Tiny clicks, grunts, and murmurs fill the absolute silence of the late afternoon. The sounds coming from the internal skeleton of this old building, I notice how odd and different they are from all the other buildings I have lodged in. I believe it has nothing to do with its long span of existence, but something strange seems to be occurring within this block of concrete that I have yet to understand.
A sigh escapes me that seems too loud for my ears. I cannot be distracted from my task at hand and conducting a discovery is not part of it. How long do I have to complete my task? I count the hours in my head, the time that has passed since my current task was assigned to me. A few days, has it been? I cannot be sure.
I look to the round clock on the wall and do the math within its numbered surface, the numbers moving by my enhanced optical, virtual guidance. I still have not gotten used to this additional convenience, although the improvement proves to be very useful at times. It does not seem to affect any other factors judging by my physical examination. Only cerebral.
Practising the handbook instructions given to me at orientation, I am now able to do very complicated mathematical equations purely in my head. I simply picture something on a flat surface and it becomes a virtual screen in my head that calculates and processes the data like a machine. An example is counting the seconds within the past few days in merely a minute just by looking at a clock on the wall, deducting hours for repose. It's impressive, not gonna lie.
Believe or not, that's just the tip of the iceberg.
Physically, I can do so much more.
I am the Huntsman.
Although I am only able to hunt at night—as what has become a binding routine—the things I can do camouflaged in the blanket of darkness is something even I have to admit is extraordinary. The old me would have been afraid of what I've become, but now I think it's rousing, majestic even.
Not even the confining hours can stop me from accomplishing my given tasks. Still, it is a bummer.
I sleep before dawn and wake up only when the sun has started to retreat into the horizon. Even then, I don't bother getting out of bed before the last sun rays have all disappeared from the cracks between the curtains. I wait for the shadows to completely take over every corner of the apartment before I unfurl the beast.
I have gotten so used to this that now, in the few times necessity forces me to be out during the day, I have to shelter my eyes behind thick, dark protective sunglasses. It doesn't matter that my eyer are the colour of dark mahogany—very much on the opposite of the spectrum to blue and grey that are known to be of the more problematic of eye colours when it comes to the sun.
Perhaps there is more to my sensitivity to the sun than routine or habit, maybe my dark lifestyle has somehow affected my immunity to all things light and good.
I don't like to think too much about what it all means to me, I simply do what I am told—these sporadic commands have given my short, empty life a mission, a sort of meaning. And because of my deep devotion to them, I succeed with every single mission. There has never been a time when I fail to do what needs to be done.
No matter how difficult. No matter how repugnant.
My mind goes back to my recent mission—whenever the subject of self—abhorrence returns to me—to just a few nights ago when the stars were hidden behind polluted air. I remember with detail the noises of the street around me as I floated through it, looking for the face I had previously etched into memory just the night before. I remember the weight of the small knife hidden in the right sleeve of my dark jacket, remember as I let the hilt slowly slide into my palm. And, when the face I had only ever seen in pictures appear a few feet in front of me, I remember the feel of the hilt markings against my thumb as I flipped the knife swiftly and jerked my arm forward in a quick movement, piercing the stranger's heart in less than a second.
I have memorised every kill, every bloodshed. All have been perfectly etched into the darkest parts of my mind, to be revisited whenever I need a reminder of who I am.
Two days ago, a message was sent to the room where I was staying. The small envelope was slipped under the doorway. As with all the other times, I never see the Messenger, They always seem to slip between my fingers every single time I am close to meeting Them. It is like They always know what I am doing. So the messages come whenever I am indisposed, never when I am aware in bed where I would likely hear the sound of a moving body in the halls.
I have considered magic to play a part in Their mysterious ways, how else could I explain how They always seem to know what I am doing even behind closed doors? But then I remember that I don't believe in magic, only a fool with an overactive imagination can believe in something more than the explainable. So I erased the magical notion from my mind and went back to believing that, perhaps, They simply know due to a familiarity with my schedule. After all, they do control it.
But this doesn't bother me, because it doesn't matter who gives me the message, or even who decides the targets, as long as I get to play predator amongst the humans who I have long considered to be my prey. And every single time an envelope slips under a doorway, a few days later, a victim will be found not far from where I reside.
My newest prey, however, was not so easy to find. When, two days ago, I was given that envelope, right away I went to open the firewall-protected laptop sitting in the corner of my hotel room. I searched for the name for almost two hours, looking on every search engines known to man, but I was unable to find this particular prey's whereabouts. This doesn't usually happen, whenever I am given a name, it typically only takes no more than ten minutes for me to find any kind of lead.
But it's also not the first time this has happened.
A few years back, when I had only a few months of experience in this current lifestyle, I was unable to find my target's identity. It took me a few days to do the research. Even went so far as buying an ancient phone book from this very old bookstore located within a sketchy alleyway. I still didn't find the name. I had no choice but to ask for help from Them and, somehow, I ended up on the Deep Dark Web—the other side of the web that most people are unaware of. I found the name there, in an old article that has been deleted by its original writer. Turns out, my target was an old man who changed his identity in the late seventies.
Like that old man, my current target seems to exist on one page of the web: a six-second video of a celebration. In the pixelated low-quality video, someone is blowing a birthday cake, the candle reads sixteen. The target is not the birthday girl. In fact, she stands smiling behind her. But, just as the flames on the candles peter out, she looks straight into the camera and her face transforms. Her smile wanes. And, as quick as a magician's quick hand, she pushes the camera away and disappears out of sight.
I heaved a big sigh of relief when I finally found her and, not even an hour later, I was packed and heading for a small city called Dartham. It took six hours for me to get here. I tried checking in for a hotel close by to where the target lives but there were no rooms available. Finally, with nowhere else to stay, I rented a small apartment for a week and, it just so happens, the apartment unit that was available is on the same floor as this unlucky soul.
It truly is pure luck. At least, for me. Cannot say the same for her.
This is where I now lay in bed. Apartment number twenty-two, exactly one apartment away from where I will be completing my task.
As I wait for the sun to go down, I reopen the envelope that was given to me just two days earlier. The envelope holds a single expensive small piece of paper—almost like a business card—and on it is written exactly two words: Kristina Jenkins.