"Hey!"
One in search of the eternal sleep has been granted me. I make no reply in honor of my mistress. I only look up at the one before me.
"Hey jackass I'm talking to you! What're you deaf?!"
"...."
"I seen you over here staring at me! You got some kind of problem?!"
"Yes." It comes out a whisper.
"Oh well maybe I can fix it for you outside!"
"Certainly. Let me lead you to the gate."
"Gate? What the hell are you talking about?!"
It never fails to amaze me how easily the sheep are led to the slaughter. We go outside into the alley behind the bar. I stand there tranquil. My unnamed victim is agitated. I am not surprised. He draws a knife and begins to lunge. I easily sidestep his clumsy, drunken assault and allow him to pass by. He tries again with the same result.
"Are you gonna fight or just stand there!?"
I make no reply but instead I draw my bowie out of its sheath. The moonlight glints off of the blade like a cold, white fire reminding me of the purity of my purpose for being.
He says nothing but closes with me. We dance about a bit and he lunges. I counter and the song our blades make ring through the night. The banshee's wail. He moves in again and I again sidestep. He rights himself and once more lunges but I hear Death's call. It is time. I stop his arm while it is still up high in mid swing. I move to the inside and my knife finds its way home into his belly. His grunt is one more of surprise than pain. At last though he finally learns. To dance with the harbinger of death is to embrace the eternal. No mere mortal can do it and live. I leave him laying there in the alley; cold, lifeless. An empty shell that slowly leaks its fluids out onto the dark earth. The moon plays great tricks with the eyes of the dead. They become flat and have an inward reflection to them. The perfect look of innocence. Life's way of handing out ironies. I sign my work and make my way back into the bar. No one seems to have even noticed that we were gone. They are still immersed in the young girl still on stage.
I resume my seat in the corner and clean the life off of my knife before resheathing it. I continue to watch the people when a woman begins to walk towards me. At first I think that I am about to be granted two harvests in one night, but as she nears I sense that her song is not yet to be sung. She is about 5'7" and in her late twenties. Brown hair and an outfit that most would find seductive. She appears to be well off which makes me wonder what she is doing here. She nears the table.
"Stone?"
"...."
"My name is Pat"
"...."
"You are Stone, right?"
"Yes."
"I'm the one who has hired your...services."
"...."
"I need you to kill someone. Can you do that?"
"Yes. Who did you have in mind?"
She looked at me strangely for a minute before replying in a somewhat surprised tone of voice:
"Well myself, of course."
