Sophie looked up, grinning. Rainbows curled around her golden locks, and reflection off of her white gown.
"Its been sooo long since I've had guests! Hi! My name is Sophie, and this place gets really, really empty. David got hit by shrapnel, you know...carotid artery, couldn't do anything. He just...bled to death in my arms. Must have ruined that rug, though. I did try not to step on any blood while coming down..Jules really loved him...went into the back after some stuff...but it depressurized...she was all pale and dried out when I got her out...vacuum...bled through her eyes or something...Which was kindof gross..the gravity wasn't working then, of course, so it just kind of floated at me...eugh...Anyway...its been like...four, five weeks, since the damn nanites finally fixed the environment here...I'm told its not self sustaining anymore, though...and they refuse to go fix the engine. sooo..I'm rather stuck here, unless someone with a lift wants to give me a hand..that'd be you, yes? The folks with a lift?"
For a few long seconds, the Bundschuh just stared.
"Er... hello to you too. I'm Oberst Klaus Schneider, of the Volksfront. Pleased to meet you."
"Pleased to meet you too. Klaus is such a nice name."
"So... er... you need us to get you off this ship?"
"Yeah, that would be most kind."
Sophie batted her eyebrows a few times.
"Okay... so... nobody else is alive here?"
"Nope, just me, all by my lonely self."
"Right. No reason to bother checking for other survivors then I suppose... anyone object to us just heading back now?"
A distracted chorus of "No sir" followed.
"Okay then, back the way we came."
As the small group walked back to the docking bay, Klaus noticed that the Sophie didn't seem bothered by any of the horrific sights along their path. He eyed her suspiciously, but decided she had probably just gotten used to whatever had happened here.
"Mitzy, take the last load to the ship. I've got one last thing to do, then I'll be back."
"You sure?"
"Yeah, don't worry, it will only take a minute. Just over by the reactor, nothing far."
"Alright...."
Hezekiah briskly walked away from the makeshift airlock. When he had reached the reactor core, he pulled out a small cylindrical object from a pocket and stuck it to the side of the containment field.
"These things are so damn useful."
After a few adjustments to a knob on the front end, Hezekiah twisted at switch on the side of the device and ran back to the ship. Mitzy was waiting at the airlock, leaning against one side and twiddling her thumbs lazily.
"Everything set?"
"Yep. What took you so long?"
"Forget it. We've gotta move though."
"Hm? Why?"
"Just get the ship started. Let's get out of here."
Everyone had them....And Sophie thought that was what Seth was waiting for....he always had her walk through his...some sort of status thing...and they are very medieval on status. You have to display power here, or you get none. Circular, that. Which is why I'm here, pulling the skin off of 14 dancers. I found them performing on a small stage in one of Berlin's equatorial cities, and pumped the entire place full of knockout gas. No one knew where they were. They were all looking about, paralyzed up to their eyeballs...just watching. I kept telling them they were beautiful. Told them they would dance forever. Each dance... So pretty. Every tense muscle would be displayed, rotating around the bone they would have pulled. I'd leave the slack muscles, and try to maintain their shape. Keep the skin where the tense muscles had been splayed open with microfilaments...sewn in to hide it, make it seem as if it were about to snap back. Fourteen Figures, the muscles that they used in their dance joining them in their twirls and loops. Three months, and incredible study of dance. I'd never danced before Hans.
I had tried to keep them all alive; pumps and artificial blood vessels, a light mist, painkillers and medicines. They whirled and giggled, and for a while, it was perfect. I walked Seth through it. Seth Driscol, bruiser of the Slaver's Union, bowed and danced with me, amid the Seasong Dancers. It was of course impossible, and they slowly died, and each time, I froze them with a new sort of injection. No longer medicine or food, I injected plastics and preservatives.
"Good. This is Bundschuh Gold One to Yanagi Depot, do you copy?"
"Loud and clear. What do you need?"
"I need a transmission relayed to Bruchsal. Tell them to get one of the guest rooms ready, we have a visitor."
"Will do. Yanagi control out."
"Alright, set course for the Frankfurt jumphole and- wait, I'm getting a reading from the ship. Swing around for a better look."
"Hezekiah, they're onto us. They haven't gotten a good scan yet, but they're coming back."
"Hold tight and fly away from the ship, keep it between us and them."
"Alright. This had better work, Bundschuh don't take kindly to grave-robbers..."
"Whipping Girl in visual range. See anything sir?"
"Nothing from here... wait, what the-"
A brilliant flash of light erupted from the Whipping Girl, and the back of the ship was engulfed in a bright bluish-white fireball. The Bundschuh fighters scrambled away from the explosion as it swept through the remainder of the hull, leaving only a broken husk and debris. Amongst the flying scrap was a small Junker vessel, lazily floating along like any other piece of metal.
"Squadron, report!"
"All good sir."
"Same here."
"Shaken but alright."
"Good, we didn't lose anyone. No readings from the debris?"
"No sir, scanners are mucked up by all the radiation. Just looks like scrap."
"Alright. Head home boys, time for a well-deserved rest."
Bruchsal guest suites were rather drab, and of course, someone had forgotten to bring her knives...and her wardrobe, her shoes, her jackets, her credit chits, any of her identity cards, nor even a sex toy. She had walked out with, quite literally, the clothes on her back.
Her clothes, while not quite what one needed to be equipped with in the wild, were just the thing to have when destitute in a decently civilized port. Her hair was put up with niobium and silver butterflies, their wings threaded with the tiniest hessian tears. Twenty three thousand credits apiece. Her gloves were embroidered with golden lace and platinum thread, as was her gown. They came to something near fifty thousand credits. Her shoes were coated in a diamond composite, and her bracelets were alien artifacts.
Her new clothes were fashionable and elegant, though only storefront fare. Sophie Amelia Richthofen was no longer dressed like royalty, but just the same, when her rescuers walked through the door, they would be stunned.
When they walked in. Yes. When...
Just right through that door, there..Right there.
It would slide open, and people would walk through.
And they'd be stunned.
The synthesizers worked. They bought her jewels, and cooked her food. They even wove a decent rug. The cortex, on the other hand...well, it wasn't a live feed. Some sort of datadump system, about a month old. Didn't have any mention of Bruchsal, though...She was on Bruchsal, right? Thats where she'd been going, before she fell asleep...This could be a prison. A really high class prison, and definitely not Rhienlandish, but...well, the door wasn't opening, and there weren't any windows. Not any real windows.
This could be a dream!
Its been quite a while. There's a sort of child lock on the simulators, too...These people..well. She was starting to dream about them. What she could do to them, these vid characters. How they'd whine and plead, cry, sob...how sweet their tears could taste..She could smell fear, these days, all around her. Rank and heavy, in the air just the same as sex. sex....
Was it her fear?
When she moved her fingers, the muscles pulled. Shifted. The blood had gone everywhere, but that's what the tubes were for. Blood didn't taste quite like anything else. Sophie had forgotten, at first, that she was cutting herself open. Blood was everywhere. The bed was probably ruined, the rug had little droplets...she'd left handprints on the walls, and smudged the floor more than a little.
The patterns were nice, though. And the pain...Sometimes, she couldn't quite tell. The pain was exquisite. The clench of her jaw, the sudden tears..She really couldn't much move her leg, anymore.. The depth had meant a lot, at the time. it was a weave, of sorts, only the deepest edge had value..but now they were all surface images. Two dimensional, bland.
She'd rogued her lips with blood.
Hush little darling, don't say a word, mama's gonna feed you...
And if that feeding don't taste right, mama's gonna...
Well...
Mama's gonna drug you if you fight.
And if under that drug, you don't sleep, mama's gonna...
Wonder wether its worthwhile to damage your feet.
And if your feet can stay on,
mama's gonna start cutting, while you're up.
Mama's gonna cut you, baby, cut you right up.
Message Encrypted.
Jamal Nassif:
Amelia here. I'm in something of a spot, you know. Or, rather, I'm not. See, I'm not exactly sure where I am. It could be Bruchsal, but then, it could be anywhere. I tried getting a message to return to sender, but never got it back...which could mean that it never sent. So, anyway, if you get this, maybe you could send a reply? I'm just a bit lonely. We used to have such fun at those charity galas. I do remember, last November, that thing for the Pittsburgh Youth Trust, when you were simply hounded by those prying reporters and we escaped in your sloop...Anyway, it'd be wonderful if you'd care to send me some correspondence while I'm tied up here. Its been a long time.
Kisses, Amelia
Oh am I in a mood. Lonely. And, whats more, I'm a mite pissed. One thinks it would be all right, it would be fine, sure. Sure. Fine.
EXACTLY.
But its not.
It isn't at all.
I'm really not even sure.
Honestly, What do I want?
Cause, you know, If I knew that, I might have it.
Might not be nearly as frustrated as I am now.
No, no no no no no no.
no.
Yes. I don't know.
Breaking the skin, a bit, now.
Been knawing on myself for hours.
Hours.
My hands, fingers, knuckles, wrists, knees...
It rather cuts, just right, if I bite down on a joint, and shake my head.
I get this way, I think, whenever I'm alone. Course, with company, I may have been hurting them.
There's a pressure in the back of my mind, too. I keep shaking my head, darting my eyes. Like I'm missing something. Like something is missing. Something must be wrong here. There's something wrong with me.
There;s everything wrong with me. Absent mother. Course, that must answer it. Because a loving father, a doting father, can't be enough. People aren't like me, though. If there were as many like me as there were broken homes...one could walk down the streets, and expect to watch rapes. Murders. Children without arms, cars repeatedly ramming trees. If there were more people like me, I'd not have to hide so much. I'd not be so trapped. And do I feel trapped. Always. Forever trapped. Not only by this room...not even by this room. By everyone else. Everyone around me. Except, of course, for those I ruin. I can make them like me, I can. I can take their perfect worlds. Twist them, shatter them, pervert them, to the point where they're just like me.
And then, I might have children. They hate me, but don't all children? I'm just making them relate. Its not my fault. No one relates. I can't even TELL anyone.