P2 - Salim and Sera
A constant unease ran through Salim's mind as he fidgeted nervously at his table. Any idiot could tell that Arnie, along with whoever he could get together to help, would be on their way any minute now.
Salim hadn't been confident he'd even make it out alive when he had settled on confronting the drug peddling gangster, but now he was sure Arnie wouldn't let this embarrassment go. The wanna-be mobster was too proud for that, he had always held himself in high, incredibly undeserved, regards.
A door opened down the hallway."You got a nice place, you know? Oh, I appreciate the shower by the way..." the redhead came around the corner, into the combination living room/kitchen, wearing a borrowed outfit, "...and you even started to clean my clothes!" She finished drying her hair and took a seat at the table across Salim.
Salim, distracted, replied, "I suppose its the least I could do," he paused to think, "Seraphina, that was your name, right?..." he stood up and moved toward the window, "... would you..." he pauses and looks outside.
Salim had been living in a room on the second floor of a motel for a few months now. He had worked out a deal with the manager for a decreased rate, so long as he helped with the manager's car, which was infamous for breaking down on a weekly basis.
Salim's talent with machinery and electronics had been how he was earning his livelihood these days. He'd wanted to obtain further education to get a well paying job building and repairing vehicles, but hadn't been able to save the money.
He cleared his throat in order to speak once more, but before words left his mouth he was interrupted.
"That guy is probably coming soon isn't he?" The woman wondered, "Didn't seem like the kind of guy to just let a butt-whooping go." She walked to the refrigerator, " And I'll only say this once, Call me Sera."
Salim nodded. He felt uncomfortable, but now he had to ask her for her help again. Salim knew he wasn't a very strong man, but even if he were, these gangsters would bring weapons, no single person could stand a chance.
"Could you... maybe help? Again?" Salim asked, ashamed, and a little upset that she was now sifting through his things without even asking. "...I don't know what he'll do. He's never killed anyone officially, but apparently most of the people he finds troublesome don't get seen again, you know?"
Sera, who was finishing chugging some orange juice turned and sighed, "I mean, I could but the problem is I've got a plane to catch." She adjusted her watch and took a long look. "I've got to be back by morning to meet a friend, and then I think it was-" she stopped.
Salim was confused. He didn't expect this supposed vagrant to have such a busy schedule. The unusual girl looked as though she was deep in thought for a moment.
"In any case," she continued, "I can only stay until the clothes are done, then I got to get out of here, places to go, promises to keep, people to do, you know how it is."
Salim's face filled with dread. He wasn't sure what to do if Arnie showed up. Salim began to think of ways he could get out of this. Running was an option, but he had nowhere to go, fighting would at least give him a chance, the police have never been much help whenever it involved Arnie. His worried expression was clear. Sera seemed to pity the man.
She grabbed an apple from a basket on a nearby counter, “So, is there a phone I can use?” Salim pointed to a nearby phone that had been sitting on an end table.
The apple was devoured in an instant as she made a call. She mumbled for someone to hurry and pick up. A quick greeting was followed by speedy chatter.
"Could you afford an extra ticket?" Sera talked into the phone. "Yeah. No. I know. No, it isn't another one. No, not a- listen! Its just someone who needs some help." Salim continued to eavesdrop on the half of the conversation he hear. "I'm sure he can do something.... then TEACH him something, you jerk! Yeah.-"
As if to punctuate the sentence, two sounds were heard, a ding from the dryer down the hall, and a car door outside.
Salim quickly looked to see two cars. From them, Arnie and four, no, five other men, all sporting a variety of suits, and each one armed with bats or brass knuckles emerged. Arnie however had neither, his weapon was partially visible. Salim knew he had something much worse hidden in that jacket of his. While the men downstairs mumbled and readied themselves, Salim turned to Sera only to see the woman calmly finishing her conversation.
"Fine, I'll head right over when we get there.... Yes. Fine... Ok! GAWD!" she laughed, "Bye-bye!" Sera put the phone down.
Salim was barricading the door. Sera stopped the anxious man.
She calmly asked, "How many people live here? Are they home now?"
Salim tried to answer, "The manager said he hadn't been very busy lately. I only saw one person's car though and that was the manag--" His answer was stopped short.
"In that case, go get my clothes, and get anything you'd need to go on a long trip, because unless you want to handle these guys alone, you're going away for a while." She motions for him to hurry into the back. "You asked for my help, well you'll get it, and you can regret it later."
Salim was unsure of what exactly she meant or why she would care to help him so much, but he knew his best chance of not dying today was with her, so he did what she wanted.
It was fairly chilly that day, so Sera would've preferred her normal outfit to the gym clothes she wore while hers were out of commission, but it would have to do. As she went outside, the suits were gathering at the bottom of the staircase. Her exit was met with recognition from the group.
"Well, look who it is." Arnie started up, "This is great, we thought we might have to hunt you down, we couldn't find nothing on you when I started asking around, didn't figure we would anyway, seeing as you were lying in a gutter and all."
Around him the group muttered to themselves about her and about what had happened that morning. Two of them looked to be the same men from earlier that day.
Sera walked over to the top of the staircase, "You seem sure of yourself for a man who had to not only come with a bunch of lackies, but is carrying what I'm sure I can assume is a nifty little handgun?"
She pointed at him and continued. "I'll tell you what, let's try a charisma check. If you leave, neither of us gets hurt, we'll both be out of your hair, and you can keep doing your sleazy business. At least until I come back and-" She stopped herself and started again before anyone can interrupt, " OR! The more fun option! You don't leave. You get hurt. I'll try not to mess anyone up too bad, but accidents happen. Then we will still leave."
The thought of being talked down to was infuriating, but Arnie knew the two who had already dealt with her were nervous, and the others weren't exactly confident. However, If he ran away there was no way he could save face, and even if she was tough, she couldn't stop a bullet. He began to reach into his jacket.
“Come on, now." She stepped forward. "Don't be an dumb dumb..." She held her hand up towards them, causing the back most two to flinch. Arnie stared her down and pulled out his gun, she chuckled "A quick draw duel! You've got bigger cojones than I thought.”
This raised the question, 'What was she planning?', a thought shared by the whole group.
Salim was peeking out the window holding a bundle of clothes and a small backpack he had filled with anything he felt was important. He tried to think of something he could do to help. The only idea he could come up with was idiotic, and would only buy a couple of seconds of distraction, but hopefully it was all the mysterious woman would need. He burst out of the door and threw the bag over the railing toward the group of thugs down below.
The moment the bag hit, Arnie made the mistake of looking away, a flash of light came from nowhere. Only Salim was looking in the right direction to see exactly what had happened. A heat, no, a burn, crawled across the side of Arnie's face. He let out a glass shattering scream and fell backwards onto a couple of his companions.
Salim was shocked. Confused. What had he seen? If his eyes hadn't betrayed him, then a ball of fire just shot out of Sera's hand, and has now burned Arnies cheek.
“I can roast alive if I need to," Sera walked down the stairs. "I'd rather not, though. If I did I wouldn't want it to be you losers." As she advanced the group scattered, leaving their boss behind.
"Ah! What the fuck!" Shouted Arnie "Where are you chicken-shi-" His rambling was interrupted by Sera whose hand was planted firmly over his mouth. She looked him over as Salim made his way downstairs and grabbed the bag.
She grabbed the gun with her other hand and removed the magazine, "These things'll kill you, ya know?" She tossed the gun away, Arnie's shouting started up again, "OH SHUT UP! It's a light burn, gonna sting for a bit, but you should be fine, it might scar a bit, but whose fault is that?"
Sera moved over to Salim and checked her watch. "Let's go. No time for goodbyes. We should be able to catch a bus or a taxi nearby, yeah?" The two hurry outward, "We'll send a postcard Arnie. I may even stop by for a visit, who knows?"
The two made their way down the road towards the airport, all the while Salim began to ask questions and Sera did everything she could to change the subject or avoid a proper answer. Salim had to know, how did she get so strong? More importantly, how did she do whatever it was she did?
For now though, he was clearly not going to get anything out of her. He settled on questioning her more once they got to the airport.
...
"You can't just pretend I didn't see you shoot fire from your hand!" Salim was persistent, his questions had stopped for a moment on the trip over, but had begun again. “Now that I think about it. How did you knock those two guys so easily before?”
Sera turned toward him and said with an angry whisper, "Would you please shut up? It isn't actually something I'd like the whole frick-fracking world to know about!" She turned away again checking numbers looking for the right gate.
As grateful as he was, Salim was annoyed about not getting his answers. "Can you at least tell me why the tickets were reserved for 'Miranda Fenix'? Is Sera not your real name? And why do you keep your hood up? It's not that cold out."
A sigh slowly left Sera's lips as she thought carefully about her answer.
After a moment she took a deep breath, "My name is Sera. I'll explain the fire later. As for the other questions, I have need of keeping a low profile due to some... business I handle, that may have left me a person of interest in the search for some info that may or may not be useful in evidence against a person who may or may not have done some bad things, but for now it just serves as proof I broke into some maybe important places and that jack-ass has a far further reach than we thought, and I think he has started to put it together that I'm American and that means he-" She stopped and looked around.
A look of confusion and amazement and a bit of fear all at once wipes across Salim's face. The explanation was stopped prematurely. They continued walking toward .
Sera continued, "Of course, I wish I could completely believe that I can trust you on not telling anyone. More likely, I can trust that you've seen what I can do and are worried I can find you if you told anyone, mostly because you're a bit of a scaredy-cat, but maybe we can fix that."
Salim took some offense to that last remark, but he knows he would be lying if he said otherwise. It seemed obvious she wasn't going to answer much else, and Salim regretting finding out what he did, for now he was simply left with more questions than ever before. The two found their plane, and began the tedious boarding process.
"I'm gonna get a nap in." Sera mentioned as she got settled in her seat. "It'll be a couple of hours once we're in the air." After careful positioning, she finishes with. "Try not to wake me, I only got like 3 hours sleep last night, then some jerk and his loud friends decided I needed a wake-up call.”
Salim's mind wondered. What was going on with this woman? For all he knew, this woman was some actually kind of witch.
His attention was pulled toward the seat next to him. An obnoxiously loud snoring spread out through the plane. She had fallen asleep in a matter of seconds. The other passengers offered a death glare toward the two of them. Salim couldn't think of anything to do but offer an awkward smile and slouch down in his sleep. Hopefully the trip would be over soon...
..............
More Notes:
I decided FUCK IT, I’ll post more today
Why not?
Lemme know if anyone likes it.
:D
