MF1.0 - 31 - The Body

The buzz cut looked down at the wound in his chest, gurgled some blood and dropped to the ground. He twitched for a moment, then went still.

‘Crap,’ Stef said, ‘probably should’ve kneecapped him.’

Apparently, it was easier the second time around, as she didn’t feel the urge to hurl this time. It also could have been the surrealism of the moment - everything was so quiet and calm.

''Someone was screaming, and it was her. The darkness of the apartment only served to make it more of a nightmare. She vomited again, then fumbled for the light switch.''

She put the gun on the table and picked up the bottle of water again. There was no point in running - she’d seen at least three security cameras. There was no point claiming self-defence - it hadn’t been.

There was nothing to do but wait. She experimentally nudged the body with her foot, just in case he wasn’t dead. He was, and she didn’t particularly care. ''You know, it’s probably a good thing you declared yourself insane. Normal people don’t think like this.'' Normal people don’t find themselves in this situation. The door clicked open. Time to pay the reaper, hero.

She could see that it was Ryan from the corner of her eye, but she didn’t turn to look at him. The lack of emotion, rather, the lack of remorse, would probably work against her.

Though, at least she wasn’t prancing around in a ballerina outfit soliloquising about the Rorschach-esque shapes that the blood splatter had made.

‘What happened here?’ his voice was a monotone. She heard the swish of his long jacket as he crouched - presumably checking the corpse’s pulse.

She wondered what the point was of checking for a pulse when there was a bloody hole in his chest, and a complete lack of movement. Surely those two indicators were enough to pronounce a person as dead.

She swallowed. ‘Look, ya, mistake, ok? Automatic failure? Just don’t neuralise me ok?’

His voice remained a monotone. ‘Why?’

‘I should have kneecapped him. I panicked, no I didn’t, that’s a damn lie, it felt like the right thing to do, and now you think I’m insane cause I said that, and guess what, I am.’

He put his hand on her shoulder only long enough to spin her to face him. ‘Why did you kill him, Miss Mimosa?’

All the fear slipped away. All of the trepidation. All of the second-guessing.

She looked him and gave him a nod. ‘He was thinking like a member of the Solstice.’

<p style="color:rgb(189,190,190);font-family:Verdana,CenturyGothic,Tahoma,sans-serif;line-height:normal;">‘That’s all?’

<p style="color:rgb(189,190,190);font-family:Verdana,CenturyGothic,Tahoma,sans-serif;line-height:normal;">‘Isn’t that enough?’

<p style="color:rgb(189,190,190);font-family:Verdana,CenturyGothic,Tahoma,sans-serif;line-height:normal;">He looked down to the body. ‘You tell me.’

<p style="color:rgb(189,190,190);font-family:Verdana,CenturyGothic,Tahoma,sans-serif;line-height:normal;">‘Yes,’ she said after a long moment.

<p style="color:rgb(189,190,190);font-family:Verdana,CenturyGothic,Tahoma,sans-serif;line-height:normal;">He didn’t reply, he just stared at the body and the large pool of blood around it. ‘Good.’ The body faded away, and he turned to her.

<p style="color:rgb(189,190,190);font-family:Verdana,CenturyGothic,Tahoma,sans-serif;line-height:normal;">‘A test?’ she asked, ‘or is that simpler than a body bag?’

<p style="color:rgb(189,190,190);font-family:Verdana,CenturyGothic,Tahoma,sans-serif;line-height:normal;">‘A test of course, as everything in life is.’

<p style="color:rgb(189,190,190);font-family:Verdana,CenturyGothic,Tahoma,sans-serif;line-height:normal;">It should have alleviated guilt - problem was, she wasn’t feeling any. On the other hand, that probably wasn’t such a big problem. ‘What now?’

<p style="color:rgb(189,190,190);font-family:Verdana,CenturyGothic,Tahoma,sans-serif;line-height:normal;">He extended a hand. ‘Welcome to the Agency.’