A Clean Hit

JK

He unpacked his rifle, a Cobra XT 500, the best sniper rifle available. It had a matte finish, barrel stainless steel with muzzle break, length 711 mm, a trigger that will not seize from dirt or freeze in the rain. Stock, Hawk B5, adjustable length of pull, adjustable cheek piece. The Cobra is capable of 1500 meter shot and even possible of shots approaching 1 mile in perfect conditions. He has used this rifle twice and both times he used only one shot. His targets were dead before they hit the ground. This time it was more important to finish his job only in one shot because his potential target was himself a good marksman and a ruthless killer not very long ago.

He was on the roof of the Wills Heights and saw the emerging crowd in the shopping mall. At an angle of 165 degrees it was really hard to see the faces of people who were entering the mall entrance. He was lying on the closest corner of the building and required all his skills to do this hit. Samant, his target, was supposed to be there any time. Samant, a professional killer just like him was the veteran in this field. It is said that he had 100 plus killings to his name. He had a name for his clean and perfect hits done for his customers.

He was given this contract through his email and was surprised to see that his client wanted him to kill a professional killer. He demanded an outrageous sum for this job and to his surprise his client had not only agreed but wired the entire sum to his account. May be the fool wanted some sort of revenge from that Samant guy. But he was not satisfied, he was the best available killer for a decade so he was not satisfied with these reasons. Suspecting everything was a basic habit for his survival. Hired killers don't live too long; they either get killed by another hired assassin or by the cops. He not only survived this long but made a fortune for himself.

He had left India five years ago to settle in South Africa. He had been living in the outskirts of Johannesburg as a wildlife photographer who was often on wild trips to shoot animals. He'd occasionally come to India to do any given job and disappear. This time the sum he demanded was enough for a permanent retirement. So he wanted to finish this job and disappear forever from India.

He was in his late thirties, tall, slim but strongly built, had a look of a blue collared executive. His appearance always helped him to mingle with normal crowd and made his job easy. He was in Rajnagar for two weeks. His customer had provided him the pictures and whereabouts of his target. He stealthily followed Samant and immediately knew that the guy was very smart, very cautious, alert like a wild dog. He lived in a big brick house, which had only one entry to the house and was guarded by an armed guard. There were not many visitors and the main gate would only open when his driver came every day in the morning and on Sunday when Samant also came out sitting in the back seat of the car. It was very hard to break into his house and who knew what surprises were waiting inside, he hated surprises. By following his car he knew that Samant usually went to The Plaza, the only shopping mall in the city which was only 5 km south of his house. The car normally stopped at one of the entrance of the mall and Samant came out of his car and got into the mall quickly through its metal detector gate. The metal detector gate ensured that he was unarmed and so would be his assailant. The only chance to get him off guard was his walk between the car and the mall entrance, which hardly took 5 to 7 seconds.

But there was another problem, this mall was very close to an army training station and on Sunday a number of young trainee soldiers were in and around this mall. These trainees were always eager to show their combat skill to the girls and women in the mall so it was very hard to draw any weapon in their presence and get away safely, Samant was smart enough to choose his outing day. There was no chance to get him in and around of this mall, he could only be taken by only any long range assault rifle. But you require a place which provides you a view of the mall entrance and to set yourself safely.

The solution might be in the several construction sites around the area. But there were not so many buildings which could fit into the bill. All he required was a tall building facing the mall's entrance around a diameter of 1500 meters. There was only one under construction building by the name of Wills Heights, approximately 950 meters from the mall, with ten floors but with a very bad angle, it was exactly 165 degrees to the mall's entrance which almost hindered the view of the mall's entrance but rooftop might provide a view. The only plus point with this building was, it was deserted now, construction was stopped for any reason and there was only one security guard. So he decided to take his chance with this building.

Suddenly he saw Samant car entering the mall.

Samant

Samant had weird feelings all the week, that something was wrong, his inner sense was telling him. He was in his early sixties and retired from his previous life and now living a very quiet life in the center of Rajnagar the town where he had never killed anybody and no one knew about him. He always preferred to be alone; he had nothing to do with the people living around him. But his neighbors knew him as an aging man who had been given up by his family and was living alone. He had gained a little weight on his short structure which he wanted to get rid of,  but his present life routine was not helping him much. Most of the time he would check online about the gangsters for whom he had done any job. He knew they would try to find him and kill him. He was not afraid of death, he was surprisingly alive so far. People hardly lived a retired life in his profession but he was retired for five years. He was retired but was fully aware of all the happenings in the world he had left. There was another guy by the name JK, who had emerged as a good killer and was almost behind every big political and underworld killing. Besides, there were other killers from eastern parts of the Northern Province. They were young lads who would do anything for money including killing people. So the underworld people were using them to kill the businessmen who refused or opposed their extortion and fellow criminals, who were threats to them. But all the big underworld killings were done either by this JK guy or by the cops. Some of those cops were on the payroll of different underworld bosses and would kill anyone upon their command.

He had strong suspicions that someone had found him out and his life was in danger. He knew a good killer wouldn't break into his house or stop his car to kill him or use bombs to kill him, he knew any wise killer would guess that his car was a fortress which couldn't be accessed by any sophisticated detonator. His only chance to be killed was in front of the mall but the killer won't get away with this killing because there were enough soldiers to take care of him. Only a suicide bomber could kill him there and in the known history of the hit men there was no suicide bomber among them. The only chance to shoot him in front of the mall was on any Sunday by using a long range sniper rifle. And the killer would prefer Wills Heights for setting himself and his rifle and other weapons. He had been in that building several times to see how his potential assassin might set himself there, roof top's eastern corner would be the best place.

So it was the time to leave this city but first of all he'd take care of this killer guy. He called up a real estate consultancy to send someone to look at his house he wanted to sell. The appointment was fixed on Sunday morning at 11:00, and today it was the day of the meeting. The owner of the consultancy Mr. Das was punctual and arrived at 10:45 exactly. Samant showed him around the house and told him that he was about to meet another potential buyer at the mall so the rest of the talking could be done in his car on his way to the mall. Das agreed. Soon they were on their way to the mall talking about the deal and Das' car was following them. When Samant gauged Wills Heights to be roughly a kilomater away, he told his driver to stop and further told Mr. Das that he had some unsettled business there and requested him to proceed in his car, assuring that he would be coming soon. Mr. Das, who was in a mood to please him at any rate to settle this deal, offered Samant his car in return which Samant accepted with pleasure.

Soon he was in the real estate agent's car, directing the driver to stop in front of Wills Heights.

Jagat

Jagat was a shrewd policeman, in his mid forties, tall and burly. He was well known as an encounter specialist who had 60 hits in his name. He started his police career as a Sub Inspector and started killing petty criminals indiscriminately. For these killings, he was punished several times by the police department. After all he was supposed to only arrest them and then the law would take its own course. But one day some higher officials realized that he could be used as a tool to kill all the big criminals whom they could never get punished by any judicial court. So he was rewarded the post of an Inspector and posted into a special squad name Criminals Eradication Unit or CEU. This unit was also supposed to arrest and bring all the criminals to law, but the criminals were so tough they wanted to fight back with the police. Soon a number of criminals fought with the police and got killed in the encounters, some policemen were also wounded but were safe. Jagat was one of the best fighters of this unit. Criminals were afraid of his name. Some of the hardened criminals tried to kill him or hired killers to kill him but in return he killed all of them. Finally it was time to sit down and reach an agreement. The top bosses contacted him and offered him large sums of money to let them operate, which he took with pleasure. Now there was a contract between him and some bosses; if they paid him regularly he let them operate in return; he wouldn't kill them or their men. Soon some bosses started offering him big sums to kill their opponents which he also did with pleasure. Now he was a dangerous man for both criminals and police.

Last week one of the big bosses, Rana, called him and told him that he had a chance to earn big money and to kill two notorious contract killers. He was surprised to see the pictures of those killers, one of them was leading a retired life somewhere in northern India and the other was based in an African country. He asked why he wanted to kill the retired men. Rana told him that those people worked only for money and who knew that they would again be lured someday by somebody to kill him or his people. So that's how the contract to kill them both was given to Jagat. He was told that the JK guy was coming to kill that Samant guy and hence Jagat would get a chance to kill them both. He took a week long leave from his department and came to Rajnagar secretly. First of all he checked the life routine of Samant and waited. He knew one day that JK guy will strike and that will be his day to wipe them both. May be today was that day because he was following Samant today and saw him riding in another car and now Samant was entering a deserted building.

'Go on man do the job, I'm waiting for you!'

The Hits

The car stopped smoothly in front of the mall. He just corrected the angle of his rifle and watched through the scope as his man emerged from the car and started towards the entrance of the mall. He could only see the back of that man so he adjusted his rifle's barrel on the head of his man and pulled the trigger. The next moment he saw the pieces of that man's head spreading in the air and the remains of his body on the ground.

'Is the job done lad?'

A voice came from behind. He turned and saw Samant was standing there smiling with a gun in his hand and immediately knew that he was dead. And Samant fired, a perfect shot between the eyes.

The soldier was screaming the hell out of him. All his face and shirt was covered with the blood, liquids, fragments of skull and brain of the dead guy. Other soldiers started gathering around him, some of them tried to pacify him. A soldier who was the smartest of them, immediately knew that it was a hit and done with a sniper rifle. He looked for the tallest building; one was in the North.

He shouted 'come on guys let's catch the killer'.

And he ran towards the jeep that he had borrowed from his captain, to enjoy a day off with his friends and have fun in the city area. Some soldiers also followed him but they had no weapons.

Jagat saw Samant rushing from the building and assumed that the other guy was dead. He waited to get him closer and in the range of his service revolver.

Samant saw the dead Mr. Das and the commotion in front of the mall's gate and moved to get out of this building and this city quickly. He came out of the building and rushed towards the car lent by Mr.Das but suddenly the killer cop emerged from nowhere.

'Hey Samant we meet again' said Jagat and pulled the trigger of his revolver. The bullet smashed Samant face and he fell dead on the ground.

Jagat was about to turn when he saw an open jeep full of soldiers coming towards him. He ran towards his hired car and the jeep halted.

One of the soldiers shouted,'Stop! Drop the gun! Put your hands behind your head!'

Jagat saw that they were soldiers but had no arms so he rushed into his car and started it. The leading soldier saw the killer starting his car, he jumped off the jeep and ran towards him. Jagat saw the soldier rushing towards him, there was no way out but to shoot him too. He assumed that the rest of them would not come near him unarmed. He fired towards the soldier but the soldier not only dodged the bullet but pulled him out of his car also.

Now he was face to face with the soldier and the rest of the soldiers were just sitting in the jeep. He raised his revolver again but the soldier moved like a whirlwind and a reverse kick to his face flattened him. He fell badly and his head struck the road and started bleeding.

Culmination

Rana saw the news of a gang war in Rajnagar, three people were dead and a man who was later found to be a cop was seriously injured and was in coma. He smiled and switched off the TV. He was ready to go to his building construction office. He had wiped out all his competitors in the field of drug with the help of Jagat and JK. And two of his potential killers were also dead. Jagat might be a threat in the future but there was little chance of his survival. He was the king of his world now, he smiled.

'Shall we go, sir?' Inquired his driver cum bodyguard.

'Yeah sure'.