He's 12 years old.
A child seeped in slowly clotting blood and hatred.
He's scared. So scared. So scared. So scared.
[ He doesn't want to die. ]
The fear is paralyzing: a deadly poison penetrating his lungs with its serrated incisors. Sharp-edged talons clutch and tear into the soft muscle of his heart and venom surges through his veins burning and scalding and it hurts. The power that this toxin holds over him is unbearable, it encompasses his entirety even as it's coils tighten and he is constricted by hot scales that ration his already limited air supply. He can't breathe.
[ He doesn't want to die. ]
The monster that looms above him is like nothing he has never seen before. A bulbous and pulsating abomination of metal and flesh. At its front is a false image. A distorted, nauseating likeness to a human face with a mouth stretched into a horrific grimance. It's eyes are wide and bloodshot, darting from side to side, up and down, never quite focusing on him - even as he feels the pressure of its full attention resting upon him.
[ He doesn't wasn't to die. ]
The once bustling street is empty now, all that remains behind are discarded clothes and piles of dust where there once stood humans. In a strange way it's a reminder to him, of the fleeting and impossible nature of life.
He is the only one left now, crouched low to the ground with his back against the wall. Three metres away lies his knife, apparently useless against this monster as all of his attacks to this point have not affected the creature in the least.
[ He doesn't want to die. ]
The nightmare advances toward him, slowly, as if savoring his fear. Cain can understand this, after all he himself is usually the predator. It's not as fun to be the prey.
[ He doesn't want to die. ]
A nearby puddle of blood catches his eye and he frowns, it's not the red of a human - a shade he knows so well - instead it is a deep, iniquitous black that is well on its way to transitioning from a liquid to a solid. Surrounding the puddle the pavement is scarred with a pattern of ebony stars.
Movement is unconscious, blood pumping through veins without a second thought and muscle memory guiding his limbs into the forms he knows better than the back of his hand.
[ He doesn't want to die. ]
He grasps the dagger in a sweaty palm and maneuvers it so that the knife is facing downwards, within a second he carefully loosens his grip so that the blade is partially submerged in the atramentous liquid.
[ He doesn't want to die. ]
He turns.
[ He doesn't want to die. ]
The knife slides through muscle, flesh and metal.
[ He doesn't want to die. ]
It's a clean incision, a neat cut that travels through the entirety of the demon, any less would be shameful for someone like him.
[ I don't want to die ]
XxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxX
He keeps the dagger, as a reminder.
Now that he has beholden the monster concealed within human flesh and bone he realises that there is much more to the world than even he had realised.
It annoys him.
To plan a kill one has to know everything. The setting, people involved, time, place, how the client wishes for the victim to die. It is imperative for an assassin to hold all of the cards, to know that he is missing half of the deck?
Cain is annoyed.
So he sets his cards to one side and shuffles a new pack, careful this time not to drop a single card whether it be a hidden ace or a sly joker he cannot afford to omit a single drop of knowledge. Because that one drop could be the difference between life and death.