Doppelganger

"The mini-crossbow trick won't work a second time." The wizard sounds confident.

This becomes personal. The hit was just another job: anonymous client, dead target. I never know who hires me; no one ever knows me. Or my methods.

Till now.

I had triggered a suppression aura on the room before he walked in. I got a dwarf who makes trinkets for me. With frills. She's never failed me, but this wizard's acting like he has a counterspell.

Not possible. Trixie's trinkets cannot be detected nor countered.

I know, not fair. People who play fair end up dead. I'm still breathing.

I don't wait for the banter: rule #2: Never give a sucker a break.

Rule #1: Keep emotions in the bedroom. Preferably Trixie's.

I flex my wrist; a fire-hardened ironwood mini-bolt with a hollow-point bronze tip flies out from my sleeve and hits the target. Bounces back, with a ringing thud, falls to the ground. An iron girdle?? What self-respecting wizard wears iron? The crossbow was loaded for body damage, not armor. If I had known, I'd've used an iron bolt.

Woulda coulda shoulda: final words of a dead assassin. Instead of wasting my last breath, I trigger my Daglangeth stiletto hidden in my other sleeve and go for the kill.

Or try. Before my blade snicks out, the old man advances and has his own stiletto at my throat. A Daglangeth. My Dalangeth. My signet etched on the handle.

God's Breath!

The old wizard is fast. And he knew the score. That's not possible; I take precautions against auguries.

"It wasn't augury."

Huh?

"And I'm not reading your mind."

Damn right you're not. Trolls have a natural resistance. Those who tell me it's because trolls are incapable of thought don't expect to breathe another breath.

The wizard's black eyes glint. I have a fleeting sense of recognition, a ghost that fades when you look directly at it. This wizard is a fellow troll, and troll wizards are as rare as a three-headed dragon. If I knew him, I would know. But the ghost won't leave. He says, "Drop the stiletto on the ground."

"What stiletto? You're holding on me, old man".

"The one you were going to open me up with. The one in your sleeve."

I look at him, I look down at the stiletto at my throat. I feel the slight weight of my stiletto still in its sling.

God's Breath!

I let it slide out of my sleeve and drop on the ground.

Our eyes lock. Again, something familiar ....

Woulda coulda shoulda

"I am you, thirty-two years from now."

I take a breath, just to prove I can.

The blade never wavers. A slight tremor, that's all I need. It woulda been better if I hadn't let him get past my defenses, but like I said, he moves as fast as me. His nerves are as solid as ... mine.

"Why am I not dead yet?"

Those black troll eyes glint again. No. Not possible.

"You are me, a younger me. If I kill you, I die. Twice."

I know a goad when I hear one; I know a fake when it brushes past my guard. I don't know why, but he wants me to attack. Never, never do what your opponent wants you to.

Rule #3.

"If you are me, you know when you lower that stiletto, you are dead."

The old man laughs. "Me against me? Youth vs wisdom?"

I'm having doubts and he's called my bluff.

He kicks my stiletto away, its doppelganger doesn't waver. He steps quickly back, nary a single unbalanced step, far enough out of reach, stiletto at the ready. I miss another opportunity because I am distracted. One of us will be dead at the third opportunity.

God's Breath.

"It's complicated." His mind-reading trick is getting on my nerves. "I am you, thirty-two years from now. I need the Talisman of G'rroth. This is the only time within my astral reach that it's accessible. I mean to have it. But someone hired you to kill ... me."

"That ... makes no sense."

"And yet ... " he waves his doppelganger. "Someone read tea leaves or something: realized the Talisman was in danger and lit on me, not knowing who I was or when I came from. Irony, them hiring me to kill ... me."

"My brain hurts."

"Stop thinking."

"If you're me, then this already happened. So. You killed ... old you? Why come back? Even trolls aren't that stupid."

"This was the only scenario that had any chance of success. And, my crossbow worked. So, not the same."

"Huh. So. The Talisman. Of G'rroth. You don't do half-measures, do you?"

"No. We don't."

"The Talisman of G'rroth is gnome-magick. We become a gnome in the next thirty years?"

"Thirty-two. It's not for us. I need it to obtain G'nelda's release."

"G'nelda?"

"My wife. Our wife."

Now I know he's lying.

"I'm telling the truth. We .... are not the same troll we used to be. She gives us meaning, purpose. She turned us away from that stupid oath of yours"

"Live fast, die young? Done right by us so far."

"God's Breath. I knew my biggest obstacle would be that cursed ego. Grow up, boy. Grow. Up. Listen. And think."

"But a gnome, old man? A GNOME??"

That does the trick. Old me slips up, gets distracted. Rule #1.

I need to use his stiletto. I can't reach my grounded one. I advance on him, grab the stiletto, youth vs wisdom. He loses because he can't kill me

The crossbow didn't work, but I still got the jump on him.

A troll wizard. A gnome wife. The Talisman. Thirty-two years. Old me can die a million times and I'll just keep coming back - thirty-two years later; just need to find a way to survive once. I think he knew that. That is why he told me the score. In case he failed. New strategy, then rinse and repeat.