I sat at the seat; a wall of bulletproof glass separated me from the outside world. My only link was a phone that I held in my hand. I had a visitor. Odd, because everyone I knew were either dead or would rather not come near a federal prison unless they really had too. My visitor walked in and sat down.
Despite his Italian made business suit, I could tell by his rigid walk that he was a military man: the way his shoulders didn't sway and how his feet walked in a straight line, never wandering away from the shortest path to the destination. He looked to be around 60 or so, with gray hair, crow's feet, and wrinkles. Still, he looked very healthy and deadly. He smiled at me and picked up the phone one the other end. "Hello Mr. Payne. I am General James L. Huff."
I remained silent. He pulled out a manila folder. I recognized the coffee mug stain on the cover; it was my police dossier. "You wiped an entire mob family, snuck into a former U.S. government military technology lab, made a full scale assault against the Aesir company fortress, and slaughtered an entire army of trained killers." My eyes widened, the police didn't know about the base underneath Cold Steel. The man noticed my shocked look. "The United States government remembers all its assets. After all, valuable tax dollars went into that lab."
"Mr. Payne, if you had done all this killing, assassinating, and property damage in Vietnam, you would have been a hero. Unfortunately, you're not in Vietnam but in New York City. Still, the government has noticed your talents and decided to make use of them."
"What do you mean?"
"We are interested in your abilities and plan to make you into a neutralizer."
"A what?"
"A covert agent specializing in neutralizing threats to national security and liquidating those who threaten the right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness."
"You want me to become a assassin," I said flatly.
"That is one way of putting it. Before you say your answer, consider this, you have been given the death sentence by the people of New York for several hundred counts of murder. You are a prodigy. We don't want to waste that. This offer can be your savior from the needle. Consider that. So, Mr. Payne, do you accept our offer?"
I thought about for about a split second. Death by lethal injection or a new lease on life? Choices, choices. I nodded my head.