Chapter 1: Reunion
Half of the hotel room quieted, shrouded by a blanket of darkness, with the other half radiated by a small sparking lamp that sat alone on top of a wooden dresser beside the mattress bed. The pitch-blackness of the sky signified it was close to midnight, and nearly every guest that had roamed the building earlier on was sound asleep, that is, except for one. A lone woman, with long glimmering blonde hair tied in a ponytail, sat and leaned close to the windowsill, clad in a pair of short denim pants that ended at knee level and a tight black shirt rolled up to the chest that exposed her toned abdomen. Her eyes were an icy tinge of blue and her lips were as moist as a ripe piece of fruit. She was Nina Williams, an Irish assassin wandering in a blizzard of her own thoughts.
She gaped at her lightly polished red toenails, clinching a small object between her palm and fingers. It was a locket, a locket of the man she had held blissfully in her heart for many years. Everyday she would gaze upon its dazzling design and open it to see the smudged face of her father, Richard Williams, a man that died years ago at the result of a murder.
Richard loved Nina dearly for sure and could not escape that fact, always appreciating her, treating her like a little princess. His wife, a British Aikido champion, trained her in the fighting art of Aikido and Bone martial arts. Later, Nina perfected her technique and became an assassin as she grew into adulthood just as her father had done. Richard was the only person she really cared for in her seemingly cold heart. No one else in Nina's life was worth a damn, including her sister Anna.
On the digital front of the alarm clock, time blinked slowly and seemed to slow down even more as Nina sipped on her last freshly cold bottle of beer that she placed in-between her open lips. Guzzling the remains of the alcoholic beverage, she tossed the bottle down and watched as it rolled across the floor until it came to a complete stop. Her eyelids started to lower, her body giving in to exhaustion, feeling sluggish. Yawning and stretching her arms up to the plastered ceiling, she scooted into the warm comfort of the hotel bed minutes later and drifted into a deep, peaceful sleep, ready to get a move on her newly scheduled assignment tomorrow.
Morning
The revving engine of Nina's motorcycle started with a heavy jump, as she trusted her leather-coated boot against the lever, grasping and turning the handle bar, and speeding out of the hotel parking lot. She wheeled through the densely populated metropolis of Tokyo in search of her client's supposed arch nemesis, the very target she had received orders to kill. This one would be an easy death, she thought, nice and slow, just as the client had wished.
The Japanese capital was beautiful during the times of morning and even more breath taking at night, transforming into a sparkling city glittered with expensive jewelry. It would be a place worth while to explore if given the chance, but Nina was not in the country for sight seeing or having fun. She had a job to carry out and she intended to do it without hesitation.
The streets were usually crowded with cars piled in heavy traffic, making it difficult to maneuver around them. However, it was morning, with less activity on the road, easing the trip. Nina was thankful, for if it had been later in the day, the overwhelming traffic would have returned. Her vehicle came to a quick stop after turning through a couple intersections.
As she disembarked from her motorcycle's cushioned seat, she strolled into an alleyway toward her destination. Little hunks of trash littered the ground with an intolerable smell that sent Nina pressing her nostrils together with her fingers to block out the terrible odor.
In little time, her unsuspecting target would be within her grasp. She would murder him and collect her payment that the client had promised for completing the job. However, unknown to her knowledge, something came following close behind, stalking her. It was then a sudden familiar voice sounding of empty concern called to Nina's ear, grabbing her attention.
"So, you're going to do in another?"
Nina's body froze instantly after turning around, looking into the dispirited eyes of her hated sibling, Anna. Anna stood leaned against a brick wall in a flashy red jumpsuit with classy-heeled shoes. She had been following her sister since she left the hotel, wanting to close the conflict wedged between them for good. Of course, it would be quite a feat to pull off, her knowing that Nina was not a very forgiving person, but Anna was willing to try.
Slowly, Nina drew a semiautomatic pistol from her back pocket and aimed it at Anna's chest. The cold fire burning in her eyes that came when she saw her sister flickered back into place. She did not expect to see Anna, especially in Japan, but that was of no importance to her. Cocking back the trigger and eliminating the woman that stood in her way was her only focus.
"I just took care of your boss, meaning you don't have to kill anymore. Do not take on any of these murder jobs from here on end. Why don't you start fresh, start over, and live a normal life? Nina, we have fought for so long it has become pointless. Let's end the feud now and stop the madness."
Nina smirked, withdrawing and hoisting her gun behind her.
"You killed my client? Clever," she said, quietly. "I guess you feel now I don't need to kill because of that, huh? Well let me tell you something, stay out of my business! I have no idea how you got here, and I do not care. All I know is that you are about to die. You chose the wrong day to mess with me, Anna."
Nina drew her gun back up and pulled the trigger, firing a bullet straight at her sister's body. Anna cart wheeled swiftly out of the way of the bullet's path and reached in her pocket, grabbing for a pistol of her own.
"Well I thought you'd see it that way, and just to be on the safe side I brought a special friend with me just incase."
Anna yanked the gun out from her pocket and shot two bullets at her sister. Jumping out of the way, Nina dodged the round pellets and ran toward her sister, disarming the gun from her hand and pulling out a double-edged knife to hold at her throat. Anna's hands trembled as she used her strength to push the deadly instrument in Nina's hand away before it pierced into her chest. However, Nina pressed her strength down even harder and brought it close to slitting Anna's neck. Back and forth, they pushed, changing and forcing the knife in the opposite direction. Lucky for her, Anna managed to move the blade away, but the tip of the knife accidentally ended up cutting a piece of flesh from her shoulder. With a loud scream and an angry surge of strength, Anna shoved Nina away and scratched her arm with her long fingernails, cutting deep into her pale white skin. Checking her arm, Nina saw squirts of blood oozing out, as did Anna with her shoulder.
Immediately, police sirens boomed the streets, coming toward the ally, disrupting and concluding the sisterly battle. The sisters glanced at each other one last time and separated, running away in different directions. Nina quickly parked her rear on her motorcycle and drove off just in time before the police showed up, riding down the street and taking another glance at her arm.
"That bitch!" she sniffled.
Anna ducked away in the shadows of the office buildings nearby and evaded the police, holding her cut shoulder as she cursed her sister's name. Things did not go as she had planned, but she felt she had given it her best shot to try to resolve the conflict with Nina. However, it was not always like this with Anna trying to make peace with her sister. She recalled the previous days of her life from where it all started.
For years since the days of her childhood, Anna resented her sister. Usually, Nina snatched most of the family attention, received all the affection, and placed in a higher spot above her younger sibling, which would later spawn into a heinous grudge between them. Ridiculed by her family all her life and forced to stay hidden away in Nina's shadow, Anna's surging jealousy grew massively. Day in and day out, she loathed her sister, unable to stomach the love and care Nina had gotten as opposed to herself. Anna's rage had taken a step further after the unexpected death of her father. He meant the world to her, though he did not give her as much love and attention as Nina. Holding so much guilt against her sister, Anna blamed her blonde sibling as the culprit with Nina placing the blame on her instead. A vicious war soon brewed between them, and everyday became like a war zone through the fiery pits of hell. With every time they had an encounter, a fight broke out into a struggle for survival, and with every encounter, nobody won. The result would always be the same, a draw, with both sisters unable to land a crippling blow that would send the other to her deathbed.
Through her life, Anna would constantly meddle in Nina's affairs, often foiling her assassinations. When she was not doing that, she would work as a bodyguard for high- paying individuals. Coincidently, Nina and her seem to meet at every point and turn. Nina would be the hired killer and Anna would be the hired protector. The battles fought lasted for days, months, and even years, but it drove to a halt when Nina disappeared from Anna's life one day. Despite the hatred she had for her sister, Anna would begin to miss Nina over time. Not until later did she decide to want to kiss and make up with her sister, but Nina never showed willingness to do the same.
When Nina had lost her memory from the effects of the cryogenic sleep experiment, Anna tried to help her sister recover it, but failed in the attempts. Around then, Anna plotted to keep Nina from becoming an assassin again, so she could lead a more peaceful lifestyle. However, she did not get what she wanted and Nina returned to life as an assassin once more, while suffering amnesia, making Anna's dream of her sister becoming normal hopeless. In time, they met again, with Nina calling Anna's phone, seeking to piece together her past. The moment Nina saw the feisty brown-haired woman's face, her memory returned, and shots fired from her gun again.
Returning from the flashback and mourning her wounds, Anna retreated to the hotel she had left to pursue her sister.