Part of her had expected to duck back in, already dodging a fusillade of bullets from slavering maniacs. That didn’t happen. Instead, she stepped out onto a dirty street, bordered on one side by her compound wall and on the other by run-down tenement housing. It looked rough, sure, but no more so than bad neighborhoods back in LA, without even any menacing individuals to add flavor.
She cocked an eyebrow at Iain, who casually stepped out, scanned the street, then inclined his head to her.
“Usually pretty quiet right around Luxholme,” he said, “your brother had a standing policy to shoot a wanderer or two every few weeks, keep people on their toes around here.”
“Well stop that,” Cora growled, horrified. Iain just shrugged.
“I’ll tell the boys iff’n ye ever get some, but dinnae go bein’ surprised when we get more riff raff at the door.”
“Better than corpses,” Cora muttered, wondering how what sounded like indiscriminate murder had gone unpunished.
EH, THE LAWMAKERS ROUND HERE WOULD SEE THAT MORE AS ‘ANIMAL CRUELTY’, AND PROBABLY NOT EVEN TAKE IT THAT SERIOUSLY
Ugh.
“Anyway,” Cora pressed on, “where are we going? This grocery run has ballooned into a full combat patrol.”
“Oh we’ll just be headed tae the Bazaar,” Iain said, starting to stroll… east? Down the street. “Should be able to get some vittles and find a place for these young ladies both, I reckon.”
Once or twice, Cora thought she saw movement in the windows of the buildings across the street, but the pavement itself remained deserted until the next block. There was clearly an unmarked border in place, because the city came alive 200 meters from her front door.
It wasn’t exactly a mass of humanity, people maintained plenty of space from one another, but it was a far cry from the desertion of her street. A few groups sat on stoops of yet more buildings that looked like they might topple at any moment, while others moved furtively, eyes locked onto Cora’s heavily armed entourage as they stepped past the invisible barrier.
Iain beckoned the two maids into the center of the group, and the armed members formed a box around them. These people didn’t look outright hostile, but they also looked desperate, and desperate was unpredictable.
“You two know anyone in the city?” Cora asked, trying to keep the women’s minds off the looks some of the men they passed were sending their way.
“Not the city, no,” said the one who had cowered. Her voice was as small as Tania’s had been, but didn’t carry the same mania. “but I might still have family outside.”
“Kind that would take you in?” Cora asked, relieved to have a thread to pull. She could already see just letting these two loose in the city would have gone poorly.
“Well…”
“The girl’s parents sold her to Linneus,” the stronger willed woman said. “Send her back there, and burning her Bond won’t’ve meant shit.”
“They what!?” Cora gasped, getting pretty tired of the kind of pearl clutching shock she’d only ever done in her earliest days doing soaps, but now seemed to be her main emotion.
“They did it out of love!” the girl protested, a little of that mania creeping into her voice. “they couldn’t provide for me, so they sent me to someone who could!”
“Someone who could provide porridge and a straw cot, alongside some of the most depraved treatment in Tyrinno,” the woman scoffed, and Hawk laughed.
“Lady, you got no idea about depraved,” she said. “Linneus was probably a shithead, died too quick for me to know, but I’ve seen his ‘dungeon’. It’s kid shit compared to my old gang’s hospitality.”
The woman looked shocked, then mad, then resigned. Still, she set her jaw and pressed on.
“Please don’t send her back to them,” she pleaded. “The girl doesn’t know what she’s saying.”
“I won’t, I promise,” Cora said, but looked between the two women. “though… what other options do you have?”
She’d been thinking of back home, where a couple clean women with a bit of money could probably find housing and work, or hop a bus to somewhere they could. So far, Cora hadn’t seen a shop that wasn’t boarded up, and while she might have expected to see some homeless people making a home of sorts for themselves on the streets, there was nobody that fit that kind of description. She also hadn’t seen so much as a horse drawn carriage, not even a burned out car, suggesting hitching a ride in Tyrinno would be a losing prospect.
She watched the women’s faces fall as they seemed to have all the same thoughts she’d just had. The smaller woman looked scared, while the strong willed one only ended up more galvanized.
“Listen,” Cora began, hoping this was the right move, “I’m not my brother, I’m going to change things at Luxholme! I—”
The woman spat at her feet.
“Fuck you, Linnea,” she snarled. “You can’t undo the scars on my back or my soul. Keep walking.”
Frustrated, but not having any response to that, at least not one that would carry any weight in reality, Cora turned her attention back to the road.
“What are those?” she gasped, an instant before Iain jumped into an alley and Hawk followed, pulling Cora behind her. The rest of the group scurried in as well, all of them pressing back up against the wall.
All Cora had seen was a glint of golden metal and an impression of pallid flesh before she’d been yanked off the road.
“What!?” she hissed, “Cops? Gangs?”
“Much worse,” Hawk whispered, a tension in her voice that felt foreign to its tone. “Oblates. Ain’t usually around here, but the baddest news in Tyrinno. You see em, you stay out of sight.”
A rattling, lockstep march had been steadily approaching their position, and as it reached them, Cora got her first good look at an Oblate.
The glint of gold came from circuitry inlaid across its body, crisscrossing it like metallic veins. That body itself though…. Well, it was a fuckin’ zombie. Cora had killed enough of them onscreen in enough different varieties that she knew one when she saw one. This variety in particular was dry and gaunt, and bleached white, like all pigment had been drawn out of it.
They didn’t move like zombies though. They moved with discipline, holding one arm to their chests like soldiers on parade for a dictator, their march just as measured and precise as that suggested.
“What are they?” she whispered.
“Government insists they’re Imperial Emissaries, enforcing the Emperor’s Law on a level us plebs can’t understand. Might be true, but if it is, those laws change daily, and the only penalty they ever mete out is death,” Hawk responded, voice low. Cora could hear her knuckles creak as she gripped hard onto her gun. “Doesn’t really matter. No one fucks with em. They have tech we don’t, guns that’ll turn you into smoke, somethin’ that makes em’ so tough I could empty this peashooter into one and not leave a scratch.”
YEAH, I HATE THESE THINGS. NOT WORKING AS INTENDED
What the fuck does that mean?
THEY’RE SUPPOSED TO PROSECUTE ABUSES OF THE SYSTEM, NOT OUTRIGHT ENFORCE THOSE ABUSES
That is not helpful!
I’M KINDA GOING FOR A CRYPTIC VIBE HERE, C, LET ME HAVE THIS
Fuck you.
“So what,” Cora asked, “We just…. Wait?”
“Oh aye,” Iain responded, “Can pray iff’n ye like as well, but I've never seen it do a body much good.”
OKAY, IF YOU’RE GONNA BE A BITCH ABOUT IT, HERE
[Imperial Oblate][Level 35 Animautomata(VII)]
[Str:200]
[Dex:200]
[End:220]
[Vit:80]
[Agi:4]
[Int:1]
[Will:1]
[Cha:1]
[Skills: {System Avatar}(c%r$$rup^7t@d)]
The words and numbers fizzled into existence around one of the Oblates, who stopped and looked at Cora.
Not fucking helpful! Cora thought, freezing under those sunken golden eyes.
SORRY! I DIDN’T THINK THEY’D NOTICE, THEY DON’T PAY ATTENTION TO ME AT ALL ANYMORE
After a frozen moment, the Oblate’s eyes left hers. It fell back into step with its brethren, stomping down the street and out of sight. Cora’s group let out a collective breath. Iain led them back into the street, and they continued on their way.
So what were those numbers? Looked like a video game.
I MEAN, YEAH, PRETTY STRAIGHTFORWARD
I KNOW YOU PLAYED A BUNCH OF WARCRAFT TO PLAY JAINA IN THAT GOD-AWFUL MOVIE, THAT’S NOT NEW TO YOU
No, you’re right, they made sense to me, but I don’t have a good baseline for any of that. You said I have stats?
[Cora Casanova][Level 1]
[Str:5+2(SP)]
[Dex:8+2(SP)]
[End:5+2(SP)]
[Vit:8+2(SP)+20(Nanostitch)]
[Agi: 8+2(SP)]
[Int:9+2(SP)]
[Will:15+2(SP)]
[Cha:26+50(seduction dependent)]
[Skills: {Star Power}, {Method Actor}]
Huh. Prettttty wide range there, kinda thought it’d all be tens or something.
NOPE! HAFTHOR BJORNSON WOULD BE A 10 IN STRENGTH, AND HUMANS DON’T REACH A 10 IN ENDURANCE NATURALLY
Not to pat myself on the back, but do they normally reach a 26 in Charisma?
ONLY ONCE BEFORE, AND FOR A VERY SPECIFIC TIMEFRAME. RDJ WAS A 26 IN CHARISMA FOR THE SHERLOCK MOVIES
Who the fuck assigns these ratings!?
ME!
Thought so. Assign those skills, too?
A LITTLE GIFT! FOR YOUR TROUBLE!
What do they, ya know, do?