A red Ford Mustang Mach 1 351 with a wide black line in the middle went through the road at high speed, passing the rest of the drivers while Santa Esmeralda’s “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood” played in the interior, which appeared during the final duel between The Bride and O’ren Ishii in Kill Bill’s first volume, the favourite scene from one of the movies preferred by the driver, Alizee. She hummed the song while attended the road and listened to her dog, Colette, bark, a stray dog of medium size that had a slightly long black fur with white sections, amongst which was a spot on her back, and a red bandana on her neck. Before arriving at her destination she left the road to the arid terrain that surrounded it, stopped the car, turned off the music and waited for the little traffic to disappear. Once this was accomplished, she got out of the car with a bottle of Jack Daniel’s in one hand and her katana on the other, followed by Colette. The full moon illuminated Alizee while she walked towards the trunk, showing her white skin, eyes dark green as an emerald and a slim and tall body covered by clothes against the cold, amongst which were her blue wool cap, a black gator neck, padded jacket as red as a poppy’s petals, black tracksuit pants, red sneakers, the same tone as her jacket, and a pair of light gloves. Her clothes hid a noteworthy characteristic of her body, a tattoo that covered all her right arm, coming from her time at the Yakuza, showing a swordswoman wearing a kimono and surrounded by butterflies, that faced a dragon while the ground where they fought was shaken by the waves, in addition to the prosthesis that substituted her left little finger, lost by disrespecting a superior, an error she never committed again.

- Assis.

The dog sat at the order while she opened the trunk, revealing a wounded man that struggled against his ties when he saw his captor, with his screams muffled by the gag he had over the mouth. Alizee pulled him off, landing roughly against the cold ground, and removed the gag while the edge of the blade carefully landed on his neck.

- Don’t talk without me asking first. Is this the place?

The murderess pointed with the left hand while holding the square bottle to a series of industrial warehouses in the vicinity, lost in the middle of nowhere and dimly illuminated by lampposts.

- Yes, yes, please don’t kill me!

The man talked hurriedly, and Alizee took a deep gulp of the bottle before answering.

- Good, now you’re going to leave. I haven’t been paid to kill you, so don’t give me motives, but I find the “activity” you’re into obnoxious, and it’s possible that someone pays me for taking care of you in the future, or maybe I’ll do it for free, on my own. I don’t want to see you again.

- I’ll do whatever you want, I’ll stop, but please, let me go! You’ll never see me again!

- I told you not to talk without being asked.

The captive shut up and the woman drank again from the bottle while rethinking the decision. She didn’t like to slice someone’s neck if it didn’t grant her some benefit, but that character disgusted her, and the way he begged, with his faced covered in tears, gave rise to the need of making him disappear. Probably no one would miss him. She increased the strength of her grip on the hilt and, slowly, travelled the man’s body with the edge to the wrists, cutting the zip stripes with a fast movement. Alizee repeated the same procedure with the feet’s ties and letting the man run away, who repeated over and over words of gratitude. As he estranged further, Alizee wet her throat with the whisky, interrupted by Colette’s barks. The assassin looked at her dear dog and shook the bottle in front of her.

- Tu veux?

The dog barked in approval, and Alizee didn’t like the idea of giving her part of the alcohol, worried about her health, but the gaze of her pet managed to go through her and gave in reluctantly, spilling part of the bottle’s content on the ground, causing her to jump to the puddle.

- Je te gâte trop.

In response of an order, the dog jumped into the co-pilot’s seat when her owner opened the door, who then occupied the driver’s seat. The sports car returned to the road and advanced to the warehouses, slowing down when they were close until they stopped at a certain distance to avoid being seen. Alizee got out of the car with the unsheathed sword in her right hand, and proceeded to take a look at the surroundings. The place was practically desert, with all the propietors and workers resting, with the exception of what she determined as the site where her objective was, a medium sized warehouse, similar to the others, but with a truck parked in front and a man guarding the door, talking with the driver. When the truck left, she carefully put the sword on the floor, ordered Colette to stay and picked a bottle of Jack Daniel’s from the car, with almost all the liquid gone. With the bottle on one hand she approached the guard acting drunk, smiling like an idiot when the man spotted her.

- Hey handsome, mind telling me where I am? I think I’m wasted.

She made a faked laughter to give the guard confidence and make him take advantage of the state she reflected.

- It’s late, so it’ll be better if you stay with me until the morning.

Her answer were a series of flirtatious gestures and a giggle. When the man was close enough, she dropped the charade and looked at him with a predator’s glare before smashing the bottle on his head and stabbing him in the neck with the remains afterwards. After throwing away the rests of the bottle the next step was to remove the body out of sight to avoid being spotted by someone, examining the handgun he carried in his trousers once done, since his friends would have the same. When this was acompished, she made a whistle and Colette came with the sword between her teeth, placing it in front of her owner’s feet.

- Très bien Colette.

She petted the dog and picked a cookie in the shape of a bone from one her pockets as a reward. Colette devoured it fast and followed Alizee to the door. The swordswoman carefully moved the door a few centimetres to gain a view of the interior, seeing some men patrolling the and talking between them, alongside a TV, sofas, desks, many boxes and a wide empty space in the middle. Quietly, she entered the structure and hid behind some boxes, with the dog by her side. After seeing one of the occupants nearby, she took a bullet out of the gun from the man she killed and threw it in front of her, bringing his attention. The man came to examine the noise, thinking that it was a rat, and when he was in sight, Alizee jumped over him and pierced his stomach with the blade while covering his mouth, pulling the sword to behead him. Three men remained, two talking with each other about their business and one smoking a cigar, so Alizee ordered Colette to bark and, before she did, she hid behind the sofa. All of them reacted to the noise, with one of them, who seemed like the one in charge, ordering the smoking thug to take care of the mutt. The hired killer analysed her situation, getting to the conclusion that she could traverse the empty space to get to the pair and Colette would finish the other at her order, so when he was far enough, she ran towards them with the katana in one hand and the gun in the other, while making a pair of short whistles, a sound that Collette associated with an order to kill, so she jumped to the thug’s neck before he could do anything and bit him, spilling blood on herself. Alizee was terrible with firearms, but even with a bad grip she could hit one of them at that distance, emptying the clip, and cutting off the boss’ hands when he aimed a weapon at her, screaming in agony. While he was shouting, Alizee cut his leg’s tendons so he couldn’t run away and took a key from his pockets, opening a door near them. The room was surrounded by darkness, so she lit the lights, revealing many children sitting against the wall. The woman took a picture from her pocket, unfolded it and show it to the kids.

- I’m looking for Mercedes Granpozo.

The children looked at each other at remain silent. For what they knew she could be worse than the men that kidnapped them.

- Your parents have paid me to rescue you.

Alizee took her phone and reproduced a voice message from the kid’s fathers: “Mercedes, dear, this woman has come to help you, she will take you home”. A girl around the age of eight rose her hand and followed Alizee when she walked away, but the swordswoman turned and talked to the other children.

- You should be more careful, bunch of brats, the next time this happen you won’t be so lucky, so listen to what your parents tell you and don’t get tricked by people like those. The police will come shortly, so stay here.

She then left to the car, taking the man whose hands were cut with her. Upon arriving at her car, she ordered Mercedes to sit behind and put on the seat belt, with Colette making her company, also giving her an mp3 and headphones.

- You have many songs to choose from, but do it fast, I don’t want you hearing what’s next.

After closing the door she opened the trunk at took a long chain from it before addressing the man.

- I’ve been promised an extra if I made the man responsible to suffer.

The crippled protested and try to use his useless body to escape, but Alizee tied the chain to the feet without problems and sat in the driver’s seat, checking on the kid and turning the engine, delighted when she step on the accelerator. While the man screamed the woman had a wicked smile on her face and the girl, even with the music hiding the sound, trembled in fear.