The First Job

My two days of rest came and went and come my first day on the job I was pulled to some wing of The Recluse I never heard of. I was lead to a room by Juno who had revealed to be my "handler" and would aid me on my missions for the regime.

She brought me to a room which wasn't numbered and told me to enter, which I abided by. The room itself was dark and had few features aside from a bulky table which, instead of legs, had a completely solid base.

I walked up to the table, scanning the room, there was nothing here. I looked down at the table to see it was indent slightly. A small blue dot was flashing on the table to my left which I looked at in mild curiosity.

I pressed the dot, thinking it was some kind of button only to have the wall I was facing light up and the table too, which, as it turns out, had a giant touch screen on it. The wall in front of me displayed five... people, cloaked in shadow due to the bright light behind them. One had a bigger chair than the rest, so I assumed they were in charge.

"Hello, Elias. We have a job for you." I couldn't tell which one was talking but his voice was deep and slow. It was quite commanding. The table in front of my lit up with the image of Requiem which then zoomed in on a street, a red dot pulling my attention to a specific location. A building, almost identical to the rest in its area.

"That building houses a prominent leader of the resistance plaguing this city and humanity at large. Your objective is to locate this man, Edward Baker, and eliminate him." This was another one, a woman this time though she sounded old and bitter. Honestly, she sounded like the angry old woman on the corner of my street... old street now.

"I'm not to capture him for interrogation?" That was the standard procedure I had always been used to. You capture people, get all the information you want out of them and then you kill them... Well, I'd let mine run as often as I could but don't tell anyone that.

"No, he has nothing for us. Simply eliminate him. Your equipment shall be provided upon your exit of this room, good luck, Elias." The entire room shut down then, the table turned off along with the wall being used as a screen. I sighed and left the room, Juno leaning on the wall.

When she noticed me, she turned and stood up straight. "So, where are you going?" I began walking down the corridor, following Juno who had already begun walking. She was leading me somewhere, probably to get my equipment.

"Some apartment complex. There's some guy in there I need to deal with." I kept things vague, I didn't know how much I could tell her so I chose to keep it hushed. Juno nodded and turned to a door.

"Well, you can grab your equipment here. Everything in there is yours, plus the motorbike out back." I had a motorbike? Well... I'm going to have to spend time tuning that up. No matter, I walked into the room and it was just... wall to wall with weapons.

Something about them put me off though, they all looked like they should be attached to something. Juno, thankfully, was here to explain. "All the weapons seen here are attached to you, be it on your wrist, thigh, shoulder or wherever else you can put them. I don't know how any of it works but it does."

I nodded and began to look through the weapons. They were all compact sidearms, like automatic pistols and whatnot, I guess you can't put an assault rifle in my arm. What took my eye though, was the melee stuff. I was used to batons and knives but this stuff was... hardly real. For example, this blade that fits into my wrist, but the blade doesn't turn on unless I want it on, like a plasma cutter only in blade form.

I, of course, picked up the yellow blade... like who wouldn't want that? Along with just some simple pistols, one automatic the other not. It's honestly hard to describe these weapons given how complex they are. What they do is fold into themselves, to the length of the lower forearm and the width of about my index and middle finger. It was all very compact and efficient.

There were also larger weapons placed on a wall, but they require a suitcase to carry them in and well... that just wasn't my style. Once I was all equipped Juno took me to the back of the Recluse, where I found the bike she was talking about.

It was a lot sleeker than my old one, lots of flowing curves and everything along those lines. It was most certainly a sports bike though, I would have to hunch over, practically on the bike, to properly ride the thing.

"I'll be here, guiding you through this, so just get going and I'll alert you to any updates in your mission," Juno noted, looking at some sort of tablet. I nodded and got on my bike and took off down the back ally onto a road.

My path was made clear by a series of blue dots on the road which disappeared as I passed. The ride over to Edward got me thinking. How am I to balance this out? I have the desire to see the bleeding sun dim, yet I had to keep my job otherwise who knows what will happen to me?

I decided I'd find some way to help the rebellion, that I now knew existed, by leaking information every so often to them, along with a small bit of sabotage. The only issue would be getting hold of leaders of this resistance movement to feed them information.

I didn't have much time to figure out the details, however, as I ended up at the address where this Edward baker was hiding out. I parked my bike on the street corner, a small walk from the residence which was visually indistinguishable from the others around it, the black walls and dim windows towering over me.

I got to the front door of the residence and knocked, stepping back and crossing my arms. A woman, about twenty opened the door partway and standing in the gap. She had long black hair and bright blue eyes, with a scar on her left cheek. "Can I help you?"

"I'm here to see Edward Baker." I was getting worried I'd have to fight through to get to him, the woman didn't look convinced that I wasn't here to kill him, or maybe she was scared and hiding it. I mean... I am half metal after all, though most of me is some polymer that looks like human skin with strange lines.

"Let the man in, Estelle." A voice behind the woman, who I now know as Estelle, spoke up. It was hard and deep, but... had hints of... I want to say regret laced throughout. The woman sighed, opened the door and stood to the side, letting me in, where I then saw the man I was sent here to kill.

He had short brown hair, shaved everywhere but on top of his head and eyes to match the colour. He also had a close shaved beard and an overall very masculine body, well built, about six feet, the lot.

Looking again at Estelle, she was small, about five foot six or so, and a very thin build which looked to me to be very agile and flexible. So she couldn't overpower anyone, but she could outmanoeuvre them with ease. "How can I help you... I didn't catch your name." Again Edward spoke up, it sounded as if he were going to try to be diplomatic about this.

"Take the shot, Elias, end it here," Juno spoke in my ear. I was tempted to take her advice. Shoot him, subdue her and search the building for anything I could use. In fact, it might be the best idea, but I didn't know how many people were in here, so it may be risky.

I relented and, to my great sorrow but with a lack of hesitation, grabbed Estelle by the throat and used the pistol in my left arm to shoot Edward through the head, blood splattering the wall at the top of the flight of stairs he was standing on. I had to decide quickly what to do with Estelle however...

I knocked her out by chocking her out, before rummaging her pockets for her phone. Finding it, I broke in, courtesy of my new mechanical augments. I then head into her email and saved it to my phone, before searching her phone for any details I could use to further an investigation. "Why are you leaving her alive?" Again Juno spoke.

Shit. I had to think of something fast. "Future operations Juno. I plan to set her up with false information and then take out another leader of this rebellion." I found it best to lie using aspects of the truth. I do plan to use her for future operations, just not for the bleeding sun.

I left the building, leaving Estelle her phone. Once outside I sent her an email and got onto my bike. That concludes my first mission then. I guess I now know what I'll be put up against.