Nadja rushed for the emergency exit, emptying the gun into the two guards as she charged through, kicking it shut and jamming one of the empty guns in the lock from the outside, her eye catching a strange sense of panic in the women walking by, in a daze.


    “Someone killed president DuPont!” yelled a woman from the crowd, Nadja’s expression changing to rage as she grabbed the woman and stopped her.


    “What did you say?” she asked.


    “President DuPont is dead.” She hollered, crying, wiping her nose on the black and green DuPont logo on her shirt.


    “You mean Former President Bloomberg is dead, Da?” Nadja asked.


    “Lady, I think I fucking know who got shot, I was in there!” she cried, as Nadja’s expression went cold, and she felt the betrayal of Judas strike her like a bullet to the soul. She bared her teeth and stomped forward into the crowd, aiming for the front of the building. She could smell the stench of betrayal and magnesium gunpowder, calling her.


    Mike reached the parking lot, stopping as the familiar click of his own revolver cocking stopped him.


    “You’re out of ammo.” He sighed. “Aren’t you?” he chuckled.


    “Michael, what have you done?!” Nadja roared.


    “I did exactly what you told me to… I did whatever I wanted, and what I wanted was to kill a president. So I did. I’m sorry that it wasn’t the one you wanted me to, but you said yourself to become what I am supposed to be I just have to do what I desire most, and am too afraid to admit that I wanted. My darkest desire. I did wanna kill a president, yours. I wanted to break your heart and kill your dreams. DuPont was a cancer on this country, and his rigged elections and Russian ties would start a war.”


    “A FAKE WAR!” she screamed.


    “Not fake to the soldiers who’d die, and the families that would mourn. Bloomberg is a piece of shit too, but he’s nothing compared to the grand plan Ivanova had in mind, and the price of that sacrifice to this country. You’re right, our country is going to hell, but it’s going there slower without him weighing us down. Maybe Bloomberg will see this as a sign to clean his act up, to fear the people who could rise up. I struck fear in him tonight and ended the war by killing your plan. Judas betrayed like it was built to do, it was just always designed to betray you…and you fucking paid me a fortune to build it.” he smiled, drawing the brown recluse revolver with the yellow tape on the barrel, pointing it at her, holy rounds next in line.


    “Michael, how dare you. I made you what you are. I gave you power and freedom, and I gave you ME!! I saved Tanner from your evil by taking her from you, and gave you something more like yourself. We could have been gods!” She growled, her voice darkening in tone, inhumanly so, Her eyes glowing neon hot as she breathed heavily.


    “We could have been devils. I’m not either. I’m just a fallen angel of vengeance.” He said cocking the hammer and aiming.


    “With a gun that only returns sights to zero half the time. You’re going to shoot me with a crooked plastic 22?” she chuckled.


    “Maybe…aiming when you think you might miss is just part of faith. Goodbye, Nadja. If it’s any consolation, Mister Black did love you, and he’s going to miss you. He just knows, like I do, that there’s no other choice.” He finished, putting a round in her forehead, reflexively firing the second round and landing it right in her heart. She dropped to her knees and folded backwards. Mike heard the click of a 9mm hammer behind his head.


    “What have you done?” Yuri asked.


    “Hearing that question a lot lately. You’re welcome, you’re free.” Mike sighed.


    “Free? I am not free! She was my only way of getting immunity and passport, money to disappear with Nicolai! They will kill him if they find out what we are, they will kill him just for knowing my failure tonight. I have nothing! You TOOK EVERYTHING FROM ME!” he yelled. “And you just had to shoot one fucking president. Look me in the eyes, Holyman. I want to see them go dark.” Yuri said with tears running down his face, “And you should prefer to die on your feet like a man, facing what you have done.”


    “Six hundred more seconds, Yuri. Can you wait six hundred seconds to save everything you love?” Mike asked.


    “What does that mean?” Yuri asked.


    “I’ve killed her a dozen times before, but never with bullets like these. I don’t know if she’ll stay dead this time. I believe, but I don’t know for sure. If you kill me, and she comes back, you just robbed her of her vengeance or her prize to torture. If I’m alive when she does, you captured me for her, and everything you wanted is still on the table. Just ask her for it.” Mike informed.


    “And if she stays dead this time?” Yuri asked, fighting the pain in his heart.


    “Then you have every right to kill me. I knew about Nicolai. I’m sorry, but two dead Russians lovers are worth stopping a war where a thousand Russians will die, a thousand Americans will die, and this country will be in chaos and betrayal. You and him mean nothing to me compared to thousands of innocent lives and the future of this nation. No offense but fuck you both, and I would shoot me too in your shoes, but I sure as hell would not get my vengeance impatiently, when waiting another 9 or 10 minutes could save him, and everything you wanted. So grab Nadja’s body before the police arrive, and drive, we have one last thing to kill together…


    If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    “What is left to kill? You have killed everything.”


    “Time.” Mike sighed. "9 very long minutes of time."


    Mike and Yuri sat near his favorite fishing spot, Nadja’s corpse lying in the grass as they waited, Yuri still holding the gun down by his side as the phone displayed the countdown and both men looked lost in the void.


    “How did we become enemies?” Yuri asked.


    “That dead thing in the grass did that. I was just a retired plumber with a dream, and you were just looking for a life. And then she happened. She fucked us both over. Two men without souls hovering over the bitch that stole them. And if she gets back up, you won. And as sorry as I am that you have to lose everything you love, I deeply hope she doesn’t get back up.”


    “You want to die.” Yuri said. “Because of what she made you do.” he sighed as if relating to the feeling.


    “No, because it’s my time. I’m an old preacher that kills evil things, and I’ve got no life left, no soul, no fight anymore. If she stays down, I just became something more than an idea, and I beat the devil. At 52 years old, that’s as good as a Hitman and a Holyman can ask for. Someone was going to kill me eventually, Some target or some lucky asshole with a younger set of eyes, some cocky prick looking for a name for himself, or just…my own broken heart. And if she gets up… I’ll just be killed by the devil in a game we both lost. She''ll start her plan over. On the other hand, going out on a victory with nothing left to fight for, isn’t so bad. Killed by a man I wronged, who damn well deserves something for his soul. I’m honored, Yuri. I deserve it. You deserve it more than anyone. I hope you get to kill me instead of her.” Mike smiled.


    “I hope I don’t.” Yuri sighed, taking a swig from a flask and tossing it to Mike. “One last drink either way.” He shrugged.


    “Russian vodka?” Mike scoffed.


    “Da. The good stuff. Hundred proof.” He sighed.


    “I’ve had enough Russian temptation, burning my insides on the way down. I’ll die sober if you don’t mind. Thanks for the offer.” He said, tossing it back. “Just make me one promise. Tanner did nothing. She shouldn’t suffer for this any more than she will already. Keeping me alive to hurt her and make me watch, just gives me lots of chances to get free and kill you. Just kill me. Make your way home to Russia.”


    “I’m insulted. I would never hurt her, even to torture you. I would gladly torture you and never tell her, I might even lie and tell you I tortured her to fuck with you, but hurting her gives me nothing. We do what we MUST, not what we want, or what is most cutting to the enemy. Always what is necessary. You protect your country and I protect Nicolai. Sadly we cannot both have this, and that fate lies in the hands of the one who cursed us both, now lying in the grass. She will not get up. I will kill you quickly, and then I will find a way to go home. If it takes me years, if I do not arrive in time, I try. I have to. Secret goes to your grave and hopefully stays there.” Yuri said as the timer beeped, and he pointed the gun at Nadja, then back at Mike, unsure what side he was ever on. There was a moment of silence between them. Mike nodded.


    “Thank God that’s over. Sorry about your bad luck.” Mike said, slowly standing. “Shot to the base of the spine at the shoulder blade would kill me slower, let you savor it for a moment, knowing I’m paralyzed and feeling the pain, trying to breathe and can’t, still a guaranteed kill, just a nastier one. In case you were thinking it.”


    “No…I too just want this to be over quick.” He said, letting out a deep breath and firing a hollow-point through Mike’s eye socket, killing him instantly. “World has enough suffering already, not enough quick deaths.” He finished, firing a round into Nadja’s already partial head, firing a second round into Mike’s ribs, and wiping down the gun, placing it in Nadja’s hand. He sighed, picking up the brass and firing another shot from her height, and from her cold dead hand. He put the revolver in Mike’s hand and stood back, making his way to the truck. He pulled from the driveway and dialed Tanner, relieved to get the answering machine.


    “Tanner, It’s Yuri. It’s over. I shot Nadja. Mike made me bring her body to the church for ritual and special bullets, insisting she would come back to life without using the bullets and killing her on holy ground. So she stays dead this time. He was right about both things. She shot him first in the chest, he shot her twice, and I shot her from reflex. Mike is dead. Bullet in the lung, bleeding badly, I gave him mercy round to the head. Quicker, painless. You will find both bodies. I am leaving to go find my home. Pray to your god, I ever get there. I have no god to pray to. I am sorry. He died not as Mister Black, but as Mike Finn, defending you, his country and his faith. He died killing the monster, not as one.” He said, hanging up and staring forward, unsure of the future.


    Tanner sprinted through the grass with Alexander closely behind her and collapsed on the ground near the bodies.


    “Tanner, love. Don’t look.” He begged. She stared blankly at his body, refusing to blink or cry.


    “No… I need closure. I can feel something reaching out to me, and I need to let him go. Alex, I was right, Mike was still in there, but he’s gone now. He was protecting us the whole time, but he killed a lot of people to do it. That had to have torn him up inside. I don’t know if I’m glad he’s dead because he’s at peace, or because it’s all just…over. I need to say goodbye to them both in my own way…very different ways.” She said, drawing her red SMG and mag-dumping the entire hold of 50 rounds into Nadja’s corpse. “So that felt kinda nice. Die in hell, you demonic fucking slutbag.” She said, throwing the gun in the pond, “Well, that’s my goodbye to her. So no more Nadja, No more Mike bullets, or Mike gun, no more Mike. That’s it. You’re stronger than me, you drag his body into the pond… I’ll get the two lighter halves of the bitch.” She said calmly, as if in a daze. Alex heaved the body up by the feet and dragged it down the little fishing dock. Letting him go, as Tanner chucked Nadja’s lower half in the pond. She grabbed the wrists and gave the top half a heave, swinging it and letting go with a flinch, retracting her hand with a strange look.


    “Are you injured?” Alex asked.


    “No…” she said, shaking off her dazed expression with a slight smile and a hint of blood. “I actually feel fairly good, considering.” She said as Alex checked her hand.


    “What a truly incredible level of evil for someone to have, to be killed twice in the same hour, cut in half and disposed of, and yet managed to still scratch someone post-mortem with those fucking horrendous nails of hers." Alex chuckled.


    “I dunno. Always kinda liked the nails. Might let mine grow out.” Tanner sighed.


    “I wouldn’t normally tempt you, but I think in the aftermath of it all, you deserve a drink if you so choose.” Alex said, taking the flask he found next to Mike, assuming it was his.


    “D-...yea why not.” She shrugged. Catching it and knocking back a swing, not a flinch or a cringe. She poured the last swig out on the ground to Mike’s memory. “Goodbye Michael.” She grinned, turning and sashaying through the grass, her right middle and index finger nails lightly tapping the flask in quick session, with a rhythmic 1-2…1-2 gallop, as she walked. Alexander hugged her tightly, sharing his coat.


    “Damn, Darling. You are absolutely freezing. Will you recover?” he asked.


    “I adapt.” She said coldly.