Agent 13

Chapter 1 - Murder

It's funny how your life can change in a matter of minutes.

Well, it's not really that funny. It's just ironic I guess. You can live so many years without any tragic events or heartbreak or anything like that but then suddenly bam, your life has been turned upside down and there's nothing you can do about it. There's no going back in time, there's no changing the cards of fate that life has handed to you. There's no going back from that one event.

For me, my life-changing event happened when I was only a sixteen year old girl that enjoyed listening to music with those massive noise-cancelling headphones. Sometimes I wondered what would have happened if I had decided to simply watch Housewives with my mother - even though all I could do was imagine my brain cells shrinking as the episodes ticked by. Would I have been able to stop it if I had been closer?

Either way, I was upstairs when the event happened. It was late at night and I probably should have gone to bed but this album I was listening to was newly released and I just had to hear it. Even though my headphones claimed to be noise-cancelling, I heard the crash downstairs. It sounded exactly like glass shattering all over something. The kitchen floor, maybe? It was, but I wasn't sure of that at the time. When I heard the crash, I ripped off my headphones and leaped out of bed. My mother was pretty clumsy so I was worried that she'd dropped a glass or fallen over. Or both.

The first thing I saw was the window to the kitchen. Well, what was left of it. The entire thing was smashed all over the kitchen floor and glass was absolutely everywhere. I may be what society labelled as 'an oblivious teenager' but it didn't take a genius to realize that something was definitely not right. Our kitchen window had been shattered open, my mother was nowhere to be seen, and the house was deadly silent. Too silent.

I froze. When the will for my limbs to move finally came back, I slowly opened the top drawer of our cabinet and pulled out a large butcher knife; if there was somebody in the house, I would need to use it for self-defence. I sure as hell didn't want to but it was better than nothing. 

I peered around the corner of our kitchen and into the living room. Even once my eyes adjusted to the darkness I couldn't see anything but blackness, which was definitely weird. Ever since my father's sudden disappearance my mother always left at least one living room light on, and now there was none. My entire body shook as I took a hesitant step into the living room. "Hello?" I called out, gripping the knife tightly. "Is anybody there?"

There was no vocal reply but I did sense something shift behind me. There was a crunch of glass that horrifyingly resembled the sound of somebody walking over the shattered pieces. I went to spin around but a large, rough hand came from behind me and covered my entire mouth, silencing my scream. Something was being pressed into the side of my head. I didn't know what a gun felt like but I did know that one was being held right against my skull. I felt like I was going to throw up. I was sweating, I was shaking, and the only noise to be heard was the sound of the intruder breathing down my neck. My knife was knocked out of my hand and it fell to the ground with a clunk.

"Olivia," the stranger whispered. I shivered; the introduer's voice was deep and gruff, clearly belonging to an older male. I didn't know this at the time but that voice would become something I could never forget. And there was also the chilling fact that he knew my name somehow. "We can either do this the easy or hard way," he added, knocking the gun against my skull for effect. Well, it definitely was affective because when he gripped my arm and shoved me into the living room I allowed myself to stumble into the room. I didn't run, I didn't try to grab the knife, I didn't even speak. All I could do was shake and do what he told.

With the gun still to my head, the stranger flicked on the light to the living room. I was blinded by the brightness for a moment and I blinked quickly to adjust. "Mum?" I whispered, biting my tongue so hard that I tasted blood. There she was, tied to one of our kitchen chairs with some kind of rope that you only ever saw in movies. She tried to say something and moved around desperately in her chair but I couldn't understand her because her mouth was covered with tape. The bastard.

"Please, don't do this," I sobbed, feeling the initial moments of shock finally settling in. I had a gun aimed at my head and my mother was tied up like we were in some kind of action movie. This didn't happen to normal people. This didn't happen to us.

My beg was ignored. "Where is the money?" the introduer demanded, pressing the gun even harder into the side of my head. From the corner of my eye I saw his masked face and I wondered who was behind it. Did he have children? A wife? A heart?

"What are you talking about?" I asked, my voice shaking. I could barely even speak. 

“The money!" he shouted, making me flinch. My mother began crying even louder and the salty tears couldn't be stopped from falling down my face. Oh my god, he was going to kill me. He's going to use this gun on you and he is going to kill you. "I know that you know what I'm talking about, you bitch. Tell me where it is or…” he pulled the gun offf of my head and aimed it at my mother, "your mother dies. Make a choice." 

“No!" I screamed desperately. Another loud sob escaped my throat. I stared at that gun like it was the most terrifying thing I had ever seen because in that moment, it was. It was so close to ending my mother's life and all I could do was stand there and beg. "Please, don’t kill my mother. I have no idea what you're talking about, believe me. I have no idea."

“I will give you one more chance.” 

“But..." I bit my lip and closed my eyes. There had  to be some kind of story I could make up, right? It's under the house. My father left it before he left. It's buried in the backyard. We used it to buy this house. God, there were so many excuses I could use but this stranger would find out that I was lying and that I truly had no idea. And then I would be dead. "No," I whispered helplessly, shaking my head. "I don't know." 

I opened my eyes just as the introduer pulled the trigger. The sound cracked into my ears and deafened me with such an amount of shock that I fell to the ground screaming. I screamed until I was sure my lungs were gone. I screamed even when I could hear again and when I lifted my head to see blood everywhere, I screamed even more. My mother didn't move because the blood was coming from the bullet hole in her head. She was dead. 

I couldn't breathe.

"I told you that we could do this the easy or hard way," the intruder leaned over me, grinning as he wiped his hands down the back of his pants. "I'll be back," he added, stepping over me with those blood-stained combat boots of his. I didn't need to watch him to know that he left the way he came in.

"Mum," I sobbed, crawling through the blood on the carpet to reach her body. I shook her, cried on her, held her, clung to her. How could she possibly be gone?

When I began feeling her blood soak into my shirt I let go of her and stumbled into the kitchen. The rest of the evening was a total blur. I called 911 and somehow managed to explain what happened, the ambulance arrived within minutes, and I was being wrapped in some kind of silver alfoil as they led me out of my house.

That was the evening when everything had changed. I didn't know what money he was talking about but I felt like he wasn't joking when he said he'd be back. He was going to be back. I was going to be next. Oh my god, my mother is dead.

I'd watched my mother die. Her blood was on my hands.

And it was all my fault.