“Hey Mikki. What are you doing here?”

His face wasn’t friendly; in fact it looked very angry.

“It’s Nikki,” he said through clenched teeth. “And if you had just drunk that stupid cocktail like I planned, then I wouldn’t have to do this.”

“Do what?”

I shouldn’t have asked because he lunged at me and next thing, had started to inject my arm with some strange liquid.

As I struggled to rip the syringe out, out of nowhere, a man appeared and hit Nikki across the skull, from behind, sending him reeling away from me. But as Nikki staggered he whipped a gun out and fired a shot at the man, who I now was startled to recognise as Jones.

I ran as bullets flew.

What was that thing Nikki poked into my arm? And what did he mean by, ‘If you had just drunk that stupid cocktail like I planned’? Megan drank that cocktail. Was she okay?

The showdown had subsided and I chanced a glance at what was happening. Jones was lying on the ground, messed with blood.

“Oh my god, Jones!” I looked around to locate Nikki. He was staggering towards us, pointing his gun.

“What do you want with me?” I cried.

“You destroyed my life, Ketsu!” Nikki shouted.

Good Lord, this Ketsu had a lot of enemies.

“I’m not her!” I said for the umpteenth time. This was all getting tiresome now. Maybe all this crime-fighting stuff wasn’t as glamorous as I’d first imagined. Veronica Mars had her work cut out for her.

“Somebody is going to pay for killing my brother. Jakes has a virtual metal armour in the form of his muscle men, but you? You’re going to pay for him.”

“Wait,” I hesitated. “Your brother?”

“Yes,” he said. “I know Jakes murdered my brother and you helped him cover it up.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I told him. “But you have it all wrong. I’m not Ketsu. I just look like her. Ketsu is an undercover agent working from the inside to bring down Jakes.”

I saw the wheels behind his eyes turning in thought as he processed this information, considering if he should believe it or not.

“I see you are a victim in all this too, Nikki, but she’s right,” Jones said, trying to stem the flow of blood from his wound.

“Please,” I said. “We have to get Jones to the hospital. He’s an undercover cop too.”

Nikki’s eyes bulged in shock. “Let’s go,” he said, obviously deciding to believe me.

At the hospital Jones protected Nikki by saying it was just a random mugging and he never saw the assailant’s face. Luckily, he just had a flesh wound, but had lost blood.

We sat outside, waiting for some more tests to be run. We waited until the first light of dawn poked through the hospital window. I was drained, and woozy, so I lay down on one of the hospital benches most of the time.

“I’m sorry I tried to drug you,” Nikki said to me. He sounded like he really meant it. “I was so angry when I saw you with those people, laughing and drinking. I’d thought you were Ketsu – enjoying life while my family and I suffered. My anger clouded my judgement. I posed as that waiter in order to drug you. I wanted to use you as bait to draw Jakes out.”

“It’s alright,” I yawned. “Don’t be too hard on yourself. It all turned out fine.”

“Argh,” he sighed. “This whole Jakes business has got me doing things that the old me would never do in a million years. I don’t even recognise myself.”

“I’m sorry, too. About the loss of your brother,” I said.

“He was a great man,” he said sadly. “He took care of our whole family. And now that he’s gone, it’s my responsibility. I was just trying to look out for them by avenging my brother.”

“The best way you can look out for them is to set a good example,” I said. It surprised me that I sounded so wise.

“Today is my wedding day,” I told Nikki, all of a sudden aware of how time was passing.

“What? You have to go!” he said. “I’ll wait here with Jones. It’s the least I could do.”

“But,” I said. “I’m not sure if I really want to get married.”

***

Tell us what you think: Nikki believed that “Revenge is sweet.” Is this proverb true or false? Would killing Jakes and Ketsu have made him feel better?