Em Ryder: Assassin X
Compendium 2020 – Story 45
By Andrew Hawnt
Author's note: This is the second Em Ryder story. The first was Em Ryder: The Fall of Agent Zero.
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Agent Em Ryder was no stranger to staring down the barrel of a gun, but staring down eight at once was a bit less frequent. Not by much, though.
“Well, this is a pleasant welcome, isn't it?”
“You've made a very bad move in coming here,” sneered Xavier Drake. “You know you won't be leaving here alive.”
The place was dark aside from the circular table in the middle of the room. It smelled of expensive tobacco and the gaseous injectors of high-grade drugs. The neon of the club she had fought her way though pulsed along with the bass of pounding music. Behind her the corridor smouldered with spent gunfire along with the smell of blood and cybernetic lubricants.
“Xavier, could you really not think of a better codename than Assassin X? I mean, it's your initial. It's as blatant as those hair plugs you've got.”
Xavier ran a hand over the spiked blue mohawk he wore. There was a glint of rage in his human eye, while the cybernetic implant of his right eye irised out, bathing Em's face in its red glow. He leaned closer to her face, impressed that she didn't wince at the stench of Stimm and vintage JD.
“Whatever proof you have, which I'm sure is a lot seeing as it's you here, you won't get to show it anywhere. You think you're gonna get the better of all eight of the Guild of X?”
Em eyed each of them in turn, all of them wearing the same mohawk and suit, but each of them sporting different cybers grafted to their skin. Each boasted one glowing cybernetic eye. “The Guild of X, all of you operating as the killer known as Assassin X, a pretty cool name until you remember it's got 'Ass' in it twice. Did you think your secret wouldn't come out? I mean, come on. You guys weren't as careful as you thought you were in hiding your DNA. Out of the eight of you we know who five of you are, and to be frank, I don't care who the others are. All I care about it picking you all off and taking your stupid hair in as a frigging trophy.”
Xavier laughed at this, and the others followed. He raised his gun to her forehead. “How you gonna take down eight of us with one gun, baby? We're the best guns in all of Magenta District. You won't get a shot off.”
“Maybe I don't need to. Let's even the numbers.”
Em twisted her belt buckle with her free hand. The Guild of X all barked in pain as a flash of interference burst through their implants.
They all trained their guns on Em, then each other.
She had sabotaged their electronics, creating eight digital mirages of Agent Em Ryder. The mohawks and suits had been replaced by the glamour of Em's blonde waves and the sleek practicality of her black uniform.
Xavier knew he was pointing his right at Em, and so he emptied his clip, the sound exploding in the smoky room but not overpowering the music beyond the corridor.
One of the Guild fell behind Em, the mirage crackling away and revealing his bullet-riddled body. Xavier screamed in fury and pointed the gun at Em again. “I'll blow your head off then steal the money from your account to pay for the dry cleaning!”
He fired again and again at Em, and immediately another of his Guild collapsed, this time revealing his face blown apart as the mirage vanished. Another lie. In rage he fired again, felling another.
Agent Em Ryder grinned at him as he faced her again. She winked at him and promptly vanished.
Gunfire erupted from the corridor. Em Ryder strode down it, expertly picking off the other assassins as she twisted her belt buckle in the opposite direction. The Guild flickered, revealing each other's final moments as the hack cleared from their cybernetics. They collapsed in turn, their suits splattered with seven batches of blood.
Xavier was the last standing.
“How do I take you down? By using assassins, of course.”
Agent Em Ryder fired, and the Guild of X met its end.
© Andrew Hawnt 2020
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About Compendium 2020:
Compendium 2020 is a project from author Andrew Hawnt that consists of 52 original short stories, flash fiction stories and vignettes given away for FREE in 2020. Featuring science fiction, fantasy, horror and more, this began as a personal quest and due to the weirdness of 2020 has become an ambition to provide free distractions for anyone who needs them.
About Andrew Hawnt:
Andrew is based in Nottingham, England. Known for his music journalism career, comics writing and film critique work, Andrew is a prolific writer and is the author of a growing stack of books, including the cult hit VHS Ate My Brain. He made the movies The Demon And I and The Demon And I: Birthrite completely in lockdown with cast members filming their scenes remotely, and new films are coming.
Andrew is also the creator and presenter of the YouTube shows Planet Hex, Turn One Shock and the VHS Ate My Brain series as well as the video versions of the Compendium stories.
Follow Andrew: YouTube Mixcloud Facebook Instagram Twitter
© Andrew Hawnt 2020
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