(Untitled)

[comm_npc]

Katya Tank is her real name. It just isn't the name her mother gave her. Nor is it the name the laws will pull up from the DNA scan on the fourth and fifth fingers she left on site at a job just a few months ago. She doesn't use that name any more, and doesn't associate it with herself

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[dreamer_fray]

"Whoa!"

A small boy that had been sitting the shadows of a nearby dumpster jumps violently as she drops down nearby, scrambling to his feet in evident panic and peering at her through thick glasses. Tattered sneakers shift on the ground as if he'd prefer to be runnin' about now, thanks.

"Wh-where the rut'd you come from?"

[comm_npc]

Katya starts, fairly violently. Drawing to a halt quickly, she squeaks loudly in the shock of being surprised. There shoudln't be anyone there. Her visor's bust.

And of course she doesn't own it legally, so she can't exactly fish it out to check.

"Jesu!" She counters, instead of answering. "What the rut are you doing? Sitting here?"

[dreamer_fray]

"...Yeah," he replies, as though it should be obvious. "'Cause it's usual you don't get people droppin' on in."

He casts a vaguely suspicious look upwards.

"Y'make a habit o'that?"

[comm_npc]

Katya glances up over her shoudler at the roof above and behind. No one caught her leaving. No alarms yet. No reason to think she came from the museum. No reason to suspect her at all.

Not that this kid would know anything about a grab, of course.

"Not these rooftops 'special," she says. "I don't live 'round here."

[dreamer_fray]

"Oh," he says.

Then, unconvincingly,

"Me neither."

[comm_npc]

Katya narrows her good eye as she examines him, hands folded around her against the cold, shifting slightly from one foot to the other.

"OK," she says, awkwardly. "So you dunno where to catch a bus to Kappa, then?"

Not that she's planning on taking a bus, or that Kappa's anywhere near Versi, but she wants to move on. She's young enough to be intimidated by teenage boys still, even those apparently even smaller than herself.

[dreamer_fray]

Harth bites his lip.

"...Never caught a bus m'self. Stop's a ways back that way," he says vaguely waving a hand in a direction that could be pretty much anywhere.

"Prob'ly faster walking, anyhow."

[comm_npc]

That really could be pretty much anywhere. Katya glances over past him peering into the dark.

"OK, then," she says, drawing back again, hands wrapped tight, and under her jacket. Her good hand closes over hte handle of her gun. Just for reassurance. He is just a kid.. "Thanks."

The route she takes to go past him is unusually large for any other street brat, but it's about normal for shy, easily intimidated Katya Tank.

[dreamer_fray]

Harth peers after her doubtfully.

"Sure."

She doesn't get far before a sheepish voice calls out again.

"Uh, wrong way. Third turn, I think. Or maybe fourth."

[comm_npc]

Katya hesitates when he calls, stops, shudders, and tightens her grip on her gun. She doesn't look over her shoudler when she calls out,

"Thanks! I'll find it!"

Go away. Go away. Go away. I know you're just a kid. I know you won't hurt me. You're just trying to help. Go away, please...

[dreamer_fray]

She's no good at hiding her terror.

With a shrug, the vampire waves innocently at her retreating back, grinning when she doesn't even turn. Funny girl.

He doesn't call out again, but vaults lightly up onto the dumpster, using it as a springboard to climb the rest of the wall. He wanders along, watching the top of her head as she hurries along below, through the winding alleyways.

Fun fact. Most o'those never got finished, or are so shoddily constructed they run into dead ends. A mind game in physical form.

[comm_npc]

Katya knew the direction she wanted to go in. She knows how to get back to Versi, but from where she was. Inn trying to pretend everything was OK to the kid, she let him send her in a direction completely out of the way.

There's a flyway back there a few hundred yards. She just needs to work back to it and avoid being seen from the alley he's in.

But he clearly sent her in the wrong direction, because that's a dead end. So she keeps going, never turning back, not ever turning back, just turning whenever she feels like she should do, tracing what from above must clealry look like an expanding circle.

Soon she starts climbing up fire escapes, following the Haddynite's First Rule for the lost: get as high as poosible and trace your route from there.

[dreamer_fray]

And below, a small, pale kid lies full length along the top of a wall, staring up through the buildings, still and peaceful. Just as if he hasn't been watching her every move.

Harth's hard to get rid of, once he decides to watch you.

[comm_npc]

That's spun.

And really rutting creepy.

Katya feels her heart miss a beat, short, painful, and she stares at him.

Just a kid, just a kid.

Katya learned once that boys that age are anything but just kids. She just wants to unlearn it so very badly.

Can't possibly be the same kid.

She swings herself up onto a level of roofs and races to the other side. Bearings are easier to get when you're higher, so she at least can figure herself into the right direction.

And get out of the area as quickly as possible.

[dreamer_fray]

Look down again, and he'll be gone.

Katya's fast for a human her size, but not to him. And if she gets away... well, so what? He knows how to find her again if he wants.

He swings upwards and along to reach the other side before she does, and with a barely repressed grin, sits casually on a windowledge a storey or two below her level. His legs swing idly above the gap as a couple of kids on rocketboards zoom past underneath, hooting and yelling.

Rough neighbourhood.

[comm_npc]

She lives in a rough neighbourhood.

But she also lives from day to day trusting in her gun and trusting that people in her rough neighbourhood like her. It was hard to get the courage together to talk to peole, but she's known in Versi. If she can just get there, she knows enough people that she can drop into someone's home before gettign to her own apartment. If they're in.

She gasps in shock as she sees the kid sitting on the windowledge, and for a second just stares.

It can't be him. Can't possibly be. Not even a lurk can move that fast. no one can except...

Now why does he look familiar?

Heart thumping painfully in her chest, she turns and scoots up another fire escape, running flat out to the sound of the nearest flyway.