falling asleep to the sound of sirens (Allison Quick, the Assassin Chic)

The last tendrils of music sing in his mind as he wipes the drool from his slacking jaw. "Where the fuck am I?" he mutters, sitting up on the stiff wooden bench. Above him, a night sky that would normally make his soul sigh, blinks at him unrelentingly. A cool breeze rustles the trees behind him. He turns to see that he’s been sleeping on a park bench at the edge of an unfamiliar park. A fire truck pulls out into the street in the distance of this peaceful night. He can just make out the sound of the siren.

“Sir,” the voice is soft yet firm, “have you got the time?” He turns his head and just catches sight of one the loveliest, most angelic faces he has ever seen. As he glances down at his Rolex, a glint of hard metal as it presses into his head. “To die,” is all he hears just before the world explodes into darkness.

Allison straightens up, pulling the her Muela bowie knife out of his temple and wipes the blood onto her black trench coat before slipping it back into its sheath. She grins, snickering to herself as she gently leans her client back. “I’ll have to remember that one. Have you got the time... to die?” Throwing her head back, she howls with laughter. The air around her whips faster as the sky clouds and rain falls. Checking to make sure he’s dead, she scampers off in the night through the park, still cackling at her own lame joke.

Across the street, a figure moves in the shadows. If it weren’t for the rain, the character would not have been noticeable. As it is, the person is almost as remote as the shadows. Taking a book from the pocket of the jacket the shadow person is wearing, then strolls over to the dead man and lays the book on his lap. After a moment of fixating on the dead man, the figure slides back into to darkness.

The distant sirens become louder as a long fire truck maneuvers its way around a corner and comes to rest in front of the bench the dead man is sitting on. A fully uniformed firefighter steps from the vehicle and, without a word, tosses the body up onto the back of the truck. Almost immediately, the truck lurches forward and the smallish figure is left standing on the cement sidewalk in full uniform.