I am no-one, I am everyone

"Ninety coi was the price offered, Gunther."

"I offfffffered no priiiice to you."

"But I'm the one with the goods." Katya's not even aware when she shifts her weight from one foot to the other. She knows she has to be firm here. She knows she's got the bargaining chips. She just has to keep remembering that. "You want it, you'll have to pay me for it. Ninety coi."

"And whaaaat makessss you thhhink I'd pay that muccch for a worthless pieeeece of sssstone?"

Her eyes dart down to the statue in her hand, doubtful. Is he really not going to pay her for it? "Mel said..."

"Melaaaaaka," the fishman says, smug. "Melaaaaka's a thieeef, little Kaatya. You can't take her word."

Katya swallows, and her weight shifts again. "She wouldn't lie to me," she says, but it's quiet, doubtful. "She said you'd pay ninety coi. She said..."

Know you can do this, Princess. Wouldn't ask but there's lurks spinning shit down in Kassa. Ninety coi, he said. Keep the solid. Favour to me. Fishstick'll get it.

Mel had shown trust in Katya. Had said she needed her. Had said...

Was that all to trick her to doing her dirty work? The price Gunther was offering now was well below Mel Fray's price range, everyone knew it.

"Ninety coi, then."

As if the awkward silence had in fact been Katya arguing her case, hard and angry. As if she were actually capable of holding an argument with the fishman.

It's a few seconds before Katya can find her voice again. "..right," she says, and places the statue down on the table everyone leaves goods for Gunther. "Glad we could come to this arrangement."

As she leaves to be paid, she tries to ignore the warning that crackles out behind her.

"Ssssshe won't watch your back foreeeeever, Sweetheart."

Katya Tank is her real name. It just isn't the name her mother gave her. Nor is it the name the laws will pull up from the DNA scan on the fourth and fifth fingers she left on site at a job just a few months ago. She doesn't use that name any more, and doesn't associate it with herself.

This is why they still hire her. Why Gunther will keep giving her jobs, because he says he has faith in her and he knows it was an accident and she won't do anything like that again.

Katya also thinks that someone may have put in a good word for her.Or that the fishman thinks she'll make it up to him in other ways. This terrifies her, so she holds tightly on to the hope that he won't. That he does just think she's a good grabber with potential to be one of his best runners.

More than anything else, Katya wants to be a great grabber. She wants to be independent.

Well, sort of. She doesn't mind, for instance, that another of Gunther's grabbers passed up this job in her favour, giving some week excuse about turf wars across the river. She doesn't mind that someone's watching out for her, making sure she gets work, the opportunity to prove herself. She knows people call her the Princess, and she doesn't mind. They like her, and that's the best part.

She wishes she knew precisely how much this other grabber likes her.

She's not bad, either. She's small, agile, and can slide through holes and vents stronger men can't. She may not have the best vision or hearing, but she saved up all her income and got a visor to cover the side of her face that was scorched away by a gunblast. And of course, it turned out to be more than worth it. Now with the eyepiece switched to night vision, and the ear setting set to amplify certain frequencies, she can see that the rooftop ahead of her is clear, empty. No sirens for miles, no cars hovering just out of sight, no living humans any closer than the busy flyway the other side of the roof she's just crept on to.

Katya Tank exhales, removes her visor and hides it in one of the hidden pocket son her jacket, right next to the ugly sculpture she's just stolen. Then she drops down another level into an alleyway.

[March 10th, 1938 @ 8:13 am CET]

Even in Nazi Germany, people still read the morning paper with their coffee.

Most Germans, however, don't read the New York Times.

The woman sitting at the cafe is blonde and beautiful, with a sweet innocent face. As surprised as any of the people sitting at the neighboring tables might be to see her reading the New York Times, they would likely be even more surprised to know what kind of thoughts were running through her head as she gazes at the picture of the famed American archaeologist/adventurer, posing proudly with the recovered Chachapoyan idol.

"Indiana Jones," she murmurs, the faintest hint of triumph in her voice. She then folds up her paper in a leisurely fashion, and takes a final sip of coffee.

She has a few calls to make.

Leon had woken in strange places before. Floors of hotel rooms, homeless shelters, dark pub corners, even churches. But never before had he found himself sprawled across the pavement in a Jersey suburb. Why would he be in Jersey anyway? He hated Jersey.

He had sat on the curb for a good fifteen minutes attempting to get his bearings before he finally pushed himself up and began walking down the streets with their tidy rows of White Flight houses. He was unsure of which way to go, and so chose randomly, figuring that he could only get so far before he ran into something else. The something else turned out to be a police car, stopping him for having the audacity to walk the suburban streets at four AM and be black. After a long and garbled explanation as to what he was doing there, the cop, being not completely heartless, gave Leon a lift to the closest convenience store and dropped him there with fifty cents for the pay phone.

Leon, for his part, was aware of the fact that the cop thought he was nuts. He was giving no indication of being drunk or on drugs, yet he was claiming that he didn't know how he had gotten to Jersey and that he must have been abducted. He was lucky to have gotten what he did from the cop, all things considered, as Leon didn't know any more about how to deal with the police than anyone else, in spite of the lucky badge he kept in the glovebox of his cab.

It was almost six AM when Leon's brother, Leroy, showed to pick the wayward cabbie up from the Wawa store and drive him back to the city. Leroy was cranky and complained the entire way about having to make the trip, not believing Leon's claims that he didn't know how he had gotten to Jersey or where his cab was. Leroy was even less enthused when, upon returning to NYC, they discovered Leon's cab in front of the drugstore where he had left it.

Aliens. That had to be the only explanation. Leon stood at the back of the cab, staring down at the neat hole left in his trunk lid. Some sort of probe, surely. He stuck his index finger through the hole and wiggled it experimentally. Yes. There was no other explanation. The inside of the cab offered no further evidence, although there was a blue t-shirt balled up in the backseat.

My name is Andrew, I am not a turtle? Is that some kind of joke? Needless to say, Leon didn't get it, and the shirt was tossed in the nearest waste bin without another thought. Leon had found way weirder stuff in his cab before, after all.

Sliding back into his familiar front seat, Leon was surprised to find his keys still dangling idly from the ignition. Somehow, he thought the aliens would have taken the rabbit's foot. The biggest surprise came, however, when he turned the key and every possible accessory turned on with the engine: The windsheild wipers, headlights, right-hand blinker, radio, disco ball, all of it.

"This means something," Leon murmurred to himself. Next stop, the National Enquirer.