Short Fiction · Chapter
Gun for Hire explained
Professional assassin Joe Prantera is transported from his own era to a future utopia where crime and violence have been eliminated.
What happens
Professional assassin Joe Prantera is transported from his own era to a future utopia where crime and violence have been eliminated. Two citizens, Lawrence Reston-Farrell and Warren Brett-James, recruit him to assassinate a dangerous atavistic figure named Howard Temple-Tracy, as they themselves are incapable of taking a life. Joe grapples with the alienness of the future and the moral implications of his mission.
Themes in this chapter
Violence as Spectacle
Joe Prantera's profession as an assassin is contrasted with a future society that has eliminated violence, highlighting the spectacle and normalization of killing in his own era.
Rebellion and Revolution
The future society's fear of Howard Temple-Tracy's appeal to the young and his atavistic ideas represents a potential rebellion against the established order.
Technology and Alienation
Joe Prantera's disorientation in the future, with its unfamiliar technology and language, illustrates the alienation caused by technological progress.
Characters to notice
- Joseph Salviati-Prantera
Professional assassin transported from his own era to the future; recruited to kill a dangerous figure.
- Lawrence Demming
Lawrence Reston-Farrell, a citizen of the future who explains the new society and recruits Joe.
- Warren Brett-James
Citizen of the future who assists in recruiting Joe and explains the utopian society.
Key passages
“The motivation for crime has been removed, Mr. Prantera. A person who commits a violence against another is obviously in need of medical care. And, consequently, receives it.”
In this future society, crime is treated as a medical issue rather than a legal one, and those who commit violence are given therapy instead of punishment.
Reston-Farrell explains the utopian approach to crime and punishment.
“We have tried, but it is simply not in us, Mr. Prantera. It is simply not within us to take the life of a fellow creature—not to speak of a fellow man.”
The citizens of the future are psychologically incapable of killing, which is why they need Joe to do the job.
Reston-Farrell explains why they cannot perform the assassination themselves.
“In your day you were confronted with national and international, problems. Just as we are today and just as nations were a century or a millennium ago.”
Every era has its own challenges, and the future is no different despite its advancements.
Brett-James contextualizes the mission as a response to contemporary problems.