The Assassin Will Rue His Life

It was a cloudy day with dark skies. It was serene but the silence made it ominous. In a corner of Los Angeles, blood smeared onto the ground. Armed men in black suits were randomly shooting around in a narrow alley. They couldn’t seem to figure out how four of their men just dropped dead. ‘Where was the perpetrator?’. There were five guards left, circling around one man, who was wearing a fancy suit and a lot of cologne, trying to protect him. He kept shouting at them, “What did I hire you for? Find him!”. He was panicking. Then suddenly one of his men smirked, and turned around, pointing his gun at his colleague. Bang! Followed by another 3 shots, and all the bodyguards lay on the floor, motionless. While the boss fell on his back, cowering in fear. “W-who sent you?”, he squeezed out a few words before he fell on the ground with a hole in his head. It started to rain down heavily, and the culprit left without any traces. The police couldn’t find any evidence or lead and the case had to be closed after months of investigation led to no results.

As time went by, the case was completely forgotten, as did thousands of cases all over the world, from bomb blasts to torture. All of which had the same culprit, who was named Assailant X by the higher-ups. He was classified as a dangerous mass murderer but they didn’t have a single piece of information about him – a world-class assassin! However, as most heroes have complicated and sad backstories, so do the villains. Thiers are usually even worse. This assassin was once a little boy, who was outcast from society as he could never remember any faces, was an orphan who was not cared for even in the orphanage and was bullied regularly. The worst part was that he didn’t know who did it. And that was when one hand reached out towards him. But he couldn’t believe them anymore, he had to walk on his own, he was scared. He was scared of being abandoned again, of not being wanted. Insecure, emotional and disturbed, this was his life. But the hand didn’t stop and picked him up even forcefully. It was a young girl who had lost her parents at an early age. She was his only support. But one day, she disappeared without saying anything. The boy wept till no more tears came out, but his eyes were still more determined than before to never trust anyone again. Until a secret organization took him in, 'The Assassin's League'.

It was just another day and Hugh woke up on his large bed, all alone. He got up and opened the curtains, and the entire room flashed with light and he looked down upon the city below him as he drank his coffee in peace and read the newspaper. Ding! His phone vibrated as he realized what he had to do today. He had got a new request. This one was quite special, as he had never seen anything like it. It was for a girl, he had to use any method to make this girl sign a contract, but there should be no visible damage on her but should be killed slowly as if it was a disease. He thought to himself, “Who can be so dumb? The girl could easily make out who was behind this, as the person who benefits from the contract was most likely to be the culprit”. But it wasn’t his job to preach to them about being anonymous, so he would just follow their orders and leave the aftermath to them. He got ready in a jiff, and set out to the airport to fly over to Berlin.

He went through the files and found out that the girl was having all her assets taken by her relative. He had seen many such cases in which he had to set up a stage in which a relative of the contractor would have to be hung to be shown as suicide or had to have him disappear forever with the body not being found. All of them had very high pay but this time the pay was outrageous and got him thinking who the girl was and how high her net worth may be. Anyway, he had been given a year to fulfil this request and he could take his time. He infiltrated this girl's building as a neighbor and tried to get close to her. However, he found out that the girl was too paranoid and always had her guard up. It was impossible to pry into her secrets as a friend, so all he had to do was make her fall in love. But this was something he was skilled at and commenced this idea immediately.

On her way to work, Lily, Hugh’s target, was walking home as she found her car had been stolen. This day had gone completely wrong. . She was exhausted from the pressure at work along with the misfortunes which kept happening for no reason. These misfortunes from having a bitter coffee to losing her car, were all orchestrated by Hugh. As she was contemplating on what to do after she got home, she had to take a turn as the road was under construction. But little did she know that the alleyway she took as a detour, would have thugs who would try to block her. She turned around and tried to walk away but found out that she was surrounded. Her face turned pale. And that is when she saw one strand of light in this darkness as a voice called out, “Are you alright Lily?”, there stood Hugh, in front of her as a shield protecting her from the strong winds and giving her hope. His back seemed to be the most heroic thing in the world. She never had a strong impression of him and sometimes found him annoying, but for now he was the only one in her vision as he fought and 'easily' defeated the thugs.

Hugh was sure that she was hooked in his trap and he was right. The girl had started to develop feelings for him as the girl started visiting him often with gifts and sweets, finding excuses to talk or hang out with him. It was evident that she had fallen for him. For her this may have been a relentless pursuit and a lifetime of fun, but for Hugh, it was a fleeting emotion. He went along with her for the sake of getting close, and, finally, he had an opportunity one evening, after one month. He casually conversed with Lily, trying to get her relaxed and talk more while chugging down drinks alongside her. She probably got drunk and started speaking of her past. This was when Hugh remembered something which he had long forgotten and his past memories surfaced, torturing him.

She was an orphan and her parents were murdered when she was little. She didn’t even know she had parents because she had been sent to an orphanage soon after her birth so that they could protect her. In the orphanage, she had met a boy about her age, who had been abandoned by his parents. He was bullied for not knowing any faces. ‘Even though his parents weren’t dead, how could they have abandoned him?' she thought. She never had a chance to meet her parents, but the boy had lived with them but still got a fate even worse than hers. It was pity or sympathy, but she couldn’t leave him alone. Then one day, someone came to her to inform her about the untimely demise of her parents. She had to be taken away and kept in foster homes with her relatives, who were after her inheritance. She had to learn the dirty truth about this world and had to grow up faster than most people. She faced many hardships but still got up and kept moving forward till she reached where she is, as an owner of a multinational company. 

That was when she went back to the orphanage to find out more about the boy from the orphanage. But she learnt the cold truth that there was no such boy in the orphanage, and it was all her hallucinations. She didn’t believe it at first, but the evidence was right in front of her and she had to slowly let it sink in. But when she looked at Hugh more closely; she found that he looked very similar to that boy and reminded her of those old thoughts. But she quickly dismissed that idea as it was just her imagination. It was late at night so she got up and went back to her own home after saying goodbye to Hugh. Hugh stumbled down on the chair and massaged his head. He was on the verge of running after Lily, and telling her the truth. However, he didn’t have the courage to do so as he knew what he was and that he could never be worthy of her. He was conflicted. Never failing a mission, always showing best results, making illegal money through crime and murder, Hugh didn’t know if he should give up this mission or continue without giving this another thought. He was bewildered and had his mind boggled. He was utterly shocked, but he woke up from that state and started thinking.

As he was going through his options; he became ashamed of the ridiculous thoughts and actions he was getting. He knew he was not a good man but he never wanted to kill the only person in the world who ever cared for him. Although Hugh didn’t realize it, he was in love. But he was ashamed of everything he had done and would never want to be together with Lily. He had made a decision. This was what would set him free and correct the mistakes he made. He couldn’t veer onto the right path as he was already far too gone into assassination so he didn’t care about the consequences, this was what he was determined to do. No matter who tried to stop him, he would move on until his mission was over. Ding! His phone vibrated one more time. Probably the last time it would ever do so. He had given himself a mission, by using all the money in his countless bank accounts.

His last mission! A few weeks later, Hugh disappeared with all his belongings. That day Lily found a note in front of her house. And she immediately realized who her neighbor really was and fell down on her knee, crying her eyes out. After a few months, there was a shocking headline on the news. There were some shocking pieces of information released on the internet, about the crimes of a man, Hugh Norman, who was recognized as the anonymous world class assassin, whose information and crimes were disclosed to the public. He was right now on top of a huge building supposedly owned by him with an alias and many cameras and police had him surrounded.

He stood there glancing towards the ocean from the terrace of his retirement home. Helicopters flew around him and inaudible noises echoed in his head as the police instructed him to surrender. He was in his own world, thinking about everything that has happened and led to this moment. He had already destroyed 'The Assassin's League' in which he grew up and trained to become skilled in the art of assassination. That was a part of his own request, but it still hadn’t ended. There was one last thing to do. He held a gun to his head. Countless faces passed through his mind at this moment. He could never remember any faces, but at this moment he knew every single person he met. He remembered every single face of the people he had killed. He would never be able to understand their expressions as they were held at gunpoint by them. He was still as expressionless as he always was during his missions, but there was a deep fear in his heart alongside a passion which he had never before felt. He pulled the trigger! Bang! It felt like millennia had passed in that instant and his mind went blank. At the same time, he felt that he had completed his last mission. He was satisfied.

News about him was passed around for a few months and a lot of new information had popped up. Many charity organizations had been donated to by Hugh Norman with many sorrowful messages and apologies. A lot of underground and illegal companies were brought out into the spotlight by Hugh and all of them had suffered financial losses under Hugh’s commands which made it easier for the governments around the world to catch these criminals and make the world more peaceful. But everyone knew that this wasn’t enough for compensation for all the lives which had been lost directly or indirectly through him. But they still forgave him, as they knew that under that huge cover was a gentle person, who had gone astray but realized too late. He was noted down as the most dangerous yet disconsolate being in existence.