The Fall and Rise of Black Assassin

by Kirk Twyman

  “No,” Frank said, and I turned back to him. “I recognized his humanity. I recognized his pain. But I didn’t forgive him. I just realized that trying to spend all day trying the kill the unkillable man wasn’t worth it. It wouldn’t change anything in the long run.”

  Frank pulled his chair closer to me. “It’s all about the long game, son. You want to create a world where what happens to you doesn’t happen to anyone else? Then you gotta play the game the long way. Revenge is just a short game with a bitter prize.”

  “And your pal the Black Assassin?” I asked, still reeling from his words. “What about him?”

  “He’s not my pal. This isn’t some Hallmark movie. This isn’t about closure. It’s about destiny. His. Mine. And maybe even yours,” Frank said. “Him and I will meet again one day. I don’t know how exactly it will play out. But I can tell you this. I won’t be no cliffhanger.”

  “Get some rest,” he told me.

  I tried to go back to sleep, but I couldn’t. At this point, I had too much to think about. So, I stayed up all night thinking about me, Frank, the Red Assassin, and the Black Assassin.

  I spent all night thinking about destiny.

  First Kill

  Something happened I wasn’t expecting. Something I wasn’t prepared for, to be honest. Life continued, like normal. I did normal things, like graduate high school.

  It was hard for all of us. It wasn’t the classes or the tests – all of those were pretty easy. It helped when you had super-geniuses like Frank and Orion tutoring us. But the graduation itself was hard, because we knew when we finally donned the black robes and looked out into the crowds of onlookers, our parents wouldn’t be there.

  More than any other time, graduating forced us to come to terms with everything we had lost. But it wasn’t all bad. It also forced to look to the future.

  My last talk with Frank had left me with more questions than answers, and I was okay with that. For years, I had held on to my vendetta, my thirst for revenge as a drive to be the best. But I soon realized that’s not what Frank meant. Frank wanted me to hold on to the pain, to remember how it felt to lose them. Revenge was the vain notion that killing would bring them back, that it would make the pain go away.

  Revenge was a coward’s way out.

  I realized I had to look at the long game with the Red Assassin, just like Frank had done with Izuki. The future had a twisty shape to it. I had to realize that Red Assassin was a person just like me if I was going to deny him any power over me. I also had to recognize I couldn’t change what terms Red Assassin and I met over the years. I just had to keep an open mind to the opportunities that such terms provided me. This meant I also had to learn patience, which was easier said than done.

  I didn’t want to kill Orra and his super killers. I wanted to erase the supers, to take them off the board so completely that they could never cause anyone else the pain and suffering they had caused me. That gave me the focus and drive I needed.

  We had one last meeting at the safe house before we departed to our separate assignments. There were cake and ice cream, hugs and laughter, all the things you might expect to find at a graduation party. Beneath all the tears and well-wishing, there was a determination and eagerness to see this through. Most people our age were heading off to college – we were going to combat. Frank closed it out with a speech.

  “I want you to know just how proud we are of all of you,” Frank said. “Many people struggle to succeed with just one life, but you’ve managed to defy every expectation and excel in not one but two lives. Unfortunately, the perils and frustrations of a double life do not end here. If anything, they intensify. However, today you have proved that you are more than capable of handling it.”

  “From here on out, you are now adults. It sounds peachy and rosy, but it’s not. It’s messy. It’s complicated. Some of the lessons you have learned in here will be the backbone of what you do out there,” Frank said. “But sometimes you will make decisions in the face of what we have taught.”

  “Strategy never survives contact with the enemy. I’ve said it so many times Boo is falling asleep,” he said, shooting a glare to the snoozing Boo, who jerked to attention. “You will be in our thoughts, our prayers, but regrettably, we will not out there with you. We will not see the things you do. We will not do as you do. But we have trained you well. We know that you will make the right decision, even if at first doesn’t look the same to us.”

  “But make no mistake, because once you exit those doors, mistakes are not a bad grade. Mistakes get people killed.”

  I thought about my infiltration of Zero Temp’s facility and how it almost cost everyone – myself including – their lives. Was it the right call? I still wasn’t sure. We still didn’t know what Orra and his crew wanted with Zero Temp. Ultimately, it was lock and step with what Frank had been saying. I didn’t know if it was the right decision, but it was mine.

  “Most people get summer breaks. You’re not most people. You don’t get breaks. You do the breaking,” Frank said, raising a glass of punch. “So, enjoy the party and get ready to break out of this joint!”

  We all cheered. It was weird going from a graduating a class of two hundred or so to simply graduating with a class of nine kids. But we weren’t children anymore, nor were we a class. We had been through hell together, training for the ultimate mission against the very thing our parents failed to defeat. It was the very thing that cost them their lives. We all knew what the risks were. It didn’t change the fact that we were a family, and we had a job to do.

  After graduation, we started to specialize our talents. As a result, we saw less and less of the whole group as we compartmentalized our operation. I was part of the general operations team, along with my cousin Elijah, Trevor and Victoria. As the most versatile in our group, we handled all multi-tier ops as needed. I liked to think of ourselves as the Marines or Rangers of the group. Regina, Kofi and Buffy handled the intelligence side of things, like the CIA or ISA arm of the organization. Boo Hall handled the planning and defense. He was like a one-man Pentagon. That left Boulder and Kofi to handle the sensitive missions involving direct actions. They were our version of SEALs or Delta Force.

  This meant that everyone had missions. Some of these missions were conducted in three to four-person units, and others were done with simply one operative. Over the course of these missions, we started to rack up the kills. Everyone did.

  Except me.

  I didn’t want to sound like a psycho. I had tried to come to terms with what had happened to my parents, and to the possibility of the long game that Frank had told me about. Still, a part of me wanted to make them pay – the supers who treated life so lightly. Plus, I didn’t really feel like I was carrying my weight on the team, even if Regina reminded me everyone does their part, whether they are in the field or not.

  The problem was that I was in the field most of the time. I did have opportunities to strike, but I held back. I had to constantly tell myself to stay on mission. After what happened at the Zero Temp facility, I knew my actions had consequences. I didn’t want to kill recklessly and have it fall back on my time. That didn’t stop Elijah from rubbing it in with every chance he got.

  “They gonna call me the Red Baron,” Elijah said after we got back from our last recon mission. “You know why?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, cuz you eat so many pizzas.”

  “No, because he was the ace of the skies, and I’m the ace of the supers,” Elijah said proudly.

  “I’ve seen you play poker,” I replied. “I don’t think you’ve touched an ace in your life.”

  “Ha ha,” he said. “At least I’ve got one. Well, more than one. I’ve lost count of how much I’ve got.”

  I learned not to put too much stock in Eli’s false bravado. He liked to play the tough guy, but it was all show. He was just as rattled by the Zero Temp mission as the rest of us, but he looked to act like he came out of it bolder and louder. He talked a good game, but he coul
dn’t sleep for months after it happened.

  Regina was our handler – we received the intel directly from her. Whenever she called, she told me it would happen in due time. And this latest mission, she explained, was past due for some intervention.

  My target was Syphon. She was a mid-level super – one of the so-called good guys. She could drain energy from people and use it to make herself faster and stronger. She worked as a nurse, and usually fed on people who wouldn’t miss it – the healthy and vital. There’d been a string of deaths at the hospital, however, and it seemed like Syphon was now getting her fix from whoever was nearby. Apparently, she didn’t care about the consequences anymore.

  If I’d learned anything, it was that there were always consequences to actions.

  Since it was taking place in the middle of a hospital, the mission required a low profile. Our direct-action operators were busy, and I was the best recon man of the group. I could blend in with the least amount of trouble.

  “You got this?” Elijah asked as I loaded up my gear.

  “Just need one thing,” I said. “I need you hit me.”

  “What for?” Elijah said. “Not that I actually need a reason to hit you.”

  “It’s a hospital, dumbass,” I explained. “I need to blend in.”

  Elijah crackled his knuckles and grinned.

  “Oh hell yes!” Eli said. “I be waiting for a chance since you asked Regina to prom.”

  “She asked me,” I said.

  “That makes this even better,” Eli smiled. One second later, his famed right hook pounded into my eye socket.

  A half hour later, my swollen black eye was being dressed and treated. Nurse Serafina looked like a nurse out of a classic pin-up – tall, buxom and brunette. She had a healer’s touch, but I knew it was just a front for Syphon. She finished applying the last of the stitches.

  “What happened?” she asked.

  “Some skinny asshole jumped me,” I said.

  “Did you at least get a couple good hits in?” Syphon asked.

  “Not as much as I would have liked,” I replied. “But I’ll pay him back when I see him again.”

  “Well, try to wait until your stitches heal,” she said.

  Her hands traced down my biceps. She regarded me for a minute and then smiled seductively. I reached for the silenced pistol in my pocket.

  “You have impressive muscle tone. Do you work out?” she asked.

  “My work keeps me in shape,” I said.

  “And what do you do?” she asked.

  I hunt supers who have been bad, I wanted to say before I raised the pistol and put three slugs in her. I was interrupted by a beeping sound. She told me to take two Tylenol and then sprinted away.

  I had lost her. I sighed and got up. I then had to spend the next thirty minutes searching the hospital for her. I found her among the newborns. That’s when I see the florescent energy flowing from a living soul into her heart. She looked as if she were enjoying it.

  She was draining a baby.

  I had to stop her, but opening here would put me in a gunfight with security, which was a headache I didn’t need. Instead, I slammed my fist on the nearby counter, startling the administrator behind it.

  “Four hundred dollars for some stitches and a few painkillers?” I yelled. “Fuck all of you!”

  When I turned around, Syphon was gone. The administrator was trying to explain their payment plan. I shrugged.

  “I just remember. I have an HSA,” I said. “So, uhh, we’re good.”

  I walked towards the sleeping newborns. The baby she had been draining looked fine. He was smiling at me before settling back into a nap.

  I hadn’t killed yet, but at least I had saved a life. My mission, however, was not over.

  I caught up to them in the parking garage. Syphon was there, along with three other supers I didn’t recognize. They didn’t actually look like supers – they weren’t heroes or villains. Instead, they had reptilian features, cloven hoofs and horns.

  Demons.

  Syphon wasn’t draining them though. Instead, she was off-loading her energy to them. She wasn’t just draining the people at the hospital – she was taking energy and then giving it to other supers. The demons were writhing and moaning as the energy flowed through them.

  “What. The. Fuck,” I said. Syphon turned around, buttoning and smoothing out her nurse’s uniform.

  “I was hoping to see you again,” the nurse said. She gestured to the demons. “Looks like dessert just found us.”

  “Thanks, but I’ll pass,” I said. “You look like you’ve had enough sweets as it is. You should try getting more fiber in your diet.”

  I removed my sidearm and fired off several shots, tearing through her nurse’s uniform. Unfortunately, she was unfazed.

  “You’ll have to do better than that, honey,” she smirked.

  The first thing Frank taught us is that bullets were a first resort, but never a final one. Not all supers are bulletproof, but you never know until you try. Thus, it helps to have something up your sleeves.

  “Will this do?” I asked as I unsheathed the sword of the Red Assassin and skidded forward. Before Syphon could move, the blade had glided through her neck. Her head fell at my feet. The demons roared with anger.

  “Get him!” the middle one said as he hunched over and tackled me. I managed to keep my balance and used it to bring the hilt of the blade down upon his back. He growled in pain. I reached for my sidearm and squeezed three rounds into the demon, who immediately toppled out.

  Unlike Syphon, it turned out they weren’t bulletproof. I cut into the other two with one long slash as they, too, went down in a pool of green blood that smelled like rotten eggs. I cut off all three of their heads just to be safe.

  In an instant, I had killed four – one super and three demons. I hadn’t had much time to think of the afterlife – I’d have to ask Frank about the demons later. Instead, I removed two fire capsules from my pocket and tossed them onto the demons and Syphon, lighting their bodies up into a blaze.

  “Take two of these and call me in the morning,” I said to no one in particular before leaving the scene.

  I was in the game now.

  The Beginning of the Rainbow Wars

  We knew shit was going down every time we saw Frank. Since we had graduated, we had seen Frank less and less, and his appearance usually coincided with a major operation taking place. The fact that all nine of us were gathered together only added to the tension. There was no time for pleasantries or catching up. Frank summed it up best.

  “It’s go time,” he said.

  “I’m sure you’re devised your purpose by now. We keep the supers in check. Keep them from crossing the line. And take them out if we have to. But there’s another player in this game. A third party which supers can turn to squelch any opposition to their plots. Some of you have already encountered them before,” Frank said. I felt my body go rigid as his eyes fell upon me. “An order of assassins who hire out their services to the highest bidder.”

  “We have intel suggesting the Red Assassin, White Assassin and Green Assassin will be meeting with several high-profile clients,” Frank explained.

  “Red, white, blue and green?” Eli said under breath. “Real original.”

  His remark was met by both Regina and me elbowing him on either side.

  “Owww!” he said. Frank shot him a glance and Eli immediately shut up.

  “As many of you know first-hand, the Assassins are not to be trifled with,” Frank said. “You’ll need help on this one.”

  Two people entered behind Frank. One of them was Gary. We hadn’t seen him since graduation, and he smiled at several of the team before entering. Another person entered the room. It was a young girl, roughly our age. She had long hair and dark skin. She moved with confidence and poise, and there was something about those movements that seemed…incredibly familiar.

  “This is Knockout,” Frank said.

  “You can sa
y that again,” Eli replied, as transfixed by the woman as I was, but for much different reasons. Frank gave another glance—one that shut up Eli for the duration of the briefing.

  “She’ll be assisting us on this mission,” Frank said.

  I couldn’t help but stare. There was something about that woman. The movements, not her features, looked very striking and very familiar, if I couldn’t put my finger on it.

  “You want to roll your eyes back into your head,” Regina urged. “Both of you.”

  I realized that I was starring just as hard as Eli. Knockout, whatever her real name was, smiled and turned away, as if she knew someone was watching.

  “You guys are disgusting,” Regina sighed.

  We all received a full load-out of weaponry, one more indication how serious this mission was. In addition to the usual fire and smoke capsules, we also received laser scalpels, short swords and power gloves. Gary met us at the staging ground, dressed in skintight armor. He immediately donned a faceplate with no eyes. I’d seen the sensor mask before. It enhanced sensory data, allowing for more precise strikes. We all knew Gary’s fighting prowess, but this was the first time he’d ever accompanied us directly into a combat before.

  “Each order has different skills. The Red Assassins have sheer numbers. The White Assassins utilize chi to merge with technology. The Blue Assassins are all recruited from the ranks of low level supers, while the Green Assassins are fittingly ex-military,” Frank explained. “Guerilla, the leader of the Green Assassins, will also be on site.”

  The sting went off without a hitch. I started to wonder if all of this preparation was overkill. We had Gary and Knockout with it. I watched her take out three guards at once with a power whip. She was good…really good. Then I see her blanch before ducking behind a wall. She almost ran headlong into me and had to press against me to avoid being seen. Her skin was warm and she smelled like cinnamon.