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Down in the Dirt v062

Individualism

William Avett

    I’ve always considered myself a loner. Sure, they taught us to be self-reliant and not to depend on anyone, but I’ve always been that way.
    Ever since I can remember I’ve had to rely on my own wits and ingenuity. No one ever pulled my chestnuts out of the fire, and I wasn’t about to start helping anyone else, either.
    So, when I got the contract to eliminate subject Terry Henderson, heir of the Henderson Corporation, I treated it like any other job. I had no idea who wanted her dead, or why, and it was none of my business. A deal was a deal, and I took the five thousand Credits down payment like any other job. After all, I was a professional.
    They gave me her complete schedule for the next six months, her normal routine, her habits, her likes and her dislikes. I grew to know Miss Terry Henderson better than I knew myself. And, as I grew to know her, I understood her faults and her foibles. She was an idealist, a rich sentimentalist out to save the galaxy. But, someone found her exploits disturbing, and wanted them terminated, permanently.
    So, I booked passage on the first flight to Tenachi, a world of vast oceans and rolling beaches. It was a vacation world, really, newly discovered and just at the early exploitation stage. I found it a beautiful planet, and an ideal place to carry out my contract.
    Terry Henderson would spend two fun filled weeks on the planet, free from her worries, and secure in the knowledge that her good works would protect her from the worst of man. I would regretfully change her mind of that assumption.
    Thus, after a week of tailing her from afar, and observing her every movement, I decided it was time to make my move. Tonight she would stay at a secluded beach house on Lansen Peninsula. I got there way ahead of time, and dug in.
    I scanned her hovercraft as it passed overhead, and read no extra security personnel, not even a rob-guard or two. She set down at the small landing pad, and carried in a bag, and then came back for two more. She was wearing beach clothing, and I decided the data file hadn’t done her justice.
    The surveillance gear kicked on, and I watched her unpack, and relax for the evening. She fixed a light dinner with her own hands, and ate it quietly while reading an old-fashioned paper book. The data file hadn’t mentioned that side of her, either. I guess they didn’t consider it relevant to the job at hand.
    An hour later she marked her place between the pages, and cleaned up the table. I knew she was heading for bed. Sometime after midnight I would pay her a visit, the last visit she would ever receive.
    She took a shower, and crawled into bed. I’m not really a voyeur, and so tried to stay professional. But, with so many people in the universe, I felt it sad that someone had picked her out for termination.
    And, I hadn’t seen her beat a servant, or even pull a tantrum—not what you would expect from the typical heiress of a family fortune. She certainly did deserve her reputation of being an angel in an earthly body, and in more ways than one.
    I patiently waited till she drifted off to sleep, and then made my move. Deactivating the exterior sensors, I crept across the beach sand to the back door. The lock opened immediately to my override code, and I was inside.
    This part I hated the most. Other professionals would complete the contract from a distance, but I felt that was cowardice. If you couldn’t face your target, see into the person’s soul, then what kind of a person were you? I had long ago decided that society required my personal attention, and I would perform every job with the same individual interest and commitment.
    So, I made my way into her bedroom, and approached her sleeping form. She didn’t stir as I raised my Neuroncer and pointed it at her face, so calm and serene without a care in the world, a face that smiled upon the universe, and seemed to make it a better place.
    “Hello, John,” she said, opening her eyes.
    I almost fired by reflex even then, but for some reason I didn’t. She represented the society that I hated, despite her attempts to make it right. It was my privilege and duty to continue my revenge upon that society and terminate her life. But, for some reason I did not.
    “Second thoughts?” she asked.
    “How do you know my name?”
    “I know all about you, John. I know about your life, about your treatment at the orphanage, about how you survived on the streets of Alpha-9. And, I know, about what you’ve done.”
    “What I’ve done?”
    “You’re here to kill me, aren’t you?”
    “Yes,” I replied.
    “Then, perhaps you had better get on with it.”
    I raised my weapon, pointed it between her eyes, and began to squeeze the trigger. Something wasn’t right. I backed off a few feet, reached over, and turned on the light.
    Her hair spread across the pillow, lovely face smiling with a twinkle in her eye—she did almost look like an angel. I could understand now how people might see that in her.
    “What’s going on,” I said. Mysteries disturbed me, and never before had a victim asked me to ‘get on with it’.
    “I had to meet you,” she said. “I had meet you on your terms, to understand that which you see.”
    “Go on.”
    “You and I are much alike, John Stanton. You have a gift, but do not know it. You have shrouded yourself in hate and vengeance, and have not seen the other side.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “You can see what truly lies within people, their evil and their good, but you have turned your heart away from the good.”
    I raised my weapon in anger. “I’ll kill you,” I said.
    “And you can, John. It’s so easy. And, you’ve done it many times before, but not from a distance. No, never from a distance. You must face the evil in each of your victims to justify your actions of revenge. But, you refuse to look at the other side of them.” She smiled. “I am the other side, John. If I were raised as you, and you as me, our roles would be reversed.”
    “You would be a murderer?”
    “Yes, I would. John, we both have the ability to see the good and the evil in others. It is our curse, and our gift. Few can do this, and fewer still can rise above to see both sides. I believe that you can.”
    “And, if you’re wrong?”
    “Then I will die, John, and sometime later, another will kill you, and the universe will be a lesser place.”
    I didn’t understand what she was saying. It was some kind of moralist garbage. I again raised my weapon. Unlike my other victims of revenge, she showed no fear, seeming to accept whatever fate I would dispense with the pull of my finger, a fate that some day another would dispense to me.
    “What can I do?” I asked.
    “You have been alone, John. Join me, and a few others like myself. We are the harbingers of the future, John. We do our best to mold society for the better. Without us, the hurt you have experienced would spread across the galaxy. We Guardians protect the future, and we need those who have seen the ugly past.”
    She rose up from the bed, the sheet falling to her waist. I looked into her eyes, and threw the Neuroncer across the room. Somehow I knew her. Perhaps I always had.
    “You have been alone for so many years,” she said. “Be alone no more.” Then we kissed, as if it were the most natural thing in the world to do.
    “You’re still in danger,” I said. “They will hire someone else to kill you, and I don’t know if I can protect you.”
    “Don’t worry, John, everything will be fine.”
    “How can you say that?”
    “Because I’m the one who hired you.”



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