A woman with long, straight bluish-black hair moved her beverage cart down the isle of jet.  She checked her watch.  2:29.  She leaned over a couple sitting to her left.

     "Can I get you something to drink?" she offered sweetly.

     The elderly man put down his magazine.  "No thank-you young lady."

     "I'll have an orange juice."  The lady spoke up.

     The flight attendant handed the woman her juice and moved on as she checked her watch.  Good.  It was two-thirty.  She quickly wheeled her cart to the back room and headed up to first class.  It didn't take her long to locate her big-chested accomplice.

     "Okay, Naga.  You know plan, right?"

     Naga laughed.  "Of coarse, Sylpheel.  I'm not stupid."  She proceeded to file her nails.  "Anyway the plan isn't very complicated, now is it?  First, we land in Tokyo."

     "Shhhh!" Sylpheel hissed.  "You want to get caught?  Fine.  Wait till I'm not with you."

     "I think you'd be labeled as an accessory after the fact." Naga grinned with satisfaction.  "If you're lucky when I get caught, we can share the same sentence."

     "What do you mean 'when you get caught'?  You won't get caught, kapish?  Now you have to wait until dark, very late at night.  You still have his room number?"

     Naga nodded.  "So I have to scale the wall up to his room, huh.  It'd be even harder trying to get into his room through the lobby and up and I just don't have the kind of money to pose as a resort guest."

     "Good." Sylpheel nodded with approval.  "Then you have to hang around town for awhile.  Two, three days after the crime it so doesn't look like you are fleeing the scene.  Shed a few tears and then take your flight to Britain.  Above all do not panic.  You're a professional, or you will be once you pull this.  If you panic and screw up you jeopardize all of us.  So do what you're getting paid for and then beat it.  Understand?"

     Naga turned to smile at Sylpheel.  "Gracia Memphis won't fail this mission."

     Naga checked her watch again.  She still had half an hour to kill.  She chuckled at her own pun.  She didn't really enjoy killing, did she?  Paid like a hot damn, though.  She sighed.  She began to wonder about some of her past jobs.  Would she have felt differently if she had got to know them?  Probably.  She'd hate them or love them, but now they were just jobs.  Some people worked in grocery stores, others were secretaries, some were artists or actors like the one she was portraying.  These were all jobs.  They all paid money, a lot or a little.  But none of them hurt people.  The idea of getting a job was about contributing to the planet and getting something for your effort.  Well, she sort have contributed.  The world was overpopulated and she keeping the numbers down.  No, she decided that wasn't too good an excuse.  That was engaging in illegal activity cause it paid so much.  Even when she was working as an exotic dancer and she got a lot of money for that, but when she finished her first job, wow, that was more money than most people saw in their entire lives.  Was the money alone worth the risk and the pain.  A while ago she decided that it was, but maybe it was time to reevaluate that idea.  Maybe it was time to toss in the towel as far as killing was concerned.  Well, after this last job, of coarse.  Killing the king was going to earn her so much money, she wouldn't ever have to work again anyway.  It nearly time anyway.  Bother Sylpheel.  The time didn't have to be exact.  Probably better if it wasn't.  She had already hung a rope down form his balcony when she posed as a chamber maid earlier that day.  It wasn't at all noticeable so there were no worries there.  She carefully gripped the rope and began to scale the hotel.  Luckily her hair was dark and she had taken plenty of precaution to wear something black so that she faded into the surrounding night.  Carefully, carefully so as not to attract anyone else's attention.

    Mental note:  Must go on diet when this is over. She told herself.  Breast reduction probably wouldn't kill her either.  After a long and somewhat sweaty climb, she made it up to the balcony and hauled herself over the metal bars where she had attached the rope.  Oh good.  The shoe she had left in the sliding glass balcony door was still there.  Now she wouldn't have to use a glass cutter.  She pulled out a pair surgeon gloves.  She hated the knife.  It was so…messy!  Lethal injection was the way to go.  Or asphyxiation even.  Guns were to noisy, but they got the job done without blood everywhere, or at least most of the time.  But knives, jeez, up close and personal when their guts were all over the place and the whole thing was just not her cup of tea.  But Sylpheel had given the orders, and the report would be on the news.  Last time she didn't want to use the knife and she used something else and she got docked pay, which she thought wasn't fair.  The point was, it was done, didn't matter how you did it as long as you didn't get caught, which she didn't.  But she wasn't the boss, and she wanted all the money, so the knife it was.
She poked her head in the room and saw him, lying in his bed.  Yes, this had to be the worst part.  Not when she killed him cause then she'd be too busy being grossed out and not after because she thought of all the cash she'd get and that made the guilt subside.  No, now she felt awful because they-the victim didn't know they were going to die when they went to bed.  They didn't have a chance to say good-bye to their loved one.  They would die and she would live and never think anything of it until her next job.  Ending lives was work, meant to be taken seriously.  Was it too late to back out?  If she didn't do it what would happen to her?  Would they try to kill her?  She knew their plan.  There was so many questions and there would be none at all if she just did it!

    She sneaked up to the bed, right next to the king of Japan.  This was going to would you?

     This would be her last job, she decided.  For the first time she starting to regret all the things she had done.  Evil, innocent, whatever, it didn't matter.  She couldn't keep doing this to other humans.  It was wrong.  She didn't even know why she was killing people.  Sylpheel told her someone had to die and she did it.  That was her goal in life.  Kill people you don't know , make money.  What most people would never dream of really doing had become natural.  She took a deep breath.  Time to see if royals really did have blue blood.

    A cold, rough hand caught hers.  "Well, well, if it isn't Gracia Memphis to see me.  Or can I call you Naga?"

    She opened her eyes.  The king was sitting up in bed, holding her hand with the knife.  He let go.

    "You may proceed.  That knife won't hurt me.  It can't penetrate my skin."

    Naga put away the knife.  "Why do you think my name is Naga?"

     "Isn't it?" He got up and out of bed fully dressed, so he must have been expecting her.  "Your name is Naga and you call yourself White Serpent.  You're nineteen years-old and you assassinate people for a living.  Your sister lives in Britain and so do your parents.  You were emancipated at fifteen and you seem to be doing quite well in your home in New York City."

    "How do you know that?" Naga whispered.

    "People say I'm crazy for saying this, but I have powers, psychic and sometimes even telepathic.  I knew about you coming before you got here and the closer you got, the more I learned about you.  Sometimes it even goes beyond that and my powers become almost supernatural.  I occasionally possess the power to move, change or levitate objects.  I have a vision about flying in the future, but we shall see, won't we?"  he sighed and walked over to Naga who was about the same height as him.  "I'm going to give you a choice.  I can turn you over to the cops and you can face your sentence."

    "I don't like that one." Naga cringed.  Wow she thought.  Supernatural powers!  He must have them to know so much about me.

    "I didn't think that you would." Zelgadiss began pacing.  "I could let you go.  You said this was your last job and it will be when they find out that you didn't complete your mission.  Or, you can stay with me in Tokyo.  I have a feeling that you are in some way connected to my vision, I don't know why.  If you stay, you'll act as sort of a bodyguard.  I don't really need one because I can see the future but it might be fun.  You'll have to make conversation and do what I tell you when I tell you.  After that, when I leave you'll have to draw up a contract with me that you'll never kill again and I'll help you get a good job.  There's good in you, Naga.  I feel it.  I know that you do."

    "Okay."  Naga agreed.  "I can't go too wrong with option three." She sat down on the bed.  "I'm sorry.  I didn't want…well, I didn't …meant to..that"

    "It's okay. I know what you mean.  Sort of." Zelgadiss picked up the phone of the night stand.       "Let's book you a room, shall we?"

End Part Three