Battletech Death of the Author (SI)

[prinCZess]

And makes a 'Prentice free in spight of his Indentures.

-The Power (or Dominion) of the Sword, ballad from the English Civil War ​

I swallow and hesitate before the door. There’s still time to back off! If I about-face and walk away, it’d be like nothing happened and I can get on with the original plan of bouncing off to the next world, turning everyone in there, and then making my way to the other side of the Inner Sphere to meet-up with my sister. One family screwed with really isn’t that bad in comparison to the massive good I could do later if I can just survive!

My stomach twists. My knees shake. My courage, if the combination of shame and horror that had brought me here after Sarah had explained the situation even deserves to be called that, fails. I make an about-face and start to move away from the door into Arthur’s quarters, happy that I’d at least had the presence of mind to send Sarah down to mollify the boy’s parents so there’s nobody present to witness the retreat—no, the reconsideration! It’s not my job, and it’s Arthur’s and Baron Tsanma’s fault, not mine! I only have the power and capacity to look out for myself right now. Arthur will be on the swinging end of justice’s rope soon enough—and I’d be the one who puts him there, so it was alright!

I’ll be the one who put him there…for the money. For how much it benefits me. Because stopping evil was only worthwhile when I could safely benefit from it. I could keep walking, and soon enough it wouldn’t bother me.

I stop, twist around, and almost sprint back to the door and slam my hand onto the entry-button when I get there.

Dear God, don’t let me be too late!

“The hell do you wa—“ Arthur begins, standing up and turning towards me from his spot kneeling over a kid he has strapped into his bunk.

I mentally ignore that entire block of my vision and the bone-deep disgust it inspires as best I can, instead tearing my eyes across more important things in the cabin. Arthur’s still dressed, but his belt is off. The scabbard that holds his sword is on the other end of the room from him, lying over a fold-down seat outside of easy reach even if he made a run for it. His actual belt, and a holster that’s attached, is closer. It’s maybe three or four steps from him, lying atop a table that folds-out from the bulkhead he’s closest to.

Maybe I can still talk this down. If I’d been thinking, I’d have drawn my sword and my pistol before coming through the door. But I’d been…distracted. By cowardice. Or it could have been pragmatism!

“I thought we had an understanding, Arthur. Your habits come after your hard work. There’s a lot of work yet to be done, and you don’t look like you’re hard at work.” I say.

Actually the bastard probably is hard…Nope. Don’t want to think about that. Ick.

Arthur doesn’t react, staring at me silently as if I’m some apparition from beyond the grave. My heart is pounding in my ears, slamming against my chest hard enough that he can probably hear it. What’s he going to do? I’m waiting for him to so much as look for his own holster, but if I draw either of my own weapons he’ll undoubtedly make a break for it and then everything I’ve grit my teeth and born so far will have been for nothing.

But what am I supposed to do? Just let him get away with it? Like I’ve let Gastocoui and Lord Bar-Dyness and Baron Tsanma and everyone else!? I just let them get away with everything they like because stopping them would be too dangerous for me? Because it wouldn’t be profitable enough?

I shudder the same way I had in the dropship’s loading-bay earlier. Why am I even hesitating? It’d be fun to kill him and with this I have the perfect excuse!

No. Not excuse. That made it sound bad. Made me sound bad. It’d be justice! That made it much better! Phrasing it like that made me sound much better!

I don’t know who moves first. One moment, we’re staring each other down. The next, he’s twitched into motion and I’m drawing my pistol in response. But he doesn’t go for either of his weapons, instead charging in straight towards me and bowling into me at a half-run while my pistol has just started to clear the holster.

Next guy I kill? I’m doing it from the safety of my Banshee’s cockpit. And I’m shooting before he has the chance to do anything to me. This is bullshit.

 

[prinCZess]

I’m brought off my feet and Arthur heaves me backwards. Instincts from taking falls kick in and I twist as much as I can so my butt, right shoulder, and the rest of my arm can slap against the wall behind me before the back of my head does the same. It helps, some. I still whack against the metal hard enough for spots to appear in my vision. Somehow, the worst pain is the dull, annoying throb of pain in my knuckles as the pistol-grip grinds them against the bulkhead, Arthur cementing my wrist there with one hand while he holds his other against my shoulder.

I panic, remembering Gronley doing the same thing, and only barely contain the desire to flail away as much as I can. To do anything and everything. I’ve tried that before. It didn’t work. If I properly aim and direct something, it might do more than a dozen stillborn hits against the man! And it might be the only chance I have.

But, then again, it might be better if I—

No time!

I cock my right heel up and use its new position against the bulkhead to push. It’s an awkward position, my knee having to force its way up into the negligible amount of space between me and my second-in-command and robbing a lot of the force. But it still moves. My foot travels upwards on the slightly-angled path I’d set it on. It navigates between Arthur’s knees, past his inner thighs, and to its target: the point where his two legs meet.

I feel the impact reverberate through my knee, my thigh, and into my abdomen. Judging by his grip on me, which loosens, and his eyes, which go from fear-stoked rage to a dull, wide-eyed shock, Arthur feels it even worse. I smirk.

It’s premature. Arthur’s eyes come back to their senses and his grip reasserts itself a moment later with a grunting, groaning noise. Ripping me forward from the wall, the grizzly-bear of a man whips me around in front of him with ease and plants his feet between mine. Curling one hand in front of me, he twists me into a bizarre contortion where he’s holding my pistol-hand in the same arm he’s choking me with while his other arm secures my left behind my back.

I can’t angle the pistol enough to hit him! I can’t get at him with my nails! I try kicking backwards, to no avail.

In movies, this was where the hero always knocked the person behind them into the wall by pushing them backwards. When I push back, it’s already like pushing into a wall. Arthur doesn’t move an inch, and it’s all just wasted effort. Just like against Gronley.

Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, oh shit!

“I…thought we…had an understanding as well, boss-lady.” Arthur hisses into my ear, his hold slowly tightening and words growing more steady as he recomposes himself. “It’s why I liked working with you so much. And we never had any problems, did we? You know I’m good to pay for it, and there’s nothing to be done until after our burn out of atmosphere at least. You know, I didn’t want to even think it, but you’ve not been like yourself lately. I think you’ve gone soft.”

Somehow, that actually manages to infuriate me even more. I growl and, twisting my wrist as much as I can in his grip, squeeze the trigger on my pistol despite knowing it won’t hit. Off-red coherent light bursts from the muzzle, brilliantly lighting the room in its hue for a moment before dying-out as it impacts against the overhead and forms a wide, black scorch-mark on top of the metal. Screaming, I try again and again, to the same result.

I can feel Arthur’s smirk as he tightens his arms until my screams cut-off by my choking. “Goodbye, boss-lady.“

Oh hell no. I’m done. I’m not putting up with this. I am the only one that should be telling me what to do! I’m not going to let another asshole force me to do one more damn thing! Certainly not something like dying. I’M THE ASSHOLE, DAMMIT! It's time I started acting like it!

Or…Something like that.

Inspiration strikes, and I twist my wrist again, angling the muzzle away from both myself and Arthur. I won’t be able to beat him in a contest of strength to actually get the barrel pointed at him. But there’s one thing I can do. Eyeballing the angle and hoping it will have enough heat accumulated from the handful of shots, I thumb the laser-pistol’s power-pack release.

The power-connection on the pistol slides back and locks open. Thin, spring-loaded metal outlets follow a moment later as the pack slides free out the bottom. With a soft hiss, the pistol cools itself by venting air through the super-heated core of its internals. The jet of hot exhaust sprays out, almost directly into the face of my second-in-command.

Arthur screams in delightful agony, and automatically pulls away from the pistol. He tries to drag me with him, to keep his hold. But he’s shocked, surprised, and in roaring pain for the second time in a few seconds. Rotating around his leg, I limbo my way through the crook of his shoulder—almost choking myself and smashing my face into his armpit in the process. It’s awkward and inelegant, but it gets me out of his hold.

I have no time to revel the victory or Arthur’s pain. He half-blindly flails at me with his left hand while the other clutches at his face and eye. I manage to duck away from the first two swings, but the third catches me square on the jaw and sends me reeling to the side, slapping into the nearby bulkhead with the front of my head instead of the back of it this time. The spots this time are spinning stars that linger longer than they probably should. But he’s still coming, and now his other hand has moved from holding his face to forming a fist at his side.

I drop the pistol. There’s no time to find the pack on the floor for it, and I’m pretty sure threatening him with it isn’t going to work anyways. It’s only in the way of the only option I can think of.

I open my hands up, keeping my palm flat and fingers held-together in something vaguely-similar to what I’d seen in Jackie Chan and Jet Li movies a millennium earlier in a different life. I have no idea if ‘karate chops’ are actually a thing. But the position gives me the chance to use my nails, and I know from real experience in previous years of this life that they work.

 

[prinCZess]

I dive at the man arms-first, trying to close the distance and get some use from the only weapons I’ve got left before he manages to hit me again.

My left hand gets redirected by his right, but my nails shave a brilliant-red slice into the skin of his forearm in the process. My right hand fares better, getting past his hurried block. As the carbon-reinforced nails catch his cheek, I curl my fingers in and jerk them downward. It’s both sick and exciting how much Arthur’s cheek being sliced open sounds like a piece of paper being cut. The first real resistance I encounter comes only when my nails start bumping across regular, jagged bulges that might actually be teeth.

I collide with the man’s chest. He barely flinches from the impact. But curling my left-arm back around, I dig into his back as I drop to the deck. It doesn’t slow me down at all, but I can feel the warm, wonderful sensation following behind my nails that tells me I’d penetrated skin. It almost makes me giddy enough to not care when I slap against the deck like a wet sack of rice.

I’m definitely not giddy enough to overlook the foot that slams into my stomach. I roll over, trying to protect it as I retch something out of my mouth. The next hit slams into my back, and hurts worse. But I only have to hold out a little while!

A third kick comes. Then a fourth and a fifth. But there’s not another, and after a few seconds I work up the courage to open my eyes. Arthur is only a few steps away, reaching out towards his pistol. Gasping for breath and trying to convince myself I can hurt later, when I’m actually sure I’ll live, I fight myself onto my knees.

I’m just starting to stagger onto my feet when Arthur’s drop out from underneath him. He twitches, though whether from trying to move or just from the effects I can’t say. Pretty soon he shoul—yep, foaming from the mouth. Usually the scorpion venom took a little longer to work. But usually I don’t manage to get it into someone’s arm, face, and back at the same time.

I stand and watch the man twitch, the pain from a dozen different places somehow muted. I’d won. Again! Despite everything, I’d won. I am alive and he is dead. Or, at least, he’s dying. So he will be dead soon enough. That makes me right. It makes me the better person. It makes me nearly-euphoric and it means I don’t have to feel bad about being so thrilled! Now I understand why someone might want to smoke after—

“Ten minutes to liftoff. All personnel, there are ten minutes…”

The announcement jerks me out of whatever trance I’d been falling into. Swallowing, I shakily walk about the cabin and rejoin my pistol with its power-pack. I can’t let the man just lay there and die like that. I’m enjoying it too much, and I’d look back on it fondly if I let him suffer. Whatever he’d done, that wasn’t right. Not even for his sake, but for my own.

I’m sane enough to recognize that still. I think. Or do I just want the satisfaction myself?

Arthur’s still twisting and flexing on the ground, occasionally managing a gasp through a constricting throat and everything else the venom did. His eyes are dark, panicked, and full of hate when they turn on me. I limit myself to a single shot. It’s enough to finish him.

The pistol returns to its holster as I briefly wonder if there’s anything I should say. It’s not like Arthur had been religious and the only respectful words or rituals I can think of are ones I learned centuries before for deer or elk I want to rest easy. I can’t find enough compassion in my entire body to give a shit if Arthur’s spirit rests or not.

“God, this sucks.” I finally grumble after I decide that what I say will be for me not him.

I’m going to have to come up with a way to deal with everything this is going to cause. Why couldn’t the universe have just let me be a coward and run off somewhere comfortable? Being a coward would have been so much easier!

I look to the kid still strapped onto Arthur’s bunk and feel myself flush with shame at the thought. I’d deal with the shitshow. At least that wouldn’t be on my conscience as part of it.

Just everything else. Dammit.

 

[prinCZess]

I cross the room and remove the blindfold from the kid strapped onto Arthur’s bunk. He’s not as young as I’d figured at first. Despite lingering baby-fat in his cheeks, his eyes and bridge of his nose make him look closer to being in his early-teens than anything else. Arthur had probably gone for his hair. The man was partial to blondes…and I really wish I didn’t know that.

Of course, the kid twists away from me as best he can the moment he sees my face, terror and horror mixing on his own. I’ve been surprised it’s not a more common reaction to the scorpion-tattooed mess. But, then, I have been running with a bunch of pirates who are used to it.

“I’m going to take you back to your parents, but I’m going to need you to stay quiet for me. Deal?” I ask, bringing one finger to my lips in a shushing motion.

Somehow, the blood-soaked digit doesn’t make him any calmer. He pulls further away and once again tries to pull free of the straps holding him down until his eyes finally scan the room and spy Arthur’s body. That actually calms him down. After a very long and incredibly awkward silence, he gives me a nod.

I wipe my hands against my pants and do my best to clean the blood off them. There’s still some left when I rip the tape free of his mouth. I worry he’s going to scream anyways, which would attract all kinds of immediate attention I really don’t need. But other than a swallowed grunt of pain, he’s quiet until I’ve started undoing the straps on the bunk.

“You killed him?” The boy asks, sounding far, far too old for his age. There’s no real inflection. Just a question that might as well be a statement of fact.

“Yes.” I answer, not sure how else to respond.

“But aren’t you…” He begins, only to trail off—probably coming to the conclusion that reminding me I’m on the same side as Arthur isn’t the smartest.

I actually manage something that approaches a snort of humor as I undo the final latch, “It’s complicated. Come on. There’s not much time.”

He flinches a bit at that, and I feel bad. But I don’t know if I’m up to answering any further questions from the kid right now. I’m having a hard enough time dealing with the fact that he’s even here because of me in the first place.

The kid gets up slowly. In a burst of energy right afterwards, he takes a few run-up steps in the right direction and slams a foot into Arthur’s body and seals the deal by spitting.

I kind of like him already.

After situating him behind me, I peek out of the room. Nobody else seems to be in the hallway, so I lead the kid out towards the lifts. I’m not really sure what I’m going to say if we run into anyone. I can’t think of any excuse that doesn’t sound like exactly that. But this close to liftoff, most everyone should be strapped-in and waiting instead of wandering about. Should.

I have a miniature panic-attack when the doors to the lift open. But there’s nobody else inside. I wave the kid inside, and slam on the panel to take me down to the bay that’s been repurposed into slave-quarters. I was going to have to think of something to say when I got there, too.

I distract myself from dealing with that by trying to problem-solve another issue entirely. The beginnings of a plan for how to deal with the crew are occurring to me as the lift hums, but it was going to take some…finesse. My initial half-crazed impulse to start systematically going through the dropship and shooting up the joint Terminator-style wasn’t really workable. It also probably shouldn’t be as enticing a fantasy as it is, but…they were pirates? Hostis humani generis.

It was the only defense I could come up with.

“Brevers, this is Death.” I say into the lift’s comm after making another shush motion to the boy at my side.

“Yes ma’am? How may your illustrious dropship-crew serve you on this wonderful day? We’re only about eight relaxing minutes out from liftoff! If you like, there’s an open seat here for you to command and control from!” Brevers came back quickly. The man was entirely too peppy and upbeat. Probably had something to do with serving under DuPont for so long. You got soft like that when you didn’t actually maim, murder or rape for a living.

“I can explain the details later, but Baron Tsanma tried to screw us. When we launch, put us into a temporary orbit rather than breaking for the jumpship immediately. I want to put a retaliatory raid up for a vote.” I say with a snarl, playing up my own feigned outrage as best I can.

There was a pause on the other end of the line. Having to contend with the flat stare from the boy beside me, it feels like it takes forever for the man to respond. I wish people would quit looking at me like that. As if they’re confused about who I am. It hits too close to home.

“Will-do.” Brevers finally says with simple finality. I hang the comm up on the wall of the lift and slump against the wall.

With some cooperation from the slaves, the impromptu plan I was mentally putting together to clear the dropship might just work. And hey! Wouldn’t you know it, I have a wonderful character witness right here that should help convince them that I’m on the up-and-up and they should help me! I could use that! Present the boy as what he was: someone who I had saved from an unspeakable horror at great cost to myself simply out of moral duty! It was a great story. I was the hero! The valiant rescuer! The pirate with a heart of gold.

…The one who had just blabbed about my supposed plan to raid the planet in front of my character witness!

I bring my head forward and then knock it back into the metal plating of the lift behind me. I am an educated woman. I read books. I went to college. I have a vociferously loquacious vocabulary and all that horseshit. I am also a worldly woman. I know how to handle myself. Pilot a BattleMech. Shoot with deadly accuracy—or scratch with it, if need be.
But I am clearly not a smart woman.

 

[prinCZess]

“Are you all right?” I very belatedly ask. Half because I really am concerned, and half out of some futile effort to make him put what he’d overheard out of his mind. Maybe I didn’t just screw myself. If I had and got torn apart by the slaves or something…Well, maybe it was worth it?

When the kid doesn’t offer a verbal response I cease my brief pity-party and bring my head forward again. He’s moved so he’s in front of the lift’s controls. Any attention he might have paid to me has been absorbed by the control-panel for the lift and the way buttons light up, change color, or fade back to dull, gunmetal gray as he taps on them.

It…actually looks fun. I’m jealous. I kind of want to join in. Were I in his position, though, this would be about the time I went into a crying fit.

I suppose it shouldn’t surprise me that 31st-century children are more mentally resilient than me.

“I’m going to get you and your parents back to your planet. It’s just going to be a bit of a mess.” I say with more emphasis, hoping he doesn’t put too much value on my slip but unwilling to explain any more to him. I…Didn’t really want to tell a kid I intended on killing a bunch of people in the immediate future, even if they were pirates. He might take it wrong, and I would probably sound far too excited over the prospect.

The boy looks back at me with a flat stare and a hard set to his chin. When he speaks, it’s with a finality and hardness I could never muster. “Will you kill Baron Tsanma, too? Or will we have to try to do it?”

Okay. Revise that to ‘31st-century children are more badass than me’.

I don’t want to admit that the thought had already passed my mind as a bit of a fantasy. From anyone else, the question would have just given me something to look forward to even more because I had even more justification. But something about the way he says it makes my chest squeeze down on my organs the same way it had when I’d seen Gastocoui whipping Sarah on Tortuga. He’s, like, twelve. It’s not fair. Somebody should do something.

Craaaaaap.

“He’ll be dealt with.” I say, compulsively speaking with enough vagueness I don’t make any actual promise. I correct myself when I notice, “The Baron will face justice, one way or another.”

It was still vague, but a little better. But if I talk about killing the man, I won’t be able to hide how much I look forward to that chance. Vague is better in that respect when I’m dealing with a kid who, however-much braver he might be, definitely wasn’t as fucked-up in the head.

The blue-eyed stare he fixes on me would do credit to a man sixty years his senior. After a few seconds and no further response, he goes back to playing with the control-panel. Maybe the kid really doesn’t have any idea I’m using him. But it’s a use of him that’s beneficial to him! So, like…I’m still the hero here?

The rest of the lift-ride passes with nothing but the hum of decks passing-by. I tense when the doors open, but again there’s nobody wandering the ship so close to liftoff. Almost without a sound, the boy hares off underneath the hand I was trying to hold him back with, running into the hall and then taking a bare second to look both ways before running left.

“Slow down…boy!” I yell as I stumble forward, kicking myself for not asking the kid’s name like a normal person would have.

I don’t want to yell too loud, so the words are more of a hissed, insistent growl than anything. If he even hears me he certainly doesn’t bother to listen, and I have to run after him as he reaches the end of the hall and then immediately turns and continues on. He only stops when he reaches the locked blast-door into the slave-quarters.

Would it look better to take his hand as I go in? I want to make a suitably dramatic entrance. But, then…I wipe my fingers against my pants again in futile effort to get rid of the bloodstains. He didn’t seem like the type for that sort of thing and I’d feel strange holding his hand like we’d been out for a stroll after using them to kill a person moments before. I’ll just have to make the best of the situation.

But I’m getting really tired of doing that. I had a plan! And it had been a good one! High on profit, low on personal risk. As any good plan should be! The fact it hadn’t been a morally good plan shouldn’t matter at all.

But it did. More’s the pity. And because of that I am probably going to die in some godforsaken backwater in the 31st century trying to pretend I’m heroic without ever getting to bathe in C-bills or see my sister again.

Arriving with the boy at my side would make for quite an entrance itself. Hopefully I can leverage it into some continued obedience to help me take out the crew. If I handle one of my problems at a time, eventually I’d run out of problems. Or one of the problems would prove too much and I’d run out of li—

I quiet my mental complaints. Rolling back my shoulders and straightening, I open the door and march into the slave-quarters waving the boy along behind me.

The first thing to strike me is the smell. The wash of human body odor and other stenches is almost physical in its authority, and its telling me to leave. I’ve smelled worse slave-pens in my lifetime here, but only after multiple days underway when the mass of bodies overwhelmed the equipment filtering and recycling their air. Little of that has been set up yet in this case. Orbital reentry and exit were too rough for any of the haphazard ductwork to hold-up.

That ductwork is ready for when we need it. Strapped and secured to the walls of the cargo-bay, it takes up a good deal of the floorspace, forcing many of the slaves to perch hammocks between units or at uncomfortable-looking angles on top of them because the floor itself isn’t large enough to hold enough of the tied-together loops of refuse-material that serves as cots for some of them. A wide, black curtain hangs from the rafters of the bay, blocking some of the light to about half of the floor and giving somewhere they can sleep without being in the direct glare.

The slaves arrayed around the compartment turn towards me in a disturbing, almost-silent near-unison that makes the gibbering part of my mind remember the stereotypical Old West saloons that a stranger walks into. But this is my responsibility. There was no more running away. I had to make a choice. And I had to make a good one, not a profitable or safe one.

It hurts. It’s not supposed to hurt!

“Behold! I come bearing gifts!” I call out, casting my arms wide and taking some comfort in the play-act of confidence.

 

[prinCZess]

The play-act is the only thing that spares me from wilting under the small sea of faces that glare at me in open hatred before moving to the boy at my side. They move back. Somewhere along the journey, most of them grow into confused hatred. After another moment, there’s a palpable shift between the recent slaves that have come aboard—who are concentrated at the bottom of the hold on the floor—and those that accompanied me from Tortuga. The new ones are still staring with eyebrows-raised and eyes hard. The ones from Tortuga are different.

Trying to pin it down more than that takes a backseat to my concerns as one of the women in the collection of new slaves springs to her feet and runs towards me. I brace, right hand immediately opening and beginning to come down towards my side so I can grab my pistol. I hurriedly try to recall how many steps backwards I’d have to take to reach the door. I won’t be able to shoot them all if they rush me!

Only the half-caught sight of Sarah mouthing something at me as she also jumps-up from where the slave had been stops me. The boy running from my side to meet her only reinforces the hesitation as correct. A few thunderous steps that almost echo in the hold later, the woman scoops him up without a word, but the sound she produces from deep in the back of her throat as she buries her face into the side of his head says more than anything more eloquent could have.

The rush I was worried about occurs a second later. Instead of being aimed at me though, every slave on the floor of the hold crowds around the woman and her son. Those that can’t fit around them on the bottom climb onto the ducting and scrubbers nearby, erupting into a small thunderclap of excited words and noises. Only Sarah, standing out in her much cleaner clothing as she picks her way around the edge of the crowd, and one elderly gentleman with an unkempt salt-and-pepper beard who follows her break the pattern by approaching me instead.

“You convinced him?” Sarah asks, in the tone someone would use to ask about magical powers or something else equally ridiculous.

“I told you that if anyone caused you a problem I’d troubleshoot them. Arthur caused you, and by extension wondrous-me, a problem. Do I look like the kind of woman who wouldn’t keep her word?” I quip, grinning widely.

She blinks, apparently not quick-witted enough or too scared to respond back with the flat ‘yes’ the question clearly called for in answer. My grin only gets wider at my own mental completion of the joke anyways. I am going to miss the abject terror and fear that my current status affords me, along with the easy laziness. But being able to have someone play off my bad jokes instead of just passively receive them might alone be worth it to some degree. Also the whole ‘not being the leader of murderers, rapists, and creeps’ thing. That would be nice too, I guess.

The older man interrupts my attempt at coming up with another good line. He strides forward to the side of me and Sarah, back straight, head high, and his hands held flat at his side—seemingly less out of trying not to prevent a threat and more from…habit? His stare is certainly something else.

“Why?”

My first impulse is to laugh at such a silly question. Before I remember it’s a perfectly reasonable one for him to ask and before I realize that, while I had thought about how to answer it because I needed something that would convince him and the other slaves to help me, I never really came up with anything.

Because it’s the right thing to do and I’m not a bad person?

I almost laugh at myself instead for the mere thought. If I can’t believe the lies, how am I supposed to make him? I’m Lady Death! Pirate-Lord of Tortuga, Scourge of the Successor States and Dame Murderess Extraordinare! Arthur and Gronley are just adding two to a small pile of people I’ve killed that’s big enough I don’t actually know exactly how big it is!

And I am clearly not a smart woman. He’s still staring at me, waiting for an answer. I need to say something! Come up with something! Something that I could use to convince—

That’s it! And I was thinking I wasn’t smart?! Pah. I am a genius!

Or, at the very least, it’ll work on some yokel from the Outback of the Federated Suns long enough that I won’t get ripped-apart by dozens of slaves pissed-off at their captor and I will instead get their help. It should even hold up for the slaves from Tortuga. None of them really knew me that well. Hell, even the boy might buy it, and it would give me an explanation for my slip in the elevator! J-E-A-N-Y-U-S.

“Because now that I’ve the hard evidence that Baron Tsanma is dealing with pirates, there was no need for me to maintain my cover or allow such harm to the people of the Federation.” I say, reveling in the shock the words clearly cause to the older gentleman.

I extend a hand to the man, and try not to drop into a schlocky impression of a 20th-century actor. I probably fail. “Bond. Jane Bond. On His Majesty’s Secret Service. And I am in desperate need of your assistance.”

He looks at me as if he can’t believe what I’ve just said. But then he starts crying and I have to force myself not to glance away or try to give him some level of pretend-privacy. Even knowing he’s been in prison or held as some slave I feel like I’m intruding on something very personal.
Especially when it’s coming because I’m lying my ass off to him.

“We knew the Federation wouldn’t abandon us! Even out here on the border. We knew it.” He wipes at his eyes and takes a few moments to compose himself. When he does he straightens and holds back his shoulders, coming to something very much like a military attention posture before he seems to reconsider and finally takes my hand. He’s a lot stronger than the beard and wrinkles on his face suggest. I wince.

“Leftenant-Colonel Charles Gerard of the Gronholt Planetary Guard—at least, I was. Before the maniac. How can I be of assistance?”

The wince turns into a scowl I immediately hide. I’m not actually sure if I should be excited about how much easier that could make things or just worried about the fact he's official enough he might just spot an imposter.

Oh well. At least he’s buying my bullshit for now.

 

[prinCZess]

'Tis not in season, to talk of Reason
Or call it Legal, when the Sword will have it Treason

-The Power (or Dominion) of the Sword, ballad from the English Civil War ​

Speaking with the Leftenant-Colonel through a final warning of impending liftoff and a countdown convinced me that his presence is definitely ‘exciting’. According to him, good portions of the militia that he’d been leading only months before have no idea whatsoever that the Baron is selling-out the planet to pirates or running what amounts to a gulag for any opposition to him—A gulag he’d been dropped into after looking too deep into the Baron’s personal failures. I try not to salivate too much at the prospect that dangles of other people who can be drafted into the matter of bringing Tsanma to justice. Maybe I can come out of this with all the credit for axing a piece-of-shit Feddie nobleman without having to put my ass in danger to do it.

It’s not that I’m a cowa—Alright, no, scratch that. It’s definitely from being a coward. But it’s also just smart! I’m about to inflict my surname on all the pirates who would crew the weapons of war that might force the man out of his position. So I’m going to need other people like the Lieutenant-Colonel to do the heavy lifting on that! An attempt to kil—bring to justice Baron Tsanma would be just plain dumb if it didn’t actually work.

I manage not to let my rushed plotting interfere with the conversation with Gerard. Most of the other slaves seem to be too intimidated by me to do much more than observe from a distance, but there’s still entirely too many that approach over the few minutes and do everything from briefly engage in the conversation I’m having with the man by offering suggestions or ideas for what to do all the way to a few who hug me and cry into my blouse.

Even after I manage to suppress the expectation of something sharp penetrating into my side during one of the hugs it’s still…Inappropriate and undeserved. But I can’t tell them that. Not if I want to get any use out of them. So I don’t. I bask in it instead. Gently returning the occasional embrace and fixing others with what I try to make a reassuring look. Their gratitude and warped, misplaced respect are no replacement for all the money in bounties I’m giving up, but it’s almost as good as fear.

Almost.

The loud, bone-shaking thrust of the dropship up and out of the atmosphere comes at the middle of the discussion. I do learn a good bit and get him and a few other slaves to understand my plan for the rest of the crew even with the weight of g-forces bearing down and slowing down the talk considerably. It’s not helped at all by the fact I have to bear the acceleration inside the slave hold where a comfortable seat is nothing but a pipe dream. The mother of the boy I’d saved had quietly offered me a wad of scrap-fabric she was using as a cushion. But I’d forced myself to refuse. It wouldn’t have given the right impression.

As the dropship’s acceleration begins to trail off and the lift brings me up towards the bridge a short while later, I’m starting to regret that decision. The gradual loss of any weight on it as we transition to zero-gravity helps a little, but my butt hurts from spending minutes of high-g rattlecan-shaking on nothing but a makeshift seat atop a hard, metal deck. The worst part is I don’t even have the release of being able to complain about it to anybody! I’d sent Sarah to make sure Arthur’s room was sealed-off and nobody would bumble into my second-in-command’s dead body, and the good Leftenant-Colonel was subtly organizing the slaves into something that might be able to secure the ship after my dramatic assistance.

“My butt hurts.” I complain to the empty lift, rubbing the offending section of fa—muscle. Definitely muscle. No one shall dare even think differently including myself!

The lift only hums. But I pretend it’s a sympathetic rather than mechanical hum and it makes me feel a little better anyway. That wasn’t crazy, was it?

I sigh, trying not to quiver in fear or anticipation of what’s coming even if everything goes right. Especially if everything goes right. “It’ll be fine. One problem at a time.”

I blink, “And now I’m talking to myself. Not healthy, Lady. That’s what crazy people do. Get your head on right before you make some stupid, naïve decision again and land yourself in prison. Or worse. If they catch-on, you just know ‘Lady Death sentenced to surname’ is the kind of stupid, wonderful pun they’re gonna run on the headlines. Can’t give them that satisfaction.”

Deal with my crew. Deal with Baron Tsanma. Get my pardon. Do whatever I needed to bounce my way to the other side of the Inner Sphere and team-up with my sister with what I had. The original plan still holds together. This is just a sidetrack where I’ll be putting an entire planet’s worth of do-goodery to my moral scorecard. That has to count for something!

Of course what it doesn’t count for is ‘C-Bills’. Gonna cost me a good number of them. So, really, how much it counted was kind of debatable? I’m putting myself in danger for a political ‘attagirl’ and warm fuzzies?

But I still get to kill people so maybe it balances out? Pressing a button might not be as satisfying as something more personal, but it was the results that count! The simple fact at the end that I’m alive and making decisions while they’re not.

I clench my teeth and focus on the lift’s indicator as it crawls back towards the bridge. After too long, it finally opens. I grab hold of the doors so I have something to pull against to send me forward through the hall in zero-gee.

The real problem with losing the ‘captured alive’ bounties on my men is that it’s going to be even harder to afford the experienced, professional shrinkery some of my screwiest thoughts call for.

I pause, holding myself up before I float down the hall. Using one hand, I leverage my way partially back into the lift. With my free arm, I scrape across the controls of the lift, watching the buttons light-up in a golden display of color that brings a smile to my face and delights my inner child.

The scratch-marks my nails leave-behind in the metal between the buttons delights another part of me still flush with the memory of what they’d done to Arthur.

I push myself out of the lift. No time for looking back, and maybe I shouldn't. But whatever. It’s showtime.

I somehow contain my urge to make jazz-hands as I float towards the bridge.

 

[prinCZess]

“Ah, m’lady! I burned us into a stable orbit. The Captain’s Chair awaits your posterior and we await your orders!” Brevers greets when I pass-through the door into the bridge itself. His sheer perkiness and energy are a bit annoying, but they fade a bit as he continues, “If I can ask, what happened to change the plan? I thought the Baron cooperated.”

I swing myself into the Captain’s Chair that, contrary to its name and status, looks very similar to all the others stationed at regular intervals around the bridge. The only real thing separating it from the other stations on the Union dropship’s bridge is being stationed far enough back that it gives a good view of everyone in the bridge.

“He pretended to. Prick actually had a bunch of bombs rigged around the internals of the machines he gave us that took a while to find.” I explain, manipulating a few switches around my station and withdrawing the voice-pickup for my upcoming announcement, “I think it’s only fair that we impose a penalty on the good Baron and his planet for that mistake. A nice’n’bloody one if I have my way...”

Brevers, who’d been all cheer and pep with my first words, fades into a quiet discomfort as I speak. By the time I finish, he visibly gulps down a large breath and is very quick to find something to distract him on one of the computer screens around the bridge. The dropper-crewmen really are the milk-drinking pansies of my bunch of rascals. I’d not even gotten into any of the more poetic turns of phrase about the sadistic potential of our vengeance and he was already paling!

It’s cute. But that works. He’s cute too so it fits, and it makes me feel better about the fact he won’t be attending the upcoming meeting with the rest of the crew.

“Of course, we’ll have to see whether our coworkers see things my way or not. What sort of lawless hooligans would we be if we just did everything I wanted to?” I continue with a twist of humor.

We’d be the RIGHT kind is what we’d be! They SHOULD obey me if they want to keep their place on MY crew aboard MY ships! Especially when I’m the only one in this bunch who isn’t a maniac who gets their thrills from sadism and stealing!

I overlook the tingle of guilt the thought produces and depress a switch that feeds my voice into the dropship. “Brethren of the Black Fifteen! Lend me your ears. This is your Captain, Lady Death, Dame Murderess Extraordinaire, speaking. We are currently orbiting Gronholt at some eighteen-hundred kilometers, and you are now free to move about the dropship. Before you become too involved in any relaxation, though, I would ask you meet in Cargo Hold C—there is a Matter of Business to be attended to!”

I have to stop and remind myself that I am lying as I feel the same buzz of excitement and anticipation those words no doubt inspire in my crew. There’s only ever one ‘Matter of Business’ to be attended at a meeting like I’m proposing: Raids.

It’s the perfect excuse to get virtually all of them into one spot.

“Baron Tsanma has attempted to pass us booby-trapped goods as payment! He has violated the terms of his contract with the Tortuga Dominion and therefore owes us restitution. Per your own contracts with me, however, what form that restitution will be requested by us is in your hands, my comrades. I will make my way to the hold in, oh, thirty minutes to take an official vote for our course of action. To find out whether to leave Gronholt’s account in arrears from punitive fees for someone else to collect, or if the local forecast should be warning the good citizens about the Death that is on its way from above!”

I set the voice-pickup back onto its holder and settle into the Captain’s Chair as best I can without gravity. Through a few halfhearted attempts at conversation by the bridge-crew, I wonder if any one of the men onboard or even back on Tortuga actually believes the threadbare justifications presented for piracy. They’d never hold up in a real courtroom. I’d certainly always known they were bullshit. But maybe some space-cherry from the sticks on his first cruise might actually think it wasn’t all just an excuse for fun?

Good thing my crew’s more experienced than that or I might actually feel bad. I’d shuffled through every single ‘file’ Arthur had collected in order to divvy up shares and contracts so I could note the bounties, and we’d never had to take on anyone even approaching ‘innocent’ besides the jumpship and dropper crews that came attached to their commands. There are nothing but the finest reprobates in my crew! None of them would be dumb enough to buy the official BS, and they were all thoroughly deserving of everything that I was about to do to them. Of anything I decided to do with them! It is justice and even my moral duty since I have the power to do it.

That I’ll enjoy it doesn’t matter one bit! It doesn’t make it less right! What kind of sick person wouldn’t enjoy the intersection of secular justice, divine retribution, and karmic comeuppance that I’m going to be the agent of?

What kind of sick person would wish she didn’t have to resort to this trickery and could just execute the bastards one-by-one herself?

I shiver a little. Knowing what’s coming is so hard. At least fighting Gronley and Arthur were more immediate affairs with easier excuses to silence the traitorous part of my mind. Now my life is on the line just the same but that damned corner of me has the gall to be guilty about it and question how necessary the killing is! It’d be easier if I didn’t have to think about it and could just kill and kill and kill and kill and—

“Lady? Would you like me to send word to the other dropper that we’ll be returning to Gronholt?”

I tilt my head towards the radioman and pin him with my eyes. He flinches and averts his eyes.

“That would be quite presumptuous of me until a vote is taken, wouldn’t you think?”

It wouldn’t be. At all. And we both know it. The crew isn’t actually going to vote to forego a raid. No crew ever would unless they were outmatched. But it’s a convenient excuse for me to stop him from throwing a wrench in things.

 

[prinCZess]

The radioman backs down and sends no message to the other dropship. Learning their lesson, the others on the bridge stop trying to engage me in any kind of conversation and keep a single-minded, almost impressive, focus on their screens. The next twenty minutes pass with an agonizing slowness that has my insides vibrating in anticipation, but they do pass.

“So. What are the votes from my bridge-crew?” I finally ask as a clock on the computer nearest me clicks over. I rise from the chair as I speak, calmly inverting myself so I’m standing on the ‘ceiling’ of the bridge and safely out of what will be the line-of-fire.

They surprise me.

“No raid.”

“Against.”

“Me too.”

The crew is either professional or, more likely, scared enough to answer without looking at me. As they pipe up, their answers differ only in the phrasing they use.

“Nay for me as well.” Brevers answers at the end. He’s the only one brave enough to pivot in-place to actually look at me as he answers. “Even if he tried something, we’re still coming out ahead without—“

Turning towards me wins him the grand prize of being first to notice my freshly-drawn laser-pistol and those weapons held by the dozen now-former slaves who’d entered the bridge at exactly the right time. Apparently, Gerard’s military career made him a bit better about things like punctuality and following a plan than the scumbags I’m used to relying upon.

His gasp draws the attention of the others on the bridge. Just like when my sword penetrated Gronley or my nails dug into Arthur, in that instant all the bullshit and lies that have brought me here is worth it! Their faces. Oh, their magnificent faces! They know, instantly, who is really in charge and that they can’t do anything about it! They know that I’m the one who determines if they live or die—and they’re confused which one I will bless them with!

They shouldn’t be. I’m Lady Death!

My trigger finger tenses. Fun, fun, fun!

“We’ll put them with the MechWarriors in the slave-hold.” One of the former-slaves who’d entered says with finality, pointing two of the men with him forward to start awkwardly putting cuffs on the bridge personnel.

One of the former-slaves blocks my shot! I can still shoot through him of course. That would be all kinds of entertaining, but also make things more complicated and difficult for me. So I can’t.

It would be wrong. Evil.

…

It wouldn’t be profitable. Brevers and the others have comparatively miniscule bounties compared to the real killers in the crew. But money is money and turning them over live brings more than dead. I was going to need to draw as much blood from this stone as I can now that I’ve been forced into the do-gooder course of action because my damned second-in-command couldn’t keep it in his pants!

“Sounds good. Though we might have to keep some up here to navigate the ship.” I say, more to fill space and distract from my disappointment as I withdraw my finger from the trigger.

“Actually, there’s a half-dozen back in the hallway who should be capable. Lot of people with at least some experience crewing dropships in the hold.”

…Huh. That actually worked out good. I could even take some credit for it! Hurray for my own foresight in having Sarah bring along competent belongings!—Slaves.

People! Competent people!

I move myself on from the surprised gawking and temptation-to-shoot the bridge crew gives me by floating to the station that controls the dropships internal systems. Navigating the menus is a bit of a hassle, but it doesn’t take long to find the commands that lock all the doors in and out of Hold C where my men have assembled. Navigating around them again and overriding a half-dozen safeties takes a little more time, but in less than a minute I’ve got the command pulled up to run a containment-test on the Hold and its immediate surroundings.

I want to give them a speech. Even go down personally and take their vote before telling them what was coming as a final courtesy before their deaths. I can even hear the argument in the back of my mind that doing such would guarantee their guilt and be the right thing to do. The condemned man had a right to face his death with either a cigarette or a blindfold, didn’t he? It would be a courtesy I’d not given to other, more innocent, people who I’d killed.

But I can recognize the excuse for what it is. I already know they’re guilty and I’m not really concerned with whether they know what’s coming or not regardless of it. I just want to drag this out. Give myself the chance to stand above them as Lady Death and see them. So that it feels better, more personal, when l press a button and make them all slowly suffocate to death.

If I give myself any more time to be tempted by the idea, I’m going to give into it.

I slap my entire palm down against the control-panel in front of me hard enough it doesn’t actually recognize what I was trying to do. Growling, I repeat the motion, focusing it on the ‘Initiate’ button that sits on one side. This time I manage to initiate the test. I have to manipulate the controls a third time to cancel the final safety-countdown that tries to delay the implementation of my genius plan.

“Systems test initiated. Deck seven cargo hold venting air. Deck seven cargo hold venting air.” The shrill, computerized voice of ‘bitching Betty’ says.

I had to trust that Gerard or other slaves had nicked the emergency-masks from their containers in the hold. They should have had enough time while I was traveling to the bridge before the crew assembled for my ‘vote’. Even if they didn’t, there were only a dozen masks available. Not nearly enough for the almost-fifty crewmembers who should be in the hold.

I almost wish the slaves missed a few. Watching the security-camera recordings of so many of my pirates fighting over so few masks as the oxygen slowly bled from the hold and they lost consciousness would be…Wrong. It would be wrong. And weird. It should be enough I’m getting to kill them. I shouldn’t let myself indulge in it too much. If everything goes right it’s the last time I’ll ever get to—have to!—do it.

“All entrances to deck seven cargo hold maintaining seal. An emergency override request has been entered from Door 732B.”

I dismiss the request. The computer, uncaring and no fun because of it, accepts the command without response or comment. A person at least would have looked at me as if I was a monster for ignoring the plea for safety. But they are pirates, and this is the only way to be sure I control the ship post-Arthur without inviting running battles through the hallways.

“Talk about a bargain. This one easy trick cut the cost of their death-sentences by almost a hundred percent!” I joke, twisting my head back and forth to catch the eyes of the former-slaves who have dropped into new spots on the bridge and begun familiarizing themselves with the controls.

They grace me with a laugh, but I’m pretty sure it’s strained rather than authentic. I suppose it makes some sense that slavery would warp someone’s sense of humor so much they couldn’t tell when Death was legitimately hilarious.

*****************************************************************************************************************
A/N: I feel like there's a snarky pop-culture comparison to Darth Vader in Cloud City and 'I have altered the deal, pray I do not alter it any further' to be made here, but this is the only way I can figure to make it.

This does allow me to point to this chapter's bad pun/wordplay/reference in the title however for its relevance and because it makes me kind've snort in amusement (as most of the titles do, honestly...I have a very easy sense of humor, forgive me):

And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, then ye shall be trodden down by it. -Isaiah 28:18

On other matters--updates may slow a bit as I go through the last bits of some heavy learnin' and whatnots and have to prioritize that over terrible puns and bad wordplay with occaisonal stompy-robot digressions. But they might not as well. Have to see where my (bad) time management skills take me!

 

[prinCZess]

I’m pooped. After dealing with most of the crew in the hold via boring-old button-press instead of anything more heart-racing, I still had to send messages to the other dropship behind us and DuPont aboard the Ravager that a vote had been held and we were returning to Gronholt to ‘punish’ the ‘treacherous’ Baron. There’s all this silly organization involved in being a pirate—or a ‘Federal agent’. It’s exhausting.

It’s not that I’m getting tired of lying or somehow losing track of things. The lies are still a rush and I still know just how vital they are to me not ending up on the bottom end of a noose. But having to juggle even more lies alongside of one another and use one to reinforce the other is becoming…confusing.

I’ve been easily-confused ever since the fight with Gronley. Easily distracted by things that shouldn’t matter to me and don’t have any impact on my own well-being. It’s aggravating.

Having to walk instead of just float around doesn’t help, even if the thrust-induced ‘gravity’ isn’t as heavy as it could be. Gerard was using his dirt on the Baron and my own supposed good guy status—cemented by the tape of my meeting with the Baron—as leverage with a small but growing faction of supporters in the planetary militia. A coup was on the horizon. The plotters included virtually the entirety of the planet’s space-observation and traffic-control, so the dropship’s descent was being offset by the Baron’s ‘triumphant’ return to the capital city from ‘fighting pirates off’. Somehow, that timing translated to needing to accelerate? I’m not really up on the rocket-science and trying to think about it just makes me regret the attempt.

I just want to revel in being, relatively, safe. All the pirates of my old crew who made career out of slitting throats were either blue in the face from lack of oxygen (or excess of nerve agent in Arthur’s case) or, for those MechWarriors and dropship-crewers few not dead, safely entombed in the slave-quarters under guard. Plus the new crew of former-slaves and Gronholt-refugees think I’m actually a Feddie and their blessed savior instead of a pirate deserving of punishment. It’s a perfect combination for easing stress and lulling me into a nice nap prior to sitting back and enjoying the show as Gerard’s militia rebels on-planet string up Baron Tsanma!

I know I won’t get it. Despite the throbbing pain behind my eyes from fatigue, I’m going to get into my cabin, undress, and roll into my bunk only to stare at the bulkhead right above me until we transition to a deceleration burn into orbit. Unless I find a way to ignore it…

The crew had trusted me. That had been their mistake. But now Gerard and the slaves trust me. If they don’t get me what I need, will that trust also be their mistake?

It should be! All I should want is to run. Be safe. Maybe make some easy money on the way. So why is everyone making that so difficult for me? Making me enjoy killing them or twisting me around their desires and wants? Why can’t I just do what I want! It’s not fair!

“Fifty dead men on Death’s dropship, yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum. I’ll turn their bodies in for a hint o’ scrip… ” I sing-song to myself with a toothy smile, wishing the clever twist on words and the half-consideration I make towards new verses for the song could actually relieve the weight squeezing around my chest.

“My mate I killed with poison nails, rest with no O-two to inhale, pilot’ll be locked for life in jail…”

It’s funny enough I know I should be laughing at it. Instead it just makes me feel empty. More empty.

I have got the remains of the booze left in my desk, and I can probably find a QwikStim or something else more potent in my men’s belongings if I raccoon through them a little bit. Now might not be the best time to take advantage of something that’d get my mind buggered, but it’d sure be the time that would feel the best!

Acting on autopilot, I open the door to my cabin and stumble inside. It snaps closed behind me, then makes an audible thunk as a magnetic-lock slides into place. Usually I have to do that from—

“That’s far enough.” Sarah says from the opposite end of the room.

I don’t know when she got the delusional idea she could tell me what to do, but—

I freeze and feel my eyes go wide and as I actually process what I’m seeing. Standing behind my desk and the chair behind it, Sarah is staring at me from behind the sights of Arthur’s pistol. She must’ve taken the chance to grab it when I had her lock-up the man’s cabin!

I am an idiot.

That thought repeats itself in my head for the next few seconds as I desperately try to come up with something to do. Maybe if we were still in zero-gee and I had more directions to juke to throw off her aim I could’ve tried rushing her, but with the microgravity from the thrust, I’m stuck charging her on a pretty flat trajectory. Even if it’s a relatively short distance, it’s still suicide. I might be able to get close enough to dig my nails into her, but I’d get chunks taken out of me in the process.

I could try to draw my own pistol, but the gun in her hands is right on me! I’m not going to win that one-sided of a quick-draw competition. All she has to do is squeeze when I make the wrong move and…and suddenly it’s fifty-one dead men on the late Death’s dropship!

My insides stutter in fear that the morbid humor only makes worse, and I just-barely manage to keep from wetting my pants. Is this what the bridge-crew felt like? Or the dozens of other people I’ve held at gunpoint before them? It’s terrible. I shouldn’t be on the receiving end of this!

“Right hand up. Left hand drops the belts. Slowly.” Sarah orders, emphasizing the words with her pistol.

 

[prinCZess]

I swallow and try to buy some time to think before so thoroughly putting myself at someone else’s mercy. Being held at gunpoint is bad enough. Being held at gunpoint with no weapons of my own at-hand? That’s the end of things right there!

“I’m flattered and you’re gorgeous, but I’m not actually that big into—“

Sarah thrusts the pistol towards me, eyes flashing dangerously. She’s going to pull the trigger. I know it! My eyes squeeze closed again and a thin, hot, wet stream slides down both my cheeks and the inside of my legs. So much for Death with dignity.

I’m going to have to come up with a damned-good excuse for all the evil shit I’ve done. ‘It wasn’t me’ isn’t going to fly when it was me.

My heart beats. One of my tears rolls to my chin and drops off it. My pants…I try not to think about. No shot comes.

I creak one eye open. Sarah’s still glaring at me. But she’s confused. She clearly had not been expecting such a reaction. I can use that against her!

With deliberate precision I bring my right hand up, and move my left down my body towards my belts. It’s awkward to remove them with one hand, and made even more difficult by how impossible it is to see through the haze blocking the lower half my vision, but I manage after a few fumbled attempts. I make no effort to hold back the tears now. They’ll make me more convincing.

“Kick them over there.”

I numbly obey. With my leg in the middle of the action, Sarah grabs something off my desk. Before I can take any advantage of the split-second distraction to choose between diving for my pistol or charging her, she tosses a small bottle to me and retrains her weapon on my chest.

“Rub that onto your nails.” She demands, “While you do that, you can tell me who you are.”

That limits my options some more. But if she was going to shoot me, she’d have done it by now. She’s trying to remove my options for defending myself and asking me questions. That means there’s a chance!

Squeezing out some of the antivenom and carefully sliding it onto my nails, I default to the most recent lie I’ve been telling. That it’s so difficult to speak past the lump in my throat and one moment away from sobbing makes it that much better for the right appearance.

“I’m Jane Bond, an agent with the Federated Su—“

Bright-red coherent light sears my eyes for an instant, and a brief wave of heat drafts against the side of my face. I close my eyes and flinch away, bringing my hands up to uselessly cover my face and on the way trying to feel out where on my body I have a new hole. I don’t want to die!

She shot me!

“Next one goes through your chest instead of the wall. No more of that bullshit. You are a pirate from Tortuga, Paula Trevaline.” Sarah says flatly.

The name ignites something in me. Something stupid that I can’t stop before it comes out. “No I’m not! I’m Lady Death!”

She’s not convinced. Because of course she isn’t. I’m not even certain I am. Not when my defense is…that.

Even my biggest argument against the charge of piracy, that I’d turned on my own crew in favor of the Law, wasn’t convincing. Betraying my own crew for personal safety and profit was well-within the realm of things I’d have done. Would do? Am doing? I don’t even know!

I wonder if the reason the greatest pirate-hunters back on 17th-century Terra had been former pirates themselves was a motivation thing. Either their own necks were on the line…Or maybe some of them grew to know stopping their former comrades was the right thing to do? That seemed like a doubtful transformation, going from looting and murder to apprehending people doing the same because of some moral awakening.

But even if that was the case, had they really changed at all if they still enjoyed killing the looters and murderers and taking their stuff?

“I think we should go down to the slave-hold, I put you with what remains of your crew, ‘m’lady’, and Major Gerard decides your fate with all the information.”

“That’s not fa—. But…I’m not a bad person?” I stumble-speak, madly clawing to think-up the best thing to say that would get me some safety. I could try telling the truth, but that’s insane and unbelievable. I could pass-off some bullshit I had half-prepared for this about how I’d had visions of the future, but maybe I shouldn’t pile on even more lies? I might lose track at this pace and I’m scared, and crying, and sick to my stomach, and I’ve peed my pants and…

“Can I clean up first? Please?” I ask, taking the risk to bring one arm down and wipe away my tears. If I just have some time! I can puke, shake in privacy, and maybe I can come up with—

Sarah shakes her head, even if she looks a little less certain of herself than she had a moment ago. “No.”

I hate having smart sla—subordinates. Captors? Maybe by some miracle telling the truth will make me more believable? I don’t want to die! If I get locked-up? That’s all she wrote. It’s just a waiting game from there to the gallows—no backwater Outback world in the Federated Suns is going to bother with a padded-room for the pirate who claims she’s seen the error of her ways because she grew a mental-tumor alternate-personality that was from 21st-century Terra but somehow knew a bunch of bullshit about the 31st! I’m as good as dead, and it’s all because I’d tried to do the damned ‘right thing’ and—

Not even the fear of what Sarah might do or the shame of showing anything in front of her can hold back the explosion of anguish and fear my thoughts cause. I lose track of my immediate surroundings in favor of tears, snot, and sobs as my mind fixates in a way I hadn’t let it since my first night in Gronley’s house.

Through the haze of tears I’m no longer bothering to restrain, I notice Sarah’s lowered the pistol and is staring at me. The immediate thought of how that suits my purposes perfectly only makes everything worse. How am I supposed to convince anyone else I’m a good person when I know I’m not?

I start talking—babbling, more like. Throwing out anything I can think of to see what sticks. I’m not a pirate, I’m a dancer! Not an experienced murderer, a sub-par student out of her depth. A coward who knows the future! But even when I run, those thoughts still interfere. I still love the power? God help me, killing still makes me feel alive! I’m trying to do the right thing. At least now. I had been just running. I’d known what Arthur was, but I’d not let it bother me so long as he benefitted me. I’d seen the slaves on Tortuga but…but they had been mine, and that had made it okay! But Baron Tsanma had been selling his own people into slavery and it makes me a hypocrite but that was wrong and now that I’ve been forced into recognizing it I need to help put a stop to it—here and on Tortuga! But I’m scared. I’m isolated. I don’t know what I’m doing! I’m probably only going to make things worse if I try, or get killed in the process! And I don’t want to die! I’m Lady Death, and I’m a killer, and I don’t want to die because I’m afraid of it? How silly is that!?

I quickly lose track as I start jumping between the different points and repeating them with what little variation in wording my brain is capable of.

 

[prinCZess]

The first thing I notice as my wits return is the clinging, rapidly-cooling dampness of my pants where the piss-soaked fabric is pressing up against my skin. At some point of my pathetic, begging collapse I’d dropped onto my knees. I don’t remember doing it, but it fits with who I am. Crumpling at the first hint of personal danger into whatever shape would give me the best chance of survival.

I snort up as much of the mucus coming from my nose as I can and bring one hand up to wipe away some of the dripping mess that covers my face. It lets me notice Sarah isn’t directing the pistol at me anymore. Instead standing a few steps closer and staring at me with an expression I can’t really place. It’s some bizarre mix of fear and wonder and pity that I can’t stand.

Ignoring how it makes me feel though, it’s perfect! A little closer and I can rush her and get the pistol. The shots might be overheard and getting the body to an airlock to dispose of might be a challenge all its own without anyone to help me, but I can worry about that when—

I bow my head, latching onto my own legs with my hands so I don’t do something stupid. My nails tear through the fabric and press against my skin on the verge of drawing blood and give me something else to think about. No matter how hard I snivel I can’t keep from leaking salty garbage from my nose onto my lips.

“You’re serious?” I hear Sarah ask, her voice flat and filled with doubt.

I can’t stop myself. My eyes rise to meet her own while one corner of my mouth rises into a smirk. “Deathly.”

It’s the obviously wrong response. I should give a reason. Make some kind of convincing argument for why she should believe me instead of making the smart choice and shooting me dead to spare herself the risk. She’d even earn herself a hell of a bounty off my corpse even if there is temporary confusion because of my claim of being a federal agent! It’s what I’d do in her position! It’s equal to what I have done already! On Arthur, on Gronley, and on an entire hold worth of pirates that were in the way of my living. I’m in the way of Sarah’s living, so she should just shoot me, and I’m being a wiseass instead of giving her a reason not to!

I’m being stupid. But I can’t bring myself to be smart. It’s too perfect an opportunity! Too bad a joke to pass up! At least I’ll go out amused rather than terrified. Maybe that would count for something in the grand scheme of things. Burning in hell might be easier if I can look back on a pre-death one-liner.

I giggle madly. It’s not really funny. But it kind of is.

For whatever reason, Sarah doesn’t shoot me for the insolence.

“You really plan on going back to Tortuga and freeing everyone?”

A glimmer of hope in the darkness. Naivety I can take advantage of. Whichever, I leap on the opportunity to prolong my life.

“Yes. Of course.” I spit out, almost stumbling over the words in my rush to get them out. But then I have a moment to think about it, “I mean…I guess…”

Guess what?

Hell, maybe honesty would keep helping. I wasn’t dead yet! “I’ve kind of been making this up as I go along and just doing whatever I thought I needed to not die and since you’re holding a gun on me I’m probably exaggerating how much I ‘planned’ to do that. But you have my word that I will! For whatever that’s worth.”

I wince. Should not have added those last words. I’d sound a lot less shifty without them.

Sarah keeps staring at me for an uncomfortable amount of time. A concert worth of different emotions flashes by on her face, the new replacing the old in warring crescendos before I can do much more than guess what each might be. Surprisingly few are the looks of retribution or hatred I had been expecting, though a flat, unreadable glare that returns periodically comes close to imitating them.

She’s clearly hesitating. For whatever silly reason, she’s not shooting me and solving her problem the easiest and most enjoyable way!

I swallow and slowly raise one hand as if I’m a schoolgirl, “I-If you’re okay with it, could I clean up and…change my clothes…and then I’ll-I’ll do whatever you like, answer whatever you like.”

The blonde looks surprised that I spoke, her eyes flash to my legs before she speaks, “Stay there.”

Her pistol comes back up, though not actually onto me, as she steps closer. As she passes nearest me and slides around the edge of the bulkhead I have to turn an urge to tackle her into an awkward knee-shuffle that, I think, just looks like I’m uncomfortable from my wet pants. I can’t attack her. It would be wrong. Right? More importantly, it’d be dangerous and make her lose any doubt she might actually have.

Sarah searches the bathroom with the precision of…a person I’d ordered to clean it for me multiple times. This time there are still weapons in it for her to find. The pistol still directed halfway towards me, she removes a knife from below the sink, the Tortuga scorpion-venom from its place in one drawer, and even the pair of stun microgrenades I kept taped behind the small intersection of pipes near the ceiling. She starts to leave.

It would be so easy to just let her. I could arm myself and everything could go back to how it was supposed to be. With me on top.

In charge. Me in charge.

“There’s a holdout pistol in a false-panel beside the toilet.” I growl out through clenched teeth, having to force every word out through an almost-supernatural urge against speaking.

She finds it quickly enough. The glare she gives me this time as she passes around the corner again is something else. She flicks the pistol in her hand towards the now-weaponless bathroom. Suitably chastised but excited for the chance to live and regain a bit of my hygiene, I stand and shuffle into the other small room with all the dignity that an adult woman who peed herself can.

“I’ll be expecting answers.” My former slave says.

“You’ll have them.” I assure her.

Whether she would like them or believe them is something else. But I need to try. To prove I can tell the truth even. It shouldn’t feel so weird to be honest, should it?

I briefly clean myself up, calling on Sarah to pass me a fresh set of clothes. The five minutes that follow as I explain my lives are the longest of either of them.

 

[prinCZess]

Lay by your Pleading, Law lyes a-bleeding
-The Power (or Dominion) of the Sword, ballad from the English Civil War ​

My spine is buzzing, driving a chill through my body even inside the sauna-like environment of the cockpit. I can’t shake the whisper of foreboding in the back of my head that tells me to expect a bullet from the woman in the jumpseat behind me. It’s not like I haven’t earned exactly that with how I’ve treated her.

I take my hands off the controls and rub them against my cooling vest, resisting the urge to fondle the pistol at my waist for comfort. Thanks to her it doesn’t exist. The sweat does. With the ‘Mech stationary and unfiring, the cockpit hasn’t actually gotten all that hot. But my palms are clammy anyways. I’ve had nothing to do for the last hours but worry about getting shot or worse while me, Sarah, and my Banshee are cooped-up inside the warehouse at the edge of the spaceport. The nervous anxiety and the fear over the silent, armed woman behind me are both gradually turning me into as much of a dripping, messy, bundle of nerves and fear as actual full-on combat probably would.

Or as just getting held at gunpoint would. Maybe not as bad this time. I haven’t peed myself!
Yet.

I gave a slight snort at my own self-deprecating joke, but can’t fully hide the quiver of lingering terror the memory of being so at someone else’s mercy gives—especially when I’m at almost as much of a disadvantage now. I’d convinced Sarah not to shoot me and to keep quiet about my ‘federal agent’ lies in return for assurances that I’d return to Tortuga to free the people I owned who I’d left behind. Whether I convinced her of anything else I’m still not sure of. She’s been frustratingly hard to read since my explanation of the bimbo in my head with memories of schlocky sci-fi that came from the 20th-century.

Who would have guessed? Being a madwoman who thinks they’re the victim of a time-traveling body-hijacker from the past who knows the future because she read about it in sci-fi books is…not exactly the most sane explanation.

But it’s the truth! It’s supposed to set you free and all that! So why don’t I feel free? I just feel like an insane person who’s given up their last tenuous claim on being able to handle their own life. Once again, I’m doing what someone else wants me to just to stay alive in this stupid madworld! Maybe it’s the right thing this time instead of buying slaves off a corrupt ruler, but I’m not doing it because it’s the right thing, I’m doing it so I don’t get shot or punished. Am I really that selfish?

Of course I am.

I can’t place why, but I almost whine at the thought. Sarah’s presence in the cockpit kills the noise while it’s in my throat. I haven’t earned displays of that kind of weakness around her—around anyone. I can’t handle the pity I can tell it’s intentionally trying to evoke, and precisely because it’s a ploy for sympathy I don’t deserve it.

Making up some crap about seeing the future during a jump through space would have been more believable. Or I suppose I could have asked Sarah if she knew much about Multiverse Theory and BS’d about how I was from an alternate universe where I was a wonderful, storybook princess who cared for her people deeply instead of being a pirate-queen who got a kick from murdering them.

I shake away the regrets over lies that could have been. Making certain Sarah didn’t blow my cover had been the important thing at the time, and she had given me a barrel’s-worth of encouragement for my honesty. With my cover intact with everyone else, I at least won’t get hung on this shitty backwater. For whatever it was worth, I also at least know I am capable of telling the truth! If I have to.

I just have to be held at gunpoint for it. What an honest and good person I am! Give yourself a round of applause for your moral character, Lady!

The descent through the atmosphere had, somewhat-surprisingly for a makeshift crew of former-slaves, gone off without a hitch. Thanks to Major Gerard’s orders, testimony from the slaves the Baron had sold to ‘me’, and my own bullshit about being an undercover federal agent, there hadn’t even been any atmospheric interceptor-craft or anti-aircraft fire sent out by the militia to challenge our touchdown just outside the capitol. If anything, Gerard was greeted with excitement and astonishment by comrades who had believed him to be dead because of some intrigue or another in the recent past that I couldn’t be bothered to note the details of. The man had quickly rallied the planetary guard to him on the back of the story and waited for Baron Tsanma’s return from ‘fighting off pirates’.

If everything continued to go well, Gerard would be arresting the Baron shortly. He was supposed to be timing his arrival at the head of a short battalion of militiamen in armored vehicles with the Baron and his bodyguards relaxing in the Ducal Mansion after their lengthy hours of piloting. My Banshee and I aren’t supposed to be needed at all. Present just in case more firepower is needed for the arrest. The coup.

Since the only other MechWarriors on-planet are Gerard’s sworn-men or Timothy and Michelle—‘Lady Death’ the pirate’s sworn-men…

I shift position on the piloting couch. The reminder of my job combined with the knowledge that those two will get hanged in my place…That I’ll get to walk away when I will but don’t deserve to? I know I’ve done worse things than Tim. Less certain of Michelle since she was a late-joiner to Gronley’s crew before mine, but still.

“Redemption for me but not for thee.”

I don’t realize I’m sing-songing the words out loud until I hear them echoing in my ears when they bounce off the cockpit.
*******************************************************************************************************

A/N:
I narrate and exposition thoughts way, way too much. Been something I've been trying to improve on, but NaNoWriMo project has made me realize just how atrociously bad I am about it. Gotta edit and work on leaving implication rather than writing everything out and slapping readers over the head with a club.
...So here's an update of me slapping anyone reading over the head with a club!

Self-improvement is hard stuff.