(Authors note: don’t kill me! *whines*)

Perhaps It’s Fate

The fact that the maniac’s hideout was a giant flying cocoon should have been the first sign that something was amiss, but screw it, she was being paid just for showing up. The henchmen were all dressed in yellow and black uniforms. Typically they obscured most of the face, which was okay, but the butterflies’ wings were creepy. Like a production of Fantasia gone horribly wrong.

It was fairly spacious on the interior, quite deceptive of the seemingly smallish exterior space. Well after all this Monarch guy was supposed to be some sort of mad genius and they were always tinkering with the laws of physics.

Eva sighed. She should have traded places with Blackie. Right now she was probably off getting a nice relaxing mud bath after offing an easy mark for a nifty sum. Well at least she’d been paid half up front. The collection of assassins and mercenaries were motley at best, except for one guy carrying a cannon on his shoulder—he must have been impressively strong just to lift it, let alone fire it.

She snoozed halfway through the briefing, if you cold call it that. Apparently except for one bodyguard—described as a demon raised from the depths of hell—and a rogue necromancer who spouted drama more often than spells, the target’s compound was completely undefended. It would be a cakewalk, pure and simple.

A deep husky voice woke her up—she realized she’d fallen asleep standing up. Stretching and yawning she opened her eyes to find herself looking into the gaze of a perfect replica of Jackie Kennedy, which made her stumble back a little bit.

“What the hell?! Don’t wake me up like that, it’s not funny!” For once she’d managed to not shoot anything; normally when people woke her up like that they wound up staring at the death end of a TEC-9.

“Everybody else has left already, sweetie.” The voice reminded Eva more of an emphysema patient than Mrs. Kennedy…cute though. Of course now she was pissed; they’d get there first and get the money for offing this rival. Apparently one bodyguard was too much for him to do it himself.

“Hey, you’re that chick who was hanging of his arm!” Eva stalked up as the woman slid a CD into a player, and a video popped onto a screen set into the wall. There wasn’t much to see other than a lot of carnage. “…looks like something I’d do.”

“I’ve seen your work. Well this was done by one man who wasn’t even armed.” Damn. That was some fine work. Eva recalculated her chances. They suddenly skyrocketed. A trained assassin against a trained assassin…it had been awhile since she’d had any challenge. Of course, aside from being surrounded by legions of bounty hunters and government tools bent on her demise.

“Just so you know I don’t normally bother with the supervillain types. Enough far more dangerous normal people to keep me busy.” The mad doctor’s girlfriend offered her a cigarette. “You know my vices.”

“Come back when the job’s finished. I’ll have something for that friend of yours, too.”

“I work alone.”

“Sure you do, sweetie.” The woman turned and walked off, sashaying in that tight miniskirt and being rather deliberately enticing. Focus, girl. Don’t get distracted; remember she sleeps with a supervillain.

It was one of her cardinal rules: “Never get involved with the disavowed.” It was more common sense than any fear of reprisals. People involved with blacklist projects tended to be a little insane and a lot sporting experimental equipment that could wind up with a dead Eva. Better to stick with the normal targets like terrorists and power-thieving governors.

The rare exception to this was in times of financial duress and when the pay was far above and beyond the normal rate. It cost a lot to keep the government from knocking on her door and lately they weren’t paying her to confuse the truth. Bastards.

It was a long flight to New Jersey, to the target’s compound near Hoboken of all places, where once off the plane she left a phone message with Blackie and went off to gather her bags. The men in suits had been kind enough to let her keep the loaned equipment from her last job with them; guns made of ceramics and plastics that wouldn’t set off the metal detectors and which presented the X-ray image of everyday hygiene items. They’d be on the market in another ten years, so she counted herself lucky to have a few already. (The Metal Storm system is just a fake to appease the cutting-edge community.)

It wasn’t hard to locate the compound. Even though it wasn’t on any maps everyone knew where it was, as it was kind of hard to notice a jet taking off from a private airstrip five miles from the stadium. A quick stroll in, a mess of bullets and blood, a few evidential photographs, and she’d be made for the next year.

Strolling right past the gate she headed for the side door, weapon at the ready. Maybe now she’d finally be able to get over that damn nervousness she felt whenever—duck, you moron! Of course, she didn’t have Spidey Sense so the stiff jab caught her straight in the jaw, knocking her backwards and causing her to drop the K-11.

“Son of a bitch.” She staggered to her feet, ready to murder the man who just had to be the bodyguard. Clearing the haze from her eyes she glared, getting a good look at him. “Get ready to die, Hercules.”

“Actually it’s Brock, Miss Sirkowski. Brock Samson.” Oh, so he was a government man, huh? This was gonna be fun.

“I don’t really give a fuck. You picked the wrong day to piss me off.” She didn’t bother going for the gun. She’d heard rumors floating around and if she took her eyes off him she’d wind up dead or worse. It was the ‘or worse’ part that had her nervous. Death didn’t bother her too much. Men like him were notoriously unstable…she lunged with a forward sweeping left kick that was easily blocked for a follow-up by a big lunging axe fist.

She ducked under it and made several swift open-palm strikes to his underarm area, forcing him back and giving her the respite to wipe some blood from her chin.

“Can’t let you kill my paycheck, kid.”

“There’ll be others. I need this one.”

“Sorry.” Then he lunged again. He’s fast for a big man. Don’t let him get you. You’re smaller and weaker and can hit more precisely. Size wasn’t too much of a worry for Eva, getting caught was. Bad things happen when you get caught. For several minutes they traded blows, at one point Eva snatching his knife while he grabbed her gun, preparing to use it as a blunt throwing weapon to knock her out. A deft throw of the knife pinned it to the wall, and she leapt at him for a Tiger Yawning in the Sun strike.

Only to meet that big meaty fist and be thrown through a window, glass cutting her body and leaving her in a little pain. To be able to actually fly through a real glass pane you have to be moving pretty fast. It’s equivalent to being hit by a car going 20 miles per hour in terms of impact.

He leapt in after her, and advanced again, growling a little. She made the first move this time, foot meeting chest with a satisfying crack of ribs, but she lingered just a little too long, worn out from the fight lasting this long, and he had her. Oh shit. This isn’t good, girl. Wait til he’s done then do that thing with the fingers in the groin.

Further thought was interrupted by a forced kiss, the man wearing a dark gleam that spoke of many lusts gone unfinished, and for a moment Eva was scared; then she remembered herself and detached from the reality around her. It helped in those times when pain was abundant and painkillers weren’t. Besides that he looked like the type who didn’t care whether she did anything or not.

She must have passed out at one point, for she woke to find it night, him snoring, a tremendous ache, and an intense loathing. Rather than try to run off or curl up in a corner whimpering like a schoolgirl she did the only thing she felt like doing: she killed him.

It was surprisingly easy, for such a feared bodyguard to go down so easily. A simple jab to the left of his trachea and that was it. She sat up, sheets sliding off of her and she shivered. Eva couldn’t find her clothes so his would have to do, even though they were a size or fifty too large. Staggering over to his closet she put some on and managed to find a belt that fit her and helped hold the pants up.

Then she retrieved her gun and his knife. Going methodically through the house she killed everyone she found, cruelly and without remorse, not caring that they were sleeping. The only one she spared was a young woman of about sixteen clutching a Mayan fetish doll. As murderous as she felt she just couldn’t pull the trigger.

Once that was all done she returned to the madman’s lair—they always had lairs—collected her payment, and then blew it up. A small smirk of satisfaction crossed her lips when the flight home passed over the crater where the flying cocoon had crashed and exploded with everyone inside.

A short cab ride home was all that was left, a little taken aback to find Blackie already returned but the woman fell silent in the middle of her explanation of “how boring it was without anyone to jibe with” when she saw the halfway dead stare Eva presented her with.

She slumped against the woman she called partner and friend (though Blackie had never heard those words cross her lips) and only then did Eva cry. Blackie was at a loss. In nearly five years of living with her she’d never seen Eva get emotional like this, but didn’t really need to guess what had happened.

Going to the police wasn’t an option for them. They were on the wrong side of the law nine times out of ten even if through their actions the world remained stable for one more day. After a couple of hours Eva finally calmed down enough to tell Blackie everything, and then she went to bed.

The next few weeks passed in a sort of quiet death for her, doing just enough to show that she was alive but not really doing anything beyond that. Eating felt strange and music just sounded like noise now, a random collection of disparate sounds and voices trying to fool people into thinking that everything was okay.

Blackie did her best to turn Eva into her old self, but aside from a return of and slight change in appetite she didn’t have much success. Eva just sat on the couch staring at the television listlessly, sometimes not even turning it on. The only thing that even seemed to make her smile anymore was reading the news on the capture of another criminal or sexual predator.

After what seemed like forever the blonde assassin finally started to return to normal, talking and even laughing again. It had been three months since her dead-eye rampage and things were finally starting to feel normal again for the two of them. Blackie was relieved at this; she’d begun thinking she might have to take her friend to see a psychiatrist, or at least that detective that was always hitting on Eva whenever there was information when he needed.

Eva for her part seemed actually a little too cheerful, in the manner that war veterans are always displaying when they retell their stories for the younger generation who wouldn’t ever have to experience it the way they had even if they went to war themselves.

The kind of cheerful when you had something to hide. Eva made herself useful and kept busy so Blackie wouldn’t have a chance to question this strange demeanor on her part; even so the woman had her suspicions and they only grew deeper when she asked Blackie to come along on her twice-yearly physical, something that up until then Eva had always done alone.

They drove in silence for quite awhile, the 45-minute drive only half finished when suddenly Eva spoke up, sounding a little nervous. “If you found out that something else had happened to you after something bad had already happened, what would you do about it?”

The question was worded confusingly, and it took her a moment to respond. “Keep it, I guess.” Behavior to the contrary she wasn’t stupid and could sense Eva’s worries. Though she would have no idea how to react if the blonde heard something she didn’t like.

“Oh. Okay. Thanks. I just want to apologize.” That almost made her swerve off the road. Eva apologizing? And for what, exactly? “All those times I pushed you away. I kept convincing myself that we couldn’t be more than friends. I never thanked you for all those times you’ve helped me, especially lately.”

“Don’t worry about it. You just focus on being you. Being the person you were meant to be.” The rest of the drive was done in silence, just the hum of the engine and the air conditioner.

An hour after that Eva came out of the office and gave a little awkward smile to Blackie, seated in the corner reading an old magazine to keep her worries quiet. Out in the hallway she stopped the dark-haired woman and gave that little grin again.

“So what’s the verdict, Eva?” Blackie was still concerned because well people acted weird when they had things they wanted to say but didn’t know how to say it. A nervous laugh escaped her. What was the crazy white lady up to?

“I’ll just say this. I’m keeping her. At first, right after it happened I’d thought that if I ended up a mother that I might get rid of it. But now, now that I know, it feels different. I feel good again. Like I don’t care what happened anymore. This kid’s gonna have at least as much chance as I did. And do you know what else?”

Blackie shook her head quietly, glad for the desolated hallway so she didn’t have to feel awkward about feeling awkward. The infamous Eva Sirkowski, pregnant? And acting awfully well-behaved, too, for that matter. She almost didn’t want know what was going to happen next. Which happened to be a kiss from the woman who, up until now had only shown she cared in those rare occurrences when Blackie was the one who needed help more than she did.

“This time, I’ll say yes.”

It took a little while longer than they had hoped and Eva had needed to go back to the tailor’s to get a little more room in the outfit but eventually they found a nice little place that provided all the documents and didn’t ask questions.

And for the first time, Eva Sirkowski, who had spent her life feeling that if she was happy it would be quickly stolen away, having had no reason to believe otherwise from her life experiences, felt good without feeling bad.