We were greeted in London by a dark, chilled, overcast sky that was pattering down rain at a slow but steady rate, just enough to make anyone still out at midnight frustrated and miserable.

As we unboarded, a sleek silver car pulled up next to the plane and popped the trunk open for Mason to throw his guns into. I checked my inboxes for any messages that came through during the flight over the Atlantic. Inboxes, plural, because having just one would be criminally incompetent and endangering.

Having been on a plane for seven hours, I was getting restless, and needless to say, that meant I wanted to cause some chaos first hand. I thought over my options from Dmitri's last update. Murder, bribes, arson...

[Do you have anything that needs to get done? I need to do something.] I texted him. My fingers tapped the armrest, waiting for a response. My phone buzzed again within the minute.

[Family member wants relative dead for inheritance, who got rich through money laundering and real estate. Just came through. Need anything?]

[Yeah, where's the best abandoned warehouse around here?] I asked, pausing for a moment. A slightly psychotic idea was formulating in my head. Quickly typing out a second message, I thought for a second before hitting send. [And where can I get the most gasoline?]

[Lloyd's Machinery Packing Co., Brickfield Road. Should take about a half an hour to get there. There's a gas storage place past it. Navigator Terminals.]

I typed in the address to see whereabouts it was. With that last piece of information, I looked over the top of the car at Mason, who raised his eyebrows as if to say, What the hell are you planning now? Whatever you're about to do, tell me.

[Tell that rich guy to be at that warehouse at 5 am. Got something for him. And tell someone at the terminal to meet us there with a bucket.]

I grinned at him, opening the car door and climbing in. "Navigator Terminals.", I told the driver, before sitting back and grinning at Mason, who was in the process of getting in the vehicle. At that moment, I was purely fueled by adrenaline and restlessness.

"You look like you're about to do something insane."

"How do you feel about stealing a gas tanker?", I chuckled.

"Yep, insane.", he sighed, dropping his hand onto the seat. "You know, the light from your phone makes you look even more crazy."

"You know I get restless sometimes. Mix that with random urges and psychopathy and you get me."

We sat in silence for the rest of the journey over. As soon as the car stopped, I pulled out my phone and checked for surveillance, looping their feed to cover us. I hopped out of the car onto the wet pavement once I was sure the cameras were diverted, Mason jumping out and jogging after me.

The courtyard was illuminated by security lights decorating the wet ground with little sparkles, the rain visibly falling around the orange and white lights. The smell of rain mixed with the breeze off the river and a hint of petroleum washed over me before fading into the background. It was perfectly quiet except for the small drops of water hitting the ground and the electric hum of the lights and machinery. I grabbed Mason and dragged him in the direction of the storage units, seeing the trucks parked nearby.

When we reached the LPG trucks, I tapped on the side of one and listened to the resonation. It sounded with a metallic, hollow, empty echo, meaning it was empty. I grinned, probably slightly manically, at Mason, who was already picking the lock on the driver side door, holding a small flashlight in his mouth. He made quick work of it before yanking the door open.

I heard footsteps and my hand instinctively went to my knife. I turned and saw a man in a protective suit approaching with a bucket in his hand. He raised his hands up defensively.

"Dmitri sent me.", he said from behind the protective face mask. "Now let me get this thing filled up for you."

For the next hour, Mason and I watched him load the truck. I took careful notes of how he handled everything, from pressurizing the tank to the order in which he opened the valves. Never knew when I would need this information again.

"When you're ready to open the side valves, open that box and open those valves. The master valve is what controls whether or not the fuel flows. After that, the lever on the side just needs to be pulled down after you hook up your hose.", he said, before showing us how to hook up the hoses. Before we left, he handed me a bunch of papers and a set of keys. "Identifications. They have to check the drivers for qualifications and the route, but since I checked you, you should be good to go."

I thanked him with a nod before grabbing the bucket and handing the papers to Mason as we made our way to the front of the vehicle. Once we were settled in the truck, I pushed the key into the ignition and turned it, hearing the engine spring to life. The clock on the dash glowed 1:57.

I slowly eased the truck out of the lot and towards the exit, before turning back out onto the A13 and flipping the windshield wipers on. We drove in silence for a while, the occasional streetlight filling the dark cabin with a soft orange glow. I snuck a glance at Mason, who in turn looked at me. We sat for a moment, looking at each other before we both burst out laughing at the absurdity of the situation.

"Oh, I missed this. Here, call Serena and put her on speaker phone.", I said through laughter, digging my phone out of my pocket and handing it to Mason. He took it and tapped the screen before holding the phone between us. After the fourth ring, the line connected.

"Hey hon, did you make it?" Serena's bright tone echoed throughout the cabin.

"Yeah, we did. It's wet here and I don't like it. Also, I got bored so I asked Dmitri if there was anything he needed done, so we're heading out to do that right now. What's going on with you?", I grinned as Mason chuckled quietly.

"Nothing much. I'm having a drink right now and reading. I was gonna take a bath later and maybe talk to a politician interested in covering up the bribes he's been taking. You two sound happy. What's going on?"

"Mmm, keep his information, I wanna see what else we can do with him.", I said as I gently maneuvered the truck around a slow-moving car. "And nothing much really, we're on the A13 right now."

"Why do you sound so far away?", Serena asked. Trust her to figure out location from acoustics. "You're not in a car, are you?"

"We stole a gas tanker.", I giggled. A dramatic gasp emanated from the phone and I bit my lip to keep from losing it again. "I told you, baby, midnight is when I thrive."

"Your girlfriend has an insane plan that she won't tell me, and she has this sort of manic look in her eyes.", Mason said, looking between me and the phone. I chuckled as I slowed down and eased into a curve.

"Listen, it involves arson.", I said, holding up a hand.

"And you needed a tanker? Hon, are you committing arson or a small scale explosion?", came Serena's concerned but amused tone. I smiled at the sound of her blatant exasperation as I maneuvered the truck down the small road into the dead-end alley.

"Yes."

"Are you blowing up the tanker?"

"No. Thanks for the idea, hon, but that's our escape."

"So what are you planning on doing?"

"Cover the floor in gasoline, light it on fire.", I said, checking my pocket for the lighter I usually carried with me. A smirk crossed my face when my fingers found purchase on the smooth exterior of the device.

"The question is, how do we cover the entire floor?", Mason asked as we pulled next to the decrepit building.

"Bucket.", I said, parking and pointing at the white plastic bin in Mason's foot area. Grabbing my phone from him, I pushed the door open with my foot and jumped down into the narrow street. I slammed the door behind me, taking in the small alleyway.

There was a streetlight at the entrance of the road where it forked off into two different directions. The road we were on disappeared into dark shrubbery a few hundred feet forward. The other road led to a small area of car garages. A few rusting trucks sat abandoned with a restricted area sign in a fenced-off area right where the pavement split.

"Why are you setting the place on fire?", Serena asked.

"Family member wanted a rich relative dead or something. I just had the whim for some good old fashioned arson.", I hummed, turning and looking at the building, leaning against the truck.

The building was in a serious state of decay. There was a gaping hole in the wall where a window should have been, stretching from a few feet off the ground and ending about a foot from the roof. Many of the intact windows were broken in several panels and there was debris all around the walls.

"Well, as long as you're having fun."

"Mmm. How do you feel about going on an adventure, baby?', I muttered, pushing away from the truck and opening the door again. "Is there a light in there?", I asked Mason.

He rustled around in the glove compartment for a minute before handing me a small flashlight. I checked to make sure it worked before getting out of the truck again. I walked over to the hole where the window used to be and shined the light inside.

From what I could see from outside, the place was covered in graffiti from years of ruin. There was debris all over the floor and I could see some of the skylights on the ceiling had fallen in over the upper level. An eerily repetitive sound echoed from my left, and I realized as I shone my light over, it was water dripping down the concrete beams. Rust stains ran down the wall like little orange streams, striping the concrete.

"What are you doing now?", Serena asked.

"Exploring. I've still got a few hours before he gets here and I don't want the gas to evaporate.", I said. I set the phone on the edge of the wall and hoisted myself over. A few hundred feet to my left, there was an upper level that covered the lower level I was on.

"Tell me about what you see.", she said. I heard rustling and assumed she was curled up with a blanket.

"This side has a bunch of stuff on the floor, there's lots of graffiti. It looks like I'm on the loading level, because there's another floor...", I trailed off, walking up to where the new floor became the ceiling and shining my light up. "There's plaster peeling off the ceiling, windows are broken. I can't find any stairs, so I'm assuming they're on the outside."

Serena hummed. "I can imagine it. What else is there?"

There was a sudden flapping noise from the corner. When I shined the light over, two pigeons had settled on the floor.

"Well, there's pigeons. Can never escape those.", I chuckled. A drop of water landed on my head. "Water. Some of the ceiling is falling in and so the water is deciding to drip on me. There's a mess of wires and piping."

"Sounds interesting. Take some pictures before you put a match to the place.", she murmured. This conversation was lulling her to sleep, I could tell by her pauses and coherency.

"You know I wish I was there.", I admitted quietly, I did every business trip. Of course, work came first in this profession, but it felt like leaving a piece behind, a little piece missing.

"Yeah, I know. Me too."

"Go to sleep. You sound like you need it."

"Mmph, yeah. Night.", she said, hanging up the phone. I smiled to myself as I made my way deeper into the warehouse, tucking my phone back into my pocket. I continued across the floor, seeing piles of rubble and rusted pipes and peeling paint.

Up ahead, the open area condensed down into a doorway before opening up again on the other side. I passed through the doorway, seeing the upper level still covered the lower. There was a small office in the distance, and past it, nothing except the wall further back.

I poked around for about an hour, before climbing back out and walking back to the truck. The clock now read 4:17. Mason was asleep, head leaning against the window, but I shook him awake.

"Time to go.", I said as he blinked blearily and clambered out of the cabin.

We hooked up the hoses and I was pleasantly surprised that they were all long enough to hang over the wall I had climbed over earlier. Mason followed the instructions from the man at the terminal and soon the gas was pumping onto the floor. I got the bucket out of the truck and climbed back over the wall. Filling the bucket, I dumped it in the middle of the large area and did this multiple times to cover most of the area. The smell of gas was overwhelming and slightly dizzying, so I kept Mason out. Once the truck was empty, the hoses put away, and most of the floor covered, I told him to move the truck after the other man arrived.

I walked over to one of the closed side doors and kicked it a few times to get it to open. Mason appeared next to the doorway, leaning against the brick and crossing his arms.

"Meet him and send him in?", he asked, staring at the garage across the narrow lane.

"Yeah. And then get away from the building.", I said, turning away from him and walking back inside just as I heard a car pulling up. I heard Mason talk with him before a middle-age man in a casual suit stepped into the building, wandering closer and looking around himself before his eyes landed on me.

"Are you the one with the proposition? I was told that someone was here to discuss a business deal.", he called, walking over to me.

"You've been very successful, haven't you? Congratulations, real estate is one hell of a business.", I said, tucking my hands into my pockets, feeling for the lighter. "But you've been naughty. Flaunting your illegitimate earnings?"

"What? How did you know-? I thought we were going to-?", he stuttered, looking aghast. This would have been great blackmail material, I thought.

"I know lots of things. By showing off, I think you've rather got yourself into a situation. See, a relative of yours wants what you have, and I'm going to give it to him.", I hummed, pulling out the lighter and flicking it on. I saw panic fill his features when he saw the flame. Smirking, I dropped the device and suddenly, everything was ablaze.

I chuckled as the man's face twisted in torment as the flames caught on his pants and climbed up his body. He fell to the floor with a cry of agony. I felt the flames licking at my skin as well, could feel the heat searing my skin, the blood in my veins literally boiling. It didn't bother me. In fact, the heat only intensified the rush.

"How the hell are you still standing? What the hell are you?", he screamed as his body was encased in flames. His body couldn't help him now, it'd given up on him. I could see his skin starting to disintegrate in places and looking down, I could see mine doing the same, hot blood running down my arms. Fifth-degree burns ran down into the muscle and started to burn the bone.

"A puppeteer.", I answered, staring down at him before walking, albeit difficultly, towards the door, tuning out his cries of distress. He'd be dead any minute now, what with the fumes and of course, the fourth and fifth-degree burns.

I reached the fork in the road before my own body gave up on me and I collapsed against the fence with a groan. Mason ran around the corner and dumped the bucket over my head, which he had filled with water. I checked to make sure it put out all the fire. He helped me up, wrapping my arm around his shoulders and walking us back to the truck, more hobbling in my case. I settled stiffly into the passenger's seat while Mason started the engine.

"You didn't tell me you were going to set yourself on fire.", he grumbled, driving down the road and pulling out into traffic on the main road. I shrugged, watching my blood drip onto the seat from the open burns.

"I told you I was bored."

"So you set yourself on fire?"

"Yeah."

"Well, that does seem your style.", he conceded. I grinned weakly, the fumes from the gas and fire fogging my brain as the adrenaline wore off. "Are you going to die?"

"From these burns? Yep, think so. It's fuzzy.", I said, looking around and finding I was having a hard time with coordination.

"Lay down.", he said. I followed his instruction, laying across the seat and closing my eyes, letting the silence wash over me.