, but I got out some candles just in case."
Leigh snorted and grinned in amusement as Aila reheated the tea, and then passed her the cup. "You really saved tea?" she asked with a laugh.
Aila rolled her eyes. "I don't believe in letting things go to waste if you can help it, Leigh," she explained, darkly glancing at a half-eaten cookie Katja had left on the kitchen surface. "Besides, it'll taste just the same."
"Yeah," Leigh shook her head and took a sip anyway. It wasn't that bad. "Cheers Aila."
"What? I…you…again..."
Katja turned away from the laptop screen and looked up at Aila, pulling a confused face. "I cannot understand a vord she is saying," she complained, shrugging.
Aila glanced out of the kitchen window. Any second now, they were going to lose power; she were sure of it. "I'm surprised you have internet access at all at the moment," the doctor responded. She pulled up a chair and focused on the laptop. Rat's face was frozen on the screen, and she currently couldn't be heard.
"I can't hear you, Katja!" Rat's voice bellowed after another few minutes of struggling.
"Well we can hear you, big gob," Leigh mocked as she sat up straight on the sofa. She watched closely as the clones attempted to communicate.
"VE ARE JUST LETTING YOU KNOW VE VILL CONTACT ARYANNA NEXT," Katja spoke loudly.
Aila covered her right ear and glared at the German. "Volume isn't the issue!" she told Katja off, who shrugged and fiddled with her sunglasses. "Rat, hang on! We'll call you back in a bit!"
Aila ended the call, sighed, and looked around at Leigh in exasperation. Almost immediately, however, Rat began calling again, and Katja didn't hesitate to answer.
"What's even the point?" Leigh moaned, rubbing her face. "Friggin' storm's making this impossible…"
Just then, the lights cut out completely, plunging the three in darkness, minus the dim light from the windows and the light from Katja's laptop as it switched onto battery. The German woman looked displeased, but said nothing as she shut the computer off.
Aila silently put candles up in the rooms that didn't have windows, illuminating the house in a dim orange light as the storm raged on. From outside, the doctor noticed the rain pouring heavier by the minute. "Jesus, some storm," she mused. "Even the non-stop rain back in the UK doesn't match up to this. Hopefully it passes soon."
"Yeah," Leigh agreed, looking out the window as lightning flashed across the sky, illuminating the soaked hills.
Just after midday, the storm subsided, and light rain continued to fall over the land. Leigh had taken the opportunity to visit the town. Katja had discovered they were running low on toiletries and insisted somebody go out for them.
Leigh was slightly irritable that they didn't think to buy these things the previous day while she and Aila were out, but still, the cool, fresh air was pleasant as she hurried across the field to make her way to town. She spent the walk daydreaming and thinking, and sure enough, she found she completed her task of shopping fairly quickly.
Then, when Leigh made it to the outskirts of the town to walk home, things changed.
The strange man she'd seen watching her and Aila the previous day stepped out in front of her from behind the last building on the street. Leigh didn't notice him at first; she was busy reading something on her phone and almost walked into him. It wasn't until the man's blurry figure caught her eye that she stepped back, pushed back her hood, and looked directly at him.
He looked as though he was aging; his face was lined with wrinkles and creases, and his dark hair was thinning. His eyes were wide with either alarm or madness; Leigh couldn't decide which, and before she could snap out of her frozen state, he began speaking rapidly.
"Ich kenne Sie," he rushed, his voice deep, yet slightly raspy, "nicht ich? Bist du es?"
"Err," Leigh managed, her own eyes wide with fear. She found herself almost running backwards; the man was getting far too close too quickly, and Leigh felt panic rise up in her chest. She turned to walk away quickly, but the man was faster; he cut in front of her and held out his arms so Leigh couldn't get past. "Wrong person!" Leigh told him in a high voice.
"Sie Präsident Katja? Katja Obinger!"
Leigh's mouth fell open in shock. So, she wasn't being paranoid after all. Whoever this man was, he knew Katja…
"I don't understand!" Leigh tried desperately to convince him. "I don't speak German! English! Wrong person!"
When she tried once more to escape him, the man reached out and grabbed her shoulder, desperate for her to understand. "Please," he added, surprising Leigh with his ability to speak English too. "You must-"
But Leigh was beyond reasoning with at this stage; she turned around and threw a punch at the man's face, and listened to him cry in outrage as he released her and she ran down the nearest side street she came across. Leigh continued to run, following the many twists and turns of the narrow alleys until she was sure she lost the mystery man.
Shaking slightly, Leigh fumbled around for her phone, and worried she might have dropped it, but she sighed in relief to discover she'd absently stuffed it into the pocket of her coat. Leigh called Aila's number, biting her lip, waiting for the doctor to answer.
"Come on, come on," Leigh whispered to herself.
Aila glanced down at her phone as it started going off, confused to see Leigh's name on the display. She clicked the button, though before she could say anything, Leigh started talking rapidly.
"HOLYSHITSOMEONEJUSTTHOUGHTIWASKATJA!" the words came out loud and too fast to be made sense of.
"Woah, woah, slow down Leigh, and try again. What about Katja?" the doctor asked, confused. At the sound of her name, the German woman looked over and tilted her head, and Aila shrugged, listening to Leigh trying to catch her breath and speak slower.
"Someone just thought I was Katja!" Leigh said. "That guy from yesterday, I'm sure it was him. He approached me and specifically said her name."
Aila blinked, glancing over at the other clone who was watching her curiously. She put the phone slightly away from her face. "Have you made any friends here?"
"No?" Katja said, still looking confused. "Vhy?"
"Apparently someone thought Leigh was you, and specifically said your name," Aila said, feeling uneasy.
"AILA?!" Leigh's voice shouted through the speaker, and the doctor quickly put the phone back to her ear.
"Yeah I'm still here, sorry. Are you OK? Did you get away from him?" she asked.
"I think so, for now. Friggin' socked him one and bolted. Shit, weren't we supposed to have some kind of warning if someone was going to be here looking for us?" Leigh asked, sounding angry now.
"Calm down. We don't even know if this guy is DYAD or not," Aila tried to reason with her. "Just make sure you're not being followed and get back here as soon as you can, OK?"
"Get Rat back online!" Leigh ordered. She most likely wouldn't have come across as demanding if she was in a calmer state. "Seriously-"
"OK," Aila assured her, pulling at her own hair. "But you need to come back, now."
"Yeah…yeah…I'm on my way," Leigh responded in a more controlled voice before ending the call.
"Katja, we need your laptop," Aila said immediately after putting down the phone. She explained to the German again what had happened, and Katja eventually agreed to let the doctor take the laptop so she could contact Rat.
"Oh, hello," Rat greeted them sarcastically the moment she answered the call. As usual, she looked bored and distracted, apparently reading something on her screen. "Am I ever going to get a day of peace and quiet without you lot calling me for whatever reason?"
"Something weird just happened," Aila began to explain. "I think we need your help."
When Leigh came through the door, she wasted no time going straight for the laptop. Aila watched her, saying nothing as she glanced outside to make sure nobody else was coming up across the plains.
On the walk up to the house, the hairdresser had calmed down slightly, but she still wasn't happy about the situation and wanted some type of explanation for the encounter.
Rat carried on doing what she had been before the call while waiting for Leigh. When the auburn-haired clone appeared, the hacker glanced at her briefly. "What do you want?"
"I thought you said you'd know if DYAD was here," Leigh said flatly.
"I would, and they're not," Rat said, her tone echoing Leigh's, and her eyes narrowing in annoyance.
"Then why the hell is there someone following us?!" Leigh challenged. "Someone who specifically knew Katja's name?!"
Rat raised an eyebrow. "According to the official records, the closest DYAD presence to your location is in Zurich, and they still haven't been able to pinpoint your location. Your trail went cold after you left Austria. Whoever's following you either isn't DYAD, or isn't doing it on the record. I can't tell you much more than that until you get some kind of ID on him."
Leigh huffed impatiently and threw her hands into the air. "So what, we go back out there and try to find him?"
"I never said that," Rat shot coolly. "No, that would be dangerous considering we have no idea what he wants yet."
"He wanted Katja; that much was obvious," Leigh responded, turning to look at the German as she spoke.
Katja was looking a little uncomfortable now. "Maybe going to talk to him ez zee only option," she suggested quietly with a shrug. Everyone stared at her.
"No," Rat told her strictly from the laptop screen. "Don't be so stupid."
"I have to agree with Rat," Leigh muttered, nodding.
"So what," Aila cut in now, "we just…carry on as normal?"
"Remember your main tasks are finding Aryanna and Danielle and warning them about this killer. As far as I can tell, there have been no more murders recently, so I don't know where the killer is. Either one of them could be next; hell, even Janika if she's made no effort to protect herself. You should probably get in touch with her and see how she's doing," Rat told them.
Leigh nodded, but still looked unhappy at the idea of having to ignore the situation.
"Vhat did he actually say?" Katja asked quietly, looking at Leigh, who shrugged.
"Hell if I know…itch-keen-see…somethingsomething; I don't speak bloody German!" the British clone exclaimed. "Wasn't exactly focusing too closely on that anyway, was I? More interested in getting away from the weirdo…"
"Useful," Rat commented dryly.
Leigh looked down at the laptop, glaring venomously. She'd had just about enough of Rat's attitude. "At least I'm actually DOING something," she snapped loudly. "All you ever do is sit on your bloody arse and make everyone else feel like shit!"
"Leigh!" Katja said sternly.
"What?! It's bloody true! We're the ones out here risking ourselves to do some good, and all that one does is hide behind a friggin' screen all damn day!" Leigh carried on, her edginess and temper getting the better of her. Aila just watched quietly as things escalated.
Rat glared at Leigh, her expression rivalling Rachel's in intensity. "Yes, because breaching a high-security government-enlisted corporation is SO very easy," she hissed. "I'd love to watch you attempt it one of these days."
"Doesn't change the fact you hide away in the dark and let everyone else do all the REAL work," Leigh carried on, her hands clenching into fists. "Quit hiding away like a pissing coward and then come talk to me about being useful!"
Rat glared at Leigh darkly. "You know nothing about me," she said, her voice low and threatening.
"Yeah, I don't," Leigh shot back. "Even though you know every bloody pissing thing about ALL of us, you get bitchy whenever you have to spill information, and you talk to us like we're scum! How do we even know we can actually trust you?! For all we know YOU could be a friggin' spy, or hell, even the bloody killer!" she shouted, though she regretted the words as soon as they slipped past her lips.
Rat stared at the screen, her expression hard to read. She looked as though she'd just been slapped. The room became deathly silent then, and it felt as though everyone was holding their breath. After several minutes, the hacker's expression settled into raw anger that almost edged on wounded, and she ended the call without a word.
After several minutes of uncomfortable silence, Katja fixed Leigh with a deep frown. "She ez our friend…vhat more do ve need to know?" she asked quietly.
Leigh grumbled. "No, she's not. We're just allies remember? Not friends…"
Most of the afternoon passed by in an uncomfortable silence. Despite her efforts, Katja couldn't make contact with Rat again for the rest of the day.
As Leigh calmed down, she admittedly felt guilty about what she'd said, even if the hacker had been asking for it. Aila attempted to maintain a sense of peace around the house, but when that failed, she simply retreated to her room to look over maps of Italy.
It was just as the sky was darkening that Leigh glanced out the window and noticed a figure making its way up to the house, and her blood ran cold when she recognized the clothing as the man she'd met earlier that day.
"Oh fuck me!" she whispered before raising her voice. "Uh guys?! GUYS?! I think that creepy guy from earlier is coming here," she said, panicking slightly. How had he found them? Leigh span on the spot two or three times before clumsily throwing herself to the foot of the stairs. "AILA!" she shouted.
"Aye, I heard! I…I'm in the bathroom, hang on-"
"What the hell; what the hell?" Leigh shrieked, grabbing her own hair in both hands.
"I can see him from my bedroom vindow!" Katja called from upstairs. Her door snapped open, and down came Katja at full speed, wearing a yellow onesie with a duck beak on the hood (Leigh took a moment to stare in disbelief before she realised now was not the time), and pushed past the hairdresser towards the front door.
"KATJA, WHAT THE HELL?" Leigh screamed after her. Katja could not just go out there confronting the stranger, especially not dressed the way she was.
"I vill see vat he vants!" Katja said simply before breaking into a sprint across the field.
"What's she done now?" Aila's voice asked loudly from the top of the stairs. Leigh waited anxiously for the doctor to join her, and when she did, she pointed after Katja, unable to explain. "Oh Jesus Christ," Aila moaned, gathering up the courage to bolt outside after her. "KATJA!"
As the clones approached him, the mysterious man stopped walking and just looked at them.
"Who are you?" Aila asked after a tense moment. "What do you want with us?"
The man simply stared for a moment, and then allowed his eyes to travel from Katja, to Aila, to Katja again. His right eye was bruised, but nobody paid attention to that. Everyone looked incredibly shocked, including the mystery man.
All was quiet.
Then the man let out a short gasp and took a step back. He raised his hand and pointed at something behind the two women. "You! Her!" he shouted, sounding alarmed.
Katja spun around. Leigh was slowly inching towards them, holding what appeared to be heavy looking saucepan at arm's length. The hairdresser attempted to look threatening as she approached the group.
"Just…just leave us alone!" she began, her voice shaking slightly. "I'm warning you!"
"Please…I do not mean you any harm," the man insisted, raising his hands over his head. Everyone watched as he knelt to the ground, showing his submissive side. "You are Katja. Katja Obinger."
"No," Leigh and Katja spoke together.
Katja frowned in confusion and took a step towards him. "I am Katja Obinger. Who are you? Vat do you vant?"
"And how did you find us?" Aila added. The doctor looked over at Leigh's pan, and mentally smacked herself for not thinking to grab something too.
The man hesitated, his eyes darting between the clones as he kept his hands up in case they saw him as a threat. "My name ez Lucas Weiss. You all are in very real danger, I have come to vorn you," he explained.
Leigh continued glaring at him. "Right now the only danger here is you," she pointed out. "How the hell did you find us?"
"Please, may vee go inside? It's not safe out here. She may see…" Lucas asked, though he fell silent when both Leigh and Aila gave him seething glares.
"She? Who is she?" Leigh demanded. She gripped the pan a little tighter and raised it a little higher, as if preparing to strike the man with it if he dared to move.
Lucas flinched a little and shrunk back, gritting his teeth. "The von responsible for zee recent murders!" he exclaimed.
Another silence followed. Katja and Aila exchanged glances while Leigh continued staring down at Lucas, her frown deepening with both confusion and worry.
"S-so y-you've brought the killer right to our doorstep, yeah? That's what you're telling us?" Leigh squeaked angrily, but the man shook his head.
"No, no, you don't understand," he told her desperately. "Not zee killer, but zee one zee killer answers to; it ez complex, and I have answers for you-"
"Who said we asked you any questions?!" Leigh cut in.
"Please," Lucas begged her, "please. She should not know zat I am here, speaking vith you all now, but if zere is a chance she comes looking, vee must be out of sight…please, I have been looking for Katja for a vhile…"
"Why Katja?" Aila asked in a calmer voice than Leigh could ever manage.
"I know zings…I know who zee killer is…I know vhy she is killing…and ven I heard she vas coming after Katja, I…" Lucas whispered. He peered up at Aila, and then dared to look at Katja, who was staring down at the man, apparently realizing who he was before he even spoke the words.
"No," she whispered shortly, but sharply.
Lucas allowed his hands to hit the ground, and gripped chunks of grass with his fingers tightly. "I am sorry, Katja," he sounded genuine but desperate as he spoke. "I…I am your real father."
"Are you bloody serious…" Leigh said, shocked as she lowered the pan slightly.
"Bleedin' hell…" Aila whispered, her eyes darting between the man on the ground and the clone standing beside her. This man was Katja's dad? Was that even real? The doctor looked at Katja with wide eyes. "Didn't you say your dad vanished when you were wee?"
"Ja," Katja muttered curtly, her eyes narrowing slightly.
Aila had never seen them looking so cold before, and she didn't know what she could do for her friend.
This was all getting to be too much.