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December 19th 1999
“I don’t know why you do these things, Rebecca. This is the second time this week I’ve been called into your school,” Melissa Saunders told her daughter with a sigh as she got inside of the family car, rubbing her forehead all the way. “You know if this is you acting out against me and your dad then this isn’t the way-“
“He isn’t my dad,” Rebecca snapped and continued to glare out of the car window she had pressed her forehead up against, not pleased that both her and her mother was still seated outside of the hellish school in the first place. “And I didn’t do it to get back at you. I did it because they were picking on Marie Watson and I was sick of seeing them steal her lunch money.” Rebecca removed herself from the window to stare at her mother, trying her best to ignore the strained look behind those wrinkles that looked so pained and distraught. “It was about time someone did it to those losers, it’s not my fault they only realized after a whole month of me doing it to them.”
Melissa’s frown twitched for a moment and Rebecca could tell by the crease in between her mother’s eyebrows that she was trying to keep that frown in place, and in the end, just as Rebecca guessed, it eventually caved. Instead it was replaced with a smirk that made Rebecca grin back, removing her gaze from her mother’s to look back at the snow-covered streets of New York outside her window. She could see her mother’s earrings glinting brightly in the reflection of the window, the dark blue of the jewel standing out starkly against the white sheet and for once Rebecca didn’t feel as though everything was about to go wrong.
When Rebecca felt fingers touch her ear she shivered, unable to stop grinning now that she knew her mother wasn’t mad with her any longer.
“I stole their Student IDs and put mine over them too, my picture I mean.” She admitted with an impish little whisper, finally looking over towards her mother with eyes alight with mischief.
Melissa still looked to be fighting with her face but Rebecca didn’t mind, she was just pleased that for what felt like months she and her mother was alone together.
Like it used to be before Dad had died.
“You know kid there isn’t much point in stealing a Student ID looking to get people in trouble when you’re only 13,” Rebecca felt the hand move from her ear to the back of her head. It started off as a slow brush but there was no denying the tension that flooded her body when fingers touched at the lump at the back of her skull, startling both of the into an uneasy silence.
It didn’t matter, Melissa broke the silence first. “Bec, how’d you do this babe?
Rebecca felt that familiar fear, the one that grabbed her by the tongue and pulled and pulled until it felt like she was going to swallow it whole.
But if there was one thing she knew it was that she was a lot better at faking her expressions than her mother was.
Not that it didn’t hurt to. “Fell I think, I can’t really remember.”
Her mother’s hands tightened on the steering wheel until it turned her fingers milky white. Rebecca swallowed and placed her head, finally removing it from its place at the window, on her mother’s arm, breathing in her scent and taking it all in: her perfume, the faint musk of cold that still clung to her coat, the shampoo she could still faintly smell…
It was enough to make her forget, just for a little while.
x-x-x-x
December 24th 2000
Rebecca opened her eyes and swallowed heavily at Doctor Fields, already feeling the itch of anger that often accompanied her as of late. It was better than fear, she reasoned with herself, better than flinching at every hand and voice that got raised towards her.
It was why it was easy to place the blame at the news.
“I’m sorry Rebecca, there was nothing we could do to stabilize your mother’s condition. She was too far gone and-“
“He did it!” She screamed at Fields and pointed to the slumped over man in the hospital room where she had not been allowed to go. There was a fury that she had not felt before and it made her want to yell until her throat grew hoarse and everything around her tore itself to pieces, so utterly moved by her pain.
“He did do it! He pushed her down the stairs! HE DID IT!” Rebecca still continued, her screams turning into an almighty roar that caused others around her to stare, including the cop that had sat by her in the ambulance and had held her hand.
The cop in question had also been looking over at Michael with suspicion that Rebecca knew had meant something, something special and when she had seen it she had been so sure that this would have meant change. Maybe they would arrest Michael like they had said they were going to if they next saw him near their house again, or something similar to that.
She would have taken all of those thoughts back if it meant her mother would just open her eyes one more time.
Michael stared at her bleary-eyed from behind his hands. Rebecca moved past the doctor that had tried to barricade her away from the room, ignoring the protests and groping hands of the cop and continued to walk on with fire on her tongue and in her mind.
It took her almost being in the room that caused Michael to stand, hands raised to curl into his ginger locks with his breathing heavy and desperate, near enough pleading.
“Bec I swear to you that it wasn’t me, I was just going to get my stuff from the house and I saw your mom and that was it. That was it!”
Rebecca closed her eyes and wished that winter had never come as fast and harsh as it had to deliver a sentence it had had no right to pass.
x-x-x-x
December 20th 2001
Rebecca didn’t answer to Rebecca any longer.
She had figured it out after going into care under Christie (some weirdly homely old white lady that talked too loud and kept shoving her into her bedroom when ‘visitors’ were over), had figured what would need to come next after everything. Everything being Michael’s trial, her only family being scattered and scattered across the world like jumbled up pieces of jigsaw puzzles and the uncertainty of whether each time there was a knock at the door she would stop flinching.
Figuring the next step hadn’t been easy and it had almost cost her the school she had been attending, but Rebecca didn’t mind that much – all of them had been assholes in the first place and even more so now that they realized she was in care. It had become a joke to them, her life, nothing more but something to laugh at.
But that had been Rebecca and now she was Claudia. Claudia Simpson who refused to take her mother’s last name, refused to let it shape her but still (to her own distaste) kept her mother’s earrings stashed in her pockets at all times. Claudia felt that they were mocking her at times whenever she slept in the same room as her other foster-sibling, her snores mixing with the faint whisper of silver on silver whenever Claudia moved in her sleep. It was a haunting melody and she wondered if she would ever tire of hearing it.
Christie had almost stolen them from her when she had been picking up dirty laundry in hers and her foster-sibling’s room, and of course Claudia hadn’t expected it. But the sight of an old, wrinkled hand in the back of her jean’s pocket had propelled her into action, had caused her to snatch it away and smooth her temper to the best of her ability. There was no use getting angry, it would only cause them to know that there was a weakness to exploit – and Claudia would never allow that to happen again, ever.
When she had got enough money from shoplifting and selling it online (Claudia never bothered to ask where her money from social was, she had a feeling Christie preferred it that way) she went to get her ears pierced again. It had taken a while but now, at the age of 15 and on the 20th of December, Claudia could finally figure out the next step.
The next step led directly to this: her mother’s earrings being the perfect fit to cause a warmth in Claudia’s stomach that made her hopeful for the first time in years.
x-x-x-x
December 25th 2002
“Where are you going?” Josephine, Claudia’s foster-sibling, asked her with tired eyes and an equally tired yawn. When Claudia didn’t answer her she looked over at the clock, blinked and gave her sibling a sly grin. “No wonder you’re sneaking downstairs, but I wouldn’t bother because I know Christie locked the presents in the spare room with that key of hers.”
Claudia snorted and continued tying her boots, eyes planted firmly on the ground to fight the urge to tell Josephine everything. It was hard but she knew that in reality Josephine just wouldn’t get it, or even worse, would try and stop her.
“Let me guess,” and still Josephine kept talking. Jesus Christ, she would have thought that the idiot would have taken the hint and just gone back to sleep. “You’re going to see a boy aren’t you? But at 1AM? Jeez Claudia, get some dignity.”
It would figure that everyone in this house (including Christie) felt that Claudia’s goal in life was to have sex with the nearest boy available at the time, but it had its advantages. It had after all given her more than enough time to sneak out during the night, prowling the city of New York and finding new friends, better ones than the ones before. Dangerous friends.
They had taught her the trade. In their suits, in their police uniforms – they showed her to the right people, were sometimes the people in the first place that Claudia needed and sometimes (but only sometimes) laughed and let her off free with the warning that one day she would outwit them all with how many shadows she managed to slip into. It was a strange compliment to receive, especially from folk people considered ‘law-abiding’, but Claudia knew scum when she saw it and had chosen to reap from their teaching before one day (and this day she knew would come soon) she would turn around and use it on them.
Then they would be sorry because stealing from criminals was a victimless crime after all.
Claudia had just finished pocketing the last of the cash she had stolen from that drug lord she had been running for during the past three weeks when Josephine spoke again, her voice panicked enough that it drew Claudia’s attention away her rucksack to stare up at her.
“Shit! That’s Christie’s ring! She’s been looking for that for months! Oh my god Claudia you have-!” She was silenced by Claudia’s hand covering her mouth, eyes widening in shock at the look of aggravation that was clear in her foster-sibling’s dark eyes. Claudia made a move of signalling with her finger over her lips to ask for silence and eventually (after making sure several times) moved her hand away, sighing after a moment or two of quiet.
“You want to wake the whole damn house up? Shut up and go back to sleep.” She said.
Josephine, ever as spineless as the day her and Claudia had met, did just that with her pale skin looking even paler in the moonlight that bathed her features. She still continued to watch Claudia as she picked up the last of her things, which was creepy at the least but Claudia didn’t care that much when all she wanted was to get out of here as soon as possible.
She was at the door when she heard Josephine again, her voice small and scared. “Is it because Christie sold your mom’s earrings?”
Claudia didn’t answer her but slammed the door shut of their bedroom. She reckoned that was an answer enough, more than Josephine deserved for not doing…something to stop Christie from ransacking their room in search for jewellery whilst Claudia had been in the shower. She should have done more, stopped and screamed and fought. But she hadn’t. And now there was nothing that Claudia had left of the woman called Melissa Saunders apart from some pictures on Google of her memorial garden.
Anyone could get those: so they didn’t matter, nothing to kick a fuss up about.
When Claudia finally left the apartment she made sure to kick over Christie’s ridiculous expensive flowerpots that adorned the area, huffing at herself for such pettiness but not caring enough that by the time she had managed to get outside with her coat, rucksack and money all she felt was a calm to the area that cleared her mind.
It was snowing still and the cold bit at her gloveless fingers with the harsh teeth of winter that made her shiver, wrapping her arm around herself whilst the other moved to signal a waiting taxi on the other side of the street. It looked like Lt O’Neil was a slimy as she had always expected him to be and had made sure she went along with the plan he had made her tell him, even including his own people no doubt.
When she got into the vehicle she recognized the younger man to be O’Neil’s partner in the precinct, some low-life thug that had managed to laud his way to where he was in the NYPD through stacks of dirty money and people willing to look the other way when asked. It was of course, disgusting, but it also allowed Claudia to know how to play the man and that was more important than how she felt on the matter.
“Where to Claudia?” He asked gruffly, sounding like he had been sleeping on the job.
“An airport,” she responded and smiled at the ‘no shit’ answer that came from her dog-tired companion. “And if you don’t tell your boss which one then you’ll get this,” she slipped him a 100 dollars and hoped against hope it would be enough, “and some more when we get there.”
Her eyes met his in the rear view mirror. She was right about him being tired with how red his eyes were, but she could also put that down to alcohol abuse while on the job, either way it didn’t stop her from seeing how his mind kept ticking back and forth. He was attempting to look as though he was thinking on the matter, but Claudia could tell differently by the way his breathing had grown short, a huge intake of breath, testing the waters.
“Oh and by the way, my name isn’t Claudia anymore, it’s…”
x-x-x-x
December 20th 2006
“And here we have Simone Ward, the one who made this all possible.” the announcer told the crowd of people whom Simone happily waved at when she stepped forward to collect her congratulations from them. She lapped their praise up, because she doubted the real Simone Ward would be receiving any when these ridiculous pen pushers realized that their money they had raised to help with infrastructure of a new bank would in fact only be going into one account. Hers.
All Simone needed to do was get to that account before the real one and then launder it. It’d be easy enough and after being away from New York for the past four years to con and lie in Los Angeles, it actually felt more like a break than usual. Los Angeles was full of idiots, but New York? Now that took the cake.
Even in wintertime, especially in wintertime.
God, she hated the winter.
That and her friends no longer were her friends, just as she had expected really. She didn’t think she would forgive if a 16 year old had managed to buy someone she thought she could trust into lying about her whereabouts for four years, but at the same time she hadn’t expected O’Neill somehow finding out her several different identities and sending people to track each one down until they had found her.
‘You have a debt to pay,’ they had said. And so Simone had come crawling back, tail between her legs and knowing very well that if she had to pay she would rather do it in cold hard cash rather than blood. It was a lot cleaner that way.
Later after they had congratulated her a million times (and she had shaken so many hands it felt like her arm was going to fall off) Simone slipped away from the party as quiet as a mouse. There was always something for Simone Ward to do, and that involved slipping her skin for a second to replace it with another: a wolf in sheep’s clothing with a piece of stolen tin on her hand.
Simone Ward had enemies and it wouldn’t be the first or the last time she would need to remember that.
x-x-x-x
December 20th 2010
“I want my money back Alicia!”
“And I said you’d get it, didn’t I?” She told Theodore for the fifth time this week, glad that the solid wood of the door was still between the both of them. She had just arrived back from a flight from Mumbai and sorely needed the rest, but it didn’t feel like anyone was going to give her that. Especially not Theodore, her sorta-not-really friend that came with Alicia Baldwin’s package when she had stolen her identity.
“You said that a month ago! Before you ‘mysteriously’ disappeared to go visit friends in Mumbai! Now where is it?” God, he would not shut up. Alicia was beginning to severely regret stealing this identity and befriending Theodore in the process when he was the kind of kid who’s ID she would have stolen way back when. “I’m serious Alicia!”
“Theodore,” she said sternly, smacking her whole weight against the door with a grunt. “Go the fuck away already! I’ve just got back from a trip and I want to sleep. You’ll get your money, alright? Just shut up and go away for a few hours.”
And when it looked like he was going to argue again Alicia stood on his foot, smirked as he howled in pain and slammed the door shut. Theodore’s cursing was barely distinguishable through the door but they amused and annoyed her nonetheless, the fucking idiot he was. He couldn’t take no for an answer, which probably explained why he had tried to ask her on a date a million times before. But he was harmless and Alicia liked it that way when it came to people in general: harmless and not a bother to her at all when it came to leaving them behind.
She had conned people ever since the age of 13 and it had only gotten easier in the process. It always did when it came to ruining the lives of people who deserved it, but sometimes it was just as easy to take the name of the dead and wear their skin for a while if only for safety purposes than anything else. It was safe and comforting and she saw no reason (apart from morality, but that had been skewered long ago) to give it up, no matter the nagging at the back of her head, that little whisper of doubt.
It always sounded like her mother, telling her off and asking her how she would feel if she was in the other person’s shoes. Hell, she didn’t know ma, but she never would have to find out would she? Nobody had ever outplayed her before and nobody ever would. She was good at what she did and kept moving, only coming back to New York once every few years until she got bored again and left. New Yorkers, so predictable and yet so hard not to enjoy the hunt when it came to them.
Every time she came back she visited Michael, still rotting away in that cell of his. Not for the charges that had gone against him before but repeated ones: drugs, another case of domestic violence and manslaughter due to his involvement with a certain gang, a small one, that went by the name of the Brotherhood. They were getting beaten down by the mob and this wiz called Elias so many times it was hard to count and each time Michael told her a different story about them, about how he only managed to get away by the skin of his teeth…
She just wished each and every bullet had hit him.
It had been ironic really, that this low-life piece of shit that she visited just to look into the eyes of the man that her mother had seen last before she died and ask and ask and ask the same question over and over again.
‘Why aren’t you dead yet?’
Killing criminals was a victimless crime too, Alicia thought knowing her heart wasn’t truly in it, but she hadn’t quite worked up the stomach for that just yet.
At least she was sure on one thing: having multiple identities meant no home and having no home meant not getting attached and not getting attached?
That meant she was capable of everything.
x-x-x-x
December 24th 2014
“Harper.”
She jumped and saw that her companion joining her tonight in watching a number was none other than Frankie Wells, the bounty hunter that she had grown so very fond of these past few weeks of working together after everything had gone belly up with Samaritan taking over the streets.
People like her and Frankie had had to lay low and in truth she was just grateful that she had been picked up by the Machine and the angst-ridden misfits that were Her agents and friends. She had grown close with all of them, bit by bit and whilst Lionel in particular was still wary of her, they had eventually accepted that if she was going to be around then they would just have to get used to her and quit complaining about it.
“What’s up Barbie?” She asked in greeting, not willing to go down the road of wondering any further on why her original partner had chosen to send Frankie instead of coming herself. There were many things Harper had expected from them, but being a coward didn’t seem like them at all and to be frank she was disappointed.
Frankie’s scoff pulled her out of her thoughts to notice that the blonde hunter had brought her one of the greasiest burgers and fries she had ever seen, and well, Harper had a feeling that maybe Frankie was in fact going to be her newest best friend after all. She was starving and sure it was 2AM and her stomach would no doubt hate her later, but this greasy ass burger was not worth turning down for one hot second.
Harper quickly snatched it from the other woman and went to town on the thing, groaning exaggeratedly around the delicious beef. “God, you’re definitely my favourite newest addition to the team.”
“Silva’s going to be disappointed.” Frankie humoured her which really should have set off alarm bells in Harper’s head, but she was too hungry to care about that and the fact that Frankie had just moved to place a jewellery box in front of her on the dash.
Whatever, food first.
She saw Frankie pull a face at her but Harper only grinned close-mouthed until she swallowed the last bit of food. “What? I’m hungry. Even Harper Rose gets hungry-“
“Yeah I’ve noticed you’ve kept that name for a while,” Frankie interrupted and Harper could tell that there was something underlying that sentence, something she didn’t particularly want to find out about but knew Frankie was going to tell her regardless of whether she wanted to listen. “Believe me, I’d know considering how many times I’ve seen your different names pop up. Always wondered why you kept this one.”
Harper shrugged and started on her fries, offering Frankie one as she talked. “Why not, I liked it and everyone knows me by it now. Might as well keep something constant about me.”
“Noticed that too.” Frankie chewed on the single fry with deliberate slowness, picking another away from Harper’s hand at the last moment to pop another it in her mouth. “Reese said you’ve been with them a while. Guess you’re becoming more constant in general.”
Harper hid back the sigh that threatened to spill from her lips. Yeah, she had noticed too, and it hadn’t made her feel any better about it either. It wasn’t exactly the greatest thing to be reminded of after all, the fact that the careful control you thought you had around something of your life was in fact starting to unravel now than all-seeing pain in the ass AI was trying to change the world and rid it of the outliers like herself. But she suspected it was more than that now, that the distance she had kept from people because they weren’t worth her time or worth her efforts of affection beyond physical attraction had started to close in on itself – all without warning.
Or rather there was only few that she considered trustworthy enough for that, having been flickering and fading through people and relationships since she was fourteen years old, trust wasn’t exactly an easy thing to breed. Though she supposed the first step was trying not to act like everyone else was out to get her, but even that was hard.
She sighed and ran a hand through her hair, throwing the last of her food into her mouth with a satisfying gulp. “Jeez, if someone had told me you were preparing to go into being a therapist I’d have asked for Silva to come take your place instead.” When Frankie scowled and narrowed her eyes scornfully in response Harper grinned, shrugging her shoulders and turning to look at the motel entrance where the number had gone for the night. The number was thought to be hiding from Samaritan and Harper was impressed at how quickly their prey had made the decision to go to the dingiest motel out without cameras or telephones nearby. It was clever and yet Finch didn’t trust it for one second.
Everything had been quiet however, like Samaritan had gone home for the night or had given up. But Harper and Frankie both knew that was a lie, especially in knowing that the other pair of Reese and Shaw were parked near the back exit of the motel, silently listening in.
Or they had been. Harper had cut them off a while back but knew that if she was needed then they would definitely let her know so they could get all this mess sorted, go home and get some sleep away from this fucking horrendous snow and chilly winds.
Eventually she caught sight of the jewellery box on the dash and eyed the oddly silent Frankie beside her with a smirk. “Didn’t I tell you I worked alone?”
“Yeah, yeah laugh it up and just open the box,” Frankie passed the box to her and shrugged. “It was left on Finch’s desk with your name on it when I was sent out.”
“Could have been a bit more romantic about it-“
“Would you shut the fuck up and open the damn thing?” Frankie interrupted, growing more and more annoyed at Harper’s growing smile. “I don’t even know what it is, alright? Just…”
Harper huffed with a feigned look of being irritated. “Okay Barbie, okay I believe you.” She opened the box and clicked her tongue, biting the inside of her cheek and blinked. Harper didn’t doubt that to Frankie it most likely looked as though she was having some strange overt reaction, but it was hardly that. It was everything to keep herself from yelling, and explained why when she turned to look at the blonde again she was met with Frankie staring at her, brow quirked in curiosity. “You think blue’s my colour?”
Frankie let out breath she hadn’t realized she had been holding in. “Not sure. Haven’t seen you wear them yet.”
There was a part of Harper that wanted to accuse rather than accept the gift that she had been so sure had been lost to her so long ago. It would be much easier to do that, she realized, than accept the familiar prized earrings that glittered even in the shadow of the night that surrounded them both. Accepting meant revealing a side of herself that she never wanted anyone to know, perhaps not even herself after so long, and yet here she was with earrings in hand and her heart thudding dangerously in her chest.
The crackle of her earpiece made her snap the box shut, throwing Frankie another smile that she didn’t feel and only widened when she heard Shaw and Reese’s familiar voices on the other end of her earpiece.
“Maybe next time, now come on, the babes need our help out back.” Harper told her, already opening her car door, heaving in a huge breath and allowing the winter cold bite at her cheeks until they were numb.
The jewellery box continued to burn in her pocket, defiant against the icy wind.