Rogue Assassin

I gasp for air as my eyes shoot open. I’m in a shower. It has glass doors with white tile on one side and blue tile on the other. There’s an indented shelf with a flower tile backsplash. It’d look pretty if it was all there. Half of it is part of a huge hole in the wall. The water in the shower is spraying at me. I’m soaked. The pipe is burst. As I try to stand up I realize two things: One, my head is pounding, and two, there’s a heavy object on my back. I take it off and look at it. It looks like a jetpack, I think. I just set it back into the tub. The bathroom isn’t particularly big; just a shower, sink, toilet, and a small closet. As I look around I notice I’m wearing tan cargo pants and a black tank top. I have black combat boots on. There’s a gun holster strapped to my thigh. With a gun in it. That’s awesome. There’s also a knife strapped to my bicep. This couldn’t get any cooler. But it can. There’s a rectangular device strapped to my wrist. As I try to take in what just happened, a voice starts talking in my ear. I look in the mirror and see that I have an earpiece in. “Are you okay?,” asks the voice in my ear. I don’t respond. “Hello? You there? Kye?” I stare at myself in the mirror. Brown ponytail, blue eyes, light complexion. Kylie. Kye. That’s my name. I think I’m in the Secret Service or something..no, it’s not the Secret Service. It’s a secret service, but not THE Secret Service. I finally respond to the person on the other end of the earpiece. “Isaiah, is that you?” Isaiah is one of my closest friends. We’re co-workers. “Kye! Finally, where’ve you been?”

“I’m not sure. I just woke up in… a shower.”

Isaiah laughs. “Yeah, I lost your signal for a minute there.”

“My signal?”

“Yeah. Kye, are you feeling alright?”

“I mean, my head hurts and I feel kinda confused, but yeah.”

“Hm. Hold on. Let me reset this…”

“Reset wha-” I feel a pulse of energy shoot through me and my head pounds even more than before. My vision gets blurry as I collapse to the floor.

I slowly sit up, my vision clearing up. “What-what happened?” I ask groggily.

Isaiah replies, “Well that did not go as I expected. What’s wrong with you, Kye? You weren’t supposed to react like that.”

“What did you just do to me?”

“Well, I was trying to clear your head up for you. It’s kinda like..How do I put this? It’s like when your computer’s not working and you reboot it. Yeah, that’s it.”

“You reboot me?”

“Pretty much. You were sounding strange.” I suddenly realize that I do remember everything now. My name is Kylie Fox Wells. I’m 22 years old and I’m a black belt in 3 different martial arts. I’m also proficient in firearms which is pretty cool. I work for Marco de Paz. Marco de Paz is the leader of the Gunbacks. That’s a gang, and that gang has a lot of enemies. And those enemies need to be…taken care of. Of course de Paz doesn’t want to do it himself so he hires people. Very specific people, though, who are very good at, well…murder. But the kind of murder that isn’t traceable or observed. So he basically hires assassins. And I’m one of them. It feels normal, being an assassin. But something feels off. Like maybe this job isn’t what I thought it was..

I run all this by Isaiah to make sure I remembered it all correctly. “Yeah, that’s pretty much it, though assassin is a strong word. You’re more like..a trained killer,” he says. Is there a difference? There’s one more thing I need to clear up. “Wait. One last thing. Why was I in a shower? I’m soaked now.” I grab a towel and dry off as much as I can while he explains. “Well, I guess because of the concussion you wouldn’t remember that,” he answers.

“Concussion?”

“Yeah, we have-well, had- a new prototype for a jetpack and you were trying it out. It malfunctioned and you crashed through the wall of this house and into the shower. You burst the pipe as you fell.”

“Sounds about right.”

“Ok, so the next client is in Georgia,” Isaiah says, getting right to the point. A couple of screens project into the air from the device on my wrist. One is a map, the other is a picture of a man. Tattoos on his face, probably in his late thirties. Shaved dark hair. He looks like he runs a gang. He probably does run a gang. Next to the picture it says his age, height, weight, etc. All the ways to identify someone. His name is Bruce Richards. No marital status. That always makes a job a little bit easier I guess. Though it could still be someone’s brother, friend, son. “So if I’m understanding correctly, I’m supposed to kill this guy,” I say to Isaiah.

“You got it,” he replies.

“Where am I now?”

“You’re in St. Louis.”

“How’d I get here?”

“Your last ‘client’ was just a few blocks away.” I feel a shiver run down my spine. I killed someone just a few blocks away? That’s terrifying. I remember the entire thing, too. Joseph Wright. Seemed like a nice guy. The weirdest thing is that it’s scary to think about how many people I’ve killed, but at the same time, it’s normal and I don’t really care. Still, something feels off about all this. I shake the feeling and get back to the “client”. “Alright, how do I get to Georgia? That’s over a ten hour drive and I don’t have a car.”

“Ok, let’s see here…There’s a Tesla outside the house. It’s electric. I’ll try to hack it and get it started.”

“Thanks,” I say, as if that’s completely normal. Well I guess it is. I dry off as much as I can as I make my way to the front door. I’m almost there when I hear a low growl. I turn slowly and see a dog across the room. It’s big, black with some orange, and does not look like it wants to be friends. Looks kind of like a rottweiler. Rottweilers are very good guard dogs. It starts to run at me and I bolt for the door. I swing it open and run out onto the porch. The dog jumps up onto the glass door and is going nuts. “There’s no one home is there?” I ask Isaiah.

“Nope, you’re good.”

“Great. Okay, I see the car, is it ready?”

“Yeah.” “Thanks.”

“No problem; it’s my job.” Isaiah is one of the tech guys for the Gunbacks. He monitors all the “trained killers” and gives them information and stuff. I get to the car, and drive out of the neighborhood. I love driving. If only this was a mustang. I stop at a gas station to get some stuff for the road. I also stop at a thrift store to get some extra clothes and a backpack if I can find one. I do, and fill it with some essentials I found at Walmart. Rope, duct tape, extra mags I found inside my vest, (did I mention I have a bulletproof vest on?) and a couple of burner phones. Luckily I remembered that the device on my wrist has a tap to pay system for all the “trained killers” to get “supplies.” Thanks, Marco. I know, it seems a bit excessive for one job, but I’m a bit out of it so I have to be prepared. Oh, and I should probably mention that I’m not going to go kill Bruce Richards. I had to get all that stuff because back at HQ they track what I do so I had to look convincing. And hey, you never know when you’ll need this stuff. Anyway, I’ve been thinking, and this whole thing that Marco De Paz is running is wrong. It’s time he’s brought to justice. I feel pretty prepared for what I’m about to do, but one, I don’t have a plan, and two, I need help. So maybe I’m not so prepared. I do know, though, that I’m going rogue and I need to get off of De Paz’s tracking system and get somewhere safe. It’ll take some convincing, but I think I can get Isaiah on my side. But where to start?