Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
I will show you fear in a handful of dust
===
No one had expected the barge to explode.
Fire rescue, paramedics, and police officers were already on the scene when the news vans arrived, and the flurry of reporters was thick enough that Katarina - milling just inside crime scene tape in civilian garb, badge hanging off her coat - was absolutely disgusted. The exploitation of humanity like it was some sort of entertainment commoditity. Your syndicated repeat of Jeeves and Wooster over? Do have some sensationalized news on the loss of human -
"V!"
The voice and, more than that, the name stopped Katarina's mind in the midst of an internal rant, and she turned away from the scene of rising black smoke and smoldering red and orange wood (plus the floating debris, bobbing across the tiny waves in the river's current) to see that reporter rushing towards the scene. Alan something-or-other, she'd stopped keeping track. The one she'd been told, several times, was no longer a member of Minako's life. The one Minako had last seen six months earlier, the one whose so-called "exposé" of local London love-agent (Minako always called it "Agent of love and justice" but apparently, alliteration sold papers) left the city in palpitations, twitterpations, and other foolish words ending in -ations for three weeks after it's publication.
Katarina had hoped to have seen the last of him, but there he was, standing at the edge of the tape and staring out into the wreckage.
She realized after a few, long moments that she was staring at him, and just as she moved to look away at the rest of the rubber-neckers with their notepads, she caught his eyes. There was something dark in them, something almost... Dark. Vile. She couldn't call it saddness or fear, but rather, possession. The need to grasp that which was missing. A shadowed emotion that, even after years as an Interpol officer, she could not adequately describe.
Her cell phone, enormous and station-issued, rung in her pocket and she groped for it, answering it with clumsy fingers. "Burke," she greeted quickly.
"Don't show any surprise that it's me."
Minako's voice was rushed and quiet, and Katarina's heart leapt into her throat. She pulled her face away from Alan's direction and started pacing slowly, just within the scene tape. "Where are you?"
"Six blocks over. I'm fine. A little dirty, but that's why there are showers." Cheeky, as always.
"Did anyone - "
"Know? Only you." She paused for a moment. "Who else would know the inner evil-thwarting plans of Sailor V?"
Katarina glanced back over her shoulder at Alan, still staring into the wreckage.
"Who indeed," she murmured, "but me?"
