Chapter Text
“Target spotted. I’m going in.”
Yaz opened the car door and stepped out into the sunshine, pulling her cap down. She walked through the glass doors into Aldi and skulked by the lunch section, pretending to pick up an egg and cress sandwich and some Monster Munch. She kept her eye on the middle aisle and waited for the target to move into eyeline, her baseball cap making her quite obvious amongst the other Tuesday night shoppers.
Once she was spotted, Yaz quickly made her way over the aisle and made to drop the bug into her bag as she walked past, but suddenly the target turned and started walking in the opposite direction without warning. Yaz was able to recover her balance quickly but she immediately cursed herself for making contact with the target and making herself memorable.
That was until she looked up into the target’s eyes and suddenly everything fell away. The file had shown Yaz what this woman looked like (stunning) and while she’d known she was drop dead gorgeous (pun intended), it had not been able to prepare her for the green and gold depths of the target’s eyes, the way they sparkled under the fluorescent lighting. It could not have prepared her for warm hands on her arms, the hot weather having made her forgo her usual leather jacket in favour of a baggy t-shirt. Pale fingers squeezed the muscles rippling under smooth brown skin and Yaz’s entire body buzzed in response. She felt exposed but in a good way, her breath caught in her throat.
“Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry! Are you okay?”
The target was looking at her with such concern and suddenly the world rushed back in and Yaz remembered she had a job to do. She gave an easy, disarming smile, hoping the target would forget her in favour of the deal on desktop fans.
“No worries, all good. Have a nice day.”
She made to move off but she’d forgotten that the target had grabbed hold of her - something the blonde seemed to have forgotten too until Yaz’s escape attempt failed and the other woman let go with a sharp intake of breath as though she’d suddenly been burnt by the touch.
“Sorry, I didn’t - I mean, I hope, well it’s - yeah. A day.”
The target’s eyes had gone wide and panicked and Yaz forced herself to take another breath as she looked into hazel depths. She felt the device in her hand and subconsciously clenched her fist; she was here to do a job. She needed to extricate herself in a way that made her as least memorable as possible, despite all the blonde’s attention on her right this moment.
“It’s - no worries, really.”
She smiled again, bringing her hand up to land on the target’s arm, subtly dropping the bugging device into the tote bag hanging from her shoulder. “No harm done.”
She gave a minuscule squeeze and then immediately moved past the target, disappearing down the aisle to pick up a random item and try to blend in with the other shoppers. The target stayed frozen for a long moment but by the time she turned to look after the mysterious stranger, Yaz was gone. She skulked in the fruit and veg section as she watched the target give herself a shake, a hand to her forehead, before she continued shopping. Satisfied, Yaz moved to the check out and slipped back out to her car.
Throwing the packet of biscuits in her backseat, she put her lunch down next to her and drove off to find a spot to park up and debrief.
“Well, how’d it go?” the voice of her handler crackled through the speaker.
Yaz scrunched up her face for a moment before she dropped it back down. Hopefully Bill would be fine with it.
“Alright. Device planted in her tote bag.”
As she’d feared, Bill immediately zeroed in on the missing details. “And?”
Yaz sighed. “Contact was made.”
“Yaz -”
“She turned around, Bill, and walked into me. I promise not even Agent 36 could have reacted in time.” Clara might have been a friend despite the competition between them but Yaz was sure even her talents wouldn’t have helped here.
“Fine,” Bill said. “Details.”
Yaz rattled off the minutiae, including the words spoken and the target’s reaction. When she finished, Bill spoke again.
“I’m worried that she’ll remember you.”
Yaz shrugged. “Maybe. But I’m not too worried about that, it won’t make a difference to my ability to finish the task.”
Bill hummed for a moment, considering. “Fine,” she said at last. “Set up base and report back to me once there’s progress.”
“Sure, boss. See ya.”
Yaz flicked off the connection and sped up, her car driving smoothly along the roads. It didn’t take long to get to the place she’d booked for the week and she was soon set up with the details of the tracking device on her screen, alerts set in place now that the target had reached home and a 0 marker could be placed.
Now all she had to do was sit back and wait. Sometimes her job was too easy.
“Amy, help, I think I just met the love of my life.”
Amy looked up from her laptop and stopped typing as she registered Annie’s words. She frowned.
“What?”
“Oh you should have seen her, Ames, she was just so - and all - and I! And then she - and really how was I - and then she was just - and now she’s gone and I’ll never see her again!”
Amy blinked. “Finishing full sentences tends to help make it easier to understand. What happened?”
Annie flopped onto the sofa. “I was at Aldi and I was wondering whether you might like a fan for your desk and then I was like no I’m not supposed to go down the middle aisle - even though it’s next to the biscuits! - and then I turned around and nearly knocked someone over and - oh Ames, I think I could have died of gay panic.”
Amy’s laptop closed with a click and then the redhead appeared in Annie’s vision, blocking her view of the ceiling. “Are you just trying to make your life like a romcom again?”
Annie scoffed and rolled away, not in the mood to be reminded of her ex girlfriend. She’d learnt her lesson and moved on - clearly, since now this stranger had taken over all of her thoughts.
Amy simply poked her in her side and Annie groaned.
“Go on,” she prompted.
“I reached out to catch her and then she looked at me and oh my god, Ames, I swear she was the most stunning incredible woman on the planet, her eyes were like galaxies.”
“You know you don’t have to mention space in every single conversation, right?”
Annie huffed and turned back towards her. “Not my fault that it’s so pretty. Or that she’s so pretty. She had dimples, Amy, dimples!”
“Mhmm.”
“And her muscles - oh my god, Amy, her muscles! I hadn’t even meant to grab her arms, I just wanted to help and then I forgot to let go because my brain was just static over that smile! And then I realised and let go but I swear I can still feel her.”
“Unlikely.”
“And then I was just like basically a gay puddle on the floor and then she touched me and I think I might have actually died and ascended to the ancestral plane. Whatever form of heaven exists, I was there. I am there. God, I feel so hot and sweaty and all tingly, I swear she was just like full of electricity and oh my god she’s so cute, right? Have I mentioned she’s the most beautiful woman in existence?”
Amy chuckled. “Yes, you have.”
“Ah, she’s just perfect,” Annie said, her hand on her chest.
“Did you get her number?”
“Amy, I could barely move for like five minutes after the interaction, of course I didn’t. I might have actually combusted if she’d given me her number, what would I even do with that?”
“I dunno, text her, call her?”
“Oh my god.” Annie dropped her hands to her face and tried to suppress the groan. “I meet the woman of my dreams and then lose her again immediately afterwards.”
Amy rolled her eyes. “How unexpected.”
Annie’s hands dropped away. “What?”
“Dude, every time you meet a pretty woman you freeze up in gay panic and forget how to talk.”
“I don’t -!”
“Every. Single. Time.”
Annie glared at Amy, who remained unimpressed.
“No I don’t!”
Amy sighed. “That woman at the bar? Forgot how to speak. The one at spin class? You literally fell on the floor. And there was the one at the coffee shop where you spilt your frapp all over the floor and yelled -”
“OKAY! Okay. We don’t need a repeat of that.”
Amy smirked and Annie knew she’d lost.
“But what am I meant to do? How do I talk to her?”
“Maybe just try and remember that she’s just human? Just take a breath and speak in complete sentences. Ask for her number.”
Annie stared at her. “Amy. Be reasonable.”
Amy rolled her eyes again and stood up. “Whatever. Good luck being single for life.”
Annie scowled at her retreating form. “We can’t all have a best friend to fall in love with!”
Amy spun and flipped two fingers up at her before retreating into the kitchen. Annie sighed.
“Ask for her number - what sort of ridiculous…”
She huffed but started imagining what could happen if she could just talk to pretty women. Texting could become dating and dating could become a relationship and then it wouldn’t be too long until they were happily married with a cat and a house filled with nice plants and a hammock in the garden.
Amy returned with cups of tea and she pulled herself up with a sigh, doubtful she’d ever see the woman again. It’s not like she’d be there the next time Annie went to the shops, and the chances of her being both gay and into Annie were infinitesimal. Annie grabbed her laptop and got back to work.
“We need an ear on her. There’s been an escalation and we need you to hold off on the kill. Bosses wanna know what she knows.”
Bill had made it sound so simple but Yaz’s leg was jiggling as she sat in her car outside Aldi for the second time that week. This needed to go perfectly, there couldn’t be any slip ups like the other day.
She was dressed differently today, her hair falling around the sunglasses that hid her face, a flowery bucket hat, a loose long sleeve shirt covering her skin - just in case. There couldn’t be any distractions. She was the best at what she did and she wanted to keep it that way. Spying was her bread and butter and it was always satisfying when she could wipe a mark off the map. Just because this woman had changed from hit list to watch list didn’t make her any less unimportant and it was crucial that Yaz was not remembered.
Bill had stayed on the line, a small camera masquerading as a button on Yaz’s shirt relaying the footage to confirm to their bosses that it was a success.
Yaz watched the mark enter the supermarket and followed her in once again. This time she didn’t wait around for an opportune moment but simply followed the woman as she wandered down the aisle amongst a throng of people.
Planting a bug was always hard as it needed to be on something that the target would keep close by while also not being obviously deposited. Luckily for Yaz, the woman had put her phone in her trolley as she shopped. Yaz simply had to wait for the right moment and the small sticker would be added to the side of the case.
It amazed her sometimes how far the technology had come. This tiny device had enough circuitry to both record conversations and share to a secure connection. And Yaz was able to stick it on undetected as the target frowned at two similar bags of salad.
Yaz quickly stepped away once it was placed and moved away. Now she just needed to blend in with the crowd, make her way out of the shop unnoticed and -
“Oh! It’s you!”
She carried on walking.
A moment later there was the sound of heavy footsteps and the blonde darted in front of her, panting. “Hi! It’s you, isn’t it?”
Her smile was wide and her hair was wild and Yaz had a moment of imagining this was real. Reality crashed back over her with the target’s next sentence.
“I almost didn’t recognise ya because you look so different to the other day but I’m digging this look on you as much as the other day.”
Think, Khan. You need to get out of this.
“I’m sorry,” she said with a smile. “You must have me mistaken for someone else.”
“No! Those are the exact same cute dimples!” the target said cheerfully. Then she faltered. “Unless… you don’t remember me?”
She suddenly looked so small and defeated, Yaz was rushing to reassure her before she’d even thought about it.
“No, no! I do remember you.” Shit. “I mean… yeah. I bumped into you. Sorry, just took me a second.”
The other woman’s eyes shone brightly.
“Oh! Awesome. That’s - yeah. Hi.”
The blonde’s cheeks had gone very pink and she almost seemed to be vibrating. It was making Yaz smile despite herself - in her defence, this woman was adorable and exactly her type.
“I was wondering if-”
“I’m sorry, I’ve really got to go, I’ve got to be on a call with my boss in like two minutes, I was just grabbing a snack.”
Yaz garbled out the excuse and practically ran away. She sped down the aisle and picked up a random packet of something and flew through the checkout. She had to get away from this woman because it seemed like she’d been about to ask Yaz out and, in all honesty, she probably wouldn’t have been able to stop herself saying yes in that moment.
This damn woman was just so good looking and Yaz was a simple gay. She couldn’t let her thoughts be dominated by other body parts and needed to keep her head.
She jumped back into the car, threw the packet of crisps or whatever they were into the passenger seat and drove off.
“Well,” Bill said.
Yaz took a breath.
“She seems to have remembered you.”
“Yeah,” Yaz agreed. “Shit.”
Bill chuckled. “Turns out there are downsides to being hot. While it helps you get guys alone for a special moment, having someone hit on you in a supermarket is not the type of interaction we want. Maybe we need to give you a monobrow.”
“I feel like someone could have warned me I’d be dealing with a hot lesbian.”
“Hey, you knew the hot bit before you went in. Wait, hold on. Are you saying you fancy her?”
“No, of course not!” Yaz said, pressing the accelerator pedal and only just missing the red light.
“Mhmm,” Bill said. “I think you got the hots for your mark.”
“Fuck off, Bill.”
“Would be my pleasure. There’ll be a new mission through for you this evening.”
“Cheers.”
Yaz reached out and closed off the call. Bill was wrong - there was nothing between them, nothing was going to happen. That would be the last time she’d see the mark and everything would be fine. A new mission would help her clear her head and give her that satisfaction of a job done right.
Something simple, easy. Kill a bunch of guys to cover up the fact that maybe she was still thinking about the woman in the supermarket who had, for one brief shining moment, just been a pretty blonde girl about to ask Yaz out, and not a woman involved in something that was pissing a lot of people off.
She could totally forget about her and move on. A nice easy kill and then pick up a girl from a local club and forget about the blonde.
“Amy, Amy, Amy! I saw her again!”
Amy slammed her laptop lid shut and turned towards her. “What?”
“The girl! The cute girl!”
Annie was practically vibrating. In fact, she was - she’d started bouncing without even noticing. She grinned at Amy.
“Okayyy, tell me more,” Amy said, leaning forward.
“Well she was there, she walked past me while I was comparing the yoghurts - which, did you know the strawberry one has twice as much sugar as the cherry? That seems crazy, right? Anyway, she walked past and I just like… felt like I’d been zapped with electricity. And I could smell her - oh my god, that sounds so crazy but she smells so good, Ames.”
Annie collapsed onto the sofa and stared up at the ceiling, the image of the girl’s smile playing over the white paint. She’d looked so pretty with her hair down, her curls cascading over her shoulders. She had sunglasses on so Annie couldn’t see those pretty eyes, the way they sparkled even under the fluorescent lighting of the supermarket.
“Annie. Annie!”
Amy’s loud clapping brought Annie back into the present.
“Hmm? What?”
“You haven’t actually told me what happened, just that she smells good and strawberry yoghurt has more sugar than cherry!”
“Oh! Sorry.” Annie scrunched up her face apologetically - she always did this. She’d get distracted by some tangent and then disappear into her head instead of -
“Oi!”
“Yeah?”
Amy raised an eyebrow and Annie blushed.
“She’s cute, I get it. But what actually happened?”
“Oh, um, well I went after her. And oh my gosh her smile was so big and bright and she didn’t remember me initially and I was just like really upset that she didn’t remember me because she’s all I’ve been thinking about all week and I thought that -”
Annie noticed Amy’s expression and realised that she was rambling again. She took a deep breath. “Yeah. Right. To the point. Anyway, she did remember me and then I was just like what did Amy say and I took a breath and I tried to speak in full sentences and ask her out like you said?”
Annie nodded up at Amy, but when she saw the hope in her friend’s eyes, she rocked back and closed her eyes.
“She had to go.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.” She opened her eyes and looked at her friend, whose face was crumpled in concern. “I was trying to ask her out and she left. So. She probably doesn’t like me back.”
“Oh, sorry babes.”
“But maybe she really did have to go.”
“What was her excuse?”
“I dunno, she looked all flustered and said she had a work call and then she just kinda ran away.”
Amy moved over to the sofa and held her hand. “I mean, maybe she’s not all that good? She is just a rando at the shops.”
Annie flopped back against the sofa with a sigh. “I don’t know. She’s just - she’s so perfect and lovely and I just know she’s the sweetest, kindest person ever and… I think I’m already falling in love with her.”
The man scrambled backwards, fear taking over. “Why are you doing this?”
“I don’t know,” Yaz said, cocking her head. It always fascinated her how people forgot how to get up and run away when they got scared - when a gun was being aimed at them. “But I don’t really care.”
She smiled and pulled the trigger.