Conversation · Klaasje (Miss Oranje Disco Dancer)

She's getting scared now. Of you -- the downstairs people. All of it.

He was a serviceman -- he must have had a gun. Somewhere, lying around. Close to her hand...

"Could the people after you have killed him?"

"That's the first thing that went through my head, when I heard the glass break."

"And?"

"I thought they'd found me. They've killed him to punish me.... All last week I've tried not to talk to anyone, or be seen with anyone..." She looks at her cigarette.

"So they wouldn't be hurt. I've come to understand, however -- this is paranoia. What happened didn't have anything to do with me."

"It probably didn't."

"Or... I don't know anything anymore. All I do is wait here." She looks at the table.

"We can't go after Looskap. Not yet. There are other, saner leads."

"I don't ask you to, lieutenant. If there's one thing I know it's that you'll get nothing from there."

If they want to kill me, they'll kill me. If they want to toy with me they will. She's come to this conclusion weeks ago.

"If there's one thing I know it's that you'll get nothing from Looskap. They don't fuck things like this up."

"Either way -- something to consider."

"But maybe it did?"

"I just don't know..." She shakes her head. "I don't know anything."

"What did you do to have these people after you?"

"It's not nice -- but it's not illegal, not here in Revachol. Or even in Oranje."

"What exactly did you do?"

"Industrial espionage. I joined a business collective with the intention of betraying them. I did my job well enough to be asked to do it again."

"With a bigger company -- the kind you really, really don't fuck with. I took their ledgers -- two decades' worth of accounting."

"I need the names of the companies involved. And who hired you." He taps on his notebook.

"The job was Loosduin County Savings Bank -- they sound small but they're part of the Looskap conglomerate. That was the second job. The first was some printer company. You wouldn't know them."

But she really destroyed them. She still feels it.

"As to who hired me for the job -- I don't know. But they're after me too. Along with Looskap, and their friends in the MI." She breathes out, heavily. "Once you're done in the competitive intelligence circuit, you don't have allies. You're radioactive."

Looskap -- these people engineer financial disasters in second world countries. The conglomerate also includes The Bank of Consecration, Eeirberg and the popular Pappa Lollo line of dairy products.

"Serves them right. When I am king, this Savings Bank will be first against the wall."

"This was not a joke. Real people lost their jobs. Not just in the C-Suite either -- good people. What I did to get to accounting..." She shakes her head at the thought.

"A lot of people got hurt," she concludes. "But that's just more of my shit you shouldn't have to deal with. You're solving a murder."

That can wait. Look into her eyes -- there's more.

"What did you do?"

"I..." She looks down, then into your eyes. "One of them killed themselves. Because of me."

She says it quickly. Like she's said it a hundred times -- to herself? To get used to the idea?

Out of guilt.

"That's..." (Shake your head.) "Not easy to deal with."

"How do you deal with anything? It's all just..." She looks at you with pleading eyes. "How do you do it?"

"I don't either."

"There you have it." She's already almost devoured the cigarette she just lit and looks at it sadly. "The way of the warrior."

Around her -- a drop in atmospheric pressure. Not long from now it will get dark. And the air will start moving faster, circling the box she stands on...

She's already in prison here. For what happened. And she is prepared to never leave. Even after his death.

Around her -- a drop in atmospheric pressure. Not long from now it will get dark. The rain will come. And the air will start moving faster, circling the box she stands on...

"I drink."

"I do that too, yes. It's unbelievably effective. Especially when combined with cigarettes. And drugs."

"I'm a cop. What I do is right."

"By bargaining then..." She takes a drag. "I do that too. It's not all that effective."

"I just try to smoke as much as possible."

"That doesn't really work, does it?" She has almost devoured the cigarette she lit. She looks at it sadly. "Not without a drink to wash it down..."

"By not remembering a single god damn thing."

"That would do the trick, yes." She has almost devoured the cigarette she lit. She looks at it sadly.

"I do drugs."

"Drugs are good," she looks to the sea. "I also do those. I try to bargain with myself too."

"That's bad. How do you live with yourself?"

"I don't." She shrugs. "How do you live with yourself?"

(Nod.) "Let's get back to what happened here, okay?"

The young woman looks at her cigarette -- with melancholy. It's almost gone.

Let's not pry. It's not part of this case.

Of course. This case takes precedence.

"I'm sure there are people who have done much worse than that."

"Sure. I'm not a war criminal -- but it was bad. People lost their jobs. Good people too, not just C-Suite..." She shakes her head at the thought.

"That's a lot of shit you've gotten yourself into."