"This looks promising. This looks very promising." The Surgeon flipped through the notes. The Doctor had copied most of the answers he'd been given onto cleaner sheets. The secret messages, however, stayed in his coat pocket. Standing next to the other white haired doctor was a man with narrow golden eyes and shoulder length black hair pulled back into a half tail in the back. He looked at the additional files he'd brought in with a look of obvious disdain. There were some photos of the Sniper, and various files regarding everything from his emigration to the states, to his high school GPA, to even his drop-out status from MIT, a surprising fact to the three of them.

"To think of all the information you can find by simply having a serial number on that rifle," mused the Surgeon as he gazed at the files. "Assassin, you always impress me with your intelligence gathering skills."

Assassin seemed more irritated than usual, the Doctor observed. The way he glared at the photos was open and clear. He let out a scoffing noise, his hand idly playing with his pocket knife.

"I don't know why a college drop out is so impressive."

"You're in a foul mood," the Surgeon sneered as he shuffled through the other notes. "I heard you found out what the contract on my head was? From his phone?"

Assassin gave another scoff. "$100,000."

The Doctor gaped openly at the price, and it made the Surgeon also stop shuffling through the paperwork momentarily. 

"$100,000?? For my little head?" the Surgeon asked, his orange eyes widening in both delight and surprise. "Mein Gott, that's a lot of deusche marks! In this economy too! I don't blame the man for taking a suicide mission like that. What is that in Euros--never mind. That's not important." Still, as he pored over the print outs, he rolled the number around in his head, muttering it beneath his breath.

The Doctor rolled the number around in his head too. Surely, that was far too much for a mere assassination...wasn't it? He realized he didn't really know. Assassin would, but to be perfectly fair, he didn't want to ask that man about anything regarding his job, and moreover, he doubted Assassin would tell him honestly anything. Especially now. He had a dawning realization of why the gunman both took the job, and why he was so out of his depth when failure came crashing down. 

With that kind of money, anyone would do anything. Even risk death.

"He's a waste of your time."

"Be that as it may, it seems the Doctor found qualities valuable enough for testing," the Surgeon pointed out, giving the Doctor a wide, unsettling smile. His cousin averted his eyes, narrowing them in both thought and defiance.

It only served to anger the Assassin more, so the Doctor tried to deflect the situation. "I figured I could get more out of him than allowing Assassin to work his magic and risk his candidacy for experimentation."

It made it worse, and both doctors sensed it immediately, so the Surgeon continued. "Regardless of schooling…there are other merits: his marksmanship and his health, outside of the possible emphysema, make him pass the initial inspection. I'll have the exam room prepared to check the rest of him tonight. I need to know more before we administer the current formulation." He scooped the files together, and straightened them with a crisp couple taps on the desk. "Assassin, please go tell the staff to prep it for us, and when it's ready, escort him."

He hesitated, but a pointed look of the Surgeon's orange eyes sent him out of the room. He watched him slam the door to his office shut, then sighed and closed his eyes. 

"Really. He seems almost jealous." He flicked his eyes back at his cousin, a look of knowing disdain and a hint of provocation in them. "How long were the two of you talking?"

"Does it matter?" he snapped, witheringly. "I got you your data, didn't I?"

"Hm. If you say so, cousin." 

--------

The next 2 days were a flurry of testing, studying of data, and more testing. They bled together, and without the benefit of the sun or even a clock, the yellow-eyed gunman couldn't tell what time it was exactly. The lights stayed on whether it was night or day in the cell, and the lights of the examination rooms were no better. When he could see his window from the cell, all it told him was daylight and nighttime, without any hours between. He'd probably had no more than 6 hours of sleep over those 2 days. 

The Doctor never met his eyes for longer than a few seconds, and he avoided him altogether when the Assassin was in the room. The golden eyed, Asian man, for his part, didn't make the tension any better. In fact, it was almost as if just having the 3 of them in the same room set him on edge. Roughly handling him from each room to the cell in that endless waltz of testing, it felt intensely personal. Snapping on the cuffs a bit too tight. Pushing him "accidentally" into corners of walls. Shoves on the shoulder, or a quick digging of his nails into his forearm in leading him from place to place. Like a school yard bully that was made into a hall monitor.

The gunman decided he didn't like this guy. In fact, he hated him from the bottom of his chest. He was normally an easy going person. Didn't take things that personally. After all, how can you take someone that personally when your job is to get them on the end of a barrel and give them a head shot? But this guy, from the moment he caught the Sniper in the woods when he hesitated in taking the shot at one of the white haired doctors in the back garden…this guy could fuck himself. 

At least in his too bright cell, he could have some peace. It wasn't much but it was better than being poked and scanned and manhandled all day. It was after the MRI, that the Sniper was settling down to try to nap when he happened to glance up at one of the cameras. 

The little red light was off. He frowned, and glanced at the other one. Its light was off too. He swung his legs off the cot and went to wave at the camera, though he wasn't sure what that was going to accomplish.

A minute later, he heard his cell door start to disengage, so he stepped back to the middle of the room. He heard an accented voice tell someone in the hall, "Dismissed." The Doctor stepped into the room, carrying a clipboard. Once the door shut and re-engaged the locks, he looked at the Sniper. His eyes were cold.

Immediately, the gunman sensed something was amiss. It was the way he looked at him with such coldness that he tensed. They stared at one another for a long while before the Doctor motioned to the cot with a nod. He didn't move.

"What's wrong with the cameras?" he asked, point-blank.

There was a millisecond of confusion in the Doctor's eyes before they returned to that cold, blank look.

The Sniper took one step back, straightening. There was a pressure he could feel coming from him.

"You're not the Doctor, are you?"

The Doctor frowned, and momentarily, the gunman thought he was just over-thinking. But when he blinked, he could swear there was something different about him. The coldness wasn't seriousness. It was a genuine, gelid stillness.

Almost like...disdain.

"You're not the Surgeon either."

Silence. Now it became glaring. The color of lilac didn't seem...right.

"Who are you?"

"Those eyes of yours are too damn good," the Doctor said, and it was a voice laced with poison. Same tone, same accent; in fact he was nearly indistinguishable from the Doctor in looks and sound.

But the tone wasn't the Doctor in the slightest. Nor was it the Surgeon's. Even the Surgeon was warmer than this.

"Assassin."

Without another word, with movement quicker than the tired Sniper could track, the Doctor lunged at him, and stuck him dead in the chest with a vicious elbow. It knocked the wind out of him and he collapsed just short of the cot, nearly hitting his head on the way down. He gasped in pain and for air before a swift kick hit him square in the chest. It was hard enough to make his eyes water. As he tried to gasp for air again, another blow came, and he nearly blacked out.

The Doctor merely watched him writhe on the ground before he bent over, grasped a handful of his shirt and dragged him to the center of the room, straddling him and laying into his face and chest with a flurry of blows. He struck him several times before pinning his arms to the floor and watched the Sniper weakly struggle, panting and groaning.

"Honestly. That's the trouble with long rangers. They're absolutely useless in hand to hand."

Sniper glared up weakly. "Typical ambush predator mentality," he snapped. It was absolutely disorientating seeing the Doctor with such an aggressive, disdain-filled expression.

The Doctor's face broke into a malice-filled grin. He let out a cold, unhinged chuckle, and it wasn't in the Doctor's voice. It was all Assassin's.

"You certainly talk a lot for a sniper."

"You talk more for an assassin. Take off his face, it's fucking annoying."

The Doctor's expression changed, melting into a look of false shock and hurt as he sat up, releasing his grip on the Sniper's wrists. "I can't wait til you table tonight."

The Sniper's heart skipped a beat and he didn't care if the Assassin could feel it. "Tonight?" he asked, unable to stop himself.

The Doctor reached behind his own neck, where the gunman now noticed a small coiled wire connecting to the earpiece he'd seen the Doctor and Surgeon wear while in the examination rooms. He pulled it off and after a visual distortion over his face flickered, Assassin's face met his.

"Marvelous cloaking tech the Surgeon has, no?" he said as he slid the device off of his ear and into the lab coat pocket.

"I've seen better."

"God, you're really a killjoy, you know that?" He reached into his other pocket and pulled out a pocket knife, flipping it around his long fingers gracefully. "If you weren't supposed to be next, I'd have carved you up like a lil jack-o-lantern. But I'm under strict orders not to maim you.... I'll likely get scolded for bruises, but you won't have to worry about that if you die."

The Sniper tried to throw him off but the combination of the attack earlier and just his sheer exhaustion made it impossible, and Assassin knew it.

"I'd have loved to keep your eyes in a jar though."

He didn't know if all of this was just his way of torturing him or was an honest confession. The unhinged aura around him certainly made it believable that he'd keep eyes in jars.

"What's your deal? You're making this personal." The yellow eyed man tried struggling again, but the Assassin's expression suddenly turned deadly serious at the question.

"Personal??" he hissed.

"Yeah. You got a grudge against snipers? Or you just pissed I got so far in?"

The golden eyes narrowed to slits as he juggled the knife across his fingers. Then suddenly he brought it to his left cheek and gave it a quick cut, flicking his wrist gracefully. Deep enough to bleed but not so much that it was too serious. It hurt, but at the same time, the Sniper knew it was just for show. A show of dominance. The Assassin then pushed it against his throat. He expected that. Knowing he wouldn't hurt him seriously, gambling on it really, the Sniper sneered back. The blade hurt a little, but it was more like a threat from a child than a real threat.

"Or are you just pissed cuz the Doctor likes me better?"

Assassin's eyes flashed in fury and a hand flew to the Sniper's throat, choking him. He tossed the knife aside as he gripped his neck with both hands and started to squeeze. That was a gamble he lost, he had to admit, so he redoubled his efforts to break his grip. Fighting for air, the Sniper clawed at his arms, nearly breaking free twice but the sheer fury behind the Assassin's grip was far stronger.

That was when the sound of the cell door's locks began to unlatch rang loudly in the room. As if the sounds snapped him back to reality, the Assassin's grip loosened slightly, allowing some air to enter the gunman's aching lungs. He didn't let go of his neck as the door swung open and the Doctor rushed in. He stopped dead at the sight of the 2 men and his face was openly terrified.

It was like a switch flipped in Assassin; his hand loosened again to where they were merely resting on his throat as the Sniper writhed and coughed, gasping for air. Gone was the crazed look in his eyes, replaced with a smugness, a familiar arrogance. No longer out of control of his emotions, back in a place of power, only over the other man.

"Let him go, Assassin," rasped the Doctor hoarsely.

"Cuttin' it kinda close there, Doc," coughed the Sniper as he tried to roll to his side. The Assassin let him up, and he rose, and stepped away, retrieving his knife from across the room.

The Doctor was at his side, helping him up but the Sniper motioned for him to give him a little space as he caught his breath. The stars in his eyes were finally beginning to fade. 

"God DAMN IT, ASSASSIN!!" shouted the Doctor as he got to his feet and stomped to him. "You KNOW he's meant to go tonight!! I can't have you over-stressing him or hurting him before we start."

"Please, Doctor, if you're so confident he's going to be a success, what difference does it make?" he scoffed as he cleaned and closed the knife, then put it back in his pocket. "We were just playing."

The Sniper was holding a hand to his cheek, checking the blood still flowing, and wincing. The Doctor turned back to him, pulling out some gauze from another pocket and putting pressure on it. He could see the Doctor's hands shaking.

"Get out." It was a low, angry growl that the Sniper didn't expect to hear. It was still different than the Assassin's cold imitation.

Silently, the Assassin turned for the door and opened it. He paused, holding it open, as if waiting for him. The Doctor pretended to ignore it for a half minute, then sighed and let go as he backed up. 

"Just...hold it there. I'll come back to treat it once I'm finished."

"Nah. I'll be fine. I've had deeper cuts on the playground." It was kind of a lie. The cut stung like hell. He flicked his eyes at Assassin. "Piece'a work that guy."

The Doctor could only sigh again and nodded at him. "I'll be back soon." He turned and exited the room with the Assassin giving the gunman a long, smug look before shutting the door and locking it. The Sniper simply limped back to the cot and laid down, still holding the gauze to his cheek.

"So much for a nap."