Snippet #2182830

Shade was lying awake in bed staring at the ceiling. He had not fallen asleep once the entire night, and now he was listening to his alarm clock go off. He debated ignoring it and skipping out today, but that would never happen. Not only for the repercussions, -he could not care any less about what would happen to him- but because it was not in his nature. No matter how he felt, he always gritted his teeth and did his job. Finally after a few minutes, he reached over and gently turned off the alarm before carefully getting out of bed to as not to mess it up any more than necessary. He then mechanically went through the motions of making his cot, taking a shower, shaving, making coffee, and getting dressed. It was the exact same routine he had been executing every single day without fail since he was 18. Once he was dressed, and had his cup of instant coffee with milk, he carefully did three self checks over himself. "Glasses, watch, ring, necklace, wallet, phone, knife, knife, knife, gun, gun, candy, briefcase, shaved, hair, teeth, key." as he muttered each item, he patted it with his hands, making sure he had it. once he was sure he had everything, he picked up his coffee cup, making sure that his steel ring clinked against the porcelain. He liked that sound. He liked almost any time his ring made a noise against something. He did hot really know why, it just did. He slowly walked out of the room, locking the door behind him, and started down the hall. Here was where his routine varied. His apartment was on the 5th floor, so he had the choice of taking the elevator, or stairs. this was the one part of his life that had no pattern, or routine. He chose when he reached the elevator. today he pressed the button and waited. he was tired and did not feel like walking so many steps. When he reached outside, he got on the bus, and road exactly 15 stops down to the office. The bus actually got closer at 17 stops, but he liked the number 15 better. it was better rounded off in his opinion. He walked the remaining 4 blocks at an angle, taking a shortcut that made it so that he arrived at his office the same time as the bus reached the 17th stop.

He sucked at his job. No self respecting assassin would be caught dead getting into such a solid routine. "Actually, they would be dead." he thought to himself, enjoying the unspoken joke. but he had been doing this for several years, and it had not hurt him yet, so he did not bother changing anything. perhaps, if his security situation changed, he would, but until then, he was happy. As he walked into the office, Jay instantly started talking to him.

"Hey, Shade," Jonathan grunted a greeting out of him. "Got any leads?"

"Good morning." he replied, "ON what in particular? I am currently screening a few targets."