Per 
SCP Tale Idea
Another Number
The alarm clock played an 80’s tune as the time reached 10:30 PM
The man in the adjoining bed made a grumbling noise as he struggled to pull himself out of the sheets after only 5 hours of sleep and issued a mental command for the alarm to stop playing. As he half-staggered to the coffee machine that had started brewing minutes before his alarm went off, he tiredly picked up to file sitting next to it and began to look through the information again and hardened his features.
Daniel did not like to think about his job, but his job required quite a bit of thought despite this. The target was a woman, about 35 years of age, brown hair, hazel eyes, and had multiple tattoos on her back and fore arms with a picture of her given in the file. The client who ordered it is a new one, should look out for disguised police or police auto-rickshaws. The target is a local anartist, she acts as the head accountant for a local anartist group, and would be leaving from a group meeting at 11:30 tonight, the meeting area is near town center so expect a higher than average police presence and possible conce-, The coffee machine beeped as it finished brewing, Daniel placed the file over a trashcan and manifested a weak fire spell, “Nothing I haven’t read before”.
Daniel slipped on a casual shirt while he walked over to a drawer and pulled out a charm necklace, pocket ring, pocket grimoire, and some thaumaturgy gear that could go unnoticed. As Daniel walk to the door, boredly reviewing his grimoire, he slipped his charms under his shirt, though charms were not suspicious, due to how effective and easy to use they were, so many of them on one person could be, especially if someone knew what some of them did.
As Daniel stepped out into the carpeted apartment building hallway, placing his grimoire back into his shorts pocket, he absently noted the burnt piece of carpet near an adjacent door before walking down the corridors to the floor’s elevator. Upon entering the lobby Daniel automatically began walking to the Way-station, which appeared to have a two-dozen person line despite the time, Daniel quickly corrected his path to the building exit, Ways left a trace, not to mention the thaumaturge manning it, who seemed to be a Maxwellist diviner by the looks of him, could inform the police about who used the Way. Exiting onto the sidewalk Daniel grumbled at the especially heavy rain and silently bemoaned the fact that he had left his rain charm in his apartment.
As Daniel weaved through the twisting Portland streets and neared the targets meeting position he began assensing the area, inside the building he noticed a half-dozen honed thaumaturgist auras and magical exhibits, as well as a few passing mages outside, no detection magic as far as he could see. Placing himself at an American themed vending shop, and beginning to meticulously browse the stock, Daniel checked the time 11:08. 18 minutes later Daniel was standing at the charm vending machine and genuinely considering buying a rain charm despite the highly illegal activity he was preparing to do when he noticed the thaumaturgist auras in the meeting area moving towards the exit.
Daniel put up an illusion of himself continuing to look at the vending machine as he triggered his invisibility charm and turned towards the exit of the meeting place to see an assortment of anartists leaving and the target chatting with one of the thaumaturgists. Daniel checked the civilians to the left and right of him before crouching down and pulling the thaumaturgist chalk out of his bag and draws a small way circle before using the pocket ring’s power to cast the spell and reaches into the small pocket dimension drawing a sniper rifle. Daniel quickly placed the visible rifle in a firing position and sighted the target, he adjusted his aim slightly, accounted for the wind, and pulled the trigger.
Daniel had about half a second to watch the target spurt blood and fall to the ground before his rifle was knocked from his grip by a powerful force and spun his head around to see a casually clothed person holding a pistol before he fired two more shots which nearly hit him as he ran down a nearby alleyway. Daniel weaved through the thin streets and checked the time left on his invisibility charm as the sound of chasing boots continued their pursuit despite the multiple branching streets he passed. As he passed by a man throwing a trash bag in a dumpster he went on a hunch and threw the pocket ring into the opened dumpster before the lid closed and split off into a branching street as his invisibility charm wore off. Daniel smiled to himself as he heard the sound of a dumpster lid being thrown open followed by swearing and slowed his pace as he jogged onto one of Portland’s larger streets.
Daniel walked a few more blocks before walking into a sushi bar and making an order of coffee and 12 tuna rolls before going into the one-person bathroom and calling the client. The phone rang once before the client picked up and asked if the job was done, Daniel took a moment to collect his thoughts and spoke.
“Why did the target have bodyguards”
“The target didn’t have bodyguards, though the information I gave you mentioned the possibility of concealed pol-“
“I know the difference between inconspicuous police and people actively guarding a target, they reacted too quickly, aimed too well for UIU or Portland police, now tell me why she had bodyguards”
“Fixer do not cut me off, as I told you there was a possibility of concealed police, and if you must know I hired you to kill a high ranking member of an anart society as an.. example, to show them the mutual benefit of an agreement with my employers”
“You told them I’d be coming”
“I told them there would be consequences and, as my observer told me, you only barely killed the target before losing your rifle and spent 18 minutes loitering at the scene prior, a little less luck and you would’ve failed, however, your skill in your craft is still considerable and you successfully completed your objective, so you will be paid in full, albeit not a cent more. I’ll send you the drop off location now”
Daniel groaned as he received the coordinates to the drop location while walking out of the bathroom towards his table and the over expensive food on it. $50,000 payment, $9,000 rifle cost, $1,200 pocket ring cost, $120 sushi cost, $39,680 profit. Daniel finished his sushi and began walking to the other side of Portland. Reaching the location he began to search for the payment, eventually he pulled an airtight plastic bag with the money in it out of a gutter. As he turned around, drying off the bag, there was the sudden and quiet sound of a silenced gun and he fell to the ground, a small trickle of blood flowing from a hole in his skull. A second man, whose body seemed to be wrapped in an indistinct black walked towards the corpse, quietly casting a cooling spell on his silencer, and picked up the bag, placing it in a coat pocket, before leaning down and beginning to draw a magic circle on the ground. A minute later the figure walked away from the alleyway, empty save for a few pieces of urban debris.
