Dead Man -Destiel AU

1. Job Done

Kneeling on the roof top, garden surrounding him, twigs and sticks scratching uselessly at the material of his pants and jacket, Castiel waited. He stared down the barrel, lining up the weapon, taking into account wind and the movement of his target. Everything would go as planned, as everything always did. No room for errors. No doubts nestled in Castiel’s mind. He knew what he was doing. He had done it a thousand times. No questions asked, Castiel would hunt through the crowds, stalking his pray, learning their habits, finding the opportune moment. He would map out the victim’s days in his mind. Weeks, he would study them, learning when they were alone, when they were in large crowds that would make it difficult to determine which of the jostling bodies had held the knife.

He had the man in sight now. He was slumped over a table, outside. The trajectory of the bullet would be measured and tracked back to the very roof Castiel was perched on, but any evidence of his brief stay in the garden beds would be gone, or lost amongst the branches. The man sitting below was eating a meal, something so completely ordinary, that it would no doubt come as a shock to feel the sharp stinging of the bullet. If it hit his shoulder, the man would have time to call out before a second bullet cracked through his skull. Yet another reason why Castiel would have to be careful.

No one would hear the gun going off. It would appear as a very loud sneeze to anyone on the floor below, but it wouldn’t even make a sound as it slipped into the man’s skull and sent his head tipping into his soup.

It would start with a scream, maybe a waitress who had gone to see if he needed anything. But then the noises would build, the screams, the cries all layering over each other in a glorious symphony of terror and chaos. 

That is when Castiel would take his leave, brushing away his footsteps, searching for any thread that may linger on spiked stems and branches. He wouldn’t leave a flake of skin, not one stray hair to lead any one to him. He would slip from the roof, circling back down the stairs stuck to the outside of the building, round the back, blocked from view. He would set the weapon down in a bin, buried where it would take a while to find, no finger prints on it, bullets impossible to trace. He would shed his mask, his hood, his gloves, folding them carefully into his backpack to be either incinerated or used another time.  He’d take his jacket off as well, and tuck it away, leaving him in a tight grey shirt with a logo and some words splashed across the front in red. He would be safe. No one would find him. No one would connect him to the killing, and Castiel would blend into the crowd, shoving his way through before stopping and gawking in terror at the dead man. He would show the appropriate response, though he would feel nothing but fiendish glee at the sight of his handy work. Another job completed, more expenses and bills paid, with some money left to splash.

Castiel narrowed his eyes slightly as he focused on the man, waiting until few people were around, waiting for the right moment. He squeezed the trigger without so much as flinching, though there was a momentary jolt as the gun kicked back.

Right on target, a hole was blown through the back of the man’s head and he fell into his soup, liquid splashing up, little chucks of vegetables and meet falling to the table around him as the wound started seeping, matting the hair with blood.

Castiel smiled to himself and searched around quickly for loose threads as he waited for the scream.

There it was. Shrill and horrified, girlish, close to a sob. More followed after it, but it was that one purely terrified sound that echoed in Castiel’s head.

He smiled. It was not a kind smile, just a tug on one corner of his mouth that contrasted with the fierceness in his eyes.  He stood and swept over the area, destroying footprints and removing anything that might betray him. He was careful, going over things once, twice in a minute, still thorough. He took his backpack, the weapon, and rushed down the stairs.