The Neo-Metropol Heist

4: Artem

Harry Cain was in no way related to Artem, but close family ties and experiences had brought them together in a way that blood never could.
Originally a 'business' acquaintance of Artem's father, Artem had taken to calling him 'Uncle Harry', a tradition that he preserved out of sentimentality and personal amusement, as the old man found it frustrating.
A world-renowned mechanic, Harry owned a garage in Long Island, just off the main island, where he maintained and repaired jump-cars as a front for his incredibly lucrative business buying illegally obtained items and selling them on as a fence.
Artem stepped out of the elevator that came up from the street into the second-floor garage.
It took him a while to spot the old man, dressed in a grubby vest and jeans, hunched over a low vehicle with decorative rear wings and a narrow front - a decadent over-compensator for men who had no imagination.
Every few seconds, there was a flash of light from a welding torch as Harry repaired something that Artem had no interest in.
Instead of interrupting him and risking the business end of the torch, Artem instead strode across the dirty garage floor to the floor-to-ceiling windows on the far side of the room. Set against the wall was a tired looking old kitchen with little more than a fridge and a microwave.
Artem opened the door the fridge and began to root around, moving bottles of beer out of the way and eventually discovered what appeared to be a ham sandwich wrapped in cling-film. He unwrapped it and took several bites, shutting the door and revealing Harry's ireful glare.
"That's my lunch, you ungrateful little turd," Harry rumbled, wiping sweat from his brow with his thick wrist.
"It's 9pm," Artem reasoned.
"Then it's my dinner."
Artem shrugged.
"I'll buy you another," he said.
Harry sniffed and dropped the welding torch on a cabinet to his left.
"Yeah, well, you're still a little turd," Harry relented, turning away and heading back to the other side of the garage, with Artem following, "there was something in the news earlier about somebody hitting the Astoria a couple of days ago. Say they dragged out a hundred thousand plus haul before the guards knew a thing about it. That you?"
Artem feigned mock coyness when Harry stopped at a wardrobe on the far side of the room and turned to look at him.
"A hundred k is a lot of jewels; you hauled all that out yourself?" Harry questioned.
"Believe me, I want to say yes, but only half of that was me," Artem admitted, finishing the sandwich and speaking as he ate.
Harry opened the doors of the wardrobe, pulled out a creased and torn check shirt and threw it on.
"Half?"
"Okay, maybe more like thirty five percent, somebody else had the same idea. Me and Cad were only there for the main piece of the new exhibit, the Argus Diamond," Artem told him.
Harry slumped onto a sofa that was pushed out of the way and Artem sat next to him, no matter the years that had passed, he always felt like a child when talking to Harry.
"Let's see the thirty five percent," Harry finally said.
Artem obliged, removing the diamond from the messenger bag he wore across his shoulder. He had wrapped it in a sheet of lead-lined fibre to prevent it being scanned by the security checkpoints across the city.
Harry took it and unwrapped it from the sheet, whistling as it was revealed and holding it up to the light. In his hand it looked much less impressive.
"It's pretty," Harry said, the delicate word heavy and forceful on his tongue, "I can move this, give me a week, I have some contacts over in Monte Carlo who have been drooling over this little beauty since the dark ages."
Artem agreed, noticing that he hadn't actually asked for Harry to fence the jewel, but that Harry had immediately known. He placed it carefully back into the sheet and placed it into his pocket carefully.
"Where's your android friend?" Harry asked, talking about Cad.
"He tends to cause trouble at checkpoints so he stays at the apartment unless I need him, plus, the place is a dump and he is supposed to be a service droid," Artem explained.
Harry frowned.
"That's a shame, I like that guy, he's polite," he lamented, half-sarcastically and half-seriously.
"I'll make sure to tell him," Artem grinned.
Harry leaned back into the sofa and looked Artem square in the eyes.
"So, that clears up the thirty-five percent - what about the other sixty-five?" He asked, his tone serious.
Artem reluctantly pulled a screen from his satchel, as thin as his fingernail and handed it to Harry, who made it look like a comedy prop.
"I pulled this from Cad's databanks, it's from the job. Somebody else was there at the same time as us."
Harry watched the screen intently as the footage from their exit from the Astoria played out. Artem could see the inverted image from the side he was sitting.
He watched as the mysterious woman in the mask appeared.
"I'm guessing you aren't security," he heard himself say, his voice higher than he thought it was.
He heard the scuffle between them and a thud and groan as he hit the ground, vaguely remembering the pain he felt in his side. Harry roared with laughter.
"She kicked your ass, huh?" He boomed.
Artem scowled and took the slate from him.
"Yeah, hilarious - any idea who she was?" he asked sulkily.
Harry shook his head.
"She's wearing a mask, I can't tell from height and hair."
That was what Artem had expected, but that didn't make it any more disheartening.
"That's what I thought, I had Cad run her through all the databases I can think of and he came up with nada," Artem explained.
"So either our lady here is a first-timer or she's..."
"Never been caught before," Artem finished, "that's impressive and annoying."
Harry nodded.
"Can I keep that?" He asked, "I'll take a look at it and keep an ear to the ground. She's bound to fence the stuff she took once the heat dies down, we can try and track her through that."
"Great," Artem agreed, handing the slate back to Harry.
"Plus, if you leave this here I can watch you get your ass kicked as often as I like!" Harry guffawed again.
"Oh, you're an awful human being," Artem told him.
"I have never claimed otherwise," Harry chuckled, wiping away a tear.
Artem shook his head and stood up from the sofa, swinging his bag over his shoulder.
"I'll drop you a line once I've shifted the diamond and I'll see if I've picked anything up on your sparring partner," Harry told him.
Artem thanked him and turned to leave.
"By the way, try not to get your ass kicked on the way home, kid," Harry called after him.
Artem turned back, flipped him the middle finger, and left, leaving Harry laughing to himself.