Backstabber

The clouds swelled with rain against the night sky, the moon reflecting whatever light it could muster through the tarry atmosphere. I was driving home that evening, and I wanted to make it to my house before the downpour began. I always hated getting wet. One could say the reason why I had such a well paying job as a professional assassin was a mystery, since it required me to get wet often. Treading through swamps to ambush the enemy, fighting in the rain, or getting soaked with a rival's blood upon shooting them at point-blank range. My reasoning was that it's different. It was my job. This was my leisure time, and I felt I deserved to stay dry.

I pulled my car up in the driveway, the door to my garage opening automatically as I drove inside, the door closing back up behind me with a slam to the floor. I promptly shut the car off and exited, eager to slip into something more comfortable and go to bed.

It was, after all, two in the morning.

I hadn't originally planned on staying out that late. It was just that I had a meeting with my team earlier that evening as well as dinner shortly after. The night was supposed to come to a close at twelve, but we decided to hit the bar nearby. After all, we had just won a major victory against BLU. Each of us played at the top of our game in taking them down, and I was no exception. Though the one memory that wouldn't leave my mind was a close encounter I had shared with the BLU Spy. Even the the mere thought of our breif fray caused my heart to race, my hands to tremble. I wouldn't admit to my team, to anyone, even myself, that I feared him so...

He was a sneaky one, he really was. I didn't see or hear him following me as I was on the move, but when I came to a pause at the enemy sewers to pop some pills from a health pack, his existence within a closer proximity than I would have liked became all too clear. There's a suspicious silence that comes with his presence, like the calm before the storm. I felt him there, his breath on the back of my neck. I could smell the aura of cigarette smoke in the hot mist that exuded from his lips. Once I felt his fingertips brushed against my side, I whipped around and grabbed the hand that held the knife, and he became fully visible as his cloak dissipated.

"You thought you could sneak up on me." I chuckled, sizing him up. I had to, we had a foot's worth in height apart, the advantage being his of course. I couldn't appear weak, though underneath the surface I was terrified.

I could tell in his eyes he could sense it...

"Chérie, I did not think. I knew." He sneered cooly, jerking my hand away from his. "Why has your team kept you around for so long? You are predictable."

"Tough words coming from someone I knew was right fucking behind me." I spat back. This wasn't my first run-in with him, and he always made it a point to belittle what he considered to be a lack of skill... whereupon he would kill me on the spot, sending me straight to respawn.

I wasn't a bad mercenary, he just... he knew how to get inside my head. He was like a cat with a squirrel in it's grasp, toying with it, teasing it with the idea of getting away, then devouring it in the most violent manner possible, because it never had a chance after all. Tearing it's victim limb from limb as it's dying eyes looked on, witness to the demolition of it's own body. Given he was much cleaner assassin, but the cruel intention of his actions remained. I could kill any other class, and I had killed each of the BLU team at one point and time, some of them I could pick off multiple times in a row. But Spy?

Forget about it.

"You know I enjoy making my presence known before killing you. Consider it a special privaledge for my favorite mercenaire." He slowly approached me as I continued to step backwards, eventually backing me against the wall. He took out his revolver and dragged the barrel from my ear to along my chin, my breathing escalating as I struggled to clear my mind, struggling to think straight...

"You know, you're the only one I won't kill off so rudely." he crooned, holding me to the cold brick wall by the shoulder with his free hand, "You should be grateful."

"I'll be grateful when you die." I wheezed as he pressed his gun against the sensitive spot on my neck between my collarbones, compressing my windpipe, doubling the discomfort.

"Such salty words from sweet, sweet lips." He teased, lavishing the panick that must have been visible in my eyes. It was my least favorite way to die, anything having to do with my throat being ruptured, slit, or ripped out to leave me bleeding on the ground, choking for air that wasn't going to save me. It was something he knew, something he preyed upon when he was feeling especially inhumane.

I spat on him, on his suit. It was a small satisfaction, but I'd take it. "Fuck you." I hissed as he pulled away immediately, screeching at what I had done.

"You.... you're disgusting!" he cried out, his voice lowering to a growl. "you're not getting away with this."

He thrusted towards me with his knife and I dodged out of it's path, grabbing his wrist with both my hands, struggling to obtain the weapon for myself so I would have something to fight with besides my fists. My back swung to his front in the struggle and I immediately realized the mistake, as he put all of his weight on top of me to land on the ground. Thinking quickly, I flipped him over my shoulders to his back. Upon letting his wrists go so I could get to my feet, I saw him struggle to get back up. Not because I had wounded him severely, but because he was hanging off the ledge, a steep fall below him if he should happen to lose his grip.

I couldn't fucking believe it. I must have been giddy from how perfect it was that the tables had finally turned in my favor, how the hunter became the hunted as simply and easily as that. It was a stroke of pure luck, one I was deeply grateful for.

I chuckled as I watched his face become frantic, clutching the earth under his leather-clad hands. I don't know which he was more frightened of, the fact that I was going to kill him or the fact that his suit was going to be dirty...

"au revoir, connard." I sneered acidicly as I dug the heel of my boot into his fingers, hearing him cry out in pain as he lost his grip and fell to whatever ground was covered in darkness below.

I allowed myself a moment to bask in my victory, then went on my way to capture his team's intelligence.

One would think that I wouldn't still hold fear for him in my heart, but I did. I will always fear him. As long as I have my career as an assassin for Redmond Mann, I will always be alert, looking for the Blu Spy around every corner, reaching at the air behind me to see if he's there, being careful not to sit still in one place for too long, no matter how tired or injured I am.

I shook my head quietly as I walked through my dark house, the rain beginning to pour down the windows, filling the vincinity with a satisfying symphony. I was looking forward to going to sleep listening to it.

Flicking on a switch in my kitchen, I walked sleepily over to the fridge. Opening the door, I stood there for a few minutes, not sure if I wanted water, soda, or juice. Making trivial desicions wasn't something I was good at...

Suddenly, I felt it.

An unpleasant slicing sensation, one of my skin being split right in the middle of my throat, immediately soaking everything below the cut with blood. I didn't have time to react...

Falling to the floor, choking and gurgling and writhing weakly on the floor with my hand clutched to it, the last thing I saw before my eyes was his. Filled with contempt, a sneer stretched across his face as he light up a cigarette and watched me die slowly at his feet.

"le chasseur devient la proie."