first blood

“No regrets…” the young woman repeated as she watched her first victim, still writhing on the ground before her, both hands clutching at his throat in a futile attempt to remove the bolt embedded in his neck.

The man’s eyes met the cold gaze of his killer. “No regrets,” she whispered to herself, her voice barely audible as she drew the katana from her waist, taking a moment to glimpse her own reflection in the blade.

In it, she saw her face. Beyond the cold stare she **** herself to wear, she saw it: doubt, fear…

Why were her hands trembling? Why was her breathing uneven?

Fear?

Doubt?

Emotions she shouldn’t have in this moment—emotions that would never serve her purpose, emotions she needed to discard. In the blade’s reflection, she saw the translucent face of her mentor appear.

“The first kill always…” the young woman didn’t let her finish. Without bothering to listen further, she didn’t want another lecture, another attempt to steer her away from the path she had chosen.

She moved the katana. The rat’s head separated from its body. Yes, this was a rat… not a person.

She shouldn’t feel guilty for killing rats; that was her job now—the job she had accepted when she decided to take her mentor’s dream as her own, no matter how much the latter tried to dissuade her.

She would succeed.

As she crouched to retrieve the spent bolt stained with her first victim’s blood, she repeated those words to herself: it was just a rat.

Rats deserved to be exterminated.

With renewed resolve, she wiped the blood off her katana before sheathed it again, reloaded the crossbow, and entered the building from the rooftop. Her victim was nothing more than a rat who had stepped outside for a smoke while gazing at the stars.

The first of many that night, if she succeeded…

No…

Not if she succeeded.

She knew she would. She would succeed.