(Rewritten) Ch. 20 – Some People Do Deserve To Die

"There's usually not a long time between the birth of a samurai, and their first, or perhaps next, killing of a human. I don't know of any active samurai—that is, those who engage incursions—that haven't had to kill a human eventually. I know very, very few that didn't in their first week.

The reasons for the killing are almost always either self-defense, or defense of another. It's rare for there to be an accidental murder, but it happens. I don't actually know of a greed-murder, though.

It seems like those kinds of people don't get chosen."

– Dr. Forthright, psychologist, respected Vanguard therapist, during an interview with the Samurai's Code magazine, July 2055

***

I'd need to open up the bubble. A knife wouldn't work against the pierce and slash resistance.

But it is Protector-grade technomagic bullshit. I focused on that mental tab and thought about identifying access points in my surroundings. Things I could connect to.

There we go. A screen in front of me, with two-dimensional models of all the samurai-tech items I had with me, among them the inlay and the membrane, and next to those a few options, including one that said Unseal. I triggered it with another mental flick, and watched as a dim line appeared at an angle all around me. Same angle I thought it had when I sealed myself in, so I figured whoever moved me, they were careful to keep the cocoon's orientation.

As I peeled it back slowly and quietly shaved a tunnel through the silk with my new-and-improved tail, more and more light filtered through the thinning material and let me really see with my eyes.

They weren't nearly as…blinding, as my antennae. Probably because I'd always had eyes?

It still took me a minute to relax at all the new shades of everything. I could tell how warm things were just by looking at them, or see strands of silk glinting in a strange, new, fascinatingly rich violet.

Trying to keep all these individual perceptions active at once got tiring and threatened to induce another headache, so I turned off the ultra-violet thing. I still wanted to be able to see heat, it would let me identify spots where somebody had just been. Even let me guess how long they'd rested there.

Eventually I was done opening a way out. I paused for a moment, appreciating that I'd discovered what an eclosion felt like. To emerge from a metamorphosis. I'd be celebrating it if I weren't in unknown territory.

Instead, I grabbed my rifle, and my finger found that old divot on autopilot. It…felt different. And somehow, instead of squeezing cold sweat out of me, it anchored the knowledge that I was changed. That I wasn't male anymore. It was proof that bridged my past and my present in a way that was incontrovertible. Written large between the stars.

For just a few seconds, I let myself bask in that knowing, smiling until my cheeks ached. Played the fur of my tail back and forth across my calves. Watched my antennae waft around in front of me, parsing the influx of scents.

Cheap, sludgy food, acrid bleach, and old sweat. Mold. Yuck.

I crawled out of my tunnel, and found myself in a completely bare room, with a camera in each corner under the ceiling. Shit, they probably already know I've woken up.

If they didn't, though, I wouldn't want them to realize. I hastily patched the hole I'd made in the cocoon and silently slipped towards the door. I was so light, so tiny on my feet that even my antennae, those gloriously sensitive feather dusters, sensed only the disturbed air I displaced with my motions.

Just as I reached the door, I heard somebody run past me in a corridor on the other side. Male. His echoing steps gave me a full picture of the space he moved through and I was able to locate several more doors in either direction. The man stopped in a room somewhere on my left, and shouted for a 'Danielle'.

That was amazing for my…tremor sense? Even the outside of my own door became obvious. A single sturdy lock, and I thought there were iron bars locking the door both at the top into the ceiling, and at the bottom into the floor.

"Tynea, any ideas?"

A dimensional shunt grenade for three points would allow you to quietly remove the door. Permanently. Less obvious options are available, but at least seven times more expensive.

"Gimme. Radius?"

Stay across the room.

Purchased:

Total cost: 3Remaining points: 92

The old point counter appeared top right in my vision, showing the gray ninety-two, and a grenade popped right in front of my face and I reflexively caught it, just as another person, female, ran past in the same direction.

Pin, trigger…timer dial. Obvious and easy. Five seconds, pin pulled, trigger released.

I set the grenade down and dashed silently around the cocoon until I reached opposite the wall. I counted four seconds off, and then waited another interminable almost-second until the timer went off. I'd crossed the room in a split-second and I'd gone slow for stealth. I really was a whole lot faster.

After a few moments of silence, I circled the cocoon again, rifle up and safety disengaged.

Empty air. An uneven two meter circle of nothing, with half a door hanging from the top, and a haphazard half sphere just eaten out of the concrete at the bottom.

I hopped down into it and cleared the corridor in both directions, but there wasn't anybody in sight.

An angry shout of "What?!" rang from my left and I whirled that way. The yell was followed by a fast whispered conversation between a man and a woman I could clearly understand and really didn't like.

"—triggered something. Looked like a flare."

I snuck closer and continued listening.

"It's not in the room. From what I could see on the cameras, it just jumped upwards, but it's not here anywhere." That was the male.

"Samurai tech. It's doing something. Figure out what." And that was the female. Danielle. Sounded like she was used to giving orders. They had a samurai here? A woman samurai? Did they also take her, just like me?

I kept moving towards them, silent and slinky.

"Is she calling for help?"

Go you, miss samurai! Show 'em what we got! Also, I'm right here. Don't you worry.

"Probably."

"What are we gonna do? We'll lose her along with the facility if another comes. They won't be long, if she called them."

"..." I could hear Danielle's cogs spinning. "Take her brain. Best we can get now. Hack her head off, dig the chip out later." My heart froze. I ground my teeth. Misjudged my new muscles' strength, was much louder than it used to be.

Silence. They'd heard that!

I dashed forward, to the doorway they were through. Shit. I hadn't killed humans in a long while. But what they said… Not humans. Monsters.

Deal later.

Saw the male, eyes widening as he spotted me. Gun in his hand started moving up. Slow. Didn't need to shoot him, save hearing. Kept dashing right at him, past the door.

Punched him in the ribs, not full strength, but solid. The skin on my fist hardened up. Blunt force resistance! Handy on the offense too.

Slight ache in my arm. Not too bad, I could probably keep that up.

His body couldn't.

I heard bones get crushed, and my fist sank right past his ribcage, shoving splinters into his lungs. I touched something hot. The hot thing beat against my fist once, twice, and then no more.

No more beats. He fell.

Bile in my mouth. I swallowed it again, along with the nausea. You're a samurai now, Tinea. Gotta take the trash out, sometimes. Even if it has a beating heart. Just like the old days.

The woman stared openmouthed, and started to scream. I punched her in the throat, broke something there. Strangled her scream. Her spine snapped, and she crashed backwards against the door, then hit the floor heavily. Dead eyes.

I stopped moving. Bad. Gotta keep moving.

I looked towards the only other, still breathing, person in the room.

A naked woman. An incomplete one.

No arms, no legs? Some sorta metal caps covering stumps.

I frowned and quickly ran to her. She was shivering badly, and very tense.

Oh god. She had no eyes. I could see fairly fresh wounds in one of the sockets. The other was scarred around the orbit.

Violence. My heart clenched so hard.

They were torn out, and at least the left one just recently. With a sharp edge. By humans.

I almost sobbed, kept it to a gasp, but my voice slipped out. Couldn't stop the tears. They flowed and dropped onto her face. My antennae, the damn antennae I couldn't control, brushed over her empty sockets. She flinched away from me.

She made no sound, nothing.

Oh no, no.

Old-new instincts hit me, strong. Mother's instincts, to soothe the hurt. I gently made some shushing noises at the woman to let her know it was ok, and with tears in my voice I whispered, "Hey, I'm Tinea. You're okay. I'll help you out of here. I'm a samurai, I can help you with your eyes and stuff. Here, this is my hand."

I reached out gently, and cupped her cheek. Slowly, quietly, caringly, stroked her cheekbone with a thumb. The woman in her early twenties suddenly turned into a girl and sobbed.

Without a voice. She was gasping mute breaths that carried no cries.

Oh god. I looked into her mouth and saw only a cauterized stump.

They'd even taken her tongue.

Half-healed cuts at the back of her throat.

They'd taken her voice.

Tears kept running down my face and I felt a small, hurt rage stir within me that wanted to validate itself, but I shoved it away. Later.

I hugged her close, laid her head against my chest and smoothed her hair, over and over.

***