Broad-Spectrum Assassin

Memory 1: The First Memory

This warmth. It must have kept this memory alive. The fire of love kept it kicking deep in my subconscious. My parents were so loving and yet I nearly forgot them.

I sped through the other memories. My father teaching me to swim, my mother taking me to her bed whenever I had a bad dream, the two of them reading me stories of brave prophets and soldiers. The list goes on and on. When one of us did argue, the other two would just tickle them until they were smiling again. My family spoiled me with gifts and affection. Oh, and they also showered with me. It was just me and my parents, every day all day. We never left home. In fact, the home I lived in had no windows nor a front of back door. It was a box where I had no choice but to be spoiled and adored.

Oh, my eighth birthday is here. Let's see that memory. I have a feeling something interesting will happen.

A spoiled stupid child, by which I mean me, is wearing a sweater with the words "you are my world" sewn into it. It's a sweater the boy made with his mother after losing another game of Death Pillow. I eat the celebration pie at a gradual pace, likely trying to stretch my moment of joy out like some addict.

Mother and Father mutter to themselves as I'm licking my plate clean. Father looks distressed and she looks excited.

I open my gift which is a small pink Weech. I cautiously poke the slimy creature, which would have been something I would have regretted had it been alive.

I look up at them. "I don't understand. What is it?"

Mother smiles. "It's your new name, sweetie" pie."

I look at the animal's corpse curiously. "My name?"

She suddenly zooms behind me and lifts me into a hug. "You're going to be Weech from now on."

Even the dull boy I was back then could sense something was amiss.

"I love it." I embrace her back.

Father approaches slowly and pats my head.

I release mom and hop into an embrace with dad.

He beams at me. "If hugs could kill, you'd be a little ninja." He ruffles my hair playfully.

Stop!

I freeze the moment and wrap my tendrils around them but they slip through the figments of my past.

They aren't there anymore. I know this for certain.

My parents set me on the couch and then hand me another present.

I open it excitedly, tearing the wrapping off like a predator hungry for the flesh within. I remove the lid to see a silver knife with a scythe emblem on its grip. I pick it up and swing it around.

"Careful, pumpkin. That's a real knife." Mother ruffles my already messy hair.

Father stays her hand. "Yes, Weech. That isn't a toy."

I look up at father. "Am I going away somewhere?"

He holds my hand steady and tightens my grip on the knife. "We can no longer keep you safe."

I drop the knife and hug him. "Please don't leave me."

Mother combs my hair. "We aren't leaving. Weech, you're special. Your father and I know it and one day everyone will know it too."

Father picks up the knife and dusts it off. "Your mother and I are assassins."

Wow! My parents are heroes!

Of course that would be my thinking. His little head was filled with heroic stories of assassins ending oppressive regimes. The truth is not so simple but it's not something a child would understand.

Mother sets me on her lap. "You're going to come home every night but in the day time, you'll be at school. You're going to be a great assassin just like us. No. You'll surpass us." She grabs my hands and looks to my father.

He looks down nervously and then nods. "It won't be easy." He pauses. "It will be terrifying at times. The whole world will be coated in despair, but as an assassin you will learn to concentrate that despair into a silent blade of truth." He grabs my shoulders. "You will be the unspoken hero in children's stories, known by his actions not his name."

Mother kisses my forehead. "You'll be a shadow of truth in a world blinded by lies and deception." She lifts me up. "Get some rest. Your teacher will be here to fetch you first thing in the morning."

My parents carry me into bed.

I'm unable to sleep that night. My child mind is filled with rainbows of fanciful heroic exploits.

There's a knock at my door.

I cover my head with my Sleepy Sheepy plushy. "Let me sleep a bit more."

My body suddenly starts shaking.

A shadow crawls under my door and then spreads along the floor of my room.

I pull out my knife from the top of my dresser and hold it out.

Only an amateur reveals their weapon before striking. Hmmm. I've come a long way, haven't I?

The shadow crawls up my bed post and I try to scream but the terror clogs my throat.

Blades come out from the shadow as it wraps around me.

I stab my knife through it but my weapon is pulled in. It flows through the living shadow, as if traveling down a river, before being pressed against my throat.

"One must go today. Is it mother, father..." The shadow binds my arms and legs and its body becomes as sharp as a sword. "Or child?" asks the distorted wispy voice.

I soiled myself and cried.

"Answer or I will take all." Its cloak extends out of my room, likely searching for my parents.

I gulp and feel the fear surround me.

My vision blurs and I grab the knife. I swing it around in a frenzy, cutting the creature as fast as I can.

It collapses to a puddle and then reforms at my doorway. It takes a more human shape. "Interesting." A scroll comes out from its sleeve. "I'm actually not here to kill you. Aren't you a lucky little bean? No. No. No. You're a student. I'm here to take you to class."

"If my parents knew you threatened me, they would end you." I glare at the creature.

"Your parents are no match for me. They are quitters. Got lucky is all. Let's see if you picked up more than luck from them." He tosses a knife at me and I freeze up.

It cuts into my leg.

This feeling. It's horrible!

Ah, it's so refreshing to feel fresh pain.

A tendril comes from the creature's sleeves and grabs onto the knife.

Its arm distorts to a blade and shakes before cleaving through the air.

Is this really real or some crazy dream?

The cut is pulled open by two blades, creating a rift.

The monster enters and drags me by its tendril.

I grab onto my blade and start cutting at the tendril with my knife.

Just before I'm pulled in the knife cuts through the tentacle.

I have to hide.

The creature comes back through the portal. "This stubbornness will keep you alive on the field, but the disobedience will end you before you graduate." Tendrils pour out from beneath him and lift up the bed. They wrap around my entire body until all I see is black.