Killer Rain#1

It was raining. A steady, almost misty drizzle; gray foggy tendrils wove their way through the shadows. Gusty breezes rocked tree branches, cutting the infrequently spaced streetlamps glare. He loved the rain. He killed, only when it rained. He carefully followed the person he was going to kill tonight. Victim, person, the mark, subject, prey, the noun didn’t matter. He liked people who used umbrellas when it rained, or wore their hats bent low against the wet, which resulted in tunnel vision. They didn’t notice anything or anyone except that which was directly in front of their water soaked faces. Falling drops and wind also made noise, along with shaking tree branches that all but obscured the footsteps of anyone who followed someone, hiding craftily in the shadows. The occasional car or taxi splashing through the water draining to the curb, also helped drown out any footsteps.

The victim walked on one side of the dark street, the killer the opposite, and a hundred paces behind, when one stopped, so did the other. The victim, the prey, did not notice anyone behind them. The mark's mind was only set on one goal, getting out of this eternal rain to a warm dry room, with an old radio, and a few shots of single malt. Perhaps read a book form their meager collection, wrapped in a terry cloth robe.

The killer, assassin, hit man, reaper, and taker of life: those nouns didn’t matter either. He was humming a show tune in his head, “Singing in the Rain”. He closed the distance to about 5 yards, yet the victim failed to notice. The killer liked death up close and personal, the preferred method being the use of a bladed weapon. Silent but deadly, the rain-washing away most of any evidence possibly left behind, not that evidence was likely. The killer was a professional. He killed for money, as a career, and for his own pleasure. The blade, a personal heirloom, was a blackened K-Bar knife, hung handle down in a nylon shoulder rig, under the black trench coat. A black fedora, black jeans, and black athletic shoes made the killer blend into the shadows; no it made the killer a shadow!

Finally the prey arrived home, soaked and fatigued; the 27 blocks feeling like 127. The lonely entrance light was burned out again; a derelict building in the center of a dark block, the nearest streetlamp hundreds of feet away. Fumbling with the keys, trying one after another in the dark. Dropping the whole ring on the wet, dank stoop, then starting to try the keys all over again. It didn’t matter. The killer drew his blade, at the same time wrapping his left arm around the victim’s neck. Not one sound was made. Blood streaked down the steps, washing away in the increasing downpour, following the killer down the sidewalk. The tendrils of fog making him seem to vanish suddenly, until another rainy night and another victim.