Dirty King

Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I do not own Facebook, it belongs to the original creators. I am only including into my story. The names depicted are fictional. Any resemblance to an actual person is purely coincidental. I also do not own Maxwell Coffee or World of Warcraft.

Chapter warning(s): Death of a minor character.

Mail as “Matt”
August 23rd, 2010
7:45 AM

A thin, somewhat muscular chest was rising and falling slowly, body half covered by soiled and threadbare sheets. His upper body was devoid of clothing, his lower half was covered in pale jeans. He was sprawled across the bed in a haphazard manner, indicative of his lack of caring for his person. On his ears was headphones playing some sort of techno or electronica music that was somewhat muted, but would still be perceived by the young male. A right arm lay across a face with sharp features, most noticeably a nose that was a little thinner than usual and high cheekbones. A fringe of dark red hair covered some of the arm; the young male shifted his arm away from this face, letting the fringes obscure his eyes by themselves. An alarm clock that was nearby started to beep loudly, prompting the red head to blearily open his eye and glare at the offending machine. He rotated his body and tiredly reached out and reached for the ‘snooze’ button. He glanced at the time and groaned in frustration. He was late for a job, like he cared; a job was still a job though and he sat up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and looking around, grey-blue eyes half-lidded in his grogginess. He takes in his ramshackle living space, the building he was in not entirely old, but old enough that there was always a lingering moldy smell, then again, perhaps it was just his laziness encroaching on his living space.

He gets up from his bed and shuffles to the rusting bathroom, making sure to take his MP3 along and pulling free his contacts container, opening each side, revealing emerald green colored contacts. He gazes into the mirror and places them one at a time, blinking to adjust them when they were in. He grinned in satisfaction, his alter-ego was out and ready to play another day. He shuffles to his closet and fished out a pair of pale ribbed jeans and strips from his slightly darker jeans and pulls on the new-ish pair. He digs around further and finds a faded red and black striped shirt, the ends of the sleeves and color are slightly frayed, but still wearable. This he pulls on lazily then shuffles out into the living room, a single laptop lay closed on a second hand coffee table that was surprisingly sturdy. He ignores that for the moment, directing himself to his coffee machine, opening the large can and frowning as he looked inside. He’d need to buy some more cans tomorrow; the very thought of going out into public when he was not on a mission made him shudder in disgust and anxiety. He’d already tossed out the last 2 months worth of coffee. Speaking of which…He opens the utensils drawer and pulls out a pack of smokes that he’d stashed there, as well as a lighter; keeping one always for his nicotine fix. He pulls a cancer stick free and brings it to his mouth and flicks the lighter on, the chemicals igniting and inhaled. It was bliss and he held the fumes in his lungs a moment longer before exhaling slowly. He pulls free a coffee filter and puts in his preferred amount of ground beans and puts that into the machine. He fills the pot with some water and adds that to the ground beans and places the pot into the appropriate spot where the caffeinated goodness would eventually assault his senses.

He finally goes to the laptop and opens it, getting it out of sleep mode and logging into one of 3 separate accounts. One account was for business transactions when he was hired, the second was for solo ‘missions’ and the last for his gaming addiction. He logged himself into his ‘business account’ and opened his mail box. He glanced over the order and the price:
-Johannes Harder, aged 65
-Has been incarcerated recently by an undercover cop, yet to be properly identified.
-Kill date: August 27th
-Sniper Rifle
-Price to be send upon reply: $23,400
Mail snorted, a little under priced for his likings, but he was good for hustling. He clicked on the ‘Reply’ button and began to type his message:
Add another $6,600 on top of that and perhaps I’ll consider the job. I am being extremely generous with this price increase. Give me his location and consider it done. I will be looking at my bank account within the next 24 hours.

He clicked the ‘Send’ button and leaned back, inhaling more fumes and glancing at his message with half-lidded eyes and a sneer.
“Probably should have asked for 50 Grand,” he told himself, breathing out the smoke slowly. His nose catches a whiff of the blessed coffee fumes and he directs his attention to the pot which was about one quarter full. He pulls his cell phone from the coffee table and flips it open. He dials the number to the local coffee house and waits until he gets an answer. It does not take long before a cheerful sounding male voice greeted him. He clears his throat and using his American accent, he relayed his order request. The man on the other end muttering out the order, obviously writing it down.
“So you’d like 10 large cans of Maxwell Coffee? Will you be picking this up?”
“Yeah, I’ll pay in cash as always. It will likely be in the late afternoon sometime.”
“Alright then, the total comes to…$84.81. I’ll see you then.”
“Bye.” He cuts the connection then gets up, the aroma of coffee far too overpowering to be ignored any longer. It was still just less than half way full and he glared at the liquid as if it had betrayed him.
“You dark brown bastard…hurry the fuck up.” He scowled as the fluid continued its casual uninterrupted pace. He reaches into the cupboard and pulls out a familiar overly used and never washed coffee cup. This he sets onto the counter and then goes into a small fit of pacing, shooting daggers at the coffee. It was safe to say that Mail was not a morning person, or a patient one at that.

Needing to distract himself, he logs into his ‘solo mission’ account and starts off by hacking into the IRS database. He browses the countless files, the countless names of people who at one point or another had evaded the tax collectors. He was one such person, but he’d been elusive and hid himself well, setting up several firewalls that would send a deadly virus should an attempt at gaining access to his system take place. Who he chose as his victims depended on his mood at the time. He was smart, Wammy’s House had given him the ability to become elusive and near unidentifiable. He already knew of his abilities with computers and other technology, using that ability to set up cameras around the perimeter of his current property, a set of older television sets were arranged in a corner to allow him to see the outside world without needing to go out himself. These he took a glance to before returning his gaze to the laptop, continuing his search for a random victim. His eyes began to hurt under the glare of the screen, prompting him to abandon the laptop in search of his goggles. He almost always wore them when in front of his laptop and when he had to go outside for prolonged periods of time. His search seemed to be fruitless for several minutes, accentuated by ‘Fuck you’, ‘Bastard’, and ‘Arse’ tossed in loudly when he was not muttering. He returns to the couch and digs underneath the cushions, spotting them conveniently tucked away from the world. He scowls, but digs them out and after a quick glance to ensure no damage had been done to them, he places them over his eyes and fixes the cushions and plops himself back onto the couch. He resumes his casual search, chuckling at some of the names listed or the exaggerated reports on others.

His gaze drifts back to the coffee pot and he sighs in relief when at last it was filled. He removes his goggles, placing them next to the laptop and gets up, the lingering aroma had been absolute torture. He takes the pot out of its place and pours the blessed dark brown liquid into his dingy cup. He took a tentative sip, the heated liquid stinging a little, making him wince. Coffee was his other vice after he left that institution, back when he was known as Mail Jeevas. That person had died a long time ago, eliminating all memories and cutting all ties that had once been his name. Coffee was his picker-upper, his sunshine in the morning. If it was absent from his person from a prolonged period of time, he was agitated and easily pissed off. The cigarettes would stave off that irritation, but not for long. He took a gulp and hissed, goddamn that always hurt so fucking good. He smirked then returned to the couch, sitting down, setting the cup on the table, placing the goggles on his eyes and resuming his search.

A stray thought entered into his mind, ‘I am late for a job…wait, what? What job?’ He closes out of the current account and logs back into the business account and starts to look through the requests, reading through the messages one at a time at a rapid pace. It wasn’t until he’d gotten to a request make the previous week that he’d realized he’d made a mistake. He had a request to off a dealer that was selling Cocaine in the requesters turf. Sniper rifle and $50K. He checked his bank account, thinking he may have already paid, but nothing more was added.
“Well fuck…there was no time in the request, so I suppose I could still get in the hit.” He takes one last gulp of his coffee and then closes the laptop. He disappears into another room in the ramshackle apartment, this one contained several assassin’s tools that he had procured in the last 5 years. Knives, wires, smoke bombs and of course a small arsenal of guns, including a pair of Colt 45’s and his trusted sniper rifle with a silencer attached. It was already detached and in case. He’d have to make this quick, the dealer may have left the area already and it was getting brighter outside. Far too risky for his tastes. He takes the case to the main area and sets it down, then goes into his bedroom and digs out a camo jacket with a hood. He puts that on, effectively masking his thin frame; the jacket was made for someone much larger than he.

He grabs a half used pack of cigarettes and shoves that into the large jacket. He finds his leather gloves and places them over thin, pale fingers, making sure to flex and un-flex the digits to ensure a comfortable fit. Doing a fast mental inventory of what was needed, he rushes back into his weapon room and frees a box of sniper rifle ammunition, taking only 3 bullets. He had this thing with the number 3, especially pertaining to his ammunition. He makes sure to get a kill shot within the three bullets he fires or else he considers himself a failure; no point in wasting that which you have a lot of. He goes back and opens the rifle case and places the 3 bullets into slots that he made himself. Re-closing the case, he does one last mental check, then grabs his goggles, placing them on and pulling the jacket’s hood over his head at last. Finally, he grabs his combat boots and pulls them on, the clunky footwear was not going to be alerting anyone to his location anytime soon; he siphoned electricity to his apartment through the one across the street; the building he called home had long since been abandoned. Calmly, he grabs the case and goes to his door, opening it and closing it without locking. He walks up the flight of stairs that would lead him to the rooftop. It was a long trek as the building was tall and he was living towards the lower levels of the structure. It did not deter him in any way, but it did annoy him when the Sniper Rifle was requested. The only compromise to this request was that it had to be within the same area that he called home, specifics were never given of course.

Several agonizing minutes later, he opens the door to the rooftop and walks to the southwestern corner of the roof, keeping low as always. He opens the case and with military precision, begins to assemble his weapon. He pauses to free the cigarette pack and pull out another cancer stick, this one he places behind his ear. Resuming then completing the assembly, he lowers himself stomach to concrete, then elevating himself on his elbows, placing the barrel on the lip of the rooftop. He checks the scope and then uses his visual memory to scan out his target. He knew the dealer was around this area and took his time, but wary all the same that his position could be given away with the growing daylight encroaching on the horizon. His spot would continue to be shrouded in darkness for several more minutes. Breath slow and even, he continues to scout for the dealer. At last, several yards away, he appeared from around a corner that was overlooked.

The red head smirked and with one final adjustment to his scope, he inhaled and slowly exhaled a couple times. He let in one more breath and held it then released it slowly, pulling the trigger. He observed as the first bullet took out the left leg, making the dealer fall onto the ground. He dislodges the bullet case and inserts the second, locking it into the barrel and then repeating the breathing exercise. The second bullet lodged itself into the dealer’s shoulder, likely piercing the lung. The third and final bullet was at last loaded and he waited several moments, the echoes of screams reaching his ears. The final bullet blew out the back of the dealer’s head, a mass of bone and brain scattering; gotta love hollow points. He pulled back and crawled on his stomach until he would be safe from view then got on his feet and opened the door with gun and case in tow.

He walks down the flight of stairs swiftly and treks into his living space, closing and locking the door behind him. He sets the case down in the living room and opens it, then proceeds to disassemble his sniper rifle, always with the same precision. He places the disassembled weapon back into its case and places that back into his mini armory. Once satisfied that nothing went missing, not that anyone ever went into the abandoned building, he removes the combat boots, jacket-taking out the pack of cigarettes-, and finally the gloves, and placing them all into his bedroom. He glances with some admiration that he still had the coffee pot turned on, another cup wouldn’t be so bad after all. He empties the contents in his cup from before and re-fills it with the warmer brew, turning off the machine. Taking a sip, he sighs in contentment then returns to his laptop, opening it and logging back into his business account. He opens the mail regarding his completed assignment and types out his reply:
Your problem is taken care of. I expect payment in full. I will check my account information in 24 hours.
-Matt-

After sending the e-mail, he checks his inbox for any new information regarding his most recent request. Not surprisingly, there was a reply not 20 minutes after his own, he opens it and takes a look:
If you are willing to re-locate for the night before, he is holed up in the East Precinct. My contact inside tells me that he’ll be there until next week when his trial begins. I have sent a photograph for you to look at; when you reply to the message and have looked at the photograph the picture will be deleted. My contact will make sure that you will have a clear shot of him. I have already taken the liberty of finding a suitable location to complete this task. As for the wage increase, I am willing to pay the extra $6,600 if that makes you feel any better.
Matt reads then re-reads the message, making sure that everything written down was clear to him. True to the contacts word, there was an image link. He clicks on it and looks at the well aged male with very short white hair and strong Slavic features. He puts the facial details to memory then sends his reply:
Consider it done. Send me the location on the 26th at no later than 5:30 PM.
-Matt-

Matt logs out of the business account and back into his solo mission account and resumes his search. One name for no unforeseen reason popped out at him: Jonas Hartman. He opens his file, noting he was not a tax evader nor held a steady job, but somehow managed to pay a substantial amount of rent to his landlord. He was not on any disability payments and he was not old enough to receive Pension payments as he was only 37, so how was he paying the landlord? Matt grinned, seeing that he was taking classes in Law at the local University. He was on a student loan, but it all went to text books and other supplies, so student loans were out of the question. The only conclusion that came to mind was that Jonas Hartman was whoring himself to pay his rent. Not a method that Matt had ever considered, but hell, he was up for a little adventure. He glances at the time and date, noting it was now 8:27 AM. Still too fucking early, but he’d already had his coffee.
“Well Mr. Hartman, it looks like you’ll be getting your last visitor to whore yourself to.” His more dominant Irish accent was the only thing he’d earned from his mother, and it stuck with him, even after growing up in that institution for all those years. He never wanted to give up the one thing from his mother and was adamant about using his original accent whenever possible. He does some digging around, looking for social networking sites that Mr. Harman frequently visits. There was the university e-mail system and an account on Facebook. Matt had a Facebook account that he uses for these sorts of missions, and in all honesty, they were few and far between. He was not a murderer so to speak, but he had his own twisted sense of justice, even when he was living the same lifestyle of those he put out of their misery. The irony was not lost on him though, that did not stop him from seeing whose name popped out at him from time to time.

He opens up a separate window and goes into the Facebook website, using one of his hacked e-mail accounts and logs into the website. His screen name was ‘James Merrick’, last status update was over a year ago, it simply said, “I’m always looking for a good time. I swing both ways. I am the aggressor so expect random messages from me.” It was liked by only 3 people, all of which he erased from his contact list. There were messages attached, but they too were erased. There was no photo of him, only an image of a Peace symbol worked into the shape of a heart: Peace and Love was the message. He typed in Jonas Hartman into the search bar and looked at the results as they came up. There were a few Jonas Hartman’s so he narrowed his search to the Los Angeles area, where about 3 came up; only one was enlisted in the University.
“Got ya Mr. Hartman,” he said with a grin. He opened up the profile link and clicked on another from which to send him a private message. He was not sure how often Mr. Hartman replied to his PM’s, but made the message blunt as he always did, only deciding to sugar coat it when the mood struck him:
Mr. Hartman,
I have a friend of a friend who takes the same classes as you. I don’t know what way you swing, but I am wondering if you’d like to get together sometime? He tells me that you are paying for your rent by an alternate means and I am willing to help you along. I understand if you feel my bluntness is rude or offensive, but I am just an honest person, in the worst way. I could make it worth your while. I am willing to pay you $3,000 straight up. I am good for it in my line of work. I would love to hear back from you sometime.
~James~

After sending the message, he logs out of his account entirely and logs into his gaming account, his addiction could only be held back for so long before he would literally be going mad if he did not spend at least 3 hours on his favorite gaming sites. Today he would play a user created version of Pac Man, one of his favorite kinds of old school games. Almost instantly, he was lost in a world of a yellow circular character chasing and devouring little ghost-shaped blobs, some of which were more cunning than the others. He was climbing high in the scores when his stomach told him it was starving. With a groan of protest, he logs out of the gaming account to make a trip to his mini fridge, it was small so as to not waste too much power while he siphoned it. Not too much was inside as Matt was not a very big eater of things. Only what he called his ‘essentials’: a loaf of bread-a necessity-, peanut butter, raspberry jam, deli meats, yogurt, a small container of milk and apple juice-a childhood favorite that never died- and finally, a small case of beer. He grabs a couple slices of bread with the peanut butter and jam and pulls from his drawer a small butter knife. After putting on an adequate amount of the peanut and fruit preserves, he puts everything back where he found it, minus the sandwich of course, and then closes the fridge. He shuffles back to the couch and makes himself comfortable, taking a large bite from the sandwich and chewing thoughtfully.

“Ya know Matt, when was the last time you went out clubbing?” He asks himself this then swallows the chewed portion of the bite, continuing to chew the rest of the bit in his mouth before at last swallowing it.
“It’s a wee bit early for that now I know, but perhaps it’s time ya got laid. In California, anyone is willing to give you a fuck for free or a fee, but it don’t matter, don’t it? It’s been what…a couple weeks and several wanking sessions since then? Unacceptable, mate.” He takes another large bite of his sandwich and chews thoughtfully.
“Another thing though…you talk to yourself way too fucking much, it’s not healthy. It will make you like the other Wammy who now lives in an insane asylum. Barnaby, was it? Well he calls himself Beyond Birthday now. You’re on the road to the same fate, man. You already killed off your old name and now we have Matt, the genius hacker and Hit man extraordinaire. Thanks to him, you’ve managed to remain as anonymous as you have been.” These words spoken were muttered thanks to the sandwich bite still in his mouth. He chews it a little more then swallows that piece. He shakes his head side to side slowly.
“You’re fucking right…Talking to myself is not healthy at all,” he muttered, finishing off his sandwich in silence. He lays onto the couch and makes himself comfortable. ‘Far too early for shit like this,’ he thought, closing his eyes and willing sleep to take over.

4:23 PM

Matt’s internal clock wakes him up to the dim settings of his living room. Bleary eyes adjust to the minimal lighting and glance around, taking in everything and getting himself back to his normalcy. Not willing to move right away, he decides to reflect on the events of earlier. It was not like it is something he enjoyed doing, but it brought in good funds and when he had enough, he was leaving this shitty city and heading south to Vegas where all the good stuff is at. This flat would be discovered sooner or later, he knew that the moment he set foot inside and started squatting in it. He was ready to make the necessary preparations for relocating himself should that time arrive. It was far too risky for anyone to see his face, he knew that. His anonymity was ranked highest on his survival list, even higher than death. Wammy’s had been a blessing in that sense; the classes on espionage and secrecy that L had trained him and the others had worked well into his favor. In fact, Matt could even go as far as saying that he was equal to or surpassing the degree of anonymity that his former mentor had achieved in his short years as a detective. This had certainly earned L his famous reputation and perhaps earn Matt the same reputation. He grinned at the thought then decided it was time to get up.

He gets into a seated position and stretches, hearing and feeling a few joints pop back into place. Just to be sure, he braces himself and twists his spine, hearing the multiple pops of his joints being shifted and letting that fall into a feeling of relaxation. It was almost tempting to fall back into slumber, but there were more important things to worry about, namely going back into his World of Warcraft account that he had been neglecting for a month now. He turns on the laptop and logs into his gaming account when a message popped up from seemingly out of nowhere
+M2, how are things?
Matt looks at the message incredulously, eyes wide and mouth slightly agape. Hesitantly, he types out a reply.
>Who the fuck is this?
+You’ve certainly changed a lot M2
>I asked you a fucking question, now give me an answer or else I am shutting this off.
+This is your old mentor L
His eyes go larger and his jaw falls a little more. No. Fucking. Way.
>Bullshit you’re L. How did you get by my firewall?
+I confess, it took some time, your defenses surpass some of the best government based defenses.
Matt scoffed and rolled his eyes.
>Well duh. Prove to me that you’re L. Tell me something that only I am capable of knowing. Something fucking deep and dark.

There was no reply for some time, making the redhead roll his eyes and letting a smirk play across his features. He was about to turn off the laptop in annoyance when a message appeared on the screen.
+It was rough on you Mail and I can understand your situation. You let your personal feelings interfere with your studies. You had so much potential to do much better things, but you allowed yourself to become caged. You never completely dealt with the loss of your parents and it showed on your papers. You excelled in my espionage and stealth classes because you wanted to disappear.
Matt glared at the screen and promptly closed the laptop and shut it off.
“Fucking bullshit…It really was him…” He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. He needed to relocate himself to the west side and wait on that reply to the hit. A little distraction is what he really needed right now. He closed his eyes and willed sleep to take over him.

August 24th, 2010
5:32 PM

Matt walks into the coffee house, ignoring the looks he received, his only goal was to get his coffee cans and leave. The owner smiled at him, but he did not return the gesture. There was some sort of weird leather clad dude facing away from him. He looks to his left, his eyes fixating themselves on his favorite feature in the whole coffee house, an original oil paint of random swirling colors that almost looked like a pair of cranes in mid-flight. Ever since laying his eyes on it for the first time a year ago when it was added, it was the only feature that he could actually admit to liking. He turns his attention back to the owner and hands him the sheet with is pre-order written down. The owner only nods then disappears. He could sense that the leather clad blonde was watching him; his goggles a blessing in these sorts of situations. They helped him from avoiding direct eye contact with anyone he did not want to look at or acknowledge. He digs into the pocket of his hooded sweater and places a $100 bill on the counter. He takes the cans and puts them into the now empty duffle bag, filling it with the blessed cans. He knew he was going to need them for the shit he was going to have to deal with for the next few days. He turns around and takes his leave, feeling the leather clad blonde looking at him on the way out and feeling more uncomfortable than he’s felt before. ‘Who the hell was he and why did I not want to be anywhere near him? Is he a fucking cop? Well shit, if he is, he has nothing on me. Fuck him.’


-----------------------

A/N: Here's #2 for you at last. This is a look into Mail's life as his alter-ego "Matt". He's developed quite the reputation so far. The truth around Mail's alter-ego and apparent split personality will be revealed in due time. Yes, L gets in touch with him, but little does he know what Mail has done in several short years. Expect more of these later on, not as often as with Mihael, but they will pop up from time to time.

Edited for content and readability. I don't think it's been improved much, but it certainly makes a little more sense than it did before.