spider-bitch

The tall man runs over, reaching down to grab you. You launch your legs into his throat, knocking him backward, then you roll into your stomach. Briefly, all his weight is pinching your neck but he struggles to keep his grip as he teeters forward on top of you, instinctively pulling his hands off your neck to keep from face planting. You throw your head up at his jaw and roll out, crawling to the bag.

He grabs your ankle, your face falling and smashing into the pavement. “Shit,” you say loudly, blinking back the pain. You yank your opposite knee up, then push your heel back down, kicking the man in the head to free yourself.

The other one was muttering something to what looked like himself, but what you realized was an earpiece. This was a bigger operation. His sunglasses and mask had fallen off to reveal piercing blue eyes, curly brown hair and a clean shaven face. He looked too baby-faced and pretty to be involved is some form of a mafia.

He stalks toward you again, moving to hit but you swiftly duck, popping back up to land two punches in the face and one in the chest. He stumbles, so you grab him and turn his body, then use your leg to kick him into the wall. You pick up the bag and find the pistol quickly, turning around to see the previously grounded one with a knife, rocketing towards you.

Almost without thinking, you pull the trigger and hit him in the abdomen with a bullet, knocking him over. You rush over to his side, realizing the blue-eyed one had disappeared. “Who the fuck are you, who sent you?” His breathing was still fast, but he just started instead of responding. You grabbed his jaw, pulling it towards you. “I’ll kill you. Tell me who.”

“You’ll know.” He wheezes, then starts hacking violently. Blood spurts out of his mouth, spattering onto you and his fresh suit. “He’s not gonna be too happy.”

“Tell. Me.” You hiss in anger, stopping his left hand from weak efforts to stab you again. You rip the knife  out of his hand, pulling back his sleeve to begin writing. 336. He winces and his eyes start to glisten, but his body is so shocked that it doesn’t seem to affect him enough.

“I won’t.” You toss the knife back into your duffel, then stand above him, pointing the gun at his forehead.

“I’ll give you one chance.”

“Fuck you,” he spits, somehow sporting a cocky grin while he’s dying. You fire one shot at his leg, wanting to cause him pain before you put him out of his misery. The silencer kept the gunshot quiet, but the leftover noise tugs you out of your focus.

There’s sirens in the distance, going in the direction of the hotel. He cries out in pain, but still just shakes his head. You click and fire again, this time it being fatal.

Now you run.                           

Hiding by an old rent-a-storage lot wasn’t your favorite pastime.

You bounce your leg up and down anxiously as you wait for your ride. It’d been over three hours since the hotel, and two since the alley. The sirens died down and you’re a significant way from the city. You’re safe, for the most part.

Soon enough, a black sedan pulls up to the back fence of the lot, flashing the brights in your direction. You hop up with the bag, climb the fence and settle into the passenger seat silently.

A few beats pass before anyone speaks. “You’re shorter in person,” Felix comments plainly. You brush it off, resisting the urges to laugh and shoot back at him.

“Thanks for picking me up,” you say, turning slightly to face him. He’s different in person.

He has warm-toned mahogany skin that’s tinted gold with the reflection of the headlights. Playful brown eyes glance at yours while you scan him up and down. He’s wearing an all black ball-cap so you can’t see his hair, and the rest of his outfit coordinated as well. “No problem. Where am I taking you, though?”

“My house. Turn right out of here.” You reply monotonously.

“Is it weird that I thought you lived underground in an abandoned subway car or something? Cause’ honestly that’d be fucking dope.”

“Where do you live?” You raise an eyebrow.

“In an apartment. In the city.”

“I’m just like you. Just a little more secluded so I’m not as traceable. I’m not a cheap drug dealer,” you laugh.

“Fair point,” he admits, shifting the car into reverse and backing into the quiet road. “What happened?” In silent response, you just turn to face him completely. He glances once or twice before processing. “Oh, shit.”

From what you could tell, you had a bloody nose, a fairly deep tissue cut above your lip, and a scraped-up face. You definitely felt soreness around your neck and some bruised ribs. “Not the worst I’ve been through.”

“What’s the worst then?”

“I got shot once. It was at an angle thankfully, it only lodged in the tissue of my outer thigh. I had surgery, recovery and then physical therapy. Good as new.”

“Who shot you?”

“Not really sure. I was in Chicago and got caught up in a gang-related scene after I was hired to hit one of their members. I was eighteen at the time.”

“Sorry.” He seems slightly uncomfortable hearing you talk about it so nonchalantly and shifts in his seat for a few seconds in the silence.

“Did I interfere with your date?” You ask, remembering that he has personal life too.

“No, it actually uh, ended pretty early on. She had a family emergency. She said she wanted to try again though, so I guess that’s good.”

“Sorry, too. Turn left here, if you take this road till the next exit we’ll be there in fifteen-ish minutes.”

“‘Kay. Just for extra measure in case these guys come around again, would you mind filling me in on the details of how you got your ass beat?”

“Well, I ended up beating them, or at least one. I was taking some alley shortcuts, but I heard someone ahead so I stopped, turn the other way and there was a guy there. So I walked in the other direction again and same thing. They were in suits with masks. But like, nice-ass fitted suits. One of them had an earpiece, curly hair and blue eyes. He got away. I killed the other because he was gonna stab me and  wouldn’t give me information.”

More silence. Nauseous  silence. He wasn’t used to the real-life parts. He’d just lived it through audio and occasional security footage that typically wasn’t anything gruesome.Seeing you hurt face-to-face was different than being able to mute out your usual antics.

You watch the headlights of the car remain steady on the road, flinching by reflex when another one passes by. They were apart of a group that wanted something from you, but you weren’t sure what. You went through a mental checklist of anyone you’ve had issues with, but it made zero sense for it to be any of them. It wouldn’t have been anyone in your legue, like Antoni or Lactski. You’d never even made contact with their underlings.

Anxiety pools in the bottom of your stomach at the thought of not knowing who they were. It’s not normal to have no idea who’s hurting you and why. You stare down and pull at the fabric of your pants, finally gripping one thread and spinning it around your finger. “Take this exit,” you say quietly, surprised out how meek you sounded. Out of the corner of your eye, you see Felix suck in his breath nervously. Because obviously, if the assassin was nervous, he should be too. “You have alibis for us right?”

“Always.” He nods pointedly, flipping on his blinker and drifting off the highway.

Clueless.

That’s how you feel.

Clueless, powerless, and worried.

Weak. You don’t like feeling weak.. You don’t like being weak.

There’s  a piece missing. A piece of the puzzle that didn’t seem to even match the box it came in. It gnaws at the back of your brain like it’s clawing around searching for any ideas or something solid to hold onto.

The driver’s fingers are drumming on the wheel, your bouncing foot following his beat. He reaches for the radio, pushing down on the volume button. Immediate noise rings and bounces around in your head, including voices you can vaguely make words with in your hazy state.

“That was Harry Styles, a former member of Britain’s One Direction, with Sign of The Times. Cardi B, Sonder, and Imagine Dragons are up next. Stay tuned into Catch 103.3 FM to-”

“Shit.” You mutter, everything clicking together. Your body begins to panic, but your brain won’t catch up.

Britain. British. They had accents. Both of the men. You were too caught up in staying alive to process the blue-eyed man speaking. “She’s good.” What the hell did that mean? 

Your hands shake and you subconciously  start picking at your nailbeds to occupy them.

“What?” Felix asks, shutting off the radio, turning his head back and forth between you and the road.

“Felix, they were English. They weren’t from America. What do they want with me?”

His hands clench the steering wheel so hard his knuckles turn white, but the rest of his body appears calm. The American underground crime system was hard to get into as a foreigner, let alone getting the location and fake  identity of someone like you,  significantly far up at the top.

As far as you know, people outside North America don’t really know of your existence, let alone criminals from across the ocean.

“Hey, hey, we’re getting to your place soon so I need you to give me the directions before we figure this out, okay?” He reminds you gently, somehow knowing you might sprial into a panic attack if he didn’t distract you.

“44954, that’s-that’s the address,” you reply, breaths becoming shallow and labored. “Turn left here.”

“We’ll figure it out.” He says sternly, accelerating a bit faster than you expect.

“Hopefully.” It remains quiet for the rest of the drive, minus the steady hum of the car.

Eventually, you flex your fingers outward, ignoring the bleeding around your nails and begin breathing regularly again. Your chest hurts, still blanketed with anxiety, but you’re physically not itching to jump out of the car anymore.You shut yours eyes when your house comes into view, waiting till the car turns.

“Expecting visitors?” Felix asks, shifting the vehicle into park and looking over at you.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” You open your eyes, quickly pulling the pistol out of your bag. There’s a single light on in the office, one that you didn’t leave on. There’s also a Mercedes parked at an angle toward the top of the driveway. “I’ll call you when I’m done.” You say, already pulling the door open.

“You sure you don’t want me to wait, or at least come in?”

He’s got concern painted all over his face, reasonably, but now you had an internal power struggle. You wanted to restore some dignity after almost crying in front of him. “Yeah. And burn the bag too, please.” You nod, stone-faced.

“I’ll talk to you soon, I guess.”

“Thanks.” You shut the door and begin your adventure into your own home, only shaking slightly now. You hear the car drive off into the distance as you click the front entrance shut behind you. The pistol in front of you is raised in caution and you quietly pace to the office.

The glass french doors let you have a full view inside, revealing a woman with stark white hair, red lips and a form-fitting body suit.

Fuck me.

You set the pistol down hesitantly on a nearby table and text your ride.

“Hey, false alarm. I’ll call you and fill you in later. Don’t worry if it takes while though.”

You push into the room, arms already crossed in a defensive stance. “What the hell are you doing in my house, Sylvia?”

“Took you long enough, Miss Black.” She sighs, tapping her fingers on the glass surface of your desk. “Have a seat.”

You grit your teeth with annoyance. “With all due respect, Miss Allison, this is my home that you’ve intruded in. If anyone’s having a seat it’ll be you.”

The woman stares at you scornfully, but after a lingering minute you switch sides of the desk and she sits down. Her eyes are menacing, but to anyone who didn’t know her she’d simply be a business woman scouring for money. If you were getting into technicalities, that is what she’d be, but she had a method more different than the average business woman.

“What do you need?” You ask, frustration still seeping through your tone.

Sylvia Allison, somewhat of a realtor for crime. She finds contracts for killers and killers for contracts, among other things. A communicator for the unspoken ranks in the underground, a communicator for the entire underground itself. She’d been in the business longer than most of the people who were in power now, and for 60 she sure as hell didn’t look bad. Of course, plastic surgery might’ve helped. She had a menacingly white smile, mischevious lips and she always wore pumps with her suits.

“I have a request-rather an order-from a special client of mine. Actually, I might be his client.” She admits, pinching her mouth together.

“You nearly got me killed on the last the operation I did for you, and the one before that you set me up. Why should I do shit for you?”

“So vulgar.” She grimaces, pausing. “If you must know darling, it’s because we’ll both be dead if you don’t comply.” She crosses her legs, trying to gauge your reaction with another piercing gaze.

“What do you mean?” You inquire, pinching your eyebrows together. What was going on? Were these incidents connected?

“My higher-up is a very powerful man. Respected and feared.”

“What’s in this for me?” You cross your arms, pacing two steps behind your desk.

“Like I said, your life. As well as money and power.” You notice her eye contact falter, and her fists are balling up and then releasing repeatedly.

“Who is he?”

Sylvia runs a manicured hand through her loosely curled hair, watching you intently. “You’ll meet him if you don’t try and walk away from this. I’ve been asked to keep identities out of the loop for now.”

Would you really be killed if you didn’t want to do this?

Were you willing to take the risk?

You slide your fingertips over the desk, watching the reflections of the lights thoughtfully.

“What’s my  mission?”

Two days later, you’re  on a private jet, courtesy of your employer, to meet him in Southwest London. Most of the information on what you were going to carry out was still unknown. If you were to be intercepted by any government forces, nothing could be traced back to him because you don’t know anything. They can’t force information out of you. That’s this mystery man’s prerogative; secrecy. Everyone owes it to him, according to Sylvia.

It’s a bit of an anxiety-inducing situation.

You bit back a smile when you look out the window, and instead sighed contently upon seeing the hues of the land beneath you, the shapes and outlines of the roads creating an illustrious quilt of art. You choose to sit at a sleek wooden table with trim on the right side of the cabin, allowing you to look over the paperwork from previous contracts and finalize the payments.

You shrug off your black leather jacket and drape it over the back of your recliner so you can  stretch your arms freely. You wore an outfit a little less than functional for fighting, but perfect for a meeting, including black high waisted jeans, paired with chunky heeled velvet booties. Your top, a little more risque than you would’ve preferred, (you were ushered out the door at 5am) is a lacy v-neck bodysuit with thin straps, the detailing on the shirt lining different parts of your body perfectly.

Red lighting lights up the space, soft sultry music playing to create a calming yet alert, enviroment. The sunrise faintly follows through the plane’s tinted windows, filtering a golden glow on everything it touched.

Rather than spending your time gazing outside, you pull your eyes away and start to scan the documents in front of you, signing this and that. Your phone starts to ring, the name on the screen belonging to someone you worked a heist with a few weeks back. You pick up and put it on speaker, tapping the pen in your hand on the table while trying to multi-task.

“Hello, Astoria.” An emotionless but intimidating voice comes across the other line. It’s almost like he meant to say more, but never did.

“What do you need, G?” You ask, already confused as to why he called.

“Did you ever get paid by Annalise? She said it’d take less than three days. It’s been two weeks. She won’t respond to any of my attempts to contact her.”

“I’m not sure.” You squint, now shifting your attention to the phone call.

“I discussed this with Latscki, who did some contracts for her a year back. She called hits on him afterward to avoid payment.”

You stand up quickly, beginning to pace back and forth in the aisle. “How did this not come up when we got hired?”

“She knows how to cover shit up. Either way, I thought I’d mention that I almost got attacked last night in a bar. Pathetic attempt, but I’m guessing it was her. Anything like that happened to you?” Your hand flew to your face, which now was left with a black eye and a small healing scar above your lip. There was scabbing on your right cheekbone as well. Anger bubbled inside your chest just thinking about it.

“Just last night. Two guys in an alley. But one of them talked about a ‘he’ before I shot him and they had accents so it wouldnt make sense to be Ann-”

The door to the cockpit opened suddenly, and a tall man walked out, already speaking. “-Annalise Hoffman. She’s a lying bitch and has really bad judgement when it comes to hitmen. It wasn’t her that night.”

You stared ahead, almost shocked, but not enough to freeze. “I’ll call you back G.”

“This has to be fixed before next week Astor-”

“Got it.” You ended the call, slipping the phone into your back pocket while watching the man with a vicious heat in your eyes.

It was him.

Blue eyes, curly hair, English accent. “Harrison Osterfield. I’m here t-” Before he could come close to finishing,  you kicked him in the gut and had him with his stomach to the ground, his arm pinned in a way where you could break it in one swift movement.

“What the fuck are you doing here?”

“I’m surprised you didn’t figure it out earlier,” he quips in a strained voice, clearly in pain.

“Did you do some shit to the pilot or something?”

“God no, will you let go?”

“Why should I?” You hiss, digging your heel into his back.

“I’m-with-your new boss,” he wheezes out, eventually worming out of your grasp and shoving you off him. This results in an scarily fast exchange of swings and careful maneuvers until you have a small knife from your back pocket at his throat, the other hand pulling back on his hair.

“Talk.”

“Put the knife down, love.”

“I don’t take orders from you.” You have the point underneath his adam’s apple, which is bobs dangerously close to the tip of the blade.

“I will explain everything you want to know if you let go of me. I’m not allowed to hurt you anymore anyway.” After a few minutes of contemplating, you drop him and step backward, still gripping your weapon just in case. He runs his hands through his hair and straightens his clothes out, then takes a seat opposite you at the table. He glances over your scattered papers curiously, then looks back up you. You don’t want to sit, but do it anyway. Nothing’s gonna get fixed unless you act civil. He’s quiet, but observing your face intensley. “Got you pretty good, huh?” He smirks, waving a hand towards the various wounds on your face.

“I got your friend better.” You shoot back, completely straight-faced and your voice dripping with venom.

His smirk drops, giving you the reaction you want. He looks you in the eye seemingly unfazed, but underneath that facade, you can read how fascinated he is. Maybe there’s fear in there, too.

“He was new. Very expendable.”

“He was so willing to die for your man, though. Had the guts to spit on me in his last moments.” Harrison stifles a laugh at that, then lets you continue. “Hope you guys recovered his body. Then you’ll get see what I do to someone like him. I only had five minutes that time around,” you sigh, feigning disappointment.

His eyebrows shoot up briefly, then he recollects himself. “I’m your new employer’s right-hand. And because of what you did to my co-worker, T isn’t letting me have any authority from you unless it’s orders approved by him. He appreciates your ‘ruthlessness.’”

“T, hm?” You ask, still wanting to decipher what was going on.

“You’ll know his name when he wants you to.”

“Okay, if you’re gonna be so edgy and mysterious about him, care to tell me why the hell I got attacked by you guys before I was hired?”

“It’s a method of testing. Seeing if you’re worth it or not to hire.” He replies, leaning back and spinning a golden ring around on his pointer finger.

“So if your potentional employee isn’t good enough,” you pause, looking him in the eye. “They die without even knowing why?”

“Some of the time.” Harrison nods.

“That is so fucked,” you uncomfortably grin, gathering up the papers in front of you and sliding them back into your briefcase. “So they don’t even get a choice in working for him. Once he notices him them they’re dead or forced into the job?”

“If you want to put it that way-”

“No. It’s not a ‘technically’ thing. It’s fucking psycho, and that’s coming from someone who’s probably also batshit crazy. I don’t want to be near you or your fuckbuddy after you tried to murder me.”

“Don’t you kill people for a living?” The man replies, frowning at your namecalling.

“I kill people who deserve it. And before they die, I make sure to tell them why and what they did. I don’t kill for people with personal grudges or that dumb shit, I kill pedophiles, rapists, politicians, people who pose threat to innocent-”

“Chaotic paid vigilante. So you’re kinda like Deadpool?” He interrupts your rant with an unexpected laugh. While it’s partially mocking, he also sounds like he’s asking a real question.  

You stare ahead blankly. “Oh, exactly.” Sarcasm soaks your tone. “I even have superhuman regenerating powers.”

The man who’d almost killed you two nights ago, now sat ahead of you grinning and making attempts at banter. It’s odd in a way, but somewhat relieving. Anxiety is still working through you, just not pulsing as frequently.  Though this is a business trip, it’s nice to be able to talk comfortably about your business without the fear of judgement. He’s accepting, but expresses his opinions honestly. You want to hold onto your anger, but it’s hard with how insanely laid back he is. Like he’s on the verge of being apologetic, but won’t let you receive the actual message.

You’re spinning the knife in one hand, winding your fingers around it smoothly to avoid hitting yourself. He seems intrigued by your attitude, menacing but with a humour. You sigh deeply, waiting for him to respond as he observes you for what feels like ten minutes. Never once does the suited man break eye contact in that time. It’s almost as if he tries to use his eyes as a weapon, to get you to break or talk or open up, but it doesn’t work. The hazy blue laced with green that trails to your (Y/E/C) cannot reach you. Absolutely nothing can reach you unless you let it.

Harrison leans forward, almost  letting onto a crude smile.