Just a Job

CW: Language, blood, suggested violence

Jason closed his laptop and sipped his coffee. He enjoyed coding; it was much cleaner than his previous profession while providing the same level of planning and strategy. Every job was a puzzle to solve—without the blood.

Functions, loops, recursion—a beautiful symphony of parts coming together in an elegant orchestra. Transforming the esoteric symbols in his editor into delightful images and functionality on a screen made him feel clever, magical.

He also enjoyed the social aspect. Today he was in town for a meeting with clients; he got to understand them, their business, their motivations.

That never happened before. Before it was just a name, photo, and address. It was never personal, which was good—very good.

With programming, Jason felt connected to the work, motivated. It was satisfying to help people improve their businesses. Set up a website, stand up a database, or build a new app—these things were all feel-good projects.

Occasionally, an old client would call and request something in a grey area like hacking a security system or stealing data. Jason would do those jobs too. Why not? They paid better and they got his blood and adrenaline pumping again; they were still less messy than his old job.

His old job was too bloody, too dangerous. His body told him he needed to move on; he was getting old. Now he got to relax and type on a keyboard all day, feet up and coffee in hand. Plus, he still traveled for jobs like this.

This life was excellent. The money wasn’t as good, but he was comfortable. Sure, his old clients were disappointed, but they respected him, feared him, and they wouldn’t fuck with him. So it all worked out.

Jason packed up his laptop and headed out. He looked forward to flying back home to embark on this enormous project. This company wanted a new cloud-hosted ordering site, complete with distribution, customer service, and metrics back-ends. They flew him out here, paid for his hotel, and offered a generous down payment which would support him for months. Landing a serious client like this was a big step up for him.

He considered hiring a contractor. Maybe he would contact Jeff again; that kid was smart, and fast. It would reduce his profits, but speed up the project since he lacked expertise in backend networking code. It would payoff in the end.

Mind lost in the details, Jason tripped—that damn leg injury—and almost stumbled on the curb. This is why he got out of the killing business. Getting shot in the leg put a hamper on running away.

Despite his efforts to steady himself, he ended up bumping into a man entering the sidewalk from the crosswalk.

“Watch it, buddy!” The man said.

It was too much. The bump from the man, his bum leg, and the weight of the laptop bag set him toppling over. Jason fell into the street just as a car turned the corner. He didn’t have time to react.

#

“Car accident—”

“—crushed leg, broken ribs, skull fracture.”

“Call Doctor Hanlon!”

Jason heard voices shouting and searing pain radiated throughout his body. He blacked out again.

He came to with bright lights overhead and panicked. Was he being interrogated? His heart raced and sweat broke out all over his body. Gods, what happened? Had they caught him? He wouldn’t talk, they couldn’t make him. This wasn’t happening. Torture? They must have already started; his leg was on fire and he couldn’t breathe. He knew nothing—it was just a job.

“Sir? Sir, I’m going to give you something to calm down,” a voice said. He felt an eerie calm wash over him.

Jason remembered then, the car, the curb, his damn leg. His body relaxed, though his leg still throbbed with pain and every breath was like inhaling shards of glass. Hanlon? Why did that name tickle something in his brain? His head was throbbing.

“Jason Smith?”

“Yes?” He thought that was his name, though he wasn’t sure. He couldn’t think.

“Jason, I’m nurse Gifford. You need surgery right away. This is Doctor Hanlon. She’s going to take you to surgery.”

Hanlon. A woman came into view. Hanlon. That name again. Oh gods. That name—

Then he saw her, and icy fear cut through the sedative. His eyes grew wide and his heart rate spiked. An alert blared and nurses rushed over to coo over him. Hanlon was a pretty woman with blue eyes, mid forties, black hair pulled back into a ponytail, just like that night ten years ago.

Ten years ago when he tied her to a chair as tears ran down her face. Ten years ago when she begged him not to kill her husband, tech magnate Vince Hanlon. Ten years ago when he said, “this isn’t personal, Mrs. Hanlon, it’s just a job”.

Would she recognize him?

Hanlon leaned over and said, “Hello Jason, I’m Doctor Hanlon. I’m going to get you all fixed up. You have extensive damage to your skull, your ribs, and to your leg. You’ll be in under for a long time, and there are risks. Do you understand?” She smiled and patted his hand.

“Yes.” He said, not sure what he was agreeing to, surgery he supposed. Jason fixated on her.

She didn’t seem to recognize him. She seemed reassuring and caring, the way a doctor should be. The bed started moving. The nurses were taking him away, moving him into surgery. They were talking above him, planning the procedure, but he couldn’t concentrate; he was remembering that night.

Vince Hanlon was one of his last jobs. He was just a name, just like any of the others. Jason knew nothing about him—a name, a photo, a location.

Their house was enormous. It was difficult, a puzzle, lots of security. That’s why he loved coding now, the challenge of figuring out all the use cases, all the what ifs, covering all the bases.

What if they have weapons stashed? Where were the exits? Did they have extra alarms? Was there a dog? Were there other staff? Children? All the possibilities had to be accounted for, planned for ahead of time, researched.

Jason had covered them all, had planned for weeks. He mapped the house, researched everything, gathered all the schedules and timed the entire encounter. He accounted for every circumstance—every detail—except for the wife, who was supposed to be at work for an evening shift. Dr. Hanlon had called in sick, had been home when she shouldn’t have been. She was not part of the job and he didn’t like to do extra work. It was messy.

The truth was, Jason should have eliminated her as well, but he didn’t like killing. It was just a job to him; it wasn’t something he enjoyed. So he didn’t, which in hindsight, was probably a mistake. Probably.

He was in the surgery room, staring up at another bright light. He was cold and the room smelled of antiseptic and blood. The anesthesiologist moved to put an oxygen mask over his face, but the doctor put up a hand to stop him.

Doctor Hanlon leaned over and smiled. This time, her blue eyes were bright and clear, no tears. She said, “This isn’t personal, Mr. Smith, it’s just a job.”

Then the anesthesiologist lowered the mask over his face and he slipped into darkness with the smell of blood in the air.