“It will be a better world when I run it. And the first change I will make will be–”
But he did not hesitate as he ran. He squeezed the trigger of the gun pointing at the most infamous criminal mastermind in history. The sound was short and loud, followed by a long silence smelling like gunpowder.
He had found his mark.
He stood up from the crumpled body lying on the marble floor. He walked past the bullet-ridden furniture and the smashed Greco-roman sculpture. He walked out of the mansion, dodging the ruins of the complex and onto a parked private jet. He flew from the remote island in the Carribean into British history and front page newspapers.
The Queen knighted him. They drank tea and discussed politics. The Russians remained quietly on the offensive while the Yanks kept on stockpiling nukes. The African genocides continued; many of the supers powers in the world fueling them as both proxy wars and to kept the costs of mineral extraction in this continent low. China’s fingers were reaching further and further while India and Pakistan seemed to ready to jump into war at any moment.
The Queen was most pleasant–though he got the distinct sense that she felt powerless in this conflict-ridden world–and bade him farewell.
It was a quaint afternoon, but mildly depressing.
He was now the most famous agent in the world. He had foiled and killed the greatest of masterminds in his plan for world domination. It had taken decades of tracking him, understanding him and infiltrating his plans to get to that point. He had had to think like him; get inside his head.
Newspapers wrote about him. Magazines interviewed him. TV shows referenced him. And then the Government could not find him.
Amidst all the noise and amidst all the lights and cameras, he was drinking far away on a quiet little island far away from international flight paths or shipping routes. These were long, quiet drinks that helped him work things out in his mind.
Something was wrong. Actually, a lot was wrong.
Everything was wrong in this world.
Everyone had an agenda. Every country wanted to come out the top and crush its real and perceived enemies. Every politician wanted his country to win, but more important he wanted to win. Every soldier, agent, spy, crimelord… All of them had agendas that placed their own end games above those of everyone else, thus threatening the world’s end game.
And herein lay the cycle of conflict in this world.
He smiled grimly. He knew what he had to do. He had known it all along, learning his enemy’s complex, subtle, twisted plot over decades. He had to rid himself of all agendas. He had to rid himself of all morals and ethics and conveniences. Laws would limit him where he was going. People would never understand him, but that did not matter.
After all, it was not for England, nor was it for himself. It was for the world and everyone in it.
The small jet roared to life as he pointed it up the runway towards a certain remote island in the Carribean, “Yes, it will be a better world when I run it.”