I remember that day as if it had been yesterday. It nighttime, and I was going to a power station, walking under a sky with no stars or clouds. A while later, I was charging my machine, a bit bored as the process was very slow. Meanwhile, I thought about the next place I would visit. A town? No, I had been at one recently. A village? No, that wasn’t a good idea either. A city? Yeah, why not? There was a city nearby, and I missed the neon lights on the signs over the pubs, the casinos and that stuff that people loved. I sighed: I missed so many things that I never did, but that wouldn’t ever be able to… but it was good. Those were mere distractions for the prisoners, so that they didn’t realize the cell they were enclosed in. I was the only one who had gone out of the building, the one who knew what freedom tasted like. I wasn’t going to leave them in their cells, was I?


Suddenly, my machine beeped. It was completely charged. I smirked, put it in my small backpack and checked I didn’t leave anything behind.  I had my cap, my fingerless leather gloves, my backpack, my chain attached to my pants and my Convers’ shoelaces untied. I crouched down a moment to tie those. I took a deep breath, jumped from the second floor window and fell on my feet, knelt to soften the landing. I ran towards the city, half a mile away, feeling cheerful, as each time I was going to set a new person free.


When I reached the city, I had a strange feeling at the same time, though I wasn’t able to think of a logical reason. I tried to focus on my objective to forget about it. There were so many streets, so many houses and flats, so many people awaiting for their savior, that I didn’t know which one I should choose. Then, again that anxiety, as if something was going wrong… I finally pushed those thoughts out of my mind and I continued. The choice wasn’t easy, but I found a house which convinced me after a few minutes. I climbed up using a pipe, put my feet carefully on the cornice and grabbed the edges of the window. It was locked, but it was easy to solve the problem. I slid in silently, closed the window and turned around to scan the place. It was a bedroom, the room of a boy, maybe a teen or young adult, seeing all the objects all around the floor and a few clothes that could be seen through the half-opened door of the wardrobe. It looked the guy liked filming stuff, as he had some recording cameras and tapes on a table, on my left, next to the window. The door was closed. It was all quiet; only the peaceful breath of the guy broke the silence. I smiled as I approached to the sleeping condemned, I took a pair of cable wires out of the backpack and put them together. Sparks came out making a sound that I had etched into my memory, though lighter than the first time.


“Ride the lightning and be free…”, I murmured as the wires were about to touch his head.


Something hit me on my stomach. I crashed against the wall, sunk down and let out a little moan of pain. I looked at the bed, where I found out the dude was moving. No, not just moving, he sat down and stared at me. At that moment, I recognized a female figure, detail which told me that she had taken the real owner of that room to other place, maybe knowing about my arrival. I half-closed my eyes, but I couldn’t see much more than her pale skin, her black hair and a mask of a white tiger. I shook my head angrily, got up and clenched my fists.


“Who the hell are you?!”, she didn’t answer, just kept staring at me silently. “Ya aren’t gonna talk? Fine… I’ll have to make ya open yer mouth!”


I moved fast, wires in my hands. She just put her feet on the mattress, squatted and kicked my face. I fell backwards and hit my head with the wall again, this time harder. I growled as I got up, glaring at her; I couldn’t see her face, but I’d have sworn she was smirking, surely laughing inside. I noticed I didn’t have the wires in my hands; they had to be close to me, but, where? I kept an eye on the young woman, who seemed to be waiting to see my next move, still on the same position. I touched the floor as I pretended to be calm.


“Where are those wires? Oh, here they are… He, he…”, I looked at her again. She had tilted her head a bit. “Do you think that’s enough to beat me? Idiot!”


A simple human wasn’t going to beat me… I wasn’t going to let that happen! Standing up, I checked the cable wires to see they were still useful; they hadn’t been damaged, fortunately. Just at that moment, that instant, I noticed the girl was moving. I couldn’t dodge her: she got up of the bed while I wasn’t paying attention and tackled me. My head hit the window; the glass broke making a loud noise. She took a piece of it that remained stuck to the frame and tried to stab my shoulder. I acted fast, taking her wrists, which made us struggle with no results. I, seeing it would just be a waste of time, pulled her from her shoulders quickly and head-butted her hard, after which I got rid of her by kicking her, held the wires tightly and run towards her.


However, she gathered impulse, slid on the floor, hit my ankles and made me trip. She rolled to dodge my body, got up and ran to the bed, though I couldn’t see what she did there. “You’re agile… Guess I’ll have to play more seriously!”, I smirked again. I liked it when prisoners put up resistance, it made the process more fun. “Let’s see how long you can fight, gurl!”


She kept quiet. I hummed pissed. “Ain’ ya gonna say anything? Are ya mute?”


My opponent stared at me, still in silence. I gritted my teeth as I felt rage taking my body over. I tensed up, chewing my lips in hate. I hadn’t had such an urge of killing someone since I murdered that politician…


She was clearly playing with me.


“No one makes fun of me!”, I disappeared in front of her and appeared at her back. She was shocked for only a second, enough time for me to close the circuit.


She received a short electroshock. She could push me, nevertheless I noticed it had damaged her quite seriously. She fell on the floor, crawled on direction to the bed and grabbed the end of it. She couldn’t go further, since I was able to grab her and crash her against the wall. I kicked her stomach, just like she did before to me; I punched her twice to weaken her and rubbed my hands. Some seconds later, I had some electricity moving between my hands, stronger than the one produced by my machine, and touched her arms. It was so powerful that her body heated up and shook violently, even after I stopped touching her. All at once, I felt my head spinning and my strengths fading.


“Argh… Shouldn’t use my own energy…”, I muttered covering my forehead with a hand. I shook my head and tried to stand up, although I froze when I noticed something taking me by my arms. “What the h-?!”


I was lifted five inches over the floor. I looked down to see my opponent gripping the wall with her nails, panting enraged. She turned her head slowly. The woman, glaring at me, not saying anything, moved to the bed again, this time to take something hidden under the blankets. I wondered how it was possible that she could lift me being so far from me. I looked up and realized what was holding me weren’t her hands, but some kind of black stuff with the shape of a human arm. Those were much stronger than hers, than four regular men’s I’d have said.


“What have you got there? Hm? Oh, hell, you’re kidding me…”


She stood before me with a weapon on her right hand. I opened my eyes widely and gasped: it was very dark, but I could see metal teeth shining under the poor light, though at the same time it was too long and thin to be a saw… I panicked when I hear a “click” and the sound of a chainsaw.


“Has she got a fucking CHAINSAW?!”, I thought. Soon I found out I was wrong…


She raised her arm, holding horizontally the weapon at a bit lower level to her eyes. Judging by the shape and the grip, I saw it was a sword; it looked like a katana, more exactly. I gulped nervously… She had a damn chainsaw katana. I couldn’t figure how the hell it could work, but it was obvious that she had managed to find out how to, which made her more dangerous than I thought at first… and more interesting at once.


“My bad, gurl…” I laughed. “I’M ALREADY DEAD!!”


I teleported again. I appeared next to the table where the recording cameras and the tapes were, took the chair and hit my foe with it three times. She wasn’t moving, but she was conscious, as her low moans of pain demonstrated. I was panting: using my own electricity made my energies drop riskily, and so did teleporting at a lower scale. Thus, I had to hurry up before I fell unconscious.


“Can you move? No? Good, but… I’ll make sure you can’t!”, I kicked her a few times and stomped on her head. I had to stop, as that black stuff was about to catch me.


I jumped backwards, watching those things moving fast in the dark. I looked at the woman, who was still lying on the floor with her arms wrapping her torso, and saw that the black stuff came from under her body. Of course… How couldn’t I discover it before? That stuff was her shadow! Or it looked to be, at least. My laugher sounded more deranged than usual. Such a fantastic opponent! I was gonna miss that one surely. A non-human being! How fun…


“So you can use your shadow as a weapon, dear? Ha, ha, ha! Nice try, but I’m afraid the game’s over!”, I moved to the window to draw the curtains. The room was swallowed in the darkness.


Things were much easier from that moment. I had to go out of the room touching the walls. I was looking for the bathroom for the next minute, till I felt the cold tiles under the tips of my fingers. After that I touched again the objects, trying to figure where the bath was. Once I found it, I turned on the faucet, went back to the bedroom and returned to the bathroom dragging my opponent. She fought back; sadly for her, her body hurt too much, thus she wasn’t strong enough to get rid of me. I tried to take the weapon away from her, although I just could turn it off. Damn, she held it really tight… I didn’t care, anyway. She wasn’t capable of using it in that state.


“Time to have a bath~!”, I sang as I threw her into the water. Finally, I adjusted the intensity, took the cable wires, stretched my arms out and put both sides in the water.

"RIDE THE LIGHTNING!"

The yells of pain where so loud that my ears hurt. She had violent convulsions for the next fifteen seconds, time I usually spent to set a person free with that current. I took the cable wires out of the bath smiling. It had been a bit hard, but I won again. The only thing I had to do was going to the power station, recharge my machine and rest to restore my energy. Then I could heal my bruises and the wound on the back of my head. After sighing relief, I put the wires inside the backpack, switched the machine off and hung the small backpack on my shoulders.


“Great job, Blitz.”, I clapped congratulating myself.


I felt something stabbing me and moving across my chest. I shouted and immediately froze when I heard the sound of a chainsaw. My yells were louder and louder as the weapon cut my skin, muscles and guts. I felt it moving down, separating my legs, and then going up, doing the same but not cutting my neck. All at once, the lights of the bathroom were switched on, so I could see her reflected on the mirror, out of the bath. Her pale skin was slightly burnt, her mask was cracked, she had a little bruise on an arm and she had to lean against the wall due to the lack of strength. I could see her clothes too: she was wearing a black and checked T-shirt with short sleeves, a pendant with a strange shape, some kind of white button attached to the T-shirt and the black skirt which almost reached her knees, and boots, same color as the skirt. At that moment I recognized her: she was the teenager I had kidnaped two weeks ago, along with that weird kid.


She had switched the lights on to have her shadow prepared to catch my halves and keep those supported so that she could finish her job easily. Making a huge effort, she swung the weapon viciously three times. The first one cut my hip; the second one, my torso; the third one, my neck. The sound of the chainsaw katana chopping my body off mingled with my screams…


Finally, it was over. She let my torn up body fall on the pool of my own blood. Everywhere I looked I saw splashes of that dark red liquid, cold as ice, along with the horrible smell of fresh flesh and guts. She crouched down, turned the weapon off and poked my head softly with the edge, head tilted. I saw her dull purple eyes fixed on mine; even though I couldn’t see it, I knew she was smiling under that mask, laughing inside insanely. She didn’t say anything; neither did I. I, nonetheless, couldn’t help but cry, due to both pain and shame… How could I lose? Wasn’t I the one who had to set human race free of their agony? Was I… wrong?

NO WAY.

I shouted a last time before wrath substituted sorrow. “I’ll find you!”, I cried when she walked away. My opponent turned her head, looking down. “I will find you, sooner or later! We’ll meet again! WE’LL MEET AGAIN! This won’t be remained like this!”


She walked back slowly. Then, squatted again, put a hand on the back of her head and pulled the thin rubber band. With a hand on the mask, she removed it, revealing her face stained with trickles of blood which fell from her mouth, those deranged purple eyes widely opened, that sick gaze that made me feel fear for the first time since my last day as a human, and a death smile filled with sharp teeth that I’d never forget.


“Cuento con ello… puta.” [I count on it... bitch.]


She walked out of the room after putting the mask on her face. I had to become intangible to heal my wounds and put the pieces of my body together. I couldn't die in that way, but it hurt as hell. If I had been quicker...

------


The pain persisted for the next two days, and later it faded away until it was a simple pinch with a scar that healed the next day. My machine was obviously destroyed when she cut me into pieces like a pig; I spent three days until I managed to steal a new one, better than the one before. That day, I sat down, enjoyed the sunset while I thought about my next destination and made a lifelong, or more exactly, “deathlong” promise.


I promised myself I would hunt that young woman down, whether she destroyed me in the process…