#warlocked

That’s the big question they always ask, isn’t it? What does she feel when she’s pulling that trigger? And Anne’s answer will always be the same: recoil.

But regret?

There isn’t room for regret when you’re told to kill someone, to ask yourself for the reasoning. You take the shot as you shoot your dog, because you trust their orders because you’re a good girl and do as you’re told. You’re just pulling the trigger. You don’t give the order. May it be that this is the easiest excuse to get out of it scotfree, she doesn’t see herself as free of guilt either. She knows very well that she takes a life there on her own volition, but she also knows if she doesn’t do it, the consequences are worse. Not for herself, but for other people. But Anne is very good at following orders and trusting judgement. If you don’t take this life, this life may take others. Innocents. There is no room for hesitation or regret, and when she hesitated once, she paid with her life. Those are thoughts that may come in before and after.

Sniping is almost intimate, albeit one-sided. She watches her target for some time while waiting for the perfect opportunity or just the permission to shoot. She watches them, observes them, how they move, how they talk to people, maybe laugh about something stupid. It’s a sort of voyeurism, if you want to see it that way. It’s a one-sided acquaintance. Like looking up someone’s profile. Snipers are cowards is also something she’d get to hear, and there  

What’s running through her mind is not taking into consideration that the target might have a family or friends that will miss them. She switches off emotional thinking as soon as she takes her rifle into her hands, and is only focussed on getting the job done. What she’s thinking about are calculations, range, if she has a clear view, if there’s much wind, how is the weather like, what’s the distance to the target? What about the Earth’s rotation? Are the variables changing, how much time does she have left until she’s spotted? All of this together, there isn’t much room for consideration or personal feelings. Sniping is an exercise in metal discipline, how to keep a cool head in a high-stress environment. But it’s applied physics and weaponised math, it’s precision and highest skill, something that’s in her blood. Anne works well under pressure. Overcoming impossible odds is part of her skillset.

She was trained to remain calm in that situation. How to take everything into consideration. And that you do pull the trigger fully exhaled. She doesn’t argue there.

     “ ---- and you’re ‘Q’, I presume.”

It’s touched with a hint of amused disdain; call-signs and designations all rattled off to him in a list had seemed more than a little ridiculous. M and R and Q, and a stern warning that from today, he’s no longer James. He’s 007.

He holds up his gun, before he slides it across the table. Untraceable and unofficial. If everything had gone terribly wrong, it wouldn’t have had any ties back to the government, and he’d have died an anonymous assassin or terrorist.

      “Care to join me, Merlin?” He holds out a crystal cut glass of scotch for his old friend to take. “You’ve been spending all your time down here, I feel I hardly see you.” 

          ‘  ––––––  that’s  the kid that everyone won’t shut up about  ?  ’