Prologue

32 days before Day F

Prologue

                I lay there almost peacefully, listening to the sounds bounce off the walls and into my ears. As I continued to lie still, the sounds started to form queer images just behind my eyes. Concentrating harder, the pictures started to develop into more distinctive objects until the world as seen just beyond the walls around me, was just there, in front of my eyes. I saw the cars speed by on rain wet streets far below. I saw people walking on soft, thick carpets in the hallways under me. And there, right there was the “Old Man”, sleeping peacefully. The image was distorted and imprecise. Every loud noise would distort the picture like a stone, dropped in a pond.

                I moved over to a gap in the white ceiling tiles and opened my eyes. Looking down, I could clearly see why the council had code-named him, “Old Man”. His face was covered in wrinkles and his breathing was raspy. I saw his frail white hair and his delicate, flimsy frame. I could see too that he wore an oxygen mask, to aid him while he slept. I couldn’t imagine then what threat he could possibly pose, but the people who were paying me, and they were paying me a lot, didn’t order a hit for idle reasons, this faded form of a man was more likely than not a sadistic killer, and if the security force guarding him was anything to go by, a dreadfully good one at that. Unfortunately for him though, I’m better. A couple of greased palms, a press pass, and a very long crawl through a ventilation shaft was all it took to get me to get to where I now am, five feet right above my target. He lay there now in his bed, blissfully unaware of what was just above him.

                I removed the ceiling panel in front of me cautiously, careful not to send masses of dust cascading down on the man sleeping below. Maneuvering over to the newly made hole in the ceiling, I started to lower myself down, every one of my motions painstakingly slow. Taking care not to knock anything off the many shelves that littered the walls, I dropped down to the floor from a one handed grab, landing beside the bed with the stealth and grace rivaled by few others in the world. I pulled a long, slender knife out from the back of my suit, wary not to make any noise that might alert the guard’s right outside the door to my presence. Raising the knife up to elbow height, I slid over to the bed where my target was sleeping. The point of the blade moving in small circles now, the anticipation of the kill was agitating me. Maybe someone had made a mistake, maybe this man was no threat at all, what could he possibly be capable of….

                I shook the shadows from my mind,” Az ratheren tü”. I whispered to myself, raising the knife over my head. That’s when I felt it; the blitz crept into my bloodstream like an adrenaline rush times ten. Like a chill down your spine, blitz feels danger far before its host, so I immediately went to full alert. Just at that moment, a spider web crack of light appeared on the floor at my feet. It seemed to grow slowly, centimeter by centimeter and I knew at once what had caused the blitz to go off. I spun around faster than anybody had ever moved. I turned to see the door opening, what would have been quite fast. Instincts taking over now, my foot leapt to the nearest dresser and kicked off it, aiming for the hole in the ceiling, not caring anymore what was knocked down. In the air, I switched my grip on the knife I was still holding and threw it at the now nearly open door.

                         ·          

The knife that the man was carrying, like everything else about him, was quite unusual. It was, in fact, not like anything the world had ever before seen. The assassin that we are fallowing was, “test driving” it, for a company in Charlee, where it was manufactured. The blade itself was only a few millimeters thick, which on its own would have been enough to make it special, but it was even more unique than that. A university in Charlee used cold-laser technology to cut ice into the dagger that now is held by our assassin. Once he stabbed his victim, the blade would be broken off inside and then melt in a matter of seconds. They called it a cold melt. They the original idea of the weapon was diverged from the shanks used in prisons.

As the man brought his weapon to his target, the guards just outside the door learned of the bribe he used to get in the building from a replacement unit that had been sent to relieve them. Previous attempts had, of course, been made on the man’s life of whom they were guarding, and they immediately rushed in. Seeing a man half in the air with a knife in his hand, they instinctively reached for the customized V-12 Raagdoes at their shoulders. Within about one second of seeing the dark figure holding a knife, four guns had been drawn and fired. Due to thee assassin’s blitz enhanced speed, he dodged three of the four in mid-air, but one was all it took. The blue-green bolt hit the man in the abdomen, sending him flying across the room.

The head of the current unit walked over to where the now dead man lay, head half propped against the full ceiling to floor windows, and looked down at him to see a great crimson crater in his side. He looked back at the doorway where his partner was lying silhouetted on the carpet, the knife that was in the killer’s hand just moments before protruding from his chest. As he watched, the handle started to tip over then fall, leaving a thin gap in his white dress shirt that looked all the world like a paper cut but for the red stain that was steadily growing beneath it.

“Damn assassins”, he swore quietly, trying not to wake the still sleeping principle.

 ‘Protect the principle’, that was his job. Together, the gauds quietly dragged the assassin and his victim out of the door.  They put the two in one bag. Tied them to the same rock too before tossing them into the Seaira.