M.Y.T.H. Inc In Action by Robert Asprin

“Tell you what,” I sez. “Chances are, only one of us will do the actual whackin’ … right?”

“Well, yeah. So?”

“So if it looks like he’s gonna get caught, then the other one whacks him. Then the survivor can say that the one what whacked the queen was a renegade, and was eliminated for violatin’ the Boss’s orders.”

“Sounds good to me,” Nunzio sez. “Let’s get going.”

If, perhaps, our attitude toward dyin’, not to mention the possibility of maybe whackin’ each other, sounds a little callous, I would suggest youse consider anew what it is Nunzio and me do for a livin’. We is bodyguards … which means that along with our jobs, we accept the possibility that at some point one or both of us might have to die so that the person what we are protectin’ does not. I repeat, it is part of the job … and we’d be pretty dumb bunnies if that part of the job description came as a surprise to us after all this time.

As to the possibility of one of us havin’ to whack the other … well, I don’t relish the thought of droppin’ Nunzio any more than I like the idea of him droppin’ me. Still, once one has accepted the above referenced possibility of dyin’ on the job to protect the Boss’s body or reputation, then it requires little additional justification to accept that dead is dead and afterwards it doesn’t really matter exactly who it was what did the number on youse. If anythin’, if Nunzio did me or vice versa, then at least we would be assured of it bein’ a neat, professional job with a minimum of fuss and bother.