Acknowledgments:
Omi as always
Lisa for being a light in my dark places
Disclaimers:
"A vague disclaimer is nobody's friend" - Willow, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
I do not own this character nor do I have any rights to anything related to the TV show Numb3rs. I plead fair use and claim only my own writing.
I'm a killer.
The whiskey in the bottle may not be as clear as vodka but there's still clarity in there.
I've just taken another man's life. That makes two this year and they weren't my first.
The first time I killed a man it affected me. I think I even lost it for a while. Now, this last one... I feel nothing. Well maybe not nothing. If I felt nothing would I be losing myself in a bottle of whiskey?
What does it mean when a man can just take another man's life like that?
I've got reasons why I did what I did but it doesn't matter how good they are. I took something that wasn't mine to take.
I've broken a commandment. Those are supposed to be God's most sacred laws.
'Thou shalt not kill' it says.
It doesn't say 'Thou shalt not kill except in the following circumstances.'
I'll bet all those crusaders in the Middle Ages acted like it did, just like I do.
I raise my gun and I fire. That's all. There's no agonizing over it beforehand. There's no weighing the options. I don't ponder the repercussions. I just pump lead into their chests until they stop moving.
And I think they're the animals.
I'm the one who's inhuman. I'm the one who walks among the normal people.
I can sit in a diner and no one who passes by me thinks to themselves 'Hey that guy's killed three men.'
Even my family... They'd never think of me as a killer.
But I do.
That is until I finish this bottle and pass out. Then I don't have to think any more.
I just have to wake up tomorrow, put my badge on and be the Agent Eppes everyone expects me to be.
At least until I get home tomorrow night.
Then it's three dead men and a bottle all over again.
Three dead men...
...and one lost soul.