The Black Willow 2 Chapter 5

This story takes place before the Princess and the Captain

After succeeding in their mission, they were in high demand. Mary was pissed that they didn't let her and Jim work on their tech much. She had many ideas and wanted to get on with them. As the months passed, many of the missions they accomplished pushed the war closer to an end. As they accomplished more and more, the money that she earned helped her sister and her guardian settle into a much more easy life.

Ann had started in school and was doing extremely well, her guardian was leading a much more easier life now and wasn't putting his life at risk anymore. Mary was glad, she wasn't ready yet to lose him. He had taught her everything and she felt that he should retire. Mary thought that the rebellion never had a chance with all the tech that she and Jim had. No one really had a chance.

Although she hadn't been told to, Mary had used the assassin skills that her guardian had taught her. As the war went on her skills improved ten fold with each mission (the tech didn't hurt either). She became almost undetectable. After 2 years, the war was finally reaching a conclusion and Mary felt she was ready to start business on her own.

At the age of 15, only a week away from being 16 and many missions under her belt with Jim, Mary found that killing people didn't bother her at all. Her body had toned to the point that she could move without any sound. Her reflexes had improved to the point that when she moved, she was simply invisible. Even Jim, who had trained her and had trained with her, was really no match for her, but he was still the only one who was fast enough to spar with her. At the end of the war, the department was heralded as the heroes of the effort and the Emperor had wanted to reward them each with a medal.

Mary looked at Jim with a scoffing roll of her eyes when he had told her about the ceremony. " I really have no interest in that, I don't want some damn fucking medal. I only did this for the tech and to help you and YOU only."

"This is supposed to be a great honor" replied Jim

"Great honor my ass, he just wants to take credit for everything WE have done to help end all this shit." she sneered at the thought of meeting the Emperor. "That pompous ass wants to be the hero so the people love him more, you and I know the truth. You, he won't be afraid of, me on the other hand, he has a reason to fear. I won't go after him for the sole reason he has helped my family, but if he comes after me then all bets are off.

Jim was taken aback a bit at the venom that she was spitting about the Emperor. He knew she had issues, but he didn't think they were that bad. Thinking back for a minute, he really didn't have all that much to be grateful himself towards the empire as they had almost thrust his family into poverty. Had it not been for his father, they might have ended up on the streets. Damn, but his father had been a great statesman, the way he had convinced the ruler that he had to be kept on and that without him all would have been lost, had been a stroke of brilliance.

Mary sighed, she had grown to really like Jim in the years they had spent working together. If she had ever had a brother he was what she wished he would have been like. The thought of leaving the lab and Jim made her a little sad, but she knew when she started that it wouldn't last forever. Mary knew that her identity was safe. All but 2 of the agents that had worked with her had been killed in the war. Of the two that were left, one was in critical condition and the other was Jim and she knew he was way too strong to get killed that easy (he was a general pain in the ass actually, something she admired about him, but wasn't about to tell him that.)

Taking her leave of Jim and everything she had grown accustomed to, she made her way to the space port. Mary had set up a small network and had put her name as the Black Willow on it for hire, for impossible jobs and assassinations. Pulling out her comp, she opened up her network and stared at the number of job offers pouring in. She smiled at the heading she had put in bold letters at the top of it.

If you want it done, if it is impossible, leave me a message and I will show you that it is possible, you pay my price, you don't renege or you will be the next target and I do not miss. I do not go after children, but I will go after those that do, assassinations will be discussed by price as it will be my main The Black Willow

She found it funny that she had picked that name, one of the other agents she had worked with (once) had called her that after a mission. He had said that she moved graceful and swayed like a willow in the darkness hence the term black willow. She had nearly killed the asshole after that, as her reflexes were so fast she had hit him 4 times before he had even raised his arms to block her hits. Afterwards, she had felt bad about it, but wasn't going to show remorse for herself or her actions. Besides, after that he had trained 10 times harder and had lasted til the end, as a matter of fact, he was the one that was injured.

Shaking her head from her thoughts, she scrolled though the jobs that were offered. Hmm, a few disbelievers. She would have to do something big to clear the minds of the many. Picking a high ranking duke, she knew this was a trap and had just the demonstration for him, as he seemed to be the biggest nay sayer against her. That night, she moved through the darkness soundlessly as she approached the Duke's residence. Her small, lithe body molding into the shadows, as if she were darkness itself. Stopping outside the walls around his manor, she switched on her holo imager and the image of the guard at the sentry post appeared around her. Damn, she and Jim had improved it. It lasted a whole hour now, more than enough to get the job done.

Walking up behind the guard, she injected him with the hypo after she used the paralysis wave on him. It was her own invention and she needed to fine tune it more, but that would come soon. She meant to make as much money as she could and possibly do SOME good along the way. Damn, Jim for installing that in her, she was happy being a non discrete killer, taking who she wanted when she wanted, now, sigh, she had a damn moral code thanks to him. Walking into the court yard none of the other guards gave her a moments notice as she entered the manor though the servants entrance.

Mary walked the length of the manor 'til she located the Duke, asleep in his bed chamber. His wife was asleep next to him. Damn, that was odd, the royalty usually slept in different rooms unless they were having sex and even then they never fell asleep together. This might be harder than she thought, but Mary liked a challenge. Pulling the hypo and the paralysis wave, she first got the Duchess, as she knew that the woman was a light sleeper, then she got the Duke. Pulling a flat square from her bag, she expanded it into a cot like apparatus and slid it under the Duke to move him off the bed. Taking another holo imager from her bag and attaching it to his shirt, she activated it as the Duke appeared to be another guard.

Moving to the wall, she pressed the MTM module and walked through the wall with the Duke. Unlike the earlier models of 2 years ago, this was almost like walking in the open air with hardly any resistance at all. Outside the manor wall, Mary quickly moved to a waiting speeder. Racing away, she knew that the wave wouldn't last much longer and the Duchess would soon raise the alarm. She only had 20 minutes left in her imager so she wanted to be as far away as possible.

30 minutes later, after securing the Duke in a cabin a few miles away, she sat in another room replacing the power supply in her imager. The Duke began to stir as she walked back in after assuming the guise of the Duke. "Who the hell are you?" he demanded "And just where in the hell are we? This isn't my manor. What have you done with my wife?"

"My dear Duke I am the Black Willow," as the Duke's eyes grew large.

"You!" he glared angrily at her, "I will have your head for this!"

"For one thing, Idiot," she shouted in his face "you don't know who I am or what I look like. No one does. For another, had I wanted to, you would have been dead, in bed, next to your wife and I would have been long gone and possibly off planet, so don't piss me off, you wouldn't like me like that.

The Duke stared in amazement that anyone would speak to him like that, though he did have to admit that he was right. If he had gotten him away from the manor this easily, then he probably could have killed him just as easily. "Alright what do you want? Money? Fame?" he asked.

"I just want you to spread the word, I am as good as I said I am. You are proof of that. I do live by a code and I will not leave that code."

"I see, so, I am not a target of yours?" he asked surprised.

"No, this was just a demonstration to prove my point," she said with a sigh. " I will leave word where you are to be found after I am gone. Don't think that you can find me. This is not my voice either," Mary laughed at her little joke as she was using the Duke's voice at the moment.

The Duke could only stare at the person before him. The Willow was right. There was no way to find him unless he made a mistake and from the look of things, he had a lot of his bases covered.

"Oh and Duke," Mary started as she was heading out the door, " If I do find out that you are looking for me, and I will, I have eyes and ears everywhere, then you WILL become a target. Is that understood?" the Duke nodded his head vigorously as Mary left the room and headed out of the cabin into her speeder. Changing her appearance again, she headed to the Duke's manor. Upon arriving, she took the note from her pocket and handed it to the sentry, turned and left. They didn't question her as she appeared as the emperor's herald, saying she was told to bring it there and return to the palace.