He stood on the roof with his sniper on standby, waiting for her to pass. He had his orders to pursue and if he did not complete them, he knew too well what would happen to him and his so-called "job".

What was the right word for what he did, anyway? Was there someone who could call what he did for a job? Could he really call this he did for a job, when his "job" usually was to eliminate people who were considered a threat to the Organization he was working for? Well, he did get paid for the trouble, so yes, this was his job in life, and had been for many years now.

This he had done so many times before and he knew exactly what was to come within a few minutes. She would pass by beneath him alone or with her friend, Orihime Inoue. He knew exactly how that Orihime looked like and what kind of person she was. Always happy, wanted to help if she could and had a strange feeling for food. He had often seen them eat together out on a restaurant, and the sights that met him were not anything that appealed to him, rather gave him puke feelings.

About Orihime's friend, his target for today, he did not know much. In her folder was not much, except that she was very dangerous and must be killed immediately. She was dangerous for the entire Organization and could plunge them into perdition if she continued to live, was what was stood in her folder.

The first time he read her folder he had been very surprised at how few facts that actually stood in it. If she was as bad as they said, should not it mean that you had a lot of facts about her everyday chores? On all other of his targets it had been much more facts about them than what was in her folder.

When he tried to obtain more information, he had only been met with silence. No one wanted to say something about this mysterious woman who was such a great risk to their Organization. Why, he wondered many times? If she was such a great risk/danger, why could he not find out the cause of this mysterious woman? It had never been a problem before, so why now?

Why her?

His thoughts were interrupted by a sound from his radio that was next to him. "Yes, over?" He said into the radio's speakers.

"Target in sight", a voice was heard saying. "Are you ready, Strawberry? Over."

"Give me a second only, over and out", he replied, and then shut off the radio to avoid being disturbed when the time would come.

Was it something he did not like when he was on a mission it was to be disturbed in any way. Many times he had been close to miss a target because of the damn radio. If he was forced to do so; he used it with a sense of disgust.

Quickly, not to waste time, he took up a black support for the sniper and sat down on the edge of the roof. He did this to make it easier to keep up the sniper, but that it would be too heavy in his hands. Was it something he had learned during these years of service, it was becoming as easy as possible.

After he had been putting down the sniper he lay down on his stomach. He putted his left hand against the bottom of the sniper and his right hand on the trigger. By the sniper rifle scope, he could look down on all the people who were below him, completely unaware of his presence. If he wanted, he could shoot them one by one without that they would understand what had hit them.

What was lucky for them was that today he had a different target to deal with.

Now he could see her. She was alone, which puzzled him. It was not often that she went alone. What had got her out of it? Had something happened that made her more vigilant right now? Could it be that she knew of his position, as he sat with the sniper in preparation there on the roof? Did she know about their plans, and in such cases, how?

He had no time to think about it now; he had a job to do. The questions had to wait until later.

In order not to lose her in sight, he changed his position so that the telescopic sight was always against her head. When she was not surrounded by a wall of people, he would strike, he knew that. He could feel the excitement that always appeared in his body as fast as he could hold a weapon in his hands which was aimed against the very person whom he entrusted to eliminate. It was like a shock through him, and always led him to focus and see one thing:

He himself, the weapon he held in his hand and his targets every move in an attempt to escape.

It was not long until the opening he waited for, came. He pressed his finger on the trigger and was just about to shoot when she turned around and looked straight up at him. Her eyes were dark blue, almost purple, and her face radiated such severity that he lost his breath. All he could see in those dark eyes was a courage that he had never before seen at a target before. She was accustomed to these situations, and she was not afraid to face death.

She knew about this, she has known of my presence all the time I have stand here and wait for her! The thought came like a punch in the stomach and made him feel sick. He felt how his finger on the trigger released its grip. He could not do it, he could not shoot her!

It was as if she just by looking at him made him lose all his power so that he could not even press down his finger along the trigger. It felt like the sniper in his hands weighed tons, and he really had to make an effort to manage to hold the gun firmly in his hands.

What should he do now? He had to finish this mission in one way or another; otherwise it was he who would get a bullet through the head instead of the woman beneath him!

A gunshot was heard and the people who stood around her broke up. Before her stood his partner with the gun raised against her forehead. His partner - whose mission was to care of her in case he missed - stood there and just waited for that she would pull her gun. That way he could blame on self-defense if the police would catch him, not as often happened, but if it against all odds did, it was good to have a backup plan in your head.

Strangely enough, at least in his eyes, she made absolutely no attempt to either pull up her gun, trying to protect herself or flee. She just ... stood there and waited for death, which just were a few feet in front of her.

Without that he understood what he did - it was as if an invisible force pulled his hands that held the sniper to where they wanted it to go - he turned his rifle scope to his partner and shot him. Just like that. He did not even have time to reflect on whether it was right or wrong what he did, it was as if his finger had his own will when it pressed the trigger.

As in slow motion, he could see the bullet get closer and closer to his partner. He knew that at any time it would hit its target, which in this case was his partner's head. He'd aim for the forehead, but he was not sure whether good he had aimed, as he had pressed so fast.

A thought that he could not stop, took shape in his head.

I never miss...

Before the bullet hit him he could see how his partner's head turned up towards him as if he had heard the shot coming towards him. Their eyes met for one last time and he could not see anything other than surprise in his partner's face.

As soon as he saw and heard the sound of his partner's dead body fall to the ground, he pulled the sniper over his shoulder and padded back the support in the backpack he had on his back. Without the slightest hesitation, he ran down all the stairs, he just half an hour earlier had gone up for. His head was empty; the only thing he could think of was that he as soon as possible had to get down to her before she disappeared.

Before the rest of the team came to finish the job he could not finish on his own:

Kill Kuchiki Rukia.