Episode 54

(March 14, 2002)

[Author’s Note: We've returned to Rin's encounter with Karkov, right after the events of episode 52.]

It hurt Rin that Karkov, of all people, would treat her with such cold reserve. Just because they were estranged didn’t mean they were strangers. And just because she was there to bind him in eternal torment didn’t mean he shouldn’t be happy to see her. The feeling was fleeting, of course. Sometimes Rin forgot she was unrecognizable.

“Rin, I presume,” he repeated without any sign of annoyance.

She nodded.

A volley of gunfire erupted, and Rin gave Karkov a disdainful look.

He just shrugged. “You don’t look like my wife.”

For a moment Rin had a bemused expression, but it quickly turned to annoyance. Of course he wouldn’t recognize her. He only knew her by one name; the rest was hearsay. She had no idea why this mattered, but apparently it did. The quirks of Rin’s unrecognizability still occasionally eluded her.

She impatiently recited her old name.

“That’s better,” Karkov announced, looking her over.

Had he really been unfazed by the sudden change? Well he did expect it, she supposed. But it had been a long time, and maybe he didn’t remember what she looked like. Was he just pretending? Perhaps she still was a stranger to him. Something about the idea saddened Rin.

Suddenly, she looked at him. “Your wife? You gave up the right to use either of those words a long time ago.”

Karkov appeared to be formulating a reply, but she didn’t give him a chance. “And how would shooting me prove anything?”

He grinned. “I know you can’t be killed. It just felt good shooting you.” Rin recalled where she’d heard that before and couldn’t suppress a smile. Daryl’s words had been ever-so-slightly different, but she liked them better. They had sounded unrehearsed.

Her smile quickly became a frown. “What if I had been some innocent woman?”

Karkov smiled. “You, my dear, are far from innocent. Besides, you’ve done much worse.”

Rin was about to object, when he laughed. “Maybe this is the sort of thing which works on that assistant of yours, but I know you too well.”

“You ruined my shirt,” she fumed.

“You look more beautiful in your natural state.”

“You didn’t even know what I looked like,” Rin pouted.

“And whose fault is that? I do know that you look very beautiful.” The compliment felt genuine and, despite herself, she could not help but blush for a moment. It was a short moment.

“Do you also know that gunfire draws attention? Now we’ll have company, idiot. Or maybe that was the intention.”

Karkov placed his hat on the table with an air of deliberation. “The hired help won’t bother us.”

“And Daryl?”

“He won’t bother us either.”

Karkov’s face was inscrutable, but before Rin could demand more he saw her crown and clapped his hands in delight.

“I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist.”

Rin regarded him with pique. “And all that bowing and groveling? Was that supposed to diminish me in some way?”

Karkov seemed surprised. “Quite the opposite! Did you like that? Though I don’t remember ordering them to grovel. You must have imagined what you’d like them to do.”

Rin rolled her eyes.

“I told them to keep an eye out for a regal looking young woman,” Karkov cajoled.

“Enough of your shenanigans.” Rin drew out the note, once again trembling with fury, and dropped it on the table. “What. Is. This.”

Karkov glanced at it indifferently. “Why it looks like a letter.” He made a point of putting on his glasses. They didn’t even have lenses, and Rin rolled her eyes again. Once he had completed the pantomime, he made a show of reading the note very carefully. Finally, he looked up. “Why, I think it may be Darrouil’s and …” He covered his mouth and gasped. “Oh my, is that … blood?”

Rin snatched the sheet back in exasperation, and Karkov tossed his glasses on the table. “Your plan was too obvious. This was my way of telling you your plan was too obvious.” He leaned back and fanned himself with his hat. “I’ve been following your career for quite some time. Your plans always are too obvious. You really should try harder.”

Studying Rin, Karkov sighed.

“I forced him to write it. Then I killed him.”

“Why?” Rin growled. “Why would you need to force anything? I was looking for you, and you obviously wanted to find me. Heaven knows why. Why all this malarkey?”

Karkov tilted his head slightly and grinned. “Sometimes a little malarkey is nice. Eternity can be so … monotonous at times.”

Rin returned his smile. “Don’t worry, I’m here to fix that.”

“No doubt. Whatever you have in store won’t work, though. I’d like to spare you the disappointment, so please be forewarned: I’m going to leave here unharmed.”

Rin’s laugh misfired, sounding more congested than cruel. “That’s very thoughtful of you. Well, half of being right is thinking you are. Unfortunately, it’s not the half which matters.”

When this evoked no response, she looked at the man. “You’re serious. What do you imagine will happen? That I’ll be drawn into a tediously prolonged game of verbal chess, giving you time to effect some miraculous escape?”

Karkov smirked and shrugged. “Isn’t that what marriage is, minus the escape? Now that we’ve been brought together, I look forward to many tediously prolonged games of verbal chess.”

Rin turned red. “Brought together? You lured me here with a bloodstained note.”

“What more fetching way to fetch you? And let us not forget that you invaded my little country with the intent of destroying me. But, much as I’d love to casually pretend to have killed Darrouil on a whim, I cannot in good conscience do so.”

“Good conscience?” Rin fumed, her voice edging upward in pitch and volume. “When did you have any sort of conscience? You and conscience don’t belong in the same sentence.”

Ignoring her outburst, Karkov explained. “Boredom isn’t why I did it.”

Rin groaned. Why couldn’t he just answer a single question without all the nonsense. Had he always been this infuriating?

“Then why?” she demanded.

“Does a husband now need a reason to kill his wife’s lover?”

Rin gave him a contemptuous glare. “Was it really something so petty?”

“No.”

“How many times am I going to have to ask the same damned question?” she growled. “Why?”

Karkov’s face lit up. “For what reason does any man do anything?”

Rin closed her eyes. “Please don’t say lo —”

“Love,” he blurted out, smiling sweetly. Rin wanted to smack that smug face.

“Ah yes, love. Same reason you stuck me in a hole in the ground, I suppose. For TWO FUCKING centuries.”

“Well, it wasn’t my fault that someone dug you up so soon.”

Rin barely could contain herself, and he smirked. “I see you never managed a protection against your temper. Think how many lives that would have saved.”

“Where’s the body?” Rin demanded.

“Body?”

“Don’t play the fool. Daryl’s body.”

“You do know his name was Darrouil, not Daryl,” Karkov pointed out, adroitly leaping out of his chair as Rin flung the crown at him.

“Now, that hurts,” he sulked, picking up the bent tiara. “It’s the original, you know.”

“I don’t care.” A brief flicker of uncertainty crossed Rin’s face before she caught herself. “Moron. You buried the original with me. Remember?”

“How could I forget?”

Rin put her head in her hands. “You forgot.”

Karkov scratched his head apologetically. “Yep. I’m afraid so.”

“I melted it down, when I was freed.”

“Was it that bad, being queen?” Karkov suddenly sounded sad.

“It reminded me of you.”

Karkov put his hands to his cheeks. “Aww … that’s so sweet.”

“And now I’m here to melt the real thing.”

“Crown? I thought you just said …”

“You.”

Karkov thought for a second. “That doesn’t even make sense. How would you melt a person? Try again. Crown, reminded …”

“Fuck you.”

“No foreplay? I thought after all this time you wouldn’t want to rush it.”

“It won’t work, you know.” Rin had a sardonic expression.

“That’s what I’m trying to tell you.”

“All these boyish tricks. They worked once. You can get me as mad as you want, but it won’t help.”

Karkov smiled indulgently. “You like my boyish tricks. They’re part of my boyish charm.”

“Speaking of charms,” Rin removed a small sphere from her pocket. “We both know there’s nothing you can do to me. But I can do this to you.”

“Throw a ball at me? I already have one, thanks. Two, actually. And we both know there’s plenty of things I can do to you. You used to come up with cute names for some of them. I’ll bet many still don’t have names.”

“Try the internet. I’ll ask you again, where is the body?” For the first time in ages, Rin felt the special flavor of impatience which only Karkov managed to elicit. Her question had a menacing quality.

He shrugged and looked at the sphere. “I guess that thing’s supposed to scare me — so, sure, let’s go with that. There is no body. I had it removed before you got here. By now, it has been destroyed.”

Rin made a mental note to return and kill each and every one of those bowing buffoons in the Palace. No, in the whole damned country. If her last visit had brought the place into the twenty-first century, this one would set it back to the sixteenth. She’d introduce them to some of the old, old ways.

She stopped herself and returned her attention to the conversation. Something didn’t sound right.

“Why would you do that?” she asked.

“Because it would decay and start smelling. That’s what humans do after you kill them.”

“Why not use him to bargain with me?”

“I didn’t want to bargain. The last time I bargained with you, neither of us liked what we ended up with.”

Rin shook her head slowly. She couldn’t argue with that. But Karkov’s intent was obvious, and she would not let him get to her. There was no more dangerous animal than an ex, no better torturer. And he certainly hadn’t slackened in this regard. Rin focused. Get info, encumber Karkov, kill everyone. It was simple enough. Maybe while she was killing everyone, she’d find and fuck a new Daryl.

“Was it quick?” Rin turned away, unsure she could tolerate the smugness her question surely would elicit.

“No.” Karkov did not elaborate. For some reason, this made Rin sad but not angry. Ultimately, there was no difference. Dead meat was dead meat.

“My turn.” Karkov suddenly was serious.

“Yes, it is.” There was a cruelty in Rin’s words, but it felt practiced. Something bothered her about this conversation. Karkov lay stretched out in his chair, like a man without a care in the world. Even if he doubted her ability to harm him, he couldn’t be sure. Such audacity was unlike the man her sources had described, cautious and calculating. It was more like the old Karkov, the one she actually knew. In fact, all this drama was like the old Karkov too.

Was she wrong about who he had become, or was he just pretending to be reckless? Was the new Karkov a fiction? Or perhaps she brought out his old self. Even after all these years, her own feelings had returned en force the moment she laid eyes on him. They were very different feelings than she used to have, but just as strong. It was possible the same had happened to him. He didn’t love her; she knew that much. No man in love could have done such a thing. But love wasn’t the only emotion, and nostalgia had a will of its own. Her presence could evoke other feelings, possibly even revive his youthful rashness.

But even that Karkov was no fool. He wouldn’t just sit there and allow her to destroy him. Even if he wanted to die, he certainly didn’t want eternal agony. The very fact they were in a room together was inexplicable, but Rin decided to look past that. She was allowing one question to crowd out all the others, but those others were important. Whatever Karkov’s reason for allowing her to find him, he wouldn’t be so confident without cause. That had to be it.

Rin rose abruptly from her seat. “Well, since Daryl’s dead and we’re both here, there’s no point dilly-dallying. If you have any final words, I’ll hear them now.”

This had no effect on Karkov, and his smile did not waver. “You’re not going to do that.”

“It’s apparent you think that. And why wouldn’t I?” Rin demanded.

“Because we both know I was lying.”

“You’re always lying,” Rin observed.

Karkov sat up, and assumed an exaggerated expression of hurt. “Well … not always. But you know what I mean.”

“No, I really don’t. And frankly, I don’t care.” She wanted to hear him say it. Rin began to stride toward him purposefully. This got his attention.

“It’s about Darrouil,” Karkov quickly explained.

“What do I care about some dead meat?” Rin scoffed.

“I think you’ll care about this,” Karkov continued. “He’s alive.”

Rin sighed. Why did everything have to involve so much drama? Now it was her turn for some.