DETERRENT - Apply Fic

11

He shrugs, "I'm not going to make you work. But keep in mind you do share a room with a bunch of criminals who won't be happy to keep picking weeds."

She glowers at him but heads off into the fields.

The thing about bad days are they compound. Eurydice was charged with money laundering; technically accurate even in maths wasn't one of her strongest skills in school. However, bounty hunting requires a base understanding of pressure. She's used to cold nights in Flage, stumbling behind a mark, watching closely to tell exactly when he realizes she is not a drunken partier stumbling home to Leth but someone following him. Eurydice knows when enough coincidences or pains or incidents will add up too high, and a mark will spill over into terror and rage.

Normally she wouldn't care enough to think about Gale, but he's making it obvious that he's going to blow over. Slamming the watering can down in between rows, denting the metal bottom, cursing at the rust under his breath. The farmworker around them is too stupid to be antsy, or perhaps to use to scary men. Kae, however, quakes. Her hands are shaking, and Eurydice smirks.

"Kae, we're taking a break," she decides.

Gale scowls, but then looks at her and flinches. Eurydice shrugs. She grabs Kae by the elbow, fist too rough, and drags her off.

Without explaining why, Eurydice goes towards their quarters. Of course, Kae knows. She heads into her bunk and digs through the pillow with Eurydice guarding outside. Together, they head upstairs again, ignoring Harvey in the kitchen. Eurydice shuts herself in the bathroom, and Kae on the outside with her set of metal picks Eurydice helped fashion begins to work on the lock.

It takes fifteen minutes, according to the clock in the kitchen, for Kae to pick the lock, but then twenty to relock it. The time is not good enough. They need to practice relocking. Eurydice has counted the locked doors upstairs. Two. If she wants to get behind them both, she's going to need Kae to be sure she can lock the door while Eurydice stalls Benji, should he come home or intervene.

"Eurydice..." Kae trails off as they head back to their workspace.

The girl turns around, black bob swinging even though the top of it is covered with a hat. Eurydice glares at Kae, who pushes her shoulders back.

"Why do you want into the locked rooms?"

"Why do you care?" Eurydice snaps. "Be lucky I've chosen you for the job, sticky fingers."

Kae closes her mouth. She's never wanted to take something that wasn't physical. Pickpockets want things, not ideas and beliefs, but she feels her hands twitching and her mouth opens before she can stop herself, "I just want to understand."

Eurydice doesn't answer. Hiding things is second nature, first being scowling. Her criminal activities, her sister's secret girlfriend, and her inconsistent feelings for her old boss, Zephyr. She tells herself that the farmer is too good to be true, that the farmer is hiding something behind those walls. That she'll find it, blackmail him, and make more money. She'll put her talents to use. Now nearing the end of her second week, she'd be surprised if Benji had a nickel to his name or a thought in his head.

"It's cute that you think I care about what you want," Eurydice snarls.

Kae bows her head. They walk back to Gale, who only grunts when he sees her. As Eurydice begins to work again, a fist ripping a piece of English ivy that wormed its way into this part of the vegetable patch, dirt sprays across Kae's shoes. Suddenly, she is sure that Eurydice was nicer than she could have been.