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There was a knock at her door. Nell wriggled uncomfortably to her feet and, after a quick last nervous glance in the mirror, dashed to the door. She was more comfortable in combats and khakis. Her hair she had refused to compromise on, however. She didn't need to. She had paid enough for the coiffure ("Kwaffewer," she thought with a mental giggle, "in't we gettin' posh, Nell girl.") at an exclusive salon in West Central. It was all short, electric-blue spikes.
The two Haredim at the door were somewhat taken aback by the apparition with which they were confronted when she opened the door. They were used to her in boots, combats and a sleeveless T-shirt with unshaven armpits. The vision of corporate elegance into which she was transformed was faintly absurd. They should not have been so surprised though. She was an associate of the Yon-Ju-Shichi, after all, and their fees and professional service were well in line with those of lawyers, consultants and bankers of the highest brass.
"Awright boys, not seen me in me whistle, 'ave yer?" She grinned at them. "Cleaned up nice, dinn'i?"
Moshe, the driver, nodded. Yehudi grinned. "A vision of splendour. A real tsatske."
Rake-hell Nell, world-class Ronin, frowned, showing her teeth.
"I wish you wouldn't use all that palaver, Yehudi. I can't tell when you're mouthin' off. I might just 'ave to assume the worst."
"It means 'gem'," said Moshe quickly. Nell grinned. Your average bloke was always a little bit cagey around Metamorphs but then it probably was sensible when they could punch through your ribcage and out the other side.
Yehudi, on the other hand, had been flirty since she had been introduced to him by Rabbi Efraim Weissmann, her current employer. Quite a few men were a bit like that. They found female 'Morphs a phenomenal turn-on. The prospect of sticking their 'Arvey Nick up a human killing machine was scarily thrilling. Yehudi was hardly the first like that. Nell didn't mind. She liked the attention.
In fact, Yehudi was not the only member of London's Ha Aheret David to have designs on Nell, indeed most Jewish men that Nell had met seemed to entertain fantasies of shtupping a shiksa, but there was an awkward rumour going around that the Rabbi himself was having his wicked way with Nell. It was not true. Rabbi Efraim Weissmann was happily married to his third wife, Ruth, a quiet submissive Jewish princess, just like the previous two.
In the car she said, "You got your end sorted, Yehudi."
"No schlep! Just the last on-the-spot run."
"Sweet."
"Nelly, what's this schlemiel done to get Rav Weissmann so crazy?"
"Smells like a monkey job to me."
"Monkey job?"
"Bugger's gone and made Mister Weissmann look like a monkey, inne? So the Rav's out for claret."
"Rather him than me."
"And if you call me Nelly again I'll snick yer weasel'n'stoat."
"Oy vey. As you like, Pumpkin."
Nell growled.
The car, a deep red Merc, had crossed Waterloo Bridge and was driving into Docklands now. Yippie ('Young infotech proficient professionals') apartment blocks were springing up all around them and the colossal pillar of light that was Canary Wharf loomed up ahead, separate from the forest of such monstrous edifices that sprouted up to their left in East Central.
Moshe said something in Hebrew and Yehudi nodded and grunted. Then the lippy hacker closed his eyes and a look of intense concentration came over his face. His brow furrowed. He remained like this for half a minute or so and then his face registered sudden surprise.
"That wasn't there before."
Nell, thrown by the abrupt absence of Yehudi's confident swagger, asked, "Everything peachy, Yehudi?"
"Don't kibitz," was the shirty response.
This was followed another twenty seconds later by, "Yentzed it". Moshe seemed to have paced his driving to perfection, despite the traffic, even on a Saturday night. The Merc wheeled round into a car park. The door rolled up into the ceiling as they descended the ramp. Yehudi grinned. "See Nell, doesn't get much more fucking yentzed than that."
"Jesus, Yehudi, what do you want, a prize? Who's been teaching you to blind like that, anyhow?" As an afterthought, "You got the clockers?"
"Clockers?"
"They should teach you Yids to speak English 'stead of blinding in front of ladies present. Security cameras you muppet."
"Ladies present. Where?" Yehudi mimed glancing round in confusion. He grinned at Nell, perhaps a little nervously, and held his hands up to show he was japing.
"Watch it. So am I clear?"
"Clear Nell." Yehudi smiled underneath his beard.
She got out of the car and shut the door gingerly (not long after she had undergone the Nietzsche Metamorphosis she had put her arm through the side of Yoshio's Lambourghini). She checked her jacket: two long throwing knives, Schneider Corpus Christi 18 mil Pistol ("Eine Uberpistole fur ein Ubermensch"), key to the old man's apartment. Check. She strode off towards the lift, glancing back over her shoulder to grin wickedly at Yehudi.
Once she was in the lift and the doors were closed on her she inhaled deeply through her nose. Breathing out again she tried to feel the cocky cockney demeanour filter out with the breath. She was tense, almost scared. She always was when she was on the job. "Use your fear. It is a weapon. But do not let it use you." Yoshio's voice came back to her.
An elaborate J.S. Bach Prelude and Fugue passed for muzak in the lift and Nell stood therein in an expensively tailored trouser suit. And she was thinking of Yoshio. She almost smiled. His voice again, "Don't think about me, Nell. Just the kill. Sword soul."
Sword soul. The body as a weapon. The mind as a weapon. If you think that you might die, that you might lose, that you missed your dentist's appointment that morning and you don't want to die with toothache then you lose. To win think about only what you must do to win. Focus.
Yes, Yoshio. "Where are you, you Nip bastard? I miss you." The doors of the lift opened.
She had been only fifteen when Yoshio had found her in the streets of Bow, the mythic hometown of the Cockney Londoner. He had realised her talent and had taken her away to Hokkaido to train as an apprentice of the Yon-Ju-Shichi. Now she was an associate, one of the Forty Seven Ronin themselves.
He had worn all black: a thigh-length leather jacket, turtle neck sweater, boots, shades, combats. Even his exquisitely trimmed pony-tail and little pointed beard were jet black. And she alone called him Yoshio. To everyone else at the Hokkaido training camp he was Fuyukage-sama, full partner of the Yon-Ju-Shichi. But to her, at nights, those sighing, sweating nights, he was Yoshio. It was hers, that precious, secret name. "Yoshio, I miss you."
Focus. Sword soul. Nell, do not think about me.
She breathed and stepped out of the lift. She was letting herself get distracted. Focus. The carpet beneath her feet was plush, marbled blue and gold. Elegant pine doors lined the right-hand side of the corridor. Riverside apartments, very yippie. The numbers were shown on elegant gold plates. The cream walls and ceiling were lit by a soft, diffuse white light. She walked down the corridor with hastily refined deportement. 401; 402; 403; 404. Bingo.
She took the key from her jacket pocket and pushed it into the lock. She took pleasure in her feigned nonchalance. Nobody passing could not have known that she should not have been there. Even his neighbours would have assumed she was some aspiring yippie fucking her way up the food chain. There was nobody in the corridor though. The door opened smoothly and, apart from the gentlest click of the key in the lock, silently.
She stepped into the room.
No carpet. The floor was panelled with ebony. Bar/kitchen chrome, black marble work surfaces. The walls and ceiling were white and, in the actinic strip-lighting, quite headache inducing.
"Good evening, Nell." She heard the voice whilst she was still scanning the room before she could identify the speaker. The harsh lighting, in contrast to the much softer ambience of the hall, was disorienting.
"Cup of tea?" He was sitting at a glass-topped table with a black teapot and two cups sitting on it. He sat in a high-back black leather swivel chair. White hair flopped over his eyes. He wore a simple white shirt and black jeans, entirely in keeping with the vehement black-and-white of the apartment. Another identical chair had been placed at the other end of the table, empty, as though he was expecting someone.
"It's Oolong," he added matter-of-factly, calmly.
At this point Nell's mind was racing with questions: "You know me?"; "You know why I'm here?"; "If you know why I'm here why do you just sit there you crazy, old bastard?".
Focus. Sword soul.
She kicked the door shut behind and drew her throwing knives in a smooth motion but so fast that a human eye could not have followed the motion. She threw the knives, left then right.
The first bit right through the side of the old man's neck, sliced a deep gash through the leather seat and hurtled on to embed itself deep in the wall behind him. The second slammed point-first into his chest. The chair skidded backwards three metres just as a huge pulse of blood spurted from his neck.
The old man smiled faintly, shrugged and slumped.
"Creepy old bastard," Nell muttered. She watched the rhythm of the jet of blood from the man's neck grow weaker and more erratic and then stop altogether. She then crossed the room and pulled her knife from the wall. She carefully dislodged the second knife from the corpse's chest, making sure that she did not get bloodied in the process. She crossed to the lounge area where she wiped the blades off on the rug before replacing them inside her jacket.
She turned the latch of the door using a handkerchief and walked on out into the corridor, the door closing behind her.
"How'd it go, Pumpkin?" asked Yehudi when she got back to the car.
"No schlep!"
Geoff Hinkley, 26/09/00
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