Satisfaction

The heavy thumping of Kira’s boots was barely audible over the sounds of a worn out Frank Sinatra record that someone had dug out of a junk shop and the dozen chaotic conversations of sleazy middle aged men. This was not her crowd; she only ever came here to see her agent. The men in this pub never really seemed to notice her, their eyes focused on the flesh showing above her black corset. It worked to her advantage as not a single man in the place could I.D her.

The back room was dimly lit and smelled of stale beer and cigar smoke. Her agent sat behind a wooden desk older than time flanked by two meatballs for bodyguards.

“Did I piss on your mother’s grave or something? I haven’t had a job in months.”

“You haven’t come to see me.” She rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. The metallic braces grafted to her hands reflected light onto his sweaty balding head. The positions of future hair plugs mapped out in red pan that most people wouldn’t see. Most people don’t have military-grade optical implants fresh off the Cheba black market.

“Do you have a job for me or what?”

“Sure I got a job for you, assuming you’re up to it.” He slid the dosier across the desk. She picked it up and flipped through it.

“Seems routine enough. Stalk a would-be assassin and make sure they don’t go through with the hit.”

“Whatever you do, don’t kill him or you won’t get paid.”

“I know that! I’ve read the fine print.”

“I’m serious!”

“What do you take me for?”

“Fine, just don’t say I didn’t warn you when the cash doesn’t come.”

Kira found her self sitting at an expensive outdoor café eating a ridiculously small sandwich for the price she paid. Behind her sat her target talking to an old friend.

“So I say to her ‘Listen babe, I didn’t mean to lead you on but this could never work. We come from too different worlds.’”

“What she do then?” This friend of his seemed enraptured.

“Started bawling like a little baby, that’s what she did.”

“Typical.” Both men began to chuckle. Anger boiled inside her making her unable to stomach the rest of her sandwich. She hated men like them. Her father was just like them and had often used her as a pity card when wooing unsuspecting young women. The skin broke where her black lacquered nails dug into the flesh of her tightly fisted hands and she unclenched them at the sign of blood. This was going to be a tougher contract then she had first assumed. They’ve finished their expensive synth-steaks, Leo, her target, takes the bill.

“You sure?” His friend asks.

“Yeah, I’m gonna have some cash coming in soon.”

“In your dreams,” She snorted to herself, both men oblivious to her.

She followed Leo for days, watching him make every mistake in the book. She would have found it cute if he wasn’t the biggest chauvinistic ass in the sprawl. Her main objective was to scare him into changing his mind about going through with the hit. So she was being fairly obvious but the man was just so involved with himself that he wouldn’t notice if the building next door were to suddenly blow up. She didin’t really mind but people were beginning to notice. Her phone rang as she entered the airport where Leo was tracking another one of his conquests.

“Speak.” She answered flatly.

“I spy with my little eye someone who has gotten very sloppy.”

“Spiketer, have you been watching me again?” Her boyfriend had taken to watching her while she worked.

“Maybe… but your making it too easy.”

“It’s intentional. The guy I’m tailing hasn’t even noticed yet. I gotta go.” She hung up quickly as her target began to move. What looked like a has-been, remodeled-but-now-aging Simstim porn star hung off of his arm. It was looking like she would be sending another night watching him go at it from the building across the street. Not that she minded, it was cheaper than renting some cheesy, poorly made flick. She was getting a little sick of it though. Eight girls in two days; it must be some kind of record.

She was following him again, maybe two feet behind him. Close enough for to be able to touch him but he didn’t notice. At least not until she sat down across the table from him in the small diner he always ate breakfast at. He nearly jumped out of his skin.

“Who the hell are you?!”

“You don’t need to know, shitface.” He opened his mouth to say something but the tip of Ernie, one of her twin guns, pressed up against his shut him up pretty well. “I’ll do the talking. I’m here to derail your plans.”

“Wha--“

“You know exactly what I’m talking about. In fact so does everyone in the business, including your target, who hired me to stop you.

“Let me tell you something, bud. You’re sloppy. You’ve made tracks wide enough that people don’t even have to look at them. Never use the same name more than twice. Never use the same line of credit for everything. And never fall into any form of routine, got it?” He nodded ferverently.

“Good. If I find out you’ve gone through with it. It’s your head.” When she left the diner it was as though she had never been there at all. She almost wished he’d gone through with the hit. She wanted so bad a reason to kill him.

Kira sat up on a rooftop across from Leo’s apartment. The rain hissed as it hit the ground, the acidity of it eating away at the black pain on her sniper rifle. She could kill him right there in his apartment while he checked his voice mail in the buff. They wouldn’t pay her but she would be damned satisfied. In the back of her mind she questioned why someone would want to keep their would-be killer alive. It didn’t really matter to her as she had never cared about her employer’s motives. She liked her job and she liked the money. Through the audio bead in her ear she heard the message she’d left him. A distorted voice rang out through the room.

“Don’t go through with it.” The message ended as abruptly as it began. A bullet crashed through the window and hit a picture of his mother that hung on the wall. An instinctive hand flew to cover his balls as he stared in shock.

“How typical.” She said out loud to no one in particular.

Satisfaction just doesn’t pay the rent.