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phormthevixdjinnTerri leaned forward over the coffee table, tray in hand, trembling.
The girl was doing her absolute her best as she made her offering, struggling mightily to hide her almost overwhelming anxiety behind a too-forced smile. Of course, she was still wearing the rest of her nightclub attire. Miniskirt, tube top, fishnets - It made for an awkward mixture, such a bold outfit to go with her utter terror and her polite, false, retail-level happiness.
The tray clattered as the rabbit girl shivered. Terri visibly struggled to maintain her composure. The assortment of items on the tray were somewhat eclectic: Several bandages of different sizes, gauze, forceps, fast-drying liquid stitches, handfuls of various painkillers, an assortment of hard candies, and a tall bottle of vodka. It was the usual array of necessities she'd bring to her compatriots when they'd return from a unfortunately difficult, violent encounter. This was the first time she'd presented them in such a manner, though. As if she were a cocktail waitress.
From the other side of the tray, where she sat upon the black leather couch, the otherworldly mink regarded Terri's offering with cool disinterest. Teff sat with one leg over the other, her cigarette holder hanging loose in her fingers, somehow seeming too large for the room to actually contain her, despite her relatively diminutive stature. Teff's gaze regarded the items only briefly, before drawing her eyes upward to focus on the terrified bunny. For her part, Teff gave as genuine a smile in reply as she was able. She imagined it must've come off as condescending, or disingenuous. But she tried.
"Thank you, dear," Teff softly noted, "But I promise you I'm fine."
"B-B-B-But," Terri stammered, "The b-b-b-bottle."
"Really. Don't worry about it. But thank you."
"Fucking shit," The words came from across the room, where Vect sat behind her desk. She had her feet up, leaning back in her own weathered, yet comfortable, executive chair. Her sneakers and denim remained a stark contrast to the other mink's elegant purple evening dress. Vect was also loading two shells into the chamber of a break-load shotgun. "All that, and you just shrug it off?"
Teff, for her part, continued to address Terri, "Feel free to take that away, and don't worry about me. I believe your boss and I have some matters to discuss, s-"
The air cracked with the sound of Vect snapping the break back into place, leveling the loaded shotgun over her desk and directly at Teff.
"Hey, what would happen if I just blasted you square in the face right now? You'd just... grow a new one? Pick the old one up and reuse it?" Vect's words were dismissive and flippant. But Teff could feel below their superficial surface. Just minutes ago, Vect had cracked - a look of terror on her face as she realized that Teff was anything but what was expected. Now, Teff presumed, Vect was posturing to make up for lost ground.
"You'd make a mess. But what's worse, you'd piss me off," Teff took a long drag from her cigarette holder, unbothered. She let the prolonged silence hang awkwardly in the air as Vect viewed her down the sight of the shotgun. "Then, I'd make a mess."
Vect hesitated a beat, before frowning and lowering her gun to the desk. She let out a sound of frustration, something like "Phhhst", before swinging her feet back to the floor and leaning forward in her chair.
"Get lost for a little bit, huh Terri?" The mink's words brimmed with misplaced anger, as if she were embarrassed to be bested again, "Go find Kayte or something."
"Y-y-yes! Of c-course," Terri turned on her platform heels fast enough that Teff though the girl might put a hole in the rug beneath her. The rabbit girl bolted for the door with tray still in hand, pausing only for a moment to look over her shoulder and struggle to say, "I-It was nice to meet you, Teff!"
The click of the door behind her as she exited left a vacuum in the office, more of that awkward silence rushing in to fill the void as the two minks stared each other down. For her part Teff lingered in the silence patiently. She had just shown Vect more than the mink was ready to see, after all. And now that Vect had to grapple with the idea that she wasn't in total control of her little world, Teff knew there was no telling what she would do to compensate.
Not that it mattered much.
Despite her outward appearance of patience, Teff was starting to get quite annoyed. She was used to getting what she wanted, when she wanted it. This encounter might've been over by this point, had Vect been just slightly more amenable - slightly more willing to share. It was galling, having to play along. Having to be so restrained. The slick mink had considered just claiming Vect, here and now, as her own to get the information she needed. In fact, she had considered it SEVERAL times already. How easy it would've been, to just take.
And yet, at the same time Teff knew the score. Making a scene here would earn her nothing. Claiming Vect would have consequences. And as much as she positively hated to admit it, Teff wanted Vect and her organization to endure. That was important to her.
She had use for them, after all.
Teff let out a sigh before hanging her head in frustration, "Listen, Vect. All I-"
"You could destroy me, couldn't you," Vect's words were very quiet. "Destroy everything about me. Everything here. You're one of those... I don't know how to put it, but I know the power when I see it. Only seen it a few times, but..."
Teff raised an eyebrow. Interesting.
"Vect, all I want is some information. I should hope I haven't given you the impression that I would destroy you or anything else." Teff tapped her cigarette holder to ash into an empty glass on the coffee table, "I've been such a good girl tonight. I hope that doesn't need to change."
Vect nodded a little to herself as she sank back into her chair. "I didn't see it in you at first. But after that little stunt... You're closer to the source than I realized. Just like..."
A jolt of uncut curiosity raced through Teff, "Close to the source?"
Vect shook her head, "Forget it. Just... yeah, okay. I see you. I recognize you. I know what and where to respect."
Teff furrowed her brown for a moment in reply. Perhaps this one had been around the block more than she realized.
"Oh, and, uh... Sorry," Vect's eyes locked with Teff's even as she sank into her chair further, abashed, "For stabbing you in the face with a broken bottle, I mean."
"Think nothing of it, dear," Teff's words were slick, but they had an edge to them. "Now, I believe you were about to tell me a story?"
"Yeah, sure. A story. Well. To begin with, you should know I haven't seen her any time recently."
"When was the last time?"
"About four years ago."
Shit, Teff cursed inwardly. This was about as cold as a trail could get.
Then again, maybe that was good news. She still had to try, "You're the last person to see her, from everything I've been able to gather. No contacts with her old lab, no published papers, no active address. No email address, even."
"Say," Vect furrowed her brow, "What's she to you, anyway? She never talked about you. And... Let's just say she'd probably have a hard time keeping you a secret."
Teff threw her head back with a riotous laugh. A cutting sound that made Vect's pupils dilate as it filled the already tense room.
"Oh, my dear Vect," She shot a dagger of a grin at the other mink, "I am her greatest secret. So much so that I don't even think she knows about me." Teff's knowing smirk was cryptic enough to make Vect inwardly scowl. She knew she was being fucked with. "The details are trivial, dear. I have business with her. Ancient history if you will, but it's important to my future."
Vect rolled her shoulders as a chill rolled down her spine, "Yeah, okay whatever."
"And what's she to you?"
"You serious?" Vect shot a genuinely quizzical look across her desk, "You came to me to find her, and you don't even know why you'd come to me?"
Teff very plainly shook her head, "As I said, your... prospective recruit... spilled the beans. That's what made the connection for me. I presume she had some manner of association with your organization, and your... endeavors."
Vect blew out a heavy breath as she leaned back in her chair now, "Naw. She never wanted to join us here, even if we were all in the same mess together. Always had her studies, had her nose in a book. She got ground into dust in that lab, but she sure as shit never seemed to want to leave for all the shit she went through there. Or at least, she never knew she could leave." Vect raised an eyebrow in Teff's direction. For as slick as the other mink seemed to be, this was a strange gap in her knowledge.
Vect shook her head as she dismissed the concern. She continued, "Forget it, I'm getting off track. If you really need to know, though, me and her? We go way back. We're sisters. Sort of. But also, very actually. The biology behind that is a little unconventional. Tends to get that way with genetic engineering."
The detail bounced right off Teff, "I'm just concerned with where she is now."
"Yeah, like I said, I got zero clue."
"So then," Teff was the one to lean forward now, "Why don't you start with when and where you last saw her?"
"Well, okay. But like I said, the girl was never much for socializing. Every time I had seen her after we... uh... 'left home', it basically had to involve my beating down her door and dragging her out by the lab coat collar. Pulling her along on some damned fool adventure just to get her out of that basement. I guess eventually over the years we reached a mutual understanding of our respective circumstances. Which is to say, we each knew we were both being hunted by The Alliance - by our good friend Andy in particular - so we both knew it paid to stick together. Fuck, at least I knew that. She never did approve much of the strategy me and the girls tend to employ. Call it 'the direct approach' if you want. She never had a taste for it. Too 'loud', I guess. Even so, it was obvious that she knew that we were all on the same side in this thing. So occasionally, I'd keep her well stocked with certain goods she couldn't get, and in exchange she'd supply us with resources we couldn't refine ourselves. Girl had a wicked way of extracting just the right shit from red ribbo-
"Well. Anyway. It pays to know a chemist.
"I'm boring you with all this shit to make it clear why I nearly fell flat on my ass the day she called me up and said she had a job for me.
"It was some miserable night in August, about four years ago. Sweltering. And she had an urgency in her voice I had never heard before. I think part of it was because she was sure The Alliance was about to drop the hammer on her. She said she'd been seeing Andy everywhere for the previous few days. Even insisted that he was standing at the foot of her bed whenever she tried to sleep. Me, I think the girl was freakin' sleep deprived. She'd just finished defending her thesis, and she was basically delirious as a consequence. Reasonable thing to have done would've been to tell her to catch a nap, and leave it at that. Though, to be fair, I never did need much prodding to dive into some weird shit, and this already smelled strange as hell. So when she said she wanted my help I just jumped on my bike and tore down I-5. Got there in about six hours.
"When I pulled up to her place she was practically already waiting for me, messenger bag loaded with all kinds of shit, ready to go. It was then that I asked what, exactly, the fuck we were going to do. And she let me know:
"We were going to rob the goddamned Huntington.
"I don't know how much you know about her, but suffice to say that breaking and entering or grand larceny aren't exactly bullet points on her CV, ya' know? But fuck, as shocked as I was, I figured it was a good step to get her to loosen up. And I didn't haul my ass downstate just to turn back around. Or be the voice of reason. I didn't think it was going to be anything serious anyway - Mischief, more like. I figure she's got a bug up her ass for some dusty scientific tome that has zero practical value, no one's gonna miss it. And at the same time, we're just going to avoid some sleepy rent-a-cops and have a giddy time. What the hell, right?
"She's obviously nervous as hell. But... At this point, I'm thinking: I've seen her nervous as hell before - Like, I've seen her fearing for her life nervous as hell. And that night she was less like that, and more... full of excitement? I knew this was going against her every instinct, to boot. She'd always been a goody-goody, and now this? In that moment, when she tells me what she wants to do, I look at her and think: She's doing THIS? HER? So whatever she was gunning for, I knew it meant something to her. This was important.
"It wasn't a long trip to the museum from the Institute. Once we got there, it was easy enough to find a place to stash my bike. And then we just... hopped a fence and started slinking through the gardens. Easy enough, it's a big place. Lots of vegetation to hide in, and not a whole lot of people around at night. So we were able to get up to the main museum building without the situation going south immediately. The lock on the door was a joke, by the way. Picked it in seconds, and... we were in.
"God, what a place. Boring as shit. But plenty of guards, contrary to my first assumption. So, you know - Not exactly dark and deserted. Brightly lit, lots of security. The shit in there must've been worth a fortune despite looking like garbage. I guess I never had an eye for classical stuff. Whatever, though. It sure wasn't easy, but we did work our way through the building undetected and find our way upstairs. Some kind of restricted storage. Everything tagged, labeled, meticulously placed and arranged. Cataloged. All kinds of shit. Vases, statues, pottery, jewelry everywhere. Mostly books, though. Shelves and shelves and shelves of books.
"Once we finally get in there, at that point she's going nuts. I could practically hear her heart racing as she poured over everything, with this gigantic stupid delighted smile on her face. And even though each piece made her more excited than the last, it's obvious she's looking for something specific in the midst of all that ancient shit. And you know, we're trying our best to be quiet. But at this point it's pretty obvious that the guards on duty know something is up. Maybe they caught that the door had been tampered with or something, because out the window, I start seeing their flashlights cutting through the dark outside. They were looking everywhere out there. I figured it was only a matter of time before they got to us.
"That's about when she finally found what she was looking for. Some kind of dusty old artifact I would've considered garbage. And wouldn't you know the silly bitch lets out a little cry of delight? Fuckin' told everyone in the goddamned building exactly we were in a single instant.
"So, I'm already hearing footsteps in the hall, and immediately my butt puckers up. She grabs the dusty thing, I grab her, and we haul ass. Directly out the window, into the trees, and down into the gardens below. We somehow managed to book it out of there without getting snagged, but all hell was already breaking loose behind us. By the time we got to my bike, I was hearing squad car sirens tearing through the midnight air. Already. And they're getting closer but fast.
"Fuckin' should've figured. It looked like a rich part of town.
"At that point, we were doing some additional felonies, given how fast I was driving. But I know we need some fucking distance from that place. That's when she tells me we have to go back to her campus. To which, you know, I'm like 'Bitch, WHAT? The last thing we need is to be where you practically live right now'. But she's insistent. She tells me there's a place to hide until the heat's off. So against my better judgement, I listened to her. And we headed back to that goddamned Institute.
"Well. At the very least she wasn't lying. Turns out that there's a freaky huge network of steam tunnels beneath the campus - Twisting, winding tunnels that stretch in every direction under the lecture halls and labs. Crazy shit. And big enough to drag my bike into, too, which was a godsend in that moment. She pulled me in there, we stashed my bike amid some huge equipment, and I figure that's the place to wait for a good few hours at the minimum. And fortunately for us, I had my scanner on me. Somehow it was still getting reception down there.
"Unfortunately for us, the updates over the air weren't exactly calming. My blood just about ran cold when the radio made it pretty clear the fuckin' feds were getting called in on this shit.
"At this point I had to wonder what the hell this prim and proper little shit just got me in to. I mean, fucking hell. You, Teff, you've only known me for what, an hour? Regardless I figure you have no issue figuring out that I have a problem with authority - and no problem telling authority to fuck itself. I'll chuck a brick at a cop on principle.
"But that? At that point? In that moment? Fucking shit. It had suddenly become way too much for me. What the fuck were we even doing? What the fuck had she stolen, that suddenly federal agents were scrambling to recover it?
"So I asked her flat out, what exactly the fuck was that thing? And she assured me it's the solution to all our problems. But I noticed she sure as hell didn't explain how or why. Naw, she was too hyper and giddy for that, said I had to wait. She dragged me deeper into the steam tunnels, to the deepest part. Of course. Eventually we get to this room. Christ, that fucking room.
"Concrete, something like ten feet square. One door in. Absolutely empty. Nothing inside but rough cement surfaces. I'll never forget it.
"So while I'm wondering why we're basically in a prison cell, she picks her laptop out of her bag, grabs the artifact, and says she needs to check to make sure it's the real deal. What's more, she insisted that I stay outside the room while she examined it. Which, like... I'm freaked out enough at this point, you know? Last thing I need is her acting weird on me. But I'm rattled, I admit it. So I agree to watch the door while she did... whatever she needed to do.
"There's like ten minutes of silence. And I started getting antsy. Fifteen minutes. Twenty. Then I started to hear her in there. Making... noises.
"I still have no idea what she was doing in there. Never got a look at it. Never figured it out. But I swear it sounded like she was getting off. The sounds she was making weren't exactly calm and decent, catch me? At first I figure, okay, you do you. I've known plenty of gals who need a crazy big shot of adrenaline to peak, you know? But then... silence again.
"After half an hour, I'd had enough. I tried to open the door - Locked. Alarm bells in my head are ringing at this point. So I pick it, and fast.
"And she's just... gone.
"Nowhere to be found. At all. Vanished. Entirely!
"I checked every wall, every inch of the floor, the entire ceiling - no hidden passages, no panels, no buttons, nothing! Not even a goddamned ventilation shaft! There was no way out of that room, yet she was simply not there!
"The only thing there was her laptop, and that damned hunk of junk that got us into this whole mess.
"And that's when I realized that she - Freaking miss goody-two-shoes, live-in-the-laboratory, sleep-in-the-library labrat bookworm - had fucking played me.
"She disappeared! Just... fucking gone! And she left me holding the goddamned bag! Meaning that, now, federal heat was after me! And she just... hung me out to dry.
"Did she do it to set me up? I have no idea. I know I got under her skin every now and then, but I didn't think I'd ever hurt her. Still no idea... no idea why she would do that.
Vect had been slumping more and more in her seat as she told her story. By this point, Teff could almost hardly see the mink over the edge of her desk.
"The damned laptop had a note on it when I went in there," she muttered, almost as if not wanting to admit it. "Some long piece of bullshit. She gave me the location of a chemical stash of hers. Said I could keep it as payment. Sure enough it was where she said it was. And it was overflowing with goods. But still, fucking shit. Hell of a price I had to pay to get it."
Teff, for her part, leaned forward on the sofa - Her eyes burned with purple intensity. Noticing this, Vect jolted in her seat suddenly. She hadn't noticed those eyes before, and seeing an almost fuming purple rising from the other mink's face startled her, to say the least.
"The 'artifact'. Describe it."
Vect shrugged her shoulders, "Hey, weren't you interested in her? "
"DESCRIBE. IT." The room vibrated with each syllable.
"Shit!" Vect planted her feet on the ground and pulled herself back into her seat at attention, "I have no fuckin' clue. Some... dusty glass bottle? Maybe with some details carved into it? Kinda a flared base? Piece of utter garbage, and not worth the trouble, if you ask me. Unremarkable in every regard. Though, I do remember it was black as obsidian when we first pinched it, and somewhere along the evening it became almost a brilliant purple?"
Vect's eye twitched visibly. Oh my god. She didn't even realize, did she? Was she honestly this dense?
"What," The slick mink tried to control her voice, and to her credit, the words came out smooth, "did you do with it?"
The other mink set her teeth and narrowed her eyes, heaving a massive sigh. "You know, at this point I'd almost wonder if you were a cop?" She shook her head slowly, "But whatever. That note on the laptop. It had instructions. She wanted me to make sure that piece of junk was sent somewhere specific. Some... fuckin' university on the Eastern seaboard. To be hand delivered to some professor. I have no fucking clue."
Vect very slowly picked up the loaded shotgun that had been casually laying on the surface of her desk the entire time. "Like fuck I was doing that," She gripped the stock firmly as she pulled the firearm with her, back into the seat. "That shit was too hot to even look at, let alone deliver to someone. I couldn't even fence the fucking thing, no matter how valuable it was! It was practically worthless. It was worthless!"
"What. Did you DO with it?"
Vect rolled her vision off Teff with another aggrieved sigh, "You sure as shit are interested in that chunk of glass, aren't you?"
Teff's gaze intensified in an instant. The world shuddered around her, and Vect felt the edges of reality going frayed - Existence momentarily came undone around Teff, framing only the smoldering visage of the gleaming slick mink. Wordless, focused, brilliant. For a moment, Vect felt a surge of vertigo - As if she were falling toward Teff. Everything else faded into dark, blurry nothing.
"Okay! Okay! Fuck!"
The world returned to a recognizable shape elastically, snapping back with a jolt.
Vect shook her head for a moment, before shooting Teff a sidelong glare. "Keep that shit under control, would you? Christ."
"When I left the steam tunnels, I had no intention of going home. Like I said, the thing was useless, and a liability. There were federal agents actively searching for it, and though I was lucky enough that they didn't know what I looked like, they sure as shit would know what that fuckin' bottle looked like. If I left it there in the steam tunnels, when someone eventually found it, that'd put a link to her - and by extension me."
"So I cut a wicked streak toward Vegas, and then went south. Somewhere on I-15 between Vegas and San Diego, I turned off and just... walked into the desert. Found some random ass place I couldn't ever find again, with nothing around. No landmarks, no features. Looked like I was on the surface of the moon. A real 'See The Curvatures Of The Planet' place, if you catch my drift."
"And then I buried it. Where even I couldn't find it again. And then I left."
Teff's intensity suddenly dwindled, her eyes fading to a mere purple sparkle, the aura of menace surrounding her diminishing to a lingering suggestion.
"You didn't open it?"
"What?"
"You didn't open the bottle?"
Vect blinked a several times in rapid succession, confused. "Why the fuck would I do that?"
"I see."
Silence filled the air for a tense moment. Nothing moved, save the erratic, rising dance of smoke that spun from the tip of Teff's cigarette.
After a long moment, the slick white mink rose to her feet - Clacking her heels to the floor as her dress fell into smooth perfection across her curves.
"Well, thank you very much, Miss Proprietor. It's been a pleasure to meet you. And further, to familiarize myself with your... establishment. I do so appreciate the education."
"Yeah," Vect added uneasily, peering upward from her seat at the seemingly towering mink across the desk, "It's been my fuckin' pleasure, sister."
"I presume we'll meet again in the future. I'll try to ensure it's under more friendly circumstances." Teff flicked her wrist in Vect's direction, a flash of white darting out of nowhere. With a deft motion, Teff caught the summoned object between her fingertips - before handing it to Vect directly. "And I'll try to match the dress code a little better next time."
"What's this?" Vect reached out to pull the slip from the other mink's fingertips. A small, flat rectangle of white, embossed with an almost cartoonish, golden oil lamp - And the name 'TEFF' in metallic, elaborate cursive. The rest was pure, gleaming slick. Nothing more. It sure didn't feel like it was made of paper. Or cardstock. It was heavy.
"My card," Teff shot Vect a knowing grin. "Hold on to that. Believe me when I say it'll come in handy in an emergency."
"Lady," Vect rose to her feet, palms down on her desk as she moved her face toward Teff with obvious effort and fatigue, "I've had enough cryptic bullshit for one evening."
"Fair enough, get some rest." The slick mink slinked toward the door to Vect's office with an almost ethereal grace.
"Take care, Vect," Teff added over her shoulder, "Believe it or not, I'm rooting for you."
The girl was doing her absolute her best as she made her offering, struggling mightily to hide her almost overwhelming anxiety behind a too-forced smile. Of course, she was still wearing the rest of her nightclub attire. Miniskirt, tube top, fishnets - It made for an awkward mixture, such a bold outfit to go with her utter terror and her polite, false, retail-level happiness.
The tray clattered as the rabbit girl shivered. Terri visibly struggled to maintain her composure. The assortment of items on the tray were somewhat eclectic: Several bandages of different sizes, gauze, forceps, fast-drying liquid stitches, handfuls of various painkillers, an assortment of hard candies, and a tall bottle of vodka. It was the usual array of necessities she'd bring to her compatriots when they'd return from a unfortunately difficult, violent encounter. This was the first time she'd presented them in such a manner, though. As if she were a cocktail waitress.
From the other side of the tray, where she sat upon the black leather couch, the otherworldly mink regarded Terri's offering with cool disinterest. Teff sat with one leg over the other, her cigarette holder hanging loose in her fingers, somehow seeming too large for the room to actually contain her, despite her relatively diminutive stature. Teff's gaze regarded the items only briefly, before drawing her eyes upward to focus on the terrified bunny. For her part, Teff gave as genuine a smile in reply as she was able. She imagined it must've come off as condescending, or disingenuous. But she tried.
"Thank you, dear," Teff softly noted, "But I promise you I'm fine."
"B-B-B-But," Terri stammered, "The b-b-b-bottle."
"Really. Don't worry about it. But thank you."
"Fucking shit," The words came from across the room, where Vect sat behind her desk. She had her feet up, leaning back in her own weathered, yet comfortable, executive chair. Her sneakers and denim remained a stark contrast to the other mink's elegant purple evening dress. Vect was also loading two shells into the chamber of a break-load shotgun. "All that, and you just shrug it off?"
Teff, for her part, continued to address Terri, "Feel free to take that away, and don't worry about me. I believe your boss and I have some matters to discuss, s-"
The air cracked with the sound of Vect snapping the break back into place, leveling the loaded shotgun over her desk and directly at Teff.
"Hey, what would happen if I just blasted you square in the face right now? You'd just... grow a new one? Pick the old one up and reuse it?" Vect's words were dismissive and flippant. But Teff could feel below their superficial surface. Just minutes ago, Vect had cracked - a look of terror on her face as she realized that Teff was anything but what was expected. Now, Teff presumed, Vect was posturing to make up for lost ground.
"You'd make a mess. But what's worse, you'd piss me off," Teff took a long drag from her cigarette holder, unbothered. She let the prolonged silence hang awkwardly in the air as Vect viewed her down the sight of the shotgun. "Then, I'd make a mess."
Vect hesitated a beat, before frowning and lowering her gun to the desk. She let out a sound of frustration, something like "Phhhst", before swinging her feet back to the floor and leaning forward in her chair.
"Get lost for a little bit, huh Terri?" The mink's words brimmed with misplaced anger, as if she were embarrassed to be bested again, "Go find Kayte or something."
"Y-y-yes! Of c-course," Terri turned on her platform heels fast enough that Teff though the girl might put a hole in the rug beneath her. The rabbit girl bolted for the door with tray still in hand, pausing only for a moment to look over her shoulder and struggle to say, "I-It was nice to meet you, Teff!"
The click of the door behind her as she exited left a vacuum in the office, more of that awkward silence rushing in to fill the void as the two minks stared each other down. For her part Teff lingered in the silence patiently. She had just shown Vect more than the mink was ready to see, after all. And now that Vect had to grapple with the idea that she wasn't in total control of her little world, Teff knew there was no telling what she would do to compensate.
Not that it mattered much.
Despite her outward appearance of patience, Teff was starting to get quite annoyed. She was used to getting what she wanted, when she wanted it. This encounter might've been over by this point, had Vect been just slightly more amenable - slightly more willing to share. It was galling, having to play along. Having to be so restrained. The slick mink had considered just claiming Vect, here and now, as her own to get the information she needed. In fact, she had considered it SEVERAL times already. How easy it would've been, to just take.
And yet, at the same time Teff knew the score. Making a scene here would earn her nothing. Claiming Vect would have consequences. And as much as she positively hated to admit it, Teff wanted Vect and her organization to endure. That was important to her.
She had use for them, after all.
Teff let out a sigh before hanging her head in frustration, "Listen, Vect. All I-"
"You could destroy me, couldn't you," Vect's words were very quiet. "Destroy everything about me. Everything here. You're one of those... I don't know how to put it, but I know the power when I see it. Only seen it a few times, but..."
Teff raised an eyebrow. Interesting.
"Vect, all I want is some information. I should hope I haven't given you the impression that I would destroy you or anything else." Teff tapped her cigarette holder to ash into an empty glass on the coffee table, "I've been such a good girl tonight. I hope that doesn't need to change."
Vect nodded a little to herself as she sank back into her chair. "I didn't see it in you at first. But after that little stunt... You're closer to the source than I realized. Just like..."
A jolt of uncut curiosity raced through Teff, "Close to the source?"
Vect shook her head, "Forget it. Just... yeah, okay. I see you. I recognize you. I know what and where to respect."
Teff furrowed her brown for a moment in reply. Perhaps this one had been around the block more than she realized.
"Oh, and, uh... Sorry," Vect's eyes locked with Teff's even as she sank into her chair further, abashed, "For stabbing you in the face with a broken bottle, I mean."
"Think nothing of it, dear," Teff's words were slick, but they had an edge to them. "Now, I believe you were about to tell me a story?"
"Yeah, sure. A story. Well. To begin with, you should know I haven't seen her any time recently."
"When was the last time?"
"About four years ago."
Shit, Teff cursed inwardly. This was about as cold as a trail could get.
Then again, maybe that was good news. She still had to try, "You're the last person to see her, from everything I've been able to gather. No contacts with her old lab, no published papers, no active address. No email address, even."
"Say," Vect furrowed her brow, "What's she to you, anyway? She never talked about you. And... Let's just say she'd probably have a hard time keeping you a secret."
Teff threw her head back with a riotous laugh. A cutting sound that made Vect's pupils dilate as it filled the already tense room.
"Oh, my dear Vect," She shot a dagger of a grin at the other mink, "I am her greatest secret. So much so that I don't even think she knows about me." Teff's knowing smirk was cryptic enough to make Vect inwardly scowl. She knew she was being fucked with. "The details are trivial, dear. I have business with her. Ancient history if you will, but it's important to my future."
Vect rolled her shoulders as a chill rolled down her spine, "Yeah, okay whatever."
"And what's she to you?"
"You serious?" Vect shot a genuinely quizzical look across her desk, "You came to me to find her, and you don't even know why you'd come to me?"
Teff very plainly shook her head, "As I said, your... prospective recruit... spilled the beans. That's what made the connection for me. I presume she had some manner of association with your organization, and your... endeavors."
Vect blew out a heavy breath as she leaned back in her chair now, "Naw. She never wanted to join us here, even if we were all in the same mess together. Always had her studies, had her nose in a book. She got ground into dust in that lab, but she sure as shit never seemed to want to leave for all the shit she went through there. Or at least, she never knew she could leave." Vect raised an eyebrow in Teff's direction. For as slick as the other mink seemed to be, this was a strange gap in her knowledge.
Vect shook her head as she dismissed the concern. She continued, "Forget it, I'm getting off track. If you really need to know, though, me and her? We go way back. We're sisters. Sort of. But also, very actually. The biology behind that is a little unconventional. Tends to get that way with genetic engineering."
The detail bounced right off Teff, "I'm just concerned with where she is now."
"Yeah, like I said, I got zero clue."
"So then," Teff was the one to lean forward now, "Why don't you start with when and where you last saw her?"
"Well, okay. But like I said, the girl was never much for socializing. Every time I had seen her after we... uh... 'left home', it basically had to involve my beating down her door and dragging her out by the lab coat collar. Pulling her along on some damned fool adventure just to get her out of that basement. I guess eventually over the years we reached a mutual understanding of our respective circumstances. Which is to say, we each knew we were both being hunted by The Alliance - by our good friend Andy in particular - so we both knew it paid to stick together. Fuck, at least I knew that. She never did approve much of the strategy me and the girls tend to employ. Call it 'the direct approach' if you want. She never had a taste for it. Too 'loud', I guess. Even so, it was obvious that she knew that we were all on the same side in this thing. So occasionally, I'd keep her well stocked with certain goods she couldn't get, and in exchange she'd supply us with resources we couldn't refine ourselves. Girl had a wicked way of extracting just the right shit from red ribbo-
"Well. Anyway. It pays to know a chemist.
"I'm boring you with all this shit to make it clear why I nearly fell flat on my ass the day she called me up and said she had a job for me.
"It was some miserable night in August, about four years ago. Sweltering. And she had an urgency in her voice I had never heard before. I think part of it was because she was sure The Alliance was about to drop the hammer on her. She said she'd been seeing Andy everywhere for the previous few days. Even insisted that he was standing at the foot of her bed whenever she tried to sleep. Me, I think the girl was freakin' sleep deprived. She'd just finished defending her thesis, and she was basically delirious as a consequence. Reasonable thing to have done would've been to tell her to catch a nap, and leave it at that. Though, to be fair, I never did need much prodding to dive into some weird shit, and this already smelled strange as hell. So when she said she wanted my help I just jumped on my bike and tore down I-5. Got there in about six hours.
"When I pulled up to her place she was practically already waiting for me, messenger bag loaded with all kinds of shit, ready to go. It was then that I asked what, exactly, the fuck we were going to do. And she let me know:
"We were going to rob the goddamned Huntington.
"I don't know how much you know about her, but suffice to say that breaking and entering or grand larceny aren't exactly bullet points on her CV, ya' know? But fuck, as shocked as I was, I figured it was a good step to get her to loosen up. And I didn't haul my ass downstate just to turn back around. Or be the voice of reason. I didn't think it was going to be anything serious anyway - Mischief, more like. I figure she's got a bug up her ass for some dusty scientific tome that has zero practical value, no one's gonna miss it. And at the same time, we're just going to avoid some sleepy rent-a-cops and have a giddy time. What the hell, right?
"She's obviously nervous as hell. But... At this point, I'm thinking: I've seen her nervous as hell before - Like, I've seen her fearing for her life nervous as hell. And that night she was less like that, and more... full of excitement? I knew this was going against her every instinct, to boot. She'd always been a goody-goody, and now this? In that moment, when she tells me what she wants to do, I look at her and think: She's doing THIS? HER? So whatever she was gunning for, I knew it meant something to her. This was important.
"It wasn't a long trip to the museum from the Institute. Once we got there, it was easy enough to find a place to stash my bike. And then we just... hopped a fence and started slinking through the gardens. Easy enough, it's a big place. Lots of vegetation to hide in, and not a whole lot of people around at night. So we were able to get up to the main museum building without the situation going south immediately. The lock on the door was a joke, by the way. Picked it in seconds, and... we were in.
"God, what a place. Boring as shit. But plenty of guards, contrary to my first assumption. So, you know - Not exactly dark and deserted. Brightly lit, lots of security. The shit in there must've been worth a fortune despite looking like garbage. I guess I never had an eye for classical stuff. Whatever, though. It sure wasn't easy, but we did work our way through the building undetected and find our way upstairs. Some kind of restricted storage. Everything tagged, labeled, meticulously placed and arranged. Cataloged. All kinds of shit. Vases, statues, pottery, jewelry everywhere. Mostly books, though. Shelves and shelves and shelves of books.
"Once we finally get in there, at that point she's going nuts. I could practically hear her heart racing as she poured over everything, with this gigantic stupid delighted smile on her face. And even though each piece made her more excited than the last, it's obvious she's looking for something specific in the midst of all that ancient shit. And you know, we're trying our best to be quiet. But at this point it's pretty obvious that the guards on duty know something is up. Maybe they caught that the door had been tampered with or something, because out the window, I start seeing their flashlights cutting through the dark outside. They were looking everywhere out there. I figured it was only a matter of time before they got to us.
"That's about when she finally found what she was looking for. Some kind of dusty old artifact I would've considered garbage. And wouldn't you know the silly bitch lets out a little cry of delight? Fuckin' told everyone in the goddamned building exactly we were in a single instant.
"So, I'm already hearing footsteps in the hall, and immediately my butt puckers up. She grabs the dusty thing, I grab her, and we haul ass. Directly out the window, into the trees, and down into the gardens below. We somehow managed to book it out of there without getting snagged, but all hell was already breaking loose behind us. By the time we got to my bike, I was hearing squad car sirens tearing through the midnight air. Already. And they're getting closer but fast.
"Fuckin' should've figured. It looked like a rich part of town.
"At that point, we were doing some additional felonies, given how fast I was driving. But I know we need some fucking distance from that place. That's when she tells me we have to go back to her campus. To which, you know, I'm like 'Bitch, WHAT? The last thing we need is to be where you practically live right now'. But she's insistent. She tells me there's a place to hide until the heat's off. So against my better judgement, I listened to her. And we headed back to that goddamned Institute.
"Well. At the very least she wasn't lying. Turns out that there's a freaky huge network of steam tunnels beneath the campus - Twisting, winding tunnels that stretch in every direction under the lecture halls and labs. Crazy shit. And big enough to drag my bike into, too, which was a godsend in that moment. She pulled me in there, we stashed my bike amid some huge equipment, and I figure that's the place to wait for a good few hours at the minimum. And fortunately for us, I had my scanner on me. Somehow it was still getting reception down there.
"Unfortunately for us, the updates over the air weren't exactly calming. My blood just about ran cold when the radio made it pretty clear the fuckin' feds were getting called in on this shit.
"At this point I had to wonder what the hell this prim and proper little shit just got me in to. I mean, fucking hell. You, Teff, you've only known me for what, an hour? Regardless I figure you have no issue figuring out that I have a problem with authority - and no problem telling authority to fuck itself. I'll chuck a brick at a cop on principle.
"But that? At that point? In that moment? Fucking shit. It had suddenly become way too much for me. What the fuck were we even doing? What the fuck had she stolen, that suddenly federal agents were scrambling to recover it?
"So I asked her flat out, what exactly the fuck was that thing? And she assured me it's the solution to all our problems. But I noticed she sure as hell didn't explain how or why. Naw, she was too hyper and giddy for that, said I had to wait. She dragged me deeper into the steam tunnels, to the deepest part. Of course. Eventually we get to this room. Christ, that fucking room.
"Concrete, something like ten feet square. One door in. Absolutely empty. Nothing inside but rough cement surfaces. I'll never forget it.
"So while I'm wondering why we're basically in a prison cell, she picks her laptop out of her bag, grabs the artifact, and says she needs to check to make sure it's the real deal. What's more, she insisted that I stay outside the room while she examined it. Which, like... I'm freaked out enough at this point, you know? Last thing I need is her acting weird on me. But I'm rattled, I admit it. So I agree to watch the door while she did... whatever she needed to do.
"There's like ten minutes of silence. And I started getting antsy. Fifteen minutes. Twenty. Then I started to hear her in there. Making... noises.
"I still have no idea what she was doing in there. Never got a look at it. Never figured it out. But I swear it sounded like she was getting off. The sounds she was making weren't exactly calm and decent, catch me? At first I figure, okay, you do you. I've known plenty of gals who need a crazy big shot of adrenaline to peak, you know? But then... silence again.
"After half an hour, I'd had enough. I tried to open the door - Locked. Alarm bells in my head are ringing at this point. So I pick it, and fast.
"And she's just... gone.
"Nowhere to be found. At all. Vanished. Entirely!
"I checked every wall, every inch of the floor, the entire ceiling - no hidden passages, no panels, no buttons, nothing! Not even a goddamned ventilation shaft! There was no way out of that room, yet she was simply not there!
"The only thing there was her laptop, and that damned hunk of junk that got us into this whole mess.
"And that's when I realized that she - Freaking miss goody-two-shoes, live-in-the-laboratory, sleep-in-the-library labrat bookworm - had fucking played me.
"She disappeared! Just... fucking gone! And she left me holding the goddamned bag! Meaning that, now, federal heat was after me! And she just... hung me out to dry.
"Did she do it to set me up? I have no idea. I know I got under her skin every now and then, but I didn't think I'd ever hurt her. Still no idea... no idea why she would do that.
Vect had been slumping more and more in her seat as she told her story. By this point, Teff could almost hardly see the mink over the edge of her desk.
"The damned laptop had a note on it when I went in there," she muttered, almost as if not wanting to admit it. "Some long piece of bullshit. She gave me the location of a chemical stash of hers. Said I could keep it as payment. Sure enough it was where she said it was. And it was overflowing with goods. But still, fucking shit. Hell of a price I had to pay to get it."
Teff, for her part, leaned forward on the sofa - Her eyes burned with purple intensity. Noticing this, Vect jolted in her seat suddenly. She hadn't noticed those eyes before, and seeing an almost fuming purple rising from the other mink's face startled her, to say the least.
"The 'artifact'. Describe it."
Vect shrugged her shoulders, "Hey, weren't you interested in her? "
"DESCRIBE. IT." The room vibrated with each syllable.
"Shit!" Vect planted her feet on the ground and pulled herself back into her seat at attention, "I have no fuckin' clue. Some... dusty glass bottle? Maybe with some details carved into it? Kinda a flared base? Piece of utter garbage, and not worth the trouble, if you ask me. Unremarkable in every regard. Though, I do remember it was black as obsidian when we first pinched it, and somewhere along the evening it became almost a brilliant purple?"
Vect's eye twitched visibly. Oh my god. She didn't even realize, did she? Was she honestly this dense?
"What," The slick mink tried to control her voice, and to her credit, the words came out smooth, "did you do with it?"
The other mink set her teeth and narrowed her eyes, heaving a massive sigh. "You know, at this point I'd almost wonder if you were a cop?" She shook her head slowly, "But whatever. That note on the laptop. It had instructions. She wanted me to make sure that piece of junk was sent somewhere specific. Some... fuckin' university on the Eastern seaboard. To be hand delivered to some professor. I have no fucking clue."
Vect very slowly picked up the loaded shotgun that had been casually laying on the surface of her desk the entire time. "Like fuck I was doing that," She gripped the stock firmly as she pulled the firearm with her, back into the seat. "That shit was too hot to even look at, let alone deliver to someone. I couldn't even fence the fucking thing, no matter how valuable it was! It was practically worthless. It was worthless!"
"What. Did you DO with it?"
Vect rolled her vision off Teff with another aggrieved sigh, "You sure as shit are interested in that chunk of glass, aren't you?"
Teff's gaze intensified in an instant. The world shuddered around her, and Vect felt the edges of reality going frayed - Existence momentarily came undone around Teff, framing only the smoldering visage of the gleaming slick mink. Wordless, focused, brilliant. For a moment, Vect felt a surge of vertigo - As if she were falling toward Teff. Everything else faded into dark, blurry nothing.
"Okay! Okay! Fuck!"
The world returned to a recognizable shape elastically, snapping back with a jolt.
Vect shook her head for a moment, before shooting Teff a sidelong glare. "Keep that shit under control, would you? Christ."
"When I left the steam tunnels, I had no intention of going home. Like I said, the thing was useless, and a liability. There were federal agents actively searching for it, and though I was lucky enough that they didn't know what I looked like, they sure as shit would know what that fuckin' bottle looked like. If I left it there in the steam tunnels, when someone eventually found it, that'd put a link to her - and by extension me."
"So I cut a wicked streak toward Vegas, and then went south. Somewhere on I-15 between Vegas and San Diego, I turned off and just... walked into the desert. Found some random ass place I couldn't ever find again, with nothing around. No landmarks, no features. Looked like I was on the surface of the moon. A real 'See The Curvatures Of The Planet' place, if you catch my drift."
"And then I buried it. Where even I couldn't find it again. And then I left."
Teff's intensity suddenly dwindled, her eyes fading to a mere purple sparkle, the aura of menace surrounding her diminishing to a lingering suggestion.
"You didn't open it?"
"What?"
"You didn't open the bottle?"
Vect blinked a several times in rapid succession, confused. "Why the fuck would I do that?"
"I see."
Silence filled the air for a tense moment. Nothing moved, save the erratic, rising dance of smoke that spun from the tip of Teff's cigarette.
After a long moment, the slick white mink rose to her feet - Clacking her heels to the floor as her dress fell into smooth perfection across her curves.
"Well, thank you very much, Miss Proprietor. It's been a pleasure to meet you. And further, to familiarize myself with your... establishment. I do so appreciate the education."
"Yeah," Vect added uneasily, peering upward from her seat at the seemingly towering mink across the desk, "It's been my fuckin' pleasure, sister."
"I presume we'll meet again in the future. I'll try to ensure it's under more friendly circumstances." Teff flicked her wrist in Vect's direction, a flash of white darting out of nowhere. With a deft motion, Teff caught the summoned object between her fingertips - before handing it to Vect directly. "And I'll try to match the dress code a little better next time."
"What's this?" Vect reached out to pull the slip from the other mink's fingertips. A small, flat rectangle of white, embossed with an almost cartoonish, golden oil lamp - And the name 'TEFF' in metallic, elaborate cursive. The rest was pure, gleaming slick. Nothing more. It sure didn't feel like it was made of paper. Or cardstock. It was heavy.
"My card," Teff shot Vect a knowing grin. "Hold on to that. Believe me when I say it'll come in handy in an emergency."
"Lady," Vect rose to her feet, palms down on her desk as she moved her face toward Teff with obvious effort and fatigue, "I've had enough cryptic bullshit for one evening."
"Fair enough, get some rest." The slick mink slinked toward the door to Vect's office with an almost ethereal grace.
"Take care, Vect," Teff added over her shoulder, "Believe it or not, I'm rooting for you."