THE MERCURIAL ??

CHAPTER TWO

Ella shouts at Iris, while twisting a guy's leg who was on the ground along with dodging a guy's punch from her right.

Iris hesitates for a flinch second but then opts to dodge, seconds before the guy fires his pistol. The bullet is a miss and it goes straight into a nearby tree. Iris runs towards the opposite direction. While three guys follow after her.

She runs as fast as she can, and at a nearby corner she quickly turns left.

"Damnit, what have you gotten me into, Ella? No, wait, what have I gotten myself into? I never should've picked up this USB, damn my curiosity!"

She muttered, tightening her grip around the USB, all the while holding the bag of brownies in her other hand.

While running, she noticed that this alley was soon leading to a dead-end and she has to do something now or else. She inhales a deep breath, softly throws her bag to the side while running and takes a sharp stop, This startles the men following after her. She quickly turns around and starts running towards the three men, who stopped running due to this strange and unexpected behaviour of Iris.

The guy at front with the gun, shoots at Iris just as she is about to close in on him. But she dodges by sliding, the bullet goes over her head and straight to the wall behind her. She stops skidding when she's below the guy's gun and swiftly kicks upwards, using her hands as support to eventually do a head stand, which leads to the gun being dropped a few feet apart. While in a head stand, she jumps, wrapping her legs around the guy's neck and twisting it just enough to make him unconscious, still being careful about not breaking his neck and killing the man. She then using force pulls the man down, but before she, herself, could fall, she uses the guy's shoulder as a boaster and jumps at the second guy who was not armed at that moment.

She kicks the guy, with all her force, at his head, making the guy twist and fall to the ground. She, also, eventually falls down after a single twirl.

Without wasting a single moment, she briskly gets up to take on the last guy left but before she could attack him, the guy stands behind her holding a gun to her head. Iris bits her lower lip, a habit which she acquired over the years to do so when the situation made her nervous, or she was thinking about something. She glances at the other two men whom she had just beaten, they were on the ground, one of them unconscious and the other groaned due to the pain. She thinks about how she should've knocked the other one out too, properly or it would've been better to break their necks and not letting them loose. But that would have been murder and she doesn't want to draw attention to herself.

"Come on, girl. Stop struggling and fighting, it's useless. Just hand me the thing and I'll let you go."

The man spoke in a tone that sounded more like an order. He hits her head slightly with the gun, nudging her to give him the device.

Iris instead clings to the USB tightly. All she knew was that it was important to Ella and she wasn't going to just give it up.

In this state of weird tranquil, where both refused to give up, they heard footsteps approaching. Soon enough they see a guy, wearing blue shirt with black jeans approach them. He was a mysterious guy and she didn't know who he was or what he was doing here. One thing she found strange was that he was wearing a black cap, along with black sunglasses, hiding his eyes. Who wears a hat and sunglasses together?, was what she thought. All she knew was that this guy was either with Ella, or these men or some third party. But judging by how the man behind her just bellowed,

"Who the hell are you?"

Iris knew that this guy could be with Ella.

"Don't you dare move a single step more or else I'll shoot this girl!"

Iris again felt the pistol hit her head slightly but with more force this time. But the threat didn't work on the guy, he didn't stop and continued walking towards them. He wasn't smiling nor frowning. His expression was bland. Iris thought to herself that of course this guy doesn't care whether I live or die, from the looks of it he only cares about killing this man and getting the USB.

The man who Iris had failed to knocked out from before, finally musters up the strength to get up. He brings out a pocket knife and attacks the guy. The guy in return, swiftly moves to the side, grabs his hand with such force that makes him drop the knife. He then cracks the man's arm. Iris could swear she could hear the cracking and breaking of bones clearly. Her eyes were wide due to the scene in front of her, while the man with the broken arm falls to the ground screaming in anguish.

The man behind Iris feeling petrified and anxious, triggers the pistol.

"I told you....if you come any closer....I'll fucking shoot this woman!"

There was desperation in his voice, even though his voice was shaky which made it seem like he was afraid of this guy.

The guy, ignores what the man just said, looks straight into Iris's eyes. Iris's eyes flicker by this, even though she can't really see the guy's eyes, she had an inkling feeling that he was staring directly at her, not at the man behind her.

The guy moves his lips without uttering a word, Iris catches on what he is meaning to say which was for her to duck.

"What did you-..."

The man stops speaking as the guy starts moving towards him, while Iris ducks reflexively because she knew that the man was about to shoot, which is exactly what the man did, seconds after Iris kneeled down and moved away.

The guy dodges the bullet like it was nothing, or maybe the man had a poor aim, perhaps due to nervousness. He twists the man's hand, the gun now at his back and pulls the trigger, shooting at the man's leg. The man screams in pain but he controls it. With one hand on his shot log, he gets up, limping. From his left hand, he brings out a knife and swipes it at the guy. The guy keeps dodging his attacks. He then kicks the man real hard in the face, shortly after which he knee-kicks him in the stomach, making him fall to the ground unconscious.

Iris was watching all this from not too far, she got amazed and impressed by the guy's fighting skills. Although she still wasn't sure whether to trust him or not. She is about to ask the guy about his identity but before she could get the words out of her mouth, the guy speaks,

"Behind you!"

Before Iris could properly turn around or better yet look back, a metal rod comes out of nowhere and hits her head hard. Iris becomes dizzy, her head starts throbbing and before her vision could go black and she could fall on the floor, the guy catches her with his arm and mutters,
"I told you so....."