Warning: Slightly disturbing content is contained in this chapter.

***
Gordon and Stephen moved closer. A while after they'd cornered her like a predator would its prey Ebun realized how scared she was. Her shaky hands were dug deep into the office desk. She was shuddering and frightened to her bones. Her teeth were chattering.

However, before she came into the consciousness of her fear, it had taken her a lot of effort to pull herself out of the memories that replayed itself like a cassette in her mind. Motion pictures of that afternoon thirteen years ago all came into full display; the twelve-year-old her walking back home from school only to realize that she was being followed by six men. She could see how the six of them had ambushed and pushed her into her father's house – her safe abode to destroy her life.

The memory of Gilbert's psychotic laughter and Gaius's words as he revealed all he knew about the mafia, the thousand other duplicated menacing grins of the gang members also flooded her mind, making her loose her balance and spatial abilities. It felt like she was floating deep down into a hellish abyss – one that tormented her mercilessly the deeper she plunged.

Tears were blocking her vision and sweat was dripping down her temples. Her palms had moistened and she could barely keep a strong hold on the desk behind her for support. An unseen knot had tightened her stomach, demanding a sudden need for her to defecate. When she became conscious of the fact that these two were really here and that she'd been gravely shaken by it, she could now feel a cold, large hand skimming its way forcefully up her right thigh.

Stephen, who'd been the fourth guy to rape her on that day had stepped really close now, Gordon was just around the corner too. Stephen was just a breath away from Ebun. And as his hands roamed her skin, Ebun could feel every pore crawl with irritation and terror. Even her body was sympathizing with her.

"It's been such a long time, Ebun," Stephen whispered in her ears once his hands found the line of her panty. "I'm sure you miss that special day. That can only be the reason why you've been trying so hard to find us. Don't worry, baby. We're here for you today. Today's going to be slightly different. We won't be doing it turn by turn. I will fill your holes from the front while Gordon fills the one behind," he chuckled dreamily. "Sounds pretty hot, right? I'm sure you can take two at once."

There was no way on earth that such a thing was desirable or hot to Ebun. In fact, if Sean had ever said such a thing to her, she'd slap the living daylights out of him. This was exactly what she was supposed to be doing to these bastards right now but for some unknown, detestable reason, she couldn't bring herself to move or say a word or even scream.

Granted, she'd been able to pull herself to consciousness so her immobility was not because she was dumbfounded or still in shock. She'd opened her mouth to say something – curses and repulsive words but those utterances just would not escape the walls of her tongue. She kept trying though but it felt as though, her tongue had been firmly tied up.

That was when she recalled a familiar experience where something like this had also happened. When Sean had pretended to kiss her in the bawdy house, the first thought on her mind had been to push him away out of sheer response to her trauma. For a moment, it didn't matter that he had been doing it to save them from the Russian police.

Still, she couldn't bring herself to even follow her impulse. And it was not because she relished the feel of his lips on hers. It didn't even matter that she liked Sean and she liked the idea of kissing him. It had just become a natural thing for her to be terrified by the feeling of having someone do something sexual to her. Sean was no exception to that. Indeed, she had been frightened for a brief moment that day and yet, she couldn't do anything. Now, it was the same thing.

Her entire body felt numb. She couldn't even use her fists, something that she was so skilled at. So she stood still even as the other guy, Gordon stepped in to stand behind her, assuming the position to smash her from behind. He was already unbuckling the belt of his jeans. Stephen was still in front of her and he was progressing pretty quickly.

Upon finding the lining of her underwear, he'd ripped it open and was making his way to insert two of his large fingers into her. It was in that horrid moment that the tripartite nature of the human being came into function. After all, humans were not only made up of a body. If her body was going to remain numb and not function, then her mind could as well come to her rescue.

Ebun! Fight these bastards and knock them down right now! You're not the twelve-year-old you! You can actually defeat these monsters if you decide to fight for yourself. Come on! Yemisi might not come on time to save you. So fight for your life otherwise you will get raped again!

The thought of getting raped the second time was effective enough to propel Ebun to action. Letting the same traumatic experience reoccur would be a massive insult to all her years of training and to Sean's tremendous efforts over her. Now that she really knew how to fight, affliction could by no means, under her vigilance, rise again the second time.

So she began to dart her eyes sideways, searching the desk behind her for any object at all. That was when her eyes landed on a ceramic mug. Perfect! It was their sheer loss that they'd forgotten to tie her hands. While Stephen was struggling to remove the buttons from her dress so that he and Gordon could fill all of her holes, Ebun carefully traced her fingers backwards to the desk till her hands found the mug.

Slowly, she picked it up with the intent to smash it on the head of any of them. But Gordon had seen her movement from behind so he snatched the mug from her hands and smashed it to the ground. Then, he crouched to the ground, letting go of her and suddenly focusing on something else as he searched through the broken mug pieces that now littered the ground.

After flinching at the sound of the cup smashing to the ground, Ebun was quick to pull herself together. She didn't give up in her attempts to fight for her life. Instead, she began to punch the face of Stephen who was in front of her, still struggling to rip open the knitted dress she was wearing. Suddenly, she was grateful for her choice of clothing.

However, Stephen wasn't willing to back down either on having his way with her now that he was already so close to doing so. Thus as Ebun continued to throw her fists in the air, aiming to batter Stephen's face into nothingness, he grabbed her by the scruff of her neck and began to strangulate her. Impulsively, Ebun resigned from fighting with her hands and brought them to the area of her neck, trying to remove Stephen's hand from her neck.

In the process, Stephen yanked off her two hands with his free hand and used it cuff her hands together behind her. So he was strangling her with one hand and weakening her means of defense with the other. Ebun started to cough loudly and her eyes became wet. Still unrelenting, she decided to look for another way to fight. Then she began to swing her legs this way and that, kicking him in the shin with each swing. Still, Stephen wouldn't loosen his grip in the slightest but Ebun believed that if she continued, perhaps she'd get him to budge. She'd rather die fighting.

However, as the grip of Stephen's hand intensified on her neck, Ebun didn't feel like today was going to be her lucky day. She regretted not coming along with her revolver. Also, heck! Why was her sister taking forever to come back from the kitchen?

Right now, she had to admit that she needed Yemisi's help to fight off these bastards even if it was painfully humbling to do so. Then a scary thought plopped in her mind. What if her sister had decided to leave her to protect herself since that was what she'd always advocated for? Yemisi wouldn't be wrong if she decided to do that to her, right? But hell no, Ebun realized that the seven years she'd spent training to defend herself and to fight suddenly meant nothing in a moment like this. No amount of fighting lessons could prepare her for her brutal death if it was fated to happen. Hence, she needed someone to save her.

"Damn, Gordon!" Stephen groaned. It seemed as though he was having a tough time holding Ebun down as the moments passed by. "Why is it taking you years to find the broken pieces with the sharpest edges?"

"It's so that we can decorate her body in a very gorgeous pattern. It's only the pieces with the sharp edges that can help us achieve that of course. That's why I'm taking my time," Gordon smirked from underneath the desk as he resumed searching for improvised weapons.

"I don't give a shit, man! This bitch is kicking me in the bollocks real hard and I need my little man intact to have a swell time today! Get up and come over here right now. I need you to grab these unfortunate legs of hers and stop them from moving. We need to put her on the freaking desk as soon as possible!"

Even though it was difficult for Ebun to move a muscle in her face because it was swelling up and inflaming due to a lack of proper airflow, she still managed to smile. She had to thank Stephen for being such a dunderhead by expressing his worries out loud in the presence of his 'prey'. If she could encourage herself to kick him even harder, perhaps his tight grip would loosen right on time before Gordon is able to find the sharp pieces.

"Aha! Found it!" Gordon rose from the ground and held up a sharp, medium-sized piece of the broken mug into the air, examining it like it were a piece of jasper from a far away mine. Ebun nearly cried out in frustration, upon seeing that she didn't even get the chance to fight harder one last time.

Gordon strode forward to stand beside Stephen so he could assist his ally in grabbing Ebun's legs and rendering her defenseless. Once they could place her on the desk, the rest of their struggles would become history. That way, they could easily remove what was left of any piece of clothing on her and smash her till the early hours of the evening.

This, however, would have been a successful plan if it weren't for the sudden, loud sound of three gunshots piercing through the air.

Ebun froze. This said a whole lot because being held so strongly by Stephen already denied her the opportunity to make much movement yet right now, she was really unable to move. Stephen froze too, finally loosening his hold on Ebun's neck and hands.

He shifted his gaze from his prey to his ally who was now laying motionless on the ground thanks to the three perforated holes in his chest that had been penetrated by the gunshots. When he turned to look for who'd just killed his ally, Ebun finally got the chance to see who it was too. And it was none other than her beloved older sister, Yemisi who was pointing a gun straight in one hand and holding a steaming, hot kettle in the other.

Ebun breathed out loud and sank to the ground in deep, unfathomable relief. As she closed her eyes, more tears flowed from her eyes in gratitude. Perhaps, God existed because he'd clearly helped to rescue her through her sister's timely appearance. She also mourned for what would have happened if Yemisi hadn't shown up just now.

"Ah! This is the person we even came for," Stephen threw a venomous smile at Yemisi. "How are you doing, most able barrister of the law? I guess I don't even need to answer that question because by the time I'm done making you pay for what you just did, you definitely won't be fine." Then he pulled out a pistol from the pocket of his saggy jeans and began to move towards Yemisi.

Now, it was Ebun's time to repay her sister. She could see that beneath the fearless and fierce look that Yemisi was trying to keep on her face, Ebun knew that her sister was frightened. Yemisi was a fighter too but her weapons were words. She was good with them. Words were malleable to her. But she wasn't so skilled with weapons or her fists.

Ebun knew that Yemisi had only tried her best to fire those bullets without missing her target because of the dire situation. So she had to save her before it was too late.

So she snatched the sharp broken piece from the hand of Gordon's corpse. Without wasting time, she moved forward, raised her right leg in mid air and kicked Stephen in the lower regions from behind. Within half of a second in which he'd fallen on his knees with the impact of the kick, she used the sharp edge of the broken piece to slash the skin of his back.

The fabric of his shirt ripped off in a long slanting line and underneath the clothing, the skin that had just contacted harshly with the edge of the ceramic ware also tore open, oozing out blood. With that, Ebun hoped faintly that she'd destroyed a fraction of Stephen's spine so he wouldn't be able to move again.

Yemisi who was facing him knew that Stephen could still turn to aim his pistol to shoot Ebun in retaliation to what she'd just done. So before he could even pick up his gun or do anything at all, while he groaned from the excruciating pain of having his back stabbed, Yemisi pulled the trigger and shot him across his chest.

This ultimately sent him lying flat on the ground, seconds away from dying.
Then Yemisi opened the lid of the kettle's hose and stood in front of Stephen's lying form, prepared to finish the work she'd started to utmost perfection.

"Who would have thought that I'd use the water from my kettle to do a thing like this?" Yemisi shook her head and for a brief moment, she looked at Ebun and said, "Sorry, Ebun. When next you come to my office, I won't waste the water on things like this. I'll prepare hot rice for you with the water instead."

Then she slanted the kettle in the appropriate angle and the boiled water in it began to pour out in torrents, landing generously on every part of Stephen's face. The steam from the hot water clouded the air and produced a thick fog. This action elicited loud weeping and gnashing of teeth from Stephen as expected.

Yemisi then moved in a slow, backward motion, ensuring to keep the kettle in the same slanting angle with every step she took. Thus the water flowed down to every other part of his body as well.

As Ebun watched this happen, still holding the mug piece that was now smeared with droplets of Stephen's blood, she could not quantify the joy she felt from seeing her sister do such a wonderful job in murdering the bastards. It particularly felt so good to watch Stephen die in such a terrible and agonizing way.

After the leader of the gang himself, the feel of Stephen's dick forcing its way into her on that day had hurt the most. It pained her so much that she was sure she was going to be torn into two. Prior to the occurrence itself, he'd even pushed her against the wooden bunk, causing the pointed nail hammered on the furniture to puncture a hole in her forehead. He was a major reason why she had all those scars on her face.

Ebun realized that watching someone fight this passionately for her gave her the same kind of joy that she always felt when she fought by herself. There was no single difference. It made her wonder why she'd always thought of it as a bad idea. Perhaps, going to Russia and coming back after many years was the only way she could have been able to see things from a different angle.

As at the time that the incidence had just happened, all she wanted was freedom and to be able to fight her battles for herself but now, watching this scene unfold before her eyes, she realized that having a team of people that were willing to carry your burdens for you was a much better thing. Fighting alone was so difficult.

Once Yemisi had ensured to pour all of the water in the kettle on Stephen's body, she resigned, leaving him to die. He was already swelling up and every patch of his skin was burning. Red blisters were springing out from its pores due to the effect of the intense degree of heat that had just been unleashed on him. And of course, the pain from the fired bullet in his chest and the slant, deep bloodied line from his back were also added to the intensity of the burns he was feeling.

The pain from those sources morphed together to create a living hell for him and within the next three minutes, Stephen breathed his last and afterward, joined his cohort, Gordon on their cursed journey to hell.

Yemisi dropped the empty kettle and the revolver to the ground and rushed to Ebun who was still standing and staring at the two dead bodies of the men who'd and had just been about to molest her again. She didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

Yemisi wrapped her arm around Ebun's shoulder and walked her to the sofa, helping her to sit. She began to examine Ebun's body in a frantic manner. She tipped her chin this way and that. The lines on her neck were sore and had taken on deep, bruised shades of red. Her wrists were also inflamed. When she noticed this, she began to panic.

"You're badly hurt! I need to take you to the hospital right now! Those damned dastardly demons dared to do this to you. I'll make sure the prison officers and the judge who freed them from prison pay dearly for this, I swear!'

As Yemisi continued to swear in a loud tone, Ebun stared into thin air with thoughts rushing through her mind. Again, those tears were gathering in her eyes. She touched her neck with the tip of her finger and applied a little pressure on it. She winced from the pain it produced.

Her throat hurt as though a knife had been stuck in her esophagus trying to cut its way through. Then she gazed down at her almost naked self, wondering why she'd chosen to wear a dress today when it wasn't even her usual style of dressing.

For once, she'd wanted to be like every other girl and look presentable in her visit to her sister's law firm. But it was obvious that she couldn't even do something as simple as that because now, the gown was almost ripped into shreds. Ebun looked back to her sister who was still expressing concerns that she'd deafened herself to a few minutes ago. Then she cut her words short with a genuine question.

"What took you so long?"

Yemisi paused, swallowed and then answered with heightened concern in her expression. "I was looking for bullets and I'd forgotten how to load the gun once I found a few in the kitchen cabinet. I don't even know why I keep those bullets when I don't even know how to fire them properly," she gave an awkward chuckle.

"But of course, it came into use today and I'm happy. You see, I can't even remember the last time I took someone's life – perhaps in a very rare situation like this. Also, in the process of trying to load the gun, I was contemplating whether I should just step outside with the kettle because time wasn't on my side and my delay was exposing you to more danger. But I figured that the kettle may not perform the sole job of killing two people. So I had to try my best to load the gun and put it in—"

"Thank you so much, Yemisi. I'm so grateful." Ebun pulled Yemisi into a fierce sisterly hug before she could even get the rest of her words out.

Yemisi closed her mouth for a while and simply allowed herself to be held dearly by her younger sister. As Ebun continued to sob, she patted her back lovingly. All she could feel in that moment was sheer relief that at least, her sister was alive and in her arms.

"You don't need to thank me," Yemisi smiled. "I swear to protect you and be by your side even if it requires that I spend more time familiarizing my hands with a pistol."

The hugging continued and so did the weeping. But slowly, the sobbing started to die down. Initially, Yemisi didn't put much thought into it because she figured that perhaps, Ebun wasn't feeling so teary anymore.

Until a few minutes later, Yemisi realized that Ebun wasn't moving. The feel of her hands were no longer so tight on her back. That was when Yemisi pulled herself away from the one-sided hug to check what was going on.

Then she saw that Ebun's eyes were closed and she was not breathing.

A WEEK LATER...

Ebun had just been freshly discharged from the hospital. The pressure that had been applied to her neck from the strangulation had caused an internal injury in her airway passage which made it laborious for her to breath. This eventually caused her to pass out.

Now though, thankfully, she was feeling much better after careful subjection to intensive care and she was safe in her family house. Ebun was making her way to the kitchen to prepare breakfast when Yemisi barged in through the front door with her assistant, Mr. Albert.

"What's going on?" Ebun whirled around, staring at them with a startled expression. "Did something happen?"

"No no. I'm sorry I scared you. I was so busy at the office that I forgot to stop by and check on you. How are you feeling now?" Yemisi asked, staring at the bandage wrapped around Ebun's neck.

Ebun took a deep breath and walked to the living room where she then settled on the armchair. Yemisi followed suit hurriedly.

"I feel better. My neck doesn't hurt as much anymore."

"I'm relieved to hear that!"

"I'm afraid I don't feel the same way," Ebun shook her head at her sister in disapproval. "Why did you go back to the office so soon? Aren't you scared that something bad might happen again?"

"I know and I'm also scared. But I had to busy myself with important things so you could have some space. I didn't want to talk about what happened so quickly."

Ebun sighed and closed her eyes for a brief moment, trying to prepare herself for this difficult moment. Truthfully, she too didn't want to talk about it. She'd tried her hardest to put it away from her mind while she was at the hospital but how could she possibly do so when the sharp pain from her throat was enough to constantly bring the occurrence to her remembrance?

"Well, I don't have a choice right now, do I? Time's not on my side." She said after a long while.

"The Black Vipers Organization is seriously after our lives right now," Yemisi stated.

"Clearly, they are. I realized it too. It's no coincidence that a few days after I interrogated Gaius about the rape, two members of the gang were released from prison and immediately came to attack us," Ebun observed.

"Also, I think they came for me in particular because I'm the one who's been doing all the interrogation. That explains why they came to my law firm. I'm sure the rapists were surprised to find you in my office too but must have been delighted that they could kill two birds with a stone. We need to be very careful right now."

"We need to protect Gaius too because I'm sure that right now, they are also looking for him and are after his life. It's a good thing you kept him in that well-furnished building. They won't find him easily nor suspect that he can be in a nice place like that."

"That's right. I'll have to stop going there for some time. They definitely have spies and hidden cameras watching. And since they know me, they'll watch my every move henceforth. I'll have Albert frequent the place instead." Yemisi turned to her assistant. "Whenever you go to the tenement, you should dress as though you're the owner of the building and have a few of your men accompany you."

"Yes, ma'am," Albert nodded.

"We need to be very careful about you, Ebun. What do you plan on doing?" Yemisi turned back to her sister.

Ebun leaned back on the chair and remained silent for a few minutes. Then she answered.

"This is clearly a move from the leader of the gang himself. He did this to warn me off – to tell me to stop playing this dangerous game of catch with him because I have no chances of winning. Despite how scary that is, the least thing I want to do is cower and back out. It makes me feel like I'm really close to finding this guy. Having Gaius spill out the truth definitely threatened him a great deal and he decided to fight by attacking you and I like that. Now though, I want to threaten him all the more because I must find him, know who he is and kill him with your assistance of course."

"I'm not even going to lie to you," Yemisi shook her head disapprovingly. "That sounds scary as hell. I don't think you should be doing that right now. When the two convicts came to my law firm that day, I overheard them telling you that you've been trying so hard to find them. The leader of the gang knows you're looking for him.

It's not wise to just keep searching and endangering yourself the more at a crucial time like this. You fainted the last time and see what's happened to your neck. Do you want to die? I think we should try to stay alive first. Then we can brainstorm how to fight the leader afterwards. We shouldn't be in a hurry to do risky things."

"Then when am I going to live my life? I can barely hold on anymore," Ebun said rhetorically.

Yemisi was right but her lack of patience didn't grant her the ability to conform to her sister's warning. When was she going to take her love life with Sean to the next level if she was still going about, looking for the monster from over a decade ago?

Speaking of Sean...

Ebun remembered the text she sent him over two weeks ago and swallowed in disappointment upon realizing that he hadn't even bothered to give her a call. Did he even read the text? Or he saw it but chose to ignore? The possibility of the latter made her heart pound painfully. Ebun couldn't tell which it was though, because she herself had not been able to use her phone for days. So she stood up and motioned to go into her room to get her phone.

"Ebun? Are you mad at me for what I said?" Yemisi called out when she saw Ebun suddenly walking out of the living room.

"Oh no. I need to get my phone," she explained.

When she got to her room though, what she saw on her phone definitely did rouse up some fury in her for several reasons. Apparently, Sean had texted back a few days ago but the content of the message was not what she expected at all.

Emergency! You may need to come back, Ebun. There's this new case of a notorious molester somewhere in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. A particular girl has been complaining to the police and even to us, the psycho barracks for a while now and she's been doing it secretly because she's scared that her molester will find out and attack her again.

I just figured you might be the best person to handle this operation because the girl reminded me a lot about you. So I want to grant you the joy of saving her. The molester's name is Curtis G. Levi.

***
I apologize if there's many errors in this chapter. I've been using my laptop to type lately and transferring the chapter to my phone might cause a bit of mismatches here and there. By the way, I've not even used grammarly in weeks so pardon me.

Yours Truly,

The Dream Elixir.