Well…
That sucks.
I move a hand to the back of my neck, suddenly very aware of the small bomb stuck in there. I can’t believe I was so careless… so stupid as to think The Order wanted anything more than to make me their fucking slave. I wasn’t thinking clearly, back when I escaped that room. I wasn’t prepared for them sticking me with anything, and I should have been.
I glance down at the tattoo on my forearm.
WWJD.
What would Josh do right now? First of all, he would definitely insult me using a British phrase I’m unlikely to have heard of. Something involving muppets, probably. But once he’d got that out of his system, he’d start working on a way to get it out of my body, or at the very least, disable it. Then he’d—
What’s that noise?
I realize my mind’s been wandering, and as my vision re-focuses on my surroundings, I see Pierce clicking his fingers near my head to get my attention.
“There we go. Did you hear what I just said?”
I frown at him and nod at his hand. “That’s really annoying. And no, I’d stopped listening to you shortly after you told me about the bomb in my head.”
He smiles. “I figured. I said… and before you get any ideas, you can’t remove the device. It has a sensor on it that acts as a failsafe, causing it to detonate the second it comes into contact with the air.”
Shit!
Okay, poker face…
I shrug. “The thought hadn’t crossed my mind.”
“Uh-huh…”
I get to my feet. “Listen, if you’re done with the science lesson, it turns out I’ve got a job to do. Any chance I can catch a lift back to Abu Dhabi?”
He steps back, giving me room to move. He puts the detonator back in his pocket and shakes his head. “No, you’re on your own. But… we did have someone drive your car over here. It’s parked outside. Make your own way home.”
“Huh… that’s actually pretty nice of you, thanks.”
He shrugs. “We’re not trying to be your enemy. If you would simply commit to what we’re trying to achieve and stop all these mindless acts of rebellion, there wouldn’t be a problem.”
I stroke the stubble on my chin. “And it’s exactly that, which isn’t sitting right with me. What we’re trying to achieve… Is The Order simply a collection of the best killers for hire, or does it actually have its own agenda? You seem pretty well informed about what The Order’s working toward, Pierce. Maybe you could share some details about what you’re trying to achieve? Y’know, purely out of curiosity…”
He rolls his eyes. “You just don’t learn, do you?”
His hand disappears into his pocket again. I hold a hand up. “Now, now… there’s no need for that. I’m not questioning the jobs I’m given. I get that, okay? That’s not what this is. The job’s done. I’m just asking, like I say, out of curiosity… one colleague to another. Just some friendly, water-cooler conversation. We’re all on the same side, right? I just want to understand what I’m a part of.”
Pierce holds my gaze for a moment. I can see the cogs working behind the scenes, as if he’s trying to figure out if I’m being serious.
He stays silent.
I sigh. “C’mon, man… I’m pretty sure I know why Sayed bin Mawal was taken out, but whose benefit did The Order do it for?”
He arches his brow. “Okay, I’ll play along. Why do you think he was eliminated?”
I shrug. “Money. He was happily giving something away that other people were trying to sell at a decent margin. I’m not an economics professor, but I know what he was doing would have had an impact on the stock exchange, which would’ve cost people millions of dollars. Without him, that doesn’t happen.”
He regards me silently for a moment, and then shrugs. “Nice theory. It makes a lot of sense.”
“So, am I right?”
He shrugs again. “I have no idea. I’m not told the reason, and I don’t fucking ask.”
I’m going round in circles here!
“Look, I get it, you’re a company man, happy to accept and feed others the company line. But what I’m asking, is if I’m right about bin Mawal, why does it matter to The Order if some rich prick in the States stays rich or not?”
“It probably doesn’t. But there will be a valid reason why we wanted bin Mawal to stop doing what he was doing. Same reason we asked you to take out Mr. Way when you first joined. Doing something bad isn’t justification enough to be killed. Lots of people do bad things every day. But we don’t go around killing every drug dealer, murderer and rapist. We take out the people whose actions are having, or are likely to have, a profound effect on the larger picture.”
I shake my head and let out a short sigh. “Okay, fine, whatever. I can see I’m wasting my time. The organ grinder won’t tell me anything, so why would the monkey, right?” He smiles at me, which I ignore. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I apparently have a job to do.”
He steps to the side and I walk past him without another look and head out into the hall. I make eye contact with everyone standing here as I push past them and make my way back toward the elevator.
This is turning out to be a really shitty day.
I’m sitting in my car on the driveway outside my house. I can’t quite bring myself to go inside. Maybe it’s on principle, I don’t know. I mean, the place is bought and paid for by The Order, and in the last couple of hours, I’ve come to realize they’re nothing but a bunch of maniacal, sadistic, delusional bastards. I’m not sure I want anything from them anymore.
I wonder how many of the assets they have on their books are actually aware they have a bomb in their neck…
I wonder how many know they’re working for a cult of arrogant pricks with a God complex…
Probably not that many. I bet the others aren’t stupid enough to keep asking questions.
Actually, no — it’s not stupidity that makes me do it. It’s fucking talent! You hear about it all the time. Well, at least, I used to, when I had Josh as my link to the community that forms the basis of the world I live in. Assassins who were supposedly at the top of their game, making big money, living the fast life… suddenly disappear because they were set up, or because they were ambushed, or because their target got lucky…
That won’t ever happen to me. You know why? Because I ask questions. I find out information for myself. I don’t take things at face value from the people who hire me, because I’m a paranoid sonofabitch. I make sure the job is done cleanly and that the target deserves to be on the business end of my Beretta. If I’m not satisfied by what I find out, I turn the job down and walk away.
D’you know what? If The Order of Sabbah doesn’t like the way I do things, they can kiss my ass! They hired me for my skills, not my personality. They would’ve done their research on me, they would’ve asked around… they would’ve known my reputation before they approached me. As far as I’m concerned, I’m well within my rights to ask for some information when I’m putting my ass on the line.