A Face in the Crowd

The beat was heavy, filling the lungs with dull reverberation. Even far below, she could feel the echoes of it, the sounds causing the musty pools of green-tinted water to shiver with gentle rings. It was dark here, thick with decay so old that the mossy film covering the black tunnel walls had long ago fossilized, now a murky grey beneath the newer slick of green.

A thin crackle of noise scratched in her ear as someone tried to use the radio. With a hiss, she crept along the tunnel, her only light coming from the occasional ventilation shafts that emptied into an overcast night sky, dully reflecting the glow of the city. Not that she needed much light. Not anymore.

The scuff of boots just ahead made her pause, until the other's face became clear.

"I've told you, the radios don't work down here," the woman growled, her lowered voice sounding harsh in the shallow echo of the tunnel, soon drowned out by the next song's beats in the concert hall far above them.

"Shut up, Charlie. I just bumped it," a man's voice replied just as quietly, and sounding even more annoyed. "This place gives me the creeps. Don't like the set up, Charlie. Not one bit. What d'ya say we just skip this gig, huh? Head somewhere warm for awhile. Somewhere with a beach. Pick up some chicks."

For a very brief moment, Charlie could glimpse a flash of white as the man smiled. She started to return the expression, but a long drum riff faintly heard from above halted her amusement. The sound waves, muffled by stone, sounded vaguely like the report of an automatic weapon.

"After this job," she answered, her voice somber and barely audible. By force of habit, she checked the rifle on her back, knowing already that both that and the pistol at her hip were in perfect condition and ready to use. She checked her watch, its illumination a sudden brilliant point of light in the tunnel's gloom. "It's time," she murmured, the last sound muffled as she pulled up the bottom of her black ski-mask to cover the rest of her face. She swung the rifle from her back, holding it in her arms with an air of familiarity. "Matt," the woman began, but she was unable to continue. Her blue-eyed gaze was unreadable, framed as it was by the black matte of the mask. She held a gloved hand out to him.

Matt laughed and clasped Charlie's hand tightly. "If both of us do not survive, no one here gets out alive," he finished for her, the phrase carrying an oddly traditional ring. The man then pulled a ski mask over his own head, his face suddenly looking almost identical to hers.

With a nod, Charlie turned, moving quickly down the tunnel. Matt's footfalls disappeared behind her.

A cold feeling of unease crawled down the woman's back as she stalked silently back the way she had come. This job did not please her one bit, but there was no way she was going to share that with her little brother. It really was the last job planned. Not just for now, but forever. She hoped Matt would take it well. To him, this was just a way of life. It was all either of them had ever known.

She could hear water dripping somewhere down one of the nearby branches of tunneling. The smell of decomposition was stronger in some of these. The architects of this building had meant well when they put their burrows down here to make all behind-the-scenes machinations invisible to their patrons, but as working conditions declined, so did the use of the tunnels. Now, they were little more than myth to most and were not even shown on the newer copies of the concert hall's blueprints. Charlie's copy was a little better than that.

A door appeared in the gloom to Charlie's right. She shined a small pen light on the hinges, only recently oiled during her excursion the night before. With one last look at her watch, she began to ease open the door with a minimum scratch of noise that dissolved into the black.

There were many things that bothered her on this job. The lack of communication with Matt was second only to the number of people seated above them in the concert hall, enjoying the city's recent attempts at more eclectic music to bring the people back to this rotting building. If everything went as planned, not a single person above would ever know she and Matt were there. But the best laid plans are only plans.

Slowly, Charlie closed the door behind her and stared forward into utter darkness. She slid her goggles into place, shined the infrared ahead of her and began to move, experience helping her interpret the two-dimensional shades of green. After only a few footsteps, the stairs began climbing steeply up, up, up towards the inner walls of the archaic building, towards the cleaner air, and towards that taste of freedom which was now so close after all this time. The beach, she reminded herself silently. Remember the beach. It was something happy. Something beyond.

* * *

Kovách Henrik sat comfortably in the plush seat, his arm around the slender shoulders of his most recent acquaintance. The music tonight wasn't great, but it was live, and the younger population had come out in force. He had been sure to get his public name attached to this effort early on, supplying just enough cash to appear generous and to keep the committee from asking for more.

The woman sitting beside him held his arm lightly, her ivory skin white against the dark blue velvet of his sleeve. She faced forward, captivated by the local two-bit band on stage as if it were a world class symphony orchestra. Of course, the little something Henrik had slipped into her drink beforehand probably aided her fascination somewhat. Women could be so wonderfully pliable with the right ingredients, the man mused, watching her for a moment before turning his attention back to the concert.

The view from their box was quite excellent. The concert hall would be glorious if they could find the money to restore it. From that vantage point, Henrik could easily spot some of the city's up-and-coming faces in the crowd below. They were not competition yet. Some might even make decent business prospects. But all in good time.

At the entrances to the main floor, a few of Henrik's closer companions watched the doors, speaking quietly to the others spaced throughout the hall and on the street outside. Not that Henrik was worried. He just wanted to make his presence felt. Budapest was going to be his town. He could feel it. He had planned it. It was within his grasp.

Riding high on his own feelings of success and worth, he asked the young woman to fetch a glass of wine. She complied without a word, ducking soundlessly out the curtain at the back of the box.

Henrik took advantage of the woman's absence to check in with his foreman, who reported an all clear from the box directly across from him. He nodded across the way to the other man and settled back in his chair, hands folded behind his head as he waited for his wine. Nothing to do but enjoy the show and wait for its end, when the departing audience would be carefully combed by his people outside, offering a variety of chemical delights.

* * *

Charlie eased her way out of the stairwell through the old service hatch, built when nutrition was a foreign concept and the human body was smaller. It was a tight fit. After only twenty meters, she came to the walkway opposite the mark's box seats. Easing out only far enough to set up her rifle, she settled down to wait.

* * *

Despite his earlier misgivings, Matt was feeling pretty good right now. He always did once they finally got to work. Charlie's map of the tunneling had been flawless so far; it was only a matter of minutes before he reached the branch that wandered off under the smaller of the two changing rooms, unused until the asbestos removal was complete. In less than a minute, he shed his mask, gloves and sweatshirt and quickly donned the black jacket and white gloves of one of the servers working for tonight's catering service. A quick look in the mirror, a comb-through with his hands, and Matt stashed his gear in one of the lockers before hooking a tarnished padlock through the slot. It was newer than it looked, and once everything was in place, it simply looked like one of the other half dozen abandoned cubbyholes.

He eased open the door to the greenroom, as deserted as the rest of this section of basement. Silently, he left for the hallway door to his left while the concert pulsated through the heavy stage door just to his right. The stage held no interest for Matt tonight.

With a mental reminder to stand up straight, he ducked out into the hallway, leaving the greenroom door ajar just enough to keep it from locking. Another thirty seconds brought him out into the bustling foyer, busy with mingling 20-somethings and younger. Beer was the predominant odor wafting along the gilded ceiling.

A chirp in his ear, then Charlie's voice, barely audible over the surrounding noise. "Brown over Oriental, blushing bride."

Brown hair, long and braided, red dress. Matt snorted lightly as he glanced over the crowd. Lots of red dresses. But braids were long out of fashion in this corner of the earth. The dazed looking woman at the wine vendor was a good guess. He tugged his gloves just a little tighter and claimed one of the trays used to collect the spent glasses or mugs. As the red dress started towards the stairs for the box seats, Matt followed at a disinterested distance.

* * *

"Your wine, Henrik," the woman purred into the black curly hair, slick with gel. She reached around his shoulder to offer the elegant little glass of a delightfully sparkling blush and placed a soft kiss on his temple.

Henrik returned this gesture with a smile and waved the woman to her seat without a word. He turned his gaze back on a blonde in the second row. His foreman already had orders to intercept the new interest once the concert was over.

The man's indifference seemed to annoy his box seat partner, who sat staring at Henrik with a poor pretence of the drugged look he expected. But Henrik was paying no attention in any case. He raised the glass to his lips, eyes still focused on the blonde. A beat of music. Another. The man frowned slightly and rubbed at his forehead then threw back a bit more wine.

The woman at his side began to smile slowly, her brown eyes shining like worn cobblestone after a storm. "You shouldn't have messed with my brother," she said derisively in her native Hungarian, leaning in as if for a kiss.

Henrik's face was growing mottled, darkening as blood rushed to his head. He clutched at his neck and stared at the woman, the surprise even more evident in his expression than the contempt was in hers.

Movement in the corner of her eye as the man's foreman rushed out into the hallway. A sound from the curtain. It was time to go. She dipped into Henrik's coat pocket and lifted his wallet with a wink. When she slipped out of the theatre box, there was no one in sight but one of the caterers, carrying a full tray of discarded glasses. She left in the opposite direction with her own best laid plans.

* * *

The droning beats of music were grating on Charlie's nerves. It actually sounded better from the tunnels. She shifted irritably while watching the box across the way through the rifle sight.

Suddenly still, movement through the scope. The red dress returned, whispered something, handed the mark his drink. Watchful for Matt, Charlie gripped the rifle, two pounds of pressure on the trigger.

Something was going on. The mark seemed to be choking. Red dress whispered again, leaned in for a kiss? No, she was smiling, lifted the man's wallet. Charlie just caught Matt's face through the slit in the box's curtain. He was looking at Charlie, not the mark. It was time to go.

Fighting the icy sliver of panic worming through her stomach, Charlie slowly pulled back, out of sight of the music hall. Twenty meters back to the stairs, goggles back in place, she ghosted her way back to the tunnels as quietly as she could, the walls blurring past in washes of green as the infrared flashlight's beam bounced ahead of her.

The music was still playing. Perhaps there was enough time.

* * *

Matt followed the red dress up the stairs. He peeked into the first box and quietly cleared the empty glasses before ducking back out into the hallway. The red dress was standing outside their mark's box, paying him no mind. She set the glass on the small inset shelf next to one of the hall's better lamps and slid a pair of opera gloves onto her hands. Carefully, the dark-haired woman wiped the glass clean with a white cloth, then pulled a tiny vial from her thick braid of hair.

As the woman glanced his way, Matt slipped into the next box just enough to be out of sight. He claimed another empty glass and backed out into the hallway. The red dress was gone. He glanced quickly up and down the narrow hallway, but there was no one in sight. Just as he reached the mark's box, he heard the woman's voice purr something in Hungarian, peeked in long enough to see the effects of the woman's vial, then glanced up towards Charlie. He knew his sister was watching, so he let the curtain fall closed and began walking back the way he had come, depositing the tray in its proper place on his way back to the greenroom.

Minutes later, he was back in the tunnels, leaving no trace behind. Taking no chances this time, he slipped into his own infrared goggles and sped along to rendezvous with Charlie, taking care to not to splash through the stagnant puddles.

* * *

A variety of oaths crossed Charlie's lips as she clambered down the narrow stairs. She was panicking, and she knew it, her heart beating a tarantella against her ribs as she tried not to slip or let the rifle bump against the grimy wall.

Finally, she reached the bottom of the stairs and tried to calm herself as she listened at the door. All she could hear was her breathing and the blood pounding through her ears. Very slowly, she forced herself to calm down. She had seen Matt slip away. He would meet her. Things were not ruined, as long as Kovách was dead. Even better if they didn't have to do it themselves. The beach, Charlie. The beach.

She heard footsteps in the tunnel outside the door. They neared and came to a stop. Still, she waited. Finally, a crackle of noise in her ear as she eased the door open.

"Don't yell at me this time, Charlie, it was on purpose," came her brother's voice. His goggled face bloomed in her vision as she shined her light towards him. His mask was pulled down to his chin and he was smiling. Always a good sign. "Let's get the hell outta here."

Charlie didn't need to voice her agreement as they turned down the tunnel and jogged quietly toward the access hatch in the distance. The thumping music abruptly ended, and without a word, the brother and sister picked up their pace, eventually putting away their infrared gear as the natural light increased.

An ancient exit sign reflected the city's glow through the crazed stain glass, but Matt and Charlie did not take that door. A few meters farther brought them to a steel grate in the ceiling that lifted away easily. First Charlie climbed up with a hand from her brother. She lifted up the gear and pulled Matt up. The grate was slipped soundlessly into place, and just as silently, the brother and sister melted into the shadows.

When they reappeared among the locals of Budapest, they looked like an average pair of tourists about to hit the road again. In less than an hour, they would be on a plane making its arcing way over the Atlantic to one of many available tropical beaches. The only marks in sight would be those on the tab at the bar.