Killers (IC)

Rodentia walked through the labyrinth of tunnels that spanned out beneath New York. She did not have a flashlight with her, her eyes had long ago adjusted to darkness, and she had quickly learned to ignore the smell of the sewers. As she moved along, she could hear the tell-tale scratching of tiny nails all around her, the sewer rats as they searched for food. She was not afraid of them, but rather, of what might happen if she, or her own pet fancy rat, Snowflake, were to be bitten. Wild rats were not tame, and could carry disease. She was too aware of what would happen, if she were to go to the hospital, in need of a rabies shot. And so it was, that she walked slowly and carefully, keeping a certain amount of distance between herself and the sewer's inhabitants. It was just her, and the rats. No other person would dare live in the sewers, not even the homeless. Abandoned Railways were a possibility, but the sewer's smell and the numerous vermin that crawled through it was enough to ward off even the most desperate of men.

Rodentia took precautions. In the dull yellow-orange and black backpack she carried, she had multiple sealed bottles of Benadryl, which she had accumulated by visiting multiple different Walgreen drug stores, and paying in cash. Buying more than one bottle of the medicine in the same store was too suspicious, and they might suspect her of being a drug addict, although that wasn't the reason she had them. The reason she had them was simple: Benadryl was one of the most humane ways to kill animals. If she suspected rats in an area to be diseased, judging by their unusual behavior, she would pull out a bottle and dump its contents on the floor, before quickly leaving. The rats would eat the Benadryl, and would fall into a slumber so deep, they ceased to breathe. In addition, rats loved the way it tasted. A rat who died from Benadryl had enjoyed probably the most wonderful meal in its life before it died. Benadryl was the same way for things like dogs and cats. As a result, Rodentia used that, instead of cruel traps. She loved rats, it was true, so much that she chose the name of their order in classification. Meanwhile, she kept any poisons she possessed far out of Snowflake's reach, so that the tame rat that now curled up in the pocket of her hoodie would not get into them.

Rodentia, in a better mood than usual, began to quietly sing the lyrics to 'Skin to Bone', thinking about what she would do if she ran into anyone in the Mafia that had killed her parents.

Skin to bone/Steel to rust
Ash to ashes/Dust to dust
Let tomorrow have it's way
With the promises we made
Skin to bone/Steel to rust
Ash to ashes/Dust to dust
Your deception/My disgust
When your name is finally drawn
I'll be happy that you're gone
Ash to ashes dust to dust...

And so it was, that Rodentia had a very depressing choice of songs that she liked to listen to. Her sense of humor was equally dark. She was going to get the men in the Mafia someday, and she wanted to relish the idea of taking the gang down.

"Killing is good.

No! It's not like what you're possibly thinking! I kill not for pleasure or fetish or just because I like it. I kill for money. Killing is my business, and business is good, so killing is good. Get it?

Do you ever heard about how the whole 'my life flashing before my eyes' thing? Funny about how it always happen when you're dying, of all times. I never really believe it. Until now, of course."




In the middle of a hard rain, A man lied on the bloody soil in the corner of the park. Blood flowed from the bullet wound that skimmed his leg, reddening his rain soaked jeans. He could see The Siren's ice-cold eye staring like a predator's. Ironic, really. The merciless eye of a rivaling assassin from a rivaling organization. Her hand held his head from moving and Her knife pressed to his throat while she knelt over him. Blood dripped from her shoulder, grazed with the man's blade. The large sawtooth knife simply lied only few inches from his grasp. There's no chance of survival indeed.

Raising her knife, she prepared to finish it. "Are you ready to leave this world?", The Siren asked with a soft yet dangerous voice. The man simply replied by closing his eyes and smirking. He could remember, as clear as the cloudless sky, how this all begins.

'You are nothing.... Why did I take you in..."


Not good enough...

Freak....

Train harder....

Such a waste....

Accident.....


The man's eyes snap open, and the smirk became a grin.

"I will not die today."

The Siren's face contorts to one of shock and disbelief, then, then pain joined the mix. She looked down at her abdomen.

The one knife the man still had was lodged into her solar plexus. The knife on the man's neck left and was dropped as the female assassin rolled off, landing on her back next to the man; still alive, but barely.

The man slowly staggered up, the bullet wound wasn't fatal, but it would scar. He knelt down on top of her.

"You can't kill the Animal. You know why?"

The Siren stared blankly up at the man, her mouth opened just barely, allowing a single word out.

"Why?..."

The man smiled, showing some somewhat crooked teeth.

"Because the Animal is part of nature... and nature always wins."

The man grabbed the knife, and ripped it out. The saw on the blade doing what needed to be done.

The Siren was no more.

The rain matted his hair to his face, the black stringy substance sticking to his forehead like glue. He turned his head, sirens could be heard in the distance, slowly but steadily becoming louder. He looked back down at the Siren one last time before taking off. His employer must've been hired to set him up, in hopes of taking him off the rivalry list. How else would the Siren, of all people, be here? In the middle of an empty park at 1AM in the morning?

He pulled his hood up, concealing his face once again. He needed to get out if here, and fast.

He turned on his heel and took off, running out of the park an into the small patch of woodland the neighbored it. It wasn't much, but it could provide temporary cover.

With that, he disappeared into the woodland. Police came soon after, recovering the body of the Siren, and rejoicing at the fact that a killer was dead... and mourning that an even deadlier killer was the cause...



He was The Ghost of Manhattan.

He was the smiling stranger.

He was the Animal.

He was Jakal.

Anne was known for her cold nature. It was no surprise when the police found the body of an assassin that, she was there, looking over the shoulders of the people taking evidence, "Any sign of who killed the Siren?" She asked, startling one forensics team member. "We found some prints, along with blood that we suspect might not belong to the victim. We're taking that to the lab to be analyzed now." He said, recovering. "Any links to the bigger guys?" She asked. "You mean the Ghost of Manhattan? Too early for that, although I suspect the fingerprints are his, way too confusing in appearance to be a normal run-of-the-mill killer. Too bad we can't just skip protocol and try to find a lead." This earned him a cold glare from another officer.

Another cop, who was following the Ghost, came up, "Well, Detective Claire, don't keep asking about the Ghost, he's my man to catch. You're after the poisoner that's been running around these parts." Claire's face grew fierce. She wanted to catch the Ghost just as badly as anyone else, and then in came Detective Walker, to rub it in that she was after some other, lesser-known person who was supposedly responsible for mysterious deaths throughout the city. The issue was, the poisoner wasn't as fascinating as the Ghost, but they always covered their tracks, and the substances they used to kill their victims usually vanished before anyone could run a test. The poisoner, whom nobody cared to give a name, was clever, and not famous. Nabbing them wasn't as important as someone like the Ghost of Manhattan. People kept telling Claire to look for white Caucasian males in their mid twenties, although anyone could be a poisoner.

"Okay, I guess I shouldn't be asking then, although I'm supposed to be looking for this poisoner, and their kills are throughout this city. I need some sort of proof, of who did this. If the Poisoner didn't do it, and it was the Ghost, then they might want to stay out of this area, seeing as the victim in question is the Siren. For all we know, they're watching the TV and seeing the incoming media as we speak. They might leave their hotel or wherever they're staying if they think the Ghost might threaten them. I know it isn't likely, seeing as I haven't seen one victim harmed with physical violence."

Walker shook his head, "Well, all I can say is, maybe you shouldn't just be looking at crime scenes. Maybe you should go look for people outside the general group the Team came up with. Not all the killers we suspect fit their descriptions. Last time, we had a poisoner, and it turned out to be a fifty-year old woman." Claire folded her arms, "Fine, but I'd suggest searching the area. If he's injured, like you think, he couldn't have gotten far."

Seymour arrived at the crime scene in a cab, most people in New York didn't drive anyway, plus, it provided a small amount of anonymity, no traceable license plates. He exited the cab, payed the driver and jogged over the the taped off section of the park, it was a multi colored muddy mess, if they had fired any shots, then the bullets would be buried in the mud, although from the body, it didn't look like any had been fired. He walked around the back of one of the vehicles that the forensics team had arrived in, there, on one of the makeshift tables were two vials filled with blood, one looked like it had mud in it as well and one of the team members was treating it with a mix of glorified detergent, meat tenderizer and alcohol and extracting the white stringy substance that floated to the top. "Two injuries... two people suspected..." he muttered walking back towards the roped off section, he leaned over the tape, not needing to go inside, the body had been found there, to the side of the second splotch of blood, knife in her solar plexus, or so the forensics report stated, and the killer... he telted his head sidways lookeing at it form a different angle, if she landed there, and the other blood was found here... aha... she was out to kill him... he was lured here, she was waiting... she was found with a gun, one shot fired, she attacked, he had a knife, so probably a leg shot to stop him in his tracks, alowing her to get within striking distance... but why didn't she just shoot him again once he was down? did she have a message to give or what? Two assassins, two rival groups, or a personal disagreement. An affair maybe? no... to risky... Now, where did this bugger go? He had one shot to the leg, bleeding heavily, he would have ran when her heard the sirens, after he killed the Siren, funny. But to where? the suburbs? not likily, someone would notice a limp. He wouldn't dare seek medical attention, the woods maybe? Well, it was a better shot than any. Then Semour heard the last snippet of Anne's conversation and smirked, he could go after whoever he darn wanted to. He jogged over to them, in a almost gleeful manor that was sure to make them angry. "Hello fellows, do you have any leads in order to be calling dibs like that?"

Jakal looked down at his leg, which had been grazed by the Siren's bullet. He needed to move. He did his best to ignore the pain. He had seen people use leaves and certain herbs as bandaids in TV shows and movies, but it was dark, and he was no boy scout. He would mist likely end up putting poison ivy on his bullet wound.

Not good.

Instead, he kept moving. He was glad he didn't bring his sniper. He felt he didn't need it for this mission. He should trust his gut more often. He then noticed he was running with his knives in his hands. He slid to a stop, and twirled the knives so that they were facing down, and sheathed them.

Suddenly, a devious idea came into his head. Up ahead, the forest was ending, and a new neighborhood was beginning. He could use that to disappear. He looked down at the tattoos on his arms, and rolled his hoodie sleeves over them. Witnesses of his more sloppy assassinations have described him as having tattoos on his forearms. His leg screamed in protest as he ran up the wall and grabbed hold of the top. He then pulled himself up and dropped back down on the other side of the wall, in the neighborhood. He faked a bad limp, and limped to the nearest house, then rang the doorbell a few times.

An angry elder woman came to the door, only to see a hooded man holding his leg. He looked like he was in extreme pain. "H-help me." He said, looking up to her. His hood kept most of his face in the shadows. The woman rushed him inside, and had him sit down on a couch in the living room. The bullet wound was really a skim. It had skimmed off his leg and created an ugly laceration. It didn't truly need stitches, but the scaring would be less.

The elder woman ran to her restroom, and grabbed a few large bandaids, a towel, and some over-the-counter antibiotics (neosporin), then rushed back to the man. Placing the towel on his leg and applying pressure to stop the bleeding. "How did you get like this?" She asked while working.

"T-the Siren attacked me... I was taking a walk, and she saw me... She looked like she was waiting for someone... Thank you for the help... I need to keep moving. She could still be after me, and I don't want to get you injured because of me." Jakal said, keeping a pained face. He didn't like to kill people. He did it for money. It was his profession. The woman applied the antibiotic to the bandaids and placing them on the wound. he hissed at it's sting. she then wrung the towel up and tied it around his leg to create a tourniquet to help stop the bleeding. He got up, despite the woman's protests, and straightened up, sighing in relief. His leg had been tended to, now it was a straight shot back to his motel room... If he could avoid being caught.

"You nee to go the the hospital. Let me call 911."

"I'll be fine... I just need to get home." Jakal said, making his way to the door.

"Stop! You're in no condition to walk. I'll drive you. Where do you need to go?"

"Take me to park on 14th Avenue. My home is near that park."

"I'll take you there. You need rest."

"Thank you...."



I am no Ghost...

I am a man...

I am what I am named...

I am a Ghost...

And I shall disappear...



(Sorry for strange mistakes. I did this on my phone.)

Anne whirled around to face the person who had sneaked up behind her, putting a hand on her gun, but then quickly taking it off when she saw that it was one of those Private Investigators, some of the only people who would be permitted this close to a crime scene. "Look, this isn't my case, but in case you're wondering, a suggestion isn't an order. Second of all, my man, or woman, we can't get a profile, is somewhere running around Manhattan poisoning people. We also think they're responsible for some sort of bomb blast going off in a residential area. That happened a day after we found a body and managed to detect traces of drain cleaner. How they found out about that, we don't know, but they did. A poisoner that sets of bombs is no laughing matter, and for all we know, they might react to a death like this so close to their turf." Detective Claire clenched her hands into fists, her upper lip twitching in the beginnings of a snarl. If this person had wanted to make her angry, he was succeeding, and she was already riled up with Detective Walker telling her to leave the crime scene.

She eventually sighed in aggravation, "Okay, then, look, just stay out of this, It's a New York Police Department Investigation." She flashed Detective Walker a glare, "Well, the search is your call. I'm going after the Poisoner." With this, she stalked off the crime scene, getting into her car and driving off, leaving Walker to stare after her, "That Detective Claire," He said, shaking his head, "Is as unpredictable as a winter storm." He had a bit of a smirk on his face, as though he found the whole situation comical, which it technically was.


Rodentia heard a distant sound from a manhole cover above her. Her heart rate accelerated. It was police sirens, and she instantly worried that they had figured out how she managed to vanish from each crime scene. Had she made a mistake setting off that bomb? But one of her associates had told her the police had found traces of the poison she had used to kill the victim. That was awhile back, but surely they wouldn't forget a bomb that easily. She had no choice. She had to dispose of the crime scene. She ran back the way she came, returning to the abandoned sewer she called home. It didn't smell, because it hadn't been used in years, and had been thoroughly cleaned. It was around a bend that was almost hidden in the darkness.

It was not that Masha Starkova held the vanities brought of the modern wallet to an unforgiving grudge. She merely accepted the presence of this money-burning society as one might a loathesome pet which had to be fed and kept alive in order to rid the house of rats, adorning herself in a neutral air of unspoken and consensual superiority.

This scruple did not, however, detract from the small scrap of pleasure she took in planning the demise of one Mr. Hinkman. Starkova had shown this man the courtesies she bestowed upon every target of hers, an attention to detail that secured her acceptance of herself as a functional member of society.

Even ware of the finest silver, after all, must be cleaned. Starkova fancied that she would purge humanity of its dirt and, throwing in a few other spices for flavor, call it a life.

At present moment, Starkova was piecing together her rifle in preparation for the deed. After all else had been assembled, she attached a long, cylindrical silencer of cold gray surface onto the end of the barrel. It would lessen the death-call of the enormous metal-and-birch Mosim Nagant by no significant amount, but this would suit Starkova's needs satisfactorily.

Starkova was, in fact, in the projection room of a rather large theater. In one corner, an operator slept in sturdily-knotted bonds. The air smelled of old wires, undusted furniture, and floor polish; a despicable faintness of buttery popcorn and expensive colognes wafted into the cabin from a sliding panel that opened up onto the mass of people far below, each entranced by the film.

It was a war film, this was all that Starkova had needed to know to center her plans around it. Completing the rifle's assembly, she - with practiced and almost motherly care - mounted it upon the sill and slid the barrel out into the darkness of the theater like a worm poking its shy head above the morning soil.

Starkova grimaced, sliding the rifle first left and right, up and down, each miniscule twitch of her arm governing the direction which the roar of death would storm forth. Self-control here was imperative to a degree greater than that of any other occupation on Earth - in Masha Starkova's eyes, at least. She recalled the seat that Hinkman had settled his bulk in, which she had observed under the guise of a custodian cleaning the theater from the previous audience's presence. Starkova still wore the gaudy white-and-crimson uniform, which had been doubly valuable as a means to convince the sleepy camera-watcher that he had been relieved of his shift. Starkova reckoned the dopey teen would not have even cared if he'd seen her slip out of the security room minutes later.

The film reached a particularly enthralling climax. Bullets hopped about in ridiculously romantic fashion as the protagonist attempted his daring escape; Starkova made a subconscious note of disgust at the parody of warfare, grimacing slightly as the well-etched crosshairs alighted upon the distinctive form of Mr. Hinkman. A few quick calculations and Starkova had tilted the barrel of the rifle imperceptibly upward. It was fortunate, the assassin thought, that Hinkman was as captivated by the scene as everyone else - his stillness allowed her the luxury of pinpointing an exact target on his body. A quick death, little blood, and little impact jolt were ideal.

The theater filled with noise as the screen erupted into activity once more, and in a few swift moments, one more gunshot joined the din, masked by its simulated fellows. Starkova watched on for a second longer than necessary, amused by the fact that Hinkman's wife and those sitting next to him did not even seem to notice the awkward slump of his body. She wondered how long it would take for the panic to set in.

But Masha Starkova preferred not to be around when it finally did. Quickly disassembling her rifle and loading it into a backpack, she was wont to remove the disguise - leaving her in a simple gray tweed suit - stuff it in a janitor's closet, and make a discreet exit from the theater. The camera footage, of course, would be reviewed, the disguise found, and fingerprints identified, but Masha Starkova was already known to the people of the law who were as bound by honor to protect society as she herself was to attack it. She was safe not in her anonymity, but in her insubstantiality, her tendency to fade away and never make a peep until someone else needed a less-respectable man swept from the Earth.

Rodentia continued to run, until she was safely inside the sewer pipe she called home. She slowed, and her pace became even, as she saw the wooden platform she had managed to build at the edge of a dead end. It wasn't much. The platform itself was held together by hastily placed nails, as she had feared the hammer would have been heard had she prolonged the construction. The planks were also only sanded on one side, just enough to keep her from getting splinters if she were to walk barefoot. The wooden surface as a whole was supported by a wide array of cardboard boxes, emptied trash cans, and just about anything else Rodentia could find that might support its weight, and would not attract wild rats.

On the platform, she had two large dark green beanbag chairs that served as a place to sit, surrounding a tiny white plastic folding table that someone had thrown out. An old, stained mattress was in one corner, covered with swamp green sheets, a matching pillow, and one fleece blanket. Half-melted candles surrounded the platform inside tin cans, although they were currently unlit, as Rodentia could see fairly well in the dark without them. A large number of locked lunch boxes in the corner of the room kept her food from being tampered with by anything that didn't have thumbs. The entire platform had a wooden frame around it, which supported plastic shower curtains, which were cloudy and slightly covered in mildew. The frame was Rodentia's greatest achievement, in her eyes, as the frame was the most difficult to build, and it allowed her privacy, thanks to the horribly cloudy quality the sheets possessed. In all, she had successfully made a sort of makeshift house in the dark recesses of the sewer.

Rodentia sighed, and walked up to the table, grabbing a candle lighter she had purchased from a kind merchant on the other side of the city. She went around the room, lighting each candle, and filling her small section of the sewer with golden, flickering light. As she did so, she worried. Had anyone heard her singing over the sirens? Would anyone try to look for the source? She hoped not. She killed when someone paid her to do so, or when she located a man in the Mafia. She didn't like to kill civilians.

Seymour shrugged, and turned to Walker and asked, "What's her problem? The guys obviously injured, leg probably, so he won't be going very far, and the woods would be an ideal hide out, however the amount of blood on the ground suggests that if he stayed there to long he would probably pass out from blood loss. So, he probably got a ride, suburbs, somone was bound to notice his limp there and had them drive him home, of course they would probably want to bandage him up first to. Anyway, I've got to go, my ma just called, said there was a new shipemnt of Cephalotus TC cultures just come in and they need help unpacking them. Bye!" With that, he ran back around the crime scene and climbed back into the cab, vanishing as quickly as he arrived.

When he got home he jogged inside and started unpacking honey jar sized tissue cultures and carrying them upstairs to the grow room and lining them up on a series of metal racks under 8-T florescent lights.

Detective Claire was reprimanding herself for losing her temper with the Private Detective. If anything, those guys seemed to enjoy getting on her last nerve. By what means they derived amusement from the Police officer's frustration, she would never truly understand it. But then again, maybe she did. Sometimes she couldn't help smiling when the PI's were barred from investigating a case. Perhaps that sort of twisted enjoyment worked both ways.

As she drove in her car, she pondered the strange, sudden rise in assassins that were now appearing on the streets. Normally, they were impossible to find. Now, all of a sudden, there was the Ghost, and then the Poisoner. Both were incredibly dangerous, and nobody knew what the Poisoner looked like. They weren't the only two, and everyone was in a frenzy to catch the hired killers.

The thought of anyone being cold and cruel enough to kill for money nauseated Claire. She wondered if any assassin was mentally stable, because she couldn't imagine anyone like that would be. However, they clearly weren't insane in a way people normally imagined the term. They were clever, elusive, and had some sort of keen intelligence that frightened people. It was like she was hunting down a whole different kind of human being, especially in the Poisoner's case.

Someone had poisoned an innocent man, and when the police had found a lethal dose of drain cleaner, they had discovered it had been administered by a needle prick. Syringes weren't as hard to obtain as people thought, people engaged in illegal activities obtained them, even if they were homeless, and regardless of age. The poisoner's techniques were crude, the poisons cheap, inexpensive, and not always guaranteed to work. That was the most they could determine, before a pipe-bomb blew up the crime scene. That was when they knew it was an assassin, as they had managed somewhat to comprehend that there was no other motivation aside from money.

Claire frowned, going over the evidence in her mind. Somehow, the assassin had escaped, managing to leave no evidence except for a syringe in a garbage can out back. They had found only cotton fibers, suggesting that they had used cotton gloves, instead of latex, which preserved fingerprints inside them. How did the Poisoner escape? It was a complete mystery, yet Claire was certain she was missing something right in front of her.

It never ceased to feel strange for Starkova to walk amongst the people of the city as if she was one of them; the fact could not be ignored that, were these people to know her true nature, she would be regarded as an alien. Each step drove the lie deeper into the earth, until, by the time Starkova had reached her apartment, the facade was so adamant that she could almost convince herself of its integrity. A stop at the grocer or subway station sometimes helped to color the illusion.

Nevertheless, Starkova found it easy to resist the primitive allure of the smiling cashiers or busied folk that she saw on a day-to-day basis. These were simpler people - she could not help but feel this way. Who, then, could blame her for feeling protective of them and occupying herself accordingly?

Thoughts such as these bounced about Masha's head, propelling her sturdy feet to the outlying suburbs, two and a half hours' walk from where they started. Humming an old folk song, turning at the ancient street light that directed her habits, she set off down the old concrete path that eventually led out of the city altogether.

Vikhodila na bereg Katyusha, na visokiy byereg na krutoy.

Rodentia debated whether or not the Police had heard her singing or not. Eventually, she had decided that they had been completely oblivious to sounds from the sewer. In reality, few would dare live in one, much less enter one. It was hazardous to health, and filled with vermin. It was only by extreme caution Rodentia survived, and she was still most likely the strangest of any assassin. She was emotionally very detached from what she did. Rodentia was never haunted by the faces of her victims. She did not wish she was, although sometimes it scared her.

Jakal hissed as he removed the tourniquet. The bleeding, for the most part, had stopped. He was on the road to recovery from The Siren. He had made it back to his motel room, having the lady dropp him off at the wrong address, and waiting until she left before heading to where he stayed, a few blocks west. He lifted off his shirt, revealing the ugly scar, along with several other that littered his skin. He led a tough life... But he thrived on it.

He grabbed his blade from it's sheath, the one he had killed The Siren with. Small bits of flesh still clung to the deadly saw, and it was still slightly coated with blood.

Jakal sighed, placing the blade on the sink and looking up into the mirror, his breath fogged it up slightly, but he simply wiped it away. Another death, and more blood was on his hands. Was killing the Siren a good or a bad thing? He would never know... "It's not everyday you murder a legend..." He mumbled, turning on the water and placing a cloth on the side of the blade. He wiped both sides off, quick and easy... He silently wished life was like that... Like wiping off a blade, a clean slate. It made him wonder if he had been wise with how he had chosen to live him life. He didn't regret it fully, but wondered what his life would've been like if he had chosen to be something else...


On his bed lay a sniper for the next mission in the following few days... Kill the person of interest, Andrew Cuomo, and get away clean... Easy enough... He just had to get a clear shot... And no more governor... He walked to the large weapon, and took a clip from his nightstand, and loaded it.

He was ready...