7PM - Jack (A 5PM Short Story)

by Chris Heinicke

  “So they start killing each other?”

  “Yes, we only want one of these six to make it to assassin status. We don’t interfere nor warn any of the others of the game.”

  Game? These young people take each other’s lives and Ed calls it a game? I bottled my concerns.

  “I know you had sex with Avril a few times, so I hope you didn’t get emotionally involved,” Ed said.

  “Not at all.” It was true—it was purely physical. It didn’t make me feel better about the dead girl in front of me, though.

  “Use the private shower. I’ll get Bjorn to make this mess disappear.”

  ******

  As I made my way to the exercise yard, I noticed a male body lying face down on the grass, and upon closer inspection, I could see the face of the only male recruit of this intake. Ed was right about how quick things played out. Emily, Kathy, and Bjorn soon joined me on the field, and the three of them placed a bet on which recruit they believed would make it through.

  “They say when Francine saw me fuck and kill that man yesterday, she licked her lips,” Kathy said. “My money’s on her.”

  “Get on the ground and give me fifty!” I yelled. “All of you… NOW!”

  On the training field, I was in charge, so none of them ever challenged my authority there. But if looks could kill, the one gifted to me from Kathy would have been enough to make the compound vacant. I made them train the whole day with the body of the young man lying in front of them. It wasn’t our job to solve a murder mystery, but the seed of curiosity had been planted deep within me to see if I could pick the killer from the reactions.

  The remainder of the day flew past without incident, and Bjorn carried out his duties removing the body and cleaning the scene of any blood. I had yet to go to the graveyard at the compound, but I had never been one to make many visits to any. Even visits to Melinda’s place of burial were minimal.

  The next body to be discovered happened just before dinner that night, outside of the meal hall, and when Kathy heard it was Francine, she shook her head and threw her fifty-dollar bill at Ed, as word also escaped on the death of Bjorn’s pick.

  “This is happening way too fast, my friend. I don’t like the smell of it,” Bjorn said to me at the dinner table.

  “I thought it wasn’t our job to interfere or make judgement,” I said.

  “You learn quickly, but normally, the deaths happen during acts of a sexual nature. Avril was the only one found naked and maybe she didn’t even have any sort of sex.”

  I sighed. I swore to detach myself from caring about the recruits after I found Avril in the shower. Death catches up with us all in the end, so why should I care if people like this kill each other?

  “I’m just here to train, Bjorn.”

  ******

  In the early hours of the morning, a knock on the door of my room woke me. When I answered, I opened the door to the red-haired recruit Bridget, naked and covered in blood.

  “Don’t worry, it’s not my blood. I’m the winner and I’m here to claim my reward,” she said. The corners of her mouth curled up while her eyes looked down upon my groin region.

  Allowing her in and shutting the door behind her, I pushed her up against the wall. I pulled my silk boxers to my ankles and took her from behind. During the whole process, she moaned until I made her come, something I had never been able to achieve for a woman previously through intercourse alone.

  Maybe the sight of blood gave me some newfound super-powered fucking ability.

  “Holy shit, DS. That was nothing short of incredible,” she said to me as her knees gave way.

  I picked her up from the floor and put her back on her feet. “We need to go shower and wash this blood off.”

  “Sounds good to me. We get nice and clean so we can get dirty again.”

  Walking into the darkness from the confines of my room, I looked up at the stars as I thought about how small and minute we really are in this universe. Millions of stars and planets exist so far from us, full of mystery, and a potential for life forms to exist somewhere out there. I waited for Bridget to go on ahead of me before shutting the door. I admired her ass as she went on ahead towards the showers and looked up again before chasing after her.

  “I can’t believe I killed them all. Are you proud of me, DS?” she asked me as we reach the door of the shower block.

  “Of course, I am.”

  She smiled and opened the entrance door and ran on ahead of me again. Without any lighting, the block was almost pitch black before one’s eyes could adjust. As I flicked the switch to illuminate the block, I saw Bridget pointing a gun at me.

  “What are you doing, girl?” I asked.

  “Phase two.”

  “So this is how it ends? I train you to kill so you kill me in return?” I took a step towards her.

  “It’s not personal. You’re just the first of phase two. I knew everything about this place before I got here, and I played you all. I’m bringing this place down and killing every single one of you. When they hear the gunshot, they’ll find your naked body with this gun in your hand and me crying that you shot yourself.”

  “Fine. Do what you must. I’ll even turn to the side so you get me in the side of the head to make it more authentic.” I wasn’t lying.

  “That won’t be necessary,” another voice joined the conversation. Before I could look at the newcomer, the sounds of several gunshots echoed from the walls and floor.

  Bridget’s eyes stared at me in horror as her lifeless form crashed to the ground. I looked from her defunct body to spot the shooter.

  “It happens every now and then—an opportunist slips through the cracks to try to take down our organisation. They start with the recruits and try to move on to take us out. Last time, they nearly took my sister out,” Ed said.

  I looked at him wearing just a pair of undies and didn’t even think about what was about to happen next as I walked up to him and grabbed his face in my hands.

  “I’m not gay. I’m not even bisexual.”

  Then I kissed him for what seemed like minutes and ran my hands up and down his waxed chest.

  “It’s okay, Jack. I’ll be gentle with you.”

  Chapter 7

  Nearly four years had passed since I first woke within the confines of the PM compound, and one particular round of would-be recruits stuck in my mind. Although there were only three in that cycle, all three were worthy contenders, and to think only one could make it through really bothered me at the time.

  I had been doing my job for nearly a year when I saw the three of them, and a girl by the name of Brittany captured my heart on her very first day. Not in a romantic way, but her feats of courage and determination were of those I had never seen in anybody during the previous three cycles I trained.

  Despite her skinny frame and glimpses of her soft demeanor, she pushed through round after round of push-ups I would command of her. Over time, she and the other two potential recruits built up a strong bond, and I worried her gentle nature might see her be the first to perish. But somehow, Oliver had managed to kill and dump the body of a girl we knew as Faith, and after an act of passion, Brittany managed to take out Oliver, the young man with lightning quick reflexes.

  “Hey man, I’m wasted,” Bjorn said after knocking on my door. He sniffed the air. “Hey, you stink like Jack Daniels.”

  I had been asleep for a few hours after downing another bottle of my new favourite drink and had no idea how long Bjorn had knocked before I woke.

  “What is it?” I asked, my head still feeling heavy and blurred.

  “Brittany’s in trouble. Says she and her date were ambushed by a pair of knife-wielding thugs. She’s still at the house where her date lives with his mother and there are three dead bodies.”

  “Why can’t Ed take care of it?”

  Bjorn sniffed a few times, and then I spotted the white powder beneath his nose.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” I asked. “You help run
an assassin training compound and decide to snort your weight in coke?”

  “If you decided not to hang out with us anymore because of one incident of anal sex in the shower, that’s not my problem.”

  It was true. Since the night with Ed, I had kept to myself every night and didn’t have sex with anyone since, male or female. I even resorted to showering every morning at five a.m. in the shower cubicle reserved for women on their period just to ensure I no longer faced nudity and temptation in the form of any person of any gender.

  “I lost touch of who I was and needed to cleanse myself.”

  “Looks like you’ve had enough of that poison to cleanse a village. Get dressed. Chopper leaves in ten minutes.”

  I grabbed a set of civilian looking clothes and rushed to the showers to try to sober up a little. As the water drenched my tired body, I thought about Brittany and the friendship we had built up in the three years since she graduated to full Praying Mantassassin status. After her training, I was able to put away the fear of her perishing during the training cycle and build up the type of friendship that made me feel like an older brother type.

  The water splashed against my face and body, not doing a thing to brighten my mood or help my senses. I needed to get it together. I quickly dried myself and dressed before heading for the helipad, making sure to grab my pistol, too.

  “She’s pretty shaken up, said she killed the two men, but they killed her boyfriend beforehand. I don’t know if she’s been drinking or got high on something, but you need to be a vigilante,” Ed said before I embarked the chopper.

  “You know I fucking hate helicopters, but I’ll take care of your girl. You got nothing to worry about.”

  “Oh, and you know I have to blindfold you before you get in that thing, though?”

  Maybe not seeing where I was going would be better for my nervousness from flying or maybe it would add to my anxiety. I didn’t care. For the first time in nearly four years, I would be outside of the compound.

  “Fine by me,” I said.

  I almost felt butterflies circling my stomach as I took my seat next to the pilot, the sounds of the rotor slivering the chill of the night air. I fastened the safety belt and allowed Ed to tie the blindfold around my head.

  “You can take it off in ten minutes,” Ed said.

  “No problem. See you when we get back.”

  ******

  I had no idea where we were flying, nor the name of the town we descended into. It took a few fuel stops to get us to Brittany’s hometown, and given the relatively low number of streetlights and house lights, I dared to guess the town not to have any more than ten thousand people in it. I sat and hoped the police hadn’t already been all over the scene and taken Brittany away.

  “We’ll land just down there, it’s only two streets away from her current location,” the pilot said.

  I pulled my pistol from the back of my jeans and hoped to hell I wouldn’t have to use it. I saw flashing lights in the distance and wondered if they were headed in the direction of Brittany’s position. I knew I would have to get her away from her boyfriend’s house swiftly. Sure, Ed was a cop, but he couldn’t control the whole of the police force in every town and city in the United States.

  “What town is this anyway?” I asked.

  “You don’t need to know. Just get the girl.”

  Relief washed over me as I disembarked the chopper and took in the directions given to me by the pilot.

  I noticed a man walking a dog across the street from the sports oval where we had landed, but he paid me no attention. I guess people often saw helicopters land on their sporting oval in this place.

  I hated not knowing where I was, but I had a job to do, and in the short time it took me to reach my destination, I didn’t come across any more people. It appeared to be the kind of town where all the action ceased after dark—unless you were in a hotel.

  Looking down at the driveway, I saw three dead males and a wide pool of blood surrounding each of them. Time didn’t exist for me to take much notice of any of them, the priority being the survivor inside the house. Concealing my held pistol inside my unzipped jacket, I pushed the front door of the house fully open. The faint sound of sirens sang in the distance telling me not to waste a single second.

  “Brittany,” I said, keeping my voice to a normal volume.

  “What the fuck are you doing here?” Brittany stepped into view from a darkened part of the house and into the lightly illuminated dining room.

  Before me stood a woman wearing boys’ clothes fitting very loosely and with a shaved head. Her eyes appeared vacant, but a bloodied knife remained held with a strangling grip.

  “I’m here to take you back.”

  “Why? I fucked up and there are three dead men out there. If I go back to the compound, I’m dead.”

  “No you’re not, and that’s the honest truth. I don’t know what happened, and you don’t need to tell me, but we have to get going.”

  “I don’t care anymore, DS. Everyone I love dies. I’m poison.”

  “Why do you think I’m so detached, Brittany?”

  “Because you’re an asshole.”

  “You know that’s not true. I loved a woman once. We were going to get married, have a baby or two or three, but some psycho nut job put an end to that.” I put a finger of my hand not carrying the gun to my chest. “I think about her every fucking day. She didn’t deserve to die and I didn’t deserve to lose her. I had it all. I had everything. For a few moments in my life, I actually held the pinnacle of true happiness in my fingers. Nothing else mattered because I had my soulmate.”

  Brittany stared at me, a tear falling down her cheek.

  I continued, “But she’s gone, and I’m never going to see her again. Every time I fuck someone in that damn compound, I think of her, and not a single woman I’ve been with could even call themselves a freckle on Melinda’s precious skin. And afterwards, I would feel so ashamed of being intimate and not caring about the woman I had just fucked. Most nights, I drink myself into a stupor and masturbate watching porn, and then wake up the next day and yell at people so they can be better killers.” I couldn’t believe what I was admitting to her, but the time of caring about my self-worth had long passed. “Brittany, I look at you, a lot. Not in a dirty way, but when I see you, I see a young female version of me. We’re broken, Brittany, and no one can ever fix us.”

  It was my turn to cry, and at that moment, I didn’t care. Brittany took a few steps until she made it to where I stood. Closing her eyes, she pressed her face to mine, and we shared a quick kiss, the most unusual one I had ever had. There was no passion in it… no lust or even romance.

  “Thanks, DS.”

  “We have to get moving. By the way, love the hairstyle.”

  Smiling back at me, I didn’t spot even a tiny bit of joy in her expression. “Apart from Ed, you’re the only guy who hasn’t tried to fuck me, and I love you for that. I always knew you had some kind of a soft spot for me.”

  We held hands as we walked back to the chopper, not exchanging any further words until we stood beneath the rotating blades.

  Sometimes in our lives, all it takes is a split second to change everything, and as I looked into the young woman’s eyes, I knew what I had to do.

  Pulling out my gun, I took a couple of steps away from Brittany. “Get in the chopper, now.”

  “What is this?” she asked.

  “This is me telling you I’m done.” The volume of the police sirens increased. I looked at the chopper pilot, who had a pistol drawn and aimed at me. “Don’t even think about it or I’ll shoot the bitch.”

  “No, please. You have to come,” Brittany yelled.

  I aimed the pistol, and fired, knowing how good my aim would be from that distance. Brittany grabbed her shoulder and screamed while I made a run for it, hearing the noise of returned gunfire echoing in the outside air. Putting one foot in front of the other, I headed away from the helicopter to find a place to h
ide temporarily. I didn’t look back, even upon hearing the chopper ascend and leaving the area. As much as he probably wanted to stop me, I dared to think the pilot wouldn’t want to be in the vicinity when the police cars and ambulances arrived.

  I put my pistol back in my jeans and kept running until I saw a truck parked down the road at a service station. I checked my wallet while waiting for a driver to return.

  “What the hell you doing by my truck?” the driver asked upon his return to his vehicle.

  “I need to get out of this town, and I have one thousand dollars in cash for anyone who’s happy to let me ride with them a few hours.”

  He looked at the paper notes in my hand. “I can take you as far as Alabama. But remember one thing, I don’t want any trouble.”

  I looked in his eyes and hoped my answer would satisfy him. “I eat trouble for breakfast.”

  “Well, get in then. It’s gonna be a long night.”

  I opened the door and took a seat, looking ahead at the darkness in front of us. I hoped we would be heading in the direction I wanted and not coming from the opposite direction. I closed my eyes a few minutes into the journey, and for once, I felt good about life again—before I slipped into another dream about the better times in my life.

  Coming Soon

  7PM – Part 3 – Ed and Hannah

  Ed is a United States cop, transferred from station to station thanks to someone pulling some major strings for him. When he’s not arresting criminals, he’s scouting for potential members of the shady organisation he works for—the Praying Mantassassins.

  Hannah is a police detective alerted to the existence of the Praying Mantassassin organisation from an online blogger calling himself DS. She goes deep undercover to the extent of having her police career records wiped and forged to appear as a recently graduated recruit.

  Ed and Hannah are soon partnered up, and while Ed has his suspicions, Hannah shows she is willing to do anything to gain his trust and soon finds herself prepping for a role in a high-paying mission involving five Praying Mantassassins.