The agent trained his gun on the masked figure, the twilight breeze twisting

shadow and cloth about his hunched frame. No, The word came out to softly, No, He
repeated it louder and then again in growing frustration, No.
Yes? The crinkling voice like so many dead things rubbing together took on a
tone of amusement that he had not before heard.
How? How can you do these things and no matter what, nothing sticks. No one
comes after you, everyone cares, but no one does a damn thing about it.
Can you really not understand after all of this? The things arms rose from the
cloak to indicate the smoldering ruin in the distance.
I understand all that counts, you kill good people in cold blood and rant some
shit about their lives meaning nothing. He took a step closer, spitting out his words in a
release of pent up fury. Ignoring the seeming threat of being shot, the masked one turned
sideways as if considering both the recently bombed building and the man attempting to
hold him accountable for bombing it.
You want to place meaning on their lives, very well, but that is a point to return
to later. A rasping sigh split the air as the concealed face turned suddenly to accuse him.
What makes them good people? Good people like you, or me?
The hell with you! They didnt hurt people, they didnt ruin lives. His words
were met with a dry chuckle like a trap snapping shut.
This country has invaded the homelands of others and even places its own
citizens under duress, who do you think contributes more to that? Do you think I pay
taxes to keep such a government in operation? Do you think I work a job that provides
for a society that permits these things to occur?
That isnt how it works, they dont decide on the wrongs others commit. His
gun wavered in the air, its weight beginning to tell as he tried to keep the thing beyond its
barrel.
But I thought their lives had meaning? They can see the wrongs that others
commit, yet choose to live with the system that allows wrongs to occur. Even choosing to
blind themselves to those wrongs, that is meaning. The fading sunlight slowly became
less bright than the tortured, glowing heap in the distance. In the strange double dusk the
mysterious criminal took on that same otherworldly air under which the two had first met
months ago. The distorted cry of a fleet of approaching sirens came across the hills like
so many souls crying out for justice.
The system doesnt do anything, its people that commit crimes and its people
that set them right. This is over, you and I are going to go over there and then its over.
The words were meant more to bolster his own confidence than to shake the others.
You said that before and yet here we remain. With another crackling exhale the
man turned to face his handiwork.
I dont know how you got out of it, it was clear evidence I handed them.
Whatever you did, I wont let it happen again. He hurriedly walked forward and held the
gun with renewed vigor.
Tell me, when I placed a phone call to have that evidence disappear, could you
have stopped that from happening? When I placed another and convinced a man that it
was more beneficial to leave me running rampant, could you have forced my detention?
For that matter, do you think you can force it now? Without turning, the cold voice pried
earnestly.

Who the hell does these things? His gun began to wave and bob again. Do you
have your people everywhere?
Who exactly are my people? Quiet curiosity met his agonized questioning.
You evil bastards, you, With nothing to truly ascribe to them, his declaration
floundered.
So close, and yet for the entirely wrong reasons. It is your people that do these
things. Just the same as it is your people that permit terrible people to do terrible things.
They squander their lives serving masters that think of them as less than pawns.
Always, always with this bullshit about dark masters running the world. There
isnt some illuminati out there, theres just honest folks trying to live and psychos like
you ruining it for the rest of us.
Of course there isnt. There isnt some cabal pulling the strings from behind
crystal balls, thats the point. A weary sigh shuddered out from the black mask. I keep
thinking that youre smart, but I keep forgetting that you just have the potential to be. You
wondered about my people, how I can make all these things happen. Thats because I am
one of them, one of those nameless lords playing the world like some game. You cant pin
anything to me because I can stop existing at will, I can buy my way into or out of any
situation. The crux of it is why I can do that, and here is where youre going to curse me.
I know how to make a mans misery into profit. Not for him, of course, but for someone
else. If every life has meaning, where does that meaning go? Why, it goes up to the man
who can collect it. If I can collect your failures as my success, what reason have I to care
whether you thrive or perish? Either way you can be used.
To these people you are like a corporate asset, not even a living thing. Your
hopes, your fears, your anger, your happiness and all the things that you could ever have
or be are valuable commodities to them. Why does your justice system so shockingly
ignore me? Because there is a man who believes it benefits him for me to spread the fear
of terrorism. Actually, there are quite a few men who believe that. One of them profits
when people buy life insurance. One of them profits when people buy firearms. One of
them profits when people stockpile food. One of them profits when people dont do these
things. And they all profit when people are too afraid to care about handing away their
lives to some faceless thing at the edge of society. The cloaked figure whirled around
with a great wheezing hiss. They stood face to face now, only the gun and a mask
between them. He was immediately taken aback by the eyes hidden behind that facade.
They blazed with such a violence that he wondered if he had ever hated something
enough to match that gaze or if his greatest outrages were but shadows of the fury boring
into him from within those eyes.