The Hit

[hazlogs]

Date: 9/7/2002, some time after Lyra's visit...

After a fast ride on the motorcycle, they park near the impressive city 
library. She takes him in, asking what he likes to read and then leading him 
to the right section. She seems to have no problem watching him look 
around--picking up a few books herself. At some point she asks if he's read 
the Harry Potter books; she ends up checking one out, "just for the hell of 
it," she says.

Cat hugs the veritable stack of books to his chest, watching each get packed 
into plastic bags with a hawk's care. "Harry Potter's one of my favorites," 
he tells Rina softly. "He's kinda like me, if you think about it, 'cause..." 
Then, realizing what he just said, he bites his lower lip and watches the 
librarion pack the last of his books, 'The Eagle Stone'.

Rina hands over her library card to check out the books, and then they walk 
out into the late-afternoon sun. There are people sitting out on the steps; 
it's a popular place, evidently.

Something isn't right.

Rina has one of those plastic bags held to her chest, as she skips down the 
steps beside him; her smile is broad, her head slightly bowed, as if she 
hlds a secret happiness from the well-spent day.

Across the street, a Cadillac pulls into a parking space. The driver leans 
out of the window to yell at a pedestrian in his way, in what sounds like a 
Slavic language.

Cat's unusually...chipper, would be the word, from getting to leave the 
apartment -and- get books. Two bags of fantasy novels, one in each hand, 
bump against his legs as he toddles down the steps, large ratty sneakers 
nearly tripping him on the last. He merely stumbles, doesn't fall, but he 
pauses to get his bearings and glances around, blinking. It's been a long 
time since he'd been around so many people. Maybe that was why he felt 
suddenly uneasy. Yeah, that had to be it. He looks up as someone starts 
yelling, wincing on reflex.

The back window of the car rolls down, as Rina glances over to him. 
"What's--"

It all happens at once. He sees the glint of sun on metal, and a vague 
silhouette of the man in the car as he aims the rifle across the empty 
street. There are people on the sidewalk, here and there, pedestrians 
passing by.

It's like a scene out from 'The Secret of the Mezuzah'. That's Cat's first, 
and only coherent thought as the rifle comes out of the car. And then it's 
just this sickening, cold grip of fear shooting up his spine as he lurches 
forward, bags falling from his grasp. "Miz Rina!" is the panicked shriek 
that starts in his throat, although how much of it will get out before the 
shots is unknown.

The spit of the silenced rifle sounds just as he speaks.

Rina's eyes widen, and for a moment she stares at him without breathing. The 
books drop from her hand and hit the ground with a thud. A man turns to look 
at them, yelling something as Rina reaches into her jacket.

Cat's heart is beating so loud it's slowing time down for him, he's sure of 
it. All he knows is that he has to get to the man, before he hurts people. 
He stumbles out in front of Rina, towards the man with the gun, dipping so 
low it's a wonder he doesn't just fall flat on his face.

"Hey--" People are beginning to notice, as Rina goes for her own gun. She 
tries, with her free hand, to pull Cat back from his headlong rush into the 
street. She fails. The rifle spits again, and the impact half-spins Rina's 
body. She still has not taken a breath.

Someone has noticed the gun, and there is a piercing scream. Another man's 
voice: "Holy /shit/--"

Just as Cat starts his dash across the street, the man with the gun sees 
him, and narrows his eyes... but he does not shift his aim; his attention 
returns unerringly to the target.

Then the sirens come. The man with the gun gets off another shot and shouts 
something, as he draws the rifle in and the window rolls up.

A police cruiser swerves past, right in front of Cat, the sirens incredibly 
loud.

The cub manages to skid to a halt as the car rushes by him. He looks around 
wildly, for the car where the gunman had been, close to utter panic. What 
where who when why where what- People are screaming, shouting, and the 
sirens are deafening. He spins around, just off the curb, looking for Rina. 
"Miz Rina!" he yells again when he spots her, voice breaking in fear. The 
books were never good enough to make you believe how loud things were in 
maddening situations like these...

She is on her hands and knees, her face blank as she waits for air to come 
again. One hand, actually; the other is clutched to her side. Her head is 
up, to search for the shooter and the boy with wild eyes.

The screech of tires and the wail of sirens: sounds of the chase fade into 
the east.

Rina on the ground, books scattered about and forgotten as people flee the 
scene, is an image that shatters Cat's sense of order. He's not registering 
sound as he falls on his knees at Rina's side, blabbering something 
incoherent and desperate. He wants her to be okay; he wants her to sit up 
and say she just fell and to explain to him what just happened was nothing 
to worry about. Because he -is- worrying and she doesn't -look- okay and 
easily upset cub is terribly close to losing any vestige of control left to 
him.

She takes a swift, desperate breath, and winces. Sharp, sudden pain. There 
is a little blood on the hand that reaches for him. "Help me up," she says 
hoarsely, her voice strange.

When the bloody hand comes out towards his, Cat freezes, his babbling 
ceasing suddenly, it's absence quickly filled in with the rush of emergency 
vehicles and screaming people. His left hand reaches out for Rina's, shaking 
nearly as badly as hers must be. Then he grasps her hand tightly, the other 
arm slipping around her back to lift her up. His facial expression has gone 
tight with fear. Inwardly, the cub shrieks and cries and quivers as he lets 
some other part of him deal with this fucked up reality.

"Good," she mutters quietly. Dark eyes dart toward the street. She is 
slightly hunched over. "Get your books." She might not be able to stand 
without him. 

Around them, people have either left in a hurry, or they are scattering now, 
as a uniformed cop comes out of the library.

Cat starts to pull away obediently, then looks back to the kin as if 
suddenly realizing she may need his support. A little of her blood is on his 
hands, and it's making them trembles. He stands there, one arm half-about 
her still as he hesitates.

With a grimace, Rina forces herself to straighten. "Fast," she mutters 
through clenched teeth. She walks toward the street, stiff but not limping, 
her shoulders a little hunched as she heads for a streetlight post.

Brushing his bangs out of his eyes furiously, the cub kneels and picks up 
eight of his books and all three of Rina's, those being the closest ones. He 
shoves them into one plastic bag and lurches to his feet, running past 
panicking pedestrians to Rina's side. "Miss Rina," he cries out desperately, 
"Are you okay?"

Teeth clenched, she manages a rough nod. "I'm good," she says quietly. 
"Settle down." She makes it as far as the streetlight as the cop begins 
taking statements behind them. "Get us a cab. We need a cab." Her voice 
stays hoarse and soft, rough with the effort of suppressing the pain.

Settle down. Cat looks like someone jammed a carton of Jolt into his 
bloodstream, in 30 seconds. He looks around wildly, not seeing any cabs on 
this street, but the corner down there had had four cabs there today, 
waiting for passengers... His free arm slips around Rina, and he leads her 
towards the other street curb.

Rina begins to limp slightly, before long. She is pale and unsteady, 
pressing her hand hard against her side. "Get a cab," she says tightly. 
"Have to get to -- someone--"

Cat's not very strong, but he's trying to half-lift, half-carry Rina down 
the street, towards the corner he'd seen with cabs. The plastic bag bounces 
against his side crazily, hurting as edges of books dig into his leg. Cars 
pull over to the side, drivers getting out and watching the havoc, and 
making it harder for the emergency vehicles to get in. But like a miracle, 
one of the cars that pulls over to the side is a white cab with black 
checkered sides. Immediately the theurge cub heads that way. The cabby, a 
small man with a Yankees baseball cap, leans out the window and stares as 
Cat and Rina stumble towards his vehicle. "'Ey now, you two look bush'd, en' 
that lady ain't she hurt?"

Rina glances to the voice with a quick shake of her head. "Just-- no feelin' 
well," she stammers out. With Cat's help, she manages to tumble into the 
car, one hand still clutched to her side. "Cat-- the address, give him the 
address--"

Cat quickly scrambles in after Rina, eyes wide in terror. "R-red M-m-mill," 
he manages to stutter out, sitting in the back with his hands wringing in 
his lap. He's so nervous he doesn't even buckle up. Markowitz, the cabby, 
looks at the two strangers in his rear view mirror and shakes his head, 
swearing something in Yiddish as he coaxes the cab to life and maneuvers 
oh-so-slowly out of the jammed street, into less-crowded roads. "Red Mill 
'Partments it is, vey, this city's goin' t' hell inna hanbasket, ain't it 
tho? What was all tat 'bout, wonder, damn. Chachka closet of criminals, Sent 
Claire is." Another worried glance, this time at Rina. Then the car takes 
off with a squeal of tires.

By the time they reach the apartment door, Rina looks decidedly less than
good. She is white and dazed, one hand still clutching her wounded side. As
soon as there is a wall to lean against, she stumbles up against it,
breathing hard.

Cat looks sick, the blood having drained from his face and his eyes so wide
that his eyebrows have disappeared into the dangling curtain of his hair.
"Miz Rina, don't fall," he croaks out, one hand on her elbow and the other
starting to knock wildly at Salem's door. The books were forgotten, left in
the cab. "Mister Salem Mizzer Salem please be home please please," is the
fervent prayer Cat murmurs.

Mister Salem is indeed still home, as evidenced by the sound of the locks
being undone moments after Cat starts knocking. The Philodox goes rigid when
he opens the door and gets a good look at the pair; he utters a curse in
Serbian and moves to help Rina into the apartment, and quickly. "What
happened?" he asks the cub, sharply.

"Take it easy, aright?" Rina says hoarsely. "I'll be fine. 'S'not deep. I'll
be okay." She slips her hand from her jacket and glances down, as she steps
in. "I think it just--got through the vest," she tells Salem. "You'll hafta
clean it out."

The theurge cub isn't listening to the Kin, or is just beyond calming down.
"Th-the guy at the li...library hada gun and he was yellin' an' he shotter
an' -help- her!" is the rambling that is Cat's voice. He steps back from the
two adults, gaze snapping from Salem to Rina and again as he expects the
Walker Philodox to work...-some- magic that will make Rina better.

Salem would be having difficulty with Rina's instruction to 'take it easy'
under the best of circumstances, and Cat's agitation isn't helping. It's
perhaps fortunate that the moon is as thin as it is. "Fucking Christ," he
mutters, and ushers the kinswoman toward the couch. "Cat, go into the
bathroom and get the first aid kit." He doesn't look over at the cub as this
order's snapped out. To Rina, he says, "Sit down. Let me see."

Her knees buckle halfway there, and he is forced to half-carry her to the
couch. "Fuck," she whispers. "Hafta get some new fucking kevlar." She
struggles out of the leather jacket and collapses onto the couch. A
bloodied, half-ripped hole marks her t-shirt, ut it does not have the burnt
edges of a penetrating bullet wound.

Cat shifts his weight to the other foot, watching the two of them for
another nerve-wracking second before weaving around to the bathroom,
stepping over the roaches without even looking down. He mumbles some prayer
to the Virgin Mary over and over as trembling hands open the medicine
cabinet and get the first aid kit. There, white box, red cross, cross,
Virgin Mary, Mother of Our Father- He reappears, box held in a tight grip,
as he comes up to Salem's side with the kit thrust out towards the Philodox.

Salem gives Cat the briefest of glances as he takes the kit, then says,
"There should be some peroxide in the medicine cabinet as well." Then his
attention's back on Rina as, almost gingerly, he pushes up the side of her
shirt to get a look at the wound itself. "Is the bullet still in?" His
tension hasn't let up a notch.

She lets out a hoarse sound, wincing. "I don't think it-- jesus /fuck/ it
hurts." Her voice is taut, unsteady.

There is only a bloodied, burned puncture marking her skin, shallow, the
driving-in of a blunt object. It is not deep.

As soon as Salem mentiones peroxide, the cub is off again, stumbling as he
enters the bathroom and as he leaves, peroxide bottle in hand. He's very
nearly as white and shaken looking as Rina. When's the last time he blinked?
Again, Cat holds the bottle to Salem, shocked glance lingering on the bullet
wound with a sharp inhaled breath.

Salem eyes the wound for a moment, muttering something low under his breath
in Serbian. He takes the bottle from Cat and, with the help of a sterilized
bandage from the first aid kit, starts cleaning the wound. By now, it should
be clear to the cub that there doesn't seem to be any magic involved; what
Salem's doing is no different than what any 'normal' person could do.

Rina cries out sharply, biting back the sound and closing her eyes. Severa
deep breaths seem to steady her against the sting of the peroxide. She looks
over at Cat, then, dark eyes a little hazy from shock. "It's all right," she
says unsteadily. "I'm not shot."

The cub cringes, eyes shutting quickly when Rina cries out. "Then what's
that?" Cat retorts, eyes opening to focus on the wound Salem is cleaning,
voice pitched higher than usual. "You're hurt! That guy shot you I saw him!"

The muscles in Salem's jaw tighten as he grits his teeth, first at Rina's
cry, then at Cat's raised voice. He continues to clean the wound
methodically, carefully. His hand's steady, at least. "Cat," he says, almost
sounding perfectly even, "calm the bloody fuck down, please."

"Oh, /fucking/ Christ," Rina snarls, a savage lashing out. "Don't you have
any fuckin' /morphine/ or somethin'?"

At first mesmerized by Salem's first aid, and then jolted out of his shock
by the calm-but-brusque order (and again by Rina's snarl), Cat steps back,
slowly at first, turning and heading back into the bathroom quickly. He
shuts the door none too gently, and crumples against it, pulling his knees
to his chest tightly.

Salem, surprisingly enough, does not even twitch. Luna hides, and the beast
under his skin sleeps. More or less. "No," he says, with enforced calm, "I
do not have any fucking morphine. I _do_ have some aspirin, if you're
desperate, and I'm almost done anyway." There is a certain lack of sympathy
in his voice, and he doesn't look around even at the slam of the bathroom
door. True to his word, though, he's soon done cleaning; with quick, sharp
movements he recaps the bottle of peroxide, drops the bloodied gauze on the
floor, and tears open another packet of bandaging.

Rina's breathing is still desperate. "Fuck it," she says roughly. "It's not
that bad." She's clearly in pain, gritting her teeth against it. "Tell the
kid it's okay," she rasps. "He did good out there."

"Did he?" Salem sounds distracted as he bandages up the wound. "What
happened, exactly? How did you get back?"

'The kid' is currently rocking back and forth in the bathroom, reciting the
Lord's Prayer this time at breakneck speed. His fingers dig tightly into his
slacks as he tries to desperately block out the image of the gun barrel
glinting in the sun.

"Took a cab," she whispers. "Cops showed up. That's why they didn't--" A
swallow, then. "Finish the job."

Salem glances up at her face for a moment. "Good." He finishes the first aid
job and sits back on his heels, eyeballing his work critically.

"Thanks," she murmurs dazedly. "Sorry I-- yelled at you." The rise and fall
of her chest is shallow, cautious. The white bandage is darker than her
skin, though. It hides the written scar across her stomach.

And Rina spinning about as she was shot. That strange look of disbelief on
her face, eyes glancing somewhere and not-quite-focused on his own. Cat
shudders with a low, weak moan in his throat at the thought, curling up even
more tightly.

Salem shakes his head dismissively as he gets to his feet. The mask is on
over face and voice; he presents nothing but that same careful, enforced
calm. "Stay there," he says, and then gathers up the debris of rough first
aid and heads for the bathroom.

The sound that comes from her is almost a laugh--but she has to hold it
back, to avoid causing herself more pain. The sound trails off, then.

An attempt to open the door will be halted, at least momentarily, because
Cat's curled up against the door. He just repeats his prayers, over and over
like a single-song record.

A spasm of impatience flashes across Salem's face. He raps sharply on the
bathroom door. "Cat. Let me in."

A moment of hesitation, but then the cub pushes to his feet and opens the
door, the other hand going to the door of the medicine cabinet
automatically. Salem must need something else for Rina. Rina, who was shot,
who made him hot chocolate and was shot and got him books- where were the
books now? -and was shot. "Is she better now?" the small boy demands to
know.

"She's fine," says the elder Garou, brusquely. "She just needs some rest.
And something to drink. Do me a favor, and get her a glass of orange juice
or something?"

Rest. She got -shot-. Cat bites his lower lip, peering out from around the
doorway at Rina before slipping around Salem and into the kitchen. The door
to the medicine cabinet swings open slowly, having not been shut. Orange
juice for Rina. The theurge has a mission, now, and it keeps his mind off
what had happened, at least a little.

Meanwhile, Salem disposes of the bandage that he used to clean the wound and
puts away the peroxide and first aid kit. Methodically; he's not rushing
this in the slightest, and the extra time allows for a moment to catch his
breath.

Rina is still and quiet, her eyes closed, her breathing shallow but steady.
It looks like she's asleep, or passed out at least. White gauze wraps her
waist, peeking out below the hem of her shirt where Salem tugged it back
down. The shirt is bloodstained... but the bandaging is not.

Still trembling hands open the fridge and reach for the orange juice,
tugging the carton out. Mechanically, Cat goes about his simple task- a
drink for Rina. Get the glass, close the cabinet, pour the drink. He misses
at first, at half a glassfull spills out onto the counter, but then the flow
of juice lands into the glass with a muted 'ping', and he watches it
carefully. He could get the spill later- orange juice for Rina.

Salem returns from the bathroom as Cat finishes pouring the juice, his hair
looking as though he's raked his fingers back through it. He glances toward
the kitchen and the shell-shocked boy, then shakes his head and continues
toward the couch. He touches her shoulder, shaking lightly enough to get her
attention if she's awake, but not enough to disturb her or wake her if she's
actually asleep.

There is a reflexive flinch, and nothing more; she is utterly unconscious,
with no sign of rapid eye movement.

Cat enters the living room shortly after Salem, juice-wet fingers clenched
tightly around the glass as he approaches the couch slowly, pausing a little
behind the Walker. "She's asleep," he mumbles, stating the obvious with wide
eyes. The glass trembles, just a bit, in his hands.

"Right," Salem mutters. He looks over toward Cat. "Nevermind the juice." His
tone is less sharp now, starting to revert to the patient authority-figure
sound that he usually takes when speaking to the cub. He considers Rina for
a moment, then bends down to pick her up and carry her back toward the bed.

The cub scoots out of the way, moving back so quickly that more juice
sloshes over the rim on the glass and onto his hands, a drop hitting the
floor. Cat watches Salem and Rina exeunt with solemn eyes, biting his lower
lip. A little color has returned to his face, but not much, and the
trembling hasn't left his hands.

She is shockingly light, a pale ghost in his arms. Her right hand, the blood
cleaned away from it now, slips from her chest to hang limp.