Slade didn’t take his eyes off the scope when he spoke. “Breathe in on the sights. Let it go on the trigger.”

The abandoned mill smelled like rust and wet wood, rain slipping through holes in the roof and dripping down support beams. They were perched in the rafters, knees on old planks that creaked every time they shifted. Below them, the target paced in the glow of a single hanging lamp, unaware that someone was lining up the final seconds of his life.

Slade watched her hands. There was a tremor there, the kind that told him she still had a line inside her head she hadn’t crossed yet. Everyone had one before their first time.

“You either walk out of here changed,” he murmured, steady, controlled, “or you don’t walk out at all. Choice is simple.”

He wasn’t trying to be cruel. This was truth, unvarnished. The first kill rewired the brain, left marks deeper than scars, deeper than training. You remembered the recoil more clearly than you remembered childhood.

Down below, the target stopped walking and flicked a lighter. Perfect stillness.

Slade gave a single nod.

The shot cracked through the mill like a bone snapping. The man dropped instantly, cigarette still burning beside his hand. Then nothing—no alarms, no shouts—just the constant patter of rain and her breathing, quick and unsteady.

Slade lowered his own weapon and studied her face, taking in every change. No smile, no praise, just acknowledgment.

“You can never undo that,” he said quietly. “But you can learn to live with it.”

He stood, chambered another round, and gestured for her to follow.

“Come on. Work’s not finished.”