I headed straight for the bathrooms, the floor turning to dark tiles near the lobby. When I entered the white bathrooms, I was reassured by the other women washing their hands. Being around people made me feel like what I was doing was more normal. It provided cover.
It wasn't until I was in a dull, light blue stall that I relaxed completely, pulling out the laptop and putting it on my skirt-clad legs. With the computer flipped upside down, I took the small screwdriver out of my left sleeve and started to take off the back of the machinery. Ashton had lifted the tool off an IT worker who had to come to fix his laptop which had a broken fan (which may or may not have been caused by using a needle with superglue to stick the center down).
With the back removed, my nimble fingers easily found the RAM chip imbedded in the computer within seconds. I only needed one of the many on the circuit board. My right hand produced an identical copy which had been snagged from a box of parts in one of the reserved rooms. Weeks ago I had stolen it while looking for server parts for an upgrade.
I popped the small black rectangle with silver prongs out of the computer, replacing it with the new one. Speedily, I screwed the top of the computer back on and placed it in my purse with the screwdriver. Inside of my wallet was a false kopeck which I had obtained courtesy of none other than Potvin. My thumbnail slid between the faults of the yellow coin, prying it apart before placing the chip in the center and snapping it closed. I dropped the steel alloy into my wallet and zipped the black leather closed before placing it back in my purse and standing up.
The toilet flushed and I left the stall, washing my hands with another women two sinks down. As I stared at myself in the mirror briefly, I saw every ounce of my cold-blooded hatred in my hard brown eyes. I was about to become the most wanted person in the world in every single country on the planet. There was no turning back now. The data was in my purse. This wasn't a bank robbery or a drug deal. This was nuclear weapons systems and millions of lives in my hands.
Some people might think I'm the bad guy in this situation, but there are also those that think I'm right in this one instance; that the Russian government should be on the losing end. To be completely honest, I didn't care about the politics of it. Of course, I was aware of the horrible things governments across the world did. I had to be to survive. I couldn't go from being an American in Syria to an American in Turkey. I'd get myself shot. I was all too familiar with the game of politics, I just didn't care who won. All I had to do was know all the players and use that to my advantage.
That's how I justified this. If I didn't do this, someone else would. Every country rises and falls, people are always born and always killed. I'm just profiting off of the inevitable circle of life. If that makes me a bad person then so be it. I was content with my life's choices even if it didn't seem like it. Because if I hadn't done what I have, then all of this would have turned out much, much worse. Despite what some seem to think, I make the best choices with what I have. There were so many chances where I could have gotten myself or other people killed but I didn't. I bit the bullet and sacrificed one life for many. Maybe it was wrong to kill a civilian to help a team of 'rouge' militants survive, but it was what had to be done.
That's why I was always reliable. I would do no matter what to make sure the ones close to me made it out. And if not, I would put them out of their misery in the least painful way possible. I had done it for Cameron and I would do it again. Because that is sacrifice. Knowing you took a loved one's life to save them was the hardest thing in the world yet I did it.
Life is only temporary, after all.
And those are the words that filled my mind, repeating over and over like a song stuck on replay. It was like a beautiful concerto of violins, their intensity growing in volume and the suspense mounting as I switched the laptops in the labs, using my body to shield the computers from the cameras. This way they would have no way of knowing which laptop I took if I switched it with the one in the cubby next to it. My fingerprints wouldn't even be on it since I used the sleeve of my blazer to make the transfer.
The orchestra of fervor was blaring in my ears as I stood in line in the lobby. I could hear every person's eyes moving, feel every single glance in my direction. In my head, I was calculating how long it would take to knock out the two guards at the door and the security officer next to the scanner.
Ashton stood on the other side of the clear security gates, sitting on a bench and reading a news article on his phone. To the military guard standing next to him, Ashton was a normal worker he saw every day. To me he was the most dangerous man in the room. If a security guard had a problem with my scan, it would take Ashton less than two seconds to snap the guard's neck, grab the assault rifle, and shoot the other. I could easily do the same to the mall cop looking man with a hand gun holstered on his hip as he waved people through the scanner. Perhaps I could even grab the precious coin before we bolted.
If we got lost in the streets, stole a car, then took off to the woods near the border, they would have no chance at catching us. Ashton and I were professionally trained in survival and evading law enforcement. We weren't common criminals; we were contract killers with a talent for backwoods activities.
I watched as the blonde with the buzz cut waved me through, gesturing for me to put my purse in one of the grey bins. I emptied my pockets of a receipt from lunch and a gum wrapper. The screwdriver was abandoned on a desk I walked past, leaving me with only one illegal thing in my possession.
I stepped into the round chamber, raising my arms above my head as the scanner moved around behind the plastic, the screen outside lighting up green as the blonde waved me all the way through this time. I stepped out, picking up my purse as it emerged from the conveyor belt X-ray machine.
As I moved the light grey bin to the end of the line, stacking it with the others, my eyes turned to Ashton. A small smile graced my lips, looking like a loving expression to the casual bystander.
To Ashton, it was much, much more.
It was a mischievous smirk tinged with the pure cockiness if scamming one of the most powerful governments in the world.
We were going to be billionaires.
