Pacer's face grew red thinking about the mistake that he had made. In his entire career, this was the first time that he had committed such a blunder. Never before had such a scenario arisen that had made him look so unprofessional.
He still remembered that he had done everything perfectly. This time, the method that he had used was one of the methods of killing that he relied on the most.
Being a professional killer, it was a necessary for Pacer to have an arsenal of methods at your disposal so as to maintain anonymity.
No one should be able to figure out the identity of the killer through the victims which is possible if one has the same method of killing because that would have been nothing more than a recipe for a good serial killer case.
Pacer was a thorough professional who did not trust anyone with his equipment. Most of his killing tools were handmade and the rest was made under his supervision and were thoroughly tested before they were used. Therefore, his weapons had never failed him before this time.
In this instance, Pacer had decided to use poison to deal with the boythat was his next victim. Therefore, he had brewed the poison himself.
The poison was colorless and odorless and most importantly did not leave a trace of itself in the toxicology report so that it was impossible to be traced.
Pacer had ensured that the poison was exactly the same as it should have been and had found no fault with it and yet it had failed to produce the desired result when he had mixed it in the boy's coffee.
He had not left the place until he was sure that the boyhad finished it until the bottom of the cup was visible.
The boywas named as Zavier Adam and it was supposed to be the name of his next victim, but on the contrary, even after drinking the potent poison the boywas still alive and kicking.
Pacer didn't know where to put his face at this moment because this was the first mistake that he had ever made in his entire assassination career.
When he had received the offer for the murder of the kid, Pacer had acted all confident and mighty in front of the customer and had boasted of his assassination ability in front of them.
He still remembered how confidently he had promised the client that he could make good on the deal within the week.
Today was the day that he had designated as the deadline for this contract. Since he had messed up, he had to make up for it.
As a professionally trained killer, he had to live up to the trust of his clients which was the most basic requirement of this trade.
Also, this time the client that had entrusted him with the job had used remote means and hadn't shown up in front of him so the entire blame of the assassination would fall on him in case he was exposed.
Pacer therefore wanted to avoid direct confrontation to avoid exposing himself and that was the reason for the failed poisoning.
This was undoubtedly the biggest embarrassment of his entire career. Pacer had been unable to kill a boywho survived despite having drunk the coffee that had been spiked with poison by Pacer himself.
To make up for the past mistakes, Pacer decided to take the risk of direct confrontation and wanted to use his own hands to deal with the boy.
He knew that if he missed this time, he would lose all his fame and popularity in the assassin community, and it would be hard for him to get a job in the near future.
Since he had decided to take on the risk, there was no way that Pacer was going to go in unprepared. He had been keeping an eye on the kid for 5 days before he had decided to go in for the first attempt which had ended in failure.
Therefore, he had enough data regarding the routine of the boy, and he did not have to conduct reconnaissance once again.
Knowing that the boywould be home by 7 in the evening and in bed by 10 o'clock, Pacer finally made up his mind. He decided to adopt the old-fashioned method of sneaking into the house to kill at night.
This was undoubtedly a classic method in the assassination books of the past, but the problem was that the risk of exposure in such a scenario was the greatest.
There were countless unknowns and infinite variables that could interfere with the successful execution of his assassination attempt, but he was past worrying about all that when his entire career was at stake.
Pacer had chosen the bedroom of the boyas the venue for his final attempt. For that he had to be there before the kid could come back and as such he had to sneak in before 7 o'clock. He would then stay hidden in the bedroom until the boycame to the bedroom to sleep before he made a move.
Pacer felt uncomfortable using a method that was so vulnerable to external variables and influences.
For example, the boymay decide to stay the night at his friends' house for the night for no reason as it is with children, always so spontaneous. Or his parents might decide to take him away to meet some old relative that they hadn't seen in a million years.
At this moment, Pacer was already riding the tiger and he had no way of getting off and could only continue with what he had planned beforehand. If there were some anomalies or external interference, the only thing that Pacer could do was improvised according to the situation.
Pacer sneaked into the bedroom of the boyas soon as the sun went down. It was close to 7o'clock.
He climbed the wall outside the house using the water pipes and landed on the balcony. Thankfully, the residents of the house were not very keen on checking whether the windows were locked or not.
The window to the balcony was unlocked and was large enough for him to infiltrate into the bedroom.
Pacer felt that the goddess of luck was finally on his side. This was the first good thing that had happened to him all day. This boosted his morale and he finally felt confident in doing the job without exposing himself.
Pulling open the window slowly and noiselessly, Pacer sneaked into the bedroom on tiptoes so as to not make any noise. The floor was wooden and had a tendency to make noise in the room exactly below this one.
Pacer wanted to exercise caution so as to not alarm anyone in the house at this time when he was so close to completing his goal.
In his profession, he had waited for countless preys to fall into the traps he had set up, but he had never felt this nervous before. Every second that passed seemed to be taunting him.
The three hours felt longer than he had imagined, but he had no way of retreat now even if he wanted to.
There was no sound in the room other than that of his own breathing and the ticking of the lonely clock in the room. The whole situation felt exceedingly novel to Pacer who had never experienced such a method before.
All his jobs had been completed perfectly without him having to lie in wait like this which was a new experience for him.
Lying under the bed, Pacer could not help but glance at the digital watch on his arm. The closer he got to the appointed time, the slower the time seemed to move which frustrated Pacer to no end.
After a long and frustrating period of wait, the door finally opened, and someone came into the room. Pacer who had previously been lying there like the dead, felt as if electricity had run through his body in that instant. He became alert instantly and focused on the intruder.
It was none other than his target. He was obviously happy that his plan seemed to be going smoothly.
The boywas unaware that a killer was inconspicuously lying beneath his bed at that moment. It was funny, how everyone in their childhood at one point thought that there was a monster living beneath their bed.
Maybe it was a phase that came in the life of every child, but at this moment the childhood nightmare was played out in real, but the boythat was being targeted was completely unaware of the danger. If only he had not outgrown the "crying out for monster under the bed" phase, the so-called plan of the reputed killer would have fallen apart on the spot. Like stated before, the classic murder plan was full of holes and prone to the infinite possibilities of deviation.
The boywas carrying a bag which he placed on the study table. The steps were unhurried but not exactly firm. He was staggering towards the bed as if fatigued from all that he had done during the day.
When he reached near the bed, he fell face forward onto the bed and lay there like the dead for some time without a sound. Pacer kept an ear out for any movement in order to wait for the opportune moment when the boyfell asleep.
The sound of his breathing was not consistent with that of a person that was asleep. That meant that the boyhad only closed his eyes for a moment and was not intending to sleep. This frustrated Pacer even further.
Soon there was a knock at the door and after a moment the door opened with a creaking noise. Pacer had the impulse to slap himself in the face for choosing such a method of assassination out of the hundreds of ways available.
This time the person who had come in appeared to be a young girl. As soon as she entered, she asked in a loud voice, "Brother are you awake?"
Pacer finally couldn't stop himself from facepalming himself. He muttered to himself, "You still have the face to ask? How shameless? Even if he was asleep, how could he have stayed asleep after your round of screaming?"
The boyseemed to be waiting for the girl as he immediately sat up after hearing the voice of the young girl. Pacer on the other hand had no choice but to listen to the conversation of the two.
"Of course, I am awake. How could I sleep after promising to chat with you tonight?"
The young girl couldn't help but giggle upon hearing his response. She always loved it when her brother pampered her like that.
"Brother you seem very tired. We can talk later if you want."
Even though the girl had uttered the sentence that the boywanted to hear, he also noticed the crestfallen expression of the girl at the same time.
Even though he wanted nothing more than to sleep at that moment, he could not bear to disappoint his younger sister who had been looking forward to this.
"No, no I am perfectly all right. You don't need to go. I am only feeling a little drowsy."
From the tone of her voice, it was easy for Pacer to deduce that the girl did not want to keep talking about the same topic. She seemed quite disinterested in the overall conversation generally.
As if to prove him right, the girl soon diverted the topic towards magic. Her laughter rang out in the room as soon as the topic of the conversation was to her liking.
The previously uninterested girl could not be stopped and was showering him with questions; some of which he was able to answer and some he couldn't.
The girl on the other hand didn't linger on a question any longer than necessary. She was only interested in keeping the conversation going and not in getting answers.
Boy was very tired, and his eyelids were getting droopier by the second. The young girl failed to notice that detail and continued in the same happy go lucky tone.
On one hand the boy was very tired and on the other hand he didn't want to disappoint the girl, so he kept going with the conversation that was revolving around magic.
When he couldn't go on anymore the boy finally stopped the young girl mid-sentence.
"This is it for today. Go back to your room and sleep now. We will continue from here tomorrow."
The girl let out a low growl that seemed to indicate her dissatisfaction with how the boy was turning her away.
"Only if you show me how to do an illusion."
The young girl sounded especially determined. The young girl seemed very interested in illusion and wanted him to teach her some illusion spells.
That's why she had been pestering her brother every time she saw him. Finally, he had agreed on showing her some basic illusion tricks today.
Pacer was unable to see his performance from his viewing angle but from the excited voice of the girl it seemed to be something very amazing.
After this the young girl insisted on seeing it again but was snubbed away by the boy in a light manner. The girl reluctantly left the room while stomping her feet. Even the assassin hidden under the bed could see that the girl was only feigning anger and wasn't truly angry with the boy.
As soon as she left, the breath that Pacer had been holding until then was released. He had been very stressed out thinking that the girl would be the ruin of his plans.
After the momentary excitement and relief, the assassin went back to his previous job that entailed endless waiting and unnecessary stress.
The boy on the other hand seemed worry free as he didn't even blow out the candles before going to sleep. He was still in his clothes that he had worn during the day and had fallen asleep in them without even knowing.
It was this moment when Pacer knew that his opportunity had arrived. He had lain in wait only to seize this opportunity. He noiselessly crawled out of the bed on all fours like a frog that had forgotten to jump and had made his peace with crawling like a bug.
From his breath, Pacer had already known that the boy was asleep, but he still wanted to make sure that he had not been deceived. One look at the boy and he knew that the boywas out cold for good.
He had long since decided on the method that he was going to use for killing the boy. It was another classic method that was also his personal favourite in such close quarter assassinations, strangling.
This way there were close to zero chances of being found out since there was no blood splatter.
Pacer didn't want to waste any more time and put his hands round the neck of the boy and gently gave a twist after applying some pressure.
It could be seen that he was extremely skilled in the way he executed the task. There was no chance for the boy to scream out and almost zero chances of him escaping the ordeal.
After having done the deed, Pacer looked at his masterpiece for a while to make sure that the task was complete this time for sure.
After nodding to himself with satisfaction at the perfectly carried out job, he was about to leave when he heard footsteps outside the door.
The footsteps seemed to be quite light like that of a young boy. In that moment he was sure that the young girl from before had come back.
It was like his death star had come back like a boomerang to take away all his happiness.
Pacer wanted to strangle the little girl as well for always getting in his way, but he didn't want to make it any messier than it already was.
Soon the young girl knocked on the door once again.
Pacer knew that she was going to enter the room soon, so he scrambled to take the body of the boy and hid him under the bed alongside him while waiting for the death star to go back.
The young girl skipped into the room but found it empty and no signs of the resident inside. She found it strange because the boyhad told her that he was sleepy but now he was not even in the room and his bed was empty.
"Umm…Where could he have gone? Is he in the bathroom?"
The girl was talking out loud to herself while speculating the position of the boy.
She moved and checked the attached bathroom but found it to be empty as well.
"I didn't see him go out as well. Did he sneak out the window or something? Let's check once again."
She immediately rushed out of the room in the hopes of finding the boy while the murderer was lying under the bed with the only witness of his crime, the victim.
This time the footsteps he heard were comparatively heavier as if the girl was running around the house in search of the boy.
It wasn't long before she returned to his room to check whether he had returned or if she had left some place unturned.
As she was pacing around the room in an attempt to locate the boy who seemed to be hiding from her, she accidently knocked a copper coin that was lying on the bedside table.
"Oops!"
During all this pandemonium, the heart of Pacer had almost given out due to how close he had been to being found out by the young girl. She was practically bouncing around him and each step closer to him was an increment to his mental stress and a reminder of the unprofessionalism he had shown today.
This coin was the last thing that he wanted to see. He was afraid that his time had come. He was about to be found out by the girl.
He prayed to whatever gods there might be for the first time in his life. He prayed so that the girl might not look at the bottom of the bed while picking up the coin.
This was contrary to his usual practice which was based on well planned and well executed strategies. This deviation from routine that had led him to this point was bound to create adverse situations for him.
The girl bent down to pick up the coin and at the same time someone under the bed almost screamed in fear but managed to hold it in.
Pacer first saw pink hair that fell down like a cascading waterfall, followed by a snow-white palm that came into his view once the girl tried to pick up the coin.
Before his heart could give out under the intense pressure and stress, a voice rang in the house that attracted the attention of the young girl.
The housekeeper was calling for someone and the young girl responded with a loud scream in return as if everyone in the house was deaf or something.
"COMING!!"
The girl paused her bending motion midway and stood up to respond to the call of the middle age voice.
According to his reconnaissance the voice belonged to the elderly housekeeper of the house. Pacer thanked her in his heart claiming that she was none other than the goddess of fortune who had finally decided to look his way.
Pacer knew that it was the only chance that he was going to get before someone else came in. He had to make sure to get out of this place that gave him worse goosebumps than any horror show he had been to.
As soon as he tried to rush out of the tiny space under the bed, his clothes seemed to be stuck somewhere. He tried to get rid of it but once he reached the root of it, he was devastated. His clothes had been clutched by his latest victim in his hand even after death.
It seemed that the boy was determined to take his killer with him to the underworld. The boy was holding his clothes with so much strength that it was impossible for Pacer to get rid of the death like grip in a short time window.
He juggled and struggled with the dead body for a while before finally getting rid of his clutches. As soon as he broke free, he had the mind to leave the house but once again footsteps arrived towards the door.
Pacer's soul seemed to be sinking into a deep chasm. The death star had come back. He didn't have to guess why she had returned. He knew that she had come back to pick up the coin that she had dropped and hadn't had the time to pick up.
If it was any other time, Pacer might have praised her thinking, "What a diligent girl." But at this moment he wanted her to be a slacker, he needed her to be.
Once again Pacer could see the pink hair fall followed by the arrival of the snow-white palm.
This time there was nothing that could have saved him. He only prayed in his heart that the girl would not deign to look under the bed.
Perhaps it was his prayers, or the lady luck was really smiling on him that the young girl barely even glanced at his direction and directly stood up after picking the coin up.
Pacer could finally let out a sigh as if his body had been bathed with a bucket full of relief. He really hoped that such a fortune could continue to stay by his side until the end of all this fiasco after which he will be able to leave this all behind in the past.
But the next second, his face changed. He cursed himself for relaxing too early. The coin that she had just picked up once again fell with a clanging sound and started to roll forward in his direction.
He wanted to shout for it to at least change direction but how could the coin understand his pain. The coin continued to grow larger in his vision until it finally stopped right in front of his nose perfectly under the bed.
Pacer was in shock. He couldn't believe how fast the lady luck had betrayed him. It didn't take more than a second.
This time his whole body started to shake and tremble in the anticipation of what was coming next. Just a single scream from the girl was enough to ruin his life.
But what could he have done at this juncture? He could only look towards her in shock as she stopped at the edge of the bed and started to bend down. The familiar pink hair were the herald of death and destruction in the eyes of the helpless assassin.
He couldn't help but think how miserable his end was going to be. This time the view didn't just stop with her palm. He witnessed her chin that was as fair as her palm followed by her slightly pouting lips as if she was being forced to do a chore.
Soon the thin and shapely nose came into view and Pacer wanted to close his eyes in anticipation of the scream that was doomed to come but managed to hold himself steady being the professional assassin that he was.
Before the two pair of eyes could meet, a teenage boy's voice sounded out from towards the door that made the girl spring back to her feet while laughing.
She moved like the wind and was directly in front of the source of the teenage voice in a jiffy.
She showed a pouty expression and complained to the teenager like young kids often do when they want their parents to spoil them.
"Where did you go just now? I have been looking all over the house for you. I couldn't find you anywhere. I even checked your room twice because I didn't see you move out of the room after I left."
What no one expected was that at this time there was someone who was even more excited than the young girl. The assassin hidden under the bed had just had his life saved by the unknown teenage boy.
If he hadn't called for the young girl at the time that he did, Pacer would already have been found out by everyone. He would have lost everything, his career, his fame and probably his life too.
The teenage boy was no less than a godsend angel for him at this time. No one could have felt this more than Pacer.
Taking advantage of this godsent opportunity Pacer decided to get out of this death trap of a house since he had already gotten rid of the target earlier.
The only thing standing between his escape and his freedom was that young girl that had come in his life like the herald of misfortune and plague.
Pacer was waiting for her to leave. Only once she left would the teenage boy leave which would be the time that Pacer was waiting for.
"I didn't go anywhere. I was right here the whole time. Where have you been looking all this time? Are you sure you aren't sleep walking?"
"Of course not. Who do you think I am? Would I lie to you for something like this?"
"Well then how would you say I am coming from the outside when the front gate was still locked?"
"I don't know how. Maybe you used magic."
"OR you are sleep walking and you don't even know what you saw. Don't cause trouble anymore."
The teenage boy looked like he was teasing the young girl. The young girl obviously retorted but the boy was adamant at his statement. The girl was soon put off and was eventually convinced by him.
The girl felt that she might just have failed to look properly or what he said might just be true because she was indeed feeling sleepy.
"Go back to your room to sleep. We can talk about this tomorrow as well."
The girl reluctantly nodded her head and replied in a low tone as if she was still confused about everything that had just happened.
"Hmm…I will listen to you then…good night, Zavier."
As soon as she left, Pacer wanted to get out of the bed and dance with joy. In his joy he even forgot to listen to the complete conversation between the two. He was only perfunctorily listening in but was more focused on the joy that he would feel once he got out of this hell hole.
Before he could feel any of that joy, there was an itch at the back of his mind that wouldn't let him feel at ease. It was like the feeling when something at the back of the mind told you that you had forgotten something.
Nine out of ten times the feeling turned out to be true in the end because it was always the subconscious mind that tried to give a reminder that some important things had been forgotten. In the same way, he constantly felt that something was wrong, very wrong.
He didn't have to wait long to notice it. When his focus returned to him, he saw it very clearly. The door of the bedroom was being bolted from the inside.
The teenage boy that was supposed to leave with the young girl was nowhere close to leaving. On the contrary, he was standing in the middle of the room and had bolted the room from the inside.
"What the hell is He doing here now? How can he stay in the room of someone else?"
While Pacer was busy cursing the intruder, the teenage boy busied himself with rearranging some things on the bedside table.
At this moment Pacer was more confused than he was angry. According to what he had deduced from his almost week-long reconnaissance, there was no other boy in the house other than his target. How could there be such a person on the day he chose to pull off the job?
He once again cursed his bad luck for bringing in another disaster.
Before he could start wailing and cursing his poor fate, some gear that was still stuck suddenly clicked and fell into place in his mind. The information that he had subconsciously put at the back of his mind played like a reel in a cinema.
The information that he had just processed brought him a shock that was enough to put him into a coma for the rest of his life. The girl that had been like the death scythe hanging over his head the entire time had said something while leaving.
"…good night, Zavier…"
He replayed the same voice in his head countless times just to make sure that it sounded right since he couldn't believe that he would make such a mistake once again. If the teenage boy was Zavier that who was the boy that he had just killed and whose body was lying cold next to him.
Pacer was close to freaking out. He still remembered that he had made sure that the boy was Zavier before he had killed him, the same boy that he had been tasked to target by the client.
He had not been in a hurry and had taken his time to identify the target before moving on to breaking his neck. He had handled everything quite professionally and there was no place for error in there.
But the result was quite the opposite and quite evident to boot. The young girl had clearly called someone else Zavier. There couldn't have been two kids with the same name.
So, either he had made a career breaking mistake once again or the girl was hallucinating.
Even though he had convinced himself that the problem should have been with the girl, and there was nothing that he had done wrong during the course of this assassination. The biggest of all problems still remained, the teenage boy was still in the room.
Whether he was Zavier or not did not matter because whoever this teenage boy was, he was blocking his way to freedom.
Pacer was deciding whether to reveal himself to the teenager so as to ascertain whether the boy was Zavier or the dead body lying beside him was Zavier.
In case the boy was proved to be Zavier, he could finish the job at the spot. And on the other hand, if the boy turned out to be someone else, he could just leave after knocking him out.
Suddenly during this contemplation, Pacer felt a cold breath at the back of his neck as if a prehistoric beast was about to pounce on top of him the very next second.
It felt to him that there was something dangerous lurking behind his back and as soon as he dared to look back, he would be devoured and even his bones wouldn't be left behind. He was afraid to look, afraid that it might be something that he was unwilling to see or unable to bear.
The dreary situation was giving him goosebumps. All his hair was standing on end in fear of what was behind him. In the end the curiosity won over the fear in his heart, and he slowly turned his head towards his back with some difficulty, as if doing that was to bear the pain of a thousand cuts.
The first thing that he saw was a pair of pitch-black eyes staring straight at him as if looking deep into his soul.
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