Faison sat up on the radio-tower foundation. He moaned to himself. Occasionally, he glared at her.

Being bested by a criminal was more than his ego could handle.

Tasìa gave him her best goblin-faced smile. It was her upper and lower rows of small teeth bared through wide lips that sealed the deal on the look. When set to non-expressive her face contoured too long for a true gobliny visage.

The rare girl who was prettier when she didn't smile.

"So Faison, is it?"

"Fuck off."

She eased her finger from the trigger as a counter-response to her desire to shoot him once more.

"Faison, I can't help but notice those arms of yours are quite massive."

"Seriously, you're trying to flirt with me? That grin on your face. Whoever told you it was pretty lied to you. It is the most strangely affected expression I have ever seen and I used to bounce at a blacklight club where half the bitches drooled on themselves from all the laced heroin being passed around."

He spat on the ground. The wound on his cheek quivered. Tasìa's grin became a full-on smirk. She squinted as she surveyed his face.

"That explains the shitty attitude. You used to pass for a pretty-boy, right? That is, before I fucked your face up."

That shut him up. Tasìa continued.

"Listen, I don't have time to fuck around, so don't dwell on the oddness of my next question. Just answer it.

"How many pull-ups can you do at one time?"

His head jerked back, his puss frowned.

"Seriously? Okay. Easy enough. I do five hundred every morning. I could add two more hundred to that without straining myself."

Tasìa felt a lightness in her stomach. That was the answer for which she had hoped. She also thought she knew his weakness.

"Your arms work just fine. So you can climb in your current state?"

"I'm not helping you."

Tasìa nodded her head in disagreement. She laid down a most condescending gaze on him. She was definitely the smarter of the two in this arrangement.

"We need to work out a deal before your help arrives."

"A deal? With you?"

Tasìa reached into her pocket and she pulled out the Liberty coin she held there.

"Faison, what is this?"

"Ah, shit. I know what it is used for in prison."

"Nevermind that. How much is this coin worth?"

"Given the decade. Close to 800 USD."

Tasìa reached into her fanny pack and she brought out four more coins.

"So does this look worth your while, Faison? I'll give you these five coins now, and return to you your account balance after you do what I ask."

Gone was the glare, but he eyed her coolly, now.

"And all I have to do is get the equivalent of my daily workout?"

"Precisely. Stand right there along the inner girders, and you climb up as I climb up on the outer girders. That's all this is going to take. Let's get started."

She placed the coins within his range on the foundation's cement. He reached out, grabbed them, and pocketed them in his vest.

Tasìa had one last calculation to make. She imagined the water-tower in her head. It was a quarter of a mile to the North. From the windows in the skywalk corridor that connected the Medical Center to the Spore Isolation Unit she had observed it often.

There were three possible locations where the sharpshooter could be hunkered down: the very top of the water-tower, on the round walk-way used to service its various gauges, or the one stairwell platform that faced in their direction.

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The first option angled too steeply, close to ninety degrees, to account for the angled surface from the bullet sheer; the last option could be eliminated as well for the angle on the shear would have been closer to forty-five degrees than seventy.

That last option, the narrow stairwell, would have given Tasìa an advantage.

It was in a tight space. She could have shot blind, emptied a magazine full of rounds into it, and been assured of at least one good hit.

Not their job to make my life any easier.

That left only one option. The sharpshooter was on the round walk-way that circled the tower. This gave him a wide breadth of options to set up rifle placement.

Tasìa picked up the rifle. It was a brand with which she had no previous experience, a 7.62 mm Ishapore sniper rifle. A Springfield cartridge in the chamber with six more in the magazine.

The rifle went across her shoulder.

She turned to her reluctant accomplice and, as she approached, Tasìa gave him another one of the smiles he refused to find in the least bit fetching.

He looked away. From the expression set loosely on his face, Tasìa could tell he was going to betray their pact. Given his personality, the impotence she made him feel, he was going to go out in a most glorious fashion.

That was okay. It was part of her plan.

Faison was set in place. He stood on his one good leg while he grabbed the inset lattice girders welded on the inside of the support girders that ran the length of the radio-tower.

The space between the latticework cleared two feet at the midpoint diameter of the diamond shapes.

Easy to scale but it worked to the sharpshooter's advantage.

Faison would serve as a body between her and the sharpshooter.

She grabbed hold of an outer-set girder placement.

They now faced one another.

"Don't even think of betraying me, Faison. I'm a vengeful bitch."

She knew he would, but it was part of the game for her to go through the motions and satisfy his expectations. Else, even in his limited mental capacity, he might grow curious.

"One step up on the count of three. One, two, three."

They moved in sync. This set of motions was repeated twice more, putting their boots at the six-foot mark. Twelve more feet, six more grilled supports to go.

Tasìa examined her companion. With his weight pressed on his bulging arms, he appeared comfortable in this position. His face impassive so not to give anything of his plan away.

He could go ahead and safely jump down and expose her position to the sharpshooter at that very moment, but he wouldn't. Such a wimpy move would not comport with the glorious story he had to tell his buddies back at the bar.

He trained for low storied jump and rolls. This would be easy!

And it truly would have been easy if his leg wasn't fucked up. The dumbass.

She needed to get her eyes on the sharpshooter. Unfortunately, Faison's spotter's mirror was not in his kit. Likely, it had already been placed in position in the lab above.

"Faison, hold your head still. Just keep it in mind, if your friend over there is not one hundred percent, you get popped, not me."

He smiled, nodded, and then held his head still.

Tasìa pushed her body up so her head was even with his. Without ceasing her flow of movement, she feinted left, then peaked past Faison's head to her right.

This did indeed draw a shot. It whizzed by Faison's right ear.

"Aie . . Fuck me to tears," he yelled.

"Easy, Big Guy. Don't lose your shit."

The taunt was enough to calm him down.

As for the sharpshooter, Tasìa had one thought in mind.

Target acquired.

"Faison, we have six more steps to make. Do you have it in you?"

He shook his head as he sneered at her expression of doubt.

"All fucking day long," he answered.

That response would go in the story he would tell in that dark bar with a double shot of whiskey in his hand and decades-old pop metal from the States in the background.

They climbed up. She repeated "One step up on the count of three. One, two, three." To this she added, "with five steps to go . . . with four steps to go . . .," to focus his mind on the goal.

When they reached the last step, Tasìa pressed the lattice girder at her waist firmly with her thighs to hold herself in place.

She could tell by the smirk that consumed his face he did not catch this move as he assumed she still bore her weight on her arms and hands.

The smirk widened into an ugly grin. There was glee dancing in his eyes. Now would come the highly insulting quip that would serve as the clincher for his barroom story.

"Hey, del Alma-Gris. Choke on Satan's cock in Hell, you ugly-ass bitch."

As he let go, she reached for the Ishapore. Tasìa pulled it over her shoulder into the cress of her arm. Set in place, she took a quick aim, and fired. The sharpshooter's head snapped back on impact.

Down below she heard Faison smack the ground once again. He didn't perform the roll he must have intended. This time he landed on his back. She heard his spine crack.

Below, his upper body squirmed while his legs stayed limp.

That is not how the story was supposed to go, now was it?

For mercy's sake, she kept her quips to herself. Her spine once again tingled with a warm glow. That she found to be quite unsettling.

The jump over to the skywalk was trivial to execute. Tasìa scurried up to the top where non spider monkeys would need a crane to access. She ran the length of the skywalk to a vent that led into the Spore Isolation Unit.

Tasìa popped the four bolts with four rounds from her newly acquired .357. She crawled into the lip of it.

Phone in hand, she made a call.

"León here."

"It's me. One last hurdle, and I am there."