Assassin’s

Tale

Jesse Haar

prologue

                 My name is Nikolai Romanov. At exactly 6:06 on my sixteenth birthday, I lost my eyesight.

I am now seventeen and have been living with the incident that day became for over a year now.

I am blind.

      And I just happen to be one of the most deadly people on the planet.

first chapter

      “How many times do I have to tell you, Nik, not to wreck the rentals?!” Jonathon, my esteemed boss, sounds at the moment like he’s either going to hit someone extremely hard or pop a vein. Had I been outside the door listening with the other employees, I would have put twenty on the vein. Jon just didn’t have it in him to hit someone as hard as his anger would have him.

      That being Jon’s personality, everyone knows but are too discreet to comment (out loud, at least) that he chose the wrong profession. Discovering and overseeing the training of budding assassins isn’t generally for the faint of heart.

     Being the blind guy, I normally get to say whatever the hell I want. In cases like this, I usually refrain. But it’s just so Goddamn tempting.

     “Jon, I know you know I can’t see you, but you sound like your blood pressure’s rising. You really should change how often this happens. I heard yoga works great. My friend’s sister’s aunt’s second nephew twice removed says it helps control anger and, incidentally, blood pressure.”

Silence.

“And, you know, who lets the blind guy drive? Really?”

      “YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO STAY IN THE PARKED CAR!!!” . . . and he explodes.

“Well, it was parked . . . before I shifted it into drive.”

Silence.

I’m beginning to sense that this whole silent thing doesn’t bode well for me.