In the dead of night, stars twinkling in the city lights shining on the streets, casting shadows in the already darkened alleyways. The occasional horns from the cars and trucks, filling the darkness with noise.
Nothing is supposed to be stirring. The city sleeping as much as it can, the push and pull of the city always on the move, people dreaming of what can be, what is, and what was. The stress of the day temporarily forgotten as mothers, fathers, sisters, and brothers, are all tucked away into their beds.
But really, can the race of man find any true peace in the dark of the night. For thousands of years, mankind has feared the dark. Humans do not have the necessary skills to be able to sense what lurks just beyond the light of the fire. Just the tiniest of noises, can set man to instantly be on the alert. Warriors worried for the rest of the clan, but now a days, the ones that can't find that tiny bit of peace when the sun goes down, are cursed to remain in the realm of awakeness.
Is that why I am still awake? All the noises outside plus the ones in the my head. As the man in the shadows, many fear me for good reason. The one that they know will come for them, but not the day when I'll come.
Others fear what they can't see, can't touch, or they can't hear. Many believe that I'm all of those things. I am the epitome of mystery and danger. The angel of justice, or of death. What goes around comes around, so maybe I'm an angel of karma. Grown men have pissed themselves when the mere threat of me was whispered to them. Men that are in their prime of their lives, the prime of their skills, have run at threat of my wrath.
So why does this woman stay anywhere near me? I could maim her, kill her, she doesn't truly understand what I could do, what I'm capable of. Watching her sleep does something to me that I do not fully understand, what are these feelings that I have? Peace isn't something I'm familiar with. I am a trained killer, I should not have any of these emotions that could be used as signs of weakness. Weakness in a warrior doesn't last very long, war is hard and brutal. Starry eyed fresh grunts, innocence to a point in their eyes, only last the first week inside of a war zone.
She makes the noises stop, the screams and gun fire are distant when I'm around her. I've lived with them for so many years that I truly had forgotten what it is like to just be me inside my head. I do not know how to handle not having those noises turned on to the loudest setting. It's easy to block them out when the bullets and fists are flying. But when the fight is over, they are right there waiting to pounce on me, not letting me forget what all I have done.
Standing from the lounge chair that she has placed next to the foot of her bed. I walk to the side of her bed, and look down at her breath softly in sleep, she seems so peaceful, like nothing could disturb her. Her body relaxed, sleep makes her seem so much younger. Face a soft red from where it rests on her pillow. The thin nightgown hugging all of her curves.
She may have placed the chair there for herself, but deep down I know she put it there for me. She wants me here, with her. I've noticed many things in this tiny apartment have changed since she found out that I come in the dead of night when the noises become to much. A key the mysterly finds its way to my key ring, the chair move, and the biggest is that she went out and bought a king sized bed when she realized that we didn't fit that well.
She is so innocent, she almost can't be real. Maybe something so innocent cannot be harmed, but no that cannot be true. I've harmed innocence before, unintentional but I have. The road to hell is paved with the good intentions of man. Civilian have a tendency to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, only trying to live their lives to the fullest the way they playing tag, young girls shopping with their mothers, men going to work to provide for their families, boys running around with their friends showing off their skills.
Walking the few steps to the bedroom window, to gaze out into the city. The lights shine back at me, taunting me with their flickering. Even though the city seems well lit, I can easily spot where predators could lie in wait for their next victim. Sighing, I turn back to the bed and gaze back at the woman that very well could already own my heart and if I still have it, my soul.
All in the name of duty, to my country, to my brothers. All for a fight that was never mine, never my brothers, all in the name for duty to the country that we all love. Different countries, different cultures, seasons, people, evil men who do not value anyone's lives but their own personal gain. So many years being a ghost, a phantom that men knew was there but couldn't find until it was too late. I have started to feel like a ghost, as I watch societies rise and fall, waiting for a phone call that would tell me if I was to aide or destroy them.
Then came the time when my service was no longer needed, my brothers and I able to go back to the country that we had been fighting for all these long cold years. Upon reaching the soil we had left so long ago, we had no mission, no orders telling us what to do. After having something for so long; you are lost when that thing is no long available to you. Finally we had the chance to do what we wanted, without any higher ups to order us what to do. No missions that we must complete, no killing, no war, just freedom.
We then decided that we were going to do the things that we had been trained to do. The skills that our country taught us, helped us become the deadly beings that we are. We could give back to our country some more, to protect those that needed protecting, we capture those who need capturing. We watch from the sidelines until we are needed. When we get called, we head out to help in anyway we can for as long as we are needed or until the job is finished.
So I ask myself again, why am I sitting in this girl's room while she sleeps? Is it because I have never been this close to true innocence before and haven't ended it yet? No that's not it, since the first time I seen her I was intrigued. This little slip of a woman walks up to a trained killer and looks him straight in the eye, sticks her hand out to shake his, and asks to be trained. One would think that this female had lost control of her senses and needed to go to a doctor. She is everything that I could ever want, but can never have. She doesn't shy away from danger, she damn well attracts it.
I have never seen anyone so unprepared for handling dangerous situations, and keep walking out smelling like roses. Well that's not totally true, she smells like honey and first spring rain. God what an addicting scent, hmm maybe that's why I don't walk out the door and never return. She is my addiction, I can't allow someone else have her. But what do I do, I can't have her either. I'm deadly to all, innocent or corrupted, I'll end up hurting her at some point. Maybe I can protect her from the shadows? Watching, making sure no one harms her. Come when she calls, do all that I can to make sure that this innocent makes it another day in a world that would see her destroyed rather than protect her. The world can't handle having innocence in it, the evils seek to destroy it as soon as it is found. But like any virus, hope and innocence is hard to destroy, and even harder to corrupt. Many evil men have tried, throughout the centuries, but can never fully succeed.
.
There is a lot worse things than dying, I've seen enough to haunt me until the day I die, or worse I'll will end up taking the nightmares with me to hell, to live them over and over. It's nothing that I don't deserve. Even after all the things I have done, before I meet up with the one that will kill me, I will make sure that this incredible being will be protected at all costs. My final long term mission, a life goal, something to keep getting out of bed for.
Whenever she needs it, I will do anything she asks. Even though what I want can never be, I will see to it that she will get the happily ever after that she deserves. And if anything should happen to me, she will continue to be protected, I have all the necessary paperwork all written up, should it come to that. My brothers will see that it is done.
Sitting back down in the chair that I have claimed as mine for the night, and probably for more nights to come. I continue to watch her, watch her breath, every sigh, every twitch. And when she whispers my name, I think for a second that she has woken up. But no she continues to sleep, I wonder what she could be dreaming about.
My thoughts were interrupted, by the almost silent buzz of my phone. I quickly reach into my pocket to pull it out. I open it up, and put it to my ear, without saying a word.
"We have a situation here." Tank said
I shut my phone, hanging up. Before I move I gaze at her again. Nothing will stop me in protecting her. I would gladly give my life for it. She even performed a miracle, bigger than even I had thought could be possible, my men would give their lives for her. Men who have no family that gives a damn about them, some that have no family at all, except for their brothers in arms. Society dictates that these men should be rounded up and put somewhere that they can't harm the public, but they need them to remain free so that their way of life is protected. And yet this little slip of a girl managed to get the love and respect from these men. Yes, this world needs this girl. No one shall end this until God needs her.
Standing from the chair, I brush a kiss across her cheek. Silently I let myself out of her apartment. Taking the stairs, I reach my car when the information starts uploading to my phone. Sitting in the driver's seat, I look up into her window and promise that I would be back.
Watching the big black vehicle leave the parking lot, a man stood from the crouching position he had been in. Looking up to the apartment building, he gazed at each window considering the new information that had been given. Walking down the alleyway into the darkness, he wondered just what had drawn the boogey man to this building. What could be in the four walls that draws him out of his lair. Shaking his head he sinks deeper into the darkness, waiting for the missions orders.
If anyone should ask, the occupants of the apartment building would say that no one knows the man that drove the black vehicle. Even if they consciously knew that this man was one of the few that stood between them, and the dark of the night. A man who felt at home in the dark. The people around the apartment building knew that the woman in the little one bedroom apartment was the safest one of all, but would she be safe from him? Maybe, maybe not but what a hell of a ride to find the answer to that question.