"Clock's ticking, Arabel," Raven hissed through the mic nestled in my ear.

I gritted my teeth, staring through the sight of my rifle down to the street twenty stories below. Without the assisted view, everyone would have looked like ants. There was only one that I needed to squash tonight, however: a businessman who had made one too many risky deals.

And he was late.

"I don't see him anywhere," I snapped in reply to my coworker's helpful observation. "Are you sure this is the way he goes home?"

"Unless he's deviated from the same path he's taken every night for the past twenty years," Raven growled, obviously not appreciating being questioned.

"Just asking," I muttered. "Maybe he stayed late at the office."

"Well, that would be a problem, because the client said that if we don't make the kill in the next half hour, he's not gonna wire us the money. Rent doesn't pay itself, Arabel."

"Can't you just go back to being a stripper?" I muttered.

"What?"

"Nothing."

A man rounded the corner, coming into clear view. He looked like a stereotypical American businessman - balding head that was shiny with sweat, potbelly pushing the limits of his suit, and chubby hands gripping the handle of a stuffed briefcase. He was walking quickly.

"Bingo," I whispered. Whether or not Raven heard me, she said nothing - she knew better than to interrupt my concentration at this point.

I lined up the man's head in the crosshairs of my sight, calmly tracing his path down the street. I had to be careful to not shoot any civilians, or risk losing some if not all of the money from our client, who wished this entire business to be over as quickly as possible.

Finally, the crowd blissfully cleared. I took a deep breath, wrapped my finger around the trigger, and exhaled slowly as I squeezed.

As soon as I saw the businessman splatter all over the storefront behind him, I was up and running before the screams even began. I had to get away from the crime scene as quickly as possible, preferably before the police showed up.

I slipped on gloves as I got to the entrance leading back into the skyscraper, to ensure that I would leave no fingerprints behind. I had picked the lock on the doors leading down hours earlier when I first came up on the roof, so my escape was unheeded.

Inside the stairwell, I dropped the magazine on my semi-automatic, racked it to ensure that it was clear of bullets, and then slipped all the resulting pieces into the bag. I zipped it shut as I hurried down the stairs and speed-walked into a nearby elevator.

There was a back exit meant only for staff on the first floor that had an exit into an alleyway. This was what I would be taking to escape.

As soon as I was in the hallway, however, I felt a strong hand close around my upper arm.

I twisted around as best I could to find a masked man holding me, propelling me forward.

"What the hell - "

"Anabel, the kill went well, right?" Raven asked nervously through my mic.

"Who are you?"

"Anabel?"

"Not you, Raven," I told her exasperatedly, but before I could explain what was happening, the man twisted the mic out of my ear, tossed it on the ground, and continued walking.

"Who the hell are you?" I demanded, my pitch raising. "Let go of me!" I gave a violent wrench, to no avail.

I examined the man more closely. He had short-cropped, sandy blond hair. He was dressed in sweatpants and a tight-fitting athletic shirt, showing off how muscular he was - my 5'1" frame didn't stand a chance in fighting him unless I could somehow open my weapons bag with one hand. My assaulter's mask was entirely covering his face and was made in the semblance of a humanoid-like person. I recognized the art style from tikis and other native culture talismans.

"Aw, shit," I muttered, realizing who this had to be.

Recently, my particular line of business had been booming. Assasin was the career to have if you failed college or didn't bother to attend. It was, as it had in Raven's case, replacing even classic jobs like stripping. I would have argued that it was better for our economy - aside from all of the businessmen that got hits called on them, that is.

In the wake of this new generation of killers rose a group of their own - self-proclaimed superheroes set out to either violently or peacefully eradicate all of us from the face of the earth. This man had to be one of them.

"You're a superhero," I muttered, not expecting any confirmation. I was surprised, then, when he curtly nodded his head.

"I don't even know why you're grabbing me."

"You just shot a man in the head," the mysterious superhero growled, pushing open the doors that lead to the outside without even slowing. He did, however, halt a short way away from the doors, so that we were still in the alleyway and hidden from everybody.

"You don't have any proof of that," I reminded him confidently.

He awkwardly attempted to grab my bag. Wincing in sympathy for all of my expensive equipment, I tossed it several feet away. "Go get it," I told him, grinning cheekily.

He glanced from me to the bag and I sensed the moment of weakness that I had been waiting for.

I bent over and sunk my teeth into his wrist. He let out a sharp cry of pain, releasing me, and I immediately made for the bag, ripping it open and loading my rifle smoothly. When he straightened back up, blood dripping slowly from his broken skin to the concrete below, I was aiming it directly at his head.

"Take off your mask," I ordered.

"Put down the gun."

"Five, four, three, two - "

He ripped off the mask, grimacing.

He was handsome. There was no denying that. He looked like a classic superhero - clean shave, chiseled jaw, and everything. He was staring at me stormily, but I didn't sense true hatred in his eyes. Not yet at least.

Not even entirely sure what I was doing, I bent, replaced my rifle in the bag, slung it over my shoulder, and stood.

"What are you doing?" he asked uncertainly.

"I'm walking out of this alleyway," I replied. "You're not going to follow me. You're going to let me go."

"Why would I do that?"

I dug out the pencil and paper I always carried around with me and scrawled a succession of numbers on it, then walked towards him. "Because you're going to give me a call," I told him. As I passed him, I slipped the paper into his mask, which he was holding like a bowl in front of him.

Sure enough, he didn't follow me as I left the alleyway.

I took that as a good sign.