skonen_blades

"So when's your kill frenzy?" asked the giant, barbed Tark beside me. His name was Jant. We were both assigned to navigation in the starship. It was our first day. He had hundreds of holes in the back of his uniform to accommodate his spikes. I’d never met a Tark before.

"Sorry, my what?" I responded.

"Your kill frenzy. Once a month for two days, my race has to kill something or go insane. My next one's coming up in six days. When's yours? If we sync up, maybe we can kill together." Jant said and smiled, sheathing and unsheathing his talons reflexively in a disconcerting tic. He had too many teeth.

"I'm a human. Uh, we don't have kill frenzies." I said to him

All of his eyes widened in shock.

"Really? Gosh. I thought all sentient species had a kill frenzy. It’s how to maintain a peaceful society. Has your race ever experienced murder?"

"Indeed we have. We can kill whenever we wish to. We have social laws and many religions that stop us from doing it, though." I said, feeling a little strange about the picture I was painting.

"But those laws and that other thing you mentioned, rell-i-jun? They haven't stopped the killing." he pointed out, obviously confused.

"Uh, well, no. But, I mean, the hope is that we, uh, maybe mitigated it. I guess." I finished lamely. I really hoped he wouldn’t ask me any questions about wars. Or holy wars.

Jant eyed me guardedly and took a small step away.

I changed the direction of the conversation, "Uh, so how do you deal with your kill frenzy when you're out in deep space like this? We can't get back to your planet in time. Do you lock yourself in your room?"

"No I told you. We go insane if we don't kill.” said the Tark, “I have several months worth of victims in my storage allotment. I merely pull one out, bring it to my quarters, and spend two days killing it." He kept tapping in astrometric data. "It's why my quarters have extra soundproofing and a drain in the floor."

I blanched. "Do you eat it afterwards?"

"Good heavens no. We're not barbarians. Who would eat living things?"

"Well we did."

"I didn't think that was possible. Well it must have driven you insane not to eat them, right? You had no choice."

"No, it was optional."

"Well, at least you never killed for sport, right?"

"Actually that was quite popular"

"With your fangs and...claws?" He looked me over, finding no evidence of naturally occurring offensive weaponry.

"No, mostly with weapons we designed to uh...kill from a distance. More effectively."

In the ensuing silence, I felt as if I’d said something sacrilegious. The soft pings of the control panels and the dull hum of the engine reactors bridged the awkward pause.

"Hey, you torture living beings for days so...." I blurted out. My back was up.

"They evolved to enjoy it. It's how their spores are released. They look forward to it and experience ecstasy as they are skinned. It's mutual. And it's not....by....choice."

A chilly, more permanent silence descended.

"I may have to request a transfer away from this station." Jant said. "You are too frightening to me."

Under my breath I whispered, “Yeah, said the eight-eyed, two-and-a-half-meters-tall bristling collection of barbs and claws that has kill frenzies.”

That was two months ago. I haven’t spoken to Jant since but I hear he’s very popular on the ship. I hear he’s very kind.

I, on the other hand, am having a hard time making friends.


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It’s a little ticklish when the needles go in but the anesthetic keeps her from moving. It keeps her laughing on the inside.

Grown from a vat of jaguar with a splash of greyhound and a swirl of human, she’s extremely thin and toothy. This is her last treatment before she’s shipped off to Overman Ranker’s Field Farms for training.

She’ll be part of an Assassin’s Guild nick-named The Circus. All of the killers are animal hybrids. The term ‘guild’ is a bit of a misnomer. ‘Kennel’ would be more accurate. The assassins are little more than happy pets that are conditioned to be stealthy and to kill without mercy.

An animal’s nose full of the scent from the victim’s clothing is much more efficient than a photograph/dossier when it comes to tracking a man down in the dark.

Tyrania is two years old. She’s either happy or in pain. No other emotions exist within her. The pain of punishment tells her what not to do. Right now, she’s happy. The spinal tap keeps her immobilized while the nano-somes do their knitting and pearling to the building blocks of her epidermis.

After training, she’ll be able to pass for human. The skeletal creature on the table with dark spots dotting the long, grey fur will become something more akin to feral super model when the process is finished.

She’ll be killing in the higher classes. It’s the bear-and-croc mods that they send to the poor places.

Her long nails are retracted and painted a garish red. The newborn killers always choose cosmetics that look like blood on their nails and lips. It’s comforting to them. It’s frightening to see them smile in the mirror after their first reward of makeup. More often than not, they’ve smeared a line of lipstick around their lips. Their eyes glass over with the dreams of blood as they tilt their head at their reflection.

They get trained to be human on the Field Farm. I mean, they get trained to kill people in any number of ways with the aid of mental downloads and grueling days of physical training but they’re also told how to act at the dinner table and how to keep a conversation going.

We teach them to be background. They’re expendable so there’s no exit routes planned when they’re sent on missions.

I miss the ones that don’t come back. I don’t like the ones that do. They change after a successful mission.

This one here, Tyrania, is looking straight up at the ceiling as I prepare the depilatory cream. I’m in her peripheral vision. I give her a wink.

I feel like a dentist operating on a child.



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The thing about top level athletes is that their sport equipment becomes an extension of them. Tennis racquets become, in the mind of the player, a 'furthering' of their own arms. Their hands become giant paddles with which to hit the ball. Golfers at the top of their game couldn't tell you where their arms end and the clubs begin. Polo mallets as well. Basketballs. Even race cars. They get absorbed into a athlete's personal energy field and mindset to the point where the equipment becomes part of the human body.

The thing about top level musicians is that their instruments join with them in a hybrid form that equals more than the sum of its parts. It's a true mixing of artistry, equipment, craftsmanship, and talent. A separation between the person and the musical generator becomes impossible. It's obvious to viewers. Musicians themselves will talk of a trance. A sort of disappearance takes place when the music is played flawlessly and with passion. The person combined with the piano or the guitar or what have you become a synergistic union that is both here and not here.

The thing about top level assasins is that they become extensions of the tools of thier trade. Their relationship with the tools is the opposite of the relationship that athletes have with their tools. The assassin's art is unlike the art of music. The killing weapon, be it a knife or a rifle, bleeds its stillness and coldness into the user if he or she is proficient. A sniper knows that when he shoots, he cannot breathe. In effect, he must mimic death in order to provide the stillness that will make him capable of making a gift of death to his target. An assassin frequently has to wait for hours or days before his quarry affords him a moment of opportunity. A passionate kill usually causes mistakes and evidence. A good assassin must be cold, methodical, ruthless and above all, patient. The plan, the tool, and the execution use the talented assassin as an extension of themselves.



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It ends like this. I’m surrounded, pinned to the pavement by the helicopter searchlight. Newspapers and coffee cups are spiraling around me, running from the downdraft out of the light and into the darkness like I wish I could. I’m bleeding and I’m on my knees. I’m slouched, looking down and crying. My empty gun hangs loosely in my hand. Caught and starkly targeted for the cops around me. I notice the details of the pavement. The way it’s cracked and sloppily repaired in this part of town. It’s a poverty street. They’re still yelling at me to drop my weapon.
I glance up and I can’t see a thing beyond the edge of the spotlight stabbing down from the nighttime sky. I think back-

-to when I was twenty six and full of promise. Best in the business. I’d be in and out before anyone even knew I’d been sent for. ‘Not bad for a girl’ became ‘pretty damn good’ period which became professional jealousy which became just plain fear. I was devoted with no percentage left over for downtime, drugs, or recreation. I was a myth now like Mr. Thirteen Per Cent or Pedro Sunshine. I became my generation’s bogeyman. If I was a scientist, I would have been Einstein.

Full of promise might be a stretch. Twenty six is old age at this level of the profession. Everyone under twenty is full of promise. I think I was keeping retirement at bay with willpower. It sure wasn’t easy anymore, that’s for sure. I wanted to give it up but what else would I do? I suppose I could have quit and had kids but I gave up on that idea years ago. I’m all hard edges and reflexes. I’m barely here in terms of conversation and other stuff that normal people do. Food is fuel and this week’s mission is all there is. I’m a phantom with more names and faces than I can count.
I’m so good at hiding that I’ve forgotten how to be seen-

-and here I am. In plain sight for the first time in four years. At least twenty people (sorry, I mean officers) looking at me. I know I’ll never see the courts. Hell, some of the work I’ve done for the Big Three is so sensitive it’ll be a toss up on whether or not to kill me or free me. I’ve even done federal work.
But I can’t risk it. I’m barely human anymore. This isn’t living. This is why the young slow down. They realize that there’s a lot of life to be lived that has nothing to do with being the best in your career choice.
I bring up the gun and point it out to where I hear the bullhorn coming from and they tear me to pieces. I wheeze out a last breath and my throat clicks closed. I’m on my back staring up at the spotlight. It looks like what I hear it’s supposed to look like when you-


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