The Job by Tim Taylor

 

 The job came in as an encrypted message, to the phone he had been given for that purpose. The message itself was no more than a jumble of letters, numbers and symbols, but it matched the one he had been given. Attached to it were four files: a document containing terse, precise instructions; two photographs, of a rotund, balding man in his 50’s; and a map. He committed them all to memory, then turned off the phone. He would drop it down a suitable drain later, somewhere distant from both his flat and the location shown on the map.

              The message had given him only a couple of hours to prepare, but the location wasn’t far away, and by now the process was second nature to him. He inspected the rifle, checking the sights and magazine, then placed it back in its innocent-looking suitcase. He took a few minutes to decide on appropriate clothing. The location was quite central, and close to the station. Confused Tourist was the obvious cover, and it would go with the suitcase. He preferred it to the briefcase or the sports bag: less obvious. He selected a grey baseball cap, a check shirt, a pair of chinos and some American-looking sneakers. A small camera, hung around his neck, completed the outfit.

              He found the building easily enough and slipped through a side doorway as instructed, locking it behind him. The place was empty but not yet derelict. Steps and a ladder led to the top floor and then the roof. He soon found an ideal spot: an indentation in the roof line, opposite the target building and screened by a metre-high wall from the street below.  He took the rifle out of the case, assembled it and found a comfortable position to watch and wait.

              In the early days, this period had been one of sweating and a pounding beat in his head. Then, as he grew used to the work, the waiting had become calm, even boring. Latterly, though, he had started to become disturbed by the thoughts that found their way into his head in these quiet moments. There was curiosity – what was the purpose of these jobs; what point did they serve? Would it really matter if what he had been told to do didn’t happen? And with those thoughts had come an emotion he was not used to and did not like: guilt. Who were these people he was paid to erase? They must have lives, people who loved them. Why did he have to do this?

              On the last job, the feeling had become so acute that he had found himself unable to pull the trigger and merely watched the mark get into a taxi and disappear. He had replied to his message with a text saying “no show”. For a few anxious days, he had expected to be grilled, reprimanded, maybe even dismissed from service. But nothing happened. This job had arrived without comment.

              The door of the building he was watching opened. He raised the rifle. A figure came out: tall, blond, athletic – it was not the mark. He relaxed, and resumed his watching. He did not see the small red spot that had appeared on the back of his head.

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"Snayperskaya Vintovka Dragunova a.k.a Dragunov Sniper Rifle" by brian.ch is licensed under CC BY 2.0.