“What was that?” John said to himself.

It was the sun glinting off of something shiny that was lying in the sand. John went up to investigate.

“Wow — a triangular piece of a gold doubloon!” John exclaimed.

John went to his camp, a tent hidden in bushes, and looked again at the report and pictures of the person he was supposed to kill.

“Where is he?” John said to himself again, since there was nobody else to talk to.

For thirteen years, John had had only his clients to talk to, and occasionally the police, but not for long, because it was boring to talk to dead people.

The reason why John was so alone was because, when he was eight, John had gone fishing with his dad, whom he loved so much, off the coast of Costa Rica. From out of nowhere, there was a tropical storm that grew into a hurricane. There was a huge storm surge coming at them, and suddenly, there was a loud crashing sound as the storm surge came down on them, and everything went black! Slowly, John’s hearing came back and everything was quiet, and then a few minutes after that, his sight came back. John realized that he was on an island with black volcanic sand. John went looking for his dad.

After a while of looking for his dad, John found his boat’s remains on the other side of the island and started to search it. While searching it, John found a telescope and his dad tangled in the ropes, dead. John quickly looked around the island with the telescope and saw the tip of a mountain smoking. Occasionally, sparks would fly out. His dad, James, had been strangled by the ropes and was bent at an unnatural angle. It soon became night, and John used his boat’s sail for a blanket and tent. John was devastated by his father’s death and cried himself to sleep. John dreamed about his mom, who was probably wondering where they were at this time. When John woke up, his eyes were red and tear stained. He was still sad, but not as sad as the night before.

The following morning, John decided to explore the island, since he had never gone to the other side of the island because it was so big. On his way to the other side of the island, John thought to try and see if there was an island nearby that he could find life on. John was looking for an island out at sea with his dad’s telescope when he stumbled on something. When John looked down, he saw the end of a stick protruding from the ground. John decided to dig it up and see what it was. It turned out it was the skeleton of a boat, and John decided to use it to make a boat. John hauled the boat down to his tent with vines he had found and laid it down beside the tent. By that time, it was already night, so he decided that first thing in the morning, he was going to explore.

The next day, John woke up and washed in the ocean. Then, he dried off in the sun and set off for the other side of the island. Once on the other side of the island, John took out his telescope and looked around.

“An island!” John shouted.

John could see boats leaving and arriving at the island! Finally, civilization. John could use the boat that he was building to get there. Later, when John was building his boat, he realized that the land he saw was where he had come from. After John finished the boat, it was weeks later. John was still homesick and couldn’t wait to leave the island and get back to his mom, but it was too late at night now. First thing in the morning. He did like that there were a ton of monkeys to play around with.

The next morning, John dragged his boat down to the shore and stopped to have breakfast, which consisted of a coconut and some monkey meat, which he had caught the day before. Finally, John started rowing himself and his food, which was even more coconuts, over to the island. That night, John stopped to camp at one of the islands he had spotted that he would pass along the way. In the night, John shivered on the cold ground; even with the sail of his ship on him, he was cold. In the daytime, it was warm, but at night, it was freezing where he was.

Finally, the following morning, John set out for the next island, which would be his last island before the main island. After hours of rowing, John still had not made it to the island, and he was scared. The reason he was scared was because there was no island near him. Finally, John made the hard decision of sleeping in his boat that night. It was a long and painful night, so the next morning, John’s back was aching, and he was so tired. John finally got to the next island, but he was soaked with not only water, but also sweat. After a few more days of rowing, and rowing, and rowing, John finally made it to the port.

Finally, John was at the island, and he was so happy that he ran all the way to his house, which was only a few blocks away. The first thing he saw when he got there was the police tape and the police surrounding his house.

This must be the wrong house, he thought, but he asked anyway.

The police closest to him said, “A woman named Sarah Cable had killed herself because she thought her son and husband died in a hurricane, so she was so depressed that she tied a weight to her feet and hands and jumped into her pool.”

“How do you know why she killed herself?” I asked.

“Sarah had left a letter on her door.”

At that point, John had been crying for a long time.

“Why are you crying?” said the police officer.

John said, “I am crying because Sarah Cable was my mom and I am John Cable and my father was James Cable, but he died in the hurricane, but I survived.”

The officer was stunned for a while. Finally, he pulled out his walkie-talkie and said, “Whoever is inside the house, this is officer P. Johnson. Are there any family photos in there?”

After a while of silence, the walkie-talkie crackled and a voice said, “Yeah. Why?”

“Because there is a kid out here claiming to be Sarah’s kid,” replied Officer P. Johnson.

An officer came out of the house carrying something in his hand. After a while of comparing the photo and John, the officer told Officer P. Johnson that the only difference was that John’s hair was longer in real life than in the picture, because he had been at sea for three years.

The next thing that happened was so sudden. Officer P. Johnson said that John had to go to an orphanage. He didn’t want to, so John tried to resist, but P. Johnson was too strong for him.

The next day, he was driving off to an orphanage in the heart of the town. He felt scared.

That night, John had a sleepless night at the orphanage. The next day, nobody talked to him. In fact, over the next ten years, all of his days were the same: Wake up, have breakfast, walk in the park outside, read a book, eat lunch, read a book, go to the park, eat dinner, read a little more, and finally go to bed. He would read action and adventure.

Well, all days were the same until one day, when he was at the park. Somebody, dressed in a coat that went down past his knees with the collar pulled up to hide his face and a hat pulled down over his eyes, asked him about the orphanage.

The person, who sounded like a man, asked questions like, “Are you happy at the orphanage?” and “Do you like the food here?” and “Do you like anyone here?”

John’s answers were: “I do not like it here, the food is awful, and I don’t like anybody.”

Just before the strange man left, he asked two more questions. The first one was, “How old are you?” and John’s answer was eighteen, and the second question was, “Are you mad at people?”

To this John’s answer was, “I am mad at people because my parents died, and I am depressed.”

The strange man replied, “I am leaving now, but I am going to leave you with this question. How much do you hate people?”

For the next two days, John thought about the question, and when the strange man came again, he had an answer.

“What is your answer?”

“I hate people so much, I want to wipe them off the face of the earth. I just wish there weren’t any people on earth except me and you, because you have been so good to me.”

“Well, then, I have the perfect job for you.”

“What is the job?”

“It is being a hitman.”

“How do I know I can trust you? What if you are the police?”

“I am not.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. Anyway, do you accept my offer?”

“Yeah, sure!”

“Okay. I will bust you out. At midnight, come down, and I will cut a hole in the fence and you can come out.”

“Okay.” John says.

Beep, beep, beep. John’s alarm clock was going off at 12:00 p.m. and he went out to the yard. There the man was, standing there with wire cutters and a hole in the fence. John crawled out, but in the process he got a lot of scratches.

When John came out, the man said, “You need to be quiet. Follow me.”

“Okay,” John said.

They walked a long time.  Finally, they got to a dark building and the strange man said to go inside.

“First, tell me your name.”

“My name is Xavier.”

“Huh,” John replied.

* * *

The next few months went by in a flash. John practiced his accuracy with a sniper, pistol, and Ak-47.

One day, Xavier came up to him after practice and said, “It is time.”

“It is time for what?” John replies.

“It is time for your first kill.”

“Okay. Who do I have to kill?”

“You have to kill somebody named David Oreily. He is a billionaire.”

“Okay. Where is he?”

“He is going to be coming out of a limo near the Italian restaurant, Gibetto.”

“Where will I be?”

“You will be across the street on the top of a building with a sniper.”

“Okay, let’s do this.”

John went to the building and climbed the stairs to the roof.

There David was. He was getting out of the car! He stopped to talk to one of his security guards, and that was the time when John looked through his thermal scope and found David’s head. Before he got moving, John shot and hoped for the best. It was like slow motion, the bullet slowly traveling through the air towards Oreilly’s head. All of a sudden, John lost track of the bullet and waited for one second before seeing Oreilly jerk his head and fall to the ground.

John did it! He took apart his gun and threw it in his suitcase and ran down the stairs. John looked out the door, and there were police everywhere. Instead, John used a side door and got into a car that was waiting for him, and off he went.

After two years passed, John was assigned to a mission at the Grand Canyon.

There was a trillionaire who had just created really high-tech virtual reality goggles. John was on his motorcycle when he saw the trillionaire driving his Mustang convertible. John started chasing him and the man looked in his rearview mirror and saw John. John opened his throttle and closed in on him. John was closing in when the man saw a huge hill. He jumped off the hill and landed in front of his car, but he kept coming at John. John pulled out his pistol and shot the trillionaire. His head jerked back and he died, but his car still kept on coming.

John started up his engine and tried to get out of the way, but the car hit him. John went over the edge! He was falling! It felt like forever. John reflected on his life and the people he killed, and that this was the feeling to know that you are going to die. He regretted killing so many people. John wished he had never done that.