#two losers

Light on her feet, she trots over — he just barely catches her by the arm when she's about to hop over the counter into his shooting range. She looks confused before she yanks her arm from his grasp. It burns as it should. Every day she just gets stranger. "You got some nerve. Think I'm a bad shot?" he hisses.

"No. But I make a better target."

"Weirdo. Would've taken you up on that last week." craning his neck back into the visor with a grimace, he gives his restless fingers some solace. The next bullet burns through Entrati's forehead with a bang; rehearsing his promise for the day the bastard will know his line. "This ain't just target practice."

Those sharp eyes bore through his skull, as though she knows more than him. It pulls — tears his gaze from his mark. The Drifter's distant stare always gave him the heebie-jeebies — as if she wasn't quite talking to him, but something else inside of him. "If that's what it is.. I've got some things of his I'd love to see holed through. What say you?" she tilts her head.

No humor in his laugh. "What d'ya want for it?"

"Nothing. You'll do us both a service."

He remembers the way she spoke to Entrati. His name was too comfortable on her tongue, as hers on his. "Hard to believe."

"You don't believe anything that doesn't come out of your mouth, do you?"

Every word put of her mouth sounds airy and light, as if not meant to insult but present simple facts. It gets on his nerves, makes his finger itch. "Scram, dickhead. You don't want me reconsidering, promise."

Taking a step back, she throws her hands up, much too unconcerned with his threat. "Got it."

And just in a blink, with no goodbye, she's gone. Oddly enough, even though it didn't feel like this before, the spot next to him feels vacant — he takes a small step in the direction where she stood, centering himself in front of the counter again. It smells faintly of river water. There's no such thing nearby.

He thinks that to be a habit — the Drifter always disappeared without a farewell and hardly a trace.