Tania’s grip became iron when Cora tensed at the voice's interjection. She forced herself to relax, and Tania’s fingers resumed their absent massage after a moment.
A diagram of Linnea’s body sprang into being in front of her.
YOU’VE HAD SOME WORK DONE, GIRL!
[CYBERNETICS: NANOSTITCH TRAUMA BOTS, REACTIMAX IMPLANT, SMARTLINK PALM, APHRODISIA GLANDS]
What the fuck?
PERKS OF BEING NOBLE! HEAL QUICK, BULLET TIME, TARGETING RETICULE, AND A LITTLE HELP WITH SEDUCTION.
Why… why the fuck do I have supersoldier implants? Based on who Linnea was, the daterape organs make sense, but everything else….
LINNEA HAD PLENTY OF PARTNERS THAT WERE LESS THAN ENTHUSIASTIC ABOUT HER ATTENTION
THAT SAID, THE REAL REASON SHOULD BECOME CLEAR PRETTY QUICK AFTER YOU LEAVE THE COMPLEX
TYRINNO IS NOT A SAFE PLACE
Great, I’m in Dredd but with plantation era politics.
LOL, PRETTY CLOSE! EXCEPT THE AREA YOU’RE IN DOESN’T EVEN HAVE JUDGES. STILL A CRIME THEY DIDN’T CAST YOU AS JUDGE ANDERSON, BTW
Eh, Thrilby nailed it. Urban would have outshone me anyway, don’t know how the man does it.
“Cora,” said Tania, voice absent and dreamy. “It’s a very pretty name.”
“What? Uh, thank you,” Cora said, coming back to the reality that she had an, understandably, unhinged woman with her surprisingly strong hands very nearly around her neck.
The door to the room burst open, and Mike strode in. A few people filed in behind them, and from their bearing alone, Cora could tell he had assessed ‘the unbroken’ correctly. Save for one that surprised her.
The girl from this morning, the one Cora had woken to between her legs, was the last in line. But her eyes were different. She still hunched, but not flinching, instead she prowled, like a predator. When her eyes fell on Cora, they flashed red with rage, and she charged.
Before she could get more than a step though, an enormous hand grabbed her by the neck, stopping her in her tracks. Cora’s gaze followed that hand, covered in rough tattoos, up a massive forearm just as inked, that disappeared into the rolled up sleeve of a boiler suit. Her eyes tracked up, up, and a little more up, to the face of a smirking giantess, sharp face crowned by an undercut raven mane, haphazardly shot through with crimson highlights.
Cora felt a little heat in her belly, and she admitted to herself: Okay, so, I have two types.
“Hold on there, Kyra,” the giantess said. She had to be 7 feet tall, and sounded every inch of it. “Can’t have her all to yourself. Let Mike clear things up, then once he’s done being delusional, I’ll help you start pulling fingers off.”
“Tina—”, Mike started, but was immediately cut off.
“Hawk,” she corrected, a casual tone of warning in her voice that chilled Cora to the bone, without it even being directed at her.
“Fine, Hawk, I understand how this all sounds, but look in the fireplace.”
There had been a lot of papers, old and thick parchment, and they hadn’t all burned away. The corner of one was still legible, Kyr- visible just before it burned away.
“Fuuuuuck,” the giantess, Hawk, breathed. “Those… those look real.”
The girl in her hand, Kyra, had her eyes locked on the scrap of paper, watching her name vanish into ash. When the last letter burned, her eyes flicked back to Cora’s, then the fire, and returned. That rage was still there, but now… confusion. Maybe even a little hope. Then her eyes fixed onto Mike.
“Mike… this is real? This bitch really burned them? I thought we were just finally fucking doing this but…. We can leave,” Kyra said, breath coming harder and faster with every word, before her voice devolved into an animalistic growl. “We can rip her limb from fucking LIMB and LEAVE.”
She jerked towards Cora again, but Hawk must be as strong as she looked, because the smaller woman didn’t move an inch.
“Ay, ay, cut it out short stuff,” scolded Hawk. “Ain’t sayin’ that ain’t what we’ll do, but no point not hearing her out first. Plus, looks like Soldier Boy over there hasn’t decided what side he’ll throw down on yet.”
The man she nodded towards had been the one to follow immediately after Mike on entry, and would have commanded attention himself, were it not for the psycho bed warmer and giantess. He was probably tall, but those kinds of things were hard to gauge when Hawk was in the room, and he had the kind of bearing Cora immediately clocked as military. A little on the older side, but he held himself exactly like a lot of the consultants she’d worked with throughout the years, and if she wasn’t mistaken, he was wearing a perfect example of the ‘NCO stache’. Tough to describe how it was different from Mike’s own lip lounger, maybe it was all in the bearing.
He was also wearing carapaced combat armor, sort of a hodgepodge between stormtrooper gear and the plate carrier style armor of the armed forces back home, and had an assault rifle slung over one shoulder. Keen dark eyes, with plenty of wrinkle at the edges, flitted back and forth between Hawk and Cora as his finger stroked the trigger guard.
“Tha’s about right,” the soldier said, slowly, a broad brogue coloring his words. “Mayhap I been a slave, but I were the paid kind, and I been paid to keep Linnea here safe.”
“More than you think we can loot from this fucking hell house?” snarled Kyra. She looked like a tiny dog that had overestimated its weight class, pulling at Hawk’s fist like a leash.
“Ayup, I’d say so,” the soldier responded, giving a slow nod without letting his eyes leave the duo for an instant. “Tryin’ to figger oot iff’n Linnea will actually have the means ta pay that out tho, now she’s gone and burnt everythin’ what made ‘er valuable.”
TECHNICALLY, YOU CAN!
“I can.” Cora said, with the well practiced confidence of a world class actress. She put on the Jane Thick face, the one that looked dangerous but gave away nothing. It wasn’t that she’d decided to trust the voices in her head, more so that she didn’t see many other options in this scenario than getting the soldier on her side and figuring the rest out later.
HURTFUL! YOU WILL NEED TO FIND THE CASH THOUGH
THAT SAFE HAD ABOUT 20K IN IT, NOT SURE WHERE YOUR BROTHER STASHED THE REST
“Aye, I trust ye can,” the soldier nodded again. “your brother was savin’ up for sumthin’. I dinnae ken what though. Easily enough to pay my salary fer now, but I ain’t getting it out the bank without yer face sayin’ it can be so.”
OH YEAH, BANK MAKES SENSE
What can and can’t you see?
DEPENDS! AND HEY, THANKS FOR TREATING ME LIKE I'M A PERSON!
Even if you’re a fun new form of insanity, you seem like one I can negotiate with. Might as well have my multiple personalities start off on good terms.
VERY DIPLOMATIC!
“Precisely,” Cora said, agreeing with the soldier. A plan was starting to form in the back of her mind. “That holds true for all of you. Yes, you can kill me and walk out of here. I don’t know what fate would await you, but I can guaran-goddamn-tee that it will be less pleasant than I plan to make life in this house. I will be of more use to you as an ally than as a corpse.”
Mike cleared his throat, adding his two cents; “For what it's worth, I agree with her. I am well aware I also have less reason to wish torturous death upon her than many of the people in this house. But, if she has had…. a change of whatever she had in place of a heart, then a noble at our backs is the only way we get out of this without ending up back in chains.”
Kyra glared at him, before her eyes tracked back towards Cora, who had to resist the urge to look behind her and check if the glare had left scorch marks on the wooden walls.
“And when this is a trick?” she hissed, even as her body lost some of the jungle cat coil it had built up for her next attempt to break free from Hawk’s grasp. The giantess laughed, dropping her hand from Kyra’s throat to clasp her shoulder genially.
“Then Linnea here will have really fucked herself,” Hawk said, still chuckling to herself. The soft laughter cut off so suddenly it felt like it left a physical void where it had been, and Hawk’s relaxed expression turned hard. “And we all get a guilt free plaything to entertain ourselves with until some other noble asshole comes to check on her leaking corpse.”
Christ, that’s a hell of an image.
“Exactly!” Cora agreed, not letting the very real fear that declaration had inspired into her voice. “I have nothing to gain from doing this, except… fuck, I get how this sounds, but except doing the right thing.”
She sighed as she said those last words, aware that it would have sounded trite even in one of her early movies, which were lucky if they’d even had a script editor. But… it was true. If this was all real, and she was far from convinced that was the case, then everything she was stopped her from allowing these people to remain slaves. Not when all she’dbhad to do to free them was throw some paper in a fire.
Like I told Mike, there’s a whole lot wrong with an American upbringing, but I think an ingrown aversion to slavery was one of the better things it gave me.
Hawk was laughing again.
“Know what’s fucked up?” the big woman said, looking around the room as if actually checking to see if anyone else had gotten the joke. “I think she’s being serious! Can’t see another angle on this for her, least not one that don’t benefit us too. Gods, this fuckin’ bitch right here. Imagine, doin’ something because it’s the right thing, in Tyrinno. Wouldn’t catch my ass sayin’ that bleedin’ heart shit.”
She laughed again, and Cora felt her heart drop a little as the laughter was weakly echoed by a few of those present.
Where the fuck did I end up?
NOWHERE GOOD!
Quiet you.
HEY, YOU’RE MAKING PROGRESS, LOOK!
More of those panels popped up above the attendees heads, all demonstrating a shift in [AFFECTION].
[HAWK: INDIFFERENT(HOSTLE) -> INDIFFERENT(INTERESTED)]
[IAIN BOONDOCK: LOYAL(PAYMENT DEPENDENT) -> DEVOTED(PAYMENT DEPENDENT)]
[KYRA LIGHT: MURDEROUS -> SIMMERING]
[JOCASTA PAIMON: DISAPPOINTED -> HOPEFUL]
What the fuck does [INDIFFERENT(INTERESTED)] mean?
DON’T KNOW! BUT I BET HAWK WON’T LET YOU WONDER FOR LONG!
Ominous.