This is Dark Alpha posting in place of Captain Exposition, as his trusty
backup poster. :)
Any response or C&C should be sent to LN411@aol.com. If any should be
found in my mailbox by accident, I'll forward them to him.
NOTE: This fic has been split into two sections due to text limit
constraints. Second segment should follow shortly. If you want the uncut
version, contact the original author.
Enjoy.
DA/R
Dark Alpha
AlphSailor@aol.com
-----------------
The Dirty Pair: Double Vision
Standard Disclaimer: I don't own the Dirty Pair. I don't claim to
either, so don't sue me. Sakura Tenjo, Natsumi Ogawa, and Bloody Mary
are original characters who may not be used without my approval. Thanks,
and enjoy the show.
***LEMON WARNING!!!!***
This fic has been equipped with a lemon-fresh scent, and may offend the
weak of heart and the exceedingly prudish. If you don't like stuff that
makes you blush, then don't read it! I do not like flames for things you
could have easily avoided, so spare me the irritation. Thank you.
Cycle 4:
"Okay…ready to try again?"
"Yes sir…the dampers are up."
"Good. Okay people, let's focus here. How's the pulse rate?"
"Just under normal. We're well into the safe zone."
"Any abnormal biofeedback?"
"Nope…he's sleeping like a baby."
"Wonderful. All right now, listen up everyone! I don't want a
repeat performance of the last time. Let's get in and out as quickly as
possible. If you feel lightheaded, confused, or anything else, alert me
and switch with your backup. You know what this thing is capable of. Got
it? Good. Bone saw please…"
"Here."
"Thank you. Nurse, official note: the neuro-dampers have been upped
two levels as a result of our last attempt, and will remain at this
level at all times until the conclusion of Project Eden."
"Yes, Doctor."
"Well, let's proceed then…Lewis, get the gravitic equalizer
charged, I don't want the cranial fluids washing over the screen again."
"Got it ready…"
"Thank you…alright people, I'm going to sound off as I go. I am now
reopening the cranial incision…Spivey, how much has the cut sealed since
our last entry?"
"Approximately…forty-three percent."
"Sweet Jesus…he heals almost as fast as I cut…okay, no problem. I
have just separated the cranial tissue in the partially healed
incision…Lewis, I need those gravitics now…"
"I'm on it."
"Great…Nurse Simpson, give me the micro-saw please…"
"Yes doctor…"
"Thank you. Orlando, how are we doing in respect to the patient's
neuro-feedback?"
"He spiked when you first reopened the incision, but the damper
slapped him down. You're right on the even-mark."
"Still, let's try and get this over with fast. Lewis, get those
gravitics going, I'm having trouble seeing. Nurse, give me the cold-
repairer nano-gel...nurse? Nurse?!"
"Oh god, she's convulsing!"
"Damn! Orlando, where are those dampers?"
"Oh my...oh Jesus! He's overloading them. They're all down! The
field is starting!"
"Get the fucking shield down over him!"
<ZZK...ZZK...ZZK...ZZK>
"Aaaaaagh..."
"Spivey's hurt!"
"Just get him through the door!"
" Close the door, close the door, close the door!!"
<SHHHHHH>
"Okay…calm down people…the door's sealed. Orlando, who'd we lose?"
"Spivey's dead…so are two of the nurses. Lewis needs help, fast.
Doctor, is your arm okay?"
"Fine, Orlando…I just scraped it getting through the door…Damn…that
thing is a monster…oh Jesus, Orlando…what are we going to do about
this?"
*****
Peter Fisher, the man known to his subordinates as "The Fish", was,
in his own mind, a very good man. A pure man. A man of ideals. Those
that knew him by reputation knew him to be a valuable ally, and a deadly
enemy. Those that could not comprehend his power simply considered him a
lunatic. For the most part, Kevin Sleet fell into the last group, but
when he actually had to confront his supervisor, he forced himself to
remember how dangerous it was to underestimate Fisher.
Fisher was the regional head of the BTR, a man capable of almost
anything in the galaxies surrounding this complex. He could make the
leader of any nation on any planet within his control vanish and have
him replaced in a single night, and nothing could be done to stop him,
at least openly. But Fisher was smart enough to never exercise such
power. He adhered firmly to the belief that power imagined was far more
intimidating than power displayed. Besides, such petty dictators and
monarchs were inconsequential in the grand scheme. Did not the Lord say,
"The meek shall inherit the Earth?"
And this led directly into his weaknesses, of which there were two
that Sleet knew of. The first was that Fisher was a rabid collector of
antiquities from pre-Nanoclysm Earth's distant past. His home was a
museum of ancient paintings, statuettes, books, armor, and other even
more esoteric objects. Sleet heard that Fisher had actually taken
Bereavement leave once when a valued vase was broken in his home. And
judging from the appearance of Fisher's huge office, Sleet could believe
it.
Sleet had been called up to his superior's office for something he
was sure related to Project Eden, Fisher's pet project. Passing into the
office, Sleet walked by a display of Celtic rune stones, past two French
paintings from the early Impressionist age, past a case of ancient
Japanese weapons and armor, and into the main office. He stood at
attention, noting that there was another person sitting in the office in
front of the desk with his back to the door. Fisher stood up from behind
his desk, and smiled at Sleet. A patriarchal man in his middle sixties,
Fisher had iron-gray hair shot through with streaks of white, a kindly
face patterned with fine wrinkles, and large, soft hands that seemed
unmarked by age save a few white hairs growing along the backs from his
wrists. Around his eyes were crows feet that suggested constant inner
laughter, a greater lie than any other in his appearance.
This was the primary reason that this man was known as The Fish.
When his eyes fell on someone or something, they never blinked or
shifted. He simply watched with distant curiosity, much like a fish
staring out from behind glass. Those eyes had unnerved men of stronger
will than Sleet. So as he saluted, Sleet carefully focused his eyes on a
point on Fisher's forehead. Fisher smiled benignly, the smile of a
favorite grandfather. With a small wave of his hand, he said, "God bless
you, Brother Sleet."
And that was his other weakness. Fisher was an intensely religious
man, adhering to the teachings of the Christian faith to the point of
zealotry, at least in Sleet's view. As he knew Fisher liked, Sleet bowed
his head in devotion he felt none of and replied, "God be praised,
Father Fisher."
Fisher beamed and waved Sleet to a chair next to the person already
in the office. Sleet nodded, using the motion of his head to
surreptitiously check out who he shared Fisher's office with. A tall
young man, well built, but obviously rather skinny until recently, sat
in the chair, hands folded in his lap, looking straight ahead. As Sleet
sat down next to him, he turned his head slightly and smiled briefly.
Sleet widened his perpetual smirk slightly in response.
Fisher remained standing, and began pacing back and forth behind
his desk, a slow and stately pace. He smiled down at the two men before
him. Sleet reminded himself that the older man across from him, though
seemingly absent-minded and maybe a bit senile, was in possession of a
mind cunning and devious enough, not to mention sharp enough, to rule in
the BTR, where cunning and brilliance was almost commonplace. Trying to
keep his exterior calm, Sleet's mind worked furiously as to why he had
been called here, and to what end.
Fisher opened his mouth, hesitated, then said, "Brother Sleet, I
must confess curiosity as to what steps you have taken to recover the
books the 3WA has taken."
Sleet grinned in his mind. So the old bastard is getting impatient
after all...His face all seriousness, Sleet replied, "Father Fisher, I
have taken your advice and chosen a subordinate to assist me in the
recovery of these books. Even now, we are working towards getting-"
Fisher cut him off in mid-sentence, an act unheard of from the
utterly polite man. "Brother Sleet, who is this person you have chosen?"
Sleet cursed silently even as he answered, "Mary Latimer, Father."
The BTR director nodded wordlessly, still pacing slowly. After a
beat of silence he asked, "She is the one called ‘Bloody Mary', yes?"
Without waiting for an answer he continued, "While I approve of her
dedication to our cause, I frown upon her methods to no end. It is a
great sin to take life needlessly. You say she is at this moment
recovering the books?"
A bead of sweat rolled down the side of Sleet's head, though he
refused to show his nervousness by wiping it away. A quick glance out of
the corner of his eye showed him that the other man was still sitting
silently, smiling straight ahead. Why does he look so damned familiar?
Sleet wondered. To Fisher, Sleet said, "Actually sir, she's doing more
of a reconnaissance mission."
Fisher raised an eyebrow and motioned for Sleet to explain. Feeling
several more beads of sweat join the first, Sleet gave a brief
description of what he had sent Mary to do. At the end, Fisher wore a
disapproving frown, but showed no surprise. It was with a sinking heart
that Sleet realized that he had known beforehand what Mary was up to.
There was displeasure in his expression, but no surprise, no hint that
what he had just heard was unknown to him. I've been set up.
Sleet fell silent as he concluded his report, mind racing. Fisher
resumed pacing, hands clasped behind his back. Sleet sat as still as
possible and furiously tried to form a contingency plan. The other man
just sat and smiled placidly, as if he were enjoying an art show or
concert. Fisher paused in his pacing to look at Sleet with those eerie
eyes of his, staring as if he intended to peer straight through him into
the space behind him. "Brother Sleet..." He began, paused, turned his
back and spoke as he looked out of his window. "I am unsure if this is a
wise course of action. I want...I need those books. But I cannot risk
an...incident. So here is what I have decided. You will call back Ms.
Latimer at the first available opportunity, before she can risk placing
both herself and you in a situation you may find it hard to remove
yourself from. I trust you did not order her to do anything that could
compromise our current truce with the 3WA, yes?"
A sinking feeling came over Sleet. Even as he heard himself say
that he had asked her to do nothing but locate the Dirty Pair and report
back, he began trying to think of ways to distance himself from Mary
without making it obvious to Fisher that he was trying to keep his hands
clean. Fisher made a satisfied sound and continued. "Good. When she has
returned here, you will report to me, and we will decide what to do
about her then. Until that time, you will take on Brother Dalton here as
your second-in-command. I expect you two to work closely together to
retrieve the books."
Sleet felt as if a hammer had been brought down upon his head. He
whipped his head around to look at the man next to him, who he knew had
to be Dalton, even though Fisher had not even looked in their direction.
The other man turned to look at him for the first time since the meeting
had started. He was young, just out of Academy it seemed, and had a
narrow face, a nose like a hatchet-blade, a high forehead and thin lips.
There was a large bandage on his cheek, and another above his left eye.
He smiled at Sleet and nodded his head slightly. "It'll be a pleasure to
work with someone as skilled as yourself, Mr. Sleet."
His voice was oddly hoarse, almost rough. The smile never reached
his eyes as he spoke either. Instead, his eyes remained utterly blank,
all emotion hidden behind a carefully constructed screen. Sleet smiled
back, and said with equally false sincerity, "If you're good enough to
be teamed up with me, I'm sure the pleasure will be all mine."
He stuck a hand out for Dalton to shake, baring his teeth in what
he hoped would pass for a smile. Dalton took his hand gently and shook
three times, each pump of Sleet's hand moving it precisely the same
distance up and down. Sleet noted a fair bit of something dark brown
crusted under Dalton's nails. It was with no little discomfort, even to
one such as himself, that he realized that it was the exact shade of
dried blood. Dalton grinned back, a mirthless retraction of his lips,
making his narrow face look almost like a skull. For a moment, Sleet saw
a glimpse of something in the man's eyes, a hot, glassy shimmer, eyes
that reminded him forcibly of Mary as she had assaulted...Oh shit. Sleet
realized where he had seen this man before. The day he had introduced
himself to Mary, right after she finished pounding Dalton into
horsemeat. Sleet found that he wanted his hand out of this other man's
grip very badly.
While he practically yanked his hand from Dalton's dry, loose grip,
Fisher said, "That will be all, Brother Sleet. Contact Mary immediately,
if you would. There is much for you to do. You and Brother Dalton both."
Sleet stood quickly. He glanced at Dalton, who was looking straight
ahead again. Unconsciously rubbing the hand that he had used to shake
Dalton's against his pants leg, he said, "Thank you, ahh...Father
Fisher. God be praised..."
Fisher waved a hand dismissively at Agent Sleet without turning
from his inspection of the building-tops he could see from the window.
The Regional Director sighed quietly as the door clicked shut. With an
ease he didn't quite feel he perused the familiar landscape of buildings
below him. But more than anything, he focused on the reflection of young
Frederick Dalton's face in the polished glass. When he thought that none
looked at him, the boy's face stretched into an expression of black
mirth. His lips pulled back in a rictus grin that practically bared his
molars, his eyes transformed into dark pits by the shadow of his brow.
Fisher turned quickly to face him. The expression vanished like
quicksilver running down a table, replaced with a polite smile and
hooded eyes. But he had seen, oh yes, he had seen it. Fisher sat down at
his desk, as if nothing had happened, and folded his hands on the desk.
"So," He said placidly, "Tell me again of these two girls from the
Academy that you are so sure will cause trouble for this project..."
After Dalton had concluded his description of the two girls and
been sent away, Fisher sat back in his chair and stared out the window,
finger tracing designs on the cover of the Bible that never left his
desk. That boy was good, very promising. In the course of days, he had
been promoted to Agent Second Class, almost unheard of in any day of the
BTR. That he deserved it made him all the more important. But that
expression, the too-wide smile and hollow-eyed stare Fisher had seen in
the window was burned into his mind. A dangerous boy, to be sure.
Silently, he measured gain against loss, with the deadly accurate
internal scales that had brought him to his current position. Gain
against loss. Risk against reward. Good against evil. Unconsciously
making the sign of the cross over and over on the cover of the Bible, he
whispered to his empty office, "And He sayeth unto them: Follow me and I
will make you fishers of men..."
*****
Kei, Yuri and Sakura returned to the ship laughing quietly amongst
themselves at dusk. Despite the fairly grim information the Hamburger
Man had imparted to them, they were still excited to have a lead. Or
rather, Kei and Yuri were excited to have a lead, and Sakura was just
glad to be on such an important mission. As they walked back to where
Natsumi had "parked" the ship, they laughed amongst themselves, talking
of light subjects.
They stepped into the clearing where the lake had so recently been
and looked up at the Lovely Angel, the Dirty Pair's signature ship. Kei
and Yuri frowned slightly when they noticed that the rear hatch stood
open, the ramp almost touching the empty lake's bank. Kei muttered,
"That little twit had better not have wandered off."
Sakura smiled and said, "I wouldn't worry about it. Natsumi may be
a bit air-headed, but she isn't the type to wander off." She thought
about this for a moment, then added, "Well, okay. She could very likely
wander off, but only if there was nothing more interesting to do. Odds
are we'll find her sitting in the cockpit making reactor noises..."
The three girls stepped onto the ship calling Natsumi's name. When
silence greeted them, they moved deeper into the ship. Worried furrows
were beginning to form on their brows. Soon, they approached the bridge.
Yuri stepped out of a storage bay frowning worriedly. "I called over the
intercom," She said to Kei and Sakura, "And I didn't get an answer..."
Kei slammed a fist into the wall and cursed. "I knew it! I just
knew that flake would get lost at the first port we stopped in!"
Sakura rounded on her, green eyes flashing fire now. "Stop saying
that! She wouldn't flake out. I know her, and she isn't like that."
Yuri nodded understandingly, patting Sakura on the shoulder, and
said in the tone of a parent explaining to a particularly young child,
"We both know that, really we do. It's just that sometimes the life we
lead in the 3WA is just too much for some people...it's not her fault,
she may just not be cut out for this kind of job."
Slapping the hand away angrily, Sakura wheeled around and strode
towards the bridge, calling her friend's name as she went. Kei and Yuri
exchanged a long look and followed close behind. The bridge door slid
open at their approach, the quiet hiss of pneumatics the only noise.
On the bridge, Sakura and the Lovely Angels stared around.
Something had obviously happened here. Yuri knelt and scraped hardening
blood from the floor with a fingernail. There were similar bloodstains,
scatterings of tiny droplets in a few places around the room. Along one
wall was a larger spray, spreading from low on the wall down onto the
floor. And on the far side of the room, there was a trail of blood, a
thin stream smeared in places, that lead into the hall that went to the
various girls' rooms. The door to the hall was shut. Sakura, Kei and
Yuri looked at each other, a combination of apprehension and fear in all
of their eyes. Finally, Kei visibly firmed steadied herself and strode
to the door. Yuri hesitated a moment, then followed. Sakura hung back, a
feeling of rising dread filling her. Kei hit the activating pad for the
door, making it slide open quietly. For a moment, a strange, stretched-
out moment, the entire universe seemed to pause. Then Kei slumped
against the doorframe.
Yuri's gasp was enough to pull Sakura forward. Somehow, she knew
what she would find, and it filled her with a hollowed-out terror, but
she could not stop her feet from moving, or her eyes from opening wide.
She stepped between Yuri, who had clamped her hands over her mouth and
was making strange sounds from deep in her throat. The effect was almost
comical, in a distant way. What could make someone like one of the Dirty
Pair make sounds like that? Kei was leaning against the doorframe as if
it was all that held her up, staring wordlessly at what lay beyond. And
Sakura saw.
Natsumi hung by the neck from a cable casement protruding from the
ceiling. A chain had been linked around her neck, locked with a padlock,
Sakura noted distantly, the other end tied crudely around the cable
casement. There was just enough length to the chain for her to keep her
feet, were she not unconscious. As it was, she slumped against the wall,
half-standing, half leaning. At first, Sakura thought she was dressed in
a strange red bodysuit, but she realized directly on the tail of this
thought that it was blood. And it was true, Natsumi was coated in blood
from head to toe. Blood seeped sluggishly down from in her hair,
covering her face and hardening in dark streaks. Blood had washed down
over her naked torso, mixing with blood from ragged wounds in her sides
and on her arms and legs. The blood that oozed from those gaping wounds
was thick and clotting, but still crawled like volcanic rock down her
sides in heavy rivulets. Still distantly, clinically, Sakura recognized
the wounds as welts of some sort. Blood was on the chain too; in that
still, silent part of her brain, Sakura surmised the wounds came from
the chain.
Aside from the obvious wounds, large bruises already showed through
under the blood wherever the wounds were not. A distant buzzing sound
nagged at the edge of Sakura's hearing. She could see that Natsumi's
hands were bound behind her with some white piece of cloth. Her only
clothing was what looked like part of a bikini. Sakura let her eyes
trail down Natsumi's legs, where thick dried rivulets of blood had
pooled around her feet. The strange buzzing persisted. Distantly, Sakura
wondered why her throat ached. Sakura looked slowly up at Natsumi's
face, almost peaceful under the layer of blood, and it all slammed back
in like a blow to the head.
The buzzing in her ears increased in volume, and she realized it
was somebody screaming. She wondered who was screaming until her jaws
began to ache, and she realized it was her. It was her screaming, and
Natsumi was hurt. She closed her eyes, and felt like she was falling
down a well. The screaming faded blessedly once again, this time
vanishing completely. Sensation slipped away from her like smoke through
a sieve, and silence held her to its breast. Everything would be better
when she opened her eyes. She knew it.
*****
Sakura gasped and sat bolt upright, grabbing for something, what it
was, she was not quite sure. When her hand closed on air, she blinked
and gave a start. Looking around, she saw she was in the small medical
bay of the Lovely Angel, a place she had only seen during the initial
tour of the ship she and Natsumi had been given. Natsumi. Sakura whipped
her head around to look at the other side of the room. Sitting on the
other side of a large containment unit she recognized as a stasis
chamber, Sakura spied Yuri watching her concernedly. A large purple
bruise had spread across her left cheek, and she was holding her
Electromag in her hand as if she intended to use it.
At Sakura's startled expression, Yuri asked quietly, "How do you
feel?"
The pink-haired girl blinked and rubbed at a lump she had just
noticed on the back of her head. "I have a lump on my head. What
happened?"
Yuri tossed her a Cold-Pak compress, which Sakura snagged from the
air and pressed gratefully to the lump on the side of her head. The
black-haired Lovely Angel said, "You passed out. We carried you to the
infirmary, after we had gotten Natsumi into the stasis tube. You woke up
a few minutes after that and became slightly hysterical. When we tried
to stop you from opening her stasis chamber, you...got a bit violent."
Yuri fingered the bruise on her cheek. "When Kei finally managed to get
a good hit in on you with my gun-butt, we put you back to bed. You
should be grateful I convinced Kei not to put you in full electrical
restraints until further notice. As it is, I think you might want to
avoid her for a while."
Sakura winced sympathetically. Then her eyes fell on the stasis
tube in between her and Yuri. She swallowed and pointed to it with a
trembling hand. At her unspoken question, Yuri seemed to become more
alert, holding the Electromag more readily as she nodded. The pink-
haired girl exhaled shakily and asked, "How is she?"
Yuri sighed hollowly. "Not good. We didn't dare move her, so we had
to wait until we got the engine fired up to activate the grav-field and
float her in here. I can't imagine how long she was hanging there before
we found her. But we're already en route to the nearest planet with a
med-tech level high enough to repair this kind of damage. As long as she
wasn't hanging there for too long, she should be okay."
A tightness in her chest prompted Sakura to ask Yuri to be alone
for a while with Natsumi. Yuri peered at her sharply and made her swear
no to try and open the stasis tube before she left the room. Once she
was sure they were alone, Sakura fell against the unit, upper body
draped over the clear viewing window, and began to cry, deep body-
shaking sobs pulling at her. Almost unconsciously, one hand dragged over
the window over Natsumi's blood-streaked face. For some time, the only
sound in the room was the hum of the stasis tube and the cries of one
who is lost and frightened.
*****
Yuri rejoined Kei on the bridge, where her partner was watching the
security tapes from while they were gone. Before Sakura had awoken, they
had located and watched the section of tape showing the fight, including
the section from the hall camera that showed what the little blond had
done to Natsumi there as well. After watching it once with the volume
up, wincing at every scream, they had watched it twice more with the
volume down. After that, they had erased the entire section after
copying it onto a micro-disk, swearing that Sakura would never see that
tape.
Aside from the terrible sadism of what they had seen, another thing
troubled them. Yuri had first postulated that the attack was motivated
by simple Anti-Dirty Pair sentiments, but after watching the tape again,
they agreed this was very unlikely. The tiny blond girl had repeatedly
demanded between blows from the chain and worse treatment that Natsumi
tell her where "the books" were. That left little doubt in their minds
as to who had ordered the attack.
When Yuri sat down beside Kei, the red-headed Angel was watching
the portion of the tape directly after the blond finished her horrific
assault. Yuri watched the girl, smiling blithely all the while, drag
Natsumi's unconscious form to her feet and lock the chain around her
neck with a padlock she had drawn from a pocket. She then tied it to the
cable housing, removed her "Kei N' Yuri-Con ‘41" shirt from the
disastrous convention that they had visited in person, and used it to
bind Natsumi's limp hands behind her.
As Yuri sat down, Kei said, "I don't understand why she did that
with the shirt. Natsumi was definitely unconscious by then, so there was
no need. She left the shirt as a message, that much is obvious. But what
was she trying to say?"
Despite common beliefs that Kei was "The Dumb Angel", Yuri actually
considered her a rather sharp mind. After a moment of thinking of some
of the things they had done in the past, Yuri amended this to a
reasonably capable mind with a knack for noticing subtleties. In any
case, Yuri had relied on Kei's perception on more than one occasion, and
on her knack for getting hunches that were spot-on even more than that.
She looked at the screen and watched with troubled eyes as the blond
attacker skipped off the ship with a broken nose and soaked in blood,
smiling happily all the way. "But who the hell was that little monster?"
She asked.
Kei snorted. "BTR muscle, definitely." When Yuri protested the idea
of such a young assassin, Kei explained, "Look at how she fights. No
frills, no flair. Just hard, fast, and for the throat. She isn't an
amateur by any means. And besides, it's no big deal to vat-breed a kid
with that kind of fighting knowledge, not if you have the funding the
BTR has. In any case, she's probably just young looking. I doubt the BTR
would risk losing a vat-grown assassin on a mission like this."
Yuri nodded. "But why? Why do this? It's not too likely she mistook
Natsumi for you or I. What was the point of the attack? A message?"
Kei nodded grimly. "What I want to know is, who was it for?
Natsumi...or us?"
*****
Kevin Sleet made his way down the hall to his modest apartment on
the edge of the BTR complex, and planned as furiously as he ever had.
For once in his life, he honestly was not sure what he should do. It was
not a question of being unsure what course of action was wisest, that
was obvious; cover his tracks with Mary, make it look like she had taken
the initiative in roughing up the Dirty Pair, then toss her to the
wolves. What troubled him was whether he really wanted to do that.
It was clear to him that this Dalton kid, who would most assuredly
get his soon enough, had buttonholed Sleet quite neatly. To what end
Sleet had no idea, and that bothered him. He was sure it had to do with
Mary, but how? In any case, Dalton had gotten Fisher's ear somehow, and
that in of itself presented a problem. Sleet wanted to simply erase the
annoying little snot, by either having him sent to some backwater planet
at the ass-end of the universe on diplomatic duties until he met with an
unfortunate accident, or have him sent into combat duty in some high-
fatality civil war. Or better yet, simply have him meet with a tragic
fall from a balcony, or an unfortunate traffic accident. All of these
were within Sleet's power, at least nominally, and had been used a few
times in the past. All it took was a call to the right program director,
or maybe a favor called in with Mil-Intel Central, occasionally the
right word or two in Fisher's ear. But none of that was possible as long
as Dalton was firmly attached to Fisher's ass. Sleet fumed as he key-
carded his door and stepped in. What he saw inside made him scream and
jump six inches straight up.
Standing in the doorway to his small kitchen was Mary, dressed in a
frilly pink apron with a nauseatingly cute cat emblazoned on it, and
apparently nothing else on beneath it. He noted rather absently that she
had a small white bandage across the bridge of her nose and a partially
healed bruise on her cheek. In her hands was a pan of something that
smelled reasonably appetizing. She smiled cutely as she resumed stirring
the pan's contents. "Hey Tiger! Didja miss me?"
Sleet gibbered as he furiously tried to remember where his gun was.
It was in the bedroom, behind Mary. Shit. When his language center
recovered, he said, "M-Mary! You're back!"
She winked at him and answered, "Yup! I cooked you dinner. Can you
guess what you're having for desert?"
She writhed sexily in the little apron, and Sleet got a fair idea
of what she meant. "Are...are you okay?"
Mary nodded happily and said, "Mm-hmm! Right as rain and twice as
wet! Now, come eat...your dinner."
She turned to go back into the kitchen. Sleet could feel his eyes,
and other areas, getting bigger as he watched her perfectly-shaped
buttocks move in a very attractive way, proving once and for all that
there was nothing under that apron. Sleet babbled something about a
status report, though he suspected it was mostly incoherent. In the
kitchen, she turned to look over her shoulder at him. "We can talk
later. Now, hurry up. Your dinner is getting cooler, and I'm getting
hotter. Or aren't you hungry?"
She licked her lips and vanished into the other room. Sleet
actually ran after her, trying very hard not to pant like the horny
bastard he most definitely was. All thoughts of tossing Mary to the
wolves were shed like the clothing he tore off as he went. Things were
beginning to look up for Kevin J. Sleet.
*****
Orius VI was a rich planet. A prosperous planet. And most certainly,
an advanced planet. Boasting the birthplace of the Osic genetic upgrade,
Orius VI had financial security for a few millennia yet at least. Of
course, such widespread wealth bred one result, and one result only:
raging class politics. Make no mistake, there were any number of planets
that showed remarkable hatred towards ethnic, religious, or biological
groups different from themselves. This was to be expected. But only the
Orius system boasted segregation among different types of genetic
upgrades.
With the advent of the Osic genetic upgrade, the Lucien model, the
most popular genetic upgrade package on the market, found itself placed
firmly in the backseat. The Osic boasts better biological gene-training,
greater resistance to disease and injury, a greater percentage of
upgrades with superior intelligence ratings, and superior physical
features, such as faster reflexes, accelerated hemoglobin to prevent
blood contamination, a feature Lucien had been working on for decades.
The Osic motto states, "The best upgrade available at the price it
deserves". While an Osic upgrade is out of the price-range of most
consumers, those that can afford it know that they can depend on what
they're buying to be the best. And that is exactly what they're paying
for; something better than what anyone else has.
Needless to say, this is exactly the sort of attitude that breeds
one hell of an ugly state of mind. Orius VI boasts Osic-exclusive
neighborhoods, where homeowners have to give a DNA sample to prove their
superior breeding before they can even get past the gates. Many public
buildings on the planet have signs in the windows that read, "Osics
only", or "No Luciens". And God forbid someone with an even more
inferior model of upgrade land on planet. In any case, the citizens of
Orius VI lived in a constant state of superior smugness, sure in their
position as genetic masters of the known Universe. They were also
unwittingly on a collision course with a wake-up call.
Dr. Gransten Morris, surgeon and amateur golf champion, was on his
way to get some coffee when an explosion hit the lobby of the Mikhail
Swanson Memorial Hospital. After a moment of confusion, he realized the
"explosion" was actually a girl. Three of them, in fact.
Two of them, a young red-head and a girl of about the same age with
black hair were pushing a mobile stasis chamber and following a younger
girl with a shock of bright pink hair. The explosion he had heard was
the pink-haired one firing a light rocket into the main entrance. She
brushed glass from her shoulders and casually slung the four-foot long
rocket launcher she was carrying into a corner by a cowering man holding
up a magazine in front of his face like a shield.
The receptionist, whose name escaped Dr. Morris at that exact
moment, stood and began trying to flag the attention of the girls. The
pink-haired one ignored her and strode on past. Then the young
receptionist, a chubby girl with badly permed blond hair, made the worst
mistake of her life. Nancy, that was her name, Morris realized. Nancy
grabbed the pink-haired one's left upper arm and said something in an
angry tone. Morris couldn't make out what, as his ears were still
ringing from the rocket explosion. Without slowing her stride, the girl
wheeled around, grabbed Nancy by her offensive perm, and began striding
back towards the receptionist's desk. Nancy was squealing loudly, but
the girl who held her so painfully gave no sign she cared or even
noticed. When they got close to the desk, she yanked mightily and hurled
Nancy bodily over the counter of the desk using only her hair for
leverage. A crash and a number of interesting sounds from Nancy issued
from behind the desk.
The two other girls said and did nothing throughout this
interchange, they only stood and watched the pink-haired one cautiously.
Dusting her hand off, said girl pointed at Morris and motioned for him
to come over to the receptionist's desk. He decided that it was wisest
to humor her until the Peacekeepers could arrive. The other two girls
wheeled the stasis tube over. Inside Dr. Morris could see another girl,
this one primarily naked and soaked with blood now frozen in space by
the stasis field. He could see she had a number of rather nasty cuts in
her sides and on her face. He also noted that each one of the girls were
Luciens.
The pink-haired one pointed at the stasis tube as she fiddled with
something on her hip. "She needs help. She's hurt." She said. Morris saw
that the thing on her hip was most definitely a holster of some sort.
Morris smiled and said condescendingly, "Young lady, I don't know
if you noticed, but this is an Osic-upgrade hospital, and-"
She cut him off and pointed back out the door. "That's what the
cops in the cruiser told me."
Dr. Morris looked back through the ruined doors. A Peacekeeper
personnel carrier lay overturned in the parking lot, belching greasy
black smoke. He swallowed nervously. From behind the desk, Nancy was
making whimpering noises. The pink-haired one pointed at the girl in the
stasis tube again. "Help her. She...she's dying."
Making an effort to make his voice comforting, Dr. Morris said,
"Miss, this hospital is for Osic upgrades only. There a number of
perfectly serviceable Lucien hospitals off-planet on the O'Neill
Stations that you can-"
In the blink of an eye, Morris found himself staring down the
barrel of a large pistol held in the fist of the girl. It was easy to
look most of the way down the barrel, as said barrel was less than a
half an inch from his eye. The girl's expression had not changed from
its rictus of worry and quiet grief since she had entered the hospital,
and it did not change now. Dr. Morris scowled at the gun and blustered,
"You can't threaten me, you little bitch! You're already in deep enough
shit for your entrance, do you want to add threatening a public servant
to the pile?"
Her answer was to reach up and grab the back of his head like a
cobra striking. Without a word, she slammed the side of his face down
against the receptionist's desk and held the gun to his cheek. For the
first time, expression crossed her face, and it was cold, murderous
rage. "You pathetic fuck," She hissed, "I'm a 3WA troubleshooter! If you
don't agree to have my friend in an operating theater by the time I
finish talking, I will kill you and find another doctor. If he won't
help, I'll kill him too. If I have to, I'll nuke your shitty little
planet into dust. You people are expendable. She isn't. Clear?"
The other two girls finally spoke. The redhead, grinning from ear
to ear, leaned down into his line of vision and said, "She isn't lying.
She really will nuke this planet."
The black-haired one added, "And if she doesn't, we will. Is that
clear?"
Morris nodded as best he could with a gun barrel trying to gouge a
hole in his cheek. "Very, very clear. I can have her in surgery in three
minutes."
The two girls looked at their friend with the gun to his cheek.
After an extremely tense pause, she nodded almost imperceptibly. She
eased the gun away from his jaw and backed up a step. Dr. Morris stood
slowly and rubbed at his jaw resentfully. The pink-haired one pointed at
the tube with her gun and said, "Get going. I'm going to go find a
chair, and I will watch you. If I see you standing still, I start
shooting."
He nodded and grabbed the phone from the receptionist's panel of
devices. After snapping at Nancy to stop sniveling, he began paging a
full host of doctors, ranging in specialties from head-trauma to spinal-
tissue damage. Once he was sure all of them were clear that this was not
one of the cases that could be put off until after the ninth hole was
done, he went over to the three girls. He was not surprised to see that
the lobby had cleared out rather quickly. The black-haired one was
talking quietly to the pink-haired one with the gun. The redhead was
reading a gossip magazine and blowing bubbles with a piece of gum.
Keeping what he hoped was a respectful enough distance between them, Dr.
Morris said, "I called all of the doctors we'll need. I can have her in
the emergency room in about a minute and a half, but all we can do now
is prep, find out what needs fixing. It'll take at least two hours to
get everyone I need here."
The girl nodded and said quietly, "Do it." Morris sighed with
relief as he motioned the three nurses that had come out an elevator to
the stasis tube. As the four of them trotted the girl to the emergency
room, he decided that once this nightmare was over, he was transferring
to a hospital in one of the restricted neighborhoods. Those Luciens were
just getting out of control.
*****
The only sound in the locker room was the drip of a shower and
Dalton's quiet breathing as he changed. He came to the gym to work out
late at night when nobody else was there. He liked it better that way,
not because it was quieter, but because he would have the locker room to
himself. He didn't like having to be naked around other people. It made
him feel uncomfortable.
As he dressed himself, he thought about those two girls from the
academy, Tenjo and Ogawa. He sneered. Idiots, the both of them. Inferior
to him in every way. Unbidden, he remembered, and his sneer vanished. He
remembered. A nervous, gawky boy, made bold by having survived his first
year in Takachiho Military Academy, something everyone, even his parents
had told him he couldn't possibly do. He had proved them wrong. He could
do anything. He remembered the nervous boy, still reed thin and looking
like an unbent coat hanger with legs, going up to a pretty girl and her
friend. He remembered the boy asking the pretty girl on a date. He
remembered the way they had laughed at the boy, mocking laughter,
teasing laughter. He remembered how everyone else in the library had
laughed too. He remembered seeing the boy run out of the library,
mortified beyond belief as the laughter pursued him. He could still hear
the laughter. He could still remember being the boy. He could still
hate.
Dalton looked down at his hand at a sudden pain. In the palm of his
hand were four crescent-shaped gouges, bleeding around the ragged edges.
He had been clenching his fist so tightly he had hurt himself. What
would people think? They would laugh if they saw it. They would all
laugh. He wiped it clean and placed an adhesive bandage from his locker
over the wound. There. Nobody could laugh now. He had hidden it, and
fooled them all. A sly smile crawled across his face. He had tricked
them all again.
Now that it had been set in motion, the path of his thoughts was
going on unbidden, a psychic freight train bulling through the night. He
couldn't have stopped it if he tried. In a way, he knew what was going
to happen, instinctively. He met this with a mix of resignation and
black glee. Triggered by the thought of what had been, Dalton began to
fantasize again. In his mind, he saw her again and again, every single
time he had ever seen her since the first time catalogued away in his
head. He looked at her from all angles, with and without clothing,
although the latter was a total product of his imagination. But he had a
good idea, oh yes. But he didn't lust after her. That was wrong, and he
wasn't so base, so common as to think of a girl in those terms. He was
of a higher order than the rest of those beefy thugs in the Academy. He
was better than them.
But she had rejected him, probably for one of those self-same
thugs. He told himself it was okay, because she was probably a slut
anyway. Opening her legs for any one of them...Dalton gave a low cry and
leaned against the locker, hitting his head against it as he moaned. No!
That was wrong! She was good, she was pure. She wouldn't have done that,
wouldn't have been like that. But then, why did she reject him? It
couldn't be him...she was a slut! A bitch, like all the others! No! She
was his ideal, the perfect, virginal woman. But she rejected him! She
was just another stupid bitch! No! She was perfect! Then why did she
reject him? It wasn't his fault, it wasn't his fault it wasn't his fault
it wasn't his fault...
Dalton screamed, a high-pitched keening noise. He slammed one fist
against the locker, leaving a half-inch deep dent. "BITCH!" He screamed.
His lips pulled up into a painfully wide grin that had nothing to do
with happiness. Eyes streaming, he swung at another locker, leaving
another dent. Blood flowed from his knuckles. Behind his eyes, it was
starting. He saw her, pure, virginal. The cancers started eating her.
Her skin crinkled and blackened as unspeakable things dripped out. She
rotted before his eyes, and there was nothing he could do. The smell of
rotted meat filled his nostrils. He screamed again and clawed at his
face. It wasn't his fault it wasn't his fault it wasn't his fault. All
of them, every one of the bitches was a slut, and the cancers were
eating them. He would kill them all. He fell to the floor as he began
feverishly clawing at his bare chest, tearing at his skin. He didn't
want to see this happen, not to her. But no matter what, he just
couldn't...stop...SEEING. Curled into a fetal position, trying to ward
off something inside his own head, Dalton laid on the floor, pinching
his nostrils shut in a futile attempt to block out the stench of rotting
corpses only he smelled. And in the silence of the night in an empty
locker room, Frederick Dalton cried and bled.
*****
Kei came out of the bathroom in time to see a gurney with a weakly
cursing orderly on it get carried by. She sidled up to Yuri and asked,
"How's Sakura?"
Yuri sighed and continued nursing a flat can of cola. "That doctor
sent an orderly to try and give her a tranquilizer while she was taking
a nap. Sakura kneecapped him and stabbed him in the ass with his own
hypo. Poor man..."
Kei chuckled and shook her head wonderingly. Sakura had been acting
this way since she had watched the security tape, edited by Kei and Yuri
first. She had cold-cocked the security guard who had approached them
when they made an unscheduled landing at this pathetic mudball's biggest
landing field, and had then proceeded to fire rockets on the three
transports of security guards that had come next with that rocket
launcher with the silly name. The fourth transport had been given a
choice between giving them a trip to a hospital and a fiery death. Once
they got to the hospital, and were warned that they couldn't get service
there- because of the fact that they were Luciens, of all the silly
things- she had blown them up anyway. In short, Sakura was shaping up
into a true Lovely Angel. Kei decided that a talk about giving official
warning before blowing things up was necessary though. They were
officers of the law after all, and they had an image to uphold.
The doctor Sakura had threatened, who had introduced himself as Dr.
Morris, stepped out of the emergency room and ran a hand through his
thick, Osic-engineered hair. He had told the three of them that they
were under no circumstances to enter the operating room, as it could
compromise Natsumi's chance of survival. They were still waiting on the
three surgeons that they needed, but they had managed to pull together
enough of a surgical team to do a fair bit for her already, or so he
said. He had promised them a full diagnosis as soon as possible, and all
three were hoping that this was it.
Morris came up to them, glanced at Sakura, who was now standing and
very obviously not tranquilized. Once Sakura had joined them, Morris
sighed and said, "It isn't good. It's definitely fixable, but we'll need
her DNA sample from the 3WA archive to regrow the necessary nerve
tissue."
Kei cursed, Sakura paled, and Yuri murmured, "Oh dear..."
When Morris looked at them questioningly, Sakura said quietly, "She
hasn't had the official DNA sample taken yet. Natsumi and I've only
been troubleshooters for a week."
Dr. Morris scratched his head and said, "Well, that does complicate
things. We can take the DNA sample now, run it to our vat-labs first
thing in the morning. But it'll take at least a month to process and
copy. I'm sorry, but if we don't take the time, she'll be paralyzed for
the rest of her life."
Sakura sighed hollowly. Yuri squeezed her shoulder comfortingly as
she asked, "We can afford the time. Can you tell us what needs fixing?"
The doctor laughed weakly and ran his hand through his hair again.
Sakura got the impression that this was a habit for him. "Where to
begin?" He said, "Most importantly, two vertebrae, the sixth and
seventh, are smashed. From some sort of severe blunt trauma."
Sakura spoke quietly, almost to herself. "It was a boot. She was
already unconscious and she stomped on Natsumi's back. She stomped on
her back, and I heard Natsumi scream..."
Morris cleared his throat nervously. At Yuri's gesture, he
continued. "Yes, well...she has four broken ribs, her collar bone is
shattered, as is her left fibula. Her jaw is broken in two places, and
she has had three teeth knocked out. Eight of her fingers are broken,
her left index finger so badly that we'll have to regrow the bone
completely. Most of the bones in her left foot are broken, not to
mention her ankle. She has a hairline fraction on the right side of her
head, but it isn't too serious, really. Then there are all of the
lacerations and contusions from the chain you say as used on her, not to
mention the blood loss and ligature damage to her neck. All in all,
she's lucky to be alive. Had she hung there for more than another hour,
she would have been dead and gone. As it is, I don't know if we can get
her out of shock. If we do anything too drastic right now, her heart
will simply stop."
All three of the girls had paled at his matter-of-fact recital.
Sakura turned to Kei and said in a dead-flat voice, "I don't recall
seeing half of the things he was describing done to her on the video
tape."
Kei shifted uncomfortably and said, "Yuri and I...edited it. A
little. It was for your own good!"
Sakura nodded and answered, "When we get back to the ship, I'm
going to see the rest of it." It wasn't a question. Kei nodded and opted
not to say anything...yet. They would have to have a little chat about
making demands of the goddess Kei. But it could wait until after they
got that stupid gun away from her.
*****
"That was...that was..."
"The best you ever had?"
"Better than that."
Mary stretched like a cat and purred deep in her throat. Sleet just
laid there and focused on making his heartbeat slow down. Without moving
his neck- he was worried Mary might have sprained it with her thighs- he
looked for his underwear. His eyes scanned slowly from the chromed bio-
specs he wore every moment of the day. He could just see his briefs
hanging from the doorknob, just above the bed sheets, which were heaped
on the floor. His eyes continued searching, now looking for his gun.
Mary smiled and bared her teeth in a way that he had come to both love
and fear. Her teeth marks dotted his arms and neck. She had threatened
to leave them in other places, but he had managed to talk her out of it.
His first hope of wearing her out and calling BTR security while she was
recuperating had dwindled at about the same rate as his stamina. For
someone so short, Mary had a disturbingly high energy level.
The tiny blond ran one of her nails up his arm and said in a cooing
voice, "Kevin honey...what were you meeting with the Fish about?"
Sleet froze instantly, all post-coital relaxation gone in an
instant. His neck crackled quietly when he looked at her smiling face,
but he didn't pay it any notice. All of his attention was riveted on
locating the subtexts in her question. His voice was quiet, deadly
serious as he spoke. "How did you know that?"
If Mary was put off by his lethal calm, she didn't show it. She
giggled and ran her finger up and down his arm, making the skin go white
from the pressure before filling with blood again, a fairy-fire trail of
her touch. As she whispered, Sleet's vision filled with her lips, the
lips that had brought any number of sensations to him so recently. Her
quiet words thundered in his ears. "Silly man. I just know." With dull
certainty, Sleet realized that he was going to die.
Mary purred again and rubbed her compact body, small, but oh, so
perfect, against him. Her nails drew ever-so-slightly stinging trails
down his chest. Sleet's mind reviewed what was within his reach, and
whether it could be used as a weapon. Her hand paused over his heart. He
tensed as little as possible, going over his hand-to-hand combat
training, knowing in his heart that it would be nowhere near enough.
Mary's hand rose slightly. Sleet readied himself for the blow, ready to
roll off of the bed and try and defend himself, even though he knew that
unless he got his gun, she would kill him. With the intense vision of
one who is on the ragged edge of survival, he saw muscles begin to tense
in her arm. He regretted not killing her the minute he saw her. Her hand
reached down past his waist to grasp his flaccid member. She smiled
sweetly and asked, "One more time?" Sleet smiled as he pulled her on top
of him. There was always time for one more ride. They weren't going
anywhere. But as she began to nip at the skin of his chest with playful
teeth, pulling quiet groans from him, his eyes narrowed behind the
glasses, and he looked at his gun, and prayed there would be enough
time.
*****
CONTIUNED IN SEGMENT B