Someone behind the lady applauded. “I'd like to shout bravo, but unfortunately some aspects prevent that,” a familiar voice added.

  Evelyne gave a startled cry and tried to wriggle out from under the assassin's corpse as quickly as possible. Still half lying on the ground, she turned around. One of her teachers was standing less than two meters behind her. She gasped for breath.

  The teacher looked at the scene before him, sighing and shaking his head.

  “I actually thought I made myself clear enough in class,” he then began, "the use of the credit card has to be carefully considered. It's your last line of defense, not your first. What exactly didn't you understand about that?"

  “Hey, I was scared to death!” protested Evelyne, “So it's understandable that I should use what I have at hand!”

  “There would have been countless other ways to deal with this situation,” growled the teacher.

  "Yes, of course! For you progamers! But not for me!"

  "At no point were you in serious danger! I was only two meters behind you the whole time. Over there on the dune, the boss is juggling at least five credit cards again... don't even look, otherwise you'll end up using that as an example. And we also have your friend with us, where is he right now - ah, he's back there killing the escort of your assassin."

  “You were there the whole time and didn't help me?” cried Lady Evelyne indignantly.

  The teacher grimaced mockingly: "We would have done that if you hadn't been able to handle the situation on your own. Don't worry, we know we can't let you walk around on your own. Because then some kind of disaster will happen! But as you can see, you managed to sort it all out without any help, albeit in a way that was, how shall I put it - horrible? ..." - he closed his eyes in agony.

  “RxW style,” the lady replied promptly, “fast, hard, brutal, but effective.”

  “Horrible,” the teacher whispered, "absolutely horrible. Do you remember what I told you about beauty, elegance and aesthetics?"

  "Yes, very well. And if I had tried to solve this beautifully, elegantly and aesthetically, I would be dead now!" complained Evelyne, trying to get to her feet.

  The teacher held out his hand to help her. “However...” he grimaced in disgust, "please don't ever slit the throat of someone who is lying on top of you again. And with whom you are in an eye-to-eye position. It makes an unbelievable mess. You look absolutely awful."

  “Thank you very much!” said Evelyne, deeply offended.

  "It wasn't ladylike in the slightest. And it was miles away from what I was trying to teach you. The ink on your certificate for the first sharp edge on the credit card isn't dry yet, and you're already putting it in... unbelievable. Please freshen up, you need a shower and you should change your clothes. I expect you in the classroom in fifteen minutes for a meeting with maneuver critique and feedback."

  He gave her a brief nod, turned around and disappeared.

  Evelyne tried to ignore the unpleasant feeling of being showered in blood and ran as fast as she could towards the clan castle. She was worried. What the teacher had said didn't sound good at all... he seemed seriously angry with her.

  Damn! What could she do for getting into such an awkward situation?

  She had tried so hard all through GW to get an “A” in the overall assessment, and now she saw her chances dwindling like ice cream in the sun. Today was definitely a deduction. Damn! She couldn't tell Zax about this. He would laugh his head off and gloat, making mocking remarks about “Miss Nerd-in-Chief” who had failed just before the finish line. She frantically thought about whether she could come up with a few good excuses. Maybe she could blame someone for the whole misery? Maybe the boss - the boss was always to blame! - actually a very good idea! She could say that she had taken the boss and his way of using the credit card as an example. Unfortunately, she had a bad feeling that the teacher would not accept this excuse.

  So, deeply worried, she ran into the clan castle. Mamydona, who met her in the corridor, was startled: "What's happened to you? You look absolutely gruesome, like a character from a horror movie!"

  “Thank you very much!” said the lady bitterly, "You're the second person to tell me that today. It's certainly not every woman's secret wish to look absolutely gruesome and like a character from a horror movie. Unfortunately, I didn't get to choose today. And now I have to get in the shower really quickly."

  She quickly gathered a clean change of clothes in her room, wrapped her long hair around her wrist and then put it up in a quick topknot on top of her head. Then she hurried to the girls' shower room. And because she was so preoccupied with all these actions and constantly thinking about her overall assessment, she made the next mistake: she once again failed to pay attention to her surroundings.

  She did not notice the shadow in the wall niche in the corridor in front of the girls' shower, nor that it followed her silently as she hurried past. In the washroom, she didn't notice a waiting person discreetly and almost invisibly materialize in front of the door. And as she stood in the shower, she didn't notice the soft click as the door was gently opened and closed again and that someone had entered the washroom.

  She stood behind the shower curtain with her eyes closed and let masses of water trickle over her body - hearing nothing, seeing nothing, not noticing the ever sharper and larger shadow approaching the curtain from the other side. Only when the curtain was torn aside did she open her eyes in shock. But by then it was already too late.

  The next black-clad assassin was standing right in front of her. And she herself was stark naked! The situation couldn't have got any worse.

  The guy let his eyes wander over her naked body with a grin and didn't give her a chance to at least reach for a towel.

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  "You were lucky earlier, lady, but not anymore. Say goodbye to your life. Now even the credit card in your bra won't help you - without a bra. And without a credit card, you're all helpless." He laughed dirty and drew his knife.

  “You're just as much of an idiot as your predecessor,” hissed the lady, "it's a rule to always have it with you. Always!" She grabbed her topknot with her right hand and pulled out the credit card in one swift movement. Her long hair fell down her wet back and the next moment a scream came from the girls' shower that could be heard throughout the clan castle.

  ____________________________

  "It's been less than twenty minutes since I told you not to use the credit card carelessly. And that it's your last line of defense, not your first. Why are you doing it again?" the teacher's voice rang through the closed door.

  “Please what?” roared Lady Evelyne from the bathroom, "you're not serious now, are you? I almost get murdered in the shower and the only thing you can think of is lessons?"

  "No, of course we want to know how you're doing! But you were in no serious danger at any point!" Dylan's soothing voice interjected from outside.

  "Because you're always looking after me, aren't you? But this is the girls' shower! You couldn't keep an eye on me because this is a taboo zone for you! And now don't you dare come in! I'll report you all for sexual harassment if you do!"

  "Now don't get so upset. We've taken precautions for everything..."

  "I don't see any precautions here! I was all alone in the shower with that bastard!" cried Lady Evelyne indignantly.

  “You weren't,” said Black, stepping out from behind the towel rail, "I'm a girl too, so I was allowed in here. I was here all the time."

  “Your gender segregation is completely fucked because you're all gay anyway!” the donkey shouted outside the window, trying to make out anything through the frosted glass.

  Black rolled her eyes: "You stay outside, donkey! I was here the whole time. We would have intervened in time."

  “When would ‘in time’ have been?” Evelyne almost cried, “when I'm dead?”

  “No, it would have been in time,” Black said consolingly, "you're just in a bit of shock right now. Two assassination attempts in less than half an hour is a bit much."

  "I wasn't even wearing anything! In the end, the guy took photos of me!"

  "He wouldn't have gotten far. I would have caught him here in the bathroom. And if he'd actually got away from me, just in case, Thundy and Bio were standing outside the door the whole time. Then they would have finished him off."

  “Tell me,” Evelyne hissed, "could it be that this was all a totally coordinated plan? I'm beginning to think that Thundy ordered and paid for these assassins. So that I could learn something and you could have a bit of action. Could that be?"

  “We're not quite that bad,” Black said reassuringly, "even if the 641 will tell you otherwise. As I said, you're a bit in shock. And we haven't even got a dry towel or dry clothes in here..."

  “Yes, it looks like the butcher's slaughterhouse and there's a corpse on the floor,” added Lady Evelyne gloomily, "and outside in the corridor are my boss, my teacher and my training manager, who will no doubt all want to see me later for a ‘maneuver critique with feedback’. I can probably forget about my ‘very good’ overall assessment because I've used my credit card inappropriately twice as my first line of defense, I look terrible and I don't even have anything to wear. Can this day get any worse? I'm afraid not."

  “Can one of you guys get a dry towel?” Black called out through the door.

  “We can help dry off!” screeched a whole group of Thunder brothers outside the window, who had gathered together in the meantime, attracted by the scream and the general excitement.

  “Why am I not surprised,” Black muttered and sighed.

  “And if Zax finds out, I'll have to listen to nasty remarks about it until the end of GW4,” Lady Evelyne whined, "he'll laugh his head off and make one joke after another about my nerdy behavior, which has totally failed! He must never find out, please promise me you won't tell him!" She looked at Black pleadingly.

  “I won't say anything,” Black replied reassuringly, "he won't find out from me. He's over at RxG now, so he won't have noticed. - By the way, that was cool with the credit card in the topknot! You really have to teach me that updo with the credit card as a hair pin."

  "Some people even put their hair up with a Chinese chopstick. So I tried it with the credit card and got it right after practising a few times. Where else are you going to put it in the shower?"

  “Most people just put it between their teeth, including me so far,” Black laughed, “except Candycane, who supposedly sticks it up his ass.”

  Lady Evelyne closed her eyes and groaned in horror. "Please don't! Now I have a movie in my head. When I open my eyes, I see the carnage here, when I close my eyes, I see Candycane in my inner eye, taking the credit card... *argh*! I don't know what's worse right now!"

  Black gave her a worried look. “Where's the towel, guys?” she yelled outside through the closed door.

  “Useless, utterly useless,” Lady Evelyne grumbled, “Lipsyte's right, they're all utterly useless.”

  She took two steps towards the shower and reached for the shower curtain. "I've had enough now, I want to get out of here. I want to dry off and I want to put some proper clothes back on!"

  She tore the shower curtain from its ceiling anchoring and draped it all around her like an extensive medieval robe, then marched angrily to the door, yanked it open and strutted past the crowd waiting outside with her head held high, deeply offended.

  "Yes, I know I look terrible. Yes, I know I'm supposed to come and talk to each and every one of you later. Yes, I know it was the wrong buttons again. And I don't care! That you just know!"

  Thundy grinned, “None of us just said anything.”

  "But you thought! And you giggled too!" The lady was definitely deeply offended. "And by the way, there's a corpse on the floor in there. I've heard that there are specialists here who are familiar with the professional disposal of corpses. So if the specialist staff present would please take care of it... I'm going to put some clothes on now!"

  Angrily, she rushed down the corridor towards her small library, dragging the extensions of the wet shower curtain behind her like a train.

  Thundy looked after her with interest and then turned to his boys: “Did I just see that right - was she barefoot?”

  ________________________________________

  On the night of the following day, all was still right with the world at the city limits of 656. Two lovers were sitting on a bench in the moonlight, holding hands and adoring each other. The cool Maximilian, who suddenly wasn't so cool anymore, played with a few strands of his companion's blonde hair. She giggled enticingly and whispered: “But I'm just a little bunny!”

  “You're the coolest bunny in this bracket,” Maximilian declared with conviction, "and all the boys in my town have a crush on you. You have so many admirers here - they all know you from the SC."

  Bunny Bunz giggled again and rested her head on Maximilian's shoulder. "Actually, I don't care how many admirers I have. I just want you."

  Maximilian beamed. “Does that mean you're coming with me?”

  “Now, here, today?” Bunny was a little surprised. She hadn't wanted to make the decision quite so quickly. On the other hand, her own faction, and with it a large part of her city, was falling apart and the future was uncertain. So why not throw her heart first and jump in after her?

  "Yes, here and now. I want to experience paradise with you - in the city of 641. We have a beautiful church there too... and yes, I know it's a bit early... but for the future... you could get married there too."

  Bunny's breath caught in her throat. Cool Maximilian was in love, but how!

  “But that's really only a thing for the future,” she smiled and wiggled her ears gently, which she was particularly good at. "But experiencing paradise sounds wonderful. I'll come with you."

  Maximilian would have liked to cheer loudly if it hadn't drawn the attention of the city guards. So he left it at a long kiss for his sweetheart and then they ran off. Hand in hand, clutching the activated international relocator close to them, they ran across the moonlit meadow towards the city of 641.

  Hitchcock 2.0

  (Illustrator: Gladyus from 656)