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  On Fon’s 20th birthday Fon officially died. Her car went off the road and burst into flames. Uncle identified the body of the bar girl inside as that of his adopted daughter - Fon. Fon didn’t go to her own funeral. She was given a new identity and a new name. She was now Nana. She was given a new apartment and Uncle told her that she would never see him again. But he would remain as her handler. She was going to become a contract killer. Uncle had all the contacts and, now retired from the Secret Service, his full time job would be sending contract killings to Nana. Nana’s full time job was to kill people. It was a simple set up. On the 1st of each month Uncle would send her his new mobile number for the month. Nana would change her number and reply to the text message with it. Once or twice a month she would receive a text with instructions where to pick up the target package. The package would usually include a photograph of the target and their details. Enough detail for Nana to find them and kill them. After the hit she would send a coded message back to Uncle’s phone to confirm the kill. Occasionally she would have to send a message to tell him that the kill had been delayed for a day or two. She had never yet had to send a ‘Mission Failed’ message. She received half the money up front and the second half after the hit. She was paid well - really well, and she was good at her job. The best. Nobody except Uncle knew that Nana existed. She killed without emotion. Her victims weren’t people - they were just targets. She didn’t think about them. She didn’t need to know what they did to make someone want them dead. She didn’t care if they were good or bad people. They were just targets. No emotion.

  Nana got up early the morning after the double killings of the Russians. She took food for the monks and went to the temple. She already knew that she was beyond redemption, but she thought that any merit that she could make in this life would help her a little in the next life. She knew that it wouldn’t be enough to save her. She had done too many bad things and killed too many people, but any merit that she could make with Buddha would be some help. She placed Lotus buds and lit incense and candles. She stuck gold leaf on the Buddha and she prayed for herself and the people she had just killed. It was just another day!

  Nana was still praying when she felt her mobile phone vibrate in the pocket of her tight fitting jeans. She didn’t check the message until she had left the temple. It was a text from Uncle. The text message simply gave the name of a hotel and the name she should use to collect the package that had been left with the reception at the hotel. She jumped on a baht bus and had to change on to another one before she was near the hotel. She walked into the reception and gave the name that was on the text message. The young man behind the reception desk checked under the counter and then handed her a brown A4 size envelope. Nana tipped him 100 baht and left the hotel. She didn’t open the envelope until she reached her apartment. She already knew what it would be. The only questions that would be answered when she opened it were ‘Who and Where’?

  It turned out that the ‘Who’ was a Japanese business man called Oiki, and the ‘Where’ was in Udon Thani in the north-west of Thailand -part of the area of Thailand known as Isaan. There was a photograph of Oiki and enough information for Nana to complete the contract killing. It detailed his hotel and room number and the restaurants where he liked to eat. It also stated how long he was expected to stay in Thailand. He was doing some business with an American and he was going to be in Udon Thani for three days. Nana caught the overnight bus up north. It was a long bus journey, but she couldn’t risk taking a flight. The risk of trying to sneak any weapons onto an aeroplane was just too great. The 10 hour bus ride was safer. Nana arrived the next morning just after 7:00am. She caught a taxi from the bus terminal, which took her the short distance into the hotel. The city had changed quite a lot since she had last been there, but all of Thailand was changing quickly, with new roads and building developments springing up everywhere. She checked into The Pannarai Hotel. It wasn’t very far from The Napalai Hotel where Mr. Oiki was staying. She unpacked and showered before she went out into Udon Thani to check out the bars and restaurants that Mr. Oiki liked to frequent. She also checked out his hotel, but ruled that out as a possible location for the hit. The restaurants and bars seemed like an easier option and Nana was an expert in making such judgements.

  As the darkness of the evening crept over Udon Thani like a shadow and pushed out the last remnants of daylight, Nana was waiting outside Mr. Oiki’s hotel. She was some distance away sitting in a coffee shop on the other side of the street. She recognised him as soon as he came out of the hotel. She paid her bill and, as he got into a taxi outside the hotel, Nana jumped onto a motorbike taxi and followed him the short distance into the city centre. Nana was expecting Mr. Oiki to go to a fancy restaurant, maybe one of the better ones that she had on her list, but the taxi dropped him off outside Bubba’s Bar and Grill. It was a little American burger place on Supahkit Janya Road, near to Nong Prajak Park.

  A middle aged American man was waiting for him at a table outside at the front of the restaurant. The two men shook hands and ordered drinks and burgers from the menu. It was obvious to Nana this was a business meeting and the two men seemed to be agreeing on whatever the business was. Nana was sitting at a little metal table, which was one of a few that had been set up outside the Seven Eleven shop on the opposite side of the neat little dual carriageway road. She was eating some food she had just bought from one of the street vendors. The two men were now in deep conversation and each making notes. They were also showing each other things on their smart phones, possibly using ‘Bluetooth’ to exchange things. They could have been bankers, businessmen or politicians. So why were they meeting in a little burger bar in Udon Thani? It didn’t matter to Nana. Mr. Oiki had a contract on his head and wouldn’t be alive to see the next day. Nana picked at her spicy seafood salad and sipped on a bottle of water. She had a syringe of Arsenic in her handbag. It was odourless and effective, if she could get it into his drink. He would suffer with a headache and drowsiness, before going to his bed and dying in his sleep. She thought that Mr. Oiki would be sitting in a restaurant and she would have a chance to administer the poison. But sitting outside a burger bar made this impossible. Nana also had a 9mm pistol and a silencer in her bag. She decided it would be easier to follow him when he left Bubba’s Grill and shoot him as the opportunity arose. She was going to wait and see how events and opportunities unfolded. A hit in someone’s home was always easier to plan than a public killing, but maybe not quite as challenging to a professional like Nana. It seemed like the American was enjoying introducing Mr. Oiki to the American culture of cold beers and burgers and it seemed like Mr. Oiki was enjoying the experience, as he tried to munch on a burger that was half the size of his face. Chili sauce dripped and splattered on the table as he tried to eat his way through the huge bun. The two men stayed at the table in front of the burger bar for 40 minutes, finishing their burgers and drinking two beers each before they packed their phones and the notes they had taken into briefcases. They stood up and shook hands and then walked off in opposite directions. Mr. Oiki reached the park. He didn’t feel anything. A 9mm bullet into the back of his head at close range killed him instantly. Nana didn’t bother to look in his briefcase. It was none of her business. Her business with Mr. Oiki had been completed!

  Nana, as usual, got out of bed early. She had had a good night’s sleep after watching TV in bed. She showered and went to the nearest temple where she prayed for Mr. Oiki and then prayed for herself. She told Buddha that one day she would be a better person and asked for his help, but in the meantime she needed more forgiveness! She ate some noodle soup at a street food stall on the way back to the hotel. She packed her small case, concealing the gun and the poison in the secret compartment of her suitcase and checked out. A taxi took her to Bus Terminal Number One in the city centre, not far from Central Plaza. It was a rather uninspiring square concrete building that had been painted a light blue colour. It was going to be
nearly another hour before the bus left to make the 450km journey back to Bangkok. Nana sat inside a small café over the road from the bus terminal. She held her small suitcase on her lap and sipped fresh orange juice through a straw while she waited for an hour to pass.

  She noticed a big silver Mercedes pull up onto the bus terminal. The driver was the middle aged American man who had held the burger, beer and business meeting with Mr. Oiki the previous evening. He got out of the car looking concerned - more than concerned. He looked scared. He looked all around, as if checking for danger, before he opened the back door of the car. Two Thai women got out. One was holding a little boy in her arms. He was half Thai and half farang and aged about four years old. Nana guessed that one of the Thai ladies was his wife and the other one, who was holding the little boy, was the nanny looking after his son. The adults looked frightened and the woman who was not holding the child was crying. The American man kissed her and ushered the three of them into the bus terminal. The little boy dropped his toy car, but nobody noticed. It seemed that the American was in a rush to get his family out of Udon Thani, although it seemed that he would be staying, as he had parked the car in the drop off zone. The family went inside the bus terminal and out of Nana’s sight. She thought that maybe the American had heard about the death of Mr. Oiki and was scared because of that. She wished that she could tell him that he didn’t have to be scared, but of course she couldn’t!

  A few moments later Nana heard gun shots and screams coming from the bus terminal and there was a lot of commotion. People were running out of the building and scattering in all directions. One of the people running out of the terminal was the Thai nanny holding the American’s son in her arms. Panic and terror were on her face as she ran across the road towards the open fronted café where Nana was the only customer.

  “Please help us. They have killed his parents and they want to kill the boy too. Please hide us!” screamed the woman holding the child.

  “Go away!” shouted the Thai woman who owned the café, waving her arms around as if shooing away a stray cat. The woman ran further along the street and turned down a narrow alleyway. Nana saw the gunman running across the road from the bus terminal towards the café. His gun was barely concealed under his jacket. He was responsible for the messy hit on the American and his family, but one had got away and he had obviously seen where the woman had run to with the boy.

  The gunman was farang. He only glanced into the café as he ran past. He ran further along the road and turned into the same alleyway where the woman had run only moments before.

  The assassin stood at the top of the alleyway. It was a dead end. A ten foot brick wall sealed off any escape from the far end. There were a few doors on each side of the alley, but they were bolted and padlocked. There were some windows, but all were barred. There was no escape for the child or his nanny. The gunman knew that they must be hiding behind some of the boxes or in one of the commercial sized metal bins. The hit man took the gun from his waistband ready for the kill and walked along the alleyway, kicking over the cardboard boxes as he approached them.

  The nanny jumped out from behind one of the metal bins and, screaming, she made a vain attempt at charging towards the killer. Her only weapon was the remains of a broken beer bottle that she had found in the metal bin. She didn’t get five feet before the gunman’s bullet hit her between the eyes. The force of the impact flipped her up in the air and she fell backwards. Dead! The gunman walked towards the metal bin. He already knew that the nanny must have hidden the boy inside.

  The blow from Nana’s suitcase was full force into the side of the gunman’s head. It sent him crashing into the brick wall before he fell to the ground. It was just for a moment but it was all that Nana needed. She dropped onto his back with her knees. She grabbed his chin with her left hand and clamped his head in the crook of her right arm. She snapped his head round breaking his neck and killing him instantly.

  She lifted the lid on the square grey metal bin. The four year old boy looked up at her with terrified eyes. Nana lifted him out of the bin, picked up her suitcase and walked out of the alleyway with him in her arms. The child stared down at the bodies of his nanny and the man he had seen shoot his mother and father at the bus terminal. Nana knew that she had to get out of Udon Thani quickly. The police would surely set up road blocks after such a public killing. Primarily they would be looking for the farang gunman, but it wouldn’t take them long to find his dead body. After that they would be looking for a four year old boy - half Thai, half farang. Five murders in less than twelve hours in Udon Thani! The police were soon going to be all over anything that tried to move out of the city and would be stopping traffic on the main roads to Laos and Bangkok. Nana broke into the first car that she came across. It was a silver Toyota. She put the child on the back seat and started the car. She headed south-west out of the city towards Bangkok, but turned off the main road as soon as she could. She adjusted the rear view mirror so that she could see the frightened child. He was lying down on the back seat, curled into a ball. His big brown eyes, frightened and alone, looked back at her through the mirror.

  “What’s your name?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Are you hungry?”

  The boy shook his head a little and then closed his eyes. Nana could hear his gentle sobs as he cried himself to sleep.

  “What the hell have I done?” she said out loud, as she headed back to Bangkok. Her head was now spinning with the potential mess that she had just made for herself!

  Nana abandoned the stolen car on the opposite side of the Chao Phraya River when she reached Bangkok. The little boy had been lying awake on the back seat for hours during the drive back to Bangkok, but fell asleep again as soon as it had started to get dark. Nana thought about waking him up and taking him with her but, now that he was asleep again, it would be easy to just leave him there. Nana tried to find a reason in her own mind that made it the right decision. She knew that she was better off without the boy. She knew that he was only going to cause her a big problem. She had no experience in taking care of anyone; never mind a child! Someone would find the car and take the child to the police. The child would probably be okay.

  Nana got out of the stolen Toyota and closed the door quietly and, taking her small suitcase with her, she started to walk towards the nearest Skytrain station at the National Stadium. She could get on the Silom Line and cross the river at Central Pier.

  As she walked away from the car she couldn’t stop thinking. A professional contract killer, just like herself, had killed the boy’s parents and nanny and tried to kill the boy. The killer was now dead, but he would be replaced and another hit man would be sent. It wouldn’t be too difficult for someone to kill the boy, even if he was in a care home or with the police. Even if she knew nothing about children, she did know about killing and killers! She would be the boy’s best chance of survival until she could get him a new identity and give him to someone else to take care. Maybe a family in the country - someone untraceable. She stopped in her tracks and turned to look back at the car. She could see from his silhouette that he was now sitting up on the back seat watching her walking away. A gentle rain started to fall. It was cool and refreshing in the warn night air.

  It was still only late evening and the market across the road was still busy. Nana decided that she needed something from the market. She had made a decision! After she had been in the market she would go back to the car. If the child was still there she was going to take him home with her. If he was not in the car when she got back then it wouldn’t be her problem anymore and she wouldn’t have to feel guilty about leaving him. She had already saved his life and given him another chance, so Buddha would be smiling on her anyway! She crossed the road and went into the market. She sat at a small noodle stall and ate noodles with fish balls. She took her time drinking the water after she finished her meal. She walke
d around the market and bought a little child’s pink dress before she walked slowly back towards the car. The rain was falling a little heavier now and the street lights reflected off the windscreen of the vehicle. Nothing was silhouetted inside the car as she approached. Nana didn’t know if she was happy or sad about it, relieved or worried! She opened the back door and the little boy looked up at her.

  “I’m hungry,” he said, in a sleepy voice.

  “Here. We have to put this on. Take your old clothes off.”

  Nana helped him undress and slipped the dress on over his head.

  “This is a girl’s dress,” he said, examining his new pink frock. His hair was quite long and he easily passed for a little girl.

  “Am I a girl now?”

  “No. It’s just a disguise. We have to hide.”

  “Is the man going to shoot me too?”

  “No. He’s dead, but he might have some friends.”

  “Are they going to shoot me?”

  “I’m going to take care of you for a little while. Nobody is going to shoot you, but we have to hide for a while. It’s like playing Hide and Seek. Have you ever played that before?”

  The boy nodded.

  Nana put his old clothes into the dress carrier bag. She picked up the little boy and he wrapped his arms tightly around her neck. She carried him with one hand and carried the suitcase and the carrier bag with the other. She walked towards the Skytrain. She felt the boys little hand patting her on her back.