Some Life This Is - Kate the Chaser X Hoodie

Exposition

Nobody would choose this life, not with knowing exactly what it entails and what it means. Some, though, maybe one in a billion would be happy with what they got with it. The rest that were forced into it would just eventually sink into a blinding black numb that's only cut into by when you get hurt on a mission, or you're deemed the least productive and the boss, The Operator thinks you need a little bit of 'encouragement' to come back up to par with your comrades.
Kate and Hoodie both fall into that second category- as do Tim and Rouge and Skully and a few others in a different group. Really the only one remotely happy with what they do is Toby. Kate has a running theory that it's because, though his memories from before being chosen by the boss are gone, the feelings remain. The embarrassment and anger over being intrinsically different from others between his tics, his inability to feel pain, his BPD, and just generally not processing the world like others do.
That's something the whole group has in common, wether through previous neurological differences or through experience, nobody processes the world like quote-unquote normal, neuro-typical people do.
Maybe that's what attracted the psuedo-god to them in the first place. The tall man, the man without a face, the static personified, the Operator, he who controls every aspect he can of his little pets, little guard dog's lives. Tim and Brian at least briefly had each other or others to talk to and fall back on about their experiences with him. The rest of the lot, Toby and Kate and Rouge had nobody until they were broken in and tossed with each other. I suppose that's why they find themselves where they are now, the five of them in a tiny little hunting lodge in the woods, previously out on a mission but now warm eating a mediocre stew made from a large deer that Kate dragged in, Kate who always feels like she's on the outside, an imposter despite how much evidence there is to the contrary with her family here, this group.
She sits on the porch, alone, breaking down the meat they didn't use and vehemently ignoring her thoughts, going through the motions of breaking down the large animal to use all the parts they can. Her mask, white with black almost scratch marks at the eyes and mouth sits next to her atop her white, now greyed with charcoal, jacket and gloves.
See, the downside to living in a semi-mobile group of serial killers who work under an eldritch psuedo-god is that you spend a lot of time together, and thus also a lot of time learning how to avoid each other. How to sneak past eachother, how to sneak away from the group in the woods or city, and thus also how to sneak up on each other.

"Boo."

Kate jumps, cutting her hand with her hunting knife in surprise. As a knee jerk reaction the knife also ends up at someone's throat.
"Fucking hell, don't do that." The woman said, brows furrowing as they turn back from him to her work. "Gave me a fuckin heart attack." She grumbles, pushing the fur and meat away out of her lap before any of her blood can drop onto it. Kate has been known to be quite paranoid, and like Tim she stays up all sorts of odd hours, despite what Rouge says about needing sleep. It's not like their boss will let them die or anything- a fact she's painfully reminded of as her wound stitches itself together and heals, only stinging briefly and leaving a small scar where it was.
"Sorry, just you seemed like a good target's all." He says, sounding a bit playful in inflections Kate is surprised to hear. He's turned off his voice modulator for the night, probably going to go to sleep soon.
"Sleeping so soon?" Kate asks, not expecting an answer as she puts her knife away and starts cleaning up with his help.
"We had a big day, you should sleep too." Hoodie says, sitting down in a chair near hers, looking out into the woods.
Nobody, not them, Nobody normal, not even the ghosts can shake the paranoia out in the woods here.
"Won't be able to." "Won't?" "Won't." She said blankly, staring out into the woods. Watching Hoodie won't do her any good, his mask stays on at all hours he's with the others and he locks the bedroom door on the rest of them (well, besides Tim. He keeps the one key they found) and they respect his privacy to that.

"I'll keep watch with you." She barely heard him say, before he called in the door to the others that they would be keeping watch. Kate only nodded vaguely at him in response, getting up and setting up the hide to dry to a workable fur, breaking the bones apart with sickening crunches. She gets up and goes around the side, grabbing some woven hemp rope. She ignores the side eyed look Hoodie is no doubtly giving her as she works, tying the smaller bones all together tight so she can boil the meat off without loosing any of them.

Eventually exhaustion does catch up to the both of them, hoodie having fallen asleep around four in the morning with his gun primed. Kate on the other hand succumbed about three hours later when Rouge came out to check on them. She laid blankets over them and left water, Kate barely had enough energy to thank her with a smile, but she did. They all deserved at least something nice, even just a thank you for the little things.

Kate missed the way hoodie turned a little towards her as she drifted off, and was fully out by the time Tim came out and carried her inside to the couch to sleep a little more comfortable while Rouge woke Hoodie up to take over watch.