The Last Kill

The Horizon's Edge

“What does that even mean?” Silas asked, adjusting his stands. He wasn't ready for this, whatever this is.

“Your earliest days?” He said, “c’mom, it was how the Hollowman allowed himself to be killed by you.”

Silas squinted in hate. Winced, and allowed it to sting again.

“You thought you were the one who killed him? No man, no, nobody killed him. There's one other thing I know, that you think I don't.”

Silas didn't respond, but he wanted to know what that was, so he kept his gun pointed at him.

“That baby you killed would have been a good 25 years old man today, but you ended his life, had his dreams vanished, now he haunts you.”

Silas tried to hide that truth beneath a solid face, a stern face.

This confrontation was a psychological duel, with The Architect's agent trying to break him, and he sure did make him weak, but break? I don't think so, and he reminded him of every life he took. One after the other, everything he did.

“So where is The Architect?” Silas asked.

“There is no Architect!”

Silas watched, shocked, and began thinking about the way hate would accompany every bullet into this man's body.

“There's only you and your past.”

And a bullet burst from his gun, flying towards the man, and another, and another, leaving like angry darts with specks of flame, and another, and another, shots he wasn't ready to take, Silas screamed with every pull on the trigger, as the man fell to his knees, and died.

He walked towards the data center, it wasn't guarded anymore, he approached, and disabled the data center, deliberately exposing The Architect's network, and walked away. He's walked away in style before, but this time, there was nothing to style about. He felt his phone vibrate in his jeans, but he had to get to the car first. When he did, he got in, and took a long inhale and a long exhale of relief, the call was from Detective Miller. He called him back.

“Miller?” He said, starting the car, as it struggled, and coughed to life. It had been hit by bullets, its windscreen was cracked and had holes in them.

“Goodnews?” Miller asked.

“In a way, I'd say yes, the data center has been disabled.”

“The Architect?” Miller asked.

“There is no Architect, Miller, can you imagine?”

“What will you do now?” Miller asked.

Silas remembered Lena, he missed her, he missed home, and everything they had, everything he had, and everywhere they'd go, her food, her hugs, her warm smile. “I'll go home.” Silas said.

“Eleanor Vance,” Miller pointed out, “escaped.”

“What!?”

“Yeah. She…she had a helicopter on her roof and escaped before I could get there.”

“How'd she know you were coming, Miller?” Silas asked.

“Alarms went off, man.”

“f**k!”

“I'll do this myself.” Silas said, putting the phone up, and stepped on the gas, “I'll find her.”

“Youll need this, it's her chopper's flight code, you can track her. 554CD. stay safe, man.”

“Thank you.” Silas hung up and drove off.

•••

Eleanor Vance had dropped with her men at an old helipad in the field of Goth down south, she was glad that she wasn't being followed all the way here.

“We've got to celebrate, Nox?” She said, sitting on the field. Nox pulled out a bucket of ice and of red wine, kept it down and the others hailed in joy. The party had barely begun when Silas's rover drove into the field, he found her, and the stun in her posture stayed for about a minute or two.

“Okay Vance, I think it's over.” Silas yelled as he walked out of the Rover. Vance's men were armed, so they quickly c****d their guns and pointed it at him in unison, but he kept walking towards her.

He finally confronts Eleanor Vance, “Tell them to drop their guns.”

She raised an arm, and they did, “You are attempting to escape amidst this chaos? Are you serious?”

“How'd you find me?” She asked, “and who are you?”

“Listen, if I wanted to kill you, I would have done that ever since, I had chances, lots of them.”

“You'd only follow me back, that's all I'm here for. Tell them to go, and with the chopper.”

“What?” She cried.

“We'd use my Rover.”

Instead of killing her, Silas publicly exposes her crimes, he carefully arranged her downfall at the hands of the authorities, proving that justice can be served without another kill. He had previously defeated The Architect's agent, and not one, or two of them, he did this not just through violence, but by outsmarting their intricate system, and breaking their control.

As the sirens wail, he could see Eleanor Vance stare at him through the window as the police took her away. The smoke cleared, and Silas made his final run, back to Moscow. Lena saw him from afar off and ran into his arms, safe and unharmed. They used a cab home, but just a little while ahead, a single, antique silver bullet dropped from his pocket, landing on the wet pavement. He looked at it and could recall every kill, but there was hope, there was a good life to live, here in Moscow with Lena.