six weeks ago, i was ordinary and pathetic. his wry smile gives way to.  black. and then.
it was rochelle's birthday, which meant there was a certain amount of inter- office pressure to go to appleby's and sit at a table of twenty-five with my boss janice presiding at the head even though she's too tight to pick up the bill. which meant, the poor bastard waiting on us had to split the check twenty-four ways -- everyone contributing to rochelle's free meal -- surf and turf, no less -- don't do us any favors, rochelle. anyway, i ate a plate of extreme nachos and then polished off a bowlful of spinach dip pretty much single- handedly.  the camera disappears in the bowl of spinach dip and we.
so by the time i got back to my cubicle, my eyelids were so damn heavy, i had to put my head down, even if it was just for a wink.
my name is wesley gibson. if you look at the corner of my desk, you'll see the billing reports i was supposed to hand in to janice an hour ago. the billing ort is highlighted on the screen for just a moment. .then the movie resumes normal speed and janice reaches wesley's cube in no time.
i meant to.
i'll do it.
i said i'll get it done. i'm sorry.
my job title is account manager. i used to be called an account service representative, but a consultant told us we needed to "manage" our clients and not " service- them. onemore "life sucks then you die."
i'm sorry, jesus.  uh.  what was the question?
well, that's the thing.-
cycles. hard market, industry-wide cycles differ from our firm's cycles so i think it's amistake to apply.
sure. wesley jots down on his pad: "action items," and underneath it: "differential responses.  then you die." he underlines it three times.
there are people, everyday you meet them, who you wish could see you in a different setting, a different place.  just then, nicole, the pretty intern, approaches and starts fishing through the refrigerator.
c'mon, c'mon. after an eternity, the doors open.
but at least at the end. of the day.  wesley steps in and turns around. before the doors close, he sees his boss janice down the hall, looking at him. she checks her watch and looks back at him, pissed.
what?
sorry. i€didn't.
i'll be right back. he turns around.
i got it.
my parents both died when i was born. he grits his teeth as we.
so i had to hide my stash like it was a bag of many jane. stuck in a hole is a copy of the count of monte cristo. he moves back around the corner and standing there is his foster mother, pissed as hell.
i'm sorry?
sorry? she looks him in the eye.
i think you got the wrong guy.
what is this? how d'you know my name?
my father died in a car wreck the week i was born.
lady.
the fraternity?
what?!! but fox just leaps into the passenger seat, guns up and ready, as wesley's legs. somehow take over and he hops behind the wheel. just then, cross's ev ll mound the corner, practically going up on two tires. wham! wesley turns the ignition, pope the clutch, and smashes the gas pedal as the car nearly snaps his neck when it launches forward. he races through the gears and rips around a corner and out into traffic.
where are we going?
hold on! . whips the car into a rubber-squealing turn.
truck!
no! shoot the tires! fox looks at wesley, momentarily stunned by his idea, then spins and fires away at the oncoming truck. the front tires on the truck explode and the truck veers hard right, where it bounces off a fed extrugk.,,, hat sends it into a violent roll. wesley guns the ferrari at the tumbling truck as it flips forward.  right over their car!!! wesley watches it fly over them, amazed his idea worked.  when finally it smashes down into the street between them and cross's chevellel cross is forced to slam on his brakes and slide out.  but it's too late.  his chevelle smashes into the 4 x 4 before skidding to a stop, a tangled mess in the street. wesley snaps back to reality and rips the ferrari off the one-way street and down a side street.
who was that?
no. i mean.  i told you my father died when i was a baby. she leans right into his face so that their noses are only inches apart.
what?
what?!
i.  i guess i'm not sure. sloan simply picks up one of the pistols and sticks the gun in wesley's hand.
what?!
i don't.  in the blink of an eye, sloan has plucked the second gun off the rolling table and ',s -pointing it at weslev's temple. he begins to count.
but i've never heard of.
why would you do that? sloan puts a hand on wesley's shoulder, gently. paternally.
fuck consultants and fuck action items and fuck differential responses. fuck it all. he takes a seat in the chair, which creaks when he sits in it.
fuck it all.
is this the beginning of my training?
what the fuck are.  whanilm 4!!!1 the pharmacist smashes him again. wesley struggles against the ropes but isn't going anywhere. the pharmacist rears back. and wham! whammm! whamq! keeps hitting him over-and over again until wesley's eyes roll to the back of his head.
you know how when you have a dream and wake up unexpectedly.
and the dream is still. on the fringe of your brain but you can't quite remember the details? he looks up at his ceiling fan, barely turning, a few blades missing.
something like that.
no. not really. same old wesley.
would you consider me to be an observant person?
just because you have one single iota of tenuous power, you think you can push everyone around?
i understand, janice, that junior high must have been particularly difficult being called tubby all the time, but that doesn't give you the goddamn right to treat your workers like horseshit. sure we laugh at you behind your back and sure we know you keep a stash of jelly doughnuts in the top drawer of your desk.  janice looks down at her fingers, which still have a little grape jelly on them.
and sure everyone takes their lunch an hour before you so we can get an extra hour away from you, and i know that must sting sitting by yourself in the white castle parking lot every day gnawing on your third burger thinking up ways to humiliate us.  janice's eyes fall to her feet.
you know, if you weren't such a bitch, we might actually feel sorry for you. as it is, i feel i can speak for the rest of the office when i say.  fuck you!!! with that, he throws all the papers off his desk, sending them flying! empowered, wesley marches toward the elevators as everyone watches him go, admiration plastered on their faces. the loudmouth from the break-room steps out.
you were watching?
like i had a gun in my hands. fox grins as wesley jumps in the car and she mashes on the pedal. the diablo's tires smoke as she launches it out of there.
they never show you this shit on the mcdonald's commercials. .  as the camera finds wesley, who is completely absorbed in the lesson. the butcher hands him the knife, and wesley starts to make his first chops at it, wanting to please the butcher, wanting to get it right.
what is this?
computer chips?
i suppose you're going to tell me to shoot her first.
mostly b's. fox cocks her head at wesley, knows he's lying.
okay, i got a d.
i couldn't remember all the rules --
every day.
i don't get it.
so we set our own rules.
just the flies.
you mean curve the bullet? how?
okay. she moves toward a separate bedroom.
fox? she stops.
really? wesley looks at her hopefully. she smiles, thinking about the past.
you worked with him?
what kind of training is that?
my father was burgess, wasn't he? fox nods, smiling. they step.
what?
what's this?
how?
my whole life i thought he was dead. i shouldn't feel any differently just because it happened 20 years later.
but, i do. like i missed my one chance.
can i see his body?
these are my father's ashes?
sloan said his heart stopped but there was no entry wound?
can i have a minute?
no.
fine. try something else.
nothing. sloan waits. wesley realizes it's useless to try to keep something from this man. he reaches into his pocket and pulls out the bullet with the hole in its center.  places it on the table.
you told me to hunt down my father's killer. that's what i'm doing.
the bullet that killed him. you said his heart stopped but there was no entrance wound. this bullet has a hole cut into its center.
you know how a mole buries into the earth by pushing the dirt back around it? i think this bullet does what the mole does.  splits the skin and pushes it back through its center, filling the space it just passed through. sloan looks at him, like he might have been underestimating him until now.
fox was telling me that my father used special bullets. it looks like cross does too.  which means these are custom made. if we find who makes them, then we find someone who has access to cross.
firing neurons.
what's that?
no rules, right? this stops sloan for a second.
what's all this?
this room. the books. seems low-tech.
what's with the red ones? sloan just smiles.  .and the camera moves to his feet, then pushes'in on one particular street on the map, further in on one red streetlight and we.
you have stashes.
jesus.
closer. impressed, the gunsmith moves the corpse closer to the target, making the angle all that much tougher. wesley gets ready to squeeze his trigger, but a pistol starts firing next to him. he looks over.  sloan is standing nr= &o him, firing at the target. every shot bends around the body and hits right in the forehead of the target. wesley smiles, impressed. library. wesley thumbs through an old fraternity book, which has detailed sketches of an assassination in 17th century paris. meat locker. wesley working out on a heavy bag, honing his punches, the chef holding the bag for him, muscles rippling. map room. wesley walks by himself amongst the miniature city, trying to memorize where the red marks are.
cross and my father were tight. but cross thought he should be one of the heads of the fraternity so he left and vowed to kill the three heads. which means my father is dead because of petty jealousy.
but i don't see jealousy in those eyes, do you? fox walks over and slams the binder shut.
the journalist who's got a price-tag on his head.
yeah.
close the gap. push the body closer to the target.
closer.
closer.
closer. i'll say when.
you wanna go first?
check the target. the gunsmith does and we see that each of the five bullets has passed clean through the cadaver and found it's mark on the target.
you'll find one entry below the shoulder, missing the major blood vessels there, exiting the back. second shot went through the abdomen, clipped only the bowel and exited cleanly. third hit the upper right quadrant of the abdomen, which is partially protected by the ribcage, and passed through the liver and probably part of the gallbladder. upper left abdomen is a good place, where number four ruptured the spleen before continuing down main street. and finally, what i like to call "the ,7fk." number five entered the mouth, was redirected downward by the upper jawbone on, and exited the back of the neck. that's the shot you'll find in the middle of the target. gunsmith sticks his finger through the hole in the middle of the target.
fuck the rules. with that, he turns and walks away, a look on his face that is his fiercest, a far cry from the kid in the cubicle. that same expression is on his face as we.
one! there is a look in wesley's eye we, haven't seen before, a burning, searing fire. as he continues to take punches and count them out.
two! three! four!
do you like being the only chick in the fraternity?
maybe i have and i'm just not telling you.
how did you end up here, fox?
what did you do before? fox looks at him, a wry smile on her face.
no shit?
i can't see it.
what made them come after you? i mean, i know why i'm here.
and yours is?
that's terrible.
where's the diablo?
where we headed?
you need a new wardrobe or something?
a test?
who's the mark?
what if i don't?
get down! .and he's looking at a man we recognize from his office.  the consultant. he's approaching rapidly behind barry, fisting a 'pair of pistols! just as barry hits the deck, wesley pulls the trigger.  .but it lust clicks, the chamber empty.
just like my father used on you. fox nods, as the security guards go to help the consultant to his feet.
you were watching me in the office.
you've known all along. you knew before i ever broke the urn.
part of my training.
there are two things about you i'm sure of right now, little man. one is that you can speak english.  pek war sees that wesley means business.
that my nutsack is bigger than you. fox snickers.
bullshit. you're as responsible as if you pulled the trigger yourself.
i'm only going to ask you one question and i want you to think very hard how you want to answer. with that, wesley sticks the stiletto into pek war's side!
relax. the blade is in only an inch or so. the little man starts jabbering to god in some foreign language.
see i've learned a thing or two about human anatomy recently. in fact, this blade is stuck just beneath the coastal cartilage of your tenth rib. just a little push and it will deflate your lung. that's called a pneumothorax. v helluva way to go, suffocating in a'room full of fresh air. plus the sound, the sound of all that oxygen hissing out of your lung.  pssssssh, like a balloon at a birthday party. enough to make a man beg for a second chance.
so my question is.  how do i find cross? pek war's eyes go wide, pleading.
you know what my foster mother. told me when i was six years old? fox shakes her head.
she caught me eating some jello out of the fridge after my bedtime. i knew i wasn't supposed to but i was so damn hungry, and it was just some fucking jello. anyway, after she hit me so hard i couldn't bite down straight for a week, she told me.  she told me that god had killed my parents because i was such a wicked boy.
so i grew up thinking i was the reason i never knew my parents. but now, to find out, that no, my father didn't give me up because he had died.  he gave me up because he was protecting me.  well i guess i want to give him something back.
not very discreet, are they? fox smiles knowingly, and looks up, revealing what wesley is talking about. on various rooftops we-see figures peering down. looking over the site.
no! the minute bellman exposes himself in the open loading dock door he is cut down from inside, his bloody body falling backwards into a newspaper truck parked at the dock. wesley and fox join the other two on the dock as screaming workers run from the place.
he'll be long gone by then.
on the pallet. they all jump on the pallet held by the forks of the lift. wesley throws the machine in reverse and it backs into the warehouse, the four assassins safely crouching on the pallet on the front.
separate. the lowest level is the loading dock, where pallets of newspapers and massive unused paper rolls await.
stay here and cover us. there's no angle for him to hit you if you stay here. wesley points at a scaffolding that runs above the machines.
don't let him get up there. and stay clear of the presses! he'll use them however he can.
it's what i'd do. with that, wesley and fox disappear amongst the machinery. the waiter takes a step back from the press, where over a hundred pounds of paper spins through every second. he sticks his head out to try and keep an eye on that scaffolding. everything looks clear, until.  . shots ring out and a shelf o w a1l o waiter's head gives way! he turns to see a bunch of cans of spray lubricant falling to the floor. no big deal, until cross shoots one of them out of the air, causing it to explode! the burning oil covers the waiter, who screams and stumbles nearer the printing press.
cross! unafraid, cross climbs up on a desk on the other side of the office. without hesitation, wesley opens fire at cross.  who immediately returns fire.  .and his bullets actually collide with cross's by ets in mid-air!!! the bullets ricochet and take out a computer screen where someone was playing solitaire. the two assassins blast away, all while diving and moving over and in the cubicles. cross has a gun similar to the imanishis, and they each steer their bullets at each other from sharp angles.  strangely,. the first bullet collision was not blind luck, but the pattern for the battle. they are fighting the same fight, their bullets meeting in the middle, each man using the same techniques at the exact same time. wesley needs an angle, and spots a dry erase board the words "action items" written on it. he fires at it, and his bullets bounce off it at an angle where one of them strikes cross in the shoulder.  thwap!!! cross can't believe he's hit but he doesn't have time to flinch.  right as wesley fires again, he turns, barely avoiding the rain of bullets and leaps through a nearby window, smashing the glass out,
he said.  he said 'pies on the fraternity' fox measures him, like she's not sure if he's telling the whole story. finally, she nods.
yeah, sure.
i think i need.a minute to myself.
naah, that's all right. you need to get stitched up. i'll meet you at that korean place.
hey.
you live here? the kid.nods .
foster home? 4014 the kid nods again.
read this. he tosses the kid the book and heads off.
yes, ma'am. she nods knowingly, sadly.
œ he killed my father.
my brother?
i'm okay. wesley sets the key down on the table.
do you know what this opens?
why didn't he just tell me?
i'll be back as soon as this is over.
skipped the hospital?
i'm all right.
naah.
yeah.
did you know cross was my father?
did you know? closer, closer.  tight on those pupils.
arrrh!
my father.  he was working on a plan, right?
can i see that for a second? the boy hands him the building in his hand. it is painted jet black, except for one corner of the first floor, which is painted red. wesley looks up at anna.
do you know where he got this?
only he didn't know where on the route they would try and hit helms. that's the missing piece he was t rying to figure out.
no. but i know who does.
it's me, nicole.
i asked you once if you thought i was an observant person. she doesn't understand.  but suddenly we.
maybe i have and i'm just not telling you. .and now with the gift of hindsight, we see that wesley meant what he said, and we.
sloan didn't just have one person in my office watching me, he had two.
what name do you go by? the intern? he points at her tattoo.
because i know you have the mark. nicole's face changes, goes hard, like someone flipped a switch. like lightning, she grabs for a butcher's knife but wesley is faster. he pins her wrist back, twisting until she drops the knife. she lunges again, but a pistol comes up right below her chin.
where's the henry helms hit going down? where's sloan?
yeah? why's that? she reaches over, slowly, so he knows she's not going to go for a knife.  and she turns on a small television sitting on the kitchen counter. the screen comes to life, showing an inf mercial for the f ob'e. nicole shakes her head and. flips up the channels.  and now we see what she wanted to show him.
motherfucker. dispose of the weapon.
i'm only going to ask you one more time. where can i find him?
then this is going to get painful quickly. she stares at that blue flame, fear in her eyes for the first time. he starts pushing her head toward it, closer and closer.
henry helms. where is it going down? the first scream from nicole is lost in.
looks like you missed your chance. now where is sloan? the gunsmith feels the edge in wesley's voice.
should've studied your anatomy, fellas. wesley fires back indiscriminately at the neighboring rooftops, lying on his back, using the.dead assassin's body as a shield.
i remember some dumb shit like that coming out of your mouth. wesley tosses the guns in his pockets and then nulls out the kniz2 in his shoulder. they charge each other, the blades whizzing and clanging off each other as each tries to gain an edge. the fight spills out the front door, and into.
but you can hear. so hear this: to cut the subclavian artery, hold the knife ice- pick style.  wesley lunges and the butcher is defenseless to stop it.
and thrust down behind the clavicle, cutting side to side. he does just as he describes and the big guy topples over as his gore spills out into the street. but before he can gloat, wesley realizes his new predicament.  he's standing in the middle of the street, and at one end is the chef, and at the other is the gardener. to make things worse, directly across the street from wesley is the pharmacist, and each has a gun on him.
i'm working off of a different map. with that, the world goes back 12 its natural colorb, and he races for the building, jumping up onto and over a lexus parked at the curb. the three assassins fire relentlessly at him, but their bullets slam into the car, smashing it to bits.  as.  . on the other side of it, wesley goes into a slide just as he reaches that cement block.  affixed to it is a small silver crossi wesley slaps his hand on the cross and the cement block mechanically opens, revealing: a new pair of sophisticated ma ishis i as his adversaries converge on him, wesley takes the guns, spins, splits both hands apart and we.
where is he?
but now you have to dispose of the weapon.
fuck you. sloan's eyes narrow.
six weeks ago, i was ordinary and pathetic. we see now that his healthy hand is inching away from his bleeding arm, reaching into his sleeve.
but not today. with that, he nulls out the matching pearl-handled gun, the twin-brother of the one sloan is holding, and they both open fire.  .wesley shoots sloan's bullets out of the air and sloan does the same. just like he did with h' father. .but sloan is good, and one of the bullets finds it's mark, hitting wesley ssmarely in the same arm that took the knife.
i'm done with this life. just like my father. and with that, wes1gy drops the n out of his h
it's true. six weeks ago i was ordinary and-pathetic. just like you. he sits up, moving out of frame.
i've learned about the man i am.
just started last week.
all over the place, really. nothing too exciting.
yes, sir.
of course.
you want to take a break with me?
well, you'll find there's nothing "usual" about me. they climb in. the camera pushes in tighter and tighter on wesley's face.
This life is ours, to make of it what we can. .until it fills the screen, looking just like the shot of Wesley we started with. And then a sly smile spreads across his mug.