In Too Deep(155)

"Okay Ms. Han," the student, a pretty little girl who was probably a junior or senior, replied. She looked like the sort of girl who was probably involved in student government, and in a more innocent time would have been dating the quarterback of the football team. She had that sort of innocent sweetness to her. "Is there anything else?"

"Not at all Stacey," Faoxin replied. "Just remember that next practice you're doing the moderator's role, so I want you listening and giving good feedback to your teammates. They kind of let you down today, so that's why I asked you to stay late. See you tomorrow."

Stacey disappeared around the corner, and I waited another minute before making my move. Pushing my mop past the now open door to Faoxin's room, I saw her sitting at her desk, checking a pile of papers that looked like they might have been a set of tests or something similar. In any case, her head was down, which is what I wanted. Pushing my mop and bucket inside, I went inside the room.

"One of you guys already got the garbage," Faoxin said, not raising her head. I was glad, since it meant there was a greater chance of her not being totally focused on who I was.

"Mopping," I said, intentionally pitching my voice soft and slightly lispy. I didn't want her knowing who I was just yet. "Sorry."

Faoxin kept her head down, and I took the opportunity to pull the door closed behind me. I didn't know if the other door to the room was locked or not, but it at least cut off the room visually. Faoxin looked up when she heard the door close, her eyes wary. She looked at me for the first time, her eyes widening as she realized who I was. "Snowman."

"Fao," I replied, using the shortened name we had used years before when I had been her bed partner. "Long time no see."

Faoxin set her papers aside, keeping her hands where I could see them. That didn't mean I didn't think she wasn't hitting some sort of panic button with her foot, and we had less than five minutes to finish this. "I didn't think I'd see you so soon," she said, smiling. "I was kind of hoping that our history would have given me a bit more time to enjoy my life, or maybe you'd let me walk away without having to be killed."

"After what you've done since your father died, did you really think that was an option, Fao?" I asked, setting my foot against the shaft of my mop. I stepped hard and twisted, snapping the wood a bit shorter than I would have liked, but still giving me a stick that was just over two and a half feet long. "Han Faoxin, you have failed this city."

Faoxin rolled her eyes and got to her feet, picking the pen up off her desk. She reached down and pulled a long metal ruler from under her desk blotter, and even from across the room I could see the glitter of the sharpened edge. I suspected that while perhaps not as sturdy as a real sword, the wrapped end and relatively hefty weight would give her more than enough cutting ability to inflict major damage if she had the chance.

"You know, that was one of the reasons I stopped seeing you," she said as I closed the distance between us. She swung her blade, and I pulled back, just out of range before trying to dart in with my own thrust with the partially sharp point of the break. "You were never short for cheesy one liners."

"You always said it was cute when we were out together," I retorted, whipping my thrust to the side and smacking into the hand that held the pen. I knew that once the distance was closed between us, she would use it like a shank, stabbing me with it.

I had to circle around her desk, or in some way get it from between us. Stepping to my right, I saw Faoxin retreat to her own, starting to circle. I kept it up until we switched places when I went for it, using what I'd been hiding in my left hand. It had hurt, but it was effective, a handful of thumbtacks. It caused Faoxin to at least try to ward off the projectiles for a moment, allowing me to dive over the desk and tackle her to the ground. The impact drove the wind out of her, although she retained enough sense of mind to lift her legs and push me over, flipping me. I rolled through, shoving a desk out of the way as I went.

Finding my feet, I spun, pouncing back on Faoxin just as she was getting to her knees, her face red and gasping from the pain of the tackle. Taking her back, I wrapped my arm around her throat, not for a choke but rather to bring her chin and around to the locked position. From there I could twist and easily break her neck. Faoxin clawed at my arm, but the janitor's coveralls I was wearing prevented her from doing much, especially with my weight bearing down on her back.

"Goodbye, Han Faoxin," I said sadly, twisting. It had to be done, but it didn’t mean I had to enjoy it. A sharp brittle crack reached my ears, and she collapsed, face first onto the floor. I looked in her eyes, and could see that there was still a glimmer of consciousness in her eyes. I could see her still trying to form words, even as her lungs failed to breathe, and her heart stopped getting the signals it had gotten for over thirty years. She mouthed something, I wasn't sure what, and then the light faded as her brain slowly died.

"Eighty one."





Chapter 45


Sophie




When Mark left that day for the hit on Han Faoxin, I was in one of our strike bases near the red light district of the city. It was a crummy tenement actually, one that Mark had owned since before he had met me, and the strike base was actually the basement, which was only reached from an outside steel door that for most people was rusted shut. Inside the basement, I found what Mark had told me was there, an AR-15 configured in a heavier caliber than the normal M-16. We were using it because Mark had trained me so much in Europe on the AR-15 and it's main rival, the AK-47. With the ability to attach a scope the same way each and every time, all I had to do was bring the scope that I had already adjusted for my own uses. It wasn't going to put a bullet through a playing card at half a mile, but it would do its job.