Bloom

[Ragunn]

He was awake the moment he opened his eyes, still where he had fallen asleep. As far as he could remember, he was still in the same position in which he'd fallen asleep. Jennie was still asleep, her arm over the scars on his chest just above his heart, so that had to go first. Gently and slowly, Cord moved it, eliciting only a tiny mumble. The second thing was to move her head off his shoulder. Luckily, he'd been getting practice with this thing. Once again, there was a tiny mumble, but this time she opened her eyes. Momentarily, he worried he'd woken her up.

Nothing to worry about, apparently. There was a smile and then she flopped back into sleep in a different position. He envied and loved her for that. When she did something, she really pulled out all the stops. He was still struggling with the nightmares, but they were far less common. Maybe Eugen might want to hear about this, at some point.

Some point. Not now. He closed his eyes for a moment and worked out the kinks in his left side, then slipped out of bed to check up on Jason. Cord opened the door and peeked in, still only in his underwear. What he saw in Jason's room was pretty much the same as what he'd witnessed just a moment ago with Jennie. He stood there for a while, head leaned against the door and smiled that skewed smile of his. Hoping.

He'd grown accustomed to the routine, and proceeded to follow it. He headed over to fetch his clothes, then over to the kitchen where he began to prepare breakfast after pouring himself some of the mint tea he kept in the thermos. He let it cool down as he prepped up, then suddenly stopped to just stare at the opposite wall. Or rather at a ghost.

Cord tried to not stare, but there she was. Mother. He swallowed and stayed unmoving as she smiled and spoke. Relax. It's just a hallucination. Eventually the hallucination seemed to decide its impossibility, but the still bed-haired man kept staring at the now vacant space. He wanted to cry, but he couldn't. Not at a hallucination. Never. Never react to them. Be cold, as always. Thus he resumed making breakfast and sipped the tea. It tasted bitter in a way. Sweet in another way.

It was pretty ironic, and he considered that as he snuck out for a smoke with the tea after getting everything ready, looking at the backyard. They'd not wake up for another ten minutes or so. As per usual, the leets in the backyard were having their little shouting match, which he'd grown so accustomed to (weirdly, it had taken only a week to get reaccustomed to it) and it was pretty obvious that some leet, somewhere, was dominant. He smoked on and looked around, nearly dropping his tea when he saw another ghost, bloodied and tattered. Blown to bits.

Again, Cord looked away. Willed the specter away. And go away it did. Five minutes later he went back inside and sat down, already exhausted. Not that any of it showed on his face or body language (much -- Jennie'd notice). He was just about to pour another cup of tea when he spied Jason, mumbling sleepily and heading off to the bathroom. Sometimes... sometimes he wondered.

Oh well. The kid was awake, so he could start putting stuff to cook and boil properly. Best not think. And think he did not, uncharacteristically not noticing someone sneak up on. He looked up and saw a half-dressed redhead with green eyes stare at him with a smile.

Cordell Kirklin smiled back with feeling.

[Ragunn]

That again.

Irony.

Cord stared at the crying woman and knew how she felt, but couldn't show it. Not to this one. Had it been Jennie, he could have. Instead, he crouched and watched the crying fit feeling some kind of sympathy but mostly sadness. He watched on at his fellow survivor of sorts, and ignored the stink of poor hygiene and the several empty bottles of some kind of alcohol stimulant mix.

Then he spoke, in his native language: "Rose?"

She didn't even look at him, sobbing instead, high on some substance or another. Once again, Cord remained passive and unresponsive, waiting and waiting. Finally, he had to repeat himself.

"Rose." It came out almost gently, and was enough to gain his previous psychiatrist's attention. To think, she'd taken the news so badly to turn to... he looked around at the empty bottles and containers of drugs, then glacially calm at the brown-haired, slightly frumpy woman he knew had loved him in one fashion or another. That had been one of the things that kept him coming back -- not the fact that both of them were alive and Wolcott as a planet was no more. He'd gone from patient to shrink, she from shrink to patient.

"I can't take it anymore," she said, in the same language, wrapped in two blankets and shivering. He figured she hadn't had a fix for a while. He'd already found four stashes. He'd left them alone. If Rose wanted to kick it off, she would. Right now, he was being her shadow. Or the monkey on her back, nearly close to crushing the next syringe.

After a minute moment of thought, he said: "Rose."

She threw a pan of piss at him, which he accepted. Again: "Rose."

"Shut up, Cordell!" Rose screamed, once pleasantly round face tight and skinny. And full of rage. "Those... assholes! I lost my..."

"You lost your license here," Cord finished calmly.

"And I have nowhere else to go!"

That was true. He examined the apartment, but knew that offering money might be a bad idea. So would be offering paid rent money -- oh, Jennie wouldn't probably mind much. So he'd struck up a deal with the landlord. He'd be nice and not a total bastard (there is something to be said about illegal rollerrat fights), and in turn Rose could bunk in the nasty flat.

The problem was the drugs. He couldn't very well go asking Esco about them without owing another favour. What he could do was ask Esco if he dealt in that particular drug. If he did... Cord would drop a hint. If he didn't... well. Then Cordell Kirklin would just have to go on the warpath, face blank and head still echoing with the pleading words from a woman who helped and liked him when nobody aside from his family much did.

But ask he did, from a source skulking around Rose's apartment. A junkie too. The trail as hot.

Five hours later, Rose was still in one of her hallucinations, crying after siblings, nieces and nephews and other family members. In that time, she had considered the shotgun again and again. But during those five hours, something else had happened. Later news reports suggested it was a classic drug compound exploding due to poor handling. Those reclaimed, however much they refused to speak, talked about a big wolf.

Then the sudden dark.

Then the bloodshed.

Then... about that chuckle and the sound of a fuse being lit.

What they did not, could not, speak of was that of their assailant, who watched in Andromeda to see the compound explode. Leaving no signs of himself, Cordell returned back to where his perhaps first friend was, passive as always, to the point where Rose asked: "Did you forget something?"

"No," he answered, not touching her at all. Staring, assessing. "I always remember."

And so said the shrink to her patient of years back: "I wish I could forget."

Cordell said nothing, knowing what it felt like. Oh, he knew. What he didn't know was how to fix a shrink. He wouldn't have to. Rubi-Ka is a strange place and Wolcott is no more. That was what betrayed him. Two days later, he found himself staring at a will. He was too late with his call to the authorities. Altogether, he wasn't too surprised.

[Ragunn]

I've stood up to everyone and everything. I walked against the wind.

So did she. He'd tracked. Walked a path he usually had not, walking her paths and ways of being. Being there, the unseen thing clearing her path all the time. Finding Rose had been a task in itself, and Cordell was checking the time -- around her all the time. Leet, wolf, cat, lizard -- anything that blended it in. He didn't know where she was going and was uncertain how much farther she could go, or who to ask for direct help. This was critical; he'd learned much of his knowledge of how people worked from Rose, and now there he was, in the middle of a night, killing monsters Rosalind Rhees could not have taken care of herself.

He actually broke an arm taking down a bull as he was keeping watch. No flashy nanobots. This was a debt to be repaid, and damn it -- what were his accelerated bots for if not healing him?

But she kept walking. Sembly had figured out that she really had cancelled her insurance and that the will was valid. Thus, now Rose was walking herself to death, walking down the Longest Road. And the best he could do was listen to her wailing, slaughtering animals as quietly as possible, not a single program in his NCU. But he would do it. The end result, depending on the results, would be whatever she wanted. So for all those miles, he stalked. Killed. Watched her from the shadows as she wondered why the wildlife hadn't come out to feast on her bones.

All these years I've spent fighting the fight. Winning my war, showing my might. It was clear to me all the time... there's no battle like that of life.

And watch he did, listening, keeping low. He was stealthy enough, after all. And smart enough to know that at some point Rose would figure it out. Having been attached to the Corps as a shrink to a regiment that was mainly made out of slightly... special people under the supervision of sane officers or non-coms that had proven to understand the system, she would sooner or later --

"Come-o-will!" came the cry, just as Cordell was taking a combat knife out of the throat of an animal. He stalked and moved along, silent, keeping to moist ground.

"Ghaist!" came the next cry with a worrying timber to the voice. He hastened on, still silent even as he listened to the continuing stream of insults in a language he knew would die with him, her and maybe Jason, one day. The people he had come on Rubi-Ka had only the twang left. Those who were alive, that was. So he brushed closer, watching her in the dim of the night, shotgun in hand and --

Cordell moved quickly, tackling Rose only to stare at her in the eyes firmly. Outwardly unfeeling, but pained. He was fighting himself and poor memories of a good place. Of course she struggled, but considering his symbiants, implants and his surprising mass compared to his size, it was all in vain.

"Rose."

"Let me!" she screamed, managing to clock him on the head with a rock.

"Rose!"

Another smack.

"Rose!"

Her wrist breaking finally got the message through. The rock dropped and he stared at her, breathing heavily, messed up hand over her throat. "Willnae let ya," Cordell said, voice like an anvil. Unfeeling, tempered, beaten up on. Then he shifted from dialect to total and utter Wolcott, still grasping the wrist. "Don't. Look you here. You helped me. You knew my parents. You know I hurt too, and God damn me, I sometimes wish you still were me doctor. I never met your family, but you t--"

The look on her face broke him down. "Stop talking," Rose said in the same language.

"You always told me to keep talking." He watched on, noting that at least she wasn't thinking of any tricks. He'd learned a lot about body language from her, after all. "So I'll talk. Look. Look at me. Look at me, damn you!"

And she did, after Cordell shook her a while, animalistic, hostile and bizarrely not ready to kill her. Rose took one look at him, those grey eyes that had wanted to murder her the first time they met and reached a conclusion. A bizarre one, but one that snapped a twig somewhere inside her mind. "My God, Cordell. You don't hate yourself anymore."

He cocked his head, watching her in the dark, the damp, the long road. And she looked on, bursting into tears as the man kept a hold on her, covered in blood, leaves, grass and a whole multitude of thoughts. Rose kept on looking. "How?" she finally asked, looking at him even as he let the wrist go.

"I found where I belong," he answered, taking the shotgun and looking around for any possible threat. "Me. Of all people." Rose fumbled herself up with his help and looked at him. Being of nearly similar height, that wasn't hard. But she was still, in Cordell's opinion, a danger to herself. Her faculties were returning after the drugs had washed out of her system earlier, and -- she realised -- just as the soldier could not fully discard his training, neither could she.

She knew these things. She knew sorrow, hate, lethargy, guilt, loss and many, many other things. Rose had found very few of those prevalent in Cordell. But the more she thought about it, the stranger the situation seemed. Prey being nurtured by a predator. Had something woken up something, or a combination of things? Rose didn't much want to analyse that further. But if he could do it... maybe she could too. "Can you take me home?" she asked, still in the same language.

Still watching their surroundings, Cord said: "I'll do that. But if you do this again... I'm not coming after you again. That's your choice." Then he looked over, grim, callous and serious. Not like the man who used to be shy around her for the fear of her understanding what was going on in his mind. He no longer cared to try and hide, apparently. Blank, blunted... and still not. Protective. Rose had made a note of it, of course, but... she thought about his offer for a long time.

"I won't," she finally said, holding her forearm. "I won't. I promise."

He nodded. Thus they left, one woman full of desperation and a man who had fooled her way of thinking in a way. He was not healed fully, but healing. Now, she needed to heal.

[Tussa]

[my god, your writing is so good!]

[Ragunn]

It whistled coming down, blasting the ferns near them. Private Wright looked up after gathering her senses, checking to see how her battle buddy was doing. Sneezing blood, it appeared. That one had been close, she realised, eyes wide and shocked when she looked at where the tank shell had hit -- she spoke a silent prayer to Lt. Prentince and Sergeant Calloway, even as the mobile tank and artillery unit over the other side of the stream bombarded them again.

Wright nudged Weaver, screaming in the radioman's ear. "We need to either get the hell out o' here or you call in for support!" She settled to shiver in the foxhole afterward, watching Weaver reach for his set of comms, dazed. When it came apparent that Weaver couldn't form any coherent sentences, she grabbed the set. "This is sector three-five-crimson!"

Another blast, she stopped to stare at one of their own fly a good fifteen feet, get up and grin -- only to get chewed up by machine gun fire. They just stared for a moment as the comms chimed for response from them. She remembered the way this war started, and had volunteered out of spite. She wasn't a too shabby recruit, but real action was another thing. Wright looked around, brown eyes wide and her shoulder still aching from a shot stopped by tactical weave, ears numb and unhearing even as the screaming from the set escalated. She never even noticed that Weaver was back on the comms until he nudged her for the fifth time.

At first she didn't quite get the expression on the man's bloodied face. Nor could she hear the words at first until she was clasped closer for him to yell in her ear. "They won't give us artillery!"

"Why the fuck not?" she yelled back, paling at the thought. What the hell were they supposed to do? Their helos were five miles further down the line, taking out a whole tank platoon, the last the LT had told them before the fuck up started down their line, too.

Weaver was about to answer when another foxhole exploded. "Shit, shit, shit. Who's in charge here? Us?"

She could only answer that with a blank stare, mouth dry as she watched the forces over the other shore, shivering as she yelled over the enfilade of fire: "Delta! Who's left?"

There was no response. It was only the two of them left, and as they met each other's gaze, she gave a sigh and grabbed the radio again from Weaver. "Command, this is sector three-five-crimson. There's going to be a breakthrough. Delta is down to two. Expect them pushing through." Her hand shook as Weaver took it, both of them knowing exactly how much they wanted to do something. But they only had rifles, no grenades or anti-vehicle weaponry -- but wait.

"Weaver! I'll go left, you go right! Something we can --" she cut off suddenly when Weaver motioned for silence, then blinked at her repeatedly.

"Understood, Command. We'll stay put." Not that he looked much like he wanted to, what with the suppressing fire still coming from the other side of the stream, those random explosions around them.

"What?" she asked, sticking close to him.

The look in his eyes was confused. "They said they have a surprise coming our way."

"...arty?"

"They wouldn't say," he said, licking his dry lips.

That filled her with more fear than anything. They peeked out of their foxhole, seeing the enemy movement build up. Why had she gone to war? She could have evacuated. Oh, sure, it would have meant leaving home, and her mother was mad at her for not following with the rest of her family. Sadly, the shuttle her family had left on had been -- she didn't want to think about it.

She'd meet them sooner or later. But the anger she felt, the quite frankly messed up state she was in, it all mixed into a confusion where Wright couldn't think of what to do. She fully expected Command to just blow the sector to bits when she noticed something that seemed impossible.

A tank exploded, mortar fire and conventional arms suddenly flashing over the stream. "What the fuck?"

"What the fuck?" Weaver echoed as he poked his head to watch the missiles flying, the people moving with a howl of unholy proportions. He reached for cover as a stray bullet flew at them, Wright just watching while Weaver tried to find out what the hell was going on through the comms. She watched, hair standing on end as he watched the sudden panic of the SOL Banking opposition as shadows moved in their own lines, creating havoc.

Some smarter person on the opposition side had decided that they needed to push now, and they headed straight at them two in the foxhole. She nudged Weaver even as she grabbed her rifle, firing away at infantry -- and less successfully at a smoking, persistent tank.

"Guess we know how this ends!" she heard Weaver shout as they fired.

But they didn't. From the water of the stream a group of five emerged -- one sticking proper Wolcott hardwood between another tank's treads, three others adding to the confusion by climbing on top of the tank, one snaking inside the hatch with a combat knife. The two others kept up the chaos by firing at enemies now beset from all sides.

And then there was that one who wasn't in regulation armour, a hooded, cloaked menace that arose from water last as the opposition noticed what was happening to the tank. It seemed to happen so quickly and violently that she actually turned green when she began to take in the entirety of the bloodbath.

This wasn't a battle. This was bloodshed. She saw one man get tied to a tree by their intestines by one of the shadows, another strangled with their own helmet strap -- and that one poor soul with a goddamn branch stabbed in their eye? What the--

She looked to her left when Weaver vomited. Shakily, he took the radio and watched as blood spattered in wide arcs as the smallish non-reg person weaved through, cutting legs, arms, tripping and maiming enemy soldiers in the same pace as the howling shadows did in the background. "...this... this is... sector three-five-crimson... who is our back-up?"

She barely heard the answer from the comms set as she and her battle buddy watched the bloodbath.

I should be like them.

I shouldn't like to be them.

But I do. And don't.

"2nd Ranger Corps," came the ghost of the answer, even as the firefight quickly turned into a clean-up operation. With knives. "What is the status there, Delta?"

Weaver shakily responded: "...situation is under control, Command." Though it wasn't. They watched the man in the cloak turning to look at them two in the foxhole passively, blood and water leaking off him... salute them, then began to bark orders over his shoulder.

For a moment, they couldn't speak. Weaver finally put it to words: "I'm afraid."

Wright was too. About the way how conflicted she felt about the amount of barbaric, primordial violence going on. The sad fact about it was, she wasn't sure how she should feel about being mildly aroused by the bloodshed and still be scared out of her mind at what she was seeing. Simultaneously. "Yeah," she answered, afraid for her soul.

There was a kind of will to be able maim people with such abandon, even though she finally had to vomit when they tied up a man by his feet to tank tracks and pushed him into the river, having cut his hands off first.

The cloaked one turned to look at what was left of Delta, letting the hooligans carry on with their bloodbath, fording the stream, gash on his face. "Don' ya worry," he spoke in brogue and sat with his back to their foxhole. "Long as Ah don' show 'em Ah want ya dead, ya be safe." The regulars glanced at each other even as the man lit a cigarette, offering the pack over his shoulder. They accepted. "Mind if'n Ah borrow ya comms set?"

Weaver handed it over, slumping in a pile next to Wright. The howling and screaming, both ferocity and pain on the other side continued even as the cloaked person grabbed the communication suite and switched from brogue to a more familiar twang. "Command. First Sergeant Kirklin, Two-WRC Echo One. Acting. Sector's..." he looked over at the continuing massacre. Sighing around his cigarette. "...getting cleaned." A pause. "Got it. Suggest you lot move some heavy ordinance over here. We blew a bridge about a mile away up this area, 'cause there's troops moving there toward here." Pause. "Yeah, copy. Don't worry about it. They boys and girls are sticking around for this. We'll keep watch."

Weaver and Wright smoked, both of them coughing. Whatever the brand was, it was horrific. But it gave a good jolt, getting them both to crawl up next to the man, rifles at the ready, all three of them watching the looting going on on the other side.

"Sure, Command." He covered the receiver only to startle the two with a yell. "Goddamnit, ya fuckers, ya think we could haul that fuckin' machine gun? Well, Ah'll take a fuckin' volunteer tae be a total eejit, 'cause they use different ammo than we do, or did ya forget that?"

What was left of Delta then watched the bloodied pillagers start bickering. And the man tensing and tossing the cigarette away, handing the unit back to Weaver. "Shit. Stay in ya hole, and communicate wiv Command, if'n ya would. Jus' tell 'em what ya see fit. Brass is ass."

Transfixed, they watched the man ford the river again into a bickering crowd of ten, stare at them for a while until only two were still arguing. Then he just clocked them in the head, one by one and began speaking in a quiet voice that... seemed to get through.

"...we really have guys like this on our side?" Weaver finally asked, unaware he was actually talking to Command on the set, flinching when there was laughter from the other side of the connection and a simple response.

"Yes we do, Delta. What's it looking like out there? Reinforcements are arriving fifteen."

The two of Delta looked at each other and resumed smoking, thinking about it for a while. "Like a pack of beasts, Command."

"Good. Report back every five minutes." And that answer didn't give Weaver much of a pleasure as he watched the on-going pack of hounds being rounded up like sheep by a very vicious kelpie. Wright, on the other hand, was intrigued.

There was little to report until a convoy of vehicle-mounted missile launchers and a few tanks with a gaggle of infantry found them.  Well, little to report aside from the fact that there was a stern talking-to going across the stream, which Command only copied to with disinterest, bodies being moved and... positioned in imaginative things as the non-reg First Sergeant turned to stare across the water, blades, a rifle and sidearm hanging about him.

The medic who first came to Delta to check up on them looked around and went through their cuts and bruises looked up and over the slowly rolling water and blinked. "...the hell happened here?"

"Haints," Weaver said. Wright nodded, looking around at the decimated area where Delta was and then over to where the cloaked man still stood, saluting an officer from the reinforcements. She climbed up and watched the Major yell at the First Sergeant, who remained quiet... even as his own people slowly move into a line near him.

Her first thought before settling down and nearly falling asleep was that she hoped Command had warned the Major. The second, hoping they hadn't. The third... well. Something had died within her. Woken up. A month later she was standing next to First Sergeant Kirklin as they burned down a factory, already bonded with much of the 2WRC, although in this case, too, it was with Echo unit.

Quite sadly, Weaver had killed himself the very same day they had been introduced to the ladies and gentlemen of at least dubious sanity. Something had snapped in his mind, as there had in hers the moment she found him with a gun in his hand behind the first aid tent, having crawled around the body bags he had opened in order to get himself soaked up in the blood of fallen Delta members before shooting himself.

That had been the final straw.

She wasn't as weak, Wright thought, watching the fire and imagining everyone close who had died that way, the empty can of gasoline still in her hand and the men and women around her laughing and joking about this being a really good barbie. Well, aside from a few, like Kirklin and Jasper (who rarely spoke due to certain reasons). Yet it was a good barbie, munitions factories tending to blow up pretty good. She smiled, even as he lit another cigarette and offered his smokes around with a blank expression, one she now mirrored. It felt good to be burning with remorseless anger instead of pain. The mushroom cloud and the explosion had knocked some of them down.

Not her. Not any of them.

[Ragunn]

They only found him after twelve hours of searching, cradling a knife. The bushwackers had been training him for months, that strange, strange kid with nothing in his eyes but a genuine lack of emotion and a weird thing to him that came up when they were on the hunt.

He really kept to it. Never questioned anything, barely said anything. And the kid was only ten, tiny, a messy mop of sunburnt hair and a tan. And even so, he managed to keep up from behind, raising their hackles by the way the way he emulated them. That was the word. Emulated. Something gave the hunters a chill as he actually stopped down to smell at droppings and look onward afterward.

They hadn't taught him that. Yet still there he was, the farmboy they'd seen hunt down and shoot a bird. Jokingly, jestingly, they had invited him along.

"B'y?" one asked another. They were all wiry and sunburnt outdoorsmen.

"Aye. See it an' --"

They began to run after the kid, who apparently wasn't after animal prey after all. There was a gaggle of sounds at a meadow nearby from the temperate dark they had been skulking in. They actually had to run after the kid who skipped over obstacles like they weren't there.

And then they finally saw what had got the shy, silent boy so fixated on the path they'd ran across.

"Cordie."

He turned a blank look at the bushwacker, then took the man's knife without asking, causing the man to angle the boy's wrist so that the knife would fall from the boy's grip, looking sternly into bright grey-green eyes with admonition. "Ya don' do that."

Nose wrinkling and struggling away, he still said nothing.

"Listen, b'y," the bushwacker said, "ya don' get involved in this."

The other stared at the scene on the meadow, someone... of similar look being beaten up by a bunch of kids. Girls, boys. This didn't look very good to him, and it got worse. The kid bit the hand holding him, grabbed a branch and went in to the fray screaming.

"...aw fuck."

Neither had noticed him stealing the knife. They did notice, however, that he ran, trailing annoyed teenagers after him, slowly losing them as his distraction let his brother run away.

He hadn't run. They knew that. He'd become a distraction. And there, finally, when they found him, bloodied and devoid of anything, knife in hand and nearly ready to stop a pulse, they finally called it in.

This kid needed help.

[Ragunn]

From the outskirts, a group of four summoned to report for a possible mission rode into a town that was a strategic choking point within friendly lines. Why they were needed there was possibly just a question of what developments would happen ten clicks further at the lines. They'd not had to hike or sneak in for a change, which was a comfort they usually didn't have when heading deep behind the lines.

Their first impression upon disembarking from their vehicle was not what they had expected. There was widespread hooliganism they didn't even respond to: not Wright, a slight woman of hidden strength; not Callis, a big lug of a man with more than a few scars to prove his experience; not Kirklin, a short and definitely non-reg piece of gear in himself; not St. James, a woman who never stopped looking around twitchily.

The smell of kerosene, bombs and hooch this far behind the lines was precisely why all of them figured they were going on a long range patrol to figure out how to communicate opposition movements to possibly arriving artillery or air strikes. What this merry bunch from a regiment of slightly tilted of mind didn't expect as they sailed into the hotel that served as the HQ was a bunch of regular Army revelling in a booze-laden festival.

St. James said it first as she watched a trio of officers drag a screaming boy barely sixteen into a room. "These shits be worse than us." There was a silent agreement to that, looks being exchanged. They walked on, listening to a drunken chorus of a traditional Wolcott song, making their way through the hotel bar to find who they were looking for. No communications had been exchanged with anyone, as was their operational model. They only carried two sets of comms, both scrambled differently, and mostly communicated with sneaky morse code -- which, of course, meant that someone from their regiment had to be attached to regular units.

When they found Frasier, a silent woman well-versed in cutting throats, sitting in the corner and looking exceedingly grim, they knew this was the shit. The sound of a fight at the other end of the bar, screaming in the distance and... bizarrely, Wright noted, some kind of joking about an auction. Kirklin, for his part, took one look around and at Frasier as St. James and Callis formed an immediate perimeter when they started hearing catcalls.

"Tell me what th' fuck's goin' on'." He liberated a bottle of scotch from a near-by table where three soldiers were too busy singing off-key, drunk off their asses. After a sip, he passed the bottle around his team. Each took only one sip, having learned that while their sergeant wasn't a teetotaller, he also didn't recommend getting plastered unless they were on leave.

"It's like goddamn Sodom and Gomorrah, sarge." There was a distinct sense of disgust in Frasier's South Wolcott, cultured voice as she glared at their surroundings. A woman of slight build -- and strong enough to snap a neck with ease -- she was, as the regiment usually was, not easily affected by violence, death or sadism.

That piqued everyone's interest. St. James and Callis watched a bunch of women being hauled on to the floor. The two looked at each other, returning to their sentry duty immediately after. Kirklin and Wright on the other hand were staring at Frasier. Wright looked around, her brow creasing. "Who's the one in charge?"

Kirklin seemed to be wondering the same thing, having turned to look around at the chaos. And the auction. By that time, the regulars had started to pay attention to the women, half-naked, terrified, slightly bruised. All natives of the town. "Don' think anyone's in charge. If'n they are, they be behind this." This was pretty much agreed to.

Callis spotted it first. A half-drunk captain, making the introductions to his soldiers when it came to the auction. "Ladies and gents! This here --" he stopped to slap a woman's behind, causing a yelp and more tears "-- is fine booty. Pure SOL, am I right, darling?" The captain, a fairly built man, not too hard on the eyes and clean and crisp grinned at the responses: the yelp from the woman, the roar of laughter and whistles from the regulars. The only ones silent were 2WRC, all having turned to watch. As the noise from the crowd of soldiers, men and women both, became loud, they watched in calculating silence.

"So let's start bidding! I know some of the boys and girls are already having fun --" he indicated toward the room where the screaming boy had been dragged into, eliciting more laughter "-- but these ones are up for grabs still." The unsaid message of 'you know what I mean' rang between the lines. As the auction began -- money, cigarettes, looted valuables -- the five from 2WRC looked on, words not necessary for a while. Wright, Callis, St. James, Kirklin and Frasier watched on with a hint of dread fascination for a moment.

"Now, this one, used to be a secretary for this town's top lawyer, so you'll get tits and brains. We'll start bidding at... well, anything interesting."

"Heirloom pistol!" shouted one.

Countered with: "Mayor's gold watch!" Cat calls at that offer, some curses and some laughter.

This went on for a while until someone won the bid with a bottle of aged brandy. This seemed pretty obvious to Kirklin, at least, considering who they were watching. He turned to Frasier. "Do us a favour, Fraze? Tell us what th' front lines be lookin' like, an' if'n we have 'nother bunch o' mooks nearby?"

They all looked at him. He shrugged and lit a cigarette, ignoring them. Of the four others, two got the idea the very second. "You're seriously not..." Callis said. Then thought about it, and began to smile the way he did whenever there were easy pickings to be had on an operation. Kirklin, for his part, didn't deign to answer. Wright licked her lips.

St. James and Frasier took a bit longer to process the information. It only coming to them after Frasier consulted the command net. "There's two battalions ten clicks away from here, up down the lines. Reserves diagonally farther down from here." She looked at him expectantly as the woman was dragged away, wailing away as the laughter and whooping continued. As he didn't respond at first, St. James and Frasier took a look at Callis and Wright, both poised for... oh. Suddenly, the silent understanding was there.

"I count twenty soldiers, sarge," St. James said, a hint to her soft voice nearly begging. There was a need to let out blood, that atavistic need to destroy something unlikable. Kindled and guided by training and psychiatry.

"Three with the boy," Callis said, looking around like a kid in a candy store as he tugged at his collar, where the garrote (highly non-reg) lurked. "Rock, paper, scissors?"

Frasier and Wright both wore the look of mild worry... but still, the cold, roaming feeling of needing to prove a point. "Fraze? Want to take the right side with me?" Wright asked, slipping out a baton from her gear, eyes wild and... excited.

"Sure. Um. Sarge?"

For a moment, Kirklin was quiet. They looked at him, recognising the look on face -- vacant, calculating, something burning behind the stillness only broken by his habitual tobacco habit. And then... that. He pulled into his vest and took out something blue, smelling it before setting it under his tongue. "Don' kill too many o' 'em. Ya choose ya directions, but lay down th' hurt once Ah'm started."

They knew this cold voice well. They'd all watched him calmly neglect to report that Callis and St. James had blown up their own lieutenant when the man had started giving orders so bad, even the brass didn't mind him gone. They knew that he knew, but they also knew he didn't give a tinker's damn. The man had broken the cohesion of their particular unit at a critical point of a hard-fought stalling operation. Furthermore, they suspected Kirklin wasn't stalking around the man with a combat knife for just any reason just as the poor lieutenant got fragged.

They spread out. Kirklin moving toward the auctioneering captain, the four others moving in pairs along left and right. "This one then! McNee, what was it you said you found in her house?"

"Beauty pageant awards, sir!" This, quite obviously rang true. The woman was a bit plumper now -- possibly because of marriage and children, but the beauty was still there. The highly admired kind of strawberry blonde that was very rare on Wolcott shone in the lights. The woman's lip was trembling. Her skirt was wet, the scent of urine present with the stink of acrid cigarette smoke and stale alcohol mixed with the sweat of soldiers.

She managed to whimper a "please no, God" -- and be rewarded with a kiss on her hair. "Don't you worry, darling. So, bidding starts at..." he droned on some whilst the soldiers on beer-whisky-spirits-lust fuel grinned. Although... then some noticed, finally, that someone was walking closer to the auctioneer, tossing a cigarette in one soldier's drink. The armband did state he was standing Wolcott army, First Sergeant, but the rest of him was so very non-regulation. His hood down, Kirklin, with all his gear, stopped to light another cigarette on the way, pulling up his hood before continuing his way toward the auction.

Once all eyes were on him, he stopped with a hand in his pocket right in front of the captain, who had noticed the shift in the atmosphere. There was still smugness left in the crowd, but also a lot of questions as to "who the fuck is that?". Eventually, as Kirklin stood there, silent and smoking and simply staring at the captain, the soldiers began to get up and come closer. Sensing the mood even more, the captain finally smiled. "Did you want to bid, sergeant? Got anything interesting?" By way of explanation, Kirklin reached into his mouth for the bit of notum, cigarette in one hand. The captain stopped to stare. "Is that notum?"

Kirklin shrugged and stuck it back under his tongue, his bots sending their hellos. Systems so sparingly used coming online. His symbiants and implants noted the change, going from their minimum activity that still gave him an edge in most situations to full-blown activity. "That'd be it," he said after moving the notum to one side of his mouth, staring at the captain. The soldiers around were now paying more and more attention to him -- especially when he dug a hand in his pocket and pulled out more chips of notum. The captain -- now that he was close, he could read his nametag: Muldoon. He didn't say anything more.

Muldoon and the soldiers looked on. There was mostly silence now, aside from the women on auction shivering in their worry about their fates and the screaming still going on where the boy had been taken. The laughter still echoed there. Eventually, Muldoon hazarded: "So, did you want one or all of them?" Laughter from the soldiers, suddenly, some considering the scenario of a foursome. Some even asking if they could get in on the action.

But no. He just stared at the captain. "Guid question. Do Ah want all o' 'em or jus' one. Lemme think on that."

"Typical northener!" one soldier shouted -- Kirklin turned to look at him, memorising his nametag and rank (Lance Corporal Cavendish, typical city district name) --, "takes a fuck load of time to figure things out!" Laughter erupted. Just out of spite, he got a cigarette flicked straight at his face. Tumbling back, unhurt but jostled, Cavendish blinked at him a few times. "What the fuck!"

The atmosphere was turning hostile. "Ya don' fuck wiv a sergeant, corporal, unless 'e's one o' ya own," he managed to say before the captain stepped up closer to glare down at him. "Aye, sir?"

"That was uncalled for. Now, did you plan to bid or... do I need to order you to leave? I'm sure the boys and girls would gladly help you get out of here. Maybe with a bit of something in their pockets." A sudden pause. "Also, you're not from this unit. What are you doing outside your own? What is it?"

"Well," Kirklin said, staring into the man's brown eyes, "thing bein', got orders tae come 'ere."

"Really? Non-regulation... what is that, a robe of--"

"Cloak," came the amendment.

"Looks like a bathrobe to me!" came a shout.

Unphased, the captain poked at Kirklin's chest. "Name. Rank. Unit. Now. I'll not be having this. For all I know, you're SOL." That seemed to hit a spot. Kirklin's eyes narrowed at the accusation even as he took in the notum, bit by bit. "Well? Tell me."

All attention was now on him. He knew it. This was good. Listening to the screaming stop in that one room meant that he needed to buy at least a minute or so. In the background, Callis and St. James had positioned themselves at the very end of the crowd of soldiers. The door where the boy had been dragged off to opened and closed just as quietly as it had a moment earlier. Inside, Cordell Kirklin was more than certain, were three dead or incapacitated soldiers and a boy too terrified to do anything than piss himself. He deliberately made a sloppy salute. "First Sergeant Cordell Kirklin. Second Wolcott Ranger Corps. Rest be need tae ken."

"Need to... what?" Muldoon blinked a moment before Cavendish supplied the translation. "Sergeant. Speak properly."

"Am." A bored look.

Unphased, Captain Muldoon sighed. "Rangers. Yes, I should have seen it. That 'special' branch." And that set off the powder keg.

"Famous last words," Cord said before erupting in a cloud of nanobots, a combat knife suddenly appearing in his hand. Being so close to him, Muldoon certainly didn't expect ending up on the floor with his leg swept with a quick movement and an elbow to his chest, hard enough to break a rib. The ensuing confusion lasted five fateful seconds as he found himself with a knee on his stomach, a knife on his throat.

"What the f--!" Cavendish managed to get out of his mouth before being summarily shanked, repeatedly, followed by the one next to him. Frasier was giving no quarter at all, the ensuing chaos rippling through the ranks. The only cohesion left was that of the Rangers, who went through to terrify and kill with impunity. St. James kneecapping and breaking bones, constantly looking for another target. Callis, not even bothering to be subtle anymore, firing his sidearm at a close range whilst dancing through the crowd, punching and sweeping people off their feet. Wright, once a regular and now part of the Corps of Mindless Ghosts, taking hers down.

A few managed to get close to Kirklin in a sense of lucid battle preparedness and opened fire, emptying clips. The man remained still and listened to the carnage, sidearms clicking empty. His knife was still on the flailing Captain Muldoon's neck. The man was screaming as every punch seemed to have no other effect than causing his hands to blister from the damage shield. Kirklin looked over at the men who had for a moment stopped to stare at his unhurt form, eyes glowing red. "E'en we have standards, ya fucks."

Slice.

Later, much later, the five Rangers sat on the bar, watching the dead and dying. The civilians had fled, probably shell-shocked for the rest of their lives. They were all smoking a cigarette and having another nip of scotch. Covered in blood. The smell of the place was now all cordite, death (shit and piss and blood). "Feels like home," St. James remarked, sipping scotch. She poured some on a wound on her knuckles.

Frasier nodded assent and blew a smoke ring. "So, sarge? What do you want me to explain to the brass?"

"That they attacked us," Kirklin said, "after we confronted them 'bout breakin' conventions. Doubt th' civvies'll say anythin' ovver than that a fight broke out while they were bein' sold as whores. 'sides, think th' CO's gang tae bovver?" There was a smirk on his face.

They mulled over that for a while. All of them. Absent-mindedly, Callis took out his sidearm and shot a still wriggling, moaning soldier. That finally got them laughing. No, their CO wouldn't give a shit. Even sociopaths had standards, after all. And no. Their CO didn't give a shit once Frasier sent the report. If anything, there was a strange hint of acceptance -- and a resigned annoyance at having to explain why troops needed to be moved to their location.

[Ragunn]

Listen. Then you hear what people are saying. That way you find things out.

Sage advice. His own, though, but still true. Showing one's face in certain circles long enough amounted to being part of the scenery, part of its ambiance, its smells. Ignored. Not a perceived threat, which was deliciously amusing in its own way considering how most people first reacted to him. The effort of becoming part of the scenery paid off on occasion, with none the wiser that sometimes the one lurking around was actually doing more than just walking around and glad to be left alone was quite more than what he seemed.

He listened. And for the past week, he had listened to the quiet mutterings of some kind of predator on the loose. Not only in Tir, or Athen, but Newland, Borealis and Rome. Rumours, of course, rumours. But to every rumour there was some kind of truth, no matter if it actually led to a different truth than what was whispered.

What he'd found was truth. Even before he'd heard guards gossip about a hunter among women and men, Cordell had felt the tug and pull. What with recent things having happened, certain signs seemed stronger. The comms chatter, more open, causing him to wake from his perpetually less than restful sleep scheduled around the needs and musts of life with the need to do something. He'd heard the whispers of the street. Watched the hurried steps and nervous looks those in the dark and the damp gave their surroundings at the deepest of night or under the gloom of the moons.

All of those whispers called out to him. The facts, too. There was an imbalance that felt like an affront to him personally. Another was skulking streets he considered, if not quite part of his sentry-go, grounds hallowed for those he gave a damn about. He had precious little sympathy to extend to anyone, but a logical part of him argued successfully that a problem left to fester was a problem that could kill.

And kill it had.

By the third victim in clan-held lands (and, by the hear of it, seventh altogether), Cordell had established quite enough of a baseline by eavesdropping as a reet to official investigators working the case. All the victims were young, just before insurance age and in the harsh occupation of being uneducated and looking for a way out. This didn't matter to him at all. Callous, perhaps, but it did not. What mattered was even more callous.

The deaths had happened on his territory twice. Once in Tir. Once in Wine. Although perhaps it was fair to say, in Wine and Varmint Woods -- seeing as the first body had been cut in half and left on both sides of the whompa system.

Protocol was one thing for the officers and investigators. For him? Not so much.

In fact, that was the last mistake that bastard made. It was one in a long string of them; cuff links left on a scene. A discarded coat that smelled of one of the victims. Tasted like one of the victims. Then another coat, similar of cut, smelling similar.

One of the investigators. Smug, at each crime scene. What was that old adage? The perpetrator usually returned to the crime scene to watch the hullabaloo?

Poor woman.

In the end, she screamed -- no, tried to through the duct tape around her face.

The slick blood covered the ground, slowly washing away in the rain past helpless limbs cauterised and cut off by a string of dark, sizzling wire. A helpless torso, that's what she was. With no compunctions or regret, the wanderer dragged her to an insurance terminal, complete with her scrapbook and video evidence of her crimes.

She'd encroached on another's territory.

Listen.

Or learn the hard way.

In the dark, he returned home, unseen in the dark skies as he rode the winds to return home. Cleaned by the rain and the winds, he landed at the front door and snuck in. Not fifteen minutes later, he was grating cheese, breaking eggs and chopping vegetables for a grilled cheese sandwich with sides.

Just in time. "Cheese, Jason?"