First Assignments, Onyx

 

It sounded easy enough.

He read through the file, staked out the target for a few days, and then made a plan. He was prepared. Unlike the other recruits in the academy, he didn’t want to show he was the best at anything. He was already the youngest recruit, and he wasn’t pulled from Blade like the rest of them. He hadn’t wanted any more attention called to himself. He had done all his real training behind closed doors. He waited until the others were in bed or at lunch to make sure he could handle all the weapons. He kept himself in the middle of the pack.

He hadn’t thought twice about the job. At least until he stood on the rooftop across the street from his first target. It had become real. He was going to kill this man. His heart rate accelerated the longer he stood there. Even with all his skill and training, his hands trembled as he watched.

Easy had been the wrong word.

This man, Caleb, was a businessman. Onyx had followed him from meeting to meeting, looking for anything that could’ve landed him on Garrote's radar. It wasn’t until the third day he figured it out. Caleb spent some of his nights as a bookie for the humans. If they got behind… Well, then, he would use his magic to torment them. He had taken out two Blade teams that had come for him. Now, he just needed to be dealt with. Why Onyx had to follow him.

It needed to be an accident. Caleb was too well known to disappear and had too many friends to let it become an unsolved murder. He checked over all this gear for the fifth time before watching for Caleb to go to bed for the night. That night, he took longer than the others. It made Onyx fidget. There was a deadline. He didn’t want to wait.

When Caleb finally got in bed and turned off the light, Onyx glanced at his watch. He wanted to wait at least an hour. It was an agonizing hour. It was freezing on the roof as he waited.

After exactly an hour, Onyx got to work. He picked his way back across the U-shaped roof until he was standing above Caleb’s apartment. It would be the most dangerous part. Scaling the side of the building, past another apartment, without being noticed. He had attached the thick nylon rope when he got there before he settled in to watch Caleb’s night. He ran it through his harness and tossed the end over the side.

He took a deep breath as he stepped up to the ledge. He couldn’t believe he was going to go through with it. It was surreal. He hopped back and let his feet plant firmly on the smooth taupe wall. He made quick work of dropping two floors. The window he had chosen was always left cracked. People aren’t as worried about locking their windows on the 12th floor. Even in a city.

Onyx pushed the window open slowly, listening for any sounds inside. He sat on the window sill and waited to see if anyone noticed. When everything stayed silent, he swung his legs in and unhooked himself from the rope. He patted his pocket to make sure the vial was still secure.

He set his jaw and moved quietly through the apartment. When he got to the bedroom, the bed was empty. He bit back a curse. He didn’t know where Caleb could’ve gone, but he couldn’t be caught there. Onyx heard movement from down the hall and slipped into the shadows of the bedroom. When Caleb ambled into the room and flung himself on the bed, Onyx was hesitant to even breathe. He couldn’t be seen.

He stood perfectly still, keeping a careful hold on his breathing, until Caleb started snoring. Onyx slipped the vial and a syringe from one of the pockets on his vest. The Garrote healers had been working on a new serum, adalite. It was supposed to nullify magic and cause heart failure. He didn’t know how they had done it, but it made jobs like these easier, so he wouldn’t complain. It had to be kept warm, and once the seal on the vial was broken, he only had minutes to use it before whatever magic in the adalite would vanish, rendering it useless.

Onyx slowly pushed the needle in by the rim of the vial. In all the tests he had done, it was the quietest way to break a seal like this. As soon as the needle punctured the thin layer of aluminum, there was a hiss. Caleb bolted upright and looked right at him.

With a growl, Caleb launched himself to his feet. Onyx swore as he drew the fluid up into the syringe. He had to make it fast, or he couldn’t finish the job as instructed. Even with two more vials on him, he couldn’t leave any other marks. He couldn’t mess up his first assignment.

He dropped to the ground and rolled under Caleb’s strike. Onyx struck out with the needle but only managed to graze him. A mark he shouldn’t have left. Caleb grabbed books from the bookcase and hurled them at him. They were easy to dodge, and it didn’t take long to figure out why. He had been going for his gun. Onyx whipped his air magic in a frenzy to fling the gun away, but Caleb had been training with metal. It was weak, but there. The gun was caught between the dueling magical forces.

Onyx knew that would be the best way to strike. He leapt forward as he dropped his magic. Caleb snatched up the gun and turned it on Onyx, firing just as he was tackled. The bullet tore through Onyx’s left shoulder as he jammed the needle into Caleb’s bicep and pushed the plunger down.

Caleb tried to bring the gun around to fire again, but his body seized up. Onyx stumbled back from him and collapsed on the floor as he watched the spasms that took over his target. He watched as the life slid from his body. He couldn’t move. His breathing came in ragged bursts.

He had been trained for this. He knew what he was supposed to do. He knew he was supposed to push aside the feeling until later. He knew he was supposed to stand. He knew he needed to clean up the scene. He knew all of it, but he couldn’t move. He was rooted to the floor.

Murderer.

It was the only thought that would slide through his mind, twining to his heart as it squeezed. He didn’t know how long he sat there. Something in him snapped, and he climbed to his feet. The pain in his shoulder was overwhelming. He reached for a tin of salve in his vest. He had to go into the bathroom to examine the wound. After applying the salve, he returned to that bedroom and got to work. The gun was put back in its place, and the books had to be returned to the shelf. He had to drag Caleb closer to the bed as if he had collapsed out of it. He used his air magic to remove all of his blood.

He didn’t have a way to fix the bullet hole in the wall. It couldn’t stay there. He paced as he went through his options. Finally, he pulled the bullet out of the hole and used his air magic to align the pieces. It wasn’t perfect, and if anyone looked too closely, they would see it. It was the best he could do.

He checked the room over one last time and let his eyes linger on the man he had killed before he went back to the window and hoisted himself up. He slid the window closed to where he’d found it. His shoulder protested the climb back to the roof.

He had finished his first assignment.