Due to his concerns about Oracle possibly tracking him later on, he took a long route back to the apartment. He came back after six and texted Elizabeth to let her know he had returned and he had gotten the briefcase. She quickly responded letting him know they were at Rebecca’s place and to come up.

Taking the elevator to the tenth floor, he arrived in a flickering lit hallway. He frowned at that and vowed he would fix the light tomorrow. The hallway was covered in graffiti and a peeling wallpaper. Heading to the left he approached Rebbeca’s room passing a room that was blasting out some sort of obnoxious music. She lived at the end of the hall, and he knocked on the door.

A few seconds later there were several clicks and Elizabeth let him inside. “Would have left the door unlocked for you, but you know how this place is.”

He nodded and got his first look at Rebecca’s room. While it was the size of a hotel room, it was fairly comfy. She had obviously taken great effort to make this as liveable as possible. From the music posters on the walls to the full sized queen bed in the room it didn’t seem to be the sort of place she would take clients too. While he was looking Rebecca looked over and pushed herself up. She was laying on the bed with her foot propped up and bandaged, an ice pack lay ontop of it.

“You got it!” She said, sounding relieved and happy.

“Yeah,” James said. Since he was gone, Rebecca had changed to what looked like pajamas. Which was short shorts and a loose tank top. He placed the briefcase next to her and said “So I hope you don’t mind, but I took a look inside just to make sure it was all there. From what I can tell it is. But you should take a look just to be safe.”

“No it’s alright.” She took the case and opened it. “Hmm the injector is all complete and the vials are still sealed. It’s all here so now I can treat my mother.”

“Speaking of which, where does she live?” James said. “Do you need help?”

Rebecca frowned and shook her head. “Thank you for your offer, but she… doesn’t do well around other people. Right now I’m paying for a flat for her near her so she can be by herself. I will take this to her tomorrow.”

James nodded in understanding. “Okay. So how are you doing?”

“Thankfully none of those bastards managed to break anything, and due to Liz’s help I should be back to normal in no time.” Rebecca gave Elizabeth a smile.

“It’s no problem. I’m used to helping with bruises and injuries. I just don’t like seeing women beaten like you were.” Elizabeth said. “Until you fully heal up, keep off your foot as much as possible till it fully heals. You don’t want to end up like me.” Elizabeth joked gesturing at herself.

“What? You mean awesome?” Rebecca grinned. “So you got the briefcase back. How did it go?”

“Well it went as well as you’d think with a group of morons. They reneged on the deal, so I had to convince them to take a new one. One that didn’t include paying them.” James said, taking out the envelope of cash and handing it over to Elizabeth. “Here is your money back.”

Elizabeth took it and looked at it for a moment and then shook her head and handed it to Rebecca. “I gave this to you for you to use. Since you aren't able to work, this should help keep you afloat till your back on your feet.”

“But I only needed it to get the briefcase back.” Rebecca began protesting.

“Don’t worry about it. I like you and you need this money more than I do at the moment.” Elizabeth shrugged.

A deep look of gratitude flashed across Rebecca’s face and she said “Thank you, I will find a way to repay you.”

“Just get better.” Elizabeth glanced at her watch and said “Looks like it’s time for me to head home. I still have some homework that needs to be done before I head out of town tomorrow.”

“Okay, it was nice talking with you today Liz. Make sure you stop by sometime and I’ll show you my movie collection.” Rebecca said.

Elizabeth stood with her crutches and made her way to the door. “Goodbye Bec.”

James stood up and was prepared to say his goodbyes as well when Rebecca gestured to him and said “Can you come over here James?”

“Sure, what is it?” He came over to her, and she gestured for him to lean down. She bent up and kissed him on his cheek. 

“Thank you for helping me. That’s twice you’ve come to my rescue.”

“You're welcome, but anyone would have done the same.” James said. 

“Maybe. But you're the one who did it.” She reached over and patted his crotch while winking at him. “When I’m feeling better, I’ll show you just how much I appreciate you being there for me.” 

He smiled and said “I would like that. I’ll head out now, but if you need help getting over to your mothers place you have my phone number.”

“Got it. Goodnight James.”

“Goodnight.” James waved goodbye and closed the door behind him. He made sure to lock it with his key and did the security bolts as well.

Elizabeth was already down at the Elevator holding it for him. Getting inside she pressed the button for the ground floor and said “She’s a nice girl.”

“Yeah, she is.” He glanced at her and said “Thanks for taking care of her while I went out. She looked like she was about to break.”

“She’s a lot stronger than you think.” Elizabeth said. “Still it was no problem. I couldn’t leave a battered woman like her alone, like I… anyway, it was nice to speak with a girl my own age. Ever since I ‘died’ I haven’t had any friends.”

“Yeah, I can see how hard that is.” James nodded. His thoughts wandered back to his friends at home. He wondered what they were up to, how they were taking his disappearance.

Elizabeth looked at him and said “So did you fuck those punks up?”

“I didn’t injure them, at least not physically. I scared them really badly. Hopefully bad enough to make them rethink the decisions that led them to this point. By the way, while I was gone, did you happen to find out what was wrong with her mom?”

“Well kind of. I got it down to being some kind of genetic problem or something.” Elizabeth shrugged. “I’m smart, but the stuff she mentioned was way too advanced for me. I didn’t take enough biology to know half the shit she mentioned. Why do you ask?”

“That briefcase came from Waynetech. I just want to make sure she’s not getting her head underwater.”

“Yeah, I can see that. Her mom’s been worsening ever since her dad disappeared when she was sixteen. She’s been having to make hard decisions since then. They didn’t have enough money, so she had to start selling her body to get cash to help her mom. “

“That must have had to be a tough decision to make. She must really love her mom.”

“Yeah.” Elizabeth said softly as they exited the elevator. He could tell she was in deep thought. “I will be out of town tomorrow, so I won’t be swinging by.” 

“Meeting up with your contacts?” James asked.

“Yeah. I probably won’t be back till Thursday. If all goes well, I will be getting some information on that special yacht.” 

“Okay. Be careful Elizabeth. These people are dangerous, especially Lex. Are you sure you don’t need me to come with you?”

“Don’t worry, I know these people. You just have to be careful with your new landlord. Wouldn’t want you to be kicked out, we’d have to find a new base then.”

He snorted and said “Yeah I will. After my shift tonight I’m going to clean the rest of the penthouse to get ready for her. Though to be honest I’m unsure why she even wants to stay there.”

“You mean because someone was killed there? I didn’t realize you were afraid of ghosts.”

“No, it’s not because of that. Because I think the original owner of that place is still alive. I mean who else would clean up the bodies. I would think they may dislike someone else taking over their room.”

“That… actually makes sense. You might want to do a look over to see if you can find anything about that last guy. See you later James. Oh and good job.” She winked at him and headed out the front door. 

Seeing it was after six, he did some light cleaning of the lobby before heading out to grab a bite to eat. When he returned, he studied using his phone. While he didn’t have access to the forefront of what was out there, he still was able to come up with several ideas. Unfortunately none of which was a way to get home. Still he had come up with several devices that could test his abilities further.

However, they required a great deal of power to run. The kind of power that would be extremely noticeable if he attempted getting it from the power grid. So he would have to build himself a generator to provide power for his projects. Which would take exotic materials or money to build. Still he had started working on a design on a small generator when he received a call. Looking down he saw it was unlisted and answered it confused.”

“Hello, this is James Mistfield.”

“Hi James, it’s Maggie from the Museum.”

“Oh hey Maggie, it’s good to hear from you. I was worried you had forgotten about me. How are you doing?”

A rich laugh came across the line, and she said “No, I can’t get you out of my mind that easily. I’ve just been swamped with work these past few days. This is the first time I was able to get some time to myself. But I’m going to have some free time in the next few days so I was wondering if you would like to have dinner with me sometime?”

“That sounds great. How about Thursday?” James asked.

“That will work with me. I have just the place in mind. I know the gentlemen usually picks up the lady, but I’ve been dying to take out my new car for a cruise. How about I pick you up at say eight?”

“Sure that will work for me. I will be around the city, so I’ll text you the location thursday afternoon.”

“Great. It’s a date. I’ve gotta go, one of the interns is completely messing up the decorations.”

She hung up, and James found that it was time for his shift. It was mostly uneventful, with the exception that around twelve a car pulled up outside and sat for a long time. He listened to it turn off and he could hear a person just breathing in the car. At first he thought it was just one of the prostitutes guests waiting for a girl, but after several girls went out none approached the car. Then about an hour and a half later, the car started back up and drove away. He didn’t know what to make about that, and his gut didn’t like that at all.

Next time a car does that, he’ll go out and check it out. After his shift he headed up to the penthouse to continue cleaning it. First he replaced the lock in the door with one he had picked up earlier in the storage area. Then he turned his attention back to the rest of the penthouse. Mostly he just needed to dust the place off and get rid of the trash. As he did so, he failed to find anything personal left behind.

But as he was moving the cut up pieces of the couch to the trash, something fluttered down from the couch as he picked it up. Looking down he spotted what appeared to be a piece of a photograph. Indeed, when he picked it up it was a torn piece from a polaroid. What it showed in the picture was a little girl that had to be about six. She had white hair and was holding up a large bass smiling at the camera. A man’s hand was on her shoulder, but the man had been torn out of the photo.

Turning it over, he saw a few lines of text on it, through most of the sentence must have been on the other piece of the photo. ‘E and Rose… rst catch.’ James checked around for the other piece even tearing apart the couches but he didn’t find it within the apartment. Clearly someone must have torn this photo up, and this piece fell in between the cushions. He stowed it away in his wallet.

With him throwing the couch out, the rest of the place was sparkling clean. He wasn’t sure if Ioana wanted to keep the furniture, though he suspected she might be given the high quality of it. He also stripped the mattress as she would likely want to use her own sheets. Finished, he rubbed his chin absentmindedly and realized he hadn’t grown any stubble like usual. Checking the bathroom mirror he was still clean shaven. Was it growing at all? He wondered. Just another weird thing about his new body.