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I’m loaded with six of my sisters, each one waiting her turn to fulfill her task. Each one equally hangry. Only One have her exit assured, but if she can’t finish the job, then Two and then me. And I will not fail. All that I need is to have a chance.

It’s around 12.30, sky is clear, weather is sunny, there is no wind. Perfect conditions for Shooter but One will have it difficult as the first shot, with the barrel cold, is usually for calibration. Yet One is ready, waiting in the chamber. The moment is at hand. The motorcade just turned the corner and Target started to recede. Everything will be over in the next few seconds, for good or bad.

I can feel the steadiness of Shooter, trying to control his breathing, but unable to control his heart. Beat after beat after beat. The crowd is cheering and is distracted. No one will hear the shot. No one will see any smoke. No one will notice us, hidden in the building, six stories up. Shooter inhales, Target is at sight but view is obstructed by the branches of a tree. Shooter exhales, following Target through the scope. Head, branch, branch, head, branch, head. Shooter inhales deeply. Branch, head, head, head… He can’t see the obstacle until it’s too late for One. Shooter squeeze the trigger and One is out. She fly unswervingly straight towards Target until a traffic light pole gets in her way. The side impact twist her body but leaves her velocity almost unaltered. She can’t stop now but is not flying to Target anymore. Her deformed body crashes squarely against a street curb and breaks apart in dozens of small pieces. She’s lost. But her fly does not end just yet. Most of its rests land in the open and gets forever lost. But one sharpnel of her dismembered body kiss the flesh of the face of nobody. But nobody is important but Target.

Shooter knows he have failed immediately and exhales a curse. With a swift movement of the bolt, Two enters the chamber and I’m maybe next. Shooter inhales. A slight correction has been made and Two is ready to fly. The barrel is warm and thermally stable now. Distance is still short. About 50 meters. She will be famous. She will do magic. I hear the click of the trigger and the hammer smashing the firing pin and the explosion of the solenite and the empty shell falling into the ground. Two is flying, going downwards at 600 meters per second, straight towards Target’s back. She bites cloth and flesh and cloth, and cloth and flesh and bone and flesh and cloth, and cloth and flesh and bone and flesh and cloth, and cloth and flesh again. It was hard to stop her. Certainly, did not the wind. Certainly did not the Target. None of us care as we are tools, and we only respect the laws of Physics, not the laws of Men. We are moved only by the violent oxidation of nitrocellulose and nitroglycerine, not by the loath nor the rage nor the hate. But this does not apply to Shooter. Two has done it. Target is broken, his body may be damaged beyond repair. But Shooter wants to be sure and pulls the action bolt again without losing sight of Target. And I got into the chamber. I’m ready to fly. I’m ready to taste the wind and the bones and the flesh and the blood, and to change the shape of human history. But I don’t care as I am a tool.

The chamber is warm from One and Two, but is going to be red hot with from me for a fraction of a second. If I succeed, Four will never be fired. And I will have success. Still holding his breath, Shooter pulls the trigger and I got fired!

I can feel the springs of the trigger tensing, and the hammer retracting, and the sudden release and the explosion. The heat and sound are left behind as I speed through the barrel quicker than both. The lands and groves of the barrel mark my body and imprint a radial velocity that will allow me to flight straight. I exit the muzzle spinning towards Targets head. It only takes me 0.13 seconds to cover the 81 meters that separates me from my objective. Target will be dead before he hear the shot.

The nasty show beggins. My 10.5 grams body of copper and lead reach the right parietal bone of the head of Target transmitting 2.5 kilojoules directly to it. My soft body can’t stand all that energy. The skull of Target either. My fragmented body continues to move forward as my initial velocity is barely altered, eating and destroying everything in its path. Most of the tissue is soft anyways. The exit is explosive and gets immortalized by chance in some crappy amateur film. The shrapnel of my body is in the air again, carrying with it some shredded bones, scalp and brain. Most of Target, now a limp body, is left behind, among with its shocked companions. They try to put the pieces of Target’s head together, meanwhile Shooter fleed. I’m sure some of my sisters will find him later. Sometimes we are summoned by violent men who throw us towards good men. Some other times there are not good men.

Some will cry. Some will cheer. Some will invent absurdities about Two’s work. But I have been who had transformed a person into a body. I have been who breaked it beyond repair. And so, in less than ten seconds, my sisters and I we shifted the course of a Nation and enter in the books of human history.

Not that we care, as we are just tools. We only respect the laws of Physics, not the laws of Men. We are only moved by the violent oxidation of nitrocellulose and nitroglycerine, not by the loath nor the rage nor the hate.