Specs

“Reset your password?” The touch screen mockingly blinked rhythmically. This single moment was the culmination of years of sacrifice. I thought to myself in retrospect of all the horrible things I’d chosen to do, all of the people I’d chosen to hurt just to arrive at this point. I found solace in the fact that after this job I wouldn’t have to do this anymore, wouldn’t have to be this person anymore. I could retire in peace. The question was, did I have the fortitude to see this through? Did I have the constitution and willpower to do what was needed just one more time?

A smirk crossed my face unknowingly as the words left my lips in a mumble. “Hell yes, I did.”

“Oi Specs er’thing alright in there?” A voice quietly with a hint of worry called out from the open doorway behind me. I must have been an eerie sight just then. Smirking wildly, my face illuminated by the glint of my handheld throwing wicked shadows across the angles of my features, while seemingly mumbling to myself and hovering over my sinister business.

“Yeah, Let’s get out of here.” I replied emotionless and matter-of-factly.

As we entered the darkened stairwell of the skeleton of some new skyrise project that we were currently escaping, the lumbering hulk of a man spat out.

“I ‘ont see why ya always be wearin’ em specs.”

I opted not to reply.

“I’s guess it’s part a’ yer mad bomber motif eh?” he half said to himself when he realized I wasn’t going to be forthcoming.

After traversing the remaining stairs and the steel access door we found ourselves back at Mr. Frank’s car. He was never far away from these sorts of jobs. He likes to watch.

“Is it done?” The lean man asked in his gravelly voice through a haze of smoke as we opened the back door and shuffled into our seats.

Looking into his square face lit only by the cigarette idly perched between his lips my only reply was a nod. At that affirmation, the bald driver handed Mr. Frank a handheld. Following a few heartbeats and the audible tapping of practiced fingers on the device's screen he said levelly and calmly but with a veiled threat dripping behind his lips.

“Where’s the show Mr. Specs?”

He was looking up at the building. Not the one the human ox and myself had been in but the one adjacent to it and several stories up. The apartment building where a rival boss of Mr. Frank hid. This was his preferred method of disposing of obstacles, using someone like myself to shape explosives like a massive incendiary shotgun blast. He liked it because it was loud, effective, and sent a message and he liked to be there to see it through. The problem was no matter how skilled of a painter you were, you were still painting with a cannon-sized shotgun full of explosives, and there was bound to be collateral damage.

I could see the rage begin to seeth that he was tamping down. good.

“It has to be the antenna, something might be interfering. I can fix that.” I said coldly hoping the sweat beginning to bead on my forehead didn’t bely me.

“We’re coming with you.” Mr. Frank replied, regaining control while fixing his tie and stepping out. He liked to see things through. “You better not mess this up. It took a lot of time and money to guarantee Guerrera would be here.”

“You can always just replace me like you did the guy before me after this, but right now I need to fix this.” Confidence slid back into me once again.

His eyes twitched in a second of confusion before it was gone at my statement. In silence, we scaled the stairs and entered the large empty room, whatever it was going to be if anything after today, where my work stood waiting for us. I positioned myself before the behemoth machination of death and made a show of checking an antenna. Mr. Frank stepped up to watch over my shoulder followed closely by the ox and his bald man. good. I stood and turned toward him, our faces feet away. His features contorted in confusion as I handed him the ID of Tony Hitsugawa, a 36 year old lanky and slightly balding man. Mr. Frank’s original demo man, and the man I put a nine-millimeter brass round through the left eye of, 2 years ago. It was then I pulled my square shades down to reveal my eye because where the other should have been was a crater of scar tissue and the remnants of burnt then healed flesh. Recognition settled in then. He knew me for the man I was. The man who had lost his family and presumably died nearly a decade ago. The man he had seen wheeled out on a gurney, a bandage covering an eye lost to a blast similar to the mayhem that could be caused by the device behind me. The device was just feet behind me. There was bound to be collateral damage.

“SHOOT HIM!” he shouted, fear taking over as he lifted an arm in a worthless attempt to protect himself. And his men scrambled and raised their weapons. I revealed the screen of my handheld, it read.

PASSWORD: emily

That name likely meant nothing to him but it meant everything to me. I'm not sure what killed me, the bullets or the hate, rage, and fireball that killed us all.