With just one hand, JJ shoved me away from the laptop, then operated it to pull back the article about Matsuda's case.
According to the police, this Japanese politician was a professional judo athlete, so attacking him alone without resistance was extremely unlikely. But who would have thought that the opponent would be a monster like this?
"Let's start with this case." She suddenly turned toward me.
"How did you attack him?"
"One stab straight into the neck, from above. He was tall and big, so it made things a bit difficult. And to create surprise, I had to use 'it'."
"Morgan?" I asked again. "You mean the weapon you dropped?"
JJ shook her head.
"No. 'It' is not an object. 'It' is me."
She pointed at herself.
"What do you mean by that?"
"It would be very difficult to do this cleanly in the real world. So I…" At that point, JJ suddenly opened her palm. "Used another space."
"Used what?" I immediately asked again to make sure I had not misheard.
"Another dimension. One I created."
"Wait."
I quickly walked to the closet, found a few cotton swabs to clean my ears carefully, then leaned close to JJ's mouth.
"One more time. What did you use?"
"Space! I used space." Her voice carried a bit of irritation. "Tch. Where are the knives in this house?"
"Calm down, girl. Why are you always trying to stab people? And you are joking, right? What do you mean 'using space'? What, are you Doraemon or something…"
JJ's face went slightly blank after my words. She clearly did not understand the joke, so her expression turned a bit annoyed. Then suddenly, she stood up and raised her voice.
"You don't believe me? You saw it yesterday yourself. Did you forget?"
"When?" I asked again.
"Uh… when was it? Maybe when I tried to ambush you, or at the bus stop."
Her vague way of speaking only made things more unclear. But then, I suddenly remembered the first moment we faced each other, and also when we met that assassin at the bus stop. Many strange things had happened at that time. Something had disappeared back then.
The smell of the air.
It was very hard to describe that smell in a way others could understand. But for someone with a special sense of smell like me, perceiving it was completely normal. Since childhood, my nose had always been able to detect scents that ordinary people could not. Sometimes, those scents were so strange that no words could accurately describe them. And the smell of air was one of them.
It had disappeared for a brief moment. And because of that, I froze. A strange sensation I had never experienced before, and all I could do was watch without being able to act.
Was that "space"? I did not know either.
"You remember now?"
JJ's question cut through my thoughts.
"A little."
"Oh? Then do you believe me now?" She eagerly leaned forward. "Yeah, I used that ability to kill all of them."
Still, there were things I did not understand. After a few operations on the laptop, I pulled up the footage of Janethan Morlyn's case and played the clip showing the girl collapsing. Three seconds. That was the entire duration. Then I turned the laptop toward JJ for confirmation.
"Three seconds. What did you do in those three seconds? Don't tell me this video was edited. I am certain this is the original."
"Too blurry…" She frowned slightly at the screen. "I remember that jacket. But I don't know how long it lasted… I was a bit carried away back then. But that girl ran pretty fast, you know. I had to play with her for a while before finishing her."
From the way she described it, this was not something that could have happened within just a few seconds like in the video. If it was not edited, then there was still another possibility. Even if it sounded illogical.
"Do you understand your 'space' ability clearly, JJ?"
"No. I just know how to use it."
"Then how long do you think it took to kill Janethan? Try to remember. I need to confirm something."
She raised both hands, muttered while counting for a while, then held up eight fingers toward me.
"About eight minutes. I think so. I chased her for eight minutes in that 'space', and she couldn't escape from it."
I swallowed after hearing her answer. It seemed more complicated than just "controlling space" like I initially thought. There was a possibility that this "space" was completely independent from our dimension, even in terms of time.
Right now, there were hundreds of questions in my head about this so-called "space". But I was also quite sure this girl knew nothing much about it either. Just looking at how she sat there picking her nose was enough to tell.
And after everything we had talked about so far, there was still one thing I did not know.
Who was she?
A serial killer. The one who almost killed me. My savior. And now, my roommate.
But I still did not know who she was.
Where did she come from?
Why did she have these abilities?
And why did she try to kill me?
"Anything else you want to ask?"
JJ stretched, then curled up on the floor like a large cat. Because of the movement, some wounds on her arm and shoulder reopened, and a bit of blood seeped out.
Tch. If this keeps going, the whole room will get dirty.
"Who are you?"
I did not know why I asked that question out loud. And her answer was.
"I'm JJ."
A meaningless answer. Yet I could not help but smile. Because I had already felt that she would answer like that.
"Then, JJ, where are you from?"
"I honestly don't know." She shook her head. "I only remember killing a lot of people to escape from there. And they used everything to stop me. But… I'm pretty sure there are many people like me there, and different from you."
"Like you?" I asked again.
"Yeah. Like me and that guy earlier. Um… you could say your reflexes are quite slow, and your strength doesn't compare to ours."
Suddenly, she showed a smug smile, and it irritated me a little.
"Sorry for being human. You guys are great, bending metal like noodles."
"Awkward. But you don't look very surprised. Normal people without preparation would scream and run away when they see us. You're different."
"Yeah." I replied. "This isn't the first time I've seen people like you. People like you are the reason I came to this city, JJ."
There were things I did not want others to know, especially people I had just met. But with someone like JJ, I felt like I could say a few things. A little honesty to gain trust.
Srimnet. A city full of mysteries.
I did not like mysteries. They were exhausting to think about. But someone had died because of this city. Someone very important to me. And only by coming here could I uncover the truth behind her death.
I had done everything I could for years just to get here. And now, the first clues were appearing. I had met someone like her in this city.
That person was JJ.
"Nice! So you like people like us?"
She smiled brightly.
"Mutants? I'm not sure. But JJ, does the name 'MI Institute' mean anything to you?"
Her face stiffened for a few seconds, then quickly relaxed.
"MI? I don't know. But 'Institute', I think I know that. That guy we met in the alley earlier, he came from the same place as me. They call it 'the Institute'. Somehow, I escaped from there, and now they're trying to capture me again. Pretty annoying."
My heart almost stopped after hearing her answer. My body temperature rose, my face felt hot. An indescribable excitement froze me in place, while my hands and feet turned cold.
Just a little more.
I want to get closer to the truth of what happened four years ago…