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There's no decision to be made. All of a sudden Sophie is just there in her sparkly top, calling Hanna's name like a question in a scared, uncertain voice. A head-shaven german is flicking out a knife and moving towards her. Hanna throws the tall one face first into a container and bounds across the opposite wall to get between them.
His knife isn't very big, a nasty looking flip-out thing, but he wields it confidently. He stabs underhand towards her sides and head, trying to get in close or cut her blocking. She turns him away easily with careful forearm-to-forearm parries and slugs him in the face.
Looking pissed off, he comes at her again. A focused quiet has settled over Hanna.
By trading a block for a dodge she catches him by the upper arm, gets under it when he tries to bring the arm up, swipes the knife, slice, slice, slice across the chest a couple of times, spin him around and slit the throat and then stab- The german goes limp when Hanna shoulders him into the container, lifting him on the blade in his stomach to cut properly into the guts. She feels warm things bubble out underneath her grip. He wont ever take a step towards Sophie again.
Sophie who's just watched her cut this guy open. Hanna squeezes her eyes shut and thinks about the look Sophie gave her when Hanna informed her parents her mother had died from three bullets. The parents hadn't been amused but in the other girl's face Hanna had seen emotions she didn't even know the names of, but couldn't wait to figure out how to bring out as often as she could. She doesn't want to know what she will see in her face now. Stupid, stupid, stupid... Finding the willpower to open her eyes and look over is harder than anything she's done today, harder than choosing to leave Sophie behind in the van, much harder than any kill she's ever made. She's still standing there though, all big round eyes and trembling lower lip, lit against the dark wet asphalt like a heavenly apparition sent into this terrible place to witness and be appalled. The german corpse in the making slumps against her and she staggers backwards a step but doesn't break eye contact with Sophie. It's a frail thread binding her to a reality Hanna had only just been coming to terms with and she can't bear breaking it. Not yet, not yet, let me keep this a little while longer... There's a sound behind her and she knows she needs to turn around and face the other one now, right now, but all of a sudden she can't see the point anymore.
Either Marissa Wiegler is dead and it hasn't stopped anything anyway or she isn't and the only thing waiting for Hanna in Berlin is more bloodshed. She doesn't turn her head and Sophie is still there. Why isn't she running? Maybe she could hear Sophie say her name one more time, that might make it worth it to live a few more seconds. Maybe not sounding so wounded and scared as she did when she said it just now. Hanna becomes aware that the pounding beat that's been with her since she got that funny feeling on spotting the germans' jeep behind the van many hours before, gone since Morocco, is quiet again. That's good: Hanna prefers the quiet.
If she looks away she knows she'll hear it again, she can step back into the rythm of the kill as easy as breathing.
Sophie's brown eyes flutter. For an instant they're like they were when it was just the two of them under a blanket. Hanna remembers everything vividly, always has, but at this moment she remembers how soft Sophie's lips were like nothing she's ever remembered before.
Something harder settles across her gentle features, she doesn't look so confused anymore. Hanna likes that. Then Sophie's eyes shift and she cries out, “Hanna for god's sake, look behind you, there's another creep!”
She sounds scared but not like before. It is better.
Her warning frees Hanna from the spell. Whatever ephemeral lifeline she's been clinging to tugs strong again and she doesn't have to try so hard to keep it secure in her chest anymore. She sets her jaw, sloughs off the german and turns into a low stance. Her heart pounds in her ears once more when she locks eyes with the skinhead.
Even as they circle each other Hanna is aware of Sophie behind her. Not running, not fighting, just standing there and watching. Then there's the third german, the worst one who she hasn't got the measure of yet.
With papa it was never like this. She couldn't rely on him when hunting, he'd often let her fall as a learning experience. Hanna had learned her lesson well, parhaps too well for she had come to resent him whenever he did catch her. She'd learned to treat him like a threat because he was. Sophie is not a threat, Sophie is the opposite: a vulnerability. Dammit, why did she have to follow!
This one is bigger and stronger than the first one, she'd prefer to run. But Sophie is still here so she can't risk it. She'll have to finish it quickly before the last one makes his move because he'll certainly go for the invitingly helpless damsell standing around being distressed. This one is just delying her, trying to crowd her without closing the distance. He has a much longer reach than her and she will need a perfect opening to get close enough. She can't risk throwing the knife, it'd leave her too vulnerable if she misses and there's no way she could guarantee a hit without telegraphing it at this stage.
Her blood burns at the thought of being too slow. She screams at the big man, harsh and breathy. It makes him grin at her for some reason, she only gets angrier. The smell of blood is thick in the air, overpowering the scent of wet asphalt and rust. But Erik taught her well; she still doesn't rush.
When the man finally makes a mistake Hanna doesn't hesitate. When he shifts for a kick she shifts for a dive. When he lifts his leg she drops under it. When she comes she up catches him by the crook of the knee with the nasty little blade. Blood spurts all over her face when she slices the taught tendons. They snap like corded rope and the skinhead topples over, his grasping hands easily evaded as Hanna drops back away from him, back into her stance. He bellows abuse in german but she feels reasonably secure in assuming he won't be doing much moving around for the time being.
Without pausing Hanna checks on Sophie. The last german is right there behind her, hefting a steel pipe about to smash her head in. “DUCK,” she screams as she draws her throw-arm back. Sophie wails and squeezes her eyes shut and covers her head with her arms – at least that part Hanna appreciates – but she does duck.
The pipe-wielding man's eyes meet Hanna's as she snarls and hurls the knife towards the exposed side of his chest. He's already moving forward for his swing with his arms raised high, and she feels instant gratification at the fearful grimace that replaces his smug relish from the moment before.
There's a wooden thud when the blade buries itself in his ribcage, underneath his left armpit. He seems to pause mid step and then he falls forward, right onto Sophie's crouched form. Hanna sees his eyes go glassy and stop moving on the way down.
Sophie whimpers and curses and wails and sobs but the master german is well and truly dead. The one with only one functional leg is still breathing, though he's stopped calling her names. When Hanna turns back towards him once more see realizes why.
He's got a gun levelled at her, from right where he's laying on his back.
His skin looks deathly white underneath the bloodsmear and there's a dangerous glint in his shaded eyes. Whetever obligations or orders were keeping Hanna's life sacrosanct in his eyes would seem to have expired with his master.
Hanna throws herself down and to the side towards him while the pistol's rapports bounce deafeningly between the big steel boxes. She comes down into a roll and before he can train the gun on her again, she redirects her movement with kick. Her body moves like water to the beat of the gunshots and she lands on top of him, catching both arms in front of her and wrenching the weapon from his fingers with a crunch of bones and torn flesh. She only catches an instant of frantic, furious eyes sunken into a worn face before she obliterates it with two quick shots in time to her own heartbeat, one to his left eye and one to the opposite temple.
She screams right down into the steaming pile of brain and splintered bone between her thighs that used to be a person's head, pouring all of her disappointment and frustration into it. It takes a few moments for the ringing in her ears to stop and the pounding rythm of the kill to fade back into the background.