The Red Nights

" I think here it will be OK " Jamal told her. They were at the right wing of the house, in a quite small court, limited by one wall of the house and two others from the concrete structure which was surrounding the entire house. There were a wooden square table and four chairs around it beside a small but still beautiful kitchen garden. Jamal supposed that it was maybe the place Glenn liked to spend his time when he wanted to relax or just to be alone with his partner. It was a quiet place, a little bit farther from the main court and almost inaccessible to the curious sights, to be able to see or only hear something one must walk the path and enter into the small court.

He turned around to face Carla, " you can have a seat " he told her while waving his hand toward a wooden chair. She inspected her surrounding, gazed at him then at the chair before she decided to sit on it. He, too, walked to go for the seat just before her, he stared at her for a moment while she was still bowing her head. Seeing that she would not take the initiative to speak, he sighed and said " well, seems like you're not willing to start the conversation so allow me take the lead then " he showed her the palm of his hand still having the marks of stings " I've found... this when I was washing myself, it seems like besides the stings, a tiny portion of my blood has also been s.u.c.k.e.d " he landed his hand back on the table and remained silent while staring at the woman before him.

" What do you want to know? " she finally said after a short waiting. Jamal sighed, " I want you to tell me what you are, I want to know your story since you were child until now ". He knew that it was quite egoistic and presumptuous to ask something like that noting that, at her reaction, her past was not the kind of thing she liked to talk about as it was surely not a really happy story. But in fact he didn't have other choice, if he wanted to understand that phenomenon he must know all about their backgrounds and compare them to see the similarities.

" Alright ", she lifted her gaze at him " but let's clear one thing first, want you ? Despite having the awkwardness of the situation you seem quite calm and even confident, to have such reaction you must be familiar with this or at least you must have experienced a similar problem, am I wrong? Answer me seriously, did you meet someone... like me, before? "

He smiled. Looked at her with enjoyment as if they were playing a match of poker or chess. " That's true, you're indeed not the first person like you I have been given to meet, even though you're not what I would call similar. "

" Who ? Are they from your hometown? What do you mean by 'we're not similar'? ", he shook his head while waving his forefinger from left to right " no no , that was not the deal, you said one thing. Now it's my turn, please tell me what I want to know "

[ It seems like she was, too, looking for people like her, what explains her enthusiastic reaction ] Jamal guessed [ from the moment I came to her she already started to suspect me to know something, I bet it's the reason why she quietly followed me without any kind of resistance. Just the confirmation that there is someone else like her is already a very valuable information. She must think that as smart as she is she can easily find out who is this person I was referring. She doesn't need me anymore ] he sighed while gazing her [ what means that she will now... ] .

Before he completed his thoughts Carla jumped from her chair drew her pistol and pointed it on his forehead. Jamal, lazily, lifted his eyes at her, not at intimidated.

" At your attitude I can deduce that you already knew what would happen, didn't you? " she asked him.

" Yeah more or less but I didn't expect you to do something so stupid, until here I thought you to be a smart woman " he extended his arms " let's suppose you manage to kill me, what will happen next ? How will you explain my death to the others? Do you even realize that you can't win this war without me ? You will condemn the lives of many people... as well as yours. "

She hesitated a moment what meant she was in doubt, her handgun shook a short moment in her hand before she cooled back, she gazed at him while a malicious smile appeared on her face " how to explain your death, huh ? I will just have to tell them that you tried to abuse me, everyone saw you leading me out from the party, I will just tell them that when you were giving me the punishment like Mr. Nelson told you to do, you've tried to **** me and while I was defending myself I shot you by accident, what a nice frame don't you think? "

Jamal bursted out laughing and while he was struggling to calm himself he asked her " and do you think they will believe that? "

She shrugged " why not, I'm a really good comedian you know? I can play the victim very nicely ".

He was laughing now more louder than before, " you're very funny you know? " as he said that her smile slowly faded out, she couldn't catch any slight of fear in his eyes as if he was not actually risking his life [ does he even realize that he is in real danger, or maybe he does not take me seriously? ] she asked herself.

" And what about the other issues? " he carried on.

" You got a little observation about my strength, no ? You know, I'm strong enough to fill up the gap you will left in the battlefield and Mr. Nelson is totally capable to play your role of leader. You see? You're not so indispensable, we will be alright without you as long as I'm with them. "

He nodded conscientiously " it's not enough to convince me but you have at least plan " then his voice became clear and his face became serious " but now you have the biggest issue, will I let you kill me? "

" What do you... ", in very quick move, Jamal clapped at Carla's hand, sending her handgun flying away and still before she could realize what was happening. He kicked in a lateral move on her leg and the shock was so hard that he swept her both legs at the same time, making her losing her balance she fell hardly on her back on the ground. He jumped on her, blocked her left arm with his left hand, blocked her right arm by pressing it with right foot and blocked all her lower part with his left leg. During the attack, he had the time to draw his knife from its case on his back and now he put it on her throat, so close that it left a tiny cut.

Now she understood what happened to her it was already too late, she gesticulated a lot trying to release herself but it was in vain. He was holding her so tightly tightly that it was impossible for her to release herself, even her super strength was not really helping. She understood that in his attack, he even took in account her ability that's why, to restrain her, he chose to press directly on her wrists like that she would unable to use her strength and at the same time would exhaust herself when she tried. She even thought to rely on her power but she quickly abandoned the idea, at the position she was her power would be useless too. She was completely trapped without no way to escape, what was about to happen to her, she thought.

" Rule number one, when you are pointing a gun at someone stronger than you, you better shoot before this person decides to react and rule number two, never drop your guard before someone you're menacing especially if this someone is able to neutralize you with as many strategies as his imagination allowed him ".

Carla's eyes were full of fear, alarm was ringing in her head as she was approaching slowly to her death. She was completely desperate as she hadn't any strength to continue to defend herself, what she could do was only to lay down there watching this beast before her, she had the stupidity and the arrogance to defy, taking her life. She started blaming and cursing herself, regretting to have done something so dumb, [ I just had to tell him about me, it was so simple and still I chose to challenge him, how could I be so stupid, Volga even warned me that he was awfully strong, once again I underestimated him too much. Now I'm gonna be killed by the monster I have tried foolishly to kill. How could I imagine one instant winning against him? My death,here , will be the ultimate consequence of my foolishness ] she cried in her heart.

She closed her eyes, trying to prepare herself mentally to die, remembering the very few happy souvenirs of her life, how she was enjoying fighting with everyone, how Nelson used to scold her when she made mistakes before starting to praise her, she started thinking about him, she would have wanted to express her gratitude for what he had done for her and to tell her how much she was sorry to have messed things up.

Jamal slowly removed his knife from her neck, released her from her immobilization, stepped back and took his seat back while staring at Carla, waiting for her to stand up.

She sat up and examined quickly her body and didn't find any wounded apart from the small cut mark he left on her neck. She gazed up at Jamal confused, " will you not kill me? ".

He shrugged " should I kill you? " he asked innocently.

The young woman tried to figure out what type of trap had he set, trying to understand why was she still alive after all what happened. " Yeah... I mean... I tried to kill you, so shouldn't you eliminate me as I represent a threat for you? "

Jamal chuckled " do you really think you are constituting any kind of menace to me? " he paused and stared at her as if he was expecting her to answer the question, " don't worry you are still too careless and naive to be able to kill me. Furthermore, I still need you to get the responses I want ", he leaned slightly toward her " or do you really want me to extract those informations from you by force? ".

Even though she was convinced that he would never go for the usage of torture, she still couldn't stop her body to shake, only by looking at his eyes she was totally scared but on the moment after he started to smile as he was joking, she took some few seconds before she understood that he was just teasing her. She sighed, stood up difficultly and went prudently to sit on the chair in front of him. She had given up any idea of escaping or trying to fool him, [ I'm no match for this guy ] she acknowledged while he was still smiling.

" Are you finally willing to tell me what I want to know without any resistance? " he asked her.

She bowed down her head, as she was still feeling shameful for having tried to kill him, and nodded silently.

" Alright, then go ahead " Jamal said enthusiastically " I'm all listening "