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Dealings with the ONI - Chapter One
Posted By: Virroken<immameanbunny@hotmail.com>
Date: 18 January 2006, 4:09 am
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Dealings with the ONI - Chapter One
"Hey buddy, you can't be doin' that."
I ignore him.
"Hey, hey! Buddy, I'm talkin' to ya."
The sound of his voice reaches my ears, but in my brain, it does not register. Instead, I concentrate on my task, my hands already flying furiously with steady, sure skill. A bead of sweat, unwelcomed, forms on my forehead and trickles slowly down. I follow it, consciously, mentally tracing its path on my face as gravity pulls it slowly but surely towards my brow. The drop of salty wetness rolls around my dark eyebrows with spiteful ease and nestles itself firmly, maliciously, on the tip of a slender eyelash.
"Awwright, buddy. Cut the crap. You know you can't be doin' that."
He walks towards me.
This time, my mind reacts. In the very edge of my peripheral vision, I watch him, sizing him up, though most my attention stays riveted unwaveringly on the mocking face of the locked door. I catalog his movements, quietly assessing his threat potential. He draws nearer ever so slowly, taking his time, careful to avoid the piled heaps of garbage strewn about the back alley we occupy together. As he comes within eight meters of me, he steps within a golden-yellow pool of lamplight, allowing my eyes to discern his features with greater clarity. In the light, he seems much diminished, wearing a standard night-guard's uniform –crisp blue shirt, slightly out of place in a damp back-alley like this, and pressed black slacks, already dirty at its cuffs, grimed by our surroundings. The brass symbol of his authority shines dully with reflected orange light. He is invitingly weak, without even a nightstick on his hip to defend himself with.
"Step away from t—"
His voice becomes muted by my insanely focused mind.
I raise my left arm across my face and wipe the sweat from my eyes against the cloth covering my bicep, wasting a precious second. My upraised hand slips instinctively into a concealed pouch on my right shoulder, not wanting my already superfluous movement to be wholly meaningless. It returns to its position, a thin lock pick held snugly in its grasp. I hold my adversary tight, and proceed to torture him. It screams, writhing in pain, but my trained hands know what to do –thrust, jiggle- click. The defeated padlock surrenders, and falls quivering, opened and overwhelmed, into my waiting hand.
"Buddy, buddy! Aw mother…"
I don't have to look to know. By now, he's close enough to notice my gloves, surgical latex superimposed upon thin woolen gauntlets, doubly layered to confuse the inevitable police and ONI involvement. I regard him, with central vision now, as his eyes widen at the sight of my masked hands. He reaches, sluggishly, for the hand radio trapped bereaved at his side, his hands fumbling numbly in his haste. He frees it from its straps, and draws it closer to his mouth, his finger itching to set into motion a string of events starting with the broadcast of his voice and ending with my eventual capture or death.
His actions set off a series of reactions in me so instinctive that I am not aware of them until after they have been completed. Immediately, my hands empty themselves of the useful, but defiantly condemning, tools of my trade and draw, seemingly from nowhere, my M6C as well as the last of my omnipresent companions in crime. He raises the radio to his mouth. He speaks.
And my gun speaks with him.
I stand firm as the shock of recoil hits my arm, watching him as he staggers backwards, yet unharmed. My bullet strikes home, lodging itself firmly into the now incapacitated communicator. He recovers slightly, somehow stumbling back onto his feet, holding mangled in his hands his only means of defense.
I sprint, I dash –I cover the two meters separating us– and my ever-present companion, four inches of polished stainless steel, glinting and grinning, plunges deep into his chest. He cries out in pain, but his cries fall only on my deafened ears. His hands fly to the wound, trying to force out the protruding handle of my beloved dagger. I allow him- I assist him in removing the blade, pulling it out with what seems like mercy. Afterwards, he lays in a filthy back-alley, earning nine dollars and seventy-five cents for each hour he bleeds slowly to death.
He turns his head towards me, the shock keeping the pain of his wound at bay still evident in his eyes, as I rummage quickly through his pockets. My hands deftly fish out his wallet, making this seem like nothing more than a back alley mugging, and force the radio from the stiff death grip of his grasp. No sound, save the pitiful moans of the guard, travels through the air as I pad softly to an unopened garbage bag. It rustles, briefly, crinkling almost musically as I untie it and drop both of the dying man's possessions inside- the police won't think to look, the ONI will. I retie the knot on the plastic covering rotting filth, and move to the already defeated door. Turning back, I take one last look at my victim.
He tries to say something to me.
Opening the door and stepping stealthily through, I ignore him.
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