Special Agent | ✓

Thirty-Three

a/n: another update alert

THIRTY-THR

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Chief Adina Tibble felt backed into a corner. It was an emotion she didn't quite like, and one she found she had no logical way out of. She would probably not even be able to find a proper logical way out of it, considering how frazzled her mind had become after Quinn had hung up.

You're worrying, Adina, and you know it.

She knew that worrying over someone who was, on paper, little more than her employee was stupid. Yet she worried, fretting until Quinn finally rang her. Her grip relaxed on the phone when she heard Quinn's tone, significantly more stable than it'd been before, ring through the phone.

"I'm sorry for hanging up. It was impulsive, and childish," Quinn started, tone apologetic, " — it's not something I'd usually do."

"I know, Quinn." Adina sighed, straightened up as she went out of the comfortable chair she'd been worrying in for the past hour, "It's not easy news. One would most likely need some time to handle it."

"Don't coddle me, Adina. You've never done that during our time working together, and you won't start now."

Quinn's tone turned firm. Adina stopped pacing, pausing to look out from the floor-to-ceiling windows of her apartment. London stretched out beyond, a cityscape of zigzagging lights and smoke wafting out of chimneys.

"Good to know," Tibble replied, a smile edging the corner of her lips. At least Quinn was alert enough to sound annoyed, " — you're not someone who needs coddling, either way."

Quinn laughed on the other end, "I'd rather be coddled than a mission file being printed, to be perfectly honest."

"We'll get you out of this, Quinn." Adina replied, eyes tracking the clouds.

A sigh came through the call, "Well, I blew off some bloody steam earlier, and now I think ... I think I'm ready to work the problem. More hands-on than before, in any case."

"Sounds swell. Just like the good, old times — working a mission like any other. We've done this a thousand times, Quinn."

"I know," Quinn replied, though the thought of them working a mission whose end goal was her six feet under couldn't help but surfacing.

"I'll see what I can do from here," started Adina, turning away from the windows, steps heading toward her home office, " — but first we'll need to narrow down exactly what they've planted on you. The definitive evidence."

"The file." Quinn said, tone empty.

"The file," echoed Adina, " — it contains the transactions you tracked in Venice, leading to your Knightsbridge HQ computer. It also shows you accessing a number of smaller mission files, intercepting their intel in order to leak shipment details, bank accounts, etcetera, to whoever pays the highest."

Pain lanced through Quinn, though she murmured something blandly, showing Adina she was still listening. A part of her felt as tattered as the shooting target she'd left behind at the range, though she'd never admit it to someone she adored as much as she did Chief Tibble. Adina was risking her neck, working the case with Quinn, and Quinn would be bloody damned if she somehow derailed that by being out of it.

You said you'd fight, Quinn. This is the first step.

"Since I didn't make the transactions," Quinn started, " — it's obvious they were re-routed through my mainframe, or someone hacked into it."