Get a real job

[Crow]

Crow's first task after leaving was to hide the evidence. Not any traces that she'd been there—she didn't care who found fingerprints or blood—but there was a rooftop a block away that she wanted to get to first. If they confiscated her Dragonov or that detonator, she'd have a hell of a time getting them back. And she liked her gun. More than most people. She was still bleeding, but it had already started to slow a little. If she could refrain from shifting for an hour or two, it would probably stop completely. Unfortunately, that wasn't likely to happen. She was leaving a trail, and even if Scotch didn't wake up, the police would be likely to follow it. Food would still be necessary though. Crow had been running on empty before feeling the effects of blood loss.

After storing the Dragonov and police files safely a few blocks away, Crow gave up on not shifting, and flew towards one of her emergency caches. It was a blocked-off section of sewer, inaccessible by anything larger than a rat, and—thankfully—fairly dry. She could survive for a few weeks off its contents, provided she wasn't picky. It was a far cry from one of her apartments, but it had medical supplies. She peeled off her shirt and wrapped the wound, not bothering with disinfectants. Shifting would take care of that. Now, at least, she wouldn't be bleeding everywhere. She could go out in public, and get some real food, and...shit. She didn't have any fresh clothing here. Crow stared at her torn, blood-soaked shirt. There was a trail down the side of her pants, too, slowly spreading outward.

Normally, it wouldn't be a huge problem. She could just shift—no one cared about naked pigeons—go back to one of her apartments, and get some fresh clothes. Except she no longer had apartments. She was, effectively, homeless. It was almost funny, considering she frequently posed as such anyway. Almost. Damn, she'd need a new plan. It wouldn't be too difficult to sneak into some store's stockroom and grab something, but it was so...inconvenient. Crow was really starting to dislike this assassin.

There was a high-pitched beeping from the pair of pants she'd discarded, above the normal range of human hearing. Crow automatically reached for the pocket where she kept her phone, pulled it out, and glanced at the screen. Huh, that was odd. Nothing. The beeping continued, obviously from the other pocket. Scotch's phone. Well, that answered the question about his senses. She picked it up curiously, looking at the screen. Hmm, interesting. It wasn't a number listed in his contacts. After another second she accepted the call, and held the phone up to her ear. Crow remained silent, waiting for the caller to speak first. If the caller wasn't aware that his phone was stolen, she was going to find out as much about them as possible first.

[Scotch]

The time it took for Crow to answer seemed to be almost too long. Luckily, Rostock had instilled a level of patience that was almost superhuman in him. Her having his phone, however, was starting to break that resolve. There were numbers in that phone that Scotch didn't want to her to ring, let alone see; or hell, memorize. Finally, the call connected and, where Scotch had thought someone might answer, there was silence. Definitely this bitch then. The silence continued for a few moments. "I want it back." He was, of course, talking about his phone. It was the only thing that he really cared about that she took and he certainly hadn't put it in any self-destruct code into it.

That thought alone was starting to make Kaden clench his fists and grit his teeth. He wasn't personally aware if self-destruct codes could be written into phones, but he was going to ring Rodderick the first chance he got and see if it was possible. "I will consider it a deal. You give it back and I will give up the job to kill you." His phone, or more importantly, the numbers within it, were that important to him.

[Crow]

It was him. She couldn't be completely sure, seeing as she hadn't heard his voice before, but who else could want 'it' back? Crow gave a quiet snort into the phone, but remained otherwise silent. It would tell him enough of what she thought about the demand. The voice continued a second later, elaborating on the topic. A deal. Interesting. This phone was more valuable to him than the considerable chunk of money he'd been offered to kill her. It looked like a nice phone, granted—touchscreen and everything—but it wasn't worth that much. And seeing as he didn't seem like the sentimental type, its value was probably in its contents. Oh, she was going to strip every file apart after he hung up.

“I assume you're talking about your phone? Well, see, you really don't have a bargaining point right now. Your employer's already dead, so I'm pretty sure the job's canceled. You're going to have to do better than that. And don't say that if I don't give it back, you'll kill me. You've been trying for a week. You can't exactly threaten to destroy my houses, since you got all of them. And I don't have family or loved ones to threaten, either.”

Although, to be fair, that last part wasn't entirely true. She had a puppy. Theoretically, if he found out they were linked, he could track down Tysk and threaten him. And then he'd have SHIELD on his ass, too. Yeah, she could probably sacrifice her kid for that. He was kind of an abomination, anyway. Crow leaned back against the sewer wall, teeth gritting at the sudden spasm of pain from her side. There were probably painkillers around here somewhere, but that would almost certainly mean vomiting everywhere for a little while. She needed real food. And coffee. Mostly that.

[Scotch]

Scotch took a deep breath in when Crow started talking. Of course he was talking about his phone. Why would he care about some hardly important papers that were easily replicated? "This is hardly about my employer anymore, is it." Not a question, although he was somewhat confused about his employer being dead. He wouldn't be surprised if she had done it though, knowing what he did now. Scotch scoffed when she said that he'd been trying to kill her for a week. "No, I have not been trying to kill you." Those explosions had only been implemented to draw her out because he couldn't kill her before that. Scotch also doubted that he had destroyed all of her houses.

Scotch was starting to get frustrated. He hated the talking part of anything and the less words, the better. After all, actions were louder. He knew that, Crow would probably know that. Scotch pressed a fist into the hall table he was standing by and he leaned forward. "Not yet. But that phone is more important to me than killing you." Of course, Scotch wasn't sentimental, but he was protective, and contacts in that phone needed that protection. If he had to, he would search the entire network of tunnels in New York to find it, and her.

[Crow]

No longer about his employer? Oh joy, he was working freelance now. Granted, if he really wanted to, Crow was pretty sure he could find someone else willing to pay to kill her. There were plenty out there who wouldn't mind seeing her dead. And plenty more who would panic if they thought there was a chance of it actually happening. Scotch continued, mentioning that he hadn't been trying to kill her. Crow didn't dignify that with a response. She was pretty damn sure that trying to shoot her through the head wasn't his preferred form of greeting. Although, considering he was walking around now...

As Crow thought about what to do, she picked the detonator where she'd left it on the floor. She still had no clue what the charges would actually do. They seemed like some type of plastic explosive, but they were SHIELD prototypes. There would be no way of finding out without pressing the button. Hmm, what was the range on the detonator, anyway? Probably not halfway across the city. More out of curiosity's sake than actual spite, she pressed the button on the detonator. As expected, there was no noise of explosion from the phone. But that was assuming that Scotch was using his house phone, and not some pay phone somewhere. Maybe she'd still managed to blow it up from here. She'd have to check later.

“Okay,” she replied finally, making up her mind. “I'll make sure it gets back to you.” After she got as much useful information out of it as she could manage. Best-case scenario, she found something useful and Scotch kept his word. Worst-case, there was nothing on the phone that was useful to her, and Scotch kept on trying to kill her. Both were acceptable outcomes. Crow hung up, not waiting for a reply from the assassin. She knew where he lived; returning the phone wouldn't be a problem. If he demanded a time frame of less than an hour, she damn well wasn't going to listen long enough for him to say it. She was in a safe enough spot right now. It was time to get to work.

[Scotch]

No response. Well, it was better than her talking as he was starting to realize. At this point, he was about to find out her phone number just so he would never have to listen to her talk again... that or cut out her tongue. The latter was probably the most preferable to him. Instead of any speech though, Scotch could hear her doing something in the background and frowned lightly until he heard a button click. The explosives. A smirk toyed in his mind, but never crossed the threshold into the physical realm. Amusing that she would try to blow up the house now. He would have done it as soon as he'd gotten out. Maybe he should point this out to her.

No, she decided to speak again and he was less than pleased with what she said, but she hung up before he had a chance to respond. Fuming, Scotch picked up the phone set and threw it at the wall. He would need to relocate now and he had no faith that he would ever see that phone again. Luckily, nothing here was too precious to him that he couldn't just leave. He might return later to use the charges she'd set to blow up the house himself... or she would do it before him and safe him the trouble.