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Post by amysutherland on May 22, 2005 16:11:05 GMT -5
"So whats going on outside thats so interesting?"
“Nothing out of the ordinary.”<br> Actually it was. She had never been spied on in her own home before. She had failsafes of course, but she liked where she was. It was probably best that she did go out. There weren’t many places to run in this building. At least if she was outside she could keep going.
As she mulled this over she looked about her room making a checklist in her mind about what she should take. She still hadn’t listened to her messages, but she wasn’t going to do it while Nate was still here.
As she was thinking about it the left hand phone clicked into life. It didn’t ring and there wasn’t any message from Amy, just a bleep. The voice on the other end of the line was deep and gruff. Sounded like a bodyguard to her.
“Who this is is not important. What is is that you listen carefully. You are not in danger, but your services are required. Be at the Baggot Inn on 82 West 3rd St. at 7:00pm. Don’t be late. You are being watched.”
Then it went dead. This was one of the stranger calls Amy had received, but she relaxed now that she knew she didn’t have to destroy her house. She also knew this pub pretty well. It was one of the many Irish themed pubs in the city and she felt reassured that they wanted to meet in a public place.
She went to the kitchen and took another slice of pizza before sitting back on her bed and watching the TV again.
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Post by xman on May 22, 2005 16:54:50 GMT -5
“Nothing out of the ordinary.”
"Ok, whatever you say," Nate walked into the bathroom when he heard the voice of a man, the man was talking about a job that he wanted Sphinx to do and that the apartment was being watched. His voice was very deep, he sounded like a large man.
Nate walked out of the bathroom to see Sphinx eating a pizza and watching TV. "So one of your clients huh?" He walked over and sat down in the stool, "If you want to go check it out, I'll leave if you want."
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Post by amysutherland on May 23, 2005 14:35:44 GMT -5
“If you want to go check it out, I'll leave if you want."
She took her eyes off the TV for a moment to look at him.
“In the state your in, I think it would be best if you just stayed here.”<br> She finished off her pizza then got up and went over to the dingy kitchen. She placed her plate in the sink with some other items that desperately needed cleaning and filled a glass with water. It was icy cold, but she didn’t mind. She looked at her watch. She had plenty of time to get there, but decided to leave early anyway.
She grabbed her coat, slipped on her gloves and sunglasses before snatching up her keys and heading for the door. She opened it and turned to face Nate. The noise of the other tenants drifted lazily into the room.
“A couple of things before I go. One, don’t answer the phone or the door under any circumstances. Two, don’t go through my things because I’ll know if you do. Three, keep the noise down, I do have neighbors.”<br> She stepped out of the door, hesitated, then leaned back in.
“Also, it would be best if you don’t leave, seeing as you don’t have any keys.”<br> She threw Nate an almost patronizing smile while looking over the top of her glasses. Then without another word she closed the door behind her and began walking down the three flights of stairs to the ground floor.
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Post by xman on May 23, 2005 16:11:17 GMT -5
“In the state your in, I think it would be best if you just stayed here.”
"Well ok if you insist," Nate really didn't want to leave, he was hoping she would let him stay.
“A couple of things before I go. One, don’t answer the phone or the door under any circumstances. Two, don’t go through my things because I’ll know if you do. Three, keep the noise down, I do have neighbors.”
He nodded to everything she told him, she stepped out of the door, hesitated, and then leaned back in.
“Also, it would be best if you don’t leave, seeing as you don’t have any keys.”
"Yes ma'am," she walked out the door locking it behind her. Nate got up from the stool and went over to the bed and started to watch the ancient television, "Well it's better than nothing." His thoughts drifted away to the woman that had saved him in the stations before Sphinx had brought him here. Who was she? Why did she just sit there? Why did she help me? The questions just made him tired, so Nate laid back and drifted to sleep.
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Post by amysutherland on May 24, 2005 14:03:31 GMT -5
When she reached the front door she took a moment to brace herself. Then in one swift movement she opened the door, stepped outside and closed it again. The wind pelted large flakes into her face which ever way she turned. She made a right and began taking large confident steps while pulling the collar of her coat together.
She carried on in this manner for another 15 minutes making the occasional left or right before she finally stopped in front of a green façade. Welcoming yellow light emitted dimly through frosted panes as well as the low contented murmur of the people within.
She stepped through the door, the murmuring becoming instantly louder, and shook the rapidly melting snow from her coat and hair. She moved through the smoky atmosphere towards the bar and sat down heavily on a bar stool.
Shortly the bartender came over doing the stereotypical motion of wiping a glass with a white teacloth.
“So, what can I do ya for?”<br> Amy saw, or rather heard, through his fake accent straight away. She looked at him over her glasses and replied to the question.
“Whiskey, no ice.”<br> The Bartender was a little taken back by both her choice of drink and by her eyes. He dismissed the eyes as contacts, but was still unsure about her request. He moved off and went to prepare her order.
She looked around the pub. It was pleasant enough. Everything was green, while the walls were covered in all sorts of paraphernalia. Some traditional Irish music played quietly in the background while quite a few white haired men sat hunched over their pints.
The bartender came back and handed the drink to Amy. She fished out a couple of notes from her pocket and waited for her change. She took a sip and instantly felt the warmness spread out from within. The bartender meanwhile tried to make small talk about the weather.
“Tis quite a blizzard out ter if eva a saw one.”
Amy gave him a look which made the bartender suddenly feel very cold and he hurried away to tend to another customer. She knew he wouldn’t bother her again tonight. She coolly took another sip and glanced at her watch. She had plenty of time so she moved over to an empty booth and waited for her latest employer to walk in.
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Post by xman on May 27, 2005 19:28:00 GMT -5
Nate slept well for the first 15 minutes until he started to dream about his fight with Holocaust and how he had arrived in this reality. He tossed and turned for half an hour or so before he finally gave up and got up from the bed. He walked away and over into the bathroom and opened the faucet, the water was freezing. He cupped his hands and filled them with the water and splashed himself in the face, wetting his shirt a little. He looked around for a towel but couldn’t find one and decided to dry his face off with his already wet shirt.
He came out of the bathroom, walked over to the window and looked outside. All he could see was white, the blizzard had covered everything in snow; it actually seemed peaceful outside in the storm. The antique that was the television was on, some infomercial about a grill, he walked over and plopped down onto the bed and started to change the channels.
“I wonder how she’s doing with that client of her’s.”
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Post by amysutherland on May 30, 2005 15:23:39 GMT -5
7:23pm. They were late. If it was one thing Amy couldn’t abide it was lateness. She had been trying her best to make her single glass of whisky last for over 50 minutes now. She was slouched back with her feet up on the table and her hands resting in her lap. She was quite aware of the angry and annoyed glances she was getting from the regulars over their pints and from the bartender who was still cleaning the same glass with the white rag. Irish folk music still played idly over the speakers while the haze of cigar and cigarette smoke had become noticeably thicker.
Finally at almost half past seven the door swung open and two burly looking men entered brushing the snow from their shoulders. The first one took a long look around the bar while the second tried to be intimidating to some nearby costumers. Amy was looking straight at the first one and waited till he caught her eye. When he did he moved over the bar with the second one in tow.
Amy sat up, drained the rest of her drink and went over to the bar herself. The bartender began to edge towards the three of them, but then decided better of it and went in the other direction instead.
“You’re late.” Amy said as she sat down on a stool and made herself comfortable.
“We were held up” Came the quiet, but gruff reply. He was obviously the one who had spoken to the answering machine. He sat facing the bar with his left elbow on the counter while the other hand was in his coat pocket obviously fingering a gun. The second man had his back to the first keeping an eye on the other costumers, but he also had his left hand wrapped around a gun. His right arm was on top of the counter gently playing with a stale peanut.
“Well, what is it you want?” Amy placed her loosely crossed arms onto the bar careful not to put her elbows into a pool of spilt beer. She looked at him through her glasses gauging his weight and strength and how good his reactions were.
“My Boss has a surveillance job for you. She’s prepared to pay big money for it.”<br> “How much?”<br> He stopped playing with his gun momentarily to take a pad and a pencil from his inside left jacket pocket. He placed it on the bar and hastily scribbled down a figure that had plenty of noughts. Amy had to look over the top of her glasses just to make sure she was reading it right.
“Half now, half when yo –” but he didn’t finish as he had just noticed Amy’s eyes. He openly stared at them with his mouth slightly open. His friend, in noticing the lack of noise coming from his partner, turned around and also stared at Amy. They shared a worried look before both looking away from each other and at Amy. The second man settled for concentrating on a wall ornament while the first man focused on the bottles behind the bar while tapping his fingers. Amy had never really gotten this reaction before. It was almost as though they were embarrassed. She quickly broke the tension with her usual excuse.
“They’re only contacts.”<br> The men shared a look again and after a conversation with their eyebrows went back to their original positions. The first man took the pad and pencil and placed it neatly back into his pocket.
“As I was saying, half now, half when the job’s done to my Boss’ satisfaction.”
Amy was more then pleased with that arrangement. Half of the full amount is what she would expect from a particularly tricky search and retrieval job and she was getting that just for watching someone.
“So, when do I find out who I’m supposed to be watching?”<br> “You will get a package tomorrow with the all the details in and the first half of your payment. Then it’s up to you to get there and how long you spend there, but you better do a decent job or else my Boss won’t be pleased. And you don’t want to see her – ”
“When she’s not pleased” she finished for him. “I get the picture.”
“Good.” And with that he tapped his friend on the back, got up and left. Amy sat there for a while longer going over in her head what she would do with all that money. She didn’t realize she had a smile on her face that was neatly showing off her fangs till the sound of a braking glass interrupted her thoughts. She looked for the source and found the bartender sweeping up large shards of glass while looking as white as his rag.
She shook her head in an amused way and exited through the door into a flurry of cold dark flakes that stuck to her as she hurried off into the night.
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Post by xman on May 30, 2005 17:32:50 GMT -5
As much as he hated to admit it he was worried that she had gotten in to some kind of trouble. Nate knew that she was a great fighter and she could take care of herself but that guy on her answering machine sounded very shady.
He got up from the bed and walked around the small apartment for a while, contemplating if he should go to that bar or not. “She’s a big girl, she’ll be fine,” he was thinking out loud now to some how prove himself right, “She kicked those guys asses back at Joe’s, she can handle herself.”
He sat back down on the bed and looked around the apartment, he had to do something to keep his mind off of the ridicules thought that Sphinx was in danger. He started to watch television, which only making him even more anxious to go out to that bar. He thought a little more about it and came to a conclusion that was simple enough. This was crazy; he was worrying over a grown woman that seemed to do this on a regular basis, which he had just met that night. He never worried like this over a person he had just met, it was difficult for him to care for a person like that, which really had Nate freaked out.
“She should be coming here soon anyway, how long could a meeting like that take,” saying those words seemed to calm his nerves and eased his mind. “I don’t even have the keys to this place, can’t leave the door open and walk on out.”
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Post by amysutherland on Jun 5, 2005 12:21:16 GMT -5
Amy had spent the night at one of her favourite haunts. It was a small dingy privately owned bar where she could relax, safe in the knowledge that only a select few could get in. It was also one of her favourite places because for her the drinks were free. She had done a job for the bartender, Zack, but he could only pay half the bounty so he gave Amy free drinks for the rest of her life in compensation for the other half. Amy quite happily agreed and frequently visited the ‘Safe House’. Of course the real name of the bar was ‘Quattuor Telum’, but it had been nick-named the ‘Safe House’ by the regulars as they were quite aware you had to be a friend of Zack to get in.
Zack was, like many of the regulars, a mutant, which was why they all knew they wouldn’t get any trouble. Zack had two extra arms which made his bartending duties very easy, but made him slightly awkward in public. Amy had seen him once or twice around the city. His two upper arms were looking very ordinary in his knee length raincoat, but she had spotted his two lower ones dangling by his sides. He had once shown her how he had put pockets on the inside of his coat so his hands wouldn’t accidentally fall out underneath the hem.
She had wiled away the hours chatting to Zack about her recent jobs, the new one she had even mentioned Nate once or twice, but only in passing. They also discussed the protests and even politics for a while. Around 3am she left and wandered the streets for a while. Unsurprisingly there weren’t that many people around, but Amy was quite happy be by herself. She had walked up the quiet high street amongst gently falling flakes while taking part in abit of window shopping. She could easily afford everything she looked at, but none of it was very practical. She did however stop in an all night convenience store to pick up some groceries as well as a small plastic Christmas tree and some decorations.
On her way home she stopped by Joe’s to get the bill for her little encounter the day before. He was much more understanding then when he was last night and after the business of the bill was sorted out she stayed for some breakfast.
She finally got home at about 10:30am to find a brown package on her doorstep. She put her purchases down to inspect the package. She found no note on it and none of her senses picked up anything suspicious so she gently placed her key in the lock and quietly entered her currently occupied apartment.
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Post by xman on Jun 5, 2005 19:47:29 GMT -5
Nate ad spent most of the night watching television waiting up for Sphinx. It was 4:00 in the morning when Nate’s body finally gave in and he went to sleep. When she had came home in the morning Nate was already awake, very hungry and very bored. He got up off the bed his arm feeling much better and walked over to her. “Long ass meeting huh, where have you been?” He paused for a moment he thought about what he had just said and shook his head, “I’m sorry, I’m acting stupid, didn’t want it to come out that way.”
He noticed the box and the other things on top. He grabbed them from her and walked over to her desk placing the items on top, “so what’s in the box, oh let me guess it’s from one of your clients.”
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Post by amysutherland on Jun 6, 2005 11:51:46 GMT -5
She couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow at Nate’s first comment as walked through the door. She had never gotten it before, not even from her own mother.
She let him take a couple of the things from her as she went over to the kitchen and stared putting her shopping away.
“There’s a Christmas tree in there if you want to put it up. On top of the chest of draws would be good. Oh, and that’s not really a request.”<br> She put the last of her groceries away then focused her attention on the package. She cleared a small space on her desk and gently unwrapped the brown paper. Upon opening it she found the promised amount in neat wads of notes and a thick grey folder underneath. She took out the folder then, placing her feet up on the desk began to read about her intended target.
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Post by xman on Jun 6, 2005 17:57:05 GMT -5
“There’s a Christmas tree in there if you want to put it up. On top of the chest of draws would be good. Oh, and that’s not really a request.”
Nate smiled at her, she was really funny at times, but Nate decided to comply and opened up the box where the Christmas tree was. He flipped the box over letting the parts of the plastic tree fall all over the floor. Looking at the instructions, the tree didn’t seem so hard to build, it was tiny but perfect for the amount of space the apartment had. “So how did the meeting go?” He had already found and separated most of the parts for easy assembly; grabbing the base he placed the “branches” around it forming a miniature tree. “Done, that was simple enough, any decorations?” he had been in this reality for maybe a year or two and he already knew enough about Christmas to know that you needed ornaments to decorate the tree.
She was already opening the box, and she seemed pleased with what see saw. Looking back down at the tree he spoke, “Well I see your happy, was it a nice surprise?”
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Post by amysutherland on Jun 12, 2005 9:40:54 GMT -5
She threw him a bag over her shoulder without looking, confident that he would catch it. Inside was a string of coloured fairy lights, a set of bulbuls, some tinsel and a gold star to go on the top. She might very rarely celebrate Christmas, but Amy did have an artistic eye.
“Well I see your happy, was it a nice surprise?”
She replied to his query with a single short answer.
“Oh yes, very.”
She continued to read about this Rouge character and when she was done she grabbed a scrap of paper and started jotting down what equipment she would need. Occasionally she would refer back to the file, but her memory was one of the best. One read through was all she needed to memorise all the facts. Thing was, she could do this before she went to School. If she had ever done any of her exams she would’ve excelled without revising.
Once her list was finished she moved over to the chest next to her bed and discreetly took out a key from in between a gap in the floorboards. She took off the padlock and replaced the key. If you didn’t know it was there it would be very hard to find. Lifting the lid she found all of her specialist equipment packed neatly inside. She reached into the right hand side and brought out a small red metal box. Without the keys this thing was impenetrable.
She took it over to the desk and once again secretly took three keys from their individual hiding places. She slid them into their respective slots and opened the box. Inside there was a lot of cash all put into neatly wrapped wads. She added most of her latest payment keeping the rest aside to pay Joe and for some other expenses she knew she would need. She had never done a surveillance job from a wood before in winter.
She locked the box back up and stored it back in the chest after replacing all the keys. She then starting taking out various bits of equipment from the chest and laying it aside on the floor in a uniform manner. This was going to be a tough job.
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Post by xman on Jun 12, 2005 22:54:09 GMT -5
“Oh yes, very.”
He smirked at her short reply as a bag fell beside him. Opening it he could see all the different lights, the tinsel and of course the star that would go on top of the tree. He might have asked what was inside the box but he doubted she would tell him, so he sat and decorated the tree. Nate paid no attention to what she was doing he was lost in his own thoughts, it had been a long time since he had met up with Xavier and he was happy he could be spending this Christmas in peace.
When he was done he admired his work for a minute and picked the tree up placing it on top of the stool, “That’s fine right there don’t you think?” He sat down on the bed and started to change the channel on the TV when something caught his attention.
“In other news, Congress will reconvene for further discussion of the controversial Mutant Registration Act. This act would require all mutants to register themselves with government, listing their current address, occupation and powers they possess. Crowds of supporters and protesters have formed outside the building for a week now, loudly proclaiming their feelings on the matter.”
As Nate looked on he could see protesters and supporters outside Congress all looking very pissed, only one word came out of Nate’s mouth.
“Crap!”
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Post by amysutherland on Jun 16, 2005 10:19:02 GMT -5
“Crap!”
She looked over to see what had caused Nate’s to curse and wasn’t very surprised by what she saw on the screen. When it came to things such as the MRA she felt indifferent to it. She would probably be classed as a mutant, but if they thought she was going to register herself as one then they had another thing coming. She hadn’t really come to terms with it herself. She had always just passed herself off a bit different because she didn’t have any of the powers that other mutants did. Just a bit of good training could make anyone into what she was.
Instead of reacting to something that didn’t really concern her she turned her attention to Nate.
“Hey. I need you to listen to me here.”
She walked over to the TV and turned the sound down while facing him.
“I’ve got a job to do and there is no way you are coming with me. I work alone. But you can’t stay here either. I’m not going to give you a key because, frankly, I don’t trust you enough to not give yourself or this place away. Understand?”
She moved over and started packing her smaller pieces of equipment into a large rucksack.
“I don’t know or really care too much about what you do, but you’ve got 2 hours to think of something.”
She opened the chest of draws and took out some clothes before going into the kitchen and opening one of the lower cupboards. She took out a dozen or so of hand sized silver packets and also put them in the bag. She then took the money she had left on the desk and placed it in an inside pocket of her coat.
“I’m going out to get some things.”
She hoisted the bag on her back and stacked some poles and other large items by the door that she would collect after her little shopping spree.
“You have 2 hours.”
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