The Queen's Toaster, Chapter 1: The Nuremberg Partridge Cup

[solarbird]

Amélie Lacroix used to be the Widowmaker. She's not, anymore. Talon is gone, and the threat is over. But few if any governments are really willing to forgive a known terrorist with dozens - no, hundreds - of kills under her belt, so coming in from the cold wasn't really an option.

But one has to make a living somehow. A lot of the same skills used to infiltrate for assassination work just as well for other kinds of infiltration, and Amélie always did have an eye for spotting value in art.

I honestly have no idea where or even if this is going anywhere. But I have some ideas about what comes next. [ao3 link]

---

The Queen's Toaster
Chapter 1: The Nuremberg Partridge Cup

"I wouldn't touch that, luv. In fact... I just wouldn't move at all."

Amélie Lacroix froze in place at the woman's voice, quiet, yet so loud in contrast to the absolute silence of the rest of the museum. Merde, she thought, eyes darting left, right, up, at possible escape routes. How?!

"Smart girl. Now, hold on until I can... wait..."

She heard a subtle tone, then another.

"Ah, yeah, that's got it. We can talk properly now. For about three minutes, anyway - 'til the next heartbeat reset."

"Who are you?" the French thief demanded. "You are not security."

A laugh, above, and to her left.

"Got that right, luv. Same as you, I think. Just bad luck for me we happened to hit the same spot at the same time."

She heard a bit of a chuckle.

"Good luck for you, though."

"And why is that?"

"You'd activated the UV subsweep in the flooring. Reactivated the touch alert system, too, so the case is a problem, and also, another step and you'd have the filth all over us. What're you after?"

"Are you serious?"

"Two and a half minutes..."

"The Nuremberg Partridge Cup."

"Oh, good! I was afraid it'd be something difficult."

A woman all in black lowered herself halfway down from the ceiling, featureless in her ninja-like costume, except for a single loose tuft of ginger hair.

"I'm after - well, that doesn't matter, now, does it? Different target, similar areas. Manual shutdown on the Partridge case's touch system is easier with two - want to work together?"

"You... are also an art thief?"

"Of course."

"Assuming I believe you, why would..."

"Because we're all up in each others plans and have two minutes and counting. We've got different targets, so it seems obvious to me that we should. Best make a choice, though! Besides - it's not like I'm asking after your client, now, am I?"

Amélie nodded, realising the necessity of it. "I suppose not."

"Unless the job's for yourself, in which case, I'm actually very interested in your client. Not too many women in this line of work, you know. Particularly not at this level."

"...are you, as you say, chatting me up?"

The woman in black's smirk was not visible, but could be heard in her voice. "Well, you came here to steal a bird - why can't I steal one too?"

Ffff, Lacroix thought, as she went over the building plans, again, in her head. Nothing. She hadn't forgot anything. But clearly, somehow, she had. "What did I miss?"

"Conductive UV fibre weave in the tile backing. Just installed three days ago. Latest thing, very hush-hush. I'll tell you about it later."

The ginger dropped to the bamboo walkway section of the floor. "C'mon. There's two good ways to do this and I came the other way, working opposites, which means we've each done half of each other's work already. Shall we get this done early?"

Madness, thought the French woman. But... "We are, as you have noted, both here. Why not?"

The two women padded nearly silently through the four rooms of the Gilbert Collection, diverting or silencing remaining alarms and triggers as they went, extracting the Partridge from its display case, then making their way together to the emergency staff stairwells, and up.

"Hold on a mo, luv - got to grab what I came for. Back in a jiff."

"What?"

"Won't be a sec." She disappeared down what appeared to be a staff hallway, Amélie dismayed, watching furtively for any sort of guard or unexpected camera, still on edge from her near-failure earlier.

What could be in this section? Amélie wondered. Perhaps she...

"C'mon!" She heard, whispered, from behind, startling her, years of discipline keeping it silent. How did...?!

"You have your prize?"

The strange woman flashed Amélie an expensive but entirely modern cocktail shaker, then gestured upwards. "C'mon. My place. I'll make the drinks. Once I clean this out, anyway."

"...you came to steal... a cocktail shaker?"

"Absolutely. Harder lock to crack than the Partridge cabinet, too." She pointed casually up the stairs, with her thumb. "Come on. Let's go!"

-----

The robbery didn't headline the morning's news on the BBC - a bit of a shame, really; I thought we did quite well, Emily thought - as the two women made their way quietly into Emily's rather dumpy-looking Swindon flat.

"You live in Swindon," Amélie had said to Emily, hopping train to train west.

"Nothin' in Swindon attracts attention," Emily had replied, and Amélie had to admit she had a point.

"Don't touch anything," Emily said, in the present, touching nothing. "Ugh," she added, "I've got to dust this place. Not convincing if it don't look lived in, is it?"

"...no," Amélie agreed.

"This way, then."

Emily led her past the small kitchen and living area, past the small bath, and into the rear bedroom and into its tiny closet.

"Do not tell me," Amélie said, "that there is a secret door."

Emily grinned, and motioned beside her, inviting Amélie into the cramped space. Amélie shook her head, and squeezed herself in, as Emily closed the door behind her.

"Ratatouille, excuse yourself!" She made a tsk sound. "You ate all the garbage!"

Amélie heard a small click. The back wall of the closet popped back a centimetre, and a crack opened at one end, and Emily slid the wall away, revealing a large, almost industrial washroom, all stainless steel and smooth surfaces, with lockers along one wall. The two women stepped through, Emily touched a pad, and the wall slid shut behind them.

"Now you can touch things," Emily said, breathing a little sigh of relief. She walked over to one of the lockers, opened her bag, and placed the cocktail shaker she'd stolen inside. "Before you ask: this'll gently - trust me, gently - remove all biotraces and similar markers from anything I've stolen. You can use the next one over for your loot - or not use either, if you want, but I think you're smarter than that."

Amélie nodded, having seen similar devices in her short but successful career. "Number four?"

"Yep!"

The Frenchwoman placed her prize in the identical locker, and watched as Emily actuated the controls first on her own, then on Amélie's.

"Did you bring a change of clothes?" Emily asked.

"No - these are my, ah, getaway clothes. I had another change in my flyer, back in London."

"Mm. How long's that got before it gets noticed?"

"It will not. It will fly itself to a hidden destination if I am not back to it by 8am. A failsafe, in case I must change plans."

"Good job. Well. What you're wearing - washable?"

"Yes," replied the French woman, "though I would normally dispose of them. But they are washable, and reversible, in the event of pursuit."

"Two sets in one. Nice." Emily pulled the tightly-folded black ninja suit out of her pockets, and threw them into a washing machine. "Everything of mine's coloursafe. If yours are, too, toss 'em in later. Cycle time's only about 10 minutes, but it's thorough."

She hopped over to one of the two sinks and washed her hands and face, carefully. Colour contacts came out, and into a small container, where they dissolved, as did a pair of nose plugs. A layer of skin covering, under her gloves, got a similar treatment. Amélie blinked, watching the degree of change, fascinated.

"Y'can hop into the shower, if y'like - I'm gonna want one myself, in a bit. The contacts, y'can put right in here, and..."

"I..."

Amélie realised she'd let herself be whirlwinded into a situation, and the last time she'd allowed that to happen, it had not gone well. She'd had a getaway set up. She'd had a transport ready, on the east end. She should be headed across the Channel, now, but was instead in a strange apartment in the southwest of England, and she had no idea what was past the next door.

"I... what is this?! Who are you? You broke in to the Victoria and Albert museum to steal a common cocktail shaker..."

"A very expensive cocktail shaker from the executive sponsor suite, thank you! Nothin' common about it!"

"What is... all this?!" A trap? Is this a...?! "Who are you?!"

Emily giggled. "Hey, hey, relax, luv!" She grinned broadly. "It's just my apartment. I'm a pro, like you. Running into you was... well, a thing that happened. But you're gorgeous, I'm addicted to risk, and yeah, I'm on the pull now, and I was hoping to get lucky while we laid low a few days for things to cool off a bit. If I don't, I don't." She grinned broadly, holding up her hands, palms out. "And that's it."

No! The thief - and she is a thief, now, she reminded herself, and that is all - Talon is gone. Talon is gone. Talon is gone. Dismembered. Partly at her hands. Gone. All of it.

"I... am sorry, but... I have..." She laughed, once, quietly, forcing herself to calm. "I..." Gone. Completely. Gone.

"...why don't we get you some food," Emily suggested, hazarding a guess. "We can clean up later."

"Thank you," Amélie said, nodding. "That may help." It will give me a moment to think. The colourant over her blue skin should last another day, and the contacts, an entire week, if necessary. "Your... setup... is rather overwhelming. And I do not eat before," missions, "jobs."

"Smart. I don't either, and I'm ravenous." Emily grinned, and pointed with her head through the open doorway. "C'mon. Kitchen's through here. Get some food into you, and I'll explain. At least, my end of it."

The two women walked out, past a small pantry, Emily grabbing eggs and bread and jam as she walked. The kitchen, beyond, had comfortingly large windows, overlooking what passed for Swindon's city centre, and looked comfortably... conventional. Modern, and English, but all the more conventional for it. And almost comforting, in that way. Except...

"Your toaster has an inappropriate number of controls," the French thief said, frowning, as the English thief inserted two thick slices of bread and actuated three controls to toast.

"Should do, luv," she said, happily. "It's the Queen's! You'd expect a posh toaster from the Queen."

"It's still nonsense." The French thief shrugged, still rebalancing herself, still regaining her poise, but hiding it well. "I do not care how English you are, you did not have to buy the same kind as the Queen."

"Didn't buy it. Stole it."

Amélie Lacroix started to say one thing, then thought, realised the implication, and said another thing, instead. "You stole it..."

"From the Queen!"

"...of England." Amélie felt the situation spinning right back out of normality, just as it had settled down a bit in her head.

"Buckingham Palace kitchen. Not as valuable as the Crown Jewels, but almost as hard to pinch."

This day simply will not become less bizarre, she thought, unsettled again, already. "You stole the Queen's toaster," she said aloud, dumbfounded.

"Yep!" She smiled. "Teapot's from the PM's office. Thought it was worth the extra stop."

Lacroix looked around the kitchen of the much larger apartment. "Your microwave's buttons... are in Arabic."

"Icebox, too," she said, grinning. "Microwave's from the House of Saud. Icebox used to be Moira O'Deorain's - she's Minister of Genetics in Oasis. You have any idea how hard it is to sneak a refrigerator into carry-on?"

"I would say it is utterly impossible."

"You'd be wrong!" Emily chirped, pulling out sausage from the refrigerator and beans from a cabinet, and setting them both up to cook. "It isn't easy, but once it's in the system, they have to deal with it, even if they don't know how."

"...I cannot even imagine." What kind of madwoman is she?!

"Washer's in Chinese, if y'hadn't noticed."

"Let me guess - the Premier?"

"Summer house. Thought it'd be fun." She smiled. "Pretty much everything in here's been stolen from somewhere difficult. Even the doorstop."

Amélie looked over to the doorway into the living room, held open by...

"Do not tell me that is real."

Emily just grinned.

"From where?"

"United States Gold Depository, Fort Knox. Where else?"

"You broke in to Fort Knox to steal a gold bar to use... as a doorstop."

"Nobody ever thinks it's real. Why would they?"

"You broke into Fort Knox to steal a gold bar to use as a doorstop."

Emily just grinned. "Not really. I broke into Fort Knox to steal one particular Major's credentials, for hire. The gold bar was just - well. I wanted a souvenir."

"So you do steal for money."

"Of course! Have to pay the bills somehow. Like I said, I'm a pro."

The toaster dinged, and Emily popped the four slices of bread across two plates and added the beans, and sausage, quickly and automatically cooked.

"But I'm in it for the art. I like the dosh, but really, for me..."

She finished the plates with the jam, adding wedges of cheese, also pulled from the refrigerator, in a surprisingly pleasing arrangement.

"...it's the art."