Michale McBride - Short Stories

The Winter Solstice Ball

The night is cold and dark. The sun has set, although it hardly matters since it has been snowing all week causing day and night to run together as the sky barely changes. On Monday it started snowing slowly, softly, beautifully you might say. Now it is Friday and the snow is falling so fast and hard that the young man would barely see the smothered world if he deigned to look out his frozen carriage window.

This young man is just past a decade and a half yet he never glances at the snowy world too wrapped up in his work to notice beauty. Michale McBride is his name though, not many know him by this feared name. Poor Michale is much too old for the few years he has been alive. Already he wears the weight of the world upon his shoulders, not that he cares so long as he gets paid what he considers fair.

As Michale's carriage reaches his destination every instinct screams at him to leave, run, escape. Something is most definitely wrong the Edmund's Winter Solstice Ball is a bad meeting place. Two young men standing in the corner spurning all companionship is sure to draw unwanted attention. But just as Michale takes a step back to leave he remembers his conversation with Boss earlier that day

"Why are you sending me I am an Assassin NOT a simple courier!" Michale had exclaimed impatiently, "Unless Delaney is a target send someone else."

"Michale this is not an option!" Boss shouted forcefully, "You are the only one with an alias and connections that will get you into the Ball. We are paying you more than enough to retrieve one simple package! So go meet Delaney. NOW!! MARCH!!!"

Michale had wanted to point out that he is no longer some dumb kid that Boss can push around, or perhaps remind Boss how many extra assassinations of annoying Others are on his dossier but he hadn't. Now it is too late to decline this mission so Michale ignores all of his instincts and steps through the door transforming from scary, sixteen-year-old Michale into genteel, twenty-three-year-old Aldwyn as he goes.

Aldwyn smiles and flirts with a young lady, or "other" as Michale calls those who are not contacts or targets, as a maid takes his coat. The Other giggles and smiles at every word that comes out of his mouth as if he is a god. Michale retreats from the heat of the Other soaking his arm as Aldwyn escorts her into the ballroom.

Whenever Michale finds himself in a situation where he can feel the heat of the Others, contacts, or targets he wonders what they feel when he nears them. Is he warm with the heat of life flowing off of him? Or is his body as cold as his mind and his heat as absent as his heart?

That is neither here nor there though as it has no pertinence to tonight's mission and so is quickly silenced in his ever clinical mind.

Mere moments after they enter the ballroom Aldwyn's Other is whisked away by a giggling gaggle of Others. Aldwyn begins circling the room chatting and flirting, acting the perfect aristocrat. Michale simultaneously begins searching for Contact among those the elite, Aldwyn deigns to mingle with.

Both are blind to the beauty of tonight. High above their head arches the vaulted ceilings embossed in gold filigree. Between the guests and the celling hang the crystal chandeliers sparkling in their own candle light. Outside the floor to ceiling windows the snow glistens while inside on the dance floor the ladies out do both the snow and the chandeliers. As they spin to the music the colors of their dresses blur and the stones in their jewelry catches the light sparkle creating a beautiful visual of the music. Quickly the dancers change between dances and partners from a slow waltz with a duke to a faster branle with a sweetheart. The music weaves the night together in a beautiful harmony.

Poor Michale is too busy to notice and even as Aldwyn he is too focused on the mission to notice or appreciate the beauty.

Suddenly half-way through the long night Michale notices a girl who doesn't quite fit standing in the corner. As Aldwyn draws closer to flirt with the young ladies clustered around Michale tries to concentrate on finding Delaney in the pack of young suitors but continues to be distracted by the girl on the other side of the group. With all the other young ladies clustered around her preening in the young suitors' attentions, it is hard to see much more than her deep blood red dress. As a new song begins however and everyone grabs a new dance partner leaving her standing alone fidgeting with a golden pocket watch. It is this watch that draws Michale to her even as he is whisked away across the dance floor by an Other whose heat he cannot escape. Even as Michale is spun around the dance floor his eyes follow this out of place child. When he looks at her she holds his gaze as no Other would while continuing to fidget with the pocket watch pinned at her waist. Nothing about her should catch his eye, which causes him to wonder why she disturbs him. Michale must get to her and find out who she is but instead Aldwyn is whisked into the next dance by an Other whose heat is smothering and whose shrill voice is deafening. Finally, Michale once again finds himself in the same group as the girl just as the clock strikes two signaling the last dance of the evening.

Michale walks up to her and introduces himself,

"Aldwyn Blaxton at your service Ma'am," he smiles bowing low and kissing her hand

"Nice to make your acquaintance, call me Delaney."

"Would you care to dance Ms. Delaney?" Aldwyn requests as Michale once again suppresses his instinct to run because something is very wrong. Why didn't Boss say that Delaney is a woman he silently wonder's, Boss should have said.

"I would indeed like to dance Mr. McBride." Delaney quietly replies breaking into Michale's thoughts by confirming that she is Contact.

As Michale takes her hand to lead her to the dance floor he is surprised to find that she is as cold as ice.

"So Delaney, what information do you have for me?" Michale questions once the circling dance begins.

In this dance you switch partners five times before returning to your original partner to end the dance so Michale knows he must ask quickly. Unfortunately, just as she opens her blood red lips to answer poor Michale it is time for the first partner switch.

With five switches between Michale and Delaney he cringes as the coolness of her palm is replaced by the heat of an Other's palm pressed to his own. With quick glances Michale keeps track of Delaney's spinning form as they are pulled farther apart.

Four switches are left but something is off, not right, wrong. Michale's heart is beating so fast and hard that for the first time he can feel it without checking to make sure. Suddenly the room feels stifling as if there isn't enough air.

Three partners left before he can collect Delaney's information and leave but the room is spinning and blurring along with his partner's face. Michale is hardly able to follow the circling steps of the dance as his head becomes lighter and the walls become blurrier.

Two partners left before contact and he knows. Michale knows he is dying. He knows how he is dying. He also knows that Delaney has vanished.

"Justice" Michale supposes unable to believe he didn't feel Delaney injecting him with his own poisonous invention. He was too distracted by her ice cold hand to notice the prick of her needle in his side which now feels like a thousand fires. As the fire spreads he can feel the strength of his muscles burn away knowing soon there will be nothing left.

Only one partner to go but he is slipping falling from this Other's hand, crashing to the floor immediately halting the dance with the Other's screams.

"Justice," he figures, "dying as I have killed. No one will know, no one will care. Ironic I will be blamed for my own death." For the first time in eleven long years a tear rolls down his cheek as he breaths his last.

Sure enough the only report of Michale's death read

Aldwyn Blaxton

Killed on Sunday December twenty-second at twenty-three years of age. Mr. Blaxton was killed by rogue assassin Michale McBride who is still at large.

No one will ever know poor Michael's fate, buried under a false name by people who barely knew him and will quickly forget this tragedy. I suppose Boss and Delaney will always know, but they will not mourn. For Boss was his betrayer and Delaney his executioner and replacement.