The soldier nodded.
"Do we have any feedback? From the citizens? The police? From anyone?"
The soldier shook his head. "We think she walked the main road towards the railroad tracks, maybe running. "There's plenty of room for her to hide."
Mike nodded his pensive nod.
"Should we send out a search party?"
Mike looked at the cell phone man who was still sitting on the bench, but instead of his cell phone, he held a bloody paper napkin in his hands. He shook his head. "No, she will manage to return to his dwelling with him or his corpse in the course of the night. We shouldn't be doing anything. Imagine she loses control of herself when she's hunted."
I'm sure Mike didn't want that after the sight in the basement. He went upstairs and called for his aide.
"Get all Target One's bank records by yesterday."
The man nodded. "Anything else?"
Mike shook his head.
Ibby had actually picked up the unconscious Hannes from the floor, put him over her shoulders, then ran up the stairs and had noticed upstairs that someone was still in the room, but couldn't see him in her hurry. She stepped to the side of chairs that stood in her way, glasses fell to the floor and made a hell of a noise. She stepped to the door and was worried that the person in the room would still fire at Hannes, she herself was not afraid of the bullets.
She looked around as she stood on the sidewalk, passers-by looked frightened at her, her bloodstained clothes and Hannes with the bloodstained back of his head. But since the passers-by did not run away screaming in panic, she could assume that nobody had noticed her strangeness. She immediately saw that if she ran to the right, she had to run up an embankment, but there were trains and tracks and lots of ways to hide.
After a short time, Ibby found a place on the railway tracks, homeless people had probably built a kind of tent here, rotten fabric, a few boards camouflaged with branches, but it was so flat that it was not immediately visible. She pushed Hannes into the stinky tent and crawled afterward. Hannes didn't move, he was still unconscious, but he was breathing. She felt the pulse, found it acceptable, waited. But it took another two hours until Hannes woke up and vomited immediately when he moved his head. He could see Ibby, but his gaze wavered back and forth. Ibby put her index finger on her lips. Hannes groaned. Ibby closed his mouth with her hand.
The machine
Ibby had actually managed to wait with Hannes until three in the morning at the railway tracks in the tent and then to get to Gingerbread Street on hidden paths, always careful not to encounter anyone. Almost impossible in Cologne, but Ibby made it. She also managed to sneak into the house with Hannes on her shoulders, lay Hannes in his bed and change. She packed the bloody clothes in a plastic bag, grabbed a lighter from the living room, briefly rummaged in the kitchen cabinet for something liquid that she could use as an accelerant and left the house again. After half an hour she was back, went into the bedroom and sat down on the bed next to Hannes.
Hannes had recovered so much that he could stagger to the bathroom, vomited, went back and fell asleep again with massive headaches. He didn't realize Ibby was treating the wound in her own way. When that happened, the skin was intact again, but the hairs on the back of the head was missing. She figured Hannes wouldn't be excited about it. She was expecting great difficulties anyway; she couldn't be sure if Hannes would have a mild amnesia from the concussion, he might have witnessed the blonde woman's killing and subsequent slaughter.
Hannes had witnessed Sabine's murder before his head hit the wall. But his headaches were too severe right now. He woke up again when Ibby had taken care of the back of his head, noticed she was sitting behind him, he was lying on his side. He stared at the wall, wanted to think, he felt a hand stroking his head, but wanted to sleep again, wanted to make all his thoughts disappear into the black again.
When Hannes woke up again, it was already noon. He felt good. He opened his eyes, stared at the ceiling. He didn't want to get up. It was Friday, he had the weekend ahead of him, after Ibby killed Sabine in the brewery cellar, and he didn't know what to tell Ibby or what to do. He heard Ibby in the kitchen, but he didn't want to see her. The unreal situation in the brewing cellar clearly came to his mind, he could still hear Sabine breathing and panting. When she reached her climax, her body stretched, a groaning could be heard, the bursting of the bones resounded through the room. A second later the lights went out on him, he remembered Ibby's hand with the gun coming at him. Then blank.
The next memory Ibby's face was in front of his, but he could barely see anything, everything was foggy, and everything was spinning. He lay down comfortably, stretched out in bed and shoved a hand under his head. Almost immediately he noticed that there was no wound on the back of his head, but there was no hair left. He sat up like a flash and palpated the back of his head with both hands. The hair was missing, probably from where he hit the wall. So, she took care of a pretty big wound. He sighed. His hair would not grow back within two days, over the weekend he could put on a cap, but Monday? Work and helmet mandatory, the colleagues would enjoy that tremendously. But whatever, Hannes decided he couldn't do anything.
He got up, took a shower, got dressed, then went to the kitchen. As usual, Ibby sat at the kitchen table, wearing only underpants, and waited. Hannes stopped. He felt trouble rising inside him when he saw Ibby. "Ibby, get dressed," he said and plucked his clothes, then pointed at her. She just tilted her head and looked at him. Hannes made himself a coffee and sat down with her. He had a lot of questions for her, but he only wanted to know one thing: Why did Sabine have to die? He did not know how to ask her, with which gestures and with which acting he should do, that Ibby understands his concern. But Ibby had already realized what was troubling him. She put her hand on his arm, but Hannes caught himself pulling his arm back and looking at Ibby angrily. She flinched a little. Amazed, Hannes looked into her face. Did she flinch? She'd never done that before. Ibby, however, had realized that Hannes needed some more information.
She made it clear to Hannes by short, precise acting that Sabine would have died anyway. Sabine would have died as the first person, then Hannes would have died, everything to catch her, Ibby. She would have prevented, gesticulated, that Hannes would have got a bullet in the head, and she would have given Sabine a good and quick death. But she also told Hannes that she wouldn't kill him.
Ibby bent over to Hannes, who was sitting at the table with an empty head, put her hand on his arm and looked at him intensely. Hannes was not convinced and leaned further back, moved the chair a little back and looked at the table, shook Ibby's hand off his arm.
"I'm gonna go to the store," said Hannes, "we need bread and cheese." He pointed to the rest of the bread and the fridge. Ibby nodded. He put on his jacket, grabbed his wallet and left the apartment. He found a letter from his company in the mailbox. It was a registered letter. He looked at the envelope in amazement, wondering who might have accepted the letter, who had signed it, then it was clear to him that his landlady had probably accepted the letter under a pretext. It was quiet in the hallway, but he suspected that Mrs. Sommer-Baumert was watching him very closely through her spy.
He opened the letter, read that he had been dismissed and that he was exempt from full pay for the period of notice, that one thanked him for his commitment and that he should please refrain from telephone or personal inquiries.
The door behind him opened, Mrs. Sommer-Baumert approached him in her housecoat. "Important letter, Mr. Rachmiel?" she asked him hypocritically. He put the letter in the inside pocket of his jacket. "Pay rise," he explained, opening the front door and stepping outside.
Before the supermarket, Hannes noticed that he had only a little money in the stock exchange and decided to look briefly at the cash machine. After he had the card in his electronic bowels, he told him that the card had to be confiscated due to a mistake. The customer should please audition at the counter of the institute. Hannes had the dull idea that he and Ibby were in m
assive trouble.
At the Sparkasse counter, his personal advisor told him that his account should have been temporarily blocked because of irregularities that would now be investigated. He was sorry, but at the moment no money could be withdrawn from the account.
Hannes left the Sparkasse with a dull feeling in his stomach. Hardly any money in the pocket, some cash, hidden as a reserve in the apartment, no more job, and the money in the account was not getting close. The rent was due in two days and the municipal utilities. Hannes had a numb feeling in his stomach and didn't know what to do. He turned around on the heel and slowly went home again. Suddenly he stopped, put his hand to his forehead, of course, he thought he should perhaps buy a newspaper to read what the press wrote about the incidents in the brewery cellar.
He bought two tabloids, because they were always the fastest, began to leaf through the street. He was looking for a report about what had happened, but he found only an advertisement of the brewery, the cellar was closed yesterday, because extensive renovations and alterations were in progress, and that one would be happy to welcome the guests again in two weeks at the reopening.
Amazed that he wasn't surprised, Hannes booted back into the apartment and informed Ibby that they were now broke and he had no more work. He also informed them that he would have to raise money for the rent and that in extreme cases they would end up on the street because his landlady would be a merciless woman who would not tolerate any delay in payment. Strangely enough, the communication of this information through speech, gestures, and acting worked so well that Ibby soon struck her hand in front of her mouth, made her laugh heard and wobbled her head. While Hannes stood sweaty and exhausted with a red head in the kitchen, Ibby cooed cheerfully.
She moved him to sit down and disappeared into the bedroom. She returned with the backpack she put on the table. She made the "pssst" gesture and opened the backpack. She pulled out a kind of wireframe that resembled an arm prosthesis and at the end had a kind of crystal, which she put carelessly, but with caution, to the side and continued to dig. Ibby revealed a series of garments and finally a black box that looked like a device Hannes knew. There was a device at the cash registers to check the authenticity of banknotes. It consisted essentially of a black case, small buttons were visible on the top, and a bright spot, probably a kind of sensor. Hannes bent over the device but was pushed back by Ibby on his chair. Ibby made it clear to him that he hadn't lost anything on the clothes, but then pressed the clothes, primarily underwear, into his hand and pointed to the bathroom. Hannes pulled the eyebrows up, but then went obediently into the bathroom and put the laundry to the other dirty laundry. Back in the kitchen, he wanted to sit down, but Ibby beckoned him to turn and pull his wallet out of his pocket. It contained two notes, a 10 € note, and a 5 € note. Ibby smiled at him and winked with one eye, which Hannes found very strange. She activated the device by placing a finger on the sensor on top, then pressing some heads. The device came to life with a soft hum. Ibby inserted the fiver into the device with pointed fingers, pressed three more buttons on the device and it began to rustle. At the other end of the device, banknotes appeared.
Ibby gave Hannes the notes, made a voilà gesture. Speechless, with big eyes Hannes took the money in his hand, checked it. Surprised, he noticed that the banknotes did not look new, but used. They had small cracks, smelled partly easily of beer, smoke and even a little of urine, had stains. These were, as far as Hannes could see, all used bills. He looked at Ibby in amazement. She smiled. She pointed to the serial number on the note Hannes was holding in his hand. Hannes checked the numbers of all the bills and found that all the numbers were different. He got up and went into the living room, dug in the closet for a while until he found the banknote detector pen he had bought ages ago. He checked every bill in Ibby's device and all the bills seemed real. A smile stole into his face, but Ibby closed his eyes, looked warningly. His smile disappeared. When he had a new coffee, he thought. Then he got up, grabbed ten of the 5-Euro notes and disappeared from the apartment.
It took him longer to come back, he had changed the money into a 50 Euro bill at Mustafa, the owner of the kebab stand, who had always complained to Hannes that his customers would always pay with 50€-notes.
Hannes gave the 50€ to Ibby, who copied it. With ten bills Hannes waved off, the rent would be secured, he thought, but Ibby made two more bills, then pointed to the refrigerator, right, they would have to eat too.
Then, Hannes thought, there would only be the problem now to get the rent by cash payment on the account of Mrs. Sommer-Baumert and the public utilities would also have to be paid. Hannes grabbed the money, pocketed it, but searched for the corresponding account numbers for about a quarter of an hour and moved away.
In another institute, he made referrals with a feeling of infinite relief. He passed a pub and decided at short notice to flush down the shock of his resignation and account closure with a few Kölsch. The pub was almost empty and so Hannes could think in peace about the absurd situation.
Great, he thought, if you could print your own money. The examination of the banknotes in the bank had shown that they were drawn without problems by the auditor. The money seemed real, and if you look at it closely, Hannes was rich. Slowly he crept into his awareness that such a small machine if used correctly, would confuse a lot of things. Just work one night with duplicating 500€, then distributing the money in the pedestrian zone, that would certainly create chaos. If the device would get into the right, i.e. wrong, circles, then these circles would try to understand the technology behind it, to rebuild it and to multiply huge amounts of money, to multiply real money. It dawned on him that this technique could have been a reason for the torture of Ibby. The device was there, but it was missing ... Hannes considered, perhaps the programming? If it was just the fingerprint, Ibby would've just cut off the finger. So, it had to have something to do with programming the device.
After the fifth beer, Hannes was convinced that the right circles had to have dozens of devices of this kind but didn't know how to put it into operation. In his head, there was something rushing, but he had the feeling that he had at least relaxed a little. But just a little. Hannes felt the need to simply drive away for a few days so that he could let the whole situation go through his head in peace. He had a female alien in the house, with whom he got along quite well, she did not frighten him. He had something strange at home and still wondered why nobody cared why they both left them alone.
He was surprised that the events in the cellar yesterday afternoon had not caused any reaction in the press. He admitted when he had paid and was reasonably drunk on the sidewalk, that he felt quite safe with Ibby at his side. But he pushed aside the thought that she had killed Sabine in cold blood, and perhaps that fate would lie ahead of him if she saw it that way.
Hannes slowly went home and kept thinking. During the last three weeks, he had primarily taken care of his work, he had identified himself with his job because this job was his livelihood and he did not want to think about his life any further. He had then found something that confused his life, but nevertheless improved it: he had someone at home who was friendly to him but did not want anything from him. He could go on living his life and was no longer alone.
Hannes briefly thought of the possibility that Ibby could feel alone among all the people who were strangers to her. He recalled the scenes where communication had taken place and Hannes felt that she was quite comfortable. He'd ask Ibby once, he decided.
In the hallway, he met his landlady, who acted with a dry mop as if she was cleaning. He walked past her and then heard her voice behind him: "The rent is due in two days, you know that!" He heard their scornful undertone, without turning around, he went up the stairs, said "All done" and went on. He knew she knew he'd lost his job.
Homesickness
When Hannes had entered the apartment, however, he knew that the problem was not the cumbersome transfer of the fixed costs or the cumbersome "money-m
aking", rather he had to think about Ibby and his relationship with her. It was, he thought when he hung up the jacket, but very difficult to go on living normally when someone is in the apartment killing without problems. She had told him that Sabine, the pretty blonde policewoman would have died anyway, but Hannes was not so convinced.
He had a lot of time in the next few days to "talk" to Ibby about it because he had no job at the moment and no other occupation that forced him to leave his home.
Ibby was in the bedroom when Hannes entered the apartment and Hannes went into the kitchen, smeared a few loaves of bread, fetched a few bottles of beer from the fridge and wanted to spend the afternoon and evening in front of the TV as usual.
Hannes flapped on the sofa, kicked the pillows into a corner, ate his bread, drank his beer and zapped indecisively through the channels.
He finally got stuck at a transmitter in which a well-known astrophysicist talked about aliens and was rock-solidly convinced that there had been no proven contacts so far and that the probability of contact with an alien intelligent life form was very small. Hannes listened to the lecture, shrugged his shoulders and thought to himself that it would be very interesting for everyone present if the professor stopped by his house for a beer. But to be honest, Hannes thought, I didn't have any proof that Ibby really came from the depths of space. It might as well be a kind of breeding, a hybrid, created by some unscrupulous scientists in a remote research facility at the end of the world.
His thoughts wandered. It surprised him, he was honest with himself, if one would disregard Sabine's murder completely, and also the strangeness of Ibby, so it was surprising that he felt no desire or better: the desire to get closer to Ibby. And: No movement of any sexual desires, although Ibby mostly walked around the apartment naked or dressed in panties. Ibby's physical charms could not be overlooked. The tight ass, the muscular, well-formed body, the tight breasts, everything in perfect symmetry and order, everything perfectly formed, did not trigger anything with Hannes. Hannes smiled that he would never let Ibby kiss him. The danger of becoming crazy was very great in this context.
E.B.E. 21- the Hunt Page 16