The assassin was on the top of a building that looked down the intercostals waterway, he was in the shadows of a door that was slightly ajar. His view was unobstructed and his target was sitting in the clear. His rifle of choice for this operation was the Windrunner Model 50 a bolt action break down .50 caliber sniper rifle that was light and very accurate. He was close to 1200 meters away just a little under a mile and his target only had a moment to live even though he didn’t realize it yet.

Darius Erbin, CEO of a giant mortgage scam company in South Florida sat on the back balcony of his intercostals water estate. He was very pleased with himself, the economy was taking huge hits but his firm was doing very well. It was a devious ploy his company had come up with, they dealt with sub-prime mortgages and the model they had developed was truly masterful.

Mortgages were bought and sold every day, his company chose sub-prime or high risk mortgages they always chose people who only had ten years or less left on the loan. As soon as they purchased the note the scam began. The software the company used to track payments and record insurance and other fees automatically put the home owner in late status and the foreclosure process started almost instantly. The forbearance program they had was just an extension of the same scam and was only in place due to legal pressure, it was just more money in the company coffers and was never applied to any loans.

The real beauty of the scam is that the legal fees for the foreclosure weren’t even paid by his company they would sell blocks of these mortgages to investors and then use the proceeds to “protect” the investor’s assets. It had taken years of experience inside the mortgage industry to plan the details of this scam and the inside circle of the Board of Directors were the only ones who truly understood the details and they also made the money, two former Congressmen saw that legislation stayed in place that helped the company skirt many finance regulations and oversight from SOX was almost a joke.

Darius was a large man, in his early sixties with iron gray hair, his eyes were cold and people found this very uncomfortable when speaking to him both he and his brother shared the soulless eyes which they inherited it from their father. He wasn’t as physically fit as he once was but he was still an imposing presence he only recently got glasses and these were only for reading. He was now enjoying his ritual brandy on the balcony, the sun wouldn’t set for another thirty minutes or so and it was his favorite time of day.

He began to raise the glass to his lips when the .50 caliber round struck him just above the bridge of the nose. The speed and size of the round tore the entire top of his head off, blood from severed arteries sprayed up into the air. And his dead body jerked several times as it attempted to cling to a life already gone. It slide slowly to floor blood now collecting in a pool at the top of the corpse.

The assassin examined the results of the shot only long enough to confirm the target was dead, he didn’t smile didn’t take any time to listen for sirens didn’t pause for anything. He quickly broke the rifle down and stowed it in its carrying case. With five minutes he was on the street below, no sirens could be heard yet. He walked across the street to the bus stop and within two minutes he was on a bus headed to Delray Beach.

If anyone saw him they would have forgotten him instantly, average height, average build, brownish blonde hair wearing non-descript clothes and pulling a non-descript case that look like a computer. As he sat on the bus feeling if any eyes were on him he allowed himself a small grin of satisfaction the target had been disposed of nicely. His next target would go just as easily he was sure.

Living Darkly II

The assassin arrived on Atlantic Ave and walked the short distance to his hotel a little hole called the Sands Inn. He went directly to his room to his room, opened the rifle case and cleaned the weapon thoroughly. As hands ran thru the well rehearsed routine his mind wandered.

After he had left the Army he had drifted without direction and purpose the only thing he was good at was killing and it had no place in this world at least so he thought. He could have returned to the war torn Middle East but the conflict disgusted him, Iran was a political excuse the government was using to obtain oil and pumped money into American companies that had ties to the Ex-President and Vice President, Afghanistan was a historic mistake with rebels fighting and living in caves over idiotic religious beliefs.

He ended up in Wichita Kansas working at a bar in the downtown area, he was there for several months when the local paper had picked up on a serial child molester/killer living somewhere in Wichita. Five children had been abducted and killed in fourteen months, the community was in an uproar. The police had no suspects at least not any they were releasing information on. The Chief of Police had broadcast a message asking for help from its citizens on the local news channel.

Out of curiosity he researched child molesters and serial behavior on the internet and at the local library. It took him very little time to understand that serial child predators had specific hunting grounds, Malls, Schools, Churches, playgrounds and any areas where children were at constantly even if parents were present the predator would be watchful and careful but still active. They also had a specific personality and past that would lead them into this behavior.

Now that his presence was know he would either move to a new hunting ground, like a new city close by or go into hibernation mode and it was likely that he had been active in other areas before coming here. As he examined the patterns of the abductions he saw a specific pattern to them they were happening in an ever expanding area from a community called West Gates. In fact they were almost linear, and his researched showed that this predator had been here for quite a while. Over the past ten years five other children has vanished and never been recovered but the abductions had occurred over a much longer period of time.

He began driving to West Gate and then he would park his car and run through its streets. He was looking for a specific type, male because males had a higher instance of molestation and killing, the average number of children abused by a child molester was fifty two in a lifetime. He was guessing based on the timeframe between killings that this predator was in his late thirty’s maybe early forties. After 3 weeks he had identified six potential’s.

Each lived alone, each was male, he learned there habits and routines, since he worked at night his days were free to observe. He quickly zeroed in on one Walter Johnson. He worked in a day care center for children only a few miles from his home. This was less than eight blocks from the first disappearance ten years before. Having Walter’s name and address he quickly got a full background check on him. He then checked for missing children in cities the man had lived in before and got three hits.

He next hacked Walter’s wireless internet connection, very easily done since he used WEP encryption which using tools like Backtrack could be compromised in minutes. He examined his PC from the street using a laptop. Walter had indeed been a very bad boy the pictures he found were graphic, detailed and disgusting.

Without even thinking Walter was now labeled as the “target”, the process of elimination now began. Walter had ordered a puppy online recently, probably to be used as bait. The records on his PC showed that he had purchased three such puppies over the years. This was a way to get up close and personnel with the “target”. A phone call to Puppy’s Online revealed that he would get his dog Friday between 3:00pm and 5:00pm, perfect.

Walter was home early Friday because he was expecting a new puppy, his anticipation was almost overwhelming, he had identified a little girl only six years old who he had seen several times in nearby Andover that he was planning on capturing tomorrow. His obsession had grown lately and he knew the pressure was on because the police were warning people about him, he had not show the discipline he had in the past and he cursed himself for it.

The doorbell woke him from his musings, he looked thru the peephole and could see a man in a delivery uniform wearing a grey hat. He opened the door and a foot landed in his solar plexus so hard he vomited in the hallway. He was in such pain that he lay on the floor unable to even scream.

A quiet voice said. “Hello Walter we have much to discuss, don’t we”?

The real delivery man found Walter an hour later or at least what was left of him. His head had been left on the front porch with his severed penis sticking out of his mouth. The police found all the evidence they needed to identify Walter as their serial molester and killer, someone had put all the evidence neatly around what was left of his mutilated body.

Living Darkly III

Thus began his journey into the world of professional assassination, he realized that many would consider him a cold blooded killer or perhaps even insane and he also realized that he cared very little what anyone thought. While in the Army he had read his physiatrist review of his personality, it stated that his dis-associative behavior was a boon as a sniper and didn’t cause the delayed emotional problems many snipers experienced latter in life. In his mind he was performing a public service he was responsible for taking out the trash that the legal and political system failed to remove.

He had very specific rules he played by, the target had to meet his requirements or he simply didn’t accept the contract. After Kansas he began to revisit his contacts in the military which led him to a number of groups that were interested in his services but many of these groups motivation’s were political or extreme in nature and he simply didn’t care about them. But other’s he was introduced too cared nothing about cause and effect only about the money the contract brought in, these were the ones he was interested in. In short order he developed several sources that provided contract work to him.

So he began to freelance, it was amazing simple he had created an avatar online that allowed clients to contact him in a totally anonymous manner he could then evaluate potential targets and based on his criteria he would accept or reject the contract. He had numerous overseas accounts under various names, the ones in Panama were the easiest to use and the least closely watched. The money wasn’t very good at first because contrary to popular belief life does have a finite value. Yet as the targets became more and more difficult the money became better and better.

His latest assignment might be his last, not because he feared failure but because there seemed to be little point in continuing his professional quest to free the unworthy from the tyranny of life. The money was exceptional and it reflected the difficulty of the targets that he had accepted on this particular contract. The risk here because there was more than a single target in a specific geographic area and at the very least being identified even anonymously by law enforcement who could realize that a single person was the source of the killings was high.

In point of fact this particular contract consisted of a total of seven targets total, each was a very public figure and each was worst than the last. To add a further layer of complexity and danger he knew that “private security” would be employed when local law enforcement failed to prevent the killings. And the “private security” meant mercs or other professionals who would be intent on tracking and killing him. That mattered very little to him in respect to the completion of his contract it simply meant more detailed planning and the refreshment of real physical danger.

The TV was on CNN and Nancy Grace who was babbling about her latest rating’s hog, already convicted in the public by this women the idea of a fair trial had for the accused was already gone thanks to her. There was no fair trail and no real justice unless he accepted a contract on a target, then justice would be very swift and without mercy. This brought a rare smile to his face.