Stay On Target
By
D.M. KURTZ
Installment 1: The First Glimmer
He was known only as “Tenebra”, a title granted by the third individual to fall at his highly skilled hands. That man, a renowned linguistics expert, had whispered the phrase as his final breath left his body. While curiosity was rarely indulged, he felt it prudent to learn whether that dying utterance held any semblance of importance, and a little research revealed the term to be Latin, which loosely translated to “concealed by darkness”. He rather liked the term, so with a solemn “salud” to the deceased gentleman he adopted it as his official mantra.
After a while, the legend of Tenebra formed amongst certain degenerates, though how his shrouded identity had emerged into the criminal underworld he sought to destroy, he couldn’t say for sure. Only one thing was ever certain: his targets always faced a swift demise, with absolutely no evidence left behind. Nothing was ever random, for his orders came via a small tablet with a direct satellite link, courtesy of the US government. The weeks or even months that followed each name were filled with study and calculations. Preparations were made, step by tedious step, and he did not strike until everything was ready, and he did so with the utmost of efficiency, bereft of any remorse. His latest would-be victim, however, had served to give his normally calm, resolute nature a certain level of pause. He’d been tasked with eliminating a pregnant woman, but that wasn’t what caused his slight hesitation. It was her status, or rather the lack thereof: she was a no-one, by any standard.
What did you do? He wondered silently from his perch behind a MacBook Pro. The face of one Emma Swanson stared at him from the dimly lit screen. Her large belly was held gingerly by the hands of two other children, Cody and Evie, while Mark, the husband, cuddled her from behind with a chin that rested on her shoulder. Staged or not they exuded a certain joy that was tangible, even from a photograph, such that he was not accustomed to seeing from the names that were issued to his small device. As he gazed intently, a pang of emotion that he thought had been fully suppressed years before suddenly surfaced. The subdued feeling both shocked and shook him. Such weakness had no place in his line of work. So what was it about this woman and her family that raised such sentiments from the darkened depths of his core? In the end, of course, it wouldn’t matter and he knew as much. She had struck the wrong nerve with the powers that held the every day lives of American citizens in the highest regard, and thus her path would align with his, if only for the briefest of moments.
Copyright © 2018 D.M. Kurtz
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D.M. Kurtz 