Fan Fiction ❯ Cupid's Mistake ❯ Chapter Two: Her ( Chapter 2 )

Chapter Two: Her

An early autumn wind swept through the black city street, twirling a few decrepit leaves along the gutter. Only one girl watched, sympathetic of the browned leaves floating away from their home on the concrete. I wonder where they came from. The city didn't have any decorative trees along the sidewalks, and the nearest park was blocks away. Her mind at ease, content even though her question had not been answered, the young woman combed her dainty hand through her umber hair, sighing slightly.

"Arty," the man behind the oversized desk addressed.

She winced. Her name was Artemis, not Arty. Reluctantly she tore her eyes away from the leaves to look at the man.

"If you want these sessions to help, you're going to need to pay attention, Arty."

Artemis had given up trying to explain to this deranged man that she didn't need any help at all. She had spoken to this psychologist once about herself to help a friend who had experienced a mental breakdown. The therapist promptly pronounced that Artemis was depressed and was indirectly the cause of her friend's mental state.

I'm perfectly fine. Even if there is something wrong, what's the matter with it? It's not as if I'm eating grass and talking to the sun. I'm not a threat to humanity.

So, each Sunday, Artemis had been "strongly encouraged" by her manager to take these therapy sessions, meaning, if she didn't take them she would be fired. Artemis couldn't blame her boss though; he had to believe anything this idiot therapist said. He was running a high-stress job, after all.

At the age of eighteen, Artemis had been specially nominated for this position. Scouts had been following her around for months, keeping their eye on her, observing her lifestyle. Of course, she didn't know anything about it until they sent her a job application.

The pay was high, hours minimal, and they weren't even asking her to have a bachelor's degree. She had to wonder what was going on. She had wondered if maybe the job was high-risk, and if she had a good chance of dying while she was on it.

However, these scouts had been watching her, calculating her probability of death and it was actually very low, so low that she was exceptional. When she graduated from high school, they pounced on her, wanting her to start immediately.

Artemis was a secret agent for a highly specialized organization called Espionage/Reconnaissance, ESRecon for short. ESRecon could be vaguely explained as a much more advanced police department. However, they refused to deal with such petty crimes as bank robberies and the like, deeming them fit for the lowly city Police Department. Comparing the skill of ESRecon agents to that of the regular PD would be like comparing the speed of a cheetah to a sickly tortoise.

Although some of ESRecon's tactics were slightly less than legal, they still got the job done and no questions were ever asked. In any case, few people know that ESRecon had a whole department based on creating plausible explanations for their actions, and various loopholes to save their hides in case said explanations weren't believed.

Artemis glared at her therapist. He's going to continue believing I'm angry and depressive anyway, so why not act like it as well?

"I'm here to help, Arty."

"My name is not-"

"Well, look at that, we're out of time for today! We can talk about that next week, okay Arty?"

"Ar-tem-is. It's not that hard…" she grumbled under her breath.

"What was that?"

"Yeah, I'll be here."

Artemis kicked a soda can littered outside as she exited the double-storied brick building. She was in a bad part of the city, but she wasn't worried at all. She'd excelled in standard training, and could take out any muggers with just one strike quite easily. However, it was only noon and broad daylight. She didn't have anything to worry about.

She did stand out a little, though, dressed in her work uniform already, as that's where she was headed. How the hell did he convince me to work Sundays? She grumbled as she walked towards the subway station. Artemis was dressed in a black long-sleeved shirt with the letters `ESR' in white on the left. She wore a black leather miniskirt, standard women's uniform (though interchangeable with the pants) and knee high boots. Artemis had the required belt, complete with her radio device, pepper spray, fingerprint replica set, gun, badge, and tracker unit. Her mirrored prescription sunglasses, which doubled as a heat target finder, were balanced on top of her head, keeping her wispy brown hair out of her face. Her boss would have scolded her, had he seen that she wasn't wearing them. Artemis' eyesight had always been faulty, but her speed and silence made up for that minor flaw.

Damn.

Artemis swiveled around and jogged back to the therapist's. She'd left her gloves. Along with being something like a perfectionist, Artemis was also very keen to have everything around her clean. Others might call her a germ freak. She always rationalized this, though. Who knows who's touched those subway poles? Although they were not standard issue, ESRecon allowed her to have the gloves. They didn't exactly want her fingerprints everywhere, either, because most of the time they were in places they probably weren't supposed to be.

Donning the black gloves, she once again headed for the subway station two blocks away, quickly buying a water bottle from a street vendor for "lunch." She drank this quickly and tossed it in its proper receptacle right outside the escalator going down to the train.

She grabbed a few quarters from a pocket on her belt and bought a ticket from the machines lined up along the turnstiles, passing through them quickly, cutting into the crowd: large groups of tourists. They never gave her a problem, though; the locals were the ones with the attitudes. "Hey woman, what's your deal?" one might shout if she accidentally bumped into his arm. She would just nod, smile, and wave and then all would be forgiven. No one could resist the charisma of this quiet young woman. She didn't have to do this; she could take `em all, but it wasn't worth her time.

Artemis entered a car just as the train was about to leave the dock, holding onto the overhead pole, almost grabbing an old wad of faded pink bubble gum. Her neighbors eyed her gun anxiously. She wasn't dressed in the normal blue police uniform that they were used to. With a sigh, she pulled out her wallet and her badge and held it nonchalantly next to the gun. She didn't want to scream it to the world, but she still wanted to calm the crowd, quietly let them know she wasn't going to harm them or anything.

After a few stops, it was Artemis' turn to exit, and she quietly slipped through the crowd quite easily. The people around her barely noticed when she left; one second she was there and they wouldn't notice she was gone until the next stop.

Artemis rode the escalator out of the dank underground subway into the bright afternoon sun. Her neighborhood had changed completely. Now she was the posh part of town, right next to a green park. This was where she lived, in a moderately sized apartment, with a perfect window view of the building next door. There was, however, a very, very good-looking young man who lived in that apartment building. Sometimes Artemis could see him, since his window was directly across from hers. She was intrigued by this mystery man who was home all day and never at night. Artemis smiled. It was okay for her to pry into this guy's life. He would never become part of her life; he'd never hurt her, and she'd never hurt him.

She pulled apart her Venetian blinds to look out at his window. They were closed, meaning he wasn't at home. I bet he's out doing something fun, not working. I'm the only idiot to work on Sundays. Artemis picked up her laptop bag and headed out again, this time towards her silver sports car in the parking garage.

The garage was cool and dark. Artemis pulled her keys off her belt and pushed the button to unlock the doors, causing the car to beep in response. The sudden sound startled the young man just exiting his car next to her, causing him to bang his head on the top of his door.

"Oh, I'm sorry… I didn't mean to surprise you there…" Artemis said apologetically. He was her next-door neighbor, but she was searching for her car keys in

"Hmm..? No, it wasn't you… I'm just a little too tall for this little car. You'd think for all the money I paid for it, I'd get one that fits… Well, it wasn't too bad... I paid it off in a few months…"

Artemis looked at the obviously expensive luxury car, then back at the man before her. What an arrogant jerk…as she entered her car to leave for work. Satisfied with the brief conversation, they both went their separate ways, only to meet again.

She drove along over to her secured office, parking her car in a wide alley and jogging up to the silver door, carrying her laptop in her right hand. There was the regular old keypad there, but voice recognition and eye retina scan as well, and this was just to get into the building. She entered her personalized identification code into the keypad and waited for the computer to boot up.

"State name," the computer voice commanded.

"Cataline, Artemis," she replied.

A green light was activated on the retina scan. She aligned her eye with the red laser and pushed a button, causing it to analyze her iris for identification.

"Verified," the little computer said as the thick latch clicked open. Artemis entered the building and made her way to her office, going through a few more of these security precautions.

Artemis turned the key into her large, contemporary office, noticing at once the ten yellow sticky-notes posted onto her computer monitor. It's interesting, though, how she noticed these before she noticed the wiry man sitting on a black sofa.

"You're late."

"I'm not late; I'm not even on duty."

"Well, I was expecting you earlier."

"You shouldn't have expected me at all."

"Artemis."

She just rolled her eyes.

"So what do you have for me now, James?"

"Well, Boss has the specs on the latest up to par, finally."

"You mean the Janai thing?"

"Yeah, that thing."

"Okay, so I go find the Swiper agent and retrieve the crystal, same old-same old. I'll do it next week."

"Um, no."

"What? James, what are you talking about? This is the way I always do things."

James was something like Artemis' personal secretary. He corresponded with the big boss and collected all the specifications of the missions. He was also the Swiper's inside agent, unluckily for Artemis. Of course, she didn't know that.

"Not this time, Arty."

"HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO TELL YOU-"

"Cool it, babe, you'll blow your top before you even hear it."

Artemis could have become very indignant for being called a "babe" but at the moment she was too curious about this strange assignment to be concerned with that.

"James. Spill it." She was wearing that expression that really meant "Spill it or I'll break your neck."

"He's paired you up with another agent."

"WHAT?! Who?"

"I don't know. Some rookie…uh, Dante Evensong, I think his name is…"

"A ROOKIE?! HE PAIRED ME UP WITH A ROOKIE?!"

"Uh, yeah. You have a meeting with Boss and this Dante guy in an hour."

James left, probably to go do some secret Swiper stuff, leaving Artemis to wait and check emails for the hour.

A ROOKIE?!