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| Nigel: The Hitman | |
| By alastair79 | ||||||||||||
| 18 May 2006 | ||||||||||||
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Sorry, far too long I know, but found it very hard to wrap up quickly. Hope you enjoy. Thanks. Alastair. To say that my chosen occupation has not paned out exactly as I had hoped would be misleading, my current league stats are fifteen attempted assassinations and none converted. This is not good for a profession that requires a favourable reputation and a happy client base. Probably the closest I have come was to slightly aggravate a targets wrist with a particularly ferocious Chinese Burn, but the man had managed to hit me over the head with fire extinguisher long before I had worked myself into a deadly rage of killing fury. When I came too I was still in the corridor outside my targets apartment, so I knocked on the door and asked him to come out as I had something I wished to tell him. For some reason he didn’t come out and told me in no uncertain terms that I was as mad as a box of frogs. So, consequently, this is my final attempt, if I screw this up I will go back to a job I hate and live out the rest of my life as a could-have-been. Last night, in the pub, I meet my new employer and his name was Trevor. “Evening Nigel”, Trevor said cheerily as he sat down at the bar next to me. “Alright Trev, how’s tricks?” “Great, made a killin’ on the markets today, maybe time for a new motor” Killing, he had just used the code word in open public, very impressive that no one else noticed. Clever, very clever I thought. “A killing you say” “Yep, my wife’s shares rocketed after the company announced new record profit for this year”. He smiled smugly. “Can I have a pint of mild when your ready Jess love” Jess, the provocatively thin barmaid, nodded and moved in her eighteen year old effortlessness as most eyes followed and dreamed. My mind sprang back to what Trevor had said; I couldn’t believe he was being so brazen. I now knew that he wanted his wife dead by means of a rocket, where I was supposed to get a rocket from was another matter. “Rocketed, really?” “Through the roof!” he grinned. Good grief, he wants me to launch his wife on the rocket. This was not going to be easy or cheap. “How much you got?” “About ten grand n’ change” This was massively more then anyone had ever offered before. I say offered, as I never completed an assignment to collect before. Thinking back now, no one ever seemed to be even remotely bothered that I had failed, strange. Well I had to get cracking on a plan so I slugged down the rest of my pint, said farewell to Trevor and walked away. About halfway across the pub I had a sudden attack of uncertainty. Turning round I walked up to Trevor and spoke quick and quiet. “So, you want me to do you wife with a rocket, is that right?” Trevor’s expression gave nothing away; he looked at me with slightly widened eyes then blinked. I took this to mean yes and smiled. “Of course not, just my over active imagination playing up again” He looked a little puzzled but turned back to the bar to finish his drink as I made my exit. Now all I needed was plan of action. Back at home I sat in my workshop looking at the remnants of a normal life, the clutter had come in useful before and I was hoping it would again. A plan was formulating, chuckling quietly I rummaged round and found the box of fireworks from last years bonfire night party that never happened after I managed to set light to next doors shed. A little more digging unearthed the pull along toy dog that I had made for my daughter several years ago. I took my wooden dog over to workbench and began modifying him. I screw fixed half a golf driving range basket to his underside ready for my payload and stuck a few odd scraps of fur material over this to disguise it. I clumping all the fireworks I could inside the basket and wrapped there fuse together so that they would go as one. It was ready to go; now I just had to get her to hold it. Next morning I stuck a lighter in my pocket, the dog in my old banged up polo and drove over to Trevor’s house to wait for his wife to appear. A few minutes later Trevor drove away in his shiny black saloon, golf clubs visible through the back passenger windows. “Today my friend, today”, I said as he disappeared round the corner and there was a knock on the car window. I turned to see PC Graham Star looking back at me, so I swallowed hard and rolled down the window. “Morning Nigel” “M…Morning PC Graham Star”, I stammered out using his full name. He gave me a slight lift of an eyebrow. “Didn’t see you in the pub last night, The Crown and Cricket’s always quiet without you” he said good-naturedly. I fixated on his badge, so shiny and discouraging and I could feel myself shrinking beneath his minty fresh breath. “No, I left early, had some… ah… brass to polish” “Brass polishing!” He said with a little surprise. “Well, you missed Trevor spouting about his windfall”. He knew, how the hell did he find out so quickly and what was Trevor doing spouting about it. Cold, ice cold burning sweat formed a cocoon around my body as I used my shacking voice. “Windfall?” “Yep, come into a bit of money apparently. Told everyone in the pub at least six or seven times. He got so drunk he tried it on with Jess and you could hear the slap in that there London”. He chuckled to himself at the recollection, I managed to force a laugh but it was too high pitched and silly so I stopped. At this point a large green four-wheel drive edged out of Trevor’s drive and turned towards the village centre and straight passed my car. I had to think fast. “Well, it’s been great and we’ve had a laugh but I left my cat and she’s quite small you know” I rambled. “Might have fallen off the curtains and be dead so got to go now, bye”. I swung the car round catching the curb at both sides, chewing up some turf as I went and then accelerated to get behind her, leaving a very puzzled looking PC Star. I pulled my baseball cap a little lower and tailgated her, so as not to loose my target, all the way into the village. A few emergency stops from me later she pulled over to the curb right outside the post office, I slid past and parked a few cars down. I looked down the row of village shops and reckoned that she would probably go to the general store for groceries, so I got my dog from the back of the car and stood by the shop. I waited patiently for her to reappear from the post office “See you later Val, and don’t let Trev spend all your money”, Trevor’s wife turned and waved quickly to the unseen voice lost in the post office. “Not a chance, I want a cruse and a slow dance with the captain”, her voice smiled with the reply. This is it; she’s coming my way. As clandestine as I could I bent down and clicked my lighter underneath the dog and heard the fizzing timer start. I had about ten seconds before the rockets fired and she is dawdling down the road, window-shopping. I had to hurry this up; if she wouldn’t come to the dog I had to take the dog to her. I hurried as slowly as I could, trying to look like I didn’t have a care in the world but the profuse sweating and rapid eye movement told a different story. “Morning Val” I said, coming to a stop and blocking her path. She looked round and recognised me. “Nigel, don’t often see you up and around and this time of the morning”. “Not normally no, please hold my dog”, I blurted out. She looked down just as a wandering spark ignited the fake fur, creating a fast moving fur fire that stripped the dog in less than a second, leaving a wooden skeleton with the lit fireworks in plain view. Panic. “Ah… Please hold my… ah… rocket dog” I said hopefully. The fireworks finally caught with loud release of power and the dog shot off down the main road of the village, teetering and rocking on the red wooden wheels. There were a few yelps as people watched it scoot by and several cars had to swerve to avoid the canine missiles rabid chase. It finally lodged itself under the slightly off white picket fence of local angry man Montague Smith. It felt an age before the rockets finally exploded in great half globes of blue, yellow, red and green, sending a few fence posts splintering into the air to fall like hard rain on cars and houses in the blast radius. My feet hurt as I ran from the scene of devastation, hoping that no one saw my swift exit. I’d left my car, which was stupid, it would be traced back to me and I’d be carted off for sure. I ran the whole mile back to my house, collapsing in a pile on my front door step, breathing hard and feeling the burn up my legs. Later, after PC Star had left, I looked at the bill he had left me for the fence and felt dejected. His word still rang in my head. “Nigel, you really are a pillock. These practical jokes have got to stop. If your not careful, you might end it killing someone, then how would you feel”.
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