The Canonical Anatomy of Robin Stevens

It was still dark outside. The wind had a chill to it. The sun had not yet fully intruded on the privacy of the darkness of the night. It was one of those days you wished to wake up late, relishing all the coziness of your warm bed, as if it were your last day of peace.

But things are not always what you want them to be, and for a person with a strange job and strange habits like me, the deviation between the desired and the available is even more. So there I was, walking alone on the desolate street in the early morning duskiness, an exercise I had become used to liking, for it kind of reflected what I was inside- cool, intriguing and unexplored.

I stopped at the bend on the way to the subway station and picked a copy of the Times, from the newspaper boy who had little reason to expect anyone else at this hour. Today he didn’t give me his usual shy smile as I shoved the customary 1o buck bill into his coat pocket. As usual I had no time to handle the change but he exhibited the lack of his usual practice of having all the time to notice me. I wondered if he was fed up of his job as well. But a job is a job and not matter how demanding it becomes, you have to have a job, not because you cannot survive without it but because the social circus would not let you survive without it- honor is certainly important to some people and I used the particular quantifier on purpose.

I didn’t want to rush into the sheets in my hand, which you would’ve noticed if you had witnessed me, I hadn’t rolled down like most people do: because I consider that gross; like my father, I like to keep all paper in two dimensions. His words “Son, even flattened cellulose pulp demands respect and you owe it to it” rang in my mind and I continued on the usual path.

I didn’t want to rush into the paper, for I recently had developed a strict policy of not rushing into things, after the divorce with my ex-wife Tatyana a week ago: she had turned out to be a Russian spy.
I still had a plethora of unresolved issues but my life had to wait till operation PINFRE could be formally deployed. (PINFRE is an acronym for the Prevention of Infiltration of the North Frontiers through Reverse Engineering, and that is all what I can reveal right now for it is still a long shot and also Confidential Information). I wondered how long the software ELF 1.0 I had been working on for six months would take to be completed- I’d love to see the look on the General’s face when he gets a taste of his own medicine.

I realized I had reached the subway station and swiping the pass against the magnetic pad, I rushed down the stairs to find my local all set to leave. Its doors were moving towards each other, and I managed to get in there just in time to prevent the amputation of my left lower limb. I smiled at the young lady in the overcoat who I had held out my hand to pull me up but who hadn’t responded. She didn’t utter a word even when I said “Hello”. She looked indifferent, as if she were oblivious of my presence. That was something I had not experienced in years, since passing out of junior college. Now I held an important office, people around me had gotten used to noticing me.

I had always preached about minding one’s own business and it was my time to practice the same, so I sat on a seat conveniently close to the door, next to the old man with the long beard. Minutes later the sleepy-eyed old buddy fell asleep and his specs fell off. Like a responsible fellow traveler, I picked them up and placed them in his palm. He woke up with a start, looked around, noticed the glasses in his hand, put them back on and dozed off again. He didn’t even look at me, let alone thanking me. I was kind of getting freaked out.

Still minding my own business, I set my eyes on the Times and what I saw sent a shiver down my spine. Right on the first page, in bold letters were the lines,

AN ASSET TO THE NATION IS LOST FOREVER- ROBIN STEVENS, THE MASTERMIND BEHIND ELF 1.0 FOUND SHOT DEAD IN HIS APARTMENT. FOREIGN HAND SUSPECTED.

I had ceased to exist.