[FFML] [BGC] Frozen Butterfly Chapter 4

[skychan]

Frozen Butterfly a story of Bubblegum Crisis





Chapter 4.0 – Thunder in the Night

Jerking unsteadily to my feet I spent a moment, *2234 Milliseconds*,
considering getting dressed before realizing how bad an idea wasting time
could be.  Instead slipping into still sodden shoes I gathered the rest of
my belongings up in a ball and paused at the door.  Straining to hear over
the storm was hard, especially focusing past the continuing chill in my
bones.

Another gunshot, and a brief scuffle and crash came echoing up the building.
I could now identify it as coming from the entry hall before more soft
sounds assailed my ears.  From the roof I heard a slither of something more
than rain on old copper roofing.  Cracking open my door the clunk and
clatter from other rooms throughout the building grew loud a moment before
everything was drowned out in the crash of thunder.

I forced my muddled thoughts to move, to plan a way out.  There was no way
this was a coincidence.  Okay, there's a fire escape across the hall, two
offices down and out the window… you can make it, it's not far, just move!

But just telling myself that wasn't enough, trying to shift into that
mindset, of strange speed and sound and accelerated thought for my escape
just wasn't happening.  I was too cold, too tired, and my body was just
unwilling.

So instead of darting out of my room with grace and speed, I stumbled, like
others just now starting to open doors.  My steps wavering, like a drunk
rousted out of his comfortable pool of vomit, and my head probably felt
much the same.

Balance improving along with my circulation I moved down the hall and
managed to pull on my shirt, it might not have offered any real protection
but I already felt better for the covering.  Still my bare legs flashed
pale flesh in the uncertain light.  I considered my jeans a moment but
given how hard they were to get into the first time… I threw them over a
shoulder and tied the legs under my arm like a sash.  With each additional
step I could feel myself coming more alert.  Each little squish as water
squeezed between my toes bringing a little more speed and clarity.

The sounds of screaming, gunfire, and heavy pounding feet reached my floor
just as I pushed my way into the second office, the gaping window and fire
escape within reach, water from the storm pooling beneath it.

That's when two things hit me.  That window shouldn't have been open, and
what felt like a freight train against my back, forcing me to my hands and
knees.  This pain was unbearable.  Unlike before a real inhibiting biting
hungry thing and I gave into the need to cry out in agony.

My voice rose high and clear as I screamed, limbs thrashing, vision nothing
but blurs of light and dark.  A knee landed on my spine, hands forcing me
fully prostate, catching my arms and twisting them remorselessly behind my
back.

As my vision cleared I tried to fight it.  This pain was normal, this pain
didn't come with the blinding agony of moments ago.  I could fight it, if
only the grip on my arms were less like a vise, or the weight on my back
less than a piano.  I heard a clack, felt cold metal, as cuffs of some kind
went around my wrists and shut with a snickt of metal on metal.

Twisting I could barely make out the form of something big, and bulky now
holding me down with one hand through the darkness.  Motion bringing my
eyes to its other arm, one swinging a bar snapping with power of some
kind *probability
of shock baton 98% *at my head.  What a stupid last th­­----.



Some sort of scene break indicator short of a chapter here? ~~~~~~~~~



*Bios restart, Loading, Loading, Loading, Loadiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii*

My vision came into being, not slowly focusing with a moment to adjust, but
suddenly.  Absent one moment and there the next.

I couldn't provide feedback to anything, couldn't turn my head, twitch a
finger, wiggle my toe.  All I could do was lay there, breathing slow,
mechanical, heartbeat utterly regular at one beat per minute.  My thoughts
were slow and muzzy, trying to operate while in power saving mode.  Worse I
couldn't switch out of it.

I could only stare through the open end of a tube as a technician moved
about, shifting things until stepping back without a glance to me showing
only the back of his head, focused on a datapad in hand.  "It's all set
sir, and has finished rebooting from the shock."

"Good…" a voice spoke from the darkness of a warehouse, echoing and giving
the impression of a vast space, but all I could see of it was the beginning
of one long aisle of stout metal braced shelving and the blue glow of
industrial mercury lighting.

I recognized him instantly, but then it was a slow slog to remember from
where and who, the man who was present when I first 'woke up', the suit.

"You didn't think you could get away did you?" he asked, stepping closer
eyes traveling down over my body, or what the tube I was in revealed of it
at any rate.

Even if I could have answered, his mocking tone let me know I wasn't meant
to anyway.  He finished his evaluation with a smirk.  "I guess it just goes
to show how successful my little project was."

Turning away he dismissed me entirely.  "Alright then, run your tests.  Crack
it, now."  His voice cold, almost inhuman.  Only the hint of avarice giving
away that the rest was a carefully composed mask.

The technician turned back to face me and I felt my spirits drop.  It was
the same hacker as before.  His smile lecherous as he asked, "Did you miss
me Doll?"  Hands manipulating something on the container, and I felt my
heartbeat accelerate, 'blood' pumping faster, and thoughts begin to race as
the limit upon my operations was removed.

I managed enough of a jerk to shake the entire container in that first
moment of glorious freedom of movement.  Then limitations on that freedom
sunk in.  I could feel the straps holding me in now, pinching against my
skin, at ankle, thigh, hips, across my modest bust and in three places
along each arm.  I wasn't going anywhere even as I snarled out my
frustrations.

After a startled hop back the pervert got a grin on his face, while the
suit didn't even bat an eyelash at my sudden movement.  "Alright, that's
what I'm talkin about."  He laughed to hide his sudden spike of fear.  I
could smell it on him as he reached in and pinched me, running a hand down
my bare stomach to play with my belly button.

"Why design these in anyway?" he asked idly before hurriedly becoming
professional again as a large blue bumer stepped from the darkness coming
closer, it's footsteps loud and slow.  "Right.. the test.." he shot a
nervous look back at his boss and reached back in.  This time to hook up
that cursed physical connection to the maintenance port just behind an ear.


I felt the connection, it was like, when you have a piece of popcorn stuck
behind your gums.  Although it fits perfectly, it was uncomfortable and I
wanted it out now.  Unfortunately that decision wasn't mine to make so I
tried as best I could to shut down power to the socket or something.

Sadly, that really wasn't in my suite of programs either.  Back came the
cold, and the preasure bearing down on me.  The discomfiting loss of motor
control I remembered from his first try only making the chill feel of being
immersed in a bucket of ice worse.

My body felt like frozen lead, and I looked to him, *eyes shift, head turn
right, chin down, eyes shift, blink, focus. *He didn't seem to have a care
in the world, fingers typing away on a laptop.  Really his typing speed was
impressive, *276 strokes per minute*, but the sense of congestion in my
thinking didn't leave much in the way of charitable thought about his skill.

Get out, the icy pressure on my brain seemed to increase.  Get Out, the
feeling growing worse as I lost all sensation from my body entirely, my
vision freezing on a still image of him typing.  The seconds passing by on
my system clock each seeming to stretch into eternity before racing past
without a chance to count them.

*Get Out, my mind felt as though it were being squeezed and now nibbled on,
countless ice mosquitoes each taking a sip and each leaving behind an
irresistible itch.  GET OUT! * I said/thought/screamed in unison with my
mind, my body, my soul.

I was panting the smell of singed plastic in my nose, vision a blur as
movement and color reached my eyes, and the sound of my pulse racing in my
ears almost too loud to hear the bastard cursing as his computer crashed.  *
 *

I would have slumped forward if I could have, countless things to say, but
none of them passing my lips.  My body felt foreign, for the first time I
could recall it didn't seem to be ME.  The world seemed to be crushing down
on me, my vision dimming, ear's hissing filled with distortion.

"Nani ga okotte iru ka, machigatte nandesuka?" asked the suit, his tone
quietly furious, but his words as meaningless to me as whatever his trained
monkey answered.

Trained monkeys, with typewriters, how long to finish their novel I
wondered the chattering of their voices fading until the body took a deep
inadvertent breath, blinking my eyes as the room sharpened painfully back
into focus.

"Got her!" the technician crowed, breathing a sign of relief as he looked
over his shoulder as the executive moved closer.  I could read his
nervousness, and was slightly surprised he didn't just have a heart attack
before scrambling to explain.

"I was pushing hard, like you wanted… to, you know, make sure, and when I
tried to overwrite part of the Bios she just, sent some kind of power surge
and shut down.  It bypassed the safeties sir, but I managed to bootstrap
the system.  I can't tell you much more about it's condition, the output is
fused."

"Very well, put her into hibernation, I'll let you know if your services
are needed in the future."  Stepping back the suit turned to leave the
technician to his work.

"You've got it Mr. Mason Sir, but, I don't know what that will do to
whoever's mind you've got squirreled away in there."  The degenerate
answered as the tube around me let out a soft whirr growing colder and I
felt several tubes connect with sharp pricks to the in and output valves
hidden under my skin.

Mason froze in mid step, and glancing up at him the technician swallowed,
looking away quickly.  *Subject's sudden spike in heart rate indicates high
degree of stress, 87% likelihood of panic, *Shouldn't have figured out his
little secret should you have pervert, I thought.  It makes me almost sorry
for what's about to happen to you.

Even as the capsule continued its programed run, my thoughts beginning to
slow as my body grew sluggish with strange chemicals rushing through me I
heard a scream suddenly cut off as the blue boomer passed my line of site
to reach the tech.

"Mark both for disposal; I don't want anyone else stumbling over this
understood?"  Mason said, his voice adding to the chill in my veins before
my eyes slid shut and I felt my heart artificial as it might be come to a
stop.


The End



Now I will go ahead and admit this isn't the end of the story, merely the
end of the first Arc.  Please let me know what you think of it.


Thank you,


Skywise, Skychan
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