Chapter 17: Scarlet Nightingale

At the same time, Alisa Reeves' office.

She let out a huge sigh. Two million is a bit too much, but for a mother like her, she doesn't care.

She will do anything for her son, even sacrifice her own life for him. Alisa wants Damien to succeed in what he loves doing. She purposely turned off her phone and told her assistants that if Damien calls, they'd tell him that Alisa is busy.

She doesn't want Damien to send the money back. It's his money now and he can do whatever he wants with it. It's just a portion of Alisa's money anyways and she can give a lot more to her son, but that would overwhelm Damien more.

Imagine if she gave Damien her entire wealth.

Damien would've died from shock alone. The truth it, she was not truly a businesswoman. That's just what she does during the day. No one from her family or even her co-workers know that she has a side job during the night.

She works as a hitman during the night. Her targets? Those of usually high positions or even mob bosses. These types of targets are usually requested to be killed by the authorities or just anyone that has any grudges on them. Sometimes they hire her to kill their competitions.

She does this not because she likes to kill or anything. It's just that she's continuing what her father did before he died. He was also a hitman, and so he thought Alisa to be one. In the underground scene, her father is feared as the most dangerous hitman in Felkra. People of high status would hire dozens of bodyguards just so they wouldn't be killed by him, but he would always find a way to get past them.

Even if there's fifty of them, he would easily get past them and eliminate his target. That's how dangerous he is. He remained a nightmare in everyone's mind until he no longer appeared. It remained like that for several years and the people with higher status were relieved that no one would come after their heads. They didn't know that their most feared assassin now has a successor.

When the new assassin appeared, the victims would have these red bird marks on their bodies. It resembles a nightingale, and so they gave the assassin the name Scarlet Nightingale.

They didn't know that the assassin was a woman until a survivor saw her fully. The survivor described her as tall and intimidating and that she was wearing a black mask covering half of her face. She wore black coat covering her upper half and wore black track pants, probably to have free movement when she sprints. He also saw her having a dark cap on. He said that her eyes showed intimidation and had no sign of emotion in them. A true killer.

He did not see what she was equipped with to eliminate her targets, but most people in the underground scene knew by now that she uses sharp weapons instead of firearms when assassinating her targets. Probably doesn't want to attract much attention with the noise guns make, or she's more comfortable with melee weapons.

Anyways, she has a record of 27 assassinations, excluding the bodyguards that were killed during her assassination. If the amount of dead bodyguards were counted, it would be 104 kills, not including the main assassinations. The authorities, even a secret intelligence agency tried to track her down, but to no avail. Until now, Scarlet Nightingale remains free.

Even so, the authorities does not want any problems with her. They know she is unstoppable and so they did not bother to track her down anymore. Furthermore, some people believed that assassinating some corrupt politicians and criminals would be like doing them a favor. She's doing all the dirty work for them.

And she is sitting in her office in a corporate building, right in Felkra's capital city.

"How much longer would this last?" She mumbled to herself as she poured black coffee into a white cup. She had no intentions of revealing her work for the time being, not for now at least, but then she thought her secrets couldn't be kept hidden forever.

She could only sigh. 'I'll think about this later,' she said in her mind before receiving a message stating that she received an offer to assassinate a mafia boss for two million.

******

"You became a WHAT?" Bianca yelled at the top of her lungs in disbelief.

I quickly showed her my phone that is showing my bank balance.

"What-"

Her eyes immediately went white and she fell back on the couch, shocked with the amount of money I currently have.

"I know. I'm shocked too. The thing is, I didn't ask for it." I said to her.

She got back up normally as if nothing happened.

"Dude, be grateful your mom gave you money. I could hardly receive even 10 credits from my mom. Stop whining and accept it before I whack you myself."

She was right, though. I can't deny that my mother loves me deeply and would do anything to make my life comfortable.

"Well now that I have this amount of money, I can buy some stuff to begin my project. I can turn one of those rooms into a workshop." I pointed to one of the rooms at the first floor.

"Workshop? Damien, did you forget that we have a garage next to the house."

Huh?

"What the fuck do you mean garage?"

Bianca's mouth opened wide when she heard that. She then facepalmed and sighed while shaking her head.

She pulled me to front of the house and brought me to the side. Over there was a garage door and a button to the side of it that is used to open the door. She pressed it and the door lifted upwards, revealing the contents of the garage.

Both of us was shocked to see what was inside.

"Bianca, you didn't know about this one, did you?" I asked.

"Nope...."

Inside the garage, there were everything that was needed to repair a vehicle, and even more tools that was arranged neatly on the wall. It was like a mechanic's workshop. A welder and some soldering iron even! Who stored these in here?! There was even a mechanical arm that is usually used in industrial factories, but the miniature version of it of course, to handle smaller things.

I didn't even need to spend a dime to buy them since it's already right here!

"This must be mom's doing. It can't be anybody else." I mumbled.

"Well, now that you maybe have everything you need, maybe, do you have anything else to get?" Bianca asked me.

She was right on one thing. I do have several things I need. The blueprints for the exoskeletons, and for that, I need to ask Mr. Warren for it. Great. Well, I obviously can't visit him now. I would need to call him tonight and visit him tomorrow.

We closed the garage door and went back inside. We spent the rest of the day wasting time by playing video games, chatting as usual where Clara also decided to join in on the conversation. Surprisingly enough, she had a lot of interesting topics that she talked about, and I thought she was an actual person at some points. It makes me feel that Clara is actually evolving and learning day by day.

Later that night, I called Mr. Warren, hoping that I wouldn't bother him. Thankfully he picked up and happily answered. He was more than happy actually. He sounded a little bit excited.

"You're finally going to start your project? Don't worry about the blueprints. Come here at around ten tomorrow and we'll discuss it over coffee. You can have breakfast at my place too. If you have any friends, I'd be more than happy if you brought them along." He said.

"Wow uh, you're too nice sir. I'll be there tomorrow. I'll bring Clara along with a friend."

"That's good. Just come to the front door and my assistant will guide you."

"Alright sir. Have a good evening."

"Likewise."

I ended the call and let out a long sigh. Relief. Bianca who was listening to my call had a faint smile.

"What did he say?" She asked.

"Tomorrow at ten. Tell Clara she doesn't need to cook breakfast. We're eating at Mr. Warren's-"

"WHAT?! WE GET TO EAT EXPENSIVE FOOD?! AW YEAAAAA BABY!!!!!" Bianca leaped in excitement and started to jump repeatedly like a child. I could only shake my head.

"WOOOHOOOOO EXPENSIVE FOOOOOOOOOD!!"

******

Somewhere not far from where Damien's house is, gunshots echoed, breaking the silence of the cold night.

BANG! BANG!

Two shots from a handgun were heard. It was replied with three shots from a handgun. A stand off.

The shooters were a group of men in dark suits wearing masks, and the other side is.....

A lone shooter. It was Scarlet Nightingale. She was going for the mafia boss but it turns out her information was false and failed to assassinate him. In return, she got into the situation she's now in, fighting against a group of mafia members by herself. Outnumbered.

She had only a few more magazines left, and each held 12 .45 rounds. She already shot four men, but she didn't know if she killed them or just wounded them. Scarlet is hiding behind cover now, which is a black sedan and each time she shot, she will shoot two rounds and then went back into cover. She can't risk several men shooting at her at once from several directions. She may be a triple-A assassin, but she's not a superhuman to shoot several targets at once.

'Fuck fuck fuck fuck. I might just die tonight.' She thought to herself. Just as she was about to pop to shoot, she was greeted by a volley of bullets from an automatic rifle. She instinctively ducked down from the shower of bullets hitting the sedan.

POP POP POP...!

Finally the shooter stopped shooting, then she swiftly popped from behind her cover and aimed at the shooter. Scarlet shot twice at the man who was standing behind a concrete pillar and he instantly dropped. She then quickly ducked down again before several shots from the other mafia members started coming towards her.

"SHIT! I would die before I could even run away from here!"

The nearest safe house she had was miles away and she had no transport. She would be hunted down all over the city before she could even get to the safe house. Her phone was destroyed, and she didn't even know how it happened! She is basically stuck! Unless....

'Ah, I don't want to go to him... It's still too soon to reveal what I do.' She instantly threw that thought away from her mind, but when she thought of the situation she's in, Scarlet couldn't help but to choose between staying or go to his son's home! Damien's house which was given by her.

'From here to the house... Might take almost take ten minutes or less. I can sprint to it.'

She mustered all of her strength into this last resort! She took several deep breaths before standing and sprinting away from the cover. Just as the mafia members saw her running away, they started chasing after her and shooting at her. Several bullets whizzed by her but one managed to hit her on her left shoulder. She staggered but kept running. Eventually she managed to lost the mafia members and went through several shortcuts to the home. She turned a corner and saw the light's still on.

At this point, Scarlet's having a hard time to walk, breathe and was getting dizzy by the second, but she fought through all of it and walked her way to the front door, and rang the doorbell before falling at the door.

******

"What do you mean I'm cheating?! Obviously I'm better at FPS games than you!" I yelled at Bianca who just threw the controller at me. Reason being me stomping her repeatedly while not giving her a chance.

"You're obviously cheating! How did you even know I was there damn it!"

"Game sense you bloody idiot!"

Just as we were to go into a skirmish, we heard the doorbell.

Clara was the first one to go open the door.

"Who is it?" I asked her from the living room.

"Damien, you might want to come here." Clara said in a nervous tone.

I didn't question anything and went to the corridor. When I saw someone lying down at the front door, I thought it was nobody I knew. The person was wearing a mask so I couldn't get a good look at her face. They were bleeding too, and I knew I had to help. I took the mask off, and I instantly froze.

"Mother?"