Few days had gone by since the arrival of Toni's new house guest, and the shared space was becoming increasingly crowded with each noise and sob that the young woman made during the day and into the night. It was driving the assassin insane. Every little whimper, wince, or struggle was attached to this silent form of begging that some how manifested in Toni's brain of, "just let her go," but she couldn't do that. She couldn't risk it, herself, Valeriya, because she knew that if either of them were caught doing exactly the wrong thing Hell would fall down on them from above.

Toni would end up being tortured and beaten for days on end in a small concrete room that was barely big enough to be considered a closet, blood stains all around her with the added heat from her own. It didn't sound like a fun time, but that was the price someone like her had to pay for harboring a failed hit. They wouldn't kill her, no, never kill, but they would hurt her. Teach her a valuable lesson on why she shouldn't do these things, go under her boss and make her own rules. It was a hard price to pay, but in the end, she'd only have to pay it if she got caught, and that's something that she was determined to keep from happening.

Valeriya, on the other hand, would be handled differently, as someone who wasn't expected to live long. It took a lot in Toni not to want to throw up at the thought of the fate of this girl if herself and Sentinel hadn't found her first, but since they did there was no need to linger on those possibilities. She was here now, and safe, despite the circumstances of landing in this place. Toni watched Valeriya often, trying to learn her without having to grate her mind by forcing herself to speak. Speaking was a hard thing to do, but looking wasn't. When you spoke to someone there was always that embarrassing feeling of fear of saying the wrong thing, but when you stared at something or someone for a long time all you had was your preconceived notions, and while that wasn't always a good thing in normal every day life it was all that Toni had right now.

Although, sooner or later, she knew that she would have to talk to her. Being that there was that violent separation between them made it hard for Toni to feel unnoticed in her own apartment. Her captive's eyes always following her around, to each room, watching everything she did, every mistake she made. It made her warmer than usual, more often than not finding herself sweating against the cold air of the place. It was becoming annoying, and it was driving her ever closer to just getting it over with and ripping off that gag to tell her to stop making her feel small.

She looked over at the slightly shivering girl still tied to the chair, having been moved up and down from that spot so Toni could assist her back and forth from the bathroom when the urge called. Valeriya had reached the point of giving up, silently crying more times than not. It turned Toni's heart upside down at the best of times, but she wouldn't let her captive know that. Here she was, held against her will in the apartment of the woman who killed her family, a woman who made it clear that she wasn't going to kill her, or hurt her any further. Their heated argument from a few days ago was the only amount of conversation that they could accomplish. Toni didn't know what to say anymore, and Valeriya was too broken to think clearly. She was spiraling.

Toni stared at her for a short moment, and then looked out of the living room window, noticing how early in the day it still was. She walked over to the pane of glass and cast her eyes over the alleyway that it overlooked, seeing nothing out of the ordinary. The cat that always hung around the dumpsters was there weaving between them, trash was piled high on the ground, ripped bags scattered all around. It wasn't a pretty sight, but that was life. The apartment itself had everything she needed, using her money to tailor it in a way that suited her. Of course, seeing the different kind of person that Valeriya used to be made her wonder.

She walked back over slowly, her hands held together behind her back as she soon came to a kneel in front of the young woman. Green eyes matched blue, and then Toni reached up behind her head and removed the gag gently, trying to show that there was more to her than violence and attitude. She watched Valeriya's shocked expression as she set the damp cloth on the ground at her feet, then she brought her gloved hands to rest over her lap and simply stared back, trying to find the right words to speak.

"I need you to understand something..." Toni began slowly, making sure to have Valeriya's full attention before continuing. "You're going to live, you're going to live a very long and fulfilling life, but you need to know that I can't let you go. Maybe one day I can, but while my boss still runs the agency I work for I can't risk you running around clueless in the streets. There's a lot at stake for us both, but you especially, because if I get caught then I'll be punished and let go... But if you get caught..."

"You told me all of this already, why are you repeating it like it's supposed to mean something to me?" Valeriya's voice strained, her eyes red and puffy from all the crying that had accumulated over the last couple of days. "And tell me, how is their form of torture worse than this?!"

A sharp inhale went in through Toni's nose and left her lips a moment after, trying to keep her logic in the forefront of her brain where her annoyance and anger would otherwise burst through by now. "Listen, if you think me keeping you here like this is even equivalent to what those psychotic guys would do to you than I really, really need you to stop for a second and re-evaluate what you think you know about the world we live in. There is a reason I only talk to and work with Sentinel, and the last couple days I've been discussing with him and we both agree that we don't want that to happen to you."

"I still don't understand why you're both risking all of this for me. I told you, dammit, I am worth nothing to you! Just let me go... Please! I'll use my money to change my identity and you'll never have to see or hear from me again." She pleaded. "Please..."

Frustration clouded the assassin's mind at the proposal, because in an ideal world it would work. Valeriya could get away with changing herself and never have to worry again, but this wasn't an ideal world, and that was the worst idea that the clueless girl could come up with. "I'm sorry, but I can't risk doing that."

"Why not?!" The desperation in Valeriya's voice grew, as did her urge to struggle from the ropes that were starting to rub burn marks into her skin.

"Because it won't work! You need to understand that it just... Will not work. You'll still get caught, and I still won't be able to do anything to help you." Toni said, her voice growing soft as she raked a hand through her curly hair to try and allieve some of the stress prickling under her skin.

"What about Lucas? What will happen to him if I get caught? He could help me too, even if they caught you." She tried still.

"No, if the three of us get caught they'll kill him. I hate to say it, but he's not valuable to them like I am. They won't hesitate to put him up in front of the firing squad."

"Then teach me how to be like you!"

For some reason that had caught both of them off guard, the final desperate request of a woman willing to do damn near anything at this point. Toni stared at her with wide eyes, shock not a usual emotion to show on her face, but this was a good occasion for it. It was almost ridiculous to consider. How could Valeriya even come close to the skill required to be a top notch assassin? Better yet, what if she became good and used those skills against Toni? Or, what if she just flat out got herself killed after all that trouble to keep her alive? There was a lot of pros and cons to consider concerning the pleading request, but it wasn't necessarily a bad idea. Best case scenario, Valeriya became a good asset to both herself and Sentinel. They could be a team. Worst case scenario, well there were two. The first would be Valeriya getting too good and trying to kill Toni with her new found skill. The second, which was much easier to stomach, was Valeriya making a dire mistake and getting herself killed in the line of fire.

Toni rubbed the sides of her face with both of her hands as she thought on it rather hard, running different variations of possibilities through her head. "Uh..." She sighed as she stood up, sending a look to the woman before turning around and heading off towards her bedroom. "Give me a minute, I'm going to make a call."

Valeriya was left there alone as the door to Toni's personal den latched shut. She pulled on her bindings a little, feeling the digging burn in her wrists from the ropes that were wrapped there for a the last few days. She hadn't eaten anything since being in this place, only drinking water every time Toni helped her up to go the bathroom, scooping mouthfuls from the sink's faucet. It was a weird feeling, water falling into an empty stomach with only it's acids to show for, mixing together into what felt like a sickness. She was trying to cloud her mind with these small things as Toni was taking an increasingly longer time on that phone than she thought she would. The idea she blurted out was out right ludicrous, but from the way the assassin reacted it was her best bet at getting some sort of freedom, and in reality, it was all she had now. The company of Toni and this Sentinel fellow that she originally knew as Lucas, if that was even his real name.

She sighed and leaned her head back on the back support of the seat, shutting her eyes and trying to overcome how uncomfortable this chair really was. It was made of hard, polished wood and caused an ache to creep up her spine a the base of her lower back. Sitting so long would do that to you though, she figured. Her eyes stayed closed until she heard Toni's door creak open, lifting her head to see the short woman walking back into the room with a small black box in both of her hands. It looked threatening and unusual, but Valeriya was quickly learning that most things about her situation were threatening and unusual.

"What's that for...?" She asked cautiously.

"Relax." Toni barked, "it's a med-kit. From the condition of your lower lip, it looks like you might need one."

"What's wrong with my lip?!" Valeriya growled, still trying to come off as overly angry and defensive.

"It's split pretty bad. Even before I pistol whipped you, I noticed that you had a healing wound there." She said as she pulled up a chair, plopping down and rifling through the med-kit for some alcohol wipes. "Were you really in a car accident?"

"Yes I was." She replied stiffly, watching Toni search through her many bandages, gauze pads, and anti-bacterial creams. "A car stopped abruptly in front of me and I was going too fast to make a proper stop, so I ran into him, which made the car behind me run into me. It was a bit of a mess."

"Any idea why your parents had a death certificate printed up for you? Cause of death on it stated that it was due to a car accident, and I know they knew you were alive." Toni asked as she gathered all the materials she would need to fix Valeriya's busted lip. It didn't pass her attention that Valeriya's voice took on a more domestic tone as she explained the details of her wreck, calming Toni down enough to not want to say fuck it to this whole thing.

"Maybe they knew they were being targeted and didn't want that same fate for me..." She said quietly, letting Toni grasp her jaw gently as she went about wiping the wound area clean.

"You think they knew someone was out to hurt you guys?" Toni asked, taking in a breath as she went through three sterile wipes to make sure the wound was completely clean before pulling out a thin surgical needle and thread. "Valeriya, do you know how much a human life is worth to the people I work for?"

Valeriya paled a little as Toni prepared to sew her lip shut, she never really responded to pain well, despite feeling a lot of it lately. "No, I don't believe I do."

"Here, tilt your head to the side a bit." Toni veered off track for a second to position Valeriya's head so that she could puncture her lip with the needle. "Just like that... Take in a deep breath, because this thing kind of hurts." She said as she placed her thumb against the skin just below the wound and pulled her mouth open, taking the threaded needed in her other hand and feeding it through the beginning of the jagged opening. "Fifty thousand dollars a head, by the way, for the main targets. Ten thousand a piece for anyone extra, they call it a security bonus. I killed five people at your mansion, so if you ever got the inkling to bribe your way to freedom with me, it wouldn't have worked."

Valeriya tried her best to keep a straight face through Toni's explanation, but try as she might it didn't work. Her expression skewed somewhat and caused Toni to slip in her handiwork, causing a brand new trickle of blood to form from the split that opened on the plump of her lower lip. Toni let out a sigh and got another wipe, dabbing it clean and waiting until it stopped bleeding to try again.

"Sorry." Valeriya muttered.

Toni locked her jaw and sighed, looking up to meet the woman's eyes briefly. "It's alright, try to control yourself though. Cry after if you need to."

She quieted at that point so that Toni could finish her work, carefully and delicately closing up the wound with that thin needle and thread. It hurt, but not nearly as bad as the injuries from the car accident, or getting smacked across the face with the gun she was trying to use against the woman who was now patching her up. It was odd how those things worked themselves out, but maybe it was some sort of sign. Like, these were just small steps in a bigger picture. One that she couldn't see clearly quite yet, but it was intriguing in that way, still angering and emotionally draining, but intriguing. Right now that's all she could really hope for.

When Toni finally pulled that thread through the final hole and clipped it off, Valeriya found the confidence to open her eyes and look at her, watching as she uncapped a small plastic tube with clear gel inside of it. She rubbed it graciously over the stitches and then put it away in her black box, locking it back up. The process was short, and they were both thankful for it ending, but there were a lot of unanswered questions still lingering in the young woman's eyes. Those blue seas were dripping with curiosity and unwavering negativity. Toni could see all of the words she wanted to say without even having to hear them, understanding how she should feel bad, how she should feel guilty. She wished that she could express those feelings to Valeriya, but she couldn't, because in reality she didn't feel those things. Her work was set in stone, in blood. There was no changing what she did, or why she did it. That was something that was initially hard to come to terms with, but she did, and now Valeriya would have to, too. Especially if she wanted to be a killer.

The silence stretched on for several more minutes as Toni began to get up, taking her box over to the island in the kitchen and setting it there. Being too close to Valeriya for too long made her feel nervous for a reason she couldn't place. Perhaps it was just the fact that this girl held a deep rooted hate in her gut for Toni, and having her live here was only a tad bit grating. Sure, that was it.

"Who did you call earlier?" Valeriya said, interrupting Toni's nervous inner ticks. It seemed that the gesture of fixing her lip was appreciated enough to open a dialogue between them.

"Sentinel. I was telling him about your little idea... He actually seemed pretty into it, oddly." She responded in a sigh, turning around to walk back over to her.

Valeriya only nodded and watched as she was approached cautiously, Toni wringing her hands about each other. It was odd to see her, especially being the type of person she was, so flustered. Her eyes trailed after the woman as much as she could, until Toni disappeared behind her and knelt down. There was a light pull on the ropes and then they fell, and a relief so great washed over Valeriya that she couldn't help but let out a pleased breath. She stretched her arms out, above her head, and then out in front of her. It felt so good to move them again. Pain circled around her shoulders and upper arms where they were strained so long, but now that she could move them that pain was quickly subsiding.

"He's actually coming over so that the three of us can discuss it further, but then he told me that as far as training you, it'll have to be me that does it. He has to leave the country soon for a contract he got last night." Toni stated, standing up and crossing her arms over her midsection. She was watching Valeriya carefully, not wanting to risk her trying to make a break for it.

"I meant to ask you, is his name really Lucas?" Valeriya wondered as she slowly stood up. The pain in her bad leg was building, causing her to wince and sit back down for a brief moment.

"What was the last name he gave you?" Toni wondered.

"Williams."

"Then yes, that's his real name." She confirmed, coming around to look at Valeriya who was clearly in pain. "You all right? Need any help, or...?"

"No, I'm fine. I injured my leg in the car accident and since then it hurts if I'm stationary too long." She said, wincing as she stood up yet again. She attempted to hobble around the apartment, trying to regain her maneuverability back. It was coming, slowly but surely. "You know, he speaks so highly of you. He was telling me how close you two are."

"Was he now?" Toni smirked, raising an eyebrow in a playful gesture.

"Yes, he was. You mean a lot to him, you know, and I can tell that he means a lot to you." Valeriya went on, walking back over to the living room so that she could sit down on the couch. The soft cushions were a much needed upgrade from that chair.

"He does, I love him to death, and I know he loves me, too... But there's nothing there, if that's what you're asking." She responded, walking over to plop down on the other side of the couch with Valeriya, who seemed to look a little unnerved by the added company, but tried to hide it quickly. This would be difficult, Toni reasoned.

"That's weird to me. How can two people love each other so much and not want to try and be together? Or, does it have to do with your jobs?" She wondered out loud.

"No, nothing to do with our jobs. He didn't tell you why we're not together?" The smirk on Toni's face faded, her arms crossing over her stomach.

"I think he was about to, but he stopped because you happened to hobble into the bar as he was talking. He rushed over as soon as he saw you." Valeriya shrugged.

"Sounds about right. Remind me to smack him one later for almost telling you, because the reason is actually pretty personal." Toni clarified, glancing over at Valeriya, and then back at the television which was droning on with some boring commercial about cat food bowls.

"Noted."

Their conversation ended shortly after that, sitting quietly as Toni flipped through channels. She was waiting for Sentinel to stop by, which was taking annoyingly longer than she thought it would. As they waited, she stopped on an old movie. It was American bred, and she seemed to be really enjoying it as she watched. The only