Retrieval

#######Author's Note#######

After surviving the attempt on her life, Ketna sneaks back into Xerxes' place to steal back the mask she left behind. No sex again, just more setup and plot elements, but you get to meet Xerxes' new pet cat.

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After her near-brush with death in the trap set for her, rumors began to surface that Ketna's hero persona, Zephyra, had died. She had not made any public appearance since that day due to still being in recovery, and with the decoy she had left behind, the buzz around the underground was that she was finally dead for good. Actions and plots became bolder to test this theory that she was no longer around, and her lack of interference only seemed to prove the rumors true. She could push herself but she had been alive far long enough to know that sometimes that did more harm than good for both herself, and others. The upside to this was that she had the element of surprise on her side when she was fit for duty once more.

It took over a month for Ketna to be in suitable functioning order after the failed attempt on her life. The after effects of the poison were still in her system, but they were slowly on their way out and her metabolism was just as slowly returning to its usual pace. After being forced into inactivity for so long, she was itching to get back out and get to work again, and she had the perfect small task to cut her teeth on before getting into real work, again: Retrieving the mask she had left at Xerxes' place the last night she was there.

Ketna didn't really care about the mask itself or what state it was in, she could make another, that wasn't the point. The point was that she didn't want Xerxes to have it, if he did. She had no idea if he was the type to even keep mementos or if he did, if he would want to keep it, but she had to check to make sure. A relatively simple task, break-in while she knew Xerxes was pre-occupied elsewhere, scour the place for the mask, and if she found it, take it back.

Encryptions and security had changed for his system from the last time Ketna had broken in, but Munin found a way in given enough time. Thousands of nanites running their own processes made for great brute force hacking. Xerxes had plenty of cameras scattered about his place on the off-chance of thieves and other nefarious activity, which made for the perfect pre-scouting tool. If the mask was sitting out in view of the camera, it would cut down her search time significantly. And luckily for her, that's exactly what she found. In his room on a desk, she found her mask placed on it. Knowing exactly where it was would make this quick and easy. But there was one hitch she wasn't expecting.

At first when she caught movement of a small furry animal, she thought maybe a stray cat had found its way in but upon taking a cursory glance at the layout she caught little changes here and there that indicated maybe the cat wasn't a stray. A scratching post here, a bed or two in high spaces, sunning ledges on windows and very obvious cat trees. While most of his place had remained largely the same in her down time, one of the rooms had been completely renovated into what looked like an assortment of hiding and climbing spaces, for a cat. Without a doubt, Xerxes had a pet cat now.

This new element, as strange as it was, put a wrench into her plans. Typically she'd only pause a few of the camera's feed of the cameras she would need to walk past, but with a roaming cat she would have to close off most of the cameras to avoid the inconsistency of it appearing in some views and not others. She would also have to ensure that any looped frame they grabbed did not have the cat visible in it. This required waiting till the cat had retreated to a hiding spot, and creating a loop in that time frame. Doable, just another detail she would have to watch out for. The other hitch was that while she did see the mask on camera the day she had pre-scouted, the day she arranged the cameras to lock into a 10 second loop, she could no longer see the mask where she found it before. She hoped at the very least, the mask was still in the room.

Getting into the penthouse itself was relatively easy. The balcony entrance had only changed slightly, but the lock remained a relatively simple one. The security had been taken care of so no alarm alerted the presence of her break-in. Though, no sooner had she stepped in through the balcony doors, she heard the distant jangle of a pet's tag. The cat in question peeked his head outside the hall from across the room and stretched with a big yawn, followed by an alerted meow.

"You must be the new cat, wasn't expecting to meet you so soon." Ketna announced to the cat's presence.

It mrowped and walked in swift steps to greet her.

The hall the cat had emerged from was where she needed to be and the two crossed paths quickly enough. Once in her shadow, the cat walked close alongside her. Distracted by the cheerfully friendly cat, the moment Ketna stopped to observe it, it moved in close to rub against her leg.

"Well, aren't you sweet." Ketna spoke in a sing-song tone at the cat aggressively rubbing itself up against her leg.

Xerxes wasn't going to be around for a while, she didn't feel the need to rush right at that moment, she could waste a few minutes with a cat. Kneeling down, she presented her hand to the cat, who sniffed at it then shoved it's whole head upon it. Ketna responded in kind, petting and scratching the cat on it's head and jaw.

Ketna caught a glimpse of the collar around his neck and the tag that jangled beneath it. She took hold of it to examine it and read the name printed on it.

"Huh. Capone." She spoke the name on the tag out-loud.

"Wait, I think I've seen you on the balcony before. Guess Xerxes took you in." The concept would have been sweet, had she not still been furious at Xerxes for corroborating on that death trap, amongst other things.

"As cute as you are, I'm afraid I can't stay with you forever; have work to get back to." She announced to the cat, who meowed in response to the statement, and then again in protest as she stood up and no longer was in petting range.

"Chatty kitty?" Ketna asked out-loud to no one in particular. "Figures he'd want something around to have a conversation with that he doesn't have to bother understanding." She muttered under her breath while making her way down the hall.

Capone made a sing-song meow and followed Ketna close behind her.

"You can follow me if you want, but I don't have anything for you." Ketna stated to her stalking shadow that would not understand any of what she said.

A meow answered her statement and little else was spoken between them on the way to Xerxes' room.

Ketna had never stepped foot in Xerxes room before this point, when she had visited it had only been in one of the spare rooms. Even with the light on, the room itself remained relatively dark in it's low lighting. This could have been alleviated by opening the window covers but she didn't want to risk being seen from out-side, even if they were high up. Idly she wondered if Xerxes had any difficulty with bright lighting, then dismissed the thought entirely, it wasn't something to dwell on.

Last she saw the mask in the room it was sitting on the corner of the desk, which made it her first target to search. It was sequestered in a separate compartment of the bedroom, like a small open study connected to the bedroom itself. The desk surface offered no hints, and one by one the drawers and compartments large enough to hold the half mask were inspected with no fruit born of the endeavor. This put her back to square one, she was going to have to systematically go through everything in the room in order to find it. First step, look on all the surfaces to ensure it is not hiding in plain sight. Then one by one, she sorted through the other remaining furniture in the study nook, and while she found a stashed shotgun and even a few grenades, there was no sight of what she was searching for.

With her one hint eliminated, she was forced to return to the rest of the bedroom. Ketna was grateful the room was relatively orderly, less chance of it being tangled in discarded clothes or bed sheets. She took careful inventory of the surfaces in the room and everything on it. Shelves, stands, dressers, tables, the bed itself, none of them had what she was looking for. In her sweep of the room, she caught sight of Capone that had settled himself on the corner of the bed.

"I don't suppose you know where it is?" Ketna wasn't expecting an answer from a cat, but talking out-loud was useful to problem solving where it might be.

Capone offered a melodious mrow that provided no assistance.

"Yeah.. me neither.." She sighed, wandering over to the next piece of furniture to look through.

The dresser was as good a place as any to look. Each drawer open did not provide her any answers, only clothes and a spare pistol, but at least they were cleaned and sorted so that it made the searching quick and easy. She moved on down the way, inspecting the small table nearby which held barely anything, then the tiered shelf next to it, taking glances at the floor on the off chance it had fallen anywhere.

In the middle of her search Ketna caught Capone's head turning toward the door, his tail flick slightly, but his focus returned back to her with a comfortable yawn and slow blink. Ketna relaxed and returned to her task.

The shelving did not have her mask hiding behind anything and no container on it was large enough to hold it. Moving to the closet, she was presented with far more surface area to scour through. As expected of a master bedroom in a penthouse suite, the closet was an exceptionally large walk-in closet. This meant much more surface space to go through. Every drawer was pulled out, every cabinet and door available were opened and still her mask was nowhere to be found.

Walking out of the closet she sighed and scanned the room again, mentally crossing another location off her list. She spotted Capone still settled on the bed and spoke out loud for her own benefit.

"No luck?"

This time Capone didn't meow, but he provided a slow blink in response.

Ketna likewise didn't respond verbally either, sighing she moved off to the bathroom on the off-chance it ended up there. Large and with far less in the way of nooks and crannies, it was a faster search than the rest of the room she had sorted through thus-far. Each place she crossed off her mental list left her feeling far more hopeless than she had before.

Back in the main area of the bedroom she was down to searching through the odd places and nooks built into the walls of the room itself. Even getting down on the floor and checking under the furniture just in case it had made its way there and nothing turned up.

All the while she sorted through the room there was something odd about it that nagged at her. It did not feel lived-in. He had been in here, he had used it, but all the furnishings and items that dotted the room looked more like something like a display room from a model house than it did someone's home. The most personal thing about the room that held any indication it belonged to him, were the weapons she found stashed about. Setting aside the notion of how lonely it felt, she was more concerned that this was potentially a sign that the mask might not even be in his home at all, anymore. But there was still more room to cover before she could call this a wash.

Capone's head twisted in a direction out the door just as Ketna caught the sound that he had- Movement from the floor below them of someone approaching.

Shit

Either he noticed something was amiss at his place or he only returned early by happenstance. Whatever the reason, her time was up and she needed to leave. Capone made joyful mrows when he hopped off the bed, walking toward the entrance of the bedroom which only served as a warning for Ketna.

Ketna scanned the room, desperate enough to risk checking one more thing before Xerxes arrived. Catching a glimpse of the bed stands again, she was struck with the knowledge that they had barely noticeable drawers indented into them and in all her search she had not checked them. In a final last-ditch effort to find her property, she dove over to the bed to find the mask before she had to bail. The first stand offered nothing she needed but the second, her gamble paid off. Sliding open the top drawer, there her mask was stashed, a portion of it appeared bent like it had been held a bit too tightly, but it was all in one piece.

Objective in hand, she made a dash for the window wrenching it open hoping through it and leaping over the bedroom's balcony only a mere minute before Xerxes' footsteps reached the door. She heard distant sounds of Capone and Xerxes' voice asking "Th'fuck happened, here?" to his cat, followed by the sound of tossed objects and furniture that faded the further down the building she slid.

Eventually he would figure out what was taken, she expected he would. But he didn't have possession of it any more and he didn't see her and that was all that mattered.