15. chasable

[exnihilo]

[Spam for Zane]

[Mira has had insomnia, off and on, for her entire stay on the barge. It's improved a bit since the mirror barge, but it is not at all strange to see her roaming the ship at odd hours. She avoids the patrols, creeps silently as a matter of habit. She peers at the stars and takes the occasional apple from the dining hall. Mostly, though, she winds her way up and down the stairs. Every murder so far has been in a stairwell. It makes sense - confined space, tight angles, good for concealment and sudden strikes. There is no tension of fear in her shoulders, no glancing back. She has her staser in her boot, but that, too, is not unusual.

It's not a trap, because her goal is not to stop whoever it is; her goal is not to survive or conquer. Only to see. The rest she leaves to skill and chance. And to that end, pins holding her unruly hair in place have been modified to carry some of Barbara's tiny bugs, hacked and modded with less skill but more advanced tech, transmitting to a screen where Mickey broods and watches and waits, and to Mira's neural Direct Interface. The culprit attacks from behind; but now Mira has eyes in the back of her head.]

Comments

[godsays]

[ The less subtle might not have caught it, might just have thought that it's just a shift in Zane's body, but with a Push on the metal ceiling, he actually changes direction slightly midair, without touching anything, and brings his feet down hard on her back. Lands, glances off the wall with one quick step, and goes to sink a glass knife in her back. ]

[exnihilo]

[She does catch it, but there's not enough time to react at the speed he's moving; the weight forces her hands onto the floor to brace. Her dress saves her, though, an innocuous sheath wrap of fractal smart-polymer military hardware. The blow makes her grunt with Zane's strength behind it, but the glass blade shrieks and skids and doesn't penetrate the cloth-like armor. She gets her hand around the handle of her staser and kicks back towards his knee with a heavy bootheel and unerring aim guided by her new vision, more to buy herself a moment of time to twist around than because she expects it to actually land.]

[godsays]

[ The armor is a surprise, and he has to readjust. The staser catches him glancingly, a shock of pain that would have him stumbling if he weren't controlling his movement almost completely by steel instead of pewter.

It's violence that guides him now, the red rising in his vision, the voice that still whispers kill, kill.

He tackles her with unnatural strength and takes a handful of her hair, trying to slam her head into the wall. ]

[exnihilo]

[She twists, struggles, makes a noise between a shriek and a groan and revels in the pain on her head as some of her hair rips out, just trying to avoid being stunned. An instant without resistance will be all he needs, she knows, and then she will be dead.

Which isn't to say she imagines there is a way for her to win: not now that she can see how he's moving, the impossible speed, the carefully trained economy of his movements. She is going to die - but now, right now, she is thrilled, filled with pain and gasped breaths and brightness, completely real, completely alive, dancing with something beyond her, life and death hanging on every minute decision. She wants it to last as long as it possibly can, as many vicious moments as she can get, so she jabs with the staser again, up into the armpit exposed by his hand in her hair, her free hand clawing at his face, trying to jab eyes hidden behind the dark warp or try to claw it away.]

[godsays]

[ She likes this, he realizes, the sublime viciousness of the fight.

He has to end it quickly; there are patrols around, and though he's seized a moment between them, there's no way to guarantee how long the moment will last.

His other hand catches her wrist short of his armpit, and he twists and breaks the bones, requiring a surge of pewter-driven strength. He tries to use the shock of that moment to get her fully on her stomach, pin her down so she doesn't have the leverage to fight back.

And if he succeeds in that, he will just touch the knife to her throat. Just dig in enough for a trickle of blood. If she enjoys this, then he'll slow it down - he'll take a few long seconds to enjoy the intimacy of death. ]

[exnihilo]

[The shock of the pain in her wrist is white-hot, sears momentarily through everything, and she is pinned before it clears, dazed with endorphins and ache. The blade lowers - and it is not one clean strike like Arkin, not one vicious overpowering strike Steve, not a vicious barrage like Jerry. A thin slice, a tease, a caress. She arches slightly, reflexively, whimpers and keens.]

Yes. Yes.

[She still struggles, tries to get a knee up, to throw him with a twitch of hips - his strength shouldn't change his weight, except something does, something she doesn't understand is bracing him. She's utterly caught, and that only makes it better.]

[godsays]

[ His movements might be slow, but there's no hint of hesitation or uncertainty. He knows just how to dig it in, to neatly sever the artery. His gloved fingers curl over her jawline, and he watches the blood spread. ]

[exnihilo]

[There's no edge to the cloth in reach, no easy place to pull, and soon her hand slides away as her strength seeps away with her blood, the floaty dizzy rush of it as her brain starts to starve for air, white pinpricks dancing in her eyes. She shudders, gives in completely to the fate she already accepted, commends herself to the smooth, eerie gentleness of his hands. She turns her head, slowly, weakly, nuzzles slightly against his gloved hand before her eyes slide closed.]

[exnihilo]

[Also: video, later, from her bed in her room, wan with the toll but loose, contented.]

I know it was you.

[godsays]

You're not doing anything about it.

[exnihilo]

Why won't I?

[One part prickly to two parts curious.]

[godsays]

I didn't say you wouldn't. But you made yourself bait on purpose. You thought you would die.

[exnihilo]

I didn't think I would or I wouldn't.

I didn't know how much of your advantage depended on people not seeing you coming.

[godsays]

None of it. That was just so they wouldn't be able to tell.

[exnihilo]

I know that now.

[godsays]

Then what are you going to do. Do you want to die again?

[exnihilo]

[She thinks about it. It was wonderful - raw and bright real, and fizzing up through her, electrifying, galvanizing. But she doesn't feel the loss of those moments now, not quite like she used to, like it's lingered instead of draining away, doesn't feel quite so hollow, even as she misses it.]

No. Not right now. I just wanted to catch you.

[And she did. Victory is sweet.]

First.

[godsays]

I'm still free.

[exnihilo]

Not that way.

[She doesn't feel particularly driven to make him understand how she meant it. She knows. But her face does pinch, then, worried, because she cares for him now, instead of just nebulously wondering how much they understand of each other.]

Did your God find you?

[godsays]

No. He's dead.

[exnihilo]

Then you just wanted to?

[godsays]

I have the power to. I can.

[exnihilo]

That's a stupid reason.

You do it because of how it makes you feel.

[godsays]

Being able to do it makes me feel good.

[exnihilo]

How different does doing it feel different from being able to do it?

[Not rhetorical. She is very curious about this.]