Blood Bargain story
A contract assassin meets his target's handicapped wife. Directed by: Bernard Girard. Story by: Henry Slesar.
16 total · 2 choice · 8 major · 6 minor
| Theme | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| compassion | choice | The main novelty of this plot is that an otherwise supposedly cold hearted assassin (insofar as assassins are per definition cold hearted) took pity on his intended mark because the man had a crippled wife whom for whose sake he was pilfering money. |
| pity | choice | The main novelty of this plot is that an otherwise supposedly cold hearted assassin (insofar as assassins are per definition cold hearted) felt sorry on his intended mark because the man had a crippled wife whom for whose sake he was pilfering money. Connie admonished Jim for taking pity on her. |
| betrayal | major | Connie double-crossed the kind Samaritan assassin, Jim, who took pity on her and her husband and tried to fake his death rather than kill him. Jim betrayed Mr. Harney by pretending to carry out the assassination for which he was contracted, and collecting the money, without actually offing the mark. |
| domestic violence | major | It was a little murky how Connie had actually ended up in the wheelchair. First we heard that Eddie had beaten her with his belt. Later we heard that it was the result of a somewhat mutual kerfuffle during which she had accidentally fallen down the stairs. Either way: the two had been physically fighting. |
| hitman occupation | major | The story features an idea of what working as a professional assassin in contemporary America might have been like. It also compares and contrasts two self-styled hitmen, one of whom ended up administering the other a sound thrashing. |
| husband and wife | major | Eddie and Connie Breech. |
| mobility impairment | major | Connie was wheelchair-bound as the result of a spinal injury she suffered in a domestic dispute with her husband. |
| organized crime | major | The contractor of the assassin was at the head of a local crime syndicate that dealt in gambling, at the very least. |
| remorse | major | Eddie felt regret over having caused Connie the injury that landed her in a wheelchair and tried to make amends by pilfering money to get her an operation. |
| spouse murder | major | Connie killed Eddie and pinned the crime on the assassin who had been contracted to do the job but who had taken pity on them and helped them fake Eddie's death instead. |