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Ninette is on her way to her flat. It's just a short jaunt from where her driver let her off. She's made this little trip a hundred times. She doesn't even think about it, really. Her heels click on the sidewalk, tall stilettos she walks upon easily. Her lips are painted cherry red, her dress sapphire blue, and she wears a mink coat. Her blond hair is done in flawless, sleek waves. She's all grown up now, ten years on and a woman. What a woman.
And he looks…..more or less the same. Though she didn't see him at the time. That's the cruelest part of it, to blame her father's death on herself, when it was someone else.
So this will be her first memory of him…..the flash of a knife and a shadow stepping out from the other shadows. "Give me your wallet and your jewelry," he says, simply. And somehow that makes the threat all the worse.
Ninette stops short, and she gives the man a scathing glance, the kind that could chill a fellow straight through. How dare he rob her? How very dare he! Men. They always want something. At least this one is up front about it. "No," she says, just as simply. Her gaze goes to that knife blade, and she swallows. She's no stranger to fear, but she'll be damned the day she buckles from it.
"I don't want to have to hurt you," he informs her, still with that level deadpan. "But I will if I gotta," And then he's coming for her in a rush, intending to knock her down, the metal shoulder leading.
Ninette screams, and she tucks her clutch under one arm. The other rises in defense, but it's not enough to keep him from knocking her down. He doesn't just knock her down, he sends her back a few feet. Her stockings tear on the rough pavement, and she lands hard, the thump silencing her. But that defensive hand finds his arm. Icy, burning pain. It comes on quickly, and it spreads, seeping into the metal, causing it to frost over.
There's a funny, fluttering noise, as each lamina of that arm locks up in turn, frozen in that position. His arm of flesh is still nimble enough to snatch at her purse, though, a hasty grab. Not thinking clearly tonight, it'd seem.
The air around them grows colder, and when the purse is snatched out of her arm, her newly freed hand goes for his face. It too burns like frostbite. «Stop it!» she shrieks in French. «Get off me! Get off me!» So cold. The pavement around them gets a crystalline sheen of frost. Breath comes out in white puffs. It's especially cold when she bites him on the fleshy shoulder. This little one is mean.
She's a mutant. Something. Cold…..that's enough to freeze him for a moment. He leaves the purse, staggers back, the frostburn clearly visible on his cheek, the ragged mark of fingers limned in little crystals. Clearly, this was a bad decision. Now his eyes are wide, almost frightened, and he turns to run.
"Coward!" she spits. She pushes herself up to sit, her dress ruined, her hair disheveled, and still she's a knockout. A bruised knockout who will need a lot of makeup for her next gig under the spotlight. It's still cold, and the street is slick with condensed water turning to black ice. She snatches up her purse, loses the heels, and starts to her feet. She's going to go after him. Like a cat aiming to tree a bear.
He's swift, though not beyond the realm of possibility for a mere human. A glance back over his shoulder is incredulous. What on earth is she doing? He doesn't dare pull his pistol - there's no need for some random death that'll just have him that much more wanted by his pursuers. And besides, she's not a mission. He heads for an alleyway, the better to lose her.
Ninette runs to the mouth of the alley, but she doesn't follow any further. "Touch me again and I will kill you!" she calls after. Frost rolls off her in the spring air. Just like it did in the factory on the outskirts of Paris. That little blonde girl (who grew up to look so much like her mother it's eerie). "You keep running!" Her mother Anne-Marie had a temper about her, too.
It's like reaching down to pick up a kitten and finding that you've grabbed an enraged badger. That'll cure him of trying to make money by random muggings. He'll have to go back to just flat out burglary, it seems. Buck's found a dark corner to work on loosening the frozen plates.
Ninette's features can be seen in the light from the street over, and she tilts her head as she hears the metal moving against metal. "Who are you," she says. Now that she's cornered the would-be robber and run him to ground, she starts to settle. Winter recedes. She's alert, though, and ready. Her pumps are in one hand, ready to wield if needs must.
He gives her this look. "Jack," he says, flatly. "Sorry. Never tried to mug a snow queen before." His arm clatters a little, as he shakes it.
Ninette's lips press thin, and she lifts her chin as she says, "And how did this work out for you?" Even her voice sounds petite and harmless. This was entirely false advertising. Bucky should write a letter of complaint.
"Are you gonna turn me into the cops? OR just lecture me for a while?" he asks, giving her that impassive face. "I'm sorry. I didn't take anything, so I got nothing to give back. I can't offer to pay for your torn clothes."
"I might freeze your balls off," Ninette retorts. Then she tosses her hair over one shoulder and says with a sniff, "Why do you steal anyway? You need money? Are you hungry? You could find sympathetic people to beg from."
"I do need money, yes," he admits on a sigh. This is embarrassing. "Not hungry at the moment. And clearly, I shoulda."
"Yes you should." Ninette frowns, then she says, "Step into the light." She steps out of the pool of light into shadows, but it does open up the stage for Bucky as it were.
He doesn't like that at all. But he does. Because he'd really rather not deal with yet more ice. He's damn near phobic about it, at this point. So it's a ragged and hangdog assassin who steps into the circle of light.
Ninette walks a circle around Bucky, sizing him up. She gives the metal arm a few raps with delicate knuckles. "Pity you're such a rude man. You've got a handsome face." She reaches into her clutch and takes out a photograph of a woman whose resemblance to her is staggering. Somewhere in the back of Bucky's fractured mind, he knows her. And Ninette is practically her doppelganger save for how they dress and that Nina's eyes are green instead of blue. "Have you seen this woman. She would be older now."
He doesn't like the touch, it's clear, but he doesn't flinch away from it. The photo he examines with that little furrow in his brow. "I don't remember," he says, wearily. "Don't remember having seen her. But that doesn't mean I never did. My memory's pretty bad."
Ninette's lips press thin, but she doesn't do something so gauche as to frown. It might give her wrinkles. "You are the metal armed man," she informs Bucky. "You knew her. I remember when she and papa talked about you."